The Malta Exchange (Cotton Malone 14)

Flowers.

He’d seen a lot of those on the memorials.

He glanced up from the screen. “Search for roses.”

The two Gallos and the curator fanned out.

He typed in RANKS AND FILE.

“Over here,” the curator called out, from near the altar.

They all hurried that way and he saw three roses on a shield, above a Maltese cross. The first memorial, the one with the three crowned lions, was only twenty feet away, toward the other side of the nave.

“There are two markers at this end,” he said. “The one with the shielded lion is at the other end. There has to be one more down there, in its vicinity.”

He glanced at the smartphone’s screen to see what came up for RANKS AND FILE. A military term realting to horizontal “ranks” (rows) and “files” (columns). Enlisted troops, noncommissioned officiers. People who form the major part of a group. A row on a chessboard (rank). A column on a chessboard (file).

Several possibilities.

A lot of officers and knights lay beneath the cathedral’s floor. Too many of each for any reference to the military being the correct answer.

It had to be the chessboard.

“Look for a checkerboard of some sort,” he said. “Let’s do it together.”

They knew exactly what he had in mind, lining up in a row, each taking about a quarter of the floor, ten feet separating them. Slowly, they walked in unison from the altar at one end toward the huge set of double doors at the opposite side of the nave that served as the cathedral’s main entrance. Eleven vertical columns of tombs stretched across, running the long side of the nave’s rectangle. He’d counted six horizontal rows across the short side and they were just coming to the center. Another six or seven rows spanned ahead toward the main doors.

So far, no ranks and files.

They kept going, slow and steady, their heads down studying the myriad marble images.

At the thirteenth and final row, Pollux Gallo said, “Here it is.”

Cotton stepped over and examined the tomb, a particularly macabre scene with a trumpeting angel, a pointing, accusatory skeleton, and a curious baby, all atop a checkerboard floor.

“This has to be it,” Cotton said. “Ranks and files. What the rows and columns on a chessboard are called.”

Four points on the floor.

Two toward the altar, the other two opposite.

Coordinates.

“We need to flag the four memorials.”

The Gallo brothers walked back across the nave, Pollux heading left toward the lion pride, the cardinal finding the memorial with the shielded animal. The curator stood on the three roses. Cotton stayed with the checkerboard. Their positions formed a warped X, one line longer than the other, but an X nonetheless.

This had to be the solution.

“Keep your eyes on the man diagonally opposite and walk slowly in a straight line toward him. Try and meet at the center point of your line. We can adjust that once we’re closer together.”

They started walking, he toward Cardinal Gallo, the curator closing in on Pollux. He and the cardinal were on the longer line of the X, so Pollux and the curator met first. He and the cardinal kept approaching each other and met at a point a little off from where the other two had joined, which meant they hadn’t found the center of their lines. So they adjusted to a spot where all four men stood together at the joining of the oblong X.

One tomb lay beneath their feet.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

The knight watched what was unfolding inside the cathedral, pleased that progress was being made. His patience finally was going to be rewarded.

The words of the Pie Postulatio Voluntatis, Most Pius Request, one third of the Nostra Trinità, written in 1113, had suddenly taken on a new meaning. Every member of the Secreti memorized that sacred document. When Pope Paschal II established the Knights Hospitallers he wrote in the Voluntatis that it shall be unlawful for any man whatsoever rashly to disturb, or to carry off any of the order’s property, or if carried off to retain possession of it, or to diminish anything from its revenues, or to harass it with audacious annoyances. But let all its property remain intact, for the sole use and enjoyment of those for whose maintenance and support it has been granted.

That directive had been violated.

The Turks tried and failed, but Napoleon stole everything he could. Hitler bombed and wreaked havoc, but it was Mussolini who killed to find what he wanted. The Voluntatis dealt with the consequences of such actions.

If, therefore, at a future time, any person, whether ecclesiastical or secular, knowing this paragraph of our constitution, shall attempt to oppose its provisions, and he shall not make a suitable satisfaction and restitution, let him be deprived of all his dignities and honors, and let him know that he stands exposed to the judgment of God, for the iniquity he has perpetrated, and let him be deprived of the Sacraments of the Body and Blood of Christ, and of the benefits of the redemption of our Lord, and at the last judgment let him meet with the severest vengeance.

How much clearer did things have to be?

All was prepared outside. His men were ready to act.

The severest vengeance had arrived.

* * *

Kastor stared down at the tomb of Bartolomeo Tommasi di Cortona and read its Latin epitaph. Bailiff, son of Nicolao of the house of Cortona, a nobleman of his city is wasting away. Admitted to the Sacred Militia of the Jerusalemite Knights, from the year 1708 onward he was dedicated to its service, fulfilling, as long as he lived, his duties on land and sea with the utmost faith. He lived for 79 years, 6 months, 18 days.

The inscription at its top seemed prophetic.

MORS ULTRA NON DOMINABITUR.

Death will not reign beyond.

Three symbols appeared above the epitaph.

Alpha. Omega. The first and last. The Chi Rho in between, formed by superimposing the first two letters of the Greek word for “Christ.” It was not used much today, but in Roman times things had been different.

He knew the connection.

On the eve of a decisive battle to decide the future of the Roman Empire, Constantine had a vision. A cross in the sky with the words IN HOC SIGNO VINCES. In this sign thou shalt conquer. Unsure of the meaning, that night he had a dream in which Christ himself explained that he should use the sign against his enemies. Of course, nobody had a clue if that tale of a vision was true. So many versions of it existed that it was impossible to know which one to believe. But it was a fact that Constantine directed the creation of a new labarum, superimposing the first two letters of the Greek word for Christ.

The Chi Rho sign.

He then ordered that symbol inscribed on his soldiers’ shields, and with his new military standard leading the way he drove his rival into the Tiber River. Eventually, he defeated all challengers and unified the Roman Empire under his rule. He came to honor the sign of his salvation as a safeguard against every adverse and hostile power, and decreed that it be carried at the head of all his armies.

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Kastor smiled.

That prior had chosen his clues with clarity.

* * *

Cotton translated as much of the Latin from the tomb as he could understand, which was most of it.

“This is significant,” Cardinal Gallo said. “That symbol there, in the center, is the cipher of Christ. The Chi Rho. Constantine the Great created it.”

“I agree,” Pollux noted. “This was intentional on the prior’s part. He led us straight here.”

Which was all fine and good, Cotton thought, but it didn’t solve the riddle. He studied the imagery on the memorial. A skeleton, shield, crown, staff, skulls and crossbones, anchors, and a table with a broken clock, on a plinth, beneath an arch.

“It’s the clock,” the curator said. “It exists, here, in the cathedral.”

Cardinal Gallo pointed downward. “He’s telling us to open that clock.”

“Where is it?” Cotton asked.

“In the oratory.”

They followed the curator to one of the massive gilded arches that led into a side nave and a magnificent doorway adorned with four marble columns topped by a white marble dove and lamb. The room beyond spanned a long, tall rectangle encased by more gilded walls, the floor dotted by more marble tombs. At the far end, through another gilded arch, past an altar, hung a huge oil painting depicting St. John the Baptist’s gruesome murder.

“Caravaggio’s Beheading of St. John,” the curator said, pointing to the painting. “Our greatest treasure.”

Cotton gave the image only a passing glance, then focused on the room. Maltese crosses were everywhere, the ceiling another grandiose baroque expression in gilt. A few pieces of furniture were pressed against the walls, one a paneled sideboard that supported a marble clock. About thirty inches tall, it was identical to the one depicted in the memorial back in the main nave. Except this one was intact.

He walked over and tried to lift it. Way too heavy.

“We’ve not moved it in years,” the curator said.