Blake directed the beam of the flashlight onto the circular metal disc. Even though it was caked in blood, there was no question as to the identification of the object. The image of an eagle above the stamped imprint of a pyramid was clearly visible on the face of the Tyrian shekel.
A vivid green scarf fluttered in the branches of the large rhododendron bush in the church gardens.
Chapter 26
Blake’s thumb pressed down on the dark band of discolouration that encircled his left index finger like the imprint of a large signet ring. The areas either side of the discolouration lightened to a pale pink as he applied pressure, but the mark remained resolutely unchanged. Blake straightened his back and opened his hand flat on the armrest of the waiting room chair outside the hospital consulting room. He compared the colour of the darkened ring of skin with the chair’s dark grey upholstery. It was getting darker. He had checked it a fortnight ago against the same chair whilst waiting for his regular meeting with the consultant to discuss Sarah’s progress. Then the colour almost matched the chair’s fabric. Today, the mark was definitely darker.
A middle-aged female nurse with a friendly smile appeared at his side.
‘The consultant will see you now,’ she announced.
Snapping his hand shut, Blake thanked the nurse and got to his feet. The nurse gave the door a couple of quick knocks, waited a moment and then entered the room. Blake walked in behind, still ruminating about his finger and subconsciously wiping the back of his hand on his trousers.
‘Mr Blake,’ announced the nurse in a hushed tone to the doctor, who was busy typing up the notes from her previous patient.
‘Please take a seat, Mr Blake.’ The doctor peered over a pair of half-moon designer glasses. ‘I’ll be with you in just a second.’
As the consultant’s well-manicured fingernails tapped on her keyboard, Blake settled himself into his chair. He had already spent far too long in these places for one lifetime. First as a boy, recovering in a burns unit for three long months from the fire that razed the family bookshop to the ground. Now with Sarah: initially with the tortuous wait to see if she would ever wake up from her coma and now the long road of her rehabilitation.
With some ceremony, the consultant’s finger hit the return key and she turned her chair to face Blake.
‘Well, Mr Blake, I have some very good news for you.’
Blake’s eyebrow raised. He wasn’t used to getting good news from the medical profession.
‘At our last progress meeting, I think I said how pleased I had been with Sarah’s recent progress, under the management of her new physio.’
‘Alina,’ said Blake.
‘That’s right. Sarah and Alina have been working very hard together. As you know, there are no guarantees with this type of recovery, but in Sarah’s case, all the hard work is paying off. She really has come on in leaps and bounds.’
Blake wasn’t sure the choice of phrase was wholly suitable to describe a patient who, until relatively recently, had been struggling to walk five yards without the aid of parallel bars.
‘I was getting really worried about her, until Alina arrived,’ said Blake. ‘With everything that has happened, with the coma and her losing her mum, it’s been …’ Blake hesitated, his voice starting to crack, ‘it’s been very difficult for her.’ He paused a breath. ‘But now she’s like a different girl, like her old self again.’
‘Alina knows how to motivate and get the most from her patients and Sarah has been up for the challenge. It’s been really good that she could join the department temporarily.’
‘Temporarily?’ said Blake quizzically.
‘Alina is going back home to Bosnia, very soon.’
A concerned frown appeared on Blake’s face.
‘When?’ he said, his voice tightening.
‘Very soon. Her work visa is coming to an end, but with the progress Sarah is making, it shouldn’t be an issue.’
The consultant opened a manila file.
‘Sarah’s scores for flexibility, balance and muscle tone are significantly higher than even a few weeks ago,’ she said, flicking through the pages of Alina’s patient notes.
The consultant turned back to Blake with a wide grin.
‘I think you need to make preparations for Sarah to come home.’
Blake could feel a wave of emotion burst up through his chest and invade the back of his throat.
‘Very good. I’ll leave you to tell Sarah the good news.’ She checked her watch. ‘She should be finishing her physio session very soon.’
* * *
The sliding sign on treatment room five indicated the room was in use. Blake hovered outside the door for a second listening out for voices, but all was silent. Perhaps Sarah was already on her way back to the ward, he thought. Without knocking, Blake pushed down on the handle and eased open the door to the treatment room.
The scene that met his eyes sent lines of concern spidering across his temple and a pang of anxiety rattling through him. His gaze darted around, straining for some clue as to what was going on.
‘Is everything okay?’ he asked.
By the tears streaming down Alina’s ghostly pale cheeks, everything was far from okay. Sarah and Alina were sitting together at the far end of the room. Sarah was holding her physio’s hand and looking back towards her dad with obvious concern. Alina’s red-rimmed eyes were staring bleakly into mid-air.
‘Dad, can’t you do something?’ said Sarah.
‘I’m sorry sweetheart, I don’t know what’s going on?’
Sarah gently let go of Alina’s hand and shuffled forward onto the edge of her chair.
‘Alina’s leaving. She’s being thrown out of the country.’
Blake searched Alina’s drawn face. After a long breath, she started to speak.
‘I have been staying at a church shelter for the last few months,’ said Alina in a trembling voice. ‘The police and the immigration department have been doing spot checks. My visa has expired, and they have told the hospital and the shelter,’ she said sweeping the moisture from her cheeks. ‘Unless I make a new application within the week, I will have to return to Bosnia. The police have issued me a notice of deportation. Without a sponsor and a solicitor, I will have to leave. I have no money,’ she said with downcast eyes. ‘I have no home in Bosnia anymore; my family and my friends are gone.’
Chapter 27
Beads of sweat stood up on Blake’s forehead as his arm took another sweep with the paint roller. There was so much to be done and precious little time. Sarah would be back from hospital in days and whilst the condition of the house was just about acceptable for an ex-military man living by himself, it certainly wouldn’t do for Sarah’s return. Blake had been forced to sell their previous family home in Clerkenwell to cover the costs of her treatment. She received the best care available in London, and the family house had been a small price to pay.
Sarah’s bedroom was the priority, and Blake had worked through the previous night applying coats of light pink emulsion to the walls. He was happy with his handiwork and, except for a few pieces of furniture, some soft furnishings and a new light shade, Sarah’s room was finished.
Next on the list for a complete makeover was the large living room that dominated the downstairs of the tired, old Victorian townhouse. Like a windscreen wiper wiping away dirt, Blake’s paint roller travelled quickly over the dreary walls. The sound of the Rolling Stones playing through the small speaker of his mobile phone and the erratic buzz of a moth dancing around the light fitting overhead were Blake’s only company as he painted.
Despite the fatigue that had settled into every corner of his body, he worked on. Every so often he would offer the wall a tired smile, content in the thought that Sarah would soon be home.
He wiped the sweat away from his forehead with the back of his hand and crouched down to refill the paint tray. As he did so, his knee gave out a delicious cracking sound, relieving the dull ache that had built up over the
hours. He remembered the lecture his knee surgeon had given him. Although his operation had been a success, the type of gunshot injury he had sustained tended to leave cartilage fragments and other debris floating within the joint’s synovial fluid, causing intermittent pain and discomfort.
This bullet wound, Blake’s third, which he sustained during a terrifying chase for sacred treasure deep within the foundations of St Paul’s Cathedral, had almost cost him his life. What precisely happened in the minutes following the pistol shot to his knee was at best fragmentary: a knife at his throat; a black dog barking; the voice of the mysterious tattooed vagrant woman. Had she been the same woman that Milton had given chase to outside St George’s church?
Blake heaved a large tin of paint closer to himself. With the end of a teaspoon he eased open the lid and began to pour the blue paint into the tray. As he watched it ooze into the plastic container, some thought from the shadow lands of his subconscious surfaced briefly in his mind.
Blake picked up his phone and immediately silenced Keith Richard’s guitar powering through the opening riff to Jumpin’ Jack Flash. Several finger taps later, Blake had brought up a map of London. The snaking shape of the River Thames was clearly visible, twisting its way through the centre of the map. He reached over to the pack of new paintbrushes and punched his fingers though the clear plastic packaging. Selecting the largest brush, Blake flexed out its fibres on the back of his hand. He dipped the brush into the paint, wiped the excess onto the side of the tray and, using the map of London as his guide, started applying paint to the wall.
Minutes later, the distinctive shape of the River Thames had been painted out with artistic flair in blue some fifteen feet across. Referring back to his phone, he found the relative positions of St George’s church and the offices of the Servant Church of London against the winding profile of the river. This time he selected the smallest brush from the pack. Loading it with paint from the tray, he marked out the positions of the churches on the wall. One above the Thames and the other slightly below the loop of the river.
He stepped back and surveyed the improvised map. His fingers carefully searched for the point of the pencil sticking out from his back pocket. After tugging it free, he carefully wrote the name of each of the two locations on the wall. Blake stared at the oversized diagram for a long time. He reached for his phone and typed ‘Servant Church of London’ into the search window and pressed return. He picked the top result and quickly scrolled through the short introduction describing the church’s mission.
* * *
Our mission is to serve the city's most needy communities. Through our pastoral outreach programmes, the Servant Church of London is committed to bringing Jesus's gospel to the most marginalised and impoverished groups within the city. Although London is a modern and cosmopolitan city, many of its citizens are isolated and struggling to provide for themselves and their families.
These people are often neglected, ostracised, and overlooked by wider society. Since its formation in 1980, the Servant Church of London has been committed to providing care across a wide range of communities and ethnic groups, including the elderly, the homeless, newly arrived immigrants, victims of domestic violence, and men and women who are battling substance addiction. Through its drop-in shelter, the Church has provided food, temporary accommodation and healthcare services for hundreds of people.
Because of its extraordinary mix of people, unique history and traditions, we consider London to be one of the most strategic cities for the world mission of the Christian faith.
The Servant Church of London is a registered charity and funded through the generous donations of its members and supporters.
* * *
Blake rubbed his tired eyes and squinted at a link labelled ‘History’ in the website’s main menu. He clicked the link and waited a second for the page to load. The instant it had, Blake’s attention immediately homed onto two words within the paragraphs of returned text. It was as if the words ‘Nicholas Hawksmoor’ screamed out to him from the screen. He quickly found the start of the narrative.
* * *
St John Horsleydown was built between 1727 and 1733 near the south bank of the River Thames in Fair Street (now known as Tower Bridge Road, just south of the junction with Tooley Street). The church was built as one of the last churches of the Commission for Building Fifty New Churches set up by an Act of Parliament in 1710.
The church’s design was a joint undertaking between two architects. John James designed a simple square church body, to which Christopher Wren’s troubled student Nicholas Hawksmoor added an unusual spire. Hawksmoor’s steeple took the form of a tapered column, making it appear much taller than it actually was, topped by an extraordinary weathervane depicting a flaming comet.
The church was severely damaged by a bomb on 20 September 1940 during the London Blitz, but parts of the building remained in use for years afterwards. The church eventually closed in 1968, and the Servant Church of London (a Christian outreach organisation) bought the site from the Church Commissioners in 1982 for £27,811. The church’s crypt was emptied of its dead and moved to Brookwood Cemetery and Naismith House.
Redevelopment of the site by the Servant Church of London quickly followed. Interestingly, the Mission’s modern red-brick headquarters was built directly on the stone foundations of the original Hawksmoor church.
* * *
Blake’s mind zipped back to the crime scene at the headquarters of the Servant Church of London. He had clocked the difference in the structure of the wall whilst examining the wild arches of the victim’s blood that had been sprayed over its surface. The memory made him swallow heavily. He remembered a clear juncture line between the wall and the platform it was built upon. The platform was a plinth-like structure made of large rectangular stones, whilst the wall itself was made of much newer less substantial blocks. The larger stones must have come from the original Hawksmoor church.
All of the murders had been committed on the sites of Hawksmoor churches. The thought woke him up like a splash of cold water. It was beyond all doubt: these were ritual killings.
Chapter 28
Blake had trouble getting the key into the rusted front door lock. Sarah and Alina waited patiently on the doorstep behind him. They looked at each other for a moment before their confused expressions turned into a shared, playful grin. Finally, Blake turned the key in the lock and with a gentle shove, the door creaked open.
‘Welcome to your new home,’ he said, as he made a sweeping gesture and ushered them into the hallway. ‘It needs a bit of work granted, but it’s large enough and school is just five minutes down the road.’
Sarah gave her Dad a dismissive frown. ‘Do we have to talk about school?’ she protested with a huff.
‘Alright, no more mention of school for today,’ he conceded. ‘Did I tell you we are really close to Farringdon and Angel tube stations here?’
Blake could see the cogs of Alina’s brain working as he tossed his keys into a chipped blue soap dish that sat on top of an old bookcase by the door.
‘Circle and Northern tube lines,’ he said. ‘We’re smack bang in the centre of town here. Right in the thick of the action.’
Alina smiled at Blake’s turn of phrase and followed her new boss and Sarah through the first doorway on the left.
If Blake had been religious, he might have described it as divine intervention. Whether it was destiny or just good timing, Alina’s dire situation with the immigration authorities had afforded them all a mutually beneficial arrangement.
In the first place, Sarah needed regular physio sessions. She had made more progress in her short time with Alina than all her time battling with her previous physio. Secondly, if Alina was going to be allowed to stay in the country, she would need a sponsor, proof of employment and a residency address to support her visa application.
‘So, what do you think, like it?’ said Blake, trying to ignore the strong smell of paint fumes hanging in the air.
<
br /> The three of them were standing in the middle of a large Victorian front living room with high ceilings and a bay window that looked out upon the busy street outside. At the far end of the room hung a homemade banner constructed from numerous pieces of A4 paper and threaded together with a piece of string. Spanning the length of the far wall, it bore the words ‘Welcome home Sarah’ penned out in different colours. It reminded Sarah of a toothy grin.
‘Thanks, Dad,’ Sarah said appreciatively whilst surveying the newly decorated living room with an approving eye. ‘It’ll do,’ she said. ‘It needs a woman’s touch though. Some pictures, cushions, and a throw for the sofa should do it.’ Sarah tossed Alina a look to coax support for her assessment.
‘It’s very nice, Mr Blake. Very nice.’
‘Something else is missing,’ continued Sarah.
Blake shrugged his shoulders.
‘Books. Where are all your books? My dad is always reading. Thousands of books,’ she added for Alina’s benefit.
Without a pause for breath, another question came.
‘What’s that over there, Dad?’ Sarah pointed beyond the draped banner to the oversized hairpin of blue paint that dominated the back wall.
Blake hesitated, trying to shuffle the right words in his head to give an appropriate response to his daughter.
‘It’s a map. A map of London. The blue paint is the shape of the Thames,’ he said.
‘Cool,’ said Sarah dismissively, now noticing the gift wrapped in silver paper on a paint-dappled chair in the corner of the room.
‘Just a little something to welcome you back home,’ Blake said, a smile broadening across his face.
‘Can I?’ she asked through a slanted, little grin.
The Devil’s Architect: Book Two of the Dark Horizon Trilogy Page 10