by Richard Reed
“Tell us more!”
“I can’t tell you too much at this stage – all will be revealed when the programme goes out this autumn. And we still haven’t finished the excavations. But we have every reason to believe it will be pretty earth-shattering.”
The interviewer turned back to the camera.
“Well, it sounds as though the mysterious village of Rennes-le-Château is finally about to be give up its secrets. Will they find Templar treasures – or perhaps a shocking revelation that will rock the Church?”
The screen cut to a trailer of the National Geographic programme, with a stunning view of the hilltop town set against the looming presence of the Pyrénées, and a voice saying dramatically: “Is one of the last big mysteries of our times about to be laid bare?”
* * * * *
Rachel winced at the over-the-top production on the trailer, then flicked off the TV on the remote and started pacing up and down her hotel room.
It was way too cheesy, and she hated it – but he who pays the piper calls the tune… Bill Krakovitz from National Geographic had insisted on the interviews to raise the profile of the programme before it aired. “I want this on the front page of every newspaper in the western world,” he had said in his clipped east coast accent. “And don’t under-sell it. I’ve put a lot of faith – not to mention cash – into your pet project. Now it’s pay-back time.”
The phone rang on her bedside table. She hesitated before reaching over to pick it up. “Rachel Spencer…”
“Hi Rachel! That was pretty impressive!”
“Oh hi, Jon. Thanks. Actually, I thought it was a bit gung-ho, but I suppose they’ve got to grab people’s attention.”
“They’ve certainly done that! Listen, how long are you in London for?”
“I’m heading back to Rennes tomorrow – we’ve got a deadline to meet. They want this to go out in the second week of September, at the start of the autumn season. You know what it’s like.”
“Sure. Look, what are you doing tonight? Fancy meeting up for a bite to eat?”
Rachel hesitated. She still felt guilty about leaving Jon, despite his oppressive, manipulative behaviour. He wanted to control her every move, to know where she was going and what she was doing. While he, of course, could do whatever the hell he wanted. It had come to a head over the contract with National Geographic in France. It wasn’t the first time she had picked up an overseas assignment, but this time Jon had been totally bloody-minded.
In the end, she just snapped; walked out with Emma, their ten-year-old daughter, and went back to her mother’s house. She knew it would be a mistake to meet up again so soon; that she had to go through with the split, for the sake of her own sanity. But she knew, too, that she had a duty to Emma to make sure her relationship with her father did not deteriorate. Whatever Jon’s flaws as a husband, he was a loving dad – when he chose to be around – and Emma needed a father figure. It was something she herself had missed dreadfully when her own father had left home and returned to the States, a loss compounded by his sudden death in a plane crash just six months later.
“Rachel?”
“Sorry, just working out if I’ve got time. OK, I’ll pop over, but I can’t stay out late – I have to make an early start tomorrow. But I suppose we could meet up in town for a quick curry, or something.”
“Actually, if you can get yourself down here, there’s a great little Italian place that’s just opened. Family-run – a really friendly bunch.”
“It’s a bit of trek from Mum’s…”
“Come on, it’s ten minutes on the train from Waterloo. You can be here in half an hour.”
Rachel fumed as she sat on the train while it crawled its way out of Waterloo station. Why had she agreed to meet up with Jon? It had been a nightmare getting across London on the tube. Why did she still feel so guilty about leaving him? There had been numerous occasions when he had failed to return home after a night out drinking with his mates. He claimed, of course, that he had crashed at a friend’s house, drunk out of his mind, but she had nagging doubts that there was more to his absences than he pretended. He was a good-looking guy; he wouldn’t find it difficult to pick up women while he was out on the town.
Making her trek half-way across London so they could meet close to his home was typical; unwilling and unable to put himself out for her, or anyone, for that matter – except, perhaps Emma.
Yet she knew the guilt would never go away. This was the guy who had supported her while she did her doctorate in archaeology – three years when she hadn’t contributed a penny to their bills. The guy who had made her believe she really could be a TV researcher, and not just put up with the lame secretarial job she had drifted into after the triumph of getting that PhD had dissolved into the drudgery of job-hunting. Guilt, too, that she was consciously and deliberately breaking up her family. Hell, why did he have to change? Was that just what happened after the sex fizzled out? God knows, she had tried to make an effort in that department.
Now he seemed to be making an attempt to win her back – something which she had absolutely no intention of succumbing to. But he was comfortably familiar, and London could be a lonely place if you were single. She also felt obligated, on a purely practical level, to try to persuade Jon to ease the burden on her mother while she was away in France. There was that guilt again – Emma was his daughter, for God’s sake; he had a duty to help look after her.
No doubt Jon would be quizzing her about Rennes. He was paranoiacally jealous about the men she worked with, so she would have to tread carefully. David Tranter, the lead archaeologist in Rennes, was a big name, and not just because of his undoubted skills. With his mane of golden curls and polished English charm, his first appearance on a TV documentary had quickly earned him the sobriquet of ‘the thinking woman’s crumpet’.
This was her big moment, and she didn’t want Jon ruining it for her in a fit of petty jealousy. With a little luck, the programme might lead on to fame and fortune. She smiled at her own irony. She might be fleetingly famous after the documentary went out. But certainly not wealthy. That didn’t matter, though: she was living out her passion: making history come alive.
She had grown up on a diet of National Geographic and the History Channel, and she had been obsessed with the HBO drama series on ancient Rome – though that might have been something to do with the hunky male actors. She just loved the past – the complex histories, the mysteries, the revelations. The more she had learned about past civilisations, the more she realised how little humanity had really advanced in the past few thousand years. Take technology out of the equation, and were we really that much more ‘civilised’?
She fished her cell-phone out of her bag and hit speed-dial. “Jon? I’m on the train now. It took forever to get to Waterloo – problems on the Jubilee Line, as usual. Anyway, you’re going to be there to meet me at Queenstown Road station, right? I’m not wandering through Battersea on my own at night.”
“South Chelsea these days, darling – the next best thing to Notting Hill. But yes, I’m nearly there now.”
“Right. See you soon.”
Queenstown Road station was like something from a 1950s black and white movie; the taxpayers’ money allegedly spent modernising the railways seemed to have passed this one by. She trudged down the worn steps in the dingy interior and emerged from a dilapidated doorway under a railway bridge.
She looked around, but could see no sign of Jon – late as usual. She stood there feeling lost and vulnerable, trying to blend into the background as a gang of adolescent males in hoodies walked past, leering at her.
“Rachel!”
She spun round and saw Jon waving at her from the other side of the street. She waited for a gap in the traffic, then started to cross. As she neared the other side, she became vaguely aware of the sound of a car gunning its engine, followed by a screech of tyres. Then something cannoned into her hard and fast, flinging her across the tarmac. She heard herself scream, s
aw a large granite kerbstone racing to meet her. Then everything went black.
Chapter 3
Bérenger Saunière, curé of Rennes-le-Château, took another long swig of Marie’s famous home-made herbal liqueur and stared out of the window of La Tour Magdala, the quixotic faux medieval turret he had built next to his new villa. It was an icy January day with a biting north-easterly wind, and despite the blazing log fire in the study, he needed the potent liqueur to keep the cold from his bones.
He was weary. The war had made life difficult. No longer could he make his trips to Budapest to draw on the money deposited there by the Hapsburgs. Instead, he was having to live on the savings he had accrued from saying masses – quite legitimately, as far as he was concerned – for far-flung members of the Catholic flock who needed intercession with the Almighty. He grimaced as the word came into his mind: his view of that had certainly changed over the past 30 years.
He pushed his stamp collection to one side, eased back his chair and moved stiffly across to the window. How he resented this increasingly infirm body; he who as a young man had walked for miles across the rugged terrain around Rennes-le-Château. Even that trip to Lourdes had proved a waste of time. Perhaps it was hardly surprising under the circumstances, but he found it hard to change beliefs so deeply ingrained during the formative years of his life.
His frown faded as he looked down from the window onto the countryside below. From here he could see the rich tapestry of hills and valleys that surrounded the village, and, beyond, the snow-bound peaks of the Hautes Pyrénées, glittering in the bright winter sunlight for as far as the eye could see. It was a magnificent panorama, one that had inspired him to create the walkway between the two towers of his chessboard. Let someone figure that one out in years to come, he thought to himself with grim satisfaction.
A sound at the door made him turn round, and he was surprised to see a well-dressed stranger enter the room.
“Do I have the pleasure of knowing, you, monsieur? I’m afraid my memory isn’t what it used to be…”
“No, you do not, Father Saunière,” came the curt reply, in a clipped Germanic accent. “But I think you know who sent me.”
“Ah! In that case we are indeed friends. Will you take a seat and have some liqueur? I can thoroughly recommend…”
“I did not come here in the dead of winter for a cosy fireside chat,” interrupted the stranger brusquely. “I have come to tell you that our little arrangement is formally at an end. The war has changed everything, and it is no longer prudent or practical to let this charade continue. You will not, of course, have been able to get to Budapest, since France is at war with Austria-Hungary, but even if that had been possible, you would have found no funds in your account. The war is not going well, your prime minister Clemenceau is conspiring against us, and the new Emperor has bigger fish to fry. There will be no more ‘donations’ to your cause.”
Saunière’s gaze hardened, and he defied the rheumatism that plagued him to pull himself to his full height. “In that case, sir, you will not object if I share our little secret with my flock?”
The stranger crossed the room and stood in front of the priest, his eyes inches from his face. “I would not advise that, Saunière. You are not a well man – we heard about your trip to Lourdes, and rumour has it you are a little too fond of your housemaid’s liqueur…” He turned his head to let his gaze fall on the half-empty bottle. “Not to mention her affections,” he added, pointedly.
Saunière was visibly startled. “How could you possibly know?” he blustered. “That’s just salacious gossip.”
“Do you really think we would let you carry on your life as if nothing as happened – that we wouldn’t take steps to ensure you were keeping your side of the bargain? How naive you really are, Saunière. You were once a well-read priest with a keen mind. Now you are reduced to trafficking in masses and endlessly playing with your little stamp collection. It has got beyond the point of embarrassment. You have been more than well paid for your services. If you will not, or cannot, keep your silence now, then steps will be taken to ensure your compliance.”
“Are you threatening me?” said Saunière thickly, unable to take in what he was hearing.
“If necessary; if you cannot hold your counsel, then yes, I am threatening you.”
Saunière eyes misted red, all the recent years of frustration and humiliation surging up in him. He lunged at the immaculately coiffured man and grabbed him by the throat, the huge strength of his youth momentarily returning to him. His eyes almost popped as he exerted every sinew to maintain his grip on the struggling man. The mist grew darker, and a loud thrumming began in his ears. His head began spin, and as the noise in his ears grew, so the strength started to ebb from his limbs.
Slowly, centimetre by centimetre, the stranger prised apart the ageing priest’s hands, then staggered to one side, slamming Saunière away hard against the wall of the library, where he slumped in a crumpled heap on the tiled floor. The stranger doubled up, clutching his bruised throat, a thick string of saliva hanging from his mouth, his breath coming in rattles. Slowly he started to regain his composure, and stumbling across to Saunière’s desk, grabbed the liqueur bottle and took a deep swig.
He gasped and shook his head as the fiery liqueur burned his throat, but there was an immediate jolt of awareness as the alcohol hit his bloodstream. He carefully replaced the stopper in the bottle and returned it to the table before stepping slowly across to where the priest’s body lay slumped on the cold, tiled floor. He bent down and felt the pulse on his neck. Still alive. That would not do. Time to be rid of this meddlesome curé once and for all. But it must look like an accident.
Grabbing Saunière by the collar, he dragged his body across the floor towards the door. The priest was a big man, grown heavier through years of self-indulgence, and it took several minutes to negotiate the desk and haul his body to the main entrance of the tower. The stranger paused momentarily for breath, then heaved Saunière’s body over the step into the glass porch and let it fall by the doorway to the promenade.
He stood up, breathing heavily, and straightened his neck-tie. Then, leaving the door wide open, he stalked out into the bitterly cold January afternoon without so much as a backward glance.
Chapter 4
Pain punctuated every waking thought. An intense, throbbing pain that gripped her skull like a vice and threatened to crush it. Every time she tried to open her eyes it felt as if a knife were being twisted into her brain.
It was too much. There must be somewhere she could go, somewhere far away from this torture. She gave up the struggle and let her mind wander. That was better; the pain was going away now; far, far away. As she drifted towards the light, a feeling of great peace spread slowly through her being. All her cares, all her troubles, all the stress, all the pain, all the heartache… she was leaving it behind as surely as a receding tide leaves its detritus on the beach. She was heading out to sea; floating; bathed in that glorious white light. Far back on the land she could see vague outlines of people, places she had known, growing further away, becoming blurred.
She was vaguely aware of a man’s face getting closer; a caring, loving face, full of compassion. It was her father, she realised, in a detached way. As the realisation sank in, her spirit soared with delight. To see him again! How she had missed him… This time, she knew intuitively, when they met again there would be no parting.
But her father’s face was changing; slowly morphing into someone else. “No!” she shrieked in a voice no-one could hear. “Not again! I can’t lose you again.” The face was becoming recognisable, now; not someone she had ever met, but a face she knew, nonetheless. It was as if in a painting, a life-drawing; not a photographic image… But why did she know that face? Where was it from? It had the look of a religious icon… Something she had seen in a church… A young woman… But not the Virgin Mary – there was no baby Jesus. Instead the woman seemed to be holding a white jar in her hands.
“Quick, we’re losing her!”
The words cut into her ecstasy. She became aware of a hive of activity around her body as it lay stretched out beneath her. She could see nurses rushing around frantically – someone grabbing a syringe, somebody else wheeling a trolley laden with instruments towards her body, another person in green coveralls standing over her, now doing something with the syringe. Strange pads were being put onto her naked chest… Why could she see her body lying beneath her like that? How interesting… but it was so much nicer back where she had come from. Let me go back, she thought, to no-one in particular.
And then the pain returned, this time ripping into her chest like a projectile, her body arching off the trolley as 3,000 volts of electricity punched into her heart. Her eyes jerked open and the stabbing in her skull returned, redoubled in intensity. She heard herself scream.
“She’s back! OK, keep up the adrenalin, but no more morphine – we can’t risk losing her again.”
“Rachel.” A man’s face loomed in front of her half-open eyes. “I need you to stay with us. Stay awake. You must stay awake.”
“I’ll try,” she mumbled through bruised and swollen lips. “I’ll try…”
Chapter 5
Marie Dénarnaud couldn’t stop herself from worrying. It was not like her Bérenger to be late for supper – especially when he knew she had been preparing one of her famous rabbit stews, for which her reputation had spread throughout the village. Bérenger was certainly a man who enjoyed his food and drink – perhaps a little too much, if truth be told.
