the sixth key by adriana koulias sample chapter

8/6/2019 The Sixth Key by Adriana Koulias Sample Chapter

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Copyright Adriana Koulias 2011. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmittedin any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.


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A Bantam book

Published by Random House Australia Pty Ltd

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First published by Bantam in 2011

Copyright Adriana Koulias 2011

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Koulias, Adriana.

The Sixth Key/Adriana Koulias.

ISBN 978 1 86325 685 8 (pbk.)

A823.4

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1

The Writer

of Letters

What then shall I ask?

You must begin at the beginning.

The beginning! But where is the beginning?

Edgar Allan Poe, Mesmeric Revelation

Venice, November 2012

I had fallen asleep on the bench waiting for the vaporetto andwoke with a dry mouth and a crick in the neck as the boat pulled

up at the Fondamente Nuove. Once we were chugging lazily over

the dusk-coloured lagoon, I dared to ask the boatman where he

was taking me. Luckily he spoke some English and pointed to

an island in the distance, saying, San Michele. The Island of the

Dead . . . the cemetery of Venice.

Well, I thought to myself. Why not a cemetery in the middle

of a lagoon? It all made a crazy sort of sense it was something

the Writer of Letters, as I liked to call him, would do.



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It was in character.

My publisher had forwarded his last letter, as always, typed

on the same watermarked paper as the others. It contained these

words:

Perhaps it is time we meet? Together, I am certain that we can fndthe solution to the riddle that is perplexing you:

HOC EST SEPULCHRUM

INTUS CADAVER NON HABENS

HOC EST CADAVER SEPULCHRUM

EXTRA NON HABENS

SED CADAVER IDEM EST

ET SEPULCHRUM SIBI

This time, along with the letter there was also an air ticket to

Venice and instructions on what to do when I arrived.

Counting this one, I had received six letters in all. At frst I

had thought them mildly amusing; after all, what author of mys-

teries doesnt receive letters from shopkeepers, housewives, or

even convicted criminals, offering interesting information? ButI only realised how different these letters were when the fourth

arrived. Thats when I began to wonder who this person was.

At the time I had just fnished a novel and my editor discov-

ered that a Latin word, a word integral to the plot, was gram-

matically incorrect. This unfortunate realisation occurred just

as the book was headed for the printing press and I quickly got

on the phone to several Latin professors. I needed a Latin word

composed of seven letters no more and no less that meant

becoming. I was on the phone to the printers trying to delay



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them when the fourth letter arrived. A coincidence, you might

ask? No, Ive come to know there are no coincidences. Inside the

letter I found the Latin word I had been looking for Fiesque.

Similarly, the ffth letter arrived when I was unable to source

important details about an underground passage in an obscure

castle on the border of Austria and Hungary. Once again, in

that ffth letter I found a miracle an essay written in the early

nineteenth century by a Knight of Malta, containing the veryinformation I needed. This was a mystery that could well have

been written by Edgar Allan Poe!

So, you see, I wasnt surprised when I received the sixth letter

containing a Latin riddle that had been confounding me for

months. The riddle was found on a sixteenth-century tombstone

in Bologna. It was entitled To the Gods of the Deadand trans-

lated it read:

This is a tomb that has no body in it.This is a body that has no tomb round it.But body and tomb are the same.

I had long been certain that it held the solution to one of themost important mysteries of our time the mystery of life and

death and I had resolved to make the solution to this riddle the

pivotal theme of my next novel. When it proved more than diff-

cult to solve, I took comfort in knowing that it had obsessed and

exercised the wits of better minds than mine: men like Carlo

Cesare Malvasia, Jung and the French writer Gerard Nerval had

also wrestled with it. But as time dragged on, and the dead-

line for delivery of the manuscript loomed, I began to wonder

what had made me imagine myself capable of solving it. The



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timely arrival of that sixth letter was compelling evidence that

its writer was either intuiting my thoughts, or indeed, perhaps

even inspiring them. Of course I had to accept his invitation.

How could I refuse? By coming to Venice I would be solving two

mysteries the identity of theWriter of Letters and the solution

to the inscription.

Now, as I looked out from the vaporetto towards that cold

island overhung with Cyprus spears, I marvelled at the ingenu-ity of the creator of those letters. He had orchestrated a scene

straight out of the Egyptian Book of the Dead: I was travel-

ling on the boat of Isis, sailing over the river of souls to the

Underworld. It was brilliant!

When the boat came to the landing stage on the northwest

corner of the island I climbed out, paid the man what I owed

him and watched him pull his vessel away into the foggy even-

ing. Above on the upper landing I saw a light moving in the

darkness it was a monk carrying a lamp. The monk turned

out to be a rather pleasant Irishman. He made animated conver-

sation as he led me through dark arches and cloisters, beyond

which lay a world suspended in a mercurial solution of fog and

Carrara marble.Will you be staying the night? he asked.

Actually, Im not certain, I said, feeling ridiculous.

Well, its good youve come before the Day of the Dead.

Thats in three days time? I hadnt thought about the Day of

the Dead, an important holiday for Venetians, and so appropri-

ate I couldnt help but smile.

Yes, the vaporetto is free all day for those who want to visit

the graves of their relatives. The cemetery ends up full ofowers

and aswarm with people. He leant in. The defnition of bedlam



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perfect with only the slightest accent, perhaps Swiss or German.

I told him that it was good to put a face to his letters and

thanked him for his invaluable help over the years.

Please. He gestured to one of the winged chairs. I hope your

journey was bearable.

First class is as good as it gets, thank you. Perhaps we should

exchange names? I ventured to say.

He hesitated and I felt that Id made a faux pas.Names get in the way, was all he said.

There didnt seem to be room for argument and I decided to

let it go for now. Do you live here at the monastery?

I am not sure if you could call it my home, was his ambigu-

ous answer.

Before I could say anything in response the Irish monk entered

the library again, carrying a tray of coffee and pastries, which

he set down before us.

When he was gone, the Writer of Letters poured me a cup and

offered the sugar. I declined, smiling to myself.

He settled back in his chair. So, what do you think of my

library?

I glanced about, taking in the many bookshelves. Itsremarkable.

This monastery once housed a famous scriptorium as well as a

school for theology and philosophy, but that was before Napoleon.

In those days it held as many as forty thousand volumes. After

the invasion of course, there was little left, everything was looted

. . . War is not a friend of books, you see. At any rate, they say

Napoleon was looking for something and when he didnt fnd it he

punished the monks by converting the whole place into a prison.

And now its a cemetery.



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He looked at me with those hooded eyes. It guards corpses.

A book is a corpse in a way, wouldnt you say?

I sipped at the coffee. Thats an interesting way to look at it.

He raised one brow. The gesture made me uncomfortable.

When the Franciscans became the caretakers of the cem-

etery, he continued, they opened the library again and began

making careful acquisitions here and there, slowly flling the

shelves again. Im happy to say that now there are over twentythousand volumes here, many of them frst editions or very rare

copies. From reading your books I can tell that you are not only

fascinated with libraries and labyrinths but also with puzzles.

Puzzles are my living, I told him.

He leant in to poke at the fre a moment. Have you read Jorge

Luis Borges?

Yes . . . but that was years ago.

He sat back again and crossed his legs, elegant and cool, as

far from my image of a Franciscan monk as you could get.

Borges Library of Babel is one of my favourite short sto-

ries, he said. I love his idea of a universe that consists of endless

interlocking galleries, in which are kept all the books ever writ-

ten, and even those likely to be written. Books whose contentand order is random and meaningless.

I thought about it a moment. Do you think Borges was trying

to convey the opposing ideas of chaos and order, or the futility

of accumulating knowledge?

He smiled. Perhaps both, perhaps neither? It might just be

the learned Arab coming out in him.

But I thought he was Argentinian?

There was an awkward silence.

I am speaking of one of his previous lives.



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My disquiet must have been palpable. I realised he was playing

a game and that everything he was saying had been calculated

to make me feel slightly uncomfortable. I decided that I wasnt

going to give him the satisfaction.

I see.

He wasnt put off. Take The Book of Sand, for instance,

he said. An infnite book that changes every time you look

into it. Then again, there is The Garden of Forking Paths,where one confronts several alternatives and these create several

possible futures, which are again full of alternatives, and these

proliferate and fork to make more futures, endlessly. He sat

forwards. Do you think Borges understood the idea of karma

and destiny?

I dont know.

Well, he certainly managed to illustrate, quite perfectly, the

experience of crossing the threshold.

What threshold do you mean?

The threshold that separates life from death, time from

space; where the past and the future converge in the present;

where the dead exist.

My smile must have looked increasingly foolish. I supposeyou are going to tell me how one crosses the threshold? Is that

the solution to the riddle initiation?

He looked at me without humour, clearly annoyed. To taste

a good brandy one must sip slowly, savouring the complex a-

vours on the tongue! A man who drinks it down in one gulp

tastes nothing and burns his throat. Isnt that so?

I nodded pensively. He was right I was being precipitous.

Still, his tone had been harsh.

He looked a little repentant. I do apologise. Ive been away



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from society for too long, Im afraid. I dont mean to be ill-man-

nered. He paused, thinking a moment, or perhaps he was just

giving me time to forgive his shortness. Yes, all initiations are

a form of death. Ones consciousness of the world dies and one

enters the realm of the spirit, the realm of the dead, as you have

intimated. But do you know this: that every time one goes to

sleep one also enters the realm of the dead, leaving behind ones

personality to enter a labyrinth, a hall of mirrors, a universe ofgalleries, wherein lies a record of all the personalities that one

has been through the aeons? He watched me, measuring the

effect of his words. Tell me, what do you think has brought you

here?

You invited me.

No, he said with a curt tone that once again caught me by

surprise. You invited yourself!

If this were so, then it would mean that I am you.

He considered it. Do you fnd me familiar?

I looked at him. Are you asking me if I feel a sense of dj

vu?

Not as its understood in the usual sense. Do you think that

my sitting here and your sitting there, thef

re, the lagoon, thisevening, this old monastery, this library, this moment, could

have been created by you?

I didnt know what to say.

Think of how meticulous you are in creating the milieu of

your books, down to the smallest detail. Now imagine you

could do the same thing in the realm of death; that you could

create what would surround you in your next life; this would

make you the writer of your own story.

Youre referring to reincarnation?



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Yes. You are here at this point because centuries ago you did

something which made this moment possible, and this moment

will lead to another moment, and so on. Like the Garden of

Forking Paths every decision creates a fork in the path of

your futures.

He paused, giving me time to digest his philosophy. Think of

it in ordinary terms: suppose someone calls you and this makes

you late and you miss a train that catches fre, in which manypeople are killed. What do you do?

I would thank the caller for saving my life.

Ah, but perhaps you wouldnt have been killed at all? Perhaps

during the course of events you would have met someone of

great importance, someone who would have led you to a differ-

ent fork in your path, a fork that would have led to another and

another? In any event, imagine that because you did not take

that train you are now crossing the road at the exact time that a

cars brakes fail and it ploughs into you, killing you. Karma was

the caller but the choice was yours to take the call. Freedom

lives in that choice. One cant imagine how many choices one

makes in the course of a day, choices that affect not only ones

future, but the collective future of all humanity. No, you arehere because you have made a choice to be here.

I looked at him, trying to see where he was going with this,

but his face betrayed nothing. But what about you you also

made a choice when you invited me to come here?

Did I? he said.

Arent you also free to create your own forking paths?

Sometimes we do things not out of our own need, but out of

a desire to further the evolution of the world.

A sacrifce, you mean?



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He nodded. Take the sniper who had Hitler in his sights and

who decided, at the last moment, to let him live. Imagine how

different the world would be now: how many writers, artists,

poets, musicians, scientists, mothers, fathers and children would

have contributed to the world had it not been for one mans

poor choice. Perhaps when that sniper died he had to relive that

moment over and over again, until he realised that his own per-

sonal goodness was a puny concern, in comparison to the manylives he could have saved.

I sat forwards and set down my cup. You are saying that

if the sniper had pulled the trigger and killed Hitler, he could

have secured a different destiny for the world, even if it meant

sacrifcing his own personal karma?

Precisely. That soldier was there to kill Hitler, that was his

karma, you see? He chose not to follow it.

I had to smile. This strange man intrigued me.

You fnd this interesting?

Yes, I do.

The moment that lies between what drives us from the past

and what pulls us towards the future is the one moment in which

we are completely free, completely conscious and completelyalive. So, imagine we are in this moment. If this were a novel as

yet to be written by you, and I were your character, poised in

that moment, what would you have me do?

I would have you tell me why Im here.

Touch! He was pleased. I would say youre here because

you want to know how it begins.

How whatbegins?

Your new novel.

And how does it begin?



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It begins with a telegram, an invitation to meet someone

mysterious. Now, lets say your character guesses the invitation

must be from a fan of his work, because the telegram offers the

prospect of a patronage. Lets assume that the message could not

have arrived at a better time. His last book isnt selling well, and

he needs funds to research another book. Lets imagine that in

the meantime, he is surviving by the barest margin, living hand-

to-mouth. So when the offer comes to meet a generous benefac-tor in an apartment in Berlin, well, he does the only logical thing

a man in those circumstances could have done he fnds himself

in Prinz Albrechstrasse.

The street has changed little since his childhood, except these

days it houses the Gestapo and the headquarters of the SS, and

everywhere on shop front doors and on walls two words are

written: Juden Unerwnscht Jews Unwelcome.

When your protagonist arrives at the fashionable apartment

building, he checks the address against the telegram and the

time against his pocket watch and looks up. The sky is steel blue

and the sun is cold. He stands like that, in his rather shabby

double-breasted suit that does little to keep off the swift breeze,

trying to resist the impulse to turn around. But where could hego? The fnancial embarrassment that led to his rather hasty

expulsion from France meant he couldnt return. At least not

until his circumstances had improved enough for him to pay

his creditors. Its no wonder the poor are all Communists! He

sighs, looking again at the telegram.

YOUR BOOK SUPERIOR WORK STOP

A THOUSAND MARKS A MONTH FOR SECOND STOP

FURTHER SUM TO SETTLE AFFAIRS STOP



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BERLIN FEB 18 15:00

7 PRINZ ALBRECHTSTRASSE STOP

Shortly after receiving this telegram, a small fortune in deutsch-

marks was wired to him and a letter followed, containing a frst-

class train ticket from Paris to Berlin. How could he resist such a

generous offer? It was a balm to know that someone appreciated

his work enough to pay for it. Still, he was full of misgivings.Why had the publisher or benefactor not given his name? Why

did he want to meet in an apartment? Could he be one of those

Jewish publishers that had been shut down by the Nazis?

Perhaps I should say something about the state of Germany

at that time. Your character had arrived back in his homeland

when there was a general feeling of enthusiasm for the prom-

ise of a new life and for the return of German pride. After all,

the re-arming of Germany had been achieved without conict,

and the endless political wrangling of Weimar was over. These

events were like the herald of a new age.

The supposed Nazi vision of cultural rebirth should have

ftted quite nicely with your characters own idealistic views,

had he been a man of his times. But he was not a man of histimes. If you were to ask him about the war against the Cathars,

or something concerning Spanish politics at the time of the

Reconquista, he would have expounded clear and concise views

that were based on genuine insights; if you had asked him about

Don Quixote, or Parzifal, or even Sherlock Holmes, he would

have had you listening for hours! You see, when it came to the

happenings of his day, he could tell you about the latest Georg

Wilhelm Pabst flm, or the most recent jazz recordings by Django

Reinhardt and not much else. The truth is, talk of politics sent



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his mind into a fog and for this reason he was not in the least bit

interested in Hitler. This confounded his friends and irritated his

family. They argued that Hitler had united the nation by erasing

ination and reducing unemployment and poverty; they even

pointed out to him the language of symbolism used by Hitler,

as a way of raising his interest, but your character was simply

not convinced. He felt there was something rather sinister about

the way the little moustached man used the ideal of onenessthat all Germans longed for, and the symbols that they only

half-understood, to gain power over them. These things your

character sensed, in the same way a deer senses the presence of a

hunter. It was an instinctive disquiet. For the ruthlessness of the

new leaders had not yet become outwardly apparent except for

the issue with the Jews.

In his view, Hebrews were as well educated, as polite, astute,

sensitive and cultured as any other race. In fact, quite a few of

them were exceedingly talented in diverse felds and were, for

the most part, possessed of impeccable ethics and moral disposi-

tions. He couldnt understand Hitlers obsession with blaming

them for everything, from the stab in the back, to bad weather.

On top of that there was the regimes stern attitude towardshomosexuals, Communists and artists. In France he had grown

rather fond of bohemians and, he had to admit, since his return

to Germany he had found it rather bland. He was starved for

good conversation! Where were the intellectuals? Where were

the poets, artists and philosophers?

Right now, standing before that apartment, he weighs the

risks. Who would believe him should it turn out to be a Jewish

publisher, or an enemy of the Reich, or a homosexual, or a lib-

eral, or a Communist waiting for him in that apartment? On



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the other hand, he knows he cant continue his research into

the Cathar treasure without money. After all, there are only so

many radio interviews he can do and only so many times he

can recount his exciting experiences potholing in the caves of

southern France looking for the Grail without feeling like a

parrot. Moreover, his scripts for the flmmaker Pabst have come

to nothing, and hes had enough of traipsing about the country

working on flm sets for a pittance. No, this interview is his lastresort and he resolves that should he not like the look of the

publisher, he will thank him politely and simply walk out. He

need never see the man again. After all, no one is going to hold

a gun to his head!

He knocks on the door. There is no answer. This is the fork

in the road, so to speak.

What does he do? I said, watching the fre.

The Writer of Letters allowed a little silence to pass. If he

had done differently, perhaps you wouldnt be here? Perhaps

there would be no need for you to write this book at all? No, he

knocks again and when he hears nothing, a sudden relief washes

over him. Providence has saved him, he thinks but from what?

The truth is, had he left one minute earlier he would never know,but his hesitation on descending those steps now means that he

is visible to the man who has, by now, unlocked the door behind

him. When he turns, he recognises the uniform. Who in Berlin

wouldnt have?

the sixth key by adriana koulias sample chapter

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