The Sanctuary

Chapter 12

Tom Webster put down his cell phone and looked out the floor-to-ceiling window of his office on the Quai des Bergues. It was a crisp early evening in Geneva. The sun was setting behind the craggy peaks of the Alps to the west, reflecting off the lake and bathing its still water with a fiery golden pink glow. The snow hadn’t arrived yet, but it wouldn’t be long now.

The call had left him with a feeling of deep unease.

He replayed the brief conversation in his mind, examining every nuance, going over every beat of what he’d heard. First came the pause once the call was answered. There was a definite hesitance there. Then the garbled words, in a language he was reasonably sure was Arabic. And then the man who’d finally spoken into the phone, claiming to be a colleague of hers. There was something distinctly formal about his tone. His insistence on knowing who was calling Evelyn was a definite signal that this was not the casual pickup of a friend’s phone.

She’s gotten herself sucked into this. Then, a more troubling thought: Is she alright?

The message he’d received from the phone operator at the institute had taken him by surprise. It had been…how long?

Thirty years.

He wondered what had prompted Evelyn’s call, after all that time.

He had his suspicions.

The two events — the call from one of his scouts in Iraq, out of the blue, a little over a week ago, and Evelyn’s call to the Haldane switchboard — had to be connected. That much was obvious. But he hadn’t anticipated any problems going forward. He and his partners always operated pretty much off the radar. They had to be careful, of course — discretion was paramount to their work — but there was no reason to expect any complications.

He tried to rationalize the call and calm his worries, but he couldn’t escape them. This didn’t bode well. A long time ago he had learned to trust his instincts, and right now they were clamoring for attention. He needed to know what was really going on. Then he’d need to call the others. Let them know what was happening. And come to a unanimous agreement — as the three of them always did — as to how to handle the situation.

He checked his watch. Beirut was two hours ahead. The time difference meant that he wouldn’t be able to get any answers for a few hours. He’d need to stay up and make some calls just before daybreak. Which he didn’t mind.

As with the others before him, this was what he had devoted his whole life to.

And if his instincts were right, it now involved Evelyn.

Again.

He exhaled deeply and turned to his desk. The codex was lying there. He’d taken it out of the safe earlier. It just sat there, innocently. He stared at it, then picked it up and shook his head faintly.

Innocent.

Hardly.

The book had entangled him, and others, in its tantalizing web for centuries. It was irresistible, and for good reason. It was worthy.

He shrugged, opened it to its first page, and thought back to how it had all begun.