Beneath the Hallowed Hill (19 page)

Rhonda shook her head. “This is the first I’m hearing this story. If you don’t mind me asking, what is this ring’s connection to Atlantis?”

“The stone in the ring is supposedly connected to the Chintamani Stone. The mythic origin of that piece is Atlantis…well, it’s actually supposed to be a gift from another star system—Orion, Sirius, the Pleiades.”

“That’s some story,” she said with a slight smirk.

Could it be the Rosicrucians hired an academic Egyptologist as their museum curator, one who knew very little about the esoteric knowledge that surrounded her? Michael wondered.

“We do have a whole filing cabinet marked with this Lewis’s name.” She stood up. “You can check the archives.”

They took the stairs into the basement. Rhonda unlocked a door marked “Employees Only” which opened into a room filled with file cabinets and shelves. She walked to one of the file cabinets marked “H. S. Lewis” and opened the top drawer. “Let’s see now.” She riffled through the files, then closed the drawer and started on the second one. She lifted several out halfway through her searching. “These might help.” She laid the files on the long table in the middle of the room and they both sat down. The first file read
Artifacts: Museum
.

“May I?”

Rhonda nodded.

Michael reached for the stack. The next ones were labeled
Artifacts: Library
, and
Personal Collection
. From the first manila file, Rhonda pulled out a typed list. “Good, there’s a duplicate.” She handed one to Michael. He scanned the items—Coffin of Lady Mesehti, Middle Kingdom; Cleopatra VII, Ptolemaic. He turned a few pages, running his eyes down the page, looking for categories, but the items seemed to be listed at random. This was going to take a while. He hoped Bob liked museums.

Rhonda apparently reached the same conclusion. She half-rose. “Shall I leave you to it?”

“If I may.” Michael tried to look eager. “Would the library have anything?”

“No, all the information about artifacts is in the museum. Let me know if you need any help,” she said, then closed the door behind her.

Michael waited a few minutes before getting up and inspecting the other file cabinets. He riffled through shipping manifests, agreements with other museums, program plans—all the usual business of any such institution. Satisfied that Rhonda did indeed find the relevant files, he sat back down and worked his way through the stack in front of him with the patience of an archaeologist.

Two hours later, he had learned a great deal about the holdings of the Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum, the expeditions Lewis participated in, and various gifts the group received. Nowhere did he find any mention of a ring, the Roerichs, or even Tibet. He returned the files to their drawer and walked out to find Bob. He’d send a thank you with a donation to Rhonda later. He found Bob in the bookstore leafing through his own recent book. “I see they carry it,” Michael commented.

“You should sign it for them.” Bob closed the book and returned it to the shelf.

“Nah. Let’s go.”

They walked out past the fountain and turned down the sidewalk. A sign reading
Ram Metaphysical Books
caught his eye. Something about the place pulled at him. “I want to check out that store before we leave,” he said.

Bob looked at the place, the end suite in an aging strip mall. He glanced at his watch. “Okay, but it takes a while to file a flight plan, you know.”

“Go ahead and do it. I’ll be just a minute.”

Bob took a seat at a bus stop, and Michael crossed the street and pushed open the door of the shop. Bells hanging from the handle announced his entrance. The place smelled of cat mixed with sandalwood. An older woman sat at an untidy desk just to the side of a jewelry case stuffed with Celtic and Egyptian designs. A blue-point Siamese lounged on the various piles of catalogs and papers on top of the desk. The two regarded him with remarkably similar blue eyes. “Welcome to Ram Books. Let me know if I can help you.” The woman greeted him. The remnants of a French accent still hung in her voice. She seemed to be in her sixties, with a round face and body, and hair the color of her youthful blond, nicely done in an old-fashioned bouffant, only not as puffy as the 50’s version. The cat regarded him haughtily.

“Thank you.” Michael made his way to the Egypt section and quickly found his latest book. He pulled the three copies from the shelf and took them up to the desk. “May I sign them for you?” he asked with a smile.

“You’re Michael Levy?” The woman pulled a stack of local weekly newspapers from a chair next to the desk and patted the seat.

“That’s right.” He took the seat she indicated. A stripped tabby looked up at him from yet another stack of magazines behind the desk, then tucked his nose back under his front paw, returning to his nap.

“Oui, I love Egypt. I try to keep up with all the new books.” Her smile was as generous as her round curves and colorful tunic. She rummaged in a drawer and took out a ball point pen. “If you’d called ahead, I would have arranged a reading.”

He opened the first book to the title page. “Quick trip, just doing a bit of research.”

“At the library?” She pointed over her shoulder.

Michael followed her gesture and discovered two Himalayans lounging on the bookshelves immediately behind the jewelry case. “Museum, actually.” He pointed to the pair. “Beautiful cats.”

“Yes, but this one is jealous.” She pointed to the queen on top of the desk. “I’m a worshiper of Bast.”

“So I see.” Michael signed the book in his lap with a flourish then opened the next.

She lowered her voice. “Are you a member?”

“Yes,” Michael said, and she nodded. “Has the store been here long?”

“Twenty years, first opened up in the old Imperator’s house.”

Michael looked up with a start. “No kidding?”

She laughed at his expression. “That’s right. I lived upstairs and ran the store on the first floor, rented out rooms. The kids called it
Pauline’s Boarding House and Home for Wayward Mystics
.”

“Imagine that. You would know.” Michael leaned forward and lowered his voice even though they were alone. “Was there really a tunnel?”

Pauline’s blue eyes lit with excitement. “We looked for it. This redheaded kid…well, he worked for the Order as a research scientist. He was in his late twenties…not exactly a kid, I suppose. He was always knocking on the walls of the spiral staircase. He swore it was hollow.” She smiled at a private memory. “We found a passageway in the basement, but it ended in rubble.”

“You think the repairs to the street probably collapsed it?”

She raised an eyebrow appraisingly. “You do know the story.”

“A friend told me.”

“We talked about doing some digging, but never got around to it.” She stroked the Siamese, who took the attention as no more than her due. “You know how it is, so many projects.”

“I know exactly what you mean.” He finished signing and closed the cover of the last book. “Shall I put them back?”

“I can do that later. Tell me about your research…unless it’s top secret.” She waggled her eyebrows to suggest this would be her preference.

“I thought I’d write about Atlantean artifacts.”

“That’s right up the Rosicrucians’ alley,” she tossed back.

Michael laughed in spite of himself. “Yes, but I’m looking for something specific. They don’t seem to have any record of it.”

“That new lot.” She waved her hand dismissively “You could fill two libraries with what they don’t know.”

“Well…” Michael hesitated now that the revelation was at hand.

“Come on. Maybe I can help.” Pauline smiled encouragingly.

“Did you ever hear a story about Nicholas Roerich giving a ring to Doctor Lewis?”

“Roerich.” She frowned in concentration, still stroking the Siamese who moved into her lap. “I don’t remember a ring, but the house and museum were picked clean back when the Church of the Moon tried to take over the Order.”

“Who?” Michael was stunned. “How could that be?”

Pauline held up her hands as if being held at gunpoint. “I’m not kidding.”

“This I have to hear.”

She laughed again. “After Doctor Lewis died, his son took over as Imperator. He was nice enough, but not the mystic his father was. He watered down the monographs too much, in my humble opinion. Nobody’s asking, mind you.” She looked around the store to reassure herself they were alone.

“He was a good administrator, though. The order expanded under his leadership. San Jose became the world headquarters in the late 1940’s, the war bankrupted the European orders. We remained the World See until Lewis’s son died in 1987. That’s when the real trouble began. The next Imperator had ties to God knows who.” She waved her hands and the blue-point jumped down in protest. “He appointed one of his minions as curator, and together they raided the museum and library. When he proposed we move the World See to Andorra, people started investigating. Guess who owned the property he chose for the site?”

“Reverend Li Yang Sun?” Michael answered.

“Exactamundo.” She slapped her thigh for emphasis. “What a fight that was, but in the end the Supreme Grand Lodge was dissolved altogether.” The tabby jumped into her lap, thinking it was his turn. “You see, there was never supposed to be a World See. The leadership did that because of the emergency created by the war.”

Pauline stroked the cat for a minute in silence. Michael waited, amazed by the story. Finally she looked up. “I think the Nazis were trying to steal sacred artifacts during the war. I’m not sure they stopped after it was over, although the new political situation made it more difficult. Rumor has it they moved certain items here to keep them safe. When the new Imperator started stealing, people soon realized the same group of dark magicians found the hiding place.”

“The Illuminati?” Michael asked.

She shrugged. “That’s the popular name. It’s somewhat misguided, in my humble opinion. I’m not sure what they call themselves. Anyway, when the dust settled, the World See was disbanded. What remained of any international leadership moved to the south of France. San Jose found itself missing several valuable artifacts and the records that they ever existed. Your ring might be in Reverend Sun’s vault, or in the hands of what you call the Illuminati.”

“Let’s hope not,” Michael said. Pauline made a small questioning sound, but he shook his head. “It’s just that the ring is rumored to be a part of the Chintamani Stone.”

She wrinkled her brow, trying to remember, and he explained it to her.

“Well, surely the monks in Shambhala know how to keep malevolent influences away,” she said.

“Of course,” Michael said, but secretly he thought Cagliostro could give them a run for their money. It was a mystery how Cagliostro could maintain his strength and effectiveness while doing such dark deeds; usually such activity disturbed the balance of energy more and more until it snapped back on the person who did the negative magic, leaving them wounded but wiser. Cagliostro seemed to have some sort of free pass.

Michael stood up to go. “Thank you for the information.”

Pauline handed him a card. “Let me know if I can be of any more help, and warn me next time you come to town. We’ll have a workshop for you.”

Michael walked across the street and joined Bob. “Good thing I know some people at the airport. We can leave as soon as we get there,” Bob said.

Chapter Eleven

After leaving Garth’s house, Anne walked down the narrow lane in the still black night. She climbed the stairs by feel, regretting she didn’t borrow a flashlight, and then went back to bed. She fell into a heavy sleep despite the coffee and woke late in the morning. The night left her shaken, so she decided to risk waking Michael. She dialed his number, but his phone seemed to be switched off. She left a quick message then showered, standing under the brisk spray to drive away the remnants of sleep.

Once dressed, she went down to the kitchen. She ate yogurt and watched the sheep graze on the green slope. A bird rode on the back of one sheep after another, blissfully eating its own breakfast—fleas, Anne imagined. After the makeshift breakfast, she walked around the corner to Chalice Well. She remembered her previous trip there, how she looked forward to a blissful month in Glastonbury alone with Michael, exploring the sites, looking through the house, and generally spending uninterrupted time alone with her fiancé. She had an assignment now: to try and discover more about the disturbing dream she experienced and the erratic flow of White Spring.

When she reached the red gatehouse, she realized that in his rush Michael forgot to leave his companion pass. She bought one for herself, thinking this was a good way to support the place. She pushed open the wrought iron gate decorated with the recurring two circles of the Vesica Piscis, and started down the stone steps to the two overlapping pools that repeated the pattern. A clump of tourists walked on the green lawn, one of them snapping picture after picture. A couple sat on the same bench she and Michael occupied just a few days ago, the woman’s head resting on the man’s shoulder. On another bench, a young mother watched her toddler play. The baby kept splashing the smooth surface of the pools, delighting in the waves she created.