There was a bundle of papers inside.
Old papers.
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Jake fished out the pages. Printed text was arranged in columns and Queen Victoria warded off a Russian bear in caricature; the year was 1848. He was holding several pages of Punch magazine, illicit reading for a former Constable of the Tower.
The sound of Jenny laughing loudly at some wisecrack tore Jake back to the present and he tried to replace the plank. But the damn thing wouldn’t fit. He stamped on the board – it snapped into position – and his shoulders slumped with relief.
Then he realized Punch was lying on the floor.
Jake fiddled the pages through the cracks and replaced the poker as Sir Richard strode into the room. The general ambled to the window and gazed out at his fiefdom. The broken plank was right under his nose; it looked horribly conspicuous to Jake. But Sir Richard was studying his minions, on the lookout for shirkers, and the intruders used the hiatus in his attention to carry out a silent conversation.
Jenny raised her eyebrows, head jutting forward. Well?
Jake smiled, with a half-shake of his head. Nada.
She pivoted both hands. What now?
He shrugged. Search me.
“Chap down there taking an awful lot of interest in Queen’s House,” observed Sir Richard. “Funny little fat man.”
Jake ignored him; Jenny had gone oddly still.
“Still, he’s got a cracker of a wife,” Sir Richard went on. “Quite the filly. Lovely silvery hair. Amazing how some chaps do it. I suppose he’s an enormously wealthy stockbroker or something.” The general laughed in disgust at the thought. “Are we done then? I’ve got a tower to be running.”
Jenny didn’t seem to have heard him – she was looking straight up.
“I said, my dear, are we almost done?”
“No,” said Jenny. “No, I’d say not. You’ve probably got a few more questions to ask, right Jake?”
The journalist sighed, a man defeated. “I think I’ve got enough material to be honest.”
“Right, excellent,” said Sir Richard, slapping his thighs. “I’ll see you out then. When do you plan on publication?”
But Jenny ignored the question. “Jake – are you sure you don’t have more questions?”
“Completely sure.”
She glared at him. “But you normally ask a few more questions.”
“Do I?” he said. “Do I?”
Then he noticed: Jenny was staring him in the face and rolling her eyes towards the ceiling, Sir Richard oblivious to the gesture. When Jake followed her gaze he physically jolted.
Carved into one of the planks were the initials R.W.R.H.
“Actually I wouldn’t mind a few more snaps,” Jenny told the general. “Just to be on the safe side. If you’d be good enough to escort me again?”
Her mouth twitched flirtatiously.
“Well, if you insist …”
As the general departed he shot Jake the look of the conqueror-to-be. Jake snatched up the poker and dragged an armchair under the initialled spot. The plank was held in place by two blackened nails – they protruded from the wood, as if they had been removed and pushed back by hand. He plucked them out and squeezed the poker through the cracks, levering a two-inch gap between the planks, then pushed his hand through to feel splintery wood. The poker slipped, clattering to the floor, and the beam snapped down on his hand. The vandal emitted a silent scream.
Jake was trapped: one hand in the ceiling, the blood cut off from his fingers, the poker out of reach. Without it he wasn’t strong enough to prize up the plank, so he wrenched out his hand, skinning his fingers. The plank snapped shut.
There was no time to consider the pain. Jake grabbed the loose brick from the fireplace and repeated the process, slammed the brick into the gap this time. It held. Jake thrust his forearm into the compartment between the ceiling and the floor above until the flesh was squeezed white. His fingers brushed against something dry and brittle, something that crinkled to the touch.
Jake felt his bladder go weak: it was paper.
Now he had two fingers on the bundle and he paddled it towards the gap, clods of black swept in its wake, spilling into the room. Jake coughed as the detritus fell, swaying on the armchair. A corner of yellow protruded from the ceiling and he snatched it into daylight.
The papyri in his hands dated indisputably from antiquity; they were the colour of over-stewed tea and crumbled to the touch. The letters were Roman and at once Jake saw the name of the scribe.
EUSEBIUS.
Below it he recognized another name.
TAGES.
Imprinted alongside the ancient text were a series of pink stamps: a swastika, an Eagle, the words ‘Streng Geheim’. Jake felt the room constrict around him. His throat felt raw and there was a throbbing in his ears. He was holding in his arms a full and unabridged copy of the Disciplina Etrusca.
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Lack of an amorous encounter had left Sir Richard in petulant mood and he swept them from the house, too worked up to notice the bundle under the reporter’s arm. As Jake descended the staircase one question confounded him. Why would Hess mark the beam with his initials? It drew attention to the very place he intended to keep secret. Suddenly the answer came, and Jake saw the Deputy Führer must have had a degree of cunning after all. The nearby Beauchamp Tower was renowned for the graffiti famous inmates had added during their incarceration – the inscriptions were now protected by Perspex screens. Hess must have calculated that as a person of historical significance, his initials would ensure the planks remained untouched. Sir Richard opened the front door with a bark of farewell. Jake stepped onto the green – and walked right into Charlie Waits.
“Wolsey, my dear old thing,” said Waits. “Fancy seeing you here.”
The spymaster was flanked by Davis and Parr, and when he saw the papyrus bundle his eyes seemed to retract into his head.
“Give it to me,” he said in a voice that quivered with want.
“You can’t have it,” said Jenny. “It’s not for you, Charlie.”
There was silence as the spymaster digested this impudence.
“How did you three get past the sentries?” snapped Sir Richard. He glared at the scarlet-clad guardsman. “What the hell are you playing at, man?”
“They’re MI6, sir,” shouted the soldier. “Had to let them through, sir.”
“MI6?” repeated Sir Richard in a voice of wonder.
Jake punched Charlie Waits in the face.
The journalist couldn’t say where the impulse had come from – he had never hit a man in his life. But his powerful shoulders lent the blow force and Waits sprawled on his back like an upended turtle.
Surprise bought them a three-second head start.
*
Jake and Jenny were sprinting across open space: it was a killing ground. Now Davis would execute them, right here, in front of hundreds of tourists. He reached for his pistol with an automatic movement – and withdrew thin air.
The assassin had been forced to leave his weapon outside due to the search. Waits had thought it best to go incognito, for if force was needed they could commandeer the troops. Davis stood stupefied as the pair dashed across the courtyard, flightless ravens bounding from their way.
Jake sensed Jenny falling behind and grabbed her by the hand, hauling her along as soldiers fanned across the citadel. They were being penned in.
Only one option was left open: the White Tower. They fled up the steps and into the keep.
A potbellied knight reared up in front of them on his armoured horse: this was the battle armour of Henry VIII, and they were inside the Royal Armoury. Display cabinets bristled with weaponry. There were cutlasses and rapiers, muskets and pistols, every device of murder that could be dreamt up by man and inlaid with jewels. Davis and Waits pursued the pair inside, leaving Parr at the entrance to make clear that what transpired within was MI6 business. Sir Richard was compelled to obey, remaining with the tr
oops and furious at this emasculation.
Alarms had sounded and the public streamed past Jake and Jenny in the opposite direction as they were forced ever-upwards. They sprinted through a Norman chapel to emerge into a hall that glittered with axes and daggers; a curator stood by an open cabinet.
“There’s a fire alarm,” said the curator. “You can’t be here.”
“Get out of my way,” Jake shouted.
Footsteps were closing in, but the curator folded his arms, feet wide apart. “You. Out. Now.”
Davis and Waits appeared in the hall behind them. From the display case Jake snatched the cutlass of Oliver Cromwell – there was a dent where a Royalist musket ball had struck the blade – and he ran the tip between the curator’s throat and navel.
“I said, out of my way!”
The curator raised his hands and flattened himself against the wall. “Ok, ok, take it easy mate …”
They rushed past, Jake still grasping the cutlass. Waits grabbed the sword of the Mad King George, inlaid with a golden coat of arms; Davis took an executioner’s axe.
Jake and Jenny fled deeper into the Tower, through chambers which have forgotten more stories than most rooms possess. They arrived at a spiral staircase where sightseers were sent back to ground level by process of convection.
Four squaddies blocked the exit.
The soldiers had been loitering in the keep when the alarm sounded, and at the sight of Jake with his cutlass they gave a cry of glee at having something to do during a tedious deployment. So the hunted pair found themselves charging up instead of down, ascending a staircase closed to the public. Even as he fled Jake knew they must confront the hydra, for the staircase could only lead to one destination. And suddenly they were staggering onto the roof of the White Tower, the sensation of space overwhelming.
“What now?” panted Jenny.
“This,” said Jake, fumbling in his pocket for a lighter.
Before he could ignite the papyri two figures emerged from the keep.
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Davis closed on Jenny at once, swinging his axe through a figure of eight. The iron blade emitted a thrumming noise as it cleaved the air and she retreated, raising her hands.
“Put it down,” she pleaded. “I can’t fight you.”
Davis continued to advance, grinning like a bully; the axe-head was a blur and Jenny found herself pinned against the battlements. She shrank against the masonry, but there was nowhere to go except down. The blade hummed closer, preparing to bite into her neck, severing her spinal column, and Jenny flinched and screwed up her eyes …
The humming stopped. Strong hands grabbed Jenny by the wrists, spinning her around, forcing her into a prone position. A knee pressed down on her neck, making her prisoner. So she had a sideways view as Jake Wolsey and Charlie Waits locked horns at last.
Waits moved with grace when armed, swishing the blade before him, languid and playful. The weapon seemed to have unleashed his inner ballerina; he was light on his feet and he advanced side on. Jake knew there was only one way to survive this: he had to kill Waits and then Davis, one after the other. He jettisoned the papyri and faced his foe, waggling the sword.
In a few seconds I’m going to be actually fighting this guy.
Jake swung at Waits then – a lover’s blow, crude and lunging. The spy parried the swipe and laughed, as though Jake had revealed himself a trifle gauche at the club bridge night. He’d used no strength whatsoever to render the blow impotent; it was all in the technique.
He’s only a trained fencer.
The realization crashed over Jake like fractured ice.
Must have learned it at Eton or somewhere.
Now Waits assumed the classic fencer’s stance: side on, knees bent, fist behind back. His blade was extended and slightly lowered and he advanced on Jake with a series of half-skips, like a bouncing crab.
“Huzzah!”
The blade fizzed out of nowhere, knocking Jake’s own sword aside, jarring his wrist.
“Huzzah!” cried Waits again, sword shivering forward once more. The journalist’s defence was blown open with a clang.
“Huzzah!” An elegant swipe this time, placed on Jake’s shoulder.
The flexibility of the blade introduced an element of whiplash to the strike and it spun Jake around. The cut was a half-inch deep, clean as a surgeon’s incision. The journalist felt a wave of panic. I’m fighting for my life here.
Tourists gathered in the courtyard below – the fire alarm must have been a ploy to move them outside so they could admire the performance theatre. But Jake wasn’t conscious of the audience. The blade grew heavier by the second and already he had a dead arm. Waits could have run him through with ease, but he was playing to the crowd. The spymaster’s swings had built to a rhythm, a grand slam tennis player with an opponent on the ropes. Each stroke was met with an ‘ooh’ and an ‘aah’ from the crowd and Jake’s blade bounced from left to right. He gripped the sword two-handed now – he no longer had the strength to wield it with one arm. The smile fell from Waits’s face, as though the stance outraged his sense of fair play, and he flicked out with the sword of King George III.
“Huzzah!”
The blades met in a shower of sparks and Jake found he was holding the sword one-handed again.
“Huzzah!”
Another clash, and Jake stumbled backward, bumped against stone. Below them the crowd roared, sensing blood.
“Huzzah!”
Waits’s sword nuzzled Jake’s, as if docking with it; then in a twirling motion the royal blade seemed to wrap itself around that of Oliver Cromwell, causing it to turn with force. Jake was forced to let go: his sabre sang through the air before crashing onto the battlements. The applause from below was spontaneous and prolonged.
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The spymaster’s forehead glistened with perspiration and he blew a chestnut-brown forelock from his glasses: the executive letting loose on the squash court.
“My dear boy, you’ve really given me the run-around these last few weeks,” said Waits. “Not bad for an amateur, I must admit.”
Jake sank to the floor. “Why are you doing this, Charlie?” he panted, leaning on his thighs. “How many will you kill to get at it? Is this being a patriot? Is this the British way?”
“Why?” Waits cried to Davis. “He asks us, why?”
One of Waits’s hands was in the pocket of his chinos and with the other he raised his blade until the tip brushed the hollow of Jake’s throat.
“Before I put out your life,” he said – Davis looked on, transfixed at the prospect of bloodletting – “let me give you a lesson in geopolitics. Nations never stand still. They rise or they fall. It is an inalienable fact of history. Now, what do you think is happening in the world today? What is the broad historical theme of the age we live in?”
Jake didn’t reply.
“I submit that it is this,” said Waits. “The end of the ascendancy of the West. The transfer of power to the East. Oh, it’s a scary time to be a westerner. We face the very real prospect that the world will be run by the Orient in three decades’ time. Of course, that may turn out for the good. But it may not. The Chinese are a cruel race, as anyone familiar with the East will tell you. And I rather fancy that once in the driving seat our Oriental cousins will not be as magnanimous with wealth and debt as the West has been. It’s a great unknown, Jake, and a world run by the Orient is not a world I want my daughters to grow up in. Thus, we must defend our position.” He smiled, revealing pointed incisors. “And sometimes that means defending ourselves very aggressively.”
“By murdering everyone in our way?” said Jake. “That doesn’t sound much like the West I know.”
“Oh, you are a silly sausage,” said Waits. “Do you think the West is an omelette made without breaking the occasional egg? Do you think Rome was built without brute force and repression?” He laughed. “Ask Carthage about that one, ask Corinth! Ask any of the other cities our predecessors razed to the gr
ound so Western society might triumph over the barbarous East.”
Waits was too engrossed in his theme to notice the slight figure who had emerged onto the roof, stealing toward the discarded papyri. And Davis only had eyes for the blade which hovered at Jake’s windpipe.
“Rome,” Waits said again, rolling the R with great reverence. “Western Civilization mark one, if you will. Ask yourself this, Jake. What happened when Constantine brought about the empire’s downfall. Was it for the good? Or for the bad?”
Jake bowed his head.
“I think we both know the answer,” said Waits. “Why, it was bad, Jake, very bad indeed, a scarcely imaginable cataclysm. It ushered in nothing less than a new Dark Age. Great works of science and literature were lost for all time. We find skeletons an inch shorter due to malnutrition. Trade routes that had lasted two thousand years fell out of use. In some places money was abandoned for barter and exchange. And art? It regressed from naturalism to distended heads and pointy feet.” Waits shook his head. “Why, we even forgot the world was round.”
He gestured to the skyline of London with a sweep of blade. “Look around you. The West, mark two. This is what’s at stake, boy. We are Rome. China is the rising Persian Empire. Russia awakes again, and the Arab Spring has left a billion Muslims in a state of ferment. And lots of them are spoiling for a fight with us. Goths and Vandals, barbarians at the gates. Don’t you see it? History doesn’t repeat itself, as Mark Twain put it. But it does rhyme.”
Unwavering fanaticism was in Waits’s eyes. “This is a war of civilizations, Wolsey, it always has been. Europe’s a busted flush. So we have a choice. Do we play Augustus? Do we breathe another five hundred years into our civilization? Or do we repeat the mistake of Constantine and condemn ourselves to oblivion? Now consider what would happen if the power to predict the future fell into the hands of our enemies. I confess that I tremble at the prospect.”
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