The Lucifer Gospel

12

True to Adamson’s word, Finn’s luggage had been delivered to her quarters in the residence quadrant, a long domed yurt like the others but with individual rooms jutting out from the main tent like the legs of a centipede. By her count there were twenty-five of these cells, each one equipped with electricity, a gravity-fed water tank, and a small chemical toilet cubicle. The quarters also had a smaller version of the triangular windows in the recreational area. She had a camp bed with an inflatable mattress and matching pillow, a tubular steel and plastic desk, a lamp, a Local Area Network Internet connection for a laptop, and a chair. She even had her very own air-conditioning duct. For communications there was a headset Motorola ten-channel walkie-talkie outfit with a five-mile range and a buzzer system for calling a steward if necessary. Everything she needed to know about the site from a plan of the “moon base” to instructions for flushing the chemical toilet was contained in a loose-leaf binder lying on her bed. Adamson had clearly spared no expense, and Finn found herself wondering what he was hoping to get for all his money. It seemed like overkill for a few Coptic inscriptions, since according to Hilts the monastery was far from a newly discovered site.

The evening meal was held in the dining hall, a large yurt like the recreation area with two dozen tables, including a large one for the actual staff in an area separated from the rest of the tables by a high, white nylon barrier. Finn found herself seated between a ceramic expert from the Royal Ontario Museum named Adrian March and Hilts. Adamson sat at the head of the table beside a small dark man he introduced as Mustapha Hisnawi, their liaison with the Libyan Office of Antiquities. Directly across from her was Fritz Kuhn, the heavyset man Hilts had said was the grandson of Hitler’s archaeologist. Beside him was Laval, the monk from l’Ecole Biblique in Jerusalem. The meal was a variety of Libyan dishes, lamb, chicken, and vegetarian. The conversation was mostly about the dig and mostly technical. Finn waited for an opportune moment and finally managed to ask her question.

“Is there any real focus to the dig?” she said. Across from her the German, Kuhn, frowned. Adamson just shrugged.

“Does there have to be a focus?”

“Usually for a project like this you’d expect some sort of ultimate goal.”

“What would you know about projects like this,” Kuhn snorted, digging around at the sauce-covered lamb and rice on his plate. His face was flushed. He picked up his wineglass and drained it. A steward appeared at his back and refilled it from a cloth-swathed bottle. Finn ignored Kuhn’s rudeness and waited for Adamson’s answer.

“Archaeology is a science of small increments, Ms. Ryan. The man seated beside you, young Dr. March, will spend several years collecting enough pieces from a shattered pot to make a reconstruction, and even then it will probably not be complete. But completeness is not the goal, is it, Adrian?”

“Dear me, no,” said the slim, fair-haired man with the thick glasses who sat on her left. “One looks for trends, points of comparison. Complete reconstructions aren’t necessary to know what one is dealing with.”

“There you are, Ms. Ryan. Our overall goal here at Deir el-Shakir is simply to add to the sum total of what we already know. This is not Howard Carter uncovering King Tut’s tomb, or a French captain of engineers discovering the Rosetta Stone as he prepared to blow up a bridge. Nothing that would be worthy of the CBS Evening News, believe me, not even Larry King.” He laughed. “This is simply the basic gathering of knowledge so that we have a better picture about the past.”

“Trudging in the fields of academe, tilling the soil of history, that kind of thing?” Hilts quipped. He picked up a chicken bone on his plate and sucked off a remaining piece of meat. He dropped the bone back on the plate, then wiped his hands on a napkin.

“Something like that, Virgil,” Adamson said with a nod.

“Just Hilts, if you don’t mind. Just Hilts.”

“As I understand it, Deir el-Shakir was originally founded by St. Thomas the Apostle,” said Finn, remembering what Hilts had told her.

“A myth,” Laval answered from the opposite side of the table. “Historically St. Thomas is presumed to have gone in the opposite direction, to India. Deir el-Shakir was born out of what is usually referred to as the Arian heresy, Arius being a well-known monk from Libya. He preached that Christ was not divine, but mortal, and merely a prophet; it is probably this doubt about Christ being the true Son of God that suggested the link to Thomas, a man given to the same sort of thinking, ergo the nickname ‘Doubting Thomas.’ The monks here were followers of Arius, but I’m afraid St. Thomas was not among them.”

“And the skull?” Finn asked. She turned to Adamson, trying to gauge his reaction.

“What skull would that be?”

“I think it’s called the Skull of Baphomet,” said Finn.

Adamson burst out laughing. Laval smiled broadly. “I’m afraid you’re getting your Knights Templar fantasies mixed up,” Adamson said, grinning. “Just because a book is on the New York Times Bestseller List doesn’t mean it’s true, especially if it’s on the fiction side. What you’re talking about is the supposed flight of Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea to England. The head on the shield of the Templar Grand Master was a representation of the skull of one of the earlier French knights named Hughes de Payen… who lived about seven hundred years after the monks here were already dust.”

“You know a lot about the Templars,” said Hilts quietly.

“I know a lot about a lot of things,” answered Adamson. Dinner went on for a little while longer and then people began excusing themselves. As Hilts stood to go he whispered in Finn’s ear.

“He’s lying. There’s something else going on.”

Finn didn’t answer. She looked down the table at Adamson, who was lost in conversation with the Libyan liaison officer, Hisnawi. Suddenly the expedition leader turned and stared down the table at her. The glance was utterly cold and without emotion. She held his hawklike gaze for a second longer, and he finally looked away. Finn stood up and shivered. If looks could kill she’d be a corpse. The expression had been exactly the same as the one on the killer’s face in the City of the Dead.