The Brotherhood of the Holy Shroud

  When she demurred, Moretti excused himself and left her alone. The room in which she found herself was breathtaking. On its walls hung a Canaletto, a Modigliani, a Braque, and a small Picasso.

  Absorbed in the Modigliani, Sofia was startled by a voice behind her.

  “Good morning, Dottoréssa Galloni.”

  She turned to find herself facing the most attractive man she had ever encountered, studying her with severe yet curious eyes. She felt herself blush, as though she had been caught doing something wrong.

  Umberto D’Alaqua was tall and elegantly dressed, probably in his mid-fifties. He radiated self-assurance and strength.

  “Good morning. I’m sorry, I was looking at the Modigliani. It’s stunning.”

  D’Alaqua merely smiled slightly. “We’ll be more comfortable in my office, Dottoréssa Galloni.”

  Sofia nodded and followed him to a nearby suite of rooms. D’Alaqua’s office was comfortable, furnished with contemporary furniture that highlighted the magnificent works of art covering the walls: several da Vinci drawings, a quattrocento Madonna, a Christ by El Greco, a Picasso harlequin, a Miró…. On a small table in a corner across from the large desk, the simplicity of a crucifix carved from olive wood drew her attention.

  D’Alaqua gestured her toward the couch, and he seated himself in an armchair beside her.

  “Well, Dottoréssa Galloni, how may I help you?”

  Sofia hit him without preamble. “Signor D’Alaqua, we suspect that the fire in the cathedral was not an accident. In fact, we believe that none of the unfortunate events that have occurred in the Turin Cathedral have been accidents.”

  Nothing in D’Alaqua’s expression betrayed the slightest sign of concern, or even surprise. He looked at her calmly, apparently waiting for her to go on, as though nothing he was hearing had anything to do with him.

  “Did you know the men who were working in the cathedral? And do you feel you can fully trust them?”

  “Dottoréssa Galloni, COCSA is one of many corporations I own or on whose board of directors I sit. You can understand that I don’t personally know all the employees of those corporations. In this as in any other business, there is a human-resources office, which I’m sure will have provided you with all the information you need on the men working in the cathedral. But if you require more, I’ll be glad to ask the head of that department to put everything you need at your disposal.”

  He picked up the telephone and asked to be put through to the head of personnel.

  “Signor Lazotti, I’d appreciate your meeting with Dottoréssa Galloni of the Art Crimes Department. She needs more information on the men working in the cathedral. My secretary will bring her to your office in a few minutes…. Yes, thank you.” He put down the receiver and looked at her calmly; clearly he considered the interview over. She’d blown it.

  “Do you think what I’ve told you is utterly absurd, Signor D’Alaqua?” Sofia pressed.

  “Dottoréssa Galloni, you and your team are the professionals, and you do your job. I have no opinion at all with respect to your suspicions or your line of investigation. Is there anything else I can help you with?”

  Sofia raised her chin slightly and smiled. “We may have more questions for you as our inquiry proceeds, Signor D’Alaqua. We just wanted to advise you of our thinking and that therefore we’re going to be doing a thorough investigation of your personnel.”

  “Signor Lazotti will give you all the help you need, I’m sure.”

  D’Alaqua wasn’t going to say another word. Sofia stood up and extended her hand.

  “Thank you for your cooperation.”

  “A pleasure to meet you, Dottoréssa Galloni.”

  Sofia was furious with herself but managed to chat amiably with Moretti, D’Alaqua’s secretary, as he walked her to Mario Lazotti’s office.

  Lazotti greeted her with a smile. “Tell me, Dottoréssa Galloni, what is it you need?”

  “I need all the information you have on the men who were working in the cathedral, including all the personal details you have.”

  “I gave all that information to one of your colleagues in the Art Crimes Department and to the police, but I’ll be happy to give you a copy of the entire file as well. I’ve already asked my secretary to prepare it for you. As for personal information, I’m afraid we won’t be of much help there; COCSA is a large corporation, and it’s difficult to get to know each and every employee. The supervisor at the cathedral might be your best source in that regard.”

  A young woman came in with a large file folder, which Lazotti handed to Sofia.

  Sofia thanked him and settled more comfortably into the chair he had offered her. “Signor Lazotti, have you had many accidents like the one in the Turin Cathedral?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “COCSA is a company that does a lot of work for the Church. You’ve made repairs and done maintenance work on almost every cathedral in Italy.”

  “Italy and most of Europe. And accidents, unfortunately, happen, even though we closely comply with all security and safety regulations and take strict measures of our own.”

  “Could you give me a list of all the accidents COCSA has had in the course of its work on cathedrals?”

  “I’ll look into it and do everything I can. It won’t be easy. In every job there are problems, incidents of one sort or another—cuts, bruises, falls, broken arms, that sort of thing—and I’m not sure we keep a record of all of them. Normally, the chief engineer or supervisor files a report at the time, though, so…How far back would you want me to go?”

  “Let’s say the last fifty years.”

  Lazotti allowed himself an incredulous look, but he never lost his air of cool efficiency.

  “I’ll do what I can,” he repeated. “Where do you want the information sent?”

  “Here’s my card, and here’s my cell phone number. Call me, and if I’m in Turin I’ll come by and pick it up. If not, you can send it to my office in Rome.”

  “I hope you’ll excuse my asking, Dottoréssa Galloni, but what is it you’re looking for?”

  Sofia measured him with a quick look, then decided to tell him the truth.

  “I’m looking for whoever it is that creates ‘accidents’ in the Turin Cathedral.”

  “Sorry?” Lazotti seemed genuinely puzzled.

  “We don’t think these events are accidents. We’re looking for the person or persons behind them.”

  “You’re joking! But of course you’re not. But who would want to damage the cathedral? You suspect our employees?”

  “That’s what we want to find out—who and why.”

  “But are you sure? On what evidence? You’re directly accusing COCSA’s employees of involvement in this?”

  “It’s not an accusation, but it’s something we need to investigate.”

  “All right. Of course. You can count on us to cooperate fully.”

  “I am counting on you, Signor Lazotti.”

  Sofia left the glass-and-steel building, mulling whether she’d chosen the right strategy in revealing her suspicions to COCSA’s head of human resources as well as to D’Alaqua. At that very moment D’Alaqua might be calling the minister to complain. Or he might not be doing anything—either because he gave their suspicions no importance, or because he did.

  She needed to call Marco immediately. If D’Alaqua was talking to the minister, she had to prepare her boss for what was coming.

  She had also come to a decision about Pietro. She was going to break it off. Their relationship suddenly struck her as disgusting.

  Izaz’s quill filled parchment after parchment with the stories that Thaddeus told.

  Abgar and the queen had praised the scrolls he had so carefully produced, and he dreamed that someday he, too, might become a royal scribe. Thaddeus called for him often, to dictate to him the memories of the Nazarene that were so dear to him, and the young man knew by heart the adventures that Thaddeus and Jesus had shared.

  T
haddeus would close his eyes and seem to submerge himself in a dream as he told the stories—what Jesus was like, the things he said, the things he did.

  Josar had also written his own remembrances and had had them copied down, and one copy of each account was kept in the royal archives. They would do the same with the stories told by Thaddeus. Thus had Abgar ordered, for the king dreamed that Edessa might leave to its children the true story of Jesus.

  Time had passed, and Thaddeus had remained. The queen and Abgar had asked him to stay, to help them be good Christians, to help Josar spread the teachings of Jesus, and to make Edessa a place of refuge for all those who believed in him.

  Izaz was glad that Thaddeus had not left the city. His uncle was comforted that there was another person in Edessa who had known the Nazarene, and Josar sought the counsel of Thaddeus with respect to what he should say to the citizens of the city who came to his house to learn of the Savior and to pray.

  Every day Thaddeus went with Josar to the first temple that the queen had had raised to Jesus. There he spoke to and prayed with groups of men and women who came to seek consolation for their tribulations, came in hopes that their prayers might reach that Jesus who had saved Abgar from his cruel disease. He also sat with the faithful who congregated in a new temple built by the great Marcius, the royal architect.

  Thaddeus had asked Marcius to make the new temple as simple as the old one, which was little more than a house with a great atrium in which the word of Jesus might be preached. He told Marcius how Jesus had cast the moneylenders out of the temple in Jerusalem and how the spirit of Jesus could live only in a place of simplicity and peace.

  “I, Maanu, prince of Edessa, son of Abgar, implore thee, Syn, god of gods, to aid me in destroying the impious men who confound our people and incite them to abandon thee and betray the gods of our fathers.”

  On a rocky promontory a few leagues from Edessa, the altar to Syn was illuminated only by the flickering torches inserted into the walls of the cave that served as the god’s temple. The relief portrait of Syn was carved into the stone wall with such art that it looked almost real, as though the gods were with them.

  Maanu breathed deeply of the incense and aromatic herbs that intoxicated the senses and helped him communicate with the powerful moon god. At his side was his faithful Marvuz, the leader of the king’s guard, who would become Maanu’s principal counselor when Abgar died and who also worshipped Syn and the other ancient deities, as did other Edessians faithful to the traditions of the ages.

  Syn seemed to hear Maanu’s prayer, for he burst forth from the clouds of incense and illuminated the sanctuary.

  Sultanept, the high priest of the cult, told Maanu that this was a sign, the manner by which the god showed men that he was among them.

  Along with five others priests, Sultanept lived in hiding in Sumurtar, sheltered by the tunnels and subterranean chambers in which they served the gods—the sun, the moon, and the planets, alpha and omega of all things.

  Maanu had promised Sultanept to restore him to the power and wealth that Abgar had taken from him when he set aside the religion of their fathers.

  “My prince, we should go,” Marvuz murmured. “The king may call for you, and we left the palace many hours ago.”

  “He will not call me, Marvuz; he will think I am drinking with my friends in some tavern or off fornicating with a dancing girl. My father hardly cares for me, so downcast is he that I will not accept the worship of his Jesus. The queen is to blame for it. She has convinced him to betray our gods and has made that Nazarene their only god.

  “But I assure you, Marvuz, that the city shall turn its eyes once more to Syn and destroy the temples that the queen has built to honor the Nazarene. The moment Abgar goes to his eternal rest, we will kill the queen and put an end to the life of Josar and his friend Thaddeus.”

  Marvuz trembled. He bore no affection for the queen; he considered her a hard woman, the true ruler of Edessa since Abgar had first fallen ill, despite the king’s recovery of his health. And the queen distrusted Marvuz. He could feel her icy gaze upon him, following his every move, for she knew that he was a friend of Maanu. But even so, could he kill her? For he was certain that Maanu would ask him to do it.

  He would have no problem killing Josar and Thaddeus. He would run them through with his sword. He was weary of their sermons, their words filled with rebuke because he fornicated with any woman who would go with him and because, in honor of Syn, he drank without moderation on nights of the full moon until he lost his senses, for he, Marvuz, still worshipped the gods of his fathers, the gods of his city. He did not accept the imposition of this effeminate and virtuous god that Josar and Thaddeus never ceased speaking of.

  THE SUN WAS RISING ON THE BOSPHORUS AS THE Stella di Mare cut through the waves near Istanbul and her crew rushed about in preparation for docking.

  The captain watched the dark-skinned young man silently swabbing the deck. In Genoa, one of his men had gotten sick and could not make the voyage, and his executive officer had brought him this fellow. The XO had assured him that although the new man was mute, he was an experienced sailor recommended by one of the regulars at the Green Falcon, the tavern on the docks they all frequented when they were in port. At the time, given their imminent sailing, the captain hadn’t noticed that the man’s hands were soft, with not a single callus—the hands of a man who had never done a seaman’s work. But the mute followed every order he was given during the crossing, and his eyes showed no emotion, no matter what job he was given.

  The XO had said that the man would depart the ship in Istanbul, but all he’d done was shrug his shoulders when the captain asked him why.

  The captain was Genovese. He’d been a sailor for forty years, and he’d docked in a thousand ports and known every kind of person. But this young man was a strange one, with failure etched on his face and resignation in his every gesture, as though he knew he’d come to the end. But the end of what?

  Istanbul was more beautiful to him than ever. He breathed deep as his eyes scanned the port. He knew that someone would be coming for him, perhaps the same man who had hidden him when he arrived from Urfa. He yearned to return to his own town, embrace his father, feel the arms of his wife about him again, hear the happy laughter of his daughter.

  He feared his meeting with Addaio, feared the pastor’s disappointment. But at this moment failure, his own failure, meant very little to him, for he was alive and almost home. It was more than his brother had been able to do two years earlier. They had heard nothing, nothing from him since that black evening when he’d been arrested like a common thief. Their contact in Turin had told him that Mendib was still in prison but should be free in a year.

  He got off the boat without saying good-bye to anyone. The night before, the captain had paid him the wages they’d agreed upon and asked him if he didn’t want to stay on with the crew. With signs, he had refused.

  He left the dock area and began to walk, not knowing exactly where to go. If the man from Istanbul didn’t appear, he would find some way to get to Urfa on his own. He had the money he’d earned as a sailor.

  He heard quick footsteps behind him, and when he turned he saw the man who’d given him shelter a few months earlier.

  “I’ve been following you for a while, watching, to be sure no one else was on your tail. You’ll be sleeping tonight at my house; they’ll come for you early tomorrow morning. It’s best you not leave the house until then.”

  The mute nodded. He’d have liked to walk around Istanbul, wander through the narrow streets of the bazaar, find perfume for his wife, a gift for his daughter, but he wouldn’t do that. Any further complication would anger Addaio even more.

  A soft rapping on the woven-rush door of the house woke Josar from a troubled sleep.

  Dawn had not yet broken over Edessa, but the soldier at the door brought him orders directly from the queen. At dusk, Josar and Thaddeus were to come to the palace. The guard was unable to mask his unea
siness, and his message delivered, he was clearly glad to be away.

  On his knees, his eyes closed, Josar prayed that God might give him balm for the disquiet that filled his soul.

  Izaz arrived a few hours later, at almost the same time as Thaddeus. Josar’s nephew had grown into a robust, intelligent young man. He brought news of the rumors that were circulating wildly in the palace. Abgar’s strength was ebbing; he was failing almost before one’s eyes. The physicians spoke in hushed voices, and rumor had it they had told the queen that there was little hope the king would emerge from what appeared to be death’s last assault upon his life.

  Knowing that he was dying, Abgar had asked the queen to call his closest friends and advisers to his bedside so he might impart the instructions to be followed after his death. That was why the queen had called Josar, then. To Izaz’s surprise, he, too, had been called to the side of the king.

  When they arrived at the palace they were escorted quickly into the presence of the king, who was lying on his couch, his pallor dramatically worse than in recent days. The queen, who was cooling Abgar’s brow with a cloth moistened with rose water, sighed with relief when she saw them enter.

  Two other men entered the king’s chamber: Marcius, the royal architect, and Senin, the wealthiest merchant in Edessa and a blood relative of Abgar, to whom he maintained absolute allegiance.

  The queen motioned them all toward the king’s couch as she sent the servants away and ordered the guards to close the doors and allow no one else to enter.

  “My friends, I wanted to take my earthly leave of you and instruct you in my last wishes.”

  Abgar’s voice was weak. The king was dying and he knew it, and the respect and love the men bore him prevented them from speaking words of false hope. Thus they stood in silence at his bedside, to hear what he wished to say to them.