Will Adams - Newton’s Fire

‘Made for me by Newton himself,’ said Jay. ‘Think about that. All my life, people have told me that I was a freak. Yet now it turns out I was made this way for a reason. Now it turns out that I have a destiny. That’s quite something, don’t you think? To have a destiny?’ He folded the robe back in its chest, turned his attention to its twin. Its interior was divided into two; on the left were sheets of some dull metal; on the right were glass flasks with encrusted stoppers three-quarters full of some clouded liquid. He closed it, turned to their mother. Its lid, however, wouldn’t lift. He frowned and walked around it, looking for a way in. It had sturdy brass handles set into its sides, but they didn’t give when he pulled. And the oak panels fitted so perfectly together that they gave no hint of how they might open. Out of frustration as much as anything, he pushed each of the sides in turn, and finally one of the end panels sank in a little way. He pushed harder and a slot opened in the lid, allowing him to slide the panel up and out. There was a second panel immediately behind it, covered in rich blue cloth and fitted with a pair of leather handles. He pulled them and an interior compartment slid sweetly towards him, like a drawer on oiled castors. He pulled it all the way out, turned it around. It was perhaps two and a half feet long, half the length of the chest. Its sides were covered in the same blue cloth, but its interior was finished with brown and white fur, and it was as obviously shaped to accommodate the Ark as a glove is to fit a hand.

He knelt to look inside the hollowed chest. A mirror twin of brown and white fur was fitted to the far end, so that the two halves together would form a perfect womb for its precious cargo. He reached inside to see if the far end pulled out too, but it appeared to be fixed in place. He looked up at Luke. ‘You can’t carry the Ark openly,’ Jay told him. ‘It’s against Jewish law. If you need to move it, you first have to wrap in tachash and blue cloth.’

‘ Tachash ?’ asked Luke.

‘It’s a kind of fur,’ said Jay. ‘Though no one’s quite sure from which animal.’ He stroked it against its nap to raise it. ‘But Newton followed the King James Version of the Bible, and the King James translates it as badger.’

‘So they built this to bring it here?’ asked Rachel.

Jay didn’t answer, his attention seized instead by a large oval cut in the bottom of the chest, the exact same shape and size as the base of the Ark itself. He smiled when he saw how it worked. He found and released a pair of latches holding the front half of the floor panel in place, then slid it out and set it aside. Now the chest could be carried over to the Ark and fitted snugly around it. The floor panel would then slot back in and lock around the base of the Ark like the collar of a guillotine around the neck of its next victim. Slide the velvet mould back in and fix it in place with the front panel and the Ark would be ready for moving without anyone having touched it at all.

The thought reminded him that he was here for a reason. He went around to the front and found the goyim with their hands all over the Ark. ‘Stop that!’ he commanded, his voice sounding imperious even to himself. ‘Put that lid back on.’

Croke gave him a sour look. ‘You’re here to observe,’ he said.

‘Don’t you realize what this is?’ asked Jay. ‘We take our time with it. We handle it with respect. And no one touches it. No one but me.’

‘But-’

‘Only a Kohen may touch the Ark, on pain of death. On pain of death . I am a Kohen. Are there any other Kohens here?’ And he looked so belligerently around the chamber that no one said a word.

Luke and Rachel watched anxiously as the Ark was packed into the large oak chest and was then hoisted by crane up to the crypt. Whatever fate Croke had planned for them, they were surely about to discover it. So it came as an intense relief to learn they’d be going with it. Walters covered Luke with his taser while Kieran cut a fat strip from a roll of surgical tape and made to gag him. ‘There’s no need for that,’ Luke assured him. ‘I gave you my word.’

‘Sure,’ snorted Walters. ‘And if you think we trust you …’

Kieran stuck the tape across his mouth, then did the same to Rachel. He and Walters then manhandled them up the ladder, handcuffed them when they got to the top, then took them out of the cathedral. A vast white canopy had been rigged up over the front plaza, large enough for two heavy vehicles to be parked inside it: a lorry hauling a container emblazoned with nuclear hazard warnings and a windowless white security truck, to which they were now taken. The three oak chests were already loaded along its spine, constricting the legroom of the bench seats that ran down either side. Walters herded them all the way in, made them sit side by side facing the largest chest. He briefly undid one of Luke’s cuffs to loop the chain through a brass handle, thus securing him to it. He did the same with Rachel, then checked to make sure his team were all inside. Satisfied, he closed and bolted the rear doors then gave the side of the truck a loud double thump.

It was time to roll.

Croke put on a yellow police bib before climbing into the front of the security truck. ‘Another quiet night in, eh, boss?’ said Manfredo, already at the wheel.

‘Another quiet night in.’

Morgenstern was on the cathedral steps. He’d be staying behind to supervise the re-plugging of the crypt floor before taking a chopper to USAF Lakenheath to meet the convoy. Croke waved to let him know they were ready, and to thank him for his help. Morgenstern relayed the signal to the driver of the nuclear container. Its lights came on. Its engine started to rumble. It began slowly to move, nudging its nose like a curious dog against the parting curtains of the canvas canopy then slipping out between them.

The security truck followed immediately behind. The sun had set, and they were greeted by a dazzling wildfire of camera flashes that made Croke blink despite their tinted windscreen. The first eruption died away; it grew diffuse. The spotlights of TV helicopters tracked them as a police escort formed around them. Blue lights flashed in synchrony as they forced a path through the crowds to Ludgate Hill, and sirens suddenly began to blare in a hideous concerted screech of noise. They picked up speed, though not too much. They were, after all, supposed to be carrying a dirty bomb.

All the feeder roads had been closed off by the police, so that there was no traffic to negotiate, no need to wait for lights. They reached the Limehouse Link and plunged down into its mouth. The white-tiled walls and compressed space reflected their sirens and lights, like some devilish nightclub. The tunnel was a mile long, with lay-bys for breakdowns every hundred yards or so. Two nondescript vans were waiting in the first. Manfredo braked sharply to drop off the back of the convoy and pull in beside them. A second security truck, indistinguishable from their own, was parked in the next lay-by along. It began to pull out the moment the last police outrider had passed, then accelerated to catch up with the convoy before it left the tunnel. In the nocturnal gloom, surrounded by this riot of noise and light, it would take a freakishly smart-eyed observer to notice the switch.

Croke opened the passenger door, jumped down, went around back. Working together, they all heaved the two smaller chests into the first van; the larger, along with Luke and Rachel, into the second. They locked up the security truck, covered it with a blue tarpaulin, then they divided into the two vans, Manfredo and Kieran taking the respective wheels. They drove on a short distance and pulled into another lay-by halfway along the tunnel. Then they waited.