Page 30 of The Secret of Secrets

Crucifix Bastion stands high atop a wooded ridgeline that defines the northern edge of Folimanka Park. In the mid-1300s, the towering crest caught the eye of Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV, who decided it was the ideal location on which to build a fortification to overlook his beloved birth city of Prague, a flourishing gem of Christendom.

Along the ridge, the emperor constructed a stone rampart topped by a small but robust fort. Its lofty perch reminded him of the mount on which Christ had been crucified, so he christened the fortification “Crucifix Bastion.”

The ÚZSI sedan wound higher along the entry road, steadily climbing the ridge until it came to a stop in front of the bastion. Langdon looked out at the ancient fortress, impressed by the elegant modernist renovation.

This is Gessner’s private lab? Clearly, the neuroscientist made a better living than Langdon had imagined.

Janáček jumped out of the passenger seat and yanked Langdon’s door open, motioning impatiently for him to get out. Langdon quickly obliged, eager to exit the cramped vehicle and also increasingly anxious to see Katherine.

The thuggish driver remained in the car as Janáček led Langdon through the falling snow toward the lab. In the dusting of white on the gravel pathway, Langdon saw several sets of muted footprints—some of them no doubt Katherine’s as she arrived to meet with Gessner.

Above the main entrance, an elegant bronze panel announced: The Gessner Institute. The bastion’s door was a broad, stylish pane of reinforced frosted glass in a steel frame. Janáček pulled on the handle, but the door did not budge. He rapped loudly on the thick glass.

No reply.

Janáček now turned to the call box beside the door—a biometric finger scanner, a speaker, and a call button. No keypad for a passcode? Langdon wondered, puzzled because last night Gessner had boasted gratuitously that her lab was secured with “an ingeniously clever passcode.”

She must have been referring to an interior door.

Janáček impatiently pressed the call button, and the speaker buzzed, an intercom now ringing inside. They waited, and after five rings, the buzzer stopped.

Janáček stepped back and raised his hooded eyes to the security camera positioned discreetly overhead, as if he were staring it down. He held his ÚZSI identification card aloft in front of the camera and pressed the call button again.

It rang an additional five times with no answer.

Langdon glanced at the security camera, wondering if maybe Katherine was looking back at him. Why isn’t Gessner answering the door? Or buzzing us in? Clearly, the two women could see that Janáček was here, and Langdon found it unlikely that Gessner’s desire for secrecy was so intense that she would rebuff an ÚZSI officer.

“Give me Katherine Solomon’s cell number,” Janáček said, pulling out his phone.

Langdon recited it from memory, and Janáček typed it into his phone, which he placed on speaker mode. The call went instantly to Katherine’s voicemail.

No service inside those thick stone walls? Langdon wondered, although it seemed odd that a tech giant like Gessner had not installed cellular boosters in her lab.

Janáček grumbled something under his breath and turned, shouting in the direction of his car. “Pavel!”

The thick-necked driver leaped from behind the wheel and hurried toward Janáček like a dog to its master. “Ano, pane kapitáne?!”

Janáček pointed to the glass door. “Prostřílej dveře.”

Lieutenant Pavel nodded, pulled out a handgun, and crouched in a firing position aimed at the door.

Jesus! Langdon leaped backward just as the lieutenant’s gun roared.

Six rapid-fire shots rang out—the bullets piercing the center of the pane in an almost perfect circular grouping. The reinforced glass did not shatter, its gooey inner layer keeping it intact. Lieutenant Pavel wasted no time spinning and kicking his leg up and back, his heavy boot striking the glass in the circle of bullet holes. A spiderweb of cracks radiated outward. He kicked again, and the entire panel crashed inward, breaking free from the frame and skidding across the floor in a shower of safety-glass shards that looked like glistening sugar cubes.

Langdon watched in disbelief, wondering if Janáček had even considered that there might have been someone on the other side of the frosted-glass door when his lieutenant fired.

Pavel reloaded his gun and stepped through the demolished opening, his boots crunching on the broken glass. He looked left and right, and then he motioned all clear for Janáček to enter.

“After you, Professor,” Janáček said. “Unless you’d prefer to wait in the car?”

Langdon had no desire to leave Katherine alone with Janáček and his trigger-happy madman. Heart pounding, Langdon stepped toward the shattered opening, wondering how many other times in history this medieval fortress had been breached.

Chapter 20

The United States embassy in Prague is located in the Schönborn Palace. It comprises more than a hundred rooms, many with the original stucco walls and thirty-foot ceilings. Built in 1656 by a one-legged count—Rudolf von Colloredo-Waldsee—the opulent palace includes several ramps that enabled Count Rudolf to ride his horse up into the building. Now, having become the official U.S. embassy, the palace housed twenty-three on-site personnel tasked with working on behalf of U.S. interests in the region.

This morning, the embassy’s media liaison—Dana Daněk—was alone in her office, organizing the daily agenda. She was a thirty-four-year-old Praguer who had perfected her English while modeling in London in her twenties. After returning to Prague and earning a computer degree, she’d applied for a post at the U.S. embassy and landed in the public relations department.