'Why?'
Baverstock pointed at the single Aramaic word he hadn't translated in the second line of the text. 'These pictures are so blurred they're almost useless,' he said, 'but it's possible that word is Ir-Tzadok.'
'And that means what?'
'Nothing useful by itself, but it could be the first part of the proper name Ir-Tzadok B'Succaca. That's the old Aramaic name for a settlement on the north-west coast of the Dead Sea. We know it rather better these days by its Arabic name, which means "two moons".'
Baverstock stopped and looked across his desk.
'Qumran?' Angela suggested.
'Got it in one. Khirbet Qumran, to give it its full name.
"Khirbet" means a ruin. The word comes from the Hebrew horbah, and you'll find the name used all over Judea to indicate ancient sites.'
'I do know what "khirbet" means, thank you. So you believe the tablet came from Qumran?'
Baverstock shook his head. 'No. I can't guarantee I'm reading it correctly and, even if I am, the word isn't conclusive – it could be a part of a different phrase. And if it does mean Qumran, it might be nothing more than a reference to the community.'
'Qumran was started when – first century BC?'
'A little earlier. Late second century BC, and it was occupied until about AD 70, round about the time Jerusalem fell. That's the main reason I think the tablet's fairly late, simply because, if I'm right and the word Ir-Tzadok forms a part of Ir-Tzadok B'Succaca, then the tablet was most probably written while the Yishiyim – the tribe now commonly known as the Essenes – were supposedly in residence at Qumran, hence the rough date I suggested to you.'
'So the tablet just refers to Qumran, but didn't come from the Essene community.'
'No, I didn't say that. What I said was that the inscription possibly refers to Qumran and the tablet probably didn't come from the Essenes.'
'So were there any other words you thought you could translate?'
'Here.' Baverstock pointed at the bottom line of text. 'That word could be "cubit" or "cubits", but I wouldn't want to put any money on it. And I think this word here could mean "place".'
'And you've still no idea what the clay tablet itself is? Or if it's valuable?'
Baverstock shook his head. 'It's certainly not valuable. As to what it is, my best guess is that it was used in a school environment. I think it was a teaching aid, something to show children how to write particular words. It's a curiosity, nothing more, and certainly of no value other than simple academic interest.'
'OK, Tony,' Angela said, standing up. 'That was my conclusion, too. I just wanted to make sure.'
Once she'd left, Baverstock sat in thought for a few minutes. He hoped he'd done the right thing in giving Angela Lewis an accurate translation of some of the sections of Aramaic script he'd been able to read. There were another half-dozen words he'd managed to decipher, but he'd decided to keep the meanings of those to himself. He would far rather have told her nothing at all, but he didn't want her running off to another translator who might take an interest in the possible implications of some of the words on the tablet.
And now, if she did decide to do any more digging, about the only place she'd be likely to turn up was Qumran, and he was quite certain that she'd find absolutely nothing there.
About two hours later Baverstock knocked on Angela Lewis's office door. There was no reply, as he'd hoped and expected, because he knew she normally went out to lunch at about that time. He knocked again, then opened the door and stepped inside.
Baverstock spent fifteen minutes carrying out a rapid but thorough search, checking all her drawers and cupboards, but without success. He'd hoped she might actually have had the clay tablet in her possession, but all he found were two other pictures of the relic, which he took. The last thing he did was try to check her emails, but her screen-saver was protected by a password so he couldn't access her PC.
There was, he supposed, still a possibility Angela had the tablet in her possession, maybe at her apartment. It was time, he mused, as he walked back to his own office, to make another call.
19
Half of the ability to blend into a particular situation is having the right appearance, and the other half is confidence. When the dark-haired, brown-skinned man walked in through the doors of the Rabat hotel, wearing a Western-style suit and carrying a large briefcase, he looked pretty much like any other guest, and the receptionist didn't give him a second glance as he strode across the lobby and walked up the main staircase.
He reached the first floor, stopped and called an elevator. When it arrived, he pressed the button for the fourth floor. As the doors opened, he stepped out, glanced at the sign on the wall indicating the location of the rooms, and turned right. Outside number 403 he stopped, put down his briefcase, pulled on a pair of thin rubber gloves, took a hard rubber cosh from his pocket and rapped sharply on the door with his other hand. He'd spotted the woman sitting with a drink in the bar just off the lobby as he'd walked through, but he hadn't seen her husband in the building. Hopefully he'd be out somewhere, in which case the man would use the lock-picking tools in the slim leather case in his jacket pocket; if her husband was up there in the room, that was his hard luck.
He heard movement from the other side of the door, took a firmer grip on his cosh and lifted a large white handkerchief up to his face, as if he was blowing his nose.
David Philips opened the door wide and peered out. 'Yes?' he said.
Philips registered the presence of a dark-haired man directly in front of him, his face largely obscured by a white cloth, and then fell backwards as a dark object whistled through the air and crashed into his forehead. For an instant he saw stars, bright flashes of white and red light that seemed to explode inside his skull, and then his consciousness fled.
His attacker glanced quickly up and down the corridor, but there was no one in sight. He picked up his briefcase again, stepped into the room, dragged the body of the unconscious man inside and then closed the door behind him.
It wasn't a big room, and his search took him under five minutes. When he left the room, his briefcase was significantly heavier than when he'd arrived and, just as when he'd walked in, nobody took the slightest notice of him as he left the hotel.
'I'm sorry to bother you with this as well,' Bronson said, sitting down opposite Kirsty Philips.
Dickie Byrd had called him a few minutes earlier and told him there had been a burglary at the Philips' house – something that Bronson hadn't liked the sound of at all. The theft of their computer just had to be connected to what had happened in Morocco. The trouble was that Byrd wasn't convinced.
'What happened?' Kirsty asked, a mixture of irritation and concern clouding her voice. 'I mean, didn't any of our neighbours see anything?'
'Actually,' Bronson said, an apologetic smile on his face, 'several of your neighbours saw exactly what was happening. They all thought you were back from Morocco and were having a fridge or something delivered. Two men arrived in a white van and carried a big cardboard box into your house. They were inside for about ten minutes, and then walked out with your desktop computer, presumably in the same box.'
'And was that all they took?'
'Yes, according to your neighbour, a Mrs Turnbull. She's looked round the house, and thinks that only the computer was taken. The good news is that although the place was ransacked – it looked as if every drawer had been emptied – nothing seems to have been damaged apart from the lock on the back door. Mrs Turnbull has already arranged to have that replaced for you, and she's told us she'll tidy up the place before you get back.'