13th Apostle

by Richard F. Heller

  Until that moment, Gil had never really contemplated what would be involved. Breaking into the Monastery suddenly took on a whole new wood-splintering-window-smashing-spending-your-life-in-jail kind of feeling about it.

  What’s this, my third crime in two days, counting the bomb scare at the Museum and my string of forgeries? Terrific.

  He had lost count.

  The afternoon tour was a welcome distraction. The Monastery was imposing—huge stone walls, towering spires, an expansive circular cobblestone courtyard led to wide stone steps. Two great wooden doors towered above them. Their tour companions, three women and a young man, paused to take pictures, and approached.

  “Our little crowbar is not going to make a dent on those,” Gil whispered.

  “Shhh.”

  Last to arrive was the tour guide. She could have easily doubled as a Wac sergeant left over from the Second World War. Square-shouldered and broad of hip, she addressed her little group of visitors in front of the Monastery’s great double doors. In keeping with her appearance, she wasted no time on pleasantries. Rules of behavior were listed with precision, as if speaking to new recruits in a tiny and somewhat odd-looking army.

  Gil, Sabbie, and the other four hapless sightseers that made up the group were instructed to stay together, abstain from eating, drinking, smoking, and especially from touching anything that might be found within one’s natural reach.

  “And you think I’m tough,” Sabbie whispered.

  The guide paused, possibly aware of the disappointment she was about to engender. “In addition, the taking of photos or video is strictly prohibited.”

  Each of the tourists, heavily laden with now-useless cameras, snacks, and bottled water, sighed deeply and grumbled their complaints. Her directives complete, the guide turned and walked past the great doors, and disappeared into a small, side entrance. The rest of their little band filed behind like ducklings with Gil and Sabbie bringing up the rear.

  The tour began in the buttery, which the guide noted had nothing to do with butter but, rather, had served as a storehouse for casks of wine and beer.

  “The sell-air-ium,” the guide explained with more enthusiasm than Gil thought justified, “has nothing to do with sun and air…it is not soooolarium…it’s sell–arium, spelled c-e-l-l-a-r-i-u-m. It means underground, which is where the food was kept to minimize spoilage.”

  “Jesus, lady, get a life,” Gil muttered under his breath. Sabbie threw him a disapproving look.

  They spent fifteen minutes learning more than any civilized human being needed to know about preventing the decay of food. “And now, on to the cow-le-factor-y,” the guide announced with precision.

  Gil couldn’t help it. It was one of those thoughts that begs to be spoken, so witty that it must be shared by another. Gil whispered the comment that demanded to be heard. “Cow-le-factory? Isn’t that where they used to build French bovines?”

  It didn’t sound as nearly as funny coming out of his mouth as it had sounded in his head. Sabbie distanced herself from him and concentrated on the guide’s explanation that a calefactory was a warming room where monks found a few moments of welcome conversation as well as respite from the ceaseless cold of their unheated cells and workrooms in winter.

  Sabbie scribbled something on her notepad then coughed a bit to mask the noise as she furtively tore off the page and handed it to Gil.

  Her note was brief but to the point. “Get a grip.”

  Gil forced himself into a semblance of sobriety.

  The tour guide’s current banter on the changing architectural features inspired Sabbie to take copious notes. Gil, on the other hand, needed some quiet and solitude, a chance to think.

  Suppose he didn’t have enough time to decipher the diary’s vague message! A list of accountings that made mention of a tapestry, that was his only signpost. The discovery of a priceless scroll bearing witness to Jesus’ life depended on that alone…and on him. His stomach tightened.

  “We’ll be finishing up in the Chapel,” the guide announced. “But, first, we’ll tour the gardens and make our way around to…”

  He had to get some God damned peace and quiet! He needed to get away from the drone of the guide’s unending commentary and eagle eye.

  “Follow my lead,” Gil whispered to Sabbie. “I’ve got to get some time alone to look around.”

  Approaching the guide, Gil spoke softly, as if no one else could overhear. “Excuse me, I need a word in private with you.”

  Reluctantly, the guide obliged. Out of earshot of the others, Gil explained.

  “I have diabetes and I’m not feeling well. May I just sit down for a while?” he asked.

  The guide hesitated, eyeing him suspiciously.

  He had placed her on the horns of a dilemma and each of the points was equally uncomfortable. If she didn’t grant him this small act of kindness, she’d have to take him for medical attention, which would necessitate canceling the tour halfway through. As this was the only tour of the day, the group was bound to be mighty unhappy. On the other hand, his request was clearly not within her narrow guidelines.

  “I’ve taken my pills and I need to rest a while. I won’t bother anything,” Gil added. Feigning exhaustion, he slid to a sitting position next to the wall, head bent, and eyes closed.

  Sabbie sprang to his support. “Please,” she said, earnestly. “If you just give him a few minutes to rest, he’ll be fine. He’ll wait right here until we return. You did say we’d swing back through here, didn’t you?”

  Sabbie’s indication that she would be continuing the tour seemed to lessen any remaining doubt the guide still entertained, and Sabbie’s question, which required a response, provided a final distraction.

  In the end, the tour guide seemed satisfied to keep Sabbie as a tour hostage should Gil take it into his mind to commit some unspeakable profanity. Within a few minutes, the group had vacated, Sabbie in the lead, leaving Gil a half hour to himself.

  He was on his feet even as the door closed behind the departing group. At best, there wasn’t a second to spare. At worst…well, he didn’t want to think about that.

  At the end of the one corridor that the group had not yet explored, Gil found himself faced with two choices. On his right, a long dark hall snaked between two massive stone walls. The narrow passage turned and trailed off, with no doors or openings in sight. On the left, a hall that, according to a small wooden sign, led to the Chapel.

  He walked quickly to the right. The chill air of the hall cooled his sweaty neck.

  How long does this damn hall go on? Shit! I must have lost five minutes already. I’m going to have to turn around if it doesn’t lead some…

  He never saw the end of the dark hall coming. He turned as the passage twisted and raced as fast as his pounding heart could manage. He rounded the final curve and barely escaped a collision with a large unpainted wooden door.

  Surprisingly, it was unlocked and it opened with ease, revealing a wealth of tapestries. The room was filled with the smell of antiquity. The scene before him reminded Gil of a large carpet store gone unattended for a couple hundred years. Dozens of tapestries hung on the walls, lay piled on the floor, or draped over racks. Knights on horseback, ladies and their attendants, dogs, even dragons were intricately woven into the designs. In their day, their colors must have been bright and rich, but the tapestries he could see had greatly faded.

  Surely these works could not be the “mediocre tapestries woven by the old, stupid or infirm” that Elias had described in one deciphered bit of diary text. Each was an intricate work of precision and beauty. There was something oddly consistent about them, as if they had been made by the same hand.

  What was it that Brother Elias had written? The Abbot had designed all of the tapestries—with the exception of only one that Elias had been permitted to conceive and create on his own? Well, Elias’ tapestry may have been special to him but among all of these, it was just another face in the crowd.

 
; Gil glanced at his watch. He was running out of time. The jog back through the passageway seemed to take longer than the forward run. He was late and, if the guide returned and found an empty entry way where he was supposed to be resting, there’d be no way to explain it. Putting on a burst of speed, he found with relief that the group was not yet in sight. He had barely seated himself when the group trooped in from the garden. Gil struggled to control his labored breathing, then turned to allow the guide full view of his pale and sweaty face.

  Sabbie stooped to wipe his wet forehead with the sleeve of her sweater. “You’re clammy and white. Are you okay?” she asked.

  The yellow cardigan smelled vaguely of vanilla, and he longed to lie flat on the cool stone floor and have her continue to keep mopping his forehead.

  “What did you find?” Sabbie whispered.

  The guide called to them to join the group in the Chapel.

  “Good stuff,” he whispered back. They hurried to catch up with their little band.

  The massive stone columns of the Chapel rose high into the air and, although the vast chamber contained the same dirty glass windows as the tapestry room, the Chapel seemed far brighter and warmer. A great pipe organ loomed at the far end and, next to it, a simple altar sat upon a huge stone slab. A small wooden bench peeked out from under the organ keyboard as if inviting the next pious soul to bring the old pipes to life.

  Gil’s body ached. He had never felt quite so tired. His head slipped backward and rested on the back of the wooden pew.

  The guide’s voice seemed to come from afar. Next to him, Sabbie took notes.

  “This, of course, is our Chapel, the part most of you have been waiting for,” the guide continued. “You may have heard about the healing power of the Chapel, but we strongly discourage that sort of talk. This is not Lourdes and we caution visitors not to expect any kind of miracle here. Some people report a feeling of peace or well-being.”

  Others have described it as a renewed sense of faith, she added. Some claim that the rejuvenation springs from the power of some ancient object that has been hidden within the confines of this building. Most of the Friends of the Monastery agree that the source of the experiences doesn’t matter so long as it continues to bring replenishment and spiritual healing to those in need.

  Having completed her obviously well-rehearsed speech, the guide stood straight and proud, a confident witness who now spoke in her own words; no longer fearful of saying the wrong thing. Her words were simple and carried a new warmth.

  “Scientists may not be able to explain it to their liking, but sitting here in this Chapel, something comes over you. People say it’s like being in the company of something holy. I will tell you that it’s a presence; a good, loving, and protective presence.”

  Got to get some sleep. Need to close my eyes. Just for a minute.

  Sabbie poked Gil with her elbow. The guide had begun moving the group to the exit. Their few minutes of Chapel healing time was up. Dutifully, he stood and filed out with the others.

  Their little group quickly disbanded. “Well, so much for healing,” Gil said. “I didn’t feel a damn thing.”

  “Maybe we’re just not believers,” Sabbie replied with a shrug. “Still, it must be nice to believe,” she added thoughtfully.

  “I prefer reality,” he said.

  “Well, speaking of reality, we need to…”

  “I found the tapestry,” he interrupted.

  “Where?” she asked excitedly.

  “In there, in the tapestry room.”

  “What does it look like?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. It was somewhere among fifty others,” Gil answered.

  She pinched him. Hard, on the soft underpart of his arm. It really hurt. “That’s not funny,” she said.

  “Oww! Don’t do that!” he protested.

  “Then stop joking,” she snapped. “Now, how will you know which tapestry is Elias’?”

  “I thought you said you trusted me,” he replied and continued to rub his bruise.

  In the fading light of day, they returned to town over the unpaved rocky shortcut that cut across the field. Neither spoke. Both made mental notes of the rugged terrain that they would need to negotiate on their return to the Monastery that evening. There’d be no light save for that from a crescent moon.

  Chapter 29

  Later that evening

  Weymouth Harbour Hotel

  As arguments go, this one was a beaut. And the timing couldn’t have been worse.

  It started when Sabbie asked Gil how he would be able to spot Elias’ tapestry among the fifty or so odd pieces he had seen during the tour.

  “We can’t just break into the Monastery and hope you get lucky,” she argued. “You’ve got to have some kind of a plan!”

  “I just need to relax and let it happen,” he said.

  The it that needed to happen had always been the same. Whether he was hot on a drug dealer’s cyber trail of money laundering or setting up a program that would pinpoint a child molester’s next most likely move, if Gil had to think about it, it just didn’t work. He had to stop thinking and just put himself on automatic.

  “You must have something better in mind than that,” Sabbie demanded. “As far as I can see, this is going to be our only shot at finding it.”

  “Once we’re inside the Monastery, I’ll know what to do,” Gil repeated coldly. He wished he felt half as confident as he was acting.

  Her panic was starting to get to him. She was afraid that Elias’ tapestry might no longer be at the Monastery or that it might not exist at all but she wouldn’t admit it. Not to him, not to herself. She was afraid there wasn’t enough time. And she was right. But pinning him to the wall, sure as hell wasn’t helping things.

  Finally, he put an end to the whole thing. “Look, I’m going to the Monastery tonight,” Gil said simply. “I’m going to trust myself—and you—to figure out which tapestry is Elias’ and what it has to tell us about the scroll. You can go or not. Do whatever you want.”

  He hoped the bluff would work. He had no intention of going it alone.

  Sabbie didn’t acknowledge his ultimatum but continued to check over their tools for the night. Backpack, flashlights, extra batteries, a blanket, two Swiss Army knives, hammer, wooden wedge, duct tape, and tape measure. Some of the items made no sense to Gil, but she said they might need them, so he went along with it. That seemed to change her mood for the better.

  After all, what’s ten more pounds in your backpack when you’re already carrying fifty?

  Over sandwiches brought in for a picnic on the bed, they made plans for that evening’s break-in. Any thought Gil might have entertained of spending the afternoon in bed together was quickly squelched. Sabbie was all business.

  Their first challenge was the massive entry doors, she explained. Hopefully, they would be able to jimmy the lock on the side door Sabbie had seen on the tour. Once in, they had to be aware of the light from their flashlights. The Chapel’s exterior walls were not visible from the village but, from what Gil could tell, the windows of the tapestry room faced the town. The blanket would have to be used to block the beams from their flashlights so as to not invite investigation.

  Timing was crucial. They had to walk right past the busiest pub in town and, if they wanted to avoid being noticed as they headed down the path that led only to the Monastery, they’d have to wait until the pub closed at 2:00 a.m. By dawn, the bakery would be offering up breakfast to its usual bunch of bleary-eyed townspeople. Given the load in the backpack and the darkness, it would take a good half hour to walk to the Monastery by way of their newly discovered shortcut and hopefully a little longer back, assuming they were successful and the load was heavier. That left them a little more than three hours to find Elias’ tapestry, make sense of its message, locate the scroll, and put things back in order.

  Gil had his doubts. Serious doubts. He guessed that she did, too.

  Chapter 30

  Day Ten
, 2:20 A.M.

  Monastery Road, Weymouth

  The walk through town had been easy; fair enough moonlight, downhill slope on paved sidewalk, and crisp air. But once they passed the pub, everything changed. The backpack seemed to double in weight.

  While Sabbie made her way easily along the jagged path in darkness, Gil strained to keep up. His chest ached straight through to his back, and he couldn’t shake the image of dropping dead from a heart attack just as they entered the Chapel; of the townspeople finding him lying face down, arms out and Christ-like in front of the altar.

  That would certainly put an end to all the talk about the healing power of the Chapel.

  Sabbie moved easily ahead of him. “First we’ll go to the tapestry room,” she said. “You don’t think you’ll have any trouble finding it in the dark, do you? I mean, with just the flashlights?”

  Gil didn’t answer. He barely had breath to keep up with her, much less offer an explanation.

  “Look, working by the seat of my pants is not just something I do when all else fails. It is my talent. I do best under pressure,” he said with his last gasp of air. The wheeze did little to instill confidence.

  In the distance to the right, fine white sand stretched to the edge of the sea.

  That beach is where we ought to be. A nice young couple, enjoying the pleasure of each other’s company.

  Instead, he was stumbling in the dark, fighting the rocky path and the terror that this time, he might finally come up empty.

  The dreary ramparts of the Monastery rose against the blackness of the now cloud-shrouded sky, its silhouette reminiscent of a city’s skyline. Gil’s foot slipped into a maze of roots and he went down hard. His extended hands, meant to break his fall, skimmed into jagged plant debris. Something pierced his right hand.

  “Shit! I just got skewered.”

  Sabbie whipped the blanket from his backpack, threw it over them like a tent, then switched on the flashlight.

  A three-inch twig, bent at an odd angle, protruded from his palm. Blood dripped freely from the twig’s hollow center. Gil reached to pull out the piercing weed.