The Waste Land

by Simon Acland

Then, as I crested a fold in the hillside, a dark mouth opened in welcome. It had been invisible from the path below. Almost on all fours now, I scrambled up to the narrow platform in front of the cave – for cave this was, much more than church. Was this truly the place where Saint Peter had prayed? My heart pounded with the exertion of the steep slope, but also driven hard by excitement at reaching my goal and by fear that this might not after all be the right place. I went in. The chamber was cool and larger than the entrance suggested. The grey walls and roof were mottled green by mould and black by ancient candle smoke. In the gloom an altar, cut roughly from the back wall, gave some reassurance that this humble spot was indeed the object of my quest.

  It was very different from my expectation. I had anticipated a church, a building, a library or at least a room where documents might be stored, perhaps even a priest who could show me what I sought. How foolish I had been. Now I realised that this simple space was of course where men would have gone to pray in those early days of the Church, hidden away from prying eyes and persecution. To the left of the altar a passageway led off, a tunnel perhaps for escape if the main entrance were threatened. I bent to enter it, cursing my lack of foresight at bringing neither candle nor torch. I stumbled my way into the deeper darkness with arms outstretched but after a few steps found nothing more than a fall of rock. I turned back out and knelt before the altar. I saw nowhere that could conceal a book and in despair more than expectation I murmured a prayer to Saint Peter.

  “Oh Holy Saint, first venerable pontiff from whom all others descend, co-patron of my old abbey, you are the rock on which Our Lord built His Church, now show me, I pray, where in this rocky place my treasure is hidden.”

  The only other object in the cave was a crude font to the right of the altar, also carved from the solid rock. I rose to inspect it and half saw, half felt an inscription around its edge. Perhaps this would guide me to what I sought.

  N I Ψ O N A N O M H M A T A M H M O N A N O Ψ I N

  ‘NIPSON ANOMEMATA ME MONAN OPSIN’

  My attention was sharpened when I saw the inscription was palindromic, reading the same both ways. Unconsciously I rolled the Greek around my tongue, translating it in my head as ‘wash the sin as well as the face’. I could not see how this advice could help me but in spite of my disappointment I smiled at its gentle humour. I walked around the cave again, carefully inspecting the walls, and went back into the dark tunnel where I scrabbled at the fallen rocks. After a hour of hard work all I had achieved was to bloody my fingers and discover that the rock fall concealed nothing more than a dead end. Exhausted in body and in spirit, I leant back against the old font, my hands behind me on the rim, and looked out through the cave’s mouth into the bright light outside. It made a dazzling contrast to the internal gloom.

  My hands rested on the ancient deep-chiselled letters, and I felt their hard clean outline with pleasure. Which disciple had chipped them out all those years before, I wondered. Perhaps even Saint Peter himself? I spread my hands out to trace the ‘N’ at either end of the inscription, then brought them in to the ‘I’, then the ‘Ψ’, and the ‘O’. Then, with a start of surprise, I went back to the ‘Ψ’. Yes, I was right. The ‘N’s’, the ‘I’s’ and the ‘O’s’ were all identical, perfect twins. But the stonemason had slipped up on the third letter. The first ‘Ψ’ was carved as I would have expected, with a rounded bowl – shaped a little like the font itself, I thought. But the last one, the letter third from the end, was different. It had a sharp point, like an arrow. Pointing down.

  In sudden excitement I turned round; could this be a hidden message? I bent down and scrutinized the old font. I pushed at it but it seemed firm. I pulled out the dagger I wore at my waist and scratched around the base. I became more agitated as I discovered that unlike the altar the font was not carved from the rock as I had first thought. The material at the join was softer than the surrounding stone. My dagger marked it more easily. The font was fixed in place with mortar which with age had become indistinguishable from the stone that it held together. Careless of my blade, I chipped away, periodically stopping my work to heave against the rim. Eventually a grating sound told me that my work was not in vain. The muscles in my arms and back cracked as I pushed at the heavy stone, but bit by bit it shifted far enough to reveal a dark hollow at its base. Eagerly, panting from excited exertion, I reached in. My hand was too big. Cursing, I bent my shoulder to its work again and heaved the font backwards another inch. Now I could squeeze my hand through the gap. Something brushed against my fingers, soft, and hairy. I snatched my hand away, thinking that I had pushed it into the lair of some insect, or some poisonous spider. I remembered the agony suffered by one of Godfrey’s men when he had pulled on his boots without the precaution of checking what might have been inside. A scorpion had stung him and his foot had swelled up to almost twice its normal size. But I had no choice. Gritting my teeth, I made myself push my hand back inside again. I found that I had involuntarily shut my eyes, and angry at my own timidity, I forced them back open. Again, something tickled the back of my hand but the sting that I feared did not come. Now I gingerly stretched out the tips of my shaking fingers. At the bottom, I felt a thin cylinder. I picked it up between my index and middle fingers. It seemed to be wrapped in something. As I brought it up towards the hole it snagged and slipped out of my grasp. I pinched my fingers together more firmly and lifted it a second time. It was too long to fit through the hole I had made. I tried a third time. Now I held it at one end, allowing it to hang vertically as I lifted it. This time I withdrew it in triumph. With my prize I rushed out into the light at the front of the cave.

  In my hands I held a wooden tube the thickness of a fat finger and a hand’s span in length. It was wrapped in frayed material, and I laughed out loud when I saw that I had been tickled and scared by a piece of harmless cotton. Both ends of the tube were plugged with wax. Impatiently I offered it to the sun to soften it and dug at with my dagger, whose once bright blade was now dulled and scratched by its valiant work on the mortar of the font. My triumph began to fade as my head told me that the tube was too small to hold a document as substantial as a gospel; my heart hoped beyond hope that this was the secret writing so desired by Hasan, Blanche’s deed of release. I levered out the wax plug. Then I flooded with disappointment as I gently eased one single papyrus sheet from the tube and unrolled it. It was still strong and surprisingly supple after its long sojourn behind the seal. But it was completely blank. I slumped down in the bright sunlight at the cave’s mouth. I could have wept. What use was this?

  My despair turned to anger – anger against Hasan who had given me this task, anger against the long dead owner-hider of the papyrus, anger against God who had so unfairly tricked me, anger against myself for my foolishness and gullibility, anger against the physical manifestation of my failure, the papyrus itself. I felt a compulsion to tear it to pieces, to scrumple it up and hurl it far down the slopes of the valley. I looked at it again with hatred. But some remnant of monkish respect for a writer’s material, for the documents that I had tended at Cluny, caused me to stay my hand. I let the papyrus curl itself up again and stowed it away in its tube, then thrusting it inside my tunic next to the pouch which held Blanche’s precious lock of hair.

  The sun was now low in the sky, the shadows long, but before returning to the city below, I determined to search though the Cave Church one more time. I had little hope and this time at least my expectation was correct. The secret chamber beneath the font was void and had given up all that it contained. For no reason other than some strange wish to leave things as I had found them, I dragged the heavy stone back into position. The altar was solid rock. The cave walls were virgin and unhewn. There could be nothing more here to find. Nevertheless, I resolved to return the next day with torch and candles to explore more thoroughly.

  I slithered back down to my horse, which carried me down the hill far more willingly than on the upward journey. Indeed, it was as if we had
exchanged our moods for the return, and I had swapped my outward enthusiasm for my steed’s outward reluctance. I returned to Godfrey’s quarters and found him preparing to go to the Palace of Antioch and Raymond’s round-tabled council chamber.

  “So one more vow fulfilled now, Hugh. And thanks given for your safe return to my side. How did you find your cave church?”

  I mouthed words to cover my bitter disappointment.

  “Not good, my Lord. That holy space is forlorn and open to the elements. Wild animals and beasts are free to make their homes there – in the sacred place where our first pontiff prayed. It is a sacrilege. It should be walled in. Whoever takes on the task of restoring it will earn favour in heaven.”

  At the council, Bohemond began by proudly staking his claim to the city of Antioch.

  “It is thanks to me that we occupied this city. I found the Armenian Firouz. I persuaded him to let my men up into the tower he guarded. Otherwise the city would never have fallen. And if I had I not shown you the way, and led you into the city, you would all have been massacred miserably in the plain outside by Kerbogha’s forces. Then it was me who laid the battle plan which gave us victory. Under my command it was executed successfully. My supremacy was recognised by the enemy. After all, the Emir who commanded the citadel would surrender it only to me. Some others tried to grab it but no. He insisted on waiting for my return from the field of battle. And now he and his men have accepted my command, and converted to the true faith. So my Normans now hold the citadel. My flag flies from its tower, just as mine was the first flag to fly over the city itself. We all know that the citadel commands the city; I hold Antioch by right of conquest.”

  Raymond quavered weakly from his litter.

  “Ni, by right of conquest I hold this palace, the Bridge Gate, and this quarter of the city in which it lies. By rights the citadel should have surrendered to me; it was only thanks to some devious plot of yours that the Emir refused to hoist the famous blue and silver flag of Provence. Wasn’t I here, commanding the town and defending it against a possible sortie from the fortress above?”

  “Yes, and protecting your feeble carcass from the dangers of battle,” muttered Bohemond.

  Raymond coldly ignored the interruption.

  “And remember that it was the Holy Lance which gave us victory, not mere mortal efforts. Remember who found the lance – the Lord chose to reveal it to one of my Provençals and to give it to me.”

  Bohemond snorted and scowled, but he could not reveal the truth about the rascal Peter Bartholomew. Raymond continued.

  “Without the Holy Lance, the silver saints would not have come to the army’s aid at the crucial moment and turned the battle.”

  Here Godfrey caught my eye. In spite of my gloom I had a struggle to prevent myself laughing at the Duke’s expression and our shared secret. Raymond looked sententiously round the table.

  “Lord Bohemond wants Antioch to keep; I do not want Antioch for myself. We have sworn oaths to return it to the Emperor. I will do so. Christian knights do not break their oaths; to do so would be to bring God’s wrath upon our expedition. Besides, we would be fools to make an enemy out of Alexios, whose help we will surely need again.”

  “Again? Again?” raged Bohemond, hammering on the table in fury. “Where was the Emperor when we needed him? His eunuch Tatikios took his gold nose out of our business months ago. He and the rest of his effete soldiery fled as soon as the going here got tough. The Greek Emperor’ll not have Antioch freely from me and I’ll wager he’s got no more balls than his eunuch to fight me for it.”

  Bohemond sat seething, looking belligerently around the table. Godfrey and Tancred spoke in favour of his cause but the Count of Toulouse, with Bishop Adhemar’s support, was adamant that Antioch would not be delivered to the Norman. In deadlock, the princes were able only to agree on inaction – that the armies should not move south until November at the earliest, the excuse being that their men needed rest after the privations they had suffered. The council broke up in vile temper.

  That night I tossed in restless sleep on the palliasse in my first floor chamber. Disturbed dreams troubled me, of an eagle soaring high, diving on a white dove and clutching it viciously in its talons. The eagle’s face turned into Hasan-i Sabbah’s cruelly beaked aspect, and the dove became Blanche, a look of terror etched on her soft features, her blue eyes wide with fear and sorrow. In the shadows behind, half-human, half-animal shapes circled, lions, bears, some bearded, others one-eyed, others still red-headed. Malevolently they wrestled with each other, snarling, as a huge black serpent slithered behind them spraying out hisses. They all watched the struggle between eagle and dove, doing nothing to intervene, gleeful that the bird of peace was about to be torn to shreds in the raptor’s claws.

  I jerked awake from this nightmare to feel a dagger’s blade cold on the sweat at my throat. It was Mohammed.

  “Don’t think that you are unobserved,” he whispered. “I warned you we would be watching. Your journey to the Cave Church was remarked. Have you found the book my father desires? Are you ready to return with me to Alamut? My father will fast become restless and your Lady Blanche will be at risk.”

  Angry, I pushed his weapon away.

  “You do not frighten me, my friend,” I whispered back. “If you kill me your father will not get what he wants. You are a fool to sneak in here. You are risking discovery and all my hopes. But I suppose at least that I can tell you what happened up there.”

  Mohammed tacitly acknowledged that there was no point keeping his knife at my throat and slipped it away into its curved sheath. His attitude seemed respectful and even a little touched with awe. He listened quietly and with some sympathy to my account.

  “Can I see it?” he asked. I fumbled for my tinder box and for one of the stock of candles on the table I used for writing. When I had a flame I gave the candle to Mohammed, felt inside my tunic and pulled out the tube. Carefully I extracted the papyrus, unrolled it and brought it into the light.

  “You see, it is blank, useless.” I turned it over to show him both sides. Anger seized me again. “The Devil take it. I’m going to burn the damned thing.” And I moved it towards Mohammed’s candle. Anxious, he moved his hand away, but not before the warmth of the flame had touched the papyrus.

  “Wait. See. There is something there.”

  The excitement in his voice brought me to a halt. I looked again and saw indeed that some faint marks had appeared in one corner.

  “Give me the candle. No, I won’t burn it. I just want to warm it a little.”

  Mohammed moved the candle nearer and I passed the papyrus through the heat rising from the flame. Now, as if by magic, letters began to appear, to cover it. They were the colour of dried blood. I made them out to be the same script as round the Cave Church font, the Greek for the knowledge of which Hasan had despatched me on my noxious quest. I spelt the words out and found the same sentence written out over and again:

  ‘Π P O Σ T H N Δ Y Σ H N Π E Π O P E Y M A I

  M E T A T O Y B I B Λ I O Y O Φ O B E I Σ Θ E

  T O A Λ Λ O E N T H I A Γ I A Π O Λ E I

  A Σ Φ A Λ Ω Σ K E K P Y M M E N O N’

  ‘PROS TEN DUSEN PEPOREGMAI

  META TOU BIBLIOU HO PHOBEISTHE

  TO ALLO EN TEI HAGIA POLEI

  ASPHALOS KEKRUMMENON’

  ‘I have travelled to the West with the book you fear.

  The other is hidden safe in the Holy City’

  As I translated for Mohammed my hope and excitement faded away again. What did this mean? What could have possessed the writer of the papyrus to set down repeatedly the same words? Was he somehow taunting the person to whom it was addressed? Could the author be the owner of the Gospel of Lazarus – perhaps even Lazarus himself? Why was it in the cave if not addressed to its occupant – could it be a message for Saint Peter or one of his early acolytes? Could it be that the book it mentioned was actually the gospel that I sought? But if so, how c
ould I possibly find it somewhere undefined in the great metropolis of Jerusalem, for that was what I supposed the ‘Holy City’ to be? Mohammed and I looked at each other.

  “What does it mean? Have you ever seen such a thing before?”

  Mohammed’s question stirred some distant reminiscence. Surely somewhere, long ago, I had seen something like it, that same script, that same red-brown colour on a papyrus of similar fashion. I felt the material between my fingers and thumbs. Then suddenly the memory came pouring out. Of course, it had been at Cluny, in the library, dropping from inside the parchment leaves of that fatal volume of Saint Victorinus. That was where I had seen such a papyrus before. In some way the two documents must be twins. In some way they must each unlock the other’s secret. The answer to the riddle must be at Cluny. There I must return.

  I stared back at Mohammed. I scarcely knew whether to laugh or to cry. I would now have to undo my whole journey. I would have to return to my beginnings. Could I again face my former mentor confessor Abbot Hugh? Would the book still be in the old library? Would I be able to find it once more? Would Hasan be patient or would he vent his enmity and frustration on poor Blanche? All these thoughts churned through me. But in my heart I knew that I had no alternative. My fate led me back to Cluny.

  My expression had given Mohammed the answer to his question, but now I spelt it out in words. “Yes, I have seen such a thing before. I think I have. In my abbey, in the place where I started my journey. In the library there I have seen a document with this same writing, in ink of this same colour, written on this same material. I am sure of it. So you see, I’ll have to return to Cluny.”

  Mohammed looked at me with scepticism, and, I thought, some alarm.

  “My friend, it is the only chance we have. It’s the only way I can find the key to unlock the Lazarus Gospel’s hiding place in the Holy City. Only at Cluny will I discover the answer your father wants. I cannot search all Jerusalem, can I?”