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Her body twitched slightly — a dream, or some neural synapse firing at random — and she took a deeper breath, then settled more closely against my back. Despite the bizarre and bloody events of the past twenty-four hours, the feeling of her body snugged against mine gave me a profound sense of well-being and comfort. A line from Meister Eckhart popped into my head: “If the only prayer you ever say is ‘Thank you,’ it will be enough.” Lying there with Miranda spooned up behind me — alive, unhurt, and important to me in ways that I didn’t understand fully, or perhaps was afraid to face — I prayed again: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

CHAPTER 24

When i woke, she was gone. On the nightstand, I found a note in Miranda’s small, neat script. It said, “Thank you, thank you, thank you.” Underneath the thanks, these words: “A souvenir. Maybe it doesn’t mean anything, but maybe it’s important.” I tucked the note — an odd souvenir, I thought, or at least an odd inscription — in the drawer of the desk.

A few minutes later, as I was brushing windblown leaves off a chair in the garden, Jean appeared, a cordless phone in his hand. “A call for you.”

Inspector Descartes was on the line. “I have something interesting to show you,” he said. “Can you come to my office?”

“Yes, of course. I was just about to have breakfast. Tea, toast, and strawberries in the garden. Can I eat first, or do I need to come right away?”

“You can eat first,” he said, then, “or…I could come there. We could talk over breakfast.”

“I’ll ask Jean—”

“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” he said, and the phone went dead in my hand.

* * *

Descartes took his coffee black and concentrated: a small shot of espresso so dense he could almost have eaten it with a fork. Turning one of the lounge chairs by the fountain to face the sun, he set his espresso and a plate full of strawberries on a small table, then settled into the cushions, loosened his tie, rolled up his sleeves, and slipped on a pair of wraparound sunglasses. “Ahhh,” he grunted happily. If not for the threadbare dress clothes, he might have been settling in for a day of Riviera sunbathing.

I sat in an adjoining chair with my cup of tea, now cold, along with two pieces of crusty toast slathered with cherry preserves. I sat without eating, waiting to see what he wanted to show me. He was in no hurry. His breathing grew slow and deep, and I wondered if he was going to sleep. “Inspector, you wanted to show me something?”

“Mmm? Ah, oui, of course.” I was glad I’d asked. “Yes, it’s right here.” He patted his shirt pocket, then pulled out a folded sheet of paper. With almost maddening slowness he unfolded it and peered at it, then handed it over. “Yes, I thought you might find it interesting.”

It took a moment for the name on the letterhead to sink in, but once it did, my adrenaline surged, and my eyes raced down the page.

“We found it in the office of his apartment,” he said. “We almost missed it. It was in his fax machine. It’s the report—”

“I know, I know,” I interrupted. “Good God.” I reread it, just to be sure I hadn’t misunderstood. “Or maybe I should say ‘Jesus Christ’ instead.” What I held in my shaking hands was the report from Beta Analytic, the Miami lab where we’d sent the teeth for C-14 dating. The figures practically leaped from the page: “1,950 +/- 30.” According to the lab, the teeth — the teeth I’d pulled from the skull in the ossuary — dated back to the year A.D. 62, plus or minus thirty years: the century in which Jesus had lived and died. “So they might be the bones of Christ after all.” My mind was racing as fast as my pulse. “You said you found this in his fax machine. Had it been faxed to him, or had he faxed it to someone else?”

He smiled. “You would make a good detective, Docteur. The answer, I believe, is both. We looked at the machine’s archive, the log, I think you call it. He got a fax from Miami around eight P.M. on Saturday. Right after that, between nine and nine thirty, he sent three faxes.”

“Three? Did the first two fail?”

“No. All three went through. They were to three different places. Rome, London, and the United States.”

“Damnation,” I said. “I think Miranda was right — I think Stefan was up to no good. He made such a big deal about keeping the bones secret, but the minute he got the lab results, he ran to the fax machine. Have you tracked the numbers yet?”

“We’re working on it.” He frowned. “There’s some bureaucracy we have to go through to get the records.”

“Do you know where in the United States?”

“Ah, oui. The city is Charlotte.”

“Charlotte?” I was stunned. “My God. Some guy in Charlotte got in touch with me a week ago. Asked if I would examine some bones and artifacts from the first century.”

Descartes sat up straight, no longer sunbathing. “Who is this guy? Where do we find him?”

“His name”—I rummaged through my mental trash bin—“is Newman. Dr. Adam Newman. Director of the Institute for Something-or-other. Ah: the Institute for Biblical Science.”

He took out his notepad and wrote down the name. “You know this place, this institute? It’s a serious scientific institution?”

I shook my head. “I’d never heard of them.” Suddenly I made a connection. “But Stefan had heard of them. I showed him the letter they sent me. He warned me to stay away from them — said they were religious nuts, and if they disagreed with my work, they’d try to damage my reputation.”

“Interesting,” Descartes mused, “that Monsieur Beauvoir knew more about this American group than you did.”

“You think that’s who he faxed in Charlotte about the bones?”

Peut-être. Maybe so. It’s a good place to start.”

“What about the London and Rome faxes? Who was he faxing there?”

He shrugged. “Other people he wanted to know about the age of the bones. But which people, and why? Sais pas—don’t know.” He selected a crimson strawberry from the plate and popped it into his mouth. He chewed slowly, as if testing the strawberry, and an appreciative smile dawned across his face. “Ah, délicieuse,” he breathed. “The food and wine in Provence are so wonderful. If I weren’t living on a policeman’s salary, I would love it here.” He cast a swift, wistful look around the garden and at the lovely buildings. Then, to my astonishment, he took a croissant from the platter, wrapped it in a napkin, and slipped it into his jacket pocket. Seeing the expression on my face, he raised his eyebrows. Was he inviting me to tease him? Daring me to challenge him? I did neither, and after a pause he continued. “Perhaps, Docteur, you can help us find out who he was faxing. If you are willing.”

“Me? Help how? Does it require me to do anything illegal, immoral, or dangerous?”

“Illegal, no. Immoral, also no.” He smiled. “Sorry if that disappoints you.”

“You didn’t say it’s not dangerous, Inspector. I’m guessing that means it is?”

He held out a hand and waggled it. “Perhaps.”