The Alexandria Link

“What was that for?”

“Don’t get any ideas. I think we’re both better off divorced, but that’s not to say I don’t remember.”

“So how about neither one of us forgetting?”

“Fair enough,” she said. After a pause she added, “What about Gary? What do we do? He needs to know the truth.”

He’d thought about that dilemma. “And he will. Let’s give it a little time and then we’ll all three have a talk. I’m not sure it’s going to matter much, from any of our points of view. But you’re right, he’s entitled to the truth.”

He paid the check and they walked over to Thorvaldsen and Gary.

“I’ll miss this boy,” Henrik said. “He and I make a good team.”

Malone and Pam had heard all about what happened in Austria.

“I think he’s had more than enough intrigue,” Pam said.

Malone agreed. “Back to school for you. Bad enough all the stuff you were into.” He saw that Thorvaldsen understood his meaning. They’d talked about that yesterday. And though he was upset at the thought of Gary tackling a man holding a gun, secretly he was proud. No Malone blood coursed through the boy’s veins, but enough of the father had seeped into the son to make him his in every way that counted. “Time for you guys to go.”

The three of them walked to where the square ended and Jesper waited with Thorvaldsen’s car.

“You had enough intrigue, too?” Malone asked Jesper.

The man only smiled and nodded. Thorvaldsen had said yesterday that two days with Margarete Herma

He hugged his son and said, “I love you. Take care of your mother.”

“She doesn’t need me to do that.”

“Don’t be so sure.”

He faced Pam. “If you ever need me, you know where I am.”

“Same for you. If nothing else, we do know how to watch each other’s backs.”

They hadn’t told Gary about what had happened in the Sinai, and they never would. Thorvaldsen had agreed to take the Guardians under his wing and provide funds to maintain the monastery and library. Already plans were in the works to electronically archive the manuscripts. Also, some recruitment would occur and the Guardians’ ranks would be restored to a respectable number. The Dane had been thrilled at the prospect of aiding and was looking forward to visiting the site soon.

But it would all remain secret.

Thorvaldsen had assured Israel that the matter was contained and, with the United States likewise providing assurances, the Jews seemed satisfied.

Pam and Gary climbed into the car. Malone waved as the vehicle disappeared into traffic, headed for the airport. He then wove through the crowd to where Thorvaldsen watched as workmen cleared rubble from his building.

“All put to rest?” Henrik asked.

He knew what his friend meant. “That demon’s gone.”

“The past can really eat your soul.”

He agreed.

“Or be your best friend.”

He knew what Thorvaldsen meant. “It will be amazing to see what’s in that library.”

“No telling what treasures await.”

He watched men on the scaffolding as they steam-cleaned the sixteenth-century exterior of soot.

“It’ll look as good as it once did,” Thorvaldsen said. “Up to you to restore the inventory. Lots of books to buy.”

He was looking forward to it. That’s what he did. A bookseller. But there was a point to be made from the lessons he’d learned over the past few days. He considered again how all three Malones had been threatened, and what really mattered. He pointed to the building.

“None of this is all that important.”

The Dane cast him an understanding smile.

“It’s just stuff, Henrik. That’s all. Just stuff.”

WRITER’S NOTE

This book involved lots of travel. Trips were made to Denmark, England, Germany, Austria, Washington, DC, and Portugal. The basic concept was born during a di

Now it’s time to know where the line was drawn.

As to the nakba, first described in the prologue, that tragedy was all too real and continues to haunt Middle East relations.

The monument described in chapters 8 and 34 is based on an actual marble arbor that exists at Shugborough Hall in England. New agers and conspiratorialists have debated its meaning for decades. The press conference in chapter 8 actually happened at Shugborough Hall, and the offered interpretations of the monument are the ones the actual experts expounded. The concept of the Roman letters being a map is my invention.

As mentioned, the idea of the Old Testament being a record of ancient Jews in a place other than Palestine is not mine. In 1985 Salibi detailed this theory in a book titled The Bible Came from Arabia. Salibi expounded on his ideas in three other works, Who Was Jesus (1988), Secrets of the Bible People (1988), and The Historicity of Biblical Israel (1998). George Haddad’s experiences in how he noticed a co

The maps in chapters 57 and 68 are from Salibi’s research. The idea that the land promised by God in the Abrahamic covenant lies in a region far removed from what we regard as Palestine is, to say the least, controversial. But as Salibi and George Haddad both noted, the matter could be easily proven, or dismissed, through archaeology. One point on language. Throughout the book, the term “Old Hebrew” is used to refer to the language of the original Hebrew Bible. Little is known of its orthography, grammar, syntax, or idiom. It was a language of learning, rarely spoken, and passed from common usage in the sixth or the fifth century B.C.E. “Old Hebrew,” as opposed to Biblical or Rabbinical Hebrew or some other descriptive label, was chosen simply for reader convenience.

The Old Testament inconsistencies noted in chapters 20, 23, and 57 are nothing new. Scholars have debated these points for centuries. The Bible, though, is, if nothing else, a fluid document, and each generation seems to leave a mark upon its interpretation.

The story of David Ben-Gurion in chapter 22 is accurate. The father of modern Israel did radically change his politics after 1965, becoming more conciliatory toward the Arabs. Thereafter, he was shut out of Israeli politics until his death in 1973. Of course, his visit to the library was my concoction.

The history of Nicolas Poussin in chapter 29 is true. His life also made a dramatic shift. The fate of his Shepherds of Arcadia is told correctly, and the excerpt from a letter that describes what Poussin may have secretly learned is real. Why Poussin created The Shepherds of Arcadia II, the reverse image of the first painting (which was chiseled on the monument at Shugborough Hall), is a mystery.

The Guardians are not real. Perhaps if they had existed, the Library of Alexandria might have been saved. The physical description of the library offered in chapter 21 is the best available. As to how more than half a million manuscripts vanished, the three explanations in chapter 21 are the experts’ best guess. The learned men described in chapter 32 all lived, but sadly, thanks to the destruction of the Library of Alexandria, none of their writings have survived. The Piri Reis Map (chapter 32) still does exist, and offers a fleeting glimpse of what might have been lost.