Timeline

Part 1 opens with Dan Baker and his wife, Liz, driving down a dirt road in the Arizona desert to a Navajo reservation in order to purchase authentic rugs. They pass by an old man on the side of the road and hear a loud noise. Liz is convinced that they hit the man; she insists that they go back to help him. The man is wearing monk’s robes with conventional jeans and Nikes underneath. It is not clear how he got to the middle of this desert. While looking for the man’s car, Dan finds a white ceramic square labeled “ITC.” Dan and Liz decide to drive the man to the hospital in Gallup. He is unconscious in the back of the car, and Liz notices that his fingertips are turning red. When he comes to, the old man begins babbling nonsense in rhyme. He sings multiple times “quondam phone, makes me roam” (9) to the tune of the John Denver song “Country Roads.”

At the McKinley Trauma Unit in Gallup, Dr. Beverly Tsosie cares for the patient. The nurse notices that his shirt has an odd design and finds a piece of paper with a strange design labeled “mon. ste. mere.” (12). The man has no identification. A policeman, James “Jimmy” Wauneka, arrives and questions Dan and Liz. Dan gives him the ceramic square, and Officer Wauneka asks if they recognize the design. Liz, an architect, says that it is a church or a monastery. Dan and Liz leave.

Dr. Tsosie is baffled by the old man’s illness and by his repetition of the phrase “quondam phone.” Another patient overhears them and says that the term is “quantum foam,” which refers to the subatomic structure of space-time. At that moment, the policeman tells them of a missing person’s report for Joseph A. Traub, materials physicist at ITC in Black Rock, New Mexico. Suddenly, an alarm sounds, and Traub bleeds out and dies in seconds. The policeman contacts ITC and informs Senior Vice President Dr. Gordon of Traub’s death.

At the Black Rock complex of ITC, the board members await the arrival of the CEO, Robert Doniger. Gordon tells Doniger that Traub is dead. Doniger tells Gordon to have “Baretto from security […] drive Traub’s car out to Corazón, and leave it in the desert. Puncture a tire and walk away” (25). The company lawyer, Diane Kramer, warns him about tampering with evidence, but he tells her that no one will find out.

ITC is building quantum computers and needs to add three more board members as investors. Doniger wants to show them some concrete results to get them to invest and claims that the site in France is the most advanced. He tells Kramer to go to the Dordogne in France to see the researchers’ progress. Kramer says that Professor Johnston will be unhappy, but Doniger says she can handle it.

Officer Wauneka and Dr. Tsosie meet with MRI technician Calvin Chee, who shows them that Traub’s arteries were misaligned; this is why Traub bled out. He also tells him that ITC has already had Traub’s body cremated. Wauneka calls ITC to tell them he has Traub’s personal effects. Kramer tells him the ceramic square is an ID tag and asks him to have it shipped back to the company. He doubts her word. Wauneka calls his local priest, Father Grogan, who tells him the diagram is of the Monastery of Sainte-Mère. Officer Wauneka’s superior officer, Carlos Chavez, tells him to drop the case because there is no evidence of foul play. Traub’s car is found. The next day, Father Grogan calls Wauneka to tell him that there is a Monastery of Sainte-Mère in southwest France, near the Dordogne River. It burned down in the 14th century, but it is currently being excavated by archeologists from Yale and the University of Toulouse.

Part 2 opens with Diane Kramer on a helicopter with a handsome Dutchman named André Marek, an assistant professor of history at Yale. He is an “experimental” historian who “had learned medieval dress, language, and customs in detail; supposedly, he even [knows] how to joust” (41). Marek tells Kramer that Professor Johnston is currently meeting with the French minister of antiquities, François Bellin. As they fly over the Dordogne River Valley, Marek points out the French town of Beynac and the former English stronghold of Castelnaud. He tells her that their site also has a pair of opposing castles. They travel west to the site to see the ruins of the former English castle of Castelgard. Kramer reflects that Doniger will be disappointed with their lack of progress on the site. They travel north over the ruins of the water mill, where graduate student Chris Hughes is standing with Professor Johnston. Then, they go east to the ruins of the Monastery of Sainte-Mère. Finally, they fly up to the cliffs where they see the fortress of La Roque, which is in better condition than the other sites and is a tourist attraction.

As the helicopter flies by, Professor Edward Johnston and Chris Hughes discuss their findings on the mill of Sainte-Mère. Chris shows Johnston his computer renderings of what he believes the mill looked like before it was burned down. Chris argues that it had been a fortified mill. Suddenly, Johnston is called away to meet with Minister Bellin, who wants him to meet with a reporter. Johnston is reluctant, but Bellin says that Kramer from ITC, their sponsor, has requested that he speak with her.

The reporter, Louise Delvert, introduces herself to Johnston, and their conversation reveals ITC spends a million dollars a year on the archaeological site. The project is a passion project of Doniger’s because of his love for history. Johnston also admits that his team’s findings are all the property of ITC. Delvert questions ITC’s massive consumption of xenon and niobium, a metal used in magnets. She also tells Johnston that ITC has made massive land purchases around the world, including all of the land surrounding the Dordogne site.

Chris, standing with the French minister, is contacted by David Stern, the project technologist, who says that Officer James Wauneka in Gallup wants to speak to Professor Johnston about a dead ITC employee. When Delvert and Bellin leave, Johnston and Chris meet with Kramer, who casts doubt on Delvert’s suspicions. Sophie Rhys-Hampton, the girl on whom Chris has a crush, calls him, and Johnston tells him to go see her while he talks to Kramer.

Chris goes back to the headquarters of the project. Stern is asking someone to scan an image to send to them. Chris turns on his radio so that he can overhear Kramer and Johnston’s conversation. Kramer is asking him to advance his reconstruction efforts. She mentions that they could easily rebuild the “refectory,” but Johnston is confused because they have not found a refectory. Then, she mentions that they could also rebuild the tower in the woods, which the team has not yet mapped. When Chris and David Stern go into the woods to find the tower, Stern falls into a hole that was likely part of the structure.

Later, Johnston, Stern, and Chris review their findings to see if their scans have revealed evidence of a tower. At that moment, Wauneka’s scan of the Monastery of Sainte-Mère arrives in their email. Johnston goes to ask the project architect, Katherine Erickson, about the diagram. When Johnston arrives, she tells him that some of the Castelgard chapel walls are poorly constructed, possibly because of secret passages. He shows her the diagram sent by Wauneka, and she confirms it is Sainte-Mère, but it shows elements they have not yet found, like a garden.

That evening, Johnston, Marek, and Chris meet Kramer at a restaurant and ask her how she knew about the refectory and the tower. They also do not understand how Traub could have such a sophisticated diagram of the monastery. When she doesn’t respond, Johnston insists on meeting Doniger in New Mexico.

After Johnston’s departure, the students decide to take the day off. Only the graphologist, Elsie Kastner, decides to keep working. Chris and Marek go to the stables. Marek works on his jousting technique with a quintain, or training device. Chris sets the quintain while Marek runs at it with an aluminum lance. While they are training, Chris is distracted by a girl riding up on horseback and gets hit in the head with the leather bag on the quintain. Chris has a crush on the girl, Sophie. She tells him that ITC tried to buy her father’s farm nearby, but he refused to sell. They agree to go riding together the next day. When she leaves, Marek warns Chris that Sophie is leading him on.

The next day, the professor calls Marek to say that he won’t be in contact for a day or two. Stern later tells Marek that there is no evidence of the refectory or the tower on their scans; he is unsure how ITC knew about them.

Sophie and Chris are riding along the river when a yellow sports car pulls up. She greets the driver, Nigel, and leaves her horse with Chris to go with him.

That evening, in the nearby town of Sarlat, Chris, Marek, Kate, and some of Kate’s friends from New York are eating dinner. The graduate students tell them about their work and the history of the area, explaining that England once controlled territory in France and that the French fought many battles to try to regain the territory. Chris finds the stockbrokers’ ostentatious wealth irritating, so he leaves; as he goes, he sees Sophie arm-in-arm with Nigel.

The next day, Kate is alerted to a significant find in the monastery. While she and Chris are en route, he makes a pass at her, and she turns him down. In the catacombs of the monastery, the team has found an archway that may lead to a room. When they explore the space, they find an oilcloth of documents, and a modern-looking lens from a pair of bifocals. Marek is concerned that the find is “contamination” that might indicate a “sloppy excavation technique” and “[call] into question any other legitimate discoveries made by the team” (97). However, Stern analyzes the lens and finds bacteria confirming that the artifact is old.

That evening, Marek gets a message from Elsie, asking if Stern can come test something. At the farmhouse headquarters, Elsie shows them the manuscripts that were recovered earlier from the monastery, which all date from 1357. On one of them is written the message “Help me, 4/7/1357” (106) in the professor’s handwriting. Stern confirms that the parchment is likely authentic. Chris tries to contact the professor but gets only a voicemail. Marek searches the professor’s room and finds bifocal glasses. When Kate arrives, they agree that the lens found in the monastery is similar to the bifocals in Johnston’s room.

The next day, they still have not heard from the professor. Elsie finds a notation in the margins of a document about an underground river; the note reads, “Marcellus has the key” (114) and “vivix,” which is not a known word in Latin. That afternoon, Marek is told that Doniger wants to speak with him. While he waits on hold, Stern confirms that the message from the professor dates to 1361, plus or minus 47 years. Doniger is concerned about the professor’s safety and asks for the group’s help; he will arrange for a plane to take them to New Mexico that evening.

Meanwhile, at La Roque Castle, Kate wonders where the secret passage to the castle from the cliffs could be. Marek tells her to return to the farmhouse headquarters.

Kramer and Doniger discuss how the professor got lost. Doniger says they need to get him back in order to avoid “a publicity nightmare” (120). The search team, Gomez and Baretto, looked for about an hour but did not find him. They hope that the graduate students will know where to look but hope that ITC does not lose track of them as well.

Chris, Marek, Kate, and Stern board the ITC plane and are met by Gordon. He tells them that ITC has developed a technology allowing people to travel to a different world in the multiverse using quantum mechanics. They “make wormhole connections in quantum foam” (131) to travel into history. Professor Johnston is stuck in the 14th century, and ITC wants the students to rescue him. Gordon gives them sedatives as well as Old English and Middle French pronunciation recordings to listen to while they sleep so that they may absorb some of it.