Page 88 of The Secret of Secrets

“Folks!” he prompted. “A book of this size, length, and complexity would have taken an estimated forty years to complete.”

“Well,” someone said, “that makes more sense than doing it in one night.”

“I agree,” Langdon said, “but there’s a major problem with the logic. In the thirteenth century, life expectancy was approximately thirty years—and it would have taken at least half of those years to master the artistic skill exhibited in this calligraphy and illustration. Stranger still, the specialists confirm that the penmanship is astonishingly consistent across the entire book. There is no degradation of the lettering from beginning to end…no signs of fatigue, loss of eyesight, decreasing mobility, aging, senility. No change in style whatsoever. You put all those factors together, and it’s a puzzle that is technically impossible.”

Silence.

“So, Professor…what do you think happened?” someone finally asked.

Langdon thought a long moment. “I have no idea,” he said honestly. “History contains many inexplicable anomalies, and this is one of them.”

“That’s why I’m a physics major,” chimed in a quiet student in the front row.

“Sorry to burst your bubble,” Langdon said with a chuckle, “but science doesn’t do much better on anomalies. Perhaps you could explain for us the double-slit experiment? Or the horizon problem? Or Schrödinger’s—”

“I retract!” the kid surrendered good-naturedly.

“Signs of intelligent life, after all,” Langdon said to laughter. “In any case, in 2007, when the stolen codex was loaned to Prague, the Swedes feared the Czech government might not return it, but indeed the artifact was returned as promised, and the good-faith gesture now means the Devil’s Bible visits Prague for six months once every ten years, provided it is never removed from its sealed display case.”

With a small jolt, the funicular came to a halt at the bottom of Petřín Hill. Langdon glanced up, still considering the codex and Katherine’s message. She was clearly urging him to return to the Devil’s Bible, and yet Langdon saw no logical reason for her to make that request.

No reason…except one.

Is Katherine there…waiting for me?

Chapter 56

The George Washington Bridge is the busiest motor bridge in the world. Connecting the steep cliffs of New Jersey with the shores of New York, its fourteen traffic lanes provide safe passage to more than a hundred million vehicles per year.

Today, however, in the predawn darkness, Jonas Faukman was nearly alone on the bridge as he rocketed toward Manhattan in the stolen SUV. His eyes flicked repeatedly to the rearview mirror, looking for any signs that he was being followed. He hoped he could reach the relative safety of Random House Tower before someone reported this vehicle missing.

Alex, the PRH tech, had just communicated horrifying news out of Prague. All Faukman could do was pray there was some mistake in what the IT tech had found.

Is the discovery in Katherine’s book really worth killing for? He thought back to the theory of consciousness that Katherine had pitched to him over lunch in New York. It was certainly a bold departure from the current paradigm, but it hardly seemed dangerous.

“The theory,” Katherine had said, “is called nonlocal consciousness. And it’s based on the premise that consciousness is not localized to your brain…but rather it is everywhere. That is to say, consciousness permeates the universe. Consciousness is, in fact, one of the fundamental building blocks of our world.”

“Okay,” Faukman said, already struggling to keep up.

“In the nonlocal model,” she continued, “your brain does not create consciousness, but rather your brain experiences what already exists around it.” She glanced from Faukman to Langdon and back. “In simple English, our brains interact with an existing matrix of awareness.”

“That was simple English?” Faukman looked bemused.

“Count your blessings,” Langdon said. “She could ruin lunch by trying to explain the triadic dimensional vortical paradigm.”

“Seriously, Robert?” she chided. “A man of your intellectual capacity should be able to grasp a nine-dimensional quantized, volumetric reality embedded in an infinite continuity.”

Langdon rolled his eyes. “See what I mean?”

“Kids.” Faukman held up his hands. “Don’t make me stop the car.”

Langdon refilled their wineglasses as Katherine continued.

“Here’s the easiest way to think of it,” she said. “Look at that speaker.” She pointed to a nearby shelf on which a miniaturized wireless speaker was playing classical music. “Let’s say Mozart traveled ahead in time and joined us right now at this table for lunch—he would be amazed to hear music coming out of that tiny box. In his world, there were no recordings. When he heard music, there was always an orchestra present. Seeing this speaker, he might mistakenly conclude there is an orchestra hidden behind the wall—or even a miniature orchestra inside the speaker itself. There would be no other options within his intellectual grasp. He would never conclude that the music was in fact hovering silently all around us in the form of radio waves and was somehow being received by this speaker.”

Faukman looked around the room and imagined it full of invisible radio waves.

“We could try to explain our reality to Mozart,” she continued, “but he would have no frame of reference to comprehend it. Even the first primitive recording technique wouldn’t be invented for another hundred years after his death. My point is, here we are sitting at this table in modern Manhattan, and yet explaining nonlocal consciousness to you is a bit like attempting to describe radio waves to Mozart. In his reality, music comes solely from live musicians playing instruments in real time, and no other possibilities exist.”