The Templar Legacy (23 page)

Malone didn’t believe a word of it, but motioned again with the paper. “So point us in the right direction.”

“It’s not that the simple. The trail has been made difficult.”

“Do you even know where to start?”

“If you have Lars’s notebook, you have more knowledge than I possess. He often spoke of the journal, but I was never allowed to see it.”

“We also have a copy of Pierres Gravées du Languedoc, ” Stephanie said.

Claridon gasped. “I never believed that book existed.”

She reached into her bag and showed him the volume. “It’s real.”

“Might I see the gravestone?”

She opened to the page and showed him the drawing. Claridon studied it with interest. The older man smiled. “Lars would have been pleased. The drawing is a good one.”

“Care to explain?” Malone asked.

“The abbè Bigou learned a secret from Marie d’Hautpoul de Blanchefort, just before she died. When he fled France in 1793, Bigou realized that he would never return, so he hid what he knew in the church at Rennes-le-Château. That information was later found by Saunière, in 1891, within a glass vial.”

“We know all that,” Malone said. “What we don’t know is Bigou’s secret.”

“Ah, but you do,” Claridon said. “Let me see Lars’s notebook.”

Stephanie handed him the journal. He anxiously shuffled through it and showed them a page.

“This cryptogram was supposedly inside the glass vial.”

“How do you know?” Malone asked.

“To know that, you must understand Saunière.”

“We’re all ears.”

“When Saunière was alive, not a word was ever written about the money he spent on the church or the other buildings. No one outside of Rennes even knew any of that existed. When he died in 1917, he was totally forgotten. His papers and belongings were either stolen or destroyed. In 1947 his mistress sold the entire estate to a man named Noël Corbu. The mistress died six years later. The so-called tale of Saunière, about his great treasure find, first appeared in print in 1956. A local newspaper, La Dépêche du Midi, published three installments that supposedly told the true story. But the source for that material was Corbu.”

“I know this,” Stephanie said. “He embellished everything, adding to the story, changing it all around. Afterward, more press accounts came and the story gradually became even more fantastic.”

Claridon nodded. “Fiction completely took over fact.”

“You talking about the parchments?” Malone asked.

“An excellent example. Saunière never found parchments in the altar pillar. Never. Corbu, and the others, added that detail. Not one person has ever seen those parchments, yet their texts have been printed in countless books, each one supposedly hiding some sort of coded message. It’s nonsense, all of it, and Lars knew that.”

“But Lars published the texts of the parchments in his books,” Malone said.

“He and I spoke of that. All he would say is, People love a mystery. But I know it bothered him to do it.”

Malone was confused. “So is Saunière’s story a lie?”

Claridon nodded. “The modern rendition is mainly false. Most of the books written also link Saunière to the paintings of Nicolas Poussin, particularly The Shepherds of Arcadia. Supposedly, Saunière took the two parchments he found to Paris in 1893 for deciphering and, while there, purchased a copy of that painting, and two more, at the Louvre. They are reported to contain hidden messages. The problem with that is the Louvre did not sell copies of paintings at that time, and there is no record that The Shepherds of Arcadia was even stored at the Louvre in 1893. But the men who promulgated that fiction worried little about errors. They just assumed no one would check the facts, and for a while they were right.”

Malone motioned to the cryptogram. “Where did Lars find this?”

“Corbu penned a manuscript all about Saunière.”

Some of the words from the eight pages sent to Ernst Scoville swept through his mind. What Lars had written about the mistress. At one point she did reveal to Nöel Corbu one of Saunière’s hiding places. Corbu wrote of this in his manuscript I managed to find.

“While Corbu spent a great deal of time telling reporters the fiction of Rennes, in his manuscript he did a credible job of detailing the true story, as he learned it from the mistress.”

More of what Lars had written ran through Malone’s mind. What Corbu found, if anything, is never revealed by him. But the wealth of information contained within his manuscript makes one wonder where he could have learned all that he wrote about.

“Corbu, of course, let no one see the manuscript, since the truth was not nearly as captivating as the fiction. He died in the late sixties from a car crash and his manuscript disappeared. But Lars found it.”

Malone studied the rows of letters and symbols on the cryptogram. “So what is this? Some type of code?”

“One quite common for the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Random letters and symbols, arranged in a grid. Somewhere in all that chaos is a message. Basic, simple, and, for its time, quite difficult to decipher. Still so even today, without the key.”

“What do you mean?”

“Some numeric sequence is needed to find the right letters to assemble the message. Sometimes, to confuse the matter further, the starting point on the grid was random, too.”

“Did Lars ever decipher it?” Stephanie asked.

Claridon shook his head. “He was unable. And it frustrated him. Then, in the weeks before he died, he thought he came across a new clue.”

Malone’s patience was wearing thin. “I assume he didn’t tell you what that was.”

“No, monsieur. That was his way.”

“So where do we go from here? Point the way, like you’re supposed to.”

“Return here at fivePM, on the road just beyond the main building and wait. I’ll come to you.”

“How can you leave?”

“No one here will be sad to see me go.”

Malone and Stephanie shared a glance. She was surely debating, as he was, if following Claridon’s directions would be smart. So far this whole endeavor had been littered with either dangerous or paranoid personalities, not to mention wild speculation. But something was going on, and if he wanted to learn more he was going to have to play by the rules the odd man standing across from him was setting.

Still, he wanted to know, “Where are we going?”

Claridon turned to the window and pointed eastward. In the far distance, miles away, on a hilltop overlooking Avignon, stood a palace stronghold with an Oriental appearance, like something from Arabia. Its golden luminosity stood out against the eastern sky with a fugitive brightness and cast the appearance of several buildings piled onto one another, each rising from the bedrock, standing in clear defiance. Just as its occupants had done for nearly a hundred years, when seven French popes ruled Christendom from within the fortress walls.

“To the palais des popes, ” Claridon said.

The palace of the popes.

ABBEY DES FONTAINES

THE SENESCHAL STARED INTOGEOFFREY’S EYES AND SAW HATRED. He’d never seen that emotion there before.

“I’ve told our new master,” Geoffrey said, nudging the gun deeper into de Roquefort’s throat, “to stand still or I will shoot him.”

The seneschal stepped close and poked a finger beneath the white mantle, into the protective vest. “If we’d not started the gunfire, you would have, right? The idea was for us to be killed while escaping. That way, your problem is solved. I’m eliminated and you’re the Order’s savior.”

De Roquefort said nothing.

“That’s why you came here alone. To finish the job yourself. I saw you lock the dormitory door. You wanted no witnesses.”

“We must go,” Geoffrey said.

He realized the danger that endeavor would entail, but doubted if any of the brothers would risk the master’s life. “Where are we going?”

“I’ll show you.”

Keeping the gun cocked at de Roquefort’s neck, Geoffrey led his hostage across the dormitory. The seneschal kept his own gun ready and, at the door, released the latch. In the hall stood five armed men. At the sight of their leader in peril, they raised their guns, ready to fire.

“Lower your aim,” de Roquefort ordered.

The guns stayed pointed.

“I command you to lower your weapons. I want no more bloodshed.”

The gallant gesture stimulated the desired effect.

“Stand away,” Geoffrey said.

The brothers took a few steps backward.

Geoffrey motioned with the gun and he and de Roquefort stepped out into the hall. The seneschal followed. Bells rang in the distance, signaling onePM. Sext prayers would be ending shortly, and the corridors would once again be filled with robed men.

“We need to move quickly,” the seneschal made clear.

With his hostage, Geoffrey led the way down the passageway. The seneschal followed, creeping backward, keeping his attention trained on the five brothers.

“Stay there,” the seneschal made clear to them.

“Do as he says,” de Roquefort called out, as they turned the corner.

DEROQUEFORT WAS CURIOUS. HOW DID THEY EXPECT TO FLEEthe abbey? What had Geoffrey said? I’ll show you. He decided the only way to discover anything was to go with them, which was why he’d ordered his men to stand down.

The seneschal had twice shot him. If he’d not been quick, a third bullet would have found his skull. The stakes had clearly been raised. His captors were on a mission, something he believed involved his predecessor and a subject that he desperately needed to know more about. The Denmark excursion had been less than productive. So far nothing had been learned in Rennes-le-Château. And though he’d managed to discredit the former master in death, the old man might have reserved the last laugh.

He also did not like the fact that two men had been wounded. Not the best way to start off his tenure. Brothers strived for order. Chaos was seen as weakness. The last time violence had invaded the abbey’s walls was when angry mobs tried to gain entrance during the French Revolution—but after several died in the attempt, they’d retreated. The abbey was a place of tranquility and refuge. Violence was taught—and sometimes used—but tempered with discipline. The seneschal had demonstrated a total lack of discipline. Stragglers who may have harbored some fleeting loyalty to him would now be won over by his grievous violations to Rule.

But still, where were these two headed?

They continued down the hallways, passing workshops, the library, more empty corridors. He could hear footfalls behind them, the five brothers following, ready to act when the opportunity arose. But there’d be hell to pay if any of them interfered until he said so.

They stopped before a doorway with carved capitals and a simple iron handle.

The master’s quarters.

His chambers.

“In there,” Geoffrey said.

“Why?” the seneschal asked. “We’ll be trapped.”

“Please, go inside.”

The seneschal pushed open the door, then engaged the latch after they entered.

De Roquefort was amazed.

And curious.

THE SENESCHAL WAS CONCERNED. THEY WERE NOW IMPRISONEDwithin the master’s chamber, the only exit a solitary bull’s-eye window that opened to nothing but air. Drops of sweat pebbled his forehead and he swiped the salty moisture from his eyes.

“Sit,” Geoffrey ordered de Roquefort, and the man took a seat at the desk.

The seneschal surveyed the room. “I see you’ve already changed things.”

A few more upholstered chairs hugged the walls. A table now stood where there had been nothing before. The bed coverings were different, as were items on the tables and desk.

“This is my home now,” de Roquefort said.

He noticed the single sheet of paper on the desk, penned in his mentor’s hand. The successor’s message, left as required by Rule. He lifted the typewritten page and read.

Do you think that what you judge to be imperishable will not perish? You base your hope upon the world, and your god is this life. You do not realize that you will be destroyed. You live in darkness and death, drunk with fire, and full of bitterness. Your mind is deranged because of the smoldering fire within you and you are delighted by the poisoning and beating of your enemies. Darkness has risen over you like the light, for you have exchanged your freedom for slavery. You will fail, that is clear.

“Your master thought passages from the Gospel of Thomas relevant,” de Roquefort said. “And he apparently believed that I, not you, would wear the white mantle once he was gone. Surely those words were not meant for his chosen one.”

No, they weren’t. He wondered why his mentor had so little faith in him, especially when, in the hours before he died, he’d encouraged him to seek high office.

“You should listen to him,” he made clear.

“His is the advice of a weak soul.”

Pounding came from the door. “Master? Are you there?” Unless the brothers were prepared to blast their way inside, there existed little danger of the heavy slabs being forced.

De Roquefort stared up at him.

“Answer,” the seneschal said.

“I’m fine. Stand down.”

Geoffrey moved toward the window and stared out at the waterfall across the gorge.

De Roquefort placed one knee over the other and leaned back in the chair. “What do you hope to accomplish? This is foolishness.”

“Shut up.” But the seneschal was wondering the same thing.

“The master left more words,” Geoffrey said from across the room.

He and de Roquefort turned as Geoffrey reached into his cassock and produced an envelope. “This is his true final message.”

“Give that to me,” de Roquefort demanded, rising from the chair.

Geoffrey leveled his gun. “Sit.”

De Roquefort stayed on his feet. Geoffrey cocked the weapon and aimed for the legs. “The vest will do you no good.”

“You would kill me?”

“I’ll cripple you.”

De Roquefort sat. “You have a brave compatriot,” he said to the seneschal.

“He’s a brother of the Temple.”

“A shame he will never achieve the oath.”

If the words were designed to evoke a response in Geoffrey, they failed.

“You’re going nowhere,” de Roquefort told them.