by Alex Thomas
The next morning Catherine came across the Holy Father in his private chapel. When she had noticed his presence, she had wanted to quietly retreat, but he noticed she was there and had asked her to stay so he could speak with her.
"How well did you know Darius, Holiness?" asked Catherine finally. She wanted to learn more about her paternal mentor.
"Not as well as you, Catherine. I only met him twice. The first time during my consecration at the Sistine Chapel. He led the ceremony and created a connection between me and the apostles. The second time we met at Castel Gandolfo where he spoke to me about the dangers of my policies to the Church. As we strolled through the Castel Gandolfo gardens, he also spoke about you, Catherine, and your trial. He asked me to keep an eye on you. You were like a daughter to him. He would have done anything to protect you."
"Thanks to him I was able to leave Lux."
Leo allowed himself to smile. "I remember. I had never seen Cardinal Gasperetti sweat like that before. Back then as cardinal I didn’t make the connection between your case and Darius. My God, it seems like ages ago."
Catherine hesitated, then said: "Darius never spoke about his family or his friendship with Cardinal Benelli. Now I understand why."
"It is not easy to be an apostle. It is not allowed to become public knowledge. Not even your own family is allowed to know."
"Was it a big shock to learn about the secret, Holiness?"
The Pope thought for a moment. "You know, Catherine, I could have stepped down, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to continue and further the policies started by John XXIII and John Paul no matter what. After all the damage Innocence did to the Church. The emissaries promised me their support."
"The same emissaries that had supported Pope Innocence before? I beg your pardon, Holiness, but that makes no sense."
"Apostles are human too. They die. During Innocence’s long papacy, two of his apostles died of natural causes. Their energy wasn’t lost right away, but rather absorbed by the other apostles. It was only after my enthronement that both unoccupied apostle seats were filled. It allows for a bit more flexibility."
"But how could those apostles who had supported Innocence suddenly support a totally different set of policies?"
"For the apostles, it is about maintaining the Church. I imagine they supported Innocence in managing the office, but at the same time they curbed his traditionalist ways. I can assure you the apostles guide my progressive approach just as much toward less destructive paths. But that doesn’t seem to be enough for the murderer."
"It doesn’t sound exactly like free will." On the other hand, Catherine thought, I never did have the impressions that Darius manipulated me. I would have felt that right away.
The Pope had shaken his head with a smile. "Through my connection with the twelve, I not only have a higher consciousness, but I also have gained a deeper insight into that which can destroy." He had paused for a moment. "Believe me, Catherine, even in the will to do good lies an incredibly strong temptation…"
Power and temptation. A topic as old as man himself.
Catherine reached the rooftop garden, her thoughts returning from her meeting with Leo to the present. She sat down on a bench, allowing her eyes to wander along the magnificent, exotic plants when she noticed she wasn’t alone. Monsignor Massini stood on the balcony, lost in thought as he looked across the Vatican premises. He looked tired, even haggard. The past few days and nights must have taken a lot out of him.
When he noticed her, he turned to her. "I had hoped to meet you here, Sister." He approached her with dark rings under his eyes and a film of sweat on his face. He sat down next to her.
It appeared as if he carried a ton of bricks on his sunken shoulders. Catherine couldn’t remember the last time she saw him so uncertain and feverish as if he were going through hell.
"Please forgive my frankness, Father, but you don’t look well. You need rest, perhaps even medical help."
Massini smiled. It was an oddly resigned smile. "Not now, Sister. Not as long as you and the Holy Father are in such danger."
Catherine hadn’t thought that Thea’s murder could be such a terrible shock to the priest. On the other hand it was clear that the murders were no longer just happening in the outside world, but rather right here in the Vatican’s midst.
"You shouldn’t leave the Apostolic Palace for any reason in the coming days," said Massini quietly. "Evil is among us."
"Evil has always been among us, Father."
A strange radiation emanated from Massini. He was pale as a ghost.
"That might be, but I fear your disguise won’t protect you much longer."
"What makes you say that?"
"One made enquiries about the new nun in the papal household."
"Who is one?"
"I don’t know. But I am certain it has something to do with the murders."
"Have you spoken with Cardinal Ciban about this already?"
"No, not yet. I thought it was more important to tell you first. Listen. I am not familiar with the details of these murderous events and I don’t want to be, but I can feel that you will be the next victim. The next few days will be critical. For you and His Holiness!" With that Massini got up and ran off without turning back.
Catherine didn’t get it. The priest hadn’t told her anything new, just the obvious. She returned to her room and switched on the laptop to work on her book some more. Aside from a few lifeless sentences that made utterly no sense at all she simply couldn’t do it. My God, how she missed Darius and Thea. How lonely she felt.
Her mobile phone rang. It was Ben’s number. With great joy she answered. "Yes?"
"It’s me, Ben. Rinaldo says His Holiness is feeling better?"
"You could say that," said Catherine. Her friend’s voice sounded a little reserved. "His Holiness is working the entire day again."
"And how have you been?"
"I just had the strangest conversation with Monsignor Massini. I think he’s going a tad loopy regarding my safety and that of the Holy Father."
"Would you like to speak with me and His Eminence about it? I am examining the crime scene at the moment and to be quite honest, I could use your help."
"That would be great, Ben. Sure."
"If you would like, I’ll meet you halfway."
"Thank you, but that won’t be necessary."
"See you in a bit!"
Catherine hung up, slipped into sturdier shoes, pulled on a hooded robe and rushed out into the corridor. It would do her some good to talk to Ben and Ciban about the odd encounter with Massini on the rooftop terrace. Something was definitely awry.
As she walked down the corridor toward the back stairwell, she saw that the light was still on in the Pope’s office. She remembered her promise to Ciban to tell him or Leo every time she left the Apostolic Palace.
74
Ben expected nothing less. If he read Ciban’s expression correctly, the cardinal didn’t have high hopes either. The Vigilanza didn’t find any traces regarding the murder in the underground parking garage or in the secret passageway that ran beneath the Apostolic Palace and was now under constant surveillance. It was as if a ghost had searched Sister Thea out at the Grotta di Lourdes, appearing from nowhere to quickly break her neck.
For the umpteenth time Ciban looked at the crime scene photos taken from every angle imaginable. The prefect also watched the video again that was so underexposed, it was a complete waste of time to even try to view it.
Ben took a deep breath and thought about Ciban’s disclosure about the deceased Pope Innocence and how he could have betrayed his congregation to one of his comrades-in-arms so that his policy could live on well beyond his own papacy. At least the list of possible perpetrators was more manageable now. According to Ciban, there were only seven men who came into question, two of which were already deceased. Sadly there was still the possibility that none of these candidates was the perpetrator in the end. It was quite possible that the murderer
belonged to Innocence’s worldly circle of friends, perhaps even to Opus Dei.
In the end the prefect reduced the list of suspects to just three people, but before he knew anything for certain, he had refrained from telling Ben any of the names. It was one thing to have a hunch; it was quite another to say it out loud and possibly ruin the person’s reputation. But as Ciban had assured Ben, he had been exploring these avenues for some time now.
Ben looked at one of the photos that lay at the top of the pile. How peaceful Sister Thea’s face looked. Without any mistrust. Without even a hint of rancour. Without a slight bit of pain. The images reminded Ben of the pictures of Sister Silvia that Father Raj had shown him in the tiny church in Calcutta. How could a crime scene photo emanate such peace?
Ciban suddenly left the conference table and walked over to the computer on his desk. Ben hadn’t even heard the computer ping.
The prefect gave him a look as he banged a few keys on the keyboard. "A message from Ralf Porter at the German Federal Intelligence Service!"
Ben dropped everything and hurried to Ciban to take a look at the computer screen himself. Ralf Porter summarised what he had discovered in his encrypted, concise email. The perpetrator’s missing rental car had been found in an underground parking garage, but the traces of DNA they collected led nowhere. Porter had also examined the poorly taped surveillance video from the Munich rental car company and had created photos from it. The search through the Interpol database had also led nowhere, but perhaps the photos would be able to help Vatican security in its further investigations.
The cardinal opened the encrypted attachment. It took a moment for the individual images to form on the screen. When the material was shown completely on the monitor, both Ben and Ciban held their breath. Even though the images were rather blurry still, they both looked the murderer in the eye. They recognised him, despite his glasses and baseball cap. Ben would recognise that scar over the left eye anywhere. DeRossi!
For a moment both of them stared at the photo in disbelief, as if they were paralysed. Ciban quickly grabbed the phone and asked to be connected with Coelho. They had no time to lose.
75
Monsignor deRossi’s flat was located in Trastevere, a historic quarter with picturesque lanes in the southwestern part of Rome, just a short walking distance from the Vatican. Coelho stood at the door of the flat with two of his Vatican policemen and rang the bell. It was the only flat on the floor and it had one of those old, classic entrance doors that in and of itself was an antique treasure.
The commander rang a second time. No one answered.
He took out a bundle of skeleton keys, opened the door lock within seconds and entered with his men, who raced through the corridor from room to room.
There really was no one there. Not even a mouse. Had deRossi caught wind of it? Or was he simply strolling through Rome and would be back soon?
While one of the men held watch in the hallway, the others combed through every single room without leaving a mark. In the living room Coelho came across a little library with about two hundred volumes, including specialist literature and non-fiction books, academic works and treatises as well as a series of art and photography books. To his amazement there was only one work of fiction, aside from the Holy Scripture and a few schoolbooks. The novel was called The Keys of St. Peter by Roger Peyrefitte.
They found nothing suspicious in the bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, hallway or living room. It surprised Coelho greatly that deRossi didn’t own a private computer, not even a laptop that he might have kept in one of the wardrobes or under the bed.
They searched through the trash, the flushing cistern over the toilet as well as the tiny broom closet without leaving a trace. Coelho didn’t even find a key to a bank deposit box or a post office box in the drawers or beneath the rug. Nor did he find a tiny bit of correspondence. Even the post-box that the watch outside had quickly examined was empty.
If not for the cassocks, suits and remaining clothing in the cabinets or the dishes in the kitchen cupboards, the commander might have thought the flat was occupied by a ghost. The bed was so tightly made that it appeared as if no one had ever touched it.
Coelho’s gaze fell on the library in the living room once again and on the antiquarian copy of Peyrefitte’s The Keys of St. Peter. He pulled the book from the shelf and faltered. It was entirely too light for its size.
When he opened the book, something fell out. The body of the book had been neatly hollowed out. The commander of the Vigilanza looked with great amazement at a mobile phone whose brand he had never seen before.
He bent over, picked up the telephone and checked its cache. Nothing. With the exception of two numbers, it was empty. Coelho placed the mobile phone back in the book and pocketed his findings just as one of his employees entered the living room pale as a ghost, holding a flat tin can.
"I found this beneath one of the creaking floorboards in the hallway."
Coelho took the tin can, opened it and found multiple finger bones.
"It looks as though someone thoroughly cooked them before they landed in the tin box," said the younger Vatican policeman with a muted voice.
The commander snapped the tin can shut once again, concealing his own revulsion. "Bring that and this book here to Cardinal Ciban, Viktor." He placed both in a plastic bag and rang the cardinal briefly.
Viktor went about his way while Coelho kept an eye on deRossi’s flat with the other Vigilanza policeman. The sky grew grey and dark. With any luck, Coelho thought, Viktor would reach the Palace of the Inquisition before the rain began to fall.
76
The master pulled on the precious cassock and looked out the window of his office. Dark clouds rumbled over Rome, casting shadows on the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica. It was going to be a stormy, rainy night in more ways than one. It seemed that knave Benelli had indeed challenged him even after his death because he somehow thought he was morally superior to him. Well, that Catherine Bell would pay the price for it. To hell with Alberto Cardinal Benelli and his entire damned brood of heretics. If he thought he could somehow maintain Leo’s ridiculous modernistic policies through them, he was sadly mistaken. The second council called by John XXII had done enough damage as it was.
The master cast a look at the clock. Only a few minutes left.
How close he had come to becoming Pope himself. But Benelli had placed himself massively against him in the conclave without the other cardinal electorates even noticing. The master was convinced that Benelli’s secret campaign against him had also brought about his defeat. Naturally his nemesis must have had allies. The master bet on none other than Ciban.
The amazing thing was that there wasn’t any proof at all that Benelli and the prefect were either friendly or politically aligned with one another and that he might have betrayed him. There wasn’t a single shred of evidence to solidify the master’s suspicion in any way. Even in the Domus Sanctae Marthae, the house on the Vatican premises in which the cardinals stayed during the conclave, nothing suspicious arose when Benelli and Ciban came into contact. Both men had gone about their business during the papal election as if they had nothing more to do with one another than with the other cardinals too. That in and of itself made the master suspicious in retrospect. In effect they were the only two men who dared defy him. Only through their alliance did their power represent an insurmountable obstacle for the master during the last conclave.
It had appeared to be going his way at the beginning of the election. During the first round of elections, he had received thirty-three of the one hundred fourteen votes. Benelli had received twenty-three votes while Leo whose name back then was still Eugenio Cardinal Tore, only had twelve. The rest had been distributed amongst eighteen other cardinals. Including Ciban. After the second round, the master had received thirty-eight votes. A vast improvement. Benelli got twenty-nine and Leo only fourteen. It appeared to be a neck-and-neck race between the master and Benelli. The former was certain he wou
ld walk away the victor.
But then everything came differently than he expected. The event was drawn out over an entire week and in the end, the master left the race. The election would be decided by a simple majority for Benelli. But what happened next was a story that never made a single paper, book, radio or television report. It never once reached the public. When the Cardinal Chamberlain approached Benelli to ask if he accepted the election results, the madman – the master still couldn’t believe it! – rejected it, saying he’d prefer to exercise his right to crown Eugenio Tore, the present Pope Leo XIV.
The master had expected a lot of things at that moment, but not that. What insanity it had been, and yet what a clever move too. All because he wanted to prevent one thing: that the master, the best candidate of them all, become Pope.
When Tore finally accepted the election and the cardinals applauded him, Benelli wore a look of great satisfaction. Even Ciban’s applause was sincere, coming straight from the heart. The master had never seen the slender, tall cardinal look so relaxed before.
Tore! Tore of all people!
It was as if the cardinals had elected a second John Paul or John XXIII. Yet another stab in the master’s heart. Of all people why did they select that wannabe revolutionary? He had no tolerance for Tore. Absolutely none. The man was simply too unrealistic, too foolish. Way too naïve!
Then a few days later after the conclave the master’s supposed promotion to Secretariat of State. At first he had felt honoured, if not somewhat mistrusting, but he had soon realised how much more freedom and information his previous office as prefect of the Congregation of the Doctrine of Faith had afforded him to further his goals and plans. Now his sources had been cut off, occupied by another cardinal. Through Marc Abbot Cardinal Ciban!