The Templar's Secret (The Templar Series) (38 page)

‘It looks as though they used the rubble from the explosion to fill in the holes,’ Edie remarked, shading her eyes with her hand as she peered at the facade of the church.

From where they sat in the small garden square, the ravages that the abbey had suffered from the gunpowder blast were discernible, the exterior wall a patchwork of mismatched stone and mortar; pieces, indeed, entire chunks of stone were still missing two hundred years after the fact. In those places where ‘restoration’ work had been done, it appeared as though odd scraps had been used to patch the gaps. A bruised and battered lady if ever there was.

Just then the church door swung open. Javier Aveles, a sneer plastered on his face, strode over to the bench where they were sitting.

‘What are you doing lazing about?’ he snarled. ‘You said that the plate was hidden inside the church.’

‘And it is,’ Edie was quick to assure the brute. ‘But it’s not as if the location is posted on the church floor plan with a big X. We need time to search the interior. Several hours at least. However, this late in the day, the light inside the church is too dim to conduct a thorough investigation,’ she said, having crafted an ingenious excuse on the fly.

‘I’m only going to say this one time, you ass-licking gringos –’ eyes glittering with suspicion, Aveles jabbed a finger in the air – ‘don’t pull a disappearing act.’

The unspoken addendum being ‘
on pain of death
’
.

‘
That guy needs to be slapped in the face with a moral absolute,’ Edie muttered as Aveles, taking up a position on the far side of the square, leaned against the garden fence.

A heavy silence descended,
Caedmon unable to summon the strength, let along the will, to rise to his feet.

Wordlessly, he and Edie watched as a woman with two small children in tow, twin girls in matching yellow sundresses, entered the garden square. Squealing with childish delight, the rosy-cheeked pair chased after a ball.

Edie sighed heavily. ‘It’s hard to believe that five days ago we were strolling arm-in-arm along Boulevard St Germain, just a stone’s throw from where we’re now sitting.’

‘On our way to have an aperitif at Café de Flore.’ And then Gita showed up, waylaying him with a
revelation he was still grappling to come to terms with. ‘It would seem that we have arrived full circle,’ he ruminated, also struck by the bitter irony.

‘So, now what?’

‘We’ll have to manufacture a forgery,’ he informed Edie, that being the only viable solution. ‘Luckily we have digital photographs of the first two copper plates. The damned thing merely has to pass muster long enough for the exchange to take place.’

Edie’s head bobbed. ‘A fake plate could actually work. I mean, l
ook at how many people were fooled by that stone ossuary in Israel.’

‘That’s because the eye often sees what it wants to see.’

‘There is one other option . . .’ Edie paused and gnawed a moment on her lower lip before saying, ‘We could always come clean and tell Irenaeus that the Chapel of the Virgin was destroyed during the French Revolution. How can he expect you to deliver a ransom that no longer exists?’

‘We’re dealing with monsters,’
Caedmon countered, having already discounted that particular option. ‘Such creatures are, by their very nature, difficult to reason with.’

‘
Even a monster has to understand that . . . Never mind.’ Edie’s voice drifted into silence, the proposal failing to reach locomotive force. Opening her canvas tote, she retrieved a plastic shopping bag. From that, she removed a packet of chocolate cookies. ‘Food of the damned. Care for one?’

Caedmon
shook his head. He needed something a bit stronger than sugar to assuage the pain. ‘Once we get back to my flat, I’ll contact Gita. She may be able to assist in fashioning a fake –’

‘Hold that thought,’ Edie interrupted as a
breeze suddenly blew the plastic shopping bag off her lap. Lurching to her feet, she chased after the airborne bag, which pirouetted on an updraft. As she tried to retrieve it, the bag fluttered out of reach.

Caedmon
shifted his gaze away from Edie and the dancing plastic bag, his thoughts turning inward. For several days now, they’d been swinging the figurative machete, hacking away at a hidden trail; never once considering that what they sought might have been lost to history several centuries ago. But Irenaeus was also unaware of that fact. Which is why they might possibly be able to fob him off with a counterfeit plate.

‘
Caedmon, there’s something that you need to see.’

‘Hmm?’ Shaking his head, he glanced at Edie who, slightly breathless, retook her seat, plastic bag in hand.

Leaning close to him, she said in a lowered voice, ‘Don’t get excited.’

‘Not a prayer,’ he grunted.

‘No, I mean don’t let Aveles see you get excited . . . It might sound off the wall, but I think the third plate is
on
the wall.’

He cocked his head to one side, wondering at her game. ‘
Either I’m dreaming or this is a very cruel joke.’

‘
One that I would never play. Not with Anala’s life at stake,’ she added. ‘Now, without being obvious about it, I want you to stroll over to the wall behind the Gothic arches. To the left of the last arch, about three feet above the ground, you’ll see a rectangular outline of a patch that’s been adhered to the exterior wall and plastered over. Some of the plaster has flaked off one corner, revealing a pistachio green piece of metal.’

His eyes opened wide, his head quite literally spinning.
Oxidized copper!

Immediately rallying,
Caedmon stood up and, placing his hands in the small of his back, slowly stretched. He then paced a bit, head bent, giving every appearance of being a man lost in contemplation.

Serendipity intervened, one of the twins kicking the rubber ball
towards the Gothic arches.

Smiling indulgently,
Caedmon stepped over to retrieve it for the child. As he crouched to pick up the ball, he examined the plastered-over piece of metal.

‘
Voilà, c’est ça!’
he exclaimed hoarsely a few seconds later.

That’s it!

Paris, France

1930h

Lost in thought,
Caedmon stood at his study window and gazed at the courtyard three stories below. Planning. Strategizing. Plotting how best to scale the dreadful, slippery slope.

The third plate survived the
eighteenth-century gunpowder explosion!
Even more amazing, someone had salvaged the sheet of copper from the rubble and used it as scrap metal to patch the damage caused by the fateful blast; oblivious to the plate’s content. Or to the fact that, five hundred years earlier, a Knights Templar had hidden the ancient gospel inside the chapel.

A bloody miracle.

One that he and Edie were very keen to keep under wraps. To that end, he’d informed G-Dog that the search for the third plate had been temporarily halted due to insufficient lighting inside St Germain-des-Prés. ‘
But, rest assured, we shall return on the morrow when the church interior will be flooded with morning sunlight.
’

The lie passed muster, giving them a provisional reprieve. With the time purchased, he had to devise a plan to elude G-Dog’s henchmen.

As he mulled over various options, Caedmon stared contemplatively at the enclosed courtyard. The summer sun lingered on the western horizon, bathing the rough-hewn cobbles in soft shades of blush and vermilion. Hector Calzada, attired in baggy denims and an oversized black T-shirt, looked out of place amidst the pots of cheerful red geraniums as he stood sentry a few feet away from the building entrance. He’d arrived on the scene a short time ago. Evidently, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern had divvied their duties, one sleeping while the other skulked.

Returning
Caedmon’s stare, Calzada puffed out his chest as he insolently grabbed his crotch.

Oh, for the love of God.

Caedmon stood motionless, refusing to react to the macho theatrics.
And how exactly was one supposed to respond?
With a similar bit of scrofulous machismo? Really. The other man’s behavior would be laughable if not for the fact that Hector Calzada was a bloodthirsty psychopath.

He
raised his highball glass in mock salute. ‘Cheers, mate.’

Turning away from the window,
Caedmon gulped down the gin-less tonic, the citrus-laced quinine water warming his stomach. There had been a time in his life when he’d dematerialized into the haze of near-constant inebriation. Curiously enough, it had been the Knights Templar and their infernal secrets that brought him out of his alcoholic fog and gave him a new purpose in life, the result being his first book
Isis Revealed.

Exhausted, his body wracked with pain,
Caedmon grasped the edge of his desk and gingerly lowered himself into the swivel chair. Rubbing a hand over his unshaven cheek, he gazed at the cluttered smorgasbord of file folders, stacked reference books, a small bronze bust of Winston Churchill, several dated editions of
Le Monde
newspaper, and a ridiculously ornate Victorian lamp that he kept meaning to toss into the trash bin. ‘
Chaos and old Night.
’
His kingdom.
Or, as so aptly expressed by the great English jurist, Sir Edward Coke, ‘The house of every one is to him as his castle.’

While he might not be the most fastidious monarch,
Caedmon knew where every file was located, knew where every book was shelved in the floor-to-ceiling cases and, other than occasionally fluttering the feather duster, didn’t see the point in tidying up. Since he was in the midst of writing his second book, an in-depth study of religion, science and magic in the ancient world, he found it counterproductive to clear his desk at the end of each day as it forced him to lose valuable time the next day searching for the very items he’d recently put away.

Nerves stretched thin, he slumped inelegantly, resting his elbows on top of the desk.
He knew that he should get some sleep, a nap at the very least, the jet lag grinding away at him.
But first I need to devise an escape plan.
Unfortunately, Calzada and Aveles had the upper hand in that there was only the one exit out of the apartment building. Eluding them would be no mean feat.

‘How’s the war plan coming along?’ Edie
inquired, strolling into his study. She’d just taken a shower, damp ringlets framing her face. Attired in a ribbed tank top with a colorful sarong tied around her waist, she was a brilliant-hued splash against the dark-stained bookcases and leather-bound volumes.

‘I’m mulling over two different plans of attack,’ he replied, not yet ready to divulge any details. At least not until they’d had a chance to discuss the potential dangers and risks.

Edie padded over to the window. For several moments she gazed at the shimmering point in the distance where the heliotrope haze melded into the urban landscape. She then tilted her head and peered at the courtyard below.

Shuddering slightly, she walked over to
Caedmon’s desk. ‘You know, I’m still having a difficult time connecting the monstrous three banditos with the feel-good story about Father Gracián Santos and his work with inner-city youths.’

‘I think it’s obvious that, s
omewhere along the line, Gracián Santos suffered a misstep,’ Caedmon remarked. ‘Moreover, I suspect that his fall from grace involves Cardinal Franco Fiorio, the self-styled Irenaeus.’

‘Speaking of whom: since the College of Cardinals will soon be going into conclave to elect a new pope, Cardinal Fiorio will officially be out of the picture, sequestered behind locked doors.’ Pushing a stack of file folders aside, Edie hitched her hip on to the edge of his desk. ‘From what I understand, once they go into conclave, the cardinals are incommunicado.’

Her passing remark caused the proverbial chill to scuttle up Caedmon’s spine.

Christ Almighty! The conclave!

Abruptly twisting in the swivel chair towards his laptop computer, Caedmon quickly accessed an online search engine. ‘I need to find out when the conclave is scheduled to convene.’

‘
Unless I’m mistaken, it’s supposed to happen some time early next week.’

‘
Try Monday morning,’ he said, glancing up from the laptop. ‘Which is why the ransom deadline has been set for Sunday at twelve noon. It also explains why each time I’ve asked for an extension, the request has been adamantly denied.’ His jaw tightened, the abyss having just become deeper and darker.

‘Do you think Cardinal Fiorio would actually use the
Evangelium Gaspar
to affect the outcome of the papal election?’ Edie inquired, her brows knitted in a worried frown.

‘It wouldn’t be the first time that a papal election has been ruthlessly manipulated.’

‘Yeah, back in the Middle Ages. But this is the twenty-first century,’ she insisted, evidently believing that modern man was more honorable than his medieval predecessors.

‘Because of the centuries-old procedures governing the conclave, no one knows what goes on once the cardinals enter the Sistine Chapel and the doors have been sealed shut,’
Caedmon was quick to point out. ‘While they take an oath to uphold the rules of the conclave, arm twisting and brokered deals still occur. So, too, the occasional Machiavellian plot. Rumors have long swirled that in 1958 the duly elected Cardinal Giuseppe Siri had the papacy yanked out from under him when the conservative block that elected him immediately came under dire threat. Two days after Siri’s supposed election, an entirely different cardinal was proclaimed the new pope.’

Edie’s eyes narrowed, the rose tint removed. ‘All of which makes me think that Gaspar’s gospel contains something incredibly explosive if Cardinal Fiorio is intending to use it to blackmail the conclave.’

Of like mind, Caedmon checked his email account.
Damn.
‘I’ve yet to receive a reply from Cedric Lloyd.’

‘H
e’s your Oxford go-to guy in Greco-Roman Jewish history, right?’

Caedmon
confirmed with a nod. ‘Until we know the gospel’s contents, all of this is mere speculation.’ Leaning back in his chair, he crossed his arms over his chest as he pondered the unexpected twist. While he didn’t have the evidentiary proof, he suspected that a dark conspiracy was at the heart of Anala’s abduction. ‘What we do know is that Cardinal Franco Fiorio has gone to extreme lengths to retrieve the
Evangelium Gaspar.
So extreme, one would think that he’d been born into the House of Borgia.’

‘In other words, murder and mayhem are mother’s milk to him.’ Getting up from the desk, Edie paced in front of the tall library-style bookcases.

‘The
plotting
of the murder and mayhem,’ Caedmon corrected. ‘Franco Fiorio is one of those puppet masters who keep to the shadows as they yank their marionettes to-and-fro.’

‘
And he’s got a particularly nasty troupe of puppets at his command.’ Edie glanced pointedly at the window that opened on to the courtyard.

‘Which brings up a matter that I’ve been meaning to discuss with you.’
Caedmon pushed back from the desk and walked over to the bookcases, forcing Edie to stop in mid-pace. In the far distance, he heard the plaintive bleat of a police siren; in the near distance, the high-pitched
bleep-bleep
of an electronic car lock. Prosaic everyday sounds in a world gone mad.

He
pulled Edie close, protectively wrapping his arms around her. Sighing, she rested her forearms on his chest as she sagged against him. Silent seconds stretched into a drawn-out moment, neither speaking. They were, at that moment, of like mind. Like heart.

The first to stir,
Edie tipped her head back to meet his gaze. The last light of day cast a chiaroscuro glow on to her skin.

‘
Twilight becomes you,’ he murmured.

‘Stop beating around the bush and
spit it out, Caedmon. You didn’t get up from your desk and hobble over here to pay me a compliment, lovely though it was.’

‘
Very well.’ Striving for a calm that he didn’t feel, Caedmon said matter-of-factly, ‘I don’t want you to accompany me to St German-des-Prés.’

‘
Did I miss the email where I got kicked off the team?’

‘G
etting out of the building undetected is going to be dicey as hell. I can’t bear the thought of something unforeseen –’

She put a hand over his mouth
, silencing him. ‘Through thick and thin,’ she informed him. Undaunted, there was a determined glint in her eyes.

At a loss for words,
Caedmon stared into those luminous brown eyes, awed by her grace and riveted by her beauty. But he was also astonished by her strength, Edie Miller a curly-haired tower of it. Without a doubt, she was a gift. One that he felt singularly unworthy of. A loner at heart, if it wasn’t for Edie he suspected that he might wall himself up completely. Retreat into his study and retire from the world.

‘We’re more than a team,’ he assured her. ‘You do know that, don’t you?’

Rather than answer, Edie went up on tiptoes, her warm breath caressing his lips. Caedmon put a hand to her cheek, smoothing away a damp ringlet. Then, bending his head, he kissed her.

Pure magic
.

Cradling
Edie’s head, Caedmon deepened the contact between their two mouths as his other hand slid to her breast. Feeling the pound of her heart against his palm, he shuddered. In that instant, he felt the clash between tender feelings and a fierce, more primal emotion, an intense heat spreading from his spine to his lower body.

With an agonized groan,
Caedmon reluctantly broke off the kiss. ‘I haven’t shaved in days,’ he muttered apologetically. ‘If we keep going like this, you’ll soon be covered in a red rash.’

Smiling, Edie caressed his unshaven jaw. ‘I like it. It makes you look dangerous. And you don’t actually expect me to wait around for you to shave, do you?’

Amused by her eagerness, he returned the smile. ‘I wouldn’t dream of making you wait.’ Caught up in the moment, Caedmon bent to sweep his lady love into his arms. Only to reconsider the romantic impulse a split second later. ‘I would carry you into the bedroom, but –’

‘
Your bruised ribs.’ Taking him by the hand, Edie led him towards the door. ‘Bit of a battered warrior, aren’t you?’

Caedmon
raised her hand to his lips. ‘Fear not. I shall soldier on.’

‘I should certainly hope so!’ Edie retorted, a f
lirtatious twinkle in her eyes.

Paris, France

Saturday 0100h

As he sat at the small bistro-style kitchen table waiting for the electric kettle to boil, Caedmon stared at the computer screen.

‘The mind boggles,’ he whispered, having just finished reading the translations from the
Evangelium Gaspar
that Dr. Cedric Lloyd at Wolfson College had emailed to him. ‘And I now know why the Knights Templar went to such extraordinary lengths to find the ancient gospel.’