The Last Cato

by Matilde Asensi

  “Exactly! If we mix up a batch of Greek fire and throw it into the water, it will catch fire with incredible force. It’s very likely that the floodgates are opened by heat.”

  “If it’s not too much trouble,” the Rock looked worried, “before we perform such a dangerous task, I would like to know how heat opens the floodgates.”

  “Ottavia, correct me if I’m wrong. Weren’t the Byzantines big fans of all mechanical things, hinged toys and automated machinery?”

  “Sure. The biggest fans in history. One emperor made a pair of roaring mechanical lions that paraded single file in front of foreign ambassadors. Other rulers had devices in their thrones that triggered lightning and thunder to frighten courtiers. There was the fantastic Golden Tree of the royal garden, with its mechanical singing birds. It was very famous back then; it’s all but forgotten now. There were priests—Christian priests, I mean—who made ‘miracles’ happen during Holy Mass, such as opening and closing church doors and things like that. In Constantinople there were coin-operated fountains that dispensed water. I could go on and on. There’s a very good book on the subject.”

  “Byzantium and Its Toys, by Donald Davis.”

  “That’s the one. I believe we have the same taste in reading materials, Professor Boswell,” I exclaimed with a wide smile.

  “True, Dr. Salina,” the Professor replied, also smiling.

  “Okay, okay… You are twin souls, great. Would you mind getting to the point, please? We have to get out of here.”

  “What Ottavia is saying, Kaspar, is that there were priests who voluntarily opened and closed the doors of the temples. The faithful thought it was a miracle, but in fact it was a very simple trick. It was triggered—”

  “—by lighting a fire.” I took the words out of Farag’s mouth, I knew the subject so well. Byzantine machinery had always fascinated me. “The heat expanded the air in a container that was filled with water. The expanded air forced the water through a siphon into another container suspended by some springs. This second container descended under the weight of the water, and the springs that held it up turned cylinders that moved the axes of the doors. How’s that sound?”

  “Sounds like gobbledygook!” the captain snorted. “We’re going to set off a fiery bomb on the chance that that opens the floodgates? You two are nuts!”

  “Well, give us an alternative if you can,” I said in an icy tone.

  “Don’t you understand?” he repeated, desolate. “The risk is enormous.”

  “Could it be I’m not the only one who’s afraid to die?” I said.

  He muttered a few abominations and swallowed his rage. Slowly but surely that man was losing his grip on his emotions. He’d come a long way from the phlegmatic, cold captain of the Swiss Guard to the visceral, demonstrative human being standing before me.

  “Fine! Go ahead! Get it over with! Hurry!”

  Farag and I didn’t wait for him to change his mind. While the Cracked Rock shined the flashlight on us, we used the burned-out torches like shovels to scoop up and mix all those elements together. I felt some irritation in my eyes, nose, and throat because of the quicklime, but it was so slight I wasn’t alarmed. Soon, a grayish, viscous mass, very similar to bread dough, was stuck to our rudimentary wood spatulas.

  “Should we divide it into several pieces or throw it in one block at the channel?” Farag asked, indecisive.

  “Let’s divide it. We can cover more surface area that way. We don’t know exactly how the floodgates’ mechanism works.”

  “Well, let’s get on with it. Grab the stick like a spoon, and let’s go.”

  The mass didn’t weigh much, but it was much easier if the two of us carried it. We walked over to the floodgates. Once there, we set our projectile on the ground, careful to keep it very dry, and divided it into three identical sections. The Rock scooped one of them up with another burned-out torch. Once we were set, we threw those sticky, disgusting projectiles into the center of the stream. We were probably part of just a handful of individuals who, in the last five or six centuries, had had the chance to witness Byzantine Greek fire, and I was almost excited about it.

  Tremendous flames leaped toward the stone vault almost instantly. The water burned with such extraordinary force that a hot hurricanelike wind forced us against the wall as if we’d been punched. In the middle of that blinding light, the horrible roar of the fire, and the dense black smoke over our heads, we watched the floodgates to see if they were opening. They didn’t budge.

  “I warned you, Doctor,” the Rock shouted at the top of his lungs. “I warned you this was madness!”

  “The mechanism will start up!” I answered. I was also going to say that we just had to wait for a little, when a coughing fit took all the air out of my lungs. The black smoke from our projectiles began to fill the room.

  “Get down!” Farag shouted, letting all his weight fall on my shoulder to knock me over. The air was still clear at ground level. I gulped air, as if I’d just pulled my head out of the water.

  Then we heard it—a sound that got stronger and stronger until it was louder than the roar of the fire. The axes of the floodgates were turning, grinding stone against stone. We sprang to our feet. Jumping together, we threw ourselves down into the dry side of the channel and ran toward the narrow opening through which the water was filtering to the other side. The fire floating on the water followed dangerously on our heels. I don’t think I’ve ever run that fast in all my life. I was half-blinded by smoke and tears, with no air to breathe, begging God to let my legs be nimble enough to make it across that threshold as fast as possible. I was on the verge of a heart attack when I got to the other side.

  “Don’t stop!” the captain shouted. “Keep running!”

  The fire and smoke crossed the floodgates too, but we were much faster. After three or four minutes, we had moved far enough out of danger and were slowing down to a complete stop. Huffing and puffing, our arms outstretched like athletes when they cross the finish line, we looked back at the long path we’d left behind. You could make out a distant glow behind us.

  “Look, there’s daylight at the end of the tunnel!” Glauser-Röist exclaimed.

  “We know, Captain. We see it.”

  “No, Doctor, for the love of God! At the other end!”

  I pivoted on my toes like a spinning top and saw the light the captain pointed out.

  “Oh, Lord!” I blurted, on the brink of tears again, although these were from sheer joy. “The way out, finally! Let’s go, please, let’s go!”

  We hurried out of there, half walking, half running. I couldn’t believe that the sun and the streets of Rome were on the other side of the entrance to that mine. Just the thought of going home put rockets in my shoes. Freedom lay just ahead. Less than twenty meters away!

  My relief at being freed was the last thought I had. A sharp blow to my head left me unconscious in the blink of an eye.

  I saw lights inside my head before I came to completely. Intense jabs of pain accompanied those lights. Whenever one of them went off, I felt the bones in my skull crack, as if a tractor were squashing it.

  Slowly, that unpleasant sensation eased, and I perceived another just-as-delightful feeling. A burning sensation, like a hot red fire, shot through me, from my right forearm, and brought me back to harsh reality. With plenty of groaning, I struggled to put my left hand on the intensely throbbing spot where I felt a sharp pain when I barely brushed against my sweater. I pulled my hand away with a shout, my eyes wide open.

  “Ottavia?…” Farag’s voice sounded far off. “Ottavia? Are you… Are you okay?”

  “Oh, my God, I don’t know. How about you?”

  “My… my head hurts really bad.”

  I made out his figure several meters away, tossed on the ground like a teddy bear. Still further away, the captain was also unconscious. On all fours, I crawled over to the professor, trying to keep my head up.

  “Let me see, Farag.”

  He tr
ied to turn to show me the part of his head where he had received the blow. He moaned suddenly and lifted his hand to his right forearm.

  “Gods!” he howled. That pagan exclamation shocked me for a few seconds. I was going to have to have a serious talk with Farag. Soon.

  I ran my hand through the hair on the back of his neck. Although he moaned and pulled away, I felt a sizable bump.

  “They whacked us good,” I whispered, sitting beside him.

  “And they marked us with the first cross, right?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  He smiled as he took my hand and squeezed it.

  “You are as brave as Augusta Basíleia!”

  “The Byzantine empresses were brave?”

  “Oh yes! Very!”

  “I never heard that…,” I murmured, freeing my hand from his. I tried to stand up to see how the captain was.

  Glauser-Röist had been hit much harder. The Staurofilakes must have thought that to bring down that huge Swiss, they really needed to let him have it. You could clearly see a spot of dried blood on his blond head.

  “Let’s hope they change their method in the future…,” Farag murmured as he slowly rose to his feet. “They’ll finish us off if they have to knock us out six more times.”

  “They may have already finished off the captain.”

  “Is he dead?” The professor was alarmed, hurrying toward him.

  “Fortunately not. But he’s really bad off. I can’t get him to wake up.”

  “Kaspar! Hey, Kaspar, open your eyes! Kaspar!”

  Farag tried to revive him, and I resumed my mental alacrity. We were still in the Cloaca Maxima, right where we’d lost consciousness, or maybe a bit closer to the exit. The outside light had disappeared, though. A torch illuminated the corner where they’d left us. I raised my wrist to see what time it was and felt that terrible burning on my forearm again. According to my watch, it was eleven at night; we’d been out for more than six hours. They couldn’t have managed that with just a blow to the skull; they must have used something else to keep us asleep. However, I didn’t feel any of the aftereffects of anesthesia or sedatives. I felt pretty good, considering.

  “Kaspar!” Farag kept shouting and slapping the captain in the face.

  “I don’t think that’ll wake him up.”

  “We’ll see!” Farag said over and over, slapping the Rock.

  The captain moaned and opened his eyes halfway. “Holiness?” he stammered.

  “Holiness? It’s me, Farag! Open your eyes right now, Kaspar!”

  “Farag?”

  “Yes, Farag Boswell. From Alexandria, Egypt. And this is Dr. Salina, Ottavia Salina, from Palermo, Sicily.”

  “Oh, yes…,” he murmured. “Now I remember. What happened?”

  The captain went through the same instinctive motions we did. He frowned as he felt the first painful throb from his head, then he tried to raise his hand to the nape of his neck. When he did that, the wound on his forearm brushed against his shirt.

  “What the…?”

  “They marked us, Kaspar. We still haven’t seen our new scars, but there’s no doubt what they did to us.

  Hobbling like elderly cripples, we held up the captain as we made our way to the exit. As soon as the fresh air hit us, we could see that we were on the bank of the Tiber River, about two meters above water level. If we dropped down the embankment and swam a bit, we would come to a dock and some stairs on our right, about ten meters away.

  On our left, farther away, we saw the Ponte Sisto, so we surmised we were halfway between the Vatican and Santa Maria in Cosmedin. Overhead, the streetlights and the upper floors of elegant buildings spurred us on despite our fatigue. We fell into the river, letting the smooth current of the freezing water carry us to the stairs. Since it hadn’t rained in several months, the river was low, but it was enough to revive Farag and me almost completely. Glauser-Röist was worse off; he didn’t regain consciousness completely, even with our river dunking. It was like he was drunk; he was unable to coordinate his movements or his words very well.

  When we finally got out of the river and climbed up the dock’s stairs, soaked, numb, and exhausted, the traffic in Lungotévere and the normal rhythm of the city at that hour made us smile. A couple of latenight runners, in shorts and T-shirts, happened by and couldn’t hide their bewilderment. We must have looked strange and pitiful.

  Holding onto both of the captain’s arms, we made it to the edge of the sidewalk, intending to stop the first taxi we saw—by force, if necessary.

  “No, no…,” Glauser-Röist murmured with difficulty. “Cross the street at the next crosswalk. I live right over there.”

  I looked at him in surprise. “You have a house in the Lungotévere dei Tebaldi?”

  “Yes… Number fifty.”

  Farag signaled to me not to make him talk, and we headed for the crosswalk. We crossed the street, under the surprised and scandalized gaze of drivers stopped at the traffic light, and we came to a beautiful vestibule with stone and wrought iron. When we searched for the key in Glauser-Röist’s jacket pocket, a wet piece of paper fell to the ground.

  “What is it?” the Rock asked, as I lagged behind.

  “I don’t know. A piece of paper, Captain.”

  “Let me see it.”

  “Later, Kaspar. Right now, let’s get inside.”

  I put the key in the lock and opened the door with a shove. The vestibule was elegant and spacious, lit up with great stone crystal lamps; mirrors on the walls multiplied the light. The elevator was old, made of polished wood and wrought iron. The captain must be very rich if he had an apartment in the building.

  “What floor, Kaspar?” Farag asked.

  “The top one. The penthouse. I need to throw up.”

  “Not here, for God’s sake!” I exclaimed. “Wait till we get you home! We’ll be there in just a minute.”

  We went up in the elevator fearing that at any moment the Rock would hurl his soul out his mouth. But he behaved himself and held back until we entered his house. Unable to wait any longer, he shook us off and staggered down a dark hall. We heard him vomit through the door of the bathroom.

  “I’m going to help him,” Farag said as he turned on the lights. “Look for a phone and call a doctor. I think he needs one.”

  I crossed the wide house with the creepy feeling I was invading Captain Glauser-Röist’s privacy. A man that reserved, quiet, and prudent about his private life surely didn’t let many people in his house. Up until that moment, I’d assumed the captain lived in the Swiss Guard barracks right there, between the right side of Saint Peter’s Square and the Porta Santa Ana. It hadn’t occurred to me he would have his own flat in Rome. While the halberdiers—the enlisted soldiers—had to live in the Vatican, it was highly likely that high-ranking officers didn’t. Still, I never imagined that someone whom I presumed got miserable pay—the Swiss Guards’ wages were famous for being incredibly low—had an elegant flat in the Lungotévere dei Tebaldi that was furnished and decorated with such good taste.

  In a corner of the living room, next to the drapes, I found the telephone book and the captain’s address book. On the same table, in a silver frame, was a photograph of a smiling girl. The girl was very pretty; she wore a brightly colored ski cap and had black hair and dark eyes. She couldn’t be the Rock’s blood relative; they looked nothing alike. Maybe she was his fiancée? I smiled. What a surprise that would be!

  When I opened the address book, a stack of papers and loose cards slipped to the floor. I gathered them up and quickly looked for the number of the Vatican’s health services. Doctor Piero Arcuti was on call, someone I was acquainted with. He assured me he’d be right over. I was surprised when he asked if I thought he needed to notify the secretary of state, Angelo Sodano.

  “Why should you call the cardinal?”

  “There’s a note in Captian Glauser-Röist’s file that says, in a situation like this, we’re to notify the secretary of state. If he can�
��t be reached, we’re to call the archbishop secretary of the Second Section, Monsignor François Tournier.”

  “I don’t know what to say, Dr. Arcuti. Do what you think is right.”

  “In that case, Sister Salina, I’m going to call His Eminence.”

  “Very well, Doctor. We’ll be expecting you.”

  I’d just hung up when Farag appeared in the hall with his hands in his pockets and a quizzical look. He was as dirty and unkempt as a homeless man who had just rummaged around in the garbage.

  “Did you talk to the doctor?”

  “He’ll be here right away.”

  He searched through his pockets and pulled something out. “Look, Ottavia. It’s the paper you found in the captain’s jacket.”

  “How’s Glauser-Röist?”

  “Not very well,” he said, walking toward me with the note in his hand. “I’d say he’s unconscious, not resting. He keeps passing out. What drugs do you think they gave us?”

  “Whatever it was, it only affected him. You’re okay, aren’t you?”

  “Not entirely. I’m starving. Look at this first, then I’ll go to the kitchen to see what I can find.”

  I examined the piece of paper. It wasn’t normal paper. Even though it was soaking wet, it was still thick and rough, with jagged edges, definitely not cut by a machine. I flattened it out on my palm and I saw some sentences in Greek scarcely blurred by the Tiber River.

  “From our friends, the Staurofilakes?”

  “Of course.”

  τί στενὴ ἡ πύλη καὶ τεθλιμμένη ἡ ὁδὸς ἡ ἀπάγουσα εἰς τὴν ζωήν, καὶ ὀλίγοι εἰσὶν οἱ εὑρίσκοντες αὐτήν.

  “‘How narrow is the door and how narrow the path that leads to life.’” I translated, with a lump in my throat. “‘And how few are those who find it.’ It’s from the Gospel of Saint Matthew.”

  “Everything in the Bible sounds the same to me,” Farag whispered. “The meaning is what scares me.”

  “It means that the brotherhood’s next initiation test has to do with narrow doors and narrow paths. What’s this below it?…”