The Bunting Quest

by Steven Marcuson

  ‘You are, are you not, first and foremost a Christian? You believe in the sanctity of life, the frailty of human beings? You will accept the quest, Herr Bunting, because you know there is no other option.’

  Hours later Bunting stared at the box again. Next to it was a bag of coins and some documents of passage that the Duke had presented him. In his palm he could feel the hardness of the papal ring that the Pope had pressed on him on his departure.

  ‘This ring,’ the old man had said, ‘will guarantee you safe passage when you most need it. Do not compromise on the final resting place of the Holy Words. It must remain a secret for as long as time itself if need be. Christendom is not ready for them and I fear they never will be. I will do what I can from my high office to protect you and our secret for now and forever.’

  Then the Pope said simply, ‘Goodbye, Herr Bunting. We will never meet again. God be with you on your quest.’

  8

  Nick was savouring the last bite of his fried egg on toast while reading Byzantium: The Decline and Fall by John Julius Norwich, when he was interrupted by the familiar tone of his mobile phone. He quickly glanced at the screen. Bronte? What could she want at this time?

  ‘Nick! Sorry to bother you so early but you’d better get down here. Some arsehole’s been in here. We’ve had a break-in.’

  ‘You’re joking!’ gasped Nick. ‘I’ll be there in ten. Don’t touch anything. I’ll phone the police.’

  ‘Yeah, Nick, I’ve already put my fingerprints over everything,’ responded the Australian sarcastically.

  Nick tried to gather his thoughts as he shoved the dishes into the sink and grabbed his jacket. Robbed? He’d rarely had a problem with theft over fifteen years. A couple of times he had experienced shoplifting, but never a break-in. Anyway, who would bother stealing old maps? They’d be hard to sell if you wanted quick money. You’d be far better off stealing computers or sports clothes: things everybody wanted.

  As usual, Nick had difficulty finding his car keys. Ever since Natasha had moved out he’d hardly used his old late-edition Triumph Stag. She had hated public transport, so they’d mostly used the car when she was here. Since she’d gone, Nick had reverted to the type of travel he preferred: buses and trains. In fact, when he thought about it, Natasha hated most things that he liked. No wonder it had become another disaster of a relationship.

  Fumbling around in his jacket for the keys, he came across Inspector Jaeger’s card from the day before. He’ll do, decided Nick, and dialled the mobile number on the card.

  A few minutes later Nick was driving out of Clapham and along the Wandsworth Bridge Road. Jaeger had been annoyingly unperturbed by Nick’s call and had agreed to meet at the gallery in half an hour.

  It was Jaeger who greeted him with another limp handshake at the gallery doorstep. Nick could see Bronte directing a hard-faced, thin-lipped, wiry man around the interior. He seemed to be brandishing a small make-up brush and a bottle.

  ‘Fingerprints, Mister Lawrance,’ Jaeger explained. ‘It would be preferable if you closed your gallery while the sergeant is here.’

  Ignoring the inspector, Nick called out across the gallery: ‘What’s been taken, Bronts? Any damage?’

  ‘Hard to tell. The maps have been chucked everywhere but so far it seems all the important ones are here. Can’t find Bunting’s World Map though.’

  ‘The Bunting maps?’ interrupted the inspector. ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘No we are not sure, Inspector,’ Nick said impatiently. ‘It’ll take at least an hour to do a full …’ Just then he noticed the finger-printing sergeant at his computer. ‘Hey, what do you think you’re doing?’

  The sergeant looked at Nick, then addressed the inspector. ‘I’ll be having to check his computer, Conrad,’ he said in a brogue Nick immediately recognised as Northern Irish. ‘I can get clearance at the Yard if need be.’

  ‘That won’t be necessary,’ responded Nick, resigned to the situation. ‘Just take care not to damage anything. I have years of contacts in there and it would be a disaster to lose the database.’

  It was almost midday before Bronte and Nick had completed the stocktake. Sure enough, every map could be accounted for except Bunting’s World.

  ‘Is it possible the priest came back in the middle of the night to steal this map?’ said Nick shaking his head in disbelief. ‘There are far more important and valuable maps here. It doesn’t make any sense.’

  However, the inspector had no time for Nick’s conjectures. With persistence bordering on rudeness, he made Nick repeat the previous night’s argument with Monsignor Montano, over and over again. It was a painstaking process for Nick as the inspector insisted on complete and full descriptions of both the Monsignor and his assistant.

  ‘Now, are you certain he was wearing black robes, Mister Lawrance?’ asked Jaeger for the umpteenth time, his odd accent irritating Nick. ‘Anything else? Did he say anything about being from the Benedictine Order for example?’

  ‘Yes, he was wearing black. Not green, yellow or bloody rainbow colours, how often do I have to tell you?’ responded Nick angrily. ‘And, no, he didn’t bother to discuss with me his religious affiliations … surprising, don’t you think?’

  Jaeger pressed on, apparently oblivious to Nick’s sarcastic out-burst. ‘And this priest took three of the maps with him and said he would return on Tuesday to collect the World Map?’ queried the inspector once again, while examining a copy of the invoice and Amex receipt Nick had written out at the opening. The inspector and the sergeant then spent some more time peering at Nick’s customer database, making notes.

  ‘That was what he said he would do. Certainly he was a bit angry that he couldn’t buy the map last night. In fact, he offered me triple its value. But that doesn’t mean he broke into the gallery last night to steal it. Honestly, Inspector, as I explained to you yesterday, it’s simply not that important a map. Certainly not to commit such a crime for, that’s for sure.’

  ‘Perhaps. But it was obviously important to him, maybe even enough to take the risk,’ responded the inspector, the scars on his face twitching with tension. ‘We should not forget the people who stole the maps from the Garner Collection also went to a lot of trouble for little reward – at least according to you. In any event, can you think of anything else at all that could be helpful?’

  ‘No, sorry, Inspector.’ Nick was anxious to get the gallery open for the day. ‘If I do, I will give you a call,’ he said as an afterthought.

  Nick and Bronte rehung the maps. ‘We’ve been lucky in a way, Nick,’ whispered Bronte, trying not to attract the attention of the two policemen. ‘I mean, only the Bunting map is missing, right? Imagine if they had also stolen others like the Blaeu or the Ortelius. It would have cost us a fortune.’

  ‘I know, Bronts,’ Nick also whispered, ‘but it doesn’t make sense! Why steal Bunting’s map of the world from here or Sotheby’s in Amsterdam? They’re not that difficult to find. I could pick up another one this afternoon for three hundred quid if I wanted to! Something else is going on. Trouble is, I haven’t a bloody clue what it could be.’

  The inspector and his sergeant were making their way to the door. ‘Mister Lawrance,’ Jaeger said in parting. ‘You will immediately phone me if, and when, this Monsignor Montano contacts you?’

  ‘Of course, don’t you worry. We’ll catch this evil black monk one way or another!’

  Unimpressed with Nick’s constant sarcasm, the inspector said gravely, ‘This may be a joke for you, Mister Lawrance. However, for us it is a very serious matter. You should not take it or us too lightly.’

  ‘Speaking of “us”, responded Nick, ‘I didn’t catch your name, Sergeant.’

  Nick could see that the hard-faced Irishman was in two minds whether to respond or not. In the end, he did. ‘It’s Robertson,’ he said gruffly. ‘Sergeant William Robertson. Good afternoon, Mister Lawrance and Ms Gibson.’

  9

  The Master did not make his condolence
visit until two days after Tommy had been buried.

  The ceremony, in the driving sleet on a typical Belfast March morning, had been indistinguishable from the many others Billy had attended over previous years.

  Billy had risen rapidly in the chapter since his initiation night five years before. He had impressed all with his uncompromising attitude: first, by leading the marches through Catholic neighbourhoods by day and invading their pubs with clubs and knives by night. He had taken the fight over the border on numerous occasions, striking deep into their leadership. Tommy, although the older brother, had taken his orders from Billy.

  The grim minister said what he always said on these occasions and the masked gunmen fired their salvos into the air. It occurred to Billy that Tommy would have been happy with this send-off, even with his face smashed beyond recognition behind the wooden coffin. His assailants had shoved Tommy into their car as he left the pub filled with drink and proceeded to beat the shit out of him, until he was broken and no longer Tommy. One shot to the back of the head and he’d been dumped like a rotting carcass into the ditch down Bog Lane.

  The Master spoke slowly. ‘You realise they thought Tommy was you, Billy? Your exploits have come to their attention and they need to make an example out of you. As you well know, Billy, it is our duty to expose them for their superstitions and their idolatry. They are enemies of freedom with their totalitarian Romanism and authoritarian Church.’ The Master lowered his voice until it was almost a whisper and Billy had to crane his neck forward to hear him. ‘It is a war, Billy. Your brother was murdered by them like so many before him. Be assured there will be more casualties before this is over. We will never surrender to a Republican Ireland where papal power is the same as political tyranny. I knew your father,’ the Master went on. ‘He would have been proud of Tommy.’

  They had blown Tommy and Billy’s father to pieces down at Short Strand. The brothers had heard the explosion from their home and had legged it down to Anderson Street with the rest of the neighbourhood, only to be greeted by the carnage. Pa had been fixing some electrics in old man Johnston’s place when the bomb had gone off. Nobody really knew what they buried a few days later; a bit of Johnston here or a bit of Pa there. From then on it was just the two lads.

  ‘Billy, listen to me very carefully,’ the Master continued. ‘You’re a marked man and we are taking you out of Belfast, out of the country. Something else, something very important has come up that will need your skills. It may take years, Billy, but it will destroy them completely.’

  ‘They thought it was me?’ said Billy in a stupor.

  ‘Yes, Billy. But now you will finish them for good. Not just in Ireland, but everywhere.’

  10

  Nick made good time on the road to Oxford. Apart from an accident near Junction 16, the traffic moved steadily, the Stag handling the wet weather with surprising aplomb.

  He’d called his old friend Julius Merton, an Emeritus Professor of Post-Medieval European History at Oriel College in Oxford, figuring the old Don might have a better feel for why anyone would want to steal the Bunting map.

  Professor Julius Merton’s rooms were obviously unused to visitors. Nick gazed wistfully out of the rain-soaked windows onto Oriel Square as his host fuddled around in the fading light, clearing books and pamphlets. Nick switched on a desk lamp.

  ‘How wonderful to see you again, Nicholas,’ Merton said when he was finished his rearranging. Nick smiled to himself. The professor was probably the only person who still called him Nicholas. They had first met at his stall at the Portobello market over fifteen years ago when Nick had sold the professor a small, steel-engraved print of Martin Luther nailing his ninety-five Theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg. The professor had been amused by the image and explained, much to Nick’s surprise, that this ‘world-changing’ event had never actually happened.

  ‘Pure fantasy, my boy,’ were the words he had used at the time. ‘Yes, he wrote the Theses but no, attaching them to the church door is just a myth.’

  In fact, the professor, now in his early seventies, seemed to make it his life’s business to annoy the establishment by exposing myths like this one. His latest stoush was with the Scottish Parliament and their intention to erect a statue of Bonnie Prince Charlie in the Harbour at Eriskay in the Outer Hebrides. ‘Pure fantasy, my boy,’ he’d chortled again. ‘Charles Edward Stuart may have landed in the Hebrides but, at Eriskay? Pah!’

  Over a cup of tea, Nick related the strange events of the previous twenty-four hours. He’d briefly mentioned it on the phone, but now he filled in the details of the robberies and the visits by the police.

  ‘A mystery, Nicholas,’ exclaimed the professor as he rummaged through his bookshelves, ‘I love mysteries. Your man Bunting is an interesting character. After you phoned this afternoon I had a hunt through my research files. My paper, Religious Intolerance in Lutheran Germany 1520-1580, revealed some very interesting information. As you already know Nicholas, Bunting wrote Itinerarium Sacrae Scripturae in 1581, when he was about thirty-six years old. It seems that a number of Protestant Commentators were reprimanded by the Mother Church for their non-orthodox Lutheran teachings and Heinrich Bunting was one of them. He too was dismissed from his post as a pastor in Lemgo in the early 1570s for publishing a number of contentious doctrinal theses.

  ‘However, he continued to publish and, from some of these papers, we can see that, in about 1573, he was the pastor of a small congregation in Magdeburg. After that, he disappears from history for a few years, until Itinerarium is published.’

  While the professor shuffled through the papers on his desk, Nick downloaded the images of all four Bunting maps from the Exhibition onto the professor’s computer. As a matter of course, Nick always took digital photos, front and reverse, of every map he sold.

  ‘Research my boy. That’s what it’s all about,’ said the professor with conviction. Nick couldn’t help but be reminded of Mole in The Wind in the Willows as he watched the small, bespectacled academic, with his unruly thinning hair, scurry around to study the images of the maps and the accompanying ancient German text.

  Neither of the men spoke as the professor scribbled notes, fiddled with the mouse and zoomed in close to scrutinise the maps’ details.

  Nick cleared a chair and settled in quietly behind the professor. Glancing at the desk, he noticed a pile of papers downloaded from Wikipedia with the heading ‘Martin Luther’. A portrait of the great reformist by Lucas Cranach the Elder stared back at him. Luther in 1533, if the portrait was accurate, looked younger than the fifty years he was supposed to be. Not a fleck of grey hair protruded from beneath his flat, black bonnet. Nick studied the portrait carefully. Luther’s gaze had a cold, scolding quality and his thin lips neither scowled nor smiled. The artist had portrayed a serious man. And why wouldn’t he be, thought Nick. By this point in Luther’s life he had been responsible, almost solely, for the greatest ever schism in the Church. He had been at odds, not only with the Pope, but also the Holy Roman Emperor, and had been the catalyst for death and destruction across Europe. I wonder if it worried him or whether he was so certain of himself that it didn’t matter, thought Nick, staring intently at the portrait, trying to glean something of the man’s personality. Reading on, he learned that Luther taught that salvation was not earned by good deeds but received only as a free gift of God’s grace, through faith in Jesus as redeemer from sin. His theology challenged the authority of the Pope by teaching that the Bible was the only source of divinely revealed knowledge. He also opposed sacerdotalism by considering all baptised Christians to be part of a holy priesthood. This rejected the Roman Catholic doctrine that priests could act as mediators between man and God.

  A good fifteen minutes had gone by and Nick was immersed in reading when the professor suddenly jumped up, grabbing his tweed jacket. ‘Nicholas, my dear boy, I suggest we make our way to Duke Humfrey’s.’

  Nicholas had not been to the Bodleian Library for man
y years. It was the repository of the largest collection of rare books and manuscripts in the world and the Duke Humfrey Reading Room was the jewel of Oxford, being the oldest reading room in the library.

  The professor spoke excitedly and waved his hands about as the two men made their way up King Edward Street and across High Street, with Nick guiding the gesticulating professor through the traffic.

  ‘Our man Bunting has used Jerusalem as his nodal point, Nicholas. His World Map primarily portrays the three continents of the old world: Europe, Africa and the eastern part of Asia, from India to the Middle East. There is one addition. He has included a piece of South America, which he calls the “New World”. The section he shows appears to be in the area of the Portuguese papal donation. Now the main point of interest in the map is Western Australia, which is somewhat accurately portrayed, preceding the Dutch charts by some half a century.’

  ‘But Julius,’ interrupted Nick, ‘surely this is a complete fluke. How on earth would this simple priest have any information relating to an undiscovered continent?’

  ‘Well, Nicholas, his inclusion of this territory in his book, on the lands known to the prophets, is logical. It was earlier known that land existed on the other side of the Indian Ocean. Ptolemy drew this imaginatively in his world map of the first century. Biblical writings substantiate this, recording trade links with distant lands and islands, such as resource-rich Ophir and the Solomon Islands. It was those riches which made Middle East potentates wealthy beyond the dreams of Europe, and enticed Portugal and Spain to search for the legendary Golden Peninsula to find the Spice Islands.’

  ‘But the map has been discredited by all the map experts. Are you trying to say that there is some validity to it?’ exclaimed Nick loudly, attracting odd stares from students as they crossed the grounds of Brasenose College.