“The painting, of course.” A slight Israeli accent. Not Menachem, but likely a close associate.
Bruce nodded at Mitchell. “No use fighting them. Give it to them.”
“I … I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Mitchell,” Bruce said harshly. “Don’t fuck around with these guys. Trust me.”
The men hoisted Mitchell to his feet. He reached for a hidden latch, pivoted aside a bookcase and, turning his body, slid into a cavity. A pair of operatives turned on flashlights and stayed with him, apparently to make sure he did not grab a weapon. Thirty seconds later he emerged with a framed panel the size of a plastic toboggan. “Here,” he whispered, eyes downcast. Sirens sounded in the distance. The operatives checked their watches.
The man with an accent removed a phone from his pocket. Comparing the painting to an image of the Just Judges on his device, he nodded. “That’s it. Let’s go,” he said to his comrades, the phone back in his pocket and his gun now on Bruce and Mitch. One of the men slid an oversized garbage bag over the painting. Wordlessly, the operatives began to pile back out the window, the second one passing the painting through the window to the first.
Bruce watched, not wanting to give them any reason to use their weapons. He tried to stay calm, rational. But there was something about an automatic weapon pointed at your chest that made it hard to breath. In fact, he realized, fear was the only rational reaction—the reality was that only a half-ounce of finger pressure separated him from death. A backfiring car, a door blown shut, even too much caffeine—any one of them could spasm the trigger-finger that would end his life.
The third man vaulted through the window, peered around, and waved the final man on. Gun still pointed at Bruce and Mitch, the leader strode over to the window and lifted one leg. He turned back with a half-smile, visible through his mask, and addressed Bruce. “Menachem told you we don’t want the painting, that we just wanted to make sure it didn’t fall into the wrong hands. Well, we changed our minds.” He wiggled his pinky at Bruce and climbed out. “Menachem says hi. He also says not to do anything stupid.”
At the wiggling motion, Bruce’s own pinky began to throb. That was it. He knew he was being followed; he just didn’t know how. The doctor at the hospital had sewed the wound closed and told Bruce he had inserted a small screw to give the finger stability. But what if it wasn’t a screw? This was the Mossad, after all. They hadn’t cut off his finger just for fun, or even to scare him. Menachem must have forced the doctor to implant some kind of tracking device under the skin. A GPS of some kind. That would explain how they tracked him despite his evasive tactics.
“That’s it, Mitchell, they’re gone,” Bruce said, watching the operatives drop into the alley and scurry away. He held up his pinky and explained his theory. “A tracking device. That must be how they followed me.”
Mitchell exhaled and paced excitedly. “You said it was a car door. But who gives a fuck?” He spoke quickly. “You were right. You knew they’d come. It worked out just like you said it would.”
Bruce nodded. It had cost him five grand to have a fake painting made. The sword, the fake painting, travel to Europe—all, hopefully, money well-spent. He closed the hidden door and re-latched the bookcase into place. “Well, we bought a few days, until they get the painting back to Israel and realize we pulled a switch on them.” He sighed. “They’ll probably be back. You don’t want to be here.”
“No shit, man. I’m going to crash at a buddy’s place until this deal is done. And the painting’s hidden, right where you told me to.” Mitch opened the fridge, his hand shaking. “I can’t believe we just bested the fucking Mossad. You may not want that beer, but I sure do.” He popped the top and shook his head. “They’re going to be pissed.”
“Pissed?” Bruce shook his head. “They have no right to be.” He allowed himself a rare feeling of satisfaction as he pictured Menachem’s face. “They should know there’s no honor amongst thieves.”
“That may be, Bruce. But they’re still going to be pissed.”
Rather than dive into a book or surf the internet, Cam took the opposite approach to his research: He threw on a barn jacket and gloves, put Venus on a leash, and decided to walk the five-mile loop around the lake in the fading afternoon sunlight.
The question on his mind was, why had the Duke of Burgundy chosen to name his Order of the Golden Fleece after a pagan legend? Especially given that the Order’s membership was limited to the elite of European society. Amanda had offered one possible explanation: That the Golden Fleece was another name for the Philosopher’s Stone, a way to turn metal into gold and perhaps even avoid death. But Cam sensed there was something more, something deeper. Was the Duke of Burgundy saying that there was a road to glory and illumination which was different than that mandated by the Church? A different path?
As was often the case when it came to medieval mysteries, Cam guessed the answer rested with the Templars. He picked up the pace as his mind raced. The Templars had been accused of various acts of blasphemy and heresy when outlawed in 1307—spitting on the cross, worshiping a skull, denouncing Jesus. A body of evidence indicated that the Templars had rejected many of the teachings of the Church, likely because they had become privy to early writings and teachings of Christianity which differed from medieval Church dogma. A different path. For example, the Templars believed in the marriage between Jesus and Mary Magdalene. And they likely became aware of the teachings of the Essenes (a messianic sect influential during the time of Jesus), later revealed in the Dead Sea Scrolls, which prophesized that there would be two messiahs—a king and a priest—rather than the single messiah as reflected in Christianity. It was this belief in a second messiah which led many commentators to conclude that the Templars secretly worshiped John the Baptist as the priestly messiah equal to Jesus, and that the head of Baphomet which they venerated was in fact the disembodied skull of John the Baptist.
But these beliefs represented secret Templar dogma, unknown to all but the senior Templar leaders. These beliefs did not—in fact, could not—represent a different path because nobody knew about them. Cam sensed he was on the wrong track: Whatever different path the Duke of Burgundy was referring to would have to be something which was generally known during medieval times. Cam considered the problem: Was there a known challenge to the medieval Church? Of course. The Cathars of southern France. The Cathars outwardly challenged Church teachings, and eventually were wiped out for their heresy—in the first religious genocide in human history, at least 200,000 (and as many as one million) of these unorthodox Christians were murdered by their mother Church in the early 1200s in what was known as the Albigensian Crusade. Cam shook his head; the story of the Cathars had bothered him since he first read about it in college. In a perverse way, it made sense for the Church to send Crusaders to the Middle East to fight the Muslims and other “infidels.” But to commit genocide on fellow Christians over a lack of orthodoxy? He supposed it was no different than Muslim sects such as the Shi’ite and the Sunni continuously ravaging each other in the Middle East in modern times.
But that didn’t make it any easier to swallow. Cam knew that the Cathar challenge to Christianity was based on ancient texts and writings discovered in Jerusalem, many of which eventually were brought to Europe by the Templars. In particular, the ancient texts revealed discrepancies in the ending of the Gospel of Mark, the oldest and therefore most authoritative of all the gospels. Cam stopped, threw a stick for Venus to chase, and used the time to pull up an article from the internet on his phone and refresh his memory.
The final chapter of Mark, he read, began with the discovery of the empty tomb by three women, including Mary Magdalene and the Virgin Mary. (Why Mary Magdalene would have been allowed into Jesus’ tomb—a blatant violation of Jewish law—had never been adequately explained, unless of course they had been married.) Inside the tomb, the women encountered a young man dressed in white who announced the resurrection of Jesus. Frightened, th
ey fled from the empty tomb and said nothing to anyone. At this point, the two earliest known versions of the Gospel of Mark, dated to the 4th century, simply ended. Bible historians referred to this ending as the “Short Ending” of Mark.
But the King James and most other versions of the Bible contained an additional twelve-verse passage in Mark, referred to as the “Long Ending.” This later alteration, which in many scholars’ minds conclusively invalidated the whole idea that the Bible was the actual word of God, was made sometime after the 5th century. Bible skeptics considered the Long Ending nothing more than a sloppy forgery. It was in this passage where Jesus appeared to the Apostles and announced he had been resurrected. In other words, one of the pillars upon which Christianity rested—that a resurrected Jesus appeared to the Apostles—never occurred, according to the oldest gospel. This “teaching” was, apparently, a later addition by overzealous Church leaders hoping to buttress their dogma. And the Cathars weren’t buying it. Though they venerated the teachings of Jesus, they rejected the claim that he had been resurrected. A different path.
Set to resume his walk, Cam called for Venus. She had run up a dirt road to chase the stick he had thrown, but now he couldn’t see her. “Venus! Come, girl.” Nothing. He began to walk up the dirt road. From a wooded area a tennis court’s distance away he heard a sharp bark. A man emerged from a thin fog amongst a copse of trees, his fingers looped inside Venus’ collar. Dressed in a black trench coat and wearing a bowler, the man looked like something out of a Sherlock Holmes novel. He lifted his hat and then pulled a Jewish star out from under his shirt and held it out for Cam to see. He patted Venus on the side and released her before retreating into the woods. Cam thought about pursuing him, but for what? The man was there to deliver a message. And Cam heard it loud and clear.
Cam fought back a shiver and returned to the main road. Unharmed, and content to carry the stick in her mouth, Venus trotted by his side. It was becoming obvious that Cam’s research was of more than just a passing interest to the Mossad.
Eyes scanning the woods around him now as he walked, Cam completed the circuit around the lake and made the final turn onto his street. He jogged the final fifty yards. Amanda had left him a note saying she went to pick up Astarte from an after-school activity, so he gave Venus a fresh bowl of water and popped open his laptop. Now would be a good time to dig deeper on the Cathars. Was it possible the Templars shared some of the heretical beliefs of their compatriots from southern France?
The Cathars, he learned, leaning on the teachings of the 2nd-century Bishop, Irenaeus, believed in a deity superior even to God. Named Abraxas, this deity created and ruled the 365 heavens, the last of which became the home of God, from where God ruled the earthly world. The Abraxas name itself reflected a deity ruling the celestial heavens—the word Abraxas was formed using the first letter of the Greek name of each of the seven classical planets (those visible to the naked eye): Mars, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, Mercury, the Sun and the Moon. The planets, in the minds of the ancient peoples, equate to heaven.
Cam read on. Abraxas was usually depicted as having the head of a rooster, the body of a man, and the legs of serpents. Cam found an image and swallowed a smile. Mr. Potato Head had nothing on this guy.
The Church, not surprisingly, labeled Abraxas a demon and its worshipers pagans. Here, however, was a possible tie back to the pagan worship themes of the Golden Fleece legend. The Cathars may have been Christian, but—based on the symbolism of their Abraxas deity—they had clearly not fully let go of the old gods. Was the Duke of Burgundy suggesting that enlightenment could be found by following the ancient pagan deities? A different path.
The next obvious question was, how did the Templars view Abraxas, if at all? Here Cam found an important, and somewhat shocking, clue. The Templars often used secret seals in their correspondence and financial dealings. One such seal, labeled the ‘Templi Secretum’ and adorned with the Templar cross, clearly featured this very same Abraxas deity:
Why, Cam wondered, would the Templars depict a pagan deity on their secret seal? Was it a nod to their Cathar brethren? Perhaps even a subtle affirmation that their different path, their rejection of Christianity, was in fact the correct route to enlightenment? If so, it would explain the Duke of Burgundy’s choice of a pagan name for his Order of the Golden Fleece: In this particular quest, in this search for the Holy Grail, one should follow the path blazed by the Templars and their Cathar brethren, not the trail lit by the Catholic Church.
Cam closed his laptop. He sensed this would not be the last time he encountered the mysterious Abraxas deity.
Bruce and Mitchell locked up the apartment but left open the hidden door to the meat locker, which was now empty of any artwork. “If they come back,” Bruce reasoned, “might as well make it easy for them to see the painting is gone. No sense in them busting up the place.”
Mitchell shrugged as he tossed an overnight bag over his shoulder and grabbed his guitar. “I’ve got insurance.”
“Let’s grab a cup of coffee,” Bruce said after they had put a few blocks between them and the apartment. He wanted to buy some clean clothes before picking up Shelby for their date tonight, but he had some time.
He explained the Saudi offer. “A billion dollars, no questions asked. They know it’s stolen. Cash and carry, couldn’t be easier.”
Mitchell blinked. “What the hell am I going to do with a billion bucks?”
“Pay a half billion in taxes, for starters,” Bruce said, smiling.
“Even so, that’s an obscene amount of money. Like I said, man, what am I going to do with it?”
Bruce shifted. “Look, how you spend it is not up to me. My job is to get you as much as I can without taking any unnecessary risks.” He sipped his tea; he didn’t actually drink coffee. “Let’s say you decide to give it away to charity. It’s still better to give two billion away than one billion, right? More for cancer research or the Boy Scouts or saving the whales.”
Mitchell slurped his coffee. It was one of those annoying little habits which would instantly be forgiven once people realized Mitchell’s net worth. “I get your point.”
“So that’s my job. If one billion is on the table now, we need to figure out a way to get to two billion.” Bruce turned his palms up to the sky. “Look, you’re paying me a flat fee, not a commission.” An arrangement Bruce had actually insisted on—he had seen too many brokers walk away with nothing after months of work when a deal didn’t close for some reason. “So I get the same no matter how much you sell for.” A hundred grand up front, plus a retainer of ten grand per month for as long as Bruce worked the deal. Mitchell needed to sell another painting to pay the retainer, but it was still a great deal for him. But Bruce had his reasons for working cheap. “I just think you should wait.”
“Wait for what? For the Mossad to come back?”
“Look, the one thing the Mossad made clear was that they don’t want their enemies, like the Saudis, to get the painting. They may be pissed now, but selling to the Saudis will make them go nuclear. So if you’re looking to save your neck, think about that.”
Mitchell let out a long sigh, torn between his greed and his neck. Bruce was hoping to convince him that waiting was the best choice for both motivations. “But what if the one billion goes away? Didn’t the Saudis say I need to make a decision right away?”
“They did. But think about it, Mitchell. If they’re offering a billion now, why not offer the same next week or next month? What’s going to change? They’re trying to make a preemptive strike, get you to bite before the bidding starts. But that’s not in your best interests.” Or Bruce’s. He needed time. And he preferred not to have to answer to Menachem as to why they sold the painting to the Saudis. “Short of the oil market completely crashing, I don’t think the Saudis are going anywhere.”
“Still. He who hesitates is lost.”
“Well, they have another saying in the Middle East: The friend of my enemy is my enemy. You sell to
the Saudis, and the Mossad will come after you, guaranteed. And no amount of money will be enough to keep you hidden.” Bruce leaned forward. “Take a deep breath. The best move is to wait. Trust me on this.”
Grudgingly, Mitchell nodded.
Bruce stood. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m heading to the emergency room.” He held up his hand. “I need to get debugged.”
Cam shared his research with Amanda as they prepared dinner. “So do you think I’m on the right track? Was the Duke of Burgundy telling us to look to the heretics for clues?”
She nodded twice. “Of course he was. The Golden Fleece story is about as heretical as you can get—filled with depravity and debauchery. The prince leading the group in search of the Golden Fleece, Jason, was the antithesis of a good Christian. In fact, his very name screams paganism.”
“How so?”
“The spelling marks the first letter of the months of harvest—July, August, September, October, November. It works when you spell the months in Greek also. He’s named after the earth’s bounty, in homage to Mother Earth and the old gods. As I said, he’s the anti-Christian.”
“Just like the Templars after 1307.” The Church excommunicated them for being un-Christian.
She peeled some shrimp at the sink. “I think we’ve pretty much beaten this to death. Whatever it is that’s hidden, the key to finding this so-called Treasure Templari is, not surprisingly, the Templars. Whether it’s the Holy Grail or the Philosopher’s Stone or this just some random treasure.” She shrugged. “But that doesn’t bring us any closer to actually finding it.”
“Do you still think it’s in America somewhere?”
“It’s still atop my list. But I’m not totally sold. One thing I learned was that William Sinclair was a member of the Golden Fleece Order. That’s another clue pointing to America.”
Treasure Templari Page 15
