The Prophecy. The pyramid-shaped letter in golden light was still burned in her retina.
When she went back inside, the waiter was chatting excitedly to the bartender, showing him the bank note Sixtine had handed to him. He lost his smile when he saw her coming, silver hair dripping wet.
“Oh. Did you want change?”
She remembered the bank note she had given him. Ten times the cost of the coffee.
“Keep it. But can I ask you a few questions?”
“Sure.” The bank note disappeared in his overstuffed leather wallet.
“Have you ever seen me?”
“I’m pretty certain I haven’t. A pretty lady like you, I would have remembered.”
“And the man who was here?”
“Yeah, he’s been coming here every day for a while. I heard he is a famous poet. Or he was. He can’t write anymore. He just drinks.”
“But he’s not from here.”
“No, I don’t know where he is from, but he sure is not from here. Although he looks like he’s going to stay. It’s a sad story, Miss.”
He glanced at Sixtine, who spurred him to continue.
“He came here to bury his daughter,” the bartender answered.
“How do you know?” Sixtine asked, turning to him.
“He talks when he’s drunk. And he’s drunk a lot.”
“Do you remember when he came here?”
“Oh yeah. May thirty-first.”
“How can you be so sure? That was five months ago.”
“That was the day before my own daughter got married,” the bartender said. “My only daughter. The guy told me his story, my heart broke. He told me I was lucky to still have a daughter. I promise you, I hugged my girl real tight on her wedding day.” He raised his index and hissed. “And I warned my son-in-law too. If the son-of-a-b–”
“Alright, Raùl, alright,” the waiter interjected, resting a gentle hand on the bartender’s shoulder. “I remember it too. The first time he came, he was with a tall woman, tattooed head to toe, and I mean, head to toe. There was a skull covering all her face, you don’t forget that in a hurry. I can’t say she wasn’t attractive though, but, well… you just don’t forget.”
“Do you know his name?”
They both shook their heads.
“No, we just call him the Poet,” the bartender said.
“But that skull lady, though,” the old waiter said, his eyes shining, “I saw her again, once. Last month, it was. She was coming out of the Gran Hotel, you know, on Zócalo? Wearing a red velvet dress, deep red, tight everywhere.”
When his fingers started to hug an invisible silhouette, his colleague rested his hand gently on his shoulder. “Alright, Javier, alright.”
Sixtine thanked them and hurried out of the café. The rain had begun to fall heavily again. She raised her hood and walked quickly, chin down.
May 31st was five days after their disappearance. They were probably already in the pyramid by then.
Dead end. Again. But in the absence of any trail to follow, the flimsiest of chance sounded like hope. And then there was the Prophecy written across the dark sky above. Was it a sign or a warning? She headed towards the main square in front of the cathedral.
Zócalo.
It was almost deserted. She had no trouble finding the Gran Hotel, on the other side. With her hair dripping wet beneath her hood, she climbed its steps. Life, love, death. Thaddeus’ words were still ringing in her mind, interrupted only by those of the Poet.
The luxurious hotel boasted a vast atrium, crowned by a stained-glass roof spanning the entire space – a masterpiece of Art Nouveau colors and patterns. She momentarily forgot the voices in her head as she gazed up at large birdcages suspended between the balconies. Parrots with bright blue plumage squawked and stumbled languidly within them. She marveled at them, yet her stomach contracted in anguish: she had never been here. Another dead end – albeit a beautiful one.
Eerily, she felt someone’s gaze resting on her. She removed her hood, and slowly turned her still dripping face toward the center of the room. A man was sitting, incredibly still, on a scarlet velvet sofa. When she recognized his face, the bursting of her heart was marked by the beating of a parrot’s wings, as it flew against the bars of one of the cages.
A single blue feather slowly spiraled through the air and fell to rest upon the marble floor.
Thaddeus.
“Happy birthday, Sixtine.”
35
The doorbell at Max's small apartment sounded once. Then twice. Then three, four, five, six times. Max hobbled out of his bedroom, leaving in his wake a trail of discarded clothes and bits of equipment that littered what was otherwise a neat and minimalistic space. Leaning against the wall for support, he shuffled towards the entrance. The doorbell let out another series of urgent chimes.
“Okay, okay, I'm coming!”
He opened the door to find Florence, who clutched an overstuffed, pink backpack.
“What’s going on?” Max said, only realizing the impatience in his tone when he saw Florence flinch.
“I wanted to see how you were and, ah, to discuss the latest developments of–” she stammered before stopping short, her eyes resting on the suitcases lying open in the living room. “Are you going somewhere?”
“I’m catching a plane tonight, I'm sorry – it’s all a bit last minute.”
“Where to?”
“Cairo.” Max saw the color drain from Florence’s cheeks.
“Have you lost your mind?” she asked, gesturing towards his leg still in a cast. “In your condition? Not to mention the fact that your face is probably on the wall of every police station in Cairo? Did you not have enough?”
Max sighed and shrugged his shoulders, “My mother’s already given me the speech. Save it for later.”
“But your mother – with all due respect – did not see what was in that pyramid. She didn’t see the carnage at the police station, and she hasn’t seen what is in this file, Max!” Florence rummaged through her pink bag stuffed with papers bearing the BBC logo, before drawing out a thick, stapled document. “I’ve just received a copy of the police report on the murder of Seth Pryce from Hunter. This one is translated into English,” she said thrusting the document towards him. “I thought it would interest you, seeing as though you’re in it.”
Max raised an eyebrow, took the document from her urgently and began to leaf through the pages.
“The autopsy, the results of DNA analysis, even the photos of the corpse – it’s all there. I haven’t been able to eat anything since.”
Awkwardly trying to keep his weight off one leg while holding the document and opening the door, Max ushered Florence into the apartment, apologizing for the mess and clearing a space for her on one of the armchairs. He remained standing and continued to flip through the report, swallowing harder with each successive page. He gazed down at the pictures of Seth's lifeless body.
“This tattoo...” His voice trailed.
“I know. I’ve seen it somewhere,” Florence agreed. “You too?”
Max nodded as he remembered the night at the museum with Jessica – no, Sixtine – and the feel of her impossibly smooth and white skin, painted in pure black ink. It was the same design. “Yes. I just can’t think where,” he lied.
“They found traces of DNA in Room X,” Florence continued. “From Seth Pryce, his wife, and from someone who is neither Moswen nor the guards. They also identified the flowers.” Florence sank into the sofa and let her head fall back, gazing up at the ceiling, “I don’t know what we’ve fallen into, but whatever it is… Max, it’s dangerous.” She looked at him again. “Can’t you find out more about Room X… from here?”
Another bell chimed, this time from Max’s computer. A new email message had come in, from [email protected]. Max opened it to a single line of text:
23/04 03:00–06:00 – no one
There was no signature or anything else that could give an in
dication of where the mail had come from, or who had sent it.
“What is it?” Florence asked.
“It’s my surveillance team,” he replied as he added the dates to a spreadsheet.
Seeing the look of complete incomprehension of Florence’s face, he explained, “Shiriko is the webmaster of a very unusual forum made up of spring-breakers who, instead of going to Ibiza, Corfu or Florida, choose to party in Egypt. At the top of Cheops.”
“Sorry, they what?” Florence spluttered.
Max smiled, “All the members of Shiriko’s forum have two things in common. They are all Japanese, and they climb the pyramids at night.”
Florence stared at him in total disbelief.
Max laughed. “It’s no joke. They dodge the guards and climb to the top, in the middle of the night. Once at the top, they engrave their names in the stone, smoke a joint, watch the sunrise and then film themselves shouting Carpe Diem or whatever that would be in Japanese.”
“That’s totally nuts.”
The calculating look on her face told Max that Florence was already weighing the implications and calculating the possibilities, “And I’m guessing it's totally illegal?”
“It wasn’t twenty years ago,” Max replied. “They banned it because there were too many accidents and suicides, but that only seems to have made it more popular. Shiriko has created a space where people can share their experiences, exchange information – tips on the best routes for the ascent, which guards can be bribed – that kind of thing.”
“All of sudden my life seems so dull,” Florence sighed.
“I passed some information onto Shiriko: the photos of Seth, Jessica, Al-Shamy, Moswen, and the rest. She’s carrying out her own little investigation. We’re lucky, the dates fell in the middle of the school holidays in Japan, so it was mayhem on the pyramid. Plenty of potential witnesses.”
“Wait, you are relying for your information on a bunch of crazy kids who were probably stoned, as they sat one hundred and forty yards above the ground. That’s your surveillance team?”
Florence didn’t know whether to be impressed or disturbed.
Max nodded. “I admit that the method might not stand in a court of law, but still, we managed to come up with some interesting leads.” He showed Florence the spreadsheet. “For instance, look at the red section, three different people are swearing that Al-Shamy came with Moswen a week before us. With gear.”
“What kind of gear?”
“We don’t know.”
“Where did they go? Did they take the route that we did?”
“Yep. On June fourteenth, they arrived around midnight and left around two o'clock in the morning. And that's where we get lucky. One of the observers was not yet at the top of the pyramid, so not yet stoned, and was lurking around the lower levels with a guide. The guide recognized Al-Shamy, and he started to panic. He insisted they all wait until the Egyptians left before continuing the climb, so they sat around for two hours. Finally, just when they had had enough, they saw Al-Shamy and Moswen leave.”
“So, Al-Shamy was in the pyramid two weeks after they estimated the date of death and four days before the discovery of Room X?”
“Yes, but at two o'clock in the morning, with gear. And in the company of the alleged murderer.”
“Are you saying that Al-Shamy was Moswen's accomplice? That they were going to check on their handiwork?” Florence paused at the sudden realization, “Do you remember what he said to you?”
“This secret passage is a one-way trip,” they said in unison.
Max and Florence looked at each other, a heavy silence falling between them as the implications of all they had just talked about became deadly obvious.
“Don’t worry, I'll be careful. I'm only going for a few days,” Max said, doing his best to sound reassuring.
But Florence had returned to her bag. She was speaking distractedly while searching for something. “But, ah, about the passage to Room X. Where are you as far as that goes?”
Max sighed and shook his head, “Nowhere. Who knows, Shiriko may come up with something. Maybe when I’m in Cairo…”
Florence placed her hand on Max’s arm, her grip surprisingly firm. “Listen Max. Once you’ve figured that out, everyone will want a piece of you. You’ll have offers from every television station and production company from here to Hollywood, and when you do, just remember who saved your ass in Cairo, okay?”
Max could not tell if she was joking or being serious. Her manner and tone were light and even a little flirtatious, and that was all Florence, but the hand that gripped his arm was telling him something else, and Max wasn’t sure if he liked the message.
“Florence,” Max said evenly, watching her to try to gauge her reaction, “Even if I found the legendary treasure of Cheops, I wouldn’t be caught dead doing interviews – for the BBC or anyone else. I owe you a debt that I will never be able to repay, but I won’t end up like Al-Shamy, with a cheap wig and shifty sunglasses, parading in front of any camera that will take notice.”
It was then that Max saw it. For just a moment, a strangely uneven smile had flashed across her face. It had not lingered long enough for him to be sure, but in that fraction of an instant, it looked like Florence was hiding something.
She looked away and gathered up her things, zipping up her bag quickly, suddenly keen to go. “I better not keep you, otherwise you'll miss your flight,” she said with a bright smile and a lightness that didn’t deceive either of them.
She kissed him on the cheek, wished him a good trip and bustled out the door. From his window, Max watched her cross the street to her car, her pink bag swinging from her shoulder.
At least he wasn’t the only one keeping secrets, he thought.
As her car disappeared, his gaze drifted to a narrow band of light that remained between the leaden grey of the London sky and the jagged rooftops of the city below. As the light faded, the lines softened and blurred and instead he saw the curve of alabaster skin, etched with ink, and a pair of piercing emerald eyes.
36
The dappled light of the Gran Hotel’s glazed atrium further smoothed Thaddeus’ tanned skin and elegant features. He was smiling. When Sixtine walked towards him, each movement felt studied and awkward.
“What are you doing here?” she said in a sharp tone, trying not to look at him.
“Seth didn’t tell you? I have a studio here,” he said patiently. “In Hipódromo. I escape to Mexico whenever New York life gets too real.”
He was staring at her as one stares at a rare creature, with caution and wonder and something else that Sixtine couldn’t quite decipher on his otherwise composed face – was it sorrow? He was too polite to say it out loud, but Sixtine knew: she was barely recognizable from the woman she had once been. She touched her face to hide from the intensity of his attention; but, realizing it was pointless, she held her head high in quiet defiance.
Then her emerald gaze stopped shifting and deliberately faced the grey eyes.
The current that rushed inside her body brought in a flash an overload of memories. Seth at the altar in Paris, time suspended, her hesitation, the weight of Thaddeus’ warning. And that night in New York, the city frozen in ice outside the ballroom of her engagement party. She had only met him twice. Both days had changed her life. Seeing him again invited all the emotions she had felt then; neither time nor the pyramid had robbed them of any of their potency.
“And how do you know about my name?” Sixtine hadn’t meant to bark at Thaddeus, but something compelled her to. There was a strange, dangerous familiarity between them, and she felt compelled to resist it with all she had. She only had to recall his words the morning of the wedding, to feel anger clasp its white-hot fingers around her chest.
“Joanne, the nurse at the hospital in Cairo, told me,” he replied patiently. “Anyway, I wanted to see you, but it looks like you found me first.”
“I was not looking for you,” Sixtine said, hurriedly.
/> “Yet you found me. Interesting, isn’t it?”
His grey eyes sparkled and he held his breath, as if waiting for something. But that something, whatever it was, never came; the joy in his gaze faded, but he kept his composure. “I’m happy to see you.”
Sixtine could not miss the simple sincerity in his voice, which tugged at her resistance.
“Thank you for the flowers, at the hospital,” she said in a whisper. “And for taking care of Gigi.”
“Don’t mention it. So what brought you here, to this hotel?” he asked.
“Chasing someone I thought I had recognized, but I was wrong. I don’t recognize anything. It’s like I’ve never even been here.” She sank her hands into her jeans pockets and gathered the courage to ask, “Thaddeus, when I was here with Seth … we didn’t see you, did we?”
“It was your honeymoon, Sixtine,” he said, the sorrow in the lines of his face now more evident. “I had no right to stand between you and Seth.”
And yet you did, Sixtine thought, before swallowing the bitter memories.
The silence between them grew electric, charged with too many questions that couldn’t be spoken. The blue parrot rammed against its cage walls and let out a shriek. Two feathers fell.
Thaddeus’ grey eyes seemed momentarily weary; but soon, he regained a steady gaze, and said in a confident tone, “Come on. DF is like my second home. I’ll take you to a place that will lift your spirit.”
Seeing Sixtine hesitate, he got closer to her and, his glance shifting to their surroundings, whispered in her ear.
“I have something important to tell you and this place won’t do.”
Under the blue and white patterned dome of the Capilla de Pocito lived hundreds of chubby cherubs.
Sixtine couldn’t help but smile at the painted dome high above her. The Baroque artists so loathed empty heavens that they had to populate them with an army of little angels fluttering their wings to look busy. The scene was as naïve as a children’s book illustration, and yet its contemplation felt surprisingly comforting.
Sixtine- The Complete Trilogy Box Set Page 18