The Descent

by Jeff Long

  “That’s your proof, a bit of scripture?”

  “Proof?” interjected Parsifal. Nearly seventy, there was still plenty of the golden boy left in him. You could almost see him bulling through a hole in the line, forcing the play. “What proof do you need? I’ve been coming here for many years. The Shroud of Turin Research Project has subjected this artifact to dozens of tests, hundreds of thousands of hours, and millions of dollars of study. Scientists, including myself, have applied every manner of skepticism to it.”

  “But I thought your radiocarbon dating placed the linen’s manufacture between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries.”

  “Why are you testing me? I’ve told you about my flash theory,” Parsifal said.

  “That a burst of nuclear energy transfigured the body of Christ, leaving this image. Without burning the cloth to ash, of course.”

  “A moderate burst,” Parsifal said. “Which, incidentally, explains the altered radiocarbon dating.”

  “A moderate burst of radiation that created a negative image with details of the face and body? How can that be? At best it would show a silhouette of a form. Or just a large blob of darkness.”

  These were old arguments. Parsifal made his standard replies. De l’Orme raised other difficulties. Parsifal gave complicated responses.

  “All I’m saying,” said de l’Orme, “is that before you kneel, it would be wise to know to whom you kneel.” He placed himself beside the Shroud. “It’s one thing to know who the shroud-man is not. But today we have a chance to know who he is. That’s my reason for asking for this display.”

  “The Son of God in human form,” said the younger Dominican.

  The older Dominican cut a sideways glance at the relic. Suddenly his whole expression widened. His lips formed a thin O.

  “As God is my Father,” the younger one said.

  Now Parsifal saw it, too. And the rest of them, as well. Thomas couldn’t believe his eyes.

  “What have you done?” Parsifal cried out.

  The man in the Shroud was none other than de l’Orme.

  “It’s you!” Mustafah laughed. He was delighted.

  De l’Orme’s image was naked, hands modestly crossed over his genitals, eyes closed. Wearing a wig and a fake beard. Side by side, the man and his image on the cloth were the same size, had the same short nose, the same leprechaun shoulders.

  “Dear Christ in heaven,” the younger Dominican wailed.

  “A Jesuit trick,” hissed the older.

  “Deceiver,” howled the younger.

  “De l’Orme, what in the world?” said Foley.

  The carabinieri were excited by the sudden alarm. Then they compared man to image and put two and two together for themselves. Four promptly dropped to their knees in front of de l’Orme. One placed his forehead on the blind man’s shoe. The fifth soldier, however, backed against the wall.

  “Yes, it is me on this cloth,” said de l’Orme. “Yes, a trick. But not of Jesuits. Of science. Alchemy, if you will.”

  “Seize this man,” shouted the older Dominican. But the carabinieri were too busy adoring the man-god.

  “Don’t worry,” de l’Orme said to the panicked Dominicans, “your original is in the next room, perfectly safe. I switched this one for the purpose of demonstration. Your reaction tells me the resemblance is all I’d hoped for.”

  The older Dominican swung his wrathful gaze around the room and fastened the look of Torquemada upon that fifth carabiniere, haplessly backed against the wall. “You,” he said.

  The carabiniere quailed. So, thought Thomas, de l’Orme had paid the soldier to help spring this practical joke. The man was right to be frightened. He had just embarrassed an entire order.

  “Don’t blame him,” de l’Orme said. “Blame yourself. You were fooled. I fooled you just the way the other shroud has fooled so many.”

  “Where is it?” demanded the Dominican.

  “This way, please,” de l’Orme said.

  They filed into the next chamber, and Vera was waiting there in her wheelchair. Behind her, the Shroud was identical to de l’Orme’s fake, except for its image. Here the man was taller and younger. His nose was longer. The cheekbones were whole. The Dominicans hurried to their relic and alternated between scrutinizing the linen for damage and guarding it from the blind trickster.

  De l’Orme became businesslike. “I think you’ll agree,” he spoke to them, “the same process produced both images.”

  “You’ve solved the mystery of its production?” someone exclaimed. “What did you use then, paint?”

  “Acid,” another suggested. “I’ve always suspected it. A weak solution. Just enough to etch the fibers.”

  De l’Orme had their attention. “I examined the reports issued by Bud’s STURP. It became clear to me the hoax wasn’t created with paint. There’s only a trace of pigment, probably from painted images being held against the cloth to bless them. And it was not acid, or the coloration would have been different. No, it was something else entirely.”

  He gave it a dramatic pause.

  “Photography.”

  “Nonsense,” declared Parsifal. “We’ve examined that theory. Do you realize how sophisticated the process is? The chemicals involved? The steps of preparing a surface, focusing an image, timing an exposure, fixing the end product? Even if this were a medieval concoction, what mind could have grasped the principles of photography so long ago?”

  “No ordinary mind, I’ll grant you that.”

  “You’re not the first, you know,” Parsifal said. “There were a couple of kooks years ago. Cooked up some notion that it was Leonardo da Vinci’s tomfoolery. We blew ’em out of the water. Amateurs.”

  “My approach was different,” de l’Orme said. “Actually, you should be pleased, Bud. It is a confirmation of your own theory.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Your flash theory,” said de l’Orme. “Only it requires not quite a flash. More like a slow bath of radiation.”

  “Radiation?” said Parsifal. “Now we get to hear that Leonardo scooped Madame Curie?”

  “This isn’t Leonardo,” de l’Orme said.

  “No? Michelangelo then? Picasso?”

  “Be nice, Bud,” Vera interrupted mildly. “The rest of us want to hear it, even if you know it all already.”

  Parsifal fumed. But it was too late to roll up the image and kick everyone out.

  “We have here the image of a real man,” de l’Orme said. “A crucified man. He’s too anatomically correct to have been created by an artist. Note the foreshortening of his legs, and the accuracy of these blood trickles, how they bend where there are wrinkles in the forehead. And the spike hole in the wrist. That wound is most interesting. According to studies done on cadavers, you can’t crucify a man by nailing his palms to a cross. The weight of the body tears the meat right off your hand.”

  Vera, the physician, nodded. Rau, the vegetarian, shivered with distaste. These cults of the dead baffled him.

  “The one place you can drive a nail in the human arm and hang all that weight is here.” He held a finger to the center of his own wrist. “The space of Destot, a natural hole between all the bones of the wrist. More recently, forensic anthropologists have confirmed the presence of nail marks through precisely that place in known crucifixion victims.

  “It is a crucial detail. If you examine medieval paintings around the time this cloth was created, Europeans had forgotten all about the space of Destot, too. Their art shows Christ nailed through the palms. The historical accuracy of this wound has been offered as proof that a medieval forger could not possibly have faked the Shroud.”

  “Well, there!” said Parsifal.

  “There are two explanations,” de l’Orme continued. “The father of forensic anthropology and anatomy was indeed Leonardo. He would have had ample time—and the body parts—to experiment with the techniques of crucifixion.”

  “Ridiculous,” Parsifal said.

&nbs
p; “The other explanation,” de l’Orme said, “is that this represents the victim of an actual crucifixion.” He paused. “But still alive at the time the Shroud was made.”

  “What?” said Mustafah.

  “Yes,” said de l’Orme. “With Vera’s medical expertise, I’ve managed to determine that curious fact. There’s no sign of necrotic decay here. To the contrary, Vera has told me how the rib cage details are blurred. By respiration.”

  “Heresy,” the younger Dominican hissed.

  “It’s not heresy,” said de l’Orme, “if this is not Jesus Christ.”

  “But it is.”

  “Then you are the heretic, gentle father. For you have been worshiping a giant.”

  The Dominican had probably never struck a blind man in his entire life. But you could tell by his grinding teeth how close he was now.

  “Vera measured him. Twice. The man on the shroud measures six feet eight inches,” de l’Orme continued.

  “Look at that. He is a tall brute,” someone commented. “How can that be?”

  “Indeed,” said de l’Orme. “Surely the Gospels would have mentioned Christ’s enormous height.”

  The elder Dominican hissed at him.

  “I think now would be a good time to show them our secret,” de l’Orme said to Vera. He placed one hand on her wheelchair, and she led him to a nearby table. She held a cardboard box while he lifted out a small plastic statue of the Venus di Milo. It nearly slipped from his fingers.

  “May I help?” asked Branch.

  “Thank you, no. It would be better for you to stay back.”

  It was like watching two kids unpack a science fair project. De l’Orme drew out a glass jar and a paintbrush. Vera smoothed a cloth flat on the table and put on a pair of latex gloves.

  “What are you doing?” demanded the older Dominican.

  “Nothing that will harm your Shroud,” de l’Orme answered.

  Vera unscrewed the jar and dipped the brush in. “Our ‘paint,’ ” she said.

  The jar held dust, finely ground, a lackluster gray. While de l’Orme held the Venus by the head, she gently feathered on the dust.

  “And now,” de l’Orme said, addressing the Venus, “say cheese.”

  Vera grasped the statue by its waist and held it horizontally above the cloth. “It takes a minute,” she said.

  “Please tell me when it starts,” de l’Orme said.

  “There,” said Mustafah. For the image of the Venus was beginning to materialize on the fabric. She was in negative. Each detail became more clarified.

  “If that doesn’t beat all,” Foley said.

  Parsifal refused to believe. He stood there shaking his head.

  “The radiation heats and weakens the fabric on one side, creating an image. If I hold my statue here long enough, the cloth will turn dark. If I hold it higher, the image will be larger. Hold it high enough, and my miniature Venus becomes a giantess. That explains our giant Christ.”

  “Our paint is a low-grade isotope, newtonium,” said Vera. “It’s found naturally.”

  “And you painted yourself with it—your own nude—to create the forgery out there?” asked Foley.

  “Yes,” said de l’Orme. “With Vera’s help. She knows her male anatomy, I must say.”

  The older Dominican looked in danger of sucking the very enamel off his teeth.

  “But it’s radioactive!” Mustafah said.

  “To tell the truth, the isotopes made my arthritis feel better for a few days after. I thought maybe I’d stumbled on to a cure for a while there.”

  “Nonsense,” Parsifal stormed in, as if remembering his hat. “If this were the answer, we’d have detected radiation in our tests.”

  “You would detect it on this cloth,” Vera admitted. “But only because we spilled dust onto it. If I’d been careful not to touch the cloth, all you would detect is the visual image itself.”

  “I’ve been to the moon and back,” said Parsifal. Whenever Parsifal fell back on his lunar authority, he was near the end of his rope. “And I’ve never come across such a mineral phenomenon.”

  “The problem is that you have never been beneath the earth’s surface,” said de l’Orme. “I wish I could take credit for this. But miners have been talking about ghost images burnt onto boxes or the sides of their vehicles for years now. This is the explanation.”

  “Then you admit there are only traces of it on the surface,” Parsifal declared. “You say that man only recently found enough of your powder there to have an effect. So how could a medieval con artist get his hands on enough to coat an entire human body and create this image?”

  De l’Orme frowned at the question. “But I told you, this is not Leonardo.”

  “What I don’t understand”—Desmond Lynch rapped with his cane, excited—“is why? Why go to such extremes? Is it all just a prank?”

  “Again, it’s all about power,” de l’Orme answered. “A relic like this, in times so superstitious? Why, whole churches came into being around the drawing power of a single Cross splinter. In 1350, all of Europe was transfixed by the display of a supposed Veronica’s veil. Do you know how many holy relics were floating around Christendom in those days? Crusaders were returning home with all manner of holy war loot. Besides bones and Bibles from martyrs and saints, there were the baby Jesus’ milk teeth, his foreskin—seven of them, to be precise—and enough splinters to make a forest of True Crosses. Obviously this was not the only forgery in circulation. But it was the most audacious and powerful.

  “What if someone suddenly decided to tap into this benighted Christian gullibility? He could have been a pope, a king, or simply an ingenious artist. What could be more powerful than a life-size snapshot of the entire body of Christ, depicting him just after his great test on the Cross and just before his disappearance into the Godhead? Done artfully, wielded cynically, such an artifact would have the ability to change history, to create a fortune, to rule hearts and minds.”

  “Ah, come on,” Parsifal complained.

  “What if that was his game?” de l’Orme postulated. “What if he was attempting to infiltrate Christian culture through their own image?”

  “He? His?” said Desmond Lynch. “Who are you talking about?”

  “Why, the figure in the Shroud, of course.”

  “Very well,” growled Lynch. “But who is the rascal?”

  “Look at him,” de l’Orme said. “Yes, we’re looking.”

  “It’s a self-portrait.”

  “The portrait of a trickster,” said Vera. “He covered himself with newtonium and stood before a linen sheet. He deliberately perpetrated this artful dodge. A primitive photocopy of the son of God.”

  “I give up. Are we supposed to recognize him?”

  “He looks a little like you up there, Thomas,” someone joked.

  Thomas blew his cheeks out.

  “Long hair, goatee. Looks more like your friend Santos,” someone teased de l’Orme.

  “Now that you mention it,” de l’Orme mused, “I suppose it could be any one of us.”

  It was turning into a game.

  “We give up,” said Vera.

  “But you were so close,” said de l’Orme.

  “Enough,” barked Gault.

  “Kublai Khan,” de l’Orme said.

  “What?”

  “You said it yourselves.”

  “Said what?”

  “Geronimo. Attila. Mao. A warrior king. Or a prophet. Or just a wanderer, little different from us.”

  “You’re not serious.”

  “Why not? Why not the author of the Prester John letters? The author of a Christ hoax? Perhaps even the author of the legends of Christ and Buddha and Mohammed?”

  “You’re saying …”

  “Yes,” said de l’Orme. “Meet Satan.”

  Those new regions which we

  found and explored … we

  may rightly call a New World

  … a continent more densely

>   peopled and abounding in

  animals than our Europe or

  Asia or Africa.

  —AMERIGO VESPUCCI, ON AMERICA

  14

  THE HOLE

  THE COLON RIDGE ZONE

  “July 7,” Ali recorded. “Camp 39: 5,012 fathoms, 79 degrees F. We reached Cache I today.”

  She looked up to gather in the scene. How to put this?

  Mozart was flooding the chamber over Dolby speakers. Lights blazed with the glut of cable-fed electricity. Wine bottles and chicken bones littered the floor. A conga line of filthy, trail-hardened scientists was snaking across the tilted floor. To The Magic Flute.

  “Joy!” she printed neatly.

  The celebration rocked around her.

  Until this afternoon it had been one vast, unspoken doubt that the cache would be here. Geologists had muttered that the feat was impossible, suggesting that the tunnels shifted about down here, as dodgy as snakes. But just as Shoat had promised, the penetrator capsules were waiting for them. The surface crews had punched a drill hole through the ocean floor and landed the cargo dead on target, at their exact elevation and place in the tunnels. A few meters to the right or left, or higher or lower, and everything would have been socketed in solid bedrock and irretrievable. Their retreat to civilization would have been vexed, to say the least, for their food was running low.

  But now they had all the provisions and gear and clothing necessary for the next eight weeks, plus tonight’s wine and loudspeakers for the opera and a holographic “Bully for You” speech from C.C. Cooper himself. You are the beginning of history, his small laser ghost toasted them.

  For the first time almost five weeks, Ali could write on her day map their precise coordinates: “107 degrees, 20 minutes W / 3 degrees, 50 minutes N.” On a traditional map of the surface, they were somewhere south of Mexico in blue, islandless water. An ocean-floor map placed them beneath a feature called the Colon Ridge, near the western edge of the Nazca Plate.

  Ali took a sip of the Chardonnay that Helios had sent. She closed her eyes while the Queen of the Night sang her brokenhearted aria. Someone up top had a sense of humor. Mozart’s magical underworld? At least they hadn’t sent The Damnation of Faust.