The Messiah Secret cb-3 Read online

  Then he saw the man again: he was running back towards the tree-line and then vanished among the trees. Less than half a minute later he popped back in to view with a bulky bag clutched in his left hand, and jogged over to the house.

  A few minutes later, Bronson clearly heard a metallic scraping sound from the bedroom to his left, and crossed to the doorway. He looked inside the room, checking the window, but the burglar was not yet visible. Bronson slid into the room, walked swiftly across to the rear wall and flattened himself against it, where he knew he’d be invisible to anyone looking in through the window.

  He felt in his jacket pocket, checking that the handcuffs he’d collected from the Canterbury station were still there. When Angela had told him what she thought had happened at Carfax Hall, he’d decided that having a pair of cuffs in his pocket made sense. And it looked as if he’d been right.

  Using his ears rather than his eyes to measure the burglar’s progress, Bronson could hear the man climb up the ladder, a muffled thumping sound as he put his feet on the rungs. Then there were a few brief moments of silence, followed by a faint rubbing sound which Bronson guessed was the insertion of the screwdriver or chisel or whatever turned out to be his tool of choice for forcing the catch.

  He heard an irritated muttering from outside and suppressed a grin. Even the first-floor window catches weren’t that loose. Then a louder noise, a click, as the catch finally gave way, and moments later the unmistakable sound of a sash window sliding upwards.

  Bronson kept behind the substantial curtain that framed the window, as the man climbed into the bedroom, an empty nylon bag clutched in his hand, then crept slowly across the bedroom towards the door. Bronson waited until he was about halfway there, then crossed the room in half a dozen swift strides.

  As he approached, the man half-turned towards him, a look of sheer panic on his face.

  Bronson grabbed his right arm, forcing his hand behind his back and up towards his shoulder.

  ‘I know it’s a cliche,’ Bronson said, ‘but you’re nicked, my son. I’m a police officer and I’m arresting you on suspicion of breaking and entering and burglary.’

  Grasping the struggling man by the shoulder Bronson held him firmly, he snapped the handcuff on to his right wrist, then grabbed his left arm and repeated the process, securing his hands behind his back.

  ‘We’re going to go downstairs,’ he said, ‘and I’ll explain what’s going to happen.’

  Once downstairs, Bronson pushed his captive into one of the kitchen chairs. ‘Now, I’m required to caution you, so please listen carefully. You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something that you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence. Do you understand the words of the caution?’

  ‘Just let me go, you bastard.’

  ‘I’ll take that as a “yes”, shall I?’

  ‘I’m not saying another word. I want my solicitor, and I want him now.’

  ‘Fine,’ Bronson said. ‘That’s entirely within your rights. I’m not going to question you — that will be done under caution at the police station — but I am going to search you to see if you’re carrying any offensive weapons. Are you carrying anything that might injure me?’

  ‘Go to hell!’

  Bronson jerked the man to his feet and checked his pockets, pulling out a small wallet and placing it on the kitchen table.

  Then he pushed the man back into the chair, sat down opposite him, and opened the wallet he’d found. Almost the first thing he pulled out was a driver’s licence. Bronson looked at the name on it and smiled.

  ‘Well, Jonathan,’ he said, ‘Carfax is a name I certainly recognize, so I assume this burglary is more personal than professional. I presume the old man cut you out of his will, so you’re bypassing the legal process and taking what you believe you’re owed.’

  His captive didn’t respond.

  ‘But it doesn’t actually matter why you did it — it’s still burglary,’ Bronson said. Then he shrugged, reached into his pocket and pulled out his mobile phone. He glanced at his watch. It was almost eleven o’clock, so he thought he’d tell Angela that his mission had succeeded, then he’d call the local police.

  ‘Hi, it’s me,’ he said, when Angela answered her phone. ‘Just thought you’d like to know I’m sitting in the kitchen looking at your burglar.’

  ‘Really? Is he — I mean, was there any trouble? Do you want me to call the police?’ Angela asked.

  ‘No, thanks. I know the form. I’ll have to go to the local police station with him to make a statement and stuff, so I won’t get to the pub for quite a while, but I’ll call you once I’m at the cop shop to let you know how long I’ll be.’

  ‘OK.’ There was a pause. When she spoke again, Angela sounded uncharacteristically nervous. ‘Will you come up to my room when you get here? I want you to tell me everything that’s happened.’

  Bronson smiled. ‘It’s a deal. I’ll see you later.’

  But Jonathan Carfax was not looking nearly so happy. ‘This is entrapment. I don’t believe you’re a policeman at all. You’re just some bloody thug the museum staff have employed.’

  Bronson pulled out his warrant card and showed it to him. ‘I’m Detective Sergeant Christopher Bronson,’ he said, ‘and I promise you that I’m a real police officer. My ex-wife works for the British Museum and asked me to give her a hand here.’ He reached across the table and pulled the local telephone directory towards him. As he did so, he looked at his prisoner. ‘Just sit quietly and we’ll get this sorted out. Are the cuffs too tight?’

  The man shook his head. ‘No,’ he said grudgingly. Then his eyes widened and he looked behind Bronson. ‘Look out!’ he shouted. ‘Behind you!’

  Bronson half-turned and, as he did so, saw a sudden flash of grey and then something slammed — hard — into the side of his head.

  He saw stars for the briefest of instants, and then nothing at all.

  19

  ‘Chris! Chris! Wake up, damn you.’

  Bronson’s head felt as if it was bursting. There was a massive throbbing ache above his right ear, and all he wanted was for the pain to go away, for the pulsing agony to stop.

  The voice was familiar to him, but for several seconds he couldn’t seem to place it. Or remember where he was. And then, with a rush, it all came back to him. Carfax Hall. The burglar, and then the kitchen. But he couldn’t remember what had happened next, or why he seemed to be lying on the floor with a splitting headache.

  He forced his eyes open. Angela was bending over him, some kind of a pad in her hand that she was pressing against the right side of his head. That hurt, and he raised a hand to stop her.

  ‘Oh, thank God,’ she whispered. ‘No, don’t touch it. You’ve got a nasty gash on the side of your head. There’s an ambulance on its way.’

  Bronson groaned and eased up into a sitting position. ‘I don’t need an ambulance,’ he muttered.

  ‘Actually, you probably don’t,’ Angela said, ‘but I really called one for him.’ She gestured behind her.

  Slumped in a kitchen chair, his arms still obviously secured behind his back, and his face battered and bleeding, was the man he’d caught climbing in through the bedroom window.

  ‘What the hell’s happened?’ Bronson said. ‘I never touched him. Is he OK?’

  ‘He’s been badly beaten up, but he’s alive.’

  Bronson took the pad from Angela, pressed it gingerly to the wound then struggled to his feet, the pounding in his skull getting worse as he stood up. Swaying slightly, he gripped the back of a chair with his other hand.

  ‘Just take it slowly,’ Angela said.

  Bronson stepped across to the man on the other side of the table. His face was puffy and cut from repeated blows, his eyes closed.

  Bronson leaned over him. ‘Can you hear me?’

  The man stirred, looked up at him and nodded.

  ‘Bend forward,’ Bronson
ordered. He took out the handcuff key, released the restraints and put them in his pocket.

  The man leaned back gratefully, rubbing his wrists. ‘Am I still under arrest?’

  As he spoke, Bronson could see that he’d lost a couple of teeth in the attack. Bronson shook his head, then wished he hadn’t as another stab of pain shot through his skull. ‘No, as far as I’m concerned, we were here in the house together this evening and somebody attacked us.’

  ‘Are you sure, Chris?’ Angela asked.

  ‘Yes. Burglary’s a minor offence compared to what’s just happened. And you won’t be trying it again, will you, Jonathan?’

  ‘Jonathan?’ Angela’s face registered her surprise. ‘Do you know him?’

  ‘He was careless enough to bring his wallet and driving-licence with him tonight. This is Jonathan Carfax, and I presume he’s one of Oliver’s numerous disinherited relatives. In other words, he’s an amateur, not a professional burglar.’

  At that moment, they heard an engine outside and the noise of tyres on the gravel drive. A few seconds later the main doorbell rang.

  ‘That’ll be the ambulance,’ Angela said, getting up.

  ‘OK, Jonathan,’ Bronson said. ‘Let’s get you checked over in the local casualty department. If anyone asks, we were here in the house together, locking up after the British Museum team, when a man burst in and attacked us both. You’ve no idea who he was or what he wanted. He beat us up and then ran away. Just stick to that — nothing more and nothing less, OK?’

  Jonathan Carfax, his face largely obscured behind bandages, pads and sticking-plaster, folded his frame into the rear seat of Angela’s Mini. Bronson got into the front passenger seat and strapped in as Angela started the engine.

  ‘Where to?’ she asked, starting the engine.

  ‘The nearest pub,’ Carfax insisted, his words slightly slurred. ‘I need a drink.’

  ‘The doctors said no alcohol for you two,’ Angela pointed out.

  ‘All the pubs will be closed by now, but a drink’s a bloody good idea,’ Bronson agreed. ‘We can go to the hotel and get something there.’

  ‘Right,’ Bronson said a few minutes later, cradling a brandy schooner. ‘The last thing I remember about this evening was looking at your driving-licence in the kitchen at Carfax Hall, Jonathan. What the hell happened next?’

  Carfax took a sip of brandy, and closed his eyes. ‘You were just about to call the police,’ he said, his voice slightly distorted due to his missing teeth and probably compounded by the effect of the painkillers he’d been given. ‘The door behind you opened — the kitchen door, I mean — and a man walked in, carrying a cosh or club of some sort. I tried to warn you, but you turned very slowly. And then he hit you on the side of the head, and you just dropped flat on the floor. I really thought you were dead.’

  ‘And then?’ Bronson prompted.

  ‘And then he started on me. He checked to make sure I couldn’t defend myself — thanks to the handcuffs you’d snapped on me, I was completely helpless — and then he started asking me questions that I couldn’t answer.’ Carfax’s voice quivered slightly.

  ‘Can you describe this man?’ Bronson asked.

  ‘I doubt if I’ll ever forget him. He was slim, over six feet tall, maybe six three. Black hair, cut very short, almost a crew cut, dark brown eyes and quite a big, straight nose. A good-looking man, really. From his accent, he’s American or Canadian, probably American as he had far too many teeth, and they were very white.’

  ‘What did he ask you about?’

  ‘Like you, he looked at my driving-licence, so he found out my name. He assumed I would know all about my family, but I really don’t. I’m only a cousin of old Oliver, and I didn’t know his father.’

  ‘You mean Bartholomew?’ Angela interjected.

  ‘Yes. All this man seemed to be interested in was Bartholomew’s Folly — you know, the way the old man squandered the family’s money on his treasure hunts.’

  ‘And what did you tell him?’ Bronson prompted.

  ‘Everything I know,’ Carfax said simply, ‘but that’s not a lot more than was printed in the local parish magazine when Oliver died, and this guy seemed to know all about that. When I didn’t tell him what he wanted to know, he started hitting me, hard. And every time I told him I didn’t know something, he hit me again.’

  ‘But why would a few unsuccessful treasure hunts that took place well over half a century ago be of the slightest interest to anyone now?’ Bronson asked, almost to himself. The whole thing made no sense at all.

  ‘I asked him that,’ Carfax said, ‘and he yelled at me that just because Bartholomew didn’t find the treasure, it didn’t mean it wasn’t there.’

  ‘Right,’ Bronson said. ‘I’d like you to tell us everything you know about Bartholomew’s Folly, from the beginning. That’s everything you told that American thug, and anything else you can think of that you forgot to tell him.’

  By the time they walked out of the hotel and climbed back into Angela’s Mini, Bronson thought he knew as much as anyone else about Bartholomew’s Folly, and exactly what had happened in the kitchen at Carfax Hall, and he did, in fact, know almost everything.

  But there was one thing that Jonathan Carfax hadn’t told him about the American and what he’d done after Bronson had been knocked unconscious. He hadn’t withheld the information, or not deliberately, anyway. What he’d seen was apparently so innocuous that he’d genuinely forgotten that it ever happened, and it never occurred to Bronson to ask the specific question that would have unlocked Carfax’s tongue.

  20

  ‘So what now?’ Bronson asked.

  It was 9 a.m., and he and Angela were drinking coffee in the breakfast room of The Old English Gentleman. Angela had told Richard Mayhew that there had been a fight in Carfax Hall, that Bronson was fine, but that the burglar had been permanently frightened off, which was actually remarkably close to the truth, albeit shaded somewhat.

  She’d also told Bronson how she’d grown increasingly concerned about leaving him on his own at the house, especially when he’d failed to call her from the police station as he’d promised, and failed to answer his mobile. Filled with a growing sense of unease that she couldn’t quite explain, she’d driven her Mini — in her words ‘like a maniac’ — back down the country roads, and had arrived at Carfax Hall to find Bronson out cold on the floor and Jonathan Carfax tied up and very much the worse for wear.

  Carfax had explained that when their attacker had heard the sound of wheels on the gravel, he had run off. Bronson now realised that Angela had possibly saved both their lives. He leaned forward and put his hand on hers, thinking — not for the first time — how fortunate he was.

  Angela looked at him appraisingly. They’d spent the night together in her room, because — she told him later — she felt sorry for him — and thought he needed mothering. It hadn’t quite turned out that way, and Bronson had proved that although his head might have been hurting, the rest of his body was in perfect working order. He sat back, stretching his legs in front of him. If getting himself knocked out was all that was needed to get him and Angela back together again — well, he’d have done it long ago.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Angela asked now. ‘Exactly?’

  ‘I’m not talking about us,’ Bronson said. ‘I know you too well, Angela. What happened last night caught both of us by surprise-’

  ‘It certainly surprised me. The first time, anyway.’

  Bronson grinned at her. ‘Yeah. Anyway, I know you’re still not sure about allowing me back in your life, and I’m prepared to work at showing you that you can trust me. What I meant, though, was this Bartholomew’s Folly thing. I saw the expression on your face when Jonathan was talking about it. Despite the dangers, you want to do some digging, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, I suppose I do, if for no other reason than to find out why some thug would travel over here from the States — I’m assuming he doesn’t live here — to try to beat i
nformation out of Jonathan Carfax.’

  ‘So here we go again,’ Bronson murmured. ‘Another Lewis-Bronson treasure hunt gets under way. Is that what you mean?’

  ‘Maybe.’ Angela smiled at him. ‘You’ve got to admit, it is an intriguing story.’

  ‘OK. I know what Jonathan told us about the old man’s treasure hunt, so if you’re serious about this, I’m guessing you’ve got something else, some other piece of information, that relates to it.’

  Angela shook her head. ‘Actually, I don’t really know very much more than you, apart from two things. First, those notes and stuff you found in the base of that hideous stuffed fox are quite interesting, though I’ll need to have a proper look at them over the next day or two. The other thing is the translation of the piece of parchment that Bartholomew Wendell-Carfax found in that earthenware pot apparently mentioned “the treasure of the world”, which is a fairly unusual expression.’

  ‘You’re assuming that the translation from the Persian original was correct, of course. I thought you said there was some doubt about that.’

  ‘There are doubts, yes, and without the original text there’s no way of checking it out, so all we can do is assume that the translators Oliver employed managed to get it right. But the thing is that I’ve read about this before, and the source I’m referring to was nothing at all to do with Bartholomew’s Folly. I remember seeing it on a fragment of text written in a different language, from another country and possibly dating from a different century.’

  Bronson knew by the look of Angela’s dark brown eyes that she was determined to follow this one through. ‘Go on.’

  ‘It all goes back to a man named Hillel. He was an important first-century Jewish religious leader, a man involved in the development of both the Mishnah and the Talmud, and he later became the spiritual head of the Jewish people. He was known to be the author of various religious treatises, and his writings aren’t all that rare. Bits and pieces turn up fairly regularly, even today.’