But, intriguing as that all might be to somebody who actually gave a damn, it told Jack nothing about his daughter.
“I’m not a Christian,” he said, his words weighted irritably. “I’m a Jew and I don’t really care. It appears that you have gone to a lot of trouble and achieved nothing. Unless, of course, the sole object of this meeting was to waste a great deal of my time.” He started to stand before he said or did something he knew a man in his position would regret.
“You should care, Mr. Bernstein, you really should. You see... sometimes paintings reflect real life. Sometimes somebody is trying to tell us something, but they are trying to do it with some degree of subtlety. Do you... understand?”
Jack clenched his teeth again, tighter than before, and slowly lowered himself back on to the cold wood.
He understood.
“Cocteau must have felt so very differently to the masses about the Christ, and his art merely serves to reflect his honesty. Who knows, he may even have had a point. Just because one version of history is widely accepted does not guarantee that it is the truth no matter how extensive the belief. It is so very easy to fool the masses.” He laughed gently. “As you demonstrated yourself with the contemptible horse riding story. The people will believe exactly what you want them to believe if you limit the real truth to those you feel you can trust. But what you really want, I mean the reason you are here, is the truth about your daughter’s death. Regardless, I suspect, of whether it endorses or conflicts with the wider view.”
Jack turned with cold eyes. The man chose to ignore his gaze, his eyes now focused back on the mural.
“So tell me then..” Jack asked with evident contempt. “If you have important information about the investigation, why not go to the German authorities? Or the FBI? Or is it just that you came to me because there is something you want in return, Mr....” In sixteen years of heading IntelliSoft, he knew an emerging negotiation when he saw one. The man did not want to offer information that might convict the guilty. He wanted to offer it so that he could make some cold, hard cash.
“You may call me Simon, Mr. Bernstein, but my name is not really important to you. I do believe, however, that my knowledge is. All you need to know is that I represent a group of people whose beliefs of history are as different as those of Mr. Cocteau here. And as for what I want...?” He paused, stretching the silence just long enough to make Jack suitably impatient. “It is certainly not money, if that is what you are thinking. I have more than enough of such trivial things.”
He gestured around at the cold walls. “This is holy ground, Mr. Bernstein, designated by none other than the Knights Templar. Long before the cornerstones of this church were laid they used this same location as a base for their crusades. For hundreds of years, in many different guises, they searched the known world for the most elusive and most coveted of religious trophies: the Holy Grail. Some say it was a cup, a chalice if you choose to believe the hype, used by Jesus at the last supper and to collect his blood as he hung in defeat from the cross. There are others who believe it to be his physical body, his corpse. Decaying bones of a less fortunate crusader. Personally I believe that the true Grail is something quite different, and it is that which I seek.”
He had deliberately stressed the ‘I’ in his sentence, as though the fact that he wanted something other than money somehow set him apart from any other brand of extortionist. It made precious little difference to Jack, he was still facing a man who was offering him a trade-off rather than an outright gift.
“And what does this have to do with me or my daughter? Why the hell am I here?”
The man laughed again, tingeing it this time with a subtle hint of irony. “Because I am a wise man, Mr. Bernstein. Not a good Samaritan.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning that I will give you the one thing that you want; namely the people who really killed your daughter, and then you in return will deliver to me the one thing that I want....”
Jack shook his head with a powerfully dismissive smile. “Will I indeed?”
The man’s voice, his cold facial expression and even the air which filled the space between them seemed to exert a quiet, almost menacing confidence. “Yes, Mr. Bernstein. You will.”
diversities of gifts
1 Corinthians 12:4
In the Sanctuary of Light, deep beneath the Temple, each of the Ministers discarded their western clothes and bathed for half an hour in the fragrant natural waters of a sunken pool. Throughout the cleansing a solemn silence was maintained, as it was each and every time they met. Then, when the three men had dried themselves Ephraim, wearing pale green robes, led them in prayer. At the final amen he took three similar robes, their colour varying to denote status, and handed them across. Benjamin was designated white, Simeon black and Zebulun red.
Ephraim removed a large key which hung on a golden chain around his neck and carefully opened the heavy studded door which separated the Sanctuary of Light from the adjoining room. For the first time in his life Zebulun felt his heart racing. He closed his eyes and gave thanks to God that he had been deemed worthy enough to be in service at the time of the New Empire.
Like the others, he had been handed a large envelope during the preceding Assembly. Within it were many smaller and much heavier envelopes, each marked with a date on which they should be opened. When those dates fell, he and his colleagues would follow their respective instructions to the letter. These, he knew, were the last tasks he would ever be asked to perform by The Abraham. If he were to die, then it must not be before he had completed them all, whatever they may prove to be. God was trusting him to pave the way, and nothing must be left undone. He must not fail The Abraham, the Child, or indeed his ever-loving God.
Following Ephraim into the Chamber for the first time since he was ordained he was rendered breathless by its immense size. Hundreds of tiny alcoves littered the high walls, each bearing one of Eternity’s may prized artefacts. Zebulun was well aware that many of these items, should their existence ever be proved, would have the power to rewrite history forever. To his left, the north wall had been kept bare and smooth save for an open case mounted on golden brackets. Standing upright within that case was the most treasured spoil in Eternity’s impressive collection, the Book of the Word.
Each of the marble blocks on the floor had been systematically positioned in such a way that the inherent grain ran seductively inward, the pattern resembling the pigmentation in a human iris. As it drew Zebulun’s gaze toward the centre of the room, he finally saw the image he had previously only dreamed of seeing during his lifetime. There, seated on a raised slab of darker marble, was the casket. A solitary figure clothed in deep crimson standing behind it. The Joseph; the father of the child.
Ephraim allowed each of his colleagues a few moments to gaze in wonder from the doorway then opened a dark wooden chest which had been sitting against one of the walls. Slowly he removed three differing sized items, each shrouded under a veil of purple velvet - the colour of Kings - and handed them to each of his Ministers in turn. Then, without the need for spoken words he turned away, walked ceremoniously across the marble floor, beyond the casket, and took his place as Jacob alongside The Joseph.
Briefed in readiness for the routine expected of him, Benjamin approached, holding forth his gift. As he reached the point where the sides of the casket, carved with religious motifs, revealed the child to him, he fell to his knees and bowed his head to the floor with almost pleading servitude. After a moment of prayer he raised it once more and removed the velvet blanket from his offering; a jewelled gold crown seated on top of an etched glass case which contained a Venetian broadsword. Laying the large case on the floor he removed the crown and placed it at the feet of the child.
The baby, gentle kicking and stretching its tiny arms, smiled. Innocent and unknowing. Benjamin took three steps to his left to allow Simeon to approach. His gift, contained within a similar glass case, was that of antique balances; the kind u
sed in ancient times for measuring wheat and barley. When he had glimpsed the child and laid the case on the floor beside Benjamin’s he took three steps to his right and Zebulun approached, bowed and unveiled the final ministerial gift; another case bearing a traditional hunting bow. Then, as instructed, he took a single step backward so that he was standing directly between Simeon and Benjamin.
When the three Ministers had fulfilled their roles as contemporary Magi bearing gifts, Ephraim approached from the other side of the casket and knelt before the child. He also produced a glass case but, unlike his predecessors, proceeded to open it. Inside, resting solemnly on a purple velvet cushion, were three keys; one to each of the other cases. Laying his offering in the centre of the crown he moved backward with head bowed. The men prayed again, asking of God that the child would grow strong and learn to use his gifts as wisely as they had.
The Ministers’ first duties to the child had been fulfilled. Whilst the Joseph had given him life itself and Benjamin, Simeon and Zebulun had respectively conferred their ability to ‘judge the unholy with sword and with famine and with death’, Ephraim had made the most important donation of all. He had, symbolically for the time being at least, offered the power of control over all three.
she hath no child
2 Kings 4:14
Jack was in no mood for childish games. “I have my daughter’s killers,” he said defiantly. “They’re in custody as we speak.”
“Please, do not allow complacency to rule your actions, Mr. Bernstein,” the man replied, calmly waving a finger of mock chastisement. “That might just prove to be the biggest mistake you ever make.”
“So... what...?” Jack said, shrugging his ignorance. “Presumably you feel you have fresh information about the bombing and you want to trade it for something. What, exactly? What is this Holy Grail?”
The man shrugged again. “A book.”
Jack sneered. “So visit a goddamned library.”
The man did not even bother to face his guest as he spoke. “It is a very special book, Mr. Bernstein, very special indeed. Now, by sheer chance, it is currently in the possession of the very people who chose to systematically peel a plane from around your little girl at thirty-two thousand feet. And I would like you to retrieve it for me.”
Jack clenched his teeth, then realised exactly what the man was doing. He was very carefully and very deliberately fuelling his anger, forcing him to picture his daughter’s final moments so that he would want nothing more than to grasp at whatever straw snippets of information he might be offered. He not only hated the fact that the man was doing it, but also the fact that it was working so effectively.
“So Mil’el have this book you want?”
Simon laughed wickedly, just enough to inflame Jack further, “Come now. Do you really think that Dalkamouni or indeed anyone within Mil’el planted that destructive sound system on board Flight 320? Mil’el are fanatics, not even I dispute that, but please do not fall into the FBI’s trap of thinking that they are also stupid. To plant an exact replica of the bomb they were discovered constructing in Berlin last year. To make no attempt to claim responsibility? And to be caught within four days of the act itself?”
He checked his diamond studded Breitling with controlled nonchalance. “Tell me, Mr. Bernstein, does that sound like the work of a group who have managed to murder one hundred and thirteen foreign nationals over a five year period, without allowing so much as one charge to stick to the grubby clothing of their members? These people, caught building a barometric explosive device last year, managed to negotiate their unequivocal release in Berlin just three months later? Trust me on one thing, Mr. Bernstein, they are a long way removed from stupid.”
Jack creased his face, trying to recall the information that Andy had shared with him regarding the terrorist group after the arrest of their key members. “As I understand it, Mil’el have actually claimed responsibility for one hundred and twenty four deaths.” It was a small point, but one he felt was worth voicing in a superiority battle he was currently losing.
“You might have been told that but, as I believe I already highlighted to you, history is far from being an exact science. The eleven servicemen in the Paris nightclub three years ago was not their handiwork, merely that of a disgruntled ex-member who claimed the attack in their name.” Simon shrugged, then the lower half of his face curled into a deep, nasty smile. “They inform me he was dealt with very shortly afterwards.”
Jack was visibly shocked. “You mean you’ve spoken to them. To Mil’el?”
“Of course I have. Not the ones who were picked up on your country’s trumped-up charges of course, but I have spoken with their colleagues in Tripoli. I’m not a member of the FBI, Mr. Bernstein, and as such I believe in thorough investigation. They reliably inform me that their members were not responsible for Flight 320 but that, because some of the evidence points their way, the authorities have decided ‘what the hell’? The fact that they did not do it is irrelevant. They’re still going to find themselves making adequate scapegoats for a swift conclusion, wouldn’t you say?”
Jack’s initial instinct was to question just how reliably a global terrorist organisation could inform anybody about anything, but decided against it. “So who did bring down flight 320? Who killed my daughter?”
“The people who have something that I need.”
“And they are?”
“Very hard to find, Mr. Bernstein. Very hard indeed. Which is why, reluctantly I might add, I come to you. I have a deal to offer and it is very simple in nature. I will give you information and from that you will work out for yourself who killed your little girl.”
“So you don’t even know who these people are?”
Simon smiled at what he perceived to be Jack’s complete lack of understanding. “I know exactly who they are, I just don’t know where they are. It is a puzzle, something that your appearance here today demonstrates to me that you revel in solving. But, if I solve half of that puzzle for you, there is every possibility that you may never understand its origins enough to complete it. So instead I will give you the information given to me and you will do what I did. You will work out their identity. The question is; can you succeed where I have failed? Can you work out their location.”
In the depths of his psyche, a cold hand reached out and pressed itself against Jack’s heightened sense of pride. He did not know if he was clever enough to solve the puzzle in question, but was certainly clever enough to know that the cold hand had previously been covered by a gauntlet. The sense of it being thrown to the floor had been carefully engineered by the man who faced him now.
“And you believe I can?”
“Would I be here if I did not?”
Simon reached to his right and picked up a leather file which, until that point, had been carefully concealed by his body. It was deep red, over an inch thick and bulging with numerous sheets of A4 paper. On a protruding sliver, Jack could just make out the corner of a technical drawing.
He carefully placed the file on the seat between them, his eyes never leaving Jack’s. “In this file is enough information to whet your appetite, no more and no less. If, based on the things you see, you are prepared to accept my terms then you will meet me here in exactly two weeks’ time and I will give you the rest.” The man’s eyes betrayed nothing of his feelings. “I will be expecting you.”
“And then what?” Jack asked. “What happens if and when I do find these people?”
“Then you use your power, your money, your contacts or whatever else you can to close them down. As you do, you will ensure that the book I want is slipped to one side and when I receive it we’re even.” He raised a single eyebrow. “I will expect you to be true to any word you give me. No book, no deal.”
There was a clap of thunder outside the church and a split second later the hall was invaded by a blast of electrified radiance. The stranger’s face was momentarily transformed into a pale blue mask but his deep set eyes remained in
darkness. Jack shook his head in disgust. Deep down he wanted to ask what was so special about the book but in reality he knew he had listened to enough of the man’s supercilious ramblings already.
“I don’t know who the hell you think you are,” he snarled, “but I’m not going to barter over my daughter’s killers.” Impatience would not allow him time to compose as venomous a closing remark as he would have wished. In the end, “Go to hell” was the best he could manage to close the deal.
He rose swiftly to his feet, pulled his collar close in readiness for the storm that had broken outside and walked resolutely toward the heavy wooden doors, not wasting so much as a second glance on the motionless stranger. The man made him feel ill at ease, the conversation even worse. The file remained untouched on the seat.
Without bothering to turn the man called after him, his voice intimidatingly calm. “I’ve been to hell, Mr. Bernstein and you will trust me when I tell you that it’s not a very pleasant place to be. But answer me this...? Are you prepared to leave your own flesh and blood to rot within its walls?”
Yet again the stranger had overstepped the mark with engineered precision.
Jack opened the door but stopped in the cobalt glow of light. It had penetrated the hall again, illuminating the faces of the beggars whose heads had lifted with muttering interest at the shout. Against his better judgement he turned and looked back toward the mural. His words were instinctive, yet slow and deliberate. They were loaded with the kind of defined menace he usually reserved only for the negotiating table. “If you’re implying that my daughter is in hell, then you’re one sick bastard.” He shook his head in disbelief. “I do not expect... No, I personally guarantee that we will not be meeting again.”
The man turned methodically, but with just enough speed to catch Jack’s stare piercing through his silhouetted outline. “I’m quite sure your daughter was a perfect angel, Mr. Bernstein,” he continued, condescension weighting every syllable, “but you seem to be reading me all wrong. I was, in fact referring to her child. The little boy she gave birth to whilst she was away.”
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