Origin

Edmond lives in a museum? Langdon still couldn’t quite wrap his mind around it. The Casa Milà loft was not exactly the homiest place he had ever seen. Constructed entirely of stone and brick, it was essentially a continuous ribbed tunnel—a loop of 270 parabolic arches of varying heights, each about a yard apart. There were very few windows, and the atmosphere tasted dry and sterile, clearly heavily processed to protect the Gaudí artifacts.

“I’ll join you in a moment,” Langdon said. “First, I’m going to find Edmond’s restroom.”

Ambra glanced awkwardly back toward the entrance. “Edmond always asked me to use the lobby downstairs … he was mysteriously protective of this apartment’s private bathroom.”

“It’s a bachelor pad—his bathroom is probably a mess, and he was embarrassed.”

Ambra smiled. “Well, I think it’s that way.” She pointed in the opposite direction from the library, down a very dark tunnel.

“Thanks. I’ll be right back.”

Ambra headed off toward Edmond’s office, and Langdon went in the opposite direction, making his way down the narrow corridor—a dramatic tunnel of brick archways that reminded him of an underground grotto or medieval catacomb. Eerily, as he moved along the stone tunnel, banks of soft motion-sensitive lights illuminated at the base of each parabolic arch, lighting his way.

Langdon passed an elegant reading area, a small exercise area, and even a pantry, all interspersed with various display tables of Gaudí drawings, architectural sketches, and 3-D models of his projects.

When he passed an illuminated display table of biological artifacts, however, Langdon stopped short, surprised by the contents—a fossil of a prehistoric fish, an elegant nautilus shell, and a sinuous skeleton of a snake. For a passing moment, Langdon imagined Edmond must have mounted this scientific display himself—perhaps relating to his studies of the origins of life. Then Langdon saw the annotation on the case and realized that these artificts had belonged to Gaudí and echoed various architectural features of this home: the fish scales were the tiled patterns on the walls, the nautilus was the curling ramp into the garage, and the snake skeleton with its hundreds of closely spaced ribs was this very hallway.

Accompanying the display were the architect’s humble words:

Nothing is invented, for it’s written in nature first.

Originality consists of returning to the origin.

—ANTONI GAUDÍ

Langdon turned his eyes down the winding, vault-ribbed corridor and once again felt like he was standing inside a living creature.

A perfect home for Edmond, he decided. Art inspired by science.

As Langdon followed the first bend in the serpentine tunnel, the space widened, and the motion-activated lights illuminated. His gaze was drawn immediately to a huge glass display case in the center of the hall.

A catenary model, he thought, having always marveled at these ingenious Gaudí prototypes. “Catenary” was an architectural term that referred to the curve that was formed by a cord hanging loosely between two fixed points—like a hammock or the velvet rope suspended between two stanchions in a theater.

In the catenary model before Langdon, dozens of chains had been suspended loosely from the top of the case—resulting in long lengths that swooped down and then back up to form limply hanging U-shapes. Because gravitational tension was the inverse of gravitational compression, Gaudí could study the precise shape assumed by a chain when naturally hanging under its own weight, and he could mimic that shape to solve the architectural challenges of gravitational compression.

But it requires a magic mirror, Langdon mused, moving toward the case. As anticipated, the floor of the case was a mirror, and as he peered down into the reflection, he saw a magical effect. The entire model flipped upside down—and the hanging loops became soaring spires.

In this case, Langdon realized, he was seeing an inverted aerial view of Gaudí’s towering Basílica de la Sagrada Família, whose gently sloping spires quite possibly had been designed using this very model.

Pressing on down the hall, Langdon found himself in an elegant sleeping space with an antique four-poster bed, a cherrywood armoire, and an inlaid chest of drawers. The walls were decorated with Gaudí design sketches, which Langdon realized were simply more of the museum’s exhibit.

The only piece of art in the room that seemed to have been added was a large calligraphied quote hanging over Edmond’s bed. Langdon read the first three words and immediately recognized the source.

God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers?

—NIETZSCHE