by J. F. Penn
"Bienvenidos to Barcelona," the man said, hand outstretched, as they approached. "I'm Inspector Ramon Perez. Your colleague told me of your interest in this case, and of course, I'm happy to share our information with you." Morgan caught a flash of concern in Ramon's expression as he spoke. She wondered briefly what strings Martin had pulled to get them in here. Being with ARKANE certainly had its benefits in terms of access.
"Where was the victim found?" Morgan asked, after the customary introductions.
Ramon pointed a meter away from them, just outside the overarching stone portico. A dark stain could still be seen on the ground, and Morgan shuddered a little as she remembered the crime scene photos of Santiago's smashed body on the gravel path.
"We think he jumped," Ramon said. "There's no evidence of anyone else being here. We've also discovered that Pereira had been forcibly retired from the basilica team a few months ago due to his age. Understandably, after so many years working in and around the basilica, he was depressed. His wife and daughter died years ago, he was estranged from his granddaughter and alone. So, it's not surprising really."
Morgan nodded as she turned to consider the detail of the facade, with the huge statue of the bound and whipped Christ at its center. Above the post of torture, there were several levels portraying aspects of the Passion story. The Last Supper was being eaten alongside Christ dragging his cross, watched impassively by muscled soldiers in armor, the crucifixion in its central position. She noticed a four-by-four square chart, like a Sudoku puzzle, carved into the stone next to the betrayal of Christ by Judas.
Her father had always made a game of adding up the numbers on license plates whenever they drove anywhere, and as he became obsessed with gematria and numerology, the results had taken on new meaning. Morgan quickly added up the first line: 33. Then the next, which was the same again. She realized that all the rows, columns and diagonals added up to 33, the age of Christ when he was executed. There were also two numbers repeated twice: 10 and 14. When the four were added together, the total was 48. According to the numerical order of the Roman alphabet, it was the gematria for INRI, Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum, the text inscribed upon the cross of the crucifixion. Morgan wondered what other codes were hidden in this magnificent house of God.
"Did Santiago work on this part of the basilica?" She squinted up at the details of the building in the rays of the afternoon sun, noting the inverted face of Christ with his vicious crown of thorns.
Ramon nodded. "He apparently worked here for most his life, only taking a year or so off to help with reconstruction work at the Mezquita in Córdoba. He worked alongside the sculptor Subirachs in the late 1960s, so perhaps he wanted to die here by his life's work."
"Perhaps …" Morgan said, walking closer to the side of the building, where Jake bent to examine a low metal door. He turned on her approach.
"It's fascinating," he said quietly. Morgan took in the riot of symbolism displayed there, words that scattered across the door in shades of green and purple. With curves and patterns, medals and roundels, it seemed to be so jam-packed with meaning, there was no room for understanding.
"I hope it's not for us to fathom," Morgan said under her breath so Ramon couldn't hear. "We only have the weekend."
"We should go inside now," Ramon said, interrupting them, clearly aware of the late hour of the day. The Catalan were renowned for their acute sense of work/life balance and the focus on what was really important. "I've halted the tourists so we can go up the tower alone, and of course, you need to have a quick look inside the nave." A sense of pride echoed through his last words, and his back straightened. Morgan appreciated Ramon's love for the basilica and his city, recognizing that it was how she felt about Jerusalem.
"Of course," she said. "Please show us around."
Ramon led the way through a great pair of double doors, words from the Bible in Spanish crammed into the space, some words picked out in greater relief. Above them, Morgan noticed the Greek letters for alpha and omega, the first and the last. She traced the letters on the door, the lines so familiar to her. She had been brought up in Israel as a secular Jew, but because her mother was a Christian, Morgan was not actually Jewish and had never converted. She felt at home in the plain synagogues her father frequented, but the depth of beauty in these graven images struck her here. She turned from the door to see Jake a few steps ahead with Ramon. As he entered the main nave of the church, Jake looked up and Morgan saw his jaw drop.
Chapter 6
Jake turned and beckoned, his eyes wide with wonder. Morgan followed them through and walked into the main nave of the church, a wide smile dawning on her face as she gazed up at the fantastical architecture. An elvish kingdom, a fantasy forest of marble pillars rose from the floor separating into branches that supported the high coffered ceiling in Gaudí's unique design. The impression was organic, as if the earth had grown up into this space, reaching to meet high above them in a forest canopy. It was light and airy and Morgan could imagine Cirque du Soleil performers in here, leaping and twisting in praise to the Creator. It was a far cry from the austerity of Gothic architecture and somber darkness of most great European cathedrals. This was all light and pattern, rippling in the evening sun. The palette of color moved across gentle pinks and blues from the Montjuïc stone to darker granite and the almost burgundy of Iranian porphyry. Light streamed in through multi-hued windows of rainbow glass, all circles and curves, caressing the flagstones as light would ripple through the forest leaves.
Those who worshipped the pagan gods of nature would feel at home here, Morgan thought. The only obvious nod to Christianity was the figure of Christ on the cross under a parachute above the simple altar. But it was dwarfed by the sheer overwhelming beauty of the stone trunks and intricate design of the basilica, lifting the worshippers' spirits above their earthly pain.
Morgan remembered sitting with Jake in the darkness of St Mark's Basilica in Venice just a few months ago. He had asked about her beliefs then, and the shadows had given her permission to share. She had told him of glimpsing God under the waters when scuba diving, looking up at sunbeams through waving fronds of giant kelp, floating in her own natural cathedral. This place made her feel the same way, a buoyancy of spirit, and she could see why Santiago Pereira could have worked here even as a Jew. It wasn't God who created these distinctions between religions, only man, and the sense of something truly ineffable could certainly be found here.
Jake turned back to her, grinning like a schoolboy, his delight evident. It was as if the demon-inflicted wounds had disappeared and he was whole again. Morgan captured the moment in her mind, grateful that the appreciation of beauty could still punctuate life in surprising moments, though the wonder never lasted long.
"Come then," Ramon said, walking towards a side door. "This way and we can ascend the tower."
The lift clunked its way to the summit and soon they stood looking out over the city from on high. It brought to mind the biblical story of Jesus tested in the wilderness by the devil, taken to the summit of a mountain and offered all the kingdoms of the world if only he would bow his head to worship. He had been encouraged to throw himself from the highest point of the temple, to demonstrate that he truly was God's son and that the angels would come and lift him up. Morgan looked down over the wall of the tower, feeling a little dizzy, on the edge of vertigo. Sweat prickled under her arms. Behind her natural fear there was a compulsion to feel the sensation of flying, of falling.
"We live in such a beautiful world," Jake whispered, his amber eyes reflecting the dying rays of the sun. It seemed his near-death experience had given him a new love of life and Morgan was grateful for his enthusiasm. It was counterpoint to her dread at possibly discovering something about her father that would tarnish his image in her mind. He had been her hero, and there was nothing that he could do wrong in her eyes. But would this trip alter the memories she had of him?
Ramon pulled aside a tarpaulin and pointed to a shallow ledge be
yond.
"We think he jumped from there. There would have been no reason to go out otherwise and the tarpaulin was found flapping in the wind, when it should have been tethered shut."
"Is there any security camera footage?" Jake asked.
"No." Ramon shook his head. "Not here, but cameras show Pereira entering the main gate not long before his death was reported. There are places where the cameras don't monitor parts of the perimeter, so just because he came in alone doesn't mean there wasn't anyone else here. But the body showed no signs of a struggle, only injuries from the impact." Ramon crossed himself. "He would have died quickly."
Morgan looked out at the stone walkway. There was nothing to indicate what had happened, nothing that might direct them to why Santiago Pereira went off that ledge. She stepped out and walked towards the end, where the wall sloped off towards the air of the city.
"Careful," Ramon said, his voice tinged with concern.
Morgan stopped only inches from the edge. She understood the pull of oblivion, the attraction of finality. The rays of the sun illuminated the gold on the statue of the risen Christ below her and the reflection glinted, as if there was something offsetting the smooth surface. She squinted a little and saw a symbol carved on the back of the statue's head. It looked like a similar grid to the Subirachs square below, but she couldn't be sure.
As Morgan bent towards it to look closer, she heard a whisper on the wind, a sound she recognized from her days in the Israeli military, distinctly out of place in the cooling air of the Barcelona evening. Her eyes flicked up and away from the cathedral, widening as she saw in a split second what would happen next.
Chapter 7
Morgan turned and took one more quick step before leaping towards Jake and Ramon, pushing them to the hard stone floor as she rolled inside the tower. The air exploded behind her with a whoosh of hot air. Debris showered down as the tower shook from the impact and chunks of rock crashed from the tower onto the forecourt as masonry and sculpture collapsed. A chorus of screams and shouts rose from below as injured tourists ran for cover.
Ramon pulled his radio from his belt, crouching on the floor of the tower as he spoke rapidly in Spanish, his police-issued Walther P99 pistol in his hand.
Morgan sat up, her ears ringing.
"RPG?" Jake coughed his question as debris settled around them.
Morgan nodded, her face grave. She stood up, brushed the stone dust from her clothes, and went to the ruined doorway, tentatively peeking out in case of further attack. The statue had been obliterated, the impact precise and the surrounding damage substantial enough to add several more years to Gaudí's multigenerational schedule. The symbol so briefly glimpsed had been thoroughly erased.
She looked out towards the direction that the rocket had come from. The area was dense with housing and it could have been fired from any of those rooftops or high windows. Whoever had fired it would be long gone by the time the address could be triangulated. Morgan was sure that the statue had been the target, the rocket small enough not to do truly extensive damage. This was not terrorism. It was intended to cover up whatever symbol Santiago Pereira had carved up here, and it made Morgan even more curious to follow his trail.
"Santiago's death couldn't have been a suicide if someone is cleaning up," she said. "We need to get to his flat quickly, in case there's more evidence to destroy."
It took only minutes to get down from the tower, and Ramon radioed for a car to meet them by the gate. The ground floor of the basilica was chaos, with injured tourists triaged on site by medical staff and a full-scale evacuation of the area underway. Some people were silent, eyes wide as they clutched their children's hands, walking as fast as possible away from the building. Others chattered nervously in Spanish, eyes darting around at backpacks as if they suspected who was responsible. The ever-present threat of terrorism fed the panic, memories of the Madrid 2004 bombings coming to the fore, when simultaneous explosions on the train system had killed 191 people and wounded 1800. The panic was almost palpable in the air and it would only take another loud bang for this crowd to stampede.
In the midst of the throng, Morgan caught sight of an old woman standing absolutely still in the forecourt, her gaze fixed on the crucified figure of Jesus above. Her lips moved in swift prayer, her fingers clicking through the rosary beads as she called out to her God.
The click of cameras and whirr of cell phones could be heard as the wail of sirens grew ever louder. Police and security shouted directions as they tried to evacuate people away from the area where masonry might fall. The usual building-site noise had stopped, to be replaced by the sounds of an explosion aftermath, a cacophony that Morgan knew only too well from Israel. Back in her own country, she would have expected a second bomb, one that targeted those who came to help the injured. But this was different. This was a very specific attack. The question was whether they had already finished cleaning up the rest of Santiago's life.
With the siren wailing and tires screeching around corners, it was only a few minutes' drive through the back streets of Barcelona to the Plaça Nova, where vibrant shopping streets merged into the Barri Gòtic, the heart of the medieval city. Ramon pulled the police car over at the edge of the square, overlooked by the towering cathedral – slightly disappointing after the eccentric grandeur of the Sagrada Familia basilica. Ramon spoke with the officer who had accompanied them, and the man nodded, getting out and joining the group.
"This is as close as we can get with a car," Ramon said. "We have to walk into El Call. The word means alleyway, and you'll see why in just a minute."
Ramon walked swiftly into the maze of tightly wound streets, so narrow that most of the area was pedestrianized. Morgan began to jog and Jake loped next to her, his long legs striding to keep up. The buildings surrounding them made a labyrinth of little shops, doorways that opened into secret courtyards, and tiny flats that clung to the edges of history. Restaurants and bars opened late here, and Morgan glanced into a tea shop as they passed, the smell of jasmine dispersing into the streets.
It was darker now, and the looming buildings prevented the last rays of sun from penetrating the tiny lanes. Morgan thought of the persecuted Jews, hunted down and massacred here, their blood mingling with the rain. Civilization was only a thin veneer over man's more animal nature.
Round another corner, Ramon stopped in front of a metal door with four call bells for the flats above. A mezuzah was hammered into the wall next to it, a simple ivory box containing a piece of parchment inscribed with verses from Deuteronomy, the prayer of Shema Yisrael. Ramon pointed down another side street.
"The synagogue of Barcelona is just over there. It's actually tiny but it's at least functional these days. It was bought in the 1990s after extensive research and opened to the public in 2002, six hundred years after the last Jews had been emptied from the city." Ramon shook his head as he pulled out a key. "Amazing to think of its restoration after all this time. Apparently, Santiago Pereira helped with the conservation, bringing his stonemason skills back into the local community."
Ramon opened the little door, indicating in rapid Spanish that the other officer remain at the street entrance to the flat. The officer nodded and took out his radio, finger ready on the emergency call button.
Morgan and Jake followed Ramon up several flights of stairs into a tiny one-bedroom flat nestled in the eaves of the building, with skylights that made the place seem bigger than it really was. As Morgan stepped inside, she had a flash of sensory memory. The air smelled of cedar wood and old scrolls, like her father's place in Safed. This was a scholar's abode, belonging to a Rabbi, a teacher of the Torah. The main room was plain with a tiny kitchenette and a single bed that doubled as a sofa. There was a cupboard with a few clothes and a hanging tool stand with pockets for the implements of a sculptor. She quickly realized that this room held no real interest for someone consumed with mysticism. It was the hub for his physical body, but the real Santiago, the Rabbi obsessed with symbols
, was elsewhere.
Morgan walked through into the room beyond. It was here she found a deeper sense of the man who had sent her the Sefer Yetzirah. Shelves lined the walls with the Torah, Talmud and Rabbinic teachings stacked neatly. On a plain wooden desk, there was a scroll rolled out to display several columns of Hebrew text. A notebook lay open next to it, with the handwritten etchings of a man obsessed by the words of his God. Morgan could sense echoes of her father here in the familiar setup of the Torah scholar. Santiago would have sat here for hours, deepening his consciousness and sinking into a trance state through the repetition of prayer and meditation on the words of God, for in each of those words lay a world within a world.
"The scene has been processed already," Ramon said. He walked in behind her and pulled a couple of pairs of sterile gloves from his bag. "You can wear these and go ahead and look through his things. Pereira's wife and daughter were killed in a car accident several years ago. Santiago was in the car too, but he was thrown free. There's a granddaughter, Sofia, a flamenco dancer in Granada, but there's no indication of any contact with her for at least a year. We're still trying to track her down to notify her of his death."
Morgan pulled on the gloves and leafed through the notebook on the desk. Santiago's Hebrew scrawl consisted of musings on the meaning of verses, and gematria equivalents for a section of Ezekiel, the vision of the living creatures emerging from a fiery whirlwind. There were doodles on some pages, stylized letters but nothing specific about the Sefer Yetzirah. At the back of the book, there was another sketch. It was a black pencil drawing of a skeleton, its mouth open in a scream, its body shaped into a key design. Morgan frowned. Could this represent the Key they sought? Was it real, or figurative? There was another four-by-four square grid beneath it, the numbers different from the ones on Subirachs' square. Had this been the carving on the back of the statue?