The Khufu Equation (12 page)

I've sent a request about this man to Paris. Only, this information should be kept secret. The community can't afford to see a repetition of this kind of thing"

"Not a secret, already," complained Slaiker. "I got this information at ten. Also, I've found something else."

"Who gave you this information?

"It doesn't mean you should call me right off the bat. So, our mummy--this . . . Michel Arno--lived in Paris, had a doctorate degree in archeological sciences. Is declared for search. Officially, he is a killer. Now the crime, assuming he committed it, fully coincides with his own demise. In the same way as Arno's housemaid was dehydrated and bled out."

Brett's face took on an expression of gloom.

"I think I know how you're getting your information."

Slaiker took a big gulp of java and followed it with half a cookie.

"Help yourself."

Brett, however, was downcast. His career was hanging by a thread, because today . . . . Tomorrow, all flights out would be overbooked. Panic, like a virus, would cause a mass exodus from the island. This kind of thing is deadly for any economy based on tourism.

"Look here," said Slaiker, looking patiently at the cards. On the table were four hearts in a line: the jack, the queen, the king and the ace.

"Imagine, the jack is Michel Arno, the queen . . . his sacrifice. The king is the de Balboa the Mexican, and the ace is our Italian, Giordano Crufo." Slaiker removed the ace of spades from the pack and placed it above the four hearts.

"Let's assume that the ace of spades is an executioner of all. How do we explain that? Who is this ace of spades?"

"Look, my head is reeling right now, but I sense that the trump card is up your sleeve. Get out of town with this stuff!"

Slaiker waved his hand in a request for silence.

"Maybe now we'll get an answer to the main question of who . . . and why. He took the phone receiver, activated the speakerphone function and dialed the number of his French-speaking friend, a man by the unlikely name of Hank Dickens. He had already called the man an hour-and-a-half earlier. That one spent a third of his life on the wire, knew practically everything the happened in the area, and managed to earn a pretty good living in the process. Hank was the kind of guy who'd sleep with the phone receiver strapped to his head.

"Listening . . . ," said a soft, petite female voice.

"Thanks for the information. Anything else?"

"Oh, that's you," moaned Hank, obviously mixing business talk with phone sex. "I'm eternally in your debt. No information can be bought . . . ." The phone, the voice, the little tidbits, the secretive words . . . he purred with the pleasure of it all.

"Hint understood. Speak. Don't pull rubber."

"I've joked about money. I'll always remember how you saved my skin. But you see, the fact is . . . ." Hank's voice became sad and hoarse. "If you are standing, sit down. What I am going to tell you refers to the sphere of metaphysics. We are now about to hunt for the Beast."

Father Krepfol Sohn was on time for his flight to Thailand, but it was critical that he make his flight to the Seychelles from Bangkok. The Boeing 747 had been in the air for about an hour.

Father Sohn was a man of fifty-five. He wasn't a large man, but he was athletic. A certain cosmopolitan sensibility was evident in his dress, his diet and his mannerisms.

Mr. Sohn never smiled unless he was flossing his teeth. His high forehead was deeply creased, but his mind, which absorbed the experience and grief of thousands of people, was much deeper. His short-cut gray hair also conveyed the depth of what he had seen and endured, but the grief he felt was hidden by the reproachful look of his dark, gleaming eyes. One could also see a crimson scar, which extended from his chin to a point just below his right ear. He was never without the memory of his last encounter with the Beast.

Father Sohn was something of a pilgrim. He had seen a lot of countries and met a lot of people. However, regardless of the situation he always preached the Law of God. He helped people not only with good advice but also by taking part in their lives. He never refused material or physical assistance. Unfortunately, sometimes people were unable to understand him because the Beast, who lived in them, had already planted the seeds of hatred, evil and fear.

Father Sohn had a window seat. It seemed to him that, as he watched the clouds drift by under the airliner, he was nearing God. In his left hand he held a crucifix of white stone. On it was engraved an ancient hieroglyph, the tactile familiarity of which had long since burned into his palm. A little book covered in buffalo hide was in his breast pocket, just above his heart.

The clouds carried Krepfol's mind back the two-day period before his arrival in Paris, where his mission started. There he stayed in the country house of a noble member of French Archeological Academy: a man named Michel Arno. In the hall, which was designed in the Renaissance style, there were two stone gargoyles along the wall. They were a fearful sight that recalled the saying, "Please make yourself at home, but remember you're only a guest." The walls were decorated with old weapons and armor, and the shelves held relics from the ancient civilizations of Central America, Mexico and Egypt. Statuettes and masks of the ancient tribes of the Aztec and Maya stood peacefully near bronze figures of tsars and different adornments from the Valley of the Kings.

Father Sohn felt an unexplainable excitement just by touching these things. It was as if he was getting nearer to eternity. Sometimes he thought he could see fragments of the lives of the people who lived then; that he could hear their voices. He could stand for hours before a certain trinket, pondering the existence of whoever might have held it.

That day, following the owner of the house, Mr. Sohn entered the parlor. As usual they placed themselves in comfortable armchairs, drank green tea and discussed a certain topic, trying to reach a decision. After that, they left the armchairs for more utilitarian seating beside the desk, and continued their conversation. At these very moments Michel Arno's face was lit with a smile. And, as Arno suggested they sit at the desk at the start of their meeting, Father Sohn understood that something of great importance had occurred.

"I'm so glad to meet you," said Arno.

"I am pleased as well. And how do you do?" replied Sohn.

"Full of life, thanks. I beg your pardon for not offering you some tea. I think we'll have it later. Today, I have invited you neither for polite conversation nor for a confession. You know perfectly well that archeology is the only woman of mine; my only passion . . . . Well, let us stop this small talk and get down to business."

Mr. Arno opened a drawer and took out a little wooden box. Beautifully painted it resembled the masterpieces of Iranian and Indian miniatures. On the top of the box, the pilgrim noticed the scenes of a tsar's hunt and a pharaoh in a chariot. The pharaoh was striking the Asians on the nearest side of the box.

The professor, without introduction, opened the box and took out a strange item. The thing was immediately attractive to Sohn, so he handed it to his guest. It was a white cross, ten inches long, with beams nearly two inches wide and half an inch thick. Initially, due to the lack of a slanting cross-beam, he decided it was a Roman Catholic cross. However, after a thorough examination he knew that was incorrect. He saw three rows of hieroglyphs on it. Having dealt with the professor quite a long time, Sohn could say without doubt that the hieroglyphs were Egyptian.

"This cross has nothing to do with . . . ."

"Either the Orthodox Church or Catholicism," interrupted the professor. "This cross is so mysterious that I'm not even able to approximate the date of its origin. Probably, it comes from the fourth century B.C., but . . . ." Michel Arno raised his forefinger. "I haven't understood what it's made of. There are no such chemical elements in Mendeleyev's table. The analysis hasn't revealed anything. The apparatuses often malfunction, and it can't even be x-rayed.

"What about the inscriptions?" asked the pilgrim.

"I've managed to decode them. And now, for the second surprise . . . ."

Michel Arno took the decoding of the inscription from the table and read it:

"O human soul
The time when you will have to pick up the stones is nearing
But when the last stone (the third one) is beside the feet of the Beast
Do not let him open the Gates of Sethu
Strike his heart with the blade that is in your hands."

Sohn, upon hearing all this, felt that something within him had been overturned. However, there was a far more exciting strike ahead.

Michel Arno pressed lightly on the tiniest ruby somewhere on the side and cut off the lowest part of the cross, which thus appeared to be a scabbard. The pilgrim now saw the blade in the professor's hands, whereupon it was clear why the upper part of the cross was sharply pointed and had what appeared to be recesses for hands. The crosspiece was reminiscent of a hilt, and the arrow-like point of the blade became wider toward the handle. More than that, it had a mat surface to decrease the reflection of light spots and a special chute for blood. The blade was seven inches long and an inch-and-a-half wide.

Michel Arno continued his description excitedly.

"I don't know the material this blade is made of, either. There is nothing of such kind in nature. It's really very mysterious."

Father Sohn's pupils were wide with astonishment. Suddenly it dawned on him what the hieroglyphs meant.

Mecca, the center of Islam, contains the site of Kaaba. In the northeastern corner of the temple, there is the famous Black Stone, which is no more than seven inches in diameter. It was touched by Mohammed, having been revered long before his time. Few other things have been so greatly honored. Kaaba is always covered with a black cloth except from that place, where the Black Stone is.

Initially, the stone was of a white color, but after sinners started touching the stone it became black. It was said that after Adam had committed the original sin, one of the angels was transformed into the stone. Many centuries have passed since the founding of Kaaba. It was destroyed either by a natural phenomenon or by humans, but it was always rebuilt. The Black Stone was also demolished but its silver frame remained, as if to say:

IT IS LIKELY THAT I AM NOT ETERNAL, BUT THE LIGHT, WHICH GOES FROM ME THROUGH THE DUST OF CENTURIES, IS!

Once there was an earthquake, and the stone was transported to a safer place. Eventually, the stone disappeared.

"It's probably one and the same Black Stone," wondered Mr. Sohn. "Did you hear that the Black Stone had disappeared from Kaaba, in Mecca?"

Arno shook his head.

"Another stone vanished from Jerusalem. There, just in front of the gates, you could see a pink stone in the floor. It was the stone that Jesus' body was placed on before he was placed in the tomb."

The pilgrim lowered his eyes.

"I wonder how you got this blade."

"Three days ago I fell down into a cave in Egypt." Then the professor put his hand back into the box and added: "Apart from what you've already seen, I found this."

Michel Arno took out a small pocket-sized book and placed it before Mr. Sohn.

"It contains no fewer riddles than the blade. There are two hundred different symbols that you can see nowhere else. The book is so decrepit that it could eventually have disintegrated into dust. Nevertheless, it looks fairly good. Its covering is made of buffalo skin sewn with silver threads. As for the pigments, nothing is clear about them. All the letters seem to have been burned with a laser or something. I couldn't understand any of them, nor do I know the purpose for which the book was written." The professor gave a sigh, after which he continued: "Still, altogether these finds are very important. They lead us to the reconsideration of our basic knowledge of humankind and reality. What is time? What is the past, and what is the future? Why do they intersect somewhere? These two things I found in the cave, into which no other human had entered for two thousand years. But these finds, especially the blade, belong to the distant future.

Mr. Sohn poured a glass of water and took a long drink. "I don't believe in coincidences," he said. "This 'third stone' must be out there somewhere."

"Actually, I haven't heard about it," said Arno. "But that's why I asked you to come. You've journeyed throughout the world and preached the Law of God for twenty years or so. You've seen a lot of things. You have met different people and helped them, if they were in need. So, there's no one I can trust as much as I trust you. I was meant to find these things, and now it's your mission to lead everything to the end. From this very moment, these two things are yours."

"Why me, exactly? Why don't you turn to church representatives?"

"I don't believe them. One of them corrupted my grandson. However, I believe in you because you were sent by God. You have no religious dogma; you're free of stereotypes. You're the representative of the old clergy, who combined breeding and wisdom, which indeed has a particular place as a spiritual culture."