Behind the two actors stood the weird sisters, three modestly gowned and visaged witches—not a hooked nose or wart among them—speaking incantations over a cauldron decorated with a scowling face not unlike that of the Bellarmine bottle.
“Hello there, Jean!”
Jean spun around, shedding bits of imagery like water droplets.
Tim Dingwall stood in the doorway of the Cheese Shop. “We’re waiting for you. You said eleven o’clock.”
No, they hadn’t said they’d actually meet her on the patio, she’d just made an assumption. Not the first time she’d been wrong. With her best ingratiating smile, Jean wove her way among the tables and up the steps into the shop.
Tim held the door open for her. As she brushed past, she caught a whiff of stale sweat from his tweed jacket. It seemed as much a costume as his admiral’s outfit, Jabba the Hutt playing the respectable academic. Inside, Sharon was inspecting a rack of chocolates, her long brown skirt, fuzzy brown cardigan, and big brown tote bag blending right in. “Not a bad selection,” she stated, turning to Jean. “There’s no table service?”
“Afraid not.” Jean indicated the “Place order here” sign over a counter at the back of the shop.
Sharon and Tim planted themselves in front of a student-age server and barraged her with questions—were the cheeses made locally? Were they kept properly refrigerated? Were the meats fresh? Were the breads whole-grain or gluten-free? Were the chips fried in transfats and were the cookies made with cane sugar or high-fructose corn syrup? After every answer they paused to reflect, as though the fate of the free world hinged on their decisions.
Jean hovered, increasingly aware of the line starting to snake between the shelves of crackers, teas, and wines. She couldn’t pretend she wasn’t with them. She tried Alasdair’s ploy of holding up her arm and staring at her watch, but neither Dingwall noticed.
At last they placed an order, then transferred their attention to the long, refrigerated case holding chilled beverages. There they read labels and debated the merits of different drinks while the slightly shell-shocked server handed two food baskets across the counter to Jean.
By the time Tim and Sharon finalized their choices, and Jean paid for their lunches and her own bottle of flavored tea—what Alasdair didn’t see her drinking wouldn’t hurt him—she was ready to buy a cup of ice, too, just to put down Tim and Sharon’s backs. Instead, she joined them at a table tucked into the outer corner of the patio and told herself to just sit back and think of Great Scot. This was going to make a fine article.
“You should have something to eat,” Tim said. “You must watch out for your blood sugar.”
“I had a big breakfast. Besides, I need to take notes.” And she was still digesting the word murder. Jean opened her notebook to a clean page and inspected her collection of two-and-a-half pencils. Yep, nice and sharp.
Sharon eyed the blank paper. “Can’t Great Scot afford a PDA? That was a really expensive dress Miranda was wearing last night.”
“Entering my notes on the computer gives me a chance to get started on the article,” Jean told her, which was almost the truth and didn’t make her sound like a Luddite. “You began as journalists in California, right?”
“We met each other at the Los Angeles Alternative News.” Tim took a huge bite of his pastrami sandwich and went on, words muffled, “Was in Los Angeles we discovered patterns behind major news stories.”
On cue, Sharon presented the official Dingwall platform: “The establishment-controlled media and their obsession with junk news keep the public distracted from the truth about the secret societies whose collusion has shaped religious, economic, and political history and controls our lives today.”
“Puppet masters,” added Tim, still chewing. “Junk news opiate of people.”
Being media herself, Jean knew that the entities pulling the strings and jerking the chains were marketers, accountants, and stockholders chasing the almighty dollar. Pound. Euro. Yen. Rupee. “ ‘Opiate of the people’. That’s Karl Marx, isn’t it, writing about religion?”
“Good heavens, we’re not communists!” Sharon started dissecting her chicken salad sandwich. “Dark meat. Just doesn’t sit well. I bet that’s where the growth hormones and other chemicals collect. Agribusiness, you know.”
Yes, selling meat, like selling stories, was a time-honored capitalist enterprise.
Tim washed down his cud with a swig from his O’Doul’s. Alcohol-free beer. What was the point? Alasdair would have asked.
“Religion is no opiate,” said Tim. “Religion is prejudice fomented by the ruling classes in order to keep the rest of the world’s population from uniting against them.”
“I see.” Nothing like throwing the spiritual baby out with the fanatic bathwater, Jean thought, but then, that was a popular pastime these days. She glanced back at her notes. “Then you lived in Roswell, New Mexico, investigating the UFO phenomenon. Do you believe the media is hiding the truth about UFOs?”
“The truth about UFOs is that they do not exist. All the stories about them, no matter how popular, are merely smoke and mirrors. They provide yet more distraction from the real issues.”
Sharon reassembled her sandwich, leaving half its components behind, and took a tiny bite. “There’s no such thing as the supernatural. No UFOs. No angels, no devils. No ghosts, no vampires, no witches. The witchcraft craze in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries was engineered by the ruling societies. Their demagogues, their agitators, stirred up fear in order to keep the ordinary people from asking important questions. People should pay attention to the real world and stop chasing after supernatural chimera.”
Well yes, Jean thought. And no. Demagoguery didn’t limit itself to supernatural foes—look at the Cold War and the Red Scare not long before her own birth, or the fevered paranoia of the present day. She was all in favor of asking questions. “Francis Stewart, Lord Bothwell, was ruling-class, but he was tried for witchcraft. He got off, of course, unlike some of his associates.”
“Exactly as we said. The events of world history are controlled by money and power,” Tim said, and chomped down the rest of his sandwich half.
Well yes, Jean thought again. That she hadn’t expected these people to make any sense at all revealed her own prejudices. Even if the Dingwalls’ definition of “sense” was one of the issues. “Now you’re living in Rosslyn, Virginia.”
“Yes.” Sharon chewed another tiny bite with her front teeth, like a rabbit. “We’re right across the river from D.C., where we can monitor all the clandestine activity. Rosslyn’s an appropriate name for a center of undercover power, isn’t it?”
Trying to keep the groan from her voice, Jean replied, “You’re thinking of Rosslyn Chapel in Scotland.”
“Yep. An entire building composed of cryptograms and codes. Of course the-powers-that-be won’t let anyone dig there and open up the crypts.” Jean noted the unintended pun—cryptogram, crypt, Kryptonite—but Sharon plunged on. “You’re doing an article on the hidden history of the Scottish borders, aren’t you? The one about Ferniebank that’s under ‘coming soon’ in the latest Great Scot?”
Jean couldn’t pry her teeth far enough apart to answer. Ferniebank. Rosslyn. Been there, done that, had the disease and built up an immunity. Or so she thought. Tim and Sharon were carrying a mighty big virus. She herded the conversation back to Virginia, more or less. “If you don’t believe in the supernatural, paranormal, whatever, then why are you so interested in the Witch Box and the charm stone?”
“As sociological artifacts.” Sharon spoke to Jean, but her gaze locked with Tim’s. “As evidence. Because of their connection with Francis Bacon.”
“Are they connected to Francis Bacon? The letters ‘F’ and ‘B’ might be carved on the Box, but with the ‘S’ they could refer to Bothwell just as well. It was his charm stone, right?”
This time Tim’s gaze locked with Sharon’s, and for a long moment his jaw stopped moving. Then, with a convulsive
gulp, he swallowed.
They were hiding something. Great, Jean told herself, now she was suspecting a conspiracy.
As if to punctuate her thought, a tinny, electronic version of the theme from The X-Files suddenly filled the air.
Chapter Ten
Jean choked down her laugh as Tim fumbled in his pocket, pulled out his cell phone, and inspected the screen. “It’s Kelly,” he told Sharon.
“She can wait.” Sharon grabbed the phone, wiped off the crumbs with her napkin, and set it on the table next to Tim’s plastic-wrapped cookie.
Kelly Dingwall, fresh off a transatlantic flight? Jean wondered. But she wasn’t supposed to know who Kelly was. “Last night,” she said, “you were connecting the Witch Box to Francis Stewart. You know, Charlotte Stewart Murray was his descendant and maneuvered her way to the colonies to search for the charm stone.”
“You were paying attention!” Tim seemed surprised. “Yes, the Box belonged to the Stewarts, members of the ancient ruling class of Europe, the families who work together behind the scenes. It has been said that there were dynasties of the Rex Deus families, the Stewarts for example, the ones descended from Jesus Christ, but let’s apply some common sense. After two thousand years most of us with European or Middle Eastern roots would be descended from Jesus.”
Well yes, assuming that Jesus had actually had children, a not-inconsiderable leap of anti-faith. Jean wrote listen on her notepad—and she’d listened to that particular wheeze before. The so-called bloodline of Christ was a marketable story if ever there was one, and had suckered in more than one reader.
“But the conspiracy that we’ve uncovered goes back a lot further than Jesus,” Tim concluded, his common sense exploding like an overripe pumpkin.
“Francis Bacon,” said Sharon, “the greatest genius of his age, perhaps of any age, worked with the Stewarts and their clandestine intrigues. He had no choice if he was going to pursue his work—they were the only game in town. When the Stewarts followed King James to London in 1603, they brought the Witch Box with them. That’s where Bacon discovered it, and saw how to use it to conceal his secrets.”
“What secrets?” Jean asked. “How could . . .”
Tim overrode her interruption. “Then the English Civil War began, causing a momentary upheaval in the class structure. At this time, the charm stone was stolen from the Box and brought to the American colonies.”
“You mean,” Jean said, writing frantically, “by some of the Royalists who came to the colonies to escape Cromwell and the Puritans?”
“No, no,” said Sharon, “it was a maidservant, one of the common people, the little guys, who stole the charm stone and took it with her when she went to the colonies as an indentured servant. She thought it was a healing stone.”
“How do you know that?”
“Of course it’s neither a healing nor a cursing stone. There is no such thing as the supernatural. Please continue to pay attention.” Tim ripped open a bag of potato chips and contemplated the foil-lined interior as though Jean’s actual question, not the one he answered, was hiding inside. “The theft of the stone dented the conspiracy of silence surrounding the subterranean cabal of movers and shakers. That set in train events that caused Bacon’s Rebellion in 1676. The Rebellion was, very simply, a cover-up.”
“Of what?” asked Jean.
“The Stewarts,” Sharon said, “and the other ruling families had been secretly trading with the Americas for centuries.”
Instead of asking, Trading what? Jean again wrote, listen.
“Nathaniel Bacon was a great-nephew of Francis Bacon. He inherited the old man’s papers and tried to put his enlightened theories into practice, bringing about world peace, but was murdered before he succeeded. He barely managed to hide Francis’s papers here, in what would in 1699 be named Williamsburg, before the forces of suppression and secrecy caught up with him.”
The issue in 1676 had been Indian incursions into the European-settled areas. Besides . . . Jean hesitated a moment, then thought, What the heck and said, “Nathaniel Bacon wasn’t related to Francis Bacon. The names are just a coincidence.”
Tim snickered, spraying the table with bits of potato chip.
“And it’s just coincidence,” retorted Sharon, turning her best pitying smile on Jean, “that one of Lord Dunmore’s direct descendants was a certain Virginia Bacon, who left her house in Washington, D.C., to an international association of retired diplomats. Just what goes on there, do you think?”
Jean didn’t bother to reply, “Cocktail parties?” Instead, she heard herself saying, “It looks like you’ve really been bringing home the Bacon.”
Leaning forward, Tim asked, “Are you making fun of us, Jean?”
“People do that, sometimes.” Sharon’s smile reversed so that her lower lip protruded. She used her dill pickle spear to move bits of chicken and celery around her plate.
“Just a lame joke. I’m sorry,” Jean said, genuinely contrite. Although part of her job as debunker was to laugh, she preferred laughing with someone than at them.
She looked in appeal at the bronze statue of Thomas Jefferson seated nearby. His eyes, intelligent even in metal, assessed the glittering display in the window of the jewelry store across the street as if formulating theories in metallurgy and geology. He had seen history as a grand progression to enlightenment and progress, and yet he himself had traded in dark human flesh. In an earlier era, he would probably have defended himself against witches.
Tim followed her gaze. “Jefferson knew more than he let on, as did all of his companions in the establishment of the United States. Many of them were Masons, you know. In fact, most of the Founding Fathers of the United States were Freemasons. And—” he lowered his voice and glanced around “—right here in Williamsburg is a Masonic Lodge founded in colonial times!”
“There was an old boys’ network,” Jean allowed.
“Can’t we just hear,” Sharon muttered into her bottle of water, “Jessica babbling on about Founding Mothers and an old girls’network?”
Yes, we can. Although Jessica didn’t babble. What Jessica said was direct and to the point. Jean opened her mouth to ask about the lawsuit, never mind it being outside Great Scot’s brief.
Tim spoke first. “Francis Bacon was a Mason, too. Of course the entire conspiracy ranges far beyond Bacon, Jefferson, and all. The full narrative is revealed in our movie, Lords of the Lie.” He inhaled the rest of his sandwich and smacked his lips appreciatively.
“You’re producing a movie?” Jean asked. “You’re not writing a book?”
“The publishing industry is government-controlled, as we stated already. If we approached a publisher, the book would be rejected.” Tim’s stubby forefingers drew quotes around “rejected.”
“Suppressed,” Sharon said, just in case Jean didn’t get it. “Besides, who has time to read any more? It’s all film festivals, YouTube, TiVo. And if Fahrenheit 9/11 or Fast Food Nation made waves, Lords of the Lie will be a tsunami. Here you go.” Opening her tote bag, Sharon retrieved a glossy file folder and passed it across the table.
Its cover was black, with the words Lords of the Lie: The True Facts of History printed in garish crimson. Well, well, well, Jean thought, anticipating Miranda’s response. And adding on her own behalf, True facts? Like free gifts?
With thumb and forefinger, she opened the folder to reveal flyers and postcards in bright colors. The neatly printed press release included excerpts from Tim and Sharon’s newspaper, magazine, and web articles, and quotes from other conspiracy mavens. The number of exclamation points scattered across the page made it look like a briar patch.
So far as Jean could tell from a quick glance, Lords of the Lie was the Dingwalls’ grand unified theory of occult history—occult meaning hidden, not paranormal, as Rebecca had used it. They traced conspiracies that ranged from the secret mathematics used by the builders of the Great Pyramid through the arcane practices of the Vatican, the Knights Templar, the Freema
sons, and the Rosicrucians to the manipulations of the modern-day Trilateral Commission and the Bilderbergers, making long pauses at the Illuminati, the Jesuits, the Rothschilds, and the CIA, and garnishing the elaborate construct with anti-Semitic and anti-Catholic asides. Jean supposed if she read further she’d find digs at every other major religion, too, including accusations that the Dalai Lama was masterminding the suppression of Bacon’s papers, whatever they contained.
Oh yes. They contained the secret of world peace. If only, Jean thought, closed the folder, and looked up.
Sharon’s pale eyes and Tim’s dark ones were fixed on her, unblinking. Tim wasn’t even chewing his chips. They expected her to validate their work. As if she had the power to do so. “Ah, um, QED Productions. That’s a new one on me.”
“It’s our own company,” said Sharon. “Named after our sons, our twins, Quentin and Dylan. It’s a play on words, Quentin et, meaning and, Dylan: QED.”
“Quod erat demonstrandum,” Jean said. “That which is proved.”
Sharon’s sharp features smoothed with a maternal glow. “Dylan just got his degree in cinematography from UCLA. He had to work nights and weekends to supplement his scholarship. We have to pinch our pennies, much of our work is pro bono publico, since we’re throwing Latin around. He’s a bit clumsy, but he’s a good kid.”
“He sounds intelligent and dedicated.” Even though his taste in girlfriends might be—and certainly was, by Jessica—questionable.
“Quentin paid his own way through school, too.” Tim’s heavy features lightened with a paternal beam. “He attended the University of Missouri and was awarded a degree in journalism. He’s not a hard-core journalist like you, but a real writer. He wrote the material on the website, and the press release, and is writing the narration for the movie in his free time.”
Charm Stone Page 10