CS 01 The Grail Conspiracy (19 page)

Cotten cleared her throat, choking up at the stirred memory.

"Next day it was back in town to see the doctor. He sent us into
Bowling Green to specialists who decided there was a possibility of
lymphoma or leukemia. They scheduled me for a lymph node biopsy
and bone marrow biopsy. Luckily, I was too young to understand how
serious it was. The night before the surgery I remember a terrible
storm. As my mother slept in a chair next to my hospital bed, Motnees appeared. She whispered to me that everything would be all
right-that my sickness would go away. She also said it was the last
time she'd come to see me.

"The next day I had the biopsies, and when the reports came in
the results showed no signs of any disease. None. I was a perfectly
healthy little girl."

"That's a beautiful story," John said.

There was one last thing she had to tell him. She scored her bottom lip. "All of my symptoms disappeared-gone, zip, zilch, nada. Doctors had no explanation. But I knew what had happened. Motnees had taken away the sickness. I never saw her again."

Cotten paused. Now she had to drop the bomb. She sat up straight.
"This may be the hardest part for you to believe, John. The language
Motnees and I spoke is the same one that Archer and the old priestess
used when they both told me that I am the only one."

When they were seated in the Terrace Room at the Tavern on the
Green, John said, "Maybe the language you and your sister used is
what's referred to as the language of heaven. There are plenty of references to it. It's called Enochian. Some say it's the tongue of the
angels. That would make sense if Motnees is an angel."

"You already know I don't buy into that heaven-hell thing. But
maybe sometimes the spirits or souls of those who die come back and
hang around for a while. Or maybe my sister, being identical, coming
from the same egg, was just another part of me. Or maybe I was the
fanciful kid my mother said I was, and Motnees was only in my imagination." She caught her breath and came back to the same question.
"But disregarding all that, John, how did Archer and the old priestess
know how to speak to me in that special twin talk? How did I even
remember it?"

"I don't know."

"You don't think I'm crazy?"

He smiled at her. "I wouldn't go that far."

"Well, thanks a lot," she said, a little bit of a bite in her voice. "On
the brink, but not completely over the edge?"

"Cotten, I think you're intelligent and well grounded-definitely
anything but crazy. You're the one with doubts. Let go. Believe in
yourself."

She lowered her eyes. "Sometimes that can be very hard."

John sat back. "Everyday, things happen around us that we can't
explain. Some call those events miracles and visions, and some
explain them away with fate or luck-take your pick. But you don't
have to convince me that your twin sister could be an angel. Angels
are my stock-in-trade. They're on my team." John paused and smiled
at her.

"Your team, not mine," she said.

"And that's where you're wrong. Stop being so stubborn, so resistant. Cotten, if God is trying to deliver a message to you through
Gabriel Archer or the old woman in Miami, or a Chinese fortune
cookie for that matter, just give in. Let it happen. Do you honestly
believe things occur for no reason? Do you think you and I are sitting
here together tonight because of chance? To me, that would be frightening beyond belief. There is purpose even when it seems like madness-there is a grand plan to what sometimes appears as chaos. And
we have a part to play in that plan. God will reveal everything when
he feels it's the right time. Okay?"

Cotten turned toward the window. "You'll excuse me if I don't
have as strong a conviction as you."

"Fine. I accept that. So does God. Just don't be so hostile."

"You're the expert." She wanted to trust in John's judgment, his
faith, but there was also the growing fear that things were moving
beyond her control. Was God really trying to give her a message or
was she majorly screwed up? She looked back at John and forced the
dark thoughts into the shadows where they belonged. "Let's talk
about something else."

They chatted about several world issues including politics in the
Middle East and what it had been like for her while she was there.

John decided to lighten the conversation.

"Want a quick history lesson on the Tavern on the Green?" he
asked.

"Sure," Cotten said.

"Look all around you. Now, try to imagine the original building
in 1870. It was a sheepfold. At one time it housed two hundred South
Down sheep that grazed across the street in Central Park." He
watched her face in the light of the Waterford Crystal chandeliers.
Here was this beautiful woman who most assuredly had her own
guardian angel, and she didn't even think she believed in them. But
he knew that deep inside she had to-turning away from God was
only a wall to keep her from hurting anymore. Behind that wall was
someone who was closer to God than anyone he had ever met. He
was discussing sheep with someone who had actually talked to an
angel, spoken the language of heaven. And whether she understood
the significance or not, she had delivered to the world the greatest
religious symbol of all time-the Cup of Christ. He was in total awe
of her but couldn't express his feelings without embarrassing her.

"You wouldn't know now that it was ever a sheepfold," Cotten
said.

The waiter came, and John ordered a bottle of Pinot Grigio.

"Tell me about Rome;" she said. "Have they proven it's the Grail?"

John slipped his linen napkin in his lap. "That can't ever be
proved beyond a doubt. It's educated conjecture. The metal work, the
detail on the vessel, Archer's plate and its translation, the cloth and
seal, everything adds up-but it'll never be one hundred percent."

"What about the stuff inside, the residue beneath the wax? Is it
blood? Christ's blood?"

John folded his hands on the table. "Without removing the wax
and taking a sample, we'll never know. Could be blood, could be anything. I pressed them to analyze it, but they refused."

"Why? Wouldn't they want to know?"

"In order to find out, some of the blood would have to be sacrificed. In the eyes of the Vatican, that would be tantamount to sacrilege."

"Oh, for God's sake-excuse me-but does the Catholic Church
still live in the Dark Ages?"

"I made that same argument-not with those exact words, of
course-that God provided us with the knowledge, and I believe He
intends for us to use it. Think of the impact on Christianity if they
announced it was human blood, male, type 0 negative-the universal donor. What else would you expect of Christ's blood? His blood.
There has to be a reason why someone sealed and protected whatever
is in the Cup. And to see the DNA! Would there be genetic markers?
Could we scientifically trace Christ's lineage? The ramifications are
phenomenal."

"And they still refused?" Cotten said.

"If there's even the slightest chance that it is Christ's blood preserved inside the Grail, then it's all that exists of His earthly body.
There is no more. Destroying even a few molecules is unthinkable.
The Church most often takes the conservative stand on an issue until
proven otherwise. That's why science and religion are so often at
odds."

Cotten sighed. "Like stem cell research or birth control. It's not
just Catholics. Fundamentalists fight the evolution battle every day."
She paused for a moment. "I thought there was some kind of light
you could shine on blood to make it show up even if someone had
tried to clean it off. I see it all the time on crime shows. Wouldn't that
work?"

"It would if you didn't have to spray or swab the evidence with
Luminol first. Doing that would mean removing the wax and exposing the residue. They won't go for it."

The waiter presented the wine. John tasted it-crisp with a light
fruit spiciness. He approved.

"Look," Cotten said, peering out of the glass pavilion at the view.
"It's spectacular."

"Do you know your eyes literally glitter when you take in something beautiful-like when we were at the Coliseum, your face
brightened."

"Maybe growing up wanting so badly to see the world made me
that way. Everyone called me a dreamer, including my mother. The
only one who supported me was my father. He told me I was destined
for great things. I couldn't wait to venture into the world. Once I
graduated and got my first job, I was excited about finally being able
to go places and take my mother with me. And you know what, she
had no interest. She believed if it wasn't within a fifty-mile radius, it
wasn't worth seeing. I never understood that mentality. She missed so
much."

"Some people are content to stay right where they are, forever."

"What about the curiosity to see an ocean or a desert? How can
anyone live an entire life inside a fifty-mile circle?"

John smiled. "In many ways, Cotten, we all have a fifty-mile circle that keeps us confined. Mine's a bit smaller-it's called a Roman
collar."

The Knights Templar became one of the wealthiest and most powerful
organizations in the Western world. It was a spectacular rise to power that
had hardly been seen before or since. Their wealth grew, and their descendants retained control over most of their holdings even to the present.

CHARLES SINCLAIR SAT BEHIND the massive ebony table in the private teleconference center at his plantation estate. He looked at the
seven blank plasma monitors arranged along the wall in the dark,
wood-paneled room.

Beside him, Ben Gearhart reached for the control panel built into
the table. "We're ready to start bringing them online."

Gearhart flipped the first switch and plasma monitor number one
flashed to life. From Vaduz, the face of the Chancellor of Liechtenstein appeared.

"Good afternoon, Charles."

"Hello, Hans." Sinclair said, before making a few notes on a legal
pad.

Gearhart flipped the next switch, and the second screen flickered
on revealing the CEO of the International Bank of Zurich.

Moving down the line of switches, Gearhart caused a new face to
appear on each monitor. They included a former deputy commander
of the Soviet Army and current chairman of the Department of
Defense for the Russian Federation; a cabinet minister to Her Majesty's government; the chief justice of the French Supreme Court; the German minister of finance in Berlin; and the president and founder of
GlobalStar in Vienna, Europe's largest telecommunications network.

"Can all of you see and hear me clearly?" Sinclair asked.

There were nods along with verbal confirmations from the seven
faces filling the video screens. "Then let us begin." Turning his attention to the Chancellor, he said, "Hans?"

"Thank you, Charles. I'm proud to report, gentlemen, that of the
twenty-seven hundred members of the Council on Foreign Relations,
we now influence slightly over ninety percent. These members are
networking their people into the U.S. State Department while building relationships with our partner one-world government groups in
Canada, Britain, and Japan. This is, of course, a key ingredient to our
success because the CFR is committed to the elimination of national
boundaries."