Past Lives (32 page)

He made to lift Simone up into his arms only to discover that she and the nun were chained to a ring in the wall and a padlock was fitted to the end. There would be no way of freeing them without a key. He started back up the ladder to begin a frantic search of the room above. The lack of furnishings made searching easy but he didn’t find any key. He had to conclude that Ignatius or Stroud must have taken it with them. But where had they gone?

The only clue he had was the architectural plan on the table. It was a photocopy of a much older document. After a few moments anxious examination, he recognised it as the floor plan of a large church. Mdina Cathedral perhaps? Could that be where they’d gone? It didn’t seem to make sense but he had nothing else to go on. He saw that one area of the plan had been circled – The Chapel of the Cross. He made a mental note of this and its location before climbing back down the ladder to try and make Simone and the nun as comfortable as possible. He left them, lying side by side on the floor of the stone bath, both still deeply unconscious.

Macandrew moved along the corridor as fast as he could, ignoring the pain that came from his injured foot. He ran up the stone steps leading up to the side door where he and Simone had first been brought in to the convent, anticipating problems when he reached the door but his luck held. The door was secured on the inside by a Yale lock and two sliding bolts - the original iron locks, although still present, were no longer in use. He undid the bolts slowly to avoid attracting attention and put his weight against the door so that the Yale would turn more easily. He put it up on the snib and slid out into dark, deserted streets.

He could see from a ceramic plaque on the wall opposite that he was in Villegaignon Street but it didn't mean much. He knew hardly anything at all about Mdina save what Simone had told him - that it had once been the capital of the island but was now a piece of history, a daytime tourist attraction. He looked to his left and recognised what he thought must be the road they had come in on. Simone had mentioned the bridge spanning an old moat. He was pleased that he at least knew the way out of Mdina. Please God, he and Simone would be using it in the very near future. For the moment, he hurried off in the opposite direction to look for the cathedral. He paused when he reached a junction, which opened out into a large open square, and wiped the sweat from his brow: the air was oppressively humid.

The square appeared to be deserted but its openness made him uneasy. He couldn't bring himself to believe that he was entirely alone despite Simone’s assertion that practically no one lived in Mdina. It didn’t feel right. He felt sure that the towers and turrets must conceal a thousand watching eyes. A street sign told him it was St Paul's Square. More importantly, he could see, standing before him on the opposite side of the square, the huge stone front of Mdina cathedral.

Somewhere inside his head, the thin small voice of reason was telling him that he should be looking for a police station; raising the alarm and calling out the cavalry, but the thought of having to explain things to blank faces who would think him mad, made him balk at the idea. He took cover in an arched doorway to work out a plan of action.

The only thing he had in his favour right now was the element of surprise. Apart from that, he was alone, unarmed and probably outnumbered four to one. He looked across to the main doors of the cathedral and decided on a look and learn policy. After that, he would play it by ear.

Although he had no notion of the significance of it, he was working on the assumption that Ignatius and the others would be in the area that had been circled on the plan - the Chapel of the Cross. He’d also learned from the drawings that the cathedral was well endowed with pillars and alcoves. The chances were good that it would also be in darkness so cover should not be a problem once he got inside.

There was no question of entering by the huge front doors - he could imagine the echoing sound that would make. He would seek out a more modest entrance at the back or side of the building, preferably on the opposite side from the Chapel of the Cross. He crossed the open square as fast as he could and felt a sense of relief as he melted into the shadows of a narrow lane.

The first door he came to was locked but the handle on the second turned easily enough. He edged the door open slowly, an inch at a time and just until the opening was wide enough to let him squeeze through: the last thing he needed at this moment was a squeal of protest from a noisy hinge. He squeezed inside, taking great care not to let the heavy iron handle clatter back against the wood. Once there, he stood stock still in the darkness and just listened until his eyes became accustomed to the gloom. All was deathly quiet.

He started to make out shapes. The cathedral wasn't in complete darkness. He could see a dim yellow light but wondered about its rectangular pattern until he realised that he was looking through the trellis top of a screen placed just inside the door. He moved to the end of the screen and crouched down before moving out into the open.

The light was coming from candles positioned at various points in the cathedral. They did little to provide illumination but much to create atmosphere. The building was alive with flickering shadows and they felt hostile. There was however, a more constant source of light on the other side of the building and a good way along to his left. By his reckoning, it was coming from just about where the Chapel of the Cross should be.

It was clear that restoration work was going on inside the building. Scaffolding had been erected at a number of places around the walls and tarpaulins had been spread on the floor. As he drew nearer, Macandrew could see that this also applied to the Chapel of the Cross where the stonework on the right hand wall had been under repair. This had proved useful to Ignatius and his cronies because two large tarpaulins had been picked up from the floor and draped over the iron-railed gates that guarded the entrance to the chapel. They effectively kept in most of the light but they also prevented Macandrew from seeing what was going on inside. There were sounds coming from the chapel.

He was close enough to hear muffled voices but still couldn't see much, other than the reason for calling this place the Chapel of the Cross. A huge crucifix bearing the body of Christ was hanging on the back wall above the altar. It was over twenty feet high and suspended by a steel cable so that it leaned out from the wall at the top while the bottom rested on a small ledge on the wall behind and above the altar. Macandrew thought it looked more like a predatory eagle than a symbol of hope. It was flanked by two smaller statues, one of the Virgin and another of a saint.

What he needed to find was some kind of vantage point so that he could see what was going on down on the floor of the chapel but there was no obvious way to achieve this. The chapel itself comprised a stone-walled cul de sac, richly decorated and separated from the main church by the two wrought iron gates, currently adorned with tarpaulins.

Something metal fell to the floor behind the screens and the sound echoed up to the ceiling. Macandrew heard muttered recriminations but shortly afterwards, the sounds changed from anger to excitement. He heard Stroud’s voice say, 'They're through! They’ve found it.'

The noise level dropped and leaping shadows on the walls above the tarpaulins told Macandrew that they were repositioning the light sources. He felt increasingly frustrated at not being able to see what was going on. He considered crawling right up to the tarpaulin screen, hoping to find a chink to look through but he could see from where he was that no light was escaping - therefore no chink. There was however, a bank of scaffolding on the right-hand side that extended into the Chapel of the Cross and reached right up to the back wall.

This could give him the height he sought but there would be little or no cover for him once up there. If any of the four should happen to look up, he would be like a clay pipe in a shooting gallery. There was a slim chance that he might be able to see enough from the outside end of the scaffold, where he would still be protected by dark shadow: it all depended on where the men were working in relation to the tarpaulin screens. There was only one way to find out.

He put his foot on the bottom tube of the scaffolding and gripped the one above his head, testing both for firmness before committing his full weight to the framework – the last thing he wanted was for the structure to start shaking when he started climbing. He raised himself slowly up on to the first element and then repeated the manoeuvre to gain a height of about six feet. The next level seemed a deal more unstable but he still managed to pull himself noiselessly up on to the wooden platform at a height now of just over ten feet. He paused before tackling the final two frames. Two more moves and he was twenty feet above the floor of the cathedral.

The last move set up a slight tremble in the framework when he was forced to take the weight off his injured foot a little too quickly but it was not enough to attract attention from inside the chapel and happened to coincide with a distant roll of thunder. He crawled slowly forward until he could see Ignatius and the others. They were looking down into a large black hole in the chapel floor.

Parvelli's head appeared in the centre of the hole and he handed something up to Ignatius who turned round and held it up reverently in both hands. Macandrew could see it was a sword and the look on Ignatius’s face suggested that it must have some very special significance for him. He appeared oblivious to anything else going on around him. Macandrew lost sight of him as he moved into the shadow of the tarpaulin screens, still holding the sword up in front of his face.

Stroud was helping with the removal of something heavy from the shaft. He was pulling on a rope while Parvelli pushed from below. At the fourth heave, a large, iron box made it over the rim of the opening and was supported on the edge by Stroud until Parvelli had climbed out and helped pull it back.

The echoing voice of the fat man came from the depths of the shaft but he was told by Parvelli to be quiet. Stroud was trying to lever the clasp away from the lid of the box without much success. Parvelli took over and used brute force of a higher order to greater effect. The lid swung back to reveal the gleam of gold, which brought gasps of excitement and an outburst of animated chatter. It died when Ignatius cautioned them to be quiet.

Parvelli was about to start emptying the contents of the chest out on to the marble floor but Stroud stopped him and pointed to his watch. Parvelli hesitated then nodded and started to winch the fat man up while Stroud closed the lid of the chest and started tidying up. When he finally emerged, the fat man was cradling a human skull in his hands. Ignatius, who had emerged from the shadow of the screens, walked over and took it from him. Macandrew felt a shiver at the sight of Ignatius standing there with a sword in one hand and a skull in the other.

'Meet our benefactor, gentlemen,’ said Ignatius. ‘James of Caesarea, the architect of our good fortune but alas . . . of no further use to us.'

He held the skull out over the shaft in the floor before letting it fall from his grasp. ‘Time we were going . . .’

The fat man leaned over the edge to look down at the splintered skull but, as he did so, Parvelli suddenly pushed him hard in the back so that he toppled headfirst into the opening and plunged to the bottom. His scream was cut short by a sickening thud. Almost in the same movement, Parvelli took out an automatic pistol and levelled it at the other two who were standing, open-mouthed.

Ignatius and Stroud both started to back away, both trying to reason with Parvelli, whose intentions were now very clear. He was going to kill them and take everything for himself. He pulled out a silencer from his pocket and calmly started screwing it on to the end of the gun.

Macandrew held his breath as he watched Parvelli walk towards the two men. He was thinking pragmatically that twenty five percent of his problem had just disappeared down the shaft and another fifty percent were in imminent danger. On the other hand, so was the key to the padlock. This would present him with a real problem should Parvelli choose to dispose of all the bodies down the shaft . . .

Ignatius and Stroud split up as they backed away. Parvelli moved towards Ignatius first. The priest raised the sword above his head but looked more ridiculous than threatening. Parvelli took aim and Ignatius panicked and stumbled over backwards. The sword flew from his grasp and sailed over the chapel gates to clatter down on the floor of the cathedral proper. He lay, transfixed on the marble floor, as Parvelli moved in for the kill.

'I don't want the gold,' he stammered. 'I have no interest in it. I only want the sword. Take the gold, all of it, it's yours. You're welcome to it!'

Macandrew noticed that – despite his apparent panic and pleading - Ignatius was crabbing sideways on the floor, a little at a time. He could now see why. He was making sure that Parvelli could not see what Stroud was up to. Ignatius moved again and Stroud was now completely out of Parvelli's line of sight . . . and on the move.

Just as Parvelli prepared to fire, Stroud arrived silently behind him and plunged a long slender knife into his back. He knew exactly where to insert it for maximum effect. Parvelli died without uttering anything more than a single gasp. Stroud let the body slump to the floor and, for a moment, Macandrew wondered if Ignatius might be about to be awarded the same fate but Stroud put away the knife and helped the priest to his feet.

Overhead, a crack of thunder – much nearer than the last – rang out and echoed off the walls. Macandrew took the opportunity to edge back along the gantry and begin his descent. He moved quickly across the tiled floor and into shadow, pausing only to pick up the sword. If Ignatius thought it so special, it might be worth holding on to. He took up position in a small alcove some twenty feet back from the chapel gates to wait his chance. With Parvelli and the fat man out of the way he felt that the odds had swung in his favour.