The Black Madonna

by Peter Millar

  ‘What?’

  Marcus chuckled. ‘Yorkshiremen. It’s just a little joke among British historians. He was staying at a military base at Eboracum – York – when his father died and he was proclaimed emperor. Yorkshiremen have a reputation for stubbornness, you know.’

  ‘Sometimes I think the English are very strange.’

  ‘Tell me about it. But it was because of Constantine that Europe, and as a result the modern ‘Western’ world, became Christian. Once the emperor had legalised Christianity and adopted it himself, though only on his deathbed, the religion was accepted as that of the state. The Romans liked the hierarchical structure, the chain of authority. It pretty much mirrored the empire. And eventually became it. The Pantheon in Rome is revered today as one of the oldest, finest Christian churches but it began life as a pagan temple. The roots of its very name – “pan” and “theos” – mean “all the gods”.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘What do you mean – exactly?’

  ‘Christianity stole what it needed to establish itself as the imperial religion, to supplant all the others so that there would only be one system of belief.’

  ‘They stole your black Madonna?’

  She sighed in exasperation: ‘Marcus, Marcus, it is not my black Madonna. It is not anybody’s. It is certainly also not the Catholic Church’s. At least not exclusively. That is what I mean by a legend, a black legend. That’s why the oldest Madonnas are all dark. The white, European-looking ones only began to appear in the Middle Ages, when Christianity was running scared from Islam which had taken over the holy places and was threatening to invade Europe. They stripped the religion of almost all its true Middle Eastern roots.

  ‘All these stories, these “other Marys”, they’re all attempts to explain away the images, their continued existence, the reverence people automatically felt for them. It’s a way of usurping their status, their power if you like.

  ‘But it’s more than that. There’s something else, older and somehow obvious but still hidden. Maybe it fits in with what the curator was saying about Altötting, about the linden trees, something that explains why no one in the Catholic Church wants to be precise about how long and why it’s been a holy site. Sister Galina didn’t understand but she knew all the same, that it goes way back, to before Christianity.’

  ‘You’re not just talking about the conflict between Islam and Christianity?’

  She stopped and stared at him suddenly as if he was being inexplicably dense.

  ‘Of course not. At their worst, the one’s as good – or as bad – as the other. It’s just that we let ourselves be blinded by what’s in our faces. You don’t think 3,000 years of culture disappeared overnight, do you. The Greeks, the Romans, the people who founded your culture, the Arabs who developed mine, all have roots in the sands of Ancient Egypt.’ She smiled suddenly: ‘Look around you.’

  ‘Hmm?’ Marcus looked puzzled and then realised where they were; their apparently random stroll back towards the hotel had taken them to the edge of Königsplatz, the great regal square laid out by Bavaria’s nineteenth-century kings. On either side rose great stone neoclassical buildings, museums of ancient sculpture and archaeology, lined with classical columns, one Doric, the other Ionic.

  Between the two, forming a third side to the square stood two Egyptian-style pylon gates. As chance had it, workmen were erecting a stage with gold and topaz sphinxes, for an open-air summer performance of Verdi’s opera Aïda, a nineteenth-century Italian’s hymn of praise to ancient Egypt, named for a Nubian princess.

  Nazreem was looking at him smugly as if it was some sign of divine intervention. ‘There are parallels between the story of Mary, Maryam, and the ancient Egyptian Isis, the goddess who was mother of Horus. When you first met me, I was studying Egyptology living in Cairo. I came to understand that ancient Egypt never went away; it was simply swallowed up, by your world and by mine.’

  ‘You’re not going to bring Leonardo da Vinci into this, are you?’

  Nazreem smiled and shook her head: ‘We’re talking real history here, facts interpreted to make sense not nonsense.’

  ‘So you’re not going to tell me Jesus Christ was secretly married.’

  ‘To be frank, Marcus, I neither know nor care about the man’s sexual preferences, marital arrangements or lack of either. As far as I am concerned, he was probably some radical Jewish rabbi who attracted a following and ended up in trouble with the Romans. But you know there’s not even any real historical record of that. Not that wasn’t tinkered with later by the Christians to make it fit their supposed facts. Come on, Marcus, you’re the expert in this field. You know how history can be rearranged to suit the present.’

  ‘That’s for sure,’ he said wryly, looking around at the great square’s imposingly monumental nineteenth-century pastiche of the ancient world’s most grandiose architecture. ‘You know what else this square is famous for.’

  She eyed him obliquely, expecting a trap.

  ‘In the 1930s it was paved over. To make it even more imposing, more of a synthesis of the ancient world and what they thought then was the new world order. That also made it more suited to military parades. They don’t talk about it much in modern Munich but in the 1930s they called this city the “Hauptstadt der Bewegung”, the “capital of the movement”, the National Socialist movement.

  ‘This square was the Nazi storm troopers’ favourite marching ground. They carried out the infamous book-burning here, close to the university. So let’s not think of it as a monument to ancient truth.’

  ‘I’m talking about the power of religion. Wasn’t Nazism a sort of religion?’

  Marcus thought of the swastika, an ancient ayurvedic symbol stolen and abused, the mass parades, the ritual obeisance and the fanaticism, Dr Goebbels the little prophet and Adolf Hitler his improbable Messiah. Oh yes, Nazism had been a religion all right.

  These buildings, museums built in the style of ancient temples, had temporarily been appropriated to fit. Was religion like history, not a matter of eternal truth but just a question of which side you were on? Why the hell not? Hell was real enough. Hell on earth.

  29

  The shadows were shrinking to pencil points on the pavements as Marcus and Nazreem turned the corner onto the broad Ludwigstrasse, the great nineteenth-century Italianate boulevard that ended in the Theatiner Church, a hulking monumental symbol in pastel papal yellow of rampant Bavarian Catholicism.

  ‘What you were saying, you know, about thinking of Jesus as just another prophet,’ Marcus said, acutely aware that he himself would once – long ago now, mercifully – have risked being burned for even discussing such blasphemy in such a bastion of Christendom, ‘it wasn’t always just a Muslim view. It’s not unlike the Arian heresy.’

  ‘Aryan? Marcus, you are not really bringing the Nazis and their crazy race theories into this?’

  ‘Hmm? Oh, God no! Not at all. I mean not like that. Not Aryan, with a ‘y’ – Arian in the sense of the heresy comes from Arius, a sort of mad monk.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Arius was a fourth-century monk from Libya or Egypt who disputed the idea of the Trinity, held that Christ might well have been the Son of God, but that meant logically that God existed first and that therefore they couldn’t be one and the same. His followers were called Arians and they concentrated very much on Christ the man.’

  ‘But they still believed Jesus was divine?’

  ‘Yes, I think so, but sort of lesser. To be honest, nobody knows exactly what they believed because the cult was wiped out. Arius was condemned as a heretic and fled to Palestine, as it turns out. I’ve heard people say that some of what he preached had echoes in Islam.’

  Nazreem looked at him sceptically: ‘I’ve never heard of him.’

  ‘Well, that might not be true. The reason his name survives is that some of his teaching caught on amongst the German tribes who invaded the early empire after Constantine. Even when the official church outlawed it,
it remained the belief of the Visigoths in particular.’

  ‘Which Goths? I never understood early European history.’

  ‘I’m not surprised. There were two main branches of the German tribes that fell on the Roman Empire, the Visigoths in the West and the Ostrogoths in the East.’

  ‘You mean like the Wessies and Ossies in modern Germany.’

  Marcus laughed. ‘Yes, I suppose so, the same root words anyhow. I’ve never thought of it like that. But the Visigoths ruled Spain for several hundred years, right up until the first Moorish invasions really. That was more or less the end of Arianism.’

  ‘Spain? Where that other black Madonna is, the one Sister Galina mentioned. I wonder … could there be a connection?’

  Marcus gave her a sceptical look: ‘I doubt it. I don’t think the Arians had any time for the cult of Mary as such.’

  ‘I think they might have been wise. I think that there has been a lot of wool pulled over a lot of people’s eyes for hundreds of years.’

  ‘Are you trying to tell me, Nazreem, you as a good Muslim, that religion is not about the quest for the truth?’

  She stopped for a second and caught his eye: ‘You are teasing me. You know perfectly well that my religion is part of my culture but that over the centuries all religions, that of my culture as well as that of yours, have been used and abused by cynical men for their own ends.’

  ‘If you say so.’

  Nazreem frowned. ‘Don’t tease me here. I believe in God, like I think maybe you do, and I believe there are many ways to do so. But history and archaeology are supposed to be about facts. I do not believe for example like your Christian creationists that God just put dinosaur bones in the earth to test our faith. We must work from the evidence, not in spite of it.’

  ‘There are plenty of mullahs who would say faith is supreme.’

  ‘Marcus, you know only too well there are plenty of mullahs who say all sorts of silly things, just as there are Christians, and probably holy men of all sorts of religions who are more than a bit mad – that does not mean we should listen to all of them. The reason God gave us a critical faculty was so we could decide who is talking nonsense and who is not – that is the real test.’

  ‘And you still want to go back to Altötting. To see the nun, even though you think everything she believes in is phoney.’

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘It sounded like it to me.’

  ‘She is a good woman, I think. I would never say anything to insult someone else’s faith. But I need to ask her some more questions, subtly perhaps, I do not want to cause offence, but after what this man said, I need to know if there is anything else.’

  Marcus let out a long breath. ‘If you want to. But don’t you think there’s something else we have to do?’

  ‘Like?’

  ‘Like find out who the hell those characters on the motorbikes were last night. I’ve tried to pretend it was coincidence, that they weren’t checking us out, but after London, and everything I heard yesterday and today, I don’t believe it. You seem to be suggesting somebody may have taken revenge for … for what happened to you … and yet somebody, maybe the same somebody, seems after you. I mean, last night, if they had wanted to they could possibly have killed us. We know they’re not afraid to use guns.’

  Nazreem looked down, a cloud over her face.

  ‘No, of course. You must believe me, I feel horribly guilty about what happened to that man, in the restaurant, in London. You are quite right – it is my fault. I am sorry.’

  Marcus put his hand on her shoulder. ‘No, no. It’s not your fault. You weren’t to know a gang of homicidal maniacs were after you. These things happen. But we have to stop something similar happening again. Maybe to you next time.’

  ‘I know that. Believe me, I know that. In fact, right now it’s the only thing I do know.’

  ‘Look, Nazreem, what is it you’re not telling me? You seem convinced there’s a link of some sort between the theft of this statue, whether or not it really was an original of the Madonna, those nutcases in London and an atrocity dished up on the desk of some nun here in Germany. But to be honest with you, other than your presence I don’t see it, and it was you who brought us here.’

  She dropped her head but continued walking and said in a quiet voice: ‘Marcus, you have to believe me on this. I just know. I’m really pleased you’re with me, but you don’t have to be. In fact, it might be better, better for you, if you were to go back to England.’

  ‘That’s not what I meant. Of course, I’m with you on this. It’s just … it’s just that we have to see things clearly. Look, if this has to do with the statue, it has to do with whoever stole it. You said you thought the Israelis were involved, but you have to admit those men who came after us in London gave a very different impression.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, lifting her head and turning briefly towards him, finally admitting something difficult to herself.

  ‘So who could have had a reason to steal it, and if they did, why are they still pursuing you? And how does that fit in with what happened with the nun.’

  ‘I don’t know, Marcus. I’m not pretending I have the answers. But …’ She hesitated a moment.

  ‘But what?

  She shook her head.

  ‘But nothing. I don’t know. I just don’t know.’

  Marcus looked at her but she kept her head down, her eyes on the pavement at her feet. Not for the first time in the past few days, he felt that for a woman who claimed she was engaged on a search for the truth, she gave the impression of not always telling it.

  30

  The girl behind the hotel reception desk gave them a frosty smile as they entered the lobby. Marcus wondered if they had outstayed their departure time. Maybe it had been eleven a.m. instead of noon. He had initially only booked the rooms for one night. Even now he wasn’t sure if it was worth booking for another or if they would be better advised looking for something in Altötting.

  The reason for her attitude, however, was sitting on the other side of the lobby. Marcus hadn’t noticed the two men in the bucket chairs next to the pot plants. But as he approached the reception desk to ask for their room keys, he was instantly aware of the pair standing either side of him. His initial reaction was verging on panic, when the one on his right, a man of about forty with a long thin moustache touched him on the arm and said politely in fluent, but heavily accented, English: ‘If we could please have a minute, sir.’

  Marcus turned abruptly, his nerves immediately on edge, wondering what he might use as a weapon if he needed one. He had just about decided that the heavy ashtray on the reception counter was his only option, when the man who had spoken to him produced an official-looking identity card and held it out to him.

  ‘Detective Lieutenant Karl Weinert, Bavarian State Police,’ he said formally, pronouncing his rank the American way – ‘loo-tenant’, a man who had obviously picked up a proportion of his English from TV cop shows – ‘and this is my colleague, Detective Hulpe. We would like to talk to you and the young lady, please, just for some minutes.’

  The girl behind the reception desk continued to display her frozen grin, but Marcus felt she was already double-checking his credit card details.

  Nazreem looked visibly nervous as the second detective took her by the elbow, gently but nonetheless obviously, and led her after Marcus and his colleague towards a small seating area off the lobby.

  ‘Is there some sort of problem, Lieutenant?’ Marcus was already asking.

  ‘No more than I think you already know about,’ Weinert replied, motioning for them both to sit. Marcus and Nazreem found themselves side by side on a well-sprung leather sofa with Weinert in a chair opposite them on the other side of a small glass-topped coffee table. The second detective remained standing.

  ‘May I see your passports, please?’ the lieutenant asked.

  Marcus was immediately taken aback. ‘I’m sorry, you’ll have to explain what this is
about.’

  ‘Of course, in a minute. But first if I might see your passports?’

  Marcus reached inside his jacket pocket and produced his. Nazreem fished inside her shoulder bag and did the same, with the practised sullen resignation of someone used to producing documents on demand.

  The policeman examined them. ‘I see,’ he said, ‘you are South African, Professor … Fray, is it?’

  ‘Frey,’ corrected Marcus, ‘pronounced like the German “frei”.’

  ‘Ah yes, of course, Dr Frey,’ Weinert repeated ponderously. ‘And you, Miss Hash-ra-vee,’ he struggled with the pronunciation, ‘are French?’ He eyed her suspiciously as if he did not quite believe it.

  Nazreem saw no reason to lie. ‘I am a French citizen,’ she said, ‘but I live in Palestine, in Gaza.’ The policeman handed the passports to his colleague who sat down in the other armchair, took out a notebook and began to jot marks in it.

  ‘Excuse me, but I think you need to tell us what’s going on here. Have we been accused of something?’ Marcus said.

  ‘I believe you were at Altötting yesterday.’ It was scarcely a question but the intonation invited an answer.

  ‘Yes,’ said Marcus, sensing that these were men’s men who expected him rather than Nazreem to provide the answers.

  ‘And spent some time talking to Sister Galina at the Institute.’

  ‘Yes. Is there something wrong with that?’

  The policeman looked as if he wished he could say yes. Instead he said: ‘You are aware of the incident that occurred there earlier in the week?’

  ‘Yes, but I don’t see …’

  ‘Were you also aware that we had specifically requested that Sister Galina give no interviews?’

  ‘No, I mean yes. But not at first. One of the other sisters did mention it, but this wasn’t an interview, not like you mean. We’re not reporters or anything like that.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it.’ The policeman’s eyes narrowed. ‘I am taking you at your word, Dr Frey, because you gave the sister at the institute the name of this hotel and it is indeed where we have found you. Therefore I am giving you the benefit of the doubt.’