by C. M. Palov
But as horrible as her predicament was, she couldn’t even imagine the emotional tumult that her mother was suffering. All because some idiot abducted the wrong person.
How could this have happened?
As her mother’s image took shape in her mind’s eyes, Anala unwillingly recalled their last heated argument, her eyes quickly filling with remorseful tears. Drawing her knees to her chin, she bent her head and sniffled, embarrassed that the quiz master was witnessing her teary-eyed moment of weakness.
‘It would seem that your mother is keeping secrets from you.’
Hearing that, Anala raised her head and stared into the gleaming light, the man’s meaning so opaque as to be incomprehensible. The fact that she couldn’t see G-Dog’s face only added to her confusion.
Step out where I can see you, you bloody coward! I’m a defenseless woman. What are you afraid of?
‘Earlier I spoke to your father and he informed me that he’s a Templar scholar.’
‘What!?’ Anala practically screeched, the interrogation having just taken a very bizarre turn.
Does my abduction actually have something to do with Dev Malik?
Even as she thought it, Anala instantly ruled out the possibility. She hadn’t seen her father in nearly twenty years, the man having turned his back on her and her mother.
Certain now that the abduction was a case of mistaken identity, Anala said, ‘Dev Malik is a computer engineer. As I said, you’ve abducted the wrong person.’
‘No mistake has been made,’ G-Dog retorted in his slightly accented voice. ‘The resemblance between you and Caedmon Aisquith, particularly in the eyes, is too strong to be a mere coincidence.’
‘First of all, I don’t know anyone named Caedmon Aisquith. Secondly, lots of people have blue eyes, none of whom I am related to. And, thirdly, I would be flabbergasted to discover that Dev Malik knows anything about the Knights Templar.’
‘Stop lying to me,’ the disembodied voice snapped. ‘According to your father’s web page, he has a graduate degree in medieval studies from Oxford University where, I presume, he met your mother.’
‘How could my parents have met at Oxford? Dev Malik attended the Indian Institute of Technology in New Delhi and –’ . . . and he has dark brown eyes.
Anala’s mouth gaped, sails slackened.
Granted, she’d always wondered how she’d ended up with baby blues since neither of her parents had blue eyes. She’d just assumed that it was a freak accident of nature. Even though, according to a biology course she once took, it was genetically impossible for a woman with hazel-green eyes and a man with brown eyes to produce a blue-eyed offspring. While her maternal grandmother, an Englishwoman, was blue-eyed, her father would still have had to contribute a dominant gene for blue eyes.
Ergo, Dev Malik cannot be my father.
Instead, some bloke she’d never heard of named Caedmon Aisquith was her biological parent.
Can that actually be true? she wondered, stunned. If the answer to that question was ‘yes’, it would explain why Dev Malik had disowned her.
Turning his back on her because she was some other man’s child.
Shaken to the core, Anala stared at the glaring light.
‘It would seem that your mother is keeping secrets from you.’
From where she sat, it was the mother of all secrets.
29
Too tired to shave, Caedmon padded out to the bedroom, the hot shower having done little to revive him.
A deluxe accommodation, their hotel room boasted teak furnishings, canopied bed, luxurious fabrics and a set of French doors that opened on to a balcony with a sea view. Lovely amenities that he didn’t have the time to enjoy or appreciate.
Gritting his teeth, every moment laden with pain, he proceeded to get dressed. Although tempted to lie down and take a catnap, it was an indulgence that he couldn’t afford. Particularly since he had little to show for his day’s labor other than G-Dog’s phone number and the name of Fortes de Pinós’s twenty-first-century descendant, the Marqués de Bagá. The phone number he intended to run past his old Group Leader at MI5. If he could get an actual name and location for the duplicitous cleric, he would be able put a rescue mission into play.
Grunting softly, Caedmon eased a clean polo shirt over his head, his shoulder still throbbing from the earlier attack in the spice bazaar. Finished dressing, he sat down at the writing table. Nothing that he’d discovered over the course of the interminably long day had brought him any closer to deciphering Fortes de Pinós’s enigmatic riddle and finding the Evangelium Gaspar.
Pen and paper in hand, he proceeded to scribble the riddle on to the sheet of paper.
‘To see the house where Lucas dwelled, the faithful pilgrim sought the brother’s way. Setting forth from the lion’s castle, he dropped the French iron in a Spanish harbor.’
‘What the bloody hell does it mean?’ he muttered, de Pinós having crafted a medieval conundrum. A brain teaser, to use the modern parlance.
He assumed that the word ‘pilgrim’ had something to do with Château Pèlerin in the Holy Land, a famous pilgrimage site. But that was merely an academic hunch without any tangible evidence.
Damn you, Fortes de Pinós.
Staring at the sheet of paper, he had the nagging suspicion that there was something important, some clue, some tidbit in the day’s potpourri that he’d overlooked. But he had no idea what that ‘something’ might be.
Think, man!
As though he were shrieking at a corpse, the admonition rang hollow, the jet lag having taken its toll. He should have slept on the flight to Kerala, but he’d been too anxious. Too overwrought. Too afraid that he wouldn’t be able to solve the damned riddle by Sunday’s deadline.
‘Hannibal crossing the Alps, elephants in tow, might well prove an easier feat than finding the Evangelium Gaspar,’ he muttered.
And then there were the three banditos, Hector, Javier and Roberto. Their presence was a chilling reminder that the danger was very real, reiterating that he now had less than five days to save Anala Patel’s life.
A drowning man will catch at a straw, the Proverb well says.
Truth be told, he was willing to grasp at anything to rescue Anala, decency be damned; the moral high ground was out of reach to a drowning man.
In dire need of a pick-me-up, Caedmon got up from the desk and strode over to the kitchenette that was tucked into an alcove on the other side of the room. Having yet to recover from the heat of the day, he grabbed a bottle of Kingfisher beer out of the miniature refrigerator. As he did, it occurred to him that he’d had his first taste of Kingfisher beer more than two decades ago. With Gita Patel, of all people. They’d gone to an Indian restaurant in Oxford. Café Masala. Or some similarly named eatery. His palate not nearly as cultivated in his youth, he’d ordered the mildest dish on the menu, palak paneer. But even the mashed spinach and curd cheese proved too much for his virginal taste buds, Gita laughing uproariously as he’d gulped his Kingfisher to put out the fire. The follies of youth. Although, strangely enough, from that day forward, Kingfisher was always his beer of choice.
That he could still recall details of his relationship with Gita with any specificity frankly surprised him. It made him think that the relationship’s denouement had been far more painful than he’d owned up to at the time. That he had, as with so many of the painful episodes of his life, shoved it into a mental lock box and promptly thrown away the key. Which is not the same thing as wiping the memory slate clean.
Hit with a lacerating pain, his eyes filled with tears.
Christ, Gita! Why didn’t you tell me twenty-two years ago that I’d fathered a child?
He shuddered as he experienced the sudden terrifying sense of falling through the floor. Except there was no crash landing. Instead, he kept smashing through to the floor below. Over and over and over again.
Taking several deep breaths, Caedmon waited for the moment to pass. He wanted very much to shove it a
ll – the pain, the fear, the anger – into the box.
But he couldn’t.
‘Damn you, Fortes de Pinós.’
With no small measure of irony, it occurred to him that the name ‘Fortes’ was derived from the Latin word fortis, meaning steadfast courage. An appropriate name for a Knights Templar. For the craven and depraved need not apply – as Philippe le Bel discovered when he attempted to join the order, the Templars shunning the black-hearted French monarch. The king, of course, wanted all of the glory of knighthood, but none of the privation that came with living by monastic rule. That the Templars voluntarily renounced whoring, pillaging and gambling – the hallowed pastimes of the knights of old – made them living legends, enabling them to pick and choose from the cream of European manhood.
‘No Kingfisher beers for the valiant knights in white,’ Caedmon deadpanned, raising the bottle to his lips and taking a noisy slurp.
And then there was the physical danger inherent with being a Knights Templar, warfare in the Middle Ages a harsh and brutal undertaking. Forbidden to call retreat unless the enemy had at least a three-to-one numerical advantage, many a Templar met his death on the field of battle.
Ironically, those were the same odds that Caedmon now confronted.
‘Except I can’t call retreat.’
Grimly he acknowledged that he had only one option available to him.
With my shield or on it.
PART III
‘Behold, I show you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed’ – 1 Corinthians 15:51
30
El Barrio de la Latina, Madrid, Spain
Thursday, 1405h
Shuddering, Edie peered at the imposing building. ‘That is incredibly daunting. And not in a good way.’
‘As it was intended to be,’ Caedmon remarked. Taking hold of her elbow, he ushered her past the fortress-like Capilla del Obispo, the Bishop’s Chapel. ‘Medieval churches were purposefully designed to induce a bum-clenching terror in the flock. That dread fear kept the communicants in line and, more importantly, ensured that they coughed up their ten per cent tithe to the bishop. This particular building is where Spanish peasants deposited their bundled hay tithes. The barred windows and prison-like entryway enabled the Church to secure their ill-gotten gains.’
‘Back in the Church’s heyday when a person could actually buy their way into heaven,’ she wisecracked as they veered on to a narrow lane.
‘Mmmm, indeed,’ Caedmon murmured distractedly, the pun failing to produce a chuckle, much less a smile. Coming to a standstill, he pulled out the city map that he’d earlier purchased at the Madrid-Barajas Airport.
Edie stood silent while he checked their coordinates; navigating the labyrinth was no easy feat. Like an elaborate spider web, cobblestone lanes radiated out from the Plaza de la Paja. A district of blocky Gothic-style buildings and ornate Baroque residences, the centuries-old edifices were all crammed together in a claustrophobic maze. For this reason, they’d parked their rental car several blocks away on a much wider thoroughfare. Located somewhere within the warren was Casa de Pinós, the seventeenth-century residence of the Marqués de Bagá.
Fending off a wide-mouthed yawn, Edie dutifully trudged onwards as Caedmon led the way down an eerily deserted street. While large businesses remained open during the traditional afternoon siesta, the smaller shops were shuttered, creating a distinctly somnolent air.
Disoriented from having crossed too many time zones in too few hours, she glanced at her wristwatch. While there wasn’t much to cheer about, circumstances being what they were, they did gain an extra four and a half hours. Time that they intended to put to good use questioning the Marqués de Bagá about his Templar ancestor and the Evangelium Gaspar.
Tucking the map into his jacket pocket, Caedmon came to a halt in front of a massive four-story building. ‘I believe this is the joint, as you Yanks are wont to say.’
Edie’s jaw slackened, ‘the joint’ being an impressive Baroque block-style residence that boasted half a dozen Juliet balconies, ornamental frieze work and a stone balustrade around the roof. ‘It’s more like a grand palacio than a simple casa.’
‘The upkeep of which may explain why the Marqués was forced to sell it off.’
‘Still, nice digs.’
According to their Internet research, the Marqués de Bagá’s fortunes had taken a nosedive twenty years ago, the result of bad investments and a sour global economy. Soon thereafter, he’d sold Casa de Pinós to a real estate developer who turned it into swanky upscale apartments, the Marqués residing in one of the renovated flats.
Caedmon opened the imposing metal-studded wooden door. ‘After you,’ he said, motioning her into the public vestibule.
To Edie’s surprise, the tunnel-like foyer led to an expansive, sun-filled courtyard, the focal point being a petit covered bridge that spanned two sections of Casa de Pinós. Arched, it had decorative leadlight windows and carved stone medallions. ‘It’s absolutely lovely,’ she gushed, charmed by the unexpected architectural detail. ‘It puts me in mind of the Bridge of Sighs in Oxford.’
‘Mmmm . . .’
Hearing another of Caedmon’s obligatory replies, Edie realized that his attention was focused, not on the connecting overpass, but on a large fountain in the middle of the courtyard, the stone base of which was shaped like a splayed Templar cross. In the center was a gigantic bronze pine cone that copiously spewed water from an opening in the top, rivulets running down the tarnished scales.
‘We obviously have the right address.’ Then, her thoughts running along a more lurid path, she cocked her head to one side and said, ‘Is it just me or is that a blatantly erotic pine cone?’
‘It is,’ Caedmon concurred. ‘Since ancient times, the pine cone has been considered a phallic symbol.’
‘Which is not something that I normally associate with the celibate Knights Templar. So, which flat are we looking for?’ she asked, changing the subject.
‘Number eight.’
‘There she be.’ Edie pointed to an elaborate doorway on the far side of the courtyard, the lintel embellished with a framed blue and white Delft tile rendering of yet another overly phallic pine cone.
‘Right. Ready to storm the barricade?’
‘Just a sec.’ Reaching up, she smoothed a hand over a few flyaway locks of Caedmon’s hair, patting the strands into place. Although neatly attired in a white polo shirt and gray linen suit, with his bruised cheekbone and bandaged left temple, he more closely resembled a backstreet ruffian than a respectable author.
Her last-minute ministrations induced a ghost of a smile. ‘Wasted effort,’ Caedmon said as he raised the knocker.
‘Well, you can always tell the Marqués that you’re a war correspondent who’s just returned from the –’
The front door suddenly swung open.
‘Sí?’ a diminutive gray-haired woman inquired. The plainly tailored black dress and white apron tied around her waist indicated that she was the hired help.
Not wanting to give Don Luis Fidelis de Pinós, the Marqués de Bagá, an opportunity to deny their request for a meeting, Caedmon had decided to catch the nobleman unawares. Worried that the Marqués would refuse to divulge any information regarding the Evangelium Gaspar, they were posing as journalists from The Times who’d been sent to Madrid to write a sympathetic piece regarding the Sovereign Order of the Temple’s lawsuit against the Vatican. The perfect cover to ask questions without arousing undue suspicions.
A rapid-fire Spanish exchange took place between Caedmon and the housekeeper, the older woman annoyed by the fact that she’d not been informed of the interview with ‘Don Luis’. Profusely apologizing, Caedmon explained that the interview had been arranged several weeks earlier, but that the office secretary obviously forgot to call ahead and confirm the appointment. Mollified somewhat, the housekeeper reluctantly motioned them inside.
So far, so good.
Finding herself in a formal re
ception area, Edie silently marveled at the opulent surroundings. Paintings stacked all the way to the ceiling, twenty-foot-long velvet drapes, Greek sculptures, Chinese vases, and a polished suit of armor replete with shiny sword and battle shield emblazoned with an inlaid golden pine cone. Wherever the eye fell, there was some dazzling object to arrest one’s gaze.
Raised in impoverished circumstances – her childhood bedroom decorated with ripped-out magazine pictures taped to the wall – Edie was torn between oohing and aahing and grabbing a pitchfork.
The housekeeper, noticeably limping, her legs encased in compression stockings, shepherded them up a flight of steps that was outfitted with a mechanical stairlift, a modern addition that Edie surmised was reserved for the master of the house and off-limits to the aged domestic.
At the top of the staircase, Edie paused in front of an impressive oil painting of a dark-haired, goateed man attired in a black velvet doublet with an elaborate white ruff.
‘I think that’s a Velázquez,’ she murmured, the ‘wow factor’ having just gone up another notch. While the Marqués may have lost the family fortune, he’d obviously kept the family heirlooms.
The housekeeper, muttering under her breath in Spanish, led them down a wide corridor lined with an extensive collection of medieval armament – battleaxes, maces, war hammers – mounted on each wall. At the end of the corridor, she stopped in front of a closed door. Casting Caedmon a narrowed-eyed sideways glance – as though she suddenly doubted the veracity of his story – the elderly domestic rapped on the dark-stained entry. A few moments passed before a curt voice bid her to enter. Permission granted, the housekeeper opened the door and announced their arrival.
Unsure what to expect, Edie nervously straightened her skirt as she and Caedmon entered a study with forbidding baroque furnishings. The climb up the flight of stairs notwithstanding, she suddenly felt as though they’d descended into the bowels of hell, an impression culled from fact that the walls were painted an ominous shade of oxblood. A massive fireplace, large enough to roast a skewered stag, was situated on the far side of the room. Adjacent to that was a line of Gothic-style gilded bookcases, jam-packed with leather-bound incunabula, proving that even the devil liked to read in his free time.