by James Becker
106
Bronson quickly led her behind a white van which offered a place of concealment and also a vantage point from which they could see the entrance to the terminal, and the two taxis still waiting outside.
A dark-coloured saloon car swept into the aerodrome, tyres chirping as the driver took the corner at speed, and slammed to a halt behind the second taxi. Two men got out and ran inside the building.
‘Walk quickly, but don’t run,’ Bronson said, as he and Angela headed in the opposite direction.
‘Bad guys?’ Angela asked.
‘Definitely.’
They’d barely left the premises when they saw a taxi coming around the bend, heading towards them.
‘That’s our ride, I hope,’ Bronson said, glancing at the business card he was still holding to confirm the name of the firm.
Seconds later, they were sitting in the back seat as the driver headed towards Tunbridge Wells, Bronson checking behind them for any signs of pursuit.
When they reached Bronson’s home town, he directed the driver to drop them near the centre, not beside his house. As soon as the taxi had gone, he and Angela walked a couple of hundred yards to the nearest cab rank, waited until the first two taxis had pulled away, and then sat down in the third vehicle. That, Bronson hoped, would end any possible pursuit.
About half an hour later the second taxi pulled up outside a hotel on the southern outskirts of Sevenoaks and they climbed out. They picked a double on the first floor at the back of the building, near the rear fire escape.
‘We could have gone to your place,’ Angela said, ‘or don’t you think that would have been safe?’
‘I don’t think we can take any chances, not until we’ve published this thing. Look, let’s go down to the restaurant and see what they’ve got on offer, because I’m really quite hungry. Then we can decide our next move — somehow we have to get you and the parchment up to London and into the museum, get the relic authenticated and translated, and go public.’
‘And then we just let the Vatican and the Roman Catholic Church face the consequences,’ Angela finished for him.
107
Antonio Morini’s feelings of desperation and guilt were growing more acute with every passing minute. He had hoped that, with the resources at the disposal of the French P2 organization, the two people he was chasing would finally have been identified and stopped while on French soil, but yet again they had done the unexpected and outsmarted their pursuers. And so, once again, he picked up the phone to dial the British mobile number.
* * *
When Morini ended the call, the Englishman put his mobile down on the desk in his study with exaggerated care, a white-hot anger burning inside him. Ever since he’d taken over the leadership of P2 he’d done his best to weed out the dross, to ensure that every member pulled his weight and acted promptly and efficiently in the best interests of the organization. But clearly, given what had happened in both Spain and France, he hadn’t done enough. Heads, he had already decided, would definitely roll because of this shameful failure, and where P2 was concerned that was not a figure of speech.
In the meantime, the ball was now in his court, because the two fugitives were on his home turf and the responsibility for stopping them lay firmly and unequivocally on his shoulders. A fact that pleased him rather more than he’d expected.
Bronson and Lewis now had very little choice about what to do next. Lewis would have to decipher the text, and then they would probably go public with the results. And because of that, he knew exactly where to find them.
For the first time since Morini’s initial call, he felt absolutely confident of success. And as a bonus, he would now have the chance to prove, once and for all, why he was the rightful leader of P2.
108
The British Museum was only a short distance down Great Russell Street, and once inside the building Angela led the way straight up to her office, where she followed her usual routine and set about grinding some Blue Mountain beans for her morning coffee.
‘While this is brewing,’ she said, ‘I’ll take the parchment to one of our specialist laboratories here and see what they can do with it. The coffee machine is right in front of you, there’s a comfortable chair over by that bookcase, and I can see that there’s a novel sticking out of your jacket pocket, so you can just relax until I get back.’
‘Sounds like a deal to me,’ Bronson said, and retired to the chair as instructed.
About twenty minutes later there was a knock on the door, which then opened, and closed again almost immediately, whoever was outside presuming that Angela’s office was empty.
It was over two hours before Angela finally returned, pushing open the door and walking across to her desk, a cardboard folder in her hand.
‘I hope that’s fresh coffee,’ she said, glancing at the filter machine.
‘It certainly is,’ Bronson confirmed. ‘I made it about ten minutes ago. Any luck?’
‘Yes, definitely. I won’t bore you with the technicalities of it, unlike the man in the laboratory where I’ve just spent the last one hundred and twenty tediously endless minutes. Suffice it to say that almost all the text showed up using a thing called multi-spectral imaging, where we could irradiate the parchment using a number of different wavelengths of light. We fed the results into our state-of-the-art digital image processing program, which analysed what we’ve got and then spat it out to an ultra high-resolution laser printer.’
‘And that’s without the technicalities, is it?’
‘Yes,’ Angela replied firmly. ‘That really is the short, short version. Trust me on that.’
‘So have you got everything you need now?’
‘Just about, yes. The only thing I haven’t got is the complete translation of the text, which is what I’m going to do right now.’
‘And what then?’ Bronson asked.
‘Then, in order to go public with this, I’ll have to write a short report about how the parchment came to be in my possession, then pass that up the line here in the museum with a request that a statement should be issued describing the relic and what the text says. If that’s approved, then I’ll have to work up a fully detailed report that will need to be checked and peer-reviewed, and then published in the appropriate professional journals. After that, we’ll need to set up a display here in the museum which will house the parchment and all the information relating to it.’
‘So it won’t be a fast process, then?’
‘Nothing moves quickly in the world of academe, my friend. But what we will be able to do once I’ve written the report is ask the public relations people here to issue a press release outlining what we found and what we believe is the significance of the relic. And that, hopefully, will be enough to get us out of the firing line. Now just sit there and be quiet while I do the translation.’
Angela took a number of photographs out of the folder and stared down at them through a magnifying lens, the pictures illuminated by two powerful shadow-free lights. Then she picked up the radiocarbon dating report that Ali had arranged to be sent to her and studied that for a couple of minutes, before going back to the parchment.
‘I know you told me not to talk,’ Bronson said, ‘but you look puzzled. Is there anything wrong?’
‘Hmm, there is one thing that’s bothering me.’
‘Which is?’
‘The language. There’s a kind of signature block at the end of the parchment that identifies the author as a centurion, a fighting man. He would have been trained in the art of war, in battle tactics and swordsmanship and hand-to-hand combat, but he wouldn’t have been trained to write in classical Latin. In those days, in the first century AD, the common man would have spoken and written — if they could write at all, which is by no means certain — a language called sermo vulgaris, or vulgar Latin. But the text on the parchment is more like classical Latin, which is a bit of a surprise.’
‘You don’t mean that after all we’ve been through wit
h that relic you think it’s a forgery?’
Angela shook her head. ‘No, I don’t. It’s possible that the centurion was far better educated than most men in his position. Or, alternatively and this is perhaps even more likely, maybe the centurion didn’t write it, but simply signed it, and had the text written by a professional scribe. In which case it’s more than likely that classical Latin would have been used.’
‘Forget the signature block. What about the text itself? Does it contain some dreadful secret about Joseph?’
‘Just a minute.’ Angela looked troubled, and was silent as she read through it again, scribbling as she went.
‘No, not about Joseph,’ she said slowly, almost sadly. ‘He actually comes out of this incredibly well. And Jesus isn’t involved either, except peripherally. No, this document is a bit of a surprise, because it’s all about Mary.’
109
‘This parchment provides the first, and as far as I know the only, written account of one crucial event. If its authenticity can be established, then the most important single event that the Church has claimed as absolutely true over the centuries — and which is the cornerstone of its faith — will be proven to be wholly and completely untrue. A blatant lie, in fact.’
Bronson looked somewhat sceptical.
‘We’ve been here before, Angela. Remember the tomb of the liars?’
‘I know, and I do remember. But this, this is different. You can argue about the actual status of St Peter and St Paul all day, but at the end of it you have to acknowledge that both of them were only bit-part players, people — if either of them ever actually existed, of course — who came along after the event. This is much more fundamental than that. This goes straight to the very heart of Christianity, and to the Catholic branch, in particular.’
There was a brief double tap on the door, and then it swung open.
‘You’re back then? Have a good time?’
Angela looked up at her visitor and nodded.
‘Hello, Charles,’ she said. ‘Yes, we’re back and no, it wasn’t particularly enjoyable. Have you heard from George Stebbins? Oh, sorry,’ she added, gesturing towards the easy chair as the man stepped fully into the room, ‘this is my husband — or former husband, I suppose I should say, Christopher Bronson. Chris, this is Charles Westman. He’s a specialist in ancient weapons.’
Westman nodded to Bronson and took another couple of steps forward.
‘I think the museum received a somewhat garbled message from a hospital in Madrid,’ he replied. ‘I hear Stebbins had some kind of an accident over there.’
Bronson laughed shortly.
‘I suppose the word “accident” does more or less cover it,’ he said.
‘So what did happen?’ Westman asked.
Bronson shook his head.
‘I didn’t get to know Mr Stebbins very well, but I got the feeling that he would probably far rather tell you himself, in glorious high-definition colour with all the lurid details, when he finally gets back.’
Westman smiled briefly at Bronson and then turned his attention back to Angela.
‘You left in an awful hurry,’ he said, ‘and I gather from the rumours running around this building that you were after some kind of an important ancient relic. Is it true? Did you get it?’
‘We did get it,’ Angela said, ‘against all the odds. And this time, we really were up against it. We’ve been chased and shot at across most of Europe, and we were very lucky to get back here in one piece, with the relic.’
‘And is that it, that sheet of old parchment?’
Angela nodded.
‘Yes, and as far as I can tell it’s probably the real thing, though I was a bit bothered by the language that was used on it. I was expecting vulgar Latin and I got classical Latin, but with hindsight I think I can more or less understand why that was the case. And we’ve even got a radiocarbon date that ties up pretty well with what we found out about it.’
‘But what is it?’ Westman asked, a faint hint of exasperation in his voice. ‘All you’ve told me is that you’ve got some Latin text written on a bit of parchment.’
‘For God’s sake, Angela,’ Bronson interjected, ‘tell the man what it is before he explodes.’
‘Just winding you up a little, Charles — just like you do to me when you’re in the mood.’ Angela pointed down at the piece of parchment on the desk in front of her, the photograph next to it that she’d used for the translation still illuminated by the two bright lights.
‘What we’re looking at here is a legal document, written by — or at the very least signed by — a centurion of the Roman Regiment Cohors I Sagittariorum. It’s an account of the trial, a sort of impromptu field court martial, of an archer named Tiberius Iulius Abdes Pantera, who was accused of the alleged rape and impregnation of a woman, shortly after the destruction of a town named Tzippori.
‘I know that period isn’t really your field, Charles, but in those days Roman soldiers accused of crimes were normally tried by their peers, and that appears to have been what happened in this case. According to the text on the parchment, the archer Pantera was accused by a man named Jerod of Cana, though he wasn’t the plaintiff. The account doesn’t identify exactly who or what Jerod was, but from the context I think it’s fairly clear that he was either a lawyer of some sort or possibly just an educated man who spoke multiple languages, which he would have needed to represent an Aramaic-or Greek-speaking Jew in a tribunal conducted entirely in Latin.’
‘“Greek-speaking”?’ Westman asked, a puzzled expression on his face. ‘Why would a first-century resident of Judaea have spoken Greek?’
Bronson glanced at him, but didn’t speak.
‘That’s easy,’ Angela replied. ‘That area had been Hellenized for some time. Anyway, Jerod of Cana presented his case on behalf of the plaintiff, a man named Yusef bar Heli, claiming rape against the woman to whom he was betrothed. I assume that Yusef didn’t speak Latin, which was why he was being represented by Jerod. Yusef bar Heli is listed on the parchment as being a naggar, a loaned Aramaic word meaning a craftsman, but which I think was used here to indicate that he was actually a scholar or a learned man, which was an alternative translation of the word.’
Angela glanced at her handwritten translation of the Latin, then continued.
‘Anyway, Jerod presented his case against the archer, surrounded by a group of soldiers from the legion who would act as the jury in the case and, if necessary, as the executioners. Even in those days rape was a very serious offence under both Roman and Jewish law, and anyone convicted of it was quite likely to be sentenced to death.
‘On the other side of the coin, in the heat of battle, rape and sexual assault were frequently used by members of the legions as tools for subduing a conquered population, and in that context it was not only accepted but often actually encouraged. The reason why this particular case was brought at all was that it hadn’t occurred during the Roman attack on Tzippori, in 4 BC, but a few days later. And there were two other factors as well. First, the victim wasn’t really a woman. She was a girl just barely in her teens, a virtual child who had been betrothed to Yusef bar Heli. The second factor was that she was now pregnant.
‘The other point about this, I suppose,’ Angela continued, ‘is that it was never going to be a fair trial. Pantera was almost certainly guilty of the rape charge and at any other time and in any other place it is likely that he would have been convicted. But he was acquitted, because every Roman soldier watching those proceedings knew perfectly well that next time it might be him standing in the circle awaiting his fate, and for that reason alone hardly any of these trials-by-peers ever opted for a guilty verdict.
‘Pantera claimed in his defence that he had indeed had carnal relations with the girl in question, but stated that she had lain with him willingly, and not once but on many occasions. According to the record, he even produced witnesses, soldiers from the legion, who supported his claim, so the result was never in any rea
l doubt.
‘At the end of the trial, the soldiers overwhelmingly voted “not guilty”, and Pantera walked free. The centurion signed the report of the trial and I imagine it was sent off to Rome along with all the other bits of routine correspondence that were generated by the army of occupation in Judaea.’
Again Angela paused in her recital and glanced down once more at the old and discoloured parchment in front of her.
‘I have no idea what happened to the parchment after that. The most likely scenario is that it was filed away somewhere in Rome, and eventually, along with thousands of other ancient relics of various sorts, it came into the possession of the Vatican. At some point, somebody in the Holy See must have looked at it and realized its significance, and no doubt they hid it away in a place that they considered to be safe. But at some time within the last century, and most likely, Chris and I think, in nineteen sixty-five, a pair of thieves broke into the Vatican and carried out a burglary to order. They grabbed the items they had been told to steal, and we believe that the parchment was hidden in or under one of these two objects.’
‘So you mean it was stolen from the Vatican, but by accident?’ Westman asked.
‘Yes, that seems most likely. The parchment then vanished from sight, probably because the thieves didn’t know what they had. It didn’t surface until a few days ago in Cairo, when a local antique dealer got hold of it. We’re not sure exactly what happened after that, but somehow the Vatican, or perhaps some other group of people within the Roman Catholic Church, learned that the relic had been found again and began taking immediate steps both to recover it and to eliminate anyone with any significant knowledge of it.’
‘That’s all very interesting, Angela, but all you’ve done is describe the trial of a Roman archer who was accused of rape. Why would anybody, two thousand years after the event, care in the slightest about this?’