‘Good God,’ Jack murmured.
‘The eunuch? We’ve met him,’ Costas said. ‘Lying across the doorway into Claudius’ study. Looked as if he was heading in, reaching for something. He got a little singed.’
‘Ah.’ The man was quiet for a moment. ‘You found Narcissus. For almost two thousand years we have wondered.’
‘I think I can guess now what he was doing there,’ Jack murmured.
‘You will know then that Narcissus was Claudius’ long-serving praepositus ab epistulis, his scribe,’ the man said. ‘When Claudius decided to disappear from Rome in AD 54, he also engineered Narcissus’ fake poisoning so that he could accompany his master to his hideaway in Herculaneum, and help him with his books. But after AD 58, there was another reason for Narcissus to stay on. He always accompanied Claudius on his nocturnal visits to the cave of the Sibyl, where Claudius sought a cure for his palsy. Narcissus came to know the Christians who hid in the Phlegraean Fields, and he himself converted after meeting St Paul there. Narcissus already knew that Claudius had been to Judaea as a young man, that he had met the Messiah and had returned with a precious document. Paul himself had never met Jesus, and was astonished to hear from Narcissus that something written in the hand of Christ might survive. He instructed Narcissus to find and bring the document to him in Rome, where Paul was going next. History overtook Paul, of course, and he was martyred, and Narcissus never found it. Claudius had been too cunning even for him. But the clamour for the document grew among the Christian brethren in the Phlegraean Fields, and word spread that Claudius was an anointed one, that he had touched Christ. The other two members of the concilium saw the threat this posed, a threat against their authority, and they implored Narcissus to find the document, to destroy it. They believed it to be false, a heresy, a fable dreamed up by Claudius, a man who they only ever saw delusional, after his visits to the Sibyl. Finally, Narcissus left Claudius one night at the cave of the Sibyl and made his way back to Herculaneum, intending to burn the study and all the books. That was the night of 24 August AD 79.’
‘When everything except that room went up in flames,’ Costas murmured.
‘The concilium had no way of knowing whether or not Narcissus had succeeded. But with the utter disappearance of Herculaneum in the eruption, the threat was thought extinguished for ever,’ the man continued. ‘Over the generations, the document, the false gospel, was remembered as heretical, as the first of many forgeries intended to bring down the Church, and its destruction as the first of many battles won by the concilium. Then, in the seventeenth century, more than a thousand years after the fall of Rome, the Bourbon King Charles of Naples began digging at the site of Herculaneum, and an ominous truth was revealed. Herculaneum had not been destroyed in the eruption. It was miraculously preserved. Even worse, one of the first sites to be discovered and explored was the villa of Calpurnius Piso, the Villa of the Papyri, which the concilium knew had been Claudius’ hideaway. Then, even worse still, books started to be found, ancient scrolls, mostly carbonized but some legible. The concilium had to act. For more than two centuries now they have done everything in their power to hamper exploration at Herculaneum, at the Villa of the Papyri. The concilium has huge wealth and resources at its disposal, more than enough to excavate Herculaneum in its entirety, or to prevent excavation for ever. Or so they thought. Just as in AD 79, natural catastrophe intervened again. The earthquake last month revealed that tunnel which had been sealed up in the eighteenth century, one the concilium knew might lead to more scrolls, even to Claudius’ secret room. With all the world’s media present, there was no way an investigation could be prevented. The work of the devil might yet see light. That was when your team was called to the scene.’
‘Phew.’ Costas sat down against the tomb, then suddenly realized what he had done and sprang up, brushing the plaster from his legs. ‘That explains a few things.’
‘But it doesn’t explain who you are, and why you are telling us this,’ Jack said. ‘Are you a member of the concilium?’
There was a silence, and then the man spoke again, more quietly than before. ‘For many years I was a Jesuit missionary. Once, in a canoe on the lake at Peten in the Yucatan, I had an epiphany, a revelatory experience. When you are on water, in a small boat, the motion seems at once to focus and to free the mind, until you think about nothing except what you are experiencing, the sensations of the moment.’ The man paused, and Jack nodded, but felt uneasy. ‘I began to think about Jesus on the Sea of Galilee. I began to think that the sea was his kingdom of heaven, that his message to the others was that the kingdom could be found, just as he had found it. That the kingdom of heaven is all around us, on earth.’
‘And that turned you from the concilium?’ Jack asked.
‘Love thy neighbour, because it is easier than hating him. Turn the other cheek, because it is easier than resisting. Free your mind from such preoccupations, and focus your energy on finding the kingdom of heaven. That was Jesus’ message. The concilium had a holy cause, but it did not heed this call. The search for heresy, for blasphemy, became all-consuming, and the goal was lost. Their methods became unsound. And now there is one among the three who has turned a dark corner, has been unable to resist the temptation. The devil has reached out and drawn him into his fold. It has happened to others in the past.’
‘Who is he? And how do you know about us?’
‘You have come to the attention of the concilium before. The one of whom I speak was also a member of the Norse brotherhood who guarded the secret of the lost Jewish treasure of the Temple, the felag.’
‘And who murdered Father Patrick O’Connor,’ Jack said grimly. ‘My friend, and a devout man of God. Butchered in the name of the concilium, it seems.’
‘The instruments used by the concilium have often been blunt. But now they have enlisted forces of darkness that seem far beyond the reach of God.’ The man paused, sinking back further into the shadows, his voice little more than a whisper. ‘Father O’Connor was a friend of mine too. He was the other young initiate who found this place years ago with me, the tomb of St Paul. He delved too deep into a past that the concilium did not wish to see opened. He knew about the book that I now hold in my hands. He believed that we must face the truth. And so, now, do I.’
‘You have put yourself at grave risk,’ Jack murmured.
‘I have done all that I can to protect you. You must swear to keep secret all that I have said until I reveal myself. I must continue to work from within. And you must understand. Were the true words of the Messiah to be found, the concilium would rejoice. Were the words to prove false, as they believe them to be, then the dogs of war would be unleashed to devour those who would convey them, who would peddle such a blasphemy. You must be careful. Do not try to find me again. Go now.’
Half an hour later, Jack and Costas sat high on the rooftop balcony beside the dome of St Peter’s, swigging water and soaking up the afternoon sun, gazing out over Bernini’s great piazza far below. Beyond the sweeping semicircular colonnades that surrounded the piazza, they could just make out Castel St Angelo, the mausoleum of the Roman emperors beside the river Tiber, and further south they could see the heart of the ancient city, the Capitol and the Palatine Hill. Costas leaned back on his elbows, his face tilted to the sun and his eyes shut behind his designer sunglasses. ‘On balance, I prefer being high up to being underground,’ he murmured. ‘I think I really have had enough of damp subterranean places.’ He peered over at Jack. ‘You trust this guy?’