‘Find out.’
Eckart played his flashlight beam around the room but didn’t see any other way for the professor and his companions to get out. The soldiers were already checking for hidden doors.
The point man squatted at the bottom of the grave. ‘Sir, there is a tunnel here. It’s not very big, looks like crawl space only, but it’s big enough.’
‘All right. Let’s see where it takes us. Drop your pack. It’ll only slow you down. Take your flashlight, pistol and extra magazines. We’ll bring your gear.’ Eckart looked round the room and chose another small man. ‘Carter, you strip down and go with him.’
Carter dropped his pack immediately and kept only his pistol and flashlight. He crawled into the hole behind the point man and they disappeared in the space of a drawn breath.
Eckart slid free of his pack and tied it to his left ankle. He dropped his pack into the hole then slid into the tunnel. As he crawled, the line kept his pack tethered to him.
Lourds and his people couldn’t be far ahead. They didn’t have that big a lead. Eckart scrambled as he’d been taught back in basic, elbows and knees, eating up the distance.
Joachim stopped crawling unexpectedly. Sharp pain exploded through Lourds’ cheek as his face skidded over the monk’s hiking shoe.
‘What’s wrong? Why have you stopped?’
‘I don’t know. Everyone else has stopped.’
Lourds twisted painfully in the tunnel and looked back the way they’d come. Bright yellow light flashed through the darkness.
‘We’re about to have company,’ Lourds said.
‘I see them.’ Joachim raised his voice. ‘Olympia.’
‘The way is sealed,’ she responded.
Lourds’ spirits sank. He had known from the beginning it might end up like this, but dealing with it in the darkness was much different. He didn’t think he could take another five hundred yards of crawling on his elbows and knees. He was certain he’d rather be shot.
‘How is it sealed?’ Lourds asked.
Behind them, the flashlight beams closed the distance.
‘It looks like a solid wall.’
‘It’s not debris? Something caused by a cave-in?’
‘No.’
‘Is it man made?’
Olympia sounded irritated. ‘I don’t see a tool mark.’
‘That’s not what I mean. It’s not a hidden door?’
‘I already checked for that, Thomas. I’m not totally witless.’
‘This doesn’t make sense. They wouldn’t build a tunnel that went nowhere.’ Lourds thought desperately, trying to imagine what the Brotherhood might have done to fool potential enemies. ‘The entrance was located in a grave. The tunnel was meant as an escape. Joachim, you don’t know anything about this, do you?’
‘No. The knowledge about the escape tunnel was passed down, but nothing more,’ Joachim answered.
‘How do you get rescued from the grave?’ Lourds asked himself.
‘If you’re dead, you have to wait till the Second Coming,’ Joachim said. ‘When Jesus Christ returns, the dead will be lifted from their graves and-’
‘I’m familiar with the theology,’ Lourds interrupted. Then a thought struck him. ‘Olympia, look up. What do you see?’
There was a pause, during which Lourds noted that the flashlights were coming closer, then Olympia called back, ‘Nothing. Just a stone surface.’
‘Smooth or unfinished?’
‘Smooth.’
‘Any markings?’
‘I don’t see – wait. There’s a fish symbol here.’
‘Push against the ceiling,’ Lourds said. ‘That should be a door.’ Now if only it works.
Stone grated in the darkness and Lourds held his breath as he watched the approaching flashlight beams. They couldn’t be too far off now, but in the darkness it was hard to judge distance.
‘It’s a door!’ Olympia called back.
‘Go!’ Lourds said. ‘Hurry!’
One by one, they went, and the flashlight beams still crept up on them. Lourds was certain he wasn’t going to make it. He sat on his haunches and passed his backpack and hat up to Joachim. His heart gladdened at the realization that the next section of the escape route was larger than the first. Once the way was clear, he stood up through the narrow passage, gripped the edges, and hauled himself up with the aid of Joachim and another monk. They closed the door.
Light seeped round the edges from below. The men pursuing them gathered there. Lourds was certain they wouldn’t be stymied for long.
He glanced up at Joachim and whispered, ‘Do you know where we are?’
Joachim shook his head.
‘We need something to jam this door shut,’ Lourds said.
‘Will this do?’ Joachim pulled the crowbar that had caused all the commotion from under his jacket.
‘Just the thing,’ Lourds said. He took the crowbar and inserted one end into the mortise of the stone door and kicked it hard, wedging the heavy door shut.
‘That should slow them down,’ he said.
The hidden door had opened out against a wall at the end of the passageway. There was only one way to go.
Only a little farther on, the new passageway dead-ended as well. Olympia immediately searched the wall while everyone else searched the ceiling.
‘Here,’ Olympia said. She shone her flashlight on a fish symbol near the top of the dead end. ‘This has to be a door.’
Hammering and banging came from the other end of the passageway.
‘Permit me,’ Lourds suggested.
They made way for him and he went up to the door. He looked all over it but didn’t see any crevices or anything that gave any indication that the wall was indeed a door.
‘I’ve found something,’ Cleena said. She shone her light on a small square at eye level on the right-hand wall. ‘It looks like a picture; it was covered with dust.’ She brushed at the thick layers of grime to reveal the image.
‘It’s not a picture,’ Joachim said. ‘It’s a mosaic.’
Upon closer inspection, Lourds realized it was a mosaic. Created of tiny coloured stones, the image showed thirteen people seated at a table.
‘The Mystical Supper,’ Joachim said in awe.
‘I take it you haven’t been in this particular passageway before,’ Lourds said.
‘Never.’
‘It would have been really helpful if you had.’ Lourds pressed the mosaic but nothing happened. He trained his beam on the walls. ‘Check the walls. There has to be something else here.’ Then he stopped and went back to the mosaic. ‘The Mystical Supper is what it was called by Eastern Orthodox Christians. Paul was the first apostle to describe it.’
‘In 1 Corinthians 11:23-26,’ Joachim agreed.
‘Yes.’ Lourds knelt below the mosaic. ‘That supper provided a lot of material for legends and mythology. The jug used to serve the wine has been purported by some to be the Holy Grail, sought after by King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table. It’s also supposed to be the beginning of the Eucharist, the sharing of Jesus’ blood and body.’
‘Yes, but what does that have to do with opening this door?’ Olympia asked.
Lourds smiled confidently. ‘In Orthodox churches, where do you expect to find a picture of the Mystical Supper?’
Joachim knelt beside him and began feeling the wall as well. ‘Above the Holy Doors.’
‘Yes. They’re also called the Royal Doors and the Beautiful Gates.’
Lourds trailed his fingers along the stone. A moment later, he felt a raised pattern. He shone his light on it and wiped at the accumulated dust. His efforts quickly revealed three more small mosaics. One was of a man with a nimbus around his head.
‘The sainted deacon,’ Lourds said. ‘Usually it’s Saint Stephen or Saint Lawrence or one of the others.’
The second mosaic presented an engraved door that looked as though it had been rendered in gold.
‘The Beautiful Gates,’ Joachim said. ‘That is the door Christ enters through.’
‘The Russian Orthodox call them the Red Gates,’ Lourds said. ‘But the meaning is relatively the same.’
A winged angel filled the third mosaic.