The Sword of Moses

by Dominic Selwood

  As she rolled out from under the vehicle and into the sunlight, she realized her mistake too late.

  A group of men was gathered there. They were looking down at her, grim faced—angered by the unwelcome intrusion and interruption.

  Before she had time to react, something cold and heavy connected hard with the back of her head, and the world went dark.

  ——————— ◆ ———————

  45

  Stockbridge House

  Nr Newton Tony

  Wiltshire SP4

  England

  The United Kingdom

  Ava awoke to the sound of tyres crunching on gravel.

  Opening her eyes slowly, she gradually became aware of being in a moving car.

  She winced as the engine slowed to manoeuvre over a speed-bump, feeling a bolt of pain flash across the back of her skull. As the rear wheels rolled down off the hump, she heard a sharp cracking noise inside her head, accompanied by a flash of bright white light.

  It felt as if her brain was being sheared in two.

  Swivelling her eyes to look through the heavily tinted black windows, she saw the car was turning off an isolated country road and nosing its way gently between a set of monumental ivy-clad grey stone pillars set into a tall dark green hedge.

  She blinked, trying to focus on what was happening. But the throbbing pain coming from the back of her head was interrupting her ability to think.

  The car was now purring along a private ornamental driveway that snaked down the side of a gently rolling hill and opened onto a breathtaking view of sheep and a village in the lush green valley below. As the narrow road bent away to the other side of the hill and rounded a corner, she caught sight of an imposing country house at the end of the driveway.

  It was an idyllic scene of English rural gentility.

  The house was built of the same grey stone as the gate pillars on the road. Its small windows were criss-crossed with strips of leading, turning each one into dozens of small glass diamonds. A long range made up the main body of the building, off which three smaller wings protruded at right angles. The resulting E-shape and period windows instantly gave the house away as a classic Elizabethan manor.

  Struggling to remember what she was doing tightly strapped into the seat, she turned to look around the car’s plush walnut and beige-leather cabin.

  With a jolt of horror, she instantly recognized the hairless head of the thickset man squeezed into the front passenger seat.

  It was Malchus.

  What on earth … ?

  Her pulse suddenly accelerated as she tried to remember what she was doing in a car with him.

  She winced as she remembered the bungled conversation with him by the Thelema stall.

  Looking around for an answer, she quickly recognized the other two men. They were his brawny bodyguards from the upper field.

  One of the bodyguards was driving, but the larger of the two, the one who had threatened her, was sitting beside her in the back. He still wore the same unpleasant expression, but this time it was backed by a matt black Glock handgun pointing directly at her.

  “Glad you could join us,” he rasped. The sarcasm dripped from his voice, and the expression of menace in his eyes was anything but welcoming.

  South African, she thought, from the accent. Probably Johannesburg. If he shared Malchus’s racist politics, then he had probably come up through the extremist neo-Nazi scene there.

  Nasty.

  As she felt her focus returning, memories of the morning’s events came crashing back—shaking off Ferguson, hiding under the car, eavesdropping on Malchus’s impassioned speech, and evading the guard dog only to be clubbed into unconsciousness by Malchus’s followers.

  At least that explained the sickening pain at the back of her skull.

  As her head cleared further, she began to register the seriousness of the situation.

  After the fiasco by the Thelema stall, she had meant to ensure her next meeting with Malchus was on her terms, so she could begin getting to the bottom of the questions to which she was increasingly sure he held the answers.

  But once again she had been caught unaware.

  Looking at the ugly muzzle of the semiautomatic gun pointing at her, it was painfully clear the odds were now heavily stacked against her.

  She would have a lot of explaining to do, and it would need to be convincing.

  Her chances did not look good. She was Malchus’s prisoner, in his car, in the middle of nowhere, and no one knew she was there.

  As they slowly drew up outside the house’s grand frontage, the bodyguard gestured with the pistol for her to open the door.

  She thought for a moment of tackling him as he got out of the car after her. He would be unstable for a second or two, and she was pretty sure she could separate him from his gun in that time. But she instinctively knew it would be suicide—Malchus and the driver would both be armed.

  She clicked open the car’s heavy door and stepped out onto the crunchy gravel, scanning the surrounding area, taking in the house’s grand doorway, the open expanse of well-manicured lawn, the carefully tended flowerbeds to its right, and the densely wooded area behind and to the left.

  She weighed up the options, but none of them were good. If she tried making a run for it in any direction she would be dead on the driveway with half a dozen rounds in her back before she got ten yards.

  There was no realistic choice except to go along with whatever Malchus had planned. Her only hope was that he kept her alive long enough for her to devise a way out.

  Looking round, she caught a glimpse of Malchus, who was scowling as he got out of the car. Their eyes met briefly, but she could read nothing from their cold hard expression.

  The bodyguard grabbed her arm roughly, bent it at the elbow, and twisted it up behind her back. A flash of pain tore up to her shoulder blade, but she suppressed the urge to make any sound.

  She was watching all her captors keenly. She needed to stay alert, to be ready for any opportunity that presented itself.

  With her arm pinned firmly behind her and the gun rammed into the small of her back, the bodyguard propelled her towards the house.

  As they approached the brass-ornamented door, the driver stepped forward, turned a key in its lock, and pushed it open, ushering her into the old building.

  The hallway was high, and thick shafts of sunshine streamed in from the diamond-leaded windows, piercing flared tunnels of light deep into the building.

  The entrance space was painted a gentle off-white, and bright geometric op art paintings hung on the walls, framing a hallway sparsely filled with simple yet elegant furniture.

  Whoever owned the house, Ava noted, was someone with a degree of sensitivity—which ruled out Malchus, who she suspected would have installed stags’ heads and suits of armour holding chunky weaponry.

  The driver had meanwhile opened a small cupboard just to the right of the doorway, and was entering a security code.

  So they were alone.

  They passed through the hall into a reception room. It was comfortably furnished with three deep brown leather sofas at one end and a large shiny mahogany desk at the other. Halfway down the far wall was a set of French windows leading onto a patio with an attractive bubbling fountain. Along the remainder of the room’s walls were a series of carved dark wooden bookcases holding antique leather-bound volumes and modern hardbacks. Between them, she could see delicately lit oil paintings—mostly landscapes.

  It was a tasteful room, without pretentions—further proof it was not Malchus’s house.

  Malchus nodded towards the middle of the room. The bodyguard marched her over to a carpet in the centre, and pushed her down onto her knees, roughly placing her hands behind her head.

  Interlacing her fingers, she glared up at him defiantly.

  He was not going to have this all his own way.

  She knew her prospects looked bleak, but for the time being was reassured by the knowledg
e he was not going to kill her just yet. He of all people knew what a messy business executions were, and she doubted very much he would have brought her into the main room to shoot her.

  But the danger was still very real. The bodyguard had not moved. He remained beside her, pressing the cool nylon polymer muzzle of the handgun against her head.

  Malchus sat down in the leather sofa facing her. He looked over at her, withdrawing an object from his pocket.

  She was surprised to see it was a set of black rosary beads, like those used by traditional Christians the world over. She did a double take, unable to reconcile the devotional object with what she knew of Malchus.

  But as she focused on it more closely, she noticed the beads were made of matt black metal. And where the rope of beads usually ended in a crucifix, the one he was holding had a sleek and sharp-pointed black steel star about the size of a dollar coin.

  At first glance she thought the pendant was a pentagram. But as it turned in the light she saw it had six points not five—although it looked nothing like the usual six-pointed star on Christmas trees and the flag of Israel.

  There was something infinitely more malevolent about it.

  He settled himself into the sofa, and began to run the metal beads between his fingers, as if in some silent meditative prayer.

  Ava slowed her breathing, telling herself to take longer deeper breaths. Dropping her shoulders, she willed her muscles to untense. She knew she had to relax if she was going to pull this off.

  Looking across at Malchus, she could see he was still eyeing her coldly. When at last he spoke, his voice had changed from when she had heard it at the rally.

  He was no longer the passionate bold-gestured orator. Now he was angry—speaking slowly and deliberately, every inch the ruthless and mechanical operator she knew he really was.

  “Let’s get this over with.” He looked expectantly at her, as if challenging her to defy him. “Who are you?”

  The question was cold. Clinical.

  She breathed an inner sigh of relief.

  Good.

  If he wanted her to answer questions, then it gave her a chance to talk her way out of it.

  But she would need a cover story. Quickly. And it would have to be good. One thing she knew for sure—there would not be another opportunity.

  An idea had begun forming while she had been kneeling, and she was still running through the angles in her head as he began talking. More than anything now, she needed to stall, to give herself the time to put the final pieces of the story together—to get it right in her mind.

  Trying to sound as unfazed as possible, she glowered back at him. “Tell your monkey to put his gun away.”

  Malchus did not rise to the bait. “I’ll ask you again—who are you?”

  Ava glared at him. She was still thinking through the details of her cover story and needed to play for time. “Call him off.”

  Malchus kept his eyes fixed on her. There was no flicker of reaction. She stared back at him, refusing to be intimidated. “Go on. Call him off.” She nodded in the direction of the bodyguard holding the gun to her head. “Call him off, and I’ll talk to you.”

  Despite the danger, a part of her was enjoying the defiance. If he was going to kill her, she had no intention of begging.

  Malchus eyed her carefully, giving her valuable seconds before at length answering. “You’re in no position to negotiate anything.”

  She nodded. “If you kill me, you’ll never know why I’m here.” She was pleased to hear that her voice sounded strong. Combative.

  She waited keenly for his answer. There was a serious point to her demands. The way he responded would tell her how she needed to handle him. If he acquiesced even slightly, then she knew she had the ability, however small, to influence him. But if he did not, then she had her work cut out if she was going to talk her way free.

  Without warning, he stood up and strode over to her. The blow came so fast she had no time to protect herself.

  The intensity of the pain surprised her, but she stifled the urge to shout out.

  It had been an open-handed slap, but hard enough to knock her sideways. As she righted herself, she felt him grab a handful of her hair. He yanked it hard, and bent low over her so their faces were only inches apart.

  “Believe me when I tell you I’m in no mood for your games.” He tightened his grip on her hair. The pain was excruciating. Her heart was hammering, and there was a rushing noise in her ears. “In a very short time you have become a considerable nuisance to me.”

  With his free hand he put something cold on her face. It felt sharp, and he was pressing it into the flesh at the bottom of her eye socket. As she tried to work out what it was, she could see the black metal beads of his rosary flowing out of his clenched hand. With a wave of revulsion, she realized he was pushing one of the sharpened tapering points of the hexagram pendant into the flesh just under her eye.

  His voice was menacingly quiet. “You need to start thinking about cooperating with me. Because I’m fast losing patience with you, and I’m very close to ending your ability to bother me.” He pushed the lethal point of the evil-looking star a little harder into the soft skin, all the while staring into her eyes.

  What she saw in his expression was not reassuring. There was nothing living—just an icy determination.

  He let go of her hair and took the vicious star from beneath her eye. Returning to his seat, he stared at her again. “Now, one more time. Who are you?”

  She did not have to feign anger or indignation any longer. The blood was coursing through her veins, and she wanted nothing more than to let herself loose on him. But she restrained herself—she had to think of the longer game.

  When the time came, he was going to pay for that, she promised herself.

  Well?” Malchus prompted.

  Ava was thinking rapidly. The incident had given her the answer she wanted—Malchus was not open for negotiation.

  It had also bought her more time. She had initially wanted to say she was a journalist—it used to be one of the best covers around. But the internet had ruined that. With a few clicks of a mouse anyone could discover she had never been anywhere near a newspaper or written any magazine articles.

  But she was now out of time. Ready or not, she had to give him an explanation.

  She breathed deeply, forcing back the intense hatred she was feeling towards him, pushing it out of her voice. “There’s no need for all this,” she began. “I have a proposition for you.”

  He stared at her, his face granite.

  She continued, concentrating for all she was worth on giving the performance of her lifetime. “You have certain unusual needs. And the organization I represent has a range of highly successful solutions to the many challenges you face.”

  She scanned his face for any reaction—even the smallest indication of interest.

  Nothing.

  His fingers continued moving over the metal beads.

  “We don’t offer these services to everyone, I’m sure you understand. My responsibility and speciality is to identify potential partners, and inform them of our services.”

  Ava was breathing more easily now. It felt good to be talking. The cover was not guaranteed to work, but it was comforting to be slipping into a role. She did not want to be herself in front of Malchus any longer than she had to.

  “I came to the rally because I wanted to meet you. As you can imagine, I don’t carry a business card, and we don’t take out advertisements in the phone book. My organization is not well known, and we keep our business private. That’s why we have presidents and prime ministers among our many satisfied customers.”

  “I don’t believe I have any needs you or your organization can fulfil,” Malchus stated flatly.

  “Yes, you do,” Ava countered confidently. “I pick our partners very carefully. And I’m good at what I do. My approach to you is not random.”

  “You’ve got two minutes,” Malchus replied, looki
ng at his watch.

  Round one. She smiled to herself. He was interested enough to give her time. Now she just had to keep him engaged.

  But two minutes?

  She felt like she was doing an elevator pitch at some business school. At that moment, there were probably hundreds of students from Texas to Taipei practising it right now: honing how to sell an idea to someone in the time it takes for an elevator to go from the ground floor to the top executive suite.

  But none of them had a gun to their head.

  Ava launched straight in, trying to make it sound like it was a speech she had given many times before.

  “When our partners have cash that comes from sources they want to keep private, we offer assistance. We place their funds into the international money system on their behalf. And then later we return it to them, through accredited routes. Our partners get legitimate money they can spend freely.”

  “So you’re in the laundry business,” Malchus sounded bored. “How disappointing. There are many people who can do that.”

  Ava shook her head. “Not like this. We offer our partners something truly unique.” She looked at him conspiratorially. “Our partners are demanding and, as a result, you’ll see we’re far more sophisticated than most.”

  Malchus was fingering the black rosary beads slowly. “Laundering is a basic service. It doesn’t call for much sophistication.”

  Excellent.

  He was slowly engaging in the discussion. It was exactly what she wanted.

  “Our methods are proprietary and highly confidential,” Ava answered.

  “Then this conversation is over,” Malchus looked up at her sharply.

  She bit her lip.

  Take it slowly.

  “We’ve been operating for over forty years,” Ava countered, unfazed. “And have never had an unsatisfied partner. I can’t disclose to you the details of how we do it, but what makes us stand apart from the crowd is that we don’t cost you or lose your money. In fact, we make more money for you.”

  Keen to ensure he had got the point, she pressed on. “Traditional laundering wastes a lot of the money. When the client hands over a million dollars, he’s happy to see half a million back in clean funds. He could never spend the dirty million anyway, so it’s half a million more than he’d have without the laundering. The lost half a million goes on people who want their cut, officials who need to be paid off, and good old-fashioned losses from haphazardly trading stocks, shares, and assets just to muddy the audit trail, because that’s everyone’s priority. Covering tracks is much more important than making good investments.”