Ancient Shadows Read online

  She turned the drawer upside down. An envelope was taped to the underside. She removed and opened it.

  Inside was an old snapshot, a group of seven young American sailors smiling at the camera, their arms around each other’s shoulders. Behind them was a pyramid.

  As she scanned the grainy, fading faces to see if Gene Oliveros was among them, her gaze froze at that of one man. Her father.

  She knew he had been in the Navy sometime in the 1970s—”after Vietnam” was how he put it—but he never mentioned going to Egypt. The most he had ever said about those days was that after high school he took a job working as an apprentice to an auto mechanic, but when he found that the economy was terrible and no good jobs were available, he joined the Navy. After he got back from serving, he got serious about his studies. He met his future wife while in school. She was independently wealthy, and his life became much easier after they married. He went on to law school and became a prosecuting attorney.

  Looking at the photo, it was almost startling to see what a fresh-faced, handsome young man her father had once been. She wished he would talk to her about those days. Not only was he close-mouthed about his time in the Navy, he was close-mouthed about himself, period. He was her father, but she hardly knew him. Here, he looked relaxed with his fellow sailors, boyish, and happy. Remarkably—no, sadly—she had never seen him that way. She was going to have to ask him about this photo and why Oliveros kept it hidden.

  She searched the faces of other men in the photo, found a young Oliveros, but then her jaw dropped. One of the men looked exactly like Kevin Wilson, the U.S. Senator from California. Could it possibly be him? Her father never mentioned that they knew each other. She had never imagined Wilson was old enough to have served in the 1970s, but clearly, he was.

  The connection between the odd news clippings about energy companies and hedge funds, and the photo struck her. Could the men in the photos be the ones in the news?

  She asked the police to bag and log in all of the material and photos as evidence and then deliver copies to her office. Something wasn’t right here.

  She hadn’t talked to her father since a short, obligatory phone call on his birthday two months earlier. She called his number.

  He didn’t answer.

  Chapter 9

  Rome, Italy

  Michael always liked walking through Trastevere on the west bank of the Tiber River, an area of old buildings and narrow, cobbled streets heavily populated by the famous cats of Rome.

  Early that morning, he located a small group of Chaldeans in Florence, but they had only recently arrived in Italy and didn’t know Father Berosus. They directed him to Rome. He had the address, but the streets were winding and poorly marked. The sky was overcast, and a light rain began to fall before he found the building. It was an old, two-story stone house with no indication on the outside of who lived within. A man in a monk’s habit answered the door, and Michael asked to speak to the leader of the community. He was left to wait in a dark hallway.

  A man, one side of his face badly scarred and his black eyes sad and world-weary, approached. He wore a casual dark blue pullover shirt and dark gray slacks.

  His name was Brother Ashur Hasani. Michael asked him if he knew Father Yosip Berosus.

  “I don’t know him well,” Hasani replied, “but our paths crossed years ago.” His gaze was wary, his voice hushed.

  “I’m sorry to say he recently passed away,” Michael said.

  Hasani shut his eyes a moment. “May he rest in peace with God.”

  “I’m here because of a conversation I had with Father Berosus,” Michael said. “I don’t know if I should believe what he told me or not. His words were strange and troubling. He came to me right before his death and asked that I help him. I would like to speak with someone who knew him, who could tell me if he was a man who took to strange flights of fancy, or if his words could be believed.”

  Hasani invited Michael into a small parlor directly across the hall from the front door. The walls were dark paneled wood on the bottom and faded cabbage rose wallpaper on top. The furniture was outdated, stained, and threadbare. Hasani waved his hand in the direction of a carafe of wine on a side table and offered Michael glass. He turned it down.

  Hasani sat on an overstuffed side chair, and Michael took the high-backed dark maroon sofa. Hasani cast his gaze downward a moment, then said, “I am not surprised to hear any of your words, but I am puzzled that Father Berosus would confide something troubling to you rather than to another priest. His story, the little I know of it, is quite strange.”

  Michael placed his hands on his knees in an attempt to seem less nervous about this visit. “Anything you can tell me …”

  Hasani seemed to be debating with himself whether to help or not. “Father Berosus was a young, enthusiastic priest in Mosul, Iraq early in the 1970s. He was a scholar, profoundly intelligent, and many of the older priests who knew him were certain he would become a bishop, perhaps even our Patriarch. But then something happened in the course of his studies, and everything about him changed as he became intrigued with the nature of evil. With … demonic things. I dare say, is that why you’re here?”

  Michael nodded. “Yes.”

  Hasani sighed, then said, “I am sorry to tell you, he became a little mad. He wouldn’t tell people what caused this sudden unholy interest, and his confessor apparently spent long hours with him, warning him that the study of demonic creatures could open a door that the devil might enter—a door to one’s own soul. But Father Berosus ignored all warnings, saying he had no choice, that this pursuit was his mission.”

  “Excuse me,” Michael interrupted. “Do you know what area, or which aspect of evil and demons he was studying?”

  Hasani shook his head. “All I’ve heard is that it was about Genghis Khan and Marco Polo. I’ll admit, what they have to do with demons makes no sense to me.”

  “I see,” Michael said.

  Hasani continued. “One day, Berosus left his church without permission and traveled to Egypt. We don’t know what happened to him there, but he never returned to us. We tried to find him, but could not. We didn’t know if he was alive or dead until one of our monks encountered him on a visit to Medjugorje in Bosnia-Herzegovina, where the Virgin Mary is said to appear. The brother scarcely recognized Berosus. The madness we once feared within him had become complete. His hair was long and unwashed, his clothes ragged. He lived alone and had stopped performing his priestly duties unless there was an emergency, such as anointing the dying, when no other priest was near. The monk asked him to return to the monastery, but Berosus said he dared not. He feared it would be destroyed if he returned, and that he held its means of destruction.

  “A few years later, another of our brothers went to Medjugorje and looked for Father Berosus, but couldn’t find him. Apparently, he had taken to living as a traveling holy man who relied on the charity of others and brought grace in his wake through nearly constant prayer to ward off evil. No one knew where he was.”

  Hasani had come to the end of his tale, and was silent a moment, contemplating what it all meant. His voice lowered to almost a whisper. “It is my observation that he was a sad man who had lost his way. He seemed to believe he carried something evil, something he must hide to protect the church he loved. I’m afraid nothing said about him made sense to me. In any case, I’ve heard nothing more about him until your news today.”

  Michael absorbed the tale a moment. “Father Berosus talked of the Nestorian Church,” he said. “I thought they had died out. Is there any connection between your church and that one?”

  “In fact there is.” Hasani folded his hands. “The priest, Nestorius, was a Syrian. He became Patriarch of Constantinople in 428 A.D. but soon found himself in trouble with the Bishop of Rome—the Pope—over the nature of Jesus. Nestorius preached that Christ had two natures: one of man and another of God, and that Mary was the mother of Christ the man, not God. That became a heresy. The Roman church be
lieves Christ’s natures are in union with each other, and refer to Mary as theotokos, mother of God.”

  Hasani must have noticed Michael’s frown because he suddenly smiled and said, “Yes, yes, I realize it must sound like trying to count how many angels can dance on the head of a pin to non-believers, but to those of us who care, it is important.”

  Michael nodded. “You read my mind, I’m sorry to say. But please continue.”

  “By the end of the fifth century,” Hasani said, “followers of Nestorius declared him a saint, completing the break with Rome. They headed eastward, traveling into Central Asia and China, to spread his teachings. In 735, they were given permission to build a church in the Chinese city of Ch’ang-an, the imperial capital of the T’ang dynasty, but as the T’ang dynasty became increasingly xenophobic, many Nestorians headed back towards the west and settled along the Silk Road.”

  “What happened to them?” Michael asked.

  Brother Hasani shrugged. “In the nineteenth century, the few that were left gave up their idea of the dual nature of Christ, and made peace with Rome.”

  “Are there any pure Nestorians left anywhere?”

  “No.” Hasani raised his head, his gaze hard as he said, “The sect is no more.”

  Just then, they heard a ruckus in the outer hall. Hasani told Michael to wait as he headed for the door. Before he reached it, the door swung open and two armed men entered, each with a gun held to the head of a monk.

  Chapter 10

  Pasadena, California

  For all his power, Judge Daniel Holt was a curiously solitary man. He chalked it up to being too intimidating to others. That was their problem, not his. A perk of being a judge for the Ninth Circuit Federal Court of Appeals was to have his pronouncements, both public and private, obeyed without question.

  It was evening as he left his office in the Federal Courthouse, a tall building with a Spanish-colonial zigzag tiled dome, and headed for his personal parking space. His cell phone began to vibrate.

  He wondered if his daughter was calling again. Kira had already tried to reach him a couple of times that day. She knew he didn’t take personal calls at work. He would return her call tonight from home when he felt like talking to her. He found her impatience annoying and became doubly irritated by the phone’s vibration. He pulled it from his pocket and was about to dismiss the call when he noticed the name of the caller.

  He hesitated, then answered while getting into his silver Mercedes. “How many times do I have to say I don’t want to hear from you?” he announced, without waiting to hear the caller’s words. He slammed the car door shut.

  “The old priest is dead.” Hank Bennett spoke quickly, as if to be sure the judge didn’t hang up on him.

  “I know,” Holt said. “Wilson already contacted me.”

  “The Senator? What the hell is wrong with you? You don’t want the government putting its goddamned nose in any of this.”

  “The government is exactly what this is about. Wilson being on the Intelligence committee gives him needed resources. Once he has what we need, there’s no stopping us. We have nowhere to go but up.”

  There was a brief silence, then Bennett asked, “Did you hear about Gene Oliveros?”

  “Of course. The man was crazy. Everybody knows it. Calm down. I don’t want to hear from you unless you know something I don’t.”

  Holt not only ended the call, he turned off the phone. He didn’t want anything more to do with the damned thing, or with the caller. Just because they had served together a lifetime ago on the U.S.S. Saratoga didn’t mean he had to listen to the crack-pot today. The fellow was a loser. He had once amounted to something, but then tossed it all away.

  Not like Holt. Half-way through his tour in the Navy, he discovered that he had a brain, and a good one. He made something out of himself.

  And now, if he wanted a little help to ensure he got onto the Supreme Court, who could blame him? He had long known that California’s junior senator, Kevin Wilson, saw himself as the next president. He smiled at the thought of the two of them together controlling Washington … with a little help from their friends, he thought … and then chuckled.

  He drove from Pasadena to the hills above Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles. The trip took a little more than thirty minutes, traffic permitting, so it was dark as he neared home. From the hills, he looked down past the steep, tree-studded darkness to the lights of the city far below. Every day that view warmed his usually cold heart, reminding him of his magnificence in having accomplished so much. He expected that was why he chose to continue to live here rather than move to the more plebeian suburban city where his office was located.

  As he pulled onto his driveway, the night was too dark and his attention too distracted to notice a dark, foxlike shape crouching on the roof, watching him. The garage door creaked as it opened. From the attached garage, he entered the kitchen.

  Nothing sat in the warming oven awaited his arrival. Nothing simmered on the range top, or roasted in the oven. He was hungry when he got home, and his housekeeper knew that. She had an easy job, keeping house for a single man. Her chief duty was to prepare a healthy, tasty meal that was warm and waiting for him when he returned from work—and being out of the house so he didn’t have to talk to her.

  His dog ... where was Oscar? The Wheaton terrier was always waiting for him, spinning with joy. If the housekeeper let the dog run out of the house, unsupervised, and maybe lost, her days in his employ were over!

  He shoved open the swinging door between the kitchen and dining room, bellowing Oscar’s name.

  From the dining room, he stormed into the living room.

  A beautiful woman sat on the sofa, her long legs crossed at the knee.

  She was petite and shapely, with straight black hair that flowed down her back to her waist. Her tight emerald green dress perfectly matched her eyes. As he stared, something about this woman niggled at his brain. And then, he remembered.

  “I don’t believe it,” he whispered.

  “I knew you would never forget me,” she said.

  Slowly, all the memories he had shut out for almost forty years flooded through him, stronger and stronger, until they frightened him with their intensity, then disgusted him over all that had happened. Somehow, he gathered himself together. He was a man in control, always in control, and then he smiled. “You’re here to help me, aren’t you?” he whispered.

  She made no reply, but simply stood up.

  “You know where the pearl is,” he said. “You know what I want, and that I’m close, so very close!”

  She lifted her arm and stretched it towards him with her forefinger pointed at his chest.

  Holt looked confused at first, and then felt a stabbing pain in his heart. “What are you doing?” he shouted as the unseen jab cut into him. He covered his heart with his hands. “Stop!”

  She laughed aloud, her laugh causing the hairs on the nape of his neck to stand.

  He gasped for breath as the pain from his heart became crippling. “Please. You need me,” he pleaded as he fell to one knee, near tears, his once-powerful voice little more than a simpering cry. He couldn’t run, couldn’t do anything to protect himself, but watched her with mounting terror.

  She continued to smile as his face crumbled, as his lungs stopped working, and he could no longer breathe. Memories swirled. A black fox.

  He was on his hands and knees now, unable to divert his eyes from the creature before him. His lungs were raw, empty, as he tore at his throat, trying to open it, needing air. His heart pounded harder, ever faster, until he feared it would burst through his chest.

  He held his hand out to her. “Please, I’ll do anything. Anything.”

  Her lips spread into a disgust-filled sneer as she shook her head.

  Against his will, he crawled to the fireplace and took hold of the poker that stood on the hearth. He reared up on his knees as he turned the sharp end of the poker towards him and drove it hard into his throat, cr
ushing his windpipe. He dropped it, bleeding, as his fingers clawed at his eyes, and his mind filled with the heat of the desert and the sounds of war.

  Chapter 11

  “Who are you?” Brother Hasani faced the gunmen who stormed into the monastery. “What do you want here?”

  Michael recognized them as the same two men who attacked him in Florence. One was middle-aged, stocky, and of medium height. His dark brown hair was combed straight back off his forehead, falling into a curly cluster in back. The other appeared younger and thinner, and wore his hair clipped short. The monks they held were young men, cowering with their hands raised. “We meet again,” Michael said, moving closer. “Did you follow me here?”

  “We aren’t here to hurt you or them,” the taller, heavier gunman said. “We just want the pearl.”

  “Pearl? What pearl?” Hasani cried. “We’re monks. We have no riches.”

  “He’s right,” Michael said, facing the big man. “They don’t have any riches and have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “No games, or you’ll have a bloodbath here.”

  “Calm down! Maybe I do know what you want, but the old priest didn’t tell me where he hid it.”

  “You’re lying!”

  The smaller gunman looped an arm around his captive’s neck, and pulled him backwards, a gun to his temple. The monk cried out, struggling for breath.

  “Why would I lie?” Michael raged. “Let these men go, and we can talk. Surely, one pearl isn’t worth taking a life. Why are you doing this?”

  “Why not?” The big spokesman gave a lazy grin.

  “Who are you working for?” Michael asked.

  “Someone with enough money to make all this worth our while.”

  Just then, the parlor door opened and a monk carrying a tray laden with cups of hot tea walked straight into the room, his gaze fixed on the tray as if to be sure the cups wouldn’t slide off. He had far more cups than there were people, but before that registered, he threw the tray at the large gunman who jumped back and roared in rage and pain as the hot liquid hit his face.