Feeling uncomfortable about leaving someone alone for so long in the early hours of the morning, the Swiss Guard decided to go back and check on the man. As he entered the chapel, the guard heard a moan. He ran his flashlight around and spotted MacLeod on his back in the middle of the marble floor, clutching his abdomen. A swath of blood was on the floor next to him.
Next to the blood, a note.
While the sounds of the hospital rattled behind her, Rossi bent over a small table jammed into a corner of the hallway and tried to decipher the message. Exhausted, she was operating on fumes. She’d been jarred from a dead sleep with a shocking call from the cardinal: MacLeod was being carted away in an ambulance. He’d been found bleeding and unconscious on the floor of the Sistine Chapel, the victim of a stabbing attack. A ciphered note had been dropped next to him. Nothing else had been found. No knife or other weapon. No report of unauthorized people spotted in or around the chapel.
Nardini had some suits drive Rossi and Khoury to Agostino Gemelli University Polyclinic. A couple of miles north of the Vatican, the large university teaching hospital was famous for having treated Pope John Paul II after he was shot. The drivers accompanied her and the priest up to the ninth floor, where more suits were already guarding the patient. They reminded her of Secret Service guys. They were about as talkative as Secret Service men, too.
On the other end of the spectrum, the priest wouldn’t shut up. Khoury was pacing and yapping directly behind her as she worked, and she was ready to smack him.
“What was he doing there in the middle of the night, alone? Who would have attacked him? Why?”
She spoke distractedly while she scribbled on a legal pad. “My guess: This opposition group or whatever you want to call it. They’re trying to slow us down.”
“Are we next?”
“Hope not.”
“How did they get inside the chapel? It’s supposed to be secure. Vatican City is supposed to be secure.”
“Those are all questions we could be asking the cardinal, if he were here.”
“I’m sure his Eminence will...”
“Ryan, if you’ll let me have a minute of blessed silence.” She scribbled over some letters and tried it again. She was sure she was dealing with another coded message using the simple Caesar Shift. Again, this wasn’t about hiding information as much as it was about intimidation.
Khoury stopped moving and stood directly behind her. “Well?”
“Space,” she said.
“Have you cracked it?”
She sat straight and tapped the eraser end of the pencil on the paper. “How’s your Latin these days?”
“Please.”
She moved to one side so he could see what she’d written:
Respice faciem Christi tui.
“Look upon the face of Thy Christ,” he said without hesitation.
“That’s what I thought it said. Explain.”
“Veronica wiped the face of Jesus while he was carrying the cross, and Christ’s image remained on the fabric,” said Khoury. “It is called the Veil of Veronica. In Latin, Sudarium.”
She remembered the angels on the bridge: One carried a cloth. Should she go back there? Her gut told her to stay and talk to MacLeod as soon as he was able to speak.
“Look upon the face of Thy Christ,” she repeated. “Look, look, look.”
“Yes?”
“I wonder if our friend looked at something key before he was attacked.”
“Something in the chapel, obviously. But what?”
“I have no idea.” She ran a hand through her hair and continued to stare at the decrypted words. “I don’t know...maybe I’m off base. Maybe...I don’t know...I can’t think straight.”
“What’s wrong?”
She swiveled around in the chair to face him. “I’m so tired.”
“Go back to the Vatican. I can stay here and wait for him to wake up.” Khoury folded his arms in front of him and grinned. “Besides, I’m his favorite.”
She rolled her neck. “Thanks for the offer, but I want to be here when the big fella comes to, screaming bloody murder - or whatever it is they scream in Edinburgh.”
“The murder of your contact, now this...”
Rossi saw a nurse and motioned her over. “Per favore, un dottore?”
A few minutes later, a doctor approached them.
“E grave?” she asked, inquiring about the seriousness of MacLeod’s condition.
In response, the doctor started speaking Italian a mile a minute.
“Parli lentamente, parli lentamente,” she pleaded, asking him to speak slowly. “Non capisco. I don’t understand. My Italian isn’t that good.”
“I can translate,” Khoury offered.
“No, no,” said the doctor, a portly man with wire-rimmed glasses and gray salting his black hair. “I can explain the situation in English. Signore MacLeod has lost some blood, but the cut was not deep and the weapon did not damage the organs. He is a big, healthy man. He will make a quick recovery.”
“Thank the Lord,” said Khoury.
“Is Patrick conscious?” asked Rossi, getting up from the chair. “Can we talk to him?”
“Later,” said the doctor. “He needs his rest.”
“This afternoon?” she asked hopefully.
“Maybe,” said the doctor. “We’ll see how he’s doing.”
“Did he regain consciousness at all?” she asked. “Did he say anything?”
“Nonsense,” said the doctor. “He talked nonsense. Bizzarro. Bizarre stuff.”
“What sorts of stuff?” asked Rossi.
“His accent...he is a little hard to understand,” said the doctor. “And injured people, they don’t always makes sense. They get...what’s the word? Hysterical.”
“What do you think he said?” asked Khoury.
“First, he asked for liquor. Absinthe.”
Rossi stifled a smile. “What else?” she asked.
“Numbers. He said random numbers. Part of a phone number, perhaps. Three or four digits.”
Rossi wondered if the numbers were a reference to the digits MacLeod had scribbled on the board. “Do you remember the numbers?”
“No. What does it matter?”
“Is there anything else?” asked Khoury. “Did he say anything else, whether it made sense to you or not?”
The doctor hesitated.
“Please,” Rossi said.
“The devil attacked him.” The doctor pushed his glasses tight against his face. “See? Ridiculous.”
Rossi and Khoury exchanged worried expressions. They’d become caretakers of the ridiculous. “Grazie,” said Khoury.
“Grazie,” echoed Rossi.
“Prego.” The doctor turned around and went back behind some doors.
“Crap,” said Rossi.
“Yes,” agreed Khoury.
Rossi snapped the latex gloves over her fingers and slipped the note back inside the evidence bag. Took off the gloves and stuffed them in her pocket. Tucked the bag and the legal pad under her arm. “Let’s go check out the scene of the bizzarro crime.”
“Maybe the devil left some prints,” said Khoury.
“That isn’t even funny,” she said, and headed for the elevators.
“I wasn’t joking,” he said grimly, and followed her.
On their way to the Vatican – the same pair of the suits drove them – they took a detour to the Ponte Sant’ Angelo neighborhood, parking a few streets away from the pedestrian bridge itself. As during her previous nighttime visit to the bridge, they were on the west end. Before Rossi got out of the car, she took out her gun and checked it. Khoury, sitting next to her in the back seat of the sedan, stared with wide eyes. “Is that necessary?”
“Better safe,” she said, and snapped the gun back into the holster tucked into her slacks.
“I’m going with you.”
“The hell you are,” she said, putting her hand on the car door.
“The...hell...I’m not
,” he shot back. “You’re not going there alone.”
The two suits in the front seat turned around and pulled back their jackets to show the guns in their shoulder holsters. Rossi didn’t mind having more firepower. She told the pair that once the three of them got to the bridge, she would make her way to the angel carrying the veil while they hunkered down at the end and watched her back. “Got it?” she asked.
“Got it,” they said in unison. It was the most they’d said all night.
All three opened their doors and got out. Rossi ducked her head back inside. “Nothing is going to happen, Ryan.”
“I should...”
“You should stay here,” she said, and closed the door.
Rossi ran with her escorts, none of them speaking. Except for the distant whine of a motor scooter, the streets were quiet. A nighttime dampness hung in the air, giving her a slight chill. Or was that nerves?
When the trio reached the west end of the span, the suits split up, each taking one side of the bridge. While they hid next to some columns, she took out her gun and continued jogging onto Ponte Sant’ Angelo. The lamps lining the bridge added an ethereal shine to the scene, lighting up the angels themselves as well as the cobblestone surface of the street. As she approached the angel carrying the cloth, she didn’t see anyone else on the span. The statue itself seemed untouched. The angel held a corner of the veil in each hand, spreading the cloth out and examining its folds with sadness and reverence. The inscription at the base:
Respice faciem Christi tui.
Her eyes followed the gaze of the angel, beyond the veil and down to the base. Rossi noticed something crammed into the grate of the bridge railing, to the left of the statue. Even in the light of day, it would have been easy to miss.
She ran her eyes up and down the span to check again for pedestrians. Still deserted. Good. She holstered her gun and pulled on the gloves. It could be garbage, or evidence. She crouched down, reached for the object and carefully extracted it from between the grates.
“Sick,” she muttered.
Rossi waved the two suits over, and both stared at the red mask. One asked if they should call for additional men, and she said it wouldn’t be necessary. The three of them walked around the bridge, searching for other clues. Rossi knew they’d find nothing else; this was the single object they were meant to find.
When the three of them returned to the car, she popped open the back passenger door and showed Khoury the mask.
“Patrick’s devil,” said the priest.
She kept the mask on her lap. The cardinal would need to see it. Beyond that, she had no idea who would or should process the object. The bureau? The Italian cops? Did it matter if they found DNA or prints on the thing? The Vatican was aware of the opposing forces, and apparently didn’t want to fight them – at least not out in the open.
Rossi and Khoury found Nardini in the chapel, supervising cleanup of the marble floor. Her eyes went from the men working on the ground to the ceiling overhead. The sun was up and as the cardinal had predicted, the newest ghosts had faded. Still, she could see that when he was attacked, MacLeod had been standing directly under the shadow hands.
“What was he doing here?” she wondered out loud.
“That is a question only he can answer,” said the cardinal.
“What do you people have for security cameras?” she asked. “Aren’t there tapes?”
Rather than answer, Nardini pointed to a spot on the floor and told the workmen, “Macchia di sangue.” Bloodstain.
She was aggravated that he hadn’t asked about MacLeod’s condition, and that he’d had the crime scene mopped up so quickly. “This is evidence,” she said, motioning toward the circle of men kneeling on the floor.
“Si, si,” Nardini said impatiently. “Vatican police have been here.”
“Do they have a crime scene crew? Forensics should...”
“What good are tests? We know who did it and why.”
“So they get away with it – again,” she said.
“There are bigger issues at work here,” said the cardinal. “Your work must remain confidential.”
“Eminence,” said Khoury, an edge of anger in his voice. “We’ve just begun, and already one of us is in the hospital.”
“He is receiving the best medical care in the world.”
“How did his attacker get past Vatican security?” asked Rossi.
“I do not know,” Nardini said. “We are meeting today to review our...”
“Could be it was an inside job,” she interrupted.
“Impossible!” said the cardinal. “Ridiculous!”
“There’s a lot about this I find ridiculous.” She held up the mask. “The person who attacked him was wearing this.”
Nardini: “Diavolo.”
“What do you know about it?”
“Venice is well-known for its carnival masks. The shops are on every street.”
“If we can trace the maker, we might be able to...”
“No,” he said, cutting her off.
She held up the note. “He left a ciphered message. He knows what I do. We need to know...”
“You are wasting time.”
“These extremists must be stopped,” said Khoury. “They must be identified and prosecuted.”
Rossi noticed her partner had dropped the Eminence bit, and she approved. “Father Ryan’s right,” she chimed in. “They can’t keep doing what they want.”
“Otherwise, what’s next?” continued the priest. “More murders? Bombings?”
“Where are the files on this group?” Rossi asked.
“I will have them delivered to you, but you shouldn’t waste your time with them.” Nardini pointed to the ceiling. “While we talk, it fades. While we talk, a miracle is unfolding in another part of the world.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
In another part of the world, Trey Petit was folded in half.
A burning pain coursed not just through his maimed hand, but also up and down his entire body. He’d been shocked once while working on some wiring at the convent, and he’d almost cried from the pain. This was such an intense and continuous jolt of electricity, he wondered if he would burst into flames. Petit couldn’t uncoil his tortured figure to hobble out the bedroom door and get help. When he tried to holler, all that escaped from his mouth was a whimper. He couldn’t muster enough movement to kick off his sheets, wet with sweat and urine.
Twenty-four hours earlier - after the late night emergency room visit and drive back to the convent - the nuns had wrapped his stumps and sent him to bed. Mother Magdalen had popped her head in a couple of times during the day to see if he wanted to eat, and he’d asked her to leave him alone. After dinner, Sister Jane had come around with a tray of food, and he’d turned her away. When Sister Prune made an appearance at bedtime, he’d yelled at her. Told her to tell everyone to stop bothering him. Let him sleep. Where were they all now, when he really needed them?
He was going to die in the middle of the night in the basement of a convent. They’d bury him in that cemetery plot behind the house, alongside sisters who’d outlived him by sixty years. From his miserable childhood to the loss of his fingers to his dependence on a pack of nuns, nothing in his life had been normal or fair. It figured that his death would be unfair. Senseless.
“God,” he rasped in the darkness. “Help me.”
With his plea, the pain increased, as if a sadistic torturer turned up the voltage on a battery. In an action that was more reflexive than conscious, his body curled into a tighter ball. A warm saltiness rushed into his mouth; he’d bit his tongue. Petit nearly gagged as he swallowed his own blood. Closing his eyes tight, he prayed a silent petition: Kill me quick, Lord.
Again, the torturer cranked up the voltage. After emitting a bestial grunt, Petit convulsed and passed out.
With the rhythm of a heartbeat, the wrap around his left hand pulsed and moved. Something tore through the bandage and grew. Stretched and flexed. A p
ale sprout stretching to the heavens, searching for light and warmth in the cool darkness. Two other shoots followed, one breaking through after the other.
Wrinkling his nose from the stink of his own perspiration and urine, Trey Petit woke the next morning. He’d passed out facing the wall to which he’d taped up Baab’s artwork. To his sleepy eyes, it was a sloppy smear of colors. Rubbing his crusty lids with the palm of his right hand, the drawing came into focus. Two giant hands attached to a skinny little janitor dude. The thing was growing on him, and he smiled.
The pain was finally gone. Had he dreamt the whole thing? No. The worst nightmare wouldn’t have caused him to empty his bladder in bed. He shifted his body to a dry spot on the mattress. Petit didn’t want the nuns to know he’d pissed on his sheets. He could beat them to the laundry room and do his own washing.
He flopped onto his back, yelped with surprise and sat up.
Every nun in the convent was in his room, and they were all on their knees, with rosaries in their hands.
Kneeling by the side of his bed, hands folded on the edge of his mattress and a rosary wrapped around her fingers, was Mother Magdalen. That strange expression on her face. Surprise? Shock? Either possibility alarmed him, and he pulled the covers up to his armpits. “Did I almost die?” he asked her. “Am I dead?”
Rather than answer, she dropped her eyes and tipped her head down. The beads clicked in her fingers.
He looked out over the veiled heads and asked the room, “What’s going on? Someone tell me! What the hell is this?”
The abbess made the Sign of the Cross and got on her feet. “When Sister Jane checked on you early this morning, she saw it on top of the covers.”
His right fist curled over the edge of the bedspread. Mother Magdalen sounded excited and happy, and that rattled him more than the strange expression on her face. “Saw what? What’d she see?”
“A miracle.” The abbess reached over and picked a damp strand from his forehead.
He brought his left hand up from under the covers and fended her off. “You’re scaring the crap...”
The Devil's Own Crayons Page 11