The Sixth Key(150)

As the boat chugged lazily over the lagoon, he leant in to ask the boatman about their destination, ‘Is that San Michele?’

‘Yes, that is the cemetery island of Venice,’ the man said, in a wonderful Italian voice.

The sun was rising, casting its golden hues over the old lagoon and the island, bringing to his mind the Egyptian river of souls and the boat of Isis in which one travelled to the realm of the dead. Well, he thought to himself, why not place a clue in a cemetery island in the middle of a lagoon? It all made a crazy sort of sense. It was something a man like Cros would do!

The vaporetto now arrived at the landing stage on the northwest corner of the island and Rahn climbed out, paid the boatman and watched the vessel pull away. He had an unnerving sense that he was about to walk into Hell again. After all, there was a monastery on the island, and a church. His mouth was dry again, his hands were shaking and he could feel his stomach churning. He seemed destined to find himself always at the gates of Hell, but it had never prevented him from continuing, even into the flames. Like his heroes Parzifal and Don Quixote, Jason, Hercules and Alexander, he would have to take the Thief’s Path through Hell to reach Heaven.

‘Well then . . .’ he affirmed to himself, as he climbed those steps. ‘I dare!’