by D C Macey
‘No. Out of the question. Absolutely not.’
9
Sunday, January 12th
Confined to bed, Helen devoted her time to thinking through how Sam’s proposed trip to Libya could be rendered unnecessary. He had taken responsibility for preparing Sunday lunch and had divided his time between the kitchen and popping in and out of her bedroom, checking she had everything she wanted and determinedly avoiding discussing anything to do with Libya.
Her own doctor had visited the previous day and had diplomatically not made too many enquires as to the source of her bullet wound. He did pronounce himself happy with the treatment she had received at the Cumberland Infirmary, and he had promised to organise some physiotherapy.
Now with lunch almost ready, Helen summoned Sam. She wanted to be downstairs and sitting at the dinner table before the lunch guests arrived. Elaine and Grace would be coming direct from church and were due very soon. Francis would arrive a little later. As the local Roman Catholic priest, he always held back after the morning service to ensure any parishioners with problems received his immediate support.
• • •
The remnants of lunch had been cleared from the table by Elaine and Sam, and coffees served by Grace. Everyone was again sat at the table and looking expectantly at Sam as he thought carefully before answering Helen’s question.
‘I don’t yet know what the true significance of the photographs was. They were taken at Leptis Magna and definitely showed a series of tiles that represented the same imagery as on the sides of our boxes. The chances of that being a coincidence are so low as to be incalculable. But why they are the same, I don’t know.’
‘Tell me, Sam,’ said Francis, ‘Helen’s box is an artefact she inherited from John Dearly as part of his Templar paraphernalia. What does it have to do with a Roman city? It makes no sense to me.’
‘I agree there is no obvious connection between the two. Their respective eras are so far apart there can be no logical link. And there’s another puzzle consequent to that. If Helen’s box, and its twin that was hidden in Ethiopia, are in fact from the Roman era, what can be inside that is so special to the Templars who didn’t come into existence until centuries later? Beats me. I’m truly baffled.’
‘The tiles must represent something, but what?’ said Grace.
‘Perhaps Xavier will be able to help,’ said Helen. ‘What time is he due to arrive?’
‘He and Angelo will be landing this evening, quite late. Not sure when exactly. They will be going straight to the seminary tonight and plan to come round in the morning,’ said Elaine, while checking her phone for messages. ‘No, no change; they haven’t left Sardinia yet.’
‘I wish he’d stay here at the manse with us,’ said Helen.
‘He’s always had his own ways of doing things, and he’s not going to change now,’ said Francis with a chuckle. ‘But seriously, I agree with you, Helen, if anyone will have an insight into this, it will be Xavier. He and John did share things that I was not privy too.’ Francis’ voice showed no sense of exclusion or envy.
John Dearly, as minister of St Bernard’s, had inherited a secret ring and role, and he’d died for it in the end. Xavier was a ring bearer too and had been subject to a brutal attack in his own church. That Francis had no secret ring or duties had made no difference to their longstanding friendships.
Francis gave a little involuntary shiver as he thought back to how his old friend had died. In fact, not being in the know may have helped to keep him safe more than once.
10
Monday, January 13th
Xavier stepped forwards and embraced Helen. He kissed both her cheeks then leant back an arm’s length while keeping his hands clamped tight to her shoulders. His expression altered from a smile of pleasure at their meeting to one of concern over her wound. Pursing his lips, he tutted and looked down towards the supporting walking stick and then Helen’s legs, currently covered by a loose-fitting skirt. ‘How are you? How are you? What have they done to you?’ He turned to look at Angelo who stood a pace behind. ‘What have they done to her?’
‘I’m fine, Xavier. Well, I will be soon enough. It’s just a flesh wound, the bullet went straight through. I guess you might say, I was lucky. See, I’m up walking already, a little.’ She smiled a greeting over Xavier’s shoulder towards Angelo. ‘It’s good to see you both, that’s for sure. Come on into the kitchen, it’s warmer.’ She turned, linking her arm through Xavier’s and they made a slow walk along the hall towards the kitchen; Grace closed the front door and followed behind.
In the kitchen, there was a flurry of movement as Francis rushed to welcome the visitors, and Elaine directed a nod of her head towards the new arrivals from her spot beside the window. Once he had exchanged an embrace with Francis, Xavier crossed the room to Elaine. He knew her well, knew she would never show her feelings, but that wasn’t going to stop him showing his.
‘Elaine, my friend, we meet again. It’s always so good to see you.’ He threw his hands up. ‘But why must you live in this awful climate? Cold, wet …’ He laughed, took Elaine’s hands, and raised them to his lips, kissing them gently. She didn’t resist. He allowed his fingers to rub across the scar marking where her finger had been amputated following Cassiter’s attempt to extract information from her the previous summer. He touched his lips against the scar. ‘You must be careful, Elaine. We have only one of you.’
Elaine nodded an acknowledgement of Xavier’s concern and eased her hands free to reach for the kettle. ‘You’ll both want a hot drink, I’m thinking.’
‘Yes, let’s all have coffee,’ said Helen, lowering herself onto a chair at the kitchen table while Francis fussed behind her. ‘Come and sit next to me, Xavier’—Helen beckoned—‘and you too Francis, here, on this side. Let’s see if we can make any sense of all this. Sam will be back in a while. He’s gone to the university to speak with a colleague in the history department, to see if there’s a link between the Romans and the Templars that we’ve overlooked. And he agrees with me that going to Libya is not a good idea. Instead, he’s going to use a scanner to find out what’s inside the boxes; he’s done that sort of thing before.’
Francis nodded agreement with the plan. ‘Anything is better than going to Libya; that’s just asking for trouble, and we certainly don’t need more trouble.’
‘Tell me about it,’ said Helen.
Nearly an hour passed as they speculated on what progress Sam was making.
‘Are we sure it’s not safe just to prise them open?’ said Francis.
‘Yes, we’re sure. I already told you what Bishop Ignatius said. When the Ethiopian Church was first entrusted with care of that box, they were explicitly warned that forcing open the box would destroy the contents. Sam said, in antiquity, it was actually a common way of guarding the most important of secrets.’
‘I have heard this too,’ said Xavier. He leant forwards a little and turned his head to catch Francis’ attention. ‘In past times, the only way to keep a secret was in your head or to write it down. Keep it in your head, and it dies with you. Write it down, and you have to protect it, very carefully.’ His hands waved, and he gave a shrug.
‘But why did they have to be so ingenious when devising it?’ said Francis, thinking hard and tapping his fingers on the table.
After a few moments, Helen reached out her hand and pressed it lightly over his. The drumming stopped, and she smiled at him. ‘Thank you.’
Their musings were interrupted by the sound of the front door opening and closing. It was followed by stamping feet and the rustling of a coat being shaken vigorously. Sam appeared at the kitchen doorway in his stocking feet.
‘The snow’s back on harder than ever. I’m glad I walked, the traffic’s logjammed in the city centre.’ He smiled towards Xavier and Angelo, and they exchanged warm greetings while Grace hurried to get Sam a hot drink. He soon settled into a place at the table.
‘So where are we?’ said Helen. ‘Did you make any progress?’
‘Not much further forwards, I’m afraid. I spoke with a couple of people in the history department. There is no obvious linkage between the Romans and the Templars, other than their militaristic traditions of course, but that’s not a natural link.’
‘What about your scanner? Any joy with that? It must have been able to see inside,’ said Helen.
‘Yes and no. I was lucky that the scanner was not in use. It was booked today, but the team using it had been unable to get in due to the snow, so there was a slot free for us.’
‘And?’
‘Not much luck, I’m afraid. Oh, and we’ll be getting a bill for the scan. The lab boys will prepare the results properly, and I’ll pick them up tomorrow - no emails, just in case somebody is tracking us again’—he looked towards Helen—‘and your leg wound says they are.’
‘I thought your scanners could see through anything,’ said Francis.
‘Well, they’re pretty good. We got to see what’s inside the boxes, but I’m afraid it doesn’t really help us.’
‘How so?’ said Helen.
‘The boxes look a pair on the outside, and the scan confirmed they have the same construction inside.’
‘And?’
‘It’s an unusual construction. A fine wooden surface decorated with inlays to form wonderful swirling patterns. All six faces of each box are similar yet they vary enough so each one is unique - that much we can all see. The external wood-patterned surface layer is lined inside with thin sheets of gold that form the shell of the boxes.’
Sam opened his bag and placed the two boxes in the middle of the table.
‘Ah,’ said Xavier, ‘I have never seen such boxes before. They are pretty, but what do the patterns mean?’
‘I’d hoped the photographs we lost at Morecambe Sands would help shed some light on it. But that’s not to be.’
Xavier nodded while giving a sympathetic shrug of his shoulders. ‘That was bad luck, but praise God, at least you both got out alive.’ He squeezed Helen’s forearm affectionately, and she leant her shoulder against his in response.
‘Hmmm,’ said Sam. ‘We were certainly lucky.’
‘Sometimes, even the unconvinced might be moved to see God’s hand at work?’ said Francis.
‘I’ll grant you this - there was a moment on the sands when I thought it was all over. Yet here we are,’ said Sam.
‘God’s hand,’ said Francis with conviction as he turned his head to look at Xavier.
‘Amen,’ said Xavier. He was quickly echoed by the others around the table.
‘Okay, okay, we’re all on the same side,’ said Sam. ‘Now back to the boxes. It gets yet more confusing, and based on what we’ve seen, I don’t know what it means.’
They looked at him attentively.
‘As I say, each box is of identical construction. A highly patterned wooden surface is secured onto a layer of gold sheet that forms the shape and structure of the box. Today, a designer might describe it as laminated. Then there appears to be an inner layer, again gold, that lines the inside of the box. Fixed between those two layers of gold sheeting are a range of little oblong iron bars, which seem to be coated in something, probably gold leaf. I have no idea what they are for at present. Finally, fixed to just one of the inner gold surfaces of each box is what seems to be a fine sheet of glass or crystal. Then nothing else.’
‘Nothing?’
‘Nothing. Well, the boxes do have an internal locking mechanism on one of the sides but no sign of how it can be unlocked. And the boxes are both completely empty.’
They sat in silence for a moment, all eyes on the boxes where they rested on the kitchen table. An enigma. A wonderfully crafted enigma - loaded with meaning, yet empty.
‘So what does that mean?’ said Helen.
‘It means the boxes have a purpose when opened, beyond any contents, and there is no way of telling what the purpose of the boxes is without opening them.’
‘And so?’
‘We still need to open them. It seems a bit like a mission impossible. I think the glass inside is the vulnerability. Somehow, forcing the boxes open will break the glass.’
Xavier reached out his hands to draw the boxes closer. He turned them, looked carefully, then pushed them away again, raising his hands in apparent despair.
‘Maybe,’ said Xavier, his elbows resting on the table while his hands rose to show open palms towards Sam, ‘maybe our Templars have been the cuckoos.’
‘Cuckoos?’ said Sam. ‘What do you mean?’
‘The cuckoos, you know, yes? The bird, it puts its egg in another bird’s nest. A cuckoo.’
‘Go on,’ said Sam.
‘Could it be, the Templars needed to hide something, and they knew the code to open the Roman box. We know the Templars gathered up many things, so that’s possible, no?’
‘Yes, that’s possible,’ said Sam cautiously. He leaned back, looked up to the ceiling. ‘It is possible. The Templars were renowned for gathering artefacts. It’s quite possible they collected these boxes.’
‘Together with the code to open them,’ said Helen as Xavier nodded agreement and encouragement.
‘Well, that would certainly explain the overlap from classical to medieval periods. But you said the scan shows the boxes are empty,’ said Elaine.
‘And we don’t have the code either, if that’s even what’s required to open them,’ said Helen.
‘Yes, yes, to both of you. I think we have to accept that the Templars have gone to a lot of trouble to keep the boxes safe, so they must contain something of value, even if we can’t see it. I have no idea in what way, but the insides must be valuable. Yet we have no code to get inside, if code it is.’ He paused for a long moment. ‘But we do know where the original code is …’
‘No!’ said Helen. ‘That’s a bad idea. No way are you going to Libya, Sam, just no.’
‘Well people are hunting us; we need to resolve this before they get to us. We know these people will stop at nothing to reach their goal.’
‘I wonder what that goal is,’ said Grace.
There was a sudden silence. ‘It’s gold, isn’t it?’ said Francis.
‘Certainly, there was a lot of gold in the Templar hoard they were after before. But this feels different. If that was the Templar treasury we found back in the autumn, and it showed every sign of being so, what can this be? I know the Templars were cautious and seem to have covered every angle twice. But two treasuries? That is a stretch I don’t buy, I’m afraid,’ said Sam.
‘You did say at the time that the find seemed to be all coin and bullion. No artefacts, no ornate jewellery - the sort of things a treasure hoard might be expected to contain,’ said Francis.
‘And no religious artefacts. None.’ Xavier leant forwards, rested his elbows on the table and allowed his hands to describe a little globe in front of him. ‘The Templar world was religion. Where are their artefacts? The icons? Those would have been valued more highly than money.’ As he finished speaking, Xavier’s lips pursed, his shoulders shrugged theatrically and his hands opened to reveal his palms. He looked around the table, shrugged again. ‘Where are they?’
‘You may be onto something there. For two hundred years, the Templars had an almost free hand to scour the classical world for religious artefacts. You’d think there would have been some things they would have valued highly enough to keep,’ said Sam.
‘And they might have stored them separately from the treasury as a kind of insurance policy,’ said Helen.
‘I think you could be right,’ said Sam. ‘Every experience we’ve had says the Templars have been very careful to compartmentalise all the clues. If they split up the knowledge, it’s logical to think they may have split up what they were storing too.’
‘But that implies that Cassiter and these other people are being driven by some knowledge we are unaware of. They must know what is out there,’ said Francis.
‘Remember that older silver-haired man in the Cretan tunnels?
He seemed to be Cassiter’s boss, and he certainly knew a lot; he even had his own dagger,’ said Helen.
‘Hmm, the aristocratic one. Yes, he did have a dagger, which may have made him, or at least his predecessors, a task bearer. He would have received some knowledge, just as John Dearly did, and you too, Xavier,’ said Sam.
All eyes turned to Xavier. He shrugged and raised his hands. ‘I know what I know. Remember, I knew nothing of the location of the hoard, so how could I know of another treasure. But I say again, it’s odd there were no artefacts. None.’
‘There are all sorts of Christian treasures that have an almost mythical presence, but nobody knows where they are or if they even still exist,’ said Francis.
‘Such as?’ said Grace.
‘Oh, all sorts. You know the sort of thing, I’m sure. Wood from the cross, Jesus’ crown of thorns, drops of the holy blood. Though, I’m not sure things such as those could have survived so long, could they?’ Francis glanced in Sam’s direction.
‘Given the right conditions, anything is possible, but organic matter is always most vulnerable.’
‘There are plenty of other things to include,’ said Francis, warming to the subject. ‘The nails from the cross, the spear that is said to have pierced the side of Jesus. And of course, the big ones: the Holy Grail and the Ark of the Covenant. You know, I’ve read the Templars spent a lot of time searching. If such artefacts were to be found, it would surely have been the Templars who found them?’
‘Probably,’ said Sam, ‘if those things existed to be found. But that doesn’t really explain how Cassiter’s people know what to look for now. Nor even that there was ever more than just the one treasury. After all, Xavier does not know of such a thing. Yet, whatever more is, it’s perfectly clear they are desperate to find it. I’m guessing most folk would have been very happy with the coin and bullion.’
‘Except, in the end, they didn’t get the treasury,’ said Elaine.
‘Yes,’ Helen continued, ‘and we know by his ownership of a dagger and all his background knowledge, that silver-haired man was, or is, a task bearer, like Xavier, John Dearly and now me. So he knows something. What can it be?’
