Jane and David made their way to Löbauer Straße and walked arm in arm under the strings of Advent stars. Heavy clouds hung over the swelling mountain to the east. Halfway down the street, they found a restaurant that also advertised itself as a beer garden. Inside, dark paneled walls and sturdy tables greeted them. Both ordered the fish. Jane decided to try the strawberry blond ale, joking that it was close enough to her own shade.
Just as the waitress brought their beer, the man she’d seen across the field walked in. At least she thought it was him. Broad in the shoulders, heavy set, but moving like a boxer, the man glanced around. Finding no other customers, he walked to their table. “I thought to introduce myself. I am Ivar. I work for Mr. Knight.” His smile revealed rather sharp canine teeth.
David perked his head up in interest, but Jane hesitated.
The man fished in his pocket and came out with a business card, which he handed to Jane. It was identical to the one Knight had given her when she’d done work for him in D.C. She turned it over and found an eye of Horus drawn on the back with the initials VK signed in an old fashioned script. Jane recognized his handwriting from the documents he’d signed while she watched.
Satisfied, Jane held out her hand. “Nice to meet you, Ivar. This is David.”
Ivar acknowledged him with a nod. “There is a chance of snow. When do you plan to return to Prague?”
“We need to meet with the archivist, then we’ll see.” At David’s questioning look, Jane explained. “Knight advised me to spend nights in the Prague suite if at all possible. Said it was safer.”
“You must be careful, yes?” Ivar asked. A quick smile made this silver wolf a touch more friendly.
“We will.” She held the card out to him, but he shook his head.
“For you.”
The kitchen door opened and the waitress came through laden with two big plates. Ivar sat at his table studying the menu, acting the perfect stranger. How had he moved so quickly? The waitress put plates of steaming fish with tomatoes and rice in front of them. Jane’s stomach growled approval. They ate in silence for a few minutes.
Once the intensity of her initial hunger subsided, Jane sat back, fork in hand. “So, what did we learn?”
“Right. Back to business.” David picked up his beer, his eyes narrowing in thought.
Jane felt a pang of regret. Would the magic that had fallen over them be lost now? “Yeah, what do we know?” she repeated more softly.
“For one thing, Leinbach knows you’ve been kicked out of the house.”
“No way.” She slammed the fork down on the table. “How do you figure?”
“He used the past tense. Said Lois asked about the house you were living in. It wasn’t a translation error. His English is excellent.”
“Damn,” she said, suddenly embarrassed.
“And he wasn’t surprised about the Masonic connections.”
“Not at all,” Jane agreed.
“Even Zinzendorf seemed to have ties to them.”
“Really?”
“Sure, at Fetter Lane if not at university.”
“I remember. That book on Blake said that Fetter Lane gave refuge to a network of ecumenical missionaries who worked with—” she tried to remember exactly “—Kabbalism, Eastern mysticism, alchemy—maybe more.”
“Swedenborg was there for a while, too.” David added.
“Who’s he?”
“You’re the Blake expert.”
The waitress came and offered them dessert. Jane shook her head no. “I’m no Blake expert. I worked in oil and gas finance and associated politics most of my life.”
“Oh, is that all?” David said.
Jane made a face at him as if she were in elementary school.
He smiled. “Blake followed Swedenborg’s teachings for a while. He was a Swedish mystic.”
“I remember reading about him, too. Mason?”
“Maybe Rosicrucian.”
“So they were also at Fetter Lane?”
“The Rosicrucians and Freemasons have always been intertwined. The Masons kept the secrets of building, but the spiritual teachings of the two groups are pretty much the same. And the Templars have interconnections with both groups. They had a smithy there for armor and weapons repair.”
“The Templars were the ones who protected pilgrims to the Holy Land, right?”
“Supposedly. They went to Jerusalem to excavate under King Solomon’s Temple.”
“Great, so they could have a whole ton of artifacts.”
“Right.”
“And the Moravians had ties to all these groups.”
David took a long drink of his beer. “They did.”
“I guess I never realized how esoteric many of the colonists were. Somehow I imagined they were like the Puritans—rigid and unimaginative. Sure you’d go to hell if you strayed from the straight and narrow.”
“Lots of the founders were involved in mysticism.” He paused for a minute, then snapped his fingers. “I just remembered. Ephrata was right next to Bethlehem.”
“Okay, Mr. Encyclopedia.”
“Sorry,” David said. “Ephrata was a Rosicrucian settlement. Zinzendorf studied with them for a while, but ultimately they couldn’t agree on some of the essentials of belief.”
“So Zinzendorf associated with the Rosicrucians and Masons, if he wasn’t one himself. The Knights Templar had a smithy at Fetter Lane. Any artifact Zinzendorf might have had could be anywhere. He sent missionaries all over and travelled a good deal himself.”
“Zinzendorf could have brought it to Fetter Lane. Or gotten it there. Taken it to Bethlehem when he visited. Or gotten it from the Ephrata settlement.”
“And from Bethlehem, it could have easily ended up in Salem.” A heaviness settled into Jane’s chest. “There are just too many options.”
“Then there’s Comenius. I never realized he knew Andrea,” David said.
“I didn’t understand any of that.”
David sat back and stretched out his long legs. “Johann Valentin Andrea was one of the—well, you could say founders of the modern Rosicrucian movement.”
“Great, one more link to investigate.” Jane finished her ale.
“They claim that their organizations can be traced all the way back to Egypt. The Masons say the same.”
“We might as well give up if we have to cover that much history,” Jane sputtered. She studied her empty beer mug. How much of this was true? The Moravian connection to the mysteries seemed irrefutable, but Egypt? That sounded more like myth.
She voiced this doubt out loud. “Can they really trace their lineage all that far back?”
“That’s what academics always say, but the same teachings can be found in Greece and Egypt, also Mesopotamia. Not to mention the sacred geometry.”
“Sacred what?”
“Ge-o-me-try.” David said it syllable by syllable.
“Miss Essig had some books on that, but I haven’t read any yet. How can math be sacred?”
“A musician can ask such a question?”
“What do you mean?”
“Music is math. It’s all about using the harmonies of nature, like the Golden Mean. When we build using these proportions, it creates a sense of peace. Certain chords and tones change people’s brain waves.”
“If you say so,” Jane smirked.
He seemed genuinely affronted. “Never underestimate the power of music. They’ve done studies.”
“Can you show me some of this research?” Jane poked his leg with her foot.
“I could show you, but it’s a Masonic secret, so I’d have to kill you.”
The joke fell flat. His words tore at the sore spot in her heart.
Lois. Why did they go after you?
What would she do without Lois’s brilliance and sense of humor? Who really understood her better? They’d had similar lives. They’d helped each other through so much, then laughed about it years later. A tear ran down Jane’s cheek. She shook her head against more.
“Sorry,” David said quietly.
Jane fished for a tissue from her purse and blew her nose. “It still sneaks up on me.”
“It’s been less than a week.” David reached over and put his hand on her forearm.
The warmth and steadiness helped. “Thanks.”
“My pleasure.”
Jane ignored the huskiness in his voice. His casual masculinity, his broad shoulders and lake blue eyes moved her. She’d steeled herself to being alone for a long time. If she let herself sink into him like she had on top of the tower, she wouldn’t want to surface for a long time. They had work to do.
She made herself focus. “Tell me about Andrea.”
“Johann Valentine Andrea claimed authorship of Fama Fraternitatis RC and The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz. Maybe The Confessio, too.”
“The chemical what?”
David chuckled. “It really means alchemical. It’s a spiritual allegory, the story of a pilgrim who is invited to a castle that is full of miracles. There he attends the wedding of the king and queen. It’s the last of the three manifestos that brought the Rosicrucians into the public eye again.”
Jane thought about this for a minute. “Leinbach said Frederick V was a Rosicrucian. I remember the Thirty Years War was between the Czechs and Germans against the Catholic ruling class.”
“The Habsburgs. They talk about this history in Masonic Lodge. Frederick came from the Palatine in what is now Germany. He married Elizabeth. Not Queen Elizabeth, of course, but the daughter of her successor—James I. The Protestants of Europe joined together to bring down the power of the Spanish throne and the Church. They failed because England didn’t join in. James must have still harbored Catholic leanings.”
“So our ancestors had to flee to escape death.”
“Right. The Rosicrucians were very involved in these politics. The Catholics have always tried to suppress the metaphysical teachings of the Gnostics. The Rosicrucians felt the Catholics kept the true teachings from the people. They call the church their ‘ancient enemy’.”
“So you think the Rosicrucians go back that far?”
“Sure. Like I said, it’s the same teachings. That humans can achieve awareness of God. Even unity with the divine.”
“As in the Unity?”
David snorted. “If they were Gnostics, they’ve turned from that teaching now.”
“Maybe in public.”
David looked at her sharply. “You think there’s a secret group within the church?”
“Like the OGMS?”
“Yeah, but . . .” He trailed off, lost in thought.
“Okay.” Jane tucked a fly-away strand of hair behind her ear. “Here’s what we know. The Rosicrucians were involved in the Thirty Years War. For now, we’ll assume the Freemasons are practically the same people. Comenius was friends with one of the founders of the Rosicrucian Order, so can we assume he was influenced by the teachings?”
David nodded. ”Zinzendorf also.”
“Either of them might have received secret artifacts. Hidden them with someone.”
“I do remember that after Heidelberg, Comenius served as pastor in Fulnek. He probably lived there the longest before he was forced into exile. If he had an artifact, perhaps it was left there.”
“Or he might have taken it to Poland with him.”
“Let’s hope this archivist can help you narrow down the options,” David said.
“Odd she only wanted to talk to me.”
“I’ll go check out Zinzendorf’s house and the other buildings while you talk to her. Drop by the bookstore.”
✬ ✬ ✬
Jane said goodbye to David and stopped in front of the Saal, trying to collect her thoughts. Where should she start with the archivist and, more mysterious, why had she insisted on seeing only her? Did it have something to do with Leinbach’s comment about her family being old and distinguished? Jane glanced at her phone again and read the archivist’s name: Penelope Pfeifer. Could she be British? But the surname was German. Perhaps she’d married someone from here. Maybe she was from the Fetter Lane congregation or some other Moravian settlement in the British Isles.
Jane shook off this round of thoughts and walked to the archives, the large, white building matching the surroundings. Inside, a round woman with straw-blond hair and dressed in a blue pants suit greeted her in English that buzzed with the guttural consonants of German.
Not British then, Jane thought.
After the introductions, Fraulein Pfeifer led Jane up the stairs to her cramped office. Jane sat in a wooden, straight-backed chair perfect for any Puritan and glanced out the window at the bare winter branches. On second look, the room turned out to be an adequate size, but every nook and cranny was stuffed with piles of books and manuscripts. Framed photographs covered every inch of the walls depicting Moravian settlements in various parts of the world, Moravian churches, large group shots of Sunday Schools, and some portraits of famous Moravians—two of Anna Nitschmann. No less than five were of Comenius.
Of course, Jane thought.
“I’m sorry that I haven’t had the time to do a family report for you and your . . .”
“Friend,” Jane supplied, feeling suddenly self-conscious.
Fraulein Pfeifer gave an apologetic look. “I promise to send one if you’ll give me an address.”
“That’s very kind of you, Fraulein—”
“Please call me Penelope. It’s a joy to me to help people connect with their origins.”
Jane smiled. “Did Herr Leinbach speak with you about our visit with him this morning?”
A shadow passed over her clear brown eyes. “He did. I apologize if we have broken any confidences.”
“No, actually that makes things simpler, although I’d recommend that you keep our business quiet. There’s been one death associated with this . . . ” Jane rejected the word ‘quest’. It sounded too much like searching for the Holy Grail.
“I’m sorry to hear that.” Penelope’s voice was full of compassion.
“Then you know that some group of fanatics thinks I have some kind of ancient artifact in my possession.” Jane made a deprecating gesture.
Penelope sat back in her chair listening intently, so Jane marched on. “Herr Leinbach confirmed the long standing connections between the Freemasons and Rosicrucians. The Knights Templar had headquarters in Fetter Lane, so the possibilities for what this artifact might be are somewhat overwhelming.”
Penelope’s open, joyful face clouded over as Jane spoke, but she still remained silent.
“We’re sorry to bring these questions to you, but I’ve been asked to find this artifact before it falls into the wrong hands.” She sat back and waited.
Penelope looked thoughtful and sat silent for so long that Jane shifted uncomfortably in her chair. Then Penelope seemed to come to a decision. She leaned forward, placing her palms flat on her desk. “Anna Szeges asked me as head of the Sisters’ House here in Herrnhut—”
Jane gasped and started to push herself out of her chair.
Penelope held up a forestalling hand. “—to convey to you her apologies for not beginning your instruction as soon as you arrived in the Choir House. None of us realized how quickly things would develop. Perhaps the time is upon us.”
Jane realized her mouth was hanging open, so she closed it. She had no idea what Penelope meant by the time being upon us.
“Anna asked me to explain more about what happened in the church after the Count’s death. To give you some idea how our group came into being.”
“Um, I had no idea—”
“Only the people involved are aware the choirs are still functioning,” she said. Before launching into her story, Penelope plugged in a British-style tea kettle and added tea leaves to a flowered teapot. She leaned down and pulled up a tray with two cups, sugar and a white creamer. At Jane’s surprised look, she smiled and said somewhat conspiratorially, “I thought we should be comfortable.”
Maybe she’s British after all. Jane ran her hand through her hair, entirely out of her depth. Apparently the choirs were still functioning here in Herrnhut, but it was not something everyone knew. So a secret church did exist.
While the water heated, Penelope began to talk about Zinzendorf’s death. “He passed into the more immediate presence of our Lord right here in Herrnhut, which was a blessing.”
“We saw his tomb,” Jane said.
“The Count was a charismatic leader with a sweeping vision. Our church flourished under his guidance, but—” she lifted her shoulders “—as is often the case with such men, his death left us rudderless. The Unity grieved deeply, but needed to redefine itself in order to continue. Many of Zinzendorf’s more unusual teachings were suppressed. Unfortunate in my view.”
The tea kettle whistled and she poured water in the pot, a thoughtful look on her face before continuing. “Many did not want to relinquish the way of life we’d developed under his leadership. But the new church leaders were anxious to redeem our reputation among the other Protestants. A few stalwart followers of Zinzendorf and his son acted to save them.
“As you may have read, the activities in Marienborn and Herrnhaag came to the attention of other religious leaders of the time and their reactions were not favorable.” Suddenly she looked up at Jane. “You do know about the Sichtungszeit, don’t you dear?”
Jane shook her head.
“The Sifting Times?”
“Only a little.”
Penelope poured out tea, sat back and took a sip, then studied Jane for a moment. Her expression was kindly, but thoughtful. She acted as if she had all the time in the world. “Anna told me you’d read some, but she wasn’t sure how much. Zinzendorf was ahead of his time. He taught there was no shame in sex, that the savior had redeemed our bodies. Sexual union could lead to joining with the divine. The husband, of course, served as the Bridegroom for the wife during their time in the blue kabinet. There was a liturgy.”
“So I’ve gathered,” Jane said.
“While the Count traveled to missionary sites, he left Herrnhaag in the hands of his son, Christian Renatus, who perhaps took things too far. Christian and a fellow elder, Joachim Rubusch, were not content to wait for death to become the wives of Christ and experience the soul’s feminine nature. They created a ceremony for single men in the Unity that declared them to be women. The two traveled to several villages and performed ceremonies.”
Jane raised her eyebrows. “So that’s what all the fuss was about.”
“In part. They also intimated that physical gender didn’t matter, that anyone could be . . . well, serve as the wife of Christ. Rumors of wild practices spread. Some were scandalized. Scathing articles were written on the Moravians, accusing the people in these two settlements of orgies and perversions.”
“Perversions, as in homosexuality?”
Penelope nodded. “It is my belief that Christian Renatus was homosexual and this was his way of coming to terms with his desires.”
“A challenge for his father.”
She gave Jane a surprised smile. “Yes, our Count was ahead of his time, but not enough in the case of his son. They reconciled in the end, though.”
“I’d like to read more about it.”
“One of our historians in Bethlehem is writing a book on this period.” She took another sip of tea before continuing the story. “Zinzendorf had been exiled from Saxony during this period because of his ecumenical stance. He wanted all Christians united, even met with Jews and Catholics. It was this last, plus his blood and wounds teachings, that made many suspicious. Some other Protestants thought members of the Unity were Catholic spies.”
Jane snorted. “After all we’d been through?”
“Indeed,” Penelope exclaimed. “During his exile, Zinzendorf lived in Ronneburg Castle and granted asylum to religious refugees of various stripes. Herrnhaag was built during this time. Marienborn also. But with the scandal, the settlement was broken up, the people sent elsewhere. After the Count’s death, the church leaders pushed his more controversial teachings aside. We became more conventional Christians. But some of us did not abandon the way of life or practices he taught.”
“So we have the OGMS?” Jane asked.
Penelope wagged her head back and forth. “Yes and no. It’s more complicated than that, but for our purposes here, yes. Since we have kept the more mystical side of the Unitas Fratrum alive, it makes sense that someone connected to other metaphysical lodges might have taken an artifact into safe keeping.”
Jane’s head came up.
“I’ve spoken with Brother Frank.”
Jane’s eyes went wide. “My cousin?”
“Yes,” Penelope said, “and he says there is no tradition of an artifact in your family.”
Jane threw up her hands. She traced the rim of her now empty tea cup thoughtfully. “On the plane over, I read a novel by H.D.”
“Yes, Hilda Doolittle. Famous poet, friend of Ezra Pound. Another Moravian. Which book did you read?”
“The Mystery.”
Penelope smiled. “Apropos. She writes about the Sifting Times in that one and hints at them in The Gift.”
Jane didn’t know about this last novel. “H.D. claims that Goethe came to Herrnhut looking for esoteric writings. Is there any truth to that?”
Penelope nodded slowly. “Goethe did come to Herrnhut, but the archivist at the time did not share any materials from the OGMS’s private library with him.”
Jane leaned forward eagerly. “Which means you do have secret esoteric writings.”
Penelope’s smile was as enigmatic as the Sphinx and she was just as silent.
“Is there anything in them that would shed light on this quest?” Jane realized the word had popped out with no hesitation this time.
“We kept some of Zinzendorf’s writings safe, what are called the Green Books. They contain accounts of his mystical experiences, his visions and prophecies.”
“Prophecies?” Jane sat forward. “Comenius, too, from what I’ve heard.”
Penelope raised a rather scholarly finger. “Comenius recorded the prophecies of other people. Now back to the Green Books. I can go through them and look for clues to our current dilemma. I’ll let you know what I find.”
“Thank you,” Jane said. She slumped against the hard back of her chair, her head whirling. She could hardly keep up with it all.
“Zinzendorf worked on them a good deal while he was at Ronneburg. There he was surrounded by people from many places. A variety of religious refugees. Today it is a tourist attraction. It is unlikely anything is left hidden there, but—” she shrugged.
“I see,” Jane said.
“Perhaps you would like to travel to the other Moravian settlements close by. Marienborn has been absorbed by modern development, but you might find Herrnhaag of interest. It was built using sacred geometry.”
“David said something about sacred geometry at lunch.”
“Reuter, who was an architect and a devotee of Christian Renatus, wanted to lay Salem out using the same plan as Herrnhaag, but his vision was not followed. I believe they used an eight-sided design instead.”
A cold chill ran through Jane, pebbling her flesh. She sat forward. “Did you say eight-sided?”
“Uh, yes.” Penelope forehead wrinkled. “Originally the church in Salem was to be in the middle with eight streets coming off it like spokes on a wheel. The choir houses would surround the Saal. But the site was too hilly. The design wasn’t used.”
“Not used?”
“No.”
Jane’s shoulders slumped.
“But Herrnhaag was built as a twelve-sided figure with the spring in the middle representing the Well of Life.” Penelope offered this bit hopefully, studying Jane’s face. “It is in ruins today, but the well is still there. Also the energy of the site is quite active, if one can attune to such things.”
Jane smiled weakly.
Penelope seemed encouraged by this. “Herrnhaag is close to Ronneburg Castle if you feel you can travel safely.”
“A friend from the corporate world—” Jane didn’t want to reveal her connection to Valentin Knight just yet “—has lent me a body guard.”
“Good. Visit these sites while I study the Count’s words. When you return, I may have news.”
✬ ✬ ✬
While Jane talked with Penelope, David went into the bookstore and looked first for Comenius. His books took up a whole section. He perused the titles, thumbing through the books on education, but quickly put them aside and settled on his theological works. The bookseller helped him decide on the most famous Labyrinth of the World and Paradise of the Heart, beautifully illustrated, and his last work Bequest of the Dying Mother.
“That one was written when he thought the church was dying,” the bookseller said. “He wanted to leave his thoughts for whoever might stumble upon them in the future.”
After she wandered back to her desk, David picked up a couple more. His German would definitely get a work out. When he reached the front desk, he realized he didn’t have the cash to pay for these. His credit card wasn’t in the best shape either. He shoved his wallet in his pocket and walked back toward the Comenius section.
Blast it, they needed these for their research. Knight was funding this escapade, wasn’t he? Knight had created some make-work for Jane so he could pay her some ungodly sum of money. That’s the way she’d explained it to him. He didn’t know how much she had, but based on the way she casually doled out hundreds, he was beginning to imagine it was quite a bit. He decided to let Jane buy them. He turned back to the front and left the pile with the owner, telling her he didn’t want to cart them all over.
“Of course, sir.” She wrote his name on a slip of paper and waved as he left the store.
Just don’t get used to all this luxury, he admonished himself.
Jane hadn’t shown up yet, so he wandered back to the museum, wanting to confirm something he’d noticed that morning. The woman at the front desk nodded him through. He sought out the display on the Advent Star. The case had a piece of paper inside giving the history, that the star had first been put together by a geometry class in Niesky in the 1830s. Just as he’d always been taught.
He walked into the next room and found a display about aristocratic families who’d taken the risk of sheltering the Bohemian Brethren, keeping the church alive. Amidst the family crests he found one with a motif almost identical to the Advent Star. He bent low to check the date. 1525.
“There you are.”
He turned to find Jane behind him, a little breathless, her cheeks flushed. “How’d it go?”
“Interesting.” She looked toward the window. “It’s getting dark. Let’s check in. We can talk over dinner.”
Outside, Jane looked at his empty hands. “I thought you were getting books.”
He flushed a furious red. “I left a stack with the bookseller. There were a lot of them.”
“Good,” she said. “Let’s get them first.”
The bell on the door of the bookstore rang as they entered and the woman behind the desk looked up. “Ah, there you are,” she said in German. She brought out David’s stack. “I was getting ready to close.”
“Do you have any in English?” Jane asked.
The woman guided them to a section and Jane quickly chose a few histories of the church and two about Zinzendorf. Toward the front, she picked up knickknacks for presents. She paid without hesitation.
David studied the bare wood flooring.
They left the bookstore and went in search of their hotel, which turned out to be on the same street in what was called the “Old Moravian House.” The clerk handed them two keys with a smile.
“Let’s get our bags,” Jane said after signing for the rooms.
David tried to shift all the books into one hand.
“You can leave those here, sir,” the clerk said.
“Danke.”
They walked up the street. By the time they reached the car, snowflakes had started to fall. David stopped. “Let’s just leave the car here.”
Jane held out her hand for the keys. She drove to Comeniusstrake and took the corner too fast. The rear slid sideways.
David gasped.
“Southerners,” she said.
“Like you’re not one.”
She parked near the hotel, more careful of the slick cobblestones. They dropped their bags in their rooms, which turned out to be adjacent.
“Should we just go back to the same restaurant? I’m too tired to go searching all over,” Jane said.
“Yeah, let’s walk rather than drive,” David said.
Jane shook her head, but she was smiling.
While David ate sausages, Jane filled him in on what she’d learned.
“So Salem was not built on the eight-sided design, then,” he said between bites.
“No.”
“Too bad. That might have solved half the mystery.”
“True.” Jane smoothed the edge of the table cloth.
“But she said the OGMS exists here,” David confirmed.
“This proves there’s a secret group in the church.”
He nodded, enjoying the rich food.
“She suggested we check out the other Moravian settlements while we’re up here. Ronneburg Castle, Marienborn, and Herrnhaag.” Jane took out her phone and poked some buttons, then handed it to him. A map to Herrnhaag glowed in greens and browns.
“It’s almost 600 kilometers. Why not go to the castle first? It’s closer.”
“She said it was a tourist attraction now. I thought we could see Herrnhaag, then maybe go to the Castle later. Stay until after they close. Do a little poking around.”
“Sneaky.” David reached for his beer. “But that’s a long way in this snow. It would mean an early morning.”
“We can take more than one day doing it.”
“What about Ivar?”
Jane waved a hand in dismissal. “He said he’d watch out for us.”
David set down his beer and sat back, replete. Jane fished in her purse. She piled enough money on the table to cover their bill and more. He pushed away another twinge of guilt.
“Come on,” Jane said. “I think we’ve done enough damage for one day.”
“Damage?” David asked, his eyes flitting to the pile of Euros.
Jane pointed to the array of mugs on their table.
The muted light of the restaurant had erased the years, the fine wrinkles around her eyes and mouth. Her silver hair looked blond again. He yearned to kiss those lips as he had this afternoon. Yeah, he was drunk, but he was pretty sure he’d feel the same way in the morning. He should talk to her about the money thing. Instead, he said, “I wonder what your Uncle Pat would say if we told him what we learned today.”
Jane burst out laughing. “‘I told you so’. That’s what he’d say.”
David reached out his hand and pulled her to her feet. She was a bit tipsy herself. Outside, the Advent stars had all been lit. They shone brightly against the dark night, casting all under their golden, red-tinged magic. David pulled Jane close and she snuggled against his side. They headed for the hotel, walking back through time.
✬ ✬ ✬
Philip leaned into the shadows of the alley watching the two besotted lovers stroll beneath the stars hung above the road. The black matte finish on the motorcycle he’d rented did not reflect the lights. He was sure Jane hadn’t seen him. It was proving to be a little tricky to stay hidden from Knight’s man, but he’d managed so far.
Spencer, his contact with Henry Coche, had asked him only to observe and report. He secured his helmet and straddled his bike. His afternoon meeting with the Herrnhut archivist had been productive, though. He’d searched Jane and David’s rooms while they ate, but found nothing of interest. He’d put a tracking device on the Fiat. He’d be thorough, but he was beginning to suspect Jane didn’t know a damn thing.