Scott Mariani - The Alchemist

‘Welcome to the Gladius Domini alchemical research facility,’ Usberti said, with a wide gesture. ‘As you see, it is a little more sophisticated than Dr Ryder’s establishment. My teams of scientists work in shifts, all around the clock.’ He took Ben’s elbow and led him around the edge of the lab. The muzzles of the machine guns were still carefully trained on him.

‘Let me tell you a little about alchemy, Mr Hope,’ Usberti continued. ‘I do not suppose you have ever heard of an organization called the Watchmen?’

‘Actually I have.’

Usberti raised his eyebrows. ‘You are remarkably well-informed, Mr Hope. Then you will know that the Watchmen were an élite group in Paris, formed after the First World War. One of their members was a certain Nicholas Daquin.’

‘Fulcanelli’s apprentice.’

‘Indeed. As you may know, then, this brilliant young man learned that his teacher had discovered something of enormous importance.’ Usberti paused. ‘There was another member of the Watchmen who was interested in Fulcanelli’s discovery,’ he went on. ‘His name was Rudolf Hess.’

At that moment the man known to certain people only as Saul parked his Mazda two-seater convertible outside an old empty warehouse on the outer edge of Paris. The night was cool. The stars twinkled above the city lights. He checked the time and kicked his feet, waiting.

The briefcase in his hand was filled with banknotes amounting to a quarter million US dollars, the sum the caller had demanded in exchange for what he claimed to possess: the Englishman Ben Hope, captured, bound and gagged. Usberti would be pleased when he found out what Saul had got for him.

Naturally, the money was counterfeit, obtained from one of Saul’s Gladius Domini sub-agents. The cash was only a diversion anyway. Even though it was fake, Saul had no intention of handing it over to anyone. In a concealed holster under his jacket was a compact.45 auto. He intended to make use of it once he’d picked up the goods. Or if it should turn out that there weren’t any.

Saul still couldn’t figure out this business with Michel Zardi. They seemed to have underestimated him. First he’d managed to evade assassination, then he’d somehow contrived to lure several of Saul’s best men to their deaths, and now he was claiming to be holding the Englishman Ben Hope? He never would have imagined that a little nerd like Zardi had that much guts and talent.

But if this was some kind of trick, he wouldn’t get away this time. And in case Zardi had friends with him, Saul had already taken care of it. A sniper armed with a night-scoped Parker-Hale 7.62mm rifle had been posted on the roof of the warehouse immediately after he’d got the call.

A minute or two went by, and then Saul heard the sound of an engine. He watched as the headlights wound up through the industrial estate and approached the warehouse. The rusty Nissan van pulled up beside his Mazda. The driver wasn’t Michel Zardi. It was a little fat man with a moustache and flat cap. Perhaps he was one of Zardi’s cronies, Saul thought.

‘You Saul?’ the man asked, getting out of the van.

‘Where’s Hope?’

The man grunted. ‘You got the money?’ At Saul’s nod he motioned to the back of the van. Saul smiled to himself as he imagined his rifleman watching this chubby fool in his sights.

The man threw open the back doors of the Nissan, and Saul approached. Lying on the rough wooden floor inside was a body. Bound and gagged.

And staring at Saul in horrified recognition. It wasn’t Ben Hope.

It was his sniper.

Before Saul could react, Lieutenant Rigault had his gun against his temple and armed officers were flooding out of the building. The red beads of laser sights that were floating all over the back of Saul’s head and jacket belonged to élite police marksmen, trained fingers on hair triggers.

Rigault threw Saul down onto the floor of the van next to the Gladius Domini sniper and cuffed his hands behind his back as he read him his rights. As Saul was led away to a waiting police van, Rigault called Simon. ‘The fish has taken the bait,’ he said.

The lift rose smoothly upwards. The guns were still pointing straight at Ben’s head as Usberti led him back to the office. He followed the Archbishop inside, the guards taking up their position outside the door. Usberti motioned to him to sit down, and poured another drink.

‘There’s only one Rudolf Hess I’ve ever heard of,’ Ben said. ‘The Nazi.’

Usberti nodded, smiling. ‘Adolf Hitler’s long-time acolyte and deputy Führer. All his life Hess had a strong interest in the esoteric, which may have been inspired by his early years growing up in Alexandria, Egypt. In his teens his family returned to Europe. Hess pursued his interests, and in the 1920s he learned important alchemical secrets from Fulcanelli’s student Nicholas Daquin. Of course, by that time Hess was also deeply involved in the rising National Socialist Party. Knowing its importance, he immediately passed his new know ledge on to his leader and mentor, Adolf Hitler.’

Ben’s head was spinning. The Alexandrian-Daquin’s mysterious friend Rudolf-could it really have been the arch-Nazi Hess?

Usberti went on, pleased at Ben’s reaction. ‘Long before the war, the Nazi Party was very interested in alchemy’s potential to help them build the Third Reich. Company 164 was a secret Nazi research facility whose purpose was to research the alchemical transmutation of matter by altering its vibration frequency.’

‘But how could alchemy have helped the Third Reich?’

Usberti grinned. He opened a drawer, and something glinted in his hands. He laid the heavy object down on the desk in front of Ben. ‘Mr Hope, I give you the secret knowledge of Fulcanelli, as revealed to his student Nicholas Daquin.’

The gold bar shone dully in the lamplight. Stamped on its side was a small Imperial eagle perched over a Swastika.

‘You’re joking.’

‘Not at all, Mr Hope. The primary aim of Company 164 was the creation and manufacture of alchemical gold.’

‘Out of base metals?’

‘Iron oxide and quartz, mainly,’ Usberti replied. ‘These were highly processed according to strict methods that Daquin confided to Hess. You see, it was all thanks to our unwitting friend Fulcanelli that the Nazis were able to gain this incredible knowledge.’

‘And they succeeded?’ Ben asked, narrowing his eyes sceptically.

‘The evidence is before you.’ Usberti smiled. ‘Suppressed Nazi documents tell that Party members witnessed the making of alchemical gold at Company 164’s plant outside Berlin in 1928. The factory was destroyed in World War Two, under the pretext of blowing up industrial facilities. How much gold they were able to produce during those years, nobody knows for sure. But I believe it was a very considerable quantity indeed.’

‘You’re suggesting that the Nazis were funded by alchemical gold.’

‘No, Mr Hope, I am stating it as fact.’ He laid his hand on the gold bar. ‘The millions of these recovered by the Allies at the end of the war-and there are many more yet to be found-did not come from the gold fillings and melted-down trinkets taken from Jews in the concentration camps, as the history books tell us. Even six million Jewish prisoners could not possibly have provided that much gold. The whole story was fabricated by Allied governments to conceal the fact that Hitler was really producing alchemical gold. They feared that if the truth were to be revealed, it would threaten to destabilize the entire global economy.’

Ben laughed. ‘I’ve heard some wild conspiracy theories in my time, but this one’s got to be the best.’