Inferno: (Robert Langdon Book 4)

discoloration he had spied earlier through the plastic—a faint line of markings that ran horizontally across the inside of Dante’s forehead. Now, however, in the stark light, Langdon saw clearly that these markings were not a natural blemish … they were man-made.
    “It’s … writing,” Sienna whispered, the words catching in her throat. “But …”
    Langdon studied the inscription on the plaster. It was a single row of letters—handwritten in a florid script of faint brownish yellow.
    “That’s all it says?” Sienna said, sounding almost angry.
    Langdon barely heard her. Who wrote this? he wondered. Someone in Dante’s era? It seemed unlikely. If so, some art historian would have spotted it long ago during regular cleaning or restoration, and the writing would have become part of the lore of the mask. Langdon had never heard of it.
    A far more likely source quickly materialized in his mind.
    Bertrand Zobrist.
    Zobrist was the mask’s owner and therefore could easily have requested private access to it whenever he wanted. He could have written the text on the back of the mask fairly recently and then replaced it in the antique case without anyone ever knowing. The mask’s owner , Marta had told them, won’t even permit our staff to open the case without him present.
    Langdon quickly explained his theory.
    Sienna seemed to accept his logic, and yet the prospect clearly troubled her. “It makes no sense,” she said, looking restless. “If we believe Zobrist secretly wrote something on the back of the Dante death mask, and he also went to the trouble to create that little projector to point to the mask … then why didn’t he write something more meaningful ? I mean, it’s senseless! You and I have been looking all day for the mask, and this is all we find?”
    Langdon redirected his focus to the text on the back of the mask. The handwritten message was very brief—only seven letters long—and admittedly looked entirely purposeless.
    Sienna’s frustration is certainly understandable.
    Langdon, however, felt the familiar thrill of imminent revelation, having realized almost instantly that these seven letters would tell him everything he needed to know about what he and Sienna were to do next.
    Furthermore, he had detected a faint odor to the mask—a familiar scent that divulged why the plaster on the back was so much whiter than the front … and the difference had nothing to do with aging or sunlight.
    “I don’t understand,” Sienna said. “The letters are all the same.”
    Langdon nodded calmly as he studied the line of text—seven identical letters carefully inscribed in calligraphy across the inside of Dante’s forehead.
    PPPPPPP
    “Seven P s,” Sienna said. “What are we supposed to do with this ?”
    Langdon smiled calmly and raised his eyes to hers. “I suggest we do precisely what this message tells us to do.”
    Sienna stared. “Seven P s is … a message ?”
    “It is,” he said with a grin. “And if you’ve studied Dante, it’s a very clear one.”

    Outside the Baptistry of San Giovanni, the man with the necktie wiped his fingernails on his handkerchief and dabbed at the pustules on his neck. He tried to ignore the burning in his eyes as he squinted at his destination.
    The tourist entrance.
    Outside the door, a wearied docent in a blazer smoked a cigarette and redirected tourists who apparently couldn’t decipher the building’s schedule, which was written in international time.
    APERTURA 1300–1700 .
    The man with the rash checked his watch. It was 10:02 A.M . The baptistry was closed for another few hours. He watched the docent for a while and then made up his mind. He removed the gold stud from his ear and pocketed it. Then he pulled out his wallet and checked its contents. In addition to assorted credit cards and a wad of euros, he was carrying over three thousand U.S. dollars in cash.
    Thankfully, avarice was an international sin.

CHAPTER 57
    PECCATUM … PECCATUM … PECCATUM …
    The seven P s written on the back of Dante’s death mask immediately pulled Langdon’s thoughts back into the text of The Divine Comedy . For a moment he was back onstage in Vienna, presenting his lecture “Divine Dante: Symbols of Hell.”
    “We have now descended,” his voice resounded over the speakers, “passing down through the nine rings of hell to the center of the earth, coming face-to-face with Satan himself.”
    Langdon moved from slide to slide through a series