The Last Cato (12 page)

The process was very fast but labor intensive. After only one day of work, we could provide a complete image of the first folio in almost perfect condition, with 95 percent of the text recovered. The lethargic sleeping spirit inside the Iyasus Codex had come back to life. The moment would come when I would read its message and interpret its content.

I was deeply moved to be back at work at the Hypogeum. After Mass on the fourth Sunday of Lent at Saint Peter’s, I sat down at my work table, put my glasses on my nose, and was ready to begin. My staff also got ready to start the paleographic analysis, based on the study of the different elements in the writing: morphology, angles and inclination,
ductus,
*
ties, nexuses, rhythm, style, and other elements. Luckily, Byzantine Greek used very few of the abbreviations and contractions that are so common in Latin and in medieval transcriptions made by classical authors. However, the peculiarities of a language as evolved as Byzantine Greek could cause significant confusions, for neither the writing nor the meaning of words were the same as in the days of Aeschylus, Plato, or Aristotle.

Reading the first folios of the Iyasus Codex was an utter thrill for me. The scribe was named Mirogenes of Neapolis, but in the text he repeatedly referred to himself as Cato. He explained that, by the will of God the Father and his son Jesus Christ, a few brothers of good will, deacons
†
of the Basilica of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem and devoted worshippers of the True Cross, had designed a brotherhood under the name of
ΣTAYPOΦΛAKEΣ
(STAUROFILAKES), or guardians of the Cross. He, Mirogenes, had been chosen archimandrite of the brotherhood, and given the title of Cato, the first day of the first month of 5850.

“5850?” Glauser-Röist said, surprised. The captain and the professor were seated across from me, listening to my transcription of the folio.

“That year corresponds to the year 341 of our era,” I explained, raising my glasses and holding them in the folds of my forehead. “The Byzantines’ calendar began on September 1 of the year 5509, the day when they believed God created the world.”

“So on the first day of September of the year 341”—the professor laced his fingers together tightly as he spoke—“this Mirogenes was a Byzantine and deacon of the basilica of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem. If I remember correctly, that’s fifteen years after Saint Helen discovered the True Cross.”

“Yes,” I added, “and on this date, he was rebaptized as Cato and began to write this chronicle.”

“We need to look for more information on that brotherhood,” proposed the captain, springing from his seat. Despite being the coordinator of the operation, he had less work than anyone and wanted to feel useful. “I’m on it.”

“Good idea,” I agreed. “We need to demonstrate the historical existence of the Staurofilakes other than in the codex.”

We heard a few discreet little taps on my lab door. It was Prefect Ramondino, smiling from ear to ear.

“I came to invite to you to dinner at the Domus’s restaurant, if you like. To celebrate the good work.”

But things weren’t going as well as we thought. That same afternoon, while I was returning with my head held high, to the tiny apartment at the Piazza delle Vaschette, the important
Lignum Crucis
of the Convent of Sainte-Gudule, in Brussels, disappeared from its silver reliquary.

C
aptain Glauser-Röist was gone all day Monday. As soon as he received the news of the robbery, he left for Brussels on the first plane, and didn’t return until noon on Tuesday. Meanwhile, Professor Boswell and I continued working in the Hypogeum lab. The restored folios began to land on my desk at greater and greater speed. The technicians had perfected a way to accelerate the process, to the point that sometimes I barely had two or three hours to complete the reading and transcription of the manuscript before the next batch of data arrived.

I believe it was that early April night, that Monday, when Professor Boswell and I had supper all alone in the employees’ cafeteria of the Classified Archives. In the beginning I feared it would be particularly hard to keep up a conversation with somebody so bashful and quiet, but the professor proved to be very pleasant company. We talked a lot and about many things. After telling me, once again, the complete story of the robbery of the codex, he asked about my family. He wanted to know if I had brothers and sisters and if my parents were still living. At first surprised by that personal turn in the conversation, I gave him a brief description, but when he heard the number of members of the Salina tribe, he wanted to know more. I even drew a family tree on a napkin so he could follow who I was talking about. It’s always strange to find someone who knows how to listen. Professor Boswell did not ask directly; he didn’t even show much curiosity. He just watched me attentively, nodding or smiling at just the right moment. Of course I fell into his trap. By the time I realized what had happened, I’d already told him my life story. He laughed, very amused, and I thought the moment had come for a counterattack, because suddenly I felt very vulnerable and even guilty, as if I’d said too much. I asked him if he was worried about losing his job at the Greco-Roman Museum in Alexandria. He frowned and took off his glasses, pinching the bridge of the nose, looking tired.

“My work…,” he murmured and retreated into his thoughts for several seconds. “You don’t know what’s happening in Egypt, do you, Doctor?”

“No, I don’t know,” I answered, disorientated.

“I am Coptic, and being Coptic in Egypt means being a pariah.”

“That surprises me, Professor Boswell. You Coptics are the true descendants of the ancient Egyptians. The Arabs arrived much later. In fact, your language, Coptic, comes directly from demotic Egyptian, spoken in the time of the pharaohs.”

“Yes, but things aren’t as rosy as you paint them. It would be great if the world saw things the way you do. We Coptics are a small minority in Egypt, divided into Catholic Christians and Orthodox Christians. Ever since the fundamentalist revolution began, the
irhebin
… I mean the terrorists from the Islamic guerrilla group Al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya have murdered members of our small communities. In 1992 they shot and killed fourteen Coptics from the province of Asyut for refusing to pay ‘protection services.’ In 1994 a group of armed terrorists attacked the Coptic monastery of Deir ul-Muharraq, near Asyut, killing the priests and the faithful,” he sighed. “There are assaults, robberies, death threats, beatings… They’ve started setting off bombs in the entrances to churches in Alexandria and Cairo.”

I silently deduced that the Egyptian government must not be doing anything to stop the violence.

“I’m fortunate, I realize,” he said, laughing suddenly. “I’m a bad Catholic-Coptic. It’s been years since I’ve been to church, and that has saved my life.” He kept smiling and put his glasses back on, adjusting them carefully around his ears. “Last year, in June, Al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya put a bomb in the doorway of Saint Anthony Church in Alexandria. Fifteen people died—among them, my younger brother, Juhanna; his wife, Zoë; and their five-month-old son.”

I was speechless with shock and horror and lowered my eyes to the table.

“I’m so sorry…,” I managed to stammer with difficulty.

“Well they… they are no longer suffering. My father is now the one suffering. He’ll never get over it. Yesterday when I called him, he begged me not to return home to Alexandria; he begged me to stay here in Rome.”

I didn’t know what to say. In light of such unfortunate events, what are the right words to say?

“I liked my job. But if I’ve lost it, as I most likely have, I will start over. I can do so in Italy, as my father wishes, far from danger. In fact, I also happen to be an Italian citizen. On account of my mother, as you already know.”

“Oh yes! Your mother was Italian!”

“From Florence. In the mid-1950s, when Pharaonic Egypt came back into vogue, my mother had just finished her studies in archeology and got a grant to work on the excavations at the birthplace of Oxirrinco. My father, also an archeologist, spent a day visiting the site, and they met. And here I am! Life can be so strange… My mother always said she married my father because he was a Boswell. She was joking, of course.” He smiled again. “My parents had a very happy marriage. She adapted well to her new country and her new religion, but deep down she always preferred the Roman Catholic rituals.”

I was very curious to know if he’d inherited those deep navy blue eyes from his mother—many northern Italian women have blue eyes— or from some distant English relative. But it didn’t seem like the right time to ask.

“Professor Boswell,” I started to say.

“Why don’t we call each other by our first names, Doctor,” he broke in, looking me straight in the eye, as always. “Everyone stands on such ceremony around here.”

I smiled. “That’s because here in the Vatican, personal relationships are developed within very strict boundaries.”

“Well, what do you say we jump over those boundaries? Do you think Monsignor Tournier or Captain Glauser-Röist will be scandalized?”

“I’m sure they will!” I said between hiccups of laughter. “But let them!”

“Then it’s… Ottavia?”

“Pleased to meet you, Farag.”

And we shook hands over the table.

That day, I discovered that Professor Boswell—Farag—was a delightful person in private, completely different from the public Professor Boswell. I understood that what intimidated the professor wasn’t people, but groups. The bigger they got, the worse he was. He stuttered, choked, blinked, pushed up his glasses over and over, doubted himself, lost his voice, and was simply a social mess.

G
lauser-Röist returned from Brussels the next day. He showed up at the lab with a forbidding look on his face, his brow knit into a frown and his lips pressed into a practically imperceptible thin line.

“Bad news, Captain?” I asked. I looked up from the folio I’d just received when I saw him come in.

“Bad, very bad.”

“Please, sit down and tell me.”

“There’s nothing to tell,” he muttered as he let himself fall in a chair that groaned under his weight. “Nothing. I didn’t find a clue, not one sign of violence, no forced doors, no clues of any kind. It was an impeccable robbery. I was unable to find out if any Ethiopian citizen entered the country over the last weeks, either. The Belgian police will question the residents of Ethiopian heritage to see if they can supply any information. They’ll call me if there’s any news.”

“It’s possible that this time the thief wasn’t Ethiopian.”

“We thought of that. But we have nothing else.” He looked around, distracted. “How’s it going here?” he finally asked, looking at the folio that lay on my table. “Gotten very far?”

“We’re getting faster and faster,” I answered, satisfied. “Really, I’m the bottleneck of the operation. I can’t transcribe and translate and keep up with the rest of the team. These are very complicated texts.”

“Could any of your staff help you?”

“They have enough on their hands with the paleographical problems! Right now, they are working on the second Cato.”

“The second Cato?” he asked, raising his eyebrows.

“Oh yes. Mirogenes died in the year 344. The Brotherhood of the Staurofilakes elected a certain Pertinax as archimandrite. Now we’re working on him. According to my staff, Cato II (as he called himself) was a very cultivated man, with an exquisite vocabulary. The Greek used in Byzantium had a very different pronunciation from the classical Greek that was ultimately the one that set the linguistic and lexigraphic norm.” The captain looked puzzled, so I gave him an example. “What happened then was what is happening now to modern English. Kids have to learn to spell words and then memorize them because they are pronounced nothing like they are spelled. After so many centuries of modifications, Byzantine Greek was equally complicated.”

“Ah, okay.”

Not too shabby, I thought to myself, relieved. The Swiss Rock was catching on.

“Pertinax, or Cato II, must have received a very nice education in some monastery where the manuscripts were copied. His grammar is impeccable and his style is very refined compared to Cato I, who seemed to have little formal education. Some of my staff believe Pertinax was more than any old monk. He could have been a member of the royal family or a cartier in Constantinople, because his
ductus
is elegant, far too elegant for that of a monk.”

“So, what does Cato II say?”

“I’ve just finished his chronicle. During his rule, the brotherhood grew unexpectedly. A large number of pilgrims poured into Jerusalem during religious festivals, and many of them took root in the Holy Land. Some of these pilgrims joined the brotherhood, and Cato II refers to the difficulties he faces in governing such a large and diverse community. He proposed imposing restrictions on admitting new members but apparently nothing was approved because the patriarch of Jerusalem was very satisfied with the growth of the brotherhood. Given the dates, the patriarch must have been Maximos II or Kyril I. I’ve already asked the Archives to review their biographies, in case we may find something.”

“Has anyone searched for direct information through our databases?”

“No, Captain. That’s your job. Don’t you remember you offered to do it?”