The Quest: A Novel

return?”
    “Perhaps some information.” Mercado returned to the story of Father Alvarez. “Father Alvarez with some other Jesuit priests had been looking for Axum because its name appeared in many ancient writings that were being circulated during the Renaissance. Also, Father Alvarez believed that Axum was the legendary lost Christian kingdom of Prester John.”
    “Did he find that?”
    “No, what Father Alvarez actually found was the capital of Ethiopia and the seat of the Ethiopian Coptic Church. He also found the last surviving member of the Alancar expedition, who was Alancar himself.” Mercado added, “Father Alvarez says in this report to Pope Clement VII, that, quote, ‘Juscelino Alancar told me that he found and saw the cup—the
gradale
—that his Holiness Sixtus had sent him to find.’ ”
    “Which got Senhor Alancar life in Ethiopia.”
    “Apparently. And because Alancar told Father Alvarez what it was that he had found and seen, Father Alvarez was also kept in Axum under house arrest.”
    “But he got out and wrote to the pope.”
    “Yes, what happened was that Ethiopia was being attacked by the Turks, so the Ethiopian emperor, Claudius, let Father Alvarez go so he could tell King John III of Portugal about the lost Christian empire of Ethiopia, and to ask the Portuguese king for military aid. Alancar himself was dead by this time, so Father Alvarez and his fellow Jesuits left Axum and made their way back to Portugal. King John actually sent an expeditionary force to Ethiopia, and in 1527 a combined Ethiopian and Portuguese force defeated the Turks, and the Ethiopian emperor Claudius pledged everlasting thanks to King John III and to the Jesuits, who, Father Alvarez says in his report to the pope, are now welcomed back into Ethiopia by the emperor Claudius.”
    They continued through the acres of gardens, and Purcell could see a building ahead that Mercado identified as the Ethiopian College.
    Mercado slowed his pace and continued his story. “There isanother report from a Jesuit priest named Father Lopes to the next pope, Paul III, which tells of the Jesuit missionary influence in Ethiopia, and of all the good works that they had done in spreading the Catholic faith. But this report also says that the Jesuits are being expelled again because the Ethiopian emperor and the Coptic pope have accused them of excessive prying into the affairs of the Coptic Church and for making inquiries about the monastery of obsidian.” He added, “This is the first reference to the black monastery and to the Grail possibly being there.”
    “Where it remains.”
    “Yes. Also, it would seem that a succession of Catholic popes had an interest in Ethiopia, and in the black monastery, and therefore the Grail.” Mercado continued, “I guess you could make the case that this is a secret passed on from pope to pope, and that’s why Father Armano got the sealed envelope from Pius XI. And it also appears, from other oblique references I’ve read, that the Jesuits, who are the shock troops of the papacy, have been tasked with the mission to find the Holy Grail.”
    “If that’s true, they haven’t done a good job of it.”
    “They are patient.” He thought a moment, then said, “Or, more likely, they and the recent popes have lost interest in this because they no longer believe in the existence of the Holy Grail.”
    “It’s a hard thing to believe in, Henry.”
    “It is. But—”
    “You believe it because it is impossible.”
    “I do.”
    They reached the Ethiopian College, a Romanesque-style structure that Mercado said was built in the 1920s when the college was moved from the five-hundred-year-old monastery of Saint Stephen. Purcell saw a number of black-robed, dark-skinned monks going in and out of the main entrance, and he couldn’t help but recall Father Armano’s story of the monks in the black monastery who’d greeted him and the Italian soldiers with clubs. “Is this place safe, Henry?”
    Mercado smiled. “They’re good Catholics, old man. Not Copts with clubs.”
    “Good.”
    But he saw that Mercado crossed himself as he entered, so he did the same.
    Mercado confessed, “I haven’t been here before, but we have permission and we have an appointment and we are on time.”
    They stood in the large antechamber and waited.
    A tall, black, and bald monk came toward them and Mercado greeted him in Italian. They exchanged a few words, and Purcell could tell that there seemed to be