A certain hardness seemed to have come over him, a bitter sort of doggedness that they hadn’t seen in him before.
For many years, the Father had nurtured a deep desire to bring them out into the open so that they no longer had to meet in secret. He wanted the truth to be brought to light. Why allow all those people to walk in darkness, he often asked himself out loud. No one, after lighting a lamp, puts it away in a cupboard. No, they put it on a lampstand, so that it can do what it was made for and spread its light to all in the house.
Hadn’t yesterday’s eclipse been a clear sign that they were acting with the approval of the Lord, the sun, himself? A solar eclipse on the very day they had begun to come out of the shadows. It was as if the universe was conspiring to make everything happen just as Tiny wanted.
Mani had given a brief account of what had happened at the police station and ended his report with an urgent question. ‘Wouldn’t it be wiser to end Peter de Haan’s mission? Now that the defectors are trying to scupper our plans?’
Tiny shook his head resolutely.
‘The die is cast,’ he said, ‘as I’ve already told you. There is absolutely no way back now.’
‘Where is Judith, actually?’ Daniël wanted to know.
‘That’s not relevant. Only I, Raven and …’ Tiny said, then sighed. ‘Only Jakob and I know that.’
‘She’s not in the temple, is she?’ Mani said in alarm. Allowing the uninitiated into the temple, the holy of holies, was unforgivable in his eyes.
‘No, not in the temple,’ Tiny said reassuringly.
‘Where’s Jakob?’
‘He should have been back by … I sent him out last night to take a photograph of Judith and send it to Peter de Haan. But as Peter no longer has the phone, I’m not sure he’s seen it. I’ve not heard from Jakob since.’
Nobody spoke.
‘Gentlemen, might I suggest,’ Tiny said at last, breaking the silence, ‘that you simply stay here? I’m going to leave for a while to take care of some business, shall we say.’
He finished speaking and stood up. The men followed his example. He raised his arms in the air, as though he was standing on the altar of the Coelikerk on a Sunday, offering his congregation the sign of peace. But instead he said: ‘He is light and in him there is no darkness at all.’
‘Light shines out of darkness,’ they responded, ‘and has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of his glory as it shines in his face.’
‘But Father,’ Daniël said, although it felt like the wrong moment to say something, like an author scribbling an extra sentence onto the end of a chapter. ‘His twenty-four hours will be up at two o’clock. If Peter fails … Do you intend to just let Judith go from wherever she is, shake her hand and wish her well? And then say to Peter: “Ah well, you did your best. You didn’t make it, but no hard feelings”?’
An unintended sharpness had crept into his words.
Tiny came over and stood in front of him, much closer than he was comfortable with. For the first time in all the years Daniël had known him, he could see a side of the priest that he would rather had been kept hidden. Now there was no sign of the usual friendliness, wisdom or life experience in the priest’s eyes. Instead, he saw something outright diabolical, a look that suggested not the beginnings of madness but full-blown insanity.
Tiny leaned forward until his forehead was lightly touching Daniël’s. Through clenched teeth he snarled: ‘Then their light …’ he almost spat the words out, ‘… will be extinguished.’
39
Saturday 21 March, 10:20am
Peter went back through the museum, retracing the steps he had taken on the way in. To a certain extent, the Boerhaavemuseum had been a long shot, but despite that, it given him an idea about where to go next. Even so, he felt a little stupid for not having come up with the idea sooner.
The lobby was still hushed and empty. He greeted the receptionist with a polite grunt as he made his way to the coat rack. He put on the coat and cap and made a firm resolution that when this was all over, he would put them in a plastic bag, go back to the barber’s and hang them on the door.
A moment or two later, he was outside again. He turned right and passed the back of Judith’s house. He glanced through the window, half expecting to see her working at her table, just as he had done so many times before. Peter desperately wished that everything would go back to normal.
He went to the Turfmarkt via the Caeciliastraat, then crossed the street diagonally to go towards the Nieuwe Beestenmarkt. He passed the halal butcher and greengrocer’s which was busy and bustling, as usual.
He knew that this wide street made him very visible and that he ought to be careful, but he could already see his target in the distance. The huge sundial outside the De Valk windmill. On its semi-circle of cobbles, slightly raised from the street, white cobbles formed Roman numerals around the outside to mark the hours. The cobbles sloped down to the middle of the semi-circle, where a metal pole, at least five metres long, emerged from the ground with its sharp tip pointing at the sky.
Peter crossed the road and stood on the edge of the sundial. According to the pole’s shadow, it was about quarter to ten, but the real time was forty-five minutes later. Someone had once told him why it wasn’t accurate, but he had forgotten the finer details of their explanation.
He walked around the perimeter, not sure what he was looking for. There was a little sign with information about the sundial. He read it carefully.
The Sundial at the De Valk Windmill
History
The sundial was created in 1983 when the route of the city’s ring road was modified. It is based on a design by traffic engineer Cees van Groeningen, made in close consultation with the staff of Leiden University and the Leiden Observatory.
What is a sundial?
A sundial is an instrument that tells the time by using the position of the sun. The oldest known sundial dates from approximately 1500 BC and was found in Egypt.
How does a sundial work?
The earth rotates on its axis. Because of this, the shadow cast by an object will constantly change its position. In the Northern Hemisphere, when a shadow points north, it is exactly noon. The sun is in the south and stands at its highest point, precisely above the meridian. It is then twelve o’clock local solar time. Using this information, the dial can then be divided into sections and hour lines can be marked out to show the time according to the different positions of the shadow.
Despite knowing it was pointless, Peter looked behind the information board, but there was no note hidden there.
The Sun-Runner, the Sun-Runner …
After that came the Father … Where was he supposed to look for that?
A builder emerged from a cabin behind the fence next to the sundial. The Lammermarkt square was completely hidden by security fencing covered in plastic banners. Behind them, an enormous hole in the ground had been created by the excavation works for what was to be the biggest car park in Leiden, and the deepest in the whole of the Netherlands.
‘I’d take a good look at the time while you still can, because you won’t be able to for much longer,’ the builder said.
‘How come?’
‘We’re demolishing it next week. Or “dismantling” as they prefer to call it.’
‘Oh, that’s a shame,’ Peter said with genuine disappointment. ‘But it will be put back, won’t it?’
‘More than likely. But don’t quote me on that. I can ask for you if you want. There’s someone here who knows a lot more about it than I do.’
‘Erm … okay. Yes, please,’ Peter said, hoping that talking to someone who knew a lot about sundials would provide some inspiration.
The builder went into the cabin and soon came back with a young woman who bounded energetically towards Peter. She looked well put together: her long hair was neatly styled, and she was wearing trendy glasses. All in all she looked rather out of place in this environment.
�
��Good afternoon,’ the woman said. ‘My colleague said you had a question about the sundial.’
‘It’s …’ Peter realised that he didn’t know what he wanted to ask her. ‘I understand that it’s going to be removed?’
‘That’s right. It’ll be removed next week. And it isn’t coming back, sadly. There won’t be anywhere to put it when the car park is built.’
‘That’s a shame. I’ve always liked it, although it’s actually rather useless, isn’t it? I always forget why it doesn’t tell the right time.’
The woman’s eyes lit up. ‘Oh, but I can explain that! It’s not that complicated really. Hang on a second and I’ll come around to you.’
She walked around the cabin and went towards the building site entrance. Seconds later, she reappeared and walked over to Peter with an outstretched hand. She was beaming, like a teacher who has just found out that one of her students is actually interested in her subject.
‘I’m Anouschka, Anouschka Jongsten. Lovely to meet you.’
‘Peter de … Peter de Vries. Likewise.’
‘It’s like this,’ Anouschka began. ‘A sundial, as you might expect from the name, tells the solar time. That’s actually the true, local time, separate from whatever our modern technology tells us it is. You could say that noon is when the sun is at its highest point in the sky. In the Netherlands, the official time is always ahead of solar time. And today, March twenty-first, is a bit of a special day because day and night are exactly the same length. In perfect balance, you might say.’
Peter nodded.
‘Six months from now, there’ll be another perfectly balanced day, and then the big drama of light and darkness starts all over again.’
‘What do you mean by that?’ Peter asked, his interest instantly piqued by the words ‘drama of light and darkness’.
The woman smiled at him in the way that people sometimes do when they are genuinely pleased that they know more about a subject than the person they are speaking to. ‘Whole mythologies have been built around that, haven’t they?’ Anouschka said, ‘Maybe even whole religions. The battle between darkness and light? From what I can see, they’re all based on a simple natural phenomenon, namely that the days grow longer and then they grow shorter again.’
Peter stared at her, but she seemed not to notice. Was he becoming cynical or was it actually a bit too much of a coincidence that she had started talking quite specifically about a battle between light and darkness?
‘But,’ she continued enthusiastically as she walked over the spot on the ground where the sundial’s shadow ended, ‘you wanted to know why the time we see here is different to the time on your watch? Look, the shadow is pointing to about ten o’clock. That’s the real local time. But your watch says it’s quarter to eleven. That’s because our official local time is based on the solar time at fifteen degrees longitude east.’
The hairs on the back of Peter’s neck stood up, almost as if his body had picked up some sort of signal before his brain did.
‘For every degree of longitude you go west, the official time is four minutes ahead of the local solar time,’ Anouschka said. ‘Plus, the earth’s axis is at an angle and it moves around the sun in an elliptical orbit. The difference between the two times builds up over the year, and that means that we need something called the Equation of Time. That changes from day to day. In the spring and summer, it’s somewhere between plus six minutes and minus six minutes, and in the autumn and winter, it’s between plus fourteen minutes and minus sixteen minutes. And then on top of that, although this doesn’t apply right now, six more minutes are added in the summertime, but that doesn’t start until the third of April.’
‘So right now …’
‘Right now … Leiden is at about 4.5 degrees longitude east. That’s 10.5 degrees further west than the fifteenth eastern degree of longitude. So, on our watches it’s 10.5 times 4, making 42 minutes ahead of the true local time. And then we add 7.5 minutes for the Equation of Time, and 42 plus 7.5 is 49.5 minutes. And that …’ She made a triumphant flourish with her arms. ‘… is exactly the time that my watch says it is now.’
Peter politely looked at her watch and then nodded, sticking out his bottom lip to show that he was impressed.
But what was it about what she’d just told him that had made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up? He was still trying to work it out as he held out his hand. ‘Thanks. I’m impressed that you could explain that off the top of your head without any preparation.’
Anouschka tried to smile modestly but she couldn’t hide the fact that she was quite proud of herself. ‘It was a pleasure,’ she said, shaking his hand.
Anouschka walked away. But a thought popped into Peter’s head, like Lieutenant Columbo who always had one more question for his chief suspect, just when they thought their interrogation was over and they had got away with the crime. ‘That pole!’ he shouted after her.
She turned around. ‘Officially you’re supposed to call that “pole” a gnomon or a style, you know, but I’ll let you off. What about it?’
‘Why is it at an angle?’
‘Ah, there’s a very simple explanation for that,’ she replied. She walked back over Peter. ‘The gnomon needs to be parallel with the earth’s axis. For us, that means an angle of 52 degrees, because we’re at 52 degrees latitude north. The gnomon’s tip has to point to the north, to the North Pole in fact. That’s why it’s also sometimes called a “polar style”.’
She took a compass from her trouser pocket, the sort of cheap-looking thing you might win at a funfair.
‘Look,’ she said, holding the compass out on her palm so that Peter could see it. ‘The needle points north … So the sea is over there …’ She pointed with her hand. ‘… and well … I’m sure you don’t need an explanation.’ She gave the compass to Peter. ‘Here, you can have it.’
‘Have it? Are you sure?’
‘Oh yes, it’s fine. We’ve got a whole box of them in the office. It’s just one of those silly little promo things.’
Peter turned it over. The name of the construction company that was building the car park was printed on the back. ‘That’s great, thanks!’ he said.
He said goodbye, somewhat distractedly and Anouschka went back to the cabin. Peter stared at the face of the compass, like an archaeologist trying to work out exactly what he’s just dug up.
Longitude east, Latitude north …
Of course! It was blindingly obvious now. The numbers he had found could be co-ordinates. Longitudes and latitudes …
But his excitement at this discovery soon faded. Because all he had was the sequence 42, 41, 41, 15, 58 … Was that 42 degrees – he assumed that was the northern latitude – and then 41 minutes and 41 seconds? And then f15 degrees east with 58 minutes and then another missing number for the seconds?
But if Leiden was at 52 degrees north, then 42 degrees would be somewhere in Southern Europe … Spain, Italy or Greece. But they didn’t expect him to find all the clues and then still have enough time left to get on a plane, did they?
42 for The Hitchhiker’s Guide, 41 for Niobe, 41 for Bach …
He started walking. He was starting to feel nervous about standing in one place for so long. He put the compass in his trouser pocket.
He left the Binnenvestgracht and crossed the Steenstraat. To avoid the busy streets, he went into the National Museum of Ethnology’s tranquil grounds. He walked past the office buildings where the museum’s staff worked during the week and headed for the museum entrance, but instead of going inside, he sat on a wall to organise his thoughts.
He must be missing something. In theory, it wasn’t such a crazy idea that the numbers pointed to a location.
‘Niobe, Niobe, Niobe,’ he mumbled to himself. ‘Nb, Nb, Nb.’
Peter could have kicked himself. He had been right after all. It was nothing to do with an atomic number. ‘NB’ also meant noorderbreedte, the Dutch word for north latitude or ‘degrees north’. But then woul
dn’t he still need a clue with ‘OL’ for oosterlengte or east longitude?
But even then … in Southern Europe?
A computer, he thought, but where am I going to find one this time?
He stared blankly ahead. Then he saw two people coming out of the museum.
The museum’s study hall of course, it was open to the public. He had spent a couple of weeks there as a student, working on a paper about Mayan temples in Guatemala.
He went up the stairs to the entrance and when he got inside, he bought a ticket, paying in cash again. He went straight to the library and sat down at the first free computer he saw.
The cursor blinked invitingly, waiting for a search term that would no doubt produce hundreds of thousands of results within half a second.
If I combine the first three, Peter thought, then I get 42 NB 41. But that’s not enough. So, what if this is supposed to be 42 41 NB and then 15 58 OL? Although, strictly speaking, I haven’t found an OL yet. Then again, our official time is synchronised with the solar time at 15 degrees eastern longitude, so …
He typed the co-ordinates into Google using Dutch notation, 42° 41’ NB 15° 58’ OL, and hit enter. The first page was mostly made up of links to Dutch websites about listed buildings. There were plenty of co-ordinates in the snippets under the links, but they didn’t look useful. He scrolled through the results and saw pages with climate data, travel journals written by someone on a boat, astronomical data. He clicked the ‘x’ in the top right corner of the screen in frustration, and the web browser disappeared. Then he saw the Google Earth icon on the computer’s desktop.
He clicked on it and typed in the co-ordinates again. Nothing happened.
‘English, of course, English,’ he hissed softly through clenched teeth.
He looked up the English words for noorderbreedte … north latitude. NL then? Oosterlengte … east latitude. EL?
42° 41’ NL 15° 58’ EL.
When he had entered the co-ordinates, he hovered his finger nervously over the enter key. He held his breath and pressed it.
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