The Pilgrim Conspiracy

by Jeroen Windmeijer

He locked his bike, and they headed for the Rapenburg canal, arm in arm.

  They were going to the open evening that night at Loge Ishtar, a Masonic lodge that accepted both men and women. Fay had joined the lodge three years ago. Every two weeks, its members met in the Masonic Hall on the Steenschuur canal where they not only learned to understand themselves better, Fay had explained to Peter, but also guided each other on a path of contemplation, reflection and self-improvement. Together, they thought about how they related to each other and to the world around them.

  Peter knew that Fay had felt a sense of belonging in this community right from the start. She had told him about its members’ genuine commitment to each other, and their shared desire to work on their own personal development and use this as a foundation from which to help create a better, more beautiful world.

  ‘I had a very odd visitor in the museum today,’ Peter said.

  ‘Another direct descendant of the Pilgrims?’ Fay asked wryly.

  ‘No, actually,’ Peter replied, laughing. ‘This one was actually descended from a Huguenot from Leiden who emigrated to South Africa in the nineteenth century.’

  The Huguenots were Calvinists, Protestant followers of the Swiss religious reformer John Calvin. They were persecuted on a massive scale in sixteenth-century France. After the horrific St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre on the night of August 23rd and 24th in 1572 when countless Huguenots were murdered, a great number of Calvinists fled France. Many of them settled in the Netherlands, where names like Montanje, Parmentier and Labuschagne are still common in Leiden.

  ‘Do tell,’ Fay said invitingly.

  ‘Like I said, it was very odd,’ Peter went on. ‘Willem Hogendoorn came in with a group of tourists. There was a South African couple with them who come from Orania. I googled it on my phone when they left. It’s a sort of free state that was set up by whites after apartheid ended. Black people are absolutely not welcome there. They have their own money, schools, newspapers, legal system, their own local government, you name it. His oupa’s oupa, as he said – his grandfather’s grandfather – left Leiden in the early nineteenth century. He was one of the original founders of the Orange Free State, which was similar to what Orania is now. And he saw a lot of that same pioneer spirit in the Pilgrims, people who move somewhere else to make a fresh start and build their own community in a place that they believe God has chosen for them.’

  ‘Well, that’s not so unusual, is it?’

  They walked along the Rapenburg. The evening was still light, and the air was crisp. Reflections of the trees and grand townhouses shimmered in the tranquil water of the broad canal.

  ‘No, that’s not really what was unusual,’ Peter said. ‘It was that the man was so blatantly racist … He said it was a shame that apartheid had ended because South Africa was a mess now. And that the Pilgrims and the other American colonists had gone about things in a much better way than the South African colonists because they had wiped out the indigenous people there.’

  ‘You’re right, that is unusual. You don’t often hear people say that sort of thing quite so brazenly.’

  ‘That’s what surprised me,’ Peter said. ‘Of course, I know that there are people who think like that, but I was quite shocked, to be honest, that he had no qualms about saying it so candidly, especially to someone he’d only just met.’

  ‘I’m sure there are plenty of people who really do still think like that,’ said Fay.

  ‘Anyway … I didn’t call him out on it. I suppose I was a bit of a coward, but I didn’t want to get into a pointless argument with him.’

  ‘That was very sensible, darling,’ Fay said, giving his arm a gentle squeeze.

  They passed the Van de Werfpark and crossed the canal via the Groenebrug before turning left onto the Steenschuur, where the door of the Masonic Hall stood invitingly open.

  The building was also home to an all-male Freemason’s lodge. Loge La Vertu, or the Virtue. It had been established in 1757, making it one of the oldest groups of Freemasons in the Netherlands. The lodge’s national serial number was 7. The lodge with serial number 1 was the oldest in the Netherlands, L’Union Royal in The Hague, founded in 1734.

  An elderly man was waiting in the open doorway to greet them. Dressed in a black suit with a white shirt and a red bow tie, with a neat grey goatee, he looked every inch the proper gentleman. All that was missing was a monocle.

  Fay gave him a quick hug. The gesture seemed a little over the top to Peter, but once they were inside, he realised that this was how the lodge members usually greeted their Masonic brothers and sisters.

  They hung up their coats in the entrance hall and went into the spacious function room. The room was painted the mint green of a hospital ward. Mounted on the walls were display cases containing awards and insignia, along with objects that Peter couldn’t even recognise let alone guess what they might be used for. Pride of place had been given to a large official portrait of King Willem-Alexander.

  The room looked dated and old-fashioned, like a 1980s-era social club. Simple tables had been arranged in groups with a doily and two freshly cut carnations in a small vase in the middle of each one. Plain but functional chairs had been placed around them, as though ready for the imminent arrival of a bridge club.

  Peter got two cups of coffee from a small bar in the corner. He carefully carried them over to Fay, keeping his eyes on the tray like a child taking part in an egg and spoon race.

  He handed a cup and saucer to Fay, who was chatting to some of the other visitors. Since he’d so far not had a chance to smoke his daily cigarillo, he decided to take the opportunity to slip outside for a few minutes.

  The double doors that led to a tiled-over back garden were open. A few people were smoking under a large, sloping glass roof that looked a little like a conservatory without walls.

  Sven, one of Peter’s students, was standing among them. He was wearing a T-shirt with the words WE WILL NOT DANCE ON THE GRAVES OF OUR FATHERS printed in faded letters over an image of a stern-looking Indian. Every now and then, he pushed a pair of diminutive but showy, round spectacles back up the bridge of his nose. He was accompanied by a larger young man whose undersized shirt strained across his muscular torso.

  The two young men crossed over to Peter. Sven looked ill at ease, as if he was in no mood for a conversation just then but realised that he couldn’t ignore his lecturer.

  ‘Hello, sir,’ said Sven. ‘Are you a member here?’

  ‘No, I’m not a member. My girlfriend is. I just came along with her tonight out of curiosity. What about you two?’

  ‘Just curiosity for us, too,’ Sven replied and then introduced his friend in the same breath. ‘This is Erik, by the way. We’re both in the Catena student society.’

  Without being asked, Sven took the cup and saucer from Peter’s hand so that he could light his cigarillo.

  The man standing next to them appeared to be lost in thought, as if he was mentally preparing himself for what was about to come. When the first wisps of smoke from Peter’s cigar curled past the man’s face, he gave Peter a brief sideways look.

  ‘Is the smoke bothering you?’ Peter asked, quickly taking a couple of steps away from him.

  The man looked at him amiably enough, but he clearly had no idea what Peter had just said. He was very tall, well-built and looked to be in his fifties. His hair was remarkably long for his age and curled out from under a Boston Red Sox baseball cap. His face was so smooth that it looked like he had shaved only minutes earlier.

  He said ‘Hello’ in English with an unmistakably American accent and shook Peter, Sven and Erik’s hands with the enthusiasm of someone at a high school reunion greeting old classmates from half a lifetime ago. ‘I’m Tony. Anthony Vanderhoop, to be precise.’

  He pronounced his name the Americanised way, as ‘Venderhoop’.

  ‘But you can call me Tony. And you are?’

  ‘I’m Peter de Haan, and this is Sven, and this is Erik.’

&n
bsp; It must be great to be able to speak your own language wherever you are in the world, Peter thought.

  ‘You don’t speak Dutch?’ Sven asked. ‘Everything will be in Dutch tonight, won’t it?’

  ‘No, I don’t speak Dutch, sadly. But my family goes all the way back to the very first Dutch colonists who went to America. One of my uncles researched it all. The way our last name is pronounced has changed over time.’

  ‘We would pronounce it “fon-der-hope”,’ Erik said, overemphasising each syllable.

  ‘Yes, just like that,’ Tony said, but when he tried to repeat what Erik had said, it still came out as ‘Venderhoop’.

  ‘I’m from Boston,’ Tony continued, ‘I’m a member of a Freemasons’ lodge there. We’re a worldwide fraternity, as I’m sure you know, so whenever I’m abroad, I like to visit my brothers … and these days, my sisters too.’

  When he said the word ‘sisters’, his mocking smile suggested that he did not entirely approve of female Masons.

  ‘But will you be able to understand what’s being said later?’ Peter asked.

  ‘Not entirely,’ said Tony. ‘But I still enjoy meeting my fellow Freemasons. I don’t understand everything that’s being said, but the words and phrases in the rituals are more or less the same, and I know all the gestures and actions too. I understand the meaning behind them, so the words aren’t so important. If you’re a Catholic, you can take part in a mass in a language you don’t know and still understand what’s going on in front of you. In your heart, you still feel like you’re a part of it all.’

  Peter, Sven and Erik all nodded.

  ‘Well,’ Tony said, suddenly bringing the conversation to an end. ‘It was nice meeting you guys. I hope you enjoy the rest of the evening.’

  He turned around and went over a group of people who looked like they had been waiting for him. As soon as he joined them, they all started to make their way back inside.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ said a loud voice. ‘We’re about to begin.’

  Standing in the open doorway was a tall, strikingly beautiful woman with short, straight hair, slicked neatly to one side.

  ‘If you’d all like to come inside, then we can begin.’

  Once he was inside, Peter saw that many more people had arrived while he had been in the garden. He had trouble finding an unoccupied chair.

  Fay and some of her Masonic brothers and sisters were sitting on a row of tall stools next to the bar.

  Fay had told Peter that one of the items on the evening’s programme would be a series of interviews with lodge members, talking about their backgrounds and their reasons for joining the Freemasons. The organisers had found a good mix of members, not only of different ages but also from the different degrees of Freemasonry: Entered Apprentice, Fellow Craft and Master Mason.

  When they were asked why they had joined the Freemasons, they all spoke of a strong feeling of comradeship. Working on yourself as part of a group – ‘the Craft’ as they called it – was what created a bond between them.

  Peter found the atmosphere extraordinarily warm and friendly but, at the same time, a little oppressive too.

  It was all so very … nice.

  It made him think of an evening in his student days and a service he had attended at a Baptist church. A study partner he’d since lost touch with had converted to Christianity. As part of their preparation for baptism, he and some of the other new members had had to introduce themselves to their congregation. He had asked Peter to provide moral support, which Peter had provided by sitting in a pew at the back of the church. When it was his friend’s turn to step forward, he had made eye contact with Peter, and Peter had given him an encouraging thumbs up. There had been many stories that evening, told by people who spoke, often too candidly, about their personal journeys. They revealed the mistakes they’d made – complete with clichéd accounts of addictions to drink and drugs, how they had found the way to Jesus at last, and how the church had become their haven of peace. One by one, they opened up about their feelings of being immersed in a warm bath, of coming home, of finally being able to be themselves, of no longer having to wear a mask …

  The very same atmosphere hung over this evening, and there was even the obligatory addiction story.

  Naturally, Peter paid the most attention when it was Fay’s turn to speak. She talked about her background in the Orthodox Church, a story that Peter already knew. She said that what she liked about Loge Ishtar was that nobody was asked to renounce their religious beliefs. One member’s guiding principles might come from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, while another’s might be based on the Bible, the Torah or the Quran. And there were even people for whom nature was the greatest source of inspiration.

  Eventually, the Worshipful Master – as the chairman of the lodge, Coen Zoutman, was officially addressed – spoke to the audience. He likened his brothers and sisters to travelling companions. Each of them took their own steps on their journeys, but the others gave them support where the path was difficult, and so they made the journey together. He sincerely invited everyone present to travel with them and join them as fellow pilgrims.

  ‘Well then, ladies and gentlemen,’ he began, but he was interrupted by a woman who suddenly jumped up from her chair. She bumped into the table in front of her, sending her coffee cup clattering to the floor.

  She was a tall, heavy-set woman with long hair scraped back into a ponytail, accentuating the roundness of her pudgy face. There were red spots around her neck that had spread up to her chin and cheeks, and there was an embittered look on her face.

  A man on the chair next to her raised himself half out of his seat and tugged at her arm in a desperate attempt to make her sit down again.

  The whole room seemed to hold its breath.

  The Worshipful Master looked at the scene with thinly veiled irritation. Before the woman could say a word, he said, ‘I don’t think this is the right moment, Jenny.’

  The man managed to get the woman back onto her seat. She looked around her, appearing to be confused, as if she couldn’t remember why she had been standing up. Her face had turned completely red.

  Her companion leaned over to her and spoke in what looked like a gentle but stern voice.

  The woman’s shoulders sagged, and she bowed her head, like an athlete who had just lost a race.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ the Worshipful Master began again, in a tone that was no less calm than the one he had used before. ‘The moment has arrived that I’m sure many of you have come here for tonight: a visit to our temple.’

  Peter smiled. This had indeed been his main reason for coming with Fay: the opportunity to look inside the Masonic temple that was still a place of such mystery to him.

  Because however you looked at it, although the Freemasons might no longer have been a secret society, they were still a society with secrets.

  Chapter 4

  A broad, winding staircase took the visitors up to the first floor of the Masonic Hall. The landing was too small to accommodate them all at once, and a few people had to stand on the stairs. An expectant hush fell over the group.

  In the hallway, three loud knocks sounded on a tall door. It opened almost immediately, swinging outwards and forcing the people on the landing to squeeze even closer together. Shortly afterwards, the hallway emptied as they all surged through the door, like water flowing from a bath after the plug has been pulled.

  Peter walked into the long hall.

  Inside, a man and a woman sat at triangular tables placed on either side of the door. A candle on a tall stand stood in front of each table. A third stand was placed a few metres away, just in front of a large, cube-shaped object that Peter knew was referred to by the Freemasons as the ‘Perfect Ashlar’.

  Fay had told him that the Freemasons spoke of God as the Master Builder of the whole universe. They saw themselves as rough building blocks that needed to be smoothed and dressed so that they could become part of the Temple of the G
reat Architect of the Universe. The Freemasons’ entire philosophy was based on the pursuit of self-improvement.

  Lying on top of the cube was an old book – a Bible, Peter assumed – on top of which was what looked like a carpenter’s set square, and a pair of compasses. On the floor, which was divided into black and white squares like a giant chequerboard, were a rough block of stone and what looked like a heavy mallet.

  Running along both sides of the hall was a double row of chairs where the guests sat with their backs to the wall, facing the open space in the middle of the room.

  Peter chose a chair on the front row so that he would have an unobstructed view of the proceedings. Before he sat down, he picked up the evening’s programme that had been printed out on A4 paper and placed on the seat.

  Because Fay was taking part in the ritual that was going to be performed that evening, she wouldn’t be able to sit next to him. Peter saw her come into the temple, but she was staring straight ahead so intently that he couldn’t make eye contact.

  Classical choral music filled the room, which, according to the programme, was an excerpt from The Magic Flute by Mozart.

  Zum Ziele führt dich diese Bahn,

  Doch musst du, Jüngling, männlich siegen.

  Drum höre unsre Lehre an:

  Sei standhaft, duldsam und verschwiegen.

  Sitting directly opposite Peter were Sven and Erik, and a few chairs away from them was Tony Vanderhoop, who had taken off his cap.

  Above them, tiny, subtle lights had been inserted into holes pricked in the vaulted ceiling. The room’s walls were panelled in wood and painted green, and the signs of the zodiac had been painted on them at regular intervals.

  Peter’s eye was drawn to the motto painted over the door, KNOW THYSELF, the Ancient Greek maxim that was inscribed over the entrance of the Temple of Apollo in Delphi. The concept behind it was that all humans possess innate wisdom: you already know everything that you need to know, but you would only find that knowledge by looking inside yourself.

  The woman next to him whispered – a little too loudly, as though she wanted everyone to know that she was already very well-informed about Freemasonry – that the man and woman next to the entrance were the Senior and Junior Warden who acted as the Worshipful Master’s left and right hand.