Ark of Fire

CHAPTER 60

Hearing a sonorous knock, Caedmon turned in his chair. The guesthouse proprietor, a florid-faced Welshman, stood in the doorway, no doubt baffled as to why the door had been left ajar. Simply put, he had not seen a need to close it.

“You’ve got a call,” the other man announced, clearly annoyed at having had to climb four sets of stairs to convey the message. “You can take it at the front desk.” Announcement made, he took his departure.

Caedmon rose to his feet. As he walked toward the door, he glimpsed the sketched drawing of the Canterbury window, along with the handwritten translation of the quatrains. Both left in plain sight on the wooden bench. A stark and painful reminder that Edie’s abduction had everything to do with the Ark of the Covenant.

Knowing he would have need of both, he retrieved the two sheets of paper, slipping them inside his anorak pocket. That being the only thing of value in the room, he trudged after the proprietor, closing the door behind him.

A few moments later, standing at the rough-hewn counter that masqueraded as a front desk, Caedmon lifted the heavy handset of an old-fashioned telephone. “Go ahead. I’m listening,” he said, refusing to engage in the hypocrisy of a civil greeting.

“I do hope you’re having a pleasant evening,” the American male on the other end smoothly, and hypocritically, said in turn.

“Sod off! Is she still alive?”

“You know that she is.”

“I know no such thing. If we are to continue the conversation, I require proof of life.”

“You’re hardly in a position to make demands.”

“I am not demanding,” Caedmon countered in a calmer tone, reining in his unruly emotions. “I am requesting, as a show of good faith, you give me proof that Miss Miller is, indeed, your captive.”

The request was met with silence, and then Caedmon could detect a muffled command being issued.

Then, a few seconds later, “It’s me, Caedmon. I’m . . . I’m all right.”

At hearing Edie’s voice, he glanced heavenward.

She was alive.

“Have they harmed you in any way?”

“No, they—”

“Satisfied?” her captor snarled into the phone.

“Yes, I’m satisfied. What must I do to ensure her safe r eturn?”

The other man chuckled, obviously amused by the question. “Find me the Ark of the Covenant, of course.”

Caedmon fell silent.

Hearing the proviso so bluntly spelled out—in clear, concise, unequivocal terms—made him acutely aware that MacFarlane might very well be asking the impossible. For nearly three thousand years the Ark had remained hidden. Naught but a legend. Many before him had tried—and failed—to find it. Somehow, against impossible odds, he had to succeed.

His stomach muscles painfully cramped; he was afraid that the challenge might prove insurmountable.

Knowing the negotiations would come to a horrible end if such doubts were hinted at, let alone verbalized, he strove for a confidence he didn’t feel. “Do I have your word that when I find the Ark, Edie Miller’s life will be spared?”

“My word is my bond,” the other man promptly replied. “As soon as we hang up, I want you to leave that rathole of a hotel and head three blocks south. Turn left at the telephone booth on the corner. There’s an alley halfway down the street. My men will be waiting for you. Don’t try anything foolish. If you do, the woman dies. And, trust me, it won’t be a pleasant death.”

Instructions issued, the call was unceremoniously disconnected.

For several long seconds Caedmon stared at the telephone, events unraveling at a faster pace than he would have liked.

Needing to be on his way, he banged his palm against the silver bell on the counter. When the Welshman appeared, he slid his hand inside his coat pocket and removed his billfold. “I would like to check out.”

The proprietor suspiciously stared at him. “Where’s the missus?”

“She has gone ahead without me.”

Bill paid in full, he left the guesthouse and proceeded south as directed, his progress slowed by an almost impenetrable fog, the gray mist as dense as Irish oatmeal.

On his right, he passed a pub, its yellow light spilling onto the pavement. Earlier in the evening, he’d glumly sat in that same pub, staring at a full pint of lager. Knowing alcohol would do nothing to resolve the unsettled business with Edie, he’d handed the glass to an inebriated local before wordlessly slinking out.

Had he not succumbed to a moment’s weakness, the abduction might have been thwarted.

Caedmon shoved the thought aside. He couldn’t change the past. He could only affect the here and now.

As he made his way through the dense fog, sound became muffled to such an extent that he couldn’t discern whether a honking vehicle was to his left or to his right. The alarming scene was so cinematic, he wondered if MacFarlane had somehow magically conjured the foul weather on command, such notions reminding him anew that all he had at his command was the nail file hidden beneath the leather insole of his right oxford.

Again, he rehearsed the plan in his mind’s eye. A jab to the eye. A deep puncture to the neck. If used correctly, the metal file could become a deadly weapon. He’d killed before. He could do so again.

Approaching a red call box, he turned left as he had been instructed. When he came to the alleyway, he made another left. At the end of the deserted lane, he sighted two men leaning against a parked Range Rover.

MacFarlane’s bully boys. Dicey characters, the both of them.

Though he had no concrete evidence, Caedmon assumed that MacFarlane recruited his mercenaries straight out of the U.S. military. Special Forces, more than likely.

“Good evening, gentlemen,” he said, touching his fingers to an imaginary hat brim.

Neither man acknowledged the greeting, although one of them pushed himself away from the vehicle and stepped toward him. Without being asked, Caedmon raised his arms, grasping the back of his head with his clasped hands. The other man impersonally patted him down, searching every crevice where a weapon might be concealed.

Search concluded, Caedmon slowly lowered his arms.

“Strip off your clothes.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You heard me—strip off your clothes.” To ensure that the order was obeyed, the other man pulled aside his jacket lapel, revealing a holstered gun.

Bang goes the smarty-smarty plan to use the nail file.

There being nothing he could do but comply, Caedmon removed his anorak, dropping it onto the ground. Then, giving every indication that he was a man with nothing to hide, he toed off his right leather oxford, purposely kicking it in his escort’s direction.

The subterfuge worked; his surrendered shoe warranted little more than a disinterested glance.

As he divested himself of his garments, he noticed that the thick fog provided a surreal modicum of privacy.

Naked, he stood before his captors. He couldn’t think of a time when he’d felt more vulnerable. “I know. I should probably be more diligent about my exercise regimen.”

Neither man responded, although the one with the holstered weapon did reach inside his jacket pocket. Removing a dark length of fabric, he tossed it at Caedmon’s bare chest.

“Put on the blindfold.”

“Such measures seem a bit draconian, don’t you think?”

Evidently not draconian enough; the other man’s response was quick and unpitying. Removing the gun from its holster, he stepped forward, smashing the revolver butt against the side of Caedmon’s head.

A myriad splash of color, like a Jackson Pollock abstract, instantly flashed behind his eyes.

An instant later, the colors bled together, turning a deep, dark inky shade of black.