by Sam Christer
‘Sarah, it’s Mitzi Fallon. You left a message on my work phone. It’s Sunday morning and if—’
‘Hello.’ The real Sarah answers sleepily.
‘Oh, hi. I just got your message.’
‘Sorry, I was dozing.’ It takes her a beat or two to sit up and get herself together.
‘No problem.’
‘I got a bill at work for a cloud.’
Mitzi’s not sure she heard her right. ‘A what?’
‘A cloud. I didn’t know Tamara had one but it seems she did. A storage cloud. It’s a digital database – Apple, Google, Amazon all have them. You upload content – documents, videos, pictures, music, whatever you like. The cloud keeps it safe, so if you have your laptop stolen or your home burglarised, you can always download your content again.’
‘Wow. They can really do that?’
‘Yeah. You want me to mail you the details of her account?’
‘That would be good.’
‘Okay.’ Sarah looks over her slim, suntanned shoulder at the handsome, naked actor stirring in his sleep. ‘I can’t do it right now – I’m going to have my hands full – but it’ll be with you in about an hour.’
146
SAINT-JULIEN-EN-GENEVOIS
Nic’s brain is working at warp speed as he frantically pumps the brake pedal. The V12 is doing seventy and he’s only thirty feet from the car in front.
He tugs the automatic’s stick down a gear and swerves into the outside lane. It makes little difference. He pulls the eight-speed transmission down another gear and zigzags violently to try to build tyre friction on the blacktop. The sudden jerking wakes Édouard and his wife. They look shocked and frightened.
Up ahead, the traffic is pulling to a sharp stop. The BMW’s down to fifty but Nic’s running out of road. He daren’t turn off the engine, he’ll lose all hydraulic power to the steering. He swerves across the lanes. Dust kicks up as he breaks out onto a thin strip of hard shoulder. There’s a sickening screech like fingernails over a chalkboard as the BMW clips the side of someone’s car.
Nic tugs down another gear. He’s still doing forty and isn’t losing speed fast enough. To make matters worse, the carriageway is sloping and curving downhill.
Édouard starts to panic. ‘Slow down! Slow down!’
‘I’m trying.’ He tries to sound calm. ‘The brakes have gone.’
There’s a police traffic van up ahead, crawling along the dusty shoulder, blocking the only safe route he has. He hammers the horn and tugs down another gear. It won’t be enough. He knows it won’t. The giant police slug is barely moving. No way is he going to miss it.
He pulls the handbrake. The Broussards lurch forward. Rubber burns. The limousine twitches. Nic braces himself. Two policemen spill from opposite sides of their big Renault. Metal hits metal. There’s a loud bang. Then another. And another.
Nic feels a punch in his shoulder. Then his face. Breath whooshes out of his lungs as the airbags pop. He loses his white-knuckled grip on the wheel. Loses all feeling in his hands. Blackness floods his brain. He can taste blood. The pain, fear and adrenalin slip away as he loses consciousness.
147
77TH STREET STATION, LOS ANGELES
Carter gathers his hurriedly assembled team in the Creeper Incident Room to brief them. He’s lessened the pain of working Sunday morning by getting secretary Alice Hooper to pick up coffees and muffins on her way in.
As the lieutenant goes through the latest news, it becomes apparent to Mitzi that Kris Libowicz and Dan Amis are case vets. They’re peas in a pod. Both early forties with that softened look that comes from too much fast food on too many stakeouts. The big differences between the two are that Libowicz has grey-black, razored-short hair, while Amis has a mass of jet-black curly springs, courtesy of his mother’s African-American parentage. Both come with good reps – stand-up cops who have seen it all, done it all.
Tom Hix arrives and smiles at Mitzi – a little too much for her liking. Carter saves her further embarrassment by showing him the bed sheet that needs to be swabbed for DNA. Once the scientist goes about his business, the cops settle down to view the footage that ruined all their weekends.
‘The sheet thing,’ Libowicz points at the freeze frame on the screen, ‘Why’s he wearing that? Why’d the fool bring that thing in with him?’
‘Emotional attachment,’ answers Amis. ‘He’s like Linus.’
‘Linus?’
‘Charlie Brown. You know, the dopey kid with the blanket.’
Carter takes a spare coffee from the centre of the table. ‘He chose the sheet rather than pick up a coat. There has to be a reason for that. You jokers might not remember this but Linus van Pelt was both weak and smart. Charles Schultz cast him as the strip’s philosopher and theologian – he even went around quoting gospels.’
Libowicz breaks a bran muffin in half. ‘Guess “Thou shalt not kill” wasn’t one of his regular sayings.’
Mitzi can’t take her eyes off the monitor. ‘What’s Deliverance holding in his left hand?’ She points at the screen. ‘Right there, look, he’s got something hooked around his thumb and dangling.’
They all lean closer to the monitor.
Carter sees it now. ‘Keys. Damn it. Car keys. Why didn’t we see them before?’ He knows the answer. They’re all dog-tired and you miss things like that when you’re running on empty. ‘Mitzi, contact the desk sergeant, he’ll still have them. Send a uniform to try the vehicles in the street. There can’t be too many around on a Sunday morning.’
She grabs the remains of her coffee and leaves them to it. On the way down to the front desk she turns her cell phone off mute and replays a message she missed during the briefing.
‘Mom, this is Jade. I’m sorry we rowed. I love you. See you soon.’
‘Love you too,’ shouts Amber from somewhere noisy. ‘We’re having a good time. Love you.’
That’s all there is. But it’s all there needs to be. Mitzi stops on the stairs and feels a rush of emotion. Thank God she’s in the middle of a murder case – two murder cases – otherwise she might just have a soppy mom moment and cry her eyes out.
148
SAINT-JULIEN-EN-GENEVOIS
Through the blackness Nic feels something covering his mouth. Choking him.
He opens his eyes in panic. A paramedic is bent over him, pressing an oxygen mask to his face. The young man confers with a colleague in what sounds like an odd French accent. He listens, then turns back to Nic and speaks English. ‘You are all right. Don’t move, you’ll be fine.’
The detective realises he’s no longer in the car. He’s outside. Lying down on damp, winter-greyed grass at the side of the road. In his peripheral vision he sees flashing lights and hears voices – but not traffic noise. Either the crash has blocked the freeway or the emergency services have shut it down. He tries to move but it feels like an anvil’s on his chest.
‘Stay still.’ The paramedic has one hand on the mask and another on Nic’s wrist.
He forces himself to sit up, and palms the guy away. Pain roars through his chest. It feels like he’s cracked a rib. He pulls off the mask. ‘The old couple – are they okay?’
The medic tries to ease him back down. ‘They are being checked, as you should be. Now please, stay still.’
Nic tries to get to his feet.
‘Whoa. Sit down. I’m not finished.’
‘Thanks, but you are.’ Nic tries again. This time he makes it. He staggers over to the Broussards, who are sat on the back steps of an ambulance.
Édouard forces a smile. ‘I never let you drive again, mon amis.’
‘I may never want to. The brakes completely failed. I put my foot down and there was nothing there.’
Ursula has her hand to her shoulder, nursing a bruise where the seatbelt snapped tight on impact. ‘We are lucky to be alive,’ she says.
‘I’m sorry,’ says Nic, inexplicably feeling compelled to say so because he was at the wheel at the time. ‘I hop
e you’re not badly hurt.’
‘We are fine,’ says Édouard. ‘Bumps and bruises, that is all. It’s good that others stopped to help and got the ambulance people here so quickly.’
‘I think that other driver called them,’ adds Ursula, gingerly rotating her arm.
‘What driver?’
‘He helped us out of the car,’ she explains. ‘Said we should move because it could catch fire.’
‘He even got our luggage out,’ Édouard nods to the banking where their small Louis Vuitton cases are standing.
Nic sees his bag isn’t among them. The one with the DNA profile and documents the scientist gave him is missing.
149
77TH STREET STATION, LOS ANGELES
There’s a point in every investigation where all you can do is wait. Wait for tests. Wait for results. Wait for a break.
But waiting is something Tyler Carter is not good at. He drums his fingers on his desk and once more goes through all the actions in his head. Mitzi has uniforms out on the street trying to find which car fits the keys recovered from the suspect. Tom Hix has taken a swab from Deliverance and is running rush blood and DNA tests on both him and the sheet he brought in. Libowicz is chasing up fingerprints, though no one is expecting AFIS to come back with a match. Amis is running mugshots lifted from the surveillance footage through LAPD facial recognition software to see if Deliverance is flagged as a known offender. Uniforms have been sent to pick up Kim Bass’s friend Jenny Harrison so she can try to ID the guy and Doc Jenkins has just completed his second review and is about to submit an official report on the subject’s condition.
Mitzi’s every bit as impatient as Carter. It’s already gone midday and she feels they’re still stuck in first gear. If she were calling the shots, they’d be in there giving the fruitcake hell. She forces herself to sit at her desk and fire up the computer.
There are a dozen new mails in her inbox, including the information that Sarah Kenny promised to send.
A cloud? Who would have thought such a thing existed?
She pastes a link in her browser and then enters the username and password Kenny’s given her. There isn’t much to look at – a dashboard of icons for Music, Videos, Photographs and Documents. She clicks the last one and it produces a spread of files: PDF, Excel, Word, Keynote, Pages, PowerPoint, Numbers, Contacts and something called Scriptmaster. She clicks on it and a new span of documents fans out on the desktop: ‘The Age of the Rothschilds’, ‘The Duke and the Showgirl’, and ‘The Shroud (Final Draft)’.
Mitzi wonders if it really is the final draft. Any other day, she’d be excited as hell to be finding out. She opens it.
THE SHROUD
By Tamara Jacobs
FINAL DRAFT
Confidential – not to be photocopied. Only signed
copies to be distributed to authorised personnel.
She flicks through the first pages. It all seems similar to what she’s already read. Boringly so. This really isn’t her kind of movie. She pulls up a wordsearch function and tries the new location that Hix added to the puzzle – LEBANON. A fresh page comes up. One she’s not seen before.
LEBANON/BEIRUT. 1176.
EXTERIOR. Night.
Scene 49
Winter. Snow-capped mountains, forests of Lebanese cedars. (As the camera moves deeper through the forests day turns to night.)
The sound of hymns being sung by male voices is heard in the distance.
Torchlights flicker through the open window slats of a secret Maronite monastery.
INTERIOR.
Scene 50
The singing stops and hushed male voices are heard. Two Maronite monks stand together. A large blood-red crucifix sown over each man’s heart uniquely distinguishes their full-length brown habits. They are as much warriors as men of God.
The first monk is called YOUSEFF. He is a senior in the order. He is stocky and in his mid-thirties. The second, KHALIL, is fifteen years younger, and is taller and thinner.
YOUSEFF
Word has come from our Holy leader: it is time for us to pray and ready our brave knights for their tasks. Satan has been hard at work. He has bestowed the blackest of his evil blessings on the foulest of his bastard offspring – the monster Salahuddin.
KHALIL
Foulest and fiercest. The whole of the Muslim world is gathering behind Salahuddin’s bloody sword.
Bells ring out. It is the call to evening prayer. YOUSEFF and KHALIL walk the dark passageways of the monastery. Wall torches flicker as they pass. Their shadows grow eerily long on the stone slabbed floors.
YOUSEFF
The infidel Muslim mocks our Lord, Jesus Christ. He generates grandly the pretence of peacekeeper among those hoards of heathens.
KHALIL
I pray for his downfall. Daily and nightly I pray with all my heart and soul that the great army of Franks, with the proud Templars and Hospitallers at their head, will burn his camps and ensure the shadow of the True Cross falls upon his sinful soul.
YOUSEFF
I fear it is not to be. Judging from the request that has come down to us, so too does the Holy Father.
They cross an inner courtyard, where a statue of Saint Maroun stands in the middle of a fountain. Flower petals are scattered on the water and it is ringed with tall, lit candles. YOUSEFF stops to dip his hand in the water and bless himself in front of the statue of their patron saint.
YOUSEFF
Do not be afraid, young Khalil, we will not ride alone. The spirit of Maroun will be with us at all times. He will guide our eyes and our swords.
He gestures past the statue to the wall opposite. It contains a giant crucifix of Christ and a number of kneelers cut into the hard stones.
YOUSEFF
It is time to unchain the Knights of the Darkness. Time for them to wield the wrath of God.
On the other side of the fountain they both cross themselves again. They kneel side by side and slide back small iron plates fitted in the wall. The stench from inside the cramped cells makes both monks wince.
YOUSEFF
Brother, our Holy Father has sent us to you.
The camera slowly zooms over YOUSEFF’S shoulder into the darkness of the cell. For seconds there is only blackness. Gradually a man’s red staring eyes grow larger and larger until they fill the frame.
YOUSEFF (cont.)
We are here to take down your stones and release you. It is the moment for you to raise the sword of God and slay the greatest of his enemies.
150
SAINT-JULIEN-EN-GENEVOIS
Two miles from the crash site, Ephrem pulls over and puts on his rental’s hazard lights. He descends the steep banking and in a thicket at the bottom busts open Nic’s cheap case. On top of the crushed clothes he sees what he wants.
What he crossed continents for.
What he killed for.
He holds the glossy, black-and-white DNA print in his hand and marvels at it. Ten rows of dark and light columns, dozens of blocks of magic stacked on each other, the ultimate historic tracer, a unique treasure.
He takes out his phone and dials a number long ago memorised and seldom called. The tone blips out into cyberspace. It crosses countries and comes to rest in the handset of Nabih Hayek. The Lebanese cleric answers on the second ring.
‘It is Ephrem. I have the profile, the original transparency and the data file it came from.’
Hayek heaves a sigh of relief. ‘You are sure?’
‘I am. I have just taken them from the scientist who conducted the tests and the American who was trying to protect him.’
Hayek doesn’t ask if they are still alive. He wants to avoid explicit knowledge, wants to be able to talk to Andreas Pathykos truthfully and in return have him speak openly to the Pontiff. ‘You have done well, my brother.
‘You wish me to destroy them?’
Hayek hesitates. Destroying something so historically important is still hard to sanction. ‘Yes.’ He swallows hard.
The cleric thinks a moment, then adds pointedly, ‘We would all sleep better knowing this never happened – knowing such a thing could never be repeated, and could never be spoken of.’
‘I understand, Father.’
And Ephrem does. He fully understands what is expected of him. His mission is not yet complete.
151
77TH STREET STATION, LOS ANGELES
Mitzi scans another page of the script. Searches every scene, every sentence of dialogue for clues that might help her solve the Tamara Jacobs murder.
The movie’s action has moved to Damascus, the ancient city sited in the shadows of the Eastern Lebanon mountain range. The year is 1187, soon after Salahuddin recaptured the city of Jerusalem.
DAMASCUS: THE PALACE OF SALAHUDDIN (SALADIN):
EXTERIOR. Late evening.
Scene 74
Two crimson-cloaked guards on black horses cross each other’s paths as they patrol the circumference of the palace. Closer to the towering walls are foot-soldiers, posted no more than an arm’s length from each other.
INTERIOR.
Scene 75
In the grand hall there is loud music and excited celebration. SALAHUDDIN is staging a lavish feast and night of entertainment for his most trusted men. They are marking their great victory at Hattin. As well as jugs of wine, pipes of hashish are being smoked and exotic women dance tantalisingly close to the soldiers.
SOLDIER ONE (taking hash pipe from friend)