Rob returned to his own screen. He checked the weather in Spain for no reason. He Googled his own name. He Googled Christine’s name. He discovered that she was the author of ’Neanderthal Cannibalism in Ice Age Euskera’ in a recent addition of American Archaeology. He also found a nice picture of her receiving an obscure award in Berlin.
Rob stared at the picture. He missed Christine. Not as much as he missed his daughter, but he missed her. The decorous conversation; her perfume; her graciousness. The way she smiled when they had sex, with her eyes shut, as if she was dreaming of something very sweet that had happened very long ago.
His mobile rang.
‘Robbie!’
‘Steve…’ His heart was thumping. He hated this bit. ‘Well?’
‘Well,’ said Steve. ‘I don’t know what to say…’
Rob’s spirits sagged. ‘You don’t like it?
Pause. ‘Nah, you arse. I fucking love it!’
Rob’s spirits rocketed.
Steve was laughing. ‘Jesus, Rob I only sent you to do a fucking history piece. Thought it might be nice for you. Bit of a break. But you witness a murder. You get assaulted by Satanists. You discover a Stone Age toddler in a pickle jar. You find some more devil-worshippers. You hear evil Kurdish death prayers. You…you…you…’ Steve was running out of breath. ‘Then you go to Iraq and you meet some mystery bloke who takes you to a sacred capital where his people worship a fucking pigeon and you find them all bowing down to some alien skull at which point the Yezzers run in and try to stab you before telling you they are all directly descended from Adam and Eve.’
Rob was silent. Then he burst out laughing. His laughter was very loud-so loud that the monsterslaughtering kid on the computer across the room looked up and tapped his headphones to see if they were working properly. ‘So you think the story is OK? I’ve tried to be fair to the Yezidi…Maybe too fair, but I just-’
Steve interrupted:
‘It’s more than OK! I love it. And so does the boss. We’re gonna run it tomorrow in the centre, dps, and we’ll have a teaser on the front.’
‘Tomorrow?’
‘Yup. Straight into print. We’ve got your pics too. You’re done a grand job.’
That’s great. That’s…’
‘Bloody great, yeah I know. Now when are you heading back?’
‘I’m not sure…I mean, I’m trying to get the first flight I can, but they’re booked solid. And I don’t fancy a twenty-hour bus ride to Ankara. Certainly I’ll be in London by the weekend.’
‘Good man. Come in to the office and I’ll buy you lunch. Might even go to a proper restaurant. With pizzas.’
Rob chuckled. He said his goodbyes to his boss. Then he paid the internet café owner and walked out into Mardin.
It was a nice city, Mardin. From what little Rob had seen of it, the city seemed poor but very historic and atmospheric. It was said to date from the Flood: it had Roman streets, and Byzantine remains, and Syriac goldsmiths. It had weird lanes that ran under the houses. But Rob didn’t care any more. He’d had enough historic and Oriental fantasies. He wanted to get home now: to cool, modern, rainy, beautiful, hi-tech European London. To hug his daughter and kiss Christine.
Standing by the doorway to a bakery, he called Christine. He’d already rung her twice today-but he just liked talking to her. She picked up at once. He told her the story had gone down well at the newspaper and she said that was great and told Rob she wanted him back in England. He said he would be there as soon as he possibly could, five days max. Then she told him she was still seeing a lot of his daughter, becoming firm friends. Indeed, Sally had asked Christine if she’d like to help out with Lizzie. Sally had a day-long law course to do in Cambridge so Christine had agreed to look after Rob’s daughter. They were going to spend the afternoon seeing De Savary, Christine’s old friend and lecturer; that is, if Rob didn’t mind. She wanted to talk to De Savary about the link with the murders in England, since he seemed to know so much of what the police were doing. And Lizzie was keen to go see some cows and sheep.
The Frenchwoman told him she missed him, a lot, and Rob said he was longing to see her, and then they both rang off. He walked down the road back to his hotel, thinking of lunch. Ambling happily. But as soon as he put the phone back in his pocket a sharp and sudden realization brought him up short. De Savary. Cambridge. The murders.
There was still one half of the story entirely unsolved. The British half. The story hadn’t finished. It had just shifted.
From feeling happy and contented, Rob was now tensed and hungry again. Pumped for action. Ready for the next instalment. More than ready: he was worried that something might happen when he wasn’t around. He needed to fly back to England as fast as he could. Maybe he could get a new flight via Istanbul. Maybe he could hire a plane…
Rob felt the prickle of a new anxiety.
36
Forrester and Boijer were staring at the River Styx.
‘I remember this from school,’ said Boijer. ‘The River Styx is the river surrounding the underworld. We have to cross it, to get to the land of ghosts.’
Forrester peered into the dank and subterranean gloom. The River Styx was not very wide, but it was vigorous: it tumbled along its ancient channel, then turned a rocky corner and disappeared further into the caves and caverns. It was a suitable spot to forsake this earthly life. The only jarring note was the old packet of Kettle Chips on the opposite shore.
‘Course,’ the guide broke in, ‘the River Styx is just a name they gave it. Actually it’s an artificial river, constructed by the 2nd Baronet, Francis Dashwood, when they were converting the caves. Though there are lots of real rivers and aquifers in these chalk and flint cave systems. It’s an endless labyrinth.’
The guide, Kevin Bigglestone, smoothed back his floppy brown hair, and smiled at the policemen. ’Shall I show you the rest?
‘Lead on.’
Bigglestone began his guided tour of the Hellfire Caves, six miles from the Dashwood Estate at West Wycombe. ‘OK,’ he said, ‘here we are.’
He lifted his umbrella as if he was leading a tour group. Boijer sniggered; Forrester shot his junior a warning glance: they needed this guy. They needed the cooperation of everyone in West Wycombe, if their plan was to work.
‘So,’ said Bigglestone, his podgy face barely visible in the darkness of the caves. ‘What do we know of the eighteenth century Hellfire Club? Why did they meet here? In these cold and clammy caverns? During the sixteenth century various secret societies arose in Europe, such as the Rosicrucians. All of them were committed to freethinking, to occult lore, to investigating the mysteries of belief. By the eighteenth century élite members of these societies were seized by the idea that evidence could be found in the Holy Land, texts and materials which undermined the historical and theological basis of Christianity. Maybe of all the major creeds.’ The guide lifted his umbrella again. ‘Of course, it was wishful thinking, in an age of anti-clericalism and revolutionary secularism. But these legends and traditions were enough to tantalize some very rich men…’ He walked to the bridge that crossed the Styx and turned. ‘Certain maverick members of the English aristocracy were particularly intrigued by these rumours. One of them, the 2nd Baron Le Despencer, Sir Francis Dashwood, actually travelled across Turkey in the eighteenth century in search of the truth. When he came back he was so inspired by what he found that he established first the Divan Club, and then the Hellfire Club. And one of the raisons d’être of the Hellfire Club was contempt and refutation of established faith.’