They crossed the Mediterranean, passed within ten miles of Rhodes and then Malta, and continued past the tip of Sicily and up the coast of Italy. Caleb pointed out the Bay of Naples and the Royal Palace, where he could almost see the scholars in white coats still teasing millimeters of carbonized papyrus from the Herculaneum scrolls. They went around the boot of Italy, circled back and continued north past Tuscany until they entered the canals of Venice. While Caleb ordered dinner, Lydia secured a room on the eastern side of the city, overlooking St. Mark’s piazza. And that night, under velvety purple skies, they were married.
Facing each other in a gondola, as the full moon painted them in ghostly auras, they said their vows before a priest, in Latin. They held hands and kissed, and people cheered — people on the bridges, people in their homes looking down, people at the edge of St. Mark’s.
They celebrated with a wonderful seafood dinner unlike anything Caleb could remember. And then there were three bottles of wine, some Chianti to wrap up the night before they stumbled back to their room. Dizzy, Caleb promised Lydia they’d consummate the marriage in the morning, and she giggled and agreed as she pulled up the sheets.
Under the covers, away from the lights from the cathedral, she whispered in his ear, “I have to tell you something.”
Caleb laughed and kissed her fiercely. He felt her nakedness entwining around him completely. He could not have been happier. His only regret was not the suddenness of their decision to marry, but the fact that he hadn’t told Phoebe.
“What is it?” Caleb whispered back, nibbling at his wife’s lips.
“Something about me,” she said. “I need to tell you—”
“Can it wait?” he asked, trying to stop the room from spinning. He wished he had taken some aspirin. Mildly curious about what she had to say, he suddenly imagined that the alcohol had freed some inherent block, and a small window had opened, which he could peer into and learn whatever dark secrets his new bride harbored.
“No,” she said. “It can’t wait. But… I don’t know if I can say.”
“Tell me,” Caleb insisted, barely able to keep his eyes open. But at that moment, his stomach lurched, the room spun even harder, and he ran to the bathroom, which happened to be down the hall, shared by six other guestrooms. Fortunately it was empty, and when he returned to the room, Lydia was snoring. He slid under the covers and fell fast asleep beside her.
In the morning, the phone woke them up.
Lydia got to it first. “Wrong room,” she said, slamming the receiver down. Her hair was a mess, and sheet lines were written over her face. She turned to Caleb. “Ugh. Sorry, I don’t think that was the most romantic of wedding nights.”
“No.” He groaned. “But the ceremony was nice.”
“Sure was.” She sighed and looked out the window, closing her eyes and feeling the cool Venetian winds. “Let’s get something to eat and go see the cathedral.”
Caleb got up, then sat back down, the room still pitching. He put his head between his hands and groaned. “Was there something you were going to tell me last night?”
She shot him a glance of surprise. “I don’t… I don’t think so.”
“You’re not already married, are you?”
She walked over, bent down and gave him a long, lingering kiss. “Yes, that’s it. I’m actually married to the prince of Monaco, and when his royal soldiers find out what you’ve done, your death will be unspeakably cruel.” She smiled and tousled his hair. “Of course I’m not married. You know I’ve been waiting for you.” Her eyes, like emerald pebbles, searched his face, his eyes, his tangled hair. “I don’t remember what I said last night, honey. But I do remember you saying something about consummating our marriage?”
He grinned and pulled her back onto the bed.
Inside St. Mark’s Cathedral they jostled in and out of crowds, shuffling from the gorgeous statues of one saint to another, from one sprawling mosaic to the next, only to find themselves standing before a wall-length image depicting, of all things, a lighthouse.
“Didn’t you know about this?” Lydia asked, and for a moment Caleb had the suspicion that she had directed him to this spot on purpose, maybe to get him thinking about the past again.
“I did, but I forgot. I remember something in my father’s research about one of the earliest surviving depictions of the Pharos being found here.” Caleb traced the tiny facets making up the image. “Not quite to scale, and smaller than I’ve seen, but that’s it.”
“Why is it here?” she asked.
“St. Mark was thought to be martyred in Alexandria. And later, in 829 AD, Christians made a daring raid into Alexandria, stole his body out from under the Arabs and buried him here, under the main altar. Along with his body may have come the legacy of the Pharos, and one of few surviving pictures of what it really looked like.”
Lydia raised her eyebrows. She poked Caleb in the side and hugged his arm. “Sorry for bringing it up, but I just thought… well, I had an idea about our next book.”
“No.” He looked her in the eyes, and his smile faded. “I’m not digging up those memories. I’m not going to—”
“—continue your father’s work?”
That was it. She had a knack for knowing how to hit him where it counted. He pulled her aside and they made their way through a tour group snapping pictures. They walked past somber statues of the saints and elaborate woodcarvings, up a flight of stairs and finally exited back at the piazza. The pigeons whirled and flitted around the crowds, the picture-takers, the musicians, the souvenir peddlers. The flapping of their wings seemed to create a breeze that stung at Caleb’s eyes.
“Sorry,” he said. “But, even despite my recent visions of Sostratus and the lighthouse… I’m just not ready for this discussion.”
“But we’re married,” Lydia said, smiling devilishly. “Good times and bad and all that. Don’t you want to keep your wife happy? I need a new project. And in case you didn’t read your contract, Doubleday needs another book out of you within two years.”
“Doubleday can wait,” he said, putting on a cheap pair of black sunglasses he had bought in Cairo. “They can wait forever if it means going back to my mother’s obsession.”
“It doesn’t have to involve her,” she said. “You have your own notes, we have all the research we need. We can go to Alexandria next week and start.”
Caleb kicked at a pigeon that came too close, missing by several feet. “Why the lighthouse, Lydia?”
“Because,” she said, barely above a whisper, “you’re dreaming about it. And not just that, I think it fits with our research. And I think you know this.”
“What do you mean?” His throat tightened up. His heart started pounding.
“You know…” she whispered. “You haven’t admitted it, but it’s the only thing that makes sense.”
His vision was getting blurry. Across the plaza, something tugged at his vision, the only clear image in the tide of activity. Beneath the Campanile clock tower, standing just at its base, was that man, the figure in green khakis with long hair over his face.
“Caleb?” A blurry Lydia tugged at his sleeve. She was still talking, trying to convince him of something. He heard her speaking about impregnable strongholds, great seals, and something else.
He blinked and wrenched his attention away from the figure, the first time he was ever able to do so, and stared at Lydia. “What did you say?”
“Aren’t you listening? I was talking about what you saw through Manetho’s eyes. The legendary writings of Thoth, said to contain the mysteries of creation, power over life and death, and knowledge of heaven and earth. Fragments of its message may have found their way into alchemy and the Arcanum, and formed the backbone of the Rosicrucian and Freemason movements.”