The Swagger Sword

by David S. Brody

  Amanda shook her head. “Sorry, Father. That’s just not realistic. The Church will always default to obfuscation and denials. It’s in their nature. You won’t see reform until they get hit between the eyes with it.”

  Cam pulled into the snow-covered parking lot of what used to be the Cistercian monastery and was now the Cumberland public library. He circled around back on the access road, Amanda noticing that the four-wheel-drive vehicle easily navigated the few inches of snow. The library itself was closed for the holiday, but the trails through the woods behind it attracted a handful of dog-walkers and joggers out for some New Year’s Eve Day exercise. Amanda smiled ruefully. None of them had any idea what was hidden in the woods nearby. Hopefully the area by the Nine Men’s Misery memorial, located on a remote trail, would be unpopulated.

  Cam grabbed the shovel from the cargo area, along with a flashlight and tarp. Amanda frowned. “You sure that won’t draw too much attention to us?”

  “Good point.” He folded the shovel in half and handed it to Astarte; his backpack was filled with the tarp. He smiled. “Astarte, you can carry this with the dynamite.”

  “Can’t, Dad. My pack is full. I’ve also got the blowtorch.”

  Marcotte watched the exchange, slack-jawed. “Are you two serious?”

  Amanda touched his arm, feeling bad for insisting he stay in the car. But she still didn’t trust him. “Just ignore them.”

  “You sure you don’t want my help?” Marcotte asked.

  Amanda shook her head. “Nothing personal, but your help always seems to involve nasty blokes with ugly intentions.” Cam had told her about Marcotte’s comment that it was okay to let the devil help you cross the bridge in times of danger. “We’ll chance our way across this bridge ourselves, thanks.”

  Driving the same van he had used to transport Thorne the night before, Brian used the tracking device still attached to Thorne’s Pathfinder to follow his childhood friend back to the Cumberland monastery. Brian’s temper tantrum at the bank had served its intended purpose, making Thorne and the monsignor believe Brian had taken his ball and gone home. But even the three-year-old Brian would not have just walked away from a treasure. And the ten grand from the duffel bag barely covered his expenses.

  For the second time in two days Brian threw on an overcoat to cover his green pants, slid his semi-automatic rifle into a deep pocket, grabbed the binoculars, and followed Thorne and family into the woods. They took a different trail this time, heading north from the parking area rather than northwest. He glanced up at a trail marker: ‘Nine Men’s Misery Trail.’ Brian didn’t know who the nine men were, but he was well-acquainted with misery and comfortable in its presence.

  He loped along, keeping his distance, a half-smile on his face.

  The snow-covered trail ran through the winter woods, the trees forming a canopy of white above them. Cam watched Astarte. Unlike yesterday, when she skipped ahead, today she seemed subdued, as if tiring from this adventure. Or perhaps unnerved—in the past twenty-four hours, the dark shadow of looming danger had engulfed them. Cam and Amanda had tried to shield Astarte from it, but she was no idiot.

  A quarter-mile in, the Nine Men’s Misery monument slowly came into focus on a short spur off the main trail, the grey-white stones, camouflaged by snow, barely visible atop a knoll.

  “I almost walked by the bloody thing,” Amanda exclaimed, stopping only when Cam turned to point to it out. It seemed to float in and out of view from behind the tree branches as if an apparition.

  “Some people say it’s haunted,” Astarte said, reading from her phone. “They say the ghosts sometimes hide the monument from visitors they feel are unfriendly. Some medical students dug up the bones in the late 1700s because they thought there was a giant buried here.”

  Amanda shivered. “Well, the ghosts will likely not fancy us digging into the cairn.”

  Cam smiled. “And yet they didn’t hide it from us.”

  Cam’s inclination was immediately to examine the cairn, but Amanda drew his attention to the setting. “This is a beautiful spot. Up on a hill, with a stream running below. And you can hear the birds singing, even in the winter.” She closed her eyes and lifter her face to the snow. “I can see why they chose it.” She squeezed Cam’s arm. “We’re in the right spot. I can feel it.”

  Astarte nodded. “I agree with Mum. This feels right.”

  They all walked around the industrial freezer-sized cairn, examining it. As they had read, the monks had added concrete to the cobblestones originally marking the gravesite, stabilizing the memorial and preventing any attempts at further disturbance. In front of the cairn the monks had erected a concrete site marker with a faded metal sign mounted on its face. Captioned, “Nine Men’s Misery,” it read:

  ON THIS SPOT WHERE

  THEY WERE SLAIN BY

  THE INDIANS

  WERE BURIED THE NINE SOLDIERS

  CAPTURED IN PIERCE’S FIGHT

  MARCH 26, 1676

  “Wow,” Cam said. “I know that’s not considered old by European standards, but 1676 is getting back there in American history.”

  Amanda smiled. “In Britain we teach the 17th century as part of modern European history.”

  Astarte brought them back to the present. “Um, guys, the ancient scroll?” She had circled the cairn, pushing the snow off with her sleeve. “I don’t see how we get inside.”

  Cam dropped to his knees in the snow and felt underneath the cairn, searching for a void or opening. Using the folding shovel, he next probed even deeper. Exhaling, he stood and brushed himself off. “I couldn’t find any openings either.”

  Amanda had also circled the pile, pushing and twisting the stones in hopes one might move or trigger an opening mechanism like in an action movie. “I struck out also.”

  Cam clapped his hands together to fight off the cold. “We can’t have come all this way only to fail now. There must be a way in.” He turned to Amanda. “Can you read the poem again?”

  She had taken a photo with her phone and read aloud:

  “Nine brave men did meet their fate,

  Their sacrifice monks did commemorate.

  They joined Jesus their Lord in heavenly rest,

  Yet still guard the scroll of your earthly quest.”

  She shrugged. “It tells us where the scroll is hidden, but not how to get in.”

  “Wait,” Astarte said. “There was something else in the locket.” She pulled a small stone from her pocket. “This was sitting on top of the poem. Maybe it was meant to do more than just point us to a stone pile.”

  “You think it’s some kind of key?” Cam asked, peering at the almond-sized dark rock. It was smooth-faced, an unlikely candidate for a key. But maybe…

  Astarte squinted, studying it. “I wonder,” she mused. She moved toward the front of the monument, where the concrete pedestal-shaped pillar stood. She brushed away the snow, turning to make sure Cam and Amanda were watching. Cam understood immediately what she was doing. The magnetic piece of cumberlandite would adhere to the metal sign.

  But before Astarte could touch the stone to the sign, Amanda burst her bubble. “I see what you’re doing, honey, but it’s not going to work. The metal has a green patina. So it’s likely copper. Not magnetic.” She touched Astarte’s arm. “Nice try, though.”

  Astarte’s shoulders slumped briefly, then she seemed to regather herself. She shook her head, as if not accepting the laws of nature. She held the stone up against the sign and released it. Rather than thudding to the ground, it snapped against the metal, drawn to it just as she expected. Just, apparently as the Cistercian monks had planned almost a hundred years ago.

  “Wait, what?” Amanda said. She tapped the sign, scratched it with her fingernail. “It’s copper. I’m certain.”

  Cam stepped forward. “I wonder.” He removed his utility knife from his back pocket and snapped open the screwdriver. Ignoring the cold, he threw off his right glove and set to work removing the four screws hold
ing the sign in place. They had been set deep, and the decades of weathering had encrusted them, but eventually he wrestled them out. Cam pulled the sign loose and turned it over.

  “There,” Astarte said triumphantly. A metal plate the size of a playing card had been attached to the back of the thin copper sign.

  “They put that metal there to make the sign magnetic. I was sure this would work. It’s the final clue. Why else would the monks have put the stone in the pendant with the poem?” She pointed to the void revealed by the removal of the sign, a rectangular hole the size of a paperback book. “This is the right spot. It has to be.”

  Cam set the sign atop the pedestal and took a deep breath. This felt right, felt like the end of the road. They had followed clues, deciphered riddles, parsed poems. Not to mention dodged bullets and outsmarted enemies. Now, here in the serenity of the woods, their journey was ending.

  He quickly brought Amanda and Astarte together into an embrace. “Love you both so much,” he breathed.

  Amanda squeezed his arm. “Love you too, honey. But will love you even more if you find that scroll.”

  Astarte grinned. “And I suppose I can tolerate you. If you find the scroll, that is.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Why am I always the sappy one?”

  He brushed aside some cobwebs and turned on his cell phone flashlight. The void angled back and then down, widening where it turned downward. But the dogleg shape made it impossible to see the bottom of the niche. “Smart,” Cam said. “I can’t see the bottom. If they ever needed to replace the sign, the scroll would remain hidden.”

  Amanda bit her lip. “Assuming the scroll really is in there.”

  He stood on his tiptoes and leaned in, burying his arm to the shoulder. But still he couldn’t reach the bottom. “Damn,” he breathed.

  Amanda smiled. “Maybe they had longer arms back then.”

  “Can I see?” Astarte asked. Cam stepped aside as she peered into the void. “I have an idea.” She withdrew a makeup compact from her purse and snapped off the mirrored top. Next she popped a piece of chewing gum into her mouth. “I read this once in a Nancy Drew book,” she explained. She chewed vigorously for a few seconds, stuck the gum to the back of the mirror, and handed it to Cam. “Stick the mirror on the back wall of the hole, where it angles.”

  Cam nodded. “Got it.”

  He did so, then shined his light onto the hole. By moving his head side to side and forward and back, he could see the entire void reflected in the mirror. “There. In the left front corner.” He felt a flutter of excitement. “I think I see a canister.”

  Amanda looked in over his shoulder. “I see it also.”

  “That must be it.” He removed his jacket. “Now that I know exactly where it is, I can reach for it better.” Opening the longest blade on his utility knife, he reached deep into the hole again, aiming for the tube. With a flick of his wrist he scraped his target. Stretching even further, the stone cutting into his armpit, he held the knife with the tip of his fingers and flicked at the canister again, this time causing it to roll toward the middle of the void. Another flick brought it even closer. “Okay,” he breathed. “I’m getting there. It’s in the middle at least.” He knelt down, untied his boot and pulled the shoelace through. Making a slipknot, he leaned deep in again, swinging the lace at the tube and finally looping underneath it. Slowly he tightened the knot and then lifted, holding his breath, concentrating on not scraping the canister against the side of the void and dislodging it, his mind oddly reverting back to the old Operation game he played as a child. At the halfway point he planted his feet firmly on the ground and reached his left hand into the hole. Slowly he felt for the tube, cupping his fingers underneath. Got it. With a flourish he swung his arm out of the hole and, exhaling, handed his prize to Amanda. “Ancient scroll in a tube, take two,” he said.

  “Better let me open this one,” she said. “You were bad luck last time.”

  A tinny clank echoed from inside the pedestal, interrupting them. “Speaking of bad luck,” Astarte said, “I think that was my mirror falling.”

  “That’s not bad luck for us,” Cam said, smiling. “That’s bad luck for the Vatican hardliners or Brian or whoever else comes looking for the scroll. All they’re going to find at the bottom of that void is your broken mirror.”

  Amanda had spread her scarf on top of the cairn and laid the canister atop it. She took Cam’s knife and pried out the beeswax from the top of the tube. She peered in, then sniffed. With her phone she shone a light in, confirming the contents. “A scroll. And it smells like animal skin. Parchment.” She grinned. “I’m not going to open it out here, but I think we hit the jackpot.”

  Astarte jogged ahead on the snow-covered trail, her half-empty backpack bouncing on her back. She was anxious to get back to the parking lot and, finally, head back to Westford. She checked her phone. Not even three o’clock. If they hurried, she’d still have time to take a quick shower and meet her friends at Papa Gino’s for dinner. Then there was a party that Raja knew about. After everything she had been through, her parents just had to let her go, even if only for a few hours. Not that they’d let her stay until midnight. She’d need to figure out some way to convince Raja to kiss her before then, and also to remember not to eat any garlic bread at dinner. Maybe some joke about it being midnight in Ireland, where she just was, and people must be kissing over there already…

  A gloved hand covered her mouth and jerked her head sideways. Before she even knew what was happening, she had been yanked off the trail and behind a tree. Panic washed over her. She began to kick and fight and try to scream. The arm twisted her neck further, threatening to snap it. “Enough of that. And don’t say a word.” A man’s voice, his acrid breath close to her ear. Brian. She sensed his presence even though she could not see him. “Listen carefully. You will be coming with me. The only question is whether I kill your parents or not. Your choice.” He pressed his full body into hers, the shovel in her backpack digging into her spine. “Come quietly and nobody gets hurt. Or make a scene and I start shooting.”

  Panic turned to cold fear. This was an evil man. She did not doubt that he would kill if necessary. Her mouth still covered, she mumbled, “Okay,” and nodded. Westford and her friends and pizza suddenly seemed far, far away.

  “Good. Smart girl. Stay smart and nobody gets hurt. All I want is the scroll.”

  Swinging her away from the main trail, he led her through thick brush and down a steep slope before ducking behind a thicket of trees. She had to force her legs to move, as if she were wading through deep snow. They watched as Cam and Amanda ambled past, oblivious to the fresh tracks leading into the woods. “Come on,” he said, his glove tightening over her mouth as if he could sense her desperate desire to call out. They cut through the woods, in a direction that Astarte could see would lead them back to the parking lot in a more direct path than the winding one Cam and Amanda were taking. In less than a minute they burst through the underbrush and stepped over a guardrail to the parking lot bordering the woods. To their right, a hundred yards away, Cam and Amanda would soon be joining them in the parking lot at the main trail entrance point. Brian pushed her in that direction, toward a lone gray van parking haphazardly across two spaces near some kind of maintenance garage. A few other cars were also parked in the lot, but their occupants apparently were off in the woods, oblivious to the drama unfolding nearby. At the van, Brian stopped and leaned against the side of the vehicle. Drawing her backward into his body, he looped his left arm around her neck and with his right drew a long gun from his overcoat. It looked like the same kind of gun, a semiautomatic rifle, those shooters used when they attacked schools. She fought, unsuccessfully, to take her eyes off it, knowing how lethal the weapon could be. “Now we wait,” he growled, his breath again on her face. “Remember, do nothing stupid and nobody gets hurt.”

  She wanted to believe him, yet knew better. People intending no harm didn’t carry attack rifles. But she also knew
there was nothing she could do about it. His left arm was like a vice around her neck. And the gun made an escape impossible even if she somehow broke free.

  Ten seconds passed, Astarte and her captor frozen in time against the side of his van. First Amanda, then Cam, exited the trail to the parking lot. They froze without taking a second step. “Astarte,” Amanda yelped, covering her mouth. Cam merely stared, his mouth open.

  “Stay there, Thorne,” Brian said calmly. “Don’t try to be a hero. You know how I hate heroes.”

  “What do you want?” he asked, swallowing.

  “Simple trade. The scroll for the girl. A treasure for a treasure.”

  Cam raised his chin. “You expect us to trust you?”

  “Really, Cameron?” Brian said, his voice rising. If Astarte hadn’t known better, she would have thought his feelings had been hurt. He cleared his throat. “You really think I would kill her just for the fun of it?” His body seemed to sag a bit behind her. She glanced over at the garage building only a car length away. There, by the propane tank, that door was ajar. If she could break away, get through the door. His hand was gloved, but if she bit hard enough…

  Amanda cut off Astarte’s strategizing. She strode forward, the clay tube held out in front of her like a baton. “Deal, Brian. Here it is. Just don’t hurt her.”

  Brian raised the gun. “Stop right there.” He swallowed, close to Astarte’s ear. “How do I know that’s the real tube?”

  Amanda angled the tube so that the open top faced him. “You can see the scroll inside. And if you let me get closer, you can smell the parchment.” She shrugged. “Besides, who carries around an extra clay tube?”

  Astarte thought about the movies, thought about doing something heroic like telling them to keep the tube, to not worry about her. But the truth was she wanted them to do anything they could to get her away from Brian. She murmured through the glove. “That’s it. That’s the right one.”