ng had
felt like a bizarre dream. I'm about to dash out of the Louvre... a
fugitive.
Sauniure's clever anagrammatic message was still on his mind, and
Langdon wondered what Sophie would find at the Mona Lisa... if anything. She
had seemed certain her grandfather meant for her to visit the famous
painting one more time. As plausible an interpretation as this seemed,
Langdon felt haunted now by a troubling paradox.
P.S. Find Robert Langdon.
Sauniure had written Langdon's name on the floor, commanding Sophie to
find him. But why? Merely so Langdon could help her break an anagram?
It seemed quite unlikely.
After all, Sauniure had no reason to think Langdon was especially
skilled at anagrams. We've never even met. More important, Sophie had stated
flat out that she should have broken the anagram on her own. It had been
Sophie who spotted the Fibonacci sequence, and, no doubt, Sophie who, if
given a little more time, would have deciphered the message with no help
from Langdon.
Sophie was supposed to break that anagram on her own. Langdon was
suddenly feeling more certain about this, and yet the conclusion left an
obvious gaping lapse in the logic of Sauniure's actions.
Why me? Langdon wondered, heading down the hall. Why was Sauniure's
dying wish that his estranged granddaughter find me? What is it that
Sauniure thinks I know?
With an unexpected jolt, Langdon stopped short. Eyes wide, he dug in
his pocket and yanked out the computer printout. He stared at the last line
of Sauniure's message.
P.S. Find Robert Langdon.
He fixated on two letters.
P.S.
In that instant, Langdon felt Sauniure's puzzling mix of symbolism fall
into stark focus. Like a peal of thunder, a career's worth of symbology and
history came crashing down around him. Everything Jacques Sauniure had done
tonight suddenly made perfect sense.
Langdon's thoughts raced as he tried to assemble the implications of
what this all meant. Wheeling, he stared back in the direction from which he
had come.
Is there time?
He knew it didn't matter.
Without hesitation, Langdon broke into a sprint back toward the stairs.
CHAPTER 22
Kneeling in the first pew, Silas pretended to pray as he scanned the
layout of the sanctuary. Saint-Sulpice, like most churches, had been built
in the shape of a giant Roman cross. Its long central section--the nave--led
directly to the main altar, where it was transversely intersected by a
shorter section, known as the transept. The intersection of nave and
transept occurred directly beneath the main cupola and was considered the
heart of the church... her most sacred and mystical point.
Not tonight, Silas thought. Saint-Sulpice hides her secrets elsewhere.
Turning his head to the right, he gazed into the south transept, toward
the open area of floor beyond the end of the pews, to the object his victims
had described.
There it is.
Embedded in the gray granite floor, a thin polished strip of brass
glistened in the stone... a golden line slanting across the church's floor.
The line bore graduated markings, like a ruler. It was a gnomon, Silas had
been told, a pagan astronomical device like a sundial. Tourists, scientists,
historians, and pagans from around the world came to Saint-Sulpice to gaze
upon this famous line.
The Rose Line.
Slowly, Silas let his eyes trace the path of the brass strip as it made
its way across the floor from his right to left, slanting in front of him at
an awkward angle, entirely at odds with the symmetry of the church. Slicing
across the main altar itself, the line looked to Silas like a slash wound
across a beautiful face. The strip cleaved the communion rail in two and
then crossed the entire width of the church, finally reaching the corner of
the north transept, where it arrived at the base of a most unexpected
structure.
A colossal Egyptian obelisk.
Here, the glistening Rose Line took a ninety-degree vertical turn and
continued directly up the face of the obelisk itself, ascending thirty-three
feet to the very tip of the pyramidical apex, where it finally ceased.
The Rose Line, Silas thought. The brotherhood hid the keystone at the
Rose Line.
Earlier tonight, when Silas told the Teacher that the Priory keystone
was hidden inside Saint-Sulpice, the Teacher had sounded doubtful. But when
Silas added that the brothers had all given him a precise location, with
relation to a brass line running through Saint-Sulpice, the Teacher had
gasped with revelation. "You speak of the Rose Line!"
The Teacher quickly told Silas of Saint-Sulpice's famed architectural
oddity--a strip of brass that segmented the sanctuary on a perfect
north-south axis. It was an ancient sundial of sorts, a vestige of the pagan
temple that had once stood on this very spot. The sun's rays, shining
through the oculus on the south wall, moved farther down the line every day,
indicating the passage of time, from solstice to solstice.
The north-south stripe had been known as the Rose Line. For centuries,
the symbol of the Rose had been associated with maps and guiding souls in
the proper direction. The Compass Rose--drawn on almost every map--indicated
North, East, South, and West. Originally known as the Wind Rose, it denoted
the directions of the thirty-two winds, blowing from the directions of eight
major winds, eight half-winds, and sixteen quarter-winds. When diagrammed
inside a circle, these thirty-two points of the compass perfectly resembled
a traditional thirty-two petal rose bloom. To this day, the fundamental
navigational tool was still known as a Compass Rose, its northernmost
direction still marked by an arrowhead... or, more commonly, the symbol of
the fleur-de-lis.
On a globe, a Rose Line--also called a meridian or longitude--was any
imaginary line drawn from the North Pole to the South Pole. There were, of
course, an infinite number of Rose Lines because every point on the globe
could have a longitude drawn through it connecting north and south poles.
The question for early navigators was which of these lines would be called
the Rose Line--the zero longitude--the line from which all other longitudes
on earth would be measured.
Today that line was in Greenwich, England.
But it had not always been.
Long before the establishment of Greenwich as the prime meridian, the
zero longitude of the entire world had passed directly through Paris, and
through the Church of Saint-Sulpice. The brass marker in Saint-Sulpice was a
memorial to the world's first prime meridian, and although Greenwich had
stripped Paris of the honor in 1888, the original Rose Line was still
visible today.
"And so the legend is true," the Teacher had told Silas. "The Priory
keystone has been said to lie 'beneath the Sign of the Rose.' "
Now, still on his knees in a pew, Silas glanced around the church and
listened to make sure no one was there. For a moment, he thought he heard a
rustling in the choir balcony. He turned and gazed up for several seconds.
Nothing.
I am alone.
Standing now, he faced the altar and genuflected three times. Then he
turned left and followed the brass line due north toward the obelisk.
At that moment, at Leonardo da Vinci International Airport in Rome, the
jolt of tires hitting the runway startled Bishop Aringarosa from his
slumber.
I drifted off, he thought, impressed he was relaxed enough to sleep.
"Benvenuto a Roma," the intercom announced.
Sitting up, Aringarosa straightened his black cassock and allowed
himself a rare smile. This was one trip he had been happy to make. I have
been on the defensive for too long. Tonight, however, the rules had changed.
Only five months ago, Aringarosa had feared for the future of the Faith.
Now, as if by the will of God, the solution had presented itself.
Divine intervention.
If all went as planned tonight in Paris, Aringarosa would soon be in
possession of something that would make him the most powerful man in
Christendom.
CHAPTER 23
Sophie arrived breathless outside the large wooden doors of the Salle
des Etats--the room that housed the Mona Lisa. Before entering, she gazed
reluctantly farther down the hall, twenty yards or so, to the spot where her
grandfather's body still lay under the spotlight.
The remorse that gripped her was powerful and sudden, a deep sadness
laced with guilt. The man had reached out to her so many times over the past
ten years, and yet Sophie had remained immovable--leaving his letters and
packages unopened in a bottom drawer and denying his efforts to see her. He
lied to me! Kept appalling secrets! What was I supposed to do? And so she
had blocked him out. Completely.
Now her grandfather was dead, and he was talking to her from the grave.
The Mona Lisa.
She reached for the huge wooden doors, and pushed. The entryway yawned
open. Sophie stood on the threshold a moment, scanning the large rectangular
chamber beyond. It too was bathed in a soft red light. The Salle des Etats
was one of this museum's rare culs-de-sac--a dead end and the only room off
the middle of the Grand Gallery. This door, the chamber's sole point of
entry, faced a dominating fifteen-foot Botticelli on the far wall. Beneath
it, centered on the parquet floor, an immense octagonal viewing divan served
as a welcome respite for thousands of visitors to rest their legs while they
admired the Louvre's most valuable asset.
Even before Sophie entered, though, she knew she was missing something.
A black light. She gazed down the hall at her grandfather under the lights
in the distance, surrounded by electronic gear. If he had written anything
in here, he almost certainly would have written it with the watermark
stylus.
Taking a deep breath, Sophie hurried down to the well-lit crime scene.
Unable to look at her grandfather, she focused solely on the PTS tools.
Finding a small ultraviolet penlight, she slipped it in the pocket of her
sweater and hurried back up the hallway toward the open doors of the Salle
des Etats.
Sophie turned the corner and stepped over the threshold. Her entrance,
however, was met by an unexpected sound of muffled footsteps racing toward
her from inside the chamber. There's someone in here! A ghostly figure
emerged suddenly from out of the reddish haze. Sophie jumped back.
"There you are!" Langdon's hoarse whisper cut the air as his silhouette
slid to a stop in front of her.
Her relief was only momentary. "Robert, I told you to get out of here!
If Fache--"
"Where were you?"
"I had to get the black light," she whispered, holding it up. "If my
grandfather left me a message--"
"Sophie, listen." Langdon caught his breath as his blue eyes held her
firmly. "The letters P.S.... do they mean anything else to you? Anything at
all?"
Afraid their voices might echo down the hall, Sophie pulled him into
the Salle des Etats and closed the enormous twin doors silently, sealing
them inside. "I told you, the initials mean Princess Sophie."
"I know, but did you ever see them anywhere else? Did your grandfather
ever use P.S. in any other way? As a monogram, or maybe on stationery or a
personal item?"
The question startled her. How would Robert know that? Sophie had
indeed seen the initials P.S. once before, in a kind of monogram. It was the
day before her ninth birthday. She was secretly combing the house, searching
for hidden birthday presents. Even then, she could not bear secrets kept
from her. What did Grand-pure get for me this year? She dug through
cupboards and drawers. Did he get me the doll I wanted? Where would he hide
it?
Finding nothing in the entire house, Sophie mustered the courage to
sneak into her grandfather's bedroom. The room was off-limits to her, but
her grandfather was downstairs asleep on the couch.
I'll just take a fast peek!
Tiptoeing across the creaky wood floor to his closet, Sophie peered on
the shelves behind his clothing. Nothing. Next she looked under the bed.
Still nothing. Moving to his bureau, she opened the drawers and one by one
began pawing carefully through them. There must be something for me here! As
she reached the bottom drawer, she still had not found any hint of a doll.
Dejected, she opened the final drawer and pulled aside some black clothes
she had never seen him wear. She was about to close the drawer when her eyes
caught a glint of gold in the back of the drawer. It looked like a pocket
watch chain, but she knew he didn't wear one. Her heart raced as she
realized what it must be.
A necklace!
Sophie carefully pulled the chain from the drawer. To her surprise, on
the end was a brilliant gold key. Heavy and shimmering. Spellbound, she held
it up. It looked like no key she had ever seen. Most keys were flat with
jagged teeth, but this one had a triangular column with little pockmarks all
over it. Its large golden head was in the shape of a cross, but not a normal
cross. This was an even-armed one, like a plus sign. Embossed in the middle
of the cross was a strange symbol--two letters intertwined with some kind of
flowery design.
"P.S.," she whispered, scowling as she read the letters. Whatever could
this be?
"Sophie?" her grandfather spoke from the doorway.
Startled, she spun, dropping the key on the floor with a loud clang.
She stared down at the key, afraid to look up at her grandfather's face.
"I... was looking for my birthday present," she said, hanging her head,
knowing she had betrayed his trust.
For what seemed like an eternity, her grandfather stood silently in the
doorway. Finally, he let out a long troubled breath. "Pick up the key,
Sophie."
Sophie retrieved the key.
Her grandfather walked in. "Sophie, you need to respect other people's
privacy." Gently, he knelt down and took the key from her. "This key is very
special. If you had lost it..."
Her grandfather's quiet voice made Sophie feel even worse. "I'm sorry,
Grand-pure. I really am." She paused. "I thought it was a necklace for my
birthday."
He gazed at her for several seconds. "I'll say this once more, Sophie,
because it's important. You need to learn to respect other people's
privacy."
"Yes, Grand-pure."
"We'll talk about this some other time. Right now, the garden needs to
be weeded."
Sophie hurried outside to do her chores.
The next morning, Sophie received no birthday present from her
grandfather. She hadn't expected one, not after what she had done. But he
didn't even wish her happy birthday all day. Sadly, she trudged up to bed
that night. As she climbed in, though, she found a note card lying on her
pillow. On the card was written a simple riddle. Even before she solved the
riddle, she was smiling. I know what this is! Her grandfather had done this
for her last Christmas morning.
A treasure hunt!
Eagerly, she pored over the riddle until she solved it. The solution
pointed her to another part of the house, where she found another card and
another riddle. She solved this one too, racing on to the next card. Running
wildly, she darted back and forth across the house, from clue to clue, until
at last she found a clue that directed her back to her own bedroom. Sophie
dashed up the stairs, rushed into her room, and stopped in her tracks. There
in the middle of the room sat a shining red bicycle with a ribbon tied to
the handlebars. Sophie shrieked with delight.
"I know you asked for a doll," her grandfather said, smiling in the
corner. "I thought you might like this even better."
The next day, her grandfather taught her to ride, running beside her
down the walkway. When Sophie steered out over the thick lawn and lost her
balance, they both went tumbling onto the grass, rolling and laughing.
"Grand-pure," Sophie said, hugging him. "I'm really sorry about the
key."
"I know, sweetie. You're forgiven. I can't possibly stay mad at you.
Grandfathers and granddaughters always forgive each other."
Sophie knew she shouldn't ask, but she couldn't help it. "What does it
open? I never saw a key like that. It was very pretty."
Her grandfather was silent a long moment, and Sophie could see he was
uncertain how to answer. Grand-pure never lies. "It opens a box," he finally
said. "Where I keep many secrets."
Sophie pouted. "I hate secrets!"
"I know, but these are important secrets. And someday, you'll learn to
appreciate them as much as I do."
"I saw letters on the key, and a flower."
"Yes, that's my favorite flower. It's called a fleur-de-lis. We have
them in the garden. The white ones. In English we call that kind of flower a
lily."
"I know those! They're my favorite too!"
"Then I'll make a deal with you." Her grandfather's eyebrows raised the
way they always did when he was about to give her a challenge. "If you can
keep my key a secret, and never talk about it ever again, to me or anybody,
then someday I will give it to you."
Sophie couldn't believe her ears. "You will?"
"I promise. When the time comes, the key will be yours. It has your
name on it."
Sophie scowled. "No it doesn't. It said P.S. My name isn't P.S.!"
Her grandfather lowered his voice and looked around as if to make sure
no one was listening. "Okay, Sophie, if you must know, P.S. is a code. It's
your secret initials."
Her eyes went wide. "I have secret initials?"
"Of course. Granddaughters always have secret initials that only their
grandfathers know."
"P.S.?"
He tickled her. "Princesse Sophie."
She giggled. "I'm not a princess!"
He winked. "You are to me."
From that day on, they never again spoke of the key. And she became his
Princess Sophie.
Inside the Salle des Etats, Sophie stood in silence and endured the
sharp pang of loss.
"The initials," Langdon whispered, eyeing her strangely. "Have you seen
them?"
Sophie sensed her grandfather's voice whispering in the corridors of
the museum. Never speak of this key, Sophie. To me or to anyone. She knew
she had failed him in forgiveness, and she wondered if she could break his
trust again. P.S. Find Robert Langdon. Her grandfather wanted Langdon to
help. Sophie nodded. "Yes, I saw the initials P.S. once. When I was very
young."
"Where?"
Sophie hesitated. "On something very important to him."
Langdon locked eyes with her. "Sophie, this is crucial. Can you tell me
if the initials appeared with a symbol? A fleur-de-lis?"
Sophie felt herself staggering backward in amazement. "But... how could
you possibly know that!"
Langdon exhaled and lowered his voice. "I'm fairly certain your
grandfather was a member of a secret society. A very old covert
brotherhood."
Sophie felt a knot tighten in her stomach. She was certain of it too.
For ten years she had tried to forget the incident that had confirmed that
horrifying fact for her. She had witnessed something unthinkable.
Unforgivable.
"The fleur-de-lis," Langdon said, "combined with the initials P.S.,
that is the brotherhood's official device. Their coat of arms. Their logo."
"How do you know this?" Sophie was praying Langdon was not going to
tell her that he himself was a member.
"I've written about this group," he said, his voice tremulous with
excitement. "Researching the symbols of secret societies is a specialty of
mine. They call themselves the Prieuru de Sion--the Priory of Sion. They're
based here in France and attract powerful members from all over Europe. In
fact, they are one of the oldest surviving secret societies on earth."
Sophie had never heard of them.
Langdon was talking in rapid bursts now. "The Priory's membership has
included some of history's most cultured individuals: men like Botticelli,
Sir Isaac Newton, Victor Hugo." He paused, his voice brimming now with
academic zeal. "And, Leonardo da Vinci."
Sophie stared. "Da Vinci was in a secret society?"
"Da Vinci presided over the Priory between 1510 and 1519 as the
brotherhood's Grand Master, which might help explain your grandfather's
passion for Leonardo's work. The two men share a historical fraternal bond.
And it all fits perfectly with their fascination for goddess iconology,
paganism, feminine deities, and contempt for the Church. The Priory has a
well-documented history of reverence for the sacred feminine."
"You're telling me this group is a pagan goddess worship cult?"
"More like the pagan goddess worship cult. But more important, they are
known as the guardians of an ancient secret. One that made them immeasurably
powerful."
Despite the total conviction in Langdon's eyes, Sophie's gut reaction
was one of stark disbelief. A secret pagan cult? Once headed by Leonardo da
Vinci? It all sounded utterly absurd. And yet, even as she dismissed it, she
felt her mind reeling back ten years--to the night she had mistakenly
surprised her grandfather and witnessed what she still could not accept.
Could that explain--?
"The identities of living Priory members are kept extremely secret,"
Langdon said, "but the P.S. and fleur-de-lis that you saw as a child are
proof. It could only have been related to the Priory."
Sophie realized now that Langdon knew far more about her grandfather
than she had previously imagined. This American obviously had volumes to
share with her, but this was not the place. "I can't afford to let them
catch you, Robert. There's a lot we need to discuss. You need to go!"
Langdon heard only the faint murmur of her voice. He wasn't going
anywhere. He was lost in another place now. A place where ancient secrets
rose to the surface. A place where forgotten histories emerged from the
shadows.
Slowly, as if moving underwater, Langdon turned his head and gazed
through the reddish haze toward the Mona Lisa.
The fleur-de-lis... the flower of Lisa... the Mona Lisa.
It was all intertwined, a silent symphony echoing the deepest secrets
of the Priory of Sion and Leonardo da Vinci.
A few miles away, on the riverbank beyond Les Invalides, the bewildered
driver of a twin-bed Trailor truck stood at gunpoint and watched as the
captain of the Judicial Police let out a guttural roar of rage and heaved a
bar of soap out into the turgid waters of the Seine.
CHAPTER 24
Silas gazed upward at the Saint-Sulpice obelisk, taking in the length
of the massive marble shaft. His sinews felt taut with exhilaration. He
glanced around the church one more time to make sure he was alone. Then he
knelt at the base of the structure, not out of reverence, but out of
necessity.
The keystone is hidden beneath the Rose Line.
At the base of the Sulpice obelisk.
All the brothers had concurred.
On his knees now, Silas ran his hands across the stone floor. He saw no
cracks or markings to indicate a movable tile, so he began rapping softly
with his knuckles on the floor. Following the brass line closer to the
obelisk, he knocked on each tile adjacent to the brass line. Finally, one of
them echoed strangely.
There's a hollow area beneath the floor!
Silas smiled. His victims had spoken the truth.
Standing, he searched the sanctuary for something with which to break
the floor tile.
High above Silas, in the balcony, Sister Sandrine stifled a gasp. Her
darkest fears had just been confirmed. This visitor was not who he seemed.
The mysterious Opus Dei monk had come to Saint-Sulpice for another purpose.
A secret purpose.
You are not the only one with secrets, she thought.
Sister Sandrine Bieil was more than the keeper of this church. She was
a sentry. And tonight, the ancient wheels had been set in motion. The
arrival of this stranger at the base of the obelisk was a signal from the
brotherhood.
It was a silent call of distress.
CHAPTER 25
The U.S. Embassy in Paris is a compact complex on Avenue Gabriel, just
north of the Champs-Elysues. The three-acre compound is considered U.S.
soil, meaning all those who stand on it are subject to the same laws and
protections as they would encounter standing in the United States.
The embassy's night operator was reading Time magazine's International
Edition when the sound of her phone interrupted.
"U.S. Embassy," she answered.
"Good evening." The caller spoke English accented with French. "I need
some assistance." Despite the politeness of the man's words, his tone
sounded gruff and official. "I was told you had a phone message for me on
your automated system. The name is Langdon. Unfortunately, I have forgotten
my three-digit access code. If you could help me, I would be most grateful."
The operator paused, confused. "I'm sorry, sir. Your message must be
quite old. That system was removed two years ago for security precautions.
Moreover, all the access codes were five-digit. Who told you we had a
message for you?"
"You have no automated phone system?"
"No, sir. Any message for you would be handwritten in our services
department. What was your name again?"
But the man had hung up.
Bezu Fache felt dumbstruck as he paced the banks of the Seine. He was
certain he had seen Langdon dial a local number, enter a three-digit code,
and then listen to a recording. But if Langdon didn't phone the embassy,
then who the hell did he call?
It was at that moment, eyeing his cellular phone, that Fache realized
the answers were in the palm of his hand. Langdon used my phone to place
that call.
Keying into the cell phone's menu, Fache pulled up the list of recently
dialed numbers and found the call Langdon had placed.
A Paris exchange, followed by the three-digit code 454.
Redialing the phone number, Fache waited as the line began ringing.
Finally a woman's voice answered. "Bonjour, vous utes bien chez Sophie
Neveu," the recording announced. "Je suis absente pour le moment, mais..."
Fache's blood was boiling as he typed the numbers 4... 5... 4.
CHAPTER 26
Despite her monumental reputation, the Mona Lisa was a mere thirty-one
inches by twenty-one inches--smaller even than the posters of her sold in
the Louvre gift shop. She hung on the northwest wall of the Salle des Etats
behind a two-inch-thick pane of protective Plexiglas. Painted on a poplar
wood panel, her ethereal, mist-filled atmosphere was attributed to Da
Vinci's mastery of the sfumato style, in which forms appear to evaporate
into one another.
Since taking up residence in the Louvre, the Mona Lisa--or La Jaconde
as they call her in France--had been stolen twice, most recently in 1911,
when she disappeared from the Louvre's "satte impunutrable"--Le Salon Carre.
Parisians wept in the streets and wrote newspaper articles begging the
thieves for the painting's return. Two years later, the Mona Lisa was
discovered hidden in the false bottom of a trunk in a Florence hotel room.
Langdon, now having made it clear to Sophie that he had no intention of
leaving, moved with her across the Salle des Etats. The Mona Lisa was still
twenty yards ahead when Sophie turned on the black light, and the bluish
crescent of penlight fanned out on the floor in front of them. She swung the
beam back and forth across the floor like a minesweeper, searching for any
hint of luminescent ink.
Walking beside her, Langdon was already feeling the tingle of
anticipation that accompanied his face-to-face reunions with great works of
art. He strained to see beyond the cocoon of purplish light emanating from
the black light in Sophie's hand. To the left, the room's octagonal viewing
divan emerged, looking like a dark island on the empty sea of parquet.
Langdon could now begin to see the panel of dark glass on the wall.
Behind it, he knew, in the confines of her own private cell, hung the most
celebrated painting in the world.
The Mona Lisa's status as the most famous piece of art in the world,
Langdon knew, had nothing to do with her enigmatic smile. Nor was it due to
the mysterious interpretations attributed her by many art historians and
conspiracy buffs. Quite simply, the Mona Lisa was famous because Leonardo da
Vinci claimed she was his finest accomplishment. He carried the painting
with him whenever he traveled and, if asked why, would reply that he found
it hard to part with his most sublime expression of female beauty.
Even so, many art historians suspected Da Vinci's reverence for the
Mona Lisa had nothing to do with its artistic mastery. In actuality, the
painting was a surprisingly ordinary sfumato portrait. Da Vinci's veneration
for this work, many claimed, stemmed from something far deeper: a hidden
message in the layers of paint. The Mona Lisa was, in fact, one of the
world's most documented inside jokes. The painting's well-documented collage
of double entendres and playful allusions had been revealed in most art
history tomes, and yet, incredibly, the public at large still considered her
smile a great mystery.
No mystery at all, Langdon thought, moving forward and watching as the
faint outline of the painting began to take shape. No mystery at all.
Most recently Langdon had shared the Mona Lisa's secret with a rather
unlikely group--a dozen inmates at the Essex County Penitentiary. Langdon's
jail seminar was part of a Harvard outreach program attempting to bring
education into the prison system--Culture for Convicts, as Langdon's
colleagues liked to call it.
Standing at an overhead projector in a darkened penitentiary library,
Langdon had shared the Mona Lisa's secret with the prisoners attending
class, men whom he found surprisingly engaged--rough, but sharp. "You may
notice," Langdon told them, walking up to the projected image of the Mona
Lisa on the library wall, "that the background behind her face is uneven."
Langdon motioned to the glaring discrepancy. "Da Vinci painted the horizon
line on the left significantly lower than the right."
"He screwed it up?" one of the inmates asked.
Langdon chuckled. "No. Da Vinci didn't do that too often. Actually,
this is a little trick Da Vinci played. By lowering the countryside on the
left, Da Vinci made Mona Lisa look much larger from the left side than from
the right side. A little Da Vinci inside joke. Historically, the concepts of
male and female have assigned sides--left is female, and right is male.
Because Da Vinci was a big fan of feminine principles, he made Mona Lisa
look more majestic from the left than the right."
"I heard he was a fag," said a small man with a goatee.
Langdon winced. "Historians don't generally put it quite that way, but
yes, Da Vinci was a homosexual."
"Is that why he was into that whole feminine thing?"
"Actually, Da Vinci was in tune with the balance between male and
female. He believed that a human soul could not be enlightened unless it had
both male and female elements."
"You mean like chicks with dicks?" someone called.
This elicited a hearty round of laughs. Langdon considered offering an
etymological sidebar about the word hermaphrodite and its ties to Hermes and
Aphrodite, but something told him it would be lost on this crowd.
"Hey, Mr. Langford," a muscle-bound man said. "Is it true that the Mona
Lisa is a picture of Da Vinci in drag? I heard that was true."
"It's quite possible," Langdon said. "Da Vinci was a prankster, and
computerized analysis of the Mona Lisa and Da Vinci's self-portraits confirm
some startling points of congruency in their faces. Whatever Da Vinci was up
to," Langdon said, "his Mona Lisa is neither male nor female. It carries a
subtle message of androgyny. It is a fusing of both."
"You sure that's not just some Harvard bullshit way of saying Mona Lisa
is one ugly chick."
Now Langdon laughed. "You may be right. But actually Da Vinci left a
big clue that the painting was supposed to be androgynous. Has anyone here
ever heard of an Egyptian god named Amon?"
"Hell yes!" the big guy said. "God of masculine fertility!"
Langdon was stunned.
"It says so on every box of Amon condoms." The muscular man gave a wide
grin. "It's got a guy with a ram's head on the front and says he's the
Egyptian god of fertility."
Langdon was not familiar with the brand name, but he was glad to hear
the prophylactic manufacturers had gotten their hieroglyphs right. "Well
done. Amon is indeed represented as a man with a ram's head, and his
promiscuity and curved horns are related to our modern sexual slang 'horny.'
"
"No shit!"
"No shit," Langdon said. "And do you know who Amon's counterpart was?
The Egyptian goddess of fertility?"
The question met with several seconds of silence.
"It was Isis," Langdon told them, grabbing a grease pen. "So we have
the male god, Amon." He wrote it down. "And the female goddess, Isis, whose
ancient pictogram was once called L'ISA."
Langdon finished writing and stepped back from the projector.
AMON L'ISA
"Ring any bells?" he asked.
"Mona Lisa... holy crap," somebody gasped.
Langdon nodded. "Gentlemen, not only does the face of Mona Lisa look
androgynous, but her name is an anagram of the divine union of male and
female. And that, my friends, is Da Vinci's little secret, and the reason
for Mona Lisa's knowing smile."
"My grandfather was here," Sophie said, dropping suddenly to her knees,
now only ten feet from the Mona Lisa. She pointed the black light
tentatively to a spot on the parquet floor.
At first Langdon saw nothing. Then, as he knelt beside her, he saw a
tiny droplet of dried liquid that was luminescing. Ink? Suddenly he recalled
what black lights were actually used for. Blood. His senses tingled. Sophie
was right. Jacques Sauniure had indeed paid a visit to the Mona Lisa before
he died.
"He wouldn't have come here without a reason," Sophie whispered,
standing up. "I know he left a message for me here." Quickly striding the
final few steps to the Mona Lisa, she illuminated the floor directly in
front of the painting. She waved the light back and forth across the bare
parquet.
"There's nothing here!"
At that moment, Langdon saw a faint purple glimmer on the protective
glass before the Mona Lisa. Reaching down, he took Sophie's wrist and slowly
moved the light up to the painting itself.
They both froze.
On the glass, six words glowed in purple, scrawled directly across the
Mona Lisa's face.
CHAPTER 27
Seated at Sauniure's desk, Lieutenant Collet pressed the phone to his
ear in disbelief. Did I hear Fache correctly? "A bar of soap? But how could
Langdon have known about the GPS dot?"
"Sophie Neveu," Fache replied. "She told him."
"What! Why?"
"Damned good question, but I just heard a recording that confirms she
tipped him off."
Collet was speechless. What was Neveu thinking? Fache had proof that
Sophie had interfered with a DCPJ sting operation? Sophie Neveu was not only
going to be fired, she was also going to jail. "But, Captain... then where
is Langdon now?"
"Have any fire alarms gone off there?"
"No, sir."
"And no one has come out under the Grand Gallery gate?"
"No. We've got a Louvre security officer on the gate. Just as you
requested."
"Okay, Langdon must still be inside the Grand Gallery."
"Inside? But what is he doing?"
"Is the Louvre security guard armed?"
"Yes, sir. He's a senior warden."
"Send him in," Fache commanded. "I can't get my men back to the
perimeter for a few minutes, and I don't want Langdon breaking for an exit."
Fache paused. "And you'd better tell the guard Agent Neveu is probably in
there with him."
"Agent Neveu left, I thought."
"Did you actually see her leave?"
"No, sir, but--"
"Well, nobody on the perimeter saw her leave either. They only saw her
go in."
Collet was flabbergasted by Sophie Neveu's bravado. She's still inside
the building?
"Handle it," Fache ordered. "I want Langdon and Neveu at gunpoint by
the time I get back."
As the Trailor truck drove off, Captain Fache rounded up his men.
Robert Langdon had proven an elusive quarry tonight, and with Agent Neveu
now helping him, he might be far harder to corner than expected.
Fache decided not to take any chances.
Hedging his bets, he ordered half of his men back to the Louvre
perimeter. The other half he sent to guard the only location in Paris where
Robert Langdon could find safe harbor.
CHAPTER 28
Inside the Salle des Etats, Langdon stared in astonishment at the six
words glowing on the Plexiglas. The text seemed to hover in space, casting a
jagged shadow across Mona Lisa's mysterious smile.
"The Priory," Langdon whispered. "This proves your grandfather was a
member!"
Sophie looked at him in confusion. "You understand this?"
"It's flawless," Langdon said, nodding as his thoughts churned. "It's a
proclamation of one of the Priory's most fundamental philosophies!"
Sophie looked baffled in the glow of the message scrawled across the
Mona Lisa's face.
SO DARK THE CON OF MAN
"Sophie," Langdon said, "the Priory's tradition of perpetuating goddess
worship is based on a belief that powerful men in the early Christian church
'conned' the world by propagating lies that devalued the female and tipped
the scales in favor of the masculine."
Sophie remained silent, staring at the words.
"The Priory believes that Constantine and his male successors
successfully converted the world from matriarchal paganism to patriarchal
Christianity by waging a campaign of propaganda that demonized the sacred
feminine, obliterating the goddess from modern religion forever."
Sophie's expression remained uncertain. "My grandfather sent me to this
spot to find this. He must be trying to tell me more than that."
Langdon understood her meaning. She thinks this is another code.
Whether a hidden meaning existed here or not, Langdon could not immediately
say. His mind was still grappling with the bold clarity of Sauniure's
outward message.
So dark the con of man, he thought. So dark indeed.
Nobody could deny the enormous good the modern Church did in today's
troubled world, and yet the Church had a deceitful and violent history.
Their brutal crusade to "reeducate" the pagan and feminine-worshipping
religions spanned three centuries, employing methods as inspired as they
were horrific.
The Catholic Inquisition published the book that arguably could be
called the most blood-soaked publication in human history. Malleus
Maleficarum--or The Witches' Hammer--indoctrinated the world to "the dangers
of f