The Dead Man's Brother

by Zelazny, Roger

  "Doctor Berwick," Collins said softly.

  I once saw the same expression and stance—eyes wide, shoulders suddenly stiffened, head thrown back—occur on a man who had just been shot in the back from ambush.

  Berwick dropped his eyes and turned slowly toward Collins.

  "I fear I was out of myself for a moment," he said, and returned to his chair.

  "It is understandable," Collins replied, "as is Mister Wiley’s reaction to his situation."

  At this point, I wondered whether smoke was beginning to emerge from my ears and spiraling up toward the obscene fluorescent lights. Somewhere inside him, I knew that Collins was smirking at me. He just wanted to keep me dangling. He knew I did not give a damn about any hypothesis of Berwick’s. He knew that all I wanted was answers to my questions. He was, I decided, a son of a bitch.

  "It should not be especially dangerous," he said. "It will simply be necessary that you take a little trip, speak to a few people, do a bit of legwork and report your findings to one of our representatives. It will most likely turn out to be a pleasant vacation."

  While in no position to criticize another’s ethics, it was not without a certain indignation that I saw what was about to come.

  "And if I undertake this bit of work for you?" I inquired.

  "Then," he said, "I am confident that your difficulties in New York may safely be assumed forgotten."

  "I see. Where, specifically, would I be taking my holiday?"

  "Mostly Italy, I’d say. Though the thing appears to have broader international ramifications."

  My palms were suddenly moist and I felt my heartbeat quicken. When I did finally speak, my words came strangely ragged through my throat.

  "If you are implying what I think you are implying, I would be a fool to accept. I’d rather take my chances on a homicide conviction here in the States than poke around that organization whose headquarters are in Palermo. No thanks. Send me back to where you found me."

  He smiled and shook his head.

  "My interest in international crime is purely academic," he told me, "and I have no desire to spy on the Mafia. That is what we pay the FBI for."

  "What then?" I asked, feeling my conjecture drop into the sea of false intuitions with a little plopping sound and no ripples.

  "The Vatican," he said. "I want to plant you in the Vatican."

  III.

  Good old Eileen. I lay there beside her, spent, staring at the ceiling. She rested her head on an outstretched arm, her hair a dark splash on a pillow. I drew on my cigarette and watched the smoke curl and wind its way through the half-lit air.

  The room was cool and silent. We relaxed, and I said, "It was rough."

  "What?" she asked.

  "Everything that has happened to me recently," I told her. "I have been sworn to secrecy."

  "So?"

  "So I want to tell you all about it."

  I let my fingers do some walking, and I began telling her.

  "I am going to Europe."

  She drew nearer.

  "Good," she said, and I felt her softness all along my right side.

  Then, "When?" she asked.

  "Tuesday."

  I felt her muscles jerk.

  "That’s only three days," she said, "and I haven’t got…"

  "I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it that way. I’m going alone."

  "Oh. What is she like?"

  "Not another girl. It’s this business I was about to—"

  "You took me once when it was a business trip. I was your secretary for tax purposes."

  "It’s not that kind of business," I said.

  "Oh. You’re screwing somebody else."

  "No, ma’am," I said. "You’re my lovely lady, and I want to keep it at that. I’d like to tell you but you’re not listening."

  "I’m listening. Tell."

  "I have a job I have to do," I said. "It involves a man who was once a priest."

  "I know they’re smart," she said. "What did he do?"

  "He stole three million dollars," I told her, "and skipped Rome."

  "Why do you have to find him?" she said.

  "Let’s leave that out of it," I told her. "I just do."

  "Someone’s got something on you."

  "Maybe."

  Finally, "I think you’re lying," she said.

  "Why?"

  "A priest wouldn’t do a thing like that."

  Finding such logic unassailable, I replied, "Okay, you’ve got me. I have a date with Sofia Loren."

  She slapped me lightly then, and I changed the subject the only way I knew how.

  But I had had to tell someone, since I had promised my boss I wouldn’t.

  Good old five feet five, slightly plump, brunette, blue-eyed Eileen. I thank whatever Powers May Be for girls like you, and the fact that I have never been married to one.

  Good night, Eileen.

  *

  Airports. Enough there already. Stop. After we had broken the smog-barrier and a few windows I suppose, we came at last to be above a green glass, lens-like area that looked as if it went on forever. I can become obsessed with the ocean, just as with an enormous mountain or a vast desert; for these things are so out of proportion to myself that they seem to represent a cosmic indifference, another order of existence, or both. They make me feel as if something within me belongs to them, and then I desire to share their destinies. Too much thinking along these lines tends to make me morbid. Which is one of the reasons I prefer both nature and art in its smaller guises. So I turned my attention to the magazine I held in my lap and left the ocean to do whatever it is Byron said it does without me as an accomplice.

  Arrowing above the clouds and the water, I read till the blue went out of the sky and the night came down, pausing only to eat a surprisingly good meal and drink two Old Granddad and waters. Sipping the second one, I regarded the stars—so bright out here, up here—lit a cigarette and considered my situation.

  Collins had taken me to the Office of the Apostolic Delegate in Washington. There, a rosy-cheeked junior counselor had told me of Father Bretagne, occasionally referring to a thick file on the man. Father Bretagne had worked in the financial offices of the Vatican. He had been a thoroughly screened, highly trusted, highly qualified man. All three were standard requirements, he had explained, with special emphasis on the screening—ever since the days of Monsignor Cippico, the only priest from that office ever defrocked and busted for swindling. Father Bretagne had come out with a record the angels might envy and seemed to be doing a wonderful job for approximately five years. It was in the sixth year that they began getting a whiff of what was going on.

  There were no irregularities in the books. He had been too clever for that. In fact, everything he had done seemed perfectly legal from the face of the record. He had employed a financial maneuver developed by the late Bernardino Nogara, with a few added twists of his own. The basic difference, though, was that Nogara had used it to benefit the Church.

  In 1929 the Holy See had received $90 million as a result of the Lateran Treaty. Pope Pius XI had entrusted the administration of this money to banker Bernardino Nogara, who proceeded to invest it with enormous skill and equal success. At times, though, currency restrictions were imposed on the export of Italian capital. Nogara, however, had set up Vatican accounts with the Credit Suisse of Geneva. When the restrictions were in effect he would order the Swiss bank to deposit money in a New York bank in its own name. He would subsequently apply for a loan from the New York bank in the name of a Vatican-owned company in Italy. The Swiss bank would inform the New York bank that they were underwriting the loan, the money would be lent and, of course, repaid with interest. Thus, additional funds were released from the country despite the currency restrictions and made available for investment elsewhere.

  All legal and proper, albeit tricky, for Nogara was an honest man.

  In the case of Father Bretagne, however, the funds had flowed from Switzerland to a bank in Rio where a loan
was then approved for a company Father Bretagne had had investigated and personally approved. It was only later that several missionaries and concerned laymen had gotten word back to Rome as to the condition of the company. They expressed concern over the fact that it consisted of an old warehouse hardly worth the stick it would take to poke through its moldy walls, filled with non-functional machinery and operated by a staff of two—a manager and a secretary, both illiterate. Oddly enough—or not so, depending on how you look at it—this report was referred to Father Bretagne, who killed it. Subsequent reports came in, however, and were eventually seen by others. In due course, an investigation was begun. The fact finally emerged that the company was wholly owned by a corporation controlled by an Emil Bretagne, the priest’s brother. After several pairs of eyebrows were returned to their normal positions, further information was requested. Word of this apparently reached Father Bretagne, though, and he vanished shortly after the inquiry was begun.

  I took another sip of my drink, mashed my cigarette, lit another one.

  If that had been all there had been to it, I thought. If only that had been all there had been to it I could be back in my comfortable apartment rather than aboard a flight bound for Rome. I could have my shoes off and my feet on a hassock, with some decent music swimming around the room, perhaps a fresh apple and a cognac at my right hand, a good book in my lap…Sigh.

  But this was not to be, for a number of reasons. The main one, I feel, was that the Vatican did not want another Cippico affair. I can see the headlines in various anticlerical periodicals: PRIEST EMBEZZLES $3 MILLION, SKIPS ROME. They wanted to keep it quiet to kill bad publicity, which is why the civil authorities had not been notified. But they also wanted their $3 million back, which is why they aroused CIA interest in the case.

  The Vatican’s inquiry had come up with information showing that Emil Bretagne was once friendly with several revolutionary leaders, both in São Paulo and in Rio. When they were tipped, the CIA was not especially interested in this, as they felt they had matters down there pretty much covered. But some people up the ladder— leftovers from the old OSS days, I guessed—while feeling as I did that the money was the real issue, also felt they owed the Vatican a few favors from World War II times. It apparently was decided that while, on the basis of the evidence presented, they could not get officially involved in the thing, something ought to be done.

  I daresay they found some reason for putting a few of their men in Brazil to scrutinizing things a bit more closely. A guess on my part, as is a lot of this, but an educated guess. From what they did tell me it was not too difficult to arrive at conclusions as to things omitted.

  Their unofficial involvement obviously extended to digging through files to locate a person with some sort of half-assed background in this area, and then narrowing the field till they found someone who could be blackmailed into taking this stupid piece of a job. As to the job itself, it promised to be quite routine and dull. I was not to get mixed up with revolutionaries or thugs. I was simply to poke around Rome and its environs, speaking with everyone I could who had any knowledge of or association with Father Bretagne. I was to submit a full report concerning this, drawing any conclusions I might as to his departure route and present whereabouts, and then I was to come home. I had a contact man at the embassy. Not a very hush-hush thing: he was a security officer there. I was also to visit a few museums and galleries, to make things look good. Everything completed, my temporary employer would move in his strange ways and the charges which might be made against me in New York would not be made. I did not appreciate this form of coercion any more than I did the fact that the cost of this trip was to come out of my own pocket rather than their fat, secret budget.

  I could not help but think that there might be a little more to the job than they had indicated. I cannot subscribe to the notion of sending out a half-armed trooper when he could be fully armed, but I am familiar with the need-to-know business—now observed like a religious ritual in classified matters, but also often used as a coverup. If I suddenly needed to know something more, I supposed they would tell me at the time, if they could reach me, if I were still living. It seems to be a law of life that whenever there is something illegally obtained and valuable in any given place, the carrion birds tend to congregate at the site. I did not wish to encounter any unexpectedly if I could have been warned. That’s all.

  "Star light, star bright," I addressed some nameless point of light within the darkness, "it would be nice if Berwick were right on that charmed life business. Just in case."

  *

  Rome. Memories. Stuff like that. Gone. Not really lamented. Nostalgia for youth and circumstances past. I guess. At least that is why I had made reservations at the Massimo D’Azeglio on the Via Cavour. My old favorite.

  After tipping, unpacking, bathing and changing clothes, I went to walk the ancient streets, to fill my head with happy sights and sounds and my stomach with lunch. It was a sunny though somewhat brisk day, but my clothing was warm and my shades adequate. For a time I simply wandered, up wide, tree-shaded sidewalks and down narrow streets that passed buildings both impressive and dirty. I watched the Vespas weave in and out of traffic and enjoyed the play of sunlight on yellow plaster walls. Here, pigeons bobbed at crumbs before a sidewalk café; there ropes of dark-leafed vines escaped across a garden wall. And the girls—I watched the pretty dark-haired, dark-eyed girls, heels clicking on cobbles and concrete, large breasts thrust almost arrogantly forward, and when they passed near enough I sniffed pungent perfumes and occasionally got a faint smile. I stopped in a small restaurant for soup, chicken cacciatore and some white chianti. Then I walked on, winding up finally at the National Museum, though this had not been my intention when I had begun my stroll. After a while, I lost all track of time and managed, somehow, to forget the messy situation which had brought me to Rome. I was shocked when I happened to glance at my watch and realized that I had spent over three hours in the place. I departed then, the bells of history still chiming in my head, and made my way slowly back toward the hotel. It grew chillier as the sun wandered west, over and out, but I did not mind it. I was happy to be in Rome again, no matter what the reason.

  The night was high, cool and cloudless, stars like a bucket of soapsuds splashed across the sky. Heading upward, I eventually reached the inevitable bulk of the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore. For a long while I studied it and the area about it. Turning, I regarded the direction from which I had approached. This section, the Monti area, is the oldest and largest region of Rome. It covers three of the famous seven hills—the Quirinale, the Viminala, the Calio—and in times long gone three of my dad’s old favorites had lived in the area: Ovid, Virgil, Horace. Also, one of the roughest, most corrupt quarters of the city once existed between the point where I stood and Colle Oppio. I wondered what my namesake would say were he to be released from Elysium to come stand beside me at that moment and share my thoughts. Doubtless, he would chuckle and not be surprised in the least as to my undesired undertaking. The old boy was too sophisticated not to appreciate that while a few of the props have been shuffled, human nature itself has remained unchanged throughout that series of betrayals and calamities we call history. He could appreciate the juxtaposition of genius and corruption, art and crime. Shrugging my shoulders at this profundity, I turned and made my way along the Via Cavour in the direction of my hotel. The sickle moon had risen, clear and clean, was poised before me now as in Time’s hand. If I were lucky I might be able to get in at La Carbonara for dinner. I’d call and see.

  Tomorrow the Vatican.

  *

  At ten o’clock the following morning I phoned a number I had been given. After several delays, I was connected with Monsignor Zingales, the man in charge of the investigation. His voice was pleasant, though he had a tendency to wheeze, and after I had identified myself he arranged to see me at three o’clock that afternoon. He was quite aware of who I was and why I was calling as soon as I mentioned my name
, but he did not want to discuss the case over the telephone. Bugs at the Vatican? Or at this end already? I wondered. Highly unlikely, but I appreciated his position. I thanked him and hung up.

  I stopped for a heavy brunch on my way to the Casina Borghese, where I wanted to view the Berninis once again while my mind was still reasonably uncluttered. I consider him the greatest sculptor who ever lived, and I wanted to see his Rape of Proserpine and Apollo and Daphne while I was in town, not to mention the rest of the things in that fabulous place. I was often annoyed, especially in recent days, at Carl Bernini being his namesake. Not half so much as at my own situation, though. It makes one feel inferior to wear the name of his better, especially if he has been told about it almost daily, over a period of years. There are those who create things, those who admire them and those who don’t give a damn. As my own poetry was dull and my painting, while technically accurate, mediocre—reminding me of Browning’s Andrea del Sarto: A common grayness silvers everything—I was almost driven into the last category by constant, thoughtless and doubtless well-intentioned reminders of these facts. So I became a thief of, and ultimately a pimp for, art. It was only in recent years that I realized I was a second-category man, rather than a third.

  This time I kept an eye on my watch and left after an hour and forty-five minutes, pausing only a moment to admire Canova’s reclining nude of Pauline Borghese, Napoleon’s sister, which had so offended Hitler’s delicate morals that he had ordered the figure covered. I am surprised he hadn’t reached for his gun. If I’d known his current address I’d have liked to send him a postcard. Ars est celare artem, or something like that.

  While it was warmer than the previous day and the sun still shone bold and bright, a mass of ominous clouds had appeared on the horizon. I returned to the hotel for my raincoat and umbrella, and took a cab to St. Peter’s.