The Istanbul Puzzle (24 page)

Arap Anach looked out of the tinted window of his night-black Maybach 62S. The Bose sound system was playing
Ride of the Valkyries
low, just how he liked it. The climate control system was purring. The electro-transparent partition between the driver and the rear compartment was up. The twin-turbo V12 engine was as loud as a distant breeze. All would have been right with the world, if the speedometer in the rear compartment wasn’t reading 0 MPH.

He pressed his fist into the black pigskin seat. He was going to be late. He hated being late. It was all the fault of this new security cordon in the City.

At that moment the in-car telephone system buzzed. Arap stabbed a finger at the control button.

‘Yes.’ His tone was imperious. It displayed nothing of his desire to see the cars around him vaporised.

‘The packages have been delivered.’ Malach sounded eager.

‘Very good,’ said Arap. He closed the connection.

The final step would be easy now. He smiled. He didn’t care about the traffic any more. It was all so close, and no one had any idea what was about to happen.

I hope it’s not serious,’ said Gülsüm.

I was out of my seat, looking around

An alarm rang out loudly from the corridor outside the room. As it did, David appeared in the doorway waving at us languidly. It would take a lot more than a fire alarm to make this guy panic.

‘All out,’ he called.

We trooped out of the room, everyone letting everyone else pass by in front of them with a great show of very British politeness. A lingering acrid smell drifted in from somewhere.

Like children after the Pied Piper, our little group traipsed after David. He led us into a small wood-panelled room. It looked as if it hadn’t been used since the Second World War, so old were the iron radiators and the two wooden desks that almost filled it. He led us on through a small door in the back of the room, and down a long panelled corridor of the same vintage.

My mind was racing as I brought up the rear. Was this about us, about what we were doing here, or was I just being totally paranoid?

Some people brushed past us going the other way. More alarms competed with each other. I could smell smoke at one point as we passed a grand stairwell, like something from a Gothic castle. The smell was stronger now. Lord Enniskerry called out for us to hurry up.

The sense of security I’d felt since coming back to London had evaporated.

Finally, we reached an old-fashioned elevator in a bare hallway. It looked like something the ordinary staff of the building might use. We took it to the ground floor and a few minutes later, after passing through a narrow concrete corridor, we exited through a four-inch-thick steel door into a vast steel hall, the battleship-grey lower concourse of Westminster Underground Station. Straight in front of us dull steel escalators loomed.

‘This way,’ said David. ‘I know a good spot for lunch.’

‘Don’t you want to find out what’s going on?’ I said.

‘I’m sure good people are looking after it all. Our job is to keep going,’ he said, loudly.

Lord Enniskerry declined the invitation, shook hands with us, then kissed Gulsum’s hand before disappearing into the crowd.

There were no alarms ringing in the station, but by the time we reached the eastbound Circle Line, two levels below, it was jammed full of people lining the platform five deep, elbow-to-elbow, all waiting quietly. The atmosphere was tense, but as usual on the Underground eye contact was avoided. Even after we’d boarded the train, conversations were hushed.

‘This was the Old Bank of England once upon a time,’ said David, fifteen minutes later, as he ushered us into a large high-ceilinged pub.

We’d got off the Underground at Temple Station, two stops from Westminster, and had walked along Fleet Street among the oblivious lunchtime crowds of King’s College students, city office workers, and pale-faced lawyers from the various Inns of Court. Now, the four of us were ensconced in a private alcove in the pub’s large basement restaurant.

The room had a vaulted wooden ceiling. It was decorated in burgundy upholstery, and had shiny brass handrails, rose-shaped lamps, which looked more like gaslights, and polished wooden tables and chairs as dark as a night in any of Dickens’s orphanages. Around us, waiters hovered, as well-paid business and legal types lunched with colleagues or entertained clients on expense accounts.

‘Nothing disturbs the flow of money,’ said David, passing us menus. ‘The terrorist threat level has been raised, you know, but it’s business as usual down here.’

‘They should all be given medals,’ said Gülsüm, beaming broadly. ‘Or flowers. I do love London.’

She’d been smiling at me all the way from the House of Commons. When I looked at Isabel, I got the distinct impression, from her frosty expression, that she didn’t like the woman.

‘Did you find out what happened back at the House of Commons?’ Isabel asked David.

He’d made a call while we were walking down Fleet Street. Isabel had made one too.

‘Nothing to worry about, my dear. A little problem in the kitchens,’ said David. ‘Everyone a bit twitchy today. For good reason too. You do know about the demonstration the Muslims are planning this afternoon, don’t you?’

‘I thought someone would have banned that after last Saturday,’ I interrupted.

‘The free speech lobby won out, old boy.’ He waved a hand dismissively in the air. ‘We don’t want them complaining they can march after prayers in Cairo, but not here.’

‘Even at St Paul’s?’ I said.

He nodded. Gülsüm patted David’s arm, then looked at me, her brow furrowed. ‘Should I do that reading now, Sean?’ she asked.

She was a persistent lady.

‘Do you believe in this stuff?’ I asked David, gesturing towards Gülsüm.

‘I write columns in the
Evening Standard
, and I hate to tell you this, but last year more people read their horoscopes than all my bloody opinion pieces put together. It’s a parlour game really, a harmless diversion.’

‘But you like it when it comes true, David, don’t you?’ Gülsüm gave him a cool stare.

‘Please, pick a card,’ she said, turning to me. ‘Just one card.’

She’d spread a yellowing deck in a semi-circle face down in front of her. I could argue, and I might have done a few days ago, but what the hell, I’d come close to death. Let’s see what it says.

Without thinking much I pointed to a card. She turned it over with a flourish. It showed a woodcut image of a robed angel holding a trumpet up, with a cockerel at its feet.

‘Aah, the Judgment card,’ she said, softly. She placed two fingers over each of her eyes, as if she wanted to see something in her mind.

‘Something’s about to change,’ she said, softly. Then she removed her fingers from her eyes and looked at me solemnly.

I smiled. She was good. But if she’d told me what was going to change, I might have been more impressed.

‘I have a confession, people. I brought Gülsüm along for another reason too,’ said David.

‘Which is?’ said Isabel.

‘When I enquired about that manuscript you found, the FO sent me an image of a symbol. I sent it to Gülsüm. It’s a square with an arrow inside it. Quite a simple thing. Did you see it?’

I nodded. Isabel was staring at David.

Gülsüm shifted in her seat, put her cards away. Then she put a hand on the table, as if steadying herself. We were all waiting for her to speak.

‘The symbol has multiple meanings, David,’ she said, matter of factly. ‘First, it has mystical meaning. The square is the earth, the triangles fire. This is simple. Anyone can see that.’ She moved her hands across the table as if arranging something.

‘And it is also a Byzantine board game. You have to see what new shapes you can make when you move the pieces around.’ She stopped moving her hands.

‘And hidden beneath that is something else. A Byzantine astrological chart.’ Her hands fluttered in the air. ‘The symbols are in the right order for a reading. The only thing I cannot say is, who or what the chart was written for.’

‘Who or what?’ said David.

‘Yes, it may have been made for a person, for a voyage, or a city even. I would need to see any other writing or symbols that were near it.’

David leaned back. ‘No need to trouble yourself any more,’ he said.

‘I hate to interrupt,’ said Isabel. ‘But I was wondering if you’d made any progress on our friend, David?’ Her tone was taut. She clearly wanted to move the conversation on.

Sir David shook his head. ‘It would be a lot easier if you had evidence, my dear.’ He obviously wasn’t enjoying being the bearer of bad news.

An awkward silence followed.

On the wall at the far end of the bar, straight in front of me, a jumbo LCD television was showing a satellite news channel. A familiar face came on the screen. At first, I thought I was mistaken. I looked away. Then I looked back. I felt an overwhelming sense of déjà vu. For the second time in 48 hours I saw someone I knew on the TV news.

It was Kaiser, the American. We’d last seen him as we’d entered the police station in Istanbul together.

I stood, mumbled an excuse, and mesmerised, crossed over to the TV, hoping the sound would be on.

As I got closer, I saw that there was a text caption running along the bottom of the screen. It read: American archaeologist discovers long-lost manuscript.

I felt as if the ground was falling away. What the hell was Kaiser up to? Then, as I came closer to the TV, I could hear his voice.

‘… we discovered it in the Golden Horn. It’s from the time of Mohammad. If it’s what we think it is, it’s the only document from the period that mentions him by name, and explains what the emperor at that time decided to do about him.’

Behind him, a blurry image of the cover of the book we’d found appeared.

Kaiser smiled like a fox who had found his way into a hen house.

The sneaky bastard!

The news presenter asked, ‘Where is this book now, Mr Kaiser?’

‘It’s under lock and key, for security reasons.’ His expression darkened. ‘Of course, it still needs to be properly translated.’

In a corner of the screen there was a medieval woodcut depiction of a double-headed eagle. I felt someone at my elbow.

‘Not much chance of keeping a lid on this now,’ said Isabel.

‘What have you translated so far?’ asked the interviewer, in an excited tone.

‘All I can say,’ said Kaiser, ‘is that we will be publishing what we know at the earliest opportunity.’

I could hear Isabel letting her breath out.

‘Well, viewers, that’s all we have time for right now,’ said the presenter. ‘But stay tuned for more after this.’

The TV news moved on to a story about the demonstration being planned for central London that afternoon. Apparently 250,000 people were expected now.

I was about to turn away when I heard the presenter say, ‘The group organising the demonstration this afternoon, after Friday prayers, is called the ECP, the English Caliphate Party.’

I felt as if I’d been punched in the stomach.

For weeks after Irene had been butchered, I’d searched for this elusive ECP group. They’d been holding a march in London against the war in Afghanistan on the day Irene’s bus had been bombed in Kabul. It was obviously a coincidence, but I wanted to meet them. I think my mind had been warped by grief. An anti-terrorist officer, who’d visited me soon after, had warned me off even talking to them.

But I’d spent weeks reading notices in every Islamic bookshop and mosque I could find in London, and on every English language Islamic website, hoping to uncover where the ECP met. After scouring and scouring, without finding even a single mention of their name, I’d abandoned my search. That was when I decided to go to Afghanistan.

But why had they reappeared now?

I walked back to our table. Isabel was already sitting down.

‘You look in the horrors,’ said David.

I stared at him, memories of that time searching for the ECP swirling through my mind, all the grim places I’d visited, the sickening despair I’d felt. How I’d imagined it could never end.

‘The people organising the demo,’ I said, slowly. Something caught in my throat. David looked puzzled. I coughed. ‘At St Paul’s. They’re the guys who held a demo in London the day my wife was murdered.’

I sat.

‘How odd.’ David’s half-smile was sympathetic, but clearly well practised.

I’d felt people’s pity hundreds of times in the past few years. And I hated it.

Why were the ECP back?

David was staring at me.

‘There’s a lot of these groups,’ said Isabel. Her tone was placating. ‘They demand the right to demonstrate, but they don’t want to allow free speech for their critics.’

‘Do you know anything about who’s organising the demonstration this afternoon?’ I asked David.

‘It’s all above board, or so I’m told. Apparently, whoever’s organising it, has no record of any terrorist connections. There must have been no incidents at their last demonstration either. That would have been important.’ He put his hand out towards me.

‘What the hell was that other thing on the news?’ he said. ‘Was that something about your manuscript?’ He pointed in the direction of the TV.

I nodded. Then I told him who Kaiser was, what he’d said.

‘We’ll have to get someone to talk to him, and quickly.’ David’s face was red, almost purple.

I put my hands on the table. ‘He better stop spreading lies,’ I said.

‘The world’s going mad,’ said David. ‘And this is certainly not going to help.’ He waved towards the TV, then settled back in his seat.

‘I have to go,’ said Gulsum. ‘All this excitement is too much for me.’ She stood, shivered theatrically, her shoulders hunching up, then bent down and kissed David on both cheeks. She did the same for Isabel and me. As we kissed, she whispered, ‘Be careful, won’t you?’

Isabel must have heard her because she replied curtly, ‘He’s well able to look after himself.’

Gulsum simply hummed in reply. A second later she was gone.

‘What did you make of what she said about that symbol?’ said David, turning to me, ‘all that stuff about mystical board games and astrological charts?’

‘I can’t argue with her,’ I said.

‘You didn’t show her the text below the symbol,’ said Isabel.

‘No. It was in Latin,’ said David quickly.

‘I’m sure you’ve translated it by now,’ said Isabel. ‘I think I remember most of it. Fame ad mortem was in there somewhere, famine and death, cheery stuff.’

David looked at her for a few seconds. ‘I suppose there’s no harm in telling you. We haven’t figured out what it means yet.’ He glanced towards the stairs, the way Gulsum had gone. ‘I didn’t want to tell Gulsum about it until I found out what she thought of the symbol on its own. One of our people thought it was an astrological chart too.’

‘What did the Latin translate to?’ I said.

He took his BlackBerry out, tapped it for a few seconds.

‘What new path must you make, if you go from famine to death, yet wish to take each path, and each once only. That’s it, apparently.’ He spoke slowly, reading from his BlackBerry, then looked at me.

‘There’s a bit of debate about whether path should stand for destiny, but that’s all it says.’