Fraternity of the Stone

by David Morrell

  Drew glanced up, startled.

  "It's time to talk about Yanus."

  Drew frowned. "You said that in the chapel at the retreat house. It took me a while to figure it out. Your accent. You mean Janus?"

  "The assassin," Arlene interrupted.

  Father Stanislaw nodded. "The two-headed god. Who's supposed to be Drew."

  PART SEVEN

  JANUS

  THE SINS OF THE PRESENT

  1

  In Ancient Rome, when an imperial army marched off to war, complex rituals had to be obeyed, lest ill fortune fall upon the venture. One of the most important of these rituals required that the army pass through a ceremonial archway while the favor of the gods - and one in particular, the god of good beginnings - was invoked. There were many such archways throughout the city, and most were not connected to walls or buildings but rather stood freely, as if their lack of practical purpose would emphasize their symbolic function. Likewise, small buildings were sometimes constructed for no other purpose than to provide a suitable setting for a priest or politician to walk into and out from.

  The most respected of these buildings was a shrine to the north of the Forum. Simple, rectangular, it had double bronze doors on its east and west side, facing the rising and setting sun, as if to signify that, while the good beginning of a venture was hoped for, so too was a successful end. Like the archway through which Rome's mighty armies marched on their way to battle, this temple too was associated with war. Indeed, so frequently did the empire's generals pass into and out of the double doors facing east and west that by custom the doors were left open. Only when Rome was at peace were the doors closed, an event that happened rarely - during the first seven hundred years of the city's greatness, from the reign of Numa to that of Augustus, only three times.

  The god to whom this shrine was dedicated was not, as might be expected, Mars. Instead, the statue that priests, politicians, and generals meditated upon as they passed from one set of doors to the next was that of a greater deity, Janus, whose likeness could easily be distinguished from those of all other gods because he had two faces, one in front, the other in back, peering toward each set of doors, the east and the west, the start and the finish.

  When petitioned for success at the start of a day, he was known as Matutinus, from which comes matins, the Roman Catholic Church's word for the first canonical service of the day, just after midnight. But Janus was also petitioned at the start of each week and each month and, in particular, at the start of each year. Appropriately, the first month of the Roman calendar was named in his honor: January.

  Janus, the two-faced, staring eternally forward and backward.

  Toward the beginning. And the end.

  2

  "At the start," Father Stanislaw said, "what we had were mostly rumors. Almost a year ago."

  "We?" Drew squinted. "Who's we?" He gestured toward Father Stanislaw's ring, the magnificent ruby, the intersecting sword and cross. "The fraternity?"

  "Is it necessary to be explicit? A man with your experience... " Father Stanislaw considered him. "It shouldn't surprise you. The Church with its seven hundred million followers is virtually a nation unto itself. Indeed, in the Middle Ages it was a nation, composed of all of Europe, during the Holy Roman Empire. It needs to watch over its interests. Just as all major nations do, it needs an intelligence network."

  "Intelligence network?" Drew's voice hardened. "I'm beginning to understand."

  "At least, you think you understand. But one stage of explanation at a time. The principal sources of our intelligence are various members of an ambiguous religious order that has come into prominence since you entered the monastery. The order is known as Opus Dei, the great work of God. I describe the order as ambiguous because its members - mostly successful middle-class professionals, doctors, lawyers, business people - continue to pursue their lay vocation despite their vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. They dress according to the fashions of society, though many retreat at night to cloisters, and all bequeath their possessions to the Church. Their views are conservative. They're fiercely loyal to the Pope. Their membership in Opus Dei is kept a strict secret." "In other words, an invisible order." "Correct. The theory is that they can spread the Church's influence by using its doctrines in their daily business practice. A kind of Catholic fifth column, if you like. Imagine the effect if members of Opus Dei were elected to Congress, or if one became a member of the U.S. Supreme Court. But they aren't merely in America. Opus Dei exists in strength in over eighty countries. One hundred thousand professionals, using their ambition, striving to gain as much secular power as they can, for the sake of the Catholic Church. They are the basis for the Church's intelligence network. And it was from rumors they began to pick up that I first heard about... "

  3

  A free-lance mercenary, who as if from nowhere appeared abruptly on the European scene and was reputed to be responsible for five assassinations in rapid sequence, all involving Catholic priests. In each case, the priests - politically active, influential, and fiercely opposed to Communist factions in their country's government - had died in ways that at first seemed merely unfortunate. A car accident, for example, a heart attack, a fire.

  Widely separated, the deaths would not have attracted notice, but so many in quick succession, and most in Italy, prompted Opus Dei eyebrows to be raised. Powerful members of the order used their influence to make sure that investigations became more thorough. Soon, various factors in each death began to seem suspicious, though not conclusively incriminating. In the case of the car accident, the brakes had failed, and yet the brakes had recently been serviced. In the case of the heart attack, an autopsy on the victim revealed no weakness in his cardiovascular system. In the case of the fire, no one could recall the priest, who'd always been compulsively neat, ever allowing oily rags to accumulate in the rectory's basement.

  At the same time, in Geneva, a young woman deeply in love made a frightening discovery. The man with whom she'd been having an affair, a pleasure-giving American, had recently installed a set of bookshelves in her apartment. One of the brackets that held the shelves to the wall had pulled from the plaster, causing the shelves to lean out alarmingly. Because the boyfriend, Thomas Mclntyre, was out of the city on business (what kind of business she didn't know, something to do with imports and exports), she telephoned her brother to come to her apartment and advise her about the shelves.

  When the two of them chanced to peer behind the shelves, they noticed a hole in the wall that had not been there before. And exploring further, they discovered a cavity filled with plastic explosives, detonators, automatic weapons, ammunition, and a metal container from which they extracted the equivalent of a hundred thousand dollars in various European currencies, along with three passports for Michael McQuane, Robert Malone, and Terence Mulligan. Despite the difference in names, the photographs on each of the passports was identical. It portrayed the face of the woman's boyfriend, Thomas Mclntyre.

  After a long, intense, and violent argument, in which the woman defended her lover, threatening never to speak to her brother again if her lover wasn't given the chance to explain, the brother phoned the authorities. Three policemen arrived within the hour. They examined the objects concealed behind the bookshelves and proceeded at once to the apartment of the boyfriend, who - it turned out - had come back from his business trip early and, without informing his lover, was having a party. After the policemen knocked on the door and were with reluctance admitted by one of the guests, they faced a group of drunken revelers in the midst of which a man who resembled the photograph in the various passports agreed to answer questions in the bedroom. Once inside, however, the American pulled a pistol, shot the three policemen, and fled down a fire escape.

  One policeman lived to tell the story. Further investigation revealed that the metal container concealed in the wall behind the girlfriend's bookshelves also held a notebook in which addresses in various cities and countries turned ou
t to be those of the five priests who had died.

  4

  "Reactions so far?" Father Stanislaw asked.

  Drew thought about it, troubled. "If this Mclntyre's an assassin, he needs a few lessons in tradecraft. That rickety bookshelf. Panicking in front of the police." He shook his head. "An amateur."

  "So it seemed to me. Unless... "

  "I don't understand."

  "Unless he was putting on an act."

  "You think he wanted to expose himself?" Arlene asked, surprised.

  "But why?" Drew added.

  "To announce himself. To gain a reputation quickly," Father Stanislaw said. "And once he'd been exposed, no doubt deliberately on his part, he suddenly became professional. The authorities did everything possible but couldn't find him, and in rapid succession, three other politically active priests were killed. Then Opus Dei members themselves began to be killed. Corporation executives, publishers, but mostly politicians. And it now was clear, this Thomas Mclntyre, and his various other similar names on other bogus passports, was engaged in systematic terrorism against - "

  "- the Catholic Church." Sickened, Drew turned to Arlene. "You told me he'd been killing politicians, but you didn't tell me - "

  "- they were in Opus Dei? How could I have known?"

  "You couldn't have," Father Stanislaw said. "How could anyone outside the intelligence network of the Church have known? That's the whole point.The members of Opus Dei are a secret."

  "Not anymore," Drew said.

  "And now we come to you." Father Stanislaw sat down next to Drew. "As the authorities investigated, spurred on by powerful members of Opus Dei anxious to find the man who was stalking them, other rumors began to surface. A man with the code name Janus was buying weapons and explosives on the European black market and at the same time hiring free-lance investigators to document scandals involving the Catholic Church. These scandals ranged from mistresses whom various Church officials maintained, to homosexual affections, to rich estates that no priest, given the vow of poverty, ought to have the resources to own. Alcoholism. Drug addiction. Deadly sins. If a priest or a member of Opus Dei had a vice, Janus wanted to know about it. And be given the proof. Sometimes he merely sent the documentation, including photographs, to the newspapers. Other times, he killed the priest or the Opus Dei member and then sent the documents, apparently to justify the assassinations."

  "Janus," Drew said.

  "The connection was obvious. Thomas Mclntyre, the assassin with the same ambition? Could he be Janus? Indeed, when the authorities tracked down one of Janus's contacts and made him talk, the man identified the passport photograph of Thomas Mclntyre as his employer."

  "Identified?" Drew stiffened. "You're telling me that this Janus - this Mclntyre - actually let his contacts see him? He didn't even have the sense to use a safe phone? Something's wrong. The tradecraft's so clumsy it almost seems... "

  "Intentional?" Father Stanislaw asked. "Almost as if he wants to be caught? Indeed. The same pattern. And yet, despite the efforts of the most powerful members of Opus Dei, and their considerable influence on Interpol and MI-6, no one's been able to find him."

  "But you thought I was Janus," Drew told Arlene. "Or at least you did till I made you give me the benefit of the doubt. Why were you tempted to make the connection in the first place?"

  "Because of the photograph in all those passports," Father Stanislaw answered for her. "It took some time, but finally the American authorities managed to find the same face in its files. Part of the difficulty was that your own legal passport had now expired. But as they searched their previous records... Younger. Thinner, though not as thin as you are now. Nonetheless an obvious likeness. Andrew MacLane. The similarity of your last name with Janus's many last names attracted immediate attention. Mclntyre, McQuane, Malone, Mulligan. Granted, an odd blend of Irish and Scot. But nonetheless the parallel could not be ignored. Janus, the authorities decided, had to be you.

  "Your choice of code name seemed puzzling for a time. But intelligence officials soon understood. You'd worked for a now defunct American anti-terrorist network, though what you did for that network was naturally never revealed. In seventy-nine, you'd sold out to Iran. You'd dropped out of sight for several years, but now you were back, ignoring your former loyalties, working for whoever paid you the most. Janus. The code name then seemed perfectly apt. The Roman god who stared forward and backward."

  "Janus, the two-faced," Drew said bitterly.

  "When the story went public," Arlene said, "Jake and I were stunned. How could you be an assassin attacking the Catholic Church? It didn't make sense. But the proof was overwhelming. Jake got more and more upset. He began to act strangely. And disappeared." She clenched her fists. "Why didn't he tell me what was going on?"

  "He couldn't," Drew said. "Not until he was sure it was me. After all, Jake knew I was supposed to be dead. He was the man who claimed to have killed me, and Scalpel had accepted his proof. But as far as Jake could tell, I was in a Carthusian monastery up in Vermont. So how could I be killing priests and politicians in Europe?"

  "Unless you'd left the monastery," Father Stanislaw said. "Unless you'd simply used him. So you think he went to the monastery to find out?"

  "I never saw him there. But my guess is he didn't."

  "What then?"

  "Let me put it this way. Whoever Janus is, he's taken a lot of effort to make the authorities think - "

  " -that he and you are the same," Arlene completed his thought.

  Drew struggled to concentrate. "Why would he do that? Why would he be so determined to blame the killings on me? If the authorities found me, I could prove that I hadn't done them."

  "True," Father Stanislaw said. "If you were in a monastery, your alibi would be perfect."

  Drew's scalp tingled. "But Janus couldn't have known I was in that monastery. And yet he was sure I'd never be able to prove I wasn't Janus. Why?"

  Arlene spoke, her voice somber. "He thought you were dead."

  The three of them stared at each other.

  "If the authorities were hunting a dead man, Janus wouldn't have to worry. I'd be a perfect distraction for them. While they went after a ghost, he could..."

  "Be invisible and do what he wanted." Arlene stood, distressed. "Then did Jake investigate his former superiors in Scalpel?" Her voice shook. "Because he believed that one of them was using the fact that you were dead -or supposed to be dead - as a cover for Janus?"

  Drew nodded.

  "And whoever invented Janus found out what Jake was doing?" She shuddered. "I hate to think it, let alone say it. Did someone kill Jake to prevent him from finding out who was masquerading as you?"

  "Arlene, we don't know that."

  "But is that what you suspect?"

  Drew looked at her with pain. "I'm sorry."

  Her face went pale. Her eyes became frightening. "Whoever did it will be even sorrier."

  "But the sequence didn't stop there. Whoever invented Janus must have forced Jake to admit why he was investigating them," Drew said. "If they found out I was still alive, in the monastery, they'd have had to kill me as well. To protect their cover for Janus. And that presented a problem. Because the Carthusian monks are anonymous, the entire monastery had to be taken out to make sure I was really dead this time. And then, I assume, my body would have disappeared."

  Father Stanislaw's mouth tightened. "And the Church, when it investigated, would have wondered why. Which brings us back to the concern you expressed to the bishop. No one could know that the Church inadvertently was sheltering an assassin, albeit one whose motives could be justified. The controversy would have been intolerable, undermining the authority of the Church."

  Drew's voice was guttural with rage. "Like a spiderweb. Everything interconnected. Janus must have found it amusing. Thinking I was dead, he used me as an alias to attack the Church. Then, realizing I was alive, he decided he could kill me without the authorities ever finding out. Because the Church, to prote
ct itself, would have to cover up the mass murder. The Church in effect would be helping him. Clever to the point of genius. And if I have my way, I'll see that he suffers in a clever part of Hell.

  "My double," Drew suddenly added. The rush of understanding made him shiver.

  Father Stanislaw squinted, rubbing the sword and cross on his gleaming ring. "So he occurred to you as well?"

  Arlene nodded forcibly. "When you mentioned him earlier, I started to wonder."

  Drew shivered again.

  A turncoat assassin... assuming Drew's identity, resembling Drew's passport photograph, sufficiently similar to convince those who met him that he was Drew.

  "Dear God," Drew said. "It sounds like the double I used when I was in Scalpel. My alibi when I went on a mission. They disbanded Scalpel. But they must have contacted some of its former members and created another network like it. Under another name, Scalpel still exists!"