His mother closed the refrigerator door, a gallon of milk in hand. “Out in the garage. Working on another birdhouse.”
“Not another one?”
She frowned at him. “He likes it. Keeps him out of trouble. His therapist says it’s good for him to have a hobby.” She crossed with two plates of sandwiches.
His mother had come straight from her university office. She still wore her blue blazer over a white blouse, her blond-gray hair pulled back and bobby-pinned. Neat, professorial. But Gray noted the haggard edge to her eyes. She looked more drawn, thinner.
Gray took the plates. “Dad’s woodworking may help him, but does it always have to be birdhouses? There are only so many birds in Maryland.”
She smiled. “Eat your sandwiches. Do you want any pickles?”
“No.” It was the way they always were. Small talk to avoid the larger matters. But some things couldn’t be put off forever. “Where did they find him?”
“Over by the 7-Eleven on Cedar. He got confused. Ended up heading the wrong way. He had enough presence of mind to call John and Suz.”
The neighbors must have then telephoned Gray’s mother, and she in turn had called Gray, worried, half-panicked. But five minutes later, she had called again. His father was home and fine. Still, Gray knew he had better stop by for a short visit.
“Is he still taking his Aricept?” he asked.
“Of course. I make sure he does every morning.”
His father had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, the very early stages, shortly after his parents had moved out here. It had started with small bouts of forgetfulness: where he had placed his keys, telephone numbers, the names of neighbors. The doctors said the move from Texas might have brought forth symptoms that had been latent. His mind had a difficult time cataloging all the new information after the cross-country move. But stubborn and determined, he had refused to go back. Eventually along with the forgetfulness came spats of frustrated anger. Not that such a line was ever hard for his father to cross.
“Why don’t you take his plate out to him?” his mother asked. “I have to call in to the office.”
Gray reached and took the sandwiches, letting his hand rest atop hers for a moment. “Maybe we need to talk about that live-in nurse.”
She shook her head—not denying the need so much as simply refusing to discuss it. She pulled her hand from his. Gray had hit this wall before. His father would not allow it, and his mother felt it was her responsibility to care for him. But it was wearing on the household, on his mother, on their entire family.
“When was the last time Kenny came by?” he asked. His younger brother ran a computer start-up just across the border in Virginia, following in his father’s footsteps as an engineer—electrical, though, not petroleum.
“You know Kenny…” his mother said. “Let me get you a pickle for your father.”
Gray shook his head. Lately Kenny had been talking of moving to Cupertino, California. He had excuses for why the move was necessary, but beneath it all, Gray knew the truth. His brother merely wanted to escape, to get away. At least Gray understood that sentiment. He had done that himself, joining the Army. It must be a Pierce family trait.
His mother passed him the pickle jar to open. “How is everything at the lab?”
“Going fine,” he said. He cracked the lid, fished out a dill, and placed it on the plate.
“I was reading about a bunch of budget cuts over at DARPA.”
“My job’s not at risk,” he assured her. Neither of his folks knew of his role with Sigma. They thought he simply did low-level research for the military. They did not have the security clearance for the truth.
With the plate in hand, Gray headed for the back door.
His mother watched him. “He’ll be glad to see you.”
If only I could say the same….
Gray headed for the garage out back. He heard the twangs of a country music station flowing from the open door. It brought back memories of line dancing at Muleshoes. And other less pleasant recollections.
He stood at the entrance of the garage. His father crouched over a vise-gripped piece of wood, hand-planing an edge.
“Pop,” he said.
His dad straightened and turned. He was as tall as Grayson, but built stocky, wider shoulders, broader back. He had worked the oil fields while putting himself through college, earning a good practical degree in petroleum engineering. He had done well until an industrial accident at a well sheared away his left leg at the knee. The settlement and disability allowed him to retire at forty-seven.
That had been fifteen years ago.
Half of Grayson’s life. The bad half.
His father turned toward him. “Gray?” He wiped the sweat from his brow, smearing sawdust. A scowl formed. “There was no need to come all the way out here.”
“How else would these sandwiches get to you?” He lifted the plate.
“Your mother made those?”
“You know Mom. She tried her best.”
“Then I’d better eat them. Can’t discourage the habit.”
He pushed away from the workbench and hobbled stiff-legged on his prosthesis to a small fridge in the back. “Beer?”
“I have to go back to work in a bit.”
“One beer won’t kill you. I’ve some of that Sam Adams swill you like.”
His father was more of a Budweiser-and-Coors man. But the fact that he stocked his fridge with Sam Adams was about the equivalent of a pat on the back. Maybe even a hug.
He couldn’t refuse.
Gray took the bottle and used the opener built into the edge of the worktable to pop it open. His father sidled over and leaned a hip on a stool. He lifted his own bottle, a Budweiser, in salute. “It sucks to get old…but there’s always beer.”
“So true.” Gray drank deeply. He wasn’t sure he should be mixing codeine and alcohol—then again, it had been a long, long morning.
His father stared at him. The silence threatened to become quickly awkward.
“So,” Gray said, “can’t find your way home any longer.”
“Fuck you,” he responded with false anger, weakened by a grin and a shake of his head. His father appreciated honest talk. Straight shooting, as he used to say. “At least I was no goddamn felon.”
“You can’t let go of my stint in Leavenworth. That you keep remembering!”
His father tipped his beer bottle at Gray. “I will as long as I damn can.”
Their eyes met. He saw something glint behind his father’s banter, something he had seldom seen before. Fear.
The two had never had an easy relationship. His father had taken to heavy drinking after the accident, accompanied by severe bouts of depression. It was hard for a Texas oilman to suddenly become a housewife, raising two boys while his spouse went to work. To compensate, he had run the household like a boot camp. And Gray had always pushed the envelope, a born rebel.
Until at last, at eighteen, Gray had simply packed his bags and joined the Army, leaving in the middle of the night.
Afterward the two did not speak for a full two years.
Slowly his mother had brought them back together. Still, it had remained an uncomfortable détente. She had once said, “You two are more alike than you are different.” Grayson had not heard scarier words.
“This goddamn sucks…” his father said softly, breaking the silence.
“Budweiser certainly does.” Grayson lifted his beer bottle. “That’s why I only drink Sam Adams.”
His father grinned. “You’re an asshole.”
“You raised me.”
“And I suppose it takes one to know one.”
“I never said that.”
His father rolled his eyes. “Why do you even bother coming over?”
Because I don’t know how long you’ll remember me, he thought, but dared not say it aloud. There remained a tight spot behind his sternum, an old resentment that he could not completely let go. There were words he wa
nted to say, wanted to hear…and a part of him knew he was running out of time.
“Where did you get these sandwiches?” his father asked, taking a bite and speaking around the mouthful. “They’re pretty good.”
Gray kept his face passive. “Mom made ’em.”
A flicker of confusion followed. “Oh…yeah.”
Their eyes met again. Fear flared brighter in his father’s gaze…and shame. He had lost a part of his manhood fifteen years ago and now he faced losing his humanity.
“Pop…I…”
“Drink your beer.” He heard an edge of familiar anger, and Gray reflexively shied from it.
He drank his beer, sitting silently, neither able to speak. Maybe his mother was right. They were too much alike.
His beeper finally went off at his waist. Gray grabbed it too quickly. He saw the Sigma number.
“That’s the office,” Gray mumbled. “I…I have an afternoon meeting.”
His father nodded. “I should get back to this damn birdhouse.”
They shook hands, two uneasy adversaries conceding no contest.
Gray returned to the house, said his good-byes to his mother, and collected up his bike. He mounted it and quickly pedaled toward the Metro station. The phone number on his beeper had been followed by an alphanumeric code.
911.
An emergency.
Thank God.
5:03 P.M.
VATICAN CITY
THE SEARCH for the truth behind the Three Magi had turned into a painstaking archaeological dig—but instead of hauling dirt and rock, Monsignor Vigor Verona and his crew of archivists were digging through crumbling books and parchments. The crew of scrittori had done the initial spadework in the main Vatican Library; now Vigor sifted for clues about the Magi in one of the most guarded areas of the Holy See: the Archivio Segretto Vaticano, the infamous Secret Archives of the Vatican.
Vigor strode down the long subterranean hall. Each lamp clicked on as he approached and switched off as he left it behind, maintaining a pool of illumination around him and his young student, Jacob. They crossed the length of the main Manuscript Depository, nicknamed the carbonile, or bunker. Built in 1980, the concrete hall rose two stories high, each level separated by a mesh metal floor, connected by steep stairs. On one side, miles of steel shelves contained various archival regestra: bound reams of parchments and papers. On the opposite wall stood the same metal shelves, only sealed and locked behind wire doors, protecting more-sensitive material.
There was a saying about the Holy See: the Vatican had too many secrets…and not enough. Vigor doubted the latter as he strode through the vast depository. It kept too many secrets, even from itself.
Jacob carried a laptop, maintaining a database on their subject. “So there were not just three Magi?” he said as they headed toward the exit to the bunker.
They had come down here to digitize a photograph of a vase currently residing at the Kircher Museum. It had depicted not three kings, but eight. But even that number varied. A painting in the cemetery of Saint Peter showed two, and one at a crypt in Domitilla illustrated four.
“The Gospels were never specific on the number of Magi,” Vigor said, feeling the exhaustion of the long day setting in. He found it useful to talk through much of his thoughts, a firm believer in the Socratic method. “Only the Gospel of Matthew directly refers to them, and even then only vaguely. The common assumption of three comes from the number of gifts borne by the Magi: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. In fact, they might not even have been kings. The word magi comes from the Greek word magoi, or ‘magician.’”
“They were magicians?”
“Not as we might think. The connotation of magoi does not imply sorcery, but rather practitioners of hidden wisdom. Hence the ‘wise men’ reference. Most biblical scholars now believe they were Zoroastrian astrologers out of Persia or Babylon. They interpreted the stars and foresaw the coming of a king to the west, portended by a single celestial rising.”
“The Star of Bethlehem.”
He nodded. “Despite all the paintings, the star was not a particularly dramatic event. According to the Bible, no one in Jerusalem even noted it. Not until the Magi came to King Herod and brought it to his attention. The Magi had figured a newborn king, as heralded by the stars, must be born to royalty. But King Herod was shocked to hear of this news and asked them when they saw the star rise. He then used Hebrew holy books of prophecy to point out where this king might’ve been born. He directed the Magi to Bethlehem.”
“So Herod told them where to go.”
“He did, sending them as spies. Only on the way to Bethlehem, according to Matthew, the star reappeared and guided the Magi to the child. Afterward, warned by an angel, they left without telling Herod who or where the child was. Thence began the slaughter of the innocents.”
Jacob hurried to keep pace. “But Mary, Joseph, and the newborn child had already fled to Egypt, warned by an angel as well. So what became of the Magi?”
“What indeed?” Vigor had spent most of the last hour chasing down Gnostic and Apocryphal texts with references to the Magi, from the Protevangelium of James to the Book of Seth. If the bones were stolen, was there motivation beyond pure profit? Knowledge could prove their best weapon in that case.
Vigor checked his watch. He was running out of time, but the Prefect of the Archives would continue the search, building the database with Jacob, who would forward their findings via e-mail.
“What about the historical names of the Magi?” Jacob said. “Gaspar, Melchior, and Balthazar?”
“Supposition only. The names first appeared in Excerpta Latina Barbari in the sixth century. Further references follow that one, but I think they’re more fairy tales than factual accounts; still, they may be worth following. I’ll leave that for you and the Preffeto Alberto to research.”
“I’ll do my best.”
Vigor frowned. It was a daunting task. Then again, did any of this really matter? Why steal the Magi bones?
The answer eluded him. And Vigor was unsure if the truth would be found among the thirty miles of shelves that made up the Secret Archives. But one consensus had begun to form from all the clues. Factual or not, the stories of the Magi hinted at some vast wealth of hidden knowledge, known only to a certain sect of magi.
But who were they really?
Magicians, astrologers, or priests?
Vigor passed the Parchment Room, catching a fresh whiff of insecticide and fungicide. The caretakers must have just sprayed. Vigor knew that some of the rare documents in the Parchment Room were turning purple, succumbing to a resistant violet fungus and leaving them in grave danger of being lost forever.
So much else here was also threatened…and not just from fire, fungus, or neglect, but from sheer volume. Only half of the material stored here had ever been indexed. And more was added each year, flooding in from Vatican ambassadors, metropolitan sees, and individual parishes.
It was impossible to keep up.
The Secret Archives themselves had spread like a malignant cancer, metastasizing out from its original rooms into old attics, underground crypts, and empty tower cells. Vigor had spent half a year researching the files of past Vatican spies, those who came before him, agents placed in government positions around the world, many written in code, reporting on political intrigue spanning a thousand years.
Vigor knew that the Vatican was as much a political entity as a spiritual one. And enemies of both sought to undermine the Holy See. Even today. It was priests like Vigor who stood between the Vatican and the world. Warriors in secret, holding the line. And while Vigor might not agree with everything done in the past or even the present, his faith remained solid…like the Vatican itself.
He was proud of his service to the papacy.
Empires might rise and fall. Philosophies might come and go. But in the end, the Vatican persisted, abided, remained stolid and steadfast. It was history, time, and faith all preserved in stone.
Eve
n here, many of the greatest treasures of the world were protected in the Archive’s locked vaults, safes, closets, and dark wooden cabinets called armadi. In one drawer was a letter from Mary Stuart on the day before she was beheaded; in another, the love letters between King Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. There were documents pertaining to the Inquisition, to witch trials, to the Crusades, to letters from a khan of Persia and a Ming empress.
But what Vigor sought now was not so guarded.
It required only a long climb.
He had one more clue he wanted to investigate before he left for Germany with Rachel.
Vigor reached the small elevator to the upper rooms of the Archives, called the piani nobli, or the noble floors. He held the door for Jacob, closed it, and punched the button. With a shudder and bounce, the small cage rose.
“Where are we headed now?” Jacob asked.
“To the Torre dei Venti.”
“The Tower of the Winds? Why?”
“There is an ancient document kept up there. A copy of the Description of the World from the sixteenth century.”
“Marco Polo’s book?”
He nodded as the elevator shuddered to a stop. They exited down a long corridor.
Jacob hurried to keep up. “What do Marco Polo’s adventures have to do with the Magi?”
“In that book, he relates myths out of ancient Persia, concerning the Magi and what became of them. It all centers on a gift given to them by the Christ child. A stone of great power. Upon that stone, the Magi supposedly founded a mystical fraternity of arcane wisdom. I’d like to trace that myth.”
The corridor ended at the Tower of the Winds. The empty rooms of this tower had become incorporated into the Secret Archives. Unfortunately, the room Vigor sought was at its very top. He cursed the lack of elevator and entered the dark stair.
He abandoned further lecturing, saving his breath for the long climb. The spiral stair wound round and round. They continued in silence until at last the stairs emptied into one of the Vatican’s most unique and historic chambers.
The Meridian Room.
Jacob craned at the frescoes adorning the circular walls and ceilings, depicting scenes from the Bible with cherubs and clouds above. A single spear of light, admitted through a quarter-sized hole in the wall, pierced the dusty air and spiked down atop the room’s marble slab floor, which was carved with the signs of the zodiac. A line marking the meridian cut across the floor. The room was the sixteenth-century solar observatory used to establish the Gregorian calendar and where Galileo had attempted to prove his case that the Earth revolved around the sun.
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