The Hopkins Conundrum

by Simon Edge

  “So let me see if I’ve understood you correctly, landlord,” says Alun Gwynne the following afternoon. He has been listening hard with a frown so discouraging that Tim wishes he had never started explaining. “It’s your belief that this vessel was carrying some kind of valuable cargo?”

  Tim reminds himself that the scheme is pretty far-fetched, so it’s not surprising that it requires patient explanation.

  “Valuable information. And I don’t actually believe it. I’m just hoping that other people might. If I could find the right way to persuade them.”

  “I see. Information, then. What sort of information?”

  “Oh, you know. The kind of secrets that men and women have given their lives for over the centuries, since the death of Jesus Christ.”

  That doesn’t sound bad. Maybe he has a talent for this kind of crap. Or perhaps it’s just that something rubbed off on him, in all those years living with Nadine.

  “You mean documents, then?”

  “It could take the form of documents, yes. In fact I think it’s highly likely. Letters sealed with the crossed keys of the Vatican, whose bearers have no idea of their contents and who only know that they can never fall into the wrong hands because the future of the Church of Rome depends on it.”

  “You know that rings a bell. What was that book called? The Puccini Connection. You know the one?”

  “The Poussin Conundrum. I do indeed.”

  The old boy isn’t so slow on the uptake after all.

  “Wasn’t it about the Holy Grail?”

  “The very same.”

  “So you think there was something to do with the Holy Grail on that ship?”

  “Could have been, Alun, could have been. That’s all we need to establish. Bear with me. Let’s say the secrets of the Holy Grail have been passed down from one pontiff to the next, for century after century, and they cannot be divulged on pain of death. But what if…” – Tim finds his own hand tracing a theatrical flourish – “what if some hostile figure had come to power in Europe, threatening the supremacy, the political power, the very existence of the Vatican Church?”

  Seriously, this isn’t bad.

  “And had there?”

  “There had indeed. You’ve heard of Bismarck?”

  “I know the name, but that’s about it.”

  “Me too, until yesterday. But let me explain.”

  And Tim fills his customer in on his new understanding – © Wikipedia – of nineteenth-century political history in Bismarck’s Prussia and post-Risorgimento Rome.

  “You see, the Vatican was running scared. Bismarck was doing all kinds of things like, erm…” He tries to remember the stuff he has read. “Yes, clamping down on convents and, erm, other stuff like that. Because the Pope had said he was infallible in a papal what-do-you-call-it…”

  “Bull?”

  “That’s the one.” Appropriately enough. Boom-boom. “This guy Bismarck was talking about the Catholics as the enemy within, that kind of thing. It could have been the start of some massive backlash, and any self-respecting Pope with a decent sense of posterity would surely have started thinking about getting the things he most wanted to protect away from danger, in other words out of Europe, while there was still time. It stands to reason.”

  Alun Gwynne is frowning again.

  “So the Pope wants to send the Holy Grail to America...”

  “That’s right!”

  “And he gives it to a party of German nuns?”

  “Why not? Who would think of searching them for it?”

  Nobody, he is thinking to himself, because this is the part where it gets a bit daft, even by the standards of the genre.

  But Alun is nodding in agreement. “I see your point, landlord. It’s a possibility.”

  “Really?”

  “Oh yes.”

  Tim has never had much faith in his own powers of persuasion. Maybe he really is onto something.

  “But where’s the evidence?” Alun is saying. “I can see it may be possible, but to make believe it actually happened you need some sign, you know, a signal, like Puccini with his pentagrams...”

  “Poussin.”

  “Right you are. But you still need something, a clue of some kind that would show the Grail was on the ship.”

  “Aha!” Tim beams triumphantly and taps the cover of Alun Gwynne’s Collected Works. “That’s what the poem is. It’s not surprising it doesn’t make sense – it’s written in code! I’m sure we just have to look and we’ll find all sorts in there. It will probably take some time and effort, but if…”

  “You mean like The treasure never eyesight got?”

  “What’s that?”

  “Look, it’s in here somewhere.” Alun picks up the book and scans the long poem. “Here it is. What by your measure is the heaven of desire, The treasure never eyesight got, nor was ever guessed what for the hearing? You could say that’s a clue, couldn’t you?”

  “You could indeed. Now you’re talking!”

  Tim gazes on the old boy with new-found respect.

  Alun Gwynne narrows his eyes and scratches Macca’s head for him, which he often tends to do when he’s thinking hard.

  “I can see all this might be a bit of a laugh, landlord, and I like a laugh. But tell me again, what’s the point of it, precisely?”

  “Well, it could, you know, put us on the map. Not that we’re not on the map already, but more so. So that we get lots of visitors like that guy at the beginning of the week, not just stopping for a pint and a quick cheese sandwich, but coming here properly, looking for treasure, kind of immersing themselves in the whole place.”

  “To the great benefit of any publican, for example, who happens to have premises in the valley?”

  Tim swallows, suddenly uncertain how this is going to go down.

  But Alun Gwynne explodes into a nasal giggle.

  “Good on you, landlord. It’s nonsense, but it’s valiant nonsense.”

  He picks up his beer glass and looks surprised to find it’s empty.

  “Let me top you up, Alun. Half, is it? On the house,” says Tim, taking the hint.

  “That’s very good of you landlord, another pint would go down nicely.” He’s still frowning hard, but it’s much less discouraging now. ”So, as I see it, you just have a few loose ends.”

  “Go on.”

  “Well, first you need to explain how our local man here in Wales is a party to the high-level secrets of the Pope.”

  Tim is proud that he has already thought of this.

  “He’s a Jesuit. The Society of Jesus, they’re called. It’s shadowy, full of secrets, isn’t it? Bound to be. And bound to have a hotline to the Pope. No worries on that score.”

  “If you say so. And secondly…”

  “Yes?”

  “Well, if I understand it with The Puccini Connection…”

  “The Poussin… Oh never mind.”

  “If I understand it with that one, weren’t people looking for the Holy Grail itself?”

  “Yes, and the idea is that it’s not actually treasure, like people always thought, but the tomb of Christ.”

  “So if they wanted to do that with your story, they’d want to start diving for it wherever this boat went down. England somewhere, was it?”

  Oh bollocks, thinks Tim, because the guy is right. This whole thing is going to need more thinking through.

  “And thirdly, how are you going to tell the world about it? You can’t just do it yourself on the internet. No offence, landlord, but no one will pay you any attention. Don’t you need someone to help you?”

  Bremen, 1875

  After completing their own Catholic prayers in the privacy of their quarters, Henrica and her party arrived on deck in time to see the crowd on the quayside waving handkerchiefs and throwing hat
s. The whole population of the ship seemed to be here, shouting or waving back: in the bow, artisans with caps pulled down low against the cold, their wives cradling squalling babies; a few smarter-dressed travellers amidships; and in the stern, beyond a forbidding white line, a small group of elegant gentlemen in silk top hats and fur-trimmed collars and ladies in coats in the brightest reds, mauves and greens.

  The five of them found their own place below the funnel to look back at the country they were leaving. Beside them, a white-haired gentleman with mutton-chop whiskers stood silent alongside his wife, neither of them waving. They are like us, with no one here for them, thought Henrica. They had had their leave-taking already, with Mother Clara surprising them by kissing them all, one by one, on the doorstep of the cloister. How far away their little town of Salzkotten now seemed! But there must be no looking back, only forward. She must set an example to poor, trembling Brigitta, and remember that the mission ahead was an important one, and their own personal fears neither here nor there.

  A tug was pulling their ship out of the harbour into the river. The low, grey bank slipped by and the crowd began to disperse around the deck as their families on the quayside dwindled out of sight. But the five of them stayed at the rail, looking at the last of their native land.

  “We’re not moving very fast.”

  “If we were closer to the shore it would look faster.”

  “Perhaps.”

  The tug was heading back to the harbour, but their progress really did seem painstakingly slow. Half an hour passed and they could still see the port they had left behind.

  “We’ve stopped,” complained a voice further along the rail, to general laughter and rubbishing.

  “No, he’s right. We have stopped! Look at the water. You can’t see any wash.”

  Gradually the same conversation travelled along the deck as puzzled men peered and shrugged and relayed to their wives the indisputable truth that they were no longer moving.

  A capped figure with brocade cuffs who had been addressing the select group in the stern was making his way forward. It appeared to be the captain himself. He gave a crisp bow of the head as he approached them.

  “This is a simple precaution, ladies. We have decided to anchor for a short time to allow the weather to clear ahead of us.”

  Henrica felt Brigitta stiffen beside her, and Aurea caught her breath audibly.

  “Weather? But it seems so fine here.”

  “We have reports of squalls out at sea, so we are simply letting them blow out. There’s nothing to worry about.”

  “But … if the weather is bad, would it not be better to turn back?”

  “Brigitta! The Captain has told us there is nothing to worry about.”

  “But he said…”

  “Brigitta please, remember yourself!”

  The captain delicately released himself from their companion’s grip.

  “Everything will be quite in order, dear lady, I assure you. We’ll have a fine passage. Now if you’ll excuse me…”

  He bowed for a third time and removed himself before Brigitta could pull him back.

  “What were you thinking?” Henrica hissed. After three days of trying to understand and sympathise with Brigitta’s constant state of terror, fury had now taken over at this display of faint-heartedness in front of the captain.

  “I don’t want to go! I never wanted to,” the other woman wailed. “Once we had left port I thought it was too late. But perhaps this is a sign, and it’s our opportunity to turn round…”

  “We none of us wanted to come. But you know how difficult everything has become. We can’t teach, we can’t nurse the sick, the bishop is in prison. None of us wants that, but there is nothing we can do about it. It is God’s will that we do his work wherever we are able, and if that means going to a different country, then that’s what we must do. Anything else is vanity. And if we do his will, he will protect us. You must believe that. Do try and stop crying. Come on, let’s go back down.”

  Her anger abating, Henrica offered to sit with her distressed companion in her cabin. But Brigitta said she wanted to lie down and it was a relief to hand the unhappy creature into Barbara’s care. Sitting on the rude bench in her own cabin, she pulled her wimple over her head and removed the pins from her over-veil, then took off her under-veil and undid the band so that her coif could come off. Some women took the rush as blood surged back to their head as an ecstatic gift from God. Henrica was wise enough to know that, if this was so, it was only because God had forced them into such an uncomfortable garment in the first place. But she was not above enjoying the sensation.

  “It’s so much more peaceful without the engines,” said Aurea, following her lead.

  It was true. Since they had stopped, the mechanical hum had cut out. Henrica had not noticed it before, but now that she did, the unmuffled silence was all the sweeter. She closed her eyes and allowed herself to enjoy the peace.

  Dusk was falling when the engines finally started up again, coughing and clanking back to life.

  “We’re moving,” confirmed Aurea at the porthole. “I can see from the wash. We must be at sea. I can’t see the bank any longer. Come and look.”

  Henrica got up from her berth. Close confinement was making her almost as restive as her cabin-mate.

  “It’s mist. Look, you can’t see the sea either.”

  “How will they know which way to go? We may hit rocks.”

  Henrica thought of the Schiller, wrecked just a few months ago somewhere off England, then put it out of her mind.

  “There are no rocks on this coast. It’s all sand.”

  “Are you sure?”

  She wasn’t, but she was not going to admit that to Aurea.

  They sat together and read from their breviaries.

  An hour later, when it was quite dark, the stewardess knocked.

  “Here, Aurea, help me with my veil. Is my band in place?”

  “No, come here. There. Now it is.”

  Henrica opened the door a slit.

  “Good evening, madam. Just to let you know that dinner will served at six o’clock.”

  The dining saloon, on the deck below their own, was a great improvement on their cabins. It had columns painted to look like marble, and the walls were hung with maritime paintings. There were six long tables, only two of which were laid. Frau Pitzhold and Fräulein Forster were already sitting down. The younger woman was wearing her hair up, emphasising her equine profile. She smiled at them nervously. Frau Pitzhold, with a severe pearl choker at the neck, gave a barely perceptible nod. The gentlemen stood up, and Henrica nodded acknowledgement on all their behalf, already feeling the strain of this social encounter. They were to spend two weeks in the company of these people. If only the five of them could dine alone.

  On their table was a gentleman in formal dinner attire, who introduced himself as Hamm, and his wife; their children had taken their supper earlier. They were returning to their home in Texas, where Herr Hamm dealt in horses. Henrica learned this from hearing him tell it to his neighbour, a gangling Swede called Lundgren who kept mopping his brow, although the warmth from the saloon’s burners was meagre.

  Henrica watched Frau Hamm across the table and wondered if she or one of the other women might help them with language lessons on the voyage. If the five of them were to be of any use to the outpost of their order in America, they must master the tongue. Henrica had been trying to study a grammar these past weeks, ever since Mother Clara had told her of her plans for them, and her intention had been to revise a chapter in advance and run a daily class for her companions. But as she listened to the confident chatter around her, with English words dropped casually into every German sentence by these worldly expatriates, her faith in her own abilities faltered. If one of these ladies who had already mastered the language was prepared to help them, it might be
much easier. But it was too early to ask now. She would wait to see who was friendly and who was not.

  An elderly gentleman got up from the other table and stooped to speak discreetly to Hamm. Henrica recognised him: it was the man with mutton-chop whiskers whom they had stood beside as the ship left the quay. She saw both men now glancing at her, and all her nervousness about their conspicuousness in their headgear, the new Prussian hostility to their religion and their calling, came flooding back. She looked down, staring hard at her plate and yearning even harder for the privacy of their cabin. Of course none of these women would help with the language. They were far too hostile – and how could it be otherwise, with the present climate of distrust in the country? She risked another glance. The whiskered gentleman was still looking at her and now he addressed her directly.

  “Dear lady?” he coughed.

  She felt the blood rushing to her head.

  “Sir?”

  “Would it be…? I hope it would not be a presumption if…?”

  Did they want them to move tables? To dine in their cabins? A few moments ago that was what Henrica had wanted too, but that was when it was her own choice…

  “…if we asked you to say grace for us?”

  She almost laughed out loud with relief. How absurd she was to jump to such pessimistic conclusions. That was the way Brigitta behaved, terrified of everything, whereas she was the leader and she ought to know that the world was not so bad. She bowed her head to cover her smile, as the two tables fell silent and the diners lowered their own heads. She looked up again to survey them all as she started to say the words. Only Frau Pitzhold seemed resistant. Henrica wondered if the old lady clenched her face like that because of some kind of infirmity, or as a sign of silent fury.

  Sleep came surprisingly easily. Herr Hamm had told Henrica they were still in the estuary, where the water was relatively calm, and the gentle rocking of her berth was not unpleasant. Perhaps the voyage might not turn out to be as bad after all.

  By morning, however, the motion had dramatically increased. They woke to find that it was difficult to stand without holding onto something. Just climbing out of her berth was hazardous for Aurea, up in the top one.