For Breuil, the bitter drink was a crucial element of the Masonic mystery. “The cup represents the door opening to real life. It is the path. Our rituals have strayed. We are mimicking initiation and not experiencing it in its fullness. The journey a neophyte takes is nothing more than a pale reflection of the true initiation that opens the gates of horn and ivory.”
The gates of horn and ivory. Yes, Marcas remembered them well from Homer and Virgil. Both gates supposedly leading to the beyond. But he didn’t know if they opened to paradise or hell.
Marcas put the pages down. He was imagining the faces of the non-Mason Soviets translating these documents. A decadent bourgeois delirium tainted with reactionary mysticism. No doubt, they had wondered why the members of this secret sect had wasted their time with such religious playacting.
He jumped when Zewinski came back in the room.
“So?”
“Your friend did a thorough analysis. But it looks like it was in vain.”
“Why do you say that?” She looked disappointed.
Marcas glanced at the photocopies. “These are just wild esoteric imaginings. Nothing of real interest. A brother with a dream of renewing freemasonry. There have been many just like him. It’s our messianic side.”
“I don’t understand.”
“The papers are from an officer during the empire. He’d been to Egypt with Bonaparte, and he wanted to establish his own lodge with a new Egyptian-inspired ritual.”
“What’s that got to do with freemasonry?”
“Nothing, I’m sure. At the time, there was an Egyptian craze that extended to all sectors of French culture, including freemasonry. Dozens of Masons created Egyptian rites: the Sophisiens, the Rite Oriental, the Friends of the Desert, and many others.
“So did it all disappear?”
“No, there’s an Egyptian freemasonry even today. The Memphis-Misraim still uses the initiation rites. But at the beginning of the empire, it was trendy. I really don’t think your friend died because of these papers. There’s nothing in them.”
32
The train was crossing the fields north of Paris. The three men set down their cards and got up, as if someone had given a silent order.
The one who had won the game removed a large signet ring from a black pouch. It had a silver band and a fine diamond mount. Then he removed a white flask with a pipette from the pouch. He applied a small drop of the white substance to the diamond and slipped the ring on his finger.
The three men opened the compartment door and stepped into the aisle without even glancing at Bashir, as if he didn’t exist.
Just before they went off, the eldest turned to him.
“When we pull into the station, take your time getting off. You don’t want to miss the show.”
The men left, leaving Bashir alone with his dark thoughts.
The train arrived at 11:35 a.m. at the Gare du Nord. Bashir got off ten minutes later, just in time to see two paramedics rushing along the platform with a gurney. Bashir spotted Blondie convulsing wildly inside the train. He was foaming at the mouth and shouting incomprehensibly while throwing himself at the window. Other travelers were huddled around him, gawking.
With bloodshot eyes, the man stared wildly at Bashir, who instinctively stepped back. The man was now hitting his head against the glass, a dark stream of blood flowing down his face. The bystanders outside the train groaned in shock and disgust. The train attendant pulled down the shade.
Bashir moved away, wondering what kind of delayed-reaction poison the killers had used. He shivered at the thought that he might be targeted once his assignment was completed. He’d been made and was now a potential threat. In Palestine, he could have found a safe house immediately, but Paris was hostile territory. He didn’t have any contacts.
At the end of the platform, Bashir took the first escalator to the luggage counter. A guard inspected his bags before Bashir chose a locker. He would take the stone and leave the papers — an insurance policy if his client decided to bump him off after he delivered the artifact. He memorized the locker number and headed to the metro, scanning the environs to make sure he wasn’t being followed.
For the first time in a very long while, Bashir felt the same sensation he had inflicted so often on his own victims: fear.
33
Jade hesitated. “That’s not what she told me when I saw her in Rome,” she said after a few seconds.
“What did she say?”
“Something about some Breuil dude. That he’d found a secret. It was in the papers.”
Zewinski examined the documents again, looking lost. “That’s all? I really thought something was going to click, that you’d find some secret formula that only a Freemason could decipher. And you’re sure the crazy old geezer was nobody special?”
“No, a bourgeois who got rich on the revolution. He bought some land in—”
Marcas shuffled through the papers, his hands coming dangerously close to Zewinski’s.
“…in Plaincourault, near the city of Châteauroux.”
Jade pulled away.
“You’re joking.”
“About what?”
“That name.”
Zewinski was breathing quickly.
“When I put the papers in the embassy safe, Sophie asked if we could change the code just for the night. I teased her about being paranoid, but she seemed really worried, so I said we could. She chose a word.”
“Don’t tell me…”
“Yep, it was the name of that village. The access code needed to have fifteen letters.”
Marcas frowned. Something wasn’t right. He picked up Breuil’s papers again and counted each letter. He shook his head.
“There’s a mistake. Plaincourault has thirteen letters.”
“When Sophie put in the code, she spelled it P-L-A-I-N-T-C-O-U-R-R-A-U-L-T. She added two letters: a T and an R. She said that was the original spelling.”
“What original spelling?”
“The one used by the knights of the Order of the Temple. The Templars.”
Marcas let out a chuckle. “Peekaboo, there they are again. It’s been a while,” he said.
“What do you mean?”
“Someone always goes and brings in the Order of the Temple. It’s bull if you ask me. We’re back to square one. We’ve got two identical murders: one in Rome and one in Jerusalem. Sophie was on her way to see someone in Jerusalem, presumably the dead man. Someone — or a group of people — wanted something from them. And it’s very possible that whoever it was has it in for the Freemasons. In other words, exactly what we knew before. In any case, the papers are clearly incomplete. What was she going to do in Jerusalem?”
“When I asked, she was cagey and got even more nervous. She said she’d been working with someone there.”
“Did she say anything else?”
“Not really. Come on, she was stressed and paranoid. I didn’t give it much thought.”
“Try to remember. What exactly did she say?”
“She’d gone on and on about the secret, which had been guarded for thousands of years. I told her to take a vacation, that the occult Mason stargazing was affecting her reason.”
Marcas nodded and looked back at the papers.
“Is something wrong?” Zewinski said.
“It’s this manuscript.”
“What about it?”
“Look here: ‘Only the shadow ritual will lead to the light.’”