eed to get off the street immediately.
The police will be looking for the limousine soon, and I do not want you
caught. Opus Dei has a residence in London, no?"
"Of course."
"And you are welcome there?"
"As a brother."
"Then go there and stay out of sight. I will call you the moment I am
in possession of the keystone and have attended to my current problem."
"You are in London?"
"Do as I say, and everything will be fine."
"Yes, sir."
The Teacher heaved a sigh, as if what he now had to do was profoundly
regrettable. "It's time I speak to Rumy."
Silas handed Rumy the phone, sensing it might be the last call Rumy
Legaludec ever took.
As Rumy took the phone, he knew this poor, twisted monk had no idea
what fate awaited him now that he had served his purpose.
The Teacher used you, Silas.
And your bishop is a pawn.
Rumy still marveled at the Teacher's powers of persuasion. Bishop
Aringarosa had trusted everything. He had been blinded by his own
desperation. Aringarosa was far too eager to believe. Although Rumy did not
particularly like the Teacher, he felt pride at having gained the man's
trust and helped him so substantially. I have earned my payday.
"Listen carefully," the Teacher said. "Take Silas to the Opus Dei
residence hall and drop him off a few streets away. Then drive to St.
James's Park. It is adjacent to Parliament and Big Ben. You can park the
limousine on Horse Guards Parade. We'll talk there."
With that, the connection went dead.
CHAPTER 92
King's College, established by King George IV in 1829, houses its
Department of Theology and Religious Studies adjacent to Parliament on
property granted by the Crown. King's College Religion Department boasts not
only 150 years' experience in teaching and research, but the 1982
establishment of the Research Institute in Systematic Theology, which
possesses one of the most complete and electronically advanced religious
research libraries in the world.
Langdon still felt shaky as he and Sophie came in from the rain and
entered the library. The primary research room was as Teabing had described
it--a dramatic octagonal chamber dominated by an enormous round table around
which King Arthur and his knights might have been comfortable were it not
for the presence of twelve flat-screen computer workstations. On the far
side of the room, a reference librarian was just pouring a pot of tea and
settling in for her day of work.
"Lovely morning," she said in a cheerful British accent, leaving the
tea and walking over. "May I help you?"
"Thank you, yes," Langdon replied. "My name is--"
"Robert Langdon." She gave a pleasant smile. "I know who you are."
For an instant, he feared Fache had put him on English television as
well, but the librarian's smile suggested otherwise. Langdon still had not
gotten used to these moments of unexpected celebrity. Then again, if anyone
on earth were going to recognize his face, it would be a librarian in a
Religious Studies reference facility.
"Pamela Gettum," the librarian said, offering her hand. She had a
genial, erudite face and a pleasingly fluid voice. The horn-rimmed glasses
hanging around her neck were thick.
"A pleasure," Langdon said. "This is my friend Sophie Neveu."
The two women greeted one another, and Gettum turned immediately back
to Langdon. "I didn't know you were coming."
"Neither did we. If it's not too much trouble, we could really use your
help finding some information."
Gettum shifted, looking uncertain. "Normally our services are by
petition and appointment only, unless of course you're the guest of someone
at the college?"
Langdon shook his head. "I'm afraid we've come unannounced. A friend of
mine speaks very highly of you. Sir Leigh Teabing?" Langdon felt a pang of
gloom as he said the name. "The British Royal Historian."
Gettum brightened now, laughing. "Heavens, yes. What a character.
Fanatical! Every time he comes in, it's always the same search strings.
Grail. Grail. Grail. I swear that man will die before he gives up on that
quest." She winked. "Time and money afford one such lovely luxuries,
wouldn't you say? A regular Don Quixote, that one."
"Is there any chance you can help us?" Sophie asked. "It's quite
important."
Gettum glanced around the deserted library and then winked at them
both. "Well, I can't very well claim I'm too busy, now can I? As long as you
sign in, I can't imagine anyone being too upset. What did you have in mind?"
"We're trying to find a tomb in London."
Gettum looked dubious. "We've got about twenty thousand of them. Can
you be a little more specific?"
"It's the tomb of a knight. We don't have a name."
"A knight. That tightens the net substantially. Much less common."
"We don't have much information about the knight we're looking for,"
Sophie said, "but this is what we know." She produced a slip of paper on
which she had written only the first two lines of the poem.
Hesitant to show the entire poem to an outsider, Langdon and Sophie had
decided to share just the first two lines, those that identified the knight.
Compartmentalized cryptography, Sophie had called it. When an intelligence
agency intercepted a code containing sensitive data, cryptographers each
worked on a discrete section of the code. This way, when they broke it, no
single cryptographer possessed the entire deciphered message.
In this case, the precaution was probably excessive; even if this
librarian saw the entire poem, identified the knight's tomb, and knew what
orb was missing, the information was useless without the cryptex.
Gettum sensed an urgency in the eyes of this famed American scholar,
almost as if his finding this tomb quickly were a matter of critical
importance. The green-eyed woman accompanying him also seemed anxious.
Puzzled, Gettum put on her glasses and examined the paper they had just
handed her.
In London lies a knight a Pope interred.
His labor's fruit a Holy wrath incurred.
She glanced at her guests. "What is this? Some kind of Harvard
scavenger hunt?"
Langdon's laugh sounded forced. "Yeah, something like that."
Gettum paused, feeling she was not getting the whole story.
Nonetheless, she felt intrigued and found herself pondering the verse
carefully. "According to this rhyme, a knight did something that incurred
displeasure with God, and yet a Pope was kind enough to bury him in London."
Langdon nodded. "Does it ring any bells?"
Gettum moved toward one of the workstations. "Not offhand, but let's
see what we can pull up in the database."
Over the past two decades, King's College Research Institute in
Systematic Theology had used optical character recognition software in
unison with linguistic translation devices to digitize and catalog an
enormous collection of texts--encyclopedias of religion, religious
biographies, sacred scriptures in dozens of languages, histories, Vatican
letters, diaries of clerics, anything at all that qualified as writings on
human spirituality. Because the massive collection was now in the form of
bits and bytes rather than physical pages, the data was infinitely more
accessible.
Settling into one of the workstations, Gettum eyed the slip of paper
and began typing. "To begin, we'll run a straight Boolean with a few obvious
keywords and see what happens."
"Thank you."
Gettum typed in a few words:
LONDON, KNIGHT, POPE
As she clicked the SEARCH button, she could feel the hum of the massive
mainframe downstairs scanning data at a rate of 500 MB/sec. "I'm asking the
system to show us any documents whose complete text contains all three of
these keywords. We'll get more hits than we want, but it's a good place to
start."
The screen was already showing the first of the hits now.
Painting the Pope. The Collected Portraits of Sir Joshua Reynolds.
London University Press.
Gettum shook her head. "Obviously not what you're looking for." She
scrolled to the next hit.
The London Writings of Alexander Pope by G. Wilson Knight.
Again she shook her head.
As the system churned on, the hits came up more quickly than usual.
Dozens of texts appeared, many of them referencing the eighteenth-century
British writer Alexander Pope, whose counterreligious, mock-epic poetry
apparently contained plenty of references to knights and London.
Gettum shot a quick glance to the numeric field at the bottom of the
screen. This computer, by calculating the current number of hits and
multiplying by the percentage of the database left to search, provided a
rough guess of how much information would be found. This particular search
looked like it was going to return an obscenely large amount of data.
Estimated number of total hits: 2,692
"We need to refine the parameters further," Gettum said, stopping the
search. "Is this all the information you have regarding the tomb? There's
nothing else to go on?"
Langdon glanced at Sophie Neveu, looking uncertain.
This is no scavenger hunt, Gettum sensed. She had heard the whisperings
of Robert Langdon's experience in Rome last year. This American had been
granted access to the most secure library on earth--the Vatican Secret
Archives. She wondered what kinds of secrets Langdon might have learned
inside and if his current desperate hunt for a mysterious London tomb might
relate to information he had gained within the Vatican. Gettum had been a
librarian long enough to know the most common reason people came to London
to look for knights. The Grail.
Gettum smiled and adjusted her glasses. "You are friends with Leigh
Teabing, you are in England, and you are looking for a knight." She folded
her hands. "I can only assume you are on a Grail quest."
Langdon and Sophie exchanged startled looks.
Gettum laughed. "My friends, this library is a base camp for Grail
seekers. Leigh Teabing among them. I wish I had a shilling for every time
I'd run searches for the Rose, Mary Magdalene, Sangreal, Merovingian, Priory
of Sion, et cetera, et cetera. Everyone loves a conspiracy." She took off
her glasses and eyed them. "I need more information."
In the silence, Gettum sensed her guests' desire for discretion was
quickly being outweighed by their eagerness for a fast result.
"Here," Sophie Neveu blurted. "This is everything we know." Borrowing a
pen from Langdon, she wrote two more lines on the slip of paper and handed
it to Gettum.
You seek the orb that ought be on his tomb.
It speaks of Rosy flesh and seeded womb.
Gettum gave an inward smile. The Grail indeed, she thought, noting the
references to the Rose and her seeded womb. "I can help you," she said,
looking up from the slip of paper. "Might I ask where this verse came from?
And why you are seeking an orb?"
"You might ask," Langdon said, with a friendly smile, "but it's a long
story and we have very little time."
"Sounds like a polite way of saying 'mind your own business.' "
"We would be forever in your debt, Pamela," Langdon said, "if you could
find out who this knight is and where he is buried."
"Very well," Gettum said, typing again. "I'll play along. If this is a
Grail-related issue, we should cross-reference against Grail keywords. I'll
add a proximity parameter and remove the title weighting. That will limit
our hits only to those instances of textual keywords that occur near a
Grail-related word."
Search for: KNIGHT, LONDON, POPE, TOMB
Within 100 word proximity of: GRAIL, ROSE, SANGREAL, CHALICE
"How long will this take?" Sophie asked.
"A few hundred terabytes with multiple cross-referencing fields?"
Gettum's eyes glimmered as she clicked the SEARCH key. "A mere fifteen
minutes."
Langdon and Sophie said nothing, but Gettum sensed this sounded like an
eternity to them.
"Tea?" Gettum asked, standing and walking toward the pot she had made
earlier. "Leigh always loves my tea."
CHAPTER 93
London's Opus Dei Centre is a modest brick building at 5 Orme Court,
overlooking the North Walk at Kensington Gardens. Silas had never been here,
but he felt a rising sense of refuge and asylum as he approached the
building on foot. Despite the rain, Rumy had dropped him off a short
distance away in order to keep the limousine off the main streets. Silas
didn't mind the walk. The rain was cleansing.
At Rumy's suggestion, Silas had wiped down his gun and disposed of it
through a sewer grate. He was glad to get rid of it. He felt lighter. His
legs still ached from being bound all that time, but Silas had endured far
greater pain. He wondered, though, about Teabing, whom Rumy had left bound
in the back of the limousine. The Briton certainly had to be feeling the
pain by now.
"What will you do with him?" Silas had asked Rumy as they drove over
here.
Rumy had shrugged. "That is a decision for the Teacher." There was an
odd finality in his tone.
Now, as Silas approached the Opus Dei building, the rain began to fall
harder, soaking his heavy robe, stinging the wounds of the day before. He
was ready to leave behind the sins of the last twenty-four hours and purge
his soul. His work was done.
Moving across a small courtyard to the front door, Silas was not
surprised to find the door unlocked. He opened it and stepped into the
minimalist foyer. A muted electronic chime sounded upstairs as Silas stepped
onto the carpet. The bell was a common feature in these halls where the
residents spent most of the day in their rooms in prayer. Silas could hear
movement above on the creaky wood floors.
A man in a cloak came downstairs. "May I help you?" He had kind eyes
that seemed not even to register Silas's startling physical appearance.
"Thank you. My name is Silas. I am an Opus Dei numerary."
"American?"
Silas nodded. "I am in town only for the day. Might I rest here?"
"You need not even ask. There are two empty rooms on the third floor.
Shall I bring you some tea and bread?"
"Thank you." Silas was famished.
Silas went upstairs to a modest room with a window, where he took off
his wet robe and knelt down to pray in his undergarments. He heard his host
come up and lay a tray outside his door. Silas finished his prayers, ate his
food, and lay down to sleep.
Three stories below, a phone was ringing. The Opus Dei numerary who had
welcomed Silas answered the line.
"This is the London police," the caller said. "We are trying to find an
albino monk. We've had a tip-off that he might be there. Have you seen him?"
The numerary was startled. "Yes, he is here. Is something wrong?"
"He is there now?"
"Yes, upstairs praying. What is going on?"
"Leave him precisely where he is," the officer commanded. "Don't say a
word to anyone. I'm sending officers over right away."
CHAPTER 94
St. James's Park is a sea of green in the middle of London, a public
park bordering the palaces of Westminster, Buckingham, and St. James's. Once
enclosed by King Henry VIII and stocked with deer for the hunt, St. James's
Park is now open to the public. On sunny afternoons, Londoners picnic
beneath the willows and feed the pond's resident pelicans, whose ancestors
were a gift to Charles II from the Russian ambassador.
The Teacher saw no pelicans today. The stormy weather had brought
instead seagulls from the ocean. The lawns were covered with them--hundreds
of white bodies all facing the same direction, patiently riding out the damp
wind. Despite the morning fog, the park afforded splendid views of the
Houses of Parliament and Big Ben. Gazing across the sloping lawns, past the
duck pond and the delicate silhouettes of the weeping willows, the Teacher
could see the spires of the building that housed the knight's tomb--the real
reason he had told Rumy to come to this spot.
As the Teacher approached the front passenger door of the parked
limousine, Rumy leaned across and opened the door. The Teacher paused
outside, taking a pull from the flask of cognac he was carrying. Then,
dabbing his mouth, he slid in beside Rumy and closed the door.
Rumy held up the keystone like a trophy. "It was almost lost."
"You have done well," the Teacher said.
"We have done well," Rumy replied, laying the keystone in the Teacher's
eager hands.
The Teacher admired it a long moment, smiling. "And the gun? You wiped
it down?"
"Back in the glove box where I found it."
"Excellent." The Teacher took another drink of cognac and handed the
flask to Rumy. "Let's toast our success. The end is near."
Rumy accepted the bottle gratefully. The cognac tasted salty, but Rumy
didn't care. He and the Teacher were truly partners now. He could feel
himself ascending to a higher station in life. I will never be a servant
again. As Rumy gazed down the embankment at the duck pond below, Chuteau
Villette seemed miles away.
Taking another swig from the flask, Rumy could feel the cognac warming
his blood. The warmth in Rumy's throat, however, mutated quickly to an
uncomfortable heat. Loosening his bow tie, Rumy tasted an unpleasant
grittiness and handed the flask back to the Teacher. "I've probably had
enough," he managed, weakly.
Taking the flask, the Teacher said, "Rumy, as you are aware, you are
the only one who knows my face. I placed enormous trust in you."
"Yes," he said, feeling feverish as he loosened his tie further. "And
your identity shall go with me to the grave."
The Teacher was silent a long moment. "I believe you." Pocketing the
flask and the keystone, the Teacher reached for the glove box and pulled out
the tiny Medusa revolver. For an instant, Rumy felt a surge of fear, but the
Teacher simply slipped it in his trousers pocket.
What is he doing? Rumy felt himself sweating suddenly.
"I know I promised you freedom," the Teacher said, his voice now
sounding regretful. "But considering your circumstances, this is the best I
can do."
The swelling in Rumy's throat came on like an earthquake, and he
lurched against the steering column, grabbing his throat and tasting vomit
in his narrowing esophagus. He let out a muted croak of a scream, not even
loud enough to be heard outside the car. The saltiness in the cognac now
registered.
I'm being murdered!
Incredulous, Rumy turned to see the Teacher sitting calmly beside him,
staring straight ahead out the windshield. Rumy's eyesight blurred, and he
gasped for breath. I made everything possible for him! How could he do this!
Whether the Teacher had intended to kill Rumy all along or whether it had
been Rumy's actions in the Temple Church that had made the Teacher lose
faith, Rumy would never know. Terror and rage coursed through him now. Rumy
tried to lunge for the Teacher, but his stiffening body could barely move. I
trusted you with everything!
Rumy tried to lift his clenched fists to blow the horn, but instead he
slipped sideways, rolling onto the seat, lying on his side beside the
Teacher, clutching at his throat. The rain fell harder now. Rumy could no
longer see, but he could sense his oxygen-deprived brain straining to cling
to his last faint shreds of lucidity. As his world slowly went black, Rumy
Legaludec could have sworn he heard the sounds of the soft Riviera surf.
The Teacher stepped from the limousine, pleased to see that nobody was
looking in his direction. I had no choice, he told himself, surprised how
little remorse he felt for what he had just done. Rumy sealed his own fate.
The Teacher had feared all along that Rumy might need to be eliminated when
the mission was complete, but by brazenly showing himself in the Temple
Church, Rumy had accelerated the necessity dramatically. Robert Langdon's
unexpected visit to Chuteau Villette had brought the Teacher both a
fortuitous windfall and an intricate dilemma. Langdon had delivered the
keystone directly to the heart of the operation, which was a pleasant
surprise, and yet he had brought the police on his tail. Rumy's prints were
all over Chuteau Villette, as well as in the barn's listening post, where
Rumy had carried out the surveillance. The Teacher was grateful he had taken
so much care in preventing any ties between Rumy's activities and his own.
Nobody could implicate the Teacher unless Rumy talked, and that was no
longer a concern.
One more loose end to tie up here, the Teacher thought, moving now
toward the rear door of the limousine. The police will have no idea what
happened... and no living witness left to tell them. Glancing around to
ensure nobody was watching, he pulled open the door and climbed into the
spacious rear compartment.
Minutes later, the Teacher was crossing St. James's Park. Only two
people now remain. Langdon and Neveu. They were more complicated. But
manageable. At the moment, however, the Teacher had the cryptex to attend
to.
Gazing triumphantly across the park, he could see his destination. In
London lies a knight a Pope interred. As soon as the Teacher had heard the
poem, he had known the answer. Even so, that the others had not figured it
out was not surprising. I have an unfair advantage. Having listened to
Sauniure's conversations for months now, the Teacher had heard the Grand
Master mention this famous knight on occasion, expressing esteem almost
matching that he held for Da Vinci. The poem's reference to the knight was
brutally simple once one saw it--a credit to Sauniure's wit--and yet how
this tomb would reveal the final password was still a mystery.
You seek the orb that ought be on his tomb.
The Teacher vaguely recalled photos of the famous tomb and, in
particular, its most distinguishing feature. A magnificent orb. The huge
sphere mounted atop the tomb was almost as large as the tomb itself. The
presence of the orb seemed both encouraging and troubling to the Teacher. On
one hand, it felt like a signpost, and yet, according to the poem, the
missing piece of the puzzle was an orb that ought to be on his tomb... not
one that was already there. He was counting on his closer inspection of the
tomb to unveil the answer.
The rain was getting heavier now, and he tucked the cryptex deep in his
right-hand pocket to protect it from the dampness. He kept the tiny Medusa
revolver in his left, out of sight. Within minutes, he was stepping into the
quiet sanctuary of London's grandest nine-hundred-year-old building.
Just as the Teacher was stepping out of the rain, Bishop Aringarosa was
stepping into it. On the rainy tarmac at Biggin Hill Executive Airport,
Aringarosa emerged from his cramped plane, bundling his cassock against the
cold damp. He had hoped to be greeted by Captain Fache. Instead a young
British police officer approached with an umbrella.
"Bishop Aringarosa? Captain Fache had to leave. He asked me to look
after you. He suggested I take you to Scotland Yard. He thought it would be
safest."
Safest? Aringarosa looked down at the heavy briefcase of Vatican bonds
clutched in his hand. He had almost forgotten. "Yes, thank you."
Aringarosa climbed into the police car, wondering where Silas could be.
Minutes later, the police scanner crackled with the answer.
5 Orme Court.
Aringarosa recognized the address instantly.
The Opus Dei Centre in London.
He spun to the driver. "Take me there at once!"
CHAPTER 95
Langdon's eyes had not left the computer screen since the search began.
Five minutes. Only two hits. Both irrelevant.
He was starting to get worried.
Pamela Gettum was in the adjoining room, preparing hot drinks. Langdon
and Sophie had inquired unwisely if there might be some coffee brewing
alongside the tea Gettum had offered, and from the sound of the microwave
beeps in the next room, Langdon suspected their request was about to be
rewarded with instant Nescafe.
Finally, the computer pinged happily.
"Sounds like you got another," Gettum called from the next room.
"What's the title?"
Langdon eyed the screen.
Grail Allegory in Medieval Literature: A Treatise on Sir Gawain and the
Green Knight.
"Allegory of the Green Knight," he called back.
"No good," Gettum said. "Not many mythological green giants buried in
London."
Langdon and Sophie sat patiently in front of the screen and waited
through two more dubious returns. When the computer pinged again, though,
the offering was unexpected.
DIE OPERN VON RICHARD WAGNER
"The operas of Wagner?" Sophie asked.
Gettum peeked back in the doorway, holding a packet of instant coffee.
"That seems like a strange match. Was Wagner a knight?"
"No," Langdon said, feeling a sudden intrigue. "But he was a well-known
Freemason." Along with Mozart, Beethoven, Shakespeare, Gershwin, Houdini,
and Disney. Volumes had been written about the ties between the Masons and
the Knights Templar, the Priory of Sion, and the Holy Grail. "I want to look
at this one. How do I see the full text?"
"You don't want the full text," Gettum called. "Click on the hypertext
title. The computer will display your keyword hits along with mono prelogs
and triple postlogs for context."
Langdon had no idea what she had just said, but he clicked anyway.
A new window popped up.
...mythological knight named Parsifal who...
...metaphorical Grail quest that arguably...
...the London Philharmonic in 1855...
Rebecca Pope's opera anthology "Diva's...
...Wagner's tomb in Bayreuth, Germany...
"Wrong Pope," Langdon said, disappointed. Even so, he was amazed by the
system's ease of use. The keywords with context were enough to remind him
that Wagner's opera Parsifal was a tribute to Mary Magdalene and the
bloodline of Jesus Christ, told through the story of a young knight on a
quest for truth.
"Just be patient," Gettum urged. "It's a numbers game. Let the machine
run."
Over the next few minutes, the computer returned several more Grail
references, including a text about troubadours--France's famous wandering
minstrels. Langdon knew it was no coincidence that the word minstrel and
minister shared an etymological root. The troubadours were the traveling
servants or "ministers" of the Church of Mary Magdalene, using music to
disseminate the story of the sacred feminine among the common folk. To this
day, the troubadours sang songs extolling the virtues of "our Lady"--a
mysterious and beautiful woman to whom they pledged themselves forever.
Eagerly, he checked the hypertext but found nothing.
The computer pinged again.
KNIGHTS, KNAVES, POPES, AND PENTACLES: THE HISTORY OF THE HOLY GRAIL
THROUGH TAROT
"Not surprising," Langdon said to Sophie. "Some of our keywords have
the same names as individual cards." He reached for the mouse to click on a
hyperlink. "I'm not sure if your grandfather ever mentioned it when you
played Tarot with him, Sophie, but this game is a 'flash-card catechism'
into the story of the Lost Bride and her subjugation by the evil Church."
Sophie eyed him, looking incredulous. "I had no idea."
"That's the point. By teaching through a metaphorical game, the
followers of the Grail disguised their message from the watchful eye of the
Church." Langdon often wondered how many modern card players had any clue
that their four suits--spades, hearts, clubs, diamonds--were Grail-related
symbols that came directly from Tarot's four suits of swords, cups,
scepters, and pentacles.
Spades were Swords--The blade. Male.
Hearts were Cups--The chalice. Feminine.
Clubs were Scepters--The Royal Line. The flowering staff.
Diamonds were Pentacles--The goddess. The sacred feminine.
Four minutes later, as Langdon began feeling fearful they would not
find what they had come for, the computer produced another hit.
The Gravity of Genius: Biography of a Modern Knight.
"Gravity of Genius?" Langdon called out to Gettum. "Bio of a modern
knight?"
Gettum stuck her head around the corner. "How modern? Please don't tell
me it's your Sir Rudy Giuliani. Personally, I found that one a bit off the
mark."
Langdon had his own qualms about the newly knighted Sir Mick Jagger,
but this hardly seemed the moment to debate the politics of modern British
knighthood. "Let's have a look." Langdon summoned up the hypertext keywords.
... honorable knight, Sir Isaac Newton...
... in London in 1727 and...
... his tomb in Westminster Abbey...
... Alexander Pope, friend and colleague...
"I guess 'modern' is a relative term," Sophie called to Gettum. "It's
an old book. About Sir Isaac Newton."
Gettum shook her head in the doorway. "No good. Newton was buried in
Westminster Abbey, the seat of English Protestantism. There's no way a
Catholic Pope was present. Cream and sugar?"
Sophie nodded.
Gettum waited. "Robert?"
Langdon's heart was hammering. He pulled his eyes from the screen and
stood up. "Sir Isaac Newton is our knight."
Sophie remained seated. "What are you talking about?"
"Newton is buried in London," Langdon said. "His labors produced new
sciences that incurred the wrath of the Church. And he was a Grand Master of
the Priory of Sion. What more could we want?"
"What more?" Sophie pointed to the poem. "How about a knight a Pope
interred? You heard Ms. Gettum. Newton was not buried by a Catholic Pope."
Langdon reached for the mouse. "Who said anything about a Catholic
Pope?" He clicked on the "Pope" hyperlink, and the complete sentence
appeared.
Sir Isaac Newton's burial, attended by kings and nobles, was presided
over by Alexander Pope, friend and colleague, who gave a stirring eulogy
before sprinkling dirt on the tomb.
Langdon looked at Sophie. "We had the correct Pope on our second hit.
Alexander." He paused. "A. Pope."
In London lies a knight A. Pope interred.
Sophie stood up, looking stunned.
Jacques Sauniure, the master of double-entendres, had proven once again
that he was a frighteningly clever man.
CHAPTER 96
Silas awoke with a start.
He had no idea what had awoken him or how long he had been asleep. Was
I dreaming? Sitting up now on his straw mat, he listened to the quiet
breathing of the Opus Dei residence hall, the stillness textured only by the
soft murmurs of someone praying aloud in a room below him. These were
familiar sounds and should have comforted him.
And yet he felt a sudden and unexpected wariness.
Standing, wearing only his undergarments, Silas walked to the window.
Was I followed? The courtyard below was deserted, exactly as he had seen it
when he entered. He listened. Silence. So why am I uneasy? Long ago Silas
had learned to trust his intuition. Intuition had kept him alive as a child
on the streets of Marseilles long before prison... long before he was born
again by the hand of Bishop Aringarosa. Peering out the window, he now saw
the faint outline of a car through the hedge. On the car's roof was a police
siren. A floorboard creaked in the hallway. A door latch moved.
Silas reacted on instinct, surging across the room and sliding to a
stop just behind the door as it crashed open. The first police officer
stormed through, swinging his gun left then right at what appeared an empty
room. Before he realized where Silas was, Silas had thrown his shoulder into
the door, crushing a second officer as he came through. As the first officer
wheeled to shoot, Silas dove for his legs. The gun went off, the bullet
sailing above Silas's head, just as he connected with the officer's shins,
driving his legs out from under him, and sending the man down, his head
hitting the floor. The second officer staggered to his feet in the doorway,
and Silas drove a knee into his groin, then went clambering over the
writhing body into the hall.
Almost naked, Silas hurled his pale body down the staircase. He knew he
had been betrayed, but by whom? When he reached the foyer, more officers
were surging through the front door. Silas turned the other way and dashed
deeper into the residence hall. The women's entrance. Every Opus Dei
building has one. Winding down narrow hallways, Silas snaked through a
kitchen, past terrified workers, who left to avoid the naked albino as he
knocked over bowls and silverware, bursting into a dark hallway near the
boiler room. He now saw the door he sought, an exit light gleaming at the
end.
Running full speed through the door out into the rain, Silas leapt off
the low landing, not seeing the officer coming the other way until it was
too late. The two men collided, Silas's broad, naked shoulder grinding into
the man's sternum with crushing force. He drove the officer backward onto
the pavement, landing hard on top of him. The officer's gun clattered away.
Silas could hear men running down the hall shouting. Rolling, he grabbed the
loose gun just as the officers emerged. A shot rang out on the stairs, and
Silas felt a searing pain below his ribs. Filled with rage, he opened fire
at all three officers, their blood spraying.
A dark shadow loomed behind, coming out of nowhere. The angry hands
that grabbed at his bare shoulders felt as if they were infused with the
power of the devil himself. The man roared in his ear. SILAS, NO!
Silas spun and fired. Their eyes met. Silas was already screaming in
horror as Bishop Aringarosa fell.
CHAPTER 97
More than three thousand people are entombed or enshrined within
Westminster Abbey. The colossal stone interior burgeons with the remains of
kings, statesmen, scientists, poets, and musicians. Their tombs, packed into
every last niche and alcove, range in grandeur from the most regal of
mausoleums--that of Queen Elizabeth I, whose canopied sarcophagus inhabits
its own private, apsidal chapel--down to the most modest etched floor tiles
whose inscriptions have worn away with centuries of foot traffic, leaving it
to one's imagination whose relics might lie below the tile in the
undercroft.
Designed in the style of the great cathedrals of Amiens, Chartres, and
Canterbury, Westminster Abbey is considered neither cathedral nor parish
church. It bears the classification of royal peculiar, subject only to the
Sovereign. Since hosting the coronation of William the Conqueror on
Christmas Day in 1066, the dazzling sanctuary has witnessed an endless
procession of royal ceremonies and affairs of state--from the canonization
of Edward the Confessor, to the marriage of Prince Andrew and Sarah
Ferguson, to the funerals of Henry V, Queen Elizabeth I, and Lady Diana.
Even so, Robert Langdon currently felt no interest in any of the
abbey's ancient history, save one event--the funeral of the British knight
Sir Isaac Newton.
In London lies a knight a Pope interred.
Hurrying through the grand portico on the north transept, Langdon and
Sophie were met by guards who politely ushered them through the abbey's
newest addition--a large walk-through metal detector--now present in most
historic buildings in London. They both passed through without setting off
the alarm and continued to the abbey entrance.
Stepping across the threshold into Westminster Abbey, Langdon felt the
outside world evaporate with a sudden hush. No rumble of traffic. No hiss of
rain. Just a deafening silence, which seemed to reverberate back and forth
as if the building were whispering to itself.
Langdon's and Sophie's eyes, like those of almost every visitor,
shifted immediately skyward, where the abbey's great abyss seemed to explode
overhead. Gray stone columns ascended like redwoods into the shadows,
arching gracefully over dizzying expanses, and then shooting back down to
the stone floor. Before them, the wide alley of the north transept stretched
out like a deep canyon, flanked by sheer cliffs of stained glass. On sunny
days, the abbey floor was a prismatic patchwork of light. Today, the rain
and darkness gave this massive hollow a wraithlike aura... more like that of
the crypt it truly was.
"It's practically empty," Sophie whispered.
Langdon felt disappointed. He had hoped for a lot more people. A more
public place. Their earlier experience in the deserted Temple Church was not
one Langdon wanted to repeat. He had been anticipating a certain feeling of
security in the popular tourist destination, but Langdon's recollections of
bustling throngs in a well-lit abbey had been formed during the peak summer
tourist season. Today was a rainy April morning. Rather than crowds and
shimmering stained glass, all Langdon saw was acres of desolate floor and
shadowy, empty alcoves.
"We passed through metal detectors," Sophie reminded, apparently
sensing Langdon's apprehension. "If anyone is in here, they can't be armed."
Langdon nodded but still felt circumspect. He had wanted to bring the
London police with them, but Sophie's fears of who might be involved put a
damper on any contact with the authorities. We need to recover the cryptex,
Sophie had insisted. It is the key to everything.
She was right, of course.
The key to getting Leigh back alive.
The key to finding the Holy Grail.
The key to learning who is behind this.
Unfortunately, their only chance to recover the keystone seemed to be
here and now... at the tomb of Isaac Newton. Whoever held the cryptex would
have to pay a visit to the tomb to decipher the final clue, and if they had
not already come and gone, Sophie and Langdon intended to intercept them.
Striding toward the left wall to get out of the open, they moved into
an obscure side aisle behind a row of pilasters. Langdon couldn't shake the
image of Leigh Teabing being held captive, probably tied up in the back of
his own limousine. Whoever had ordered the top Priory members killed would
not hesitate to eliminate others who stood in the way. It seemed a cruel
irony that Teabing--a modern British knight--was a hostage in the search for
his own countryman, Sir Isaac Newton.
"Which way is it?" Sophie asked, looking around.
The tomb. Langdon had no idea. "We should find a docent and ask."
Langdon knew better than to wander aimlessly in here. Westminster Abbey
was a tangled warren of mausoleums, perimeter chambers, and walk-in burial
niches. Like the Louvre's Grand Gallery, it had a lone point of entry--the
door through which they had just passed--easy to find your way in, but
impossible to find your way out. A literal tourist trap, one of Langdon's
befuddled colleagues had called it. Keeping architectural tradition, the
ab