by A D Davies
“What now?” Bridget asked.
“My wife,” Giovani said.
“The airplane.” Toby wiped his face with a handkerchief, shaking. “Let’s get out of here before our faces appear on a wanted poster.”
With Charlie on radio silence, Jules had little choice, not this close to recovering the bangle. He would jump down on the plane, go for Valerio with a blow to the head rather than a sleeper hold, then take his chances against Horse. A couple of knives should even the odds at least a bit.
“Jules, you still there?”
Charlie’s transmission paused his plan for the time being. “Yes,” he said, “I’m here.”
“The team is okay. They’re heading to the Lear. They need to get out of the country. Or at least back to Sicily.”
“I’m glad.” He meant it, but pushed away any positive feelings in exchange for direct action. “You know the airfield I’m at? Where Valerio landed?”
“Yes?”
“Can you access its emergency systems? I need a distraction.”
Typing accompanied her reply. “You and Dan should hang out sometime. Compare notes.”
“Is that how Welsh people say yes?”
A brief laugh from Charlie preceded the speaker up in the top corner bursting with a static-filled aaoooooga alarm. It was what Jules had spotted before getting in touch with her, a chance to clear the hangar no matter how briefly.
The same noise blasted across the other hangars, and Valerio, as hoped, rushed to the open doors, Horse with his gun drawn, as they both searched for the source of the problem.
As soon as their backs were turned, Jules hopped over the handrail, landed with no more than a scuff, then ran, ducked under the wing, and darted up the three steps into the Gulfstream’s cabin.
Tina Trussot sat up in shock. “Who are you?”
“I’m one of the good guys.” Jules spotted the manuscript on her lap. “Your husband’s safe. Cops’ll be heading to your daughter’s house.”
“You will free me?”
“Just need that book.”
“No.” She clung to it. “Get me out of here.”
He could take it from her easily, but that might be the wrong thing to do. Morally. If she put up a fight, he’d have to hurt her, and he couldn’t do that to an innocent person.
He peered out the window, the angle favoring him so he could see Valerio and Horse clearly discussing the situation with one of the men who had been circling the hangar.
Jules said, “To get you outa here, I’d have to sneak you past three trained killers and a guy who’s probably less well trained but armed all the same.”
“Then you can’t have it.” She hugged the book tighter, making the white cotton gloves pointless.
“Okay.” Jules stepped forward, eyes on the window. Suddenly, he whipped his hand out and snatched the journal. “Sorry.” He moved for the door.
Tina gawked down at her hands and then stood. “I will scream.”
Jules halted. Sometimes, he hated being right.
He returned to face her, taking in the cabin. “Keep watch.”
The alarm still blasted, and no one from Valerio’s crew had so far returned. The perimeter was secure, so why would they?
“What you do?” Tina asked.
Jules set the book on a miniature mahogany desk attached to one wall beside a private cabin. He opened the book to the back pages, feeling their brittle edges, fearful of damaging them. The material still bent, though, and a remarkable sense of responsibility flowed through him, the rush of history physically gripping his chest.
Was this what Bridget felt about all those lost words?
Jules brushed it off, took out his phone, and opened the WhatsApp feature.
Tina joined him. “I ask you question, tough guy.”
“I’m getting the intel to people who can use it. Then I’ll help you. Fair?”
“I watch for men.”
He snapped a picture of the last page, a language he didn’t understand. Hebrew he could just about get the meaning of if not the nuances, Greek was easier, and Latin was a breeze. But he suspected this may be a form of Aramaic, which he’d struggled with, but was currently studying. Languages were always useful.
Good job Bridget and the others lived.
He checked that his photo showed the etchings clearly and transmitted it to Charlie since she’d have the best tools to sharpen the image. The next two pages had only words, which he sent off too, but the next ones showed diagrams that appeared to be basic representations of the two bangles. He snapped photos and turned the page. Then again. And dozens more, until the alarm died.
Then he turned the ancient pages faster. More writing. More photos. Another sketch. More digital signals into the ether.
“Men are coming,” Tina said.
Jules crouched, shifted to a better angle, and peeked up.
Yes, all four men were returning: Valerio, Horse, and both guards.
Jules returned to the desk and closed the manuscript. “I really need this book.”
Tina rushed to block his exit. “I tell you, I scream. Your friends have writing from back of book. That is what you need, yes?”
“I don’t know if I got all of it.”
Jules detected voices now. The men were even closer.
Tina said, “You get me out. Free me.”
Jules placed the manuscript down.
Judging by the casual nature with which these people were willing to bomb an apartment building, they would definitely murder this woman once she was no longer useful.
“I can’t get either of us out now. Wait till we land. Then we run.”
“Wait, you come with us?”
Jules opened the rear door to a galley kitchen with a second door that led to a unit resembling a studio apartment: a bed, a couch aimed at the TV, and an en suite bathroom. “Don’t pretend. Don’t stall too much. Work it chronologically. They don’t know what they got here, not exactly. Do as you’re told. When they get what they’re looking for, they’ll need you again. Tell ’em that. Stay alive, and I’ll get you clear, soon as I can. Okay?”
“Why should I believe you?”
“Because in the time it took me to say all that I coulda knocked you unconscious and been outa here with the manuscript.”
She held one hand in the other. Thinking. “Fine. But where you hide?”
“I’ll think of something. Now I gotta go. I need to make a couple of phone calls before we’re outa range.”
Jules entered the bedroom, its square footage taking up half the plane, and searched for somewhere to hide. Under the bed was the obvious place, but no telling if he’d be spotted or if Valerio used it for other activities aside from sleeping. The bathroom might get used. All furniture was bolted down, including the couch that stood a foot away from the wall.
It was tight, but Jules managed to squeeze himself into the gap between sofa and wall just before voices resonated outside the door. He wriggled farther down to where the back of the couch angled out a few more inches, allowing himself a tad more breathing space.
For this ridiculous situation to succeed, he needed to ensure Charlie received the photos, that the LORI brain trust could interpret them, and that this next bangle could be obtained without Valerio getting there first. That required brief conversations conducted in a low voice through the bone-conducting earpiece.
Once satisfied, he turned his cell phone off and, lying on his back behind the opulent leather sofa, he had little choice but to meditate until the chance to escape presented itself.
Part Four
We didn’t go to the moon to explore or because it was in our DNA or because we’re Americans. We went because we were at war and we felt a threat
—Neil deGrasse Tyson
I know where I’m going and I know the truth, and I don’t have to be what you want me to be. I’m free to be what I want —Muhammad Ali
Chapter Nineteen
Sicily
After
four hours with the twenty-six pages Jules fired off to Charlie, printouts of Saint Thomas’s journal spread over the shiny dark wood table, Bridget should have been in heaven. An unknown pre-Christian language mixed with Aramaic? Yes, please. Bridget would literally have paid for the privilege of solving this.
However, as soon as Jules called everyone he needed to, he went dark. All he said about his whereabouts was that he’d be on Valerio’s tail, wherever that led.
Still paranoid about using the tracker, she guessed.
After ditching Giovani to deal with the cops himself and advising him to be honest about his wife’s whereabouts, Bridget and the others had flown directly from Rome to Sicily where Alfonse granted them the use of his villa. He was out and about on business, and since Alfonse’s main acquisition was to be the Mary bangle, they agreed there was no need to inform their paymaster of their failure just yet. The manuscript was just a means to an end.
These days, most cell phone cameras rated alongside document scanners, so in almost every snapshot, the words and markings were legible. In some of the later ones, Jules was plainly rushing to ping as many clues to LORI as possible, so half an inch or so got cut off at the edge.
Oh, why aren’t I holding the real thing right now?
The photos also printed the time stamp, so she reversed them to make the pile chronological. She read the words she already knew, jotting those down, and left spaces for those she didn’t, like a massive, multi-page sudoku puzzle. Then the team began talking.
“You sure he’d have done it that way?” Dan asked.
“I can’t be sure at all,” Bridget replied. “But it’s a logical assumption.”
“Even in someone as reckless as Jules?”
Bridget looked up from the first photo. “He got us this.”
“He’s dangerous,” Charlie said on the screen, conferenced in using a laptop webcam stationed in Alfonse’s dining room. “So calm when you were in danger. Reminded me of someone waiting for the result of a TV poll to come in.”
“Calm under fire.” Toby eyed Dan across the room from where he prepped a coffee pot. “Not the worst trait I’ve come across.”
“He’s a control freak,” Harpal said. “Remember when I first came on board? I know Dan and Charlie were fine with jumping out of planes and what have you, but we’ve entered hard-to-reach places using wing suits. I persuaded you all to race those sports cars in Germany after selling that necklace to the duke or whatever he was. You all loved it. Started to see why I go for the extreme sports instead of football. I think Jules is like that. Maybe he needs it.”
“That makes him controlled?” Dan asked.
“That’s what extreme sports are all about. He’s dropping off buildings with a homemade bungee rope. He works out how far it should stretch and blocks off the slack so he lands just so. He’s leaping over vehicles, walls, all at full pelt. Apart from the speed of his mental calculations, it’s all the same as the folks I hang around with when I’m not here.”
“Wait,” Charlie said. “You do other stuff?”
“Of course. Me and the girlfriend.”
“You have a girlfriend?” Dan said.
Toby started pouring mugs of coffee. “We’re getting away from the point. You’re all correct. He’s an oxymoron of the most intriguing kind.” He poured the last of the coffee, picked up the tray, and made for the table. “A reckless control freak.” He placed the tray at the end opposite the laptop.
Harpal selected a cup. “A useful asset or a disaster waiting to happen.”
“So we win big or lose big,” Dan said. “Great.”
Bridget jumped to her feet. “Would you all please stop talking about him?”
Everyone stared.
Bridget said, “Right now, he’s got Valerio Conchin in sight, and we don’t have the first clue where he is or how much danger he’s in. But he’s in that danger to get us these photos, and I’ve nearly got a decent start. So please, if we can stop speculating, I might dig up some answers.”
Silence.
Until Charlie said, “He only got the photos to us because we can help him get his hands on the bangle he wants.”
Bridget resumed her seat and found her place. “We don’t know that. He might not be the awful person you all assume. Now, please give me some quiet.”
Valerio’s Gulfstream, Airborne
Valerio Conchin was never a sickly child. Athletic and intelligent, he had straddled high school’s social divide and thrived because of it. Without that combination of brains and brawn, he’d never have developed his first app or made his first million.
Weight loss and exercise were a fledgling fad when he launched Fit Freak, but the fad grew into a multibillion-dollar industry. Because Valerio was building from a solid base, his additions were a big splash in a big pond.
As an adult, though, he’d developed a rare liver condition which might kill him at any second. On the other hand, he could live for another five or even ten years. It was not something he liked to think about, but on long, aimless flights, he couldn’t help it.
He and Horse were sitting opposite one another in swivel chairs while the antique smuggler’s wife pored over the manuscript stolen from Windsor. Valerio stared out into the night without seeing anything. “How much longer?”
Horse twisted toward the Trussot woman. When he came back he said, “Hard to tell, boss.”
“Not good enough.”
Very rude of that amateur outfit trying to double deal them like that, but they’d paid the price. Shame, really; they were a gutsy bunch with plenty of big brains among them. At least that left the way open for Valerio to track down the kid who made the bangle glow.
Horse sat forward, elbows on his knees, and adopted a kinder tone. “Boss, you know I’m with you all the way on this, don’t you?”
Horse picked his own terminology. He insisted on the name “Horse” rather than his given one, which Valerio had forgotten a while ago, and started calling Valerio “boss” about a year into his employ as a personal bodyguard. As he heard more and more private business, Horse interjected with ideas, and it soon became apparent that his military experience carried transferable skills to seeking out objects of potentially arcane origin. At some point, he also began acting as a personal counselor, and at an even more blurred moment in time, he graduated to friend. Without losing the paycheck of course.
You know I’m with you all the way on this.
Valerio said, “I guess.”
“So you gotta have faith here. What do we need?”
“The location of that second bangle.”
“Right. I found you the intel on the Queen’s manuscript. Might be helpful, might not. We’ll know soon. But you should rest.”
Valerio nodded, his impatience softened somewhat. “Where are we headed?”
“The pilot’s plotted a course back to Strionia near the Russian border, and filed a flight plan. It was the least suspicious option, but we can divert midflight. If we don’t have a location before we land, we’ll refuel and take off as soon as we get a destination.”
Valerio yawned. He’d been fighting fatigue for hours. It was a stressful business, and he didn’t particularly enjoy kidnapping and murder. They were tools, like this Gulfstream or a trowel or a car or a gun. But if Giovani had obeyed instructions, he would still be alive. And when someone like Valerio gave instructions, people should listen.
Because people such as Valerio didn’t become rich, powerful, and benevolent overnight. The riches were a result of his brilliance, the power had come from his riches spent well, and benevolence started as part of his cover. He grew to genuinely like and value charities and other good causes, ones that benefited humankind; they helped him prove to himself he was not a bad person. Not really. He only killed those who went against him, and it wasn’t fun.
Fun was visiting an African village, meeting kids who’d benefited from his investment in a new pump system for their well.
Valerio smiled.
>
Yes, his acts of goodwill far outstripped those some might deem irresponsible or selfish, for instance blowing up six people in an apartment building without considering the potential for collateral damage. Was it six? Of five? Or seven?
Didn’t matter.
What did matter was that he continue his work for the good of the human race.
“I’m going to bed for a while,” he announced, standing.
Horse nodded and shifted his legs aside.
Valerio made his way to the back of the plane, pausing by Tina. He opened the door to the kitchen. “Can I get you anything? Coffee? A bite to eat?”
Tina froze in whatever she was writing. “Coffee. Strong.”
Valerio waved a hand at Horse, who rose and acknowledged the request. Then Valerio went through the kitchen and into his bedroom where he closed the door and flopped on his bed. He didn’t bother to undress.
By the time he awoke, he might know the answer at long last.
Sicily
“Thomas left India,” Bridget said, almost breathless as she triple-checked her work and came to the same conclusion. “Northwest to be precise.”
“What do we have?” Toby asked.
Since Bridget demanded peace and quiet to work the language, Charlie had muted her connection while Dan ditched his coffee and went to lie down. Harpal played a video game in another room, and Toby refreshed his already-impressive knowledge of Saint Thomas by accessing as many resources as he could. Not easy when only using the internet. Too much misinformation, not like the source texts.
Still, Bridget supposed it was better than nothing.
“I’m not entirely sure,” she said to the team, who had now gathered again. Charlie was back online. “It’s partly Aramaic, partly what might be Hindi but must be a precursor to that. Harpal?”
Harpal looked at the page in her hand—number twenty-one. “Yes, it looks kind of like Hindi.”
“You recognize anything?”