‘It’s not coming up,’ Gallio says. ‘Don’t know why, but this one’s close enough. You’ll get the idea. And by the way, welcome back to planet Earth. Take a good look at what’s been happening in your absence.’
The footage of Mexican Immigrant Beaten to Death is ill-lit but visible, filmed on a cellphone and available at a click anywhere in the civilised world. The microphone picks up ‘Por favor’, and ‘Señores, help me’. At this point, Anastasio Hernandez Rojas is surrounded by US Border Control agents, but he is lying on the ground and not resisting when tasered at least five times. The agents then kick and club him.
The border patrol claims self-defence. Methamphetamine was found in the victim’s bloodstream, and the police reaction was a measured response to extreme antisocial behaviour. The exact moment of death, on YouTube, is unclear.
‘Why did James and the other disciples suffer unbearable deaths?’
‘I don’t know,’ Bartholomew says.
‘Want me to play the clip again? There must be a reason.’
Bartholomew can’t say what the reason is.
‘No one came to save James from the riot police. Philip was the same. No one intervened when he was hanging upside down from his legs, and no one stood up to help Thomas or Jude. You were in a coma for weeks. If Jesus is alive, he’s indifferent to your suffering.’
‘But I’m still alive. I’m here.’
‘Thanks to me.’
‘Jesus may have sent you.’
‘Jesus didn’t send me.’
‘Without you knowing. You wouldn’t have to know.’
‘I would know.’
‘Would you?’
The hail is back, vicious fistfuls on the car windows, deafening on the roof. Claudia thumbs a text, her face lit up by the screen. The sky darkens and the car is barely moving so they stop in the services at Thorpe. Cassius Gallio buys everyone a flapjack, including the driver. Bartholomew likes coffee, so Gallio fetches him a cappuccino from the Costa, and Bartholomew makes a big effort to leave intact the heart shape in the chocolate on the milk. That is not a heart, Gallio wants to say, it’s a coffee bean. You are protecting a bean shape that looks like a heart.
Bartholomew says: ‘Ouch. That eye of yours looks like it must have hurt.’
The night before, Gallio had organised the removal of the body of James from the pavement. Then the formal suspension of seven members of Valeria’s riot squad. After that, he’d sat with Claudia in the van. They reviewed on the monitors the last moments on earth of James the Less, the sixth disciple of Jesus to die.
James looked old, Gallio thought, realising he too must be old. They had grown old together.
‘One more time,’ Gallio said, and Claudia pointed the remote control.
One more time for the very end, a rooftop wind fluttering the Galilean clothes that James and the other disciples chose to wear. James ignores the whistling and jeering from the riot police below, and focuses entirely on his will. He prays, lips moving. He steps forward. Into a pure drop of silence he pronounces the name of Jesus.
He jumps.
‘We need that trace on the phone call.’
‘It’s coming.’ Claudia says. ‘Be patient.’
‘James received a phone call. He listened, but whoever was at the other end of the phone had nothing to say. James ended the call. He left the flat and went up to the roof. He held out his arms like Jesus. He jumped.’
‘Maybe he heard something on the phone we didn’t. Or the silence had a different meaning to him than it does to us.’
Cassius Gallio had reached the roof edge a second after James stepped off, in time to see that the road surface below had done most of the damage. The riot police finished the job, attacking James as if he were deranged and dangerous, a surprise assailant from above. He’d launched himself unprovoked at officers of the law. They had no choice but to subdue him.
In the van Gallio felt he was missing a piece of the puzzle. James ended the silent phone call, stood up and went to the roof. His immediate reaction suggested a pre-arranged sequence, and explained why he prayed so much — prayer kept him close to the phone and in a heightened spiritual state, ready for the call, in the mood to jump.
Gallio found it hard to re-watch what happened next. The riot police should not have responded in the way they did, even though Cassius Gallio was increasingly convinced the disciples were shielding a secret. They denied it: everything pointed to it. They’d rather die than be disloyal, and if James was prepared to jump then Bartholomew’s initial silence in the taxi to Caistor came as no surprise. Unlike Baruch, however, Gallio didn’t believe in coercion. Six disciples had died horribly, and no new information had surfaced.
Claudia did eventually get a trace on the call, that same night. When the results were phoned through she listened closely then clicked off her phone. ‘Landline,’ she said. ‘Via a switchboard. Internal phone at the King David Hotel. We have a room number.’
‘Paul,’ Gallio said. ‘I’m guessing the room number matches up.’
‘It does. Surprise, and yet not.’
Cassius Gallio whistled. ‘No, you’re right. Paul. I’m still surprised.’
The two Speculators made eye contact, but in the van everything was too close and they quickly looked away. Neither of them were convinced that Paul was responsible, even though he had motive. He wanted to be a disciple but they wouldn’t let him join. He also had the experience, a killer from the beginning of his career.
‘In the Israel Museum Paul was genuinely frightened,’ Gallio said. ‘I don’t believe he’s the killer.’
‘But the call came from his suite. Somehow he made this happen, or that’s what it looks like. What do we do?’
‘Paul is all we’ve got,’ Gallio said. ‘We have no option. We pick him up at the hotel, and make Baruch a happy bunny.’
When they arrived at the King David, Baruch volunteered to make the arrest. ‘My reward,’ he said, ‘seeing as I’m the only one who suspected him from the start.’
Baruch wasn’t interested in the how or why. Paul had made the phone call, which was evidently a signal. James had jumped. Paul was involved up to his neck, and he’d devised a way of killing James without even having to speak.
‘So explain how that works.’
‘Don’t know,’ Baruch said. ‘But give me a few days with Paul in custody and I can assure you details will emerge.’
In the breakfast room of the King David Hotel, while Paul was shaking out his napkin and dabbing at the corner of his mouth, Baruch gave him the right to remain silent. Gallio gauged Paul’s reaction, but this wasn’t his first arrest and he calmly rearranged the tableware, made sure the cutlery was aligned at a correct distance from the plate.
‘You’re arresting me on what charge? Making a phone call?’
Paul adjusted his spoon, then he coherently waived his right to silence. He’d need to hear a legally valid charge. He intended to make an official appeal, which he was entitled to do as a citizen like any other. He demanded a secure escort to Rome, where he intended to defend himself in person at the appeal hearing. He’d expect to retain his personal bodyguard because he was innocent until proven guilty.
‘Why did you telephone James?’ Gallio asked. He didn’t believe Paul was the assassin, able to kill with a phone call, but he couldn’t be sure.
‘We traced the call,’ Claudia said. ‘You made it. James jumped.’
‘No one could prove that connection. I’m sad that James has passed away, and I’ll miss him, but his death has nothing to do with me.’