The Third Revelation (43 page)

“It was mutual,” he said, and let it go at that.

 

 

In town, she asked to be dropped at a metro station. “I wouldn't advise that, Angela. Take a cab.”

“Maybe I will.”

“Do.”

He put his car in the underground garage beneath his office building and walked to the Vatican, trying to look like a neutral as he hurried through the hostile crowds. At the gate, the Swiss Guards wouldn't let him through, but he persuaded them to call Donna Quando. Whatever she told them got him inside the Vatican.

She was waiting for him outside the Domus Sanctae Marthae. They crossed the cobbles to a little park and sat on a bench where, when the breeze freshened, they were lightly sprinkled with spray from the gurgling fountain. Neal gave her a quick version of what he had just heard from Angela di Piperno.

“Who told you that?” Donna asked.

“Not you, my dear. I thought we were friends.”

She lay her lacquer-tipped fingers on his sleeve. “It's all true.”

She told him of the exchange that Traeger was arranging and that she and Rodriguez would be monitoring it from a building higher up the Janiculum.

“I want to be there, Donna.”

She thought about it. “Will you behave?”

“Only if provoked.”

“Oh, do get us in there.”

Nate spent the first several hours of the flight in the front cabin with Laurel and Hardy, on a little jump seat. Laura busied herself in the galley, readying a meal—all prepared, just pop things into the microwave—while Ray sat, contemplatively sipping single malt scotch and looking down at the clouds. The trip had been set up on the spur of the moment, but what trips with Nate were not? Nate was convinced that what was going on in Rome could only benefit from his presence, and his general track record made that seem less presumptuous than it might have. Laura had put through a call to her brother John from the airport before takeoff.

“Things are a mess here, Laura.”

“That's why we're coming. How is Heather?”

“Happy as a lark.”

Get thee to a nunnery? Who knew? Maybe that was Heather's destiny, although Laura had been surprised when she found that Heather had been giving asylum to Vincent Traeger. Heather's hiding him had removed any smidgeon of doubt Laura might have had about Traeger's responsibility for what had happened to Brendan Crowe. Heather's protective attitude had, at least momentarily, suggested something more.

“Where will you stay?” John had wanted to know.

“The Hilton?” Laura said.

“Better not. That was one of the first targets of the rioters, I don't know why. I'll get you into the Villa Stritch.”

“Where you used to live?”

“A secret, Laura. The pope is there now.”

“Oh, do get us in there.”

After the call, Laura said to Ray, “We may be staying with the pope.”

“I thought he'd got out of there.”

“Out of the Vatican. He's still in Rome.”

“He might consider Avignon,” Ray said wryly.

“Ho ho.”

With everything ready to go in the galley, she took a seat next to Ray.

“This is great scotch. Want to try it?”

“Maybe later.”

He passed her his glass. She took it and sipped. It confirmed her belief that scotch was a man's drink.

When Nate joined them, he just shook his head at the suggestion of a drink. It was the first chance Laura had had to tell him of the Villa Stritch. It was only when she added that the pope was there that he reacted.

“I want to meet him.”

“We'll see.”

“I want his blessing on Refuge of Sinners, Laura.”

“I told John you'd like an audience.” And so she had, weeks ago.

“Good. Good.”

She went on to tell him of Traeger's thus far unsuccessful efforts to retrieve the third secret of Fatima file.

“I hope he's careful,” Nate said. “The man who has it killed for it.”

“More than once. Traeger has something the man wants more.”

Nate had been involved in enough business negotiations to realize that many things could go wrong with even the most carefully planned deal. A quid pro quo could look pretty good until one began to think of getting the quid without giving up the quo. But what would that assassin want with the third secret of Fatima?

“Did you ask about Heather?” Nate asked.

“She's fine.”

“She can fly back with us.”

Laura fed Laurel and Hardy first, and then the three of them settled down to their meal.

“There ought to be some wine back there,” Nate said.

“Red or white?”

“Not for me.” He was on some kind of ascetic kick but wouldn't talk about it. He had found a spiritual director at Saint Anselm's, a Father Fortin, in whom he was well pleased. So pleased, he had talked with the abbot about assigning Fortin to Empedocles as resident chaplain.

“He said the college would fall apart without him.”

“Father Fortin said that?”

Nate frowned. “No. The abbot.”

After the meal, they dimmed the lights. Nate kept the light over his seat on so he could read
The Soul of the Apostolate
. Laura cranked back her seat and closed her eyes. Who would have thought when she went to work for Ignatius Hannan that she would get swept up in a one-man religious revival? She and Ray were celibate for the nonce, their form of wedding preparation. Nate had not seemed surprised when they told him their plans.

“You'll have to find your successor, Laura.”

“Are you firing me?”

“But you'll be resigning.”

“Marriage and resignation go together like a horse and carriage,” Ray said.

 

 

The weather got choppy as they approached the Continent. Nate went forward again and Ray dozed, thanks to the single malt scotch. The sun had been coming to meet them throughout the flight, and it was a clear bright morning as they came down the coast of Italy. They landed at Ciampino and John was there to meet them.

“We all set at the Villa Stritch?” Laura asked.

“All set.”

As they drove to the villa, John said, “Traeger was there when I left, talking with a man named Dortmund.”

“Who's Dortmund?”

“A former colleague, apparently.”

“No one is more ruthless than a zealot.”

“I still have the floor plans you drew for me,” Anatoly said, increasing Remi Pouvoir's surprise at finding him at his elbow in the Vatican Archives.

“How did you get in here?” the little priest asked.

“I just followed your directions.”

Pouvoir looked left and right, beyond Anatoly, then took his arm and drew him off behind a row of cabinets. “What you are looking for isn't here,” he hissed.

“You're sure?”

“Of course I'm sure.” Pouvoir thought. “I can show you where the reports should be.”

“And I will trust that you are telling me the truth.”

Fear is a remarkable aid to honest reactions. He could almost see the thoughts sliding through the little priest's mind. This was the man who had killed the secretary of state, Buffoni his aide, and then Cardinal Maguire. What restraint could be expected of a man with that kind of bloody record? Anatoly recalled the almost eager complicity with which Pouvoir had drawn up the floor plans and given him directions. Had he imagined that Anatoly would burn those sheets after they had served their purpose?

“I know the reports are not here. I have arranged to get them.”

Pouvoir nodded. “I know, I know. You will make the exchange at the risk of your life.”

“Explain.”

Pouvoir's mood of eager complicity was back.

“First of all, there is Rodriguez and his people. They will have an excellent vantage point to the proceedings.”

“And you think they will try to take me out?”

“There are others,” Pouvoir said.

Others from the CIA were in Rome, their mission to apprehend Traeger. “He is wanted for a murder committed in the States.”

Anatoly smiled. He took pride in the way he had neutralized Traeger after they had played their cat and mouse game in New Hampshire. Of course the pursuit of Traeger would continue once they knew he had escaped to Rome. But that meant Traeger was at risk, not him.

“You could be a target of opportunity.” But Pouvoir simply said it, laying no stress on it. “The Confraternity of Pius IX will give anything to get hold of the third secret of Fatima.” He peered at Anatoly. “You have it?”

“I have it.”

Pouvoir stepped back to study Anatoly. The little archivist's fear was waning. He and Anatoly were allies, were they not? Had he not awaited him through the years, and helped when his help was asked? Of course, Pouvoir had thought he was acting in an official capacity, that Chekovsky had run out of patience pursuing the reports in a diplomatic way and had decided on direct action. Anatoly had encouraged that inference; it had got him the floor plans, the incriminating floor plans, as Pouvoir must now realize they were.

“And Chekovsky?”

Pouvoir was surprised. “You would know more about that than I.”

He let it go. “What about the confraternity?”

“I know their minds. They would not consider the use of force in taking that file from you as a breach of morality. No one is more ruthless than a zealot. Jean-Jacques Trepanier has come to join forces with Catena. He is a greater zealot than any of them. Think. You have stolen a message from the Mother of God. What moral prohibitions could protect you?”

“They know where the exchange is to take place?” Anatoly did not like this.

“They have heard.” He passed a thin hand over his sunken cheek. “There could be others there as well, I think. The electronics billionaire Ignatius Hannan has come to Rome with his staff.”

Anatoly was not surprised that the proposed exchange should have drawn such attention. One of the reasons for drawing Traeger to the rooftop on what he did not realize was a trial run was to give the planned exchange a chance to be more widely known. There were too many people too deeply interested to expect that it could have been kept secret. He didn't want it to be a secret. He wanted many rival and competing interests to be represented there. Traeger he trusted. He doubted that Traeger had divulged the plan for the exchange. Obviously Anatoly had not been the only one to observe him come onto the rooftop of the North American College. If no one else, Rodriguez would have kept himself informed of what Traeger was doing.

But it was not from such people that he felt danger would come. Chekovsky's interest in the reports of the assassination attempt on John Paul II had been too intense, too persistent, to be merely a diplomatic interest, the activity of a man representing his country. His country! With that animal Putin in charge of the government. The others Pouvoir mentioned were interested in the document he was willing to exchange. Only he and Chekovsky seemed interested in what he would receive for it. No, if there was to be danger for him, it would come from Chekovsky.

“I appreciate your help,” he said to Pouvoir. “As always.”

“Is that why you came here?”

“In part. But also to remind you of your helpfulness in drawing up those floor plans.”

“Then you will know your way out.”

“First, another favor. Where is the apartment Rodriguez will use for observation?”

Pouvoir told him. “I don't think he would harm you.”

“You might want to tell them to be on the alert this afternoon.”

 

 

Anatoly moved easily through the angry mobs that thronged the streets. They would consider him one of them. Perhaps he was. He crossed the Tiber, sat on a ledge, and telephoned Traeger.

“Two thirty.”

“Tomorrow morning?”

“This afternoon. Come alone.”

“It's a priest.”

Neal Admirari had just settled himself for forty winks when Donna Quando called.

“H hour approaches.”

He actually had to think before he understood. “When?”

“I'll meet you in the penthouse apartment.” She gave him Ladislaw's address.

“I'm on my way.”

And on the way, unbidden thoughts came. The realization that the gap between his age and Angela's precluded any of the dalliance that, for better or worse, characterized his professional life, invited speculation about Donna. There was no impediment of that sort with her, but that seemed a remote premise for anything amorous. Was he wrong to think that she enjoyed his company? It had been a pleasant surprise when he first met his contact in the Vatican. He had kept that first appointment with the fear that he would be meeting some nunnish lady who would see him as simply a conduit for favorable publicity. But the meeting had been like a date.

“What's a nice girl like you doing working in the Vatican?” Neal had asked the second time they met, outside the Vatican.

“Who said I'm a nice girl?”

“I just did.”

Her smile formed slowly, revealing a lovely row of teeth, one at a time. “You even look like a journalist.”

“It's the lighting here,” he said.

“Here” was Ambrogio's in the Borgo Pio. Cats slithered around among the tables, and birds perched, defying the cats as they swooped in for fallen crumbs. A carafe of the house red was on the table before them, better than he expected, and they were doing justice to it. She sat across from him with the air of a woman who had the afternoon before her. When they exchanged phone numbers and e-mail addresses, to facilitate their arrangement, there seemed to be more than business involved.