The Aztec Heresy

by Paul Christopher

  ‘‘I still don’t see the connection to this Cavallo Nero group,’’ said Finn.

  "P-Two was effectively a continuation of the Inquisition—the Vatican Inquisition—all of it, not just the Spanish directorate. Their job then, as now, was to root out the enemies of the Holy Church and deal with them. Often violently. At some level they had to be at arm’s length from the Vatican itself, so they invested special powers in the Dominican order to do so. The so-called Hounds of God—Domine Canis, an old joke, I’m afraid. Their job was to find the heretics. The particularly powerful and important ones like Hernán Cortéz were handled by an even more secret group within the Dominicans—the Cavallo Nero. The Black Knights. Effectively they were the Vatican’s hit men.’’ He paused. ‘‘They still are.’’

  ‘‘Cortéz was a heretic?’’

  ‘‘Hernán Cortéz was extremely wealthy by the time he’d finished with Mexico. And he wasn’t leaving, which worried the governor of Cuba at the time, Don Diego Velázquez. Somehow he discovered that Cortéz had hidden a vast fortune from the court of the king and he had proof.’’

  ‘‘The Codex.’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’ The old man nodded. ‘‘A complete history, including precise directions to the secret hoard, a virtual city of gold in the Yucatán jungle.’’

  ‘‘What happened to the Codex?’’ Billy asked.

  ‘‘Bartolome de las Casas was taking it to the Vatican. It was lost aboard the Nuestra Señora de las Angustias. Destroyed in the wreck.’’

  ‘‘But the story doesn’t end there, does it?’’ Finn said.

  ‘‘Stories like that never do. That’s how they become mysteries and legends.’’

  ‘‘How does it end?’’

  ‘‘With a question mark’’—the old man smiled—‘‘and rumors.’’

  ‘‘What kind of rumors?’’ Finn asked.

  ‘‘Rumors that Don Diego Velázquez, the governor of Cuba and Cortéz’s sworn enemy, was no fool. He had a copy of the Codex made and sent it off on another ship, the San Anton, a nau, or caravella, a much smaller ship than the treasure galleons. Some were less than a hundred tons. They were fast, mostly used to carry important passengers or documents.’’

  ‘‘Like the copy of the Codex,’’ said Billy.

  ‘‘Umm.’’ The old man nodded. ‘‘Like the Codex.’’

  ‘‘What happened to her?’’ Finn said.

  ‘‘She sank in the same hurricane as the Nuestra Señora de las Angustias,’’ said the old man. He poured himself another cup of tea and took a third biscuit from the plate.

  ‘‘Where?’’ Billy asked.

  ‘‘Ah,’’ said the old man, eyes twinkling behind his candy-colored spectacles. ‘‘Now that’s an entirely different story.’’

  ‘‘One you’re willing to tell us?’’ Finn asked quietly.

  ‘‘I’d be happy to tell you if I knew, but that sort of thing is well outside my present mandate.’’

  ‘‘Mandate?’’ Billy said. ‘‘Odd word.’’

  ‘‘Have you ever heard of an organization called the Vatican Watch?’’

  ‘‘Good Lord, not another secret society!’’ Billy laughed.

  The old man smiled. ‘‘Nothing secret about it at all, although we don’t advertise our existence very strenuously.’’

  ‘‘What is Vatican Watch?’’ Finn asked.

  ‘‘An association of concerned Catholics, lay members as well as those like myself, people with a religious vocation. We monitor the activities of certain groups within the Holy See. Discreetly. One would assume that the Vatican of all places could police its own activities, but events of the last hundred years or so have sadly confounded that hypothesis.’’

  ‘‘Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?’’ Billy nodded.

  ‘‘The benefits of a classical education, I see,’’ said the old man.

  ‘‘Who shall watch the watchers?’’ translated Finn. ‘‘You learn a few things in public school as well.’’

  ‘‘Quite so,’’ the old man said. ‘‘You’re quite right to chide me. I’ve become something of a snob in my old age.’’ He dipped his cookie again. ‘‘Plato, and later Juvenal, were perfectly correct. The watchers are not capable of watching themselves since any position is corruptible. Thus, the monitoring must fall to those outside the organization being monitored. That is the origins of Vatican Watch.’’

  ‘‘And Vatican Watch has been monitoring Cavallo Nero?’’

  ‘‘Yes. For many years.’’

  ‘‘What does any of this have to do with Cortéz and the Codex?’’ Finn asked, her tone a little frustrated.

  ‘‘Nothing directly,’’ said the old man. ‘‘But Cavallo Nero has made a number of somewhat disreputable alliances over the years to further their cause.’’

  ‘‘What sort of alliances?’’ Billy asked.

  ‘‘Dangerous ones,’’ said the old man. ‘‘It is not so much the Codex but where the Codex leads that is important. Equally, it is the people along the way to that destination who we find disturbing.’’

  ‘‘Who?’’ Finn asked bluntly.

  ‘‘It is not my place to say. In fact, if anything, my purpose is to warn you against pursuing this matter any further.’’

  ‘‘And if we decide not to heed your warning?’’

  ‘‘Then go with God,’’ said the old man. ‘‘But before that I suggest you visit a friend of mine.’’

  ‘‘Who?’’

  ‘‘His name is Pierre Jumaire. He lives in Paris. He operates a bookstore on the rue de la Huchette. Perhaps he can guide you better than I.’’

  7

  Rue de la Huchette is a short narrow street on the Left Bank of the Seine one block in from the river and the Quai St. Michel. The street runs between rue de Petit Pont on the east and Boulevard St. Michel on the west. ‘‘Huchette’’ is probably an archaic bastardization of the word ‘‘hachette,’’ or ‘‘hatchet,’’ which stands to reason since the street was once predominantly occupied by charcoal burners, who must have chopped a great deal of the hardwood from the local forests that grew in what was at one time the outskirts of Paris.

  For most of the twentieth century rue de la Huchette was an eclectic mix of cafés, small hotels, and neighborhood shops that ranged from Le Garage de Terreur to a pawnshop named Aux Temps Dificiles, and a brothel called Le Panier Fleuri. It formed the backdrop for dozens of movies, and by the fifties it had been made famous in at least two books, The Last Time I Saw Paris and Springtime in Paris.

  By the beginning of the twenty-first century all that had changed. Mado, Daisy, Consuelo, and Amandine, once the favorites at Le Panier Fleuri, were all great-grandmothers, and Monge the horse butcher was long dead, as was his trade. L’Oursin, the man who’d once sold chestnuts outside the Pharmacie Rabat at the corner of the narrow alley romantically known as rue de Chat Qui Peche—Street of the Fishing Cat—vanished the day Kennedy was shot and was never heard from again. The street was now filled with Greek restaurants offering cheap plates for smashing, overpriced boutiques selling questionable name brands, and trendy bed-and-breakfasts for trendy tourists. The last remnant of what had once been the essence of Hemingway and Fitzgerald’s Left Bank was Librarie Pierre Jumaire, a dusty little bookshop on the corner at rue de Petit Pont.

  The shop was a classic: dark, dusty shelves stuck here and there wherever there was room, books in piles everywhere, crammed in willynilly with little regard for price or age, the popular beside the obscure, the sublime sharing space with the profane, and all of it smelling faintly of mildew, ink, and binding glue.

  Jumaire himself was equally an archetype: he was squat, old, his white hair a halolike memory on the edges of a freckled skull; he wore thick bifocals and a black suit with a green bow tie on the worn collar of his wrinkled white shirt. There were two heavy briarwood canes beside his high stool behind the counter in the front where he held court, always with a fat yellow Boyard cigarette dangling between his thin lips and poking o
ut of his bushy white beard, the mustache the color of nicotine, his right eye in a permanent squint where the acrid smoke wound its way up beneath the lenses of his spectacles.

  Librarie Pierre Jumaire had always specialized in nautical books, and the very tops of the bookcases were decorated with ships in bottles, bits of carved ivory, and a collection of brass navigation instruments, none of which had felt the touch of a duster for more than half a century. On the rare occasions that Jumaire left the shop, he inevitably wore an ancient peaked officer’s cap and a dark blue peacoat that could easily have been worn by Melville’s Ishmael in Moby-Dick.

  As Finn and Billy entered the store, Jumaire was arguing with a customer in a loud voice and waving his arms to illustrate his point. The customer eventually slapped several bills down on the counter, picked up his purchase, and left in a huff, brushing past them and banging the door hard enough to make the little dangling bell at the lintel ring angrily.

  ‘‘Idiot!’’ Jumaire said to no one in particular.

  ‘‘Trying to bargain?’’ Billy asked, smiling.

  ‘‘Ach!’’ Jumaire answered. ‘‘The price is written on the flyleaf of every volume. This is not some bazaar in the souk at Marrakech. Would they argue over the price of a Royale with cheese at McDonald’s? I think not!’’ Finn burst out laughing. Jumaire eyed her severely. ‘‘You are very pretty, my dear, and I have a weakness for women with red hair, but I am quite serious. The fools try my patience endlessly. Would you barter at Hermes or Christian Dior? No again, of course you would not! They throw you out on your pretty little ear. Faugh!’’

  ‘‘Sorry,’’ said Finn.

  ‘‘Beautiful women should never apologize,’’ answered Jumaire, eyes twinkling behind his glasses.

  ‘‘Martin Kerzner sent us,’’ said Billy.

  ‘‘Really,’’ said Jumaire.

  ‘‘Yes.’’

  ‘‘He said you could help us.’’

  ‘‘Will and can are two entirely different words.’’

  ‘‘We understand that,’’ said Finn.

  ‘‘We’re trying to find out what happened to the San Anton,’’ said Billy.

  ‘‘She sank in a storm,’’ answered Jumaire.

  ‘‘But where?’’

  ‘‘Ah,’’ said Jumaire. ‘‘As Long John Silver would say, ‘there’s the rub.’ ’’

  ‘‘We thought you could help,’’ said Finn.

  ‘‘Why should I?’’

  ‘‘Because Cavallo Nero is trying to find out as well,’’ said Billy.

  ‘‘Ah,’’ said Jumaire again. ‘‘The fiends from the Vatican. The new great Satan for thriller writers.’’

  ‘‘You think they’re a fiction?’’

  ‘‘No, of course not. They’re genuine enough, but they have nothing really to do with the Vatican. There is no sinister conspiracy of albino men of the cloth protecting the secrets of the new millennium via strange messages embedded in the streets of Paris or old paintings. The only thing embedded in the streets of Paris is used bubble gum. It is as it ever was: it is all about money. The Inquisition was about greed and power. It still is.’’

  ‘‘Will you help us?’’ Finn said bluntly.

  ‘‘Certainly,’’ said Jumaire with a shrug. ‘‘Why not?’’

  ‘‘That was easy enough,’’ said Finn. ‘‘Why the sudden trust?’’

  ‘‘Kerzner told you we were coming,’’ said Billy, suddenly understanding. ‘‘He called to warn you.’’

  ‘‘Of course. He described Miss Ryan perfectly.’’

  The old man struggled to his feet, balancing himself on his canes. ‘‘Turn the sign on the door, throw the bolt, and pull down the blind,’’ he instructed Billy. The reverse of the OPEN sign read Entrailles pas Fiables: uncertain bowels. ‘‘It covers a multitude of situations and rarely invites questions,’’ explained Jumaire. He came out from behind the counter and headed through the stacks. ‘‘Follow me, if you please. I have rooms in the back. I’ll make coffee for us.’’

  Max Kessler sat in Jack Kennedy’s bomb shelter and examined the file he had assembled on Harrison Noble and his father. It made interesting reading. Noble Pharmaceuticals had begun as a family business almost a hundred years before, trafficking in patent medicines of all kinds but specializing in nostrums, pills, powders, and tonics, a number of them containing opium derivatives, several based on cocaine and one extremely popular concoction used for distress related to ‘‘a particular periodic occurrence’’ named Lady Helen’s Tonic, which contained a healthy dose of heroin. Over the decades Noble Pharmaceuticals added to its fortunes, expanding into a variety of over-the -counter products but maintaining a solid base in patent medicine of all kinds, especially its flagship product, Noble’s Mixture, a cure-all that was still being sold well into the fifties. In 1960 Conrad Noble, the family patriarch, died, and James Jonas Noble took over. His first act was to change the names of almost all their products. Thus, Noble’s Mixture became Nomix, Grady’s Hair Tonic became Brillamine, and Noble’s Liver Pills became Heparine. Under James Noble’s guidance the company slowly phased out the old quack items and began the manufacture of generic prescription drugs, carefully watching the growth of antipsychotics and antidepressants based on the ever-expanding volume of new diseases being listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, generally referred to as the DSM and presently in its fourth incarnation, DSM-IV, in which ‘‘shyness’’ had become something called Social Anxiety Disorder, or SAD.

  Every time a new DSM mentioned a new disease, Noble found a drug for it or adapted someone else’s. Prozac and Paxil became Danex, Zoloft became Antipan, and Celexa became Cytoloft. A drug by any other name made billions. By the year 2000 Noble Pharmaceuticals was the eighth largest drug manufacturer in the world, and their motto, ‘‘We Feel Your Pain,’’ had been adopted by Late Night with David Letterman and spoofed regularly on Saturday Night Live. The humorless lawyers for Noble Pharmaceuticals assured James Noble that he had grounds for a lawsuit, but the CEO told them not to be silly, it was free advertising on an enormous scale.

  Harrison Noble, James Noble’s only child, was only a faint reflection of his father, and some of the gossip columnists said the only things he’d inherited from his father were a strong chin and a weakness for blondes. A student at Yale and a member of Skull and Bones only because of his father, Harrison Noble had no particular interests except spending his trust fund and seeing how many debutantes he could sleep with, until he started sleeping with the daughter of the president of the United States and managed to get her pregnant. The silencing of the scandal of both the pregnancy and its termination led to an ultimatum from his father about making something of himself, which in turn resulted in Noble Ventures, ostensibly an oceanographic foundation funded by Noble Pharmaceuticals but really nothing more than an excuse to provide a platform for a series of ill-advised treasure-hunting expeditions and a way to indulge Harrison Noble’s passion for scuba diving and island hopping through the Caribbean. It also managed to fulfill his father’s desire for keeping his son out of dangerous political bedrooms. The connection between the younger Noble and a drug czar like Angel Guzman led Max Kessler’s analytical intellect down a number of intriguing avenues and bore closer attention, especially if, as Max Kessler surmised, Harrison Noble was acting for his father. Like the taped door at the Watergate Hotel that led to Nixon’s resignation, Max knew the tip of an iceberg when he saw it.

  8

  Pierre Jumaire poured coffee and set out a plate of petit fours in his simple kitchen, then sat down with Finn and Billy. ‘‘I’m still not sure of the importance of the Codex,’’ said Billy.

  ‘‘Beyond its intrinsic value as a historical document, the Cortéz Codex was proof of Cortéz’s treason. He was hiding a vast treasure from King Charles. In those days the monarchy received a quinto, one-fifth of any plunder from any expedition to the New World. By that time Cortéz himself was so powerful that the only way to deal
with him was by having him excommunicated by the Inquisition, in which case all his lands and treasures would be forfeit to the Church, which would in turn pass on an agreed-upon proportion to the crown. It was exactly the kind of thing the Nazis did to the Jews in the thirties and Roosevelt did to the interned Japanese after Pearl Harbor. Government -sanctioned theft, all neat and tidy and done according to the laws of the day.’’

  ‘‘Follow the money,’’ murmured Finn.

  ‘‘Generally a wise course to follow as a historian, ’’ said Jumaire. He sipped his coffee, then lit another of his foul-smelling cigarettes.

  ‘‘Why would anyone be interested in the Codex now?’’ Finn asked.

  ‘‘Because it is a treasure map, of course,’’ answered the bookseller. ‘‘You’re proof of its interest yourself.’’

  ‘‘I don’t buy that,’’ answered Finn. ‘‘You and your friend Brother Kerzner haven’t been hanging around on the off chance that someone’s going to come looking for a five-hundred-year-old scrap of parchment.’’

  ‘‘It’s actually tree bark,’’ said the bookseller mildly.

  ‘‘Called amatl. Made from a fig tree, usually Ficus padifolia,’’ she answered just as mildly. ‘‘As I said, a public education from Ohio can be quite good.’’

  ‘‘Touché,’’ Jumaire said and laughed. ‘‘I apologize.’’

  ‘‘Apology accepted,’’ said Finn. ‘‘But you still haven’t answered my question.’’

  ‘‘Tue-mouches,’’ said Jumaire.

  ‘‘Flypaper,’’ translated Billy.

  ‘‘I don’t get it,’’ said Finn.

  ‘‘A lure,’’ explained the old man. ‘‘We are aware of the interest Cavallo Nero has in such things. The more we know of their activities, the better.’’

  ‘‘Forewarned is forearmed,’’ said Billy.

  ‘‘Something like that.’’

  ‘‘And has somebody from the Black Knights been sniffing around?’’ Finn asked.