Intervention (31 page)

“I think I could feel some movement,” Shawn said. He was encouraged but concerned that if he applied too much torque, he could snap off a piece of the ossuary’s top. The ossuary had been intact for two millennia, and he wanted it to stay that way.

“Can’t you speed this up,” Sana said, beside herself with excitement. From her perspective it seemed that Shawn was dragging this part out unnecessarily.

Shawn paused and glanced up at his wife. “You’re hardly being helpful,” he snapped.

Repositioning himself, he went back to work with the chisel. There was no telling how long it would take, or if it would work at all.

Just when he paused to stop and rethink the situation, there was another cracking noise, and Shawn’s heart skipped a beat. Quickly, he pulled out the chisel, expecting to see a crack in the limestone, but there was none. He ran his hand along the edge to see if he could feel a crack that for some reason he could not see, but there was no discontinuity.

Gingerly, he reinserted the chisel and tentatively began to rotate it. To his relief, the top, in its entirety, lifted off the base. It was free! He looked at the others and nodded. “This is it,” he said, grasping both ends of the top with his hands. He gently lifted it high enough for the rabbet to clear the sides and placed the top on the table. Then they leaned over and peered into the ossuary that had been hermetically sealed for two thousand years.

21

9:48 A.M., SATURDAY, DECEMBER 6, 2008

NEW YORK CITY

D
ear Lord, I beseech You,” James prayed. “Show me the way to deal with the ossuary.”

He was in the exquisite private chapel dedicated to Saint John the Apostle on the third floor of the archbishop’s residence, kneeling on an antique French prie-dieu beneath an ebony wall plaque.

On the plaque was a superbly rendered image of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin.

The Mother of God was standing on clouds with two cherubs at her side. Attached to the plaque’s base was a finely wrought sterling-silver holy-water font. James had always loved the piece, and that morning its image had particular significance.

“I never question Your will, but I fear that my capabilities involving the task You have placed in my unworthy hands may not be sufficient. I firmly believe that whatever remains might be found in the ossuary are not those of Your Virgin Mother. It is my humble wish that there will be no possibility anyone will believe whatever relics are found are those of a woman. Only then may I feel capable of dealing with this problem.

I also pray that my friend Shawn Daughtry will disavow any and all association he might have originally felt between the ossuary and Your Blessed Mother.” Crossing himself, he rose, saying a fervent “May Your will be done. Amen.”

James’s torment had made sleep difficult, and his eyes had popped open that morning before five. Rousing himself from the warmth of his narrow metal bed, he’d prayed a similar prayer to the prayer he’d just voiced in the chapel, using another more simple prie-dieu in his ascetic, cold bedroom.

From then on, the morning had been similar to other Saturday mornings. He’d read his breviary, celebrated Mass with his staff, and breakfasted with his two secretaries. There had been a short ten-minute interruption when Shawn and Sana arrived to pick up the ossuary. James had watched with mild distress as Shawn and Father Maloney carried the box up from the basement and placed it in the trunk of a dirty yellow cab. When the trunk had been slammed shut, James had winced. Even though he trusted the relic did not contain the bones of the Virgin, the rough treatment seemed sacrilegious.

After the Daughtrys had left, James had returned to his private quarters to change into his full regalia as the day was to include an official visit at the Church of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary. At that point, fully dressed, he had gone into the tiny chapel.

With some effort, James got to his feet. Then, dipping his fingers into the holy water, he made the sign of the cross before descending to his office on the floor below. Checking his e-mail was part of his morning routine. Just as his computer monitor awoke, his phone rang, drawing his eyes to the caller ID screen. When he saw it was Jack Stapleton, he snatched up the receiver. Unfortunately, he wasn’t quite fast enough. He got a dial tone instead of Jack’s voice, meaning Father Maloney or Father Karlin had beaten him to the punch. Impatiently, he drummed his fingertips on his blotter. The intercom buzzed a moment later.

“It’s a Dr. Jack Stapleton,” Father Karlin said. “Are you available?”

“Yes, thank you,” James said. But he didn’t answer immediately, knowing that Jack’s call meant the ossuary was now open. Reciting another quick prayer, James eyed the small blinking light. He suddenly felt less confident, as if he somehow knew the Good Lord meant for his torment to continue.

Taking a deep breath, James answered softly.

“Is that you, James?” Jack asked.

“It is I,” James said in a depressed tone. He could hear laughter in the background and excited conversation, erasing any last hope in his mind about what he was about to learn.

“I’m not sure you want to hear this,” Jack said. “But—”

James could tell that Jack had been cut off by the ecstatic Shawn, who was apparently fighting with Jack for the phone. James could clearly hear Shawn say, “Is that His Eminent Excellency, hoping soon to be wearer of the Fisherman’s Ring? Let me talk to that pudgy bum!”

James cringed and considered hanging up, but his curiosity prevented him.

“Hey, brother!” Shawn said blithely, coming on the line. “We hit gold!”

“Oh?” James questioned with feigned disinterest. “What did you find?”

“Not one scroll but three, and the biggest says in Greek on the outside: GOSPEL

ACCORDING TO SIMON. We have the gospel of Simon Magus. Isn’t that a gas?”

“Was that all that was in the ossuary?” James asked, with a glimmer of hope appearing on the distant horizon.

“No, that was not all, but I’ll give you back to Jack for that. Talk to you soon.”

A moment later Jack came back on the line. “He is one happy archaeologist,” Jack explained. “I’m certain he doesn’t mean to be disrespectful if you heard what he’d said before he got the phone away from me.”

“Just tell me, were there bones in the ossuary?” James asked. At the moment, he was uninterested in manners.

“There were,” Jack admitted. “To me, it looks like a complete skeleton, including a skull that’s in reasonably good shape. It could be more than one skeleton, but there’s only one skull.”

“Holy Mary, Mother of God,” James murmured, more to himself than to Jack. “Can you tell if the remains are human?”

“That would be my guess.”

“How about the sex?”

“That’s harder to say. The pelvis is in pieces, which is the way I’d try to tell. But as soon as I saw the bones when we got the top off the ossuary, I called Alex Jaszek, the head of the OCME department of anthropology, told him what we were doing in a very general way, and asked him if he’d like to come over. He’s on his way.”

“You didn’t mention anything about the Virgin Mary, did you?”

“Of course not. I just said we opened a first-century ossuary.”

“Good,” James said, trying to think of what he should do. He was tempted to go over to the city DNA building himself to view the relics, but to do so would require changing again, lest his visit appear on the cover of tomorrow’s
Times.
Since he had to be at the luncheon at noon in his ecclesiastical finery, he decided he didn’t have enough time to change and then change back.

“James, Shawn wants to talk with you again. Is it okay if I hand him the phone?”

“Yes, it’s okay,” James said warily. He assumed Shawn wanted to hit him a few more times while he was down for the count.

“Hey!” Shawn said, coming on the line. “I just remembered it’s your birthday! Happy birthday, Your Eminent Excellency.”

“Thank you,” James said. It took him by surprise. As upset as he was over the ossuary and its potential ramifications, he’d totally forgotten his own birthday. He also wondered why his staff had not said anything, even though he’d never been a stickler for such things. “My title is Your Eminence or Your Excellency,” James said in partial rebuke.

“But from you I would prefer James.”

“Right you are,” Shawn said with indifference. “I have a suggestion. How about we throw a party tonight, provided you don’t have to dine with some country leader or other muckety-muck. We’ll celebrate your birthday and our breakthrough find together. What do you say? The simultaneity is a bit ironic, of course, but life is like that.”

James’s first reaction was to say absolutely, categorically, no. He didn’t want to listen to Shawn bragging about how he was going to shock the world with his revelations. But as James quickly thought about the invitation, the more he began to believe it might be a good idea to bear the burden. He needed to be part of the investigation from the beginning so that he could keep a healthy amount of skepticism alive in the minds of all concerned, if he was to have any hope of ultimately talking Shawn out of publishing anything about the Virgin Mary. Perhaps it was a long shot, but for the moment it was the only strategy James could imagine beyond prayer.

“I’m thinking about picking up some steaks, salad makings, and some terrific red wine on the way home,” Shawn went on when James didn’t respond. “We can grill the steaks on the back porch. What do you say?”

What made James continue to hesitate was the worry of Shawn being insufferable and riding him the whole evening. James doubted he could endure such an evening on so little sleep.

“Instead of staying in we could always go out,” Shawn persisted in the face of James’s silence. “I just thought you don’t like to go out.”

“Only with you,” James said. “We always get into an argument over dinner. I’m not blaming you, I’m just as guilty, and even if I go as a civilian, someone always recognizes me. I don’t need that type of publicity. Let me talk again with Jack!”

“He wants to talk with you,” Shawn said, with frustration.

“What is it?” Jack asked with a tired voice. He had a premonition of what was coming, meaning the refereeing was already beginning.

“Jack, Shawn’s planning a celebration dinner tonight at their home. You’ve got to be there.”

“I haven’t actually been officially asked, and besides, I have to get home to help Laurie with JJ, our son.”

“Jack, I need your help, as I made clear yesterday. If you’ll come to this impromptu dinner party, I’ll do the same, but I’m going to need a buffer with Shawn, especially with the current high he is on. I need to know more about what he’s found and what he’s thinking, but you know it’ll be torture.”

“So I’ll play referee once again,” Jack said grudgingly. He’d never liked the role.

“Jack, please!”

“All right, if it’s not going to be late.”

“It won’t be late. I have to say Mass in the cathedral early in the morning. On top of that I slept poorly last night. Believe me, it is not going to be a late night. Listen, I’ll bring my car, and I’ll drive you home.”

“Okay, I’ll come,” Jack said, “but I have to check with Laurie.”

“Fair enough,” James said. “Put Shawn back on.”

James told Shawn what had been decided and asked what time.

Shawn shrugged. “Let’s say seven. I think I’d be speaking for Sana if I say we’ll want to get an early start in the lab tomorrow. We’ll want to break up on the early side.”

“I couldn’t agree more.”

22

10:40 A.M., SATURDAY, DECEMBER 6, 2008

NEW YORK CITY

O
nly a little more than ten minutes after the conversation with James, Alex Jaszek, the anthropologist, arrived. During the brief interim Shawn and Sana continued to whisper epithets back and forth. Despite their earlier joy over their discovery, they had begun arguing about the evening’s plans until Sana, in disgust, had disappeared into the laboratory to check out the equipment.

Alex looked young for a seasoned Ph.D., with a skimpy beard on his youthful face. He was built like the quintessential high-school football player, with broad shoulders and a narrow waist. He wore khaki pants and an old-fashioned flannel shirt.

“Is this the way the bones looked when you got the top off?” Alex asked, peering into the ossuary.

“Pretty much,” Jack said. He was looking in as well. “The three scrolls were inside as well. Shawn carefully lifted them out. The thigh bone might have moved a tiny bit when he did so, but we took plenty of photos.”

“It looks like quite a complete skeleton.”

“That was our guess as well,” Shawn said.

“You could have lifted the bones out,” Alex said. “The position is not going to tell us anything, since this was, as I’m sure you know, a reburial. When ossuaries were in use, the body was first left to decompose, then the bones were gathered up and put into the ossuary in no particular order. So let’s go ahead and lift them out one by one and arrange them on the table in their general anatomical position.”

Sana emerged and joined them around the table, and Jack made introductions. Sana made a big show of shaking Alex’s hand while expressing unctuous gratitude that he’d sacrificed part of his Saturday to lend them his extraordinary expertise.

Jack could sense that Sana’s over-the-top performance was to irritate Shawn, which seemed to be working. So, while Sana was helping Alex in the gowning room, Jack leaned over and quietly asked, “Are we still on for tonight, or should we reschedule?”

“You bet your sweet ass we’re still on,” Shawn snapped. “I don’t know what’s come over her sometimes. Whatever it is better stop.”

Sensibly, Jack refrained from further commenting but rather plucked a bone from the ossuary and tried to figure out what it was.

After returning from the gowning room Sana carried on for another five minutes with Alex, who was obviously charmed by her attention. But seeing that Jack and Shawn were having some trouble with determining where the bones belonged anatomically, she and Alex pitched in to help. Then, after several minutes, Alex took over completely since he had begun to comment on each bone as he took it from the ossuary and added it to the expanding skeleton. After a half-hour it was done.