by James Becker
The Lost Testament
( Chris Bronson - 6 )
James Becker
For thousands of years we guarded it. But now it has been found. This could be the end — for us; for our organisation; for the world. You must destroy it, and those who have taken it.
An ancient object is discovered in a Cairo souk. Hours later, the market trader who sold it is tortured to death. As the bodies begin to pile up, a request for help is sent to British Museum historian Angela Lewis.
Angela travels to Spain with her ex-husband, undercover police officer Chris Bronson. There they discover the key to the greatest secret in the history of Christianity.
Their only problem is deciphering it before they are brutally murdered like those before them…
James Becker
The Lost Testament
To Sally, as always
This book is a work of fiction, but several of the incidents described are founded on real events, including the robbery that acts as the catalyst for the story. The criminal organization described is also real, and the revelation at the end has its basis in the historical record.
Prologue
Byzantium
AD 325
‘Bring him forward.’
Two trusted soldiers from the emperor’s personal bodyguard saluted their master, then turned and strode out of the temporary council chamber, each step they took accompanied by the metallic clattering of their armour and weapons.
Moments later, the two soldiers reappeared, a nervous-looking civilian now walking between them. They continued to the very end of the chamber, where Flavius Valerius Aurelius Constantinus Augustus, accepted only the previous September as the fifty-seventh Emperor of the entire Roman Empire, sat flanked by a coterie of advisors.
‘So, Flavius, what did you discover?’ the emperor asked.
The civilian looked even more nervous at that moment, and Constantine had a sudden realization that he wasn’t simply overawed by being in the presence of the most powerful man in the world. Flavius had been in his employ for years, and had spoken with him countless times. There had to be something else that was disturbing him, and if Flavius was worried, then that was a real cause for concern.
Before the man could speak, Constantine raised his hand, demanding silence, then glanced at his advisors.
‘This is a private matter,’ he said. ‘Kindly leave us.’
Without a word, the half a dozen or so officials standing on both sides of the throne filed out of the chamber, followed by the servants and other retainers stationed elsewhere in the room. Constantine then instructed the two soldiers to retire to the opposite end of the chamber, out of earshot, but ordered the guard commander, the officer in charge of his personal bodyguard, to remain close beside him. Constantine was far too cautious a man to allow himself to be left entirely alone with anyone, no matter how apparently trustworthy and loyal, and Marcellus had proved his loyalty beyond doubt on numerous occasions.
‘It is not as we had hoped, Our Lord,’ Flavius began. ‘I have seen the original document, and the claims made in it are powerful and very damaging.’
Constantine gestured, and the guard commander stepped forward, took the document Flavius was offering and handed it to his master. The emperor unrolled the parchment and read the Latin text written on it. Then he read it again.
Constantine was not a scholar, but he had no doubt of the authenticity of what he was holding. The report he had just read was, he was quite certain, both authentic and accurate. And that posed a major problem for him, and for his empire.
‘Where did you find this?’ he asked.
‘It was in Rome,’ the man replied. ‘I walked into the archives and searched through the documentation relating to Cohors I Sagittariorum until I found it. Then I brought it to you.’
For perhaps two minutes the emperor remained silent, staring at the parchment in his hand, reading and rereading the words, his acute political mind pondering the direct implications of the document, and how best to use it to his own advantage. From the first, he’d realized that the matter he’d sent Flavius to investigate posed an indirect — but still a potent — threat to him, and would call his leadership and political judgement into serious question if it ever came to light. But it was also clear that without the document he had just been handed there was no direct proof of certain statements made by a notorious troublemaker almost one and a half centuries earlier. He held the key to the matter — held the single surviving item of undeniable proof without which the story was nothing more than an unsupported allegation in his own hands. And the only other person who knew anything about it was Flavius himself.
In fact, Constantine suddenly realized, the document was less of a threat to him than a potent weapon he could use to his own advantage. He was starting to distrust the ambitions of the leader of an emerging religious movement that was beginning to spread its influence across the empire. But he could bring that group to heel any time he chose, simply by threatening to reveal what this document stated.
And that left only one other matter to be taken care of; and the emperor had made his preparations for this step as well.
Constantine gestured to the guard commander, who took a couple of steps forward and then stood waiting, his right hand resting on the hilt of his gladius. Behind Flavius, the two other soldiers of the bodyguard strode swiftly into position, standing a few feet behind the civilian.
‘I thank you for your diligent efforts on my behalf, Flavius, in this matter as in many others over the years,’ Constantine said, ‘and I apologize for the necessity of what I now have to do.’
‘I don’t understand.’ Flavius stared at the emperor, the truth dawning and a look of fear spreading across his face.
With another gesture, the two soldiers stepped forward, seized Flavius by the arms and held him firmly in place.
‘I dare not risk anything of this matter becoming known. I know you would not willingly divulge what you have learned, but I cannot take any chances. I’m sorry, but this has to end now, my old friend. I bid you farewell.’
‘No, no, Our Lord, I beg of you. Please, not this.’
Constantine ignored Flavius’s agonized pleas and turned to the guard commander.
‘One blow, so he doesn’t suffer.’
Marcellus nodded, drew his sword and stepped directly in front of Flavius.
‘Keep a firm grip on his arms,’ he ordered, as the doomed man struggled ineffectually in the steady grasp of the two soldiers.
The guard commander drew back his right arm and with a single and massively powerful blow drove his sword right through Flavius’s body, the pommel slamming into the man’s ribs as the point of the blade burst out of his back in a spray of blood.
For a second or two, Flavius just stared ahead, his eyes wide, his mouth open in a soundless scream of unbearable agony. Then a gout of blood poured out of his mouth and his head fell forward.
Marcellus let go of his weapon and stepped back.
‘Drop him there,’ he ordered, and the two soldiers lowered the limp body of the dead man to the stone floor of the chamber.
Then Marcellus took a dagger from inside his tunic and handed it to one of the soldiers.
‘Cut me,’ he ordered, ‘in my left shoulder. Twice. Not too deep.’
Obediently, the soldier ran the lethally sharp blade across Marcellus’s left upper arm, making two cuts that immediately started to bleed copiously. The man didn’t even flinch.
‘Now drop the dagger beside him,’ he went on, and then turned around to face Constantine.
‘As you ordered, Our Lord,’ he said.
‘Excellent,’ the emperor purred. ‘Now summon help.’
When the ot
her soldiers and advisors ran back into the council chamber, the scene spoke for itself. The treacherous Flavius, so long a trusted emissary of the emperor, had suddenly changed his allegiance and drawn a dagger to make a cowardly attack upon the ruler of the empire. An attack barely foiled by the selfless heroism of Marcellus, himself badly injured in the assault.
As the bloody body of the ‘traitor’ was dragged out of the room, and Constantine was congratulated on his lucky escape from death, nobody thought to ask what had become of the parchment Flavius had been carrying when he had entered the chamber.
That was the first time in over three hundred years that blood had been spilled because of that single sheet of parchment, but it was destined not to be the last.
1
Vatican City, Italy
25 November 1965
‘Stop! I heard something.’
Instantly both figures froze into immobility beside the wall. They could almost have been twins, though they were unrelated, both slimly built men of a little below average height, wearing black close-fitting clothing and dark-coloured climbing shoes. Even their hair was black, and they had the typically swarthy complexion of people who live around the Mediterranean.
Neither man had begun his working life as a professional thief. They had both worked as members of an acrobatic troupe in a travelling circus, honing their climbing skills to a high degree of perfection. But after retiring they’d quickly acquired a reputation in certain circles in Italy: these men could be relied upon to get into the most heavily protected of buildings, complete the job they had been hired to do, and keep their mouths shut afterwards.
And that was precisely why they were then in the midst of the Vatican City, carrying out perhaps the most dangerous commission they had ever been given.
For a minute, the men remained immobile, two dark and silent shadows against the light-coloured stone of the wall, listening intently. Then Stefan took a half step closer to his companion and murmured in his ear.
‘What did you hear?’
‘It sounded like a stone falling, something like that. Are you sure there are only two guards on duty tonight?’
‘That’s what we’ve been told: one two-man patrol, nothing more; and they should be a long way from where we are right now. I’ve checked the patrol route, and the gardens are not a high priority.’
‘I hope you’re right. I suppose we’ll find out soon enough. Let’s go.’
Dragan grinned at him, his teeth a white slash in the darkness. Then he opened the black fabric rucksack at his feet, extracted a metal grappling hook, the points and shaft coated in thick rubber to muffle any noise, and seized the rope about two feet from the end where it was attached to the hook. He whirled the hook in a circle half a dozen times, then released it. Both men watched critically as the hook sailed up into the air and then vanished over the top of the wall. There was a muffled clunk as the hook came to rest somewhere out of sight.
Cautiously, Dragan reeled it in, pulling the rope towards him and down the wall hand over fist. Suddenly the rope went taut, and he took a step backwards and peered up towards the top of the wall.
‘I think I can see it,’ he whispered. ‘Just check it out, will you?’
Stefan reached into his pocket and took out a small but powerful torch, black tape placed in a criss-cross pattern over the lens to cut down the amount of light that would be emitted. When he switched it on the narrow beam clearly showed two of the four hooks jutting out over the top of the wall.
‘That looks secure to me,’ he said quietly. ‘Do you want to go first?’
‘Yes.’
Dragan picked up his rucksack, closed the flap and slung it over his shoulders. Then he seized the rope with both hands and climbed up it with as little difficulty as if he’d been ascending a flight of stairs. At the top of the wall, he paused for a moment to check the positioning of the grappling hook, then gestured for his companion to join him.
Moments later, both men were in position, sitting astride the wall as they repositioned the hook so that they could descend into the gardens that stretched out before them. Once they were down at ground level again, this time on the inside, Dragan flicked the rope expertly to dislodge it. The rope represented their escape route, and they dare not leave it in position in case the roving patrol passed by the wall and noticed it dangling there. As soon as the hook fell to the ground, he picked it up, coiled the rope and replaced it in his rucksack.
‘That was the easy bit,’ he said. ‘Now we have to do a bit of proper climbing.’
Neither man had set foot inside the Vatican before, but they moved with unerring certainty. Both of them had spent the previous two weeks studying detailed plans of the Holy See, and they now knew their way around with as much familiarity as if they’d been regular visitors.
Their objective was the Apostolic Library, located off the Belvedere Courtyard underneath the Apostolic Palace, the Pope’s official residence. The library had been founded in 1420 by Pope Nicholas V with an initial endowment of some nine thousand books, but was later incorporated into the Vatican Museum and by 1965 it contained more than a quarter of a million volumes.
The two men couldn’t enter the building at ground level — that would be impossible to do undetected — so they would be taking a very different route to get inside. The Stradone dei Giardini runs along the side of the Belvedere Courtyard, between the line of linked buildings and the gardens to the west, and that would be where they would make their entrance. A couple of minutes later the two men stopped near the Fountain of the Sacrament to make absolutely sure they were unobserved before they crossed over to the side of the building.
‘I don’t see or hear anything.’
‘Neither do I. Let’s go.’
The two dark shapes, deeper black shadows in the blackness of the night, flitted silently across the roadway, then crouched down beside the wall of the building, again checking in all directions. The next few minutes would be the most crucial of the entire operation, and if they were spotted neither man was in any doubt about what would happen to them.
‘Still clear,’ Stefan said.
Dragan nodded, and then both men took a step back and stared upwards at the vertical wall that formed one side of the building. Ten feet away from where they were standing, a water pipe ran all the way down the wall from the gutters at the edge of the roof high above them. The pipe was in excellent condition — the Vatican, as one of the richest organizations in the world, didn’t stint on the maintenance costs of its buildings — and within seconds the dark shape of one of the two men, a coil of rope looped around his shoulders, was already a dozen feet off the ground and climbing swiftly up towards the roof.
They didn’t need to climb all the way up. Near the top of the building, a balcony beckoned, though it was a few metres from where the water pipe ran down the wall. But just below the balcony was a narrow ledge, barely wide enough for a human foot, and that would provide the means of access they needed.
When he got almost opposite the balcony, about thirty feet above the ground, Dragan stopped to catch his breath — he wasn’t as young, or as fit, as he used to be — locking his hands around the back of the water pipe while his climbing shoes rested on one of the junctions. Then he stretched out his right foot, the thin sole allowing him to test his foothold on the ledge before he trusted it with his full weight.
It felt solid, and after a couple of seconds he released his grip on the pipe and flattened himself against the wall as he began edging his way along the ledge. When he neared the balcony, he reached up, stretching as high as he could go, until his hand closed around the carved stone that formed the top of the wall around it. He took a firm grip, then pulled himself up and onto the balcony itself.
Moments later, he lowered the climbing rope he’d been carrying and waited while his companion attached their two rucksacks to the end of it. Then he hauled it up to the balcony and waited a couple of minutes for Stefan to follow in his footsteps and cl
imb up the pipe.
At the back of the balcony was a set of double doors flanked by two windows, all of which were locked, a fact that surprised neither man. They had expected no less, but glass is fragile, and once they were satisfied that the roving patrol they’d been told about was nowhere in sight, the curved end of a crowbar swiftly disposed of one of the panes of glass in the door, and within a minute both men were standing inside the building, the door closed again behind them.
‘This way.’
They walked cautiously out of the chamber accessed by the balcony and stood for a moment in the passageway outside, where a single dim light was burning. It provided just enough illumination for them both to study the plan they had been given. Then they moved on, heading for one very specific part of the building.
‘The Sistine Hall,’ Dragan murmured a few minutes later, pointing at the sign beside the doorway. ‘That’s it.’
None of the interior doors in the building appeared to be locked, the staff presumably believing that the external doors offered sufficient deterrent to thieves, and as soon as both men were inside the room, they split up and began their search.
By any standards, they were surrounded by treasures: glass cases containing ancient manuscripts and other relics, intermittently illuminated by the narrow beams of their torches. In one case lay an enormously valuable fifth-century New Testament written in Greek. In another, documents signed by Martin Luther. In yet others were a collection of love letters sent by King Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn, an essay written by Galileo to the Cardinal who later became Pope Urban VIII, a letter from the painter Raphaello, and another letter, this one sent by Michelangelo to the Superintendent of St Peter’s. But they barely glanced at any of these priceless exhibits. They were looking for two very specific objects, and in a couple of minutes they had found them both.