Seven Ancient Wonders (29 page)

‘A Soviet fragmentation grenade in Afghanistan in 1987. For many years, I was unable to even walk on it. And a man with limited movement is useless in trap-laden quarries and inlets. While I retrained my withered muscles throughout the’90s, building them up again, I researched all I could about the Capstone. I was actually grooming a team of mujahideen in Afghanistan at the time of the attacks on New York and Washington DC to hunt for the Pieces. But then the September 11 attacks happened and Afghanistan was plunged into chaos. And I was captured by the Americans. But now my leg is strong.’

‘The Zeus and Artemis Pieces,’ West repeated. ‘Where are they?’

Zaeed grinned a sly smile. ‘Interestingly, these two Pieces that defy your search are neither hidden nor concealed. Both exist in plain sight—if only one knows where to look. The Artemis Piece, yes, it is indeed in St Peter’s in Rome, in no less than
the most holy place
of the Cult of Amun-Ra. As for the Zeus Piece. . . ’

Zaeed leaned back in his chair, recited the appropriate verse from memory:

‘No thunderbolts did he wield, no wrath did he bear
,
No victory did he achieve
.
Indeed, it was only the Victory in his right hand that made him great
,
Oh, winged woman, whither didst thou fly?’

Zaeed looked at West. ‘It was only
the Victory in his right hand
that made him great.’

West followed his line of reasoning. ‘The Statue of Zeus at Olympia was said to hold in his right hand a smaller statue of “Winged Victory”: the Greek goddess Nike, a woman with wings coming out of her back, like an angel or the figurehead on the prow of a ship. And since the figure of Zeus was so immense, its statue of Winged Victory was said to be life-sized.’

Zaeed said, ‘Correct. And if it was Victory who made him great, we must look not for
Zeus
’s Victory. Thus the verse asks: whither did she fly?

‘Now, as I’m sure you know, many life-sized statues of Winged Victory have been found around the ancient Greek world. But after a comprehensive study of the works of Pheidias, the sculptor of the statue of Zeus, I have found only one statue of Victory that possesses the features of his superior level of artistry: fine lines, perfect form, and the rare ability to reproduce the appearance of
wet
garments in marble.

‘The specimen I have found is the greatest surviving example of Greek sculpture in the world today, yet ironically, Western scholars still assign its construction to an unknown artist. It was found in 1863 by a French archaeologist, Charles Champoiseau—’

‘Oh, no way. . . ’ Wizard gasped in understanding. ‘It’s not . . .’

Zaeed nodded. ‘The very same. Champoiseau found it on the Greek island of Samothrace, and thus the statue now bears that island’s name: the Winged Victory of Samothrace.

‘It was taken back to France, where its genius was quickly appreciated, whence it was taken to the Louvre. There it has sat to this very day in pride of place on a great landing at the top of the Daru Staircase, underneath a high domed ceiling in the Denon Wing of the Louvre in Paris.’

The
Halicarnassus
sped towards Europe.

It was decided that the team would split into two.

West would lead one sub-team to Paris to go after the Zeus Piece, while Wizard would lead a smaller team to Rome, to chase the Artemis Piece. As for Zaeed, he would stay with Sky Monster on the
Halicarnassus,
bound and secured.

Everyone scattered around the plane, some to rest, others to research, others to just prepare for the missions ahead.

It happened that Pooh Bear found himself preparing his guns near Mustapha Zaeed, still handcuffed to his chair.

‘Hello, my brother,’ Zaeed whispered. ‘May Allah bless and keep you.’

‘And you,’ Pooh Bear replied, more out of religious habit than because he meant it.

‘Your father, the sheik, is a great man,’ Zaeed said. ‘And a fine Muslim.’

‘What do you want?’

‘The presence of the Jew concerns me,’ Zaeed said simply, nodding at Stretch over on the far side of the main cabin. ‘I can understand your father aligning himself with these Westerners for convenience, but I cannot believe he would ally himself with the Jewish State.’

Pooh Bear said, ‘The Israelis were not invited to join this mission. They discovered us somehow—and threatened to reveal our mission unless we allowed them to join it.’

‘Is that so? How typical,’ Zaeed hissed. ‘Then I am doubly glad that you are here, my friend. The second assembling of the
Capstone will be one of the greatest moments in all of human history. Before the end, all will show their true colours. When the time comes, Allah’s brethren should stand together.’

Pooh Bear just kept his eyes downcast.

In West’s office in the rear of the plane, West, Wizard, Zoe and Big Ears were gazing at the brown leatherbound diary West had found inside Hamilcar’s Refuge: Hermann Hessler’s notebook detailing his search for the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World during World War II.

Translating it from the German, they found several references that they understood:

WORD OF THOTH—
MULTIPLE DIALECTS OF INCREASING DIFFICULTY . . .  NEED TO LOCATE THE ORACLE FOR PRECISE TRANSLATION
. . . 
CATHOLIC CHURCH = CULT OF AMUN-RA.
COLOSSUS: THIRD NECKPIECE.
MYSTERIOUS BUILDING EXPEDITION IN 85 BC.

Accompanying these last entries was a teletyped order from Heinrich Himmler himself authorising Hessler to use a U-boat to trawl the entire North African coast of the Mediterranean for the false section of coastline.

There were also some hand-drawn hieroglyphics that Wizard translated aloud:

‘THE CHOICE OF MAN

ONLY ONE OF THE TWO RITUALS MAY BE CHOSEN.
ONE BEGETS PEACE,
THE OTHER POWER.
ON THE FINAL DAY,
A CHOICE MUST BE MADE,
A CHOICE MADE IN THE PRESENCE OF RA HIMSELF
THAT WILL DETERMINE THE VERY FATE OF MEN.’

Wizard leaned back. ‘It’s a reference to the two incantations— the rituals. But only one of them can be performed when the Capstone is placed atop the Great Pyramid.’

They found other references, however, that they did not understand. Like these rather ominous inscriptions:

1ST INSCRIPTION FROM THE TOMB OF IMHOTEP III:

WHAT AN INCREDIBLE STRUCTURE IT WAS,
CONSTRUCTED AS A MIRROR IMAGE,
WHERE BOTH ENTRANCE AND EXIT WERE ALIKE.
IT PAINED ME THAT MY TASK—WHAT WOULD BECOME MY LIFE’S
MASTERWORK—WAS TO CONCEAL SO MAGNIFICENT A STRUCTURE.
BUT I DID MY DUTY.
WE SEALED THE GREAT ARCHWAY WITH A LANDSLIDE.
AS INSTRUCTED, THE PRIESTS’ ENTRANCE REMAINS OPEN SO THEY
MAY TEND THE SHRINES INSIDE—THE PRIESTS HAVE BEEN
INFORMED OF THE ORDER OF THE SNARES.

2ND INSCRIPTION FROM THE TOMB OF IMHOTEP III:

ONLY THE BRAVEST OF SOULS
SHALL PASS THE WELLS OF THE WINGED LIONS.
BUT BEWARE THE PIT OF NINGIZZIDA,
TO THOSE WHO ENTER THE SERPENT-LORD’SPIT,
I OFFER NO ADVICE BUT THIS:
ABANDON ALL HOPE,
FOR THERE IS NO ESCAPE FROM THERE.

WINGED LIONS.
COMMON ASSYRIAN STATUE FOUND IN
PERSIA/MESOPOTAMIA.
NINGIZZIDA:
ASSYRIAN GOD OF SERPENTS & SNAKES.
POSSIBLE REF TO THE HG OF BABYLON???

A few pages later there was a pair of scribbled pictures, simply titled ‘Safe Routes’:

After this there was another translation, which caused Wizard to say, ‘Ooh, it’s a reference to one of the rituals that must be performed on the final day.’

It read:

THE RITUAL OF POWER

AT THE HIGH ALTAR OF RA,
UNDER THE HEART OF THE SACRIFICIAL ONE
WHO LIES IN THE ARMS OF VENGEFUL ANUBIS,
POUR INTO THE DEATH GOD’S HEART
ONE DEBEN OF YOUR HOMELAND
UTTER THOSE ANCIENT EVIL WORDS
AND ALL EARTHLY POWER SHALL BE YOURS
FOR A THOUSAND YEARS.

‘“One deben of your homeland”?’ Big Ears frowned. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

Zoe began, ‘A deben was an ancient Egyptian unit of measurement: about 100 grams. I imagine it means—’

But suddenly Wizard jumped up and gasped, seeing the next entry. It read:

FROM THE SECRET GOSPEL OF ST MARK

AT DAWN ON THE DAY OF JUDGEMENT,
THAT FINAL HORRIBLE DAY,
AT THE ONLY TEMPLE THAT BEARS BOTH THEIR NAMES,
THREAD THE POWER OF RA THROUGH THE EYES OF
GREAT RAMESES’S TOWERING NEEDLES,
FROM THE SECOND OWL ON THE FIRST
TO THE THIRD ON THE SECOND . . . 
. . .  WHEREBY THE TOMB OF ISKENDER WILL BE REVEALED.
THERE YOU WILL FIND THE FIRST PIECE.

Beneath this entry, Hessler had scrawled:

THE TOMB OF ISKENDER—THE BURIAL PLACE OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT. ALEXANDER WAS BURIED WITH THE FIRST PIECE!

Wizard leaned back, his eyes wide.

‘The Secret Gospel of St Mark.’ Zoe exchanged a look with West. ‘The Heretical Gospel.’

‘Explain,’ Big Ears said.

West said, ‘It’s not widely known, but St Mark actually wrote
two
gospels while he was in Egypt. The first gospel is the one we all know, the one in the Bible. The second gospel, however, caused an incredible stir when he produced it, so much so that nearly every copy of it was burned by the early Christian movement. And Mark himself was almost stoned for it.’

‘Why?’

Zoe said, ‘Because this secret gospel recounted several
other
things Jesus did during his life. Rituals. Incantations. Bizarre episodes. The most infamous of which was the so-called homosexual incident.’

‘The
what!
’ Big Ears said.

Zoe said, ‘An episode in which Jesus went away with a young man and, according to Mark,
initiated
the young man into “the ancient ways”. Some sensationalist writers have interpreted this to have been a homosexual experience. Most scholars, however, believe it was a ritual of the Cult of Amun-Ra, which has subsequently been adopted as the initiation rite of the Freemasons, another Sun-worshipping faith to have emerged from ancient Egypt.’

West said, ‘Now do you understand why it’s called the Heretical Gospel?’ ‘Yuh-huh,’ Big Ears said. ‘But wait, the Freemasons. I thought they were
anti
-Catholic.’

‘They are,’ Zoe said. ‘But the Freemasons hate the Catholic Church as only siblings can hate each other. They are like rival brothers, religions born from the same source. Just as Jerusalem is holy to both Judaism and Islam, so too do Catholicism and Freemasonry share a common source. They are simply two faiths born out of the one Mother Faith—Egyptian Sun-worship. They just diverged in their interpretations of this Mother Faith somewhere along the way.’

West patted Big Ears on the shoulder. ‘It’s complicated, buddy. Think of it this way: America is a Masonic State; Europe is a Catholic State. And now they’re both fighting for the greatest prize of their two faiths: the Capstone.’

Big Ears said, ‘You say America is a Masonic State. I thought it was overwhelmingly Christian. The Bible Belt and all that.’

Zoe said, ‘Just because the
population
is Christian, doesn’t mean the
country
is. What is a country anyway? A group of people with a common heritage who band together for reasons of mutual prosperity and security. And that’s the key word:
security
. You see, countries have armies; religions don’t. And who commands the armed forces of the entity we call “the United States”?’

‘The elected president and his advisers.’

‘Exactly. So, America’s
people
are indeed honest Christians; but America’s
leaders
since George Washington have almost exclusively been Freemasons. Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt, the Bushes. For over 200 years, the Freemasons have used the armed forces of “the United States of America” as their own personal army for their own personal purposes. Hey presto, a religion got itself an army, and the population never even knew.’

West said, ‘You can see Masonic worship of the Capstone everywhere in America. Why, over the years, American Freemasons have built replicas of each of the Seven Ancient Wonders.’

‘No way. . . ’

West counted them off on his fingers: ‘The Statue of Liberty, built by the leading French Freemason, Frederic-Auguste Bartholdi, replicates the Colossus of Rhodes almost exactly—she even holds a torch aloft just as the original statue did. The Woolworth Building in New York is disturbingly similar to the Pharos. Fort Knox is built according to the floorplan of the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus. The Statue of Zeus, a great figure seated on a throne, is the Lincoln Memorial. The Temple of Artemis: the Supreme Court.