When Bergstrom sent the picture of the Anastasius tile, Mercurio's heart had begun pounding in his chest.
What made the tile special was not just the depiction of the Grail. There were many of those, although not from that time period. What made it special was that it identified Anastasius as the confessor of Theodosius. That tied in with the manuscript claiming the emperor had possession of the cup. The confessor of the emperor would have been present at his death, when all trace of the Grail had vanished.
The tile was a clue.
Bergstrom had demanded an exorbitant price and threatened to sell the artifact elsewhere. Antonio Bellini was a fellow companion in the society. Mercurio had sent him to Sweden in the hope he could persuade Bergstrom to see reason. At the time, it had seemed a good decision.
Now Bellini was dead, and it was on his soul. It was why he knelt on the hard stone of the chapel floor, praying for forgiveness. Mercurio was a devout man. He thought of himself and Antonio as soldiers in a war against Satan. Soldiers died in wars, but that didn't make him feel any better.
He got up with difficulty, his aging joints protesting, and made his way from the chapel to the library on the other side of the villa. He rang for a servant and told him to bring a café Romano.
Mercurio stood at the glass doors of his library, looking out at the garden of his villa. The glass reflected the image of a distinguished looking man. Tall, erect, somewhere in his 70s, Mercurio had a long, narrow nose that went with his aristocratic features. His hair was a perfect silver. His brown eyes were so dark they were almost black. He wore a dark blue suit of silk made for him by the best tailor in Rome. The third finger of his left hand bore a large, gold signet ring with words in Latin circling a cross and a cup, the sign of the society.
The garden enclosure was bordered by a high brick wall lined on top with sharp shards of colored glass. It was cold in the hills outside of Milan, where the villa was located. Winter was fast approaching and the garden had turned mostly brown. At the moment, it was bathed in the luminous light unique to Italy and beloved by Renaissance painters. A winding path of white gravel led to a fountain at the far corner of the garden, where water poured into cascading basins during the summer months. For now, the fountain was dry. A stone bench nearby provided a place for quiet contemplation.
The servant brought the coffee and left the room. With practiced motion, Mercurio twisted a piece of lemon peel to spray oil over the coffee. He sipped. The bitter taste of the espresso and pungent smell of lemon stimulated his senses. He turned from the window and picked up a picture of the tile from his desk. He hadn't known about Anastasius until he'd read the manuscript. Now he had an image of him, holding the Grail.
God has shown me the way. He revealed the tile to guide me in the quest.
He would follow in the footsteps of Anastasius.
CHAPTER 18
Lamont looked out through Elizabeth's office windows at a foot of new snow covering the grounds.
"Sometimes I wonder why I ever left Georgia," he said.
"They have snow in Georgia," Ronnie said.
"Not like this, not often."
"They're predicting a bad winter on the East Coast," Stephanie said.
"What else is new?"
Steph sat in a chair beside Elizabeth's desk, leaning back to take some pressure off her swollen belly. She didn't look comfortable. Her complexion was marred with red blotches.
"You look like you're getting ready to pop," Ronnie said.
"Can't be too soon for me. The baby has been kicking the heck out of me lately."
"When are you due?"
"The last week in November, but we might've gotten the dates wrong. It feels like it will be sooner."
Elizabeth tapped her pen on her desk. "All right. Let's talk about Sweden. Nick, there have been developments since you got back."
"That doesn't surprise me." Nick shifted his position on the couch to get more comfortable. "I don't think Bergstrom was the only Swede involved in that smuggling operation."
"You may be right. Gabriel is dead."
"Selena packs a mean kick."
"That's not what killed him. Someone gave him a shot of potassium cyanide."
"That'll do it," Lamont said.
"That's not all. The mosaic tile you found in Bergstrom's house has gone missing. It was supposed to be in the police evidence locker, but it's gone."
"I told you so," Selena said to Nick.
Elizabeth looked at the two of them. "You thought something like this might happen?"
Selena nodded. "I wanted to keep the tile but Nick overruled me. I thought it might help explain why Bergstrom was killed."
"It might have been to stop him from talking about the smuggling operation," Stephanie said.
Nick nodded. "That's possible."
"What about the other guy, the Italian?" Ronnie asked. "Anything on him?"
"There's nothing in the criminal database about him," Steph said. "I'm working on it."
"The Swedish police matched the bullets that killed Bergstrom and the Italian to Gabriel's pistol," Elizabeth said.
"I'm wondering about Gabriel," Nick said. "He had time to leave but he was still there."
Selena said, "Maybe he was looking for that tile."
Nick nodded. "Now that it's gone missing, you could be right."
Elizabeth said, "A clue to finding the Grail would be enough motive to murder Bergstrom."
"You believe the Grail's real?" Lamont asked. "I think it's a myth."
"A lot of myths have a basis in fact," Selena said. "We know Christ ate and drank with the disciples before the Romans took Him. Even if most of what we know about the Grail is a myth, He would've used a plain cup to drink from, just like the one on the tile."
"It's a Swedish problem now," Nick said. "It doesn't concern us any longer."
"I'm afraid it does," Elizabeth said. "Think about it. What would happen if ISIS found the Grail? What about that prophecy in the scroll? Half the world is ready to explode and the Grail could light the fuse."
"You think finding the Grail would start a new holy war?"
"I don't know, but I don't want to find out the hard way. Steph, I want you to look for anything you can find about the priest on the tile, Anastasius. What happened to him after Theodosius died? Where did he go? There must be something about him."
"There are some collections of early Christian documents I can search through," Stephanie said. "If Anastasius was confessor to Theodosius, he might be mentioned."
"I've been thinking about that gold ring," Selena said. "Bellini was wearing a large gold signet ring. It was unusual."
"I noticed that. It's in one of the pictures Ronnie took," Stephanie said.
"It was quite large, round, with a sword and a cup. The cup could be a representation of the Grail. There was a Latin inscription on it."
"What did it say?"
"I don't know, I got distracted by everything that was happening."
"It must be religious," Elizabeth said. "Steph, find out what you can about it. It will tell us more about Bellini. I want to know why he was there."
"Got it."
"In the meantime, the rest of you get some range time in. I don't want you getting rusty."
"We going somewhere anytime soon?" Lamont asked.
"You never know," Elizabeth said.
CHAPTER 19
It snowed overnight. The next morning found the ground covered with six inches of new snow. A few paw prints outside the patio doors of Elizabeth's office showed where Burps had ventured out for a few seconds before deciding he wanted nothing to do with it. Now the cat was curled up in a corner of the couch, sound asleep. Snoring.