The Last Gospel

by David Gibbins

  ‘This is the side tunnel,’ Costas said. ‘I’ve clipped the other end of the rope to a piton inside.’ Jack heaved himself against the current for the final few steps, then Costas reached out and hauled him in. Both men sat for a moment slumped against the side of the tunnel, panting. Jack sucked at the hydrating energy drink stored inside his suit, sluicing it round his mouth to get rid of the unpleasant taste. He looked around. They were in a smaller tunnel, but it was still a good three metres high and three metres across, with an arched barrel-vaulted roof and a flat bottom, a channel filled with water flowing down the centre. The flow was exiting into the Cloaca Maxima, and the water was clear.

  ‘Time for a final reality check,’ Costas said, peering at his wrist gauge. ‘This must be it. The Velabrum. It’s orientated straight into the Palatine Hill, and I can see Massimo’s line running ahead along the right side as far as I can make out, to wherever they stopped.’

  Jack put his hand on the side of the tunnel. ‘This is an impressive piece of engineering,’ he said. ‘The Cloaca Maxima has masonry and brickwork from lots of periods, from when it was first covered over in the sixth century BC. But this is different, a single-period construction. Regular, rectilinear blocks of stone at the entrance. If I didn’t know better, I’d say we were walking into one of the great aqueduct channels made by the emperors.’

  Costas looked at Jack through his visor. ‘About this Lupercale place, Jack. The cave of Romulus and Remus. I didn’t have a clue what you were on about.’

  ‘Sorry to spring that on you. Massimo and I did talk about it at that conference where we met him in London, shortly after the discovery of the cave under the House of Augustus was announced. I told him I’d love to come and take a look, to join his urban speleology group. When I realized yesterday we were coming to Rome, it was the perfect pretext. Once I guessed that Pliny must have hidden the scroll under the Palatine Shrine of Vesta, right next door to the House of Augustus, I also realized it was the site where the Lupercale was found. At the moment we just can’t risk bringing anyone else in on this quest. I hate keeping Massimo in the dark, but maybe he’ll forgive us once we tell him the role he played.’

  Costas grunted, got up and started forward again, the rivulet of clear water from the darkness ahead rising over his ankles.

  ‘I hate to say this, Costas, but you’re trailing something.’ Costas turned round, stared, and made a strangulated noise. A mess of stringy brown tendrils extended back from his left foot towards the Cloaca, and caught in their midst was a writhing form with a long black tail. Costas shook his foot frantically, and the whole mass slithered off out of sight into the drain. ‘Never again, Jack,’ he muttered. ‘I swear to God, you’re never doing this to me again.’

  ‘I promise I’ll make it up to you. Next dive will be pure heaven.’

  ‘We’ve got to get out of this version of hell first.’ Costas resumed his slog up the tunnel, and Jack followed close behind. He still felt connected to the world outside, only a quick abseil along the rope back to the base of the spiral staircase, but with every step now the underworld seemed to be closing in on him, with darkness ahead and behind and only the immediate walls of the tunnel visible in their headlamps. He forced himself to concentrate, to push aside the claustrophobia, counting his steps, estimating how close they were getting to the foot of the Palatine Hill. After thirty paces he sensed that the angle had changed, that they were going down. The walls appeared buckled, fractured. The fluorescent line ended abruptly at a piton in front of a dark pool, and he could see where the ceiling sloped down into the water about five metres ahead.

  ‘This isn’t natural,’ Costas murmured. ‘I mean, the tunnel wasn’t designed this way. It looks like damage from seismic activity, like some of those fracture lines at Herculaneum.’

  ‘They get earthquakes here too,’ Jack said.

  ‘A pretty big one, but some years ago, centuries probably. And this might be a dead end for us, though there’s still plenty of flow getting through.’

  ‘Time for a swim,’ Jack said.

  Costas sloshed into the pool, then disappeared in a mass of bubbles. Jack followed close behind, dropping to his knees and flopping forward, hearing the air in his suit expel as his computerized system automatically adjusted to neutral buoyancy. The water was extraordinarily clear, cleansing, like the underground cenote they had dived through in the Yucatán, and even here Jack felt the exhilaration he always felt as he went underwater, the excitement of the unknown. He reached back and slipped his fins down from where they had been tucked up behind his calves, and powered forward after Costas. His depth gauge showed three metres, then six. The earthquake had created a sump in the tunnel, and they were coming back up again. He saw in front of him that Costas had surfaced, and that the floor of the tunnel rose up to less than a metre depth. He swam up as far as he could, pulled his fins up again and rose out of the water beside Costas, who was staring ahead down the tunnel.

  ‘I’ve got that feeling again,’ Costas said.

  ‘What feeling?’

  ‘That feeling of walking into the past. I had it at Herculaneum, even had it diving down on to the shipwreck of St Paul. It’s weird, like déjà vu.’

  ‘So you get it, too,’ Jack murmured.

  ‘Maybe it’s the force.’

  ‘I had it explained to me once,’ Jack said. ‘It’s that you’ve had exactly the identical emotional response before, in very similar circumstances. Your brain’s playing tricks on you. It’s a short circuit.’

  ‘No, Jack. I’ve seen it in you. It’s the force.’

  ‘Okay. It’s the force. You’re right. Maybe you can use some of it to get us through the next sump.’ Jack pointed ahead to another dip in the tunnel, to more cracked and fragmented masonry, another pool. He knew they must now be on the very edge of the Palatine Hill, under at least eighty metres of fractured tufa. Costas splashed in again and Jack followed him. This time the tunnel regained its former shape and continued underwater, but about ten metres ahead it constricted. As Jack swam closer he realized that the point of constriction was two ancient columns on either side. Beyond them the tunnel narrowed into a culvert like an aqueduct channel, taller than it was wide, with a barrel-vaulted ceiling. The dimensions would have allowed them to stand upright and walk through it, single file, were it not for the water. He reached out and touched the right-hand column. It was grey granite, with white and black flecks, a stone seen all over the ruins of Rome, in the columns of the Pantheon, in Trajan’s basilica next to the old forum. Jack had been with Hiebermeyer to the source, Mons Claudianus in Egypt, the great quarry first opened under the emperor Claudius, another of his distinctive stamps on the architecture of the city.

  ‘Maurice would love this,’ he murmured. ‘His doctoral project was Claudius’ quarries in Egypt, and that’s where this stone came from.’

  ‘Jack, take a look at this.’

  Jack rolled over and looked up, and realized that Costas had broken surface about three metres above him, bobbing in a wavering sheen of water that reflected his headlamp in shifting patterns of white. Jack rose up slowly, pressing his buoyancy control to inject air, remembering to exhale as the ambient pressure decreased. His head emerged out of the water, and he gasped in astonishment. Costas’ beam was shining at a rock face that rose directly above the columns and the conduit entrance. It extended high above them, at least four metres high and five wide, carved out of the living rock. Above them Jack could see the triangular gable of a pediment, projecting half a metre out of the rock. He looked down into the water again, saw the columns. He realized that the entire structure was a monumental entranceway, carved and decorated as a work of art in its own right. He gazed at it, awestruck. It was like the great rock-cut façades at Petra in Jordan, yet deep under the Palatine, a curious mixture of ostentation and secrecy, the creation of someone who cared about his own achievements but not what other people thought of them.

  ‘Check this out,’ Costas said. ‘Tak
e a look at the stone face under that gable.’

  Jack raised his head again above the surface. An eddy effect from the current below had pushed them closer to the rock face, and he was now within touching distance. He reached out and put his hand on it. What looked like mould and slime was rock-hard, and he realized it was calcite accretion, the seepage from groundwater that Massimo had talked about. He saw tiny rivulets of wet running down the rock, evidently from rainwater far above. Then he saw the regular incisions in the rock. He pushed off, and aimed his headlamp up. Of course. It was an imperial monument, and there had to be a monumental inscription. The calcite lay over the inscription like icing, but instead of smudging it seemed to clarify it, crystallize it. There were four registers, the letters only about three inches high, scarcely big enough to be seen from the floor of the chamber. Whoever had made this dedication did it for propriety, for his own private satisfaction and to sanctify the place, not to impress the masses.

  TI.CLAVDIVS.DRVSI.F.CAISAR.AVGVSTVS.GERMANICVS

  PONTIF.MAXIM.TRIBVNICIA.POTESTATE.XII.COS.V

  IMPERATOR.XXVII.PATER.PATRIAE.AQVAS.VESTIAM.

  SACRA.SVA.IMPENSA.IN.VRBEM.PERDVCENDAS.CVRAVIT

  ‘This is authentic, no doubt about it,’ Jack murmured. ‘It has the characteristically archaic spelling of the word Caesar, harking back to the glory days of Julius Caesar, the Roman Republic. The wall’s like that too, carved as if it’s made of blocks in a rusticated style, the surfaces left rough with almost an exaggerated lack of finish. Absolutely characteristic of Claudius, of buildings where he had a personal involvement. And typical of Claudius to get the epigraphic details right, the archaic reference.’

  ‘You’re talking about our Claudius? The emperor? This was his doing?’

  Jack translated the inscription: ‘ “Tiberius Claudius, son of Drusus, Caesar, Augustus, Germanicus, Chief Priest, with Tribunician power for the twelfth time, five times Consul, twenty-seven times Imperator, Father of his Country, saw to the construction at his own expense of the Sacred Vestal Water.” ’

  ‘That’s going to make Massimo very happy,’ Costas said. ‘It’s all we need to tell him. His tunnel rats can have a party down here when they see this. Their hero.’

  ‘The formula’s similar to Claudius’ inscription on the Aqua Claudia, at the Porta Maggiore where the aqueduct entered Rome,’ Jack said. ‘But the fascinating thing here, the unique thing, is those three words. Aquas Vestiam Sacra. The sacred waters of the Vestals. It means Massimo may well have been right about that too, that this tunnel connects with the House of the Vestals on the other side of the Palatine, with the channel that joins the branch off the Cloaca Maxima he explored under the old forum.’

  ‘The strange thing is, this isn’t a drain from the Cloaca,’ Costas murmured. ‘It’s exactly the opposite. The fact that the water’s crystal clear on this side suggests it must be on the other side too, flowing down back towards the forum. There must be a pretty big spring smack in the middle of all this, right under the Palatine.’

  ‘Perhaps a sacred spring,’ Jack murmured. ‘Maybe the Vestals were the guardians.’

  Costas eyed his navigation computer again. ‘Judging by the direction of this tunnel and the likely angle of the tunnel Massimo explored under the forum, the point of confluence should be almost exactly under where we were sitting by the House of Augustus this morning. Maybe that cave, the Lupercale, was actually an entranceway down to the spring, a secret passage from the palace. Maybe all that myth stuff, Romulus and Remus, could actually have some fact behind it.’

  ‘The Romans never doubted it,’ Jack murmured.

  ‘Right,’ Costas said. ‘The myth could even underline the importance of the spring. The earliest settlement of Rome was on the Palatine Hill, right? Well, control of a spring could have been crucial to their success. Maybe we’re about to find the real reason why Rome became great. Water.’

  ‘You never cease to amaze me,’ Jack said. ‘And it makes sense that the Vestals were involved, an ancient priesthood dating from the foundation of Rome, probably from way before. By sanctifying this place, by keeping it secret and pure, they would also have been safeguarding Rome. No wonder they were feared and revered. Down here under the Palatine they may literally have been the powerhouse of ancient Rome.’

  ‘Time to find out.’ Costas pushed off from the rock and vented air from his buoyancy system, dropping under the rock face between the two columns. Jack lingered for a moment, staring at the inscription, his excitement pushing against a feeling of apprehension which had not yet fully grown, but was there. He dropped down and followed Costas, finning into the tunnel, completely submerged again with the tufa vault above him.

  ‘Waterproof concrete,’ Costas said. Jack could see the cone of light from his headlamp a few metres ahead, aimed at a section of the conduit wall which had partly cracked and crumbled.

  ‘Another Claudius speciality,’ Jack replied, coming up behind him. ‘It’s how they built the underwater moles of his great harbour at Ostia, and what they used to line aqueducts. In here it was probably used to keep groundwater from leeching down into the conduit, contaminating the springwater. The key ingredient of hydraulic concrete was a dust called pozzolana, from ancient Pozzuola. That’s Puteoli on the Bay of Naples, beside the Phlegraean Fields.’

  ‘Small world,’ Costas murmured as he pressed ahead.

  Jack passed the damaged section, and then came under Costas’ legs where he had stopped, about fifteen metres beyond the columns that had marked the entrance to the conduit.

  ‘It’s all choked up,’ Costas said. ‘It looks as if there’s been a collapse.’

  ‘A dead end?’ Jack said.

  Costas bent over and delved into the tool pocket on his e-suit. He produced a device about the size of a spoon, activated it and held it out in front of him. Jack watched the flashing red light turn to green. ‘The water current meter shows we’ve still got flow. Wherever the spring is, it’s still ahead of us.’ Costas pocketed the meter, then looked at the gauge on his wrist. ‘And we’re still going up at a slight angle, about ten degrees. At this rate we’ll break surface about twenty metres ahead, if the tunnel continues at the same angle beyond this rubble.’

  Jack edged under Costas, and peered at the jumble of tufa fragments on the floor of the tunnel. He reached down and shifted one, then moved several more. ‘Take a look at this,’ he said. ‘There’s a crack underneath us, a fissure in the base of the tunnel. It must have split open when the quake brought down the ceiling. We might be able to get through.’

  Costas dropped alongside Jack, and looked into the hole, angling his head so that the beam shone deep inside. ‘You may be right,’ he said. ‘It widens ahead of us, maybe body width, and goes on as far as I can see. The rubble seems to have compacted at the top of the fissure, and not fallen into it. If we can clear the first couple of metres or so, we might reach the point where the fissure’s wide enough to fin through.’

  ‘My turn to take the lead,’ Jack said. Costas dropped back and peered at him closely, his visor almost touching Jack’s, and made the okay sign. The two men knew each other too well, and words were unnecessary. It was always the second sump that did it for Jack, the realization that escape was no longer straightforward, that he would need to go back through several submerged spaces before reaching the final passage to freedom. He had survived a near-death experience as a boy diving a sunken mine shaft, when his air had cut off and his buddy had saved him, and the memory rose up again every time he confronted similar circumstances, every time his mind began to lock into that sense of déjà vu. He had already felt the icy grip of claustrophobia before he saw the inscription, and now he needed all his reserves to fight it, his own secret battle that only Costas knew about. Taking the lead helped him to focus, to concentrate, to see the objective ahead as his own personal quest, to feel responsibility for one who now came behind him.

  ‘We’re still at about six metres water depth,’ Costas said. ‘By my r
eckoning, we’re only about thirty metres from the point directly below the House of Augustus and that temple, where we were sitting on top of the Palatine.’

  ‘Okay. Here goes,’ Jack muttered. He angled down and pulled himself through the crack. He finned hard, but got nowhere. He was beginning to hyperventilate. He closed his eyes, then felt a jostle from behind. ‘Your coil of rope caught on a rock,’ Costas said. Jack felt a hard push, and then was floating free inside the fissure, which had quickly widened to about two metres. He realized that he was dropping, and dropping fast. He looked at his gauge. Fifteen metres depth already. He must have deactivated the automated buoyancy control as he squeezed into the fissure, and he fumbled with the controls on the side of his helmet. There was a hiss of gas into the suit and he slowed down, reaching neutral buoyancy at eighteen metres. For the first time he looked along the length of the fissure ahead of him. The water was still crystal clear, and he could see horizontally at least thirty metres, to a point where the rough volcanic tufa walls on either side seemed to join together again. He looked down. There was nothing, a yawning blackness, an abyss like he had never seen before, deep below the heart of one of the world’s most ancient cities.