The Sixth Station (37 page)

I sat down at the dressing table, ran my fingers through my hair, and loaded up on the makeup, including insane Amy Winehouse eyeliner.

You’ve lost your mind. He’s old enough to be, ah, your stepbrother? Yesterday it was cousin. Where’s a straightjacket when you need one?

Eight o’clock came and went. I sat on the bed paralyzed with indecision. At eight fifteen it was either call room service and have Pierre think I was for sale looking like that, or go the hell down to the bar.

I picked up the phone, dialed room service, hung up, and put my tablet, wallet, passport, money, and the diary in the wall safe in the room. Then I walked out the door and into the bar, tottering on the impossibly high heels.

33

Pantera was sitting at the bar nursing what was probably a very, very good Scotch. He was decked out in his leather jacket, a starched white open-neck shirt, and dark blue trousers. He actually had a cigarette dangling from his lips like Daniel Craig or Humphrey Bogart or someone.

He glanced up and saw me staring at him as I entered the impossibly sexy bar area.

It’s the atmosphere that’s getting to you, not the man.

Unlike what I had been expecting, Pantera simply said, “I’m so glad you decided to join me. You deserve a night off. You won’t have one again for many, many days. Please, do sit down,” indicating the stool next to him. “Or would you prefer to sit on one of the easy chairs inside?”

He didn’t even say how great you look. He is a giant horse’s ass.

“Oh, this is fine,” I said, slipping onto the velvet bar stool next to him.

“Johnnie Walker Blue, I presume?”

“You presume wrong.” I asked the bartender for a Belvedere martini, straight up, dry, lots of twists.

“Thanks for the duds. They fit.”

Stop looking for a compliment, big pathetic American! Fat-girl-without-a-date-for-the-prom syndrome strikes again!

“I’m glad of that. There are quite fine shops in Carcassonne.”

“I doubt that’s why you call it home.”

“Do I?”

We sipped our drinks in a strange, slightly uncomfortable silence. When I finished mine he said, “They are quite relaxed here in terms of
réservations pour le dîner,
but I’m sure you must be hungry.”

“You made reservations? How did you know I’d show up?”

Immediately after saying it, I felt myself flushing with embarrassment. I mean, I had shown up looking like Anna Wintour meets Lady Gaga. Obviously this somewhat dubious look required effort and, worse, caring. Yusef was polite enough not to answer.

“So then, where are we going?” I asked, hoping to change the subject.

“Does it matter, and would you know even if I told you?”

“Wow. You really know how to charm a girl.”

“I wasn’t aware that I was attempting to do that.”

Son of a bitch!

“Yes, you are. Okay? Is that settled?”

He laughed and put his arm lightly around my back as he led me out of the hotel’s side entrance nearest the bar and into the cobblestone street. He grabbed an umbrella from the bin, and we walked out into the rainy night. He held the umbrella in one hand over us and put his arm around me with the other to keep me upright on the cobblestones in those giant heels.

He pointed to the beautifully lit city walls and said, “One of these towers housed the Catholic Inquisition in the thirteenth century. It is even now called the Inquisition Tower.”

“Real knights and all that…”

“Actually, in 1142, an extraordinary thing occurred here. All the Christian tenants of the Jewish landowners donated their lands to the Templar Knights. Carcassonne became their stronghold.”

“There were Jews here in the twelfth century?”

“Yes, in the whole Languedoc area, from Montségur to Carcassonne to Rennes-le-Château—all were populated with Jews. It’s the source of the Magdalene chalice legend.”

At that point, we ducked into a little place not one hundred and fifty feet from the hotel. It was an underground restaurant that probably hadn’t changed since the Templars downed brews there.

We ducked our heads to get into the tiny front door. The fire was lit and music was playing on an antique stereo system complete with a turntable.

“I like the music here.” He stopped, closed his eyes, and smiled. “Arturo Sandoval. Nobody ever did ‘I Can’t Get Started’ like that man.”

Such a strange guy!

“Old—
very
old school—all the way, huh?”

“Not necessarily. But sometimes I think I only got as far as Jovanotti and Paolo Nutini music-wise.”

“Who?”

“Never mind.”

Touchy bastard, aren’t you?

He led me to a table in the back, and we sat down in the half-filled place. There was a banged-up piano in the corner, but no one was on board.

Immediately a bottle of Bordeaux was brought, along with
panier de crudités,
fresh vegetables, including a huge bulb of gorgeously fragrant anise, plus some bread, and a little bit of pâté.

He addressed the woman who brought the food, rising and kissing her warmly on both cheeks.

“Chère Madame, je vous présente mon ami Alazais Roussel.”

“Non! Il ne peut pas être!”

“Oui!”

With that I stood and Madame Cheri kissed me on both cheeks and then on my hand, tears springing to her eyes. She backed away, rubbing her hands together and mumbled what sounded like words of thanksgiving—in any language—and retreated into the other room.

“Don’t bring the ladies around much? She’s very grateful that you seem to have what looks like a date.”

He grinned, and I saw the very cute gap in his front teeth. “Don’t fill up too much on
crudités.
The food here is exquisite.”

“But you come for the music.”

“Definitely,” he said, filling our glasses, clinking mine. “To a good hunt.”

“Oh, jeez.” Just as I was beginning to feel slightly ridiculous all done up in the black Chanel dress, the Prada spikes, the red sweater, and a face full of tarty makeup—as if on cue—a very sexy song started playing. Well, in fact it was exactly on cue. Clearly in this place, they knew what this guy liked. I slipped my sweater off. Suddenly I felt embarrassingly warm.

“Ahhh, a personal favorite. Gato Barbieri. ‘Europa.’”

As I was about to take a sip of wine, Pantera stood up, grabbed my hand, and lifted me to my feet. He pulled me to him smoothly, and we began to dance—very, very slowly. I automatically put both of my arms around his neck, but he reached over and took my right hand, closed his around it, and brought our closed hands back in to our bodies.

Holy crow.

“Old—very old—school,” he said in that honey voice, leaning away from me and looking directly at my face. Let me take a moment here to tell you that I am, in fact, quite a good dancer. Always have been. However, the “following the guy’s lead” thing has never been my strong suit on a first dance. I tend to stiffen and have a hard time allowing anyone to lead me around anywhere, but that time, after an initial reserve, I was able to fall into his arms as comfortably as if we’d danced before. Many times.

As we were dancing, floating, actually, he exerted the slightest pressure with his hand on my back, and the silk of my dress felt exquisite as it touched my skin as we barely moved our feet to the delight of the other patrons. Madame Cheri walked in and almost split her face smiling.

When the music stopped, so did we, and he led me back to the table. I was slightly shaky. Hey—once a girl has held a grenade for a guy, a kind of camaraderie develops, OK?

“I feel like a Bond girl.”

“Not a Bond girl, but a ‘chosen woman’ is more like it. One whose story has yet to be written. You will do well in finding the truth of Demiel, I’m sure.”

Did we just have that slow dance together, or am I mistaken here?

I pretended that I was not feeling smeary-eyed and stupid, so I got back down to business.

Screw you, mister—or better yet, don’t screw you!

Instead, in my best reporter voice, I said, “Speaking of Demiel, I had an extraordinary message from my reporter friend in New York.…”

“That would be Dona Grimm.…”

“And you know that—how?”

Of course he didn’t answer. “All right then, at any rate, she was pulled aside very briefly, she told me, by Randall Mohammed, ben Yusef’s lawyer? He said that she was to tell me to ‘Go forth,’ but also—and I quote—that I should ‘trust the man who raised him.’”

“C’est moi.”

“
Apparently so.” Then switching the topic because I wasn’t about to give him another leg up, I asked, “I guess you’ve seen the coverage? About the alleged healings of those kids who were victims of the Manaus bombings?”

He looked unfazed.

“What? You aren’t saying anything.”

“If you think it surprises me, it doesn’t. The Son of the Son has healed since he was a little boy. I told you that.”

“Yes, you did. Did you also see the reaction of that evangelical preacher slash TV personality Bill Teddy Smythe?”

“If Demiel is the Son of God, then Smythe is the son of Satan himself. He’s part of the coalition that ordered the murder of Demiel and His Mother when the Girl was but thirteen and the boy just hours old. Smythe heads the Face of God Fellowship.”

“The what?”

“It’s also called the Black Robe. It operates as the opposite of Headquarters. But both are powerful shadow groups with international followers. Both have members in the highest realms of government, military, and justice. But Headquarters members choose to live more simply, more like the early Christians.”

“What does this mean, ‘Headquarters,’ anyway?”

“It’s been known by hundreds of names since the days of Jesus. Its goal has always been to bring about the Second Coming.

“The preacher’s organization, on the other hand, has morphed into many different loosely connected groups since the end of the Inquisition to
stop
that from occurring.”

“All right then, so that I understand your role here, tell me, why is all this intrigue and Holy Grail stuff concentrated in this rural area of Southern France?”

“Well, as everyone who’s read contemporary thrillers knows, Mary Magdalene probably settled here and may even be buried here—or so the local legends have it. Remember I told you about the so-called ‘head’ that the Templars worshipped and used as a banner in war?”

“Yes, of course. How did it end up here, though?”

“That goes to the heart of the mystery itself. What I can tell you is that all the Templars in the Languedoc region, as I had mentioned, converted to Catharism. There were no finer or more loyal warriors—if they were on your side, at any rate.”

“Let me guess,” I broke in, “your ancestors?”

“The ancestors of many in this region.”

I was beginning to get the picture.

“The blood may have been carried in something that Mary Magdalene brought here with her. Something that was placed into the hands of the Cathars.”

“You aren’t saying it was a skull with blood in it, are you?”

“Doubtful. The Baphomet might have not been a vial, but merely an imprint on a cloth—as in the tale of the Veil of Veronica.”

“You believe this?”

“Yes. I do. But who knows where—or if—it exists any longer. There are so many copies around the world, it’s become a joke.”

“But the real one—if it exists—is in the Vatican—right? I mean the most important relic in all of Christendom?”

“Have you not listened to anything I’ve said? It was the job of the Cathars and then the Templars to keep the thing
out
of the hands of the popes, who would do nothing but evil with it.”

“Your people may have
cloned
with this blood!” I snapped. “That’s not evil?”

“It was meant for good. Nothing from the actual DNA of Jesus, you must understand, could ever do evil. Trust me, I know evil.”

“I’m sure you do.”

“The Vatican claims to have a copy, which they bring out once a year. But it’s a fake—or at least not the image of God.”

“The Vatican has a fake? You sound crazy, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

Apparently not minding at all, he continued with the education of a Russo.

“What’s interesting is that—and listen to this carefully—the Baphomet is only mentioned
once
in relation to the Templars, and it was right here—at the Templars’ tribunal in Carcassonne. The Church held an Inquisition against the Templars to try to coerce the Templars to reveal what they’d done with the head.

“But even under unimaginable torture they refused.”

“And what happened to them? I mean, they’d been Crusaders and had killed for the pope and his mission.”

“Every one of them was convicted of worshipping the ‘devil head’ and was burned alive.”

“Like the Cathars.”

“But not all at once—and probably because they’d converted.”

It was all coming together in my own
Baphomet.
I needed to find this “head,” this cloth, this cup with a head on it, or whatever it was.

If I could find it, and the source blood, it would either prove the legitimacy of Demiel or unmask the hoax. Either way, I couldn’t lose—if I lived long enough to find the story and tell it, that is.

“I’m sorry. You must be very hungry after I touted the cuisine here,” Pantera interjected, allowing me time to let it all sink in. “May I order for you?”

“Sure, be my guest. No fleshy horns though.” Back to reality.

He ordered
Carpe à la bière,
a local fish, for himself, and
Coq à la bière,
a kind of chicken stew, for me. Since the food arrived literally in five minutes, I assumed that he must have told them beforehand what we would be having. For once I kept my mouth shut.

It all smelled delicious, but I just wasn’t hungry. Was it my reporter’s zeal for a story, or was it the company that was making me forgo my previous ravenous appetite?

“You’re not eating,” Pantera said, gesturing with his fork at my steaming bowl.