The Priests' Code

by B. B. Balthis

  The Priests’ Code

  B. B. Balthis

  Copyright © 2018 B. B. Balthis

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

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  ISBN 978 1788034 821

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

  To bring the dead to life

  Is no great magic.

  Few are wholly dead:

  Blow on a dead man’s embers

  And a live flame will start.

  (Robert Graves)

  Contents

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FORTY

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

  CHAPTER SIXTY

  CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

  CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO

  CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE

  CHAPTER SEVENTY

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER EIGHTY

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-ONE

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-TWO

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-THREE

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-SIX

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-NINE

  CHAPTER NINETY

  EPILOGUE

  A NOTE FROM B.B. BALTHIS

  REFERENCE

  PROLOGUE

  Vengeance is mine; I will repay.

  (Romans 12:19)

  2013

  Matti Jonsson stood at the window, looking out into the black night. It was snowing again and even that looked black as it came down, in large, soft clumps. He could only just make out the lights from his nearest neighbours, a few hundred metres away.

  His main base was a London flat but, like many Icelanders, he had a small log cabin perched on a mountainside, a few hours’ drive from Reykjavik. If something was bothering him, as it was now, then this was where he came.

  His work as a renowned archaeologist meant that he travelled widely, but the past few months had been spent in England, working for the British Museum. It had been a particularly long and complex assignment, and one that had left him with considerable unease.

  He walked over to the wood burner, threw in a few logs, and firmly closed its door. He then sat at his desk, picked up a file, and began to flick through a report he had written last week. He had been asked to visit an old church and, at a first glance it had seemed like so many others in the UK and was not likely to cause too much excitement. Further examination had, however, revealed things that were much less common… in fact, in his considerable career, things he had only ever seen once before.

  He had sent a basic report to the museum, but since then had spoken to a colleague, done more research, and concluded that the church was indeed far more than it had first appeared. He had been left with a feeling of poking a stick into a hornets’ nest, and wished he had never set eyes on the place. A final conversation with a trusted, though now retired, professor, confirmed this, and he had been strongly advised to back off, which he fully intended to do.

  At that moment, he heard a tapping sound. He went over to the window and peered through it, his face pressed hard against the cold glass, straining to see what might have made the noise. People who had cabins up here looked after each other, and emergencies were not unheard of in the hostile climate. He walked across the room, into the lobby, and opened the front door of the house, pulling on a thick jacket as he went outside. The cold hit him hard, and the great lumps of snow falling from the sky seemed even larger now he was outside. He took the torch from his pocket and shone it in front of him as he peered through the blackness.

  ‘Hello? Hello? Who’s there? I can’t see you… is there trouble? Please shout and I will come and find you.’ He continued to walk around the small, single-storey building and, for a moment, thought he saw a flash of orange at the rear corner of the house. He walked steadily on, his feet sinking into the thickening snow.

  Then a voice came from behind him.

  ‘So, Jonsson, we meet again. Charming place you have here. Quite hard to find, but perhaps, for you, not hard enough?’

  Quickly turning around, Matti didn’t recognise him at first.
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  ‘Who are you? What do you want?’ He reached up and snatched the large fur hat from the man’s head. With this gone, he shone the torch right into his face and stared. As he remembered, he stepped back, dropping the hat onto the snow. Gripped with fear, his voice shook as he spoke…

  ‘You? What the hell are you doing here? What do you want with me?’

  ‘I want nothing, Jonsson. But I have something for you… this.’

  If he had been able to talk about what happened on that black, freezing night, Matti would have said that he had known what was coming the moment he realised who the man was. When the gun was raised and the shot fired directly into his chest, he had felt strangely peaceful. A sharp bolt of pain… a few flakes of snow on his face… then nothing.

  CHAPTER ONE

  There is always a pleasure in unravelling a mystery,

  in catching at the gossamer clue

  which will lead to certainty.

  (Elizabeth Gaskell)

  2015

  My name is Father Benoît Balthis, although in England, I am mostly known as Father Ben. As a fifty-five-year-old Catholic priest I have lived and worked in many places, but I was born in France and still consider it to be my true home.

  My mother was French and my father Lithuanian, and they met in France during the Second World War. My mother was part of the French Resistance in the Languedoc region, which was her home, and my father was a refugee, fleeing the Russian armies as they swept through the Baltic states in 1944. He had found himself in this part of France quite by chance, if there is such a thing, but you’ll hear more of their story as I continue to write.

  I grew up in our ancestral home, which is a part of the ancient Château of Antugnac, a small village in the Aude region of the Languedoc, and almost hidden in the mountain ranges that were as much my home as the house was.

  I was born on the 11th of April 1960, in our home at the request of my mother. My French grandparents lived with us too, or, I should say, we lived with them, since the house was theirs. My mother had been born quite late in their marriage, and they were elderly when I arrived, my grandfather being seventy-three and my grandmother sixty-five. They welcomed my arrival with as much joy and love as I could take, and this I returned to them willingly.

  My mother was a small-time dealer in antique furniture, and my father a skilled watch and clock restorer. They were, however, frequently away for weeks, sometimes even months at a time, for which no explanation was ever given. My grandparents looked after me during their absences, and I eventually learned to neither question their disappearance nor talk to anyone else about them. To avoid any tears when I was very young, they took to leaving in the middle of the night, and in the morning, I would run around the house looking for them, searching each room, screaming and crying, much to my grandparents’ distress.

  As I grew older, I became more accustomed to their absence and eventually accepted that this was how our lives were to be. I had my rambling home, my adoring grandparents, and the hills, mountains, and ancient villages to roam from dawn till dusk. I lacked nothing.

  Many an evening after supper had been spent by the huge fireplace, flames leaping over the logs and the resinous scent of wood smoke permeating everything. I would listen, enraptured, to my grandparents, particularly my grandfather, who told stories about the area that he had lived in his whole life, as had his parents before him. My grandmother came from the nearby Rennes-le-Château, and I still had a relative living there, just a few kilometres away. A large part of my childhood had been spent in that village, and it was as familiar to me as Antugnac. My closest friend and relative was, and still is, my cousin, Caro, the daughter of my mother’s twin. In childhood we were inseparable, and in our advancing years we were still very close.

  * * *

  Today saw me returning to my old family home. I was taking some time off because of a difficult situation in which I had found myself in England. You’ll soon hear of the circumstances that led me to return here in some haste, but for now I was immensely glad to be back in France. An old friend, Arnaud, had driven to Carcassonne to pick me up, and had driven the car that he had recently sold me, through his car dealer brother-in-law. I felt too tired to drive it myself and was very happy to allow him to act as chauffeur.

  I had thought it best to arrange to have a car straight away, since the village was remote, and I would need to get around immediately. I recognised him straight away in the waiting crowd, with his wiry, grey hair, tanned face, and muscular, stocky build. He was a couple of years older than me, but we had grown up in the same village and were immediately at ease with each other. We soon fell into speaking the local dialect, exchanging news, teasing each other, and catching up on the local gossip, as though no time had passed at all. I thanked him for his help, and his response to this was a painful punch on the arm.

  I sat back in my seat and, before long, we were driving through the familiar lanes of home. Five minutes later, we pulled up outside my house, which was placed directly behind the church. Part of the old château, it was thought to be at least eight hundred years old, and the cellars below, were almost certainly older than that. A long, simple, three-storey structure; its front dropping down to the river below and the rear showing its last major repair from the wars of religion in the late sixteenth century.

  It was typical in style as a house built for the local nobility, although had been split into three dwellings more than a hundred years ago. Now devoid of any turrets or lookout posts, it might easily go unrecognised for what it once was, unless one stands back some fifty metres or so and views it as part of the original defensive circulade, still in existence. Many of these remain in the locality, often Cathar or Templar in origin, some still boasting blocked-up tunnels and arrow slits in their massive stone walls.

  At the centre of the – now – three houses, it looked the same as it always had: paint peeling on the shutters, grey rough render, huge blocks of stone around the windows and doors, and an ancient blocked-up archway buried half way into the ground.

  Arnaud had the key and his wife had been in to air and dust, and to open the shutters for my return. I was grateful, and told him so.

  ‘No problem at all,’ he said quietly. ‘Welcome to your home, Benoît.’

  I felt emotional to be back, and my eyes glazed over as I placed one hand on the car door.

  Seeing this, Arnaud brought me around with another hard punch on the arm, of which, this time, I was glad, since there was nothing like pain to momentarily stop a flow of tears. He helped me with my bags, opened the door, and left, raising his hand as he walked up the steep hill to his own home further up the village, towards the mountains.

  I turned from watching him and faced the large, solid front door of the house, slightly ajar and waiting for me to enter. It seemed longer than the six months since I had last been here, but as I pushed it open further and looked down into the salon, I was flooded with relief to be back home. The huge room was filled with sunlight and dust motes, lit up by the golden beams that poured in through the open terrace doors and windows. Then the familiar smell hit me: a heady blend of wood smoke, beeswax, lavender, and age from the ancient stones.

  The stress of the past week had been immense, and I sat down on the worn, stone steps that led down to the huge room. Leaning my head against the cool wall, I closed my eyes for a moment. I must have dozed off, because when I opened them again the sun had dropped low in the sky, its beams now less bright on the glowing terracotta floor.

  Feeling much calmer, I walked down the steps and gazed around me. The look of the room had changed quite a bit since my parents’ and grandparents’ time. My grandfather had died in 1980, at ninety-three, and my grandmother just six months later at eighty-five. My parents continued to live here until 2001, when they were both killed in a car accident in Rome. True to form, they hadn’t even told me they were going t
o Italy, and to this day, I still had no idea as to why they were there.

  * * *

  Each time I had come here in the ten years or so after their death, I had cleared out more of the clutter, and kept only my most favourite of the things that had belonged to them. One of these was the large, round, fruitwood table and chairs, polished to a deep treacle tone by my grandmother. I had also kept the huge dresser that stood against the wall, made by my great-great-grandfather, which showed the patina of hundreds of years of use. This held plates and other crockery, and the large drawers the ancient silver cutlery, dented and bent but still beautiful. The shelves were filled with the old glasses and jugs that my family had used for more than a century.

  The large, tan leather sofa wasn’t theirs and I had bought it in Italy when I had been living there. I rarely bought new things, and certainly not as expensive, but as a priest I spent very little, and my inheritance had been considerable. Two armchairs sat either side of the fireplace, both worn and old, one leather and the other red velvet, which had been bought cheaply in local second-hand stores. A long Persian rug brought back by my parents after one of their trips still glowed with its faded reds and burnt umber colours, as did the cushions and throws brought back by them from various other places, mostly unknown to me, because they would never say where they were going or where they had been.

  The kitchen area was in the far corner and this had changed little in the past century. It comprised a stone sink and drainer with brass taps fixed to the wall, curtains underneath in faded red checked linen, and several scrubbed, wooden cupboards providing storage and work surfaces. A large, cream fridge, bought in Italy at the same time as the sofa, stood in the corner, along with an ancient, bottled gas cooker.

  There were a few of my favourite paintings on the walls, mostly local scenes, and I supposed that, to an outsider, the massive room with its high ceilings and huge beams might look somewhat empty, certainly more so than in my parents’ time. However, this was how I liked it. I kicked off my shoes, pulled off my socks, and threw both into the small utility area under the stairs. The glossy terracotta floor was warm under my feet, which was a wonderful sensation after the cold and draughts of my cottage in England.