The Last Scion

by Richard Reed

  “He knew, David, he knew – Da Vinci was privy to some kind of secret that had been handed down over the centuries. Let’s do a search and see if we can find anything more on that…” She typed in ‘Leonardo da Vinci The Last Supper hidden symbols’ and waited.

  “There certainly won’t be a shortage of theories out there,” observed David drily. “Do we really have to waste any more time on this?”

  “Just bear with me… Here we are. Hey, this is interesting – look: ‘Templar figures hidden in The Last Supper’.” She clicked on the link. “It seems some Italian researcher by the name of Slavisa Pesci has found some hidden images in The Last Supper by manipulating it… a baby and two Templar knights. Seems he copied the painting, mirrored it, and laid it over the original as a semi-transparent layer. You can do that stuff in Photoshop, right?”

  “Yes, but…”

  “Just humour me?” she said, jumping out of her seat and smiling sweetly at him.

  David sighed and sat down in front of the laptop. He opened a copy of The Last Supper, created a duplicate layer, flipped it, then reduced the transparency to 50%. “Leonardo may have been a genius, but he didn’t have access to computers,” he grumbled as he did so. “There we go. Can’t see a baby, I’m afraid,” he added, scrutinising the composition carefully. “What’s the matter?” he asked, as he heard Rachel gasp.

  “Look at the end of the painting, on the right,” she said in a strangled voice.

  “Good God,” said David. “Some kind of knight wearing a chain-mail helmet!”

  “There’s not just one – scroll to the other end of the painting.”

  “Well there would be two of them, since we’ve duplicated the layer,” said David.

  “True. But they are perfect images – because the top layer is reversed, all the other characters in the scene are jumbled up, yet these two are just sitting there, perfectly formed. And it fits, because we know Leonardo used mirrored handwriting. We also know he used glass as tracing paper to create landscapes and study perspective. But why the Templars – what’s the connection?”

  “You’re assuming they are Templars – we don’t know for certain.”

  “Their reputation as a mysterious order guarding some secret knowledge or ancient relic is pretty well established,” protested Rachel.

  “‘Reputation’ is the right word. They were certainly secretive, and they may well have had a ‘holy’ relic – just about everyone returning from the Holy Land did in those days. But the rest is just pure speculation.”

  “Maybe,” said Rachel. “But clearly Da Vinci knew of some connection. And is it a coincidence that the original figure this composite is based on, Simon the Zealot, appears to be explaining something to those two other disciples?”

  She paused, deep in thought. “Do you remember that mysterious ‘Lost Leonardo’ they found in Scotland recently?” she asked suddenly.

  “The one that the owner nearly threw out with the rubbish?”

  “Yes – I wonder if it’s another piece of the Da Vinci puzzle? A painting of a woman with a baby on her lap, and an old papal bull stuck on the back with the word ‘Magdalene’, clearly visible.”

  “I heard they thought it was a portrait of the Magdalene.”

  “Well it’s can’t be the Virgin Mary – she was always painted wearing blue, by order of the Church. And the papal document seems to bear out the theory that it is Mary Magdalene. But why is she holding a child? Let’s have a quick look.” She made a quick search. “Here we are,” she said. “Oh my goodness!”

  “What?” said David peering closer at the screen.

  “Well as with many of Da Vinci’s paintings, John the Baptist is in the scene, and here he is pointing at the lamb. Remember the phrase ‘Ecce agnus dei’? ‘Behold the lamb of God’? I think I’ve seen in the church somewhere – it’s taken from the New Testament and it’s a common Catholic motif. So if this is Mary Magdalene, why is she holding a baby next to the symbolic lamb of God that John is pointing to – unless Mary is holding Jesus, or his bloodline…” her voice trailed off.

  “Well it would tie in with the pregnant Mary over the porch, but as for the idea of a bloodline I’m pretty sceptical, I’m afraid.”

  “And look at all this symbolism,” said Rachel, ignoring his comment. “There’s a distinctive little ‘V’ in her hairline…”

  “You mean her parting,” said David, scathingly.

  “Well, it could be, taken on its own – but how do you explain the fleur de lys just below her neck, coming out of the back of the baby’s head?”

  David took a closer look at the screen. “OK, I have to admit that’s about the weirdest thing I’ve seen in any painting of this era, bar none.”

  “The fleur-de-lys cropped up a lot in my research on this place,” said Rachel. “It seems that in France it’s strongly linked to Clovis, founder of the early French Merovingian dynasty. And, of course, in Holy Blood, Holy Grail, the 1980s book that inspired the Da Vinci Code, there are claims the Merovingians carried the bloodline of Jesus.”

  “I wondered how long it would take to get round to that old chestnut,” said David disparagingly. “I’m sorry, but I’m not buying into the hysteria that some shadowy organisation called the Prieuré de Sion has been guarding this knowledge for centuries – that particular group has been proven to be a complete bunch of fakers. Now, let’s leave the realms of fantasy and get back to Saunière, and the photos I took inside the church.”

  “The Prieuré de Sion may well be a ‘bunch of fakers’,” said Rachel frustratedly, “but that doesn’t answer the question about why Mary is holding a baby, or why the little boy beside them with the cross is pointing down at the Lamb of God.”

  David ignored her and scrolled down to the next series of images. “OK, after the statue of Old Nick ready to meet visitors just inside the door, next up is the statue of Jesus’s baptism by John the Baptist. It’s right opposite the entrance. See anything unusual?”

  “Nothing at first glance,” said Rachel, coldly. “Hang on a minute – look at the banner John’s carrying!”

  “Ecce agnus dei, again.” His voice trailed off. “Are you psychic or something?”

  She smiled smugly. “Look at the shape of it.”

  “I was – it appears to be a large capital M.”

  “There’s no way that’s random.”

  “All right, smart arse.”

  “Then there’s the ‘M’ pattern around the statue of Mary Magdalene…” She grabbed the pad to have another look at the layout. “Is there anything else in those statues? Working from the back of the church, we’ve got St Germain, St Roch, St Anthony the Hermit, the Magdalene, St Anthony, St Luke…” She scrawled the names on the pad as she read them out, underlining the initial letters for emphasis. “G-R-A-M-A-L,” she said slowly, with an edge of disappointment in her voice. “Not much to go on there. I was hoping there might be another clue… Hang on!” Rachel leapt out of her chair in excitement. “Take M for Mary out of the equation – after all, she’s the focus – and look what you’ve got! G-R-A-A-L! The old French word for ‘grail’, as in the Holy Grail. You know all about theory that the Holy Grail wasn’t the chalice from the Last Supper at all, but that Mary herself was the grail; or more specifically, her womb, carrying the holy child of Jesus.”

  “Hmm…”

  “Oh for God’s sake, David, don’t be so sceptical!”

  “OK, I’m not ruling it out. Given all these other clues it has to be a possibility. Though the whole san graal/sang raal thing that they also raked up in Holy Blood, Holy Grail – that ‘holy grail’ should actually have been written in old French as ‘royal blood’ – turned out to be nothing more than a spelling mistake by an illiterate monk.”

  “We don’t know that for certain, David – the change might have been made deliberately. Monks were well educated and went to painstaking lengths when copying books. I’m not sure I accept the glib theory that such a crucial change was just a ‘mistak
e’. How do they know? Anyway, we’re getting off the point. Is there anything in the statues themselves that might give us a clue? What about him – St Anthony of Padua? Why does he take pride of place in front of the altar?”

  “Ask me another.”

  “OK, let’s Wiki him.” She sat down again at David’s laptop. “Here we are.” She scanned down the Wikipedia entry. “Born in Lisbon – seems he was related to royalty. Joined a local abbey against the wishes of his family. Went on to join the Franciscans because he was impressed with their simple lifestyle. Became known as a famous preacher… Spent a lot of time in southern France – Montpelier, Toulouse, Arles. That’s the reason, I suppose, a saint with local connections…” Again, she could not help feeling a little disappointed. Why give him pride of place? She was missing something. She scanned on down. “Patron saint of Padua in Italy and many cities in Portugal…” She stopped in mid-sentence, her mouth open in disbelief, as a flash of intuition hit her.

  “Well?” said David impatiently. “Don’t sit there like a goddamn goldfish! What is it?”

  Rachel was barely able to speak. “‘He is especially invoked for the recovery of lost things,’” she read haltingly off the screen.

  “So?”

  “My God, don’t you see? She’s here! Saunière found the tomb of Mary Magdalene! That’s why he went so potty about her, that’s why there are so many nods and winks to the Magdalene everywhere. It’s a shrine to the Magdalene – a Magdalene pregnant with Christ’s baby. That statue over the porch proves it. That’s why St Anthony of Padua has pride of place – Saunière is giving thanks for finding such a precious relic – and leaving another deliberate clue in the process!”

  “I suppose you might have a point…”

  “Might have a point?” shrieked Rachel. “How much more evidence do you need?”

  “OK, keep your hair on. Let’s have a look through the rest of these photos and see if anything else jumps out.” Rachel glowered at him but he carried on obliviously. “We’ve done pretty well so far. Here’s the eastern end of the church; the semi-circular Romanesque apse containing the altar. There are some more of the altar itself, but this is worth a quick glance…”

  They both studied the photo intently. “Not much there,” said Rachel with a tinge of disappointment.

  “What about the altar itself? There’s a painting on the front of that.” They peered down at the screen as David brought up the enhanced image of the altar. “Hmm. Just the usual picture of Mary with the skull and the Bible – the triumph of the Scriptures over death. You can see that imagery in several Renaissance paintings.”

  “I agree. Nothing obvious there at a glance – though I’ve always wondered about the credibility of that explanation. I mean, why connect those thoughts specifically with the Magdalene? There’s not much in the New Testament to link Mary with anything like that. It wasn’t until the translation of the ‘Lost Gospels’ from Nag Hammadi in the 1970s that scholars realised just how big a role Mary really played in Jesus’s ministry – not to mention his life.”

  “The Gospel of Mary was actually found in 1896 – the year before the restoration of this church was completed,” said David. “Not at Nag Hammadi.”

  “My, you’ve been doing your homework, haven’t you,” said Rachel tartly. “I know damn well the Gospel of Mary was found before Nag Hammadi, but several of the gospels found there also contain lengthy references to her.”

  “I wasn’t trying to score points,” said David defensively. “It came up in my research. I was trying to find out as much as I could about the Magdalene – we were, after all, digging up her church. The codex turned up in Cairo and was bought by a German scholar by the name of Carl Reinhardt. The translation wasn’t published until the 1950s, but it’s interesting that it showed up in Egypt – a melting pot of illicit archaeological relics – only five years after Saunière made that enigmatic entry in his diary ‘Discovered a tomb’. Officially, the codex was found in a niche in the wall of a Christian burial site in Egypt, but there’s considerable doubt about that among academics. Left out in the open, it would have crumbled to dust, yet it was in remarkably good condition. It makes you wonder…”

  “You’re not kidding. There are just way too many coincidences here.” Rachel turned back to look at the laptop screen again. Something caught her eye and she frowned, zooming in the photo to a higher magnification. “Now it’s my turn to ask an odd question: what does that look like to you?” she said, pointing to the top left-hand corner of the altar painting, which now occupied most of the screen.

  “Looks like the ruins of an old castle.”

  “Look more closely.”

  “Good grief! It’s another ‘M’ – the ruins form a perfect M!” enthused David. “At least on the right. And that stump on the left is a perfect cross, set back slightly, as if it were on a gravestone. I’m beginning to agree with you on this one – it looks like yet another clue that Jesus and Mary were an item, and a 19th century Catholic priest doesn’t make those sort of allusions all over his church without having some pretty strong evidence. I wonder if there’s anything else we’ve missed?” He slowly scrolled around the painting. “That area in the bottom right looks pretty murky – let’s see if I can enhance it.” He selected the area in Photoshop and boosted the contrast. “What on earth is that?” he exclaimed. “It looks like a sword lying among the rocks.”

  “Hey, you could be right,” said Rachel, peering at the screen. “And is that a coronet or something underneath it? That band of gold? In fact there are several blobs of gold there, though it’s hard to distinguish anything else. You know what I think? I think Saunière hit the jackpot here at Rennes. All his numbers came up – he found the Magdalene, or something closely associated with her, that proved she was Jesus’s widow, and he also found some hidden gold. That would explain everything.”

  David ran his fingers through his unruly mop of blond curls. “You’re stretching things again, Rachel…”

  “Hell, by the law of averages, every once in a while, someone hits the jackpot,” she interrupted. “Vegas is built on that dream. Look, you know all the legends about the gold that’s supposed to have been stashed here over the centuries…”

  “I’ve heard the stories.”

  “Right! And we know there’s some truth in that. What about that shepherd boy in the mid-1600s who came back to the village with his pockets stuffed with gold?”

  “Ignace Paris, I think, was his name. He was looking for a lost sheep and fell into a ravine crammed with skeletons and huge amounts of gold. Unfortunately no-one believed him, and he was stoned to death for theft. Allegedly.”

  “That’s the one! Not to mention the gold objects that farmers reputedly keep finding in their fields round here. As I said, maybe Saunière just got lucky. I’ve been focusing on the religious side, but perhaps he found both spiritual and literal treasure. Any other pictures worth a look?”

  “Obviously there are the 14 Stations of the Cross, but it could take some time going through all those, and we need to find something conclusive before morning.” David sat drumming his fingers on the table in frustration.

  “Is there anything in the windows?”

  “The stained glass windows? Good call – let’s look at that big rose window in the apse. If Saunière’s putting clues here, there and everywhere, he wouldn’t have missed a chance to leave a hint there when he replaced the window.” He pulled up the image – a stunning tableau of richly coloured glass depicting Mary Magdalene at Jesus’s feet.

  “No, hang on a minute, what was that other one?” said Rachel.

  “What other one?”

  “The one you just skipped past.”

  “It’s just a detail from the wall painting above the rose window. It’s pretty blurry. I wasn’t using the tripod when I snapped it – it didn’t strike me as being particularly significant at the time… Here we go. As I said, pretty dim and blurry. I’ll try improving it.”

  “He
y, tell me that isn’t significant,” said Rachel when David had finished fiddling with the picture quality. In front of them was a still slightly blurry photo depicting two large intertwined letters – M and S; the M in gold, the S in silver. To the left of the monogram was a silver vase, to the right a gold cross. “A monogram of Mary’s and Christ’s initials!”

  “I hate to deflate you, but it’s an M and S, not M and J or C.”

  Rachel ignored his sarcasm. “The way I see it, the images of the vase and the cross on either side don’t leave much room for doubt. S could stand for Saviour.”

  “I’ll admit the symbolism of the vase and the cross is pretty striking, but S and M could just as easily stand for Sainte Marie, since the church is dedicated to her. OK, let’s see what the window itself has to reveal. Here we are – Mary kneeling beside Jesus, washing his feet with her hair…”

  “I think you mean anointing…”

  “Whatever…”

  “There’s a big difference! That vase Mary is using contained pure nard – an incredibly expensive perfume! That’s why Judas criticised her for wasting money that could have been given to the poor. It was worth a year’s wages! The word Christ means ‘the anointed’ in Greek, yet he was only anointed once in the entire New Testament, and that was by Mary Magdalene. Some scholars see it as a symbolic act; anointing Jesus as a king before his sacrificial death. It’s only in Luke’s gospel, the third to be written, and the most heavily edited version of events, that we have mention of a sinful woman washing Jesus’s feet with tears, rather than oil. It’s also Luke who describes Mary as a woman from whom seven demons had been cast out. A classic piece of misogyny by Christian elders in Greece, who wanted to undermine Mary’s position as a key disciple.”

  David bristled, but forced himself to continue. “As I was saying… Here’s that scene. Now, is there anything odd there? Anything out of the ordinary? I must say – as an atheist,” he added pointedly, “it seems odd to me that only Jesus and Mary have haloes. None of the other disciples have any.”