Chapter 60
“When Stoichev had finished, Helen and I sat mute for a couple of minutes. Stoichev himself shook his head now and then, drawing one hand over his face as if to wake himself from a dream. At last Helen spoke. ‘It is the same journey-it must be the same journey.’
“Stoichev turned to her. ‘I believe it is. And surely Brother Kiril’s monks were transporting the remains of Vlad Tepes.’
“‘And this means that-except for the two who were murdered by the Ottomans-they reached a Bulgarian monastery safely. Sveti Georgi-where is it?’
“It was the question I had most wanted to ask out of all the puzzles that pressed on me. Stoichev put his hand to his brow. ‘If only I knew,’ he muttered. ‘No one knows. There is no monastery called Sveti Georgi in the Bachkovo region, and no evidence that there ever was one there. Sveti Georgi is one of several medieval monasteries in Bulgaria that we know existed but which vanished during the early centuries of the Ottoman yoke. It was probably burned, and the stones scattered or used for other buildings.’ He looked sadly at us. ‘If the Ottomans had some reason to hate or fear this monastery it was probably completely destroyed. Certainly they did not permit it to be rebuilt, as Rila Monastery was. I was very interested, at one time, in finding the location of Sveti Georgi.’ He fell silent for a minute. ‘After my friend Angelov died, I tried for a while to continue his research. I went toBachkovski manastir, and I talked with the monks and asked many people in the region, but no one knew of a monastery called Sveti Georgi. I never found it on any of the old maps I examined, either. I have wondered if perhaps Stefan gave Zacharias a false name for it. I thought that there would be a legend among the people of the region, at least, if the relics of such an important figure as Vlad Dracula had been buried there. I wanted to go to Snagov, before the war, to see what I could learn there -’
“‘If you had, you might have met Rossi, or at least that archaeologist-Georgescu,’ I exclaimed.
“‘Perhaps.’ He smiled strangely. ‘If Rossi and I had indeed met there, perhaps we could have joined our knowledge then, before it was too late.’
“I wondered if he meant,Before the revolution in Bulgaria, before I was exiled here; I didn’t want to ask. A second later, however, he explained. ‘You see, I stopped my research rather suddenly. The day when I returned from the Bachkovo region, with my mind full of a plan to go to Romania, I came back to my apartment in Sofia to find an awful scene.’
“He paused again and closed his eyes. ‘I try not to think about that day. I must tell you first that I had a little apartment nearRimskaya stena -the Roman wall in Sofia, a very ancient site-and I loved it for the history of the city all around it. I had gone out to buy groceries and left my papers and books about Bachkovo and other monasteries open on my desk. When I returned I saw that someone had gone through all my things, pulled books off the shelves, and searched my closet. On the desk, all over my papers, was a small trail of blood. You know how ink-stains-a page -’ He broke off, looking piercingly at us now. ‘In the middle of the desk there lay a book I had never seen before -’ Suddenly he rose and shuffled into the other room again, and we heard him moving around, shifting books. I should have gotten up to help him, but I sat instead staring helplessly at Helen, who seemed frozen, too.
“After a moment Stoichev returned with a large folio in his arms. It was bound in worn leather. He laid it in front of us and we watched as he opened it with his reluctant old hands and showed us, wordlessly, the many blank pages, the great image in the center. The dragon looked smaller here, because the larger pages of the folio left considerable empty space around it, but it was certainly the same woodcut, down to the smudge I’d noticed in Hugh James’s. There was another smudge, too, in the yellowing border near the dragon’s claws. Stoichev pointed to it, but he seemed so overcome with some emotion-distaste, fear-that he apparently forgot for a moment to address us in English.‘Kr’v,’ he said. ‘Blood.’ I bent close. The brown smear was clearly a fingerprint.
“‘My God.’ I was remembering my poor cat, and Rossi’s friend Hedges. ‘Was there someone or something else in the room? What did you do, when you saw this?’
“‘There was no one in the room,’ he said in a low voice. ‘The door had been locked, and it was still locked when I returned and went in and saw this terrible scene. I called the police, and they looked everywhere and finally they-how do you say?-they analyzed a sample of the fresh blood and did some comparisons. They discovered easily whose blood type it was, at least.’
“‘Whose?’ Helen leaned forward.
“Stoichev’s voice dropped even lower, so that I too leaned forward to catch the words. Sweat stood out on his wrinkled face. ‘It was mine,’ he said.
“‘But -’
“‘No, of course not. I had not been there. But the police thought I had prepared the entire scene myself. The one thing that did not match was this fingerprint. They said they had never seen a human print like it-it had too few lines. They gave me back the book and my papers and caused me to pay some money for playing tricks with the law. And I almost lost my teaching position.’
“‘And you dropped your research?’ I guessed.
“Stoichev lifted his thin shoulders helplessly. ‘It is the only project I have not continued. I might have gone on, even then, except for this.’ He turned slowly to the second leaf of the folio. ‘This,’ he repeated, and there on the page we saw a single word written in a beautiful and archaic hand in ancient, mellowed ink. I knew just enough by now of Kiril’s famous alphabet to puzzle it out, although the first letter stumped me for a second. Helen read it aloud. ‘STOICHEV,’ she whispered. ‘Oh, you found your own name in it. How terrible.’
“‘Yes, my own name, and in a handwriting and an ink that were clearly medieval. I have always regretted that I was a coward about this project, but I was afraid. I thought that something might happen to me-like what happened to your father, madam.’
“‘You feared with good reason,’ I told the old scholar. ‘But we hope it’s not too late for Professor Rossi.’
“He straightened in his chair. ‘Yes. If we can somehow find Sveti Georgi. First, we must go to Rila and look at the other letters by Brother Kiril. As I said, I never before connected them with the ”Chronicle“ of Zacharias. I do not have copies of them here, and the authorities at Rila have not allowed them to be published, although several historians-including myself-have requested permission. And there is someone at Rila with whom I would like you to talk. He may not be of any assistance, however.’
“Stoichev looked as if he had something else to say, but at that moment we heard vigorous footsteps on the stairs. He tried to rise, then shot me a pleading look. I snatched up the dragon folio and plunged into the next room with it, where I hid it as well as I could behind a box. I rejoined Stoichev and Helen in time to see Ranov open the door to the library.
“‘Ah,’ he said. ‘A conference of historians. You are missing your own party, Professor.’ He browsed unabashedly through the books and papers on the table and at last picked up the old journal from which Stoichev had read us parts of the ‘Chronicle’ of Zacharias. ‘This is the object of your attention?’ He almost smiled at us. ‘Perhaps I should read it, too, to educate myself. There is much I still do not know about the medieval Bulgaria. And your so-distracting niece is not as interested in me as I thought. I have given her a serious invitation at the most beautiful end of your garden, and she is rather resistant.’
“Stoichev flushed angrily and seemed on the verge of speaking, but to my surprise Helen saved him. ‘Keep your dirty bureaucratic hands off that girl,’ she said, looking Ranov in the eye. ‘You are here to bother us, not her.’ I touched her arm, hoping she would not enrage the man somehow; the last thing we needed was a political disaster. But she and Ranov simply gave each other a long, measured glare, and then each turned away.