by Darren Swart
“Baron Rothberg is on line one for you, Fredrick. Do you have time for him?”
Gretchen Hapsburg was the only person, other than his wife that he allowed to call him by first name. And, he really didn’t care for his wife all that much.
She could hear the peevish tone, as he responded to her. “Yes, Miss Hapsburg, put him through.”
He touched the desktop to bring up the call. Flawless audio accompanied the Baron’s nasally British accent. “Duke Lindenspear, you are in good health, I trust?”
He snapped at the Baron. “Yes, Baron. What is the purpose of today’s call?”
True to form, he started with, “The President would be most pleased if he could meet with you to discuss our arrangement. How would you like for me to respond?”
The Baron winced, as the duke asked, “The President of what?” He paused for a moment before stuttering out, “W-why, the United States, Duke.”
The duke smiled. “Please extend my warmest greetings to Washington, but I am not in a position to grant an audience at this time. It will be two months at least. I’ll have Miss Hapsburg inform you when my schedule is free.”
“Very good, Sir. I’ll inform Mr. President.”
“Baron?”
“Yes, Duke Lindenspear?”
“He does understand our relationship, yes?”
“I’m sure he does, Sir. However, I will clarify it with him.”
“Please make sure that he appreciates that my time is precious. With seventy-five percent of his campaign contributions flowing from me, I will let him know when I need to see him. You may use those words.”
Quietly, the Baron responded, “Thank you, Duke. I will make that abundantly clear.”
“Very good, Baron. I’ll be in touch.” The duke tapped the glass screen loudly without waiting for a reply. He eased back into the soft leather of the chair, irritated at the interruption over such a trivial matter.
He sighed, leaned forward and considered the scroll. Clearly the notes were from a different time period. They bore the marks of being translated from code into another language. He unrolled more of the text. There were notes all over the margins. He stopped at the worn intricate lines of an illustration drawn in such fine detail that at a glance the characters were almost invisible to the naked eye. He retrieved a large magnifying glass from under a pile of papers and stared at the finely written letters, along the branches of a tree. The hair-like lines had corresponding symbols above them. He stopped. He had seen the symbols before. He shuffled through another pile of papers until he removed an 8x10 color glossy photo of the Ark. With the magnifying glass, he studied the inscriptions along the side of the Ark, alongside the scroll. His jaw dropped. They were the same. Have I broken the code? In the scroll, along one entire side of the tree, the symbols correlated with the words and formed a sequence in such fine detail that it appeared to be part of the drawing. He slapped his leg and laughed aloud. The noise sounded odd in the deep silence. The scrolls predated the Sixth Century. However, the notes were Eleventh Century Arabic. Someone else had tried to break the code. He keyed the characters into the interpreter program and watched as the sequence evolved before him. At last, he had the code to activate the Ark. It was clear to him now and the sequence of events surrounding the story of this ancient forgotten scroll unfolded. He pictured Saladin high in his mountain fortress, seeking to find a weapon to drive out the white invaders. What could be better than to use their own weapon against them? He sent his deadly agents forth to seek the Ark and the means to use it. They couldn’t find the Ark, but they had tortured a priest until he had given them the location of the scroll. A century later, Crusaders discovered a cache of jewels in an underground vault, but still there was no Ark. The Arabs had the scroll. The Norman Crusaders had the jewels. It was only now, a millennium, later that the duke had all three save the final gems.
The duke sat back, letting a small self-satisfied smile cross his face, one of smug assurance that he had been right. He sat up straight and his thoughts raced. He realized how tantalizingly close he was to the final piece of the puzzle. When the American led them to the final gems he would finally fulfill his destiny.
He was like a child on Christmas morning and he was too excited to read any further. He wanted to be near Her. He stood and walked briskly to the ornately carved bookcase on the far wall. He clicked a small remote from his pocket. The bookcase slid silently into a pocket in the wall, revealing the mirror like chrome of the elevator doors behind it. The doors quietly whooshed opened at his approach. As he entered the car, a multitude of LED lights lit at his approach. Deep within the bowels of the castle, a small Trident class nuclear reactor hummed away providing more power than was feasibly needed. The elevator glowed with seven buttons for him to choose from; three for the stories in the citadel above him and three for the sublevels below him. The workers had labored against the stubborn bedrock for ten years to install the shafts. The cost was sadly exorbitant, enough to feed South Africa for a year. He had never even asked Gretchen how much it had been. He didn’t care.
The elevator chimed to the tune of Vivaldi’s Spring movement when he reached the sublevel. As the doors opened, the soft sheen of gold relief formed the full size image of an arch-angel before him. It was so realistic that the angel seemed to reach out and touch him. His one hand reached out, while the other held a mighty sword aloft as though preparing to strike. The construction team had commissioned an artist from Milan to complete the piece. It was, without a doubt, unsurpassed by any of his best work. It was most unfortunate that he would not remain silent about it. McPherson had seen to it that he had died quietly in his sleep.
The duke reached out and touched Gabriel’s hand. His touch triggered a sensor behind the gold plating. A section of Gabriel’s robe silently recessed, revealing a biometric pad behind it. The duke placed his thumb on the pad, allowing it to scan. The system scanned and verified the duke’s thumb print before titanium rods began to sequence open. The process took a full minute to complete. The foot and a half thick door pivoted on a massive hinge, making an opening large enough for a small car to drive through. As he entered a small anteroom in the vault which doubled as an airlock chamber, he moved to the protective suits hanging neatly along one wall. Ultraviolet light filtering glass segregated the chamber from the main room of the vault. He had left nothing to chance when it came to protecting the Artifacts Chamber.
He slipped into one of the self-contained suits and clicked on a small oxygen pack on his belt. He would hook into a supplied air once inside the vault chamber. He zipped up the suit and turned on the oxygen pack. Walking toward the door to the Artifact Room, he reached another security device on the door. He entered a ten digit cipher to enter the room. The door to the air lock hissed, as it sealed. Within seconds, the airlock began to purge air and replace it with pure nitrogen. The door hissed at him angrily when the sequence was complete. The vault was deceptively large; rooms and chambers divided the space which could have contained a regulation soccer game. While it housed some of the most priceless pieces of unknown treasure, his only interest today was the Center Piece of the chamber. In the center, a black marble pedestal gleamed in dark contrast to the gilded golden chest crested by two solemn Angels standing watch over a carved tree in the middle.
Despite the dim light the chest glowed with a faint blue light. Ancient symbols were etched into the thinning gold plate, dancing in the dim light. He knew the entity within didn’t like him and he really didn’t care. He would control it, if it was the last thing he did. He stood as close as he dared. Even with his protective suit, the ancient energy within could kill him with a single touch. He knew it longed to do so, but he wouldn’t give it the satisfaction. He longed to caress the skin of the artifact with his bare hand; to touch it in a manner that no other man could. He had found a way. Soon, it would be within his grasp.
Chapter 8
For over an hour, Gillian cut back through uneven dirt tobacco roads and
obscure shortcuts to ensure that they weren’t followed. Confident they were alone, she eased the Bronco toward the safe house to rest and regroup. Little had passed between them during the trip—mainly because she had informed Marty that he was not to distract her while she drove. It needled him being treated like a six year old. In reality, he understood. It gave him time to think. The one question that preyed on him was, Is she a friend or foe?
After a long silence, she pointed to a stash of energy bars behind the seat. “Hand me one of those, please? Help yourself, if you like.”
Without a word, he opened a bar and handed it to her. He tore the wrapper off a second one and gnawed at it, hungrily. Silently, he handed her a bottle of water from the cooler and took one for himself. The water tasted sweet to his parched lips. The nutrients from the treat made him feel almost normal.
The day was pleasant and he enjoyed the coolness of the morning breeze against the warmth of the early June sun. The air had the delectable hint of honeysuckle. It wasn’t long before Marty’s head began to nod. As he dozed, she drove on. She occasionally glanced over to make sure that he was all right.
As he dozed, she sized up his lumbering frame. He was stocky but not fat, tall but not overly so. His round cheeks and button nose topped with strawberry blonde curls made him look angelic as he slept. She caught herself and pushed away the feelings which would make her think of him as anything other than the focus of her duty.
Marty dozed peacefully. For the first time since his kidnapping, he had pleasant dreams. He dreamed of Barb. She stood before him in the old farm house. The room smelled of apple pie and cinnamon. Her eyes sparkled, as she looked at him adoringly. A small beatific smile crossed her lips. She had never failed in letting him know that she loved him unconditionally, as she would for any child. It made him smile in his sleep.
Silently, she pointed to her favorite chair in the living room. His eyes followed the length of her hand to a seat where the soft brown leather of her Bible glowed in the sunlight. It sat on the polished table beside her faded comfortable rocker. This is where she had always been when he came to visit as a child.
The Bible seemed to beckon him. It drew him closer, begging to be picked up. As his hand reached for it, he awoke with a start. The Bronco had stopped moving. Darkness surrounded them, the air was thick and stuffy. In the dark, he heard Gillian’s voice. “Stay put, while I turn on some lights.” He was good with that.
A single stark light bulb suddenly glared inside the Bronco. Against the glare and stark shadows, he could make out the inside of a garage. Gillian was standing on the step to the house. Marty flinched as the the click of the door unlocking snapped.
She turned to him. Something in her eyes had changed. They didn’t seem quite as hard. Softly, she spoke. It was loud enough from him to hear, but just barely. “I’m going to sweep the house. I’ll be back for you in a minute, okay?”
Marty nodded in agreement.
He looked around, though there wasn’t much to see. This was probably the cleanest garage he had ever seen in his life. There were no implements hanging on the walls, no work benches, nothing of any kind around him. The walls had a fresh coat of white paint. It almost looked as though no one lived here.
He looked around the Bronco. In the dim light, he could see energy bar wrappers, empty water bottles and pages of type written papers were scattered across the back seat. He looked at the Bronco and then the garage. This was clearly not her garage.
Gillian’s head popped out of the doorway. She motioned to him and said, “Everything is clear. Come on in.”
He eased out of the truck and walked around. His skin felt gritty and the hint of his own body odor made him wince. He looked up at her beseechingly. “Any chance of a shower around here?”
For the first time since he seen her, she smiled. “I think we can probably manage that and some fresh clothes to boot.”
The house was neat and well ordered. While nice, the furniture was rather ordinary as was the room. It reminded him of a model home—attractive and impersonal. They scrounged through a couple of rooms and came up with an entire outfit, including underwear. It seemed odd that many of the clothes were his size. What are the odds of that? It probably would have frightened him to know the real answer.
The steaming hot water began to peel away the layers of grime and stress. His mind cleared. Of all the weird things that had happened to him, he kept going back to the image of Barb standing before him, smiling. The memory of the Bible burned in his mind, the dream drove his every thought. He remembered back to when he was a child. They’d sat in a tiny chapel on a cool November morning. She stood and handed him her Bible. With an uncharacteristic solemnest, she said, “Take good care of my Bible, Dear. It holds the key to many secrets.” It was an odd statement at the time, but he had shrugged it off as some religious connotation. Now he wondered.
He turned off the water and toweled off. He opened the medicine cabinet door to find his brand of deodorant, toothpaste and toothbrush on the shelf. The coincidences were beginning to rattle him. This isn’t normal. It’s like they planned his arrival. He walked out of the bathroom and into the bedroom where he found an outfit laid out on the bed for him. He almost felt human again, as he slipped on a pair of rugged hiking shoes, one of a new generation of lightweight waterproof shoes designed for the urban explorer. They felt very good.
As he walked out, he found Gillian talking to…his bartender? He recognized the new guy from the Green Lake Golf Club House. Now, the alarm bells were really beginning to ring. The young man smiled, as he looked at Marty. He extended his hand. “Hi, my name’s Digger Delgado. Welcome to my home.”
Marty shook his hand guardedly, as he positioned himself near a window in case he needed to jump. Digger could read his look of concern. Digger pointed to a chair. “Relax, dude. We just want to talk. You look like you might need to be filled in.”
The trio piled onto comfortable overstuffed furniture. It was Digger who opened up first. “Man, do you have any idea what’s going on?”
Marty shook his head. “Not really.”
Gillian chimed in. “How much do you remember about your grandmother?”
It was Marty’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “Which one?”
Gillian responded, “Barb is what everyone called her.”
“She was one of the best people I ever knew. She took me in when I was five. My parents died in a plane crash. She died when I was ten. I went to live with my other Grandmother Bess.” It was all true, nothing revealing. Surely, this isn’t about money.
Gillian understood he was confused and suspicious. There was no way he would say anything under the circumstances unless she and Digger came clean first. So, she began. “Let me tell you what I know.”
“Your grandmothers held a secret, an important one. I work with an organization that is trying to protect that secret.”
Marty looked at her, skeptically. “What? You mean they were spies? What could they have possibly known?”
“Evidently, they knew of some important artifacts that were thought to be lost.”
Marty raised an eyebrow. “Okay, I’ll bite. What kind of artifacts?”
Digger stepped in. “The old name for it is a Sappir. We call them sapphires. The one we are trying to find was thought to be one of the original stones brought down from Mount Sinai by Moses.”
Marty looked at him, doubtfully. “I thought Moses brought down the Ten Commandments?”
Digger nodded. “He did. But that wasn’t all. Part of the Biblical text says he went forth with the leaders of the twelve tribes of the Hebrews and they brought down Sappirs for each tribe.”
Marty blinked, looking from Digger to Gillian. He burst out laughing. “Okay, I get it. This is one of those reality shows that are supposed to make you react, right?”
Digger and Gillian looked at each other and then back at Marty. They weren’t laughing. They weren’t even smiling.
This isn’t good. Marty tried
to reason with them. “Look, after Barb’s funeral, her sister Faye dumped me at Bess’s. They left me with a toothbrush, comb, my clothes and that’s it. I never saw them again until last night. Bess took good care of me, left me with a pretty decent nest egg, but no secret jewels; nothing more mysterious than an old cat. I got an inheritance and a house full of antique furniture. I really miss the cat.”
Gillian prodded. “Did they leave you any clues or messages? Maybe something they said?”
“Nothing. I’m telling you—someone must have confused me with someone else. You’ve got the wrong guy.”
They sat quietly for a moment. Marty considered what they’d just told him. Clearly, Gillian was armed and dangerous. Had she wanted to hurt him, she could have already done that and searched the house at her leisure. The little Scottish guy was clearly after something. He had drugged him and locked him up with his dead relatives. It was clear that something was going on. Marty spoke, thoughtfully. “There is one thing that occurred to me. It may be nothing…”
Digger encouraged him. “Anything is better than what we have now.”
“Barb once handed me her Bible and said one day it would be mine with all its secrets. I was little at the time and it didn’t make any sense then, but in retrospect, maybe she left a clue in it?” He didn’t dare mention that it came to him in a dream. They would think he was crazy.
Gillian shrugged. “It’s more than we have now. Where is it?”
“Back at the farm house, I guess. That was the last time I saw it. That’s been fifteen years ago.”