‘What letter is it?’ she demanded. ‘A, B, C?’
‘The letter P, as in Paul.’
Or in Paccius, she thought to herself. Excited by the possibility, she kissed the tour guide on both cheeks.
‘Thank you! Thank you so much! That’s the letter I was hoping you’d say.’
‘It was? Why’s that?’
But instead of answering, Maria ran off to tell Dr Boyd the good news, convinced she had discovered proof of the laughing man’s identity.
29
Nick Dial unzipped his portfolio and carefully removed its contents. Inside, he had the portable bulletin board that he’d filled with a series of pictures, notes, and maps.
After hanging it in the Libyan police station, he tried to figure out what he needed to add. Definitely some pictures of Narayan. Maybe some close-ups of the bloody arch. He also needed to start drawing connections to the Jansen case, pointing out similarities, no matter how ridiculous they might seem. He knew the preposterous often turned out to be the most profitable.
Glancing at Jansen’s side of the board, the first thing he noticed was his unblemished skin. Why savagely beat the second victim, tearing his back to shreds, but leave the first victim untouched? Did they run out of time with Jansen? Did something spook them? Or were they following the pattern that Dial had seen several times before: the more victims that someone kills, the more comfortable the killer becomes?
Or maybe, Dial thought, this had nothing to do with comfort. Maybe this had something to do with religion, something he was overlooking. Just to be safe, he decided to call Henri Toulon at Interpol headquarters to get additional background information on Christ’s death.
‘Henri,’ Dial said, ‘how are you feeling after your night of drinking?’
Toulon answered groggily, ‘How did you know I was drinking? Are you back in France?’
‘No, but you always have a night of drinking.’
‘Oui, this is true.’
‘Did you have a chance to research that Shakespeare stuff that we discussed?’
Toulon nodded, jiggling his ponytail like a tassel. ‘Yes I did, and I decided it was bullshit. Nothing more than a red herring to lure you away from the truth.’
‘I was hoping you were going to say that. My gut told me to follow the religious side of this case, so that’s what I’ve been doing. I would’ve been so screwed if Hamlet came into play.’
Toulon smiled as he placed an unlit cigarette between his lips. ‘Was there anything else?’
Dial stared at Narayan’s autopsy photos. ‘Just one more thing. The victim here is different than the one in Denmark. I thought you might have some theories on it.’
‘What kind of differences?’
With his finger Dial traced the marks on Narayan’s back. ‘This one was beaten with some sort of a whip. And I mean beaten badly. We found more blood than skin.’
‘The victim was scourged?’
‘Scourged? Is that what the Bible calls it?’
‘That’s what everyone calls it. It was so common back in the day that John didn’t even have to explain it in his Gospel. In John 19:1, he wrote, they “took Jesus and had him scourged.” No need to go into details. Everyone knew what it meant.’
‘Everyone but me,’ Dial muttered. ‘What did the weapon look like?’
‘They used a whip called a flagellum. In Latin it means “little scourge.”’
‘There was nothing little about Narayan’s injuries. It cut right through his muscle.’
Toulon nodded. ‘That was its intent. The flagellum is a leather whip with tiny balls on the end. They were made of bone or metal barbells, some had tiny claws like barbed fishing hooks. That way when soldiers withdrew their weapons they would rip out chunks of flesh.’
‘Pretty barbaric.’
‘Yet common. Ultimately, it was done to weaken the criminal so he’d die quicker on the cross. In a twisted way, they did it out of mercy.’
Dial shook his head at the logic. There was nothing merciful about these wounds. He could see Narayan’s rib cage through the slashes in his flesh. ‘How long would the scourging last?’
‘Roman law limited it to forty lashes. Most soldiers stopped at thirty-nine, one below the maximum.’
‘Another way to show their mercy?’
‘Exactly. After that the patibulum – the horizontal beam of the cross – was tied to the victim across both shoulders, right behind his neck.’
‘Like a squat bar?’
‘Yes, just like you use in the gym, only much heavier. Probably fifty-five kilos.’
Dial wrote approximately 125 pounds in his notebook. ‘Then what?’