Chapter 10 chapter eight

Langdon couldn't take his eyes off the writing on the parquet floor that shimmered purple.It seemed impossible for Langdon to understand Jacques Saunière's farewell message.The text is like this: 13-3-2-21-1-1-8-5 O Harsh (Draconian) Demon King! O lame saint! Although Langdon had no idea what that meant, he did understand why Fache's intuition told him that the pentacle was associated with devil worship. Ah, the Draconian lord! Saunière wrote down the words "devil king".Also strange is this set of numbers. "It's kind of like a digital password." "Yes," Fache said. "Our cryptographers are trying to decipher it. We believe the numbers might tell us who killed him. Maybe a phone number or some kind of social code. Do you think there's any symbolic meaning to those numbers?" Langdon looked again. Knowing the symbolic meaning of these numbers, it is impossible to guess for a while, even if Saunière did presuppose the symbolic meaning.To Langdon, the numbers seemed irregular.He is used to explaining symbols with related meanings and certain rules, but everything here—pentagrams, words, numbers, etc.—seems irrelevant at all.

"You asserted just now," Fache said. "Saunière was trying to convey some kind of message by doing that... Goddess worship or something like that, didn't it? Does that make sense?" Langdon knew the question didn't require an answer.This kind of weird information obviously does not match the situation of goddess worship."The text appears to be an accusation? Do you agree?" Fache said. Langdon tried to imagine the curator's final minutes trapped in the Grand Gallery, knowing he was going to die.This seems logical. "I think it makes sense to say it's an accusation against the murderer."

"My task, of course, is to find the man's name. Excuse me, Mr. Langdon, besides these numbers, what is the strangest thing about this information in your opinion?" weirdest?Isn’t it strange that a dying man seals himself in a gallery, draws a pentagram out of his body, and writes cryptic indictments on the floor? "Draconic the word," he tentatively said the first thing that came to mind.Langdon was fairly certain that it was unlikely that a man would think of Draco, a brutal seventeenth-century BC statesman, before his deathbed. "'Draconic devil' seems like an odd phrase."

"Dragonic?" Fache said with a touch of impatience. "Saunière's wording does not appear to be the most important issue." Langdon wasn't sure what Fache was thinking, but he was beginning to think that Drago and Fache were alike. "Saunière is French," said Fache emphatically. "He lives in Paris, and when he writes these things, he chooses to use..." "English," Langdon continued.Now he understood what the chief of police meant. Fache nodded. "Exactly. Do you know why?" Langdon knew that Saunière's English was excellent, but Saunière's choice to write his last words in English did not attract Langdon's attention.He shrugged.Fache pointed to the pentagram on Saunière's belly and said, "It has nothing to do with devil worship? Are you still so sure?"

Langdon couldn't be sure of anything now. "Semiotics don't seem to be able to explain this passage. Sorry, I can't help you." "Perhaps that will explain," Fache stepped back from the body, raising the black light up again so that the light came from a wider angle. "What about now?" This stunned Langdon, and a roughly formed circle shimmered around the curator's body.Obviously, after Saunière fell to the ground, he drew several long arcs around himself with a pen, roughly drawing himself in a circle. Suddenly, the meaning became clear. "The Vitruvian Man," Langdon said quickly.Saunière reproduced the famous Leonardo da Vinci painting with a real person.

Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man, considered the most anatomically accurate drawing of its time, has become a modern cultural icon appearing on posters, mouse pads and T-shirts around the world.This famous painting has an extremely round circle, and inside the circle is a naked man... arms and legs spread out like a plucked eagle. Da Vinci.Langdon shuddered.It cannot be denied that Saunière had clear intentions.At the last moment of his life, the curator took off his clothes and unmistakably used his own body to assume the appearance of Da Vinci's "Vitruvian Man". This circle is the key element that was missed at first.The circle is a female protection symbol that surrounds the naked male body.This fulfills the message da Vinci wanted to express - harmony between men and women.However, the question now is why Saunière imitated such a masterpiece.

"Mr. Langdon," Fache said, "someone like you certainly knows that Leonardo da Vinci liked to paint more mysterious and cryptic works." Langdon hadn't expected Fache to know Leonardo so well.To explain clearly why Director Fache thinks it is devil worship is not something that can be explained clearly in a few words.Historians, especially those following the Christian tradition, have long considered Leonardo an awkward character.He was a painterly genius, but he was also a very visible homosexual and a worshiper of the divine order of nature, both of which made him forever guilty of violating God and committing crimes.In addition, the artist's eccentric behavior undoubtedly casts a demonic color: Da Vinci stole corpses for human anatomy research; his mysterious diary was written in reversed letters that others could not understand; A touch of alchemy, which can turn lead into gold, and even deceive God by developing a panacea to delay death; What a painful weapon of war.

Misunderstandings breed mistrust, Langdon thought. Leonardo da Vinci's astonishing plethora of Christian paintings only served to further spread the painter's reputation as a "spiritual hypocrisy."He has accepted hundreds of for-profit jobs from the Vatican.When he painted a Christian subject, he did not express his belief in it, but saw it as a commercial act—a means to pay for his extravagant life.Unfortunately, da Vinci liked to play tricks, and he would silently take a bite of the hand that offered him food for fun.He stuffed many Christian paintings with symbols that had nothing to do with Christianity to express his praise of his beliefs, and also subtly expressed his contempt for Christianity.Langdon gave a lecture at the National Gallery of Art entitled "The Secret Life of Leonardo Da Vinci: Pagan Symbolism in Christian Painting."

"I understand your thoughts," Langdon said now, "but Da Vinci never put those mysterious and dark things into practice. Although he had constant conflicts with the church, he was a purely spiritual person." Then, a weird idea popped out of his mind.He looked down at the text on the floor again.Ah, Draconian demons!oh!Lame saint! "Really?" Fache said. Langdon said cautiously, "I was thinking just now that Saunière and Da Vinci have a lot in common in their spiritual concepts, including their views on things like the church's expulsion of the feminine spirit from modern religion. Perhaps, by imitating Da Vinci's famous painting, Saunière just wanted to respond to Da Vinci's dissatisfaction and anger at the church demonizing the goddess." Hearing this, Fache's eyes straightened. "You mean that Saunière called the Church lame saints and cruel devils?"

Langdon had to admit that this was far-fetched, and that the pentacle symbol seemed to indicate an idea in some way. "I'm just saying that Mr. Saunière has devoted his life to the study of the history of goddesses. Nothing has been done more than the Catholic Church in eradicating the history of goddesses. Mr. Saunière wants to express his disappointment when he bids farewell to the world. Understandable." "Disappointed?" Fache asked, his tone hostile. "These words express more anger than disappointment, don't you think so?" Langdon was losing patience. "Director, you want my own opinion on what Saunière is trying to say, and that's all I can tell you."

"That's an accusation against the Church, isn't it?" Fache gritted his teeth and squeezed a word out. "Mr. Langdon, I've seen a lot of death because of my work. You see, when a man is murdered by someone else, I don't think his last thought is to write a purely spiritual sentence that no one can understand. Sentence. I believe he has only one thing in mind—" Fache's deep voice came through the air. "Revenge, I believe this is written to tell us who killed him." Langdon glared at him. "But that explanation doesn't hold water at all." "Can't stand?" "Untenable," he shot back, clearly weary and annoyed. "You told me that Saunière was attacked in his office by a man whom he had apparently invited." "That's right." "Then we should conclude that the curator knew his attackers." Fache nodded: "Keep talking." "So, if Saunière knew the man who killed him, accuse him in this way?" He pointed to the floor. "A digital code? A crippled saint? It’s also kind of incredible.” Fache frowned, as if this had never occurred to him before. "You have a point." "Given the circumstances," Langdon said, "I thought that if Saunière wanted to tell us who killed him, he should write that person's name." As Langdon said this, a smug smile flicked across Fache's lips for the first time tonight. "Exactly," said Fache, "exactly." As he turned the tuning wheel and heard Fache's voice coming from the earphones, Lieutenant Sergeant Collet thought, I'm witnessing the work of a master.The officer knew that under such circumstances, their chief of police would enforce French law to the extreme with extreme means. Fache dared to do what others dared not. In the modern law enforcement process, the ingenious technique of inducement talk, which requires excellent psychological preparation under pressure, does not exist.Few possess the requisite composure for the job, but Fache was made for it.His temperance and patience are almost entirely automatic. Fache's only emotion tonight seemed to be one of firm determination, and his actions tonight seemed to be his private business.Fache's order to his subordinates an hour earlier was also very concise and affirmative.Fache's order to his subordinates an hour earlier was also very concise and affirmative. "I know who murdered Jacques Saunière," Fache said. "You know what to do. No mistakes tonight." So far, nothing has gone wrong. Collet didn't know what evidence led Fache to convict the suspect, but he knew not to question the bull's instincts.Fache's intuition was almost supernatural.Once, after Fache displayed his admirable sixth sense, an agent insisted that God was whispering in Fache's ear.Collet had to admit that if there was a God, Bezu Fache would be on his A-list.The Chief attended Mass and Confession regularly with great zeal—far more often and regularly than other officials in public affairs who attended only when they had to on holidays.When the Pope came to Paris a few years ago, Fache pulled out all the stops to get an honor as an audience.A photo of Fache with the Pope now hangs in his office.Secretively, the agents referred to the photograph as the Pope's Bull.Ironically, one of the rare stances Fache has shared with the public in recent years has been his outspoken opposition to the Catholic pedophilia scandal.These priests should be hanged twice.Once for the children, and another time for dishonoring God's name.Collet had a whim, always feeling that it was the latter that annoyed Fache more. Collet turned to his laptop, where he had to perform the other half of his duties for the evening - operating the GPS tracking system.The image on the screen clearly shows the floor plan of Denon Hall.On the screen, Denon Hall resembles a schematic superimposed on the Louvre Security Department.Collet's eyes traveled through the labyrinth of galleries and corridors, and he found what he was looking for. There is a small red dot blinking in the center of the large gallery. that mark. Fache tied his prey tight tonight.This is very clever.Robert Langdon proved to be a calm and collected guy.