The Malta Escape

by Chris Kuzneski

  As a student of war, Payne could think of a number of reasons behind the grand master’s lack of action, but none of them were good. “Out of curiosity, what nationality was Hompesch?”

  Marissa looked at him, confused. “Hompesch was German. In fact, he was the first German ever to hold office as grand master. Why do you ask?”

  Payne smiled. “Because if he was French, I’d say he threw the fight.”

  She laughed. “It’s funny you should say that, because nearly two-thirds of his Knights were of French descent, so Hompesch really couldn’t be sure where their loyalties were until he saw them in battle. Furthermore, the rules of the Order explicitly stated that the Knights couldn’t fight against fellow Christians, which complicated things further. Then, when you factor in what I told you about the locals, it’s pretty darn obvious that he wasn’t going to win that war.”

  “Did he even try?” Jones wondered.

  “There was some fighting in western Malta before it eventually fell to the French, but it was token resistance at best. During the entire battle, the French only lost three men. After that, it was all over except for the paperwork. Hompesch surrendered on June the eleventh, signed the treaty on June the twelfth, and a week later, he was on a ship to Trieste, Italy, where he established a temporary new headquarters for the Order.”

  Jones grunted. “Was Hompesch involved in the fighting like de Valette?”

  She shook her head. “Heck no. He remained in Valletta the entire time.”

  Jones rubbed his chin in thought. “Interesting. Very interesting.”

  Payne knew that look quite well. Anytime his friend was close to a breakthrough, he would temporarily leave the real world and disappear into that computer brain of his, the one that produced the highest score in the history of the Air Force Academy’s MSAE (Military Strategy Acumen Examination) and had organized hundreds of operations with the MANIACs. He had a way of seeing things several steps ahead, like a chess master.

  “What are you thinking?” Payne wondered.

  Jones grinned at his best friend. “I’m thinking you should have figured this one out before I did, given your proclivity for magic.”

  Payne did, in fact, enjoy the art of prestidigitation and had been collecting magic tricks ever since he was a boy. His grandfather had started the collection for him, buying him a deck of magic playing cards when Payne was only five, and the gift had turned out to be habit-forming. For many years, it had been a way to spend time with his grandfather as they learned and practiced tricks together. Then, when Payne’s parents were killed by a drunk driver, he had used magic as a diversion, his way to escape the real world and focus on the miraculous instead.

  But unlike most skilled magicians, who seemed to love sequins and crave the spotlight, Payne was more of a closet magician, half-embarrassed of his abilities and unwilling to showcase his talents to anyone but his closest friends. Occasionally, he would use sleight of hand to baffle total strangers in public in order to amuse Jones, but other than that, he preferred to keep his magical skills and knowledge to himself.

  Of course, that wasn’t possible now that Jones had blown his cover.

  Thinking as a magician, Payne replayed what he had just learned about Hompesch and his curious, if not baffling, strategy in 1798 AD and realized that Jones might be onto something. “Holy shit. He didn’t throw the battle. The battle was a misdirect.”

  Jones nodded. “I mean, it makes sen—”

  Payne interrupted him. “You’re right. But man, it would take some serious balls. How do you send men to risk their lives while—”

  Jones cut him off. “But were they risking their lives? Given what we know about—”

  Payne grinned. “You’re right! How much danger were they actually—”

  Jones laughed. “Man, if this is true—”

  Payne nodded. “Then it’s one of the ballsiest escapes of all time!”

  Jarkko glanced across the table at Marissa, who glanced back at Jarkko, and both of them were dumbfounded. For the past few seconds, they had witnessed Payne and Jones having a conversation without needing to fully voice their thoughts, almost as if the two of them were sharing a brain. Sometimes couples had the ability to finish each other’s sentences, but this was beyond that since Payne and Jones didn’t even need to utter their thoughts out loud.

  They simply knew what the other was going to say.

  Jarkko spoke first. “Tell Jarkko truth. Were you involved in comic-book science experiment? That would explain fighting skills and ability to speak without words.”

  Marissa agreed. “I’m with Jarkko. That was pretty freaky.”

  Payne looked at her. “Was it?”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Jarkko said. “Important thing is Marissa’s desire to be with Jarkko. So question has finally been answered. Marissa now has boyfriend.”

  “Wait!” she said, not wanting to be misunderstood.

  Jarkko dropped his head. “And now she is single.”

  Payne ignored Jarkko and focused on Marissa. “What was freaky?”

  Before she answered, Marissa glanced at Jarkko to make sure he was okay. He gave her a quick wink to let her know that he was just messing around. She breathed a sigh of relief before she focused on Payne’s question. “Your conversation with DJ. Or should I say your non-conversation with DJ?”

  Payne laughed. “Yeah, sorry about that. When we were in the military, we were in so many tough spots together where words needed to be kept to a minimum that we developed this weird vocal shorthand that allowed us to communicate without saying much.”

  Jones grinned. “We used to drive the guys in our unit crazy.”

  Payne nodded. “Even though it saved their lives—”

  “—on multiple occasions,” they said in unison.

  Jarkko frowned. “Jarkko can’t tell which is ventriloquist and which is dummy.”

  “No dummies here,” Jones bragged, “since we figured out what happened.”

  “Actually,” Payne said to soften his boast, “it’s just a theory.”

  “A really good theory. It fits everything we know.”

  “Maybe so, but—”

  “Guys,” Marissa said, “stop talking to each other and talk to us. What’s the theory you’re bragging about? I’m assuming it deals with Hompesch. At least that’s what I gathered from your freaky half-statements and insane ramblings.”

  Jones glanced at his best friend. “Go on. The floor’s all yours.”

  Now it was Payne’s turn to tip his imaginary hat.

  Jones grinned and tipped his in return.

  Then Payne explained one of the greatest tricks of all time.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Payne glanced at his friends as he tried to figure out where to begin.

  “Okay,” he said, “here’s what we know about Grand Master Hompesch. In 1798 AD, he finds out that an unstoppable force is headed his way. Even though Napoleon is bringing ten thousand fewer men than the Magnificent Sultan did for the Great Siege, Hompesch realizes that his own men are fat off the land, their loyalties are divided, and the locals are unlikely to offer support. He also knows that his allegiance is to the Order itself and not to Malta. This is a key piece of the puzzle, one that I didn’t think about when you first depicted the impending battle. You had described the Order as the home team during the Great Siege, and that was accurate in 1565 AD—but that doesn’t apply here, because the Order was no longer welcome in Malta.”

  Jones nodded. “That explains why Hompesch didn’t poison the local wells or fortify the defenses around the harbor. As far as he was concerned, that would have been a wasted effort on his part because he had no intention of risking his life to save the locals who wanted him gone. Plus, he didn’t want this battle to last any longer than it needed to because that would only result in additional deaths of his men. You see, his goal all along wasn’t to fight. It was to escape.”

  Payne smiled at the thought. “In order to pull this off, you
would need to have a team of willing associates that you could trust explicitly. You obviously couldn’t trust any French knights because of possible divided loyalties, but you probably could trust men from your homeland. Tell me, was there a langue for Germans at the time of the French invasion?”

  Marissa nodded excitedly. “Over the centuries, the original eight langues were forced to change with the times. The Crown of Aragon and the Crown of Castile no longer existed as medieval states, and the other langues had morphed as well. If I remember correctly, the German knights would have been housed in Auberge d'Allemagne in Valletta. Strangely, very little is known about the structure other than it was the only auberge to be intentionally demolished. That happened way back in the early nineteenth century.”

  Jones laughed. “Of course it was demolished! It probably had evidence about Hompesch’s escape. You can’t afford to leave that standing.”

  Payne rolled his eyes. “Don’t start with your conspiracy theories, or we’re gonna lose all credibility with our audience.”

  Marissa smiled at Jones. “I promise, you won’t lose me. I love conspiracy theories. The crazier, the better.”

  Jones grinned. “Then wait until I tell you where spiders come from! You won’t believe it!”

  Payne shook his head. “Come on, DJ. Stay focused! We’re on a roll here.”

  Jones nodded. “Sorry, man. You’re right. Treasure first, spiders later.”

  Payne realized that he had about five seconds to get the conversation headed in the right direction or else Jones was going to launch into a monologue about alien arachnids. “As I was saying, Hompesch would need a team of willing associates that he could trust to pull this off, and my guess is that he found them at Auberge d'Allemagne. Did I say that right?”

  Marissa nodded her head. “Oui.”

  Jarkko was confused. “Pull off what?”

  Payne smiled. “If DJ and I are correct, Hompesch used a classic misdirect to conceal what he was actually doing. Think about what we know: When Napoleon first arrived in Malta, Hompesch wouldn’t let his fleet into the harbor to get water. In fact, his men made a big production out of it, saying that only two French boats could come into the harbor at a time. Why in the world would he do that? Why risk pissing off an ill-tempered general with far superior numbers over something as mundane as water provisions?”

  Jarkko guessed. “To buy time.”

  Payne nodded. “That’s what we were thinking. Marissa already told us that Hompesch wasn’t fortifying their defenses, or poisoning wells, or even moving his troops into position. He was sitting on his ass in Valletta—her words, not mine—until it was time to negotiate the Order’s surrender. So the question is, what was he buying time for?”

  Jarkko grinned. “For treasure!”

  Payne smiled. “The thought had crossed my mind.”

  Jones picked it up from there. “I’m not sure what you know about Napoleon’s military career, but Malta wasn’t his main objective on this trip. It was merely a pit stop for the French on their way to Africa. At the time, Napoleon was getting ready to launch a major expedition to seize Egypt. His goal was to establish a French presence in the Middle East, where he could link up with Muslim enemies of the British in order to secure a trade route to India. So the last thing he wanted to do was lose a bunch of men and supplies in a meaningless battle with the Knights.”

  Payne nodded. “And Hompesch would have known that.”

  Marissa cut them off. “If that’s the case, why piss off an ill-tempered general—your words, not mine—at all? Why not just negotiate a treaty and be done with it?”

  Payne couldn’t help but smile. Not only was Marissa highly intelligent, but she was more than eager to engage in the verbal jousting that he enjoyed with his quick-witted best friend. Over the years, he had come across very few people—let alone beautiful women—who could keep up with their verbal repartee, but she was matching them jab for jab.

  “Here’s the thing,” Jones explained. “Fighting a war on foreign soil is very expensive—particularly when you’re battling extreme elements as well. And that’s what Napoleon would be facing as he marched across Egypt. In order to pay for everything, you either need to start your journey with a massive war chest, or you need to accumulate resources along the way. And since the Knights of Malta were one of the richest organizations in the world but no longer able to defend themselves, Napoleon was probably salivating at the thought of their riches.”

  Marissa chimed in. “Just to be clear, the Knights of Malta had lost a lot of their assets over the centuries and were no longer as wealthy as they once were. When I was fast-forwarding for Jon’s sake, I skipped over the Protestant Reformation, which decimated the Order’s holdings in Europe and weakened the stability of the Catholic Church. Don’t get me wrong: the Knights were far from broke, but they weren’t nearly as rich as they were at the height of their power.”

  Jarkko groaned. “Jarkko’s flag now at half-mast. Jarkko will keep you posted.”

  Jones grimaced and moved even further away on the bench.

  But Payne ignored them both. He was too focused on Marissa.

  “Believe it or not,” Payne said to her, “your comment only strengthens our theory.”

  “How so?” she wondered.

  Payne did his best to explain. “If the Order had tons of riches throughout Europe—and I’m talking about literal tons of gold and jewels—then they probably didn’t need to tangle with Napoleon at all. But now that I know their assets were centralized in Valletta, then the entire future of the Order rested on the shoulders of Grand Master Hompesch. But here’s the rub: because of divided loyalty amongst the knights and the fact that two-thirds of his men were French, Hompesch couldn’t move the Order’s wealth in advance of Napoleon’s approach. Hompesch needed to wait until there was something massive going on to distract his men.”

  Marissa smiled. “So Hompesch wasn’t sitting on his ass while waiting to sign the treaty. You think he was actually killing time while waiting to move the treasure?”

  Payne nodded. “It’s a classic misdirect. He sends a bunch of knights—I’m guessing French, just to fuck with them—down to the waterfront to tell freaking Napoleon that he can only send two ships into the harbor at one time. Then he sends another group of knights—I’m guessing French, just to fuck with them some more—to defend the western flank of Malta from advancing French troops, knowing full well that they’re unlikely to put up much of a fight. But that’s okay as far as Hompesch is concerned, because the only thing that matters to him is moving the Order’s wealth without being seen by disloyal French knights.”

  Jones jumped back in. “Meanwhile, Napoleon is sitting in his high chair, getting ready to throw a hissy fit, because he’s being disrespected by a stupid German, who is making the French fleet wait their turn at the water fountain. But Napoleon’s mood quickly brightens when he finds out the Maltese people are aiding his cause and that the knights in the west are providing minimal resistance at best. So Napoleon heads to the negotiating table in great spirits, thinking he has just defeated the legendary Knights of Malta while losing only three men. Meanwhile, what he doesn’t know is that the so-called stupid German had emptied the Order’s massive vaults under Napoleon’s massive nose while he was waiting for a drink of water.”

  Payne laughed at the thought. “Like I said before—if our theory is correct and Hompesch actually pulled this off—it was one of the ballsiest escapes of all time.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Although Marissa had been filled with doubt when Payne and Jones had started to explain their theory about Hompesch’s escape, she had found herself getting caught up in their momentum as they somehow managed to present a creative hypothesis that utilized all of the facts that they had been told about the Order’s last days on Malta. But as a highly trained academic, she knew there was a major difference between imaginative conjecture and substantiated fact, so she felt it was her job as the historian on this
adventure to explain the difference to them.

  “Guys,” she said. “It’s a great theory, and I really want to believe it, but as far I can tell, it’s just speculation. Don’t get me wrong: I found it highly entertaining, and maybe even plausible, but what do you have that actually supports what you’re thinking?”

  Payne took a moment to absorb her comments before he replied. “As the newest member of our team and someone who was kept in the dark on the true nature of our mission until a few minutes ago, it took a lot of guts to express your doubts about our theory. And yet, in the interest of group morale after a highly stressful day, I feel there is only one appropriate response.”

  She stared at him, unsure. “What’s that?”

  He picked up a scrap of bread and threw it at her. “Boooo!”

  Jones and Jarkko quickly joined in. “Boooo!”

  She laughed as she swatted the projectiles away like Godzilla. “That’s okay. I’m used to butting my head against popular opinion. I’ve been doing it my entire academic life. It’s the only way you can truly make a difference in scholarly pursuits.”

  Jarkko shook his head. “First you break Jarkko’s heart. Then you shatter Jarkko’s dreams. Maybe it’s time for Marissa to swim to shore.”

  She playfully stood from the table. “No problem. I’ll leave if you want me to go. But your odds of finding the treasure will go down significantly if you make me walk the plank.”

  “Perhaps,” Payne said with a laugh, “but if you want to fit in with this crew of pirates, you’ll learn that we’ve had a lot of success with wild speculation. Why spend your days buried in books when you can just make up an awesome theory as you go along?”

  “Because,” she countered, growing annoyed, “the key to proving any hypothesis is through methodical research based on established facts, not wild conjecture. Otherwise, you can’t effectively determine anything. You’ll just waste your time, stumbling in the dark, while the real work is being done by people who happen to enjoy spending time in libraries.”