40

Antoine Marcas’s home

Evening of his discharge from the hospital

A document icon appeared in the flash-drive window. Marcas clicked, and a text filled the screen.

My Dear Brother,

If you’re reading this, my worst fears were founded, and my time has passed. I wish the end had not come so quickly, especially at the hands of a murderer.

Forgive me, Antoine, for waiting until now to tell you my story and for doing it this way. You have been my friend and my brother. And it was never a matter of trust. It’s just that some things are best left unsaid until it’s necessary.

In writing these lines, I realize that I’m afraid of death. I’ve been dispirited over the last several months, and in truth, I fell into a depression a while ago that I just couldn’t shake. It wasn’t about my inability to use my legs. It was more about what I hadn’t accomplished. My career had reached a dead end, and I never found the right person to share my life with. But I don’t want to bore you with my lamentations, because what I have to tell you is far more important.

Before anything, I need to ask you to believe me. My story is so strange that I, too, refused to give it any credence for a long time. And it’s because I doubted that I died.

I’m going to share a family secret with you.

My father died a little more than twenty years ago in a suburb of Lausanne. We hadn’t seen each other in years. In fact, it was our shared heritage that separated us. Descending from Lafayette was a weight my father couldn’t bear. It was as though the marquis’s shadow kept him from being himself. So as soon as I showed the desire to know more about our ancestor, my father distanced himself. Later, when I wrote books about that period, I had to bear his criticism. And when I became a Freemason, he cut me off entirely.

That was why it wasn’t until my father died that I learned the family secret, which I discovered while handling his papers.

What I’m going to tell you was written in a small notebook handed down from one generation to the next. Each heir added his part. Some tried to crack the enigma. Others, like my father, were just depositories. I had no knowledge of this notebook, and the last person to study the enigma was my grandfather. Because I never had any children myself, it might as well be a brother like you who takes up the flame.

The Marquis de Lafayette honored my family and France at a time when Freemasonry had as many aristocrats as commoners. Everything has been recounted by my famous ancestor’s biographers, including me—everything except one secret.

When he fought in the American Revolution, he was friends with three brothers—all French. And these four brothers shared a secret so powerful, they made a pact to split the information up and encode it. Each would be guardian of part of it, to be handed down in secrecy and safety from generation to generation.

Marcas made himself more comfortable in his armchair, his laptop balanced on his knees.

What he passed down is found in these two sentences:

“The blade follows the flame of perfection.”

“In the shadow of Jachin.”

According to the notebook, each of the four descendants has a formula like this. Together, the four formulas should shed light on the mystery.

Unfortunately, my notebook didn’t disclose all the other heirs. I had reason to believe that each descendant knew at least one other descendant. The name Archambeau was in my notebook.

I did my research and was able to locate an old French family in the United States, whose only descendant lives in New York. I found her a month ago, and we talked on the phone. She seemed suspicious and wouldn’t confirm the story. I didn’t press her.

That was when my troubles began.

Two weeks ago, a man contacted me. He seemed to know everything. This time, I was the suspicious one. His voice was strange, insistent. And he spoke like a brother.

Then, last week, someone broke into my house.

The Grand Orient has my ancestor’s sword—the real one. I have reason to believe it holds one of the keys to the enigma.

If you read these lines, get the sword. I’m also leaving you contact information for Joan Archambeau. Either she has played a role in my disappearance and will give you a lead to my killer, or she has nothing to do with it, and she is in trouble.

Be the light.

Your brother, Paul.

“The blade follows the flame of perfection. In the shadow of Jachin.”

Marcas leaned back. Every Freemason in the world was familiar with the meaning of Jachin.