The Pilgrim Conspiracy

by Jeroen Windmeijer

  Van de Kooij would contact the Leiden Freemasons to ask if they knew a Y. Falaina. And he would also search the police records to see if they already had information about him.

  Back in his office, Rijsbergen spread the contents of the wallet out on a tray. As well as the student ID card, there was a debit card and a few loyalty cards, nothing unusual. There was a handful of loose change and a twenty-euro note but no receipts or anything else that might contain a clue.

  Rijsbergen sat down and sighed deeply, then called the forensics team who promised they would send someone straight over to pick up the wallet and subject it to closer analysis, although he didn’t expect them to find much. The murderer – or murderers or murderess – could have disposed of the wallet if they’d wanted to.

  There were two brisk knocks on the office door.

  Without waiting for a response, Van de Kooij burst in and immediately started to talk. He was holding a sheet of paper in his hand, but he didn’t look at it as he spoke.

  ‘Yona Falaina. That’s what he’s called. The surname is Greek, apparently. The first name is Hebrew – it means “dove”. That’s the only concrete information we’ve been able to turn up so far. Not much else otherwise, and nothing at all that’s of any use to us. He’s lived in the Netherlands for about fifteen years. He’s legal. National insurance number checks out. He’s got a valid passport and a valid residence permit, no criminal record, always paid his taxes on time, no speeding tickets or parking fines, nothing. If you google his name, all you’ll find are pictures of women’s shoes on eBay and really colourful fake nails – no idea what that’s about. No family, no memberships, and I couldn’t find a single photo of him. He’s not on Facebook, doesn’t seem to have had any paid work, and it looks like he was a ghost student, registered for classes but not attending them. But he must have had a source of income from somewhere – we’re looking into whether that was from a job or capital of some sort – because he was renting a room in Leiden. There’s a car on its way to that address now.’

  Van de Kooij had delivered all this information to Rijsbergen at such speed that he was almost breathless. He made no effort to conceal his pride at having been able to discover so many details about someone who seemed to be almost undiscoverable.

  ‘Well done, Sherlock,’ said Rijsbergen. ‘We should … We’ll give the photos that were taken at the scene to a sketch artist so they can create a good likeness of him. We can circulate that and start by showing it to the Freemasons. I’m sure he must have known Coen Zoutman, the man who had the same tattoo as him. Or rather, had a tattoo in the same place … If Zoutman knew him, then the other Masons probably knew him too. And get the financial investigation unit to look at his bank account. Where was he getting his money from? What was he doing with it?’

  ‘There was one more thing.’ Van de Kooij held out the sheet of paper he had been holding in his hand.

  There was a picture on it.

  ‘What are we looking at?’ Rijsbergen asked.

  ‘The official symbol of the Freemasons: the square and compasses. I’ve just printed it out.’

  ‘That does look like two triangles,’ Rijsbergen said dubiously, ‘with a small circle on top of one of them. But the triangles on the tattoo are arranged differently. And what about that G?’

  ‘No, that G wasn’t on the tattoo.’

  ‘What does it stand for?’

  ‘Could stand for all sorts of things,’ Van de Kooij said. ‘I’ve just been reading about it. Going from what we’ve heard so far, it seems typical of Freemasonry. By which I mean that it’s left up to the individual Masons to fill in their own meaning for it. The G could stand for God, Gnosis, Goodness, Geometry, the Grand Geometer – for God as the Great Architect of the Universe.’

  Rijsbergen looked at the image again. ‘I’m not convinced,’ he said, ‘even if it does have two triangles and a circle in it. But let’s keep it in mind. First, go and sort out the other business I was just talking about.’

  Van de Kooij, visibly excited by the new tasks, turned around and left the room.

  The telephone rang.

  ‘Hey, Rijsbergen.’ It was Michiel Kooman from the digital forensics department.

  ‘Hello, Michiel,’ Rijsbergen said. ‘Have you got something for me?’

  ‘Yes and no …’ Michiel replied. ‘Getting into the phones was a piece of cake. No security to speak of, just a normal PIN code, but we cracked that straight away. He didn’t make any calls on the smartphone, but he didn’t receive any either. He’d completely turned off the phone’s location services and disabled Google’s location history. He’d also disabled the function that allows apps to search for available wireless networks. I could go on, but what it comes down to is that he mainly used the phone at home for looking things up. Unfortunately, the search history was set up so that it was deleted regularly. But we might be able to recover it in some way.’

  ‘That’s all a bit odd, isn’t it?’

  ‘Very odd. He definitely didn’t want anyone knowing where he was or where he’d been. And it looks like he took a large sum of money out of a cash machine every now and then and paid for everything in cash. We’ll soon see.’

  ‘And the other phone?’

  ‘Actually, that’s an even weirder story,’ Michiel said, sounding surprised. ‘It’s a prepaid phone. He might have replaced them regularly because this one looks new.’

  ‘And he used this one for making calls?’

  ‘Correct,’ Michiel said. ‘And the strange thing is, the contacts list is completely empty. But two days ago, he was called multiple times by the same number, and he didn’t pick up. It could be that he was already dead by then. The number was still in there.’

  ‘And?’ Rijsbergen said with a growing feeling of excitement.

  ‘So we called the number, and it went to voicemail.’

  ‘Whose voicemail?’

  ‘Coen Zoutman’s.’

  Chapter 20

  Peter and Mark arrived at the History department, still deep in discussion about what could have happened to make the case more complicated.

  They hovered at the building’s entrance, holding onto their bicycles, unsure what to do next.

  ‘We could go for a coffee,’ Mark suggested. ‘And you can show me that Pilgrim manuscript. I’d really like to see it.’

  ‘All right,’ Peter said.

  It would be nice to have some company just now.

  ‘Strictly speaking, though, whoever wrote that document wasn’t actually one of the Pilgrims because he stayed behind in Leiden.’

  They went inside.

  ‘What does Fay think about you going away for three weeks?’ Mark asked once they were in Peter’s office.

  Peter busied himself with the coffee machine to give himself more time to compose his answer. ‘To be honest …’ he said, ‘I still need to tell her. I haven’t spoken to her yet.’

  Mark narrowed his eyes.

  ‘But, uh …’ Peter said, ‘I’m sure she won’t have a problem with it. She’s been working on that book for such a long time, and I know she wants to get it finished. She’ll be glad to have me out of her hair for three weeks.’

  He’d hoped this would sound light-hearted, but Mark didn’t laugh.

  ‘Things are all right with the two of you, aren’t they?’ Mark asked, sounding concerned. ‘This trip isn’t you running away from something, is it?’

  Mark wasn’t known for his keen sense of empathy, but this wasn’t the first time he’d surprised Peter with this sort of insight. Every now and then, he would say something that defied everyone’s expectations of him.

  ‘No, there’s nothing wrong,’ Peter said hastily. ‘Nothing to worry about, anyway. Every relationship has its ups and downs, right?’

  ‘That’s what they say, but Judith and I have never had a “down”. Not as far as I’m aware of, anyway,’ Mark said and smiled.

  While the coffee brewed, Peter uncoupled his laptop from the docking stat
ion on the desk and sat down next to Mark on the sofa. He opened the files that Piet van Vliet had sent him.

  ‘There’s something interesting in the last fragment. You’ll see it yourself when you read it. It looks like a group developed within the Leiden Separatists, and it specifically mentions that it was mostly builders, masons …’

  ‘A group inside the English Puritans?’

  ‘Yes. It’s all a bit cryptic, really. You need to see it for yourself. But the author also says: “he that hath ears to hear, let him hear”. Like a word to the wise. I think he’s hinting at something, but he either doesn’t dare say it or doesn’t want to. And straight after that, there’s a sentence about the key player in the group, Josh Nunn, who’s got his own loge box at the theatre. His own loge.’

  Mark looked at him in astonishment.

  ‘Builders, masons …’ Mark said slowly. ‘And a loge? As in Loge La Vertu? Okay, he’s writing about a loge in a theatre, but still … It surely can’t be what I think it is.’

  ‘You’re thinking it’s the Freemasons too, aren’t you?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ Mark replied. ‘Stonemasons meeting at a loge … That would be incredible. This was about a hundred years before the first English lodge was established. If Piet can find a connection between the Freemasons and the English Puritans who stayed behind in the Netherlands and show that they were the forerunners of the Leiden lodge … I mean, it seems far-fetched, but if he can find evidence to back it up and develop it into a hypothesis, I’d be very interested in seeing it.’

  For years, Mark had been avidly compiling a collection of theories that could be filed under the category ‘alternative science’. Many of these were sent to him unsolicited by people who believed that they had found a code in the Bible that had never been discovered before. They would attempt to back up their claims with complicated calculations that were impossible to follow. Often, these were about the Book of Revelation, the last and by far the most enigmatic book of the Bible, full of dark verses and apocalyptic predictions.

  Mark had an acquaintance who was an Egyptologist. He regularly sent him large envelopes stuffed with densely written sheets of paper that he’d been given by people who thought they could prove that the conventional Egyptian chronology was incorrect, or that the pyramids had been built by aliens, or that there were long-forgotten energy sources – deliberately covered up by governments! – that could solve our current energy problems in an instant.

  Mark planned to turn them into a book one day; he already had enough material to fill several volumes.

  ‘But it’s not very likely, is it?’ said Peter.

  ‘It’s not likely at all, but it’s not completely impossible either. It would be unscientific to just dismiss everything that doesn’t fit with what we already know. Because there could have been Masonic groups before the first English grand lodge was established in 1717. That was a union of several English lodges, so they were clearly active before then. It’s possible that there were similar groups in the Netherlands – or in Leiden. There’s no way of knowing for sure. But if it’s true, it’s not recorded in any official histories. If the Pilgrims and the Freemasons were connected, we would have to revise history as we know it by more than a hundred years. The first Dutch loge was set up in The Hague in 1734 with help from English and French Masons, the Loge du Grand-Maître des Provinces Unies et du Ressort de la Généralité …’ Mark pronounced the name with perfect French diction. ‘Our Pilgrims went to America in 1620. The connection between them has never been made before.’

  ‘But most of the Pilgrims stayed behind.’

  ‘That’s true, but even so … Look, nothing is impossible. This idea is just completely new.’

  ‘It would clarify something that I’ve often wondered about,’ Peter said.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘It’s simple, really. Whatever reasons the Pilgrims had for leaving, they must also have applied to the people who stayed behind, but most of them stayed here. Why didn’t they all leave? It’s an obvious question, isn’t it?’

  ‘Maybe they didn’t have enough money for the crossing,’ Mark said sensibly. ‘Or maybe they fell in love with a beautiful Dutchwoman. They might have been afraid of spending weeks on a boat heading for a world they didn’t know. It might have been their promised land, but it was full of dangers. I could think of a dozen other reasons. Staying here might have been the wisest choice in the end. Lots of passengers died before they even reached America, and half of those who survived the crossing died during that first winter. The ones who stayed in Leiden were probably smarter than the others.’

  ‘Well, who knows? Their reasons could have been as banal as you suggest they were. But if it was their promised land as you say, wouldn’t that have been like most of the Israelites deciding to stay in the desert rather than going to the promised land with Joshua?’

  Mark laughed heartily, like he had just heard a brilliant joke. ‘And that they thought,’ he said, still laughing, ‘“Oh, this will do. We survived the Ten Plagues, we’ve wandered in the desert for forty years, the storm has passed. The manna’s falling straight out of the sky and the quails are almost flying into our mouths. Let’s just stay here, eh?”’

  ‘Yes, pretty much,’ said Peter, looking at Mark with amusement.

  Mark put his glasses back on, still grinning.

  Peter passed the laptop over to Mark and got up to pour the coffee. ‘Oh! Sorry, I completely forgot to ask about the graffiti on the Sionshof wall. Has there been any news?’

  ‘Oh, that?’ said Mark, who was already intently focused on the screen. ‘They solved that pretty quickly, actually, amazingly quickly. They’ve caught the people who did it. The police officer who called me sounded very surprised himself, like he couldn’t believe how quickly they’d cracked the case.’

  ‘That’s very impressive. Did anyone see them?’

  ‘No. The policeman was a bit of a pompous sort. He went on about good detective work and intelligence from the field, good sources and so on, but I got the impression that what really happened was that someone from their own circle snitched on them. It turns out they were protestors, objecting to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land.’

  ‘What about Judith?’

  ‘She was relieved. But she knew it wasn’t aimed at her, or at least, it wasn’t likely to have been.’

  ‘I’m glad it’s been sorted out before she leaves on Sunday.’

  ‘Me too,’ Mark said. ‘Right, let me read this.’

  Peter opened the window and perched on the windowsill.

  ‘Do you mind if I …’ he began, but Mark was so absorbed in the text that Peter didn’t need to bother asking. He lit his cigarillo, took a careful first drag and allowed the smoke to escape from his lips. He sipped his coffee slowly and allowed himself to relax for the first time that day. He closed his eyes and tried to focus, although he wasn’t sure exactly what he should focus on.

  Something that Mark just said? Or something in Coen’s Bible stories?

  Peter took another drag on his cigar, keeping his eyes closed, afraid that he would lose his train of thought if he opened them. He felt like he was on to something but couldn’t put his finger on what it was. Often, when he was working on a paper, an idea would form in the back of his mind, but it was more of a hazy notion than something he could put into words.

  A few moments later, he opened his eyes and looked at Mark. He was still engrossed in the manuscript.

  I might as well light another cigar, Peter thought. Mark’s a fast reader, but this will take him a while.

  Peter gave up. Experience had taught him that it was pointless to try to focus on this vague feeling. It was better to leave it alone, like stewing a good cut of meat on a low heat without removing the lid so that the cooking process wouldn’t be disturbed.

  ‘Fascinating stuff,’ Mark said excitedly when Peter had finished his second cigar. ‘Really fascinating. Not much in it that we didn’t already know, of
course, but to have an insider’s view … Fantastic.’

  ‘Yes, most of it is just what we already know,’ Peter said. ‘But what was new for me was this idea that there were tensions within the group. I’ve never heard about that before. That could explain why more than half of them ended up staying in Leiden, couldn’t it? And those references to a young boy … That’s a bit odd too.’

  ‘Isn’t it? The idea that there was some sort of split, that really is new. Interesting. And the boy … Maybe he was meant to be the new leader? Was he being initiated? Who knows?’

  Mark scrolled through the text until he found the passage that he was thinking of.

  ‘This part is very unusual, Peter.’ Mark let his index finger hover half a centimetre away from the screen, like someone just learning to read. ‘Those who have gravitated towards Josh Nunn – many of whom work in the building trade, stonemasons and so on – he that hath ears to hear, let him hear – have chosen to stay in Leiden,’ he read aloud. ‘That explicit reference to Masons is striking.’

  Peter sat back down next to Mark. ‘And so is that quotation, “he that hath ears to hear, let him hear”.’

  ‘The emphasis on that specific trade is intriguing, especially because it’s mentioned together with that scripture, which gives it even more emphasis.’

  Mark moved to give the laptop back to Peter but then paused. ‘Can you email it to me?’

  ‘Sure, no problem. Piet is always saying that he’s a great believer in sharing resources as much as possible.’ Peter stood up and put the laptop back on his desk. ‘I’m going to head home to Fay,’ he said. ‘It was good talking to you, Mark. We’ve covered a lot of ground, and something gives me the feeling that I’m getting closer to finding a solution. Even though I don’t know what it’s supposed to solve.’

  ‘That sounds hopeful,’ Mark said, smiling. ‘Well, I’ll be on my way. I’ll see you at La Bota on Saturday.’

  ‘See you then.’