“Explain,” Big Ears said.
West said, “It’s not widely known, but St. Mark actually wrote two gospels while he was in Egypt. The first gospel is the one we all know, the one in the Bible. The second gospel, however, caused an incredible stir when he produced it, so much so that nearly every copy was burned by the early Christian movement. And Mark himself was almost stoned for it.”
“Why?”
Zoe said, “Because this secret gospel recounted several other things Jesus did during his life. Rituals. Incantations. Bizarre episodes. The most infamous of which was the so-called homosexual incident.”
“The what!” Big Ears said.
Zoe said, “An episode in which Jesus went away with a young man and, according to Mark, initiated the young man into ‘the ancient ways.’ Some sensationalist writers have interpreted this to have been a homosexual experience. Most scholars, however, believe it was a ritual of the Cult of Amun-Ra, which has subsequently been adopted as the initiation rite of the Freemasons, another sun-worshipping faith to have emerged from ancient Egypt.”
West said, “Now do you understand why it’s called the Heretical Gospel?”
“Yuh-huh,” Big Ears said, “but wait, the Freemasons. I thought they were anti-Catholic.”
“They are,” Zoe said. “But the Freemasons hate the Catholic Church as only siblings can hate each other. They are like rival brothers, religions born from the same source. Just as Jerusalem is holy to both Judaism and Islam, so too do Catholicism and Freemasonry share a common source. They are simply two faiths born out of the one Mother Faith—Egyptian Sun worship. They just diverged in their interpretations of this Mother Faith somewhere along the way.”
West patted Big Ears on the shoulder. “It’s complicated, buddy. Think of it this way: America is a Masonic State; Europe is a Catholic State. And now they’re both fighting for the greatest prize of their two faiths: the Capstone.”
Big Ears said, “You say America is a Masonic State. I thought it was overwhelmingly Christian. The Bible Belt and all that.”
Zoe said, “Just because the population is Christian, doesn’t mean the country is. What is a country anyway? A group of people with a common heritage who band together for reasons of mutual prosperity and security. And that’s the key word: security. You see, countries have armies; religions don’t. And who commands the armed forces of the entity we call ‘the United States’?”
“The elected president and his advisers.”
“Exactly. So, America’s people are indeed honest Christians; but America’s leaders since George Washington have almost exclusively been Freemasons. Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt, the Bushes. For over two hundred years, the Freemasons have used the armed forces of ‘the United States of America’ as their own personal army for their own personal purposes. Hey presto, a religion got itself an army, and the population never even knew.”
West said, “You can see Masonic worship of the Capstone everywhere in America. Why, over the years, American Freemasons have built replicas of each of the Seven Ancient Wonders.”
“No way …”
West counted them off on his fingers: “The Statue of Liberty, built by the leading French Freemason, Frederic-Auguste Bartholdi, replicates the Colossus of Rhodes almost exactly—she even holds a torch aloft just as the original statue did. The Woolworth Building in New York is disturbingly similar to the Pharos. Fort Knox is built according to the floor plan of the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus. The Statue of Zeus, a great figure seated on a throne, is the Lincoln Memorial. The Temple of Artemis: the Supreme Court Building.
“The Hanging Gardens of Babylon couldn’t be exactly replicated, since no one knows what they looked like, so a special rambling garden was built and tended in their honor at the White House, first by George Washington, then Thomas Jefferson and, later, Franklin Roosevelt. The Catholic president, John F. Kennedy, tried to rip the garden up, but he never managed it entirely. And while he didn’t survive, the garden did. It’s had many names over the years, but we now call it the Rose Garden.”
Big Ears folded his arms. “What about the Great Pyramid, then? I don’t know of any monumental pyramids in the U.S.?”
“That’s true,” West said, “there are no giant pyramids in America. But when the Egyptians stopped building pyramids, do you know what they started building instead?”
“What?”
“Obelisks. The obelisk became the ultimate symbol of Sun worship. And America does indeed possess one colossal obelisk: the Washington Monument. Interestingly, it is five hundred fifty-five feet tall. The Great Pyramid is four hundred sixty-nine feet tall, eighty-six feet shorter. But when you take into account the height of the Giza Plateau at the point where the Great Pyramid stands—eighty-six feet—you will discover that the peaks of both structures sit at the exact same height above sea level.”
While this conversation was going on, Wizard was gazing at the text in the notebook.
“The only temple that bears both their names …” he mused. Then his eyes lit up. “It’s Luxor. The Temple at Luxor.”
“Oh, yes. Good thinking, Max. Good thinking!” Zoe clapped him on the shoulder.
“It would certainly fit …” West said.
“What would fit?” Big Ears asked, again not understanding this code they were using.
“The Temple of Amun at Luxor in southern Egypt, more commonly known as the Temple at Luxor,” Zoe said. “It’s one of the biggest tourist attractions in Egypt. The famous one with the giant pylon gateway, the two colossal seated statues of Rameses II, and the lone obelisk out in front. It stands on the east bank of the Nile in Luxor, or—as it used to be called—Thebes.
“The Luxor Temple was built by several older pharaohs, but Rameses II comprehensively rebuilt it and so claimed it as his own. It was also augmented, however, by none other than Alexander the Great. Which is why—”
“—it’s the only temple in all of Egypt in which Alexander the Great is recorded as a pharaoh,” Wizard said. “At Luxor alone, Alexander’s name is carved in hieroglyphics and enclosed in a ringlike cartouche. The only temple that bears both their names: the Luxor Temple is indeed the only temple that bears both the names of Rameses II and Alexander.”
Big Ears said, “So what about threading the power of Ra through the eyes of Great Rameses’ towering needles.”
West said, “Towering needles are usually obelisks. The power of Ra, I’m guessing, is sunlight. Dawn sunlight on Judgment Day: the day of the Tartarus Rotation. This verse is telling us that on the day of the Rotation, the morning sun will shine through two matching holes in the obelisks to reveal the location of the tomb.”
Big Ears turned to Zoe. “But I thought you said there’s only one obelisk still standing at Luxor.”
Zoe nodded. “That’s right.”
“So we’re screwed. Without the two obelisks, we can’t see how the Sun shines through them, so we’ll never be able to find Alexander’s Tomb.”
“Not exactly,” Wizard said, his eyes gleaming at West and Zoe.
They both smiled back at him.
Only Big Ears didn’t get it.
“What? What?”
Wizard said, “The second obelisk from the Temple at Luxor still exists, Big Ears, just not in its original location.”
“So where is it?”
Wizard answered him. “Like many of the obelisks of ancient Egypt, it was given to a western nation. Thirteen obelisks went to Rome, taken by the Sunworshipping Catholic Church. Two went to London and New York—the pair of obelisks known as Cleopatra’s Needles. The second obelisk from the Temple of Luxor, however, was given to the French in 1836. It now stands in pride of place in the Place de la Concorde, in the very heart of Paris, about half a mile from the Louvre.”
“The Zeus Piece and the obelisk,” Zoe said. “Looks like it’s going to be double trouble in Paris.”
West leaned back in his seat.
“Paris,” he said, “isn’t going to know what�
��s hit her.”
THE PARIS OBELISK, PLACE DE LA CONCORDE, PARIS
THE CHAMPS-ÉLYSÉES
PARIS, FRANCE
MARCH 18, 2006, 11:00 A.M.
TWO DAYS BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF TARTARUS
Jack West Jr. sped around the huge multilaned traffic circle that surrounded the Arc de Triomphe, whipping through traffic in a rented four-wheel-drive SUV.
Lily sat in the passenger seat, while in the back were Pooh Bear, Stretch, and Big Ears.
They all sat in tense silence, as one does before an outrageously daring mission deep inside enemy territory.
The heart of Paris is shaped like a Christian cross.
The longer beam of this giant cross is the ChampsÉlysées, which travels all the way from the Arc de Triomphe to the Palais de Louvre. The short horizontal transept of the cross ends with the National Assembly at one end and the stunning Church of St. Mary Magdalene at the other.
Most important of all is what lies at the junction of these two axes.
There one will find none other than the Place de la Concorde.
Made famous in the French Revolution as the venue for the executions of hundreds of noblemen and -women, the Place de la Concorde was the bloody home of the guillotine.
Now, however, standing in the exact center of this plaza, in the exact center of Paris—the very focal point of Paris—stands a towering Egyptian obelisk.
The second obelisk from the Temple of Luxor.
Of all the obelisks in the world—whether still in Egypt or not—the Paris Obelisk is unique in one important respect:
The pyramidion at its peak is coated in gold.
Historians love this, because this was how obelisks appeared in ancient Egyptian times: the tiny pyramids on their peaks were coated with electrum, a rare alloy of silver and gold.
Interestingly, however, the golden pyramidion on the Paris Obelisk is only a very recent addition—it was added to the great stone needle in 1998.
“Pooh,” West said as he drove, “you checked the catacombs?”
“I did. They’re clear. The entry gate is under the Charles de Gaulle Bridge and the tunnel runs all the way under the Boulevard Diderot. Lock has been disabled.”
“Stretch. The train?”
“TGV service. Platform twenty-three. Leaves at 12:44 P.M. First stop Dijon.”
“Good.”
As West drove down the Champs-Élysées, he eyed the wide boulevard ahead and beheld the Paris Obelisk, rising above the traffic, easily six stories tall.
He had climbing gear in his car—ropes, hooks, pitons, carabiners—ready to scale the great needle and examine its upper reaches. He figured he’d look like just another reckless thrill-seeker and if he was fast enough, he’d be gone before the police arrived. After that, his team would proceed to the Louvre, for the larger, more dangerous mission.
Only then, as he drove closer, the traffic parted—
“Oh, no …” West breathed.
The entire lower half of the Obelisk was concealed by scaffolding. There were three stories of it, planklike levels shrouded with netting, like the scaffolding on a construction site.
And at the base of this temporary scaffold structure, guarding its only entrance, were six security guards.
A large sign in French and English apologized for the inconvenience as the Obelisk was covered for “essential cleaning work.”
“They’re cleaning it,” Stretch scoffed. “A little convenient, don’t you think? Our European rivals are onto this lead.”
“The heretical Gospel of St. Mark is notorious. There are other copies of it around the world,” West said. “Del Piero would surely have one. He must have already checked and measured the Obelisk and since he can’t remove it from here, he’s sealed it off, stopping us from doing the same. Which means—damn it—del Piero is one step short of locating Alexander’s Tomb and getting the topmost Piece …”
West gazed at the scaffolding-enclosed Obelisk, re-thinking, replanning, adapting.
“This changes things. Everyone. Switch of plans. We’re not going to do the Obelisk first anymore. We’re going to take the Louvre first, in the way we planned. Then we’ll grab a look at the Obelisk on the way out.”
“You have got to be kidding,” Stretch said. “We’re going to be running for our lives. Half the Gendarmerie will be on our asses by then.”
“Confronting the Europeans at the Obelisk now will attract too much attention, Stretch,” West said. “I was hoping to climb up and down it unnoticed. I can’t do that now. But after we do what we plan to do at the Louvre, Paris is going to be in an uproar—a state of chaos that’ll give us the cover we need to get past those guards at the Obelisk. And now that I think about it, our intended escape vehicle will also come in handy.”
“I don’t know about this …” Stretch said.
Pooh Bear said, “What you know or don’t know is irrelevant, Israeli. Honestly, your constant doubting grates on me. You’ll do as Huntsman says. He is in command here.”
Stretch locked eyes with Pooh Bear, biting his tongue. “Very well then. I will obey.”
West said, “Good. The Louvre plan remains the same. Big Ears: you’re with Lily and me; we’re going in. Pooh, Stretch: get the escape vehicle and make sure you’re in position when we jump.”
“Will do, Huntsman.” Pooh Bear nodded.
Twenty minutes later, West, Lily, and Big Ears—gunless—strode through the metal detectors at the entrance to the Louvre.
The building’s famous glass pyramid soared high above them, bathing the great museum’s atrium in brilliant sunshine.
“I think I’m having another Dan Brown moment,” Big Ears said, gazing up at the glass pyramid.
“They didn’t do what we’re going to do in The Da Vinci Code,” West said ominously.
Lily provided the perfect cover: after all, how many snatch-and-grab teams enter a building holding the hand of a small child?
West’s cell phone rang.
It was Pooh Bear. “We have the exit vehicle. Ready when you are.”
“Give us ten minutes,” West said and hung up.
Eight minutes after that, West and Big Ears were both dressed in the white coveralls of the Louvre’s maintenance crew—taken from two unfortunate workers who now lay unconscious in a storeroom in the depths of the museum.
They entered the Denon Wing and ascended the impressive Daru Staircase. The staircase wound back and forth in wide sweeping flights, disappearing and reappearing behind soaring arches, before it revealed, standing proudly on a wide landing…
… the Winged Victory of Samothrace.
She was, quite simply, breathtaking.
The goddess stood with her chest thrust forward into the wind, her magnificent wings splayed out behind her, her wet tunic pressed against her body, perfectly realized in marble.
Six feet tall and standing on a five-foot-high marble mounting, she towered above the tourists milling around her.
Had her head not been missing, Winged Victory would almost certainly have been as famous as the Venus de Milo—also a resident of the Louvre—for by any measure, the artistry of her carving easily outdid that of the Venus.
The management of the Louvre seemed to recognize this, even if the public did not: Winged Victory stood high up in the building, proudly displayed up on the first floor, not far from the Mona Lisa, while the Venus stood in confined clutter on an underground level.
The marble mounting on which the great statue stood resembled the pointed prow of a ship, but this had never been a ship.
It had been the armrest of Zeus’s throne; the broken-off tip of the armrest.
If you looked closely, you could see Zeus’s gigantic marble thumb beneath Winged Victory.
The natural conclusion was mind-blowing: if Victory was this big, then the Statue of Zeus—the actual Wonder itself, now vanished from history—must have been absolutely gigantic.
Victory’s position on the first floor of the Denon Win
g, however, created a problem for West.
As with all the other key exhibits in the Louvre, all items on the first floor were laser-protected: as soon as a painting or sculpture was moved, it triggered an invisible laser, and steel grilles would descend at every nearby doorway, sealing in the thieves.
On the first floor, however, there was an extra precaution: the Daru Staircase, with all its twists and bends, could be easily sealed off, trapping any would-be thief up on the first floor. You could disturb Victory, but you could never take her anywhere.
Dressed in their maintenance coveralls, West and Big Ears strode up onto the landing and stood before the high statue of Victory.
They proceeded to move some potted trees arrayed around the landing, unnoticed by the light weekday crowd strolling past the statue.
West placed a couple of trees slightly to the left of Victory, while Big Ears placed two of the big pots far out of the way, over by the doorway that led south, toward the side of the Louvre that overlooked the River Seine. Lily stood by this doorway.
No one noticed them.
They were just workmen going about some unknown but presumably authorized task.
Then West grabbed a rolling REPAIR WORK IN PROGRESS screen from a nearby storeroom and placed it in front of Victory, blocking her from view.
He looked at Big Ears, who nodded.
Then Jack West Jr. swallowed.
He couldn’t believe what he was about to do.
With a deep breath, he stepped up onto the marble podium that was Zeus’s armrest and pushed the Winged Victory of Samothrace—a priceless marble carving twenty-two hundred years old—off its mount, to the floor.
No sooner had Victory tilted an inch off her mount than sirens started blaring and red lights started flashing.
Great steel grilles came thundering down in every doorway—bam!-bam!-bam!-bam!—sealing off the stairwell and the landing.
All except one doorway.
The southern doorway.
Its grille whizzed down on its runners—
—only to bang to a halt two feet off the ground, stopped by the two solid treepots that Big Ears had placed beneath it moments earlier.
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