The Secret Of The Cathars (2011)

by Michael Hillier

  “Oh, absolutely, old chap,” Bernard hastened to assure him. “I know how careful all you archaeologists are not to miss anything.”

  When they got back to Quillan, Bernard took Jackie aside. “I believe I’ve settled all the hotel bills and anything else that I know about. Any contractors, such as the scaffolders, can send their invoices straight to TV France, where the orders came from. Now then,” he patted her hand, “here’s ten thousand for you to keep you going until your big cheque comes through in a week or so. Let me know if you need any more.”

  “Where does all this cash come from?” asked Philip.

  “My dear chap, it comes straight out of the coffers at TV France.”

  “When did you get it?”

  “Oh, I had to call round there before I set off to come here. They opened up especially for me. I can tell you, it was after midnight.”

  “It seems an awful lot of cash for a TV company to have lying around in their safe.”

  In reply Bernard just shrugged before enfolding Jackie in his embrace.

  “Keep your pecker up, old girl.” He glanced at Philip. “Mind you, you seem to be in good hands. Goodbye. I’ll see you soon. Now, where’s that chap, Gaston?”

  The man was waiting outside. Jackie saw the pair of them off. Philip kept out of the way. When she came back in she announced, “Well, that’s all of them gone now. Armand and Jeanette left half an hour ago. All the others had already gone. What about Jean-Luc?”

  “He disappeared while the rest of us were up at le Bezu.”

  “He never said goodbye.”

  “He’s not exactly a social person,” said Philip. “Oh, that reminds me. When you were walking round the castle, I was in the shed some of the time. If you remember I collected the record books for you. While I was there that journalist woman turned up again.”

  “I didn’t see her.”

  “Well, I hope you won’t mind.” He cleared his throat. ““She said that she wanted to interview you about progress and what you’d found about the Cathar occupation of the site. I’m afraid I told her that it was all over and that the whole place was being closed down. Did I do wrong?”

  “It’s not important any more. What did she say in reply?”

  “Oh, she just decided that she was obviously wasting her time and moved off again. I didn’t see her after that.”

  Jackie shrugged. “Forget it. So, we’re all alone here now, are we?”

  “I suppose we’d better check with reception.”

  When they did so, they were informed by a disappointed concierge that their two bedrooms were now the only two occupied rooms in the hotel.

  “Are you going to move in with me?” she asked.

  “Yes please.” He grinned. “We might as well keep a tight rein on our money even if we seem to be awash with the stuff at the moment.”

  “Well, we can at least make sure that we lunch well. I’m hungry and I expect the chef will be willing to get us a late lunch.”

  Over the meal Philip said to her, “I felt a fraud taking the two thousand euros. I’ve really only done two days work.”

  “Rubbish, you’ve done more than most. If nothing else, you’ve kept the director sane.” She pulled a face. “Besides, after the way Alain has treated me, I want to take TV France for every euro I can.”

  After an excellent lunch they moved Philip’s things into her room and took a restful siesta which turned into a love-making session from which they emerged at about six o’clock.

  “It’s a bit early for dinner,” Philip observed.

  “I couldn’t eat another thing after that lunch. Why don’t we just have a drink somewhere and come back here after that.” She smiled coquettishly. “I’m sure we could find a way of passing the rest of the evening.”

  Philip thought she seemed to have recovered well from her shock of the morning. “Well, actually I’ve been thinking. This evening would be as good a time as any to go up to the site and do some poking around. I want to find out about this Cathar secret and it’s likely to be very quiet up there at the moment.”

  “Are you sure about this? By the time we’ve got changed into work clothes and driven up to the castle it will be nearly seven o’clock - not long before it gets dark.”

  “That’s just the point. There won’t be any visitors looking round at that time of day. You see, Jackie, I’ve been thinking about that bit of masonry walling while you were sleeping. I know it’s partly above the new stone slabs. However, if you remember in the journal, the shallow cave where they hid the bamboo tubes was high up in the room. Why do you think they put this new paving over such a large area?”

  “You’re going to tell me.” She was alert now.

  “I think it’s because the roof of this room, or the floor above it, had already been removed before they used it to store whatever they put there. Or perhaps the floor wasn’t very strong and they decided to replace it with the new slabs. Anyway, I think it’s possible that the new paving had been laid lower than the old floor and ended up being fixed across the stone rubble walling which my ancestor used to block up the cave.”

  “Well, it’s a possibility. How large was the cave?”

  “As far as I remember - in modern measurements it was about two metres long by over a metre and a half high.”

  “And how big is the bit of stone walling?”

  He rubbed his forehead. “Well, the length is about right. You can only see about half a metre of walling above the stone slabs, but I don’t know how far down it goes below the slabs.”

  “Hmm.” She looked up at the ceiling, trying to picture the area. “I suppose it’s worth a try.”

  Philip leaned forward persuasively. “And this evening would be a good time to look. If anybody is still interested in what we’re doing, they’ll be less likely to watch us at night. I noticed there was still a bag of tools in the shed - hammers, small cold chisels and crow-bars. We could use those.”

  “It might be a bit dodgy if we were stuck up there in the dark.”

  “Ahah,” he said triumphantly, “I have acquired a torch.”

  She laughed. “You seem to have thought of everything. All right. I agree.”

  So they got dressed in working clothes - jeans, sweaters and safety boots - and went up to le Bezu in Philip’s little car. It was about a quarter past seven by the time they’d picked up the bag of tools from the shed, carefully locking the door behind them, and made their way down to the trench. It obviously hadn’t been touched since Armand and Philip were taken away from the area the previous day.

  When they got there, Jackie asked, “Is it going to take a lot of work to demolish the wall?”

  “Hopefully it won’t take long levering with that crow-bar. Luckily we’ve got better tools than my ancestor had.”

  However it took more than half an hour to get the first stone out. It had been very firmly hammered in by the people who built the wall. Philip had to virtually smash the stone into pieces to get it out. Finally it was done and he pulled away the last of the rubble. Then he groaned because he found he was only looking at the face of the natural rock behind the wall with a cavity only a few centimetres wide.

  “Don’t worry,” said Jackie. “Phillipe de Saint Claire said the cave was quite shallow. It will get deeper as we remove more stone.”

  Philip realised she was right. So he concentrated on getting the next stone out, which was a much easier task. Gradually he enlarged the hole down to the paving level, handing her the stones when he pulled them out. As he did so, he found that the cavity was indeed getting deeper. Although they tried to remain calm, the atmosphere was getting more tense.

  At last he decided the hole was big enough to get his head in.

  “Can you see anything?” asked Jackie.

  “It’s pitch black in here. Have you got the torch?”

  He held out his hand and she gave it to him. He could just make room to squeeze it in beside his head. He switched it on and was momentarily blinded
by the glare. However he moved the torch away from his eyes and pointed it down into the darkness of the expanding cavity. It appeared to just be an empty black hole.

  “There’s nothing here,” he said disappointedly. “This can’t be the right place. There must be more than one little cave in this rock wall.”

  He waggled the torch around, trying to point it right down to the bottom of the void. Then suddenly he thought he saw something.

  “Wait a minute. There is something there - right down at the bottom. But I can’t see what it is.”

  There wasn’t enough room to manoeuvre the torch into a position to light the far extremities of the cavity. Then he had the bright idea of turning the torch up to shine on the rock face so that the reflection would reach the bottom of the hole.

  “Yes,” he called excitedly, “I can see something. It’s not very easy to tell what it is but it looks a bit like some sticks - straight sticks. They’re right down at the bottom, close to the wall and partly obscured by stones projecting above them.”

  “Bamboo tubes look like sticks,” she reminded him. “Let me have a go.”

  He withdrew his head and let her look down, pointing the torch for her to try and give her enough light. After a minute or so, she pulled her head out again.

  “I’m not sure,” she admitted. “There are so many shadows. But I think there’s definitely something there.” She looked at him. “But how are we going to reach them? They seem to be an awful long way down.”

  Philip had been turning this over in his mind. The cavity seemed somewhat deeper than his ancestor had described. It was indeed a long way to the bottom.

  “Well,” he said, “I don’t think it’s much over a metre down from the top of the paving - perhaps a metre and a quarter. If we clear a decent-sized hole and remove the course of stonework below the edge of the stone slabs, I could lower myself head first into the cavity. You would have to hang on to my legs. Then, with my arms outstretched, I think I could reach whatever it is.”

  So they set out to enlarge the hole. This took well over half an hour. By the time they had made it large enough to get the whole of his upper body into the void it was almost dark. Jackie pointed this out.

  “Do you think we ought to give up for tonight and come back tomorrow morning?”

  “Not likely. Not now we’re this close. We’ve got the torch to light the path back.” He took a breath. “Come on, Jackie. I’m ready to go in now.”

  Space was restricted in the narrow trench, but Philip lay down on his stomach and eased his way into the enlarged hole. With Jackie hanging on to his legs he was able to gradually wriggle down into the cavity. His progress was made more difficult by the back of one large stone which projected into the void and squeezed his chest. How was he going to get past this?

  “Can you pass me the torch?”

  He reached back one arm and she put it into the palm of his hand. He noticed she had the foresight to have already switched it on. He manoeuvred it past his body and pointed down into the hole. Now it was much clearer.

  “Yes, it’s definitely the tubes. They’re wrapped in some kind of material. That’s what made them so difficult to see clearly before. The fabric seems to be sticking out in strange shapes but has gone almost transparent with age.”

  “If you can get hold of the tubes you can pass them up to me.”

  In response he tried to reach down to them but he knew he wouldn’t make it. The big projecting stone meant that the tips of his fingers were still at least thirty centimetres from the nearest tube.

  “I just can’t reach them.”

  “If you slide down further I can still hold you.”

  “The problem is that one of the lower stones is very big. It projects into the cavity such a long way that I can’t get my head past it and my arms aren’t long enough to reach down to the tubes without getting part of my body past this large stone. I’ll have to break it off or knock it out of the way to reach to the bottom.”

  “That sounds like a long job,” said Jackie. “It’s almost completely dark now. I don’t think we’ve got any choice but to abandon it for tonight and come back in the morning.”

  “Let me just have one more try. Then we’ll pack it in.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Give me the hammer. I think there may be a bit of movement in this big stone. If I can push it out of the way just a little I may be able to get past it.”

  Philip transferred the torch to his left hand and reached back with his right. Still sitting on his legs, she put the hammer into it.

  He pushed his body to one side to give space to swing the hammer a little. There wasn’t room to get much momentum, but he gave the large stone as strong a knock as he could. He put the end of the torch in his mouth and used his left hand to try and wriggle it loose. There was a definite feeling of movement there. He took another swing at it and felt there was a clear loosening of the large stone. One more swing and he might push it out of the way.

  He put all his strength into the next violent whack which he gave to it and the stone suddenly went. With a violent rush and rumble the whole wall gave way below him and cascaded into the void. And with it, before his horrified gaze, the five bamboo tubes lifted on end and fell from his sight. As they went he dropped the hammer and made a despairing grab at one as it upended and fell and he triumphantly caught hold of the end of it. But in the excitement he opened his mouth to shout about his success. He let go the end of the torch and it disappeared into the black hole and was immediately extinguished.

  - 23 -

  “What happened,” gasped Jackie as the rumble of the falling stones died away and darkness descended on them.

  “Oh hell,” rejoined Philip. “The whole wall has collapsed into the void below the slabs. I guess that must be the room which my ancestor was in when he hid the stuff. All the tubes but one have gone with it. I don’t know what has happened to them. But I just managed to grab one.”

  “Can you hand it up to me? Then I’ll pull you up.”

  “OK.” With a bit of wriggling he managed to get the length of bamboo, which was swathed in some sort of greased fabric, past his body and Jackie took it.

  “Can you help me out now?”

  It took several minutes of pushing and heaving to extract his body from its bent position in the hole. At last he was able to stand up and brush some of the earth and dust from his clothes.

  Jackie grinned at him. “You look like a scarecrow.” She smoothed his tousled hair. “Actually, I think you’d make rather a sexy scarecrow.”

  “I think we’d better keep sex out of it until we’ve got ourselves out of this mess. I’m afraid I’ve also dropped the bloody torch. I put it in my mouth so that I could have both my hands free. Then, when the wall caved in and I grabbed at the tube, I let it go.”

  “Well, that means we can’t do any more tonight, without a light. We’ll have to come back in the morning to see what we can find.” She shrugged. “At least we’ve got one tube to look at.”

  Philip felt a new surge of hope after the heart-stopping moment of seeing everything disappear into a black hole from just beyond his reach. “Now we’ve got the problem of getting out of here carrying that one precious bamboo tube.”

  “I’ll keep it close to my chest and hang on to you.”

  He looked back at what he could see of the opening in the rock. “Do you think that hole is too obvious?”

  “Only if someone comes all the way down here. Who’s going to do that tonight?”

  “That’s right. And we’ll be back here first thing in the morning.”

  So they set off back up the rough track, slipping and stumbling in the dark. It took them a long time to get up to the main site. Jackie was carefully cradling the precious tube in her arms and Philip was trying to support her and prevent her from losing her balance on the rough ground. Yet twice she nearly dropped it and the second time she fell heavily and bruised her shoulder protecting the piece o
f bamboo.

  When they reached the office, she said, “It’s no good, Philip. We daren’t risk damaging this as we go down the path.”

  “We’re over the worst part now,” he pointed out. “There’s less risk of dropping it going to the car.”

  “But it’s still rough going in the dark. I don’t think you realise, Philip, that this is a most valuable artefact. We don’t know how fragile the contents are after nearly eight hundred years. I couldn’t face my professional colleagues if I was responsible for damaging it or causing it to deteriorate in some way.”

  “What are you going to do with it?”

  “I think we should leave it here in the office.”

  “Huh. We should have thought ahead and brought a padded bag to carry it. We must do that in the morning.” He shook his head. “But will it be safe here?”

  “I’ll put it under the desk and pile some papers and equipment on top of it. That should keep it safe till morning. We’ll come up here as soon as we can with a bag.”

  “I want to do that anyway. I’ve got to be able to let myself down into the void under the slabs to rescue the other tubes. I just hope they’ve not been seriously damaged. At least the stones went first and, because they’re heavier, they should have hit the floor first and the tubes should have landed on top.”

  “I pray they’re not smashed.” She chuckled humourlessly. “I’m beginning to think of myself as the worst kind of treasure hunter - chasing after artefacts without a thought for what I’m destroying in my search. I’ve always hated that sort of person.”

  “Wait a minute, Jackie. We did agree that I probably have first right to these things, although I guess I’d have a problem trying to prove that in a French court of law. And it was me who blundered by knocking that big stone out of the way.”

  “But Philip, the information contained in these tubes may be vitally important to historical researchers. It’s something we owe to posterity.”

  He put his arm round her. “Of course you’re right. We must do everything we can to care for the tubes and their contents.”