“While you finish analyzing the ossuary, I’ll work on preparing a bone sample for carbon dating.” She motioned across the room to the skeleton.
“Sounds good. By the way,” Bersei reached for his notepad and jotted something down. “Here’s the name and number of my contact at an AMS lab here in Rome.” He tore off a sheet. “Tell him I referred you. Say we’re doing work for the Vatican and need immediate results. That should get his attention. And request that he call back with the results straight away. The dating certificate can be sent later.”
Hennesey read it. “Antonio Ciardini?”
“Pronounced Char-dini. Old friend of mine, plus he owes me a favor.”
“Okay.”
“And don’t worry, his English is pretty fluent.” Bersei glanced at his watch: a quarter after one. “Before you do that, how about taking a lunch break?”
“I’d love to. I’m starving.”
“The tuna sandwich didn’t appeal to you?”
“Not my idea of Italian cuisine.”
24
******
Jerusalem
Graham Barton turned off Souk El-Dabbagha in the Christian Quarter and stopped briefly to admire the magnificent facade built by twelfthcentury Crusaders that masked the original crumbling edifice of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
Christian pilgrims flocked to Jerusalem to retrace Christ’s footsteps along the fourteen “stations” from flagellation to crucifixion—the “Way of Sorrows,” better known as the “Stations of the Cross.” The journey would begin at a Franciscan Monastery on the Via Dolorosa, just beneath Temple Mount’s northern wall—the site where many Christians maintained that Christ had taken up the cross after being scourged and crowned with thorns. Stations ten through fourteen—where Christ was stripped, nailed to the cross, died, and was taken from the cross—were commemorated in this church.
After all that had happened in Jerusalem over the past few days, Barton wasn’t surprised that there weren’t many tourists here today. He made his way into the main entrance.
Beneath the church’s massive rotunda high above two tiers of circular Roman colonnades, Barton walked a circle around a small mausoleum embellished with elaborate gold ornamentation. Inside this small structure was the most sacred site in the church—a marble slab that covered the rock where Christ had been laid out for burial.
“Graham?” a warm voice called out. “Is that you?”
Barton turned to face a corpulent old priest with a long white beard, dressed in the ceremonial garb of the Greek Orthodox Church: a flowing black soutane and a substantial black pipe hat.
“Father Demetrios.” The archaeologist smiled.
The priest clasped Barton with both his pudgy hands, fingers like sausages, and pulled him slightly closer. “You look good, my friend. So what brings you back to Jerusalem?” He spoke with a heavy Greek accent.
It had been almost a year and a half since Barton first met the priest to arrange for an exhibit of some of the Sepulchre’s Crusader-era crucifixes and relics in the Museum of London. Father Demetrios had graciously loaned the items to the museum for a three-month period, in exchange for a generous donation.
“Actually, I was hoping you’d be able to help me translate an old document.”
“Of course,” the priest cheerily replied. “Anything for you. Come, walk with me.”
Strolling beside Father Demetrios, he eyed the numerous clerics milling about the space. The Greek clergy was compelled by a long-standing Ottoman decree to share this space with the church’s other resident sects— Roman Catholics, Ethiopians, Syrians, Armenians, and Copts—and throughout the Sepulchre, each had erected their own elaborate chapels. It was a haphazard arrangement both physically and spiritually, Barton thought. From somewhere in the church, he heard a requiem being chanted.
“Rumor has it that the Israelis have called you in to assist in the investigation over at Temple Mount,” the priest whispered. “Is there any truth to that?”
“I’d rather not say.”
“I don’t blame you. But if it is true, please tread lightly, Graham.”
The priest led him into the Greek Orthodox chapel known as “the Center of the World,” named for a stone basin in its center that marked the spot ancient mapmakers had designated as the divide between east and west. From his last visit, Barton knew that Father Demetrios felt most comfortable here, on his own turf.
On the side wall stood a Byzantine shrine, covered with gold ornamentation and dominated by a massive gold crucifix boasting a life-sized, solarhaloed Christ, flanked by two Marys looking up in mourning. At the altar’s base was a glass enclosure encasing a rocky outcropping where Christ had supposedly been crucified. Golgotha.
The twelfth station of the cross.
In front of the altar, the priest made the sign of the cross, then turned to Barton. “Show me what you have, Graham.” He reached beneath his vestment and produced a pair of reading glasses.
Barton pulled the plastic-sealed vellum from his breast pocket and handed it over.
The priest fingered the Ziploc bag. “Good to see you’ve employed the latest technology. Now let’s see what you have here.” Putting on his glasses, he held the document higher against the ambient glow of an ornate hanging candelabrum and studied the text intently. Seconds later a blanched expression came over him and his lower lip sagged. “Oh my.”
“What is it?”
The priest looked concerned. Scared.
He peered at Barton over his glasses. “Where did you find this?” he
asked quietly.
Barton considered telling him. “I can’t say. I’m sorry.”
“I see.”
By the look in his eye, it was obvious that the priest already knew the
answer. “Can you tell me what it says?”
Father Demetrios scanned the chapel. Three rival priests, dressed in
Franciscan cassocks, were loitering close by. “Let us go downstairs.” He
motioned for Barton to follow.
Father Demetrios led him down a wide staircase that wound beneath
the nave.
Barton was pondering how the ancient words could have so spooked
the old priest. Deeper they went, until stone brick walls gave way to cool,
hewn earth.
Standing in what looked like a cave, the priest finally stopped. “You
know this place?”
“Of course,” Barton said, scanning the low-hanging rocky ceiling that
bore telltale marks of mining activity. “The old quarry.” His eyes wandered briefly to the wall behind the priest where hundreds of Knights
Templar equilateral crosses had been carved into the rock—twelfthcentury graffiti.
“The tomb,” the priest corrected him, pointing to the long burial
niches carved into the far wall. “Though I know your reservations in wanting to accept this idea.”
Where Helena was also lucky enough to unearth Christ’s cross, too,he
wanted to say, but curbed his response. The fact that Constantine’s elderly