Page 18 of The Secret of Secrets (Robert Langdon #6)

Wedged into the backseat of the ?koda Octavia sedan, Robert Langdon felt boxed in.

In front of him, Captain Janá?ek had rammed his own seat as far back as possible, and Langdon now had his knees to his chest, fending off mounting claustrophobia.

The vents were blowing stiflingly hot air, mixed with the captain’s cigarette smoke, and Langdon was glad he had worn only his Dale sweater and not his bulky Patagonia “puffer.”

Janá?ek was on his phone again, talking in hushed Czech as the car raced southward along the banks of the Vltava.

The captain’s thick-necked driver was a twentysomething lieutenant in a navy-blue úZSI jumpsuit and tilted military beret.

He looked more like a bodybuilder or professional wrestler than a law enforcement agent, and he was now serpentining in and out of traffic with only one hand on the steering wheel, as if trying to impress his boss.

As the car sped southward along the river on Masarykovo náb?e?í, Langdon felt nauseous and forced his gaze out the window into the open spaces.

They had just passed a small island in the Vltava River, on which stood the bright yellow Neo-Renaissance ?ofín Palace.

In stark contrast to the ancient palace, Prague’s most famous ultramodern structure was ahead on the left.

The Dancing House consisted of two small towers leaning into each other as if they were dancing.

Architect Frank Gehry referred to his towers as Fred and Ginger, which seemed a stretch of the imagination, but considering London’s skyline now boasted The Gherkin, The Walkie-Talkie, and The Cheesegrater, perhaps Prague’s two dancing film stars could be considered a blessing.

Langdon had long been impressed by Prague’s passion for art of the avant-garde.

Some of the world’s most progressive collections were housed here at the DOX Center, Trade Fair Palace, and Museum Kampa.

Unique to Prague, however, were its amateur “pop-up” installations that routinely materialized around the city and, for a few lucky ones—like The Lennon Wall and The Hanging Umbrella People —were so admired as to be adopted permanently.

“Professor,” Janá?ek said, turning abruptly to face Langdon, causing his seatback to dig farther into Langdon’s knees. “When we arrive at Crucifix Bastion, I will be separating you from Ms. Solomon. I intend to question her without you present. I don’t want you two coordinating your stories.”

“Our stories ?” Langdon repeated, trying to keep the irritation from his voice. “Everything I told you is absolutely true.”

“That is good to know. Then you have nothing to worry about.” Janá?ek had already spun around to face front.

Langdon was concerned about Katherine’s impending encounter with Janá?ek. The captain seemed to have made up his mind that the two Americans—or at the very least Katherine —had somehow orchestrated this bizarre series of events for personal gain.

Utter madness.

Even so, no matter how many ways Langdon examined the situation, he saw no explanation for her dream foretelling the scene on Charles Bridge.

She didn’t tell anyone about her vision…and we went straight back to bed.

The only remaining explanation, as incomprehensible as Langdon found it, was that Katherine had experienced an actual precognitive dream…her own Titanic premonition.

The challenge for Langdon was that he had never believed in precognition.

Throughout his career, he had encountered the subject in ancient texts, but he had always dismissed the notion of clairvoyance, arguing that precognition by any name— prophecy, soothsaying, augury, divination, astrology—was history’s oldest delusion.

For as long as humans had been keeping track of the past, they had longed to see the future.

Prophets like Nostradamus, the Oracle of Delphi, and the Mayan astrologers had been revered as demigods.

Even to this day, a steady stream of well-educated people consulted palm readers, fortune tellers, psychics, and modern-day astrological guides.

Knowing the future is a human obsession.

Langdon’s history students often asked him about Nostradamus, arguably the most famous “seer” of all time.

The prophet’s enigmatic poems seemed to predict, among other things, the French Revolution, Hitler’s rise, and the collapse of the World Trade Center.

Langdon admitted to his class that a handful of the prophet’s quatrains contained what seemed like shocking references to future events, but he always reminded them that Nostradamus wrote “Copiously, Cryptically, and Commonly.” That was to say, the prophet wrote a copious collection of 942 separate poems, using cryptic and ambiguous language, and predicted commonplace events like wars, natural disasters, and power struggles.

“It’s no surprise we see occasional points of congruence,” Langdon told them. “We all want to believe in magic or something beyond this world, so our minds often trick us into seeing things that are not really there.”

To illustrate his point, every year Langdon began his freshman seminar by asking each student to submit his or her precise date and time of birth.

A week later, he handed everyone a sealed envelope with their names on it and told them he had given their birth information to a well-known astrologer and asked for readings.

When the students opened their envelopes, they invariably gasped in disbelief at how accurate the astrologer’s readings had been.

Then Langdon told them to swap papers with another student. To their surprise, they learned that all the “astrological readings” he had distributed were identical. The readings simply felt accurate because they included common personal beliefs:

You have a tendency to be critical of yourself.

You pride yourself on being an independent thinker.

You feel doubt at times that you have made the right decision.

Langdon explained that eagerness to find personal truth in general statements was known as the Barnum effect—so named for the sideshow “personality tests” that P. T. Barnum had employed to fool so many circusgoers into believing he had psychic powers.

The úZSI sedan swerved hard left, pulling Langdon from his thoughts as the car began ascending the vast wooded landscape of Folimanka Park, a sprawling public space on the outskirts of central Prague.

High atop the hill, Langdon was just able to make out the stone rampart of Crucifix Bastion perched on the ridgeline above them.

He had never visited the small fortress, which had been in ruins for many years and had been renovated only fairly recently, but he now knew far more than he cared to about the reconstruction—having been regaled relentlessly last night by the bastion’s proud new tenant.

Dr. Brigita Gessner.

The Czech neuroscientist was on the board of the Charles University Lecture Series and had personally invited Katherine to be last night’s presenter.

After the lecture, Gessner had joined Katherine and Langdon for a drink in the hotel bar.

But rather than congratulating Katherine, Gessner had barely mentioned the brilliant lecture, boasting instead about her own work and her incredible new private lab.

“The bastion is quite small, but it’s a sublime little location for a research facility,” Gessner had gushed.

“The old fortress sits atop a ridge with unparalleled views of the city, and its thick stone walls offer superb shielding from electromagnetic interference, making it ideal for my delicate work in neuroimaging.”

Gessner went on to boast that her success in the field of brain imaging technology and neuroinformatic networks had given her total autonomy in her research—both financially and programmatically—and now she spent her time working on “whatever I damn well please, in an extremely private setting.”

As the úZSI sedan emerged from the trees, the sight of the lab looming on the cliff brought with it an unexpected pang of concern for Katherine’s safety.

For some reason, Langdon felt a sudden sense of danger.

He hoped it was not precognition.