‘You must stop this at once,’ someone was saying. ‘Remove those stones.’
‘This is the archbishop’s castle.’ You have no authority here, Bishop.’
‘Cardinal,’ the new-but-familiar voice corrected him. ‘I am moving up in the world. And you will be dropping like one of your stones down a very deep well if you do not free my friend this instant.’
‘This man is a heretic.’
‘He is a truer servant of God than you will ever be.’
There followed a pause, filled with a hope more excruciating than any torment I had endured. Then – praise God! – the sound of a stone being taken off me. I tried to breathe and found my chest lifted a hair’s breadth further than before.
‘Faster,’ the cardinal insisted. ‘If he dies now, you will take his place.’
The trickle of rocks became a cascade, crashing onto the floor like a tower being torn down to its foundations. Stone splinters ricocheted against my cheek but I barely felt them.
The board lifted off me like a door opening. Fingers fretted at the cords around my neck, prising loose the knots.
A dazzling light blinded me, like morning sun on the Rhine. It made a halo around the face that peered into mine. Even in that cruel room he managed an impression of his usual smile, though it was heavy with care.
‘Truly, you are a most extraordinary man.’
The car fishtailed as Nevado swerved into another corner. He knew he was driving too fast. The road switched and twisted through the forest, steep hairpin bends dropping suddenly into icy straights tucked among the trees. In the headlights, the world became a corrugated tunnel of trees and snow. He kept his eyes fixed ahead.
The road straightened and he began to relax. The highway to Mainz was shut, but his boat was moored in Oberwinter. He could be in Frankfurt by dawn, then a fast train to Basle and a friend who would swear he hadn’t left Switzerland in two days. The police would call, and he would reluctantly telephone the Vatican with the terrible news.
He realised his attention was wandering and snapped it back to the road. He was approaching a bend where a landslide had carried away the trees to offer an open view back across the gorge. He pressed the brake – gently – and felt the car shudder to a standstill. He stared across the valley. A vast plume of smoke choked out the stars; flames glowed red through the skylights he had left open to fan the fire. He smiled, trying to steady his breathing. Everything had worked.
A brilliant white light passed over him like an angel. The whole car shook with the vibrations of the aircraft passing overhead. Whose could it be? Had they seen him? Suddenly his whole plan was in doubt.
Gripped by panic, he hit the accelerator. Too hard – the wheels spun, whining in protest as they sprayed snow behind him. He pushed harder, stamping the pedal and rattling the gearstick. The wheels howled, then bit the frozen earth. The car lurched forward. Still dazed from the searchlight, he didn’t see the bend ahead until it was too late. He tried to turn; he slammed on what he thought was the brake, not realising it was the accelerator still locked to the floor.
There were no crash barriers, no trees to catch him. The car flew over the cliff and plunged head first into the gorge. The last thing Nevado saw was his headlights reflected in the snow, twin points of light rushing towards him, the eyes of a vengeful God. He screamed.
A small puff of fire erupted in the trees on the southern slope of the gorge. It burned like a ball of paper for a little while, then died, leaving a black blot on the virgin snow.
Nick shielded his face against the spotlight and peered into the sky. Through the whipped-up snow he could see helicopter blades spinning like giant scissors, the glint of a glass canopy and a square of light where a door had opened. Someone was standing in the opening, looking at them. He waved frantically, screaming for help. The rotors drowned his cries and flung them into the darkness.
But someone must have seen him. A cable snaked down. A moment later he saw a man attached to it, descending like a spider. He touched down on the roof and waddled over to Nick. He wore a green jumpsuit that looked vaguely military, though his face was hidden under an enormous helmet.
Nick pointed to Gillian, lying behind the balustrade. Blood had soaked through the makeshift bandage and clouded in the puddles around her. The man in the jumpsuit gave a thumbs-up. Together, he and Nick lifted Gillian upright and wriggled her into a harness.
Emily cupped her hands over his ear. ‘Who are they?’
Nick shrugged. With the spotlight shining in his eyes he couldn’t make out any markings on the helicopter. It crossed his mind that perhaps these were Nevado’s men; that they might take Gillian away and leave him to burn on the rooftop. But a minute later – it felt like an eternity – he saw the spider-man coming down his thread again. This time he’d brought two harnesses, and ear protectors. Nick and Emily clipped in and were hoisted up, while below them gouts of flame erupted from the collapsing roof. It was like flying over a volcano.
The noise of the rotor hammered with a new intensity as they reached the helicopter. The air itself seemed to be against him, a great weight battering his shoulders, trying to hold him down. The cable swayed – but strong hands were waiting. They hauled him in.
At the back of the cabin, Gillian lay strapped to a stretcher. A medic inserted a drip into her arm and slipped on an oxygen mask. Her face was blue with shock, but when the mask went over her mouth he saw it fog up. She was breathing.
He felt a hand tap his shoulder and turned. Sitting on a bench opposite, one looking anxious and slightly ill, the other with a grim smile on his face, were two of the last men he’d expected to see.
LXXXV
I lay on a bed at an inn – I do not know where. The hard bed offered little straw to ease my limbs, but after the agonies I had suffered it was like a sack of feathers. Aeneas held a cup of water to my lips. I could barely drink; half of it splashed down the front of my tunic.
‘Are you really a cardinal?’
He put a finger to his lips, though there was no chance of being overheard. ‘I will be soon. Until then, these fools have no way of knowing.’
‘Thank you.’
‘You saved my life once. Now the debt is repaid.’
He picked up the book he had taken from the inquisitor and read in silence for a moment. The gleam in his eyes turned grey.
‘How did they find it?’ I asked. I knew from my interrogation that they had not discovered the copy that had slipped behind my bed. If they had, I would probably be dead.
‘It was left on the cathedral steps for the archbishop. He had seen pages from your Bible – he recognised your art. He guessed at once you must have made it.’ Aeneas gave me a look that seemed to penetrate my soul. ‘Did you?’
‘It was made in my house, with my tools.’
‘But not by you?’
I shook my head. ‘Do not ask me to say who.’
It was an unreasonable request, and Aeneas bridled at it. But a second later the anger passed, replaced with weary resignation.
‘If you held your tongue under that ordeal, I will not use friendship as a lever to prise it out of you. We will find out.’
I thought of Drach, of his ever-changing character and quicksilver affections. If ever there was a man who could make himself disappear, it was he.
‘You will never find him.’
‘We had better. Many in the Church will think he is the most dangerous heretic since Hus. Worse, perhaps. At least Hus could only write his sedition one copy at a time.’
He laid the book aside. ‘Remember what I told you in Frankfurt? Your art is a way to speak into the hearts of men. This book is a contagion. By the power of your art, it could carry the plague of heresy further and deeper than ever before. It could tear Christendom apart.’