Sean took in a long breath and sighed. I need to be more methodical about this, he thought. One thing he’d noticed was the loose grouping of headstones according to the year they died. It made sense, the more he thought about it. The people in charge of the burials would have filled out the available land as needed. With that logic, Sean assumed those on the far end of the field could be eliminated as potential candidates for Jackson’s grave, since he died in the relatively early nineteenth century.
He checked a tombstone nearby with a date of 1797. Then another that displayed 1802. A third revealed 1803.
If Jackson were buried in that section of the cemetery, he’d have to be nearby.
Sean found a few anomalies to his theory, people who outlived their relatives were buried close to loved ones in their family plots. Those headstones had dates in the 1830s. As he circled around the dense overgrowth, a particular monument stood out above all others. It was an angel, carved from granite, watching over the entire eastern section of the cemetery. Sean made his way over to it and knelt down. He swiped away the tall weeds and read the name. Francis Jackson.
He pulled the phone out of his pocket and sent a quick text to Tommy and Adriana, then returned his attention to the elaborate monument.
The angel’s face stared off to the south, pointing with one finger outstretched in the same direction. The eyes drooped, as if overcome with sadness. Sean noticed another cipher symbol below the birth and death dates on the placard.
A minute later, Tommy and Adriana rounded the corner of the chapel and stomped their way through the unkempt area, lifting their knees high as they moved.
Tommy spoke first as they arrived at the stone angel. “Hardly a subtle burial place.”
“Right.” Sean affirmed. “And there’s another cipher below the name and dates.”
Tommy knelt down and pulled his little notepad out of his jacket. “Had a feeling I would need this again.”
He started working through the symbols, one after another. This particular cipher wasn’t as complicated as some of the others, and when he’d finished working out the lettering, they all realized why.
The words on the paper read, The end.
Adriana frowned, as did the two men. “The end? What does that mean?”
Tommy scratched his head. “I guess it could mean that the end is death, but that doesn’t help us with the riddle. Why would Jackson have that put on his tombstone?”
Sean didn’t have an immediate answer. He took a step back and glanced around the area. A car door closed somewhere, the thud echoing across the field. If it were the men who were after them, they would have been a little more subtle. Still, he’d not been alert enough for the past few minutes while searching for the grave.
Adriana and Tommy continued discussing the potential meanings of the message, aimlessly trying to find a solution. Sean stared down at the base of the angel monument. His eyes weren’t trained on the dates or the strange cipher symbol below them. Instead, his pupils were fixed on the name of Francis Jackson. Suddenly, something occurred to him.
“We’re not looking for Francis Jackson,” he blurted out.
The other two stopped in midsentence and turned their heads.
“What do you mean?” Tommy asked, his face representing a lost confusion.
Sean crossed his arms and thought for another second before answering. He pointed at the headstone as he spoke. “We’re not looking for Francis Jackson. Remember? The message he left in his diary said that we have to find the one who started the journey.”
“But wouldn’t that be him?” Adriana asked, frowning.
“No,” Sean answered. “Because Francis Jackson wasn’t the one who started the journey. He began his own personal journey to unlock the mystery of Holger Danske, but he wasn’t the first to discover evidence of the mythical warrior’s existence.”
He could see that his companions were thinking hard but couldn’t completely see where he was going with his line of thought. “Jonathan Stuart was the one who began the journey after the first battle of Copenhagen in 1801. Jackson mentioned it in his diary. He said that Stuart and his men found some kind of burial mound and hid inside it until they felt it was safe to leave. It was Stuart who told Jackson the location of the mound.” Sean’s face took on an air of certainty. “It was Stuart who started the journey. Jackson just picked up where he left off.”
“Okay,” Adriana said, understanding Sean’s thinking now, “so we look for Stuart’s grave?”
Tommy shook his head. “We don’t even know if he’s buried here.”
“He should be,” Sean cut off his friend. “We have the right cemetery, just not the right person. Let’s spread out, but keep to the same section this time. From what I can tell, most of the burials here work their way around in a semicircle toward the front entrance. That means if Stuart died sometime in the early 1800s we should be able to find his grave in one of these four rows.” He motioned to the loosely organized headstones that looped around the field toward the dividing hedges in front of the chapel.
The three waded through the grass, only spreading out enough to check a few outlying headstones as they moved through the cemetery. Even with three people checking the monuments, their progress went at a snail’s pace as they inched their way along.
A crow cawed in a tree overhead, adding to the eerie feel of the place, and startling Tommy while he checked a gravestone.
After ten more minutes of searching, they reached an aged crypt, wedged between several stone crosses at the edge of a stand of oak trees. The crypt featured two smooth, cylindrical pillars on either side of the entrance, rising to a flat overhang at the base of a triangular roof. A recessed circle with a Templar-style cross was carved out of the triangle’s center. The arched wooden door in the middle hung from two rusty hinges. Both the hinges and the door had seen better days, the wood deteriorating in many places from centuries of rot. It was a wonder it hadn’t disintegrated. Engraved into the entrance’s awning was the name they’d been looking for.
Jonathan Stuart.
“How do we get inside? Should we go see if the sexton has the key?” Tommy asked, pointing at a rusty lock hanging in the middle of the door. The mechanism looked like it was two hundred years old.
Sean grinned mischievously at Adriana. “I’d rather not have to use a key if at all possible.”
She stepped toward the door and pulled something out of her pocket that looked like a small Swiss Army knife. Adriana knelt down in front of the mechanism and began working her magic, inserting a straight micro rod into the opening, followed by a flat metal hook.
“Wait,” Tommy tried to stop her. “You’re not just going to break in, are you? We’re not grave robbers.” She continued working, ignoring his protest.
“Relax,” Sean said, holding out a defensive hand. “We’re not going to take anything. Well, we’re not going to take anything of value that anyone knows about. And to be perfectly honest, if we don’t get it, those other guys might. Not to mention the fact that they could possibly show up at any second now, which means we don’t exactly have time to go find whoever is in charge of the cemetery and politely ask them to go find a key that may or may not exist.” He exhaled after finishing the spiel.
Tommy pursed his lower lip and shrugged. “Good point.”
“If you two are done bickering and have made a decision,” Adriana interrupted, “I’ve got it.”
The lock made a short creaking sound then clicked and dropped a little, hanging loosely from its housing.