by James Becker
‘So who was this Jerod of Cana?’
They were sitting in the hotel room discussing a few of the words that Angela had managed to translate.
‘He might have been a lawyer of some sort,’ she replied, ‘if this is a record of a trial or legal proceeding, or maybe just a minor official. He probably spoke Greek because Judaea had been Hellenized for some time and that language was spoken there almost as commonly as Hebrew. And he also spoke at least some Aramaic as well, because according to this sentence on the parchment he describes Yusef – Joseph – as a naggar.’
‘And that means what?’
‘It’s a loanword from Aramaic that has two different but related meanings. The literal translation would be a “craftsman”, but it also had a metaphorical interpretation as a scholar or a learned man, which I suppose is another way of looking at a craftsman – somebody who works with words rather than wood, say. And that’s interesting, because I had expected to find the word teknon being used instead. That’s not Aramaic. It’s a Greek word that also means a craftsman or a technician, a man who worked in metal or wood, and it was almost certainly the root of the modern English word “technician”. But the point is that it has no other meaning.’
‘I don’t see the significance.’
‘It’s very simple. Forget the parchment for a minute and think back to what you were told when you were at school, during your religious instruction classes, or whatever they were called. What job was Jesus Christ supposed to have followed?’
‘He was a carpenter, of course. Everybody knows that.’
Angela nodded. ‘Of course everybody knows that,’ she replied. ‘And actually everybody’s got it wrong. When you go back to the oldest known sources, to the original Aramaic, it’s quite clear that whoever translated the word naggar assumed that the correct meaning was the literal one, that Jesus was a craftsman of some kind, a carpenter or metal worker, and more importantly so was his father.
‘But actually it’s almost certain that that was a mistranslation, and the word they should have used was the metaphorical meaning, a “scholar”. Quite apart from anything else, at one point Jesus was supposed to have begun teaching in the synagogue, and there is no possible way that any carpenter would have been permitted to do that. But a scholar would actually have been expected to carry out this kind of duty, and nobody would have thought it unusual in any way.’
Bronson shook his head.
‘I still don’t see why that’s important.’
‘It’s important,’ Angela said, ‘because it possibly shows that the parchment is contemporary with whatever event it’s describing, and not something written much later. In particular, because the carpenter story became established quite quickly, it would be far more likely for a later writer to describe him as a teknon, using the Greek word, rather than the Aramaic naggar. It’s not proof positive, of course, but it does suggest – at least to me – that the parchment is most probably an authentic and contemporary record of something. We just don’t know what.’
94
Bronson drove the Renault, wearing the stolen number plates, through the streets of Madrid, constantly checking his mirrors and all around for potential problems. So far so good. As he had hoped, their hotel seemed to have been safe.
By ten thirty they were clear of the city – most of the traffic heading in the opposite direction, back into Madrid – and steadily heading north-west in the general direction of Valladolid. That wasn’t the ideal route, bearing in mind their ultimate destination, but Bronson had guessed that the majority of the surveillance would be concentrated on the obvious routes out of the city, either due north towards Burgos and Santander where the overnight ferry to Britain docked, or north-east towards Saragossa and on to the French border. Well before he reached Valladolid, he would swing north-east and head towards France, staying off the autopistas.
The further they got from Madrid, the lighter the traffic became, and Bronson was able to maintain a reasonably high speed, although he was careful to keep within the limits. The last thing he wanted, with three unlicensed pistols about his person, was to be stopped by a member of the Guardia Civil for an offence as mundane as speeding.
He’d seen nothing to give him the slightest cause for concern up until that moment, so when he saw a sign for Segovia he took it without hesitation, because the sooner they started driving towards the French border the better.
‘Where are we heading now?’ Angela asked.
‘Pau,’ Bronson replied. ‘It’s just north of the border and the Pyrenees. Even sticking to the minor roads we should be able to get there by late this afternoon.’
They stopped for petrol shortly after they’d made the turn towards Segovia. Bronson wanted to make sure they had plenty of fuel for the crossing of the Pyrenees, and adequate petrol in reserve, just in case at any point they had to make a run for it.
He was very aware that crossing the Pyrenees and later the English Channel would probably be the two most dangerous parts of the journey. There were very few roads linking France and Spain across the mountains, and putting a team of men on each one wouldn’t involve an enormous expenditure of manpower. And the opposition would need an even smaller number of people to cover both the Channel Tunnel terminal and the handful of ferry ports on the French side.
They could lose themselves in the byways of France without any difficulty, Bronson knew that. But first they had to get across the border. The main problem was that the major roads, or autopistas, which would allow them to travel quickly, also had barriers at each exit. These were obvious places where a watch could be kept for them, and where he would have nowhere to go if the opposition suddenly appeared in front of him.
But he had another idea. A car is a lethal weapon: over a ton of metal moving at sixty miles per hour takes a lot of stopping. He’d checked the maps very carefully before they’d set out, and he’d been pleased to find that there was at least one fast road across the mountains that didn’t have any barriers, due to a strange quirk in Spanish road-building practices.
‘So where are you planning on crossing the mountains?’ Angela asked, as though she was reading his mind.
‘We’re taking the E-7, which is an autovia. They look pretty much the same as autopistas, and are usually dual carriageways, but traffic like bicycles and tractors and stuff is allowed to use them. Once we get on that road, I can wind the speed up quite a bit and cross the border into France as quickly as possible without having to stop.’
‘I see what you mean,’ Angela said, looking down again at the road atlas on her lap. ‘That road is marked slightly differently. Do you think we’ll have a clear run through?’
Bronson glanced across at her and shook his head.
‘I genuinely don’t know. It all depends on how many men they have available to watch the roads over the mountains. And there are a lot of other factors, a lot of unknowns, as well. They might have access to helicopters, or possibly some of the members of P2 might actually be serving as police officers or forest rangers, that kind of thing. But it’s our best chance.’
95
The autovia ran fairly straight once it had left a small development called Villanua, and a short distance further on, positioned at the top of a small hill that offered an excellent view both up and down the road, a young Spaniard who called himself ‘Juan’ had been positioned with very specific instructions, a two-way radio and a set of powerful binoculars. Every time a car appeared on the gentle bend in the road where the autovia emerged from Villanua, he’d focused the binoculars on it.
He’d been lying in that same spot for a little over seven hours, and had been told that he was to stay there until it was too dark to see the occupants of any of the passing traffic. He’d also been told that there was a bonus in it for him if he managed to identify the vehicle his people were looking for.
As another car came into view, he tensed, focusing the eyeglasses on it, concentrating on the occupants. The people who had given him his
orders were well aware that their quarry might have changed the number plates, or even the car. Privately, he had assumed he was just wasting his time, and that the man and woman in question would be taking another route out of Spain. But it looked as if he’d been wrong about that. It was immediately apparent that there were two people in the vehicle, a large dark-haired man behind the wheel and a pretty blonde woman sitting in the front passenger seat.
Juan glanced down at the ground beside him, where he had a large A4-sized colour photograph of the woman they were looking for, then looked back through the binoculars. It was them.
The moment he was certain he picked up the two-way radio lying beside him and keyed the transmit button.
‘Miguel, soy Juan.’
For a few moments, there was no reply, and he imagined the man at the other end of the radio link, a couple of miles further up the valley, being almost startled by the hitherto-silent radio suddenly bursting into life. Then a deep voice, speaking heavily accented Spanish, sounded from the earpiece.
‘Si. Dígame. What is it?’
‘I’m looking at them, right now. They’re in a silver-grey Renault Megane, the same car as before, but the number plates have obviously been changed.’
When Miguel replied, his voice was tinged with excitement.
‘Are you sure? Completely certain?’
‘Yes. I’ve got a photograph of the woman. It’s definitely her.’
‘Right,’ Miguel snapped. ‘And they’re heading towards me? Give me the new registration number.’
As the target vehicle passed in front of the hill where Juan was lying, he read the number into the radio microphone.
‘Leave the next bit to me,’ Miguel said. ‘But make your way up here as quickly as you can. You know what to do when you get to the scene.’
‘Understood.’
Juan slid the binoculars into the case, picked up the remains of his scratch meal and stuffed everything into a bulky rucksack. He slung the straps over his shoulders and started jogging quickly down the slope to where he’d parked his old Suzuki jeep, at the side of the rough track that ran almost parallel to the autovia. He would be on the road behind the two fugitives in less than two minutes.
As he ran down the hill, he smiled slightly. The bonus was his.
96
Miguel had chosen his position with some care. He knew that there were no major junctions on the autovia to the north of Villanua until the road reached Canfranc-Estaciòn. There it split, the E-7 autovia running through the Túnel de Somport while the mountain road continued north, winding back and forth along the sides of the valleys until it finally rejoined the E-7 at Les Forges d’Abel, a few miles north of the French border. He had no doubt that if the two fugitives decided to try to leave Spain that way, they would take the tunnel. And that meant he had to stop them before they reached the entrance and vanished from sight into the solid stone safety of the mountain.
He knew it wouldn’t be easy. He’d had to choose a vantage point that was inevitably a compromise. He’d needed to be sufficiently far away from the road so that he would have a clear view of his approaching target and have time to take his shot, but close enough so that he would be reasonably certain of hitting it.
He had also wanted a long enough stretch in front of him so that if somehow he missed with the first round, he would have sufficient time to work the bolt on his favourite long-distance weapon, a Remington 700 BDL chambered for the powerful .270 Winchester round, and take his shot before the car moved out of sight. He needed at least two or three hundred yards distance.
Hitting a stationary target at that range, with that weapon, would not be difficult. But hitting a moving target, especially a car that could well be travelling at over one hundred kilometres an hour, was more complicated. He would have to factor in the bullet’s flight time, and aim his rifle not at where the target was, but at where it was going to be when the bullet arrived.
As soon as he ended his brief radio conversation with Juan, Miguel put the radio to one side. Then he lay down flat on the ground, getting as comfortable as possible, picked up the Remington, wound the leather strap around his left arm, formed a tripod with his two elbows, and stared down the valley through the powerful Schmidt & Bender 5-25 x 36 telescopic sight. At the same time he worked the bolt of the Remington to chamber the first round from the magazine, then checked that the safety catch was off.
Away to his right, three articulated lorries were moving slowly up the hill in the right-hand carriageway of the three-lane road, directly towards him, the elevated exhaust pipes belching black smoke into the clear mountain air. Behind them, a few cars were travelling much more quickly, making easier work of the incline.
Miguel focused on each one in turn. A white van was in the right-hand lane, travelling quite quickly, but with a line of three cars approaching in the centre lane to overtake it. Behind the van was another light-coloured car, the driver presumably waiting his turn before pulling out to go past the van.
Miguel quickly checked the overtaking vehicles, but none of them fitted the description of the car he was looking for, so he moved the barrel of the rifle microscopically until he could see the car boxed in behind the van.
He gave a sharp intake of breath as he recognized the Renault badge and glimpsed the first part of the registration number on the plate below it. The make, model and colour were correct, and when he moved his head slightly so that he could see the note he’d made during Juan’s call, he confirmed the number as well.
He looked again through the telescopic sight, lifting his field of view slightly to look at the occupants as a final check: a dark-haired man behind the wheel, a blonde woman sitting beside him. He couldn’t make out their features, but he had no doubt that Juan had identified them correctly.
Now all he had to do was pick his moment.
His orders had been unambiguous. The two Britons were not to make it out of Spain. Ideally he was supposed to just stop the car so that they could be taken alive to allow Tobí to enjoy himself with them. If that wasn’t possible – and as far as he could see it wasn’t an option because of the speed of the vehicle – then their deaths were to appear to be an accident. In either case, their luggage was to be removed and handed over to Tobí as soon as possible.
Making it look like an accident meant he couldn’t simply drive a bullet through the man’s chest. But at the speed that the car was travelling, blowing out one of the front tyres would probably do the trick. The driver would lose control and the car would hit the barrier on the right-hand side and with any luck somersault over it and hit the rough ground on the east side of the autovia. If he was really lucky, it might even end up in the river at the bottom of the valley.
All Miguel needed was a single clear shot at the front of the Renault, and it looked as if his opportunity was coming. The last of the three overtaking cars was now almost parallel with the target, and as soon as that vehicle moved clear, Miguel would take his shot.
He concentrated on the view through the telescopic sight, tracking the target as he estimated the approximate range to that point on the road, and calculated how much lead distance he would need to allow. In his peripheral vision, he saw another car beginning to approach from the south, but disregarded it. It was too far away to interfere with his shot.
The overtaking car moved clear, and for the first time since it had come into view, he could see all of the Renault clearly. As he had expected, as soon as the driver had the opportunity, he indicated left and began accelerating to pull out and overtake the van.
Miguel focused, allowed just a fraction more of an angle off to allow for the bullet’s flight time, and then squeezed the trigger.
97
‘It’s a pretty road this,’ Angela said, as Bronson began easing to the left to overtake the white van that they’d been following. ‘It’s just a shame there’s so much traffic on it.’
Bronson nodded and glanced in his mirror. Almost immediately, he depressed the b
rake pedal to slow down the car and moved back into the right-hand lane.
‘What’s wrong?’ Angela asked.
‘Nothing,’ Bronson replied. ‘But there’s a Porsche 911 on Barcelona plates coming up fast from behind us, and I’d rather he was in front. The English community in Catalonia call the locals “Barceloonies”, I gather, because of the way most of them drive.’
Then everything happened very quickly.
There was a loud bang from the white van Bronson had been planning on overtaking, and the entire rear of the vehicle lurched over to the left as the back tyre blew. There was a squeal of brakes from behind them as the driver of the Porsche 911 saw the unexpected shape of the van suddenly starting to fill the lane he was driving along. Bronson reacted instantly, steering the Renault over to the right, towards the hard shoulder and out of any danger.
The van driver hit his brakes as well, and steered the vehicle back into the right-hand lane and then over onto the hard shoulder. The driver of the Porsche gave a short blast on his horn, and, as Bronson waved, he accelerated past the disabled van. Then Bronson pulled out again, the car quickly picking up speed.
On the hill on the opposite side of the autovia, Miguel cursed and worked the bolt of the Remington to chamber another round. The unexpected action of the Renault driver in pulling back in after he’d started to overtake had meant he’d hit the tyre on the wrong vehicle.
But that shouldn’t matter. There was another straight stretch of road in front of the Renault, and now that the Porsche had almost vanished from sight, there were no other vehicles around to spoil his next shot.
Again, he tracked the front of the car through his telescopic sight, waiting for the vehicle’s speed to build up enough to make the ‘accident’ he had planned look like a viable outcome.
‘Oh, shit,’ Bronson muttered, as he accelerated past the white van, which had now come to a stop on the hard shoulder. The left-hand door had opened and the driver was climbing out to inspect the damage, damage that was also obvious to Bronson. The bullet hole through the rear wheel arch was impossible to miss, and he knew that the jagged hole hadn’t been there just seconds before.