The Ghost Manuscript Page 7

  Nicola looked at Carys, her eyes damp.

  “We will not ask again,” she said. “If you decline, we must make other arrangements as soon as possible. But I need you to understand the chance we’re giving you. You could write your own ticket once this is done.”

  Nicola stood up. “I’ll let you think for a while. Shout if you want more tea.” She left and softly closed the library door.

  Carys sat for half an hour, breathing in the smell of the room, trying to clear her mind enough to think. It was fruitless. Finally, she got up and started walking along the perimeter of the library, running her hand across the glass fronts of the bookcases. She opened the first one, grabbed the cross-referenced catalog, flipped it open, and looked with fresh eyes at the entries within.

  Listed were places, battles, and names that she had seen in the Dark Age manuscripts that she’d procured for Harper and had the chance to read. But she’d never seen a mention of a man named Riothamus Arcturus. Or maybe she had and just hadn’t noticed it. She’d never sought the name Arthur or its Latin or Celtic variations when she gave herself the pleasure of reading these manuscripts. She was more interested in how the people lived at that time, how their daily rituals were like her own and how they were different. How love was the same. How fear, jealousy, passion, and grief were the same. Their motivations and fears were the same. It was all there, exactly like today. The only thing different was the language they used.

  Carys reached back into the bookcase, placed her hands on the manuscripts on the shelf directly in front of her, and smoothed the parchment with her bare hands—a sacrilegious act. The oils from human skin could deteriorate the material. She ran her fingertips over the remnants of the hair follicles on the parchment, the ancient goat skin as soft as silk and still pliable fifteen hundred years later. She inhaled deeply, relishing the dusty, ancient smell. She smiled at this one familiar thing. When she turned back around, Nicola was standing in the doorway holding up a key like an unspoken question.

  What do I have to lose? she thought. What do I have?

  “I need to verify some things for myself before I start,” said Carys.

  Nicola smiled, closed the library door, and walked to the desk. Carys walked to her side.

  “Put on your gloves,” said Nicola. She did as she was told. Nicola handed her the key.

  “The desk drawer,” she said.

  Carys slid the skeleton key into the drawer lock, turned it, and slowly pulled the drawer out. A solitary pencil rolled to the front of the drawer. She looked up at Nicola, confused.

  “Reach into the very back,” said Nicola. She reached in and felt something taped to the rear of the drawer. She pulled on it and retracted her hand. She held another key, this one more modern with a small black chip on it. Nicola backed away and motioned to a huge ficus plant in a pot on the floor by the window. “Slide that aside, please,” she said.

  Carys bent over and with a grunt slid the pot to one side. There was a circular brass plate on the floor with a small key slot in the center. She inserted the key in the slot and turned it.

  There was a thunk, then a mechanical sound came from the other side of the library. Carys looked up to see an entire bookcase sliding slowly forward about three feet into the room. It stopped after about ten seconds, leaving a space barely big enough for a human to slide behind She looked up from her crouched position at Nicola, who reached down to help her up. Carys moved the plant back into place.

  The two women walked to the bookcase and slid into the space behind it. There was another door with a keyhole and numbered keypad. Nicola motioned for Carys to use the same key. She did, and Nicola tapped in a code on the keypad. The door slid to the side. Nicola stepped in and flipped a switch to the right.

  Dim lights flickered on, illuminating a staircase. Carys descended and found herself in a large windowless laboratory filled with machines that made it look like a hospital MRI facility. In the center, away from the equipment, was a table with a rectangular glass case on it. It was much cooler in this room than in the main library. There was a thermometer and a hygrometer on the top of the glass box. Inside was a small book, about seven inches tall and five inches wide and three inches deep. A codex, with a cover made of animal hide. It took Carys’s breath away. These ancient works of art always did.

  Nicola came forward, now wearing her own gloves, and lifted the cover of the glass case. She reached in, took the book in both hands, lifted it from the case, and turned to Carys.

  Carys stood, her eyes glued to the codex. She was overcome by a desire to touch it, to open it, to learn its secrets. To crawl inside the life, the head, and the heart of the man who had written it. Even if she had to go to the one place she vowed she’d never go.

  “I’ll do it,” Carys whispered as she reached for the manuscript.

  5

  Wednesday, June 13

  From the moment she’d been shown the manuscript the previous day, Carys’s world had shrunk to the size of the book vault. She’d spent the remainder of the previous afternoon, and into the evening and wee hours of the morning sitting in the chair next to the glass table that contained the manuscript, her white gloves cradling the precious book. She flipped slowly through its heavy skin leaves. Every few pages, she stuck her nose between the sheets and inhaled the warm, musky smell deeply into her lungs. She was in a place as close to heaven as she’d ever been.

  Her first order of business should have been to take a tiny section of the parchment out of the manuscript and send it to a lab for another radio carbon dating to ensure the previous readings were accurate. The technology had gotten so much better, even just in the past couple of years. She should also have busied herself collecting the tiny traces of dust and dirt that had accumulated between the parchment pages to send for analysis. Analyzing the handwriting and the ink, the form of the Latin used, and so many other details, were the purpose of her profession. But holding the book in her own hands blocked out all thoughts of what should be done. She would get to all that eventually. When she was done reading.

  I am Lestinus. I am a Christian monk. My village, my home, and my family were murdered by invading armies seeking to destroy all that is good. Only I survived. I wish they had taken my life with them. Instead, I am saved by a great leader, Riothamus Arcturus, and am in the service of he who fights the tyranny of ignorance and hate. I set down the exploits of my most exalted master, so that the children who live and their children will know that brave men fought for them. I write here in the language of the learned, safe in the knowledge that my words can be read only by them and never by those who destroy.

  The Latin handwriting rolled across Carys’s eyes like a wave climbing a smooth, sandy beach. First, she read the X-ray photo image of the palimpsest’s page—it showed Lestinus’s tiny Latin handwriting emerging from the overlaid, newer writing on top of it like a faint whisper. Then she read a few pages of the English translation—done, she assumed, by Nicola. Lastly, she held up the manuscript itself, peering behind the newer writing to find any traces of Lestinus’s actual hand. Parchment was almost as precious as gold back when it was used for manuscripts, and older manuscripts were frequently erased entirely and reused, as this one had been. It was why so many of the oldest examples of written language had disappeared. Some monk, in the grips of religious myopia, fixated only on writing another psalm book, had judged the ancient writing not valuable enough to preserve.

  After sleeping a few fitful hours back in her own bed, Carys drove back to Adeona. She knocked on the door, and JJ opened it.

  “Hi,” said Carys. “JJ. This is a surprise. Is Nicola here?”

  “She’s not awake yet,” said JJ, moving into the foyer. “I think she’s having a bad morning.”

  “That’s too bad,” said Carys.

  “Yeah,” said JJ. “She was my mother’s caretaker for years, and the whole time, she was sick herself. She�
�s such a trooper. Listen, I’ve got to leave for a meeting in ten minutes, so I’m going to cut to the chase here. The sale is off. Mr. Plourde released me from the contract.”

  “Yes,” said Carys. “He told me.”

  “It’s, ah, it was a bit of a surprise,” said JJ.

  “I’m sure it was,” she said.

  “Were you aware that your boss was blackmailing me?” asked JJ.

  He stood next to the big round table in the center of the foyer. He didn’t look angry or accusatory, but there was a tension in his shoulders that unnerved her.

  “Did you know that he threatened to reveal my father’s illness if I didn’t sell the collection privately through Sothington’s?”

  Admitting anything would give him grounds to sue the auction house, and as much as she hated Plourde, she wasn’t interested in being responsible for that. Her mouth hung partially open as she tried to figure out what to say.

  “Your silence answers my question,” said JJ. “Did you know from the beginning? Were you in on it?”

  “No,” said Carys, before she could check herself. “As soon as I realized what was happening, I insisted he cancel the contract.”

  “Why would he listen to you? Don’t you work for him?” said JJ. “And what’s to prevent him from spreading rumors to get back at me and my family?”

  “It’s complicated,” said Carys. “You won’t have any more trouble with Mr. Plourde. I promise. I’m so sorry, Mr. Harper. If you feel you need to work through someone else to get the collection ready for a donation, I completely understand. Just know that Mr. Plourde does not represent me or the people who work at Soth—”

  “No, no,” said JJ. “I’m not blaming you. Plourde, however…well, I’ll deal with him. I’m not used to being threatened. If it had been anyone but my father, I would have made sure that Mr. Plourde never worked in this industry again—and he would have had trouble eating for a few months. Him and his buyer.”

  “He had a buyer already?”

  “Yes,” said JJ. “I thought you knew.”

  “No. And I’d be very surprised if he actually had one. It would take months for him to arrange a sale of this magnitude.”

  “Well,” said JJ, “Plourde had one. One person who he said was going to buy the whole thing. He brought him over here to view the library last week. Very early Friday morning. British guy. Martin Gyles.”

  “Martin Gyles? How the—”

  “Plourde brought him over,” said JJ. “He wanted me to open the bookcases, show him the manuscripts. Made me sick to my stomach.”

  “I can’t believe Plourde contacted Gyles so quickly. I mean, a man of Gyles’s reputation—he’s a renowned antiquities specialist. And Plourde is…”

  “Yeah,” said JJ. “A dirtbag. They’re quite the odd couple.”

  “A collection of this size and value would usually go to a few different buyers, and they’d all want to see the catalog first. No one commits to a sale of this size without airtight provenance,” she said. This certainly explained Gyles’s visit to Sothington’s.

  “I swear, Carys, if I hear a single word about my father’s illness in the press, I will sue Mr. Plourde, Sothington’s, and this Gyles person,” said JJ. “And I’ll expect you to testify to everything you told me today.”

  “Of course,” said Carys. She sincerely hoped it wouldn’t come to that. “Have you told your father about any of this?”

  “No,” said JJ. “That’s the last thing he needs to hear in his condition. The hospital called and said you’d visited him yesterday. What did you talk about?”

  “He asked to see me,” she said.

  “It’s fine,” said JJ. “How did he seem? What did you talk about?”

  “The collection,” she said, swallowing swiftly as the lie came out. “I feel like he wanted to have a hand in the appraisal. He said he didn’t want to sell the collection or the house. He insists that he’ll be home soon.”

  “I know,” said JJ. “It’s so sad. He’s been saying that for six months. But he isn’t getting any better. I wish I could do something. This is one of the few times when throwing lots of money at a problem doesn’t make it go away.”

  JJ looked up at the sweeping foyer staircase above their heads and took a deep breath. He smiled wistfully.

  “I used to ride down that railing when I was little,” said JJ. “Used to freak my mom out something awful. She couldn’t even be in the room when I did it. But Dad thought it was the best game ever. He’d stand down here, and I’d get on up there, and he’d make sure he was underneath me the whole way down so if I fell off the railing he could catch me. I never fell, though.” JJ kept looking up at the railing above them for a moment longer, and when he looked back at Carys, his eyes were watery.

  “I’ve got to get going,” he said. “I’ll be in touch later for some recommendations for the donation. Please tell Nicola I was here and said hello. Thank you, Ms. Jones. I really appreciate your honesty about all of this.”

  “Please let me know if there’s anything at all that you need, or that I can do.”

  “You’ve already done plenty,” he said.

  As JJ left, Carys’s heart ached. JJ was about to lose his last remaining parent. He knew it, too. She knew all too well how it felt––like looking down a long tunnel and seeing a headlight slowly coming toward you, and you can’t get out of the way or make it stop. All you can do is watch. She wouldn’t wish it on her worst enemy. Even Plourde.

  It didn’t take long for her conversation with JJ to dissipate once she was back in the book vault. She dove back into the manuscript, and before long, she was sure that the translation by Nicola and Harper was impeccable. Latin had been one of the few languages she had immersed herself in throughout high school and college, and she read it as confidently as she read English. Her sophomore-year teachers at Boston Latin Academy used to tell her it was so typical of her—the solitary, scholarly Carys Jones, bent on spending all her time and energy learning to read and write a language that no one spoke—another way of shutting out the living. The living were too messy. Latin was the perfect language for her.

  Ironically, her mastery of Latin was the reason she had a career. But the best reward for all her study was in her hands at that moment. It was the direct connection with the actual thoughts and words of a man dead for fifteen hundred years.

  It became obvious quickly that the monk had been young and afraid but determined to avenge the deaths of his people.

  I am forbidden to fight. My master has instructed me to tend to the needs of those who have fallen under the sword or who have been forced from their villages. He bids me save minds and souls and leave the killing to him. I ache only to swing an axe at a savage’s head.

  He described the villages they passed through, or what was left of them. Carys could feel the pain and his sadness in his stark language. Next to the well, the infant and its mother were felled together with a single sword stroke. In death, the mother clutched the babe with the arm she still possessed.

  Violence and depravity had not changed a bit in the ensuing fifteen hundred years. Neither had war.

  I smell of earth and blood and my own shit. We march from dawn until dusk in pursuit of the enemy. All discomfort falls away when we engage. Then there is nothing else.

  Lestinus described his master, Riothamus Arcturus, as confident and immensely compassionate, but filled with rage at the aggression of the invaders and their brutality. Arcturus was willing to listen to his men, but he had usually already chosen his course of action. He fought with the ferocity of a bear.

  His cross/shield held high he drew down fourteen men.

  Lestinus mourned the need for them, but knew that these battles were being waged in the defense of a life, of a culture, that was on the verge of destruction. As he described his terrible black grief over the murder of the parents, sis
ter, and three nieces he never got a chance to save, tears formed in Carys’s eyes.

  The first time through the manuscript, she read for love. She didn’t question a single fact or bit of potentially erroneous translation. She read only to know this monk and hear his words from a millennium and a half in the past. She saw the names, Legionum, Badonicus, battles that had oozed their way up through the sediment of history to become attached to the Arthurian legend. But there were other battles and towns of which she had never read or heard. As the journal progressed, as Arcturus’s victories increased and it looked like he and his forces might have succeeded in stopping the advance of the hordes, Lestinus began to describe the leader more thoroughly, as if he’d realized that the task of memorializing the great man’s exploits had fallen exclusively to him.

  He was born near Aquae Sulis to Roman parents who wore the purple. He was educated by priests and joined the army as a young boy, as he hoped to carry on the brave work of his great King Ambrosius Aurelianus. He chose not to hide behind his status, and he came among the people to be with them. His wife bore him two sons. He led men into battle from his sixteenth year and earned his great renown at our finest battle, Mons Badonicus, at his age of thirty. We flung the savages into a funeral pyre and they did not rise up again. In the peace that follows, our people begin to return to what is left of their homes. Ambrosius considers Arcturus among his most important war generals and has gifted him with a ring to honor his bravery and selflessness, which Arcturus wears proudly each day. It is a band of solid gold, the width of a man’s thumb. Set into it is an emerald, the size of a thumbnail. On either side are two blue sapphires. The emperor’s seal is on the inside of the ring. My master now approaches his forty-fifth summer, his greatness past all imagining.

  Carys came up for air only when Nicola placed a blanket on her shoulders, which she hadn’t realized were shaking. Nicola said nothing and left the vault as quietly as she’d entered.