The Quest: A Novel (44 page)

Mercado agreed. “They don’t want visitors.”

“Well, they are about to get three.” He said, “From what I see below, and from what we’ve experienced ourselves, most of this terrain is impassable, even for an all-terrain vehicle. What I suggest is that we have a driver in Gondar take us as far as the spa, and from there we’ll walk to Shoan. Should be a few hours.”

No one replied.

“I suggest we use Shoan as our base of operation and explore out from there.”

Mercado said, “I’m not sure the Falashas would welcome our intrusion, old man. Nor would they be keen on us looking for the black monastery.”

“Gann was telling us something. And I think what he was saying was, ‘Go to Shoan.’ ”

Mercado informed him, “The English are not that subtle, Frank. If he wanted us to go to Shoan, he would have said, ‘Go to Shoan.’ ” He further informed Purcell, “That’s the way we speak.”

“I think he was clear.”

“What is clear to me is that we should avoid all human contact as we’re beating about the bush. Nothing good can come of us trying to get help from friendly natives.”

“I hear you, Henry. But as we both know, you can usually trust the outcasts of any society.”

“The Falasha Jews are not outcasts—they are people who just want to be left in peace as they have been for three thousand years.”

“Those days are over.”

“Apparently, but if Sir Edmund is correct about the Falashas and the monks, and if we engage the Falashas, we may find ourselves as permanent residents of the black monastery.”

“There are worse places to spend the rest of your life, Henry.”

Vivian had stayed silent, but now said, “I think you are both right to some extent.”

“Meaning,” Purcell replied, “that we are both wrong to some extent.”

She pointed out, “We could clear this up if Colonel Gann shows up.”

No one responded to that.

They continued south, toward Addis.

Vivian said, “I think we are missing something.”

“The carafe?”

“There was something that Father Armano said… He gave us a clue, without knowing it.”

Purcell, too, had had the same thought, and he’d tried to drag it out of his memory, but couldn’t.

Vivian said, “It’s something we should have understood.”

Mercado reminded them, “He didn’t want us looking for the black monastery or the Holy Grail, so he wasn’t giving us an obvious clue to where the monastery was located. But Vivian is correct and I’ve felt that as well. He told us something, and we need to understand what it was.”

No one responded to that and they fell into a thoughtful silence. The engine droned, and the Navion bounced and yawed in the highland updrafts. Purcell scanned his instruments. This aircraft burned
or leaked oil. The engine probably had a couple thousand hours on it, and the maintenance was probably performed by bicycle mechanics.

He glanced up at the Saint Christopher medal, which may have been the only thing that worked right in Signore Bocaccio’s aircraft.

He tried to figure out if he’d taken leave of his senses, or if this search for the black monastery and the so-called Holy Grail was within the normal range of mental health. A lot of this, he admitted, had to do with Vivian.
Cherchez la femme
. His libido had gotten him into trouble before, but never to this extent.

And then there was Henry. He not only liked Henry, but he respected the old warhorse. Henry Mercado was a legend, and Frank Purcell was happy that circumstances—or fate—had brought them together.

And, he realized, the sum was more than the parts. He wouldn’t be here risking his life for something he didn’t believe in with any other two people. Also, they all had the same taste in members of the opposite sex. That ménage, however, was more of a problem than a strength.

Vivian was sleeping, and so was Henry, curled up on the remaining two coffee bean bags.

Within three hours of leaving Gondar, he spotted the hills around Addis Ababa, then saw the airstrip. The southern African sky was a pastel blue, and streaks of pink sat on the distant horizon.

Vivian was awake now, and she glanced in the rear to see Mercado still asleep. She said to Purcell, “I had a dream…”

He didn’t respond.

“You and I were in Rome, and I was the happiest I’ve ever been.”

“Did we have the Grail with us?”

“We had each other.”

“That’s good enough.”

He throttled back and began his descent.

V
ivian came out of the Reuters news office carrying three thick manila envelopes in her canvas tote, which contained a total of ninety-two eight-by-ten photographs.

Purcell and Mercado met her outside and they walked toward Ristorante Vesuvio, which claimed to be the best Italian restaurant in Africa, and probably the only one named after an Italian volcano.

To add to the surreal and almost comic quality of Addis Ababa, the street was lined with Swiss Alpine structures, which seemed to fit the mountainous terrain, but which Mercado thought were grotesque parodies of the real thing. He explained, “The Emperor Menelik II, who founded Addis, commissioned a Swiss architect to design the city, and I think the Swiss chap had a bit of fun with the emperor.”

“You get what you pay for,” Purcell said.

They went into Vesuvio and took a table in the back. Mercado said, “This place has been here since the Italian Army conquered the city.”

Purcell observed, “The décor has not changed.”

“They took down the portrait of Mussolini. It used to be right above your head.”

“Where was the portrait of the emperor?”

“Also above your head.”

“What’s above my head now?”

“Nothing. The proprietor is waiting to see who survives the Derg purges.”

“The Italians are very practical.”

Vivian gave an envelope to Purcell and one to Mercado, and they slid out the enlarged photographs. They all sat silently, flipping through the matte-finish color prints.

A few of the photos showed part of the wing, and some were almost straight-down shots, showing only a green carpet of jungle
without wing or horizon, and these were not easy to orient, but they did penetrate into the jungle. All in all, Vivian had done a good job, and Purcell said, “You could work for the Italian cartography office.”

“And you could work for the Italian Air Force.”

Purcell looked closely at a few photos, studying the sizes, shapes, tones, and shadows of the terrain features. He said, “We’ll look at these with a magnifier and good light in one of our rooms.”

Mercado looked up from his photos and said, “We did not see anything that could be a man-made structure when we were in the air, and I don’t think we will see anything more in these photographs than the Italian cartographers did forty years ago.” He pointed out, “The monastery is
hidden
. By overhanging trees.”

Purcell reminded him, “Father Armano said that sunlight came through the opaque substance used in the roof of the church. If sunlight came through, then the roof can be seen from the air.”

Mercado nodded reluctantly, but then said, “That was forty years ago. Those trees have grown.”

“Or died.”

Vivian was looking closely at the photos in her hands. “Father Armano also mentioned green gardens, and gardens do not grow well under a triple-canopy jungle. So what I think is that the monastery is hidden by palms—palm fronds move in the breeze and block the sun, but they also let in some sunlight.”

Purcell observed, “We’re back to palms.”

“Makes sense.”

“All right. But I don’t remember Father Armano saying anything about palms.”

Vivian reminded him, “He did say that on the doors of the church were the symbols of the early Christians—fish, lambs, palms.”

“That’s not actually the same as palm trees overhead.”

“I know that, Frank, but…” She studied a photo in her hand.

Purcell thought, then said, “All right… in Southeast Asia, from the air, or in aerial photographs, palm fronds were a good camouflage. They create a sort of illusion because of their shape, movement, and the shadows they cast. They break up the image on the ground and fool the eye. Photographs, though, capture and freeze the image,
and if you’re a good aerial photo analyst, you might be able to separate the reality from the optical illusion.”

Vivian looked at him. “Did you make that up?”

“Some of it.” He said. “Okay, let’s concentrate on clusters of palms. Also, there is something called glint.”

Vivian asked, “What is glint?”

“If you buy me lunch, I’ll tell you.”

“I’ll buy you two lunches.”

The waiter came by, an authentic Italian who, like Signore Bocaccio, hadn’t bought his ticket to Italy yet. Most of what his customers wanted on the menu was no longer available, but pasta was still plentiful, he assured them, though the only sauce today was olive oil. There was also a small and diminishing selection of wine, and Mercado chose a Chianti that had tripled in price. He said to his luncheon companions, “I miss Rome.”

Purcell asked, “What makes you say that?”

Vivian reminded them, “There is a famine out there. Get some perspective, please.”

Purcell admitted, “I hate eating in restaurants when there’s a famine.”

Mercado admonished, “That is insensitive.”

“Sorry.” He reminded Mercado, “I almost starved to death in that Khmer Rouge prison camp. So I can make famine jokes.” He asked, “What do you call an Ethiopian having a bowel movement? A show-off.”

“Frank. Really,” said Vivian. “That is not funny.”

“Sorry.” He said to Mercado, “You can use that as a Gulag joke.”

Purcell lit a cigarette and said, “This famine is mostly man-made by a stupid, corrupt government that has instituted stupid policies.” He continued, “Half the famine relief food coming in is stolen by the government and sold on the black market. The birr is worthless and you can’t buy food at any price unless you have hard currency. The UN relief workers are being harassed, and the military uses all the available transportation to move soldiers around instead of food.” He told Mercado, “That’s my next article for L’Osservatore Romano.”

“You can write it, Frank, but it will not run. And if it does, you will be lucky if you only get expelled.”

“The truth will set us free, Henry.”

“Not in Ethiopia. Save it for when we are out of here.”

“What is worse—me not demonstrating the proper guilt about eating during the famine, or you not letting me write the truth about it?”

Mercado stayed silent awhile, then replied, “Your point is made, and well taken.” He smiled, “Someday you will make a good journalist.”

Vivian asked, “Is the pissing match over?”

Purcell said, “Pass the bread.”

The wine came and they drank as they flipped through the photographs.

Purcell looked around the restaurant, which, if it could talk, would have some stories to tell. The clientele was mostly Western European embassy staff, though he spotted four Russians in bad suits at a table. Vesuvio, unlike the Hilton and other hotels, was not in a position to demand only hard currency, but the proprietor and staff did not go out of their way to welcome the Russians or Cubans who paid in birr.

This country was in bad shape, Purcell thought, and the worst was yet to come. The old Ethiopia was dead, and the new Ethiopia should never have been born.

Vivian said, “I assume there was no message from Colonel Gann at the hotel.”

Mercado replied, “None.”

“Do you think something has happened to him?”

Mercado replied, “If he’s been arrested, and being held in Addis, someone in the press community would have heard through sources.” He added, “But if he’s been killed in the hinterlands, we may never know.”

Purcell said, “We will hear from him.”

Vivian reminded Purcell, “You were going to tell us what a glint is.”

“It is what you see in my eyes when you walk into a room.”

Purcell thought that was funny, but Vivian did not, though she might have if Henry was not at the table. Clearly she was still uncomfortable with the situation, but no more so than he was. Henry, too, was not amused, though he smiled for the record.

Purcell said, “A glint is what it sounds like—a quick reflection of light off a shiny surface. Pilots in combat look for the glint of an enemy aircraft, or the glint of a metal target on the ground.” He picked up his wineglass. “Glass, too, can give off a type of glint. Glass roofs, even if opaque, may give off a glint.” He drank his wine.

Mercado was nodding, and Vivian was flipping through the photographs again, looking for a glint.

Purcell continued, “Obviously, the sun has to strike the object, and the object has to be reflective enough to produce a glint.”

Mercado nodded again, and Purcell continued, “Father Armano said he thought the roof could have been alabaster, and he said it let in the sunlight and bathed the church in a glow that made his head swim and hurt his eyes.” He speculated, “It could also have been quartz, or, despite what the priest thought, it could have been a type of stained glass that was rippled and mostly clear, and that might account for the strange light.” He concluded, “In any case, this substance did not let all the sunlight in, and that means it had to reflect some sunlight back.”