Secrets of the Dead (48 page)

I turn to Porfyrius.

‘How have you done this?’

‘I told you.’

‘It’s impossible.’

‘Nothing is impossible through God,’ he answers calmly. ‘Do you want to stick your fingers into the scar you made in his back?’

How does he know I stabbed Crispus in the back? Everyone believes he was poisoned
.

‘Impossible,’ I whisper again.

‘Once, I thought the same as you.’

‘And why …?’

From outside, rendered distant by the thick walls, I hear the blare of trumpets. Constantine’s funeral procession must be coming near. And with the sound, a resonance. At long last, too late, I know what Porfyrius is going to do.

‘You’re going to present …
him
… as Constantine’s successor.’

‘When the flames go up and the eagle flies out of the fire, the people will see Constantine’s true heir. A miracle. What chance will Constantius and his brothers have against that?’ A chuckle. ‘Of course, we’ve bribed some of the guards as well. They’ll cut Constantius to pieces, and Crispus will rally the empire.’

‘With you behind the throne telling him what to do?’

‘This isn’t about me,’ he snaps. ‘This is for the empire, and for God.’

I’ve heard too many people telling me they’ve done things for God recently. ‘Is this all because of the Arians? Because of
Eusebius
and Alexander?’ Compared with the enormity of what I’ve just witnessed, their jealousies and hair-splitting seem irrelevant.

‘I couldn’t give two obols for Eusebius, or his enemies.’ There’s genuine frustration in Porfyrius’s voice. ‘Do you think Christ returned from the dead so that men would kill each other debating whether he was co-eternal or consubstantial with the Father? Eusebius and his kind are like men who inherit a book of wisdom and simply use it as kindling for a cooking fire.’

I’m lost. ‘What then?’

‘I’m doing this for Constantine. Because he was right – that unity is the only way to save the empire from tearing itself apart. One God, one church, one emperor. The moment you divide it, the divisions multiply on themselves until they consume the world in chaos. Constantine knew that – but in the end, he wasn’t strong enough to defeat the forces of chaos. By this miracle, we have a second chance.’

I try to digest it. So much of what he’s saying makes such perfect sense, it’s easy to forget it’s built on the most ludicrous foundation.

In order to rule the world, we have to have the perfect virtue of one rather than the weakness of many
.

Crispus – the new Crispus – is still obscured in the shadows. Out of sight, the shock receding, reason reasserts itself.

‘Do you really think the people will accept this imposter you’ve dug up?’

‘They’ll accept it because it’s the truth.’ A grunt. ‘And because they’re desperate to believe.’

A knock sounds from the door, the same intricate pattern that Porfyrius used. One of his men cracks it open.

‘It’s time.’

Rome – Present Day

There was nowhere to hide – not even a niche. The gravediggers hadn’t cut any
cubicula
here. With a flash of despair, she realised even the darkness didn’t hide her. The lamp on her helmet was still on, shining its futile light on the rock wall and drawing her pursuers like a beacon.

She thought of what Mark had said – almost his last words, it turned out.
They can’t have brought us all this way to drop us now
. It reminded her of a line from an old gospel record her parents used to play when she was a child.

Nobody told me that the road would be easy
.

‘Abby?’

It was the last voice she expected to hear – warm and reassuring in the darkest place imaginable.

‘Michael?’

‘You can come out now.’

She didn’t ask why or how; she didn’t stop to think. She turned back and walked slowly around the bend in the tunnel. There was Michael, caught in the head torch like a deer in headlights. And there, behind him, two men with raised guns.

There was no fight left in her. All she could do was stare.

Michael gave a sad, tight smile. ‘I’m sorry, Abby. I had no choice.’

A fourth man appeared in the shadows beyond them, a dark silhouette against a light whose source she couldn’t see. He was smaller than the others, a slight man with close-cropped hair, maybe a small beard. He seemed to absorb light: the only part of him that reflected anything was the chrome-handled pistol tucked in his waistband.

‘Abigail Cormac. Again, I have to ask you: why are you not dead?’

Dragovi
ć
. Abby had no answer. He laughed, then shrugged.

‘It does not matter. Now that I have you, you will wish you were dead. Many times, before I let you die.’

One of his men came down the passage and pinned her arms. She didn’t resist. He dragged her back to the junction. Her feet kicked against something soft and recently human on the ground; she didn’t look down.

Dragovi
ć
’s men all had head torches, though no helmets. They trained their beams on the brick wall.

‘This is the place you came to,’ said Dragovi
ć
. ‘Left is nothing; right is nothing. I think we must go straight on.’

One of his men – Abby counted four, plus Dragovi
ć
and Michael – stepped forward and unslung the backpack he carried. From inside, he took out a nail gun and a coil of plastic tube that looked like a fat clothesline. He fired three nails into the brickwork, then wrapped the tube around them like wool, making a rough triangle against the bricks. Two metal plugs and a length of electrical cable came out of the bag. He stuck the plugs into the tube, then unspooled the cable. The hands that gripped Abby pulled her back down the tunnel; the others followed. Round a corner, they paused.

‘You’re going to be OK,’ Michael whispered in her ear.

They all crouched down. Her guard released her, though only so he could put his hands over his ears. Abby did the same. The man at the front connected the wires to a small, remote-control box.

Abby didn’t see him press the button. All she felt was the blast, pulsing through her hands and into her ears; and a punch of air against her chest. Fine grit rained down from the ceiling; Abby braced herself for worse, for the whole catacomb to shake itself apart and bury her. It didn’t happen.

The man with the detonator ran forward, shouted something. They all advanced down the tunnel. Now the wall was
just
a heap of bricks, wreathed in a cloud of dust that was still settling. The dust blocked the torch beams, but as it swirled small holes appeared in the cloud, letting the light through. Not on to brick or stone, but into dark space beyond.

One by one they ducked through the hole. For a moment, all Abby could feel was the dust, coating her tongue, choking her lungs. She gagged. Then she was through.

In the deepest part of the catacomb, seven torch beams played over a chamber that hadn’t been seen in seventeen centuries. It reminded Abby of the tomb in Kosovo: larger, though not much – perhaps three metres long and almost square, with a barrel ceiling just high enough for them all to stand upright. Every surface was painted: an eclectic mix of doves and fish, ranked soldiers standing to attention, a clean-shaven Jesus peering out from behind a huge Bible, and bearded saints or prophets leaning on their staffs. A curved niche filled one end, flanked on the walls by two enormous painted symbols, the Christogram and the staurogram.

Between them, filling the niche, stood a coffin. Not a plain stone affair, as had served for Gaius Valerius Maximus: Abby could tell at once that this was different. It was made from a lustrous purple marble, intricately carved. Two rows of cavalry trotted towards each other on its face; on its pitched lid, a flotilla of boats seemed to be engaged in a naval battle. Even in the torchlight, the detail leapt out at Abby: every oar and rower, every link of armour and twist of rope.

‘How did they ever get that down here?’ Michael wondered aloud.

Dragovi
ć
walked across the chamber. He bent over the
sarcophagus
, put his cheek against the surface and stretched out his arms to embrace it, communing with the cold stone.

‘Porphyry,’ he said. ‘The right and prerogative of emperors.’

‘Is that … Constantine’s?’ Abby asked.

‘Constantine was buried in Istanbul.’ Dragovi
ć
straightened and turned to Michael. ‘This, I think, is for Constantine’s son Crispus.’

There was something in the way that he spoke to Michael that chilled Abby. Not cruelty or malice – familiarity.

She looked at Michael. ‘How did you get here?’

‘They caught me just outside Split. I didn’t have a chance.’

Dragovi
ć
heard him and laughed.

‘Don’t lie to your little girlfriend. You still think she loves you? You came to
me
, just like in Kosovo. And for the same reason. Because you wanted money.’

Abby felt a pit opening inside her. ‘What about Irina?’

‘Irina?’ Dragovi
ć
asked. ‘Who is Irina, please?’

Michael’s shoulders slumped. ‘There was no Irina.’

‘But – the photo? In your apartment.’

‘Her name’s Cathy. My ex-wife. She’s never been to the Balkans. So far as I know, she’s living with her second husband back in Donegal.’

Abby felt another part of her world collapsing in on her. Dragovi
ć
sensed her pain and chuckled.

‘You thought he was one of the angels? The good sheriff in the white hat?’ He jerked his head dismissively. ‘He wanted money. Like everyone.’

Abby stared at Michael, willing it not to be true. ‘
Why?
What happened to doing the right thing? Fighting the barbarians?’

Michael tried to force a grin, a ghost of his old insouciance. He couldn’t quite make it. His face simply looked broken.

‘If you can’t beat them …’

Dragovi
ć
had lost interest. He barked an order: his men surrounded the sarcophagus, one on each point. Stubby crowbars came out of a backpack. They levered them under the lid, cursing and sweating.

‘How did they get that down here?’ Michael said again. He’d turned so that he had his back to Abby.

Dragovi
ć
pointed to a thin crack down the corner. ‘They bring it in as panels and cement it together. Like IKEA.’

The four men leaned on their crowbars. They were large men, built like weightlifters, but they struggled to make an impact on the purple stone.

‘Maybe we use some detcord?’ grunted one.

‘No.’ Dragovi
ć
was watching them intently, his whole body tensed. In that moment, Abby almost thought she could have slipped away without being noticed. She didn’t dare try.

‘We do nothing to damage the
labarum
.’

The men heaved again. The bars strained, the stone resisted. Nothing gave. Abby felt the tension taut in the air, the quiver of something about to snap.

The bars moved – first one corner, then spreading to all four. A deep rumble rolled around the room.

The lid lifted and slid back. Dragovi
ć
walked forward and peered into the open coffin.

Constantinople – June 337

The sun from the open door is a blinding, brilliant white. Porfyrius turns to me.

‘It’s time. Are you with us, or against us?’

I’m alone
, I want to say.

‘We can tie you up, leave you here until it’s over. Or you can join us.’

There’s no choice. I have to see how this ends. ‘I’ll come.’

I follow them up the stairs. In daylight, I can see that there are about twenty of them, mostly with the close-cropped hair and straight shoulders of military men. They’re dressed in white Schola uniforms, though that doesn’t mean anything. The
man
– I still can’t bring myself to call him Crispus – is near the front; all I can see is his back. His hair is curly, almost touching his collar – longer than he wore it eleven years ago, but still jet black. Is there a hunch to his left shoulder, a stiffness when he moves? Does he remember what I said to him on that beach? If only I could have five minutes alone with him, I could be sure one way or the other.

The scaffolding’s still standing at the rear of the mausoleum, screened from the crowds who have gathered on the ground outside. I can hear their quiet roar as we climb the ladders, criss-crossing back and forth up the platforms. No one tries to stop us.

Just below the copper dome, there’s a walkway around the outside of the rotunda. A stone balustrade guards it, with latticed metalwork in between the pillars. The outside is painted gold, though from behind all you see is iron.

We crouch beneath the balustrade and wait. Peering through the lattice, I can see the audience settling. The senators and generals have taken their seats on the banked stands facing the pyre; the legions have drawn up in scarlet squares around them, with the great mass of people behind straining for a view.

How many of them will be alive at sunset if Porfyrius has his way? He says he wants to unite the empire – but even Constantine needed twenty years of fighting to achieve it. Not everyone will accept Porfyrius’s miraculous proposition on faith.