Thrillers in Paradise

by Rob Swigart

  “Do you really think it was nothing important?” Lisa asked.

  “No,” Ted admitted. “He was a bit too curious about a couple very much like you two, and despite being dressed as a workman he had a distinctly Churchly air. So no, I don’t think it was unimportant.”

  A cloud brushed a shadow over the garden as Marianne brought a plate of crackers and cheese from the kitchen.

  “But we’ve taken some precautions, haven’t we, Mrs. Maintenon?” Ted said heartily.

  “Yes, Ted, we’ve taken some precautions. We’ll be ready.”

  “What do you mean, ready?”

  “If he’s from the Order, he won’t quit and he won’t be alone. Perhaps we should pick up the pace, so to speak. Where was I?”

  “The Oracle.”

  “Ah, yes.” He continued as if there had been no interruption. “Well, you see, there was something different about Delphi, something that set it apart. It had become an institution, something more than a cult. This had not been an intentional transformation; it just happened. By the fourth century the Oracle at Delphi had created a kind of expertise.”

  “A science of divination.” Lisa’s voice was barely a whisper.

  “Perhaps not exactly a science,” Ted replied. “A philosophy, a technique, an art? We don’t really have a term for it today, not in English, not in French. It wasn’t divination, but it involved the collection of as much information about a subject as possible, and a rigorous analysis of that data – historical, social, geographical, natural philosophy, astronomy, mathematics, anything that could contribute. Philosophers came, usually quietly, to talk to the priests of Apollo and gradually Delphi became a focus for the ancient world in a way no one really understood. No city, tyrant or politician could act without first consulting the Oracle. The supplicants were never disappointed, though there were cases when they demanded a second opinion, as when Athens sent envoys to ask the Oracle how she should respond to the invading Persians. The Oracle answered, in effect, run for it, but the envoys couldn’t go back to Athens with this response so they asked again the next day. This time the Oracle said, ‘Trust in the wooden walls.’ Themistocles interpreted this, correctly, to be the ships of the Athenian fleet, and not, as others did, the palisades around the Acropolis.”

  “But the Delphic Oracle was like all the others, part folk wisdom, part crackpot mystery babble.”

  “No,” Ted cried, chopping downward with the edge of his hand. He relaxed and continued more softly, “Delphi was different. Despite all the mumbo-jumbo and show business of the temples, the sacrifices, the smoke, the speaking in tongues, Delphi harnessed philosophy and reason with intuition and insight and whatever other techniques only the Pythos, or Pythia would know about.

  “Delphi had become, in effect, an intelligence organization. You could say it was the CIA of the ancient world. And because it was effective, it became rich and powerful. And as with its pronouncements, it applied reason and science to its own existence. It saw the world was changing, and it adapted. It saw that the world needed it, and at the same time new circumstances would suppress it, so it went underground. Even before Theodosius closed the temples, the Oracle had told Julian the Apostate’s quaestor that it was out of business.

  “Yes,” Lisa interrupted. “Swinburne translated it:

  Tell the king on earth has fallen the glorious dwelling,

  And the water springs that spake are quenched and dead,

  Not a cell is left the god, no roof, no cover;

  In his hand the prophet laurel flowers no more.

  This was the last utterance of the Oracle’s we know about.”

  “Yes, Lisa, you’re right, of course, it is indeed the last public utterance,” Ted said soothingly. “But although many who worked for the Oracle were not professionals but part-time amateurs, there was a rich and complex organization of others who maintained the records (yes, they had historians even then) and analyzed what they knew and learned. These people did research, studied their clients, and were protected and nourished by Clio, the muse of history. Without the Oracle, these people had nowhere to go.

  “The last priest of Apollo, the one who gave that verse to Julian’s envoy, was a clever man, and a wise one. We don’t know his name, but we do know that in the spring of 394 he went to Alexandria and met with Hypatia, at that time perhaps the most famous philosopher in the world. We know that he was struck by her beauty, as were all men, and by her poise. She and her circle called themselves hetairoi, companions, and constituted a closed, even secretive, if not secret, society. And we know she agreed to help.”

  Lisa was shaking her head. “There’s no evidence…”

  Again Ted held up his hand. “Ah, but there is evidence, and in his own words. However, the papyrus recording the founding of the secret Pythos was hidden. Its location and contents have been carefully guarded for over sixteen centuries, though we suspect it contains the secret of the Pythos’s power of divination. Some say it might be like the Messiah Medicine, that mythical unguent used to anoint Moses and the prophets and kings of Israel. At any rate, Hypatia also knew the world was changing. Even today some suggest that at that time it was falling apart, but it didn’t seem that way to those living then. There are always people who complain about the state of the world and cling to the past, but Hypatia was not one of them. She wanted to preserve the past, yes, along with the powerful culture and philosophy of Hellenistic Greece, the long tradition of thought in her native city, yes, again, but she knew the prophecies of Antoninus and Olympius had foretold the fall of the temple of Serapis in Alexandria even before Theodosius’ decree. She also looked to the future, and when the temples were destroyed, she knew time was limited. So she and the priest of Apollo devised a way for the Oracle to continue to do its work.”

  “Why didn’t she become the Pythia?”

  Ted shook his head. “She was wiser than that. She was too well known, too much in the public eye. The Pythos would have to be discreet, and for the most part they were. Also, she knew little of music save the music of the spheres – astronomy – and music is an important talent for the Pythos, who needs more than logic and reason.”

  “Raimond certainly loved music.”

  “And so, I believe, do you. But to continue, she felt, in the end, she could do more good as a private citizen advising and protecting the organization than as a Pythia. Besides, she was more interested in reason and abstract philosophy. A true Pythos would have to care more about what effect such things could have in the world if applied appropriately.”

  Ted sighed. “It’s a shame, in a way, because she was certainly an amazing person, and in our opinion would have been a wonderful Pythia. But it was not to be, was it, Marianne?”

  Before his wife could answer a small red light above the kitchen door began blinking rapidly and Ted jumped to his feet. “Do you know, Marianne, I do believe we had better get inside.”

  She gathered the glasses onto the tray. “I believe you are correct, Mr. Maintenon.”

  Ted walked without haste toward the kitchen. “Lisa, don’t leave anything behind. We will be moving soon.”

  Lisa swept her bag from the ground beside her chair. Moments later, just as Ted was closing the kitchen door behind them, an explosion obliterated the back yard, filling the air with smoke and a swirling confetti of flower petals.

  25.

  The passport control officer at Ataturk International Airport saw the cardinal’s vestments and passport and waved him through with a pleasant nod.

  The Prior General nodded back. He found that his religious dress allowed him to move more freely through the various inconveniences of international travel.

  He was hurrying past the baggage claim toward the exit, when he stopped suddenly. It had struck him that the transcript of Rossignol’s confession in the calfskin briefcase swinging at his side, the confession he had read and reread on the flight from Paris, contained too many parentheses that said (moan) or (long pause).

&
nbsp; Something about it rang false.

  Yet it clearly revealed the location of the inner disk, the keyword to the cipher, and the very clever location of the message itself.

  It had to be true. After all, the Order had long experience extracting information from reluctant witnesses. The tradition had come down through the Inquisition and all the shadowy organizations that preceded it.

  He could trace it back to the destruction of the witch Hypatia herself. Her death was that event that in retrospect seemed to have put into motion the whole long Struggle. First pagans, then heretics, had fallen under the inexorable march of the Church’s inquisitors.

  Yet, he thought, extorted confessions were sometimes unreliable. Rossignol could have sent him here to the very edge of Europe for nothing.

  Ridiculous! They already had part of the disk. The rest was here in Istanbul. The end was in sight.

  The Order’s black Mercedes E 320 was just pulling up to the curb. The Prior General pursed his lips and hurried outside. The heat stunned him and when the driver opened the door for him he settled gratefully into the air-conditioned comfort of the back seat.

  They left the airport behind, and soon they were cruising on the highway along the water’s edge. Lacatuchi stared through the darkened windows at the landscape sliding by.

  Perhaps the Struggle had been a tragic mistake. If Saint Cyril hadn’t killed the witch, would it have come to pass at all? Would the Order still have been forced to wage this war, with its terrible losses and more terrible triumphs? Would they have had to kill so many people, crush so many heresies, begin so many crusades? Would the Order even exist? The Pythos?

  No, he thought, the Order and the Pythos were reflections, one of the other. It was useless to play this game of What If.

  He sighed. There was no turning back. It had to end. This was the twenty-first century and again secularism, humanism, evangelicals and infidels beset the Church from all sides. Compromise and concessions were always failures in the long run, weakening the power of true doctrine. This was war, not blessing the flock or granting indulgences. The Pythos was a threat and always had been, a sharp and possibly mortal danger to the body of the Church. It must be eliminated once and for all.

  The Sea of Marmara sparkled darkly in the early afternoon. Ships dotted the surface, their twin reflections rippling. A few puffy white clouds floated over a freighter steaming toward the entrance to the Bosphorus. The Mercedes rolled smoothly between the sea and the old district of Sultanahmet.

  Much as the burden of his office weighed on him, and much as he would have desired the advice and counsel of the Holy Father, the current Pope was unaware of the Struggle. Lacatuchi knew it was better that way. The Vatican had other matters to weigh and resolve. Best to continue in the shadows, separate from the official, and very public, world. Only those directly involved knew how important the work of the Order of Theodosius really was. It must remain a closely held secret.

  It was here, today, in this ancient Byzantine capital, once seat of the Eastern Church, capital of the Ottoman Empire, and now the greatest city of the country of Turkey that he, Prior General Gabriel Lacatuchi of the secret tribunal of the Order of Theodosius, would sew up one more rent in the fabric of the Church. He would have in his hands the second part of the Alberti disk, and with it would be that much closer to gaining the final knowledge of the Pythos. Once the Order had the disk, the Founding Document would not be far from their grasp, and once they had that, there could be no more Pythos, no more Oracle, no more of its satanic knowledge surviving to be used against them.

  For this he prayed. Soon he would know for certain.

  They left the highway and wound slowly through the narrow streets of the old city, patiently inching through dense throngs of pedestrians, cars and motorcycles. The Mercedes pulled up at last in front of a mustard-colored building with a Turkish neo-classic façade, the century-old prison now converted into the luxurious Four Seasons Hotel.

  His suite was everything he remembered from his last visit, from the thick Turkish bathrobe to the huge bed. The Prior General allowed himself few luxuries, but he was self-aware enough to know how much the Struggle drained and demoralized its soldiers. The banker’s screams still echoed in his ears. He needed some moments free from care.

  They would have to wait, though. He changed into an open-necked shirt and blue jeans and went back to the waiting car. While they drove he went over the transcript one more time. A few minutes later the driver let him off at the main gate to the famous Grand Bazaar, the Kapalı Çarşı. “Would you like me to come with you?” the driver asked. His English was perfect, but the Prior General said only, “If you could wait? I hope this won’t take too long.”

  “Of course, efendim.”

  The Grand Bazaar had been updated into something like a modern Western shopping mall. The enormous maze of covered streets was packed with up to four thousand shops and restaurants, many of them now enclosed, selling gold jewelry, carpets, glassware, leather, cotton and wool textiles, calligraphy, glazed tiles and pottery, copper and brass ware, alabaster bookends. Though he missed the shouting, haggling and quaintly oriental chaos of the old days when the Bazaar had been more open, it was still astounding.

  The flags and tapestries that had once hung at intervals from metal rods set into the vaults of the painted ceilings had been replaced by brilliant plasma screens animated with advertising for cosmetics and perfumes, but the real smells of spice, leather, wool and metal swirled around him, and thick crowds of tourists still trudged slowly along the maze of fifteenth century streets. The shopkeepers still beckoned and called. He ignored them, but inwardly he was pleased to be back amid all these signs of tradition reluctantly giving way to modernity.

  He turned right toward the Takkeçiler Cad, carefully followed the instructions of Rossignol’s confession. He searched along the lines of shops until he came at last to a narrow booth with the single name Ahmet written in gold letters beside the door. Through the glass he could see a man with a narrow face and a pencil mustache under a completely hairless scalp examining something through a large magnifying glass mounted on an arm clipped to the counter. The man looked up when the bell attached to the door jangled. “May I help you?” he asked politely in English.

  The Prior General gave a nod and looked around the shop. There was little to see besides a few common trinkets gathering dust on shelves, two chairs, the counter, and a stack of old inexpensive leather-bound nineteenth century copies of the Koran. The glass case under the counter contained nothing but a small sea of dust. “I’m looking for Ahmet.”

  “I am Ahmet. How can I help you? You would like to buy an antique Koran, perhaps? Very old, very valuable.” The shopkeeper put his hand on the stack of books as though they were a treasure beyond price.

  Lacatuchi cleared his throat. “Don’t be foolish, Ahmet, and don’t think I’m a fool. Those are cheap nineteenth century copies, not at all valuable. No, I’m looking for an orrery. Early eighteenth century. Bronze, lapis and coral.”

  The man frowned. “An orrery? That would be a model of the planets?”

  Lacatuchi faltered. Could he have made a mistake? This was not part of the exchange. “Yes, of course! That’s correct, a model of the planets.”

  “No need to speak loudly, efendim, sometimes even my memory fails me. Please wait.” The shopkeeper put down the object and disappeared through a door at the back, leaving his client alone. Lacatuchi watched people amble along the corridor outside the glass enclosure but no one paid any attention to this small stall. He remained the only customer.

  He tired of the game and leaned over the counter to take a look at the object Ahmet had left. He couldn’t quite make out what it was and shifted the magnifying glass so he could examine it more closely.

  He saw a piece of coral intricately carved into a starkly pornographic image of a couple engaged in mutual oral sex, their miniscule genitals exquisitely detailed. A tiny lever on the side of the man’s head see
med to compel him to tug on it with a pair of tweezers lying nearby. The couple performed a harmonious, sinuous and remarkably lifelike movement together.

  “Do you like it?”

  Lacatuchi turned. “It’s quite unusual.”

  “Yes, fine workmanship. Late sixteenth century Persian. It is worth quite a large sum of money.”

  “This time I’m sure of it, but I’m here…”

  “About the orrery,” Ahmet continued smoothly, emphasizing the article. He took the tiny sculpture from Lacatuchi’s hand, put it in a box and placed it carefully in a safe behind the counter. “I’m afraid there has been some kind of mistake. The orrery of which you speak was withdrawn from the market. The planets no longer revolve.”

  Lacatuchi relaxed. “It is true there have been mistakes,” he said. “Since Copernicus.”

  “Since Copernicus, yes. Perhaps I could interest you in something else? A bronze, for instance.”

  “That would depend on the bronze,” the Prior General answered. “If it were part of a set, for instance, I might be interested.”

  “Ah, well, then, I may have just the item.”

  He seemed to materialize a plain box of dull silver about ten centimeters square. This he placed on the counter. When Lacatuchi reached for it the man seized his wrist. “Please, efendim. There is the matter of the fee,” he said.

  “Fee?” The Prior General retrieved his hand. “I was aware of no fee.”

  “Indeed. This item is nearly five hundred years old.”

  “But I understood…”

  “This is the Grand Bazaar, sir, not a charity. We must discuss the arrangements like civilized men.”

  “Very well. How much do you want?”

  But Ahmet had already turned to a small two-burner stove and was heating water. He looked over his shoulder at Lacatuchi with a thin smile. “We’ll have tea, you and I. You would like tea? It is customary, for easing the negotiations.”