‘Then you’re going to love what I’ve got,’ Morgan said excitedly, patting his bag. ‘Someone else was doing the same thing almost a hundred years ago. His work was left unfinished, and has never before been published. It’s mostly a detailed record of the early medieval elevations, but there are some observations on the Roman stuff underneath that will take your breath away.’ Morgan lowered his voice. ‘He thought that when King Herod Agrippa rebuilt the city walls in the mid first century AD, he also put a shrine on this spot, only a few years after the crucifixion. If you can help me follow his clues, we may have one of the most extraordinary revelations ever in the archaeology of early Christianity.’
Helena seemed rooted to the stool, and had gone pale. ‘You’re kidding me. Wait till you hear what I’ve found. Who was this guy?’
Jack took out a sheaf of papers from his faded khaki bag, and laid them on his knees. Costas leaned over from where he was sitting and shut the door. ‘That’s what we couldn’t tell you about on the phone,’ Jack said.
For the next forty minutes he quietly ran through everything: the shipwreck, Herculaneum, Rome, the London tomb, the clues they had found the day before in the nunnery in California. At the end he glanced at Helena, who was staring speechless at him, and then he placed a photograph on her desk of Everett’s wall painting with the chi-rho symbol and the Greek letters. ‘Does this do anything for you?’
Helena looked straight at the bottom of the photograph. She seemed stunned, and remained motionless.
‘Well?’
She cleared her throat, and steadied herself on the side of the desk. She blinked hard, then peered closely at the image. ‘Well, that’s an Armenian cross. The lower shaft is longer than the arms and top, and those are the distinctive double tips.’
Jack nodded. ‘Does that help us?’
‘Well, if you’re looking for something Armenian inside the Holy Sepulchre, you’d be thinking of the Chapel of St Helena, below the church in the ancient quarry. It’s one part of the church the Armenian monks are responsible for.’ She stopped abruptly, gripped the table and whispered, ‘Of course.’
‘What is it?’
Helena spoke quietly. ‘Okay. Here’s my take. My particular interest is what lies under the church. Everything above, between the bedrock and the roof, is encrustation, that word again, Costas. A fascinating record of the history of Christianity, but encrustation on any truth this place may have to offer on the life and death of Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus the man.’
‘Go on,’ Jack said.
‘It’s what Dr Morgan said about Herod Agrippa, the idea of a first-century shrine. Ever since first standing in that underground chapel, I’ve been convinced there’s more Roman evidence buried under the church, from the time of Jesus and the Apostles. From everything you’ve just told me, from what you’ve managed to piece together about the events of 1917, it turns out we’ve been following the same leads.’
‘Explain.’
‘You say this man Everett was here during the First World War? A British intelligence officer? A devout man, who spent much of his time in the Holy Sepulchre? An architect by training?’
Morgan patted his bag. ‘He’s the one who wrote the architectural treatise I mentioned. I’ve got a CD copy you can have.’
‘I didn’t know the name, but I know the man,’ Helena murmured. ‘I know him intimately. I feel his presence every time I stand in that underground chapel.’
‘How?’ Jack exclaimed.
‘Three years ago, when I first arrived here. The key to the main door of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is held by two Muslim families, a tradition that goes back to the time of Saladin the Great. One family takes care of the key, the other opens the door. They’ve been more sympathetic to the Ethiopians on the roof than some of our fellow Christian brethren, and I became close to the old patriarch of one of the families. Before he died he told me an extraordinary story from his youth. It was early 1918, when he was a boy of ten. The Turks had been evicted, and the British were in control of Jerusalem. His grandfather remembered from decades before that British officers often had a great interest in the history and architecture of the place, engineers like Colonel Warren and Colonel Wilson who mapped out Jerusalem in the 1860s. Because of this, the caretakers were better disposed towards the British occupiers than the Turks, who were fellow Muslims but had no interest in the Holy Sepulchre. The old man told me that a British officer who spoke Arabic came with two army surveyors and spent many days in the church, mapping out the underground chapels and exploring the ancient quarry cuttings and water cisterns. Afterwards the officer came back many times by himself, and befriended the boy. The officer was sad, sometimes tearful, said he had children of his own he’d not seen for years and would never see again. He’d been badly wounded and gassed on the Western Front, and had difficulty breathing, coughed up blood a lot.’
‘That’s our man,’ Jack murmured excitedly.
‘Apparently on his last visit he spent a whole night in the church. The caretakers knew he was a very pious Christian, and left him alone. When he emerged he was muddied and dripping, shivering, as if he’d been down a sewer. He told them they had a great treasure in their safe keeping, and they must guard it for ever. They knew he had been badly traumatized in the war and thought he was probably delirious, and was referring to the Holy Sepulchre, to the tomb of Christ. He disappeared, and they never saw him again. With his lungs being so weak, they thought his final night’s exertions might have killed him.’
‘Did the old man talk about anything that Everett and his surveyors might have found?’ Jack asked. ‘Anything in the Chapel of St Helena? We’re looking for some kind of hiding place.’
Helena shook her head. ‘Nothing. But the custodians have always known there are many unexplored places under the Holy Sepulchre, ancient chambers that might once have been tombs, cisterns cut into the old burial ground. Entrances that were sealed up in the Roman period, and have never been opened up since.’
‘Then we’ll just have to trust our instincts,’ Jack murmured.
‘I’ve spent many hours down there, days,’ Helena said. ‘There are so many possibilities. Every stone in every wall could conceal a chamber, a passageway. And they’re almost all mortared up or plastered over. I know of at least half a dozen stone blocks in walls that have spaces behind them, where you can see chinks through the mortar. But doing any kind of invasive exploration is out of the question. The Armenians are going to take a dim view of me taking you down there in the first place, let alone unleashing jackhammers.’
Jack reached for the photograph of Everett’s wall painting from the nunnery, and opened his folder. ‘If we don’t try, someone else will. There are others who know we’re here, I’m convinced of it. We need to move now. Can you get the door to the Holy Sepulchre unlocked for us?’
‘I can do that.’ Helena caught another glimpse of the photograph in Jack’s hand, then suddenly reached out and grabbed his arm. ‘Wait! What’s that? Under the cross?’
‘A Latin inscription,’ Jack said. ‘It’s not clear in the picture, but it says Domine Iumius.’
Helena was still for a moment, then gasped. ‘That’s it! Now I know where Everett went.’ She got up, her eyes ablaze. ‘I need at least two of you with me. Two strong pairs of hands.’
Costas gave a thumbs-up. ‘I’m with you.’
‘Where?’ Jack demanded
‘You’re the nautical archaeologist, Jack. Ships and boats. What’s the most incredible recent discovery in the Holy Sepulchre? Follow me.’
23
H alf an hour later, Jack stood near the main entrance to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, in the enclosed courtyard below the facade built almost a thousand years before when the Crusaders took Jerusalem. He had lingered behind talking quietly with Morgan as they made their way down from the Ethiopian monastery on the rooftop, and just before reaching the courtyard had handed him a compact disc from his khaki bag. He had already arranged with Helena for an escort to take Morgan out of the Old City, to the place where he would pass on the disc to Jack’s contact. At the bottom of the steps he and Morgan were met by a man in street clothes carrying an unholstered Glock pistol. The man had looked questioningly at Helena, who pointed to Morgan, and the man ushered him away across the courtyard. Ahead of them two Israeli policemen suddenly rushed by, in full riot gear and carrying M4 carbines at the ready. A burst of gunfire echoed through the streets, followed by screams and exclamations in Arabic. The bodyguard pushed Morgan against the wall on the far side of the courtyard. Morgan looked back, and Jack tapped his watch meaningfully. Morgan nodded, and then the bodyguard pulled him up and they both ran out of sight around the corner.