“Hi, Remi.”
“Hi, Selma. You’re being included in a very important discussion. Did you get the Latin inscription I e-mailed you?”
“Yes,” said Selma. “It was like a puzzle—or maybe just the beginning of one. Are you going after it?”
“Yes,” said Sam. “First, we need to know where ‘the world was lost.’ Albrecht was just saying there are a couple of candidates. Go on, Albrecht.”
“Well, certainly if Albrecht—”
Albrecht interrupted. “We called because we want you to verify the facts, and, in the end, we’ll want your opinion too. Our command of history and its principles will give us an advantage. But Mr. Bako has done a decades-long obsessive study of Attila’s life. He’s probably got an incredible command of the details. Buffs and fanatics can be powerful opponents in a contest of trivia.”
“You said you saw two possible meanings for when the world was lost,” Remi said. “What are they?”
“One would be the battle Attila fought at Châlons-en-Champagne, France, in the year 451. The Huns had advanced to the west through Germany and most of France, pillaging and destroying cities. The Romans, under Flavius Aëtius, along with a larger contingent of allies, raced to cut off the Huns’ advance. They met on the plain at Châlons. Both sides lost many men, but there was no conclusive winner. This was the farthest west that Attila ever got. If he had won a clear victory, he would have gone on and taken Paris, and then possibly the rest of France. He would have ruled most of the area from the Urals to the ocean.”
“What’s the other candidate?” asked Selma.
“It’s a bit more complicated story,” Albrecht said. “It began a year earlier, in 450. Honoria, the sister of the Roman Emperor Valentinian III, was in exile, living in Constantinople, the eastern Roman capital, because at the age of sixteen she was pregnant by a servant. Now she was about to be married off to a Roman Senator she didn’t like. Her solution was to write a letter to Attila the Hun, asking him to rescue her. Attila definitely interpreted the letter as a marriage proposal. He believed she would bring him a dowry consisting of half the Roman Empire.”
“Was that really what she had in mind?” Remi asked.
“It hardly mattered, because her brother Valentinian wasn’t going to let it happen. He hustled Honoria back to the Western Empire, to Ravenna, Italy, where he had his court.”
“Attila wouldn’t have put up with that,” said Tibor.
“He didn’t,” Albrecht said. “In 452, after his disappointment in France, Attila and his men went south and east into northern Italy. They took Padua, Milan, and many other cities. Attila, at the head of his huge army, moved south toward Ravenna, forcing Valentinian and his court to flee back to Rome.”
“And Attila followed?”
“Yes. Until a delegation met him south of Lake Garda, near Mantua. The delegation included noble Romans, led by Pope Leo I. They begged for mercy, asking him to spare Rome. History says he turned around and left for Hungary.”
“That’s all?”
“I said it was complicated. He had taken northern Italy almost unopposed. He wasn’t a Christian and wouldn’t have been interested in the Pope’s request. Italy was at his feet. They had no army comparable to his. I think that his great army made the conquest of Rome impossible. The country was in the middle of a terrible famine. There was also an epidemic. The descriptions indicate it was probably malaria. If Attila pushed on for Rome, there would be no food to feed his huge army, and many would die from illness. So he left, planning to return another day.”
“Is that what you think is the meaning of ‘where the world was lost’?”
“Yes,” said Albrecht. “He was already receiving annual tribute from the Eastern Roman Empire. He controlled most of Europe, from the Urals to central France. If he’d been given the Western Roman Empire, legitimized by the hand of the Emperor’s sister, that was pretty much what he would have considered the world.”
“Albrecht is the expert, but if my opinion makes a difference, I heartily agree,” said Selma.
“It’s a year later than the battle in France,” said Sam. “At the end of his life, I think he wouldn’t say the battle was the most recent loss, and ignore losing Rome when he had it in his hands.”
“Exactly,” said Albrecht. “Fighting to a standstill in France was important. But having Rome was having the world.”
“Attila says he buried a treasure. So it’s off to Italy.”
“The place where the world was lost was where he stopped his army and went home,” Albrecht said. “We’ll research it carefully, but it would be south of Lake Garda near Mantua.”
“All right,” said Sam. “Beginning now, we’re in a race. Arpad Bako will dig up the crypt, expecting to find us in there dead. He’ll find the message, get it translated, and head where we’re headed.”
“If that’s his interpretation of the message,” said Remi.
“Right. What’s the plan?” asked Tibor.
Sam said, “I think that Bako has more reason than ever to want to snatch Albrecht. Interpreting these ancient messages is going to be crucial. So we fly Albrecht to California on the next flight so he can work with Selma in the research center at home in La Jolla. It’s also extremely important that we know what Arpad Bako and his men are doing and where they are from hour to hour. The only one who can hope to accomplish that is Tibor, so he returns to Szeged and recruits people he can trust to help him. Remi and I will catch the next plane from Budapest to the area south of Lake Garda and get started on the search. Other suggestions?”
“No,” said Albrecht. “Perfectly right.”