The Moses Stone

by James Becker

  As she told him what had happened, Bronson realized that not only were Margaret O'Connor's digital camera and memory stick missing, along with the clay tablet – the finding of which she'd described to her daughter in such breathy and exciting detail in her last but one email – but also her spare data card and card reader.

  'My husband's convinced it wasn't just a road accident,' Kirsty said. 'Of course, if the clay tablet was still in the car after the accident, then obviously he's got it all wrong.' She looked at Bronson keenly. 'So was it?'

  'No, it wasn't,' he admitted, pointing to the inventory on the table in front of them. 'I asked the police officer in charge about it myself. I should also tell you that your mother's camera and one or two other bits are also missing. But they could have been stolen by a pickpocket on their last day here, and perhaps she decided not to bother bringing the tablet back with her. We're not necessarily looking at a conspiracy here.'

  'I know,' Kirsty Philips sounded resigned, 'but I haven't been able to change David's mind. Oh, and there's probably going to be some more press coverage. David's contact on the Canterbury paper told a Daily Mail reporter about the story, and he phoned us here yesterday afternoon to talk about it. I think he's doing a story on it in today's edition.'

  At that moment a tall, well-built young man with brown curly hair appeared in the lounge and strode straight across to them.

  Kirsty stood up to make the introductions. 'David, this is Detective Sergeant Bronson.'

  Bronson stood up and shook hands. There was a kind of tension in the man in front of him, a sense of suppressed energy, of forces barely contained.

  'Let me guess, Sergeant,' Philips said, as he sat down on the sofa, his voice low and angry. 'A road accident, right? Just one of those things? A British driver in a foreign country and he just makes a Horlicks of steering his car round a gentle bend? Or maybe he was driving on the wrong side of the road? Something like that?'

  'David, please don't do this.' Kirsty looked close to tears again.

  'It wasn't a gentle bend, actually,' Bronson pointed out.

  'It was quite sharp, and on a road your father-in-law probably wasn't familiar with.'

  'You've been there, right? You've seen the place where the accident happened?' Philips demanded.

  Bronson nodded.

  'Well, so have I. Do you think you could have steered a car around that bend without driving into the ravine?'

  'Yes, of course.'

  'Then why do you suppose my father-in-law, who had an unblemished driving record, who was a member of the Institute of Advanced Motorists, and who I think was one of the safest and most competent drivers I've ever known, couldn't manage to do the same?'

  Bronson felt torn. He agreed with David – the circumstances of the accident didn't make sense. But he also knew he had to toe the official line.

  'The thing is,' he said, 'we have an eyewitness who observed the whole thing. He says he saw the car swerve off the road, hit some rocks and then crash into the ravine, and his testimony has been accepted by the Moroccan police. I sympathize with your misgivings, but there's really no evidence to suggest that what he described didn't happen.'

  'Well, I don't believe a single word any of them are saying. Look, I know you're only doing your job, but there just has to be more to it. I know my parents-in-law didn't die in a simple road accident. And nothing you say will convince me otherwise.'

  13

  When Bronson left the Philips' hotel, he stopped a few hundred yards down the road at a pavement café and ordered a coffee while he tried to decide what he should do. If he called DCI Byrd and told him he was satisfied the O'Connors had been killed in a freak accident, he knew he could just walk away. But if he voiced his suspicions – and that was really all they were – he guessed he'd be stuck in Rabat for far longer than he wanted.

  Not that the city was unpleasant – far from it, in fact. Bronson lifted the cup to his lips and glanced round. The café's tables and chairs were spread across a wide pavement on one side of a spacious boulevard, lined with palm trees. Most of the tables were occupied, and Bronson could hear the slightly guttural sounds of conversation in Arabic alternating with the softer and more melodic accents of French speakers. No, the beautiful weather, café society and relaxed lifestyle of Rabat were undeniably attractive – or would have been if Bronson had been there with Angela. And that thought made the decision for him.

  'Sod it,' he muttered to himself. 'I'll just wrap it up.'

  He drained the last of his coffee, stood up and walked away from the table, then realized he'd forgotten to pick up his briefcase and turned back. And found himself looking straight at two men wearing traditional jellabas who had just stood up from their table on the far side of the café and were themselves staring directly at him.

  Bronson was used to being stared at in Morocco – he was a stranger in a foreign land and more or less expected it – but he had the uncomfortable sensation that these men weren't just looking at him with idle curiosity. Something about their gaze bothered him. But he gave no sign of even noticing them. He simply picked up his briefcase and walked away.

  Fifty yards from the café, he stopped at the kerb, waiting to cross the road, and looked in both directions. He wasn't entirely surprised to see the two men walking slowly towards him, and less surprised when they, too, crossed to the far side of the street. Within two hundred yards, he knew without any doubt that they were following him, and one was talking animatedly into a mobile phone. What Bronson didn't know was what he should do about it.

  But that decision was taken out of his hands less than half a minute later. As well as the two men behind him, steadily getting closer, Bronson suddenly saw another three men closing on him from the front.

  They might just have been three innocent men taking an afternoon stroll, but he doubted it, and he wasn't going to hang around and find out. Bronson took the next side-street, and started running, dodging through the scattering of pedestrians on the pavements. Behind him he heard shouts and the sound of running feet, and knew his instincts had been right.

  He took the next turning on the left, then swung right, getting into a rhythm as he picked up the pace. He risked a quick glance behind him. The two men from the café were running hard to keep up with him, perhaps fifty yards back. Behind them, another running figure was visible.

  Bronson dived round another corner and saw two men approaching from his left, trying to intercept him. It looked as if they'd guessed which streets he'd take and were trying to cut him off.

  He accelerated, but headed directly towards them. He could see them hesitate and slow down, and then he was on them. One of them fumbled in his jellaba, perhaps looking for a weapon, but Bronson gave him no chance.

  He slammed his briefcase into the Moroccan's chest, knocking him violently to the ground, then turned to face his companion, just as the man swung a punch at him. Bronson ducked under the blow and rammed his fist into his attacker's stomach.

  He didn't wait to see the man tumble to the ground; already he could hear the yells from behind as the other men closed up on him. Two down – at least for a short while – three to go.

  Without a backward glance, Bronson took to his heels again, his breath rasping in his throat. He knew he had to finish this, and quickly. He was used to running, but the heat and humidity were getting to him, and he knew he couldn't go much further.

  He ducked left, then right, but all the time his pursuers were slowly eroding his lead, catching him up. As Bronson reached a main road, he slowed slightly, scanning the traffic, looking for one particular kind of vehicle. Then he took off again, and ran into the road, weaving between slow-moving cars and trucks.

  Perhaps a hundred yards in front of him, a taxi had stopped to let out two passengers, and the instant before the driver pulled away, Bronson wrenched open the back door and leapt inside. He met the man's startled gaze in the interior mirror.

  'Airport,' he gasped. 'Quickly.' For good measure he
repeated the request in French.

  The driver pulled out and accelerated, and Bronson slumped in the seat, sucking in great gulps of air, then looked back through the rear window. About forty yards behind, two figures were running along the pavement, but slowing down as the taxi gathered speed.

  Then they started speeding up. Bronson looked through the windscreen to see half a dozen stationary vehicles blocking the road in front. If the taxi stopped, he knew the men would catch him.

  'Take the next turning,' Bronson said, pointing.

  The driver glanced back at him. 'That's not the way to the airport,' he said, his English good but heavily accented.

  'I've changed my mind.'

  The driver swung the wheel. The side-street was mercifully almost empty of other traffic, and as the taxi sped down it, Bronson saw his pursuers stop at the end of the road to stare at the retreating vehicle.

  Ten minutes later, the taxi pulled to a halt in a street close to his hotel, and Bronson paid the fare, adding a generous tip.

  About ninety minutes later, in the security of his room in another Rabat hotel – he'd decided to move just in case his pursuers had followed him from his original lodging – he picked up his mobile and rang Maidstone police station.

  'What have you found, Chris?' Byrd asked, once Bronson was connected.

  'I've just been chased through the streets of Rabat by a gang of thugs who definitely didn't just want my autograph.'

  'What? Why?'

  'I didn't stop to ask. But I don't believe that the O'Connors' accident was quite as accidental as we thought it was.'

  'Oh, shit,' Byrd said. 'That's all we need.'

  Quickly, Bronson outlined his concerns about the accident and the damage to the Renault Mégane, and then explained Margaret O'Connor's habit of snapping anything that moved.

  'Kirsty Philips gave me copies of all the photographs her mother took here, and I spent an hour or so going through them. What really bothers me is that one of the men she photographed in the souk turned up as the only eyewitness to the accident on the road outside Rabat, and according to Kirsty another man in the same picture was found dead just outside the medina with a stab-wound in his chest. I think she photographed an argument in the souk that led to murder, which means the killer was almost certainly one of the people in the pictures she took.

  'And that,' Bronson finished, 'is a pretty good motive for knocking off the two eyewitnesses and stealing the camera.'

  14

  MYSTERY OF THE MISSING TABLET was the title of the short article on page thirteen of the Daily Mail. Bronson was able to read it thanks to Dickie Byrd and one of the fax machines at the Maidstone police station. Below the headline, the reporter asked the question: 'Were British pensioners killed to recover priceless object?'

  The story was pretty much a straight rehash of what had appeared in the Canterbury evening paper, with a single addition Bronson was sure had been carefully incorporated in the text to give it an importance it didn't deserve. Towards the end of the article, when the reporter was discussing the value of the clay tablet, he stated that a 'British Museum expert' had been unavailable for comment, but managed to imply this was slightly sinister, as if the 'expert' knew exactly what the tablet was, but had for some reason refused to divulge the information.

  Well, that was something Bronson could check straight away, and it gave him a perfect excuse to talk to Angela. He pulled out his mobile and dialled her direct-line number at the British Museum, where she worked as a ceramics conservator. Angela answered almost immediately.

  'It's me,' Bronson said. 'Look, I'm really sorry about the other night – I didn't want to come tramping all the way out here to Morocco, but I had no choice.'

  'I know, Chris, but it's not a problem. You told me what happened.'

  'Well, I'm still sorry about it. Now, are you busy?'

  Angela laughed shortly. 'I'm always busy; you know that. It's eleven thirty in the morning. I've been at work for nearly three and a half hours and I've just had another three boxes of potsherds dumped on my desk. I haven't even had time to grab a cup of coffee this morning, so if you're calling just to pass the time of day, forget it. Or did you actually want something?'

  'Just the answer to a question, really. There's an article on page thirteen of the Mail today about a clay tablet. Have you seen it?'

  'Oddly enough, I have, yes. I read it on the way in to work this morning. It made me laugh because I was the socalled expert the reporter couldn't contact. He rang the museum yesterday afternoon, and the call was diverted to my office. Clay tablets aren't really my field, but I suppose the switchboard operator thought "ceramics" was close enough. Anyway, I'd just slipped out for a cup of tea and by the time I got back, the Mail reporter had hung up. So it's quite true that I was "unavailable" for comment, but only for something like three minutes. Typical of the bloody press.'

  'I thought it would be something like that,' Bronson said. 'But could the report be correct? Could that clay tablet be really valuable?'

  'Highly unlikely. Clay tablets are ten a penny – well, not literally, but you know what I mean. They're found all over the place, sometimes as fragments, but complete ones turn up very frequently. There are estimated to be about half a million locked in museum storerooms around the world that haven't yet been studied or deciphered, or even really looked at. They really are that abundant. They were used by most of the ancient races as short-term records, and they listed everything from property ownership details and accounts to recipes, and almost any other information you can think of in between. They've been found with inscriptions in Latin, Greek, Coptic, Hebrew and Aramaic, but the majority are cuneiform.'

  'Which is what, exactly?'

  'It's an ancient written language. Cuneiform letters are wedge-shaped, and that kind of script is particularly easy to impress onto wet clay using a stylus. Clay tablets are just curiosities, really, that help us better appreciate daily life in whatever period they were made. They do have some value, obviously, but the only people who are usually interested in them are academics and museum staff.'

  'OK,' Bronson said. 'But two people have been killed out here in Morocco and the clay tablet we know the woman picked up in the souk is missing, along with her camera. And yesterday I was chased through the streets of Rabat by a gang of men who—' 'What? You mean some local thugs?'

  'I've no idea,' Bronson admitted. 'I didn't hang around to ask what they wanted. But if the tablet really is worthless, maybe the important thing is what's written on it. Is that possible?'

  Angela was silent for a few moments. 'Just about, I suppose, but it's extremely unlikely, simply because of the age of the object – most of them are between two and five thousand years old. But what happened to you is a worry, Chris. If you're right and the inscription on the tablet is significant, then anyone who's seen it might be in danger.'

  'I've got half a dozen pictures of it, but I haven't the slightest idea what the inscription means. I don't even know what language it's written in.'

  'Well, we can do something about that. Email a few of the photographs to me here at the museum and I'll get one of our ancient-language specialists to take a look at them. That way, at least we'll know what's on the tablet, and then you can see if you're right about the inscription.'

  'Good idea.' That was exactly what Bronson had been hoping she'd suggest. 'I'll do it right now. Look in your inbox in about five minutes.'

  15

  A quarter of an hour later, Angela checked her messages and immediately spotted the one sent by her ex-husband. She glanced at the four pictures of the clay tablet on the screen of her desktop computer and printed a monochrome copy of each of them, because the definition would be slightly better in black and white than in colour. Then she leant back in her leather swivel chair and studied the images.

  Angela had occupied the same office ever since she'd first arrived at the museum. It was small, square and organized, dominated by a large L-shaped desk, on the short ar
m of which stood her computer and a colour laser printer. In the centre of the larger section of the desk was a collection of potsherds – part of her current workload – and several files and notebooks. In one corner of the office was the wooden bench where she carried out the mechanical aspects of her conservation duties, working with a collection of precision stainless-steel tools, cleaning fluids, various types of adhesive and other chemicals. Beside that was a row of filing cabinets and above them a couple of shelves lined with reference books.

  The British Museum is simply huge: it has to be to accommodate the one thousand permanent staff who work there and the five million visitors who pass through the doors every year. The structure covers about 75,000 square metres – that's four times larger than the Colosseum in Rome, or the equivalent of nine football pitches – and contains 3,500 doors. It's one of the most spectacular public buildings in London, or anywhere else, for that matter.

  Angela stared at the photographs she'd printed, then shook her head. The quality of the images was nothing like as good as she'd hoped and expected. The object in the pictures was clearly some kind of clay tablet, and she was reasonably sure she could identify the language used, but transcribing it was going to be difficult because all four photographs were so badly blurred.

  After a minute or so, she replaced the pictures on her desk and sat in thought for a few seconds. Looking at the images had inevitably started her thinking about Chris and that, as usual, revived all the confusion and uncertainty she felt about him. Their marriage had been brief but it hadn't been entirely unsuccessful. They had at least remained friends, which was more than a lot of divorced couples could say. The problem had always been the unacknowledged third person in their relationship – the shadowy presence of Jackie Hampton, the wife of Bronson's best friend. And that was almost a cliché, she realized, a wry smile playing across her lips.

  Bronson's problem had been his unrequited desire for Jackie, a desire that she knew he had never expressed, and that Jackie had been blissfully unaware of. There had never been any question of his being unfaithful to her – Bronson was far too loyal and decent for anything like that – and in one way the failure of the marriage had been Angela's fault. Once she'd realized where his real affections lay, she had found she simply couldn't cope with playing second fiddle to anyone.