The Lost Treasure of the Templars by James Becker Read Free Book Online Page A

more than I expected,” Stevens said. “They’re yours.”
    â€œThanks. But could you please read my e-mail first, see what I’ve said to make sure you understand my valuations and why I’ve made the offer that I have? If you’re still happy with the figure, then I need your confirmation in writing—just replying to the e-mail would be fine—and your bank account details so that I can do a transfer. If you want cash, I can do that as well, but obviously I’ll need to go to the bank first.”
    â€œNo, a transfer’s fine. I’m just around the corner from my house now, so I’ll go and check my messages and get back to you in a few minutes.”
    â€œThanks, William.”
    Robin didn’t have long to wait. Less than five minutes later her laptop emitted a musical double tone to indicate the receipt of an e-mail. She opened the program and read the message with a smile of satisfaction. William Stevens had simply confirmed that he was happy to accept the stated sum for the entire collection of books, including the book safe. He’d added his bank details, and within another few minutes Robin had logged on to her business account and arranged the transfer.
    As far as she was concerned, the moment the bank’s computer reported that the transfer had been initiatedand was in progress and could no longer be stopped or amended, the deal was done. She sent another very short e-mail to Stevens confirming that the money was on its way, then pushed the laptop to one side and turned her attention again to the mysterious leather-bound object sitting on her desk.
    She propped it up with a couple of books so that it sat at an angle, the small hole in the pages directly in front of her, and shone the small LED flashlight directly into the opening. She took the small magnifying glass, the more powerful of the two, and used that to try to peer into the locking mechanism. It wasn’t easy to do, because even the tiniest movement of the magnifying glass meant that everything would suddenly become blurred and out of focus, because of the power of the lens, and it took several minutes for her to finally be able to gain a clear idea of what she was looking at.
    Strangely enough, it didn’t look to her as if the opening in the locking system was designed for a key at all, because she could see no sign of a lock. In fact, as far as she could tell, the lid of the book safe was held in place only by a catch, or possibly by a number of catches, and all that she would need to do in order to release it was to slide something like a slim screwdriver through the hole until it made contact with the mechanism, and then give it a firm push. The thing that gave her pause was that although it certainly looked like a catch, held in place by a short spring, there seemed to be other levers as well that didn’t seem to be directly connected to it, and she had no idea what possible purpose they could be serving.
    She shrugged, laid the book safe flat on the top of her desk, and positioned its spine against the horizontal pen holder that was an integral part of her old desk, to give herself something to push against because she expectedthat the mechanism would be stiff through lack of use and the dust of the centuries. And she didn’t think that was an exaggeration because her best guess was that the object was most probably medieval. The mechanism might even, she acknowledged, be rusted solid, though if it had been kept in a library for most of the time, she hoped that wouldn’t be the case.
    She turned her attention to her small tool kit that, frankly, didn’t contain very much: four screwdrivers, a couple of pairs of pliers, and a utility knife with a retractable blade, plus a handful of the screws, nails, washers, and other assorted bits of hardware that seemed to migrate into every toolbox over the years. Two of the screwdrivers had Phillips head bits, and so were of no use