Saint and the Templar Treasure Read Free Page A

because only a small quantity is produced and the family do not have the hectares to extend their market.”
    “Noble but poor?” Simon prompted. “Do you know the family?”
    Pascal wagged his head noncommittally.
    “I am sure there is a lot to tell, but I do not know very much of it except that the war almost bankrupted the estate. Monsieur Yves—he is the head of the family—vowed that he would never make wine for the Germans, so every year the grapes were picked and pressed, and every year something happened. One year all the bottles were mysteriously broken, another year the wine was contaminated, and so it went on. Even when the Germans took over the chateau and billeted their officers there, the accidents continued.”
    “That must have been an expensive piece of resistance,” the Saint commented.
    “Very expensive. But since the war ended there have been other troubles. There is a legend locally that the Florian family is cursed,” Pascal added hesitantly.
    “Vineyard workers are traditionally as superstitious as sailors,” said the Saint with a smile. “And who do they think cursed the family—the Germans?”
    Pascal laughed harshly and said: “I think their methods of punishment were more direct. But the curse on the Florian family is supposed to be much older. In fact, it goes back to the Templiers.”
    The name, dropped quite casually, sounded in the Saint’s ears like a tocsin.
    Whereas a little earlier the recall of Chateau Ingare had caused only an almost caressing frisson at the roots of his hair, this new association set off a whole jangling of physic alarm bells which no facile scepticism could silence.
    For the translation of Templier is “Templar,” and les Templiers is French for what English historians call the Knights Templar—from whom, in the remote past, some ancestor of Simon’s must have taken his patronym.
    “The legend is that the castle was built by the Templars, and when they fled it is said they cursed whoever should own it next.”
    Although the Saint had always been aware of the historic connotation of his unusual name, he had never taken much interest in the snob sport of ancestor-tracing, and in fact had not even bothered to study the subject of the original Templars. He had a vague idea that they had protected pilgrims on their way to the Holy Land and had fought with distinction in the Crusades. He confessed as much to Pascal without revealing his own identity, and the young student seemed pleased to be given the chance to show off his own erudition.
    He explained how they had banded together at the beginning of the eleventh century and had taken their title from the Temple in Jerusalem, swearing to win back the city for the Christians and rebuild the temple. Their bravery in battle and support for the Christian cause had won them the extremely rare privilege of appointing their own bishops and being answerable only to the Pope himself.
    “By the end of the thirteenth century there were more than twenty thousand Knights in Europe,” Pascal continued, “and they were the single most powerful organisation on the continent. They owned vast areas of land, paid no taxes, and were often far wealthier than kings. They wore a surcoat with an eight-pointed cross on it which guaranteed them immunity wherever they went, and because they were so powerful they began to be feared.”
    The Saint thought of his own emblem of a haloed matchstick figure and the near supernatural awe that it had once inspired among the ranks of the ungodly, before it had become so famous as to be virtually unusable any more.
    “Jealousy bred rumours,” Pascal went on. “It was said that initiates had to spit on the Cross, that the Knights were often homosexuals, and that many of them practised black magic. As the Crusades failed, they concentrated on increasing their wealth and power and became generally corrupt.”
    “A sort of medieval Mafia,” Simon murmured approvingly.
    “In a way, yes.