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  A Song in Stone

  by Walter H. Hunt

  a division of F+W Media

  To the love of my life, my wife Lisa, who has always believed in me and stood with me. The music I hear is that which we have made together.

  Acknowledgements

  This book came about as a result of a visit to Rosslyn Chapel in August 2005. I received a first class tour of the Chapel courtesy of a Masonic brother, James Munro; his descriptions of Rosslyn and the high points of his tour are part of the narrative of the book. He appears in this book as Rob Madson, and I hope the rendition does him justice.

  During the development of the story, our Scottish friend Dinah Tennant was of inestimable help, not only with plot points, but with Scots authenticity. She will be able to tell all of her friends that she has become La Vierge sous-Tierre— the Black Virgin of Chartres, and Ian’s Gran MacPherson.

  Thanks to Tom Easton and Jack McDevitt for their timely advice, to Paul Bourke (whom I’ve never met, but who has an outstanding web page on Chladni plate interference), to the Bowdoin College Library (especially Ms. Virginia Hopcroft, for her assistance during my research efforts there), to Cecily Christensen, the Reference Librarian at Bellingham Public Library for her great help, to Bruce Coates, my Edinburgh Masonic friend, and of course to my dear wife Lisa, who read parts of this book many times and helped me get it right. Thanks also to my editor Cortney Marabetta and my agent Don Maass, who have helped me move forward on the path of light as a writer with this new venture.

  The esoteric pilgrimage described in this book is based on the one detailed in Rosslyn: Guardian of the Secrets of the Holy Grail, by Tim Wallace-Murphy and Marilyn Hopkins, to whose work the author is indebted. While neither the most detailed nor the most definitive work on the subject, it served as an inspiration at many points and opened up avenues of inquiry and research that helped articulate the plot and background.

  For more information on my books, please visit www.walterhunt.com.

  Contents

  Introduction

  Part I

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Part II

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Also Available

  Copyright Page

  Introduction

  Seven summers ago my family visited Scotland for the first time to attend the World Science Fiction Convention in Glasgow. My fourth mass-market paperback ( The Dark Crusade ) had just been released, but circumstances were pointing my career in a different direction. I hoped that I would be able to use the trip to research some material I wanted to incorporate in an alternate-history novel.

  Our journey after the convention took us to Edinburgh, and during that stay I visited Rosslyn Chapel, a few miles from the center of that city. It was then as it is described in the book: a small building at the end of a lane, surrounded by scaffolding (which has since been taken away) and filled with amazing carvings (which are still there).

  In the northeast corner of the chapel—a place significant to Freemasons, of which fraternity I (and my guide) are members—I was told about the Rosslyn music; and something remarkable happened: I had an Idea. It involved polyphonic music and Gothic architecture, and it was an epiphany that all made sense. That day I had a sense of the story; by the end of that week I had a plot; by the time I went home a few weeks later I had several thousand words on paper.

  My agent at the time was not terribly enthusiastic, but Phil Athans, whom I met the next summer at the Los Angeles Worldcon, was impressed. He bought the book, and teamed me up with Cortney Marabetta, who helped make A Song In Stone a more coherent and sound story. If circumstances had permitted, it might have been a greater success; but publishing is a funny business. The original edition went out of print; it has returned as a small-press trade paperback and has impressed many readers. Now, the wheel has turned again, and the new technology of e-book publishing has made it possible to make it available to a new audience. It is Phil Athans that has made it possible once again, and I am appreciative of his continued and renewed interest and support.

  It has taken seven years to get here; the inspiration in the summer of 2005 is something I will never forget. The story is still near and dear to my heart. More than one reader has told me that Ian Graham is autobiographical: that is only true to the extent that any protagonist springs from a writer’s own persona. but I do think that, like Ursula K. LeGuin and Earthsea, there is still some of his story yet to tell. I have moved on, but Ian and A Song In Stone are still with me.

  I hope his story is something that stays with you as well.

  Walter H. Hunt

  Bellingham, Massachusetts

  March 2012

  Part I

  CLIMBING THE HILL

  And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not.

  —Gospel of St John I:5

  “The Divine Logos … is the Light that shineth in darkness, by which all things are made, and that enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world.”

  —Denis the Areopagite

  Chapter 1

  It was half ten in the morning; I was sitting in my flat in Leith half-watching the television, the morning Scotsman spread out on my breakfast table.

  For the last seven years it had been nothing like this: I’d been up at dawn, tuned in to News 24 or the Beeb blaring so I could catch the headlines, down a quick cup of tea, take two or three calls on my mobile, then out the door. It was never quiet—never like this.

  This was a new experience, though it was beginning to wear: get up, turn on the TV, look at the paper and wait for the phone to ring.

  Surprising, really, when it did. I fairly jumped.

  “Graham,” I said, with my polite Channel 4 voice.

  “Ian! How’s the lad?” If he had work for me, my agent, Rodney Weiss, always sounded as if I was the long-awaited Messiah.

  “Unemployed.”

  This was a month or so after Ian and Lily became Alex and Lily, six months after Jan left the show. Remember Ian and Jan? That was me, Ian Graham. We’d been the toast of Scotland; people turned us on at tea time as we sat at our coffee table or traveled abroad, shaking hands with celebs, telling them what everyone was wearing, or showing off the latest recipes.

  I’d been hired on there seven years ago, one of Gerard Lamont’s bright young men at Channel 4. Gerard lost to cancer—good old Gerard, watching out for me—and I’d thought I didn’t need anyone to do that anymore.

  “Not for much longer,” Rodney said. “Are you listening?”

  “Lost in my own thoughts. Go on.”

  “Well,” he said after a moment. “I’ve got a simply marvelous offer. ITV called—th
ey asked for you personally.”

  “ITV?” My thoughts ran to soaps, quiz shows, sport. Mostly soaps and more soaps. “What do they want?”

  “They’re looking to do a documentary, Ian. A sort of edgy hour-long thing, investigative reporting. Uncovering the mysteries.”

  “Geraldo.” Ian and Jan had taken us overseas a few times, and I’d seen a lot of American telly; their broadcast and cable networks were filthy with that sort of thing. “You mean, sex crime and conspiracy.” At least it’s not a quiz show, I thought.

  “Well, they’d like to be a bit more tippie than that, Ian,” Rodney said, sounding like he was pouring on the patience. I cringed when he used the Edinburgh slang, especially in his annoying Midlands accent. “That’s why they wanted you : to be the heid-bummer, add a wee bit of class to the programme and bring over a better sort of audience.”

  “And they asked for me.”

  “Yes.”

  “Personally,” I added.

  “Yes,” Rodney insisted. “Yes, personally. They thought you’d be just the chiel.”

  Rodney had been working with Scots for better than twenty years. He prided himself on his ability to mix the lingo into the conversation—he probably kept a £3 Scots dialect dictionary on his desk. A night stroll in certain neighborhoods in Glasgow or Edinburgh would cure him of that someday; one chiel out of his mouth and he’d get the crap beaten out of him.

  Still, he was a good agent for all that. “What does it pay, Roddy?”

  He hated the nickname, but every Rodney in Scotland is called Roddy. He sighed and named a figure; it wasn’t insulting. Turned out they were willing to put half a dozen programmes in the can and try me out at half seven in the evening.

  It wasn’t my usual brief, but it would get me back on the air at least. Show the face to the viewing audience. Six hours of this sort of stuff couldn’t be that bad.

  No, not desperate, I added to myself. Not Ian Graham. Not me.

  “Tell them yes.”

  “Splendid, splendid,” he answered. “I knew you’d be pleased.”

  Beggars can’t be bleeding choosers, I thought but instead said, “Where do we start?”

  “Rosslyn.”

  • • •

  It was a step down from Ian and Jan, but after a month of waking up alone in the flat, nothing to do but read the papers, drink coffee, chain-smoke, and listen to voices from the telly that weren’t mine, it was something. It beat lying about the flat all day waiting for the phone call.

  It wasn’t the money: I’d put aside enough to be comfortable. But to be honest—and after I rang off and began to dress, I knew it was past time to be honest with myself—the lunches and drinks with producers and telly execs had resulted in no more than vague promises that turned into nothing. In no time I’d become old news. I wanted the audience, the spotlight, the feeling of being that chiel that everyone knew and tuned in to watch.

  I only knew a little bit about Rosslyn Chapel; I’d lived in Edinburgh all my life and never visited. It had been much in the news lately; they’d been shooting some sort of movie there, as I recalled.

  Look the part, I thought as I finished my shaving. They’d get the top shelf Ian Graham with no desperation in his eyes: it would be as if I walked straight off the set of Ian and Jan and into ITV’s documentary. I needed a look around to get my bearings and feel comfortable with the setting. Damn it, this—whatever it was, whatever sensational thing that ITV wanted—wasn’t why I’d climbed the hill in the industry: to be ordinary.

  But a question kept crossing my mind. How the hell did you let it come to this, old lad?

  As I left my flat and walked down the street to where I parked my motor, then started it up and pulled it out into traffic that late-July morning, I realised that I didn’t have an answer.

  • • •

  Any heavy-drinking chain-smoking television pro will tell you that once you’re in the business you’re always in the business, and you don’t lose the skills you’ve picked up—still, it had been damned hard to think about really working for a living instead of smiling into the camera and telling the afternoon crowd what book they should take to the beach with them.

  It had been seven years since Gerard Lamont had hired young and handsome Ian Graham from the Kilts and Heather Club of the Scottish BBC to pair up with sweet, sophisticated Jan Pierce to do lightweight interviews, talk about summer reads and host cooking demos for the late-afternoon telly watchers on Channel 4; six years since my loving wife Liz had gone from thrilled at my success to jealous of my success to becoming my ex in a matter of months. Jan’s husband, by comparison, hadn’t been jealous even when he should have been. Jan and I were good together, better than my marriage ever seemed to be. I took the parting in stride: divorce was a part of the backdrop in the business. That’s show business, we’d say. Can I buy you another drink?

  It was six months since Jan had decided to move on—she’d been offered an opportunity in London with the National Trust of all things. 4’s upper management wanted the programme to continue and had replaced Jan with Lily Burton: young enough to be Jan’s daughter, and what she lacked in native talent she made up for in pure spite. Lily must have had some spitfire quality they liked —she was everything that Jan was not—but the viewers took to her straight away.

  Then a month ago, Ian and Lily had become Alex and Lily, with Alex maybe two years out of university. “Younger crowd watching, you know,” they told me. “Nothing personal,” they added as they pushed me out the door. At thirty-four I was old news and not fit for the afternoon crowd. Word came through the grapevine that Liz and her friends were laughing their socks off about my “fall from grace.” I felt old—angry and betrayed as well, but mostly just old.

  • • •

  It’s only a few miles to Rosslyn from the centre of Edinburgh. I took the BMW down South Bridge and twisted and turned my way out of the twenty-first century; the road changed its name three or four times as it took me out into the countryside. Past the retail centre, round the roundabouts, and down a lane into the village of Roslin.

  Edinburgh’s busy and loud late in the summer, what with the Festival and the Fringe and all—I’d been stunned when Channel 4 made me redundant, so I’d noticed it much more than usual—so my first impression of Roslin was how little it was. Used to be just the faithful and the conspiracy nutters who came there—now it’s people who read best-selling novels … some of whom are the faithful and the conspiracy nutters. Somehow I expected something more grand.

  I knew blessed little about it. Out of old habit I envisioned tracking shots all the way to the end of the lane as I drove down and pulled into a little car park opposite the entrance: the wind in the elms—remarkable, really: hadn’t seen many of them since Dutch Elm disease took hold—leaden clouds behind. All very photogenic.

  I joined the tour, with one of the handheld audio guides, turning down the volume so that I could gather my own impressions. I had a polite smile and nod from the clerks but I didn’t have the feeling they recognised me. Old news indeed.

  When a half-dozen of us were assembled, a guide led us through the gift shop and down a little hall, then through a door and into the courtyard—and there it was.

  From the outside Rosslyn Chapel’s not much to look at these days. The outer shell is surrounded by scaffolding, put in place to keep it from crumbling. It was a fanciful thing at first glance.

  “Welcome to Rosslyn Chapel,” the guide began: a tall, balding man with a bit of an overbite. “I’m William MacLeod, one of the Friends of Rosslyn, and I’ll be showing you around the building and grounds this afternoon.”

  He squinted at the low clouds. It was one of those summer days when the grey and threatening sky bends down almost to touch the earth. It was a bit cool for July, and the air felt as if a storm was waiting to come on stage.

  “This structure was founded in the year 1446 by Sir William St Clair, the third and last St Clair Prince of Orkney. It was—or was in
tended to be—the Collegiate Chapel of St Matthew, one of more than three dozen such chapels erected between the reigns of James I and James IV of Scotland, a period covering roughly the entire fifteenth century.” He delivered it with crisp efficiency—more information than I really needed. MacLeod stopped and smiled: a tourist had a video camera inexpertly aimed right at his face—and even from the rear of the group I could see the light was all wrong. He glanced away and looked up—and gave me a wink. I assume he recognised me.

  “For more than forty years there was construction at this site. Indeed, this building was intended to be only a part of a larger cruciform structure—excavations a few centuries ago revealed foundations that extend more than ninety feet—almost thirty metres—beyond the west end of the Chapel, and underneath the baptistry—a later addition to the building intended to support the organ. But when Sir William died in 1484 it was still incomplete.”

  MacLeod gestured to the building, turning away slightly; he was clearly used to the patter. If I can get him to cut it to fifteen seconds we may be able to use this, I thought.

  After getting us from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries in a few more minutes, he beckoned us inside through the north door, where the monks entered. Gargoyles, soldiers on horseback, foxes and geese, and green men and musical instruments attended us.

  We walked along the north aisle to stand in the northeast corner of the Chapel. What was left of the afternoon light strained to pass through a beautiful stained-glass window of St Matthew, the patron of the Chapel that had been. I stifled a yawn; it was an amazing confection, reminding me of the sort of thing my Gran had kept in miniature in her china-closet—but it was still just a church.

  “There are many remarkable aspects to this structure,” MacLeod continued. “A brief visit can scarcely do it justice, but I would like to point a few of them out to you.