Conclave

by Robert Harris

  ‘She dropped a bottle of wine, I think.’

  Whatever it was, the incident seemed to be over. The cardinals who had stood resumed their seats. The drone of conversation slowly started up again. Lomeli turned back to the counter to collect his food. Holding his tray, he looked around for a place where he could sit. A nun came out of the kitchen carrying a bucket and a mop and went towards the Africans’ table, at which point Lomeli noticed that Adeyemi was no longer there. In a moment of terrible clarity, he knew what must have happened. But still – how he reproached himself for this afterwards! – still his instinct was to ignore it. The discretion and self-discipline of a lifetime guided his feet towards the nearest empty chair, and then commanded his body to sit, his mouth to smile a greeting at his neighbours, his hands to unfold a napkin, while in his ears all he could hear was a noise like a waterfall.

  So it was that the Archbishop of Bordeaux, Courtemarche – who had questioned the historical evidence for the Holocaust, and whom Lomeli had always shunned – suddenly found himself sitting next to the Dean of the College. Mistaking it for an official overture, he began to make a plea on behalf of the Society of St Pius X. Lomeli listened without hearing. A nun, her gaze modestly averted, came and stood at his shoulder to offer him wine. He looked up to refuse, and for a fraction of a second she looked back at him – a terrible, accusing look: it made his mouth go dry.

  ‘. . . the Immaculate Heart of Mary . . .’ Courtemarche was saying, ‘. . . the intention of heaven declared at Fatima . . .’

  Behind the nun, three of the African archbishops who had been sitting with Adeyemi – Nakitanda, Mwangale and Zucula – were approaching Lomeli’s table. The youngest, Nakitanda of Kampala, seemed to be their spokesman. ‘Could we request a word with you, Dean?’

  ‘Of course.’ He nodded to Courtemarche. ‘Excuse me.’

  He followed the trio into a corner of the lobby. ‘What just happened?’ he asked.

  Zucula shook his head mournfully. ‘Our brother is troubled.’

  Nakitanda said, ‘One of the nuns serving our table started talking to Joshua. He tried to ignore her at first. She dropped the tray and shouted something. He got up and left.’

  ‘What did she say?’

  ‘We don’t know, unfortunately. She was speaking in a Nigerian dialect.’

  ‘Yoruba,’ Mwangale said. ‘It was Yoruba. Adeyemi’s dialect.’

  ‘And where is Cardinal Adeyemi now?’

  ‘We don’t know, Dean,’ said Nakitanda, ‘but clearly something is wrong and he has to tell us what it is. And we need to hear from the sister before we go back to the Sistine to vote. What exactly is her complaint against him?’

  Zucula seized Lomeli’s arm. For such a seemingly frail man, his grip was fierce. ‘We have waited a long time for an African Pope, Jacopo, and if God wills it to be Joshua, I am happy. But he must be pure in heart and conscience – a truly holy man. Anything short of that would be a disaster for all of us.’

  ‘I understand. Let me see what I can do.’ Lomeli looked at his watch. It was three minutes past one.

  To reach the kitchen from the lobby, Lomeli had to walk all the way across the dining room. The cardinals had been observing his conversation with the Africans, and he was conscious of his progress being followed by dozens of pairs of eyes – of men leaning across to whisper to one another, of forks poised in mid-air. He pushed open the door. It was many years since he had been inside a kitchen, and never one as busy as this. He looked around in bewilderment at the nuns who were preparing the food. The sisters closest to him bowed their heads.

  ‘Your Eminence . . .’

  ‘Your Eminence . . .’

  ‘Bless you, my children. Tell me, where is the sister who had the accident just now?’

  An Italian nun said, ‘She is with Sister Agnes, Your Eminence.’

  ‘Would you be kind enough to take me to her?’

  ‘Of course, Eminence. Please.’ She indicated the door that led back out to the dining room.

  Lomeli shied away from it. ‘Is there a rear exit we can take?’

  ‘Yes, Eminence.’

  ‘Show me, child.’

  He followed her through a storeroom and into a service passage.

  ‘What is the name of the sister, do you know?’

  ‘No, Eminence. She is new.’

  The nun knocked timidly on the glass door of an office. Lomeli recognised it as the place where he had first met Benítez, only now the blinds had been lowered for privacy and it was impossible to see inside. After a few moments he knocked himself, more loudly. He heard the sound of someone moving, and then the door was opened a crack by Sister Agnes.

  ‘Your Eminence?’

  ‘Good afternoon, Sister. I need to speak with the nun who dropped her tray just now.’

  ‘She is safe with me, Your Eminence. I am dealing with the situation.’

  ‘I am sure you are, Sister Agnes. But I must see her myself.’

  ‘I hardly think a dropped tray should concern the Dean of the College of Cardinals.’

  ‘Even so. If I may?’ He gripped the door handle.

  ‘It’s really nothing I can’t deal with . . .’

  He pushed gently at the door, and after one last attempt at resistance, she yielded.

  The nun was sitting on the same chair Benítez had occupied, next to the photocopier. She stood as he entered. He had an impression of a woman of about fifty – short, plump, bespectacled, timid: identical to the others. But it was always so hard to see beyond the uniform and the headdress to the person, especially when that person was staring at the floor.

  ‘Sit down, child,’ he said gently. ‘My name is Cardinal Lomeli. We’re all worried about you. How are you feeling?’

  Sister Agnes said, ‘She’s feeling much better, Eminence.’

  ‘Could you tell me your name?’

  ‘Her name is Shanumi. She can’t understand a word you’re saying – she doesn’t speak any Italian, poor creature.’

  ‘English?’ he asked the nun. ‘Do you speak English?’ She nodded. She still hadn’t looked at him. ‘Good. So do I. I lived in the United States for some years. Please, do sit down.’

  ‘Eminence, I really do think it would be better if I—’

  Without turning to look at her, Lomeli said firmly, ‘Would you be so good as to leave us now, Sister Agnes?’ And only when she dared to protest again did he at last swing round and give her a look of such freezing authority that even she, before whom three Popes and at least one African warlord had quailed, bowed her head and backed out of the room, closing the door behind her.

  Lomeli drew up a chair and sat opposite the nun, so close to her that their knees were almost touching. Such intimacy was hard for him. O God, he prayed, give me the strength and the wisdom to help this poor woman and to find out what I need to know, so that I may fulfil my duty to You. He said, ‘Sister Shanumi, I want you to understand, first of all, that you’re not in any sort of trouble. The fact of the matter is, I have a responsibility before God and to the Mother Church, which we both of us try to serve as best we are able, to make sure that the decisions we take here are the right ones. Now, it’s important that you tell me anything that is in your heart and that is troubling you in so far as it relates to Cardinal Adeyemi. Can you do that for me?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Even if I give you my absolute assurance it will go no further than this room?’

  A pause, followed by another shake of the head.

  It was then that he had an inspiration. Afterwards he would always believe that God had come to his aid. ‘Would you like me to hear your confession?’

  11

  The Fourth Ballot

  ROUGHLY AN HOUR later, and only twenty minutes before the minibuses were due to leave for the Sistine for the start of the fourth ballot, Lomeli went in search of Adeyemi. He checked in all parts of the lobby first, and then in the chapel. Half a dozen cardinals were on their knees with their backs to
him. He hurried up to the altar to get a look at their faces. None was the Nigerian’s. He left, took the elevator to the second floor and strode quickly down the corridor to the room next to his.

  He knocked loudly. ‘Joshua? Joshua? It’s Lomeli!’ He knocked again. He was about to give up, but then he heard footsteps and the door was opened.

  Adeyemi, still in full choir dress, was drying his face with a towel. He said, ‘I shall be ready in a moment, Dean.’

  He left the door open and disappeared into the bathroom; after a brief hesitation, Lomeli stepped over the threshold and closed the door after him. The shuttered room smelled strongly of the cardinal’s aftershave. On the desk was a framed black-and-white picture of Adeyemi as a young seminarian, standing outside a Catholic mission with a proud-looking older woman wearing a hat – his mother, presumably, or perhaps an aunt. The bed was rumpled, as if the cardinal had been lying on it. There was the sound of a lavatory flushing, and Adeyemi emerged, buttoning the lower part of his cassock. He acted as if he was surprised that Lomeli was in the room rather than the corridor. ‘Shouldn’t we be leaving?’

  ‘In a moment.’

  ‘That sounds ominous.’ Adeyemi bent to look in the mirror. He planted his zuchetta firmly on his head and adjusted it so that it was straight. ‘If this is about the incident downstairs, I have no desire to talk about it.’ He flicked invisible dust from the shoulders of his mozzetta. He jutted out his chin. He adjusted his pectoral cross. Lomeli maintained his silence, watching him. Finally Adeyemi said quietly, ‘I am the victim of a disgraceful plot to ruin my reputation, Jacopo. Someone brought that woman here and staged this entire melodrama solely to prevent my election as Pope. How did she come to be in the Casa Santa Marta in the first place? She’d never left Nigeria before.’

  ‘With respect, Joshua, the issue of how she came to be here is secondary to the issue of your relationship with her.’

  Adeyemi threw up his arms in exasperation. ‘But I have no relationship with her! I hadn’t set eyes on her for thirty years – not until last night, when she turned up outside my room! I didn’t even recognise her. Surely you can see what’s happening here?’

  ‘The circumstances are curious, I grant you, but let’s put that aside for now. It’s the condition of your soul that concerns me more.’

  ‘My soul?’ Adeyemi spun on the ball of his foot. He brought his face up very close to Lomeli’s. His breath was sweet-smelling. ‘My soul is full of love for God and His Church. I sensed the presence of the Holy Spirit this morning – you must have felt it too – and I am ready to take on this burden. Does a single lapse thirty years ago disqualify me? Or does it make me stronger? Allow me to quote your own homily from yesterday: “Let God grant us a Pope who sins, and asks forgiveness, and carries on.” ’

  ‘And have you asked forgiveness? Have you confessed your sin?’

  ‘Yes! Yes, I confessed my sin at the time, and my bishop moved me to a different parish, and I never lapsed again. Such relationships were not uncommon in those days. Celibacy has always been culturally alien in Africa – you know that.’

  ‘And the child?’

  ‘The child?’ Adeyemi flinched, faltered. ‘The child was brought up in a Christian household, and to this day he has no idea who his father is – if indeed it is me. That is the child.’

  He recovered his equilibrium sufficiently to glare at Lomeli, and for one moment longer the edifice remained in place – defiant, wounded, magnificent: he would have made a tremendous figurehead for the Church, Lomeli thought. Then something seemed to give way and he sat down abruptly on the edge of his bed and clasped his hands on the top of his head. He reminded Lomeli of a photograph he had once seen of a prisoner poised on the edge of a pit waiting his turn to be shot.

  *

  What an appalling mess it all was! Lomeli could not recall a more exquisitely painful hour in his life than the one he had just spent listening to the confession of Sister Shanumi. By her account, she had not even been a novitiate when the thing began but a mere postulant, a child, whereas Adeyemi had been the community’s priest. If it had not been statutory rape, it had not been far off it. What sin therefore did she have to confess? Where was her guilt? And yet carrying the burden of it had been the ruin of her life. Worst of all for Lomeli had been the moment when she had produced the photograph, folded up to the size of a postage stamp. It showed a boy of six or seven in a sleeveless Aertex shirt, grinning at the camera: a good Catholic school photograph, with a crucifix on the wall behind him. The creases where she had folded and refolded it over the past quarter-century had cracked the glossy surface so deeply it looked as if he were staring out from behind a latticework of bars.

  The Church had arranged the adoption. After the birth she had wanted nothing from Adeyemi except some sort of acknowledgement of what had happened, but he had been transferred to a parish in Lagos and her letters had all been returned unopened. Seeing him in the Casa Santa Marta, she had not been able to help herself. That was why she had visited him in his room. He had told her they must forget about the whole thing. And when he had refused in the dining room even to look at her, and when one of the other sisters had whispered that he was about to be elected Pope, she had been unable to control herself any longer. She was guilty of so many sins, she insisted, she barely knew where to begin – lust, anger, pride, deceit.

  She had sunk to her knees and made the Act of Contrition: ‘O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended You, and I detest all my sins, because I dread the loss of heaven and the pains of hell. But most of all because I have offended You, my God, who are all good and deserving of all my love. I firmly resolve, with the help of Your grace, to confess my sins, to do penance and to amend my life. Amen.’

  Lomeli had raised her to her feet and absolved her. ‘It is not you who has sinned, my child, it is the Church.’ He made the sign of the cross. ‘Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good.’

  ‘For His mercy endures forever.’

  *

  After a while, Adeyemi said in a low voice, ‘We were both very young.’

  ‘No, Your Eminence, she was young; you were thirty.’

  ‘You want to destroy my reputation so that you can be Pope!’

  ‘Don’t be absurd. Even the thought of it is unworthy of you.’

  Adeyemi’s shoulders had begun to shake with sobs. Lomeli sat down on the bed next to him. ‘Compose yourself, Joshua,’ he said kindly. ‘The only reason I know any of this is because I heard the poor woman’s confession, and she won’t ever speak of it in public, I’m sure, if only to protect the boy. As for me, I’m bound by the vows of the confessional never to repeat what I’ve heard.’

  Adeyemi gave him a sideways look. His eyes were glistening. Even now, he could not quite accept his dream was over. ‘Are you saying I still have a hope?’

  ‘No, none whatever.’ Lomeli was appalled. He managed to control himself and went on in a more reasonable tone, ‘After such a public scene, I’m afraid there are bound to be rumours. You know what the Curia is like.’

  ‘Yes, but rumours are not the same as facts.’

  ‘In this case they are. You know as well as I do that if there is one thing that terrifies our colleagues above all others, it is the thought of yet more sexual scandals.’

  ‘So that is it? I can never be Pope?’

  ‘Your Eminence, you cannot be anything.’

  Adeyemi seemed unable to raise his gaze from the floor. ‘What shall I do, Jacopo?’

  ‘You are a good man. You will find some way to atone. God will know if you are truly penitent, and He will decide what is to happen to you.’

  ‘And the Conclave?’

  ‘Leave them to me.’

  They sat without speaking. Lomeli could not bear to imagine his agony. God forgive me for what I have had to do. Eventually Adeyemi said, ‘Would you pray with me for a moment?’

  ‘Of course.’

  And so the two men got down on their knees under the electri
c light in the sealed room that was sweet with the scent of aftershave – got down easily in Adeyemi’s case, stiffly in Lomeli’s – and prayed together side by side.

  *

  Lomeli would have liked to have walked to the Sistine again – to have inhaled some cool fresh air and turned his face to the mild November sun. But it was too late for that. By the time he reached the lobby, the cardinals were already boarding the minibuses, and Nakitanda was waiting for him by the reception desk.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘He will have to resign all his offices.’

  Nakitanda’s head dropped in dismay. ‘Oh no!’

  ‘Not immediately – I hope we may avoid a humiliation – but certainly in a year or so. I’ll leave it up to you to decide what you tell the others. I have spoken to both parties and I am bound by vows. I cannot say any more.’

  On the minibus he sat at the very back with his eyes closed, his biretta on the seat next to him to discourage company. Every part of this business sickened him, but one aspect in particular had started to niggle away in his mind. It was the first thing Adeyemi had brought up: the timing. According to Sister Shanumi, her work in Nigeria for the past twenty years had been at the Iwaro Oko community in Ondo province, helping women suffering from HIV/AIDs.

  ‘Were you happy there?’

  ‘Very much so, Your Eminence.’

  ‘Your work must have been somewhat different from what you have to do here, I would imagine?’

  ‘Oh yes. There I was a nurse. Here I am a maid.’

  ‘So what made you want to come to Rome?’

  ‘I never wanted to come to Rome!’

  Quite how she had ended up in the Casa Santa Marta was still a mystery to her. One day in September she had been called in to see the sister in charge of their community and informed that an email had been received from the office of the Superioress General in Paris, requesting her immediate transfer to the order’s mission in Rome. There had been great excitement among the other sisters at such an honour. Some even believed that the Holy Father himself must be responsible for the invitation.