Paris, Charles de Gaulle Airport, 20th of June, 11:45
The eve of the summer solstice
The two and a quarter hours it took for the Naples-Paris flight to get me to my destination seemed just as endless as the fifteen hours before them had.
I’d had no contact with Asar and his men – no phone call, no message. Nothing. Àrtemis had been kidnapped for some reason which eluded me, and they had disappeared. Their destination was Chartres, of that I had no doubt. Just in time for the twenty-first of June – the summer solstice.
Riccardo had been very supportive when he had heard the news and had even offered to accompany me, but I had been adamant. I did not want anyone underfoot. It was a free country, though: let him go to Chartres if he wanted to – but my priority was certainly not the Cathedral of the Nine Mirrors.
With me were Andrea and Oscar. My friend and fellow mason was the only person I wanted with me at that moment. I had rushed straight to him the day before when I had realised what had happened, and he had offered to do whatever he could. For a few seconds he had tried to dissuade me from going to France, assuring me that the gendarmerie would handle the situation and that Andrea would do whatever it took to make sure that nothing happened to Àrtemis. I hadn’t needed to say anything to make him realise that it would be pointless to try and stop me.
We had no luggage to pick up so we set off quickly towards the exit. Behind the crush of people awaiting relatives or friends, we saw a man with a sign saying ‘Kominkova’. It was one of the French Interpol agents who had been sent directly from the Lyon headquarters to meet Andrea. Evidently the transalpine authorities had been informed of the dramatic turn of events in the last few hours and had offered their full co-operation.
“Sergeant Major Philippe Blanchard, welcome to Paris – please, this way,” said the young man as we approached, and, indicating that we should follow him, he walked over to a handsome, athletic-looking man in his fifties with grey hair and a beard who was waiting just beyond the barriers. “Let me introduce you to Lieutenant Edmond Thomas of Interpol.”
Unlike his Czech colleague, Thomas greeted us with a coolness that bordered on hostility.
“You lot have made a bit of a mess of things, haven’t you?” he said listlessly in English as we headed for the exit.
“We did our best,” said Andrea coldly. “We are aware that we made some mistakes.”
Thomas stopped and turned round in the middle of the busy airport entrance a few metres from the exit. “Some mistakes?” he said, with a sarcastic smile on his face. “So far it’s three deaths, a robbery and a kidnapping. More than a few mistakes, I’d say.”
Oscar felt compelled to defend Andrea. “Look, let’s get one thing straight, Thomas – we’re here to work together and help Lorenzo Aragona, not to be fucked about.”
Oscar’s French was good enough to allow him to express himself using colourful metaphors and his pas pour être foutu de la gueule had the desired effect.
Thomas hesitated, then, looking slightly embarrassed, muttered, “Yes, Lorenzo Aragona… you brought a civilian with you. Okay, let’s work together and try to keep our heads.”
“Especially because to do otherwise would mean risking the head of my wife, Lieutenant. That’s why this civilian is here,” I said, to underline to this arrogant policeman that I wouldn’t be spending my time in a bistro drinking wine.
Thomas sighed and said no more. We had reached the car that would take us to the city centre, a nondescript Renault minivan.
On the way, Thomas brought us up to date on the investigation which had begun the day before, when Oscar and Andrea had contacted French Interpol for support.
“We are monitoring ports and airports,” said the Frenchman, “and of course we immediately deployed checkpoints between Ile-de-France and the department of Eure-et-Loir, of which Chartres is the capital. To be honest, I am very skeptical that the kidnappers have brought your wife to France, Monsieur Aragona. I fear you may have been hasty in coming here.”
“I understand your skepticism, Lieutenant, but I’m sure that they have found a way to bring her. For them it is not only important to get to Chartres, but it is crucial that they are there by twelve o’clock tomorrow.”
Thomas, sitting next to Sergeant Major Blanchard, who was driving, shook his head visibly. “People who kill and kidnap over a legend… It’s the first time I’ve encountered such a thing.”
“Some people take these things very seriously, Lieutenant,” I concluded.
“Perhaps… In any case we already have men in Chartres. Even if they did manage to get from Naples to Paris or Chartres with a hostage, it’s unlikely that they’ll manage to go unnoticed in the cathedral tomorrow.”
“We thought the same thing – Chartres cathedral is a very popular tourist attraction,” observed Andrea, who had been silent since Thomas’s initial sarcasm.
“And that's not all,” said Thomas. “Have you ever been at this time of year? It’s chaos there on the day of the solstice – it’s no secret that the sundial indicates the height of summer through the Sant’Apollinare window. I’ve been looking into it and in about an hour a retired professor of art history who acts as a tour guide there will be joining us in my office. He’s an Englishman who has lived in Chartres for decades, and he knows the cathedral like the back of his hand. I’ve already spoken to him on the phone and he tells me that, in addition to the usual tourists, on the twenty-first of June there are always some fanatics like your friends… Masons, nostalgic druids and what not, who believe that there is some esoteric secret hidden in that window. Believe me, there will be a lot of people there tomorrow and we won’t be able to evacuate the church while the phenomenon occurs, otherwise I’ll have the Curia and all the shopkeepers and restaurateurs of Chartres on my back. Half the city makes its living off the cathedral.”
“So what do you plan to do?” asked Andrea.
“My men will all be in plain clothes and they will be stationed very discreetly around the Sant’Apollinare window. If they notice anything, they will move everyone away. I don’t want any shooting – nothing that looks like it’s out of some American action movie.”
“None of us do, Thomas, believe me,” said Oscar, already bored of being treated like a rookie.