‘You can’t mean me?’ she gasped.
‘You have been prompted to meet with me for a reason, Aleta, but the challenge is yours to accept or decline.’
‘If I accept such a challenge,’ Aleta asked slowly, as his words sank in, ‘will you help me, Jose?’
‘I can be your mentor, Aleta, but again, that is up to you. If I am to be your guide, you will have to undergo a cleansing and rebuilding of your inner spirit.’
‘I’m not sure I understand.’
‘You’re not sleeping well, Aleta.’ It was a statement rather than a question. Again Aleta sensed the power around this gentle man.
‘No,’ she admitted. ‘Not for some time now.’
‘I can see the unhappiness in your eyes.’
‘Is it that obvious?’
‘Not to the casual observer. Outwardly you are functioning at a very high level, but your eyes tell a different story, Aleta. You have intense brown rings around your irises, which is an indication of stress and acute depression.’
From his position near a display case in one of the museum’s exhibition corridors leading to Cafe Nautilus, Curtis O’Connor observed the quiet conversation between Aleta Weizman and the man with the greying ponytail. O’Connor was not surprised to find that the swarthy young thug who had taken a back seat in Monsignor Jennings’ lecture was also having coffee in the museum’s restaurant, pretending to read a copy of the Osterreich Journal. O’Connor reached again for his high-resolution camera.
‘The brown rings… do they have something to do with the iris’s connection to the brain?’
‘Exactly,’ Dr Arana answered. ‘When you are first conceived, your eyes start as part of the brain, but after separation the nerves of the iris remain connected to a part of the brain known as the hypothalamus. The eyes actually reflect the condition of all organs, and we can detect a problem, such as cancer, long before the symptoms appear in the body itself. We can also detect depression, and if you are to be successful in finding and decoding the Maya Codex, that part of your spirit will need healing.’
‘You said I’m in grave danger?’
‘Because you have embarked on a quest to find out who murdered your family, especially your father and grandfather. Your grandfather was very close to recovering the missing Maya Codex when he was murdered by the Nazis.’
Aleta swallowed, her grief rekindled. ‘What does “close” mean?’
‘My father spoke with him many times when your grandfather visited Lake Atitlan and Tikal. Your grandfather eventually found two of the three figurines that are needed to recover the codex. He had begun to decipher the hieroglyphics that would lead him to the last figurine and the Maya Codex itself, but he was murdered before he could complete his task.’
Aleta sank in her chair, the past weighing heavily on her. ‘My grandfather made some notes,’ she confided, ‘and he mentioned that three figurines would be needed to unearth the codex… but I’ve never seen any figurines.’
‘I’m sure your grandfather took steps to ensure their safekeeping. There is a divine timing in these things, Aleta. Just as we can see the powerful warning signs that are now gathering in the natural world, the two figurines your grandfather found, the remaining one and the codex itself will all remain hidden until they are meant to be discovered – and that time is now close. Because of your quest to find those who have destroyed your family, you have come to the attention of both the CIA and the Vatican. There are two very powerful men who are determined you won’t succeed. Both organisations are also determined, for different reasons, to recover the codex and keep it from the public.’ Arana paused to allow Aleta time to reflect.
‘There are two more men, one of whom will deal with the other,’ he went on. ‘You will come to trust one of these men with your life. If you decide to go on, you must come back to the shores of Lake Atitlan to prepare for your sacred mission.’
30
O ’Connor returned to the Imperial Hotel for dinner and then retired to his room. He recovered his laptop from the wardrobe safe, dialled in a series of codes to connect with the vast database held in the CIA’s Cray supercomputers at Langley and waited while his request for access went through a series of encryptions and decryptions.
With access approved, O’Connor fed in the photographs he’d taken earlier in the day. Within seconds, a profile page for Antonio Sodano appeared, together with surveillance photographs provided by the Guardia di Finanza, the Italian financial and customs police: Antonio Sodano – executive summary. Born Corleone, Sicily, 14 August 1987. Rising member of the Cosa Nostra and suspected hitman, although young and inexperienced. Arrested in 2006 for the murder of a member of a prominent mafia family in Palermo in a dispute over protection money for quarries. Trial aborted for lack of evidence with a strong omerta surrounding the case. Moved to Rome 2007. Has connections with a black Masonic Lodge, Propaganda Tre, an offshoot of the infamous Propaganda Due or P2 Lodge, suspected of involvement in the Red Brigades’ assassination of Italian prime minister Aldo Moro. Sodano has links to the Vatican Bank (see attached photo). Now under investigation and surveillance by the Italian Guardia di Finanza for suspected drug-trafficking.
O’Connor scanned the rest of the report, but stopped when he came to the surveillance photographs. Sodano had been snapped at a dockside in Naples, at Rome’s international airport, and at La Pergola, one of Rome’s finest restaurants, where he had been photographed at dinner with another man. The photo was grainy and O’Connor couldn’t quite place him, but he looked vaguely familiar. O’Connor knew the restaurant well. Located on Via Cadlolo 101 in the Cavalieri Hilton, with panoramic views of the city from Rome’s highest hill, La Pergola’s cellar held 48 000 bottles. O’Connor had dined there with Kate Braithwaite.
O’Connor felt the old anger and hurt return, and he fought to control his deepest emotions. Kate. He pictured her in her level four spacesuit, calmly working with some of the deadliest pathogens known to humankind. She had been a brilliant microbiologist. They had worked together on an assignment in Beijing involving the biggest biological threat the world had ever faced. Their love-life had been a sensation between the sheets; but just when O’Connor was accepting there was someone very special in his life, Kate had been brutally taken from him – a needle stick in a lethal hot-zone laboratory at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. From the moment the Ebola virus had entered Kate’s bloodstream, her fate had been sealed. Her agonising death was seared into his memory.
The coroner returned a finding of ‘accidental fatality’, but O’Connor hadn’t believed a word of it. He and Kate had made some powerful enemies in Washington and at Langley, and the needle had punctured the back of her arm. He had considered resigning, but decided against it, knowing he would have a better chance from within the Agency of discovering how Kate had met her fate. He still harboured a hope that the CIA might change course – back to the old agency that had once been run by honourable professionals.