Eminence
by
Morris West


Morris West has lived in Rome and has friends and acquaintances in the
Vatican.  His plot, as always in his works, is based on thorough
research.  It is possible indeed quite probable that this book, too,
may be prophetic.

Fiction

Also by Morris West

Fiction

MOON IN MY POCKET GALLOWS ON THE SAND

KUNDU

CHILDREN OF THE SUN

THE BIG STORY

THE CONCUBINE

THE SECOND VICTORY

THE DEVIL'S ADVOCATE

THE NAKED COUNTRY

DAUGHTER OF SILENCE

THE SHOES OF THE FISHERMAN

THE AMBASSADOR THE TOWER OF BABEL

SCANDAL IN THE ASSEMBLY (with R. Francis)

THE HERETIC A play in three acts

SUMMER OF THE RED WOLF THE SALAMANDER

HARLEQUIN THE NAVIGATOR

PROTEUS

THE CLOWNS OF GOD THE WORLD IS MADE OF GLASS

CASSIDY MASTER CLASS

LAZARUS THE RINGMASTER

THE LOVERS VANISHING POINT

IMAGES AND INSCRIPTIONS An antholgy

Non Fiction A VIEW FROM THE RIDGE

Morris West EMINENCE

THE HARVILL PRESS LONDON

First published in Great Britain in 1998 by

The Harvill Press

2 Aztec Row

Berners Road

London Nl OPW

www.harvill-press.  com

Copyright Melaleuka East Investments Pty Ltd, 1998

Morris West asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of
this work

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British
Library

ISBN 1 86046 527 7 (hbk) ISBN 1 86046 528 5 (pbk)

Designed and typeset in Galliard at Libanus Press, Marlborough,
Wiltshire

Printed and bound in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner Ltd at Selwood
Printing, Burgess Hill

CONDITIONS OF SALE

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of
the publisher

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of
trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated
without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover
other than that in which it is published and without a similar
condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent
purchaser

For Carol and David Ashley-Wilson, good companions, friends of the
heart.

Author's Note

I offer a special word of thanks to my two editorial consciences, my
personal assistant, Beryl Barraclough, and my wife, Joy, companion of
many voyages, sharer in many literary enterprises.  Between them, they
have kept me as honest, consistent and self-critical as any man can be
in a confusing world.

"The Church in Argentina, and we its members, have many reasons to
confess our sins and to beg pardon of God and society: for our
insensitivity, for our cowardice, for our omissions, for our
complicities in respect of illegal repression."

Monsignor Jorge Novak, Bishop of Quilmes, Argentina Quoted in
Politico."  29 April, 1995

"Where law ends, tyranny begins."  William Pitt, Speech, 9 January,
1770

One

HIS BAD DAYS AND THIS WAS ONE OF HIS WORST for a long time Luca
Rossini fled the city.  His staff were accustomed to his sudden exits
and entrances.  They could reach him at any moment on his mobile
number.  His peers, who could recite by rote his titles and offices,
knew also that he was a special man commanded from the highest place.
They accepted that he was charged with secrets.  They had secrets of
their own.  They understood also that gossip was a dangerous pastime in
this city, so they kept any resentments for private and comradely
moments.  His master, a curt man, never called him to account for his
movements, only for his official transactions.

He travelled widely and generally alone.  Few were able to chart his
movements or the reasons for them, yet wherever one turned one was
conscious either of his presence or of his influence.  His reports were
laconic.  His actions were brusque.  The reasons he offered were clear
and precise, but he declined to argue them with anyone except the man
who commanded him.  He could be agreeable in society but he committed
himself rarely to intimacy.  Before he left the city, he would change
into jeans, walking boots, a scuffed leather jacket, an old cap.  He
drove an elderly Mercedes which he kept garaged at his apartment twenty
minutes walk away from his office.

His destination was always the same: a small holding in the foothills
which he had bought twenty years before from a local landowner.  The
property, invisible from the road, was enclosed by an ancient stone
wall, pierced by a heavy wooden gate studded with hand-forged country
nails.  Inside the walls was a small cottage, once a barn, with a roof
of barrel tiles.  It consisted of one large living space on to which he
had built with his own hands a country kitchen and a paved bathroom.
There was water and electricity and the gas was delivered in cylinders.
The furniture was sparse: a bed, a dining table, a set of chairs, a
battered sofa and armchair, a modern CD player with a large collection
of classics, a bookcase over which hung an olive wood crucifix with a
grotesquely agonised Christus.  The garden contained a vegetable plot,
a stand of fruit trees, a trellis of vines, a pair of rose bushes in
pots.  During his absences, which were many and long, the garden was
kept by a villager whose wife cleaned the house.  When he came, as he
was coming today, he lived a hermit's life.  When he departed he left
money in an envelope propped against the table-lamp to pay the
custodian.

This was the one place in the world where there was no curiosity about
his identity or his station in life.  He was simply Signer Luca, il
padrone.  Heaven or Hell and sometimes he had wondered which it was!
this was his true home.  No one could look in on him.  He could not see
beyond his own garden wall, yet he recognised that this was a place of
healing.  The cure had been slow.  It was not ended yet; perhaps it
would never be ended; but as he pushed open the gate and walked into a
garden rich with the first flush of autumn fruits, he felt a sudden
surge of hope.

His rituals began the moment the gate closed behind him.  He walked
into the house, laid out the few purchases he had made along the way:
bread, cheese, wine, mineral water, sausage and ham.  Then, he made the
circuit of the room.  It was clean, dusted every day as he required.
There was fresh linen on the bed and towels in the bathroom.  He tested
the pressure in the gas cylinder and checked the pile of wood in the
locker by the fireplace.  He would have no need of it in this mild
weather, but there was comfort in the thought that he could set and
light the fire if he chose.  He paused by the bookshelves and looked up
at the twisted figure on the olive wood cross.  He talked to it in a
sudden burst of Spanish:

"It still isn't settled between you and me!  You're out of it out of it
and into glory.  That's what we claim anyway!  I'm still here.  I'm
held together with string and sticking plaster.  The moment I got out
of bed this morning, I knew it would be a bad day.  I'm in flight
again.  What else can I do?  I'm still in the dark."

He pushed aside the volumes on the top shelf of the bookcase.  Behind
them was a small steel safe let into the wall.  The key hung around his
neck.  He opened the safe and took out a pile of letters held together
with faded ribbon.  He did not read them.  He knew every line by heart.
He held them in his hands, rubbing his thumbs over the thick paper as
if he were handling an amulet.  Then he put the letters back in the
safe, relocked it and replaced the books.

Isabel and he still corresponded; but her letters now were evanescent
texts on a computer screen, read and erased, leaving only a trace of
her in his memory, like the track of an insect in desert sand.

The disc on the CD player was Mozart's Prague Symphony.  He switched it
on and let the music take hold of him.  Then he moved to the bed.  He
stripped off his jacket and his shirt and laid them carefully on the
bedspread.  Although the air inside the house was warm, he shivered. He
wrapped his arms around himself so that his finger-tips touched the
first ridges of the scars that covered his back and reached around his
rib case.  He could not see them.  He did not want to see them.  He
could only feel them.  After a while, he released himself from his own
embrace and walked out into the sunlit garden.

Outside the door, a number of simple country tools were stood against
the wall: a spade, a mattock, a fork, a rake.  He picked up the
mattock, feeling as he always did a pleasure in the touch of the rough
handle.  He laid the mattock over his shoulder and began to work his
way around the garden grubbing out weeds between the lettuces and the
bean rows, chopping back grass from the edges of the plots.

All the time, he was aware of the sun upon his back, of the trickles of
sweat along the raised surfaces of the scars.  That, too, was a comfort
but the greatest comfort of all was to be able to expose the scars and
feel no shame, because here there was no witness to what, so many years
before, had diminished him to a nothing.

He worked for more than an hour, finding new tasks, even in the
well-kept garden.  He raked leaves and burned them.  He clipped dead
flowers and leaves from the rose bushes.  He picked tomatoes and salad
leaves for his supper.  He inspected the ripened fruit and damped the
ground under the vine trellises.  By the end of it, his jangling nerves
were quiet and his familiar demons had stopped their chattering.  He
was where he needed to be: in the quiet of a physical world far from
politicians, philosophers and the contentions of warring pedants.

He cleaned the tools and set them back in their place against the wall.
He spread dust on the embers of the fire, then went inside to take a
shower.  He found a childish delight in the grouting he had done to the
tile work and wished there were someone to whom he could demonstrate
his handiwork.

He was still to welling himself when he heard the shrilling of his
mobile phone.  He hurried into the living room and answered in his
usual laconic style:

"This is Rossini."

The voice of the caller was familiar but rasping now with anxiety.

"This is Baldassare.  Where are you?"

"An hour out of town.  What can I do for you?

"Get back here as soon as possible."

"Why the rush?"

"We have a problem, Luca."

"Don't describe it.  Just give me the code."

"Job and his comforters."

"Don't tell me Job has left so soon."

"That's the problem.  He's very much with us and we're all sitting on
the dung-hill with him."

"I presume you've shut down communications?"

"As far as that's ever possible in this place.  That's why we need you,
Luca.  You're good at this kind of thing."

"I wish I felt flattered.  I'll be there as soon as I can."

When he switched off the phone he burst out laughing.  This was a
moment of purest irony.  He had survived the flaws in himself.  He had
survived with singular distinction the flawed system to which he had
committed himself.  Now he was summoned out of his private nowhere to
lend counsel, strength and political skill to its most potent
counsellors of whom, most surprisingly, he was one of the juniors.

The image of Job on his dung-hill was a vivid one.  The password
signified much more than it said: that an irreversible event was taking
place, but that until it had been completed Job's comforters were
themselves squatting on the dung-hill and if they failed to comport
themselves with sufficient cunning, they themselves would be loaded
with all Job's disasters.

Once again, the scars on his back began to tingle, this time as if a
small, chill wind were blowing over them.  Out of the past came the
voice of one of his earliest physicians, a psychiatrist who specialised
in the treatment of trauma victims:

"For a long time, my friend how long I cannot tell you you will find
yourself looking backwards, worse still, wanting to live backwards. You
will even find yourself using two mirrors, trying to look at the scars
on your own back.  You will seek redress, justice, retribution. You
will never get full payment.  You will declare a vendetta against the
ungodly and the godly who have collaborated with them.  You will demand
vengeance as of right.  You will claim it even as a necessity for your
personal survival."

"There's an old proverb among my people: "Before you start a vendetta,
make sure you dig two graves."  I'm not sure you can have both
vengeance and survival."

"For a while, you may.  The Nuremberg trials disposed of certain war
criminals.  The Israelis caught Eichmann, tried him and executed him.
Nevertheless, the tally of atrocities has mounted over the decades. The
Christian faith offered other solutions.  The churches reconciled their
criminals by demoting some of them and sending others into a
penitential silence.  There was a cost in that, too, but spread over a
few centuries, no doubt it seemed reasonable."

"To the institution.  Never to the victims."

"What do you expect me to say?"  The doctor shrugged and spread his
hands in a gesture of resignation.  "I am not a miracle worker.  I
cannot rewrite your past.  I cannot prescribe your future.  You will
make your own terms with life in your own time."

So, he had made a choice: to stay within the system, use it as a
fortress from which to wage his private wars.  The choice was highly
dangerous.  It involved another rift within his damaged self.  He was
now both victim and vindicator.  By all the beliefs which he professed,
vengeance was itself a crime.  It preempted the rights of divinity.
None the less, he was committed to it.  From the moment of that
commitment, everything he did became a calculation and a contrivance.
His public life was based upon a private lie.  He could not surrender
to uncertainty.  The belief by which he lived had to be stronger than
that to which he was bound by public profession.  Very carefully,
therefore, he sealed up the springs of compassion and the small
seepages of doubt.  He could not afford confusion.  He could not afford
illusion either.  He could work only by the clear light of his own
reason.  If that light proved in the end to be a darkness, so be it.
There had been a moment when, spreadeagled on the cartwheel and waiting
for each stroke of the lash, he had prayed for darkness as the last
mercy.

He dressed quickly, put the food he had brought in a wooden bowl in the
centre of the table, scribbled a note on an envelope, stuffed the
envelope with money for the custodian and propped it against the bowl.
He left, slamming the old studded gate behind him, then drove at speed
through the gathering traffic towards the city.  He switched on the car
radio, listening intently for any news item that might indicate that
security had been breached in the matter of Job and his comforters.
When he heard nothing, he rehearsed in his own mind the meaning of the
parable.

Job was the code name of the Roman Pontiff, ageing, ill and crotchety
but still assertive.  The comforters were the members of the Curia, the
most ancient court in Europe.  Mention of the biblical dung-hill
signified that the Pontiff had been stricken with the illness which his
physicians had predicted: a massive stroke involving severe brain
damage.  Already, there had been a series of minor preludes, ischaemic
episodes which, according to the doctors, presaged a major incident.

The man who had telephoned him was the Cardinal Camerlengo, Chamberlain
of Vatican City State, whose responsibility it was to consult with the
physicians over the treatment of the sick man, run the Papal household
and, finally, when the Pontiff died, to take over the interim
government of the Church while a successor was elected.  The Camerlengo
was a skilful man, but he was faced with a large and uncomfortable
dilemma.

An ailing Pontiff was one thing a brain-damaged one was quite another.
How did you dispose of him if indeed dispose were not too coloured a
word.  Towards the end of the nineties, rules had been promulgated to
take care of the problems of ageing among the high prelates of the
Church and, indeed, of the Pontiff himself.  If he were incapacitated,
either the Secretary of State or a majority of the College of Cardinals
could declare him unfit for his office and discharge him with all due
charity into retirement.  This done, the Camerlengo was free to declare
that the See of Peter was vacant and to summon the electors to choose a
successor.

The rules were less clear on what to do with the retired Pontiff if he
remained alive in a vegetable state.  The worst-case decisions would be
whether to place him on a life-support machine and, if he were so
placed by error or misjudgment, whose hand would switch off the
current.  The presumption was that the Pontiff would have expressed his
own will in the matter of the excessive prolongation of his life.
However, if he had left no instruction, who would make the decision?
Clearly, it could not be left only to the physician.  It could not be
left to family because, in theory at least, the Pontiff had passed out
of the circle of kinship.  He belonged to God and to the Church of God.
The prelates he had created were therefore the arbiters of his fate.

That, however, would be only the beginning.  The press of the world
would translate the Vatican dilemma into another chapter of the ongoing
debate on euthanasia.  As Rossini drove back to the city, this was the
reading which he gave to the situation.  If the Pontiff had not been
moved out of the confines of the Vatican, things were still under a
measure of control.  If, however, he were removed to his usual clinic,
the Gemelli Hospital, outside the sovereign territory of the Vatican,
the situation would change radically.  Secrecy would be impossible.
Medical bulletins would have to carry more than the mere colour of
truth.  The media would suborn half the hospital staff to provide them
with daily facts and saleable fictions.

The Cardinal Camerlengo was an experienced administrator, yet one of
his predecessors had made an egregious mistake by trying to gloss over
the details of the death of Pope John Paul I. That mistake had released
a torrent of political disinformation and produced a world bestseller
in which it was claimed that an American Cardinal, and an American
Bishop resident in the Vatican, together with a Mafioso criminal,
Michele Sindona, had conspired to murder the Pontiff.  The scandalous
tale was still current.  The book was still in circulation.  If the
present affair were handled badly, new rumours would spring up and grow
faster than the legendary beanstalk.  This was another irony which he
pondered amid the tumult of horns and shouted imprecations: secrecy
created and perpetuated the scandals it was designed to prevent.

The homeward journey took an hour and three-quarters.  By the time he
reached his apartment, he was convinced that the security still held.
He locked the car in the garage, changed into his clerical clothes and
telephoned his office to send a limousine for him.  Fifty minutes
later, a guard at the Porta Angelica saluted him and waved his vehicle
into the parking place reserved for senior prelates.  Luca

Rossini, Cardinal Presbyter, grey eminence of the Roman Curia, was back
at work.

He hurried to the Papal apartments where a forlorn secretary sat guard
in the Pontiff's study, while the physician and the Camerlengo waited
by his bedside.  Pale and immobile, hooked up to an oxygen supply and
the portable monitors, which for months now had become part of the
furniture of the Papal bedroom, he still had the look of an old lion
dozing in the grass but formidable to any intruder who might disturb
his rest.  When Luca Rossini entered the room, the Camerlengo and the
physician greeted him with obvious relief.  He stood for a moment
staring down at the prone figure of his master.  Then he asked:

"How is he?"

The doctor shrugged.

"As you see.  Deep coma.  We are administering oxygen.  There is
probably massive cerebral damage.  No way to be certain, of course,
unless we put him into hospital for a CAT scan and twenty-four hour
monitoring."

"Is the damage reversible?"

"I would say not."

"So, at very best, there will be serious incapacity?"

"Yes."

"At worst, a vegetative existence?"

"If we put him on life-support, yes."

"Which is the last thing he wants or deserves."

"I would have to agree."  The physician hesitated a moment, then added
a careful afterthought: "It would be helpful if His Holiness has left
in writing some clear expression of his wishes."

"Did he ever express them to you, doctor?"

"Only in the most equivocal terms."

"Such as?"

"We must wait and see what God has in store for me."

"Nothing more precise?"

"Nothing."

Rossini turned to the Camerlengo.

"Does his secretary have anything?"

"He knows of no document expressing the Pontiff's wishes in this
matter.  There is no relevant codicil to his will."

Luca Rossini looked from one man to the other.  A small sardonic smile
twitched at the corners of his mouth.

"I wonder what he expected: to exit like Elijah in a fiery chariot?"

The Camerlengo frowned in distaste.

"I would remind you, Luca, His Holiness is still alive and with us.  We
have to decide what is best to be done for him and for the Church."

"Have you sought specialist advice, doctor?"

"Cattaldo and Gheddo have both seen him."

"Their opinions?"

"Correspond with mine.  There is irreversible damage.  From a medical
point of view, it would be simpler to have him in hospital care.
However, we do understand ..."

The Camerlengo cut him off abruptly.

"There are certain consequences, very public ones.  The Pontiff will be
outside the borders of Vatican City State.  Those who treat him though
not the Pontiff himself will be under the jurisdiction of the Republic
of Italy and the constant surveillance of the world media."

"If he dies," Luca Rossini laid down a series of bald propositions, "we
have no problems.  We bury him with pomp, elect a successor and get on
with business.  If he survives, but is grossly incapacitated, we have
to retire him.  There are provisions for that in recent amendments to
the Apostolic Constitution.  If, however, he survives in a vegetable
state on life-support, decisions will have to be made on when to
terminate him and who will be the terminator of record."

The Camerlengo challenged him formally.

"So, how do you answer your own questions, Luca?"

"Keep him here.  Let him die with dignity in his own house.  Do not
attempt to prolong his life.  Do not permit others to do so under any
pretext.  I will go on record that this was the desire expressed to me
by the Pontiff himself on various occasions during the last couple of
years.  You, Baldassare, can confirm that we have had a rather special
relationship.  It was hard to define sometimes, but yes, it was a very
special relationship."

The Camerlengo was silent for a moment.  Then he nodded agreement.

"It makes sense."

"Eminent sense," said the physician with obvious relief.  Luca Rossini
rounded on him.

"You still have a duty to perform, doctor.  We need an immediate
bulletin for release by the Press Office of the Holy See.  It needs a
special tone, a certain emphasis.  How far are you and your colleagues
prepared to go in stating your prognosis?"

"I am not sure what you mean, Eminence."

"What words are you prepared to use?  A massive cerebral incident?
Beyond hope of recovery?  Terminal?  The end is expected hourly?  What,
doctor?"

"Why are the words so important?"

"You know why."  Luca Rossini was brusque.  "So long as the Pontiff is
alive and in the care of his own household, the press will demand to
know what kind of care he is getting and how long he may be expected to
last.  Baldassare here, and the Secretary of State, will communicate
with the senior hierarchy.  The Press Office will deal with the media.
It is not my business to frame the statements.  I simply indicate the
importance of their terms.  Do I make myself clear?"

"As always, Luca."  The Camerlengo's tone was dry.

"And you, doctor?"

"I'm sure we can come up with an appropriate text."

"Good."  He looked from one to the other, studying their faces.  His
own face was set in a stone mask.  "Now, with your permission, I should
like to be alone with him for a little while."

The doctor and the Camerlengo looked at each other.  The doctor told
him quietly:

ii

"As you see, he is deeply comatose.  He will see nothing, hear nothing.
He will not feel even the touch of your hand."

"I want to be private with him."  Luca Rossini was full of cold anger.
"I have private things to say to him on the million to one chance that
he may hear me.  Can that do him any harm?"

"Of course not, Luca."

"Then indulge me, please!"

The Camerlengo and the physician hesitated a moment.  A glance passed
between them.  The Camerlengo nodded his assent.  The two men left the
Papal chamber, closing the door on Luca Rossini and his silent
master.

As they waited in the adjacent room, the physician remarked:

"That man troubles me, Baldassare."

The Camerlengo made a wry mouth.

"What in particular troubles you, my friend?"

"There are so many angers in him, so much arrogance.  It is as if he
has to master the whole world every day with whips and scorpions!"

"The angers, I know."  The Camerlengo was a careful critic.  "I have
seen him face down senior colleagues in the presence of the Pontiff
himself.  The arrogance is another matter.  I see it as a defence.  He
is a man who has suffered much.  He is still not fully healed."

"And that is a constant danger, is it not?"  The physician put on his
mask of clinical detachment.  "The unhealed wound, the unresolved
crisis of the spirit."

"Is that what you perceive in Luca Rossini?"

"Yes."

"I have to tell you, my friend, that he is superbly competent in
everything he does.  The Holy Father uses him as a personal emissary,
and he is, as you know, a very exacting task-master."

"So what does that signify?  The court favourite is always treated with
indulgence.  How do Rossini's colleagues feel about him?  You, for
instance?"

"I find him distant, but loyal always.  He will confront you eye-to-eye
and say what is in his mind."

"All of it?"

The Camerlengo was beginning to be angry.

"How can I answer that?  You heard him a few moments ago.  He was
saying things you and I had not had the courage to put into words."

The physician was instantly defensive:

"I have no authority here, Eminence.  I am a physician, but I can only
counsel, not prescribe, even for my distinguished patient."

"You have already agreed the treatment," the Camerlengo corrected him
swiftly.  "But Luca Rossini is not your patient.  You should not offer
an opinion on his medical condition or judgments about what you may see
or hear in your privileged position."

The physician reddened with embarrassment and bowed his head.

"I am reproved, Eminence.  Forgive me."

"There is nothing to forgive.  At this moment we are both under stress.
Luca Rossini is wrestling with his own dark angels."

He was sitting by the bed, one hand laid over the hand of the
unconscious Pontiff whose skin was cold, dry and creped like the skin
of a reptile.  There were tubes in his nostrils and electrodes
connecting him to the monitors.  Luca Rossini spoke into his ear in
sharp staccato sentences, challenging him out of his silence.

"You hear me!  I know you do!  This time you listen!  You were mistaken
in me.  You believed what they told you: that I was the hero, the young
pastor spreadeagled on a cartwheel in a little town and publicly
flogged to terrorise his people and teach them that there was no power
but from God and the Colonels were God's voice in the land .. . You
ordered me brought here to shame the coward Bishops of my country.  You
favoured me.  You pushed me forward and upward.  You made me a high
man.  You could not believe that I was a flawed man, a vessel cracked
and damaged.  I accepted all you gave me.  I was so full of guilts, so
full of shame,

I thought I was hearing the voice of God.  Are you listening to me?
It's the nearest I've ever come to a full and open confession and you
can't even raise your hand to give me the absolution I don't believe
in!  But let me tell you just this once that I loved you not because
you were my patron but because you made me pay for every trust you gave
me.  That's why I don't want you shamed now.  I'd rather kill you with
my own hands than see you rotting on the vine like a piece of fruit.
But you can do it yourself.  Just loosen your grip and slip away.
Please, please go!"

He bent and kissed the forehead of the silent man.  He pushed himself
away from the bed.  There were tears on his cheeks.  He wiped them
away, then composed his features once more into a mask, hostile and
imperious.

Just before eight o'clock that evening a bulletin was issued by the
Sain Stampa, the official Press Office of the Holy See.

At 1430 hours today His Holiness suffered a major cerebral haemorrhage
which has left him paralysed and deeply comatose.  A series of minor
ischaemic episodes during the summer vacation at Castelgandolfo had
alerted both the Pontiff and his medical advisers to the possibility of
a major incident.

Certain interventions had been discussed by the Pontiff and his medical
advisers.  All were attended by high risk.  His Holiness had
steadfastly declined what he called the officious prolongation of his
already long life by surgical means or by mechanical maintenance.  He
would go, he said, in God's time, and he would prefer to go from his
own house, rather than from a hospital bed.

It is in response to these clear wishes that nursing care, and
appropriate neurological and vascular monitoring is being provided in
the Papal apartments.  The Pontiff's physician, Dr.  Angelo Mottola, is
assisted by two distinguished colleagues, Dr.  Ernesto Cattaldo,
neurologist and Dr.  Piero Gheddo, cardiovascular specialist.

All three hesitate to predict how long the Pontiff may survive.  They
agree, however, that the cerebral damage is massive and the prognosis
is negative.

The Cardinal Camerlengo begs the prayers of all the faithful that God
may be pleased to call His good and faithful servant to Himself.

Further bulletins will be issued from this office daily, at 1200 hours
and 1800 hours.

Background material will be available from Vatican Information Service
(VIS) in English, Spanish and French.  The daily wire service from VIS
will continue as usual.

"I wonder who cooked this soup?"

Stephanie Guillemin of Le Monde tapped the bulletin board with a
scarlet fingernail and challenged her audience: half-a-dozen late
drinkers at the bar of the Foreign Press Club in Rome.

"Who cares?"  Fritz Ulrich of Der Spiegel waved away the question.  He
was into his third whisky and ready for an argument.  "The man's been
working himself to death for years now.  Finally he's popped a blood
vessel.  What do you expect the Sain Stampa, to say about it?  They're
saving the eloquence for his obituary."

"My point exactly, Fritz."  Stephanie Guillemin was not easily
rebuffed.  "This text is completely out of character.  It lacks the
personal touch of Angel-Novalis.  My guess is that it was put together
in committee and handed to the Press Office for release."

"But who's the committee, Steffi, and why would they intervene?"  Frank
Colson of the Telegraph knew the lady well enough to pay respect.  She
looked like a young George Sand and she wrote a clean, classic prose,
with a fine edge of malice.  She lived in some style with a very rich
widow of an Italian banker, so her news sources were exotic but
reliable.  Her readings of people and events were subtle enough to have
earned her the nickname of la.  dechiffreuse, the decoder.  She was
flattered by Colson's deference.  She smiled and reached out to stroke
his cheek.

"The committee?  Figure it for yourself, Frank.  It had to be at least
a threesome the Camerlengo, the Secretary of State, the physician, with
maybe another curial Cardinal.  Jansen comes to mind, or perhaps that
floating mystery, Rossini.  The document had to be got out in a hurry
and it had to represent at least a token consensus in the Curia."

"But why should they want to intervene in the composition of a simple
document?"

"Because it isn't simple at all, Frank."

She had everyone's attention now.  Fritz Ulrich's drink was suspended
in mid-air.  Enzo, the barman, laid down his napkin and leaned across
the bar to listen.  Colson prompted her out of the momentary silence.

"Go on, Stem."

"What have we got here?  Half a page of flat, banal prose; not at all
in the usual style of the Sala Stampa.  Nevertheless, it's very
carefully contrived."

"To what end?"  Ulrich was back on the attack.

"To answer awkward questions before people like us begin to ask them.
Consider!  They speak of a major cerebral haemorrhage, a massive
incident.  Why didn't they rush him into hospital?  We all know the
monitor equipment in the Papal chamber is elementary stuff.  They
certainly don't have a CAT scanner.  So, in spite of those three
respectable names on the medical bulletin, what the old man is getting
is basic bedside diagnosis, elementary monitoring and home nursing."

"What more would he be getting in Gemelli Hospital?"

"Wrong question, Fritz."  Guillemin was fast as a fencer on her feet.
"When did you ever read a Vatican document that offered an explanation
for any action let alone an excuse for it?"

"Never in living memory!"  Ulrich emptied his glass and pushed it
across the bar for a refill.  "So you are saying .. ."

"It was crafted to justify a very odd situation.  It attributes to a
stroke victim directions and dispositions which he could not have made
after the event, and which he seems to have addressed only in the most
general terms before it."

"You still have not made your point," said Ulrich.

"They want him to die."  Guillemin made an emphatic assertion.  "They
need him to die as quickly and quietly as possible.  They are even
appealing to the whole Church to pray for that event as a divine mercy.
Why?  Because if he doesn't die, they are left with a seriously damaged
Pontiff who must be formally retired and replaced to allow the life of
the Church to continue."

"So, they kill him!"  said Colson softly.  "They kill him by a
conspiracy of benign neglect."

"That's one reading.  The tabloids will certainly make headlines of it.
However," Guillemin raised a cautionary hand, "the alternative is
clearly stated in the bulletin.  His Holiness is exercising his
fundamental moral right to decline a prolongation of his life by
officious and excessive intervention."

"Provided," Ulrich waved an admonitory finger under her nose, "provided
always, the text we have is an authentic rendering of the Pontiff's
wishes!  You will note that there is another departure from custom.
There is no citation of a relevant authority a letter, a will, not even
a quotation from his encyclical on euthanasia."

"Fritz is right," said C6lson.  "That's something we could quite
legitimately ask from the Press Office."

"I've got ten bucks to say they won't come up with a line."  This from
the UPI woman who had just drifted into the end of the talk.  "Any
takers?"

The others grinned and declined the bet.  The UPI woman then made her
own point.  "If they don't give us a citation, then we're free, are we
not, to speculate?  We have conflicting stories: a cabinet of concerned
prelates nursing their ailing Pontiff to a quiet end or Frank Colson's
version conspiring to kill him by benign neglect."

"Either way," said Guillemin, "it makes Part One of a great story."

"And what, pray, is Part Two?"  Ulrich's tone was still provocative.
Steffi Guillemin, the code-breaker, gave him a cryptic answer.

"It begins with my first question, Fritz.  Who's cooking this soup?"

"And you, of course, have the answer?"

"Not yet; but as always you will read it first in Le Monde.  Then you
can buy it from our Syndication Department.  Excuse me now.  I have to
get home."

"Give my love to your Lucetta."  Ulrich laughed.  "That's one very
pretty woman."

"And you're a pig, Fritz!"  Guillemin was out the door while he was
still groping for a retort.

There was a more muted hostility in the late-night meeting of Cardinals
summoned by the Secretary of State.  This was not a formal gathering
but a convocation of those curial prelates residing in Rome and
available at short notice.

These were all high men, firmly anchored to the rock of authority on
Vatican Hill.  Whether they were all as securely anchored in virtue was
a moot question; but they understood the potency of protocol, the
delicate balances of interest and influence, the awesome reserves of
power that resided in the Petrine office.  They knew how that power
could be used to honour a man or hang him, high as Haman, on the
slenderest thread of definition.  For the moment, at least, the power
was represented by the Cardinal Secretary of State.  He came swiftly to
the subject of the meeting.

"I understand that several of you are unhappy with the bulletin on the
Holy Father's health, which was issued this evening by the Press
Office.  Under the Apostolic Constitution of 28 June 1988, the Press
Office is attached to the Secretariat of State.  I, therefore, must
accept full responsibility for its actions.  The text of the bulletin
was drafted in consultation between the Cardinal Camerlengo, the Papal
physician and myself.  Members of the Press Office had no part in the
composition.  They simply distributed it through their normal
channels."

"Then, with great respect, and in privacy among colleagues, let me
register objection.  This is a hasty and ill-considered document which
will, in my view, have serious negative consequences."  The speaker was
Gottfried, Cardinal Gruber, Prefect of the Congregation for the
Doctrine of the Faith, watchdog of orthodoxy in the Church.  A small
silence followed his protest; then the Secretary of State answered with
studious restraint.

"The document was prepared in haste, because it was required in haste,
to cover the unexpected event of the Pontiff's illness."

"I would hardly call it unexpected.  Given the state of the Holy
Father's health in recent times.  I would accept that we were
unprepared for the event.  I submit that we might have been
forewarned."

"We were forewarned, Gottfried, as was the Holy Father himself.
However, he had his own mind on the matter.  We could not move him."

"Did anyone try, seriously .. . ?"

"I tried, for one."  Luca Rossini was cool and relaxed.  "I tried many
times in private talks.  He would not change.  He insisted that he
would go when God called him.  He wanted to die in his own bed."

"Did you never suggest that he leave some document expressing his
wishes?"

"I suggested it several times; but you know better than I, Gottfried,
how hard it was to get him to sign anything until he was ready to do
so!"

A small ripple of amusement went round the assembly, and the tension
relaxed a little.  Gruber nodded a reluctant assent, but continued his
complaint.

"I still say he should have been taken directly to the hospital."

"Against his published wishes?"

"He didn't publish them.  We did."

"Are you suggesting," the Secretary of State was dangerously quiet,
"that our colleague, Luca, is lying, or that the rest of us have
conspired to fabricate a document?"

"No, of course not!  But think a moment, we are on record now as
praying for his death."

"I seem to remember," said the Secretary of State, "that the
traditional prayer for the seriously ill patient is that God will grant
'a speedy recovery or a happy death'.  In the case of the Holy Father,
there is no hope of recovery."

"But we cannot establish that with certainty except under full clinical
conditions."

"Which, on the evidence, he has declined in advance as officious and
unacceptable.  We are all the family he has, Gottfried, what would you
have us do?"

"I believe we should override the wishes of the Holy Father and put him
immediately in complete clinical care."

"Do it, by all means," said Luca Rossini with weary indifference.  "But
remember his vital faculties are in decline.  So, to protect
themselves, the first thing they'll do at the hospital is put him on
life-support while they scan him.  After that, if the present diagnosis
is correct, you'll find yourselves tending a vegetable.  Is that
respect for life?  Is that a moral imperative?  If it's not, then I
assume Gottfried here will volunteer to turn off the switch and the
feeding tubes."

"That's enough, I think," said the Secretary of State.  "This is not a
formal consistory.  It has no canonical status, so I will not ask for
your votes on the matter.  I believe in good conscience that the Holy
Father should have his wish.  He will stay here in his own place ..."

"Then," Gruber asked the crucial question, "how long will you give him,
before you decide to depose him as incompetent and declare the See
vacant?"

"I have trouble with the word depose."  This time the Prefect of the
Congregation for Bishops intervened.  "It seems to me to presume powers
we may not possess."

For the first time, Baldassare Pontormo, the Cardinal Camerlengo,
raised his voice.

"That's a problem which faces us all in this meeting and outside it.
Let's ignore the drama of the Holy Father's collapse and ask ourselves
what we would do if the nature and circumstances of the illness were
different if he were dying of any protracted disease, or were suffering
from dementia.  The Church would go on.  Its structures are strong,
tested over the centuries, and the Holy Spirit abides in it as our Lord
Jesus Christ has promised.  For the rest, let us admit that we are not
well organised to deal with one of the principal phenomena of our time,
longevity and the problems of ageing, like Alzheimer's disease.  In the
case of a stricken Pontiff, it may not be possible it is not possible
to secure his explicit consent to resignation.  We may have to depend
on implicit and circumstantial evidence of his will to do the best for
the Church.  So, we work in prayerful prudence.  We wait and watch and
take counsel with our medical advisers and with one another!  In spite
of the misgivings of certain of our colleagues, we are not subject to
outside opinion.  The Vatican is a sovereign state.  We hold our
stewardship of souls under God.  We should deal with each other in
charity."

It was the longest speech Luca Rossini had ever heard him make, and he
was surprised at the eloquence and power of it.  It also made him wary,
because it suggested that it might not be so simple to depose an ageing
Pontiff- even an incompetent one.  He led a small round of applause
which brought a smile to the lips of the Secretary of State and a nod
of reluctant approval from Gruber; but the old watchdog still had a
growl in him.

"I agree with Baldassare, but only under caveat.  The Church can
function without its Pope.  We know that.  It has done so in the past,
it can do so again but not for too long, not in these troubled times!
As for public opinion, we are not subject to it; but we have a duty to
form it where we can, to accord it with the teaching of our Lord.  I
should like to propose that all future bulletins on the Pontiff's
health and treatment be submitted to a select committee of the
Curia."

The Secretary of State sat bolt upright in his chair.  His knuckles
were white against the dark fabric of his soutane.  There was a rasp of
anger in his voice.

"No!  I will not consent to that.  We are dealing here with facts and
not with opinions on moral theology.  My authority is clearly defined
in the Apostolic Constitution of 1988.  I will not, I cannot, delegate
or abrogate it."

"As Your Eminence decides."  Gruber bowed stiffly and sat down.

"The meeting is closed," said the Secretary of State.  "Thank you all
for coming."  The Secretary of State beckoned Luca Rossini to his side.
He had a request and a commission.

"You said good words tonight, Luca.  Now, if I may suggest, you should
step back into silence: no arguments, no commentaries.  You understand
why?"

"Perfectly.  There are issues and opinions here that could drag us all
the way back to Constance in 1415: Papalists and Conciliarists at war
with each other.  That's an ancient mess; but part of it is still on
our doorstep."

The Secretary of State made a wry mouth.  He fished in the breast
pocket of his cassock and brought out a sealed envelope and held it out
to Rossini.  "I'd like you to read this at your leisure and send me a
minute on it."

"What is it?"

"The Argentine Ambassador to the Holy See is retiring soon.  It's a
patronage post, as you know.  The government would like to make an
early appointment.  That's the dossier on their candidate.  They want
to be assured as soon as possible that we're happy with him."

"So, what has that to do with me?"

"Argentina is your home-place.  You have special insights into its
people and its history.  Your comment is important to me personally."

"Please!  Don't involve me in this!  Argentina, of course, is my
home-place; I do have special insights, but my judgments about it are
skewed, as you know.  You can find twenty better opinions in your own
office.  I beg you to dispense me."

"And I am begging you, Luca, to accept what is after all a very simple
task.  There is no hurry.  We shall do nothing until our situation with
His Holiness is resolved.  Just toss the envelope on your desk and wait
until you're in the mood to deal with it.  Now, let's get to bed.  This
has been a brutal day for all of us!"

He thrust the envelope into Rossini's hands and clasped his palms
together so that he was forced to retain it, then with a curt
goodnight, he walked from the room.

For a long cataleptic moment Rossini stood staring after him, then he
too hurried from the conference chamber.  His day was ending as it had
begun, in panic flight across a wasteland, filled with the wailing of
yesterday's ghosts.

Two

IT WAS AFTER MIDNIGHT WHEN LUCA ROSSINI CAME HOME to his apartment in
the Via del Governo Vecchio, a narrow thoroughfare lined with time-worn
palaces built in the fifteenth century but converted long since into
twentieth-century apartments.  Once, this had been called the Papal Way
because it led directly from the Lateran Basilica to St.  Peter's
across the Tiber.  Now the ground floors were occupied by workshops and
small traders, and the apartments inhabited by a population of
middle-aged Roman bourgeoisie who cursed the pollution of the city but
could not afford to move out of it.

Rossini's apartment occupied the fourth floor, to which one either
climbed by a stone staircase or ascended by an antique elevator.  His
household consisted of a Spanish couple, she a cook-housekeeper, he a
valet and factotum, who had been recommended to him by an outgoing
Ambassador.  They had their own living quarters.  They were sober,
quiet folk, drilled in the Castilian manners of the diplomatic service
and protective of their taciturn master whose comings and goings were
as mysterious as his past.  They knew that he was an Eminencia at the
Vatican.  They knew that he spoke the Spanish of Argentina, where his
father and mother had gone as migrants from Naples after the Second
World War.  They knew that he entertained exotic people of both sexes
Chinese, Indians, Ethiopians, Ukrainians, Indonesians, Africans.

Domestically, he was not an exacting man.  He spoke to them quietly and
always with respect.  His only demand was that they observe what he
called "the privacy of the house".  They should not discuss outside
what they saw or heard in their daily service.  They should not gossip
about his guests.  Rome was plagued by the threat of terrorist groups
from more than one country.  Lives could depend on their discretion,
his own included.  Did they understand that?  They did.  They kept his
confidence and he gave them a comfortable life within the means his
office provided.

When he came home this night, dog-weary, they were asleep, but beside
his armchair in the lounge supper was laid out: a thermos of coffee, a
decanter of brandy, sandwiches under a silver cover.  Before he ate he
went into the bedroom and changed into pyjamas and dressing gown.  The
letter which the Secretary of State had given him was still in his
pocket.  He did not bother to read it but took it with him into the
lounge and locked it in his bureau drawer.  The contents were already
known to him.  They were the cause of the unease that had plagued him
since dawn.  He switched on the computer and punched up the e-mail
which he had received that morning from Isabel.  Then he poured himself
coffee and brandy and sat down to contemplate the text again.

Her letters came infrequently at irregular intervals, generally from
New York where her husband held a senior posting at the United Nations
and she herself was a Director of Studies at the Hispanic American
Institute.  No matter how rarely they came, the fire and the passion in
them never waned and there was always a surprise and a smile to end
them.

My dearest Luca,

Even after all these years, I miss you.  On one level my life is calm,
well-ordered, rewarding, as yours seems to be.  Buried deep below the
surface, however, is a lava stream, flowing red hot, seeking always
some crack or fissure in the thick crust of everyday existence to burst
out and flood my life again.

One such crack appeared today.  Raul told me that he has been
recommended for the post of Ambassador to the Holy

See.  This is a pre-retirement post, as you know, a reward for discreet
service in the turbulent times, before and after our disastrous war
with the British in the Malvinas Islands.

For Raul it represents something much more, a final public absolution
for things done and undone in his life as a vacillating careerist.  I
am not disposed to deny him this small, sterile triumph.  He has been a
good father to Luisa and he has never attempted to deny me the freedom
I demanded to survive the desert stretches of our marriage.

I could hardly object, therefore though I did try to counsel him
against it when he insisted on including in his dossier an account of
his part in getting you out of the country, when the military put you
on a list of those they wanted "disappeared" because of the witness you
could mount against them.  You and I know the real facts but, each in
our own way, we have consented to revise history at least enough to
make our lives tolerable.

It was RauPs hope, I think, that I might intervene in some fashion on
his behalf.  I told him the truth which is only half-true, that you
have been out of my life since you left my father's house and I could
not in any case solicit favours or recommendations from you.

Yet that is exactly what I am doing now, my dearest Luca.  I am doing
it for myself and not for him.  If Raul is appointed to Rome, Luisa and
I will come with him.  I want, I need most desperately to see you
again, and you, in your letters, confess the same need of me.

Love is like grief.  One has to work through it.  We have never been
able to do that.  I should like to think we could before the hidden
fires are quenched and the ice-age of indifference overtakes us.  So,
if you can, please write or say the word that may bring us to Rome,
officially and without scandal.

I smile to myself when I think what a beautiful romantic comedy it
would make if I, as the Senora Embajadorci, could entertain Your
Eminence in our embassy.  Which raises another question: how and where
would Your Eminence entertain me?

All my love, always Isabel

The symbols on the screen began to blur before his eyes.  He deleted
them.  Then, because he was a punctual man, he typed in his reply.

Isabel, my dearest one,

My answer is yes.  I will write and say the right words at the right
time.  I must tell you, however, that nothing will happen quickly.  The
Pontiff is very ill and is likely to die soon.  No diplomatic
appointments will be made until his successor is elected.  Inevitably,
therefore, the comedy you hope to stage between the Eminence and the
Lady will have to be postponed!

How right you are about the need to work through both grief and love!
You seem to have done it much more successfully than I. I thought I
could accomplish it like an athlete surfing on the adrenaline rush of
power games.  I have become very good at that, as you know, but the
disciplines are rigid, the diet is spartan and the bed is lonely at
night.

There's another cost, too, which mounts higher every day.  I cannot
call myself a believer any more.  Ironic, isn't it?  I am one of the
hinge-men of the Church.  I am a potent figure in an ancient cult,
whose rituals I practise, but whose belief I no longer accept.  Simple
folk kneel to kiss my hand.  For them, I still dispense a magic.  For
myself, there is no magic any more.  The inner shrine is dark and
empty.

Strange as it may seem, there is a kind of liberation in this.  There
is no one who can suborn me or frighten me.  Even so, I cower like a
child from the vestigial nightmares which still take me unawares.  I
use your name like a spell to rid myself of them.  Perhaps when you
come you will help me to purge them for ever.  You ask where and how I
shall entertain you.  I have just the place.  It is small and private
and every foot of soil, every plant and fruit is mine.  For me, it has
been like the sacred island of Cos, a healing place.  I shall be glad
and grateful to welcome you into its peace.

It's late, the Pope is dying.  I have had a long day.  There will be
longer ones yet.

Goodnight my dear, my very dear.  Luca

He waited a long moment before he decided to transmit the message.  He
knew that this was the most naked avowal he had ever made, and that if
it ever became public it would be a catastrophe.  Yet, the need to say
it was overpowering.  So, drunk and reckless with the toxins of fatigue
and stress, he entered the transmission code and let it go.

In the Papal bedchamber, the Pontiff still lay ashen and immobile.
There were oxygen tubes in his nostrils, an intravenous drip in his
arm.  His eyes were blank and expressionless.  Two Sisters of Mercy had
just taken over the night watch and Doctor Mottola was giving them
instructions:

"... You've both dealt with this sort of thing before, so you don't
need a lecture on it.  At the moment he appears to be stable, though,
in fact, he is going downhill.  All we're doing is administering oxygen
and hydrating him with the drip.  I don't expect any major change
before morning.  Of course, there will be a continuing build-up of
mucous fluid in the lungs, because he can't clear it by coughing. There
will also be an excess of carbon dioxide which typically will produce
apnoea and Cheyne-Stoke's respiration.  If that comes on, call me. 
I'll be here in ten minutes.  Don't panic.  You'll see nothing you
haven't seen before.  Even a Pope gets no respite from mortality."

The elder of the two nuns asked:

"What about coning?"

The doctor gave her an approving look.

"You do know your job, Sister.  If coning occurs, he will be swiftly
and visibly terminal because the pressure of bleeding inside the skull
will compress the brain and force cerebral tissue out of the skull case
at the base.  However, there are no significant indications that coning
is imminent here.  My hope is that you'll have a quiet night.  Just
look in on him every half-hour or so and make sure you write up the
chart each time.  It won't help the patient very much; but it will keep
our professional reputations clean!  Say a prayer for him and for
me."

"We'll do that, doctor.  Goodnight."

When he had gone, the two women settled themselves in the anteroom from
which they had a clear view of their patient.  They were, as Mottola
had acknowledged, experienced senior nurses, and they had kept a
death-watch many times.  Even so, they were religious women and there
was a certain numinous quality about this event which would colour the
rest of their lives.  The man, dying piecemeal before their eyes, was
endowed with an awesome series of titles: Bishop of Rome, Vicar of
Jesus Christ, Successor of the Prince of the Apostles, Supreme Pontiff
of the Universal Church, Patriarch of the West, Primate of Italy,
Archbishop and Metropolitan of the Roman Province, Sovereign of Vatican
City State.

The tides were inflated by centuries of myth-making, conf lated with
imperial histories, fortified by traditional Roman legalisations,
sanctified by long memories of martyrdoms buttressed by great edifices
over whose lintels were carved in stone the legend.  "Tues Petrus .. .
You are the Rock upon which the Kingdom of God is built."  All of which
was reduced to a single, bleak irony an old man dying in a small
bedroom, attended by two women, gossiping softly in the antechamber.

There was a discreet knock at the door and Claudio Stagni, valet to the
Pontiff, came in with a tray of coffee and food for their supper.  He
was a short man, ruddy and cheerful the only one, according to court
legend, who could make the Pontiff laugh and lift him out of his
crotchets and ill-humours.  In the small, family circle they called him
Figaro, because, as he trotted about his tasks, he parodied himself
with the Rossini melody "Figaro qua, Figaro la, Figaro su, Figaro
gOt!".  When the women thanked him for his service and apologised for
keeping him up late, he grinned and shrugged.

"In this job, one has to be a night creature.  His Holiness often works
into the small hours.  He needs coffee and sandwiches and an occasional
chat.  He likes to try out his ideas on me because he says even a Pope
can't be a hero to his valet, but if he can get through to me, he has a
reasonable chance of making sense to the rest of the Church!"

The younger nun asked him:

"What is he really like in private?"

Claudio made an eloquent gesture of deprecation.

"What's he like?  Boh!  How do you turn an epic into a sonnet?  He's
been a big man in his time and it's been a long time too!  Some might
say too long.  But you can't measure him by what you see in the bed
there."

"Would you say he was a saint?"  This time it was the older nun who put
the question.

"A saint?"  The valet made an elaborate comedy of pondering the
question.  "My dear Sister, I'm not sure I know what a saint is.  In
lots of ways he's just as human as you and me.  He's got a quick temper
and it hasn't got any sweeter these last years.  He doesn't like people
to contradict him, but he admires anyone who is prepared to face him in
a knock-down fight.  He likes gossip, which is why he likes to have me
around; but he listens too readily to people who make him feel good,
because it's lonely up here, as you can feel for yourselves.  Any
mistakes he makes are bound to be big ones, with big consequences.  In
spite of all that, he's a generous man.  He'll listen to all sides of a
case provided, of course, the Curia lets him hear them, which doesn't
always happen.  Is he a saint?  I'd say you'd have to be something of a
saint just to stick out the life he's lived.  He scoots around the
world like a tenor on tour, handing out smiles and blessings which the
people lap up and reading speeches that the local hierarchies have
written, and the people yawn over.  He also prays a lot.  He used to
say he couldn't survive without God to lean on.  And God is very real
to him."  He broke off, then gave the women a little conspiratorial
grin.

"Tell you what, Sisters, why don't you two finish your coffee, while I
go in and tell him goodnight.  I'd like to do that.  And I think I
should just tidy his closet and leave out a change of nightclothes in
case you want to freshen him up before morning.  Besides, it will make
me feel useful.  There's precious little else I can do for him."

He left them then.  They lost sight of him as he turned inside the door
of the bedroom to reach the Pontiff's clothes closet.  A few moments
later, they caught a glimpse of him bundling up a few items of laundry
and setting down a small pile of clean nightclothes at the foot of the
bed.  Then he did a curious and touching thing.  He took two white
handkerchiefs from the pile of fresh linen and touched them to the
brows of the silent Pontiff.  Then he brought them out and with a
rueful smile presented one to each of the nuns.

"Here!  We all know he's never going to need them again.  I'm sure he'd
like to say thank you for what you're doing for him.  If they make him
a saint one day, these will be important relics, won't they?  And don't
feel badly about taking them.  I'm his valet.  I bought them for him.
You can't imagine a Pope going shopping for fine cambric in the Via
Condotti, can you?"

The two women were deeply moved.  They were still murmuring their
thanks when he waved goodnight and stepped quietly out of the room with
the bundle of laundry in his hands.  They did not know how could they?
that Claudio Stagni had just procured for himself a lifetime pension
three slim volumes of the most intimate diaries of the Pontiff, which
he had written up at the end of each day, and kept concealed in a
drawer in his closet.

Their existence was unknown to anyone except his faithful valet,
confidant and court-jester, who had often provided an audience for the
brusque comments of a weary man as he set them on paper.  When he died,
these records would pass immediately into the custody of the Cardinal
Camerlengo who might well choose to bury them for a century or two in
the Secret Archive.  Better, far better, that Figaro, the happy
ironist, the long-suffering body servant, should present them to the
world, provide them with context and provenance, and in due time, write
his own biography of the Pontiff.  There were already profitable deals
on offer from several media sources for any material he chose to
provide about his life as body-servant to the Pope, but, with these
texts in his possession, Figaro was certain he could double and
redouble and double them again, and live rich and happy ever after.

The nightmare of Luca, Cardinal Rossini never changed.  It was as if a
strip of old silent film had been looped inside his skull and set to
roll at the coldest, darkest hour before dawn.  The action began each
time with the same frame: a tiny, sub-Andean town north west of
Tucuman.

There was a church and a priest's house, facing a small colonnaded
market square, where grain and livestock and pottery and woven fabrics
were traded for goods imported from Buenos Aires.  The local population
was a typical Argentine cocktail of the mid-seventies: Creoles, legal
and illegal migrants from Chile and Uruguay, mestizos and the relics of
Inca tribes, fragmented by the policies of old Imperial Spain.

The carts of the traders, heavy lumbering vehicles, were lined around
the square so that the dwellers above the colonnades had a
theatre-goer's view of the small dramas enacted on the cobbles below.
This also was Rossini's viewpoint for the film unrolling in his head.
He was watching himself, enacting himself on a silent screen.

The action began with a military truck driving into the square.  The
townsfolk froze at the sight of it.  A group of militiamen leapt out
and formed themselves in a line facing the entrance to the church.
Their commander was a sergeant, a hulking fellow who looked like a
circus strongman.  He stepped out of the cabin of the truck and stood a
long time, an ominous giant, surveying the scene, and slapping at his
breeches with a riding-crop.

Then he began a slow circuit of the square while its small population
of men, women and children huddled, mute, around the carts.  When he
had completed the circuit, he signalled with his riding crop to the
waiting troops.

Four men stepped out of the ranks, two on either flank of the square,
and moved around the stall holders demanding, always in dumb show,
their identity papers.  If there was any delay or hesitation, the trade
goods were smashed or trampled on the ground.  Anyone who protested was
felled immediately with fist or rifle-butt.  Children were cuffed or
kicked aside.

Halfway through this systematic intimidation, Luca Rossini came running
out of the church.  He was dressed in shirt, slacks and sandals.  The
only symbol of his priestly office was a small silver crucifix hung
about his neck.  Even as witness of the dream, he was shocked to see
how young he was.  The terror was that he could not hear the words he
shouted, nor restrain his fierce gestures of protest.

He noted, however, that his silent shouting had some effect.  The
militiamen halted in their tracks and looked to the sergeant for
orders.  The sergeant raised his hand to command a pause, then walked
up slowly to confront Rossini, who was still expostulating with
gestures and silent mouthings.  The sergeant smiled benignly and
slashed him twice across the face with the riding-crop.  He signalled
again to the troops and Rossini was overwhelmed by a rush of armed
men.

They tore the shirt from his back, and pulled his trousers down around
his ankles so that his back and his buttocks were bare.  They
spreadeagled him against the big wooden wheel of a trader's cart and
tied his wrists and ankles to the rim and the spokes.  He could see
nothing now, except a patch of cobbles between the spokes, and a pile
of spilled grain and the frightened face of a child, hiding under the
cart.

Then, measuring and savouring each stroke, the sergeant began to beat
him with the riding-crop.  At first he tried to remain silent, biting
his lips, but finally the first soundless screams were torn from him,
and the screams turned to moans and grunts as the blows continued to
fall on his back and buttocks.  The crowd in the square were silent.
The watchers in the windows were dumb with fear and horror.  From a
quarter of a century away, in another dimension of time and space,
Luca, Cardinal Rossini watched the cold-blooded degradation of the
young man he had been.  Finally, the beating ended.  The sergeant wiped
blood and tissue from his riding-crop, then he stepped back to survey
his handiwork.  He nodded, smiled and turned to address his troops.
This time, the words were audible.  They were spoken in Lunfardo, the
argot of the slums of Buenos Aires, which Rossini had learned in his
childhood.

"There now, see!  I've softened him up for you.  He's wet and warm.
Who'd like to fuck a priest?"

The screen went black and Luca, Cardinal Rossini struggled out of the
nightmare to face a grey Roman dawn.

There were others in Vatican City stirring early that morning.  Staff
members of the Said Stampa had been up all night monitoring media
sources in Europe, the Arnericas and South East Asia.  Their director,
Monsignor Domingo Angel-Novalis, was at his desk by five, summa rising
the information for the Secretary of State.

Angel-Novalis was an Aragonese, educated in Madrid, and launched early,
with family money, on a successful career as an international
financier.  He had married well.  His wife, a pious woman, had
encouraged him to join the lay wing of Opus Dci.  When his wife and
their infant son were killed, he was supported in his grief by the
fellowship of the congregation.  Their rigorism, their close-knit and
elitist community life matched his needs.  Their closed-circuit
philosophy stilled all doubts, as the old battle-cry of the crusaders
had steeled them to battle " Ut deus vult!  "As God wills it!  At the
end of a year he applied and was accepted as a candidate for the
priesthood.

In any profession he would have been prime material.  In this one, with
a marriage and a successful career behind him, a personal battle won,
he was gem quality.  He finished his studies in Rome and was ordained
there.  He was commended to the attention of the Pontiff.  His history
and his manifest talents as a communicator brought him swift
appointment to the Sala Stampa, where a certain cool irony about the
world and its ways won him respect if not affection.  His note to the
Secretary of State was touched with the same irony:

So far, we have not done too badly with the world media.  Most editors
were caught off balance by the timing of your first bulletin.  They had
little chance to assemble commentary material or strike a clear
editorial line.  However, we may be sure that such material will emerge
in the next few days.  Early indicators are the following:

Daily Telegraph London: "The Pontiff's collapse was not an unexpected
event.  What was unexpected was the decision to treat him in his
Vatican apartment, rather than in Gemelli Hospital where he has usually
gone for treatment.  One explanation current in Rome though not yet
advanced by any Vatican source is that the Pontiff is so severely
brain-damaged that no intervention is feasible or desirable.  However,
in his present condition, every medical act the administration of
oxygen, hydration by intravenous drip represents a significant act of
intervention.

Le Monde, Paris: The message of the bulletin is clear enough.  His
Holiness had, at an earlier time, expressed his desire that there
should be no officious prolongation of his life.  Someone in the
Vatican is clearly prepared to give witness to that effect.  What is
not at all clear is whether, in the same context, the Pontiff consented
in advance to be relieved of his office if there were any doubt about
his competence to serve the Church.  In the absence of such consent,
then other questions arise: Can his wish be presumed?  If the
presumption is disputed, who decides the issue?  And, how and in what
form will he be removed to open the way for a successor?

New York Times: Vatican physicians and curial officials are now facing
a tight-rope walk on an issue which, when it touches the ordinary
faithful, they tend to dismiss with a trenchant theological
proposition.  It is said that the Pope has rejected in advance any
prolongation of his already long life.  So far, no documentary evidence
has been offered.  The Pope can no longer express himself in any
fashion at all.  He certainly cannot function in his office.  Who
decides for him, his physician or a curial committee?  And by what
criteria will they judge: a rigorist theology or a liberal one?  Both
are current in today's Church.  The Pontiff was, without doubt, a
rigorist.  He pushed the limits of infallibility as far as he could
stretch them without a schism.  So now, quis custodi et ip sos
custodes? Who will guard the guardians at the gates, and how will the
faithful judge their actions?

With great respect, Eminence, I suggest that from this moment onwards,
we return to the customary order of communication.  The Salct Stampa
drafts the bulletins, submits them to you for approval and issues them
through its normal channels.  We are walking now through a minefield
and we have yet to encounter the tabloid press and the talking-heads of
television!

I beg an urgent instruction from your Eminence.  I should like to draft
the next bulletin myself, as soon as the physicians have made their
morning report.  D. Angel-Novalis

At six-thirty in the morning, Doctor Mottola and his two specialist
colleagues examined their patient.  They had asked to be left alone
with him.  The nursing Sisters had gone to take coffee, while the
Secretary of State and a group of senior prelates, together with the
Papal secretary and Domingo Angel-Novalis, were waiting in the
Pontiff's study.

"So, gentlemen!"  Doctor Mottola addressed his colleagues.  "Diagnosis
and prognosis.  We have to be as plain as we can.  The gentlemen in the
other room are under the grille.  They need us to turn the heat down.
They've brought Angel-Novalis back into the loop.  He'll fit the right
words to what we tell him.  You first, Ernesto."

Doctor Ernesto Cattaldo shrugged resignedly.

"What you see.  Deep coma, fixed stare, no sensation.  He can't
swallow, his respiration is low and spasmodic, with moments of apnoea
which will become more frequent.  He can't cough to clear fluid from
his lungs.  I'd list him terminal."

"Piero?"

Gheddo, the cardiologist, spoke first.

"I'd agree terminal, but the decline is more gradual than one had
hoped.  He could last a few days yet.  I'd suggest that the Sala Stampa
leaves a little leeway in the prose: "The Holy Father's life is ebbing
peacefully to its close."  That sort of thing."

"So, prognosis negative.  How do we describe the treatment?"

Doctor Gheddo shrugged.

"Tell them the truth but not necessarily all of it.  We're
administering oxygen, which still isn't enough to balance the carbon
dioxide levels in the blood.  We're hydrating him enough to keep him
from burning up.  We're not nourishing him at all."

"We're walking on egg-shells here."  Doctor Mottola was dubious.

"No we're not."  The neurologist was sharp.  "We're carrying out normal
ethical treatment.  Our business is with our patient, not with the
press or the Roman Curia."

"I think," said Doctor Mottola judiciously, "it's rather a question of
helping them to find the right words to fit both the circumstances and
their consciences.  I count on your support in there, gentlemen!"

"All they need," said Gheddo, "is a few well-rounded phrases: 'limited
intervention', 'studious care for the comfort and dignity of a dying
man'.  The gentlemen in there are even less disposed than we are to a
debate on ethical principles."

"Are we ready, then?"  Doctor Mottola put the question.

"Ready as we'll ever be," said Doctor Gheddo with weary resignation.
"Christians to the lions!  Let's get it done!"

They were surprised to find how little was required of them.  The
half-dozen senior prelates assembled in the room gave them a subdued
greeting.  The Camerlengo presented Monsignor Angel-Novalis, who would,
in due course, seek any clarification of their medical reports for
inclusion in his bulletins for the world media.  He asked Doctor
Mottola to deliver the report in simple, non-clinical terms.  Doctor
Mottola summed up concisely the conclusions he had reached with the
assistance of his distinguished colleagues.  Then he waited.  The first
response came from Domingo Angel-Novalis, who was no mean professional
himself.  He was good-humoured and he cut clean to the heart of the
matter:

"Thank you, gentlemen.  May I rehearse what you have told me, to make
sure I have it right.  First, the Holy Father is dying.  The end is
expected very soon.  You are delivering oxygen and hydration.

His body cannot deal with more than that, because its functions are
deteriorating.  Correct so far?"

"Correct," said Doctor Mottola.

"And your colleagues agree?"

"They do."

"Will they continue to attend the Pontiff until his demise?"

"If the Cardinal Camerlengo so directs, of course."

"A question, then, for all of you gentlemen.  You have initiated the
treatments you describe.  You are continuing them at this moment?"

"Yes."

"Have you terminated any treatments for any reason?"

"No."

"Would you recommend any treatments which are not presently being
given?"

"No."

"Have you had any invitations from the media to discuss this case?"

The three doctors looked at each other.  Doctor Mottola hesitated a
moment before he answered.

"I have been questioned, yes.  I cannot answer for my colleagues."

Cattaldo and Gheddo nodded, but did not speak.  The quiet inquisitor
continued.

"I am sure, gentlemen, your responses were respectful of the
patient-doctor relationship, and of the family-doctor relationship
which subsists between you and all members of the Papal household."

"That goes without saying," said Doctor Mottola.

"I wonder, therefore," Doctor Cattaldo was annoyed, "why it was
necessary to say it at all!"

"Please!"  Angel-Novalis was instantly the diplomat.  "Please don't be
offended.  I am simply uttering a caution.  My colleagues and I deal
every day with media folk all round the world.  They are adept at
building headlines around the most fragmentary phrases.  Your simplest
answer to any question is that you cannot discuss the case."

"That can raise problems, too."

"I submit, my dear doctor, that we are better equipped than you are to
pre-empt them and to solve them.  I would not presume for one moment to
trespass on your professional ground.  In my own field, however, I am
quite expert.  I am sure, for instance, that in the next few days, you
and your colleagues will be offered substantial sums of money by the
media, either for press statements or television interviews, on the
last days of His Holiness.  When you refuse them, as I am sure you
will, then you may be invited to answer some innocent-seeming
questions.  I counsel you to decline."

A small murmur of agreement went round the assembled prelates.  They
approved this man.  He did not mince words.  He waltzed lightly round
the booby traps.  Angel-Novalis picked up his notes and left the room.
The Cardinal Camerlengo made a little face-saving speech.

"Before you leave, gentlemen, I should like to express on my own behalf
and on behalf of all the members of the Curia, our thanks for your care
of the Holy Father.  We know that you will continue to support him to
the end, which, we pray, may not be long deferred."

He swept them to the door, shook hands with each one and was back in
half a minute to face the assembly once more.  He looked like a man who
had just eased a great weight off his shoulders.

"So, my brothers, we are losing our Father.  I do not think any of us
will grudge him relief from the burdens of his service to the Church.
It falls to me as head of his household to prepare for his passing and
then to assume the governance of the Church while the See is vacant.
There is much to do.  I should like your permission to begin work now.
Plncetne fm tres  Do you agree, my brothers?"

"Placet."

The old-fashioned formula ran like a ripple through the assembly.  To
this they could all assent.  Whatever their rivalries and discords, the
community of the people of God continued in Christ.

Luca Rossini had dispensed himself from the early morning meeting at
the Vatican.  The Secretary of State had counselled him to silence.  It
was not easy to be silent in an assembly of curial Cardinals who were
keeping a death-watch on their supreme pastor, preparing for his
obsequies, waiting to elect his successor, wondering what would happen
when, as custom demanded, they resigned their offices, and waited for
the new Pontiff to redistribute them.

He had little to add to their discussions of protocol and procedure.
They were the inner cabinet.  He had always been a rider on the farther
marches, an emissary to the outposts of Christendom.  More than any of
his eminent colleagues, he would be vulnerable to the sharp winds of
change.  He had strong adversaries and few advocates in the Sacred
College and he lacked the patience to placate the hostile or cultivate
those who favoured him.

Soon his patron would be dead.  The man who had used the power of his
office to salvage a damaged body and spirit would absent himself for
ever.  Luca Rossini would be alone then.  They called him a Cardinal a
hinge-man, one upon whom the gateways to power were swung.  Soon he
might be a hinge to a gate that opened into nowhere.  He, too, would
have to resign the shadowy office he held and swear fealty and
obedience to a new Bishop of Rome, a new successor to Peter the
Apostle.  Was he prepared to do that?  Leaving aside any questions of
morality or ethics, was he prepared to accept the perquisites of
office, and use them without guilt or remorse for his own ends, however
those ends might define themselves?  Once, he had believed the
definition was easy.  His first medical counsellor had given it to him:
"You will seek redress, justice, retribution.  You will never get full
payment.  You will declare a vendetta, against the ungodly and the
godly who have collaborated with them.  You will demand vengeance as of
right..."

At his first audience in Rome, the Pontiff, who was to become his
patron and protector, had offered another definition:

"You are scarred.  You are bitter.  You are angry.  If I were in your
place, I should feel the same.  In a way, I am in your place, because I
appointed some of the prelates who, by their silence or their
connivance, permitted these atrocities to happen.  Because they were
dumb, we here in Rome were rendered blind and deaf.  I'm ashamed of
that.  I am ashamed of the many barbarities we appear to condone,
through culpable ignorance or the false opportunism that induces us to
make pacts with evil.  So, wear your scars with pride.  Keep your
anger, but learn to forgive!  Meditate every day on the words of our
Saviour at the height of his agony: "Father, forgive them.  They know
not what they do."  Do not forget either that this was the same man who
strode through the precincts of the temple striking out with a lash at
the pedlars and money-changers who defiled the house of God .. . you
will not change the world or yourself overnight, but you have to try.
You have to practise every day so I will give you work to stretch your
strength and enlarge your spirit."

He had accepted the counsel in good faith.  He had discharged the tasks
he had been given with energy and good judgment.  He had accepted
promotions as they were offered because, though they healed no wounds,
they put power into his hands.  He learned early to use it with
restraint, mindful of its misuse against himself.  The last thing he
wanted was to create tyrannies of his own.

He was scrupulous to weigh all the evidence in a cause against any
cleric or clerical institution.  He allowed the largest tolerances
common sense would permit; but a case once proven, he was as ruthless
and precise as a surgeon excising a malignant tumour.

It was this draconian discipline, and the secrecy within which he was
permitted to exercise it, which had driven him up the steep slopes of
preferment.  It was this same discipline which had leached out of him,
drop by drop, the last, life-sustaining dregs of passion, leaving him
parched and empty, a lost traveller walking in circles.

He had seen it happen to others, older and wiser than himself.  Trapped
in their careers, lacking the will or the inducement to break out of
them, protected always, they declined all risk and surrendered
themselves to a sceptical conformity in creed and conduct.  In his
early angry days he had mocked them.  Now, he was faced with the choice
they had been offered at some stage of their lives: "If you can't stand
the heat, get out of the kitchen.  If you still want to wear the chef's
hat, step back from the stove and content yourself with licking the
spoons to test what real cooks have made."  Now, he himself was
confronted with the same bleak proposition: Stay without honour, until
the mask you wear becomes your own face.  Or quit and walk out to
become a no-man in a no-place.

The thought brought back the terrors of his nightmare.  He thrust them
away from him, rang for his morning coffee, then switched on his
computer to down-load his overnight e-mail.

There were letters from Manila and Djakarta, from Taiwan and Thailand,
from Shanghai and Bombay.  All of them dealt with under-box issues in
the lesser known bailiwicks of the Church, where he had been sent or
called to mediate contentions or establish constructive dialogues. This
was where his best work was done.  His scars were his passport to the
least friendly territories, even to old men in Beijing, who had
survived the cultural revolution.  There was a curious freemasonry
between political martyrs.  There were perennial unspoken bonds between
the victims of the rack and the inquisitors who had put them there.

He toyed with this thought as he dealt with his correspondence.  He
remembered how Paul the Apostle described himself in his letter to the
Ephesians: "Paul the prisoner of Jesus Christ..  . a prisoner in the
Lord."  For Luca Rossini, the phrase carried a sour aftertaste.  Unlike
Paul, he had no zeal left, only a stale conviction that common decency
required him to finish the work that lay to his hand.

Just as he was about to switch off the machine, Isabel's letter
appeared on the screen.  The superscription showed it had been sent
from New York at 0215 hours.  He looked at his watch.  Rome time was
0820 hours.  The transmission had been immediate.  The tone of the
letter itself was urgent, almost peremptory.

My dearest Luca,

As you see, it is very late for me, but at least I can be private and
alone.  My husband is spending two days in Washington.  However, I
telephoned him with the news that you are prepared to commend his
appointment when the time is ripe.  He was, of course, delighted and he
has asked me to convey his thanks to you.  He will write personally to
you in due course, but, prudent fellow that he is, he feels that any
correspondence at this time would be inopportune!

I found it, however, an opportune moment to get his approval for Luisa
and myself to leave immediately for Rome and to stay there long enough
to show an unofficial family presence, with Argentine diplomats, at the
obsequies of the present Pontiff and the installation of a new one.  I
put it to Raul also that this would be a useful introduction for Luisa
into diplomatic circles abroad.  He thought that, too, was an excellent
idea.  Since he has maintained for a long time now a mistress in New
York, he will not find himself too deprived of home comforts.

Why am I doing this?  I am my father's daughter.  You know how little
taste I have for pomps and ceremonies.

I am coming to see you, Luca.  I have been desperate with worry since I
read your letter.  I have known you in every mood.  I have held you in
my arms while you wept like a child.  I have seen you murderous with
rage.  I, your Isabel, taught you to turn the rage into passion and
spend it on my body in nights that I shall remember till I die.  I
reopened your heart to love.  I cannot bear to see it locked again
under this glacial calm which you display to the world.

The calm will not last.  It cannot.  Either the Luca I know will wither
and die of the cold, or he will burst out like the volcanoes of Iceland
and blow himself to fragments.  So, like it or not, I am coming.  In
the morning I have to make final arrangements.  I have to get there
fast, before you go into conclave to elect a Pope.  What if they elect
you and you never escape from your prison-house?  That's a nightmare,
isn't it?

Don't write again.  I'll contact you as soon as we arrive.  One special
request: please spare a little attention for my daughter.  She is a
beautiful young woman and much interested in this important man whom
her mother and her grandfather had rescued from the brutal militia.
Expect us very soon.

All my love always, Isabel

He leaned back in his chair, sipped his coffee slowly and contemplated
the text on the screen.  He smiled and shook his head, admonishing
himself for his own self-deceit.  This was the visitation he had
dreamed often and now, albeit subconsciously, had contrived.

There was nothing exaggerated in Isabel's memories of him, nor his of
her.  She was too open and forthright a woman to tolerate the
half-truths which, as a celibate cleric in a high place, he used to
assist his commerce in society.  Everything she claimed to have done
for him, she had done.

There was more still to be told.  There were omissions even from the
last story that had been told to him by Carlos Menendez, Isabel's
father:

"You know I'm running a big prospecting operation in the foothills for
Petroleo Occidental.  We have our base-camp in the mountains, but I
keep an apartment over the colonnades in the square.  Sometimes Isabel
comes in from Buenos Aires to stay with me.  She's been married to Raul
a little more than a year; but the honeymoon is long over.  He's always
been ambitious, always a snob.  Isabel despises his lick-spittle
defence of the military who, God knows, are a pretty shabby bunch. I've
been a military engineer myself, rank of major.  Then, I quit to join
Petroleo Occidental.  Still, I've remained on the reserve, and I keep a
uniform handy.  It pays when they send the bully-boys around to
frighten the country folk.

It happened that Isabel and I were both in the apartment when the
militia hit the town.  We saw you strung up.  We saw the beating
begin."

"And you let it happen?"

"We let part of it happen.  I knew that sergeant, he was an ugly,
sadistic brute.  He was quite capable of ordering his men to open fire
on the people in the square.  I gave Isabel my rifle and told her to
keep him covered while I climbed into my uniform and buckled on a
sidearm.  I knew you'd survive a beating, but no one survives a bullet
in the head."

"But, for God's sake, Carlos, that beating went on for a long time."

"Long or short, by the time I was ready to intervene, it was over and
the sergeant was challenging the boys to sodomise you."

"That's as far as I remember.  I blacked out."

"Didn't Isabel tell you the rest of it?"

"She fed it to me in small doses like medicine.  She said you'd give me
the whole story later."

"I'm giving it now.  The troops held back.  The sergeant laughed and
told them he'd show them how to do it.  He started unbuttoning his
breeches.  I rushed down the stairs.  When I hit the square, I saw him
showing off his penis at the troops.  Just as he turned to rape you,
Isabel fired and blew the back of his head off.  The troops were still
standing, flat-footed in shock when I fired two shots in the air and
shouted to them to come to attention.  When they saw the uniform, they
obeyed.  I ordered them to toss the sergeant's body in the truck and
get the hell back to their barracks.  As soon as they were gone, I cut
you down.  The townsfolk helped me carry you to the apartment.  Isabel
dressed your wounds as best she could.  I called the military
commandant at Tucuman.  I told him he had big trouble on his hands,

trouble with the junta and with the Church, whom the junta were wooing
like a virgin bride.  I had sent the troops back to him, with a body to
bury.  I told him to bury it fast and deep.  Then, I made two calls,
one to our base-camp to send in a chopper with our camp doctor, the
other to a friend of mine who has a big estancia north of Cordoba.  We
flew you there.  Isabel stayed with you.  I went back to Tucuman and
then on to Buenos Aires to square things off with the junta and get the
Cardinal Archbishop and the Apostolic Nuncio on side.  My company
helped, too, but God!  it was the roughest six weeks of my life.
Isabel's husband was useless.  In the end, we cut a deal.  I would fly
you into Buenos Aires and hand you over to the Apostolic Nuncio, who
would have you flown out immediately to Rome.  I would go back to my
work.  Isabel would return to her husband.  No publicity.  No comment.
Case closed.  Is there anything else you want to know before you leave
Argentina?"

"How do you feel about Isabel and me?"

"She was good for you.  You, in a strange way, were good for her.  I
was happy to see you enjoy each other.  You're much better value than
the clown she married."

"Why did she marry him?"

"He was a beautiful piece of merchandise: old family, well-educated,
good manners, rich, all the girls wanted him; so, Isabel had to have
him.  Well, she got him.  An empty man who rattles like a gourd, but
still looks like sound fruit in the bowl."

"Why doesn't she leave him?"

"She's thought about it more than once.  Now she can' tat least not for
a while."

"Why not?"

"Use your brains, man!  You don't know what it cost to bargain
ourselves out of this mess.  Isabel has to keep her head down.  Her
husband's not powerful in the junta but his father is, and he'd make a
bad enemy .. . That's one very good reason why I want you gone and out
of her life."

"Are there other reasons?"

"Several."

"Let me hear them!"

"You're a priest.  She has no future in you."

"There's not much of the priest left."

"Something of the man may be lost, too.  It takes a long time to
recover from the experience of torture and the degradation that goes
with it.  That's why it's such a powerful tool in politics.  It's too
soon to know how you'll come out.  If you want it plain, I'll give it
to you.  I don't want Isabel playing nurse-maid to an emotional
cripple.  One of those is more than enough for any woman."

"What will happen to her now?"

"Nothing will happen.  She's my daughter.  She'll cut her life to her
own pattern.  Your folk came from Italy, didn't they?"

"Yes, why do you ask?"

"Because you'll understand what I mean when I tell you Isabel's a made
woman now.  I hope one day you'll be a made man."

"Does that mean I have to kill someone?"

"Someone, something.  You'll know when the time comes ..."

Now it seemed the time was very near, the time against which good
Christian folk prayed every day.  "Lead us not into temptation."  but
deliver us from evil."" Luca, Cardinal Rossini could not pray.  The
gift of belief was gone from him.  He could only wait, alone in his
desert, for the day of trial.

Three

SUDDENLY, THE CARDINAL CAMERLENGO WAS A VERY BUSY man.  The Pontiff was
now officially declared and prayed for among the dying.  The Curia had
agreed that it was not indecent indeed that it was necessary and
appropriate to prepare one set of ceremonies to usher him out of the
world and another to elect and inst al a successor.

In each case, the presumptions of canon law were different.  The Pope
was still alive, therefore his wishes and intentions still prevailed
-in so far as they were known or could be guessed.  He was being cared
for in his own house, with privacy and dignity; but now the embalmers
were put on notice to come swiftly when he died.  The three coffins of
cypress, lead and oak were already being made.  The Master of
Ceremonies was setting out the order of events that would take place at
his lying-in-state, at his funeral Mass and his interment in the crypt
of Saint Peter's Basilica.

The Council of State of Vatican City was already preparing the new
currency and the new stamps which would be used during the vacancy of
the See.  The security force was making ready for a large influx of
secular and clerical dignitaries who would attend the obsequies.

Vatican bureaucracy moved often slowly and cumbrously on creaking
wheels, but in matters of life, death and public image, it ran with
wonderful smoothness.  It performed most spectacularly in ceremonies,
which also contributed to the ageing and death of the most vigorous of
Pontiffs.

At this mid-morning hour, however, the Camerlengo was engaged, not in
ceremony, but in a dialogue with Monsignor Victor Kovacs, private
secretary to His Holiness.

"You understand, Victor, what happens when His Holiness dies?"

"More or less, Eminence.  You have to verify the event, sign the death
certificate with the physician, summon the embalmers and consign the
body into their hands."

"All that and a little more.  I have to deface his personal seals and
take possession of everything in his chambers, even down to his
underwear.  What I need from you now is a guided tour.  I have to know
where everything is kept: his will, his correspondence, both personal
and official, his diaries.  After the body has been removed, the rooms
will be locked and sealed.  It would help me a great deal if you could
prepare an inventory as quickly as possible."

"I've already begun it, Eminence.  Let me walk you around so that you
see for yourself how everything is arranged.  As I think you know, his
Holiness was not forgive me, is not!  the most systematic of men.  I've
had to beg him not to rummage through files but ask me to find whatever
he wants and let me put it back afterwards.  He always told me I was
fussy as an old woman.  Even so, I confess I'll miss him .. . Let's do
the desk drawers first and then the filing cabinets."

"Does His Holiness have a private repository of any sort?"

"There's a wall-safe behind that picture."

"Who has the combination?"

"Only His Holiness and myself."

"You should give it to me also."

"Of course."

"And if you would, please demonstrate the opening and closing of the
safe."

Monsignor Kovacs wrote out the combination on a card and handed it to
the Camerlengo.  Then he showed him how the framed sepia sketch by
Raffaello was hinged to the wall.  When it swung back it revealed the
wall-safe.  The secretary opened the safe, locked it immediately and
asked the Camerlengo to repeat the routine.  When he had done that
successfully, the secretary swung the picture back into place.  Neither
man had attempted to take anything from the safe.  This was the
protocol.  The Pontiff was still alive.  His writ still ran.  The
Camerlengo and the secretary completed their circuit.  The Camerlengo
asked:

"Is there anything of importance in his bedroom?"

"Not to my knowledge.  He keeps a breviary and a bible on one bedside
table, on the other whatever other book he happens to be reading at the
moment.  When he's been ill at various times, he has had me bring him
whatever documents he needed.  I always made sure that Figaro excuse me
again!  - Claudio Stagni returned them to the office.  He, of course,
would know what else is in the bedroom.

The Camerlengo gave a small chuckle:

"Claudio Stagni knows everything but never tells the half of it. Still,
he's an amusing fellow.  I'll talk with him now."

"It's strange, Eminence."

"What's strange, Victor?"

"His Holiness was always quite jealous of his personal privacy.  Stagni
was the only one who shared it with him.  Now he just lies there with
people coming in and out all the time.  He would have hated that if he
knew.  He's so utterly dependent, like a newborn child, except he has
no life at all ahead of him.  May I ask you a question, Eminence?"

"Of course, Victor.  What's troubling you?"

"When I said my Mass very early this morning, I offered it as a
petition to God to release the Holy Father from this life which for him
is not a life any more.  When I was reciting the creed, one phrase hit
me like a blow: descendit ad inferos.  He descended into the lower
regions.  I asked myself whether it was just an archaic expression
describing the mysterious time between Our Lord's death and His
Resurrection, or whether it might also describe what has happened to
the Pontiff.  Is he in some other region or state?

Is he really with us still?  Even you and I are acting as though he's
long gone."

The man's distress was so real that the Camerlengo himself was touched
to a rare gentleness.

"I tell you truly, Victor.  I don't know.  Ask my colleague, Gruber,
and I'm sure he'll read you a fine metaphysical lecture on the subject,
but for my part, I confess ignorance and I am content to remain
ignorant.  For me, the act of faith is an act of acceptance that we
live and die in mystery.  Hope is a trust that one day the mystery will
be made as plain to us as God chooses to make it.  And charity is the
gift to love and be joyful in love.  I know you're depressed; but be
assured you served his Holiness well.  He acknowledged that many times
to me and to other members of the Curia.  He could be difficult, I
know, but he was fond of you."

"That's good to hear.  Thank you."

"Now, I'll go talk to our friend Figaro.  I'll inspect the bedchamber
and say a prayer for our patient.  You have work to do.  I won't bother
you any longer."

In the presence of the dying Pontiff and the inquisitive Camerlengo,
Claudio Stagni gave a splendidly muted performance.  He knelt by the
bedside with the Cardinal and the attendant Sisters and responded with
grave emotion to the verses of the De Profundis -Out of the depths I
have cried to you, O Lord, hear the voice of my pleading.  After the
prayer, he had led the Cardinal around the chamber, opening every
cupboard and every drawer, exhibiting the items they contained,
pointing out, as the secretary had already done, that the Pontiff,
especially in his later years, was a hard man to keep tidy.  He
burrowed, he disarranged things, he put things down and forgot where he
had left them.

"Of all the people in the world, His Holiness needed a valet. Monsignor
Kovacs and myself worked out a little arrangement.  No documents to be
left lying around in the bedroom.  His Holiness knew that he was being
managed.  He grumbled about it sometimes,

but he was glad of it, really.  Secret repositories?  Strange you
should ask that, Eminence.  Here, let me show you something.  This
bureau drawer has a secret compartment.  It is open, as you see, and
empty.  There is a key inside it, but in all the years I've served him,
I've never known His Holiness to use it."

"And that's everything you can show me?"

"Everything, Eminence.  But I do have a small confession to make."

"About what?"

"Last night, on an impulse, I gave each of the Sisters on night-watch
one of the handkerchiefs I had bought only a few days ago for His
Holiness.  They were so deeply touched, I was glad I had done it.  Then
afterwards I began to think."

The Camerlengo was not happy.  His reproof was sharp and angry.

"That was a foolish and a reckless act, Claudio.  That is the very
thing I am appointed to prevent any un authorised traffic in relics and
souvenirs after the Pontiff dies.  You've been here long enough to know
better."

"I realised that afterwards, Eminence.  It was impulse only.  If you
want, I shall ask the Sisters to return the handkerchiefs."

"No, no!  That would only compound the mistake.  But understand, there
must be no more of this!  It could very easily grow into a scandal or
worse still, an absurdity!  People peddling the pontifical underwear in
the flea market at Porta Portese!  Use your brains, man!"

"I am truly sorry, Eminence."

"We'll say no more of it, then.  I'm finished here.  You are
excused."

"Thank you, Eminence."

He walked out, stoop-shouldered and repentant as a school boy.  The
moment he was outside the Papal apartment, he broke into a little jig
step to the rhythm of his theme song," Figaro qua, Figaro la, Figaro
su, Figaro gin!"

Steffi Guillemin was a late riser.  She liked to sit up in bed with
Lucetta, sipping coffee, while she read the morning papers and checked
the various Eurovision channels for headline news.  This morning's
Vatican bulletin provoked an exclamation of surprise and a reluctant
tribute to Angel-Novalis.

"He takes first prize, that one.  He's clever and handsome as Lucifer.
He's disarmed most of the land mines in the euthanasia argument and
short-circuited his own right-wing theologians in Opus Dci.  He makes
no argument with them.  They can have no quarrel with him, but he still
creates a profound impression with a question he leaves unasked: "What
would you do if your own parent were stricken like this?""

"So, it's a clever piece of public relations.  What else does it
signify?"

"Possibly nothing; but think about this.  His Holiness has been packing
the hierarchy and the Sacred College itself with men who are, by his
standards, safe conservatives.  In other words, he has tried to ensure,
as far as he can, that his policies for the Church are continued after
his death.  He's always been a centralist and an interventionist; but
both policies have already begun to backfire.  So, there exists an
interest group who want to keep the old man alive as long as
possible."

"But why?"

"The longer the election can be deferred, the better chance they have
to consolidate their voting block.  It's no secret that there has been
much travelling of late by members of the Sacred College -visits to
colleagues around the world.  In the old days, that wasn't possible.
Now, it's easy and much safer than correspondence."

"But now, you say, he's being nursed at home, and the conservatives may
be thwarted by his early demise?"

"That's what I think, but I've always believed he was too smart to be
outflanked even by death.  My thought is that he must have kept notes,
dossiers, observations for and against any future candidates for the
succession."

"If such notes exist," Lucetta was dubious, "where are they now?"

"Probably not in the Vatican."

"Why do you say that?"

"It's common sense.  His Holiness knows that when he dies everything
will pass into the hands of the Cardinal Camerlengo.  I'm guessing that
he would have made provision against that by giving the documents into
safe-keeping."

"Whose for instance?"

"I don't know."  Steffi pondered the thought for a few moments, then
exclaimed: "My God, I'm a fool not to have thought of it before!"

"Thought of what?"

"Three days ago, my people in Paris told me they had been approached by
a New York agent who suggested that a document written by the Pontiff
might be coming on the market after his death.  They were asked whether
they'd be interested in picking up French language rights."

"And were they interested?"

"How could they not be?"

"Who else has been approached?"

"In Germany it has to be Der Spiegel which might explain why Fritz
Ulrich was being so obnoxious to me yesterday.  Maybe also that was why
Frank Colson was so supportive.  The Telegraph would not normally be
the first target for a deal like that.  The Sunday Times would be a
more likely bidder."

"So, what's your next move?"

"Nose about.  See if I can pick up the smell of money or rumour.  Once
the documents are demonstrated, then my people will expect me to check
on provenance and authenticity before they pay out money.  But by then
the story won't be exclusive."

"Where can you start?  You can't very well wander round Vatican City
quizzing this prelate and that about contraband documents."

"I doubt Rome would be a good place to start anyway.  Whoever's
offering this merchandise would be looking to make money far away from
Italy and keep it away."

"That still points to an original Vatican source for the documents,
someone close to the Pontiff with ready access."

"In other words, a civilian, who has a readier exit than a cleric?"

"But how could you prove it?"

"Why would we want to prove anything?  All we need to know is that
whatever documents we're offered are genuine.  Any more would be an
embarrassment."

"Why should it be an embarrassment?"

"Because, my love, our prime interest is in the story.  So long as its
provenance is sound, nobody will care how it came into my hands. That's
for other people to worry about."

Luca, Cardinal Rossini was bidden to lunch with the Secretary of State
in his private apartment in the Apostolic Palace.  He knew of old that
it would be a spartan repast: soup, pasta, cheese, a small carafe of
thin white wine and strong black coffee to banish any thought of sleep
during the Roman siesta time.  Cardinal Salvatore Pascarelli - Turi to
his few intimates was tall and thin as a hay rake and he deplored
obesity in clerics, which, he said, with a certain sardonic wit,
brought the Church into disrepute.  He was an industrious and subtle
man who had climbed the formidable ladder of training and education in
the Secretariat from attache second-class to attache first-class, to
minute-writer, counsellor, office chief for general affairs, substitute
secretary, and finally to the award of a Cardinal's hat and the premier
title in the Roman Curia.

He wore his rank lightly; but the cares of his office weighed heavily
on his bony shoulders.  He claimed, with some reason, that the only way
to handle the political interests of a billion professing believers on
a very messy planet was to think of them as a huge mosaic and to keep
the loose pieces cemented, however small or unimportant they might
appear.  If too many loosened themselves at once, the whole picture
could fall apart.  This attitude of mind made him appear often
exacting; but his sense of history, of how the past re disposed itself
in the future, was sound and sometimes prophetic.  So, Luca Rossini
judged it prudent to have his minute on the Ambassadorial candidate
written and delivered before the luncheon.  The Secretary of State
begged that it be read to him.  He apologised for the eccentricity with
a disarming smile.

"I was taught in my youth that the test of a good document was that the
cadences fell rightly.  The truth is, Luca, I like the sound of your
accent.  Please read it to me."

"You're the host, Turi!  You call the tune.  It's a very short text.  I
assume you didn't want a whole essay."

"Of course not.  Go ahead."

"Minute on Raul Jaime Ortega, proposed by the Government of Argentina
for appointment as Ambassador to the Holy See.  I have read the
proposal.  I have never met the candidate personally, though I have
some knowledge of his background.  I note that he claims an important
role in securing my safe exit from Argentina during the regime of the
military junta.  My information at the time was that his influence was
minimal.  The real power was exercised by his father, General Jaime
Alfonso Ortega, who was an important personage in the junta.  On the
other hand, Raul Ortega's wife, Isabel, nursed me back to health after
the beating and sheltered me in secret while her father was negotiating
for my safe-conduct out of the country.  Given Raul Ortega's eagerness
to have this final posting at the Vatican, it is perhaps understandable
that he should exaggerate his own role.  I see no good reason to
contest his version of the affair.  I am sure he would make at least a
competent Ambassador and, by all accounts, an ornamental one.  In
short, I record a nihil obstat no fundamental objection.  I recommend,
however, a minimal expectation of him in either good or harm to the
Holy See."

The Secretary of State leaned back in his chair and laughed.

"Beautifully read, Luca!  Beautifully drafted!  An elegant warrant for
a bloodless execution!"

"Isn't that what you were expecting?"

"Let's say I was curious to know what you would say given the special
circumstances."

Luca Rossini chided him sharply.

"Don't play games with me, Turi!  We've known each other too long!"

"This is not a game, Luca, just the prelude to our lunch-time
discussion.  When you came to Rome all those years ago with the
Apostolic Nuncio, a certain amount of rumour came with you.  The Nuncio
discounted it in his report but pointed out that the junta would
certainly use it against you if you attempted to speak out against
them."

"The junta is long out of power.  So the threat is irrelevant."

"True."

"But these rumours remain noted in your files."

"As a matter of record only."

"What do they say?"

"That during your rescue a sergeant was shot and that while you were
recovering in a secret hiding place, you had a love affair with
Ortega's wife."

"The love affair was constructed as a rumour.  It happened to be a
fact.  I made this known to His Holiness when he first received me in
Rome.  I have never made any pretence or excuse about what happened. On
the other hand, I have never felt obliged to broadcast it.  To do so
would have put Isabel at even greater risk.  She had killed a man to
save me.  She gave me a love that restored my manhood."

"Were you never tempted to stay in Argentina and continue the
affair?"

"Of course, but that would have put both her and her father at risk of
their lives.  My exile was the price of their safety."

"Did you love her, Luca?"

"I did.  I do."

"And she loves you?"

"Yes.  We still correspond.  It doesn't heal the wounds, but it makes
them easier to bear.  Why are you raising all this now, Turi?  It has
been buried for more than twenty years!"

"Because I wondered how you would react to Ortega's posting as
Ambassador if he intended, as he obviously does, to bring his wife and
daughter with him."

"In point of fact, Turi, his wife and their daughter are coming to Rome
for a private visit in the very near future."

"That's news to me!"  The Secretary of State was genuinely surprised.
"When did you hear this?"

"Only this morning.  There was a message from Isabel on my e-mail.  I
hope your people can reserve a couple of good seats for them on the
diplomatic fringes in Saint Peter's and in the Piazza."

"Of course.  I take it you'll be seeing them during their visit?"

"Isabel said she would contact me when she arrived in Rome."

The Secretary of State permitted himself a slow smile of approval.  He
said gently, "I hope it's a pleasant experience for you both.  You have
been given a special gift, Luca, the gift to survive in a solitude of
the heart.  I've often wondered how you could be so bold in your
dealings, even with the Holy Father himself.  You hide nothing.  You
face up to every question, as you have just done now.  We're all going
to need that gift very soon.  Now, let's have lunch.  There are large
matters to discuss and we need nourishment."

The frugal meal was soon over.  The wine was as thin as ever, but they
lingered a long time over coffee.  The Secretary of State opened his
heart to Luca Rossini as he had never done before:

"Our man is dying, Luca the man who gave each of us the red hat and put
me in this job.  The press of the world is sitting in judgment on him.
Before and during the conclave, you and I will be delivering our own
judgments."

"And what will be yours, Turi?"

"We must abrogate many practices we have condoned too long, and many
policies which our master has framed."

"And which you administered."

"Administered, enforced or at the very least did not protest strongly
enough.  Even so, I shall feel like a traitor to his memory."

"Don't blame yourself too much, Turi.  We are what we were trained to
be obedient in heart and mind and will."

"I'm not in the mood for mockery, Luca!"

"I'm not mocking you.  God forbid!  I, too, have wept over our Pontiff.
He gave me kindness when I needed it and dignity when I had none.  I
fought him, sometimes more bitterly than you know, because I saw behind
him the shapes of old tyrannies, and before him the shadow of new
ones."

"But you fought him.  I didn't."

"You were always a good officer, Turi.  You were incapable of mutiny.
I've been on the verge of it many times."

"Where are you now, Luca?"

Luca Rossini frowned as he tried to frame his answer.

"I'm still in uniform.  I live by the book.  I draw my stipend.  I do
my job as best I can.  Only my reasons have changed."

"How?"

"That's another question for another time.  Tell me what's on your
mind, Turi?"

The Secretary of State was silent for a moment.  He seemed to be
gathering his thoughts, sorting through words, debating whether or not
to entrust himself to Luca Rossini.  Finally he began to talk,
haltingly at first, then with passion and eloquence.

"You don't need me to read you a list of the ills of the Church.  We
have defied the reality of human experience, we have refused to listen
to the People of God, men and women of goodwill.  They have asked for
the bread of life and we have offered them stones.  So, they have
turned away, men, women and children, too.  We, ministers of the Word,
have become irrelevant to them.  Sometimes, of late, I have had a
recurrent nightmare: His Holiness in full pontificals, standing on the
battlements of a ruined castle, a lost crusader, shouting his rallying
cry across a desert, empty of people ..."

"When he topples off," Rossini supplied the coda, "we bury him and turn
away to find another candidate for crucifixion.  When that one's bled
out, we let him, too, hang on the cross while the crows peck his eyes
out."

"That's the beginning of madness!"  There was fire in Pascarelli's
voice now.  "We are twentieth-century people.  God knows, we should
have learned by now the diminishments and dangers of the ageing
process.  Even for a Pope, there is no insurance against dementia, or
any other encroachment of age.  Yet we elect our candidate for life,
kneel in perpetual fealty, attribute to him an infallible discernment
and use every sophistry in theology to endow him with the numen of near
divinity .. . Vicar of Christ!  I've always found the title hard to
swallow, though I've never had the courage to challenge it.  Was
Alexander VI a Vicar of Christ, or Julius II or Sergius III, who
murdered his two predecessors?  We can't blame ourselves for the past,
but we are responsible for repeating it.  You're right, my dear Luca,
when you talk about electing a candidate for crucifixion.  We begin
indeed by tempting him up to a high mountain and showing him literally
all the kingdoms of the world at one glance.  I can do that little
trick in my own office with a map of the world and some flashing
lights!  Then we play on his crusader's ambition.  The Word is the
sword of the spirit.  With swift travel and instantaneous
communication, the Word can be made always and everywhere present,
delivered by and in the Pontiff himself.  That's heady wine, Luca.  All
those upturned faces, those outstretched hands!  The need they express
is much more seductive to a good man than all the gold and glitter and
lechery of Avignon or Renaissance Rome.  So, when we ask him "Do you
accept election?"  he consents with appropriate gravity and humility.
Then he sets out, as Paul did, full of passion, zeal and certainty, to
change the world."  He broke off abruptly.  "You can finish the story,
Luca.  I need more coffee."

Luca Rossini picked up the narrative on a note of smiling irony.

"He learns the hard way that jet-lag and travel weariness do impair the
judgment, that those he leaves to keep house in Rome have their own
ambitions: to create their own dukedoms inside the Kingdom of God.  He
learns what every politician and every beautiful woman has to learn:
that over-exposure is a danger, that the image becomes shopworn, the
noblest phrases sound like cliches and the warmest welcome wears out in
time, because the guest and his entourage cost money to feed and
entertain."

"There's more yet, Luca."  The Secretary of State continued the
recital.  "All this learning doesn't come at once.  It comes in a
series of subdued shocks, like the tremors in an earthquake zone.  The
tremors are unsettling.  They create a sense of solitude, which creates
in its turn a dependence upon the comfort of counsellors within an
inner cabinet.  So, the great traveller becomes a recluse, clinging to
certainties within his own soul, trusting a small cabal of intimate
friends, losing the language of the common folk from whom he sprang. We
have a chance to change that, Luca one chance."

"Define it for me, Turi."

"Let's find ourselves a Pope who will agree to call a new General
Council, to write into the canons a statutory age for the retirement of
a Pope, just as it has been written for us, and a consent in advance to
his own removal, should he become mentally incompetent."

"Let me ask you then, Turi, if you were elected would you do such
things?  There's a catch here, you see.  Once you're in office and
endowed with all the absolute powers, who reminds you of your promise?
Who exacts performance?  You have to know the answer, Turi.  You're a
prime candidate."

"I shall not be a candidate.  I shall so inform the electors."

"Why, Turi?  Why are you telling me this?"

"To the first question: I'm a good diplomat because I can juggle
endlessly with the possible.  I work in private, not in public.  I have
no pastoral experience, nor any real wish to acquire it.  Why am I
telling you?  I think there's at least an outside chance that you could
be elected."

"Me?"  Luca Rossini was shocked.  He was no longer the sceptic and the
ironist.  "That's madness, Turi!  I've always been an exotic here. Some
of our colleagues used to call me 'the protected species'.  That's what
I was, the pseudo-hero, the young martyr miraculously preserved to do
great things in the Church!  Let me tell you, Turi, I was one of His
Holiness's more notable mistakes!  I'm not what you think I am.  I'm
not even .. ."

There was the muted shrilling of a telephone.  The Secretary of State
held up his hand to silence Rossini.  He fished in the pocket of his
soutane and brought out his phone.

"This is Pascarelli."  He listened in silence for a few moments,
thanked the caller and switched off.  He turned to Rossini.

"His Holiness has just died."

"God rest him," said Luca Rossini, the unbeliever.

"Amen," said the Secretary of State.  "Now the See is vacant and we all
have work to do."

Claudio Stagni had one last service to render to his master.  He laid
out the vestments in which the Pontiff's body would be clothed by the
embalmers for the lying-in-state and the entombment.  Then he presented
himself to the Camerlengo.

"I have finished, Eminence.  Is there anything more you need from
me?"

"Thank you, Claudio.  There is nothing."

"Will there be employment for me here after the election?"

"I'm sure there will be something, but not in the present post.  A new
Pontiff will wish to make his own household arrangements.  You are of
pension able age, yes?"

"I am.  I also have several months accumulated leave."

"I suggest you take some of it now."

"Thank you, Eminence.  I need to think what I shall do with my life."

"Of course.  We are grateful for your long and faithful service,
Claudio."

"It was my honour and always my pleasure to serve His Holiness.  He was
a great man."

"A great man," said the Camerlengo absently.  "Was there anything else,
Claudio?"

"Just one thing, Eminence.  I hope it will not seem disrespectful if I
do not attend the funeral.  I don't think I could face the crowds and
the long ceremonies.  My life with His Holiness was a very private
one."

"You're a bachelor, I understand."

"That's right.  His Holiness used to say sometimes we were just two old
bachelors living in a house too big for them."

"That's one way of putting it."  The Camerlengo's tone was dry.  "Have
a good holiday."

"Thank you, Eminence."

His Eminence was already bent over his checklists.  Figaro bowed
himself out and walked sedately down to the paymaster's office to
collect all the monies due to him and file the application for his
pension.  Once outside Vatican City, he hailed a taxi to take him to
his apartment in Trastevere where he picked up his baggage -an
overnight bag and a scuffed briefcase.  From Trastevere he was driven
to Fiumicino airport to embark on a six o'clock flight to Zurich.

On arrival in Zurich he checked into a suite in the Savoy Hotel.  The
tariff made him gasp, then he remembered what had brought him here and
was cheerful again.  He locked his briefcase in the room safe, called
the desk clerk to tell her that he could be found in the grill-room,
then went downstairs to order a dinner that even a self-indulgent
Cardinal might envy.  He was sitting over his coffee and an excellent
brandy when the waiter brought him the telephone.  A woman's voice
asked in Italian:

"Claudio Stagni?"

"Yes."

"This is Barbara Busoni from New York.  We are downstairs in the lobby.
May we come up?"

"The concierge will send someone to escort you to my suite."

"There will be three of us."

"So many?"

"A handwriting expert, an attorney and myself."

"Good!  I like tidy work.  I, myself, am a very tidy man.  I'll see you
in a few minutes."

He called for the bill, signed it with a flourish, drained the last
drop of brandy, then walked jauntily to the elevator to face the
inquisitors, whom he hoped to turn overnight into generous
paymasters.

The woman was younger and more attractive than he had expected, with
honey-coloured skin, dark eyes and a Florentine accent and russet hair
cut in a page-boy style.  She made the introductions quite formally.

"Mr.  Stagni, I am Barbara Busoni.  We have talked several times.  I
work with our agency on developmental projects.  If we go ahead, I'll
be your editor.  This gentleman is Maury Rosenheim, our in-house
attorney, and this is Sergei Malenkov, a recognised handwriting expert.
This, gentlemen, is Signor Claudio Stagni, formerly valet to His
Holiness."

"Formerly or presently?"

"Formerly, Mr.  Rosenheim.  His Holiness died this morning."

"I didn't know.  I've been flying for eight hours, sleeping for most of
it.  I take it you have already left your employment."

"Not at all.  I am on holiday.  The Cardinal Camerlengo that's the
Chamberlain in English suggested I use up some of my accumulated leave
before deciding whether I should seek other employment in the
Vatican."

The lawyer frowned in puzzlement.

"This isn't the way it was represented to me, Barbara.  I know I'm
tired but ..."

"Why don't you just hush up and listen, Maury.  We're a long way from
documents yet.  It is my understanding that Mr.  Stagni is offering us
an intimate personal memoir of his years as valet to the Pontiff,
together with exclusive rights to certain private papers of the Pontiff
which have come legitimately into his possession.

Mr.  Stagni has agreed in principle that he would dictate his memoirs
under my supervision, that I would edit them as we work, so that they
could be ready for syndication before the conclave begins.  The price
we discussed was one million five in US dollars for world rights in all
media, payable half on the beginning of work and half on completion. Is
that your understanding, Mr.  Stagni?"

"I understood and accepted it as a starting-point for negotiation.
Circumstances have changed since then."

"In what respect, Mr.  Stagni?"

"Much more material intimate and exclusive material in the Pontiff's
own hand has been made available to me.  It is of such a nature that I
believe it should be published first, and my memoir second, because
that way great value would be added to both projects."

"You mean, Mr.  Stagni, you're hiking the price?"

"On the one hand, yes.  On the other, I'm offering you an enormously
more valuable product."

"May we see some of it, please?"  Barbara Busoni was testy now.  "You
must admit this is something of a surprise."

"Figaro was always full of surprises, wasn't he?"

"Figaro?"

"That was the nickname they gave me in Rome.  I was the Pope's valet,
barber, costumier, whatever but I was also one of the few people who
could get a real laugh out of him.  Here, let me show you what we're
talking about."  He opened his worn briefcase and took out a
leather-bound missal.  He opened it to a flyleaf and passed it to
Malenkov, the handwriting expert.

"I presume, sir, you have studied some specimens of the late Pontiff's
handwriting, otherwise you wouldn't be here?"

"That's true."

"And since this is a friendly discussion and not a court of law, I
accept you as an expert.  Now, would you be good enough to study the
dedicatory inscription in this missal.  In case you don't read Italian,
I'll translate it for you:

To my faithful servant, Claudio Stagni:

My Figaro, who in some very dark hours offered me the gift of
laughter.

On the occasion of his fiftieth birthday.

and that's followed by his signature.  You have no problem identifying
the handwriting or identifying the signature?"

"None at all."

"Now look at this.  It is, as you see, a short letter from the Pontiff,
written on one of his memo-cards.  Again, I'll read the text.

My dear Figaro,

Five and a half centuries ago, one of my predecessors, Pope Pius II,
Enea Silvio Piccolomini, dictated his memoirs to his secretary, who
later suppressed them for fear of scandal.  I did not dictate these
pages to you, but you were present in the late hours of many nights
when I composed them.  In olden times, I might have been able to enrich
a faithful retainer like yourself.  Soon I shall die as a Pope should,
owning nothing.

These volumes are my legacy to you.  Pray for me sometimes.

"Once again, you will recognise the signature.  I ask you again is the
handwriting authentic?"

This time the expert took a little longer to scrutinise the
handwriting.  He used a magnifying glass and lingered over the details
of the calligraphy.  Finally, he faced the small assembly.

"No doubt at all.  It's authentic."

"So where does that lead us?"  Maury Rosenheim put the question.

"It leads us to this."  Stagni put on a pair of white gloves, took the
three volumes from their tissue paper wrappings, spread the wrappings
on the table and laid the volumes reverently upon them.  Then he made
the climactic speech of the evening.

"I trust, ladies and gentlemen, you will not be disappointed.  Miss
Busoni, you can read the texts and judge their editorial value.  Your
expert has already authenticated the handwriting.  And you, Mr.
Rosenheim, have seen proof of clean provenance.  Now, a very simple
question.  Do you want to start dealing?"

"Where do you suggest we start?"  Maury Rosenheim was leading with his
chin, as he always did.

"We start at five million US dollars," said Stagni calmly.  "That
secures your right to handle the property in all media.  Then we talk
about percentages and overriders."

Maury Rosenheim gaped at him in wonderment.

"Overriders?  Where the hell did you learn about overriders?"

"I'm a quick study."  Stagni gave his happiest smile.  "If you want to
sample the manuscript, if you want to confer, use the bedroom.  If you
want to call New York, please use the telephone or the fax.  Just one
detail, my friends.  Please don't play bazaar games with me.  My offer
expires at eleven tonight Zurich time.  That's close of business in New
York and remember it's cash against documents in Zurich tomorrow."

As the bedroom door closed on his three guests, Stagni breathed a long,
silent sigh of relief.  He had invested two thousand dollars in the
best forger money could buy an old counterfeiter who had served ten
years on Lipari and had lived with his married daughter and her husband
two alleys away from his apartment.  Stagni had composed the text, and
supplied the necessary specimens of the Pontiff's handwriting.  The old
forger had guaranteed his handiwork against any expert in the world. He
was careful to point out that it was not poor handiwork which had put
him in gaol, but a jealous woman who had found him in bed with her
sister and denounced him to the carabinieri.  Unfortunately, he could
not guarantee himself against mortality.  He had died of a heart attack
two weeks after delivering his work.

Stagni had every intention of profiting from the event.  The moment the
funds were in his bank, he would be off and away to Brazil by a very
roundabout route.

Four

FOR TWO DAYS AFTER HIS DEATH AND HIS EMBALMING, THE body of the Pontiff
lay in state in the Chapel of the Most Holy Sacrament in Saint Peter's
Basilica.  Tall candles burned about him.  Officers of the Swiss Guard
stood vigil while thousands of believers and non-believers Romans and
strangers alike passed in slow procession by his open coffin.

His body was dressed in full pontificals, with a veil over his face, a
rosary in his hands, his breviary laid open on his breast with the silk
marker set at the Office of the Day.  Tucked into the casket were
copies of the medals he had struck during his reign, and a small
leather purse containing specimens of his coinage.  These, so the
reasoning went, would help to identify him if, after the cataclysms of
another millennium, he were exhumed and reburied.  The Romans, a
sceptical people, with a long history had another explanation: The Pope
is human, too.  He has to pay the ferryman like the rest of us.

On the third day, they entombed him in the crypt.  The world media
treated the obsequies and the interment with suitable gravity.  The
first editorials were couched in sonorous, panegyric prose.  The first
photographs emphasised architectural grandeur, ritual splendour, the
world-wide reach and diversity of the Church One Holy Catholic and
Apostolic.  The television services delivered reverent rhetoric and
self-indulgent visuals of the familiar and unfamiliar icons.  Then
began the Novemdiales, the nine days of masses, prayers and public
preaching by notable prelates in the major churches of the city.  The
sermons were not pious celebrations of a dear departed soul.  They were
intended as public expressions of the needs of the faithful, as signals
to the electoral college about their duty to find a good pastor for the
Romans and for the Church at large.

At the same time, the world media were playing in a different key.  The
florid prose was dropped.  Pious platitudes became political barbs. The
election of a new Pontiff was a critical act whose consequences for
good or ill would spill over the frontiers of nations and the barriers
of race, creed and custom.  The world was in crisis, the Church was in
disarray.  The media reflected all their confusions.  It was the New
York Times, however, which pulled the pin from the grenade:

The late Pontiff was a stubborn and courageous man who saw it as his
pastoral task to mould human clay into a Christ-like image.  However,
it seemed often as if he were trying to create a community as uniform
and as passive as the entombed warriors of China.  He alienated the
women of the Church.  He silenced or intimidated its boldest thinkers.
He was always a centralist and an interventionist.  The notion of
collegial government was as alien to him as the idea of a priesthood of
women.  It was a not unexpected move when he appointed men of like
views to vacant bishoprics and gave others the Cardinal's hat. Clearly,
he hoped that the College of Cardinals would elect a Pope who would
continue his own policies.

Now, immediately after his death, there is a new surprise.  It could be
interpreted and most certainly will be by many as a posthumous attempt
at intervention in the electoral process itself.

In our weekend edition, we shall be publishing, simultaneously with
other major newspapers around the globe, an extraordinary document. The
document consists of private diaries written each evening by the late
Pontiff.  He kept them in a secret place in his dressing-room, and
finally gave them, as a personal legacy, into the hands of his
long-time valet, Claudio Stagni, who often kept the Pontiff company
while he worked into the small hours.

The document has been fully authenticated by two handwriting
specialists one in Europe and one in the United States.  The provenance
is simple and direct from the Pontiff to Stagni.  The tide is beyond
question: a letter of legacy written by His Holiness to Stagni in the
last days of his life.  All this evidence will be displayed in our
publication.

The diaries contain revealing footnotes on Vatican policies and vivid
pen-portraits of high prelates all around the world, including those
who are at this moment assembled in Rome to elect a new Pontiff.  The
material will be published in full, except for a few passages which, on
attorney's advice, might be considered libellous .. .

There was more yet; a promise of backstairs gossip from Claudio Stagni
himself under the title, The Little World of Figaro and his Papa.  The
upshot of these announcements, and a rash of similar ones in various
capital cities, forced the Cardinal Camerlengo to summon an emergency
meeting of Cardinals in the Apostolic Palace.  They were aggrieved.  He
himself was hugely embarrassed, especially when the Cardinal Archbishop
of New York tabled a proof-copy of the offending material, and
distributed copies which had been run off that afternoon at the Villa
Stritch, where His Eminence was lodged.  In his brusque military style
he was Chaplain General to the US Armed Forces he addressed the
gallery:

"This was delivered to me this morning from the Roman bureau of the New
York Times.  They were quite courteous about it.  They said they had
nothing to hide.  They claimed their tide was unassailable, and from
what I've read, the documents are authentic.  What we all want to know
is just how this could have happened, and second, do we have at this
late stage any hope of injuncting the publication?"

"No hope at all, I'm afraid."  The Camerlengo was regretful but firm.
"I've discussed the matter with Monsignor Angel-Novalis and with our
legal advisers, both lay and clerical.  On the face of it, Claudio
Stagni has full title to the documents, which the Pontiff himself
designates as a legacy.  The buyers and the literary agents who sold
them around the world have obviously conducted their own enquiries. Our
advice is that there are no grounds for injunction in any territory."

"But how could His Holiness have committed a folly like this?  You saw
more of him than any of us, Baldassare.  Was he in his right mind?"

"I have no doubt of it no doubt at all."

"Was there any possibility of undue influence by this Stagni fellow?"

The Camerlengo gave a small humourless smile.

"You know we all know how hard it was for any of us to influence the
late Pontiff in these last years."

"Where is Stagni now?"

"He's on vacation."

"For which we are paying?"

"Naturally.  He had accumulated quite a lot of leave for which he is
entitled to be paid.  He is also entitled to a pension to which he and
we have contributed for a long time."

"Are we going to pay that too?"

"In the absence of any evidence of criminal behaviour, we are obliged
to do so."

"Are we seeking such evidence?"

"We are at a loss where to begin.  Consider a moment.  Before His
Holiness died, I made a full inspection of his study in the company of
his secretary, and of his bedchamber and dressing-room with the valet.
There was no evidence of any of these documents."

"Did you see the secret hiding place?"

"It was shown to me.  It was empty."

"And the valet made no mention of the documents?"

"No."

"In hindsight, at least, doesn't that look suspicious?"

"Not suspicious enough to go to law about it, then or now.  At worst,
his silence could be characterised as an act of enlightened
self-interest."

"Or a response to the wishes of the Pontiff himself."

The interjection came from Luca Rossini, who stood up holding the text
in his hand.  There was a sudden shocked silence before the Cardinal
Archbishop quizzed him sharply.

"Is that what our eminent colleague believes?"

"It's what this eminent newspaper suggests."  Rossini was unruffled.
"First it points out, quite correctly, that the late Pontiff made
certain appointments to the College of Cardinals in the hope that the
man whom the College elected would continue his existing policies.
Then, it goes on as follows: "Now, immediately after his death, there
is a new surprise.  It could be interpreted and most certainly will be
by many -as a posthumous attempt at intervention in the conclave
itself"."

Out of the silence that followed came the voice of the Camerlengo.

"Is that what you believe, Luca?"

"I believe that such an interpretation will be made by many readers and
many commentators."

"What is your own reading of this unfortunate incident?  You were,
after all, very close to His Holiness."

"I was close enough to know that, in his later years, he could be
sometimes hasty in judgment and that sometimes he believed that he
could, or should, pre-empt the future course of history.  That,
however, is a personal opinion.  It gives us no grounds to take legal
action against Claudio Stagni, or even to impugn his reputation."

"You mean we should do nothing?"  The Archbishop of New York was
outraged.  "The man's a thief!"

"Can we prove that?"

"Not yet.  But we have to discredit him."

"We may end by discrediting ourselves.  Let's reason a little here. The
most powerful newspapers in the world will defend the authenticity of
what they have bought.  Most of us in this room recognise in the text
echoes of remarks that the Pontiff has made from time to time in public
or in private.  We can all attest at the very least that the
handwriting closely resembles that of the Pontiff.  So, I think we'd
look foolish if we tried to discredit the documents.  Stagni's claim of
ownership is another matter not easy to dispose of.  He has a holograph
document, a letter in the Pontiff's handwriting, giving him the diaries
as a legacy.  Two handwriting experts have verified it as genuine.  I
submit that by the time we could offer contrary proof in court, we'd
have spent millions and we'd be handing our new Pontiff a sackful of
litigations in a dozen jurisdictions.  Hardly a good beginning to a new
reign!"

Rossini sat down.  There was a long silence while the Camerlengo looked
about the room, waiting for another intervention.  Finally, the
Secretary of State stood up:

"Our colleague, Luca, is right.  Prima facie the diaries are authentic.
Our only real challenge hard to mount and expensive to sustain is to
the validity of Stagni's title to the documents.  Are they a valid
legacy from the Pontiff to his valet?  The letter of gift is in the
same handwriting as the diaries, which most of us here would accept at
first glance as that of the Pontiff himself.  So what do we do?  Mount
a full-scale challenge or raise whatever legitimate doubts we can and
hope that the affair will fizzle out like a Roman candle once the
procedures of election begin?"

"Any more comments?"  asked the Camerlengo.

"Only one," said the man from Paris.  "I hate the thought of that
little salaud sunning himself in Rio or some place like it and living
like a prince on his ill-gotten gains!  Maybe he'll catch the
plague."

"I wouldn't wish that on anyone," said the man from Rio.  "My city is
one of the pest-houses of the world."

"Not half as bad as mine," said the man from Kinshasa.

The Camerlengo called the meeting to order.

"His Eminence the Secretary of State has offered a motion: We make no
challenge to the authenticity of the diaries.  We announce that
enquiries are being made as to the legitimacy of title."

"With respect," said Luca Rossini, "I suggest a small addendum.  That
Monsignor Angel-Novalis be given authority to conduct the enquiry and
make whatever comments are possible to the press.  The rest of us are
going to have more important things to do."

"I accept the amendment," said the Secretary of State.

"I second the amended motion," said the Archbishop of New York.

"Placetne fm tres  The Camerlengo put the ritual question.  All hands
were raised.  All voices murmured agreement.

The Archbishop of New York raised his hand with the rest, but being a
testy fellow, he delivered a final unhappy protest to his neighbour,
Gottfried Gruber:

"I still can't figure out the relationship between that little creep
Stagni and the Holy Father."

"I can," said Gottfried Gruber moodily.  "The Holy Father became such a
public figure, he had no place to laugh or cry except in his own
chambers.  Even with us, his colleagues, he was often wary and
withdrawn.  His valet was the only person with whom he could relax and
share a joke or the gossip of the day We all knew that.  Some of us
were jealous of it."

"Do you really believe he gave his diaries to Stagni?"

"I'm sure he shared some of the entries as he wrote them."

"I could see that happening.  I know what it feels like to be alone at
the end of a rough day, with only God to talk to.  He's a good
listener, but a silent one.  Sometimes it's hard to believe He's there
at all."

"My point exactly," said Gruber.  "No one has worked harder than I to
keep the Faith pure and defend the authority of the Roman Pontiff as
its arbiter and interpreter.  But lately, I have come to wonder ..."

He broke off in mid-sentence.  The Archbishop prompted him sharply.

"You wonder what?  Say it, man!  We're all brothers here."

"I have come to wonder whether I have not helped to create a recipe for
revolution."

"There's only one way to answer the question, Gottfried."  "Please,
tell me!"

"Ask yourself what you would do, if suddenly we sat you on the throne
of Peter!"

The idea was proposed by Steffi Guillemin at the bar of the Foreign
Press Club.  Fritz Ulrich was loud in support.  The vote in favour was
unanimous.  Monsignor Domingo Angel-Novalis should be invited to
address the members of the Club at luncheon the next day and answer
questions afterwards.  Guillemin made the phone call and received a
favourable answer.  A shout of jubilation went up when she put down the
receiver and gave the thumbs-up sign.

"He wants to do it.  He's just got to clear it with the Secretariat. He
doesn't expect any problems."

"They'd be fools to refuse," said Ulrich.  "It's the best chance
they'll get to respond to our publication of the diaries."

"It could also be Angel-Novalis's last hour in the spotlight and the
Opus Dci people must be wondering how their role will change in a new
pontificate."

"Angel-Novalis won't have to hedge as much as usual," Colson reminded
them.  "He'll give us answers in double space, so we can read between
the lines."

"Provided we ask the right questions," said Guillemin, "and don't waste
time duplicating them."

"A suggestion then.  Why don't we pool our questions and have them put
by a single interrogator who can't be side-tracked and can move forward
quickly?  Our guest is very fast on his feet, as we all know."

"I nominate Steffi."  Ulrich grinned at her.  "She thought of the idea.
She's fast on her feet, too.  I've never known a man who could catch
her!"

Guillemin ignored the jibe and refused the challenge.

"The questions should be asked in English, in which our guest is
fluent.  It makes for easier coverage and pooling both of questions and
answers."

"Who chooses the final list of questions?"  This from Colson.

"Bureau chiefs of those papers who bought the publication rights and
television services who contributed to the purchase.  Does anybody have
problems with that?"

"None from me," said the man from the New York Times.

"None from us," said The Times of London.

Guillemin had the final word.

"All questions to be handed to the barman by six this evening.  We need
a morning's work to set them in order and give ourselves the best
chance at a first-rate story.  I nominate Frank to put the questions.
Even I can understand his English.  One more thing -we're more
interested in what is said than in camera angles.  We'll allot
positions for TV crews and still photographers.  We can't have people
popping off flash bulbs during the speech or the question time.  And
people who have paid for syndication rights get priority.
Understood?"

Of course they understood!  In Rome everyone understood everything,
even before it was uttered, so no one took time to listen to anything.
But Steffi Guillemin had lived long enough in the city to understand
arrangiarsi the art of arranging oneself.  So, she gathered her own
small group of conspirators to set a seating plan and formulate the
questions in English with Frank Colson.

At five in the afternoon, Angel-Novalis called.  He had been granted
permission to speak at the luncheon.  There were, however, certain
conditions.  Guillemin was instantly in combat position.

"What conditions, Monsignore?"

"First, you must note in reports that I am speaking as a private
individual and not as a Vatican representative."

"That's stretching the truth, isn't it?"

"It's expressing a canonical fact.  The See of Peter is vacant.  All
the prescriptions of the recent Pontiff are in force until a new Pope
is elected.  I cannot comment on his policies or make prophecies about
new ones.  I can, however, express my private opinions, provided they
are so designated."

"You understand that what we send from here may be changed or omitted
by editors in our home offices?"

"Of course.  I am as you might say ..."

"Covering your backside," said Steffi Guillemin.  "We understand that,
Monsignore.  What's the next condition?"

"I will not express opinions on specific persons whose names are
mentioned in the diaries.  The risk of libel still exists for me and
for you."

"But you won't back away from general enquiries about 'certain
persons'?"

"I reserve always my right to refuse comment."

"We're comfortable with that.  Anything else?"

"The subject of my address will be "Past and Future in an Abiding
Church'."

"It doesn't sound like a lunch-time laugh show," said Guillemin; "but
I'm sure you'll do a beautiful job.  You may find this hard to believe,
but you will be among friends."

"I never doubted it, Mademoiselle!  Until tomorrow, then."

Guillemin hung up and gave a little yelp of delight.  This man was
bright sometimes too bright for his own good, but he had enough
self-esteem to guarantee a first-rate performance.  This would be a
classic court-room piece with a very assured defendant and a very
urbane prosecutor.  At issue would be twenty-five years of centrist
Church government and a vision if such existed of a new millennial
epoch, each interpreted from the secret diaries of a dead man.

When Luca Rossini returned home at seven in the evening, there was a
message from Isabel.

Luisa and I leave New York at 18.30 hours this evening.

We arrive Rome 0850 hours tomorrow morning and will be met by an
attache from the Argentine Embassy.  Raul has reserved a suite for us
at the Grand Hotel.  He insists that we

"present ourselves with a proper style".  After a long night flight, we
shall both need a rest and some beauty treatment before we meet our
very special Eminence!  We shall expect you at eight for dinner in the
suite.  Please leave a message at the hotel to confirm that you will
arrive even if Attila is at the gates of Rome.

All my love, Isabel

In spite of all the fantasies he had nourished, the impact of the news
took his breath away.  After a quarter of a century of separation and
soul exile, they would be together in the same room.  They would meet,
eye to eye, lip to lip, body to body and all the lost yesterdays would
be forgotten.

Then a sudden panic seized him.  This, too, was a fantasy.  There would
be a witness to the meeting, a young woman in her mid-twenties,
daughter of Isabel and Raul, granddaughter of that doughty old
adventurer, Carlos Menendez, who had bullied the junta and the Church
to send him safely out of the country.  Menendez's grim warning still
echoed in his memory: "It takes a long time to recover from the
experience of torture.  It's too soon to know how you'll come out.  I
hope one day you'll be a made man."

How would old Carlos judge him now wherever he was lodged?  He had died
ten years ago, when his chopper went down in a remote Andean valley. He
asked himself also how the young woman would react to him.  Most of
all, he wondered how he would look to Isabel who, so many years ago,
had nursed him out of an obscene degradation into the image of a man.

He walked into the bedroom, and stood a long time looking at himself in
the mirror on his bureau.  He saw a lean, fifty-year-old fellow with
the olive skin of a Mediterranean man, iron-grey hair, and a mouth grim
in repose, which could twitch into a rare smile when the lights were
lit in his dark eyes.  He was tall for a southerner and he had wondered
sometimes what tincture of corsair or raiding

Norseman had given him his height and his long loping gait.

Suddenly he burst out laughing at the image in the mirror and the tally
he was making of its good points, as if he were judging an animal. This
was the root of his fear: that Isabel, the one woman he had loved,
should find him ridiculous.

Which brought him, by a round turn to a new series of questions.  How
would they greet each other: with a handshake or a kiss, and what sort
of a kiss would be appropriate in the presence of her daughter.  Isabel
had given him no signals in any of her letters, yet she, too, must have
dreamed the moment of their meeting.  Whenever she mentioned her
daughter, it was with pride and affection and a genuine satisfaction
that relations between the girl and her father were good.  "She adores
him, because he denies her nothing.  She is his show-pony whom he
delights to display and he is very careful about whom among his
friends, male or female, he introduces to her.  She on her part has a
generous and happy spirit and we have become good companions."

So, another question more foolish than any others: what should he wear
to this three-cornered dinner-party?  He had several choices: a cassock
scarlet-piped with scarlet cincture, highly formal and certain to
create a stir in the lobby of the Grand Hotel, a standard clerical
suit, with only a Roman collar and the purple stock to denote his rank,
or the business suit with collar and tie which he wore when he
travelled to places where it was expedient to display a religious
neutrality.  He rejected that option instantly.  It would take too long
to explain.  However, he promised himself that when he drove Isabel out
to his retreat in the hills, he would wear his work clothes and she,
please God, would agree to come alone.

A shadow of resentment intruded into his musings.  Why had Isabel
arranged their first encounter like this?  Had she already drawn some
kind of line in the sand?  Was she afraid of a sudden impulse of
passion on his part or her own?  He was angry with himself even for
entertaining the idea.  She owed him nothing.  He was the debtor.  She
had the right to set the terms of payment.

Besides, her letters were the true testimony to her feelings for him
-and, he had to admit, they were much more open than his to her.  So,
he rejected the untimely thought and exchanged a grin of self-mockery
with the image in the mirror.

None the less, he was restless and uneasy.  He did not want to face the
evening alone.  He told the staff" he would be out for dinner.  Then he
dialled the number of a certain Monsignor Piers Paul Hallett, who
worked as a palaeographer in the Vatican Library.  Theirs was an
unlikely friendship which had flowered out of a chance meeting in the
Library just after Rossini's arrival in Rome.  As soon as they had been
introduced, Hallett had asked the languid question: "I say dear boy,
you wouldn't happen to know anything about Inca time numeration would
you?"

Hallett had a witty tongue, a gift for indolent scholarship, and a very
English contempt for the excesses of clerical government.  Was he free
for dinner?  Always when the Eminent were paying.  Would he be happy
with Antica Peso!  Of course.  The place was splendidly discreet and it
would be even more comfortable if they could both wear civilian
clothes.

"No offence to my eminent host, but Rome these days is suffering from a
plague of prelates.  All that red and purple!  It's like a measles
rash!"

The name Antica Pesa signified the "Old Weigh-house" where carters'
loads were checked and taxed before they went on up the Janiculum Hill.
It was situated in an ancient tenement whose front doors opened on to
the cobbled pavement of the Via Garibaldi, while at the rear it gave
access to a small enclosed garden, a pleasant place for summer
dining.

There was a chill in the air that night, so Rossini and his guest
settled themselves in the glow of an olive wood fire set in an
ingle-nook large enough to roast an ox.  They agreed on the menu:
spaghetti alia- poverella and vitello arrosto with a flagon of red wine
and a bottle of mineral water.  Then, counting on a leisurely service,
they began the ambling talk of old friends.  Hallett, as always, put
the opening questions.

"So tell me, eminent friend, what's the truth about these diaries?  Are
they authentic?  Were they stolen?  Why no public protest from the
Vatican about their publication?"

Rossini shrugged and rattled off the answers:

"They're authentic, yes.  The provenance seems simple.  The Holy Father
gave them to Stagni as a personal legacy.  There's a manuscript letter
to prove it."

"The man must have been in his dotage!"

"He's dead and buried, my friend.  Let him rest in peace."

"What do you know about this valet?"

"Not much.  He was already a fixture when I arrived in Rome.  I've
passed the time of day with him; but like everyone else, I've just
taken him for granted.  You've been here longer than I, what do you
know?"

"I work in the Library, which is a long way from the Papal bedchamber,
but I do take coffee every morning in the Nymphaeum across the garden.
It's a lively place for the Vatican at least!  Stagni was there
often."

"What was he like?"

"An agreeable gossip.  People liked him.  They called him Figaro; but
you know that, of course."

"I know it."

"What you probably don't know is that he had been talking for a long
time about writing a book when he retired.  Obviously some Italian
publisher had approached him, but he had larger ambitions.  He was like
a jackdaw snatching up scraps of information about agents, publishers
and the media in different countries.  I gave him an old copy of "The
Writers and Artists Yearbook' and suggested he get a similar
publication for America.  He was profusely grateful."

"Once he had the contacts," Rossini mused, "he would have been
encouraged to extend the ideas."

"Exactly!  Now here's another sidelight.  This time I'm involved."

"You?  How in God's name ..."

"Patience, dear Eminence!  Patience!  In my line of work, the question
of forgery crops up from time to time.  It's an ancient trade: people
have been forging artefacts and documents for centuries.  We've done
our share of it in the Church, too!  Anyway, the question came up one
morning at coffee time.  Stagni was there.  He claimed to know an old
man who had done time on Lipari for forgery of identity documents,
banknotes and even would you believe phoney patents of nobility.  There
was quite a trade in those just after the war."

"Do you remember this man's name?"

"I do, as a matter of fact.  I got his address from Stagni and
consulted with him on a disputed document.  His name was Aldo Carrese.
He's dead now."

"When did he die?"

"A few months ago."

"Was Stagni using him?"

"I suppose it's possible."

"Why would Stagni give you his name?"

"He could hardly refuse it.  I told you he was a gossip.  He had talked
himself into a corner."

"Not that it helps us very much now.  The man's dead.  The diaries are
already in publication.  Stagni's home free and rich."

"That's a shame!"

"Still, we may be able to salvage something.  Angel-Novalis is
addressing the Foreign Press Club.  I'll talk to him in the morning.  I
confess I can't care too much.  This whole affair is a nine-days'
wonder."

"Is that meant to be a pun?"

"It is.  We've just started the nine-day memorials looking back,
looking forward.  The press will go into a feeding frenzy over the
diaries, until we're locked into the conclave.  After that, it will be
a dead issue a footnote to history."

"That touches a nerve!"  Hallett was suddenly moody.  He relapsed into
silence.  Rossini prompted him.

"Something's on your mind, Piers.  We're friends.  Tell me."

"I was just thinking," Hallett began slowly, "I've been dealing with
footnotes all my life."

"I thought you were happy in your work."

"I was, until recently."

"Something's happened to change that?"

"Nothing's happened exactly.  I'm just going through a bad patch
boredom, accidie, vanity of vanities, all flesh is grass that sort of
thing."

"You probably need a holiday or a change of job."

"The latter, more likely.  It's the job itself that's getting to me.  I
used to love it, but now there's no taste in it any more."

"Go on."

"It's simple enough.  I'm a palaeographer.  I deal with ancient
writings and inscriptions.  It's one of the most arid fields of
scholarship one of the most lonely, too.  Everything refers back to the
past.  The sign-posts all point down dead-end streets, to crumbling
temples and forgotten gods.  My own self has become a very dusty
habitat.  That's why I was so delighted when you called and invited me
to dinner tonight."

Before Rossini had time to respond, the waiter set down the heaped
plates of pasta and chanted his litany: "Cheese, gentlemen?  Pepper?
Good appetite!"

"I have the appetite," said Luca Rossini.  "I could use a blessing."

Hallett made the sign of the cross over the food and pronounced the
benediction.

"Bless us, O Lord, and the food we share in friendship."

"Amen!"  said Luca Rossini.  "I'm grateful for your company, too,
Piers."

They ate steadily through the mountain of pasta; but halfway into the
dish, Rossini was defeated.  He picked up the thread of Hallett's
talk.

"I understand what you say, Piers, about the solitude of specialist
scholarship.  The Hittites and the ancient Illyrians are hard to share
over a breakfast table."

Hallett put down his fork with a clatter and looked up at Rossini.
There was a fire of anger in his eyes.

"It's the breakfast table I'm missing, Luca!  I'm withering in celibate
solitude.  I hit fifty next year and what have I got to show in merit
for myself or good for anyone else?  I'm not a priest; I'm a pedant.
More than that, Luca, I'm a wasted man!"

"Who's the girl, Piers?"  It was only half a joke, a fly cast to catch
a too difficult confession.  Hallett rose to the lure.

"It's not a girl, Luca.  It's a man."

Rossini hesitated for a split second only, then asked with studious
neutrality:

"Do you want to tell me the rest of it?"

"He's a priest, like me.  He's been working for the last six months
over in the Secret Archive.  He's British, like me, which adds a
certain piquancy to the joke.  Remember old Peyrefitte and the young
French cleric who fed him material from the Archive to build into his
plots?  Peyrefitte grew rich and famous on the novel, which, if memory
serves me, was called The Keys of Saint Peter.  The cleric achieved
fame as a character in his works."

"I never read the book," said Luca Rossini, "but I understand how you
feel."

"I wonder if you do.  This is the first time in love for me, Luca and,
God help me, it's the coup de foudre!  I don't know how to handle it. I
don't know what to do or say.  Until now, all my fantasies and all my
little lusts used to be safely hidden under my cassock.  I had work I
enjoyed.  I prayed as I was taught to do against the noonday devil.  I
played by the rules.  Now, I see no point in the game.  I'm too
vulnerable.  The Church is too vulnerable to me."

"And your friend in the Archive?"

"We meet, we talk, we find pleasure in each other's company.  For the
moment that's all but it won't go on like that."

"What does he want to do?"

"I don't know.  He hasn't had to declare himself yet.  I'm not sure
either that I'm ready for it.  All I know is that this is the wrong
place for me."

"I'm sure we could find another appointment for you in a more congenial
environment."

"You know that's not the answer."

"I know it, my friend better than most.  We carry our own devils on our
backs, because often they're the only company we can endure.  We're
just friends talking through a difficult situation; even so, I am not
sure how to advise you."

The waiter came back to clear the pasta dishes, carve the veal and
offer a second flask of wine.

"Can we manage it?"  Rossini asked.

"I need it," said Hallett.  "Perhaps we'll find wisdom in the bottom of
the bottle."

"Better, I think, that wisdom be justified in her children."  He said
it with a laugh and then raised his glass to Hallett.  "I'm honoured
that you've confided in me.  I know how dangerous it is to be alone
when a crisis hits."

"I believe you do," said Hallett.  "The thing I fear most is that I
could be so needy that I might enslave myself, utterly demean myself to
a lover."

"In particular, the young man from the Archive?"

"In a way, yes.  He's like a young god, proud in his youth.  I'm what?
An ageing cleric with the seven-year itch.  Not a pretty picture, is
it?"

"It's a sad picture, my friend.  My heart weeps for you."

"I wish I could weep.  I can't.  I'm just so bloody ashamed of my own
need.  Do you have needs, Luca?"

"I do.  Not the same needs as yours, but yes, I have them."

"How do you cope?"

"Not very well."  Rossini smiled.  Hallett persisted with the
question.

"' This kind is not cast out except by prayer and fasting?  Is that
what you're saying?"

"That hasn't been my experience."  There was a sharp edge to his
retort.  Hallett apologised.

"I'm sorry.  I stepped over the line.  I should tell you I've been
thinking of leaving the priesthood.  It would be one less burden to
bear, one fear less to carry.  You know how exposed we are these days
to scandal and litigation."

"I know very well.  As a Church we have yet to learn how to cope with
our own humanity.  If you left, would you be able to sustain yourself
professionally?"

"Without a doubt even with the handicap of age.  In my own narrow
field, I'm one of the best in the world."

"Then you should think calmly about it as a possible decision.  There
is a process to go through if you want a formal release with all the
seals in the right places.  I'd try to shorten it for you if I could;
but God knows where I'll end up under a new Pontiff.  You don't have to
make a decision yet.  You don't want a crisis situation with your
friend."

"He's not likely to create it.  I am."

Rossini was silent for a moment, toying with a new thought, then
abruptly he put it to Hallett.

"First you need to cool off."

"What are you suggesting?"

"I was thinking of a retreat."

Hallett gaped at him in surprise and anger.

"Come on, Luca!  Not from you of all people!  Cold showers and a hair
shirt and some solitary confinement!"

"Not at all!  As a conclavist, I am entitled to bring with me a minimal
staff.  I was thinking of taking someone from my office.  You can have
the job if you want."  His eyes lit up and his mouth relaxed into a
boyish grin.  "At least it will keep you off the streets and put you in
the company of your elders and betters."

"That's uncommonly kind of you.  You're right, it might provide a
therapeutic shock to the system, but what happens afterwards?"

Rossini, still smiling, refused the challenge.

"One day at a time, Piers.  That's all we're given; that's all we can
take, any of us.  We invoke the Holy Spirit to guide us in the
conclave.  Maybe the Spirit will speak to you."

"Are you expecting Him or should it be Her?  to speak to you, Luca?
Give you a name for your voting card?"

"At this moment," said Luca Rossini lightly, "the Spirit and I are out
of touch with each other.  You don't have to answer yet about the
conclave.  Just think about it for a day or so.  Pour me some more wine
like a good fellow!"

Five

EARLY THE NEXT MORNING, MON SIGNOR ANGEL-NOVALIS was summoned to a
conference with the Camerlengo, the Secretary of State, Rossini and
three other Cardinals.  They were assembled for one of the curial
committee meetings which would take place every day until the conclave
began.  Rossini laid out a proposal for Angel-Novalis.

"You have accepted to speak today, as a private person, at the Foreign
Press Club.  As that same private person, we ask, but do not command, a
service from you.  If you agree, you will make few friends and some
enemies in the high clergy.  You will expose yourself to harassment and
a possible lawsuit with big financial risks.  We have explained the
risks to your superior and assured him that we shall underwrite them.
However, you will not be able to reveal that now or later.  If things
go wrong, there may well be some damage to your public career in the
Church.  Are you prepared for that?"

"I am not a careerist, Eminence.  My talents, such as they are, were
placed long ago at the disposal of my superiors."

"Good.  For this role, we need a very good actor."

"I'm a passable actor, Eminence.  I'm not a good liar."

"You will not be asked to lie.  You will be required to offer a
hypothesis to your audience.  We should like you to offer it with as
much personal conviction as possible."

"Is it a reasonable hypothesis?"

"We believe it is."

"But you can't prove it?"

"At this moment, no."

"So you want me to see how it flies with the media?"

"Yes."

"Can you tell me what you are trying to achieve?"

"We want to throw the press a bone a very big bone which they can gnaw
over until the conclave begins.  After that, this unfortunate affair
will fade into history."

"And I am to be the bone?"

"Exactly.  How do you feel about that?"

"I'm prepared to hear you out.  As you say, gentlemen, in this I am a
private person."

"Who may soon be very public."  Rossini returned his smile.  "Here is
what we propose."

Angel-Novalis heard him out in silence; then gave a thin smile.

"Your evidence would be worthless in a court of law, Eminence.  You
know that."

"We are not asking you to present evidence, only to make a public
assertion of a private opinion."

"That's pure casuistry, Eminence."

"I know it is.  You know it is.  The press doesn't and our friend
Figaro will assume we know a great deal more than you are saying.  Most
importantly, you will have introduced into the whole affair a useful
element of doubt.  Will you do it for us?"

"I will do it," said Angel-Novalis.  "I shall try to compose myself to
total obedience, of mind, heart and will.  Now, if you will excuse me,
gentlemen."

"You are excused, Monsignore.  We thank you for your cooperation."

"De nada, Eminencia.  In Spain we make fine swords and fine
distinctions!  By your leave, gentlemen!"

He bowed himself out of the meeting.  As soon as he was gone, the
Camerlengo turned to Rossini: "Now, my dear Luca, we have a commission
for you, too."

"What is the commission?"

"Our eminent colleague, Aquino, would like to meet with you this
afternoon.  He feels that there are issues between you which need to be
resolved.  We are of the same opinion."

There was a long silence.  Rossini looked from one member of the group
to the other.  They did not meet his look.  They sat, eyes downcast,
their hands folded in their laps.  Finally, Rossini asked:

"Has Aquino defined the issues between us?"

"He has," said the Camerlengo.  "And we'd be grateful if you spared us
the embarrassment of rehearsing them."

"Have you thought of the embarrassment to me?"

"We have, Luca.  We believe you are a big enough man to wear it."

"In whose interest?"

"In the interest of the Church.  Another scandal at this time and on
the eve of the conclave would be highly embarrassing."

"We need more than embarrassment!  We need to be shamed!"  There was
anger in Rossini's tone.  "We have covered too many scandals.  This one
is already out.  It is firmly planted in the newspapers.  It has to be
dealt with openly.  I will not be party to any conspiracy of
concealment."

There was another moment of silence, after which the Secretary of State
himself intervened.

"It is for that reason, Luca, that we think your meeting with Aquino is
important.  You can reason with him on a level different from ours. You
may even find some ground of compassion which would encourage him to
confront his accusers.  You may perhaps break through to the real man
behind all the enamel."

"If there is such a man," said Luca Rossini.

"You have to believe there is," said the Secretary of State.  "Will you
please meet with him?"

"On whose ground, his or mine?"

"Mine," said the Secretary of State.  "Two-thirty in Conference Room

A."

"I shall be there, but understand, I make no promises on the
outcome."

"We understand that.  Thank you, Luca .. . Now, if we may pass on to
the rest of the agenda."

When he stood at the lectern in the Foreign Press Club, facing an
audience of media folk and a battery of television cameras,
Angel-Novalis had the air of an ancient hidalgo, challenging all
comers.  When he began to speak, however, his tone was simple, almost
humble:

"My dear colleagues, I speak to you today as a private man, caught, as
you are, in a millennial moment in this ancient city.  I have never
explained myself to you before.  As a Vatican official, I felt that
would have been improper.  As a private man, I can be open with you.
You know that I am a member of the Priestly Society of the Holy Cross,
better known to you as Opus Dci.  Many people don't approve of us. They
judge that we are elitists, rigorists, old-fashioned ascetics,
dangerous dealers in secret works.  I am not here either to defend our
reputation or our practice of the religious life.  I declare simply
that when my world was falling about me, when my wife and children were
killed, when I had neither wish nor will to survive, the Society helped
me to put my life and myself together again.  I tell you this not to
persuade you to join us.  We wouldn't suit most of you and most of you
wouldn't be happy with us!  However, there are larger fellowships,
wider embraces and broader fields where we can all meet in comfort, as
we do today.

"The Bishop of Rome is dead.  Soon another will be elected in his place
because the Church abides and is continuous in Christ.  In the memorial
Masses we pray for the departed: "Enter not into judgment with your
servant, O Lord."  Here, today, we are doing just that: entering into
judgment on a dead man who can no longer answer for himself.  On the
other hand, it is your profession to report news and comment on it.  I
have no quarrel with that, provided you render true report and prudent
judgment.

"This brings me at one stride to the subject of my small discourse:
Past and Future in an Abiding Church.  The late Pontiff represents the
recent past a large slice of this century.  The man who is elected in
his place is elected for the future but is commissioned also as a
custodian of the past: that body of teaching, tradition and revealed
truth which we call the Deposit of Faith.  Bear with me, I beg you,
while we explore this notion together."

They were all professionals.  They knew a good performer when they saw
one.  They gave him their full attention.  They knew he was wooing
them, softening them up with sedulous skill, trying to disarm them
before question time.  He was also making more concessions in his
private role than he would ever have made in his public one:

"The Church has its own enormous inertia, its own glacial immobility ..
.

"It is not, like truth, a seamless cloth, but it is almost as hard to
unpick and reshape .. .

The burden of office is laid like a leaden cope on the shoulders of a
Pontiff.  It is not too long before he realises that one day it will
crush him .. .

"He knows, too, he can be destroyed by his own shortcomings -as Peter
knew that he had betrayed his master three times at the jibing of a
servant girl and Paul knew that he had stood in silence holding the
cloaks of those who stoned Stephen to death.  It has been my personal
task to present the late Pontiff to the world through the media with as
much truth and as little blemish as possible.  Now, in the diaries, he
presents himself as Everyman in pyjamas and bedroom slippers.  It's not
always an edifying spectacle, I enter a personal plea: pity him before
you blame him!"

It was this final sentence that brought him generous applause: the
simple admission of human frailty and the implied confession of
necessary myth-making around the Pope and his office.  It also provided
a standing-place for Frank Colson in his role as inquisitor:

"So you would agree, Monsignor, that your first task at the Sala Stampn
is to protect the Pontiff?"

"Our task is to convey official information and to convey it as clearly
as possible.  Others, like the Congregations and the Bishops, are the
official interpreters."

"How did you feel as a private person when you heard of the publication
of the Papal diaries?"

"Saddened, angered."

"Angered by what?"

"The gross breach of privacy."

"But the Pontiff must have been aware of that possibility when he made
a formal deed of gift to his valet?"

"I know nothing of his intentions in the matter."

"There is a phrase in his letter which is interesting, I quote: "In
olden times, I might have been able to enrich a faithful retainer like
yourself.  These volumes are my legacy to you."I Do not those
expressions indicate that the Pontiff knew that his gift might be
turned into money by his faithful retainer?"

"I have no brief as an interpreter, Mr.  Colson.  I must decline the
question."

"Let me put it another way.  Are you, as a private person, satisfied
with the document of gift?"

"As a private person, no.  I have certain reservations about it."

"Could you be more specific?"

"Not at this moment.  Later perhaps."

"Has any legal action been taken by any Vatican authority to challenge
the document?"

"I have not been informed of any such action."

"Do you think it is likely?"

"I would venture to doubt it.  The See of Peter is vacant.  The
Camerlengo is only a caretaker."

"Given your doubts, would you recommend such action or enquiry?"

"My opinion will not be asked, Mr.  Colson.  In the normal order of
things, I may soon be out of a job."

That raised a laugh and some of the tension in the room relaxed.  Frank
Colson took a sip of water, straightened his papers and glanced at the
note which had just been handed to him.  It was from Steffi Guillemin.
It said: "Hejs pleased with himself.  Move in.  Cut him down."  Colson
gathered himself like a prosecutor for the next assault on his
witness.

"It is clear, Monsignor, that, whatever your private opinions, the
Vatican is not prepared to challenge the authenticity of the diaries,
or the validity of the gift to Claudio Stagni."

"It would be more exact to say that, at this point, the Vatican has
made no formal challenge."

"So, another scenario presents itself.  The gift of the manuscript was
valid.  It was made by a Pontiff in full possession of his faculties
-fully aware of the use to which it might be put."

"That is pure speculation."

"But, you agree, at least an admissible hypothesis?"

"Improbable, but yes, admissible."

"Extending the thought a little, is it not equally admissible that
certain members of the Curia, close counsellors, suggested this
stratagem to the Pontiff, and encouraged him in it?"

"That's too big a leap for me to make, Mr.  Colson.  I was counsellor
to the Pontiff only on matters affecting the media."

"But surely this was a matter of prime concern to the media?  It is the
sole subject of our discussion here today."

"All I can say is that I was not consulted on the matter at any
time."

"But you would concede that such discussion might have taken place with
the most intimate and powerful counsellors of the Pontiff?"

"It's a possibility.  I can say no more than that."

"The alternative is rather frightening, is it not?"

"What alternative, Mr.  Colson?"

"That the Holy Father, a man charged with enormous responsibility,
committed an egregious folly by giving a most private document into the
hands of his valet."

"There may be other explanations."

"What, for instance, Monsignor?"

"Theft."

"Which would make us and our employers traders in stolen goods?"

"It could.  Such things have happened before."

"Another alternative?"

"Forgery of the document of provenance.  That, too, has happened."

"Either alternative leads to a very uncomfortable conclusion, does it
not?"

"Tell me your conclusion, Mr.  Colson."

"That the Holy Father kept in his close personal employ, and shared his
most intimate thoughts each day, with a man who abused his trust,
invaded his privacy and committed or organised a series of criminal
acts for personal gain."

"Precisely.  And if your conclusion is right, Mr.  Colson, then you,
your colleagues and your corporations are all complicitous in crime."

"And the good judgment of a Pontiff, charged with the universal care of
souls, is sadly compromised."

"That, too, has happened many times in history, Mr.  Colson.  We are a
pilgrim Church.  We are not a perfect society."

Colson let him take the point.  He, himself, had won enough already. He
started on a new line of questions.

"Let's look now at some of the most significant entries in the diary.
You've more or less admitted that it's an authentic document.  It will
soon be a public one.  It's a unique insight into the mind of a man
whose tides are Vicar of Christ, Supreme Pastor of the Universal
Church."

"He is also in this document, at least a private man, expressing
intimate thoughts."  Angel-Novalis was on the attack now.  "He has laid
aside the public role and is in discussion with himself and with
God."

"Unless, as you have admitted to be possible, he is pursuing his public
role through a post-mortem testament."

"His role ceases with his death, Mr.  Colson.  His successor is not
bound."

"But the electors may be influenced."

"Influenced by what?"

"Ambition perhaps.  The pressure of their peers, partisan loyalties. It
is no secret that there are factions in the Sacred College.  I quote
from the diaries: "I am not blind to the ambitions of certain Cardinals
or their capacities for intrigue.""

Angel-Novalis held up a hand to stay him.

"I think we should stop here, Mr.  Colson.  I am not prepared to offer
a commentary on the secret papers of a dead man.  I'll leave that to
the historians.  I think I've given you and your colleagues reasonable
value for their lunch-money."

"You have indeed."

"May I then ask a small favour in return?"

"Of course."

"Thank you.  I have a short formal statement which I should like you to
report verbatim.  Will you engage to do that?"

"With pleasure."

"This is a personal statement: I can say that the Pontiff's private
diaries are admitted as genuine.  There is, however, some
circumstantial evidence that they were stolen from his dressing-room
while he was in a coma, shortly before his death.  The letter of
donation from the Pontiff is a forgery prepared by one Aldo Carrese, a
convicted felon who died two months ago.  I make this statement as an
open invitation to Claudio Stagni to answer these charges or to sue me
for defamation.  I am aware that in making it, I am exceeding my brief
and exposing myself to censure.  None the less, I have a personal duty
to protect the reputation of a man whom I admired and respected.  What
you or your editors choose to do in the circumstances is up to you.
Thank you ladies and gentlemen.  I bid you good day."

As he strode from the rostrum, the storm of applause, led by Steffi
Guillemin, was breaking about him.  He deserved every hand clap  He had
given them a week's worth of headlines.  They understood, too, however
dimly, that he had put his career on the line.  The Vatican had a long
memory and small patience for turbulent priests.

While Angel-Novalis was tasting his sawdust triumph at the Foreign
Press Club, the man who had set him up for it was waiting in Conference
Room A at the Secretariat of State.  His visitor, Cardinal Matteo
Aquino, had telephoned to say that he had been detained at another
meeting and would be twenty minutes late.

As a former diplomat he had served as Nuncio in Buenos Aires and in
Washington Aquino should have known better.  On the other hand, Rossini
reflected, the man had never known better.  He had always been
arrogant, proud of his soldier ancestry, his skills as a tennis player,
a fencer, and a diplomat who, to use his own words, "had special
qualifications to treat with military regimes".

He was seventy-five years old.  He had already tendered his resignation
to the deceased Pontiff; but he was still eligible to vote in the
conclave and in theory at least was still a candidate for election.
After a long reign, there was always the chance that the electors might
decide on a Pontiff with a short life expectancy.

Now, suddenly, Aquino, that very soldierly fellow, was himself under
siege.  Those who threatened him were the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo,
a group of women who had exposed and ultimately destroyed the
dictatorship in Argentina.  They were the mothers, widows and sisters
and sweethearts of those thousands who had "been disappeared" under the
regime of which Rossini himself had been a victim.

They had come to Rome with evidence compiled over twenty years on
Aquino's alleged complicity in the reign of terror, in acts of
betrayal, kidnapping, torture and execution which the government
tallied at nine thousand, but the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo declared
to be nearer to thirty thousand.  The purpose of their visit to Rome
was to petition the Pontiff to waive Aquino's immunity as a citizen of
Vatican City State, and thus allow his indictment under the laws of the
Republic of Italy.  Many of the victims of the terror were migrants
from Italy and some, it appeared, had resident status only in
Argentina, while remaining still Italian nationals.  Now that the
Pontiff was dead, the women had announced their intention of waiting to
present their formal petition to the new Pontiff.

The substance of their material evidence was familiar to Rossini.  The
files of the Secretariat of State were also open to him: one slim
folder chosen from many lay before him on the table.  For a brief span
Aquino himself had been a familiar figure in his life: taciturn and
withdrawn, unwilling messenger delivering an unsavoury package of
damaged goods from Argentina to Rome.  As Rossini rose in Papal favour,
they had met rarely and their greetings on formal occasions were brief
and cold.  Now Aquino was a suppliant for Rossini's public advocacy
against the white-veiled furies of the Plaza de Mayo.  For Rossini, he
was a figure from the nightmare years and his shadow would lie over the
meeting that same evening with Isabel.

There was a knock at the door and, in response to Rossini's summons, a
young cleric ushered Aquino into the room.  Rossini stood to greet him.
He bowed but did not offer a handshake.  Aquino also bowed and made a
brusque apology.  Rossini motioned him to a chair.  He sat,
straight-backed, unsmiling, until Rossini prompted him.

"You asked to see me, Eminence."

"Yes.  I am, as you know, in a difficult situation."

"What is this difficult situation?"

"These women, the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo.  They have come here to
mount a campaign against me.  They want to bring me before a civil
court in Rome.  They want a waiver of my immunity as a citizen of
Vatican City State.  They propose to wait in Rome until a new Pontiff
is elected.  It's all most embarrassing, most distressing."

"I imagine it must be," said Rossini mildly.  "Of course, what these
women suffered, what their sons, brothers, husbands suffered was also
very distressing."

"I know that."

"Of course, you had to know it was your job.  Though, on several
occasions you did publicly disclaim that knowledge."

"That was a necessary diplomatic gambit."

"I've seen your reports."  Rossini's manner was still mild.  He tapped
the file on his desk.  "They belong to a very painful period of my
life, which even now I find difficult to deal with.  For that reason, I
have been given other assignments in other areas.  I am still too
vulnerable to the traumas of twenty years ago.  Still, in preparation
for our meeting today, I did go through several key files.  I note that
your minutes were always judicious, carefully balanced even on the most
controversial subjects."

"Thank you.  That is a diplomat's duty never to exaggerate or over
emphasise  He must penetrate to the root causes of events."

"Even when men and women are being tortured with cattle prods and
stifled in shit-buckets in the Navy School?  Even when they are being
flogged and sodomised with broom handles and castrated and blinded then
tossed out of aeroplanes over the ocean?"

"I protested these things constantly."

"To whom?  And how publicly?"

"Everything I knew was reported to the Secretariat of State."

"But you still played tennis with the men who ordered atrocities.  You
still sought, what did you call it?"  He lifted the cover of the manila
folder and laid his fingers on a line.  "Ah, yes, 'sound theological
advice on the moral limits of torture which may be necessary to extract
information from enemies of the State, and in many cases, of the Church
as well'.  You got your advice and you passed it along at tennis with
the generals: "Extreme measures may be used provided they do not exceed
humane limits, have non-terminal consequences, non-crippling effects,
and a duration not exceeding forty-eight hours in all."  Who wrote that
garbage for you?"

"It was written by a reputable moral theologian."

"Reputable!  God Almighty!"

"To provide some basis of reconciliation for men in the armed services
who were obliged by force majeure to undertake brutal tasks."

"And how did you propose to reconcile the families of the dead and the
disappeared ones?"

"I did not come here to be abused!"

"This is not abuse.  This is truth.  Why did you come here?  What did
you expect from me?  Silence?  A gloss on all that filthy history?"

"Did it never occur to you," Aquino was still in control of himself,
"that I might come to seek understanding and help?"

"If that's what you want, talk to the women!  Plead for their
understanding.  Confess to them, beg their forgiveness.  They will
listen, I promise you!  They are accustomed to silence.  They waited
every day, veiled in white, silent accusers outside the presidential
palace.  Their disappeared ones are silent for ever."

"You know I can't confront them."

"Why not?"

"They would tear me to pieces."

"That would depend, would it not, on how you presented yourself to
them?"

"That too."  A small humourless smile twitched at the corners of
Aquino's lips.  "What did you have in mind?  A shirt of sackcloth, a
halter round my neck?"

"You have another idea, perhaps?"

"I had hoped you might speak for me and with me, since you, too, were a
victim."

Rossini let out a whispered blasphemy.

"Sweet suffering Jesus!  What sort of man are you?"

"I'm a survivor," said Aquino calmly.  "I need your help to survive
this this infamy!"

"What infamy?"

"These charges of conspiracy and collaboration."

"The best way to survive is to answer the charges!"  In spite of
himself Rossini was drawn into argument.  "Look!  Our late colleague,
Bernardin in Chicago, was accused by a former seminarian of sexual
abuse.  He didn't hide behind the Church or his high office, he
challenged his accuser to meet him in court.  The charge was withdrawn.
Bernardin met with the man and treated him with compassion and charity.
Unfortunately, Bernardin did not survive, but he died with honour and
the people bless his memory."

"Everyone blesses a good pastor!  Nobody blesses diplomats!  You've
seen what the Italian press has done already.  Imagine what they'd do
with a full court hearing!  It's impossible!"

"Why impossible?"

"I refuse to be arraigned like a criminal.  I helped many families of
the victims.  Now these women pursue me with unproven allegations."

"Then take them to court.  Let the evidence be tabled and examined.  If
it's false, you will be vindicated.  If it's true then may God have
mercy on your soul."

"You're playing a cruel game, Rossini.  I came to you for help as a
colleague and a Christian.  Remember you owe me a debt.  I got you out
of Argentina."

"I know that.  Thousands of others were not so fortunate.  But I'm not
playing a game.  I'm trying to assess your situation and decide how and
under what conditions I can help you."

"Conditions?"

"Of course.  You're a diplomat.  Conditions, terms, bargains, these are
your stock-in-trade."

"Very well, let's have the deal on the table.  What will you do to help
me?"

"First I will contact the women's delegation.  I will engage to present
you to them privately.  I will ask them to give you, in my presence, a
summary of their evidence.  I will persuade them, if I can, to hear
your rebuttal and at least discuss an arbitrated solution."

"And if arbitration is unsatisfactory to either party?"

"You will offer to waive your immunity and volunteer an appearance in
court.  If you do that, I will work with Angel-Novalis to secure the
best possible interpretation of your situation by the world press."

"You ask too much, Rossini.  You offer too little."

"It's the best I can do."

Aquino stared at him with cold and hostile eyes, then he stood up.

"You did better for Raul Ortega.  You recommended him as Ambassador to
the Holy See so that you could bring your own mistress to Rome."

When Rossini did not answer, he added a contemptuous little
post-script:

"You seem to have forgotten something.  I need permission from the
Pontiff before I go to law on any matter.  Therefore, I can do nothing
until the new Pope is elected.  You, however, are free to intervene
informally on my behalf.  So, if you want to revise your offer of help,
call me.  There isn't much time left before the conclave.  After that,
as the Americans say, it will be a whole new ball-game."

It was then that the light dawned on Rossini.  He let out a long
exhalation of surprise, then shook his head in total incredulity.

"You're right, of course.  I was a fool not to see it.  You're not
looking for a vindication.  All you want is a reprieve a truce!"

"Precisely.  And you're the best man in Rome to negotiate it!"

"Suppose just suppose you were elected Pontiff, what then?"

"Then, as I said, there's a whole new ball-game.  The Pontiffis head of
a sovereign State.  He is also the leader of a billion believers.  He
is not answerable to any court on earth.  Plenitudo potestatis.  The
fullness of power.  It's an old concept, but it's been growing again
during this reign.  There is much support for it in the electoral
college.  Think about it Rossini.  But don't delay.  Time's running
out."

He turned away and walked out of the room, closing the door behind
him.

Ten minutes later, a very angry Rossini made his report to the
Secretary of State.

"It was a mistake, Turi!  I should never have agreed to take the
meeting.  I can't stomach the man!"

"No matter."  The Secretary of State shrugged.  "He asked for the
meeting.  We arranged it.  You attended!  Basta!"

"Do you think he could be elected with his record?"

"The question's improper, Luca, but I'll answer it.  His record is
clean until he is convicted of misdeeds.  He has a small faction of
powerful supporters in the Curia.  Yes, he could be elected, if only as
a stop-gap candidate.  There are historic precedents for that. However,
don't ask me to give you betting odds."

"Another question, Turi.  How did Aquino know that I had given you a
recommendation on the appointment of Raul Ortega?"

"I don't know.  He didn't hear it from me.  In fact, I haven't
discussed it with anyone.  I haven't shown it to anyone.  It's still
locked in my private file.  Still, knowing that the Argentinians had
made the recommendation, he could easily have guessed that I would
refer it to you."

"So, he still has close ties in Argentina?"

"In Argentina, in Washington, wherever he has served.  That's a merit
in a diplomat."

"There was a threat in his remark about Isabel."

"And you will be wise to remember it, Luca, now that Senora Ortega is
in town.  I should tell you that Aquino is aware of her arrival."

"How the devil would he know that?"

"Again, from the Embassy.  He's been in constant touch with them over
the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo.  He also suggested to me that there
might be a connection between this group and the sudden arrival of
Senora Ortega.  Is there a connection?"

"I don't know.  I'll certainly ask Isabel.  We're dining together
tonight, with her daughter."

"I trust you have a pleasant evening."

"Thank you."

"I wish you nothing but good, Luca.  You know that."

"I do."

"So, before you meet, calm down.  Get rid of your anger.  Enjoy your
reunion."

"Thank you, Turi."

"Now, I have another job for you.  Tomorrow I'd like you to attend a
meeting with half-a-dozen elderly members of the College of Cardinals
who will not be able to vote because of their age.  They want to
communicate their views to you and other voting members."

"I'd like to be excused, Turi.  I have reserved tomorrow for private
business."

The Secretary of State was annoyed.  He demanded curtly:

"More important than the service you owe here at this time?"

"I believe it is, yes."  Suddenly, he was a different man, open and
passionate.  "Listen to me, Turi, try to understand!  What our older
colleagues want is what Paul VI denied them a voice in the conclave, at
least a hearing for their own lifetime's experience.  I understand
that.  I believe they are entitled to it.  But for me, Turi, it's
another question altogether.  I am in crisis, a desperate darkness.  My
meeting with Aquino plunged me deeper into it.  I'm not sure that I
should enter the conclave at all.  I am tempted to resign before it
begins."

"Why, Luca?  Why?"

"Because I'm not sure I'm a believer any more.  Suddenly, I am bereft.
The God I once believed in is a stranger to me.  The Church in which I
have spent my life in which I hold, like you, high and honourable
office, is a city of strangers.  I'm not explaining myself very well,
but you understand, I hope, why I need a small space of silence.  I am
what I was in the beginning an empty man, a hollow man, with his head
full of clear arctic light, and a lump of ice where his heart should
be."

"Both excellent qualifications for a conclavist!"  The Secretary of
State leaned back in his chair and toyed with a paper-knife.  "A clear
head and a cold heart.  I will not demean you with sympathy.  If you
decide to resign, I shall regret it, but I beg you to defer your
decision until after the conclave.  The judgment of an unbeliever,
delivered without fear or favour, might help us all."

"How would that sit with your own conscience, Turi?"

"Perfectly well.  I take what you have told me as a confessional
confidence.  I do not accept your present disposition as in any way
final.  The dark night of the soul is a familiar phenomenon in
spiritual life indeed it is for some a necessary halting place on the
road to Sanctity.  In the absence of a formal rejection of faith, I
accept you still as a brother in Christ, a colleague in the government
of the Church.  Does that answer your question?"

"In part, at least.  Thank you."

"Then may I suggest you suspend judgment on our colleague, Aquino.  He,
like you, has problems of conscience.  We should not presume to
adjudicate them."

Rossini bent his head respectfully under the rebuke.  Then he grinned.
"You're right, Turi.  I'm sorry.  Now, please may I have a free day
tomorrow?"

"By all means.  We have your mobile number.  We'll try to leave you in
peace.  And, Luca?"

"Yes?"

"Walk warily.  Aquino and his friends are a powerful group.  Some
unkind people call them the Emilian Mafia."

"What can they do to a man who has nothing to lose?"

"They can rob you of your power to do some good in the Church which, in
spite of your personal problems, is greater than you know.  Enjoy your
evening."

Six

HE SIGNED OUT FROM HIS OFFICE EARLY THAT AFTERNOON.  The mood of black
anger was still on him; he needed the open air and the press of
heedless folk about him.  He decided to walk home, across the Ponte
Sant'Angelo and through the old streets beyond Lungotevere For di Nona,
where the bankers of another age had plied their trade.

As he walked, the cloud began to lift from his spirit and he felt a
growing sense of liberation.  The truth was out now.  His confession to
the Secretary of State had been a necessary cleansing act.  The
Secretary, good diplomat that he was, had noted it and had asked him to
defer a final decision.  He had even provided a convenient piece of
casuistry to save face for Rossini and good conscience for himself.
There was a charity in that, which Rossini prized the more because of
its absence in men like Aquino.

Rossini wondered, not for the first time, why so many prelates, good
liberal men in their youth, changed into tyrants when they were
promoted to high office.  It was as if suddenly they felt charged to
upset the whole human order of things and replace it with a theological
artefact instead of a new infusion of charity.

Halfway across the bridge, he stopped, leaned on the stone balustrade
and stared down at the muddy waters of the Tiber.  He remembered
another confession which he had made many years before, in his first
interview with the late Pontiff.  The old man had pressed him hard,
chivvying him, now from this side,

now from that, like a sheepdog working a stray lamb into the pen:

"How do you feel about the man who flogged you?"

"He was a brute and a sadist.  I am glad he is dead."

"Have you forgiven him?"

"I have not yet been given that grace, Holiness.  I loathe everything
that he represents in my country the atrocities that are being planned
and committed every day by high men and low ones.  I hate yes, I hate
the silence and the connivance of those who call themselves priests and
bishops.  I ask myself what Your Holiness thinks about all this,
because we do not hear what you say about it."

"You forget yourself, young man."

"I lost my youth when they strung me up on the wheel."

"And your innocence, my son?  When did you lose that?"

"Like many of my brother priests, I lost mine in the silence of our
bishops and in the silence of Rome.  There was torture and murder,
Holiness all done in silence.  We didn't understand that.  I still
don't.  That's another thing I find it hard to forgive.  It was a woman
who killed my tormentor.  It took weeks of negotiation for the emissary
of Your Holiness to intervene."

"Meantime, you had entered into an adulterous relationship with this
same woman, Senora Ortega."

"A woman whom I remember with love and gratitude."

"You see nothing sinful in that?"

"My sins are my own, Holiness.  I was a shattered man.  Isabel put me
together again, piece by piece.  She put her life at risk to do it."

"She is out of your life now?"

"No.  She will never be out of it.  I remember her every day in my
Mass."

"You are still a believer then?  You are still a priest."

"I practise my priesthood in public.  I pray for light in darkness.  I
wrestle all day and every day with my doubts about this Church of
ours."

"You're a very difficult young man."

"I have survived difficult times, Holiness.  Others were not so
lucky."

"Other people are afraid of me.  You sit there like a young Lucifer and
defy me."

"I do not defy you, Holiness; but I am not afraid of you.  I find you
easier to understand than many of those who speak with your authority.
I know you're trying to be kind to me, but ..."

"You're not making it easy for me, my son!"

"Please, Holiness!  Try to understand.  You sit here, an undisputed
monarch in your own kingdom, supported by the loyalties of the faithful
all round the world.  I've just come from a battlefield where your
ministers and your people, men and women, are down in the bloodied
dust.  Their stake is simple survival.  The government's policy is
total repression, 'woe to the conquered'.  The Gospel words that ring
loudest are "My God, why have You forsaken me?".  It was a woman who
answered for God to me, Holiness.  I have left her, still at risk.  I
am shamed by the silence of those who claim to be defenders of the
faith but will not raise voice or hand to protect the flock ... I beg
your pardon, Holiness.  I am still angry.  I have said too much.  I beg
your leave to go."

"Not yet, Luca!  Let's bear with each other a while longer.  I want to
talk to you about your future."

The talk which had begun that day extended itself over years as the
Pontiff prepared him for higher office and drew him slowly into his
personal confidence.  Their relationship was a paradox which the
Vatican gossips embroidered with even more contradictions.  While his
Holiness, like his namesake, Paul, committed himself to spectacular
global journeys, Rossini was put into tutelage at the Secretariat of
State and loaded with supplementary studies at the Biblicum, the
Gregorian University and Propaganda Fide.  It was a harsh therapy that
gave him no time to brood, if never quite enough to order his life to a
free choice of a new vocation.

Slowly at first, and then more swiftly, the changes began.  Now Rossini
became the traveller and the Pontiff devoted more of his time to
instruction and discipline within the Church.  He gave more confidence
and credence to rigorist theologians and hard-line disciplinarians in
the Curia.  At the same time, he turned to Rossini for private
interpretations of a world which, as the years went on, was becoming
less and less accessible to him, less and less welcoming.

Naturally enough, this gave rise to criticisms and jealousies, which
Rossini studiously ignored.  He had no talent for clubbish ness no
taste for cabals and conspiracies.  He had seen more than enough of
those in his own country.  If he was lonely he never confessed it.  He
was his own man always, living at risk between the Almighty and Peter's
successor and all the thrones, dominations and principalities of the
twentieth-century Church.

The Pontiff's speeches and writings were drafted by the most
conservative theologians, and there was a concerted effort to extend
their magisterial authority and stifle debate on their conclusions.
There was small compassion in their juridical tone.  They alienated
instead of uniting the pilgrim Church.  Expressions of dissent by the
clergy were harshly repressed.  Dissent by the laity was ignored so
that, knowing themselves irrelevant to authority, they absented
themselves from its bailiwick.

Rossini, on the other hand, minced no words with his patron.  He stood
like a rock against the waves of his anger, deferring only when he was
forced to bow to a direct command.  His argument was always the same:

"I know you want to be the Good Shepherd and when you visit your people
they love you; but when you write, you are like a judge delivering a
verdict.  One can almost hear the seal slamming on the parchment:
"There!  That's the truth, pure no and undefiled.  Let them swallow it
or choke on it!"  Life doesn't work like that, Holiness.  People aren't
built like that.  The best they can manage is a long way from
perfection, and they need coaxing and gentling to get them even that
far."  "Are you telling me I should dilute the truth?"  "I'm asking
Your Holiness to consider how Our Lord taught it: by tales and parables
that took root and grew slowly in the minds and hearts of people.  He
called down woes only on the hypocrites and the overly righteous." "Now
you are presuming to teach the Pope?"  "I'm a son of the house,
Holiness.  I claim the right to be heard in it and that is another
warning I keep repeating.  The daughters of the house also have been
ignored too long.  They hold up the rafters of our world and yet they
have few voices and no votes at all in the assembly of the faithful. We
are poor without their presence."

"This is old ground, Luca.  I will not go over it again with you."

"It is ground you do not own, Holiness, though presently you claim to
control it."

"And you give no ground at all, do you, Luca?"  "The small space I
stand on was bought with blood.  Even for you, I will not surrender
it."

Many times after such exchanges, he had expected to be exiled to some
outland on the fringes of Christendom.  Many of his colleagues wanted
him gone.  His roving commissions kept him far enough and often enough
out of Rome so that the Curia could tolerate his existence.  Yet
whenever he came back, the Pontiff welcomed him like a returning
prodigal and spent much time with him time which others with some
justice claimed as their own due.  A few days before his final
collapse, he had made a poignant confession:

"You have been a good son to me, Luca, though you have often made me
angry.  I'm a stubborn old man.  From where in

I sit on Vatican Hill, I am supposed to see the whole world and all
God's plans for it, plain and clear like a child's picture-book.  Yet
you, my wayward Luca, have shown me things I have never dreamed.  You
have shown me the face of God, even in the Temples of the Strangers."

"I'm not sure what you mean, Holiness."

"You, yourself, called it to my attention: on the sacred island of
Delos, where visitors came from all over the Mediterranean to take part
in the Delian games, shrines were built in which each people could
worship its own gods in peace.  I thought of that often when I
meditated on Saint Paul's text about the Unknown God.  The older I get,
Luca, the more I regret all the time and all the fierce effort I have
spent trying to create a conforming Church.  I suppressed the liberal
voices and the questioning ones.  I raised blind men to power and set
deaf ones to mediate the petitions of the people.  In the end, as you
warned often, I have failed.  The people were tired of being berated,
crushed with absolutes in a still unfinished universe.  So, they simply
gave up the argument and absented themselves from the family.  They
retreated to the God who still dwells within them -who, they know,
instinctively still dwells even in the Temples of the Strangers.  They
will not come back in my time, Luca!  I shall have much to answer for
when I come to judgment."

"We pray every day that our trespasses will be forgiven, Holiness.  We
have to believe that our end will be a home-coming, not a session with
the torturers!"

"Do you really believe that, Luca?"

"If I did not, Holiness, I think I could not endure the chaos of this
bloody world or the presence of whatever monster called it into
being."

"Until this moment, I have never understood why you were so angry with
me.  Forgive me, my son and pray for me."

Rossini still remembered the wintry silence that fell between them and
the bleak sadness of the final confidence they had shared.

He took one last look at the grey waters swirling about the foundations
of the bridge, then resumed his homeward walk.  The meaning of the
stolen diaries was plainer to him now.  They were the pillow-books of a
sad and solitary old man, whose time was running out, whose deeply
divided family was spread around the planet, and whose bishopric would
soon be voted to another.

A block from his apartment Rossini treated himself to a small Roman
indulgence, a visit to the barber, for a haircut, shave and manicure.
It was a small, sensual pleasure and a large concession to his own male
vanity.  After all these years, he could not, would not present himself
to Isabel only half-groomed.  There were other reasons too.  He still
had time to kill and he was jumpy as a cat on hot tiles.  The gossip of
Dario, the barber, would be a welcome diversion.  It was delivered
always in a steady clattering flow.  It covered the river-front and the
alleys and the high-life and the low-life of the city from Quirinal
Hill to Vatican Hill and the latest crop of murders on the Via Salaria.
By the time the session was over, Rossini was fully sedated and his
head was bursting with Roman trivia.  Home at last, he bathed and
dressed in street clothes, then took himself by taxi to the Grand
Hotel.

He had just entered the foyer when he was stopped by a young woman
whose appearance was vaguely familiar.

"Excuse me, Eminence, are you not Cardinal Rossini?"

"I am."

"I'm Steffi Guillemin, Rome correspondent of Le Monde.  I've just been
interviewing one of your colleagues, Cardinal Moly-neux from Montreal.
I recognised you from the photograph in my files."

"I'm flattered, Mademoiselle.  Just now the city is full of people like
me."

"Well, like all journalists, I'm an opportunist.  I'd like to arrange
an interview with you."

"Another time perhaps."

"How do I contact you?"

"Call the Secretariat of State.  They'll connect you to my office."

"I'd like an hour of your time, if that's possible."

"My office will let you know what time I have available."

"Thank you, Eminence."

"Excuse me now, Mademoiselle."

She watched him as he moved briskly to the concierge's desk.  She saw
the concierge lift the telephone, speak briefly, then direct Rossini to
the elevator.  When the door closed on him, Steffi Guillemin took his
place at the desk and slid a fifty-thousand lire note under the
blotter.  She had found a lot of good stories here in her time.  She
had kept the natives friendly.  They told her that the Eminent person
was dining in suite number thirty-eight on the third floor with an
Argentine lady, Senora Isabel Ortega.

He had a moment of panic before he rang the doorbell of her suite.
There was a long pause before Isabel opened the door and drew him into
the salon.  The next moment she was in his arms and time stopped while
they embraced and kissed and held to each other and wept quietly in
wordless wonder.  Time started again when he held her at arm's length
and said simply:

"I'd forgotten how beautiful you are."

"And you, my Luca, you've become so grand!"

It was only then that he thought to ask:

"Where's Luisa?"

"In her bedroom.  I'll call her when we're ready."

"I kept wondering how it would be when we came face to face again."

"I knew exactly how it would be."  She kissed him again and wiped a
smear of lipstick from his mouth.  "Luisa will join us for a drink,
then a very presentable young man from the Embassy is taking her out to
dinner."

"I asked myself how you were going to arrange that."

"Did I ever disappoint you?"

"Never.  I was afraid I might disappoint you."

"Pour yourself a drink.  I'll call Luisa.  She has her own room down
the corridor.  She needs her privacy as much as I do mine."

When she left him, he crossed to the bar, poured himself a brandy and
soda and made a silent toast to the dark-eyed, passionate beauty whom
the years had touched so lightly, dusting the raven hair with grey,
leaving still the fire in her eyes and the laughter lines about her
lips.  The simplicity of their encounter after so many years had an air
of miracle about it, even though Isabel had happily confessed to her
contrivances.  For himself, it was like the rising of a new moon: for
this night at least, all fears were laid to rest, all mysteries swept
aside; tomorrow could take care of itself.  He had another surprise
when Isabel came back with her daughter.  Luisa Ortega was a startling
replica of the young Isabel whom he had seen for the first time when he
woke after his beating in the village square.  He looked from one to
the other, groping for words.

"I can't believe this, you are so like your mother.  I'm happy to meet
you, Luisa."

He offered her his hand.  She bowed her head and made to kiss it in the
old-fashioned style.

"I am honoured, Eminence."

He declined the gesture and drew her to her feet with a smile.

"Tonight, young lady, I am not an Eminence.  I am Luca, your mother's
old friend."

"I hope you will be mine, too."

"How could we not be friends!"

"What do I call you, then?"

"Unless your mother has any objections, why not Luca?"

"But only in private," said Isabel.  "In company he is always
Eminencia."

"Mother!  You can be so stuffy!"

"Your father can be even worse, as you know.  May I have a glass of
white wine, Luca?"

"And for me, a Campari soda, please."

Rossini poured and passed the drinks, then offered a toast.

"To the friends of my heart, absent too long!"

They touched glasses and drank.  Luisa challenged him, smiling:

"One of these days, Luca, I want to hear your version of how you and my
mother met.  Everyone seems to be using a different text.  I really am
quite confused."

"It's a long story we'll keep it for another day.  Your young man will
be here any moment.  Who is he, by the way?"

"I haven't met him yet.  His name is Miguel Alamino.  Mother set him up
to get me out of the way while you're here.  His father is first
Secretary at the Argentine Embassy a friend of Papa."

"Where is he taking you?"

"A place called Piccolo Mondo.  Do you know it?"

"I do.  I can't afford to eat there very often, but you'll enjoy it."

"I thought all Cardinals were rich.  Aren't they called Princes of the
Church?"

She was beginning to tease him and he was happy to play the little
game.

"Very few of them are rich in this day and age.  As for being princes,
that's an old-fashioned notion, but a few still cling to it."

"Do you?"

"Do I look like a prince, Luisa?"

"Mother thinks you do."

"And what do you think?"

"I'm reserving judgment till I know you better.  So far I'm
impressed."

"And I'm impressed, too.  You're a very beautiful young woman.  Your
mother and father must be very proud of you."

"Father is very proud.  Mother keeps trying to turn me into a scholar
and a lady.  I want to be a painter.  I go to art school in New York
but Mother is reassured because I'm also working as a restorer at the
Metropolitan.  She wants me to be an independent woman."

"She was always an independent woman herself."

"Do you think I could see how the restorers work in the Vatican
Museum?"

"I'm sure I can arrange it, and you should also go to Florence."

The telephone rang.  Luisa answered it.  A moment later she
announced:

"My date is waiting in the foyer.  Don't wait up for me, Mother.  And
you, Luca, don't keep her up too late.  She hasn't been well lately and
the Atlantic flight didn't help."

She kissed her mother and surprised Rossini with a hurried embrace and
a flattering request.

"I hope you can find some time for me, too, while we're in Rome."

"With pleasure.  I may not have too much free time before the conclave,
but certainly after it."

"Good!  I'll hold you to that.  Now wish me luck.  I hate blind dates,
but a girl has to start somewhere in a big city.  And remember I'm
doing this for you both."

When the door closed behind her, Isabel laughed.

"Well!  You've made another conquest.  I'm glad.  I had no idea at all
how it would go between you.  Would you pour me another drink, please,
then let's relax for a while.  I've ordered the meal to be served at
nine.  I chose a simple menu, so we wouldn't have waiters skipping in
and out."

"I'm so happy that you're here."  He handed her the wine and sat facing
her across a low coffee table.  "I'm as awkward as a schoolboy.  I
don't know how or where to begin."

"Remember the game we used to play when you were sick: Past, Present or
Future?"

"I remember it very well.  Let's get the past out of the way first."

The phrase seemed to disturb her.  Her smile faded.  She shook her
head.

"That's not quite as easy as you think, my love."

"Forgive me.  It was a clumsy expression."

"You're forgiven; we've both been travelling a long time, with oceans
dividing us.  There's an awful lot of baggage to be dealt with most of
it mine!"

"So, let's deal with it.  Your marriage seems to have lasted."

"For what it was, when and where it was, it has lasted very well.  It
got us all through some dangerous times.  I was an impulsive, greedy
young woman, who demanded all life's good things as soon as I saw them.
Raul was a weak, handsome man with small talents, big family money and
a powerful father clever enough to survive his brother generals, the
disasters of the Malvinas and even the aftermath of the atrocities.  In
Argentina we stayed together because we were safe together.  By the
time we were posted to the United States, Raul had learned enough from
his father to make him a useful nonentity among the bureaucrats.  I
taught him enough to maintain a diplomatic menage, and provide a
civilised upbringing for Luisa.  I was able to develop a career for
myself in Hispanic American studies and maintain the friendships that
kept me what can I say?  emotionally stable.  It was a marriage of
convenience, that somehow worked.  My father was a great help in all
this.  He was an old-fashioned cynic who taught me never to expect too
much of human relationships.  You, my love, were the one indulgence he
approved, and when he watched your star rising in Rome, he took it as a
compliment to his own good judgment.  It was he who helped me with
Luisa while Raul was catting around in New York and Washington and
Paris."

"She's a beautiful and impressive young woman.  You should be very
proud of her."

"I am.  Now tell me about yourself.  Your letters were landmarks in my
life, yet they told me nothing that I did not know already: you loved
me,"I loved you.  Don't forget, we didn't start corresponding until I
moved to New York with Raul.  In the bad times in Argentina letter
writing was dangerous."

"And even when the good times came I never had the right words."  He
gave a small embarrassed smile.  "They don't teach you to write
love-lyrics in the Secretariat of State.  My minutes, on the other
hand, are highly praised for brevity and accuracy!"

"Even so, I've kept all your letters."

"Is that wise?"

"When have I ever been wise, Luca?"  "Then I can confess that I have
kept yours."  "Now tell me how it was when first you came to Rome."
"That was another Luca Rossini, the one with stripes on his back and
the taste of wormwood in his mouth.  I had been a good priest -a simple
one, but a good one.  I thought I had heard the call and I had answered
it.  I cared for my people1 tried to protect them, but I failed.
Afterwards, when I realised how deeply we had all been betrayed, I was
enraged enough to kill.  There were moments when I think I was a little
mad."

"I remember those moments.  I nursed you through some very bad ones."

"You did more than that.  You kept another Luca alive, the simpler one
who still had cobwebs of dreams in his head.  You put your imprint on
him: your taste, your touch, your perfume that smelled like citrus
blossom.  When that Luca was separated from you and taken to Rome, he
was fragile, powerless, uncertain as a hurt animal in a jungle of
exotic predators.  The other Luca was in control then.  He began a
vendetta against all those whom he saw involved in the conspiracies of
oppression and there are too many of those still in the Church.  He was
not yet armed for open warfare, so he campaigned by obstructions,
impediment, challenge.  Because he was still a little mad, and because
he did not fully understand what was happening to him, he survived.  He
was patronised by the Pontiff himself.  Because he did not seek the
patronage and refused to bargain for it, he was respected and sometimes
feared."  "And the other Luca, the one with my imprint on him?"  "At
first he was like a pale ghost, living on fading memories: the memory
of a lover's bed, of long-dead parents, of neighbourhood loyalties, of
early trusts.  Sometimes, when I looked in my mirror, I would see this
Luca and mourn him, and lust after the love I had lost."

"But I was never there with Luca the avenger?"

"Oh yes, you were!  You were the Isabel who taught him never to waste a
bullet in a fight or a word in argument.  You taught him to bow his
head and say softly: "As your Eminence pleases!"  You taught him the
uses of power.  You gave him the gift of silence.  You convinced him
that he should never let his peace reside in the mouths of others."

"Were there no other women in your life, Luca?"

"Neither before you nor after you.  My only regret is that I wasn't
bold enough to carry you off and join the guerrillas."  He grinned and
spread his hands in a comic gesture of defeat.  "Just as well I didn't
try it.  I'm sure I would have bungled it, and we'd both be long
dead."

"You'd probably be better at it now."

It was a provocative remark, but he chose to sidestep it.

"We'll talk about that tomorrow."

"What's happening tomorrow?"

"I'm taking you out for the day, to my own private place."

"The one you mentioned in your letter?"

"The same.  You'll dress in country clothes.  You'll take a taxi from
here and come to my apartment, then I'll drive you into the country and
we'll spend the day pottering in my garden.  We'll drink wine.  I'll
cook you lunch and nobody in the world will know where we are.  I'll
drive you back before the traffic gets too bad.  How does that
sound?"

"It sounds wonderful; but what about Luisa?"

"Give me two minutes and I'll have her happily arranged for the day."
He picked up the telephone and dialled the home number of Piers
Hallett.

"Piers?  Luca Rossini."

"My eminent friend.  I tried to call you a couple of times, but you
were out.  I wanted to say thank you for the dinner, thank you for your
invitation to devil for you in the conclave.  I'm happy to accept. I'll
wait on your instructions."

"Good!  Now I'd like you to do something special for me."

"Anything, my friend."

"Call the Grand Hotel first thing in the morning.  Ask for the Senorita
Luisa Ortega.  Tell her you've been designated by me to show her round
the Vatican Museum and especially the section where the restorers work.
After that, buy her lunch at a cheerful place in Trastevere, hire a
carrozza and deliver her back to the Grand in good order."

"All of this, I hope, on your expense account."

"Of course.  If you're short of cash, call my office, ask for Roderigo
and have him advance the cash on my authority."

"Please!  I was joking.  I'm flush with cash at the moment a cheque at
last from the Connoisseur.  What time do you suggest I call the
lady?"

"Eight o'clock, no later, and make your own arrangements for the
pick-up.  If she wants to bring a friend, take care of him, too.  If
she cries off, try not to be too hurt."

"Where will you be?"

"In the country with her mother."

"Enjoy, Eminence, enjoy!  Who knows what plagues may strike after the
conclave.  Ciao!"

Rossini put down the receiver and turned back to Isabel.

"There now.  All arranged."

"And who is Piers?"

"Piers Hallett, a Monsignor no less, an Englishman, a scholar who works
in the Vatican Library and who will, I promise you, prove a most
amusing and instructive tour guide for your Luisa.  Before I leave,
I'll write a small note of explanation, which the concierge will give
her tonight when she picks up her key.  If she's made other
arrangements, like falling madly in love with Miguel what's-his-name,
then she can take him with her, or cancel Hallett.  It makes no
matter."

"It seems to me," Isabel mocked him gently, "that you, too, did some
careful thinking about this visit."

"I had to.  The Secretary of State had me listed for a meeting with a
group of elderly Cardinals who are not entitled to vote but want their
views made plain to the conclavists."

"And what excuse did you offer to the Secretary of State?"

"The truth.  He knows you're in town.  He knows I want desperately to
spend time with you.  He gave me a free day tomorrow."

Isabel frowned and shook her head.

"If this means what I think it does, then you and I are an open secret
in Rome."

"We have been for many years, my love.  Ever since my return, in fact.
I was brought back, if you remember, by the Apostolic Nuncio, who is
now Cardinal Aquino.  He worked hand-in-glove with the junta.  He made
sure that every suspicious circumstance about me was noted, every guess
inflated into a known fact.  I was questioned by the Pontiff
himself."

"And you told him about us?"

"No!  He told me."

"And what did you say?"

"That you saved my life; that we were lovers; and that I would love you
all the days of my life."

"So, he made you a high person, to purge your demons on a
mountain-top."

"Rather the contrary, I think.  He used me to purge his own devils."

"You know what this tells me, Luca?"

"What?"

"You and I are still pawns in this game of silences."

"Will you answer one question for me?"

"If I can."

"My colleague, Aquino, confronted me with it.  He suggested you were
connected in some way with the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, who are
here in Rome now, trying to bring an indictment against him."

"And what did you tell him?"

"I told him I would ask you."

"Then, when you see him again," there was resentment in her dark eyes,
"tell him to go to hell!"

"With very great pleasure, Senora."

The doorbell rang.  Rossini stood up to answer it.  A waiter and a
butler came in with a trolley to lay out the meal and serve the wine.
Isabel went into the bedroom, while Rossini waited in the salon,
chatting with the butler about the food, the talents of the chef who
had prepared it, and the virtues of the wine from a very noble reserve
near Montepulciano.

Finally, they were seated at table, alone, with the hot dishes
simmering in the chafing-dishes, and the wine ruby red in the goblets.
Isabel was calm again and Rossini was sedulous to divert her.

"The wine you'll be drinking tomorrow is a lot rougher than this one,
but it goes well with my home cooking."

"Are you a good cook, Luca?"

"Within limits, yes.  Soup, pasta, salads, paella, ragout, a charcoal
grill; that sort of thing."

"Do you entertain much in your country house?"

"You'll be my first visitor since I built it."

She gave him an odd, searching look and an uncertain smile.

"Should I be honoured or afraid?"

"I hope you'll feel welcome and comfortable.  Understand something, my
love.  This is my hermitage, the foxhole where I hide from the wars of
the world.  No one comes except the local farmer and his wife who keep
it tidy for me."

"The way you put it, I could be invading a shrine."

"No.  You have always been there.  I have lived without you all these
years, yet I have worn you, sleeping and waking like my own skin."

"I had no idea my Luca was a poet."  She said it lightly, as if she
were fearful of lending too much importance to the words.  He answered
in the same easy fashion.

"Not really.  The songs I sing for you are all borrowed, but in my
hermitage garden they sound sweet."

"I'm proud that you love me so much, Luca.  I am more happy than I can
tell you in my love for you.  It is your loneliness that frightens me,
I think."

"It should not, believe me.  My exterior life is busy and varied.  In
my secret life I have had some bad times, but since I have known you
would be coming, I have reached a strange, calm place.  The air is
cold, but there is no wind and the sea is flat under the moon.  I feel
it is a gift I have been given to help me reflect on my future, to make
a decision about it."

"What decision, Luca?"

"To stay in the Church, or leave it."

"Luca!  You can't mean it."  There was a note of panic in her voice,
she set down her fork with a clatter.  "That's an enormous decision for
a man like you.  I pray God that I am not part of it!"

"You are part of everything I am, everything I do.  That is something
both of us know and neither of us can escape.  But this experience is
personal to me.  I have to decide whether, here and now, or next week,
or next month, I am truly a believer.  I feel curiously relaxed about
what may be in the end a devastating loss.  Piers Hallett tells me the
English have a saying: "God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb."  I
can't even pray about it.  I just wait."

"I'll pray for you, my love."

"You are still a believer, in spite of everything?"

"Because of everything, probably.  I fight like an old conquistador
hacking my way through to what I want, but always with the Church to
clear up after me.  You're different.  You swallow all the bile and
wait ..."

"As you taught me."

"Or as you read my lessons.  Who knows?  In any case, there are things
I have to tell you.  I wasn't going to do it tonight but why carry them
into tomorrow?  I want to enjoy your hermitage."

"You can tell me anything you want, and in your own time."

"That's the problem.  There isn't too much time.  You're going into
conclave.  I can't stay in Rome indefinitely.  And yes, I have work to
do for the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo.  There is evidence that most
of the files on the 'disappeared ones' were shipped out to Spain to
keep them out of the hands of future investigators.  Some, however,
were copied by friendly hands and sent to Switzerland.  While you're in
conclave, I'll be flying to Lugano with two of the women to verify
them.  Since I was a protected person in the bad times, I feel it's one
way I can pay off my debt.  There's another thing also, but it can
wait."  Abruptly she changed the subject.  "Let me serve the second
course.  We shouldn't let the food spoil."

"It's very good food."  Rossini matched her changed mood.  "You'll make
a splendid Embajadora."

"Tell me frankly, Luca.  Do you think Raul has a chance of appointment?
Will the Vatican accept his nomination?"

"That is a decision for the next Pontiff."

"What did you say about Raul?"

"I gave him a qualified approval.  He couldn't do much harm.  We
shouldn't depend too much on him, either."

"You weren't tempted to make it better, for me?"

"A little tempted, yes, but cynical enough to know that stratagems like
that never work for very long."

She laid his plate in front of him and took her place at the table
again.  They ate for a while in silence, then Isabel said:

"Even if Raul got the appointment, I should not be coming with him."

"But you said in your letter ..."

"I wrote it while I was waiting for the specialist's report on the CAT
scan he had ordered for me.  I have bone cancer, Luca, a serious
invasion.  When I go back, they want me to go into hospital for
therapy, but they warn me the prognosis is negative."

For a moment he stared at her, dumb with shock, then the only words he
could find were banality.

"O God!  I'm so sorry."

"Don't be, Luca!  Like you, I have come to a certain place, and your
love is there, too."

His grief threatened to choke him.  Isabel reached across the table and
imprisoned his hands in her own, holding him until his emotions
subsided and he surrendered to quiet tears.  Finally, he asked:

"Does your husband know?"

"Yes.  He's accommodating to the idea in his own fashion.  He will be
generous in everything except personal involvement.  He will tailor his
life as he always does."

"And Luisa?"

"She doesn't know it all yet.  She thinks I'm going into hospital for
more tests.  I've tried to spare her the worst so she can enjoy her
holiday."

"Is there any way I can help?  I feel so useless to you."

"Never think that!  In a strange way, we have completed each other. And
there is something perhaps, which you can do for Luisa."

"Anything in my power.  You know that."

"I do, but we'll talk about it after dinner.  Now, I want you to finish
this meal which I ordered so carefully.  We'll talk about Luisa over
coffee.  So, for the moment, no more of my affairs.  Talk to me about
the conclave and what you think will happen there."

Once again, though his heart was breaking for her and for himself, he
bent to her wishes and talked about what would happen when the
hinge-men met to elect a new Pontiff.

It was nearly half past ten when the waiter wheeled out the trolley and
they were alone.  Isabel looked suddenly weary.  Rossini told her he
would leave in fifteen minutes.  She would not hear of it.

"Please, Luca!  I know that look of yours.  You are closing yourself to
me."

"Not to you, my love!  Never believe that.  My life has been lived so
long behind a facade, I lack the words of common speech.  I am not sure
of the moment when my hand's touch may become an intrusion instead of a
comfort.  But please believe, I am not, I never have been closed to
you."

"But you must let me talk.  I have other things to tell you."

"I am listening."

She set down her cup, folded her hands in her lap, took a deep breath
to steady herself, then she told him:

"Luisa is your child, Luca."

It was then that she saw what the spartan years had done to him.  There
was the faintest flicker of surprise in his eyes, but his lean features
were frozen into the predator's mask.  When he spoke, his voice was
soft as the rustling of silk.

"Well!  This is a gift I didn't expect!"

"Is it truly a gift, Luca?  Some men in your position would find it a
poisoned cup."

He stared at her in silence for a long moment, then, in the same
subdued fashion he explained himself.

"I don't think I have ever said this to you before, but my hardest
moments as a young priest were when I held a baby in my arms at the
baptismal font and knew that I had renounced for ever the right to
fatherhood.  I am telling you the truth, you have given me a gift.  My
problem is I am handling it very awkwardly.  Does Luisa know I'm her
father?"

"No."

"Does Raul know?"

"No."

"So, let's pause here.  Tonight I visit you, an old-time lover, yes,
but a constant one, remembering happiness, celebrating the bonds that
have held us together.  Suddenly, you open a box and these big secrets
pop out.  You have a mortal illness.  I have a child who is a grown
woman."

"I debated a long time before I decided to tell you."

"Thank you for trusting me," said Luca Rossini.  "Yet I would never
have thought to find myself so poor in words or in resources.  I am a
man in bondage.  What can I offer you but a helpless love?  What can I
offer to Luisa?  She won't thank me for invading her life, nor will she
thank you for rocking the foundations of it.  Am I missing something
here?"

"I wondered for years whether I should tell her.  I respected your
right and hers to live in ignorance."

"But now you think differently?"

"That happens when they read you the death sentence.  My courage failed
me.  I couldn't any longer carry the secret alone.  That's why I'm
putting the question to you now.  Should Luisa be told?"

"I don't know," said Luca Rossini.  "I truly don't know.  However, I'm
sure of one thing, if she is to be told, you and I should tell her
together."

Suddenly he laughed: a dry humourless chuckle of self-mockery.  Then he
stretched out a hand to touch her cheek and told her:

"Now, why don't you start again and explain this old-fashioned opera
about which you have told me nothing all these years."

"I think a drink might help."

"Pour one for me, too, please; but only mineral water.  I need to be
very sober for this performance.  And please sit opposite me so I can
see your eyes."

"Why?  Don't you believe me?"

"Oh yes, I believe you; but I want to read your face as you tell me.
Don't you understand?  You've just endowed me with a love-child.  It's
a strange experience.  It would have been easier in olden times when
prelates bred quite large families and endowed them with wealthy
livings or arranged noble marriages for them."

His taut features relaxed into a grin.  Isabel gave him an uncertain
smile.

"Luisa is quite well endowed from my father's estate.  She will also
inherit from Raul.  What I don't want to risk is Raul trading her off
in to a marriage of convenience."

"What happens if he tried?  Luca comes riding in like Julius II in full
armour crying "Stop!  Stop!  Unhand the girl!"?  Isabel, you're telling
yourself fairy-tales!  Please, pass me my drink and sit down."

She huddled herself in the big armchair, facing him as he had directed.
She gagged a little on her first mouthful of brandy, mopped her mouth
with a paper napkin and then started slowly with her story:

"You've probably forgotten some of this, but I remember it by days and
even by hours.  When Papa went into Buenos Aires to bargain for your
life and indeed for mine we were left together on his friend's esttmcia
near Cordoba.  We lived in the guest house and, for everybody's sake,
we kept away from the workers.  For the first ten days, you were very
sick.  You were also in great pain from the wounds of the beating and
the infection.  It was not until the fourth week, just after my period
had finished, that we began to make love.  Figure it then, our
honeymoon lasted a few more weeks.  I thought I was being careful; but
I wasn't careful enough.  At the end, you were spirited away to fly
back to Rome with the Nuncio.  Papa, according to the agreement, took
me back to my home in Buenos Aires.  Fortunately or so I thought Raul
was away on business in Chile and Peru.  I was home nearly five weeks
before he returned.  Meantime, I had missed my period.  When Raul came
back, I gave my usual performance as a loving wife until, as usual,
Raul got bored.  Then I missed another period; after which I went to a
doctor not just any doctor but one recommended by my Aunt Amelia, my
father's sister a tough old lady, wise in the ways of male society in
Argentina.  When my pregnancy was diagnosed and remember, Luca, you
were thousands of miles away back in the warm bosom of mother Church!
Aunt Amelia gave me wise counsel.  "Think ahead, Isabel!  Your father
has told me everything that happened.  You shot a militiaman, and slept
with a priest.  If your husband, or your husband's family ever turned
nasty, you'd be in deep trouble.  What you don't want to happen is to
pop your baby six weeks early and then have to explain it.  So, think
ahead.  We'll find you a good physician in New York and a good medical
excuse to visit him.  Then you'll set a date for a Caesarian birth in
his hospital a date that fits the facts and creates the convenient
fiction.  The Caesarian won't hurt the baby and it will save you a lot
of trouble."  Well, that's exactly what I did, with help from Papa and
Aunt Amelia.  Even Raul was happy with the idea.  He was able to build
his contact list in New York and romp in some old playgrounds.  When
Luisa finally arrived, beautiful and healthy, he was enchanted.  His
father and mother showered her with gifts and attention.  The
fairy-story was complete ..."

"But not for you?"

"No.  I was in total confusion.  During all the celebrations, I was
living a lie.  I was deceiving Raul.  I was making a mockery of his
real joy.  If the truth ever came out, it would be a devastating shame
for him.  On the other hand, it was your child I had borne.  I was
happy about that but the happiness turned sour because I could not
share it.  For a while, I lapsed into deep depression; but I recovered
and began to count my blessings."

"And Raul never asked a single question about my sojourn with you?"

"Not one, not ever.  I doubt he could ever perceive a country priest as
a rival.  Besides, all the papers were in order, my medical history in
order, too.  So, what misgivings could he have?"

"So, I ask again," Luca Rossini was suddenly another man, an imperious
inquisitor.  "Why did you have to raise the question with me after all
these years?"

She did not flinch but thrust herself forward in the chair to confront
him.

"Because I wanted you to know!  I wanted to share her with you, to have
you see what we made together in that country bed in Cordoba.  I didn't
expect you to acknowledge her.  I still don't, but yes, yes, yes, I
wanted you to know.  I hoped you might find some happiness in the
secret the last, probably, we shall be able to share."

"I can understand that."  Rossini's tone was carefully neutral.  "That
takes care of you and me.  What did you plan for Luisa?"

"I hoped God knows why I hoped that you might be a gift for her, too.
When I saw and heard you together this evening, I knew you would be
good for each other."

"That's a guess, a gamble.  You have no right to take it with your
daughter's life!"

"She's your daughter too, Luca.  Or don't you believe what I've told
you?"

"Oh yes!  I believe Luisa is my daughter but she's mine by nature; by
nurture she's yours and Raul's.  There's a precarious balance here.  If
you tip it the wrong way, who knows what damage you may do?  I have to
think about this.  We'll talk about it again tomorrow."

"Do you still want to take me to your hermitage?"

"I do."

He stood up and stretched out his hands.  He drew her close, and held
her to his breast, his lips brushing her hair.

"I love you.  Nothing changes that.  I shall love you from now until
doomsday.  But I'm sad, too, because you're suffering and there's
nothing I can do about that, except pray, and my praying isn't very
good these days.  Then there's Luisa.  I'm sad about her, too, in
another way.  There was a spark between us, wasn't there?"

"There was."

"Then let's push the gamble a little further."

"What do you mean?"  She drew away from him so that she could look into
his face.  He was smiling again.

"I was thinking about tomorrow.  These days there are few graces in my
life, but my little country place is one of them.  I wanted desperately
to share it with you.  Now ..."

He broke off, hesitating over the next phrase.

"Now what, Luca?"

"Now, much to his own surprise, Luca Rossini, Cardinal Presbyter, is a
family man!  I'm suggesting we invite our daughter to join us on our
picnic."

"You mean you're going to tell her?"  There was a note of alarm in
Isabel's voice.

"I have no idea except that I'm going to take her into the kitchen to
prepare lunch with me, while you sun yourself in the garden.  We'll
talk and see where the talk takes us.  How do you feel about that?"

"What can I say?  The grace of your garden may touch us all."

"Good!  Now I'd better call Piers Hallett and cancel the pick-up
arrangement.  He'll be very disappointed."

"Have you thought what we'll do if Luisa doesn't want to come?"

"So be it.  Let her do what she wants.  There will be other times and
other seasons."

"Don't count on that, my love," said Isabel sombrely.  "Remember I'm on
call for the last act of this opera!"

They parted that night in the shadows of mutual griefs.  The passion of
their long-awaited encounter had spent itself, like a firework in a
fine dazzle of emotion.  Now they clung together in a dark landscape,
under a moonless sky, bereft of all but the most primitive physical
comfort: hands' touch and brief body-warmth and the trailing of
yesterday's dreams.  It was Isabel who found the few words that needed
to be said:

"I know what you're thinking, Luca my love.  We should lock the door
and shut out the world and sleep together until morning.  But we can't,
and even if we could, we'd wake and feel ridiculous when the sun came
up."

"To me, you were the most beautiful thing in the world.  You always
will be."

"Go home now, please, Luca."

"You have my address, my telephone number."

"Everything.  We'll see you at ten.  Goodnight, my love!"

It took him more than an hour to walk home through a city sinking
slowly into sleep, but still turbulent with traffic and night noises,
still foetid with the smog that lay along the Tiber, and coiled like a
lethal snake through the ant heaps that covered the ancient hills.

For all his iron self-control, he was still in shock.  Isabel was the
rock upon which his ravaged manhood had been rebuilt.  Now the rock was
crumbling, like a sand castle in an encroaching tide.  He could do
nothing but watch helplessly while the foundation of his fragile inner
life was swept away.  Luisa was another kind of grief: a daughter whom
he could not acknowledge, whose childhood he had never shared, whose
future he might well put at risk.  The anguish rose in him again:
anguish for the illusions he himself had nurtured, and which now lay
scattered at his feet like the petals of last week's roses.

He walked fast, but heedlessly, head down, shoulders hunched, bearing
vaguely in the direction of his house, but caring not at all when he
arrived there.  Lovers embracing in doorways ignored him.  A drunk
jostled him.  A motor-cyclist with a girl riding pillion roared past
him with an eloquent Roman curse.  A pale Madonna, imprisoned in a
little glass shrine with an oil-lamp guttering in front of her, gazed
at him with blank, plaster eyes.

The sight of her woke childhood memories of a Neapolitan household in
the slums of Buenos Aires, with a picture of the Dolorous Virgin over
the matrimonial bed and, tacked over his own, a First Communion card
representing the mythical Virgin Martyr Philomena for whom his mother
was named.

The passing years had made him more and more sceptical of the
mythography of the Church, yet more and more conscious of its potency
and the deep human need for mystery and miracle which sustained it. The
irony was that, while rejecting one set of myths, he had adopted
another: the myth of the ideal lover, enshrined in memory, endowed with
heroic virtue, immune from the risks of mortality.  This was a creature
he could dream without guilt, desire without remorse, because she was
set beyond his reach like the street-corner Virgin behind the dusty
glass.

He had been warned, of course, a thousand times.  His earliest teachers
in the spiritual life had cautioned him against attachments to
perishable things and perishable people.  They had tried vainly to
cauterise his emotions and the cautery had lasted until a brute with a
whip had stripped the hide from his back and left the raw tissue
exposed.

Tonight had been another kind of exposure: to the pain of the beloved,
now perilously mortal, to whom he could offer neither healing nor hear
tease nor even company beyond a few short hours.  Even if he quit the
Church and took the long road to nowhere to maintain his own precarious
identity, what could he offer Isabel?  She was stronger than he.  The
love she gave and the love she took carried no price-tags. She had
accepted like the she-wolf to live and die in her own place, in her own
skin.

And where did that leave Luca Rossini?  In love, he could not, would
not ask for more than had been given him.  He understood the obsessive
element in his own nature.  His sense of the ridiculous, his refusal to
compromise the personal dignity for which, as he saw it, he had paid in
blood, had kept him safe from folly, if not from questions about what
might have been.

One thing, at least, the evening had done for him.  It had separated
Isabel from the question of his relations with the Church itself as a
baptised believer.  The question was now radical and simple.  Was he
still a believer?  If so, he must renew his assent, and serve in that
office to which he was called.  If not, he must withdraw with dignity
and make no scandal for others.  He could not see himself as a seedy
renegade, piping his protest in the forecourt of the temple, neither
could he beg the charity of the faithful or their pity for his reduced
estate.

By the time he had wrestled his confusions into this elementary order,
he was home again.  There was a notice pinned to the elevator, Fuori
Servizio, which meant he had to trudge up the long stone staircase to
reach his apartment.  Then, because custom and ritual were the last
fragile armour against fear and grief, he opened his breviary and read
the comp line of the day:

"Hear, O Lord, my prayer and let my cry reach you .. . My life has
vanished like smoke, I am alone like a pelican in the wilderness.""

Seven

IT WAS ROSSINI'S CUSTOM TO SAY HIS EARLY MORNING MASS in the chapel of
a small convent a few blocks from his apartment.  The convent was the
property of a community of women who called themselves the Sisters of
Redemption.  They devoted themselves to charitable works, one of which
was based in the convent itself: a halfway house for women who had
served prison time or were released on conditional bail.

The community was small; funds were low; so in traditional Italian
fashion, two nuns went out each day, professional mendicants, begging
alms from local residents and shopkeepers.  It was a thankless task.
The community was ageing and few young women offered themselves for
service, but the Sisters themselves managed to preserve a wry Roman
humour, which matched the often anarchic wit of their gaol-birds.

Rossini had met them first on one of his bad days when, dressed as a
layman, he was preparing to set off for his hermitage.  He gave them a
donation, then fell into talk with them.  A slum child himself, born to
an emigrant Neapolitan family, he had a traditional respect for beggars
and a deep-seated hate for the indifferent who despised beggary but
accepted it as a social imperative.

In the course of his dialogue with the Sisters, he revealed his
identity and offered a continuing subvention in cash and his occasional
service as celebrant to the community.  Many times later he was to
regret the impulse, as he found himself drawn more and more into the
position of confessor, counsellor and friend of last resort to the
community and those whom it protected.  He was cool-headed enough to
recognise the system for what it was: old-fashioned ecclesiastical
charity, no substitute at all for an overdue but impossible reform in
the Italian social system.

So, the women in the convent became for him a small private
constituency where he could function as he had done years before in his
upland parish in Argentina.  The nuns trusted him.  The other women
were cautious at first.  He understood that they could hardly be
otherwise.  They knew the harshness of life around the campfires on the
Annulare where the truck drivers pulled in for a quick tumble on a
greasy blanket.  They had suffered the violence of pimps and the
bullying of police and prison staff.

In the end, however, the older ones spread the word that this was a man
to be trusted.  He gave no lectures.  He understood the words and the
facts of life on their side of the street.  He understood how it could
be with the police.  They knew that his gifts made life a little easier
for them all.  There was nothing furtive about him either.  He spoke
gently, but he knew the difference between merda and macaroni and you
knew he'd tell you straight if you tried to play games.  He let it be
known discreetly that he, too, had been embroiled with the police in
his own country and that he understood their reticence.  There was no
compulsion to come to his Mass, but first a few and then more came, so
that when they knew he was coming the chapel was usually full.

This morning, he was reluctant to move from his house, but he would not
disappoint them.  The nuns were a special breed, a diminishing but
still courageous tribe.  The women in their care were, like himself,
the outlanders, the exiles, the proscribed, the nvanze di gahra,
remnants of a gaol system to which some would, almost inevitably,
return.  It was to these he addressed his own poignant petition.

"My friends, I have a favour to ask you.  A very dear and close friend
of mine has just been told she has an incurable cancer.  Many years
ago, this woman risked her life to save mine.  I beg you to pray for
her this morning.  I am offering the Mass not to ask for a miracle
cure, but that courage may be granted to her and a speedy respite from
pain.  I wish I knew why she, of all people in the world, should be so
stricken; but that's the mystery we all face, isn't it?  As I came here
this morning, I kept asking why she?  Why not me instead?  I feel like
a blind man, groping in a sudden darkness.  Then I remind myself that
Our Lord and Saviour was stricken with this same darkness, just before
he died: Pray for me, too.  You are all my sisters.  Pray for me."  His
voice cracked.  He stood for a moment recovering himself, then he
stepped to the altar to begin Mass.

When the Mass was over, he lingered just long enough to drink a coffee
and exchange courtesies with the Mother Superior.  Then, as he was
leaving the building, one of the women, a sturdy veteran of the
roadside, stopped him and thrust into his hand a small medallion of the
Virgin on a flimsy silver chain.  She told him: "Here!  Give this to
your friend!  It saved me from a lot of trouble on the street.  Maybe
it will do something for her."  Then she was gone, clattering down the
paved corridor on her wooden pat tens  Rossini, touched again with
emotion, shoved the gift into his breast pocket and hurried out of the
building.

Back at his apartment, he checked the screen for his e-mail.  There
were three messages.  The first two were from his own office.  The
interview requested by Steffi Guillemin of Le Monde was scheduled for
ten o'clock the following morning at the Sain Stnmpa.  Monsignor
Angel-Novalis was prepared to attend and to record the conversation if
his Eminence wished.  A moment's reflection convinced Rossini that this
was a wise insurance.  The next message was from the Secretary of
State: "I have reset your meeting with the non-voting Cardinals for
eleven-thirty.  This gives you a half-hour break after your meeting
with the press.  Angel-Novalis may need some support and you may expect
some rough words from the press over the Pontiff's diaries.  They
resent the notion that they may have been trafficking in stolen
material.  So, they are establishing a defence line.  Our colleague,
Aquino, gave me his version of your conversation.  When I told him
you'd be talking to the press, he asked, rather more meekly than usual,
whether I could arrange another brief talk with you "More brief and
more friendly' was the way he put it.  I suggest you call him.  You may
be able to dispose of the matter with more grace and civility.  Have a
pleasant day in the country."

Rossini glanced at his watch.  There was still an hour and twenty
minutes before Isabel arrived with or without Luisa.  He picked up the
phone and dialled Aquino's number.  When his Eminence answered, Rossini
was carefully bland.

"I have a message from the Secretary of State.  He asked me to get in
touch with you."

"That was kind of him.  Good of you to respond so promptly.  I've been
troubled.  I felt our talk went astray.  My fault, I'm sure.  If it's
possible, I'd like to make amends, repair the damage, so to speak."

"We were both revisiting old battlefields," said Rossini calmly.
"There's always the danger of stepping on a land mine  What would you
like me to do?"

"I'd like to accept your offer of intervention with the women.  I'd
like to see whether an arbitrated situation is possible.  I'd be happy
to use Angel-Novalis to handle the press.  However ..."

There was a momentary silence.  Rossini prompted him.

"I'm listening."

"However, I felt, I still feel that the condition you made that I
should offer myself for a court appearance is too much to ask, and
besides, it is canonically impossible."

"I thought about that, too," said Rossini mildly.  "It was a condition
I had no right to make; but there is still a condition as far as I am
concerned."

"Which is?"

"Open response, open discussion.  There is much anger.  I don't want
yours or mine added to it."

"How do we handle matters of secrecy?"

"We don't.  If you have the answers, you give them freely and openly.
If you do not have the answers, say so.  If there is a real impediment
to disclosure, you admit at least the impediment.  But there is one
thing that you should know.  In addition to the evidence collected by
the women, there are documents lodged for secrecy in Spain.  Some of
these have been copied and deposited in Switzerland.  The women will be
inspecting them while we are in conclave."

"You're sure of this?"

"Yes, though I have no knowledge of the documents themselves."

"But the source of your information .. . ?"

"Is impeccable."

"I shall have to think a little more about this.  There are certain
complications, not least of which is any clerical involvement in the
transactions.  I'm sure you take my meaning."

"Not all of it," said Rossini, "but I should prefer not to embarrass
Angel-Novalis, who will be doing us both a service."

"I'll keep that in mind.  Expect a call from me very soon and thank you
for your courtesy, Rossini."

"It's good that we understand each other better."

"Very good, very good indeed.  Thank you."

When he put down the phone, Rossini was smiling.  Aquino's words were
cordial enough but he sounded as though he were sucking a very sour
lemon while he spoke them.  He glanced at his watch.  There was still
time for a call to Turi at the Secretariat of State to brief him on the
conversation with Aquino.  His response was warm.

"Thanks, Luca.  I appreciate it.  The less friction we have at this
stage, the better.  By the way, where did you get your information on
the Spanish and Swiss documents?"

"From Senora Ortega.  She is going to Switzerland to help authenticate
those which are held there.  It's a matter of conscience for her.
That's confidential to you, Turi."

"Of course.  You had a pleasant evening, I trust?"

"Pleasant but sad.  Isabel won't be with us very long, I fear.  She
tells me she is very ill and the prognosis isn't good."

"I'm very sorry, Luca, for her and for you.  I'll say my Mass for
her."

"Thank you."

"You're spending today in the country?"

"Yes, her daughter's coming with us.  She's a beautiful girl, the image
of her mother."

"You'll be working tomorrow?"

"As promised, Turi.  I meet the elders of the College at eleven-thirty,
before that I have an interview with a woman from Le Monde.
Angel-Novalis will be there to hold my hand."

"A word of caution, Luca.  You, yourself, are mentioned in the
Pontiff's diaries.  The piece will be coming up soon.  You may be
questioned on it."

"I wonder if the Guillemin woman will raise it tomorrow."

"Who knows?  If she does, you'll have to handle it as best you can."

"I'm not too worried, Turi.  I don't want scandal for the Church any
more than you do, but for myself, I'm a stripped-down man.  There's
nothing they can take from me that I shall miss very much."

"I'm glad to hear that.  The weather's beautiful.  Enjoy the day, my
friend."

But when he put down the receiver, the Secretary of State was pensive.
He dealt with crisis somewhere in the world every day.  Men and women
were made martyrs while he himself brokered deals with their
executioners to protect the remnant faithful.  He was a man of
disciplined appetite and cool judgments, but he cherished a deep
friendship with Luca Rossini.  He knew very well that what had kept him
sane and stable was not the ancient faith.  It was the private and
potent cultus of a personified Madonna of Perpetual Help, represented
by Isabel Ortega.  He preferred not to speculate on what might happen
to Rossini if she were taken from him,

and he were left a worshipper at an empty shrine, in a wasteland of
abandoned beliefs.

The elevator was still out of service.  There was a promise that it
would be fixed by midday: midday today or one fine tomorrow was always
a moot question.  So, Rossini decided to spare Isabel the long trudge
up the staircase.  He waited in the street by his car, a
twelve-year-old Mercedes which he had bought cheaply from an American
colleague transferred back to the United States.  It had been lovingly
cared for, and now it stood solid and gleaming on the cobbles outside
the entrance while Rossini waited, lounging against it like any Roman
driver on guard against cruising youths who might scrape it with a coin
or wrench off the radiator symbol.  He prized these moments of complete
anonymity, when he was absolved from his past, detached from his
present state and accountable for neither.

Isabel was late.  The arrangement had been clear.  They would meet at
ten.  It was now ten-thirty.  Roman times were flexible, but Rossini
was irritated because with the shadow of coming loss hanging over them
like a storm-cloud, he was jealous of the few hours they could spend
together.  He called the hotel on his mobile phone.  There was no
answer from the Senora's room.  According to the doorman, she had just
left in a taxi with her daughter.  If the Signore would like to leave a
message?  No, thank you.

It was another ten minutes before the taxi pulled up with a squeal of
brakes and decanted the two women on the pavement.  Both were voluble
with excuses, talking over and against each other: Luisa had come in
late and had overslept, Raul had called from New York, which meant a
long conversation with both Isabel and Luisa, then Miguel had called to
make another date for this evening, which Luisa wasn't sure she wanted,
and, finally, when they were just about to step into the taxi, Isabel
was called back for a very long conversation with the woman with whom
she would be travelling to Switzerland.

"... And that, my dear Luca, ends our litany of excuses.  We're sorry!
Now, will you please give us absolution and get us to hell out of
here!"

"Kiss the woman, for God's sake," Luisa commanded.  "She's wound up
tight like a fiddle-string.  That's not good for her or for me!"

Rossini did as he was bidden.  He kissed Isabel and laid a comforting
hand on her shoulder as he settled her into the car.

"Now you may kiss me, Luca."

"Luisa please!"

"Why not, Mama?  He's out of uniform, isn't he?"

Rossini leaned into the back seat, gave her a hurried peck on the
cheek, then climbed into the driver's seat and pulled away.

"My place is tucked away in a fold of the Sabine Hills a few miles
south of Tivoli.  If you like, we can go by way of Tivoli you can see
Hadrian's Villa, and the Villa d'Este, then go on to my place for
lunch.  I should warn you, however, it's a popular tour, so there'll be
lot of groups in buses."

"If you don't mind, Luca, I'd be happier to spend a quiet day with
you."

"I'm all for a quiet day."  Luisa was prompt to support her mother.  "I
had a very late night.  Miguel was attentive, but he did it all by the
book dinner, a club, then the whole Rome-by-night scene with bells and
whistles!"

"That's settled then.  No tourism.  We'll take the back road to my
place.  We'll stop in the village to buy food which you, Luisa, will
help me cook while your mother takes her ease.  Agreed?"

"Agreed."

"We'll both help," said Isabel firmly.  "I'm not yet an invalid!  What
did you do with yourself after you left me last night?"

"I suppose you could call it my own version of Rome-by-night.  I walked
home.  I lost myself a few times, because I had a lot to think about. I
remember looking up and seeing, through a lighted window, a most
wonderful frescoed ceiling.  I was almost run down while I was staring
at it.  When I got home, I read the last of my breviary and went to
bed.  I had to be up early today to say Mass for a community of
Sisters, and make phone calls.  So, here I am!  A free man today with a
loaded calendar tomorrow!"

Dressed in country clothes, behind the wheel of his own car, Rossini
was a changed man a throwback to the Neapolitan street urchin.  He
drove with skill and verve.  He responded with enthusiasm to
horn-blowing and personal abuse.  As a tour-guide, he was less than
informative, as a commentator on the race-track tactics of Roman
drivers, he was eloquent, entertaining and theatrically abusive in
Lunfardo.  The two women were laughing one moment, gasping the next and
deeply grateful when they turned off the Via Tiburtina and wound their
way through a series of country by-ways towards Rossini's hermitage.
They stopped in a small village to buy food, and watching him in easy
talk with the shopkeeper, Isabel was overwhelmed by a rush of memories,
of another Rossini, youthful pastor of another village tucked away in
the sub-Andean foothills.

Finally, Rossini unlocked the heavy gate and drove into his kingdom. He
helped the women out of the car and left them standing while he walked
back to close the gate.  When he rejoined them, Isabel smiled and laid
a hand on his arm and told him:

"I remember in one of your letters you told me you wanted to have un
hue rto abigarrado, a dappled garden.  Now I see what you mean."

"You are both welcome.  My house is your house."

Inside, there was a chill, but the fire was set with kindling and logs.
He set a match to it and switched on the CD player.  The flames were
rising and the Haffner Symphony was filling the room as he took them on
their tour of his small retreat.

"I did most of the alterations myself."  His pride in his handiwork was
beguiling.  "You can see where I started and how the work improved as I
got better at it.  I like to have tools in my hands."

"Did you design it yourself?"  Luisa was already testing the taps,
opening drawers and cupboards, checking cutlery and crockery.

"Yes, I did.  For the plumbing I had some local help; but the rest of
it is mine.  You two finish looking around.  I'll bring in the box of
food."

When he stepped out the door, the two women looked at each other. Luisa
shook her head incredulously.

"He's so happy with so little."

Isabel challenged her sharply.

"Are we happier because we have so much more?"

"Mother, please!  You've been snappish all morning."

"I'm sorry.  I had a restless night.  You were touring Rome.  I was
touring my yesterdays and looking at the future.  It's not a pretty
landscape."

"Luca has his own past to cope with and you're part of it.  No!  Don't
turn away, please!  When his face is in repose, it's tight and closed.
When he looks at you, it changes completely.  I don't see where he fits
in your future, but I hope I can find a man who will look at me like
that."

"I found him and then I lost him."

"You never lost him, Mother."

Rossini came in at that moment and dumped the food box on the table.

"Leave these now and let me walk you round the garden.  The house will
be warmer when we get back."

As they walked, they held hands, a family trio comfortable with each
other, yet separate, each preoccupied with a private question.  Luisa
asked:

"Don't you ever feel shut in here?  Nobody can look in, but you can't
see over your own fence either."

"That's the way I like it, but you have to understand I spend most of
my life meeting people, engaged with them always in discussion or
negotiation.  I come back empty as a clay pitcher.  Here I am filled
again."

"But don't you ever get lonely?"

"The celibate life is a lonely road, Luisa."

"But Mother has never been celibate and she's been lonely, too, though
she hates to talk about it."

"I don't talk about it either."  Rossini was gentle with her.  "In one
way or another, we all have to cope with the essential solitude of
being human, whether we're celibate or married."

"If you're a good person, doesn't God fill your loneliness?"

"He fills it, I think, with a divine discontent."

Isabel seized on the phrase with an intensity that surprised them
both.

"It's the discontent that keeps us alive.  When the last desire is
stilled, we've already crossed the river."

"Then you and Luca have a long way to go yet."

"Meaning what?"

"Please, Mother!  A blind man can see that you two love each other. I'm
happy for you both but I don't understand why you've made it so hard
for yourselves."

This time it was Rossini who reproved her.

"You're treading on private ground, young lady!"

Luisa refused to be silenced.  "You told me this house was my house,
too.  So, if there's ground I can't tread on, point it out to me.  I
don't know the whole story about you and Mother, because nobody's
thought I had a right to know it.  But I'm here with you both in this
garden.  That needs some explaining, doesn't it?  It's no secret that
Mother and Father live separate lives, and Mother, too, has had lovers
from time to time."

"Luisa, please!"  Isabel was angry.  "Nowyou're really over the
line."

"Let her finish," said Rossini, quietly.  "She's right.  I gave her the
freedom of the house.  Please say whatever you want, Luisa."

"I don't blame Mother or Father.  I've had love and care from both of
them a different love, a different care from each.  So, I have no
complaints, Mother.  But Luca has been part of my life also a legend, a
mysterious figure whom Grandfather Menendez used to talk about
sometimes.  It was only yesterday that he became real.  So, you can't
shut me out any more, either of you."

Isabel was about to intervene again.  Rossini cut her off with a
gesture.

"Here's what we do.  Let's all prepare the meal together.  While we
work, we talk.  If you have questions, I'll try to answer them.  Your
mother can speak or be silent as she chooses.  Does that sound fair?"

"Yes, it's fair provided neither of you patronises me."

He steered them back into the house, talking as he went, pausing to
pluck ripe pears from the laden tree.

"Understand something from the beginning.  Some of what you'll hear
happened before you were born.  Some of it happened when you were a
very little girl and Argentina and its people were bitterly and
brutally divided.  No matter what side you were on, there was enmity
and suffering.  You were spared a lot of that, so try not to judge
anyone too harshly.  One more word before we start.  I do love your
mother.  I'll love her till the day I die.  She loves me, too.  We have
corresponded for years.  But in the circumstances of the times, each of
us was a mortal threat to the other.  In a way, we still are ..."  He
turned to Isabel and asked: "May I show her?"

"If you can bear it, so can I."

As Luisa watched, Rossini unbuttoned his shirt and took off his
undershirt so that he stood naked to the waist.  Then, Isabel turned
him about so Luisa could see the crisscross of scars and welts on his
back.  She gasped in horror.  Isabel said calmly:

"That's where the story starts for both of us.  Raul was away in Chile
and Peru.  I was staying with your Grandfather Menendez.  Our apartment
looked down on the square and the church where Luca was pastor."

After that first brutal moment of revelation, the rest of the story
seemed to fall naturally in rhythm as now one, now the other, picked up
the cadence of the narrative, while Luisa worked silently at the
kitchen bench with them, asking no questions, offering no verdict until
the narrative ended with Rossini's return to Rome and Isabel's return
to Raul.

"So, now you know."  said Rossini.

"Thank you both for telling me."  Luisa was subdued.  "Now, may we eat?
I'm very hungry."

Rossini poured wine while the women served the pasta.  Then he invoked
a blessing on the food and on the company.  After the first mouthfuls,
Isabel raised her glass.

"Compliments to the chef!"

"And the chef thanks his sous-chefs!"

"This sous-chef was working under a certain stress," Luisa admonished
them both gently.  "That was high drama you were giving me."

Isabel laid a hand on her cheek.

"I'm sorry you had to wait so long.  Luca told me there was a grace in
this house."

"There is love in it this day."  said Rossini.

"And what was there before, Luca?"

"Some faith, some hope a memory of love only.  But this is our agnpe,
the meal at which we celebrate love together."

"And what about tomorrow?"  Luisa's question hung between them like a
drop of clear water ready to fall into a dark pool.  Isabel sat silent,
with downcast eyes.  It was left to Rossini to offer an answer.

"There's an old adage among diplomats deal with the hard questions
between the pear and the cheese.  Why don't we do that?  Let's enjoy
the meal and the moment, and talk afterwards."

"Promise you won't put me off?"

He looked at Isabel.  She nodded.  He answered Luisa:

"We promise: both of us."

He got up to clear the first platters from the table, but Luisa pushed
him back into his chair.

"Leave these to me!  Mother and I are serving the meal.  You look after
the wine and try to look like a prince of the Church!"

It was a cheerful and chatty hour before the fruit and cheese were laid
on the table and the coffee was ready to be served.  Their talk

H7

trailed off as Rossini made a small ceremony of slicing a pear and
offering "the first taste of the fruit of my garden".  When they had
approved the offering, he turned to Isabel:

"Now, my love, we have a promise to keep.  Let's talk about the
future."

"Not yet."  Luisa stayed him with a gesture.  "We haven't finished with
the past."

"I thought we had," said Isabel.  "When Luca came back to Rome, I
resumed my life with your father.  Luca and I have corresponded, but
last night was our first meeting in ..."

"In twenty-five years," said Luisa.  "I know that; but while we've been
talking, I've been doing some simple arithmetic.  I know when I was
born, where I was baptised.  I know you had a Caesarian in New York.
So, I ask myself whether there's any possibility I might be Luca's
child."

"You were born, registered and baptised Luisa Amelia Isabel Ortega."

"That doesn't answer my question, Mother."

"Why do you ask it now?"

"Because this is the first time I've seen you and Luca together -and
it's the first time I've seen two middle-aged people so desperately in
love it breaks my heart."

"I think you should tell her," said Luca Rossini.  "Tell her exactly
what you told me last night.  It's your story.  She can interpret it as
she chooses.  I'll do a little work in the garden.  Call me when you
want me."

He left them then, stripped off his shirt and began hoeing the rows of
vegetables, trying to slow down his whirligig thoughts to the pace of
the mattock strokes as they broke the dry crust of the soil.  It was
the most primitive and most effective remedy he knew against the manic
conflicts of ideas and arguments, of high matters and low ones, of
interests and prejudices and claims and counter-claims which pressed
for his attention every day.

Whatever argument or discussion Isabel and Luisa were pursuing inside
the house would spill over on him, but their destinies were ultimately
beyond his control.  The question of his acknowledgment of Luisa as his
natural daughter was a minor one, already settled.  Her acknowledgment
of him was another matter, far beyond the simple dispensation of
affection.  Soon, her mother would be gone from her life but the going
could be long, painful and destructive.  What could he offer to Isabel
to ease her passing, what to Luisa to make up for her loss?

Which brought him by a round turn to a question he had debated many
times with the Pontiff and discussed with his curial colleagues: the
abiding problems of a celibate clergy in the Roman discipline of
Christianity.  Each age in the life of a celibate cleric brought its
own crop of problems.  In the training period, their sexual instincts
were suppressed, their expressions of affection inhibited, their
language purged of passion, so that when they encountered it again if
they ever did in the writings of the great mystics, it was always with
a sense of shock.  In the middle years of pastoral life, companionship
or shared ambition provided a partial support; but in the later years,
illness or ennui or simple loneliness changed the landscape of their
lives into a grey despair.  And they had lost too long the simple
skills of companionship with women and other men.  What angered Rossini
often was the element of hypocrisy in the discussions at every level
and that, also, was a very Latin skill: to add the colour of virtue to
the least convincing argument, as the forgers of antiquities aged their
bronzes and marbles in dung-hills and cess-pits.

This much-chewed argument brought him to the end of his bean rows and
he was just scraping off his mattock, when Isabel came out of the
house, hand in hand with Luisa.  He waited, dusty and sweating as they
approached.

Isabel stopped a few paces away.  Luisa halted just out of his reach.
He leaned on the handle of the mattock and waited.

Suddenly she looked small and vulnerable, a lost child alone on an
empty beach.  Yet he could find no words either to comfort her or to
explain himself.  Her first words put him completely off balance.

"How are we supposed to feel about this, Luca?"

"I don't know.  Luisa.  I can only tell you how I feel."

"Then tell me, please!"

"I'm glad the truth is out at last.  I was upset that I'd been kept so
long in ignorance.  I'm sad to think of the years that are lost to me.
That's pure selfishness, I know.  I'm glad you've seen your mother and
me together.  I think you understand the love that has bound us
together all these years.  I hope you understand that you are truly a
love-child and that you will let me spend some love on you.  I confess
I don't know how, but I know the love is there to spend.  How do you
feel?"

"Confused, but not unhappy.  I feel as though I've been born again, and
all the landmarks in my life have changed suddenly."

"For better or for worse?"

"When Mother goes and I know how ill she is!  it will be for the worse.
But now that I've seen you both together, I know how important your
love has been in her life.  That still leaves me with a host of puzzles
to solve."

"Like what?"

"How do I cope with two fathers in my life?  Nothing will change with
Raul.  I know it can't.  I know it mustn't.  How can I live with so big
a secret, because I know I'll have to?  How can I get to know you
better; because I want that, too?  Then there's the problem of how I
should feel about you."

"How would you like to feel?"

"At ease even loved a little, but for myself, not for mother.  I'd like
you to hold me in your arms and kiss me and tell me I'm as welcome in
your life as Mother is."

He straightened up and tossed the mattock away and held out his arms to
her.  She came in a single leap and he held her to him, murmuring over
and over: "Welcome, my daughter, welcome."  Then, Isabel joined them
and they embraced in silence until Luisa herself broke the cobweb that
bound them.  She said lightly:

"Mother was right.  Look at us!  Three graces in a garden!  You need a
shower, Luca, and afterwards I think we should all have a drink to
celebrate."

"Well, we're dealing with country matters," said Isabel.

"And what, pray, are country matters?"  Rossini asked.

"My Aunt Amelia taught me the phrase.  She learned it from the British
who made themselves very rich in Argentina.  Country matters are
anything to do with sex and reproduction on either side of the
blanket."

"I never knew Aunt Amelia," said Luisa.  "But she certainly played an
important role in my life.  I think I would have liked her."

The rest of the afternoon should have played itself out as an agreeable
epilogue to the drama of revelations.  Instead, Rossini found himself
witness to the sudden eruption of a quarrel between mother and
daughter.  It was triggered by an apparently casual remark from
Luisa.

"Now that you've sorted my life out so neatly, Mother, let's talk about
yours."

"There's nothing to talk about.  As soon as we get back to New York, I
have another series of tests.  What happens after that depends on the
results.  It's simple.  One day at a time."

"It isn't that simple and you know it.  Father has told me how
seriously ill you are."

"Then he shouldn't have!  It's my life."

"And he's your husband and I'm your daughter and now Luca comes into
the frame as well."

"My life is still mine.  I'll make my own decisions about it, as long
as I can."

"And when you can't?"

"Then your father can take over for whatever time remains.  I won't
have you wasting your life nursing a terminal case.  Raul can well
afford any nursing I may need."

"I know that, Mother.  Father isn't a monster.  He's kind and generous,
but a fool with women."

"That's enough!"

"No, Mother, it's not enough!  What I want is that you should face
whatever's in store for you with calm and contentment ..."

"I can't do that, if everyone's badgering me about how I arrange what's
left of my life.  Give me time to work it out.  I need privacy.  I need
personal space.  You try to explain it to her, Luca!"

It was then he remembered the medallion which the woman had given him
at Mass that morning.  He picked up his jacket from the bed and took
from the pocket the small tissue-wrapped object.  He carried it back to
the table, and laid it in front of Isabel.  v

"What's this?"  v

"Before you open it, let me tell you about it.  This morning, I said my
Mass in a convent where the Sisters run a halfway house for women on
release from the gaol system.  They've all had tough lives, but they've
learned to trust me.  I asked them to offer their prayers for you
because, as Luisa does, I feel helpless to change the future for you,
helpless even to support you towards it.  After the Mass, this woman
came up to me.  She's in her early fifties, I'd say, and she's spent a
large part of her life as a campfire girl flagging down truck drivers
on the highways leading into Rome.  It's a rough game, as you may
imagine, peddling yourself winter and summer in a roadside ditch.  I
was just walking out when she hurried after me and pushed her gift into
my hand.  She said: "Give this to your friend.  It saved me from a lot
of trouble on the street.  Maybe it will do something for her."  That's
the end of the story.  Look at it one way, it's a social outcast and a
not very good cleric invading your privacy.  Look at it again, and it's
an act of love and care."

Isabel opened the package and brought out the medallion on its fragile
chain.  She asked Luisa:

"Would you put it on for me, please?"

As Luisa adjusted the pendant, Isabel reached up to touch her hands.

"Forgive me!  I don't mean to snap.  When I'm frightened, I get angry.
When I'm angry, I have to hit out at someone.  Luca should be glad he
didn't marry me!"

Rossini was swift to answer.

"Married or not, we're all bound to each other.  So, let me say my
little piece in my own house.  My whole life has been an act of
gratitude for what you did for me and what you gave to me -dignity and
manhood!  I can't make any judgments on your husband.  I know only what
you've told me.  However, you must leave him the chance to give you
what he can, to be what he can for you in this last term of your life.
You can't refuse that to Luisa either.  We all need the chance to
redeem ourselves by giving.  Do you understand?"

"I understand; but no more lectures, please, Luca!"

"My God!"  said Luisa with a grin.  "He sounds just like the Grand
Inquisitor, doesn't he?  I'm glad he's on our side!"

"Come and help me do the dishes, young lady.  Isabel, why don't you put
on some Haydn.  I feel we need some nice orderly music in our very
disorderly lives!"

As they worked together at the kitchen sink, Luisa asked:

"Are we likely to see you again before the conclave?"

"It's unlikely.  We could probably make a dinner at my place, but all
of us in the College are under heavy pressure for the next few days.
After the conclave, it will be much easier."

"Unless you're elected Pope?"

"That, dear daughter, would be the outside bet of all time.  What's
much more likely is that I'll be exiled to some very obscure office in
the Vatican."

"Is there any chance you could come to New York to see Mother before
the end?  That's what she's hoping though she's too proud to admit
it."

"I'll move heaven and earth to be there.  That's a promise: but I need
a promise from you, too.  I'll have to depend on you for regular news
of your mother's condition.  Send it e-mail."

"Count on it.  I'll keep you informed."

"Good!  Now we should think of heading back to Rome."

"Not yet, please.  Mother needs some time alone with you.  I'll go talk
to the birds in the garden."

Then, swiftly, she was gone and he was alone with Isabel, sitting
side-by-side on the battered sofa, his arm around her, her head resting
on his breast, savouring the silence.  After a long time, Isabel
murmured drowsily:

"Luca, my love, I think this has been the longest day of my life."

"Has it been happy?"

"Happy, yes; but after all, each of us will sleep alone tonight and all
the nights after.  I'm scared, Luca and cold inside, as if I were
already locked in my burial chamber."

He drew her close, murmuring words of comfort and hope which, even as
he spoke them, sounded dry and hollow.  Isabel, however, seemed to
brighten a little.  She began to finger the tarnished little medallion
which lay in the cleft of her breasts.  Finally, she spoke again, in
the same drowsy, detached fashion.

"Imagine all the things this little Virgin saw by the light of the
roadside fires.  I hope the woman who gave her to me isn't lonely
without her.  Will you do something for me, my love?"

"Anything, you know that."

"Buy another medal, a gold one with a gold chain, have it blessed by
the new Pope and send it to her with a note from both of us."

"What shall I say?"

"Tell her the gift was very important to me and already her little
Virgin is looking after me, and most of all, I feel I have a new
sister.  Can you remember all that?"

"How could I forget it?"

"Too easily, my love.  I know this black spirit that haunts you.
Whatever you decide to do with your life, don't do it in haste or
anger.  Above all, don't do it for me, because I shan't be here to
share anything with you."

"Please, my love, please .. ."

"No!  Let me finish!  If you find in the end you can't believe, I'll
believe for you.  If you can't hope, I'll hope for you.  If that sounds
foolish, remember that we both have love and that's stronger than
death, stronger than despair.  Kiss me now.  Hold me a moment, then
take me back to Rome with our daughter."

Eight

TO PREPARE FOR HIS INTERVIEW WITH STEFFI GUILLERMIN, Rossini had
arranged a half-hour briefing session with Angel-Novalis at the Sala
Stampn.  He was an ideal mentor: crisp, lucid, dispassionate.  He
offered first a portrait.

"She's a stylish woman, with a clear mind.  She will come prepared in
her subject and its vocabulary.  She has no interest in men as sexual
partners; but she demands that they acknowledge both her brains and her
style.  You may rely on accurate quotations of what you say, some acid
descriptions of your attitudes under questioning and some insight that
may surprise you.  She will not accept anything off the record.  Her
attitude is that you have accepted the rules of the game.  Subjects?
Certainly she will refer to the Pontiff's personal relations with you.
Certainly she will want to discuss the drama of your rescue from the
soldiery and your eventual exit from Argentina.  My guess is that she
will have more information than you may be expecting.  It is common
knowledge now that the husband of Senora Ortega has been proposed as
the next Argentine Ambassador to the Vatican ..."

"Which leads directly to the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo."

"Yes."

"And since you will be present at the interview, that will certainly
raise the question of the participation or involvement of members of
Opus Dci in the dirty war in Argentina.  Do you have any briefing for
me in that area?"

"Guillemin is too practised to address any questions to me.  This is
your interview, Eminence.  I shall simply be a fly on the wall.  My
counsel would be to give your own answers, and not try to guess what
her commentary will be or attempt to instruct her in the faith.  Some
of your eminent colleagues have already fallen into that snare.  You'll
inevitably get two general questions: What is the present state of the
Church, and what kind of a Pope do we need?  Each one of those has its
own built-in bear-trap.  If the Church is in a bad way, who's to blame?
If the Church needs repairs, who's the man to fix it?  And your answer
to that one could have you in trouble with the whole electoral college.
Any more questions, Eminence?"

"Let's get back to the one you haven't answered," said Rossini.  "What
is your personal response to the actions of certain members of Opus Dci
in my country during the dirty war?"

The question took him completely by surprise.  He blushed crimson.  He
opened his mouth and closed it again.  Then he sat in silence, staring
down at the backs of his hands.  Finally, he lifted his head to face
Rossini.  His voice was steady and his answer studiously formal.

"You are not my confessor, Eminence.  So, I am not obliged to answer
that question."

"I understand that."

"So, why does your Eminence ask?"

"Because, in my personal life first, and now in my collegia!  life as a
Cardinal, the matter assumes a special importance.  A few moments ago,
when I raised the question, you declined to give me any directions at
all as to how if at all it might be answered for the press.  So, I put
it again to you in confidence.  There is evidence, clear evidence, that
members of Opus Dci were involved directly or indirectly in the
repressive activities of the military in Argentina, that they helped to
suppress proof of crimes committed in the dirty war.  I know you as an
upright and honourable man.  It would help me to know how you come to
terms with these anomalies.  I, too, have questions of conscience to
solve, and I'd like to have a very clear head when I face my
inquisitor!"

"Then the answer will have to be in shorthand, Eminence."

"I accept that."

"Let's start with this proposition: Opus Dci is not a popular or
populist group.  It is elitist.  It is secretive.  It does deal with
power-groups in the law, in money, in politics.  It endeavours, not
always successfully, to apply Christian principles to the mechanics of
social order.  Its origins, like those of the Jesuits, are Hispanic.
Its asceticism is, if you like, Hispanic too.  For my part, I have to
acknowledge that its training enabled me to survive a most difficult
period of my life.  But, as we both know, power is a dangerous and
corrupting game especially when you have God and Christ's Vicar on your
side!  Our society constitutes a very strong pressure group in the
Iberian and the South American Churches.  Areas in which, let me say
it, the power game has been played most brutally.  Ask me for evidence
of our involvement, I cannot give it.  It is too deeply buried.  I have
chosen not to dig any deeper than I am obliged to do.  Like you,
Eminence, I have lived and worked under the close personal patronage of
the late Pontiff, who gave our society a special place in his plans.
His Holiness was a potent influence in the downfall of Communist
regimes in Eastern Europe.  In politics and in the Church, he leaned
more to the right than to the left.  Thus, living so close to the seat
of power, it has been easy to dissociate myself from its abuses, to
pull the cowl over my head like an ancient monk, and tell myself that
God and the Holy Father know what is best for the world.  Now I'm not
so sure!  What to do about it?  I'm not sure either, especially with
all the changes that a new man will bring.  So, I wait.  I wrestle with
my conscience and pray for light enough and strength enough one day to
cleanse my own corner of the house of God!"  He broke off.  His
fine-boned features relaxed into a smile and his voice took on its
habitual tone of irony.  "You see how easy it is to forget the
disciplines and lapse into excessive emotion."

"Your excess was a gift to me," said Luca Rossini.  "The light dawns
slowly, doesn't it?"

"Too slowly sometimes.  But let me repeat my warning, Eminence.  Steffi
Guillemin is a seductive interviewer.  She has much intelligence and
she likes to display it.  Just remember, she's got ice water in her
veins and acid in her pen!"

The interview took place in a room in the Press Office.  Guillemin and
Rossini sat facing each other, with a small table between them.
Angel-Novalis sat apart, out of their line of vision.  His tape
recorder sat beside Guillemin's on the table-top.  She began without
preamble.

"You're a busy man, Eminence.  I thank you for consenting to this
interview.  Let's deal with the big questions first.  What's wrong with
the Church?"

"The same things that have been wrong with it for two thousand years
people!  Men and women and children, too, who make up the family of
believers.  This isn't a community of the pure and the perfect. They're
good, bad and indifferent.  They're ambitious, greedy, fearful,
lustful, a rabble of pilgrims held together by faith and hope and the
difficult experience of love."

"Let's be more specific, then: the institution of which you are a key
official, how would you describe its present condition?"

"Sometimes it's called the tarque of Peter'.  It's a good metaphor.
It's a ship a very old ship riding in stormy waters.  It's been well
built its essential structures are sound, but its timbers creak; some
of them are worm-eaten and have to be replaced.  The rigging is frayed,
the sails have been patched and repatched.  It wallows in the troughs
and lurches over the crests of big seas, but it's still afloat and the
crew is still manning her even though they, too, look a motley bunch
sometimes."

"And now, of course, the captain is dead.  You are one of the people,
the very few people, who have to elect a new one.  What special talents
do you bring to that electoral task?"

"Fewer than you might think.  I know how bureaucracy works, though I
have little taste and less talent for it.  However, the electoral
process is a play of forces and interests within a small body of highly
diverse individuals; sometimes an oddity, like myself,

may tip the vote in one direction or another at least that's what I am
told by those who have attended a conclave.  This will be my first."

"His Holiness had a very long reign.  Is that a good thing or a bad
thing?"

"Good or bad, it's a fact which produces certain consequences."

"Could you be more specific, Eminence?"

"There's no mystery about it.  The process of ageing produces certain
inevitable consequences.  The catalogue is familiar.  The arteries get
clogged.  The joints stiffen.  The brain functions may change
radically.  There are psychological changes as well.  The aged can
become fearful, paranoid, even tyrannous.  In human societies under a
long regime, there are analogous changes."

"Does this not suggest that changes may be necessary in the traditional
system?  A compulsory retiring age for a Pontiff, a revision of the
rules for retirement or deposition on the grounds of incapacity?"

"These are all matters of proper concern for the whole Church.  Yes."

"But in the end, as things stand, they can be determined by one man,
the reigning Pontiff?"

"That's true."

"And in the normal course of events, what Pontiff is going to provide
for his own execution?"

Rossini threw back his head and laughed.

"You have a point!"

"The secret diaries of the late Pontiff emphasise the point.  An
accusation has been made that they were stolen by the Pope's valet and
that we, along with other media, are publishing them illegally.  You're
aware of that?"

"I'm aware of it, yes."

"Are the diaries authentic?"

"To the best of my knowledge, they are."

"Were they stolen?"

"There is strong presumption that they were."

"One of the passages in the diaries reads as follows: "There are those
in the Curia who think my advancement of Luca Rossini is a mistake.
They claim that he is secretive, arrogant, and too readily dismissive
of opinions that run contrary to his own.  I know what these critics
mean.  I have often had to reprove him for over-emphatic argument.  But
I know what he has been through.  I know how tenaciously he has fought
to maintain the integrity of his tormented spirit.  He has confessed to
me his deep and abiding affection for the woman who saved his life.  I
believe this experience has given a special value and character to his
service to the Church.  I cannot protect him from scandal, calumny or
hostile rumour.  He would consider it beneath his dignity to seek such
protection.  His reasoning is very simple.  He told me once: "Holiness,
I have been stripped naked in front of my own church, and flogged into
a bloody pulp.  I was about to be raped.  My assailant was shot just
before he penetrated me.  What can rumours do to me?"  This thought was
in my mind when I named him Cardinal.  It was my fantasy to think how
he might act if he sat on Peter's throne.  But then, I thought of
others who survived torture and were considered papMli .. . Beran,
Slipyi, Mindszenty.  All were maimed in some fashion."  Do you have any
comment on that, Eminence?"

"None."

"Are you a deeply tormented spirit?"

"Let's say I limp, like Jacob after his wrestle with the angel."

"How do you see your future?"

"Each day is new to me.  I take it as it comes."

"Do the Pontiff's remarks embarrass you?"

"I am embarrassed that his privacy has been invaded by their
publication."

"This woman, for whom you have this deep and abiding affection.  What
can you tell me about her?"

"I owe her my life.  That says it all, I think."

"According to my information, her name is Isabel Ortega, born

Menendez.  She is married to an Argentine diplomat, by whose family she
was protected during the dirty war.  She has a twenty-five-year-old
daughter."

"You're very well informed, Mademoiselle.  So, let me say now, I have
no intention of pursuing the subject with you."

"The episode is closed, then?"

"Please, Mademoiselle, don't play games with me.  We are talking not of
episodes and incidents, but of my abiding gratitude.  When I first went
to Japan on a private mission for the Holy Father, I was given some
instruction on the habits and customs in that country.  I was warned,
among other things, not to intervene in any way in a street accident,
but to leave the victim to the care of others.  If I intervened, I
risked a lifetime relationship of duty to the victim -a relationship I
could not possibly sustain."

"And the moral of that story, Eminence?"

"I could not, would not and did not lay any burden of continuing
relationship on the woman who saved my life.  Now, let's address
whatever other questions you have."

"Before we do, Eminence, please let me say something.  I cannot avoid
discussing this matter in the context of the diaries and of the
election itself.  It has in fact been raised with me by certain of your
colleagues."

"I will not ask you who these colleagues are."

"Better you don't.  I understand from my interview with Cardinal Aquino
that you had agreed to mediate a discussion between him and the Mothers
of the Plaza de Mayo."

"Hold a moment!  You say you have interviewed Cardinal Aquino?"

"Among others, yes."

"And he volunteered this information?"

"Yes."

"When did you have this interview?"

"About this time yesterday.  Why?  Is something wrong?"

"No.  Nothing's wrong.  I did have such a discussion with him.

I find it strange that he should reveal such a delicate matter in a
press interview."

"How delicate is the matter, Eminence?"

"Very."

"I ask myself, therefore, why you have consented to be advocate for
Aquino?"

"Once again, Mademoiselle, your language is loose and inaccurate.  I
have not consented to be Aquino's advocate, only to mediate a
discussion on the accusations which the women are laying against
him."

"That could be interpreted as a very effective plea for his defence or
the defence of the policies of Rome and of the local Church."

"It would be a false interpretation."

"So, how do you describe what happened in your country, Eminence?"

"Too many of our people sold their souls to the devil."

"For what, Eminence?"

"An illusion of order, stability, prosperity.  An illusion, old as
history, that you can wipe out ideas by guns and the instruments of
torture."

"Why then would you agree even to give comfort to Aquino, who, on his
own admission, gave at least some comfort to the regime?"

"Because, first, he has a right to my presumption of his innocence and,
second, I am bound as a Christian to find forgiveness in my heart for
those who have injured me."

"Have you succeeded in doing that, Eminence?"

"I work at it."  Rossini made a wry mouth.  "I have not succeeded
yet."

"Can you explain why?"

"Yes.  As the late Pontiff rightly says, I am still a flawed man,
conscious of my own capacity for evil."

"Are you afraid of that capacity?"

"Oh yes, I am.  The prevalence of evil is the darkest and most
frightening mystery of the universe."

"So, how do you see the role of the Church in the fight against
evil?"

"As a community of believers, formed in faith and hope, supported and
enriched by charity, spreading the good news of Redemption.  But the
community has to renew itself every day."

"Let's talk about the role of leadership in that renewal."

Rossini smiled and shook his head.

"That's a very big can of beans.  There's no way either of us can
digest it in a short interview."

"Let me put it another way, then.  In a few days' time, you'll be going
into conclave with a hundred or more members of the electoral college
to choose a new Pontiff.  What sort of man will you be looking for?"

"I can speak only for myself, as a single elector."

"Yet you share a common interest: the good of the people of God."

"But being human, we are divided on how that interest should be
served."

"It is claimed, is it not, that the Holy Spirit is present in the
conclave?"

"We invoke the Spirit."  Rossini's tone was cool.  "There's no
guarantee that all of us, or any of us, is open to its promptings."

"And the man you elect, will he be filled with the Spirit?"

"We pray he may, but he, too, will be subject to the daily temptations
of power which, as a great Englishman once wrote, tends always to
corrupt."

""And Satan took him up on to a high mountain,"" Steffi Guillemin
quoted the familiar text, " 'and showed him all the kingdoms of the
world and the glory thereof So, truly, Eminence, you and your
colleagues are embarked on a high-risk enterprise.  And the risk is
doubled, is it not, by the dogma of infallibility, which of late has
been given some very wide interpretations?"

"I would express it otherwise," said Luca Rossini.  "I believe that the
Church is best served when infallibility is not invoked but charily is
most abundantly dispensed."

"Let's talk about charity, then, divine love and human love."

"Two sides of the same coin."

"And the sexual act is an expression of that love."

"It should be.  It is not always.  Sometimes it is an invasion,
sometimes a debasement.  As, for example, sexual abuse by clerics or
religious teachers."

"And you, of all people, must find such abuse intolerable."

"I do and I find that its concealment by authorities within the Church
compounds the crime."

"What about the perpetrators?"

"We have to admit that some of our training systems have contributed to
their delinquency.  We cannot keep them in hidden circulation through
the pastoral or educational systems."

"Forgive them?"

"They, like all of us, must have the chance to change and seek
forgiveness."

"The ordination of women: where do you stand on that?"

"I stand where the late Pontiff ordered us to stand against the idea.
Unless and until a later wisdom changes the order, and so long as I
hold an official position in the Church, I will not speak against
it."

"Is there any possibility that either position could change: a Papal
decision, your own position within the Church?"

"In spite of rumour and pressure to the contrary, I believe the Papal
position could change.  My own position?  Like everyone else in the
Curia, I resign automatically and wait at the disposition of the new
man."

"How do you feel about partnerships between gay or lesbian couples?
Should they be given marital status?"

"I think not.  On the other hand, they should be given a civil
recognition as partnerships with mutual rights and obligations."

"And what about the physical and emotional side of their lives?"

"The Church proclaims a Christian ideal of chastity.  It cannot, and
should not, intervene in the commerce of the double bed."

"That sounds rather cynical."

"It is not meant to be.  Men and women are very complex creatures.  I
repeat, they need love more than they need legal prescription."

"And moral prescription?"

"The Church points out the road.  We are free to choose or refuse it.
If we choose the wrong road, the Church holds out its hand to help us
back to the right one.  That's what a family is for, is it not?"

"Do you have any thoughts on where you'd like to be, what you would
like to do, at this stage of your life?"

"I'm not sure I can answer that question.  The words that keep running
through my head these days are those of Goethe on his deathbed: Mehr
Licht more light."

"We're out of time, Mademoiselle," said Angel-Novalis from the
sidelines.

"We're finished."  StefH Guillemin switched off her tape recorder. She
stood up and held out her hand.  "Thank you for your time and trouble,
Eminence.  I hope I can do you justice."

"When do you expect to publish?"

"Two days before the conclave begins."

"Then you send me like Daniel into the lions' den."  He said it with a
laugh and Guillemin laughed with him.

"If I were a lion, Eminence, I'd try very hard to make friends with
you."

As he ushered her out of the room Angel-Novalis added his own
postscript:

"I warned you.  He's a hard nut to crack."

"He made me work for every damned line.  He's a formidable fellow. Just
for the hell of it, I might have a small bet on him in the election
stakes at the Press Club!"

Rossini's next appointment was more daunting: a mid-morning coffee
session with six of the most senior members of the College of Cardinals
whose collective ages totalled half a millennium.  They were all
Italian, all veterans of pastoral or curial appointments, but still
active enough and ambitious enough to lobby the electors before they
went into conclave.

They were also openly resentful.  In 1975 Pope Paul VI had excluded as
electors all Cardinals over the age of eighty.  The move was planned to
stop the growth in the Church of a gerontocracy, a government of old
men stubborn and jealous in their hold on power.  Logically, it should
have dealt with the tenure of the Papal office itself.  It made no
sense that the Pontiff alone should be elected for the term of his
natural life, throwing the Church into possible disorder if he were
crippled by age, infirmity or even dementia.  However, the radical
indecision of Paul VI's nature had caused him to draw back, leaving
this essential anomaly still to be confronted.

This deputation to Rossini was a lobby group of elders, addressing a
junior with a clear complaint and a firm request.  They were led by a
sturdy eighty-five-year-old, the Archbishop Emeritus of a major Italian
city.

"We are all brothers in the same family, but we are disfranchised by
the Apostolic Constitution of 1975.  Whatever we possess of wisdom and
experience is denied to the Church.  We need you and other colleagues
to convey our views to the voters in the conclave."

"I've never been in a conclave."  Rossini was mild and accommodating.
"So, I'm rather at a disadvantage."

"You'll learn!  Keep your eyes and ears open.  Weigh your words and
watch your back.  Things can get rough in there."

"Rough!  I'm not sure I understand."

"Sibling jealousy!"  The old man broke into a wheezing laughter. "We're
all brothers in the Lord; but when we're all locked up together, we're
like a sackful of cats, mewling and scratching.  The longer the
conclave goes on, the worse it gets."

"Tell me, then, exactly what do you expect of me?"

"A voice to express our opinions."

"An approving voice?"

"Not necessarily.  We'd be content with an honest messenger."

"Why me?"

"Oh, you're not the only one we're talking to; but you have a special
interest for us.  On the one hand, you're a foreigner.  On the other,
your origins are here in Italy.  We believe you have how shall we call
it?  - a sympathetic position, a certain neutrality."

"I'm not a neutral man," said Rossini, "and with what or with whom am I
deemed to be sympathetic?"

"With the notion of an Italian Pontiff."

"There are certain merits in the idea."

"How would you define them?"

"I would rather you defined them for me," said Rossini mildly.

"Let me try, then, my friend."  This was a new and emphatic voice.
Rossini glanced down at his list to identify an eighty-three-year-old,
former Chancellor of the Lateran University.  "We start with a
proposition, clearly stated by the Second Vatican Council that the
Church is a community always in need of reform, 'ecclesia semper
reformanda,".  The process is sometimes slow, sometimes fast, but it
does and it must continue.  For some time now, the pace of reform has
slowed almost to stasis, and this in spite of the fact that we have had
all these years a globe-trotting Pontiff with a personal mission to
unify and centralise the Church.  He has succeeded to an astonishing
degree.  Radio, television, the Internet and fast travel have brought
the world to Rome and Rome to the world in a fashion never even dreamed
before!  What we have now is a new imperial Church, united but deeply
divided, policed by Vatican Congregations, monitored by Vatican Nuncios
and delegates, doctrinally censored in secret by today's version of the
Inquisition, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith."

Rossini burst into laughter.

"I value your frankness, Eminence.  So, how do you propose to change
this imperial image?"

"I think we need an Italian Pope, and a total review by an ecumenical
council of the role and the office."

"How do you get the two things in one package?"  Rossini's puzzlement
was genuine.  "A Pontiff who is prepared to commit hara-kiri and an
ecumenical council which will forge the weapons to help him do it."

"Simple!  Muster enough votes for the right man, and he'll agree to
it."

"Why should he?  You know that no pre-election promise is binding in
law, and even simony itself does not invalidate an election.  One more
question: why does an Italian candidate offer you better prospects for
change than a non-Italian?"

"It's a question of attitude."

"Can you explain that, please?"

"Easily.  The biggest problem we've had during the recent pontificate
has been old-fashioned absolutism, the fear of 'moral relativism'.  It
was and always has been the talent of the Italians to arrive at a
workable concordance between the two notions: We make horrendous laws
about everything.  We accept that the principle of law is immutable and
its perfect practice impossible.  That's where 'tolleranzri' comes in.
That's where we differ from the Germans and the Anglo-Saxons .. ."

In principle Rossini was sympathetic to the idea.  The Italians had a
singular talent for dealing with impossible situations, and somehow
co-existing with the perennial criminalities of human nature.  Their
family life was firmly rooted in the matriarchal system, in which,
provided she could survive infidelity, male tyrannies and multiple
child-bearing, every woman must arrive at sovereignty -the respect of
the whole tribal family with whom her word was law.  It was one of the
great strategic errors of his late master, that he had alienated the
women of the world.  Faced with the ill-fated decision of his
predecessor to rule against artificial birth-control, he had mitigated
nothing of woman's burden and, in a hungry and over-populated world,
had opened the gates to more grievous problems while closing the door
to open discussion of them by Catholic theologians.

Rossini had no illusions about the complexity of the issues involved in
the primitive process of survival.  He understood also that most
individual human decisions were made in moments of crisis and often
without support or counsel.  He had learned painfully in his own life
that to preach against sin was one thing, to offer compassion and
forgiveness to the sinner was quite another.  His answer was simple and
pragmatic.

"I agree that we have to elect a Pontiff who will embrace a mission of
reconciliation.  That's the heart of the matter.  Whom do you have in
mind?"

This time the answer came from a Cardinal who had in former times
headed the Congregation for Bishops.  He was frail and white-haired,
but clearly this was his brief and he was ready to speak on it.

"We have three candidates.  Two are pastors of important Italian
cities, one is a curial prefect with long diplomatic experience."

Rossini waited in silence for the rest of it.  This was the old Roman
treatment: keep the man in suspense, dole out information like pearls.
Finally, it was delivered.

"Our first candidate is the Cardinal Archbishop of Genoa.  You know
him, I believe?"

"We've met, yes."

"No other comment?"

"For the moment, no."

"The second candidate is the Cardinal Archbishop of Milan."

"I know him also, a little better than Genoa."

"The third is your curial colleague, Aquino."

"He is well known to me."

"Would you be prepared to give your vote to any or all of these?"

"I'd be prepared to consider each one on his merits and in the changing
climate of each ballot, presuming that multiple ballots are
required."

"Is there any one you would reject out of hand?"

"You mean here and now, outside the frame of the electoral process?"

"Here and now, yes."

"I don't think it would be appropriate to pre-empt the electoral
situation."

"As you wish, of course."

"Did you have any advice to the contrary?"

"We were led to believe by our colleague, Aquino, that you were a man
with positive opinions."

"Did he give any examples of my opinions?"

"Not specifically.  In fact, it seemed to me he was paying you a
compliment.  He said "Talk to Rossini.  He gets about a lot.  He knows
how to read the wind.  If I were Pontiff, I'd make sure to keep him
very close to me.""

"That was most kind of him," said Rossini.  "Did either of the others
offer a comment?"

"Let me think now.  Genoa simply shrugged and said you were a good man
who kept his own counsel and probably would make little impact on the
conclave."

"And Milan?"

"That one's a Jesuit, of course, and a biblical scholar of high
reputation.  Both are, or could be, handicaps for a Pontiff.  How did
he describe you?  Oh yes, he said, "Rossini?  Interesting fellow.  I'd
like to think we could learn from each other."  So, there you see!  If
you helped to elect him, he'd probably become a good patron.  Two
prospects in one batch.  That isn't bad, is it?"

It was a bad joke and it fell flat.  An awkward moment followed.
Rossini sat tight-lipped and silent.  The others in the meeting studied
the backs of their hands.  Then the Angelus bells began to toll all
over the city.  Like the well-drilled soldiers they were, the old men
stood and looked to Rossini as the host to make the ritual prayer:
"Anjjelus Domini nuntiavit Mariner Their old voices responded in a
ragged chorus: " ?  con cepit de Spiritu Sttncto?  When the prayer was
ended, there was a moment's silence as each one remembered that this
day, and for more days yet, there would be no familiar white-clad
figure at the window of the Papal apartment, reciting the Angelus with
the pilgrims in the square.  The See of Peter was vacant.  Those who
stood together in Rossini's office were members of a trusteeship whose
powers were limited by the decree of a dead man.  When the Angelus
prayer was ended, Rossini seemed suddenly withdrawn.  Out of the
silence, the Archbishop Emeritus prompted him tactfully.

"It would help greatly if you could give us some immediate reaction to
the ideas we have proposed to you."

Rossini was momentarily nonplussed; but his answer was firm.

"To be frank, they puzzle me.  Your trio of candidates is interesting,
but I can't believe it's exhaustive.  Your policy if it can be so
described lacks substance and detail.  I should have expected a more
reasoned exposition of the needs of the Church."

"We presumed that you were aware of them.  We hoped you had already
some remedies in mind."

"I fear, gentlemen, that you are asking too much of me.  Let me speak
plainly.  My service as a pastor was very short.  It was given in a
primitive corner of South America.  It ended abruptly.  For the rest of
the time by the personal disposition of the late Pontiff I was trained,
if you like to express it so, to a vagrant mission.  I reported from
places as far apart as Tokyo and Tulsa.  His Holiness saw, or thought
he saw, a certain value in my reviews of local situations, in my
contacts with politicians and with leaders of other religions who would
not, or could not, have received me formally and openly.  I used to
think often that what I was seeing was the underside of a carpet and
what I was losing was the grand design on the other side.  I developed
insights, yes.  I had friends and acquaintances who could give me
backstairs access to people in power but, remember, my reports were
delivered on the basis of that fragmentary knowledge and my instinctive
reaction to unexpected circumstances.  My judgments acquired value
because of the man to whom they were delivered.  He gave me confidence.
He added his own insights to mine.  Now, I have to tell you, I am much
less confident.  I am not at all sure that my opinions have any value
for you."

"Be assured, Rossini, they do, and remember, whether our opinions are
right or wrong, we need your voice to offer them to the voters in
conclave.  We are old and only sometimes wise, but we have been
rendered dumb by decree."

Rossini made a gesture of resignation.

"So be it, then.  I promised you an honest voice in the conclave.  You
shall have it.  Now, do you all have transport?  If not, it will be my
pleasure to arrange it."

And so it was done, if not successfully, at least in traditional style.
Soundings had been taken.  Plans had been drawn in a fine Italian hand,
then magically erased as if they had never existed.  There had even
been the muffled chink of those most precious currencies of all
position, preferment, patronage none of which was truly the gift of
those offering it.  And yet, Rossini knew there were kernels of truth
among the husks of fallacy.

In the last decades of the twentieth century, the office of the Roman
Papacy had been inflated beyond any one man's capacity to fill it.  The
late Pontiff had travelled the world with the Good News in his
briefcase even though half of it was rewritten for him by local
advisers.  Modern media had given him a pervasive presence, a degree of
exposure unthinkable in olden times.  The aura which surrounded him now
was no longer of mystery but of familiarity and idiosyncrasy.  Too many
of his texts were written by other hands.  They had begun to smell of
the lamp, of stale incense and stale argument.

No man, even one filled with the Spirit, was large enough, wise enough,
durable enough to bring off the illusion of universality: a universal
pastor of a universal Church.  There was much more reason, much more
appeal perhaps, in the image of a Roman Pontiff, Bishop of his own See,
subsuming in himself, as indeed his city did, the long history of
Christendom, the fundamental unity of its sacraments and beliefs.  His
primacy would be one of millennial tradition among the churches.  He
would be the final arbiter of their disputes, the ultimate censor of
their conduct.  He would rule, not by the devious exercise of
bureaucratic power, but by collegial consent to a common Gospel and a
common apostolic tradition.

This, too, perhaps was an illusion, because power once gained was not
readily relinquished, yet the notion of authority based on service,
validated by apostolic tradition, was in the end the only authentic
one.  This was the true mustard tree of the parable, sprung from a
single root, spreading its branches so that all the birds of the air
could rest therein.  If the Good News of a universal Gospel was to be
heard above the babble of tongues and the clangour of discordant temple
bells, it must be delivered with the simplicity of morning bird-song:
"Love your enemies.  Do good, to those who do harm to you."

It was the easiest of all prescriptions to preach, the hardest to
practise.  Rossini was coming painfully to understand that this was the
core of his own problem.  Ever since he had come to Rome, he had been
building a fortress for his fragmented self.  The fortress was founded
not on firm level ground, but on a granite outcrop of anger and
resentment.  At the heart of it was a shrine where a silent God dwelt
but where a lamp burned always to a miraculous image of an absent
woman, Isabel Ortega.  It was she who mediated between him and the
silent God, whose existence he acknowledged with all formality, but
who, in his unconscious mind, was always associated with the harshest
presumption of magis tracy  "There is no power but from God and the
powers that be are ordained by God."

It was the visible lover who had kept him alive and sane.  After her,
he had lived celibate, he had refrained from acts of retribution or
revenge; yet the very punctuality of his service was an act of
exclusion against the memories of abuse.  "I don't expect you to love
me, gentlemen, but respect me you will!"" Now, Isabel was here in Rome.
He had kissed her and held her in his arms.  She had displayed to him
the fruit of their love, a girl-child grown into a woman.  He had
embraced his child and she had embraced him.  All three had found a
measure of joy in the encounter.

But the silent God had presented them with an exquisite irony.  Isabel
was under a death sentence.  It might be deferred, but it could not be
rescinded.  He himself was one of two fathers to Luisa the one who
could offer her least in terms of love, care and heritage.  The silent
God had hidden his face perhaps for ever so that the public liturgies
he offered, the duties he performed in high and public places became a
sterile mockery.  Soon, the shrine would be empty.  The foundations of
his fortress were cracking.  The walls were crumbling about him.  One
fine day, he would be standing amid ruins, staring up at an empty sky,
deprived even of the gift of tears.

And that was the final irony of the silent God: there would be no one
with whom he could share his desolation.  Isabel would be gone.  Luisa,
grieving but secure in the love of two fathers, would in the end
dispense with both of them and find her own man.

In spite of the impending ruin about him, he could not surrender
without a fight.  He would not involve Isabel or Luisa in his private
war.  If love meant anything, it meant the last steps had to be made to
support the beloved.  The last prayer had to be shared, even if , it it
had no meaning for himself, but only for the other.  After that, |.
what?  One last great horn-blast like Roland's at Roncesvalles to
challenge the mute God to make himself heard once more in the desert
silence?

Luca, Cardinal Rossini was an ironist himself.  He could still raise a
thin smile at his own conceits.  Too much talk and too much caffeine on
an empty stomach were bad medicine.  The black devils were beginning to
crowd in on him again.  He needed food and company.  He reached for the
phone and dialled the number of Monsignor Piers Hallett at the Vatican
Library.  Mercifully, the man was still at his desk.

"Piers, we need to talk.  If you're free, I'll feed you lunch at my
house.  Pick me up here in twenty minutes."

"Eminence, you've saved my life.  I'm facing a stale ham sandwich and a
page of a sixth-century Gospel text in Greek.  My problem is that it's
owned by a rather irascible prelate from middle America.  He isn't
going to be very happy when I tell him it's a poor fake and the
original text is held in Rossano in the custody of the Archbishop!"

Nine

ISABEL AND LUISA HAD SPENT THE MORNING IN AN ORGY OF shopping.  They
had wandered into every gilded trap between the Via Condotti and the
Corso and had fetched up, footsore and poorer, in Babington's Tea Rooms
at the foot of the Spanish Steps.  They found themselves a discreet
corner, kicked off their shoes under the table and ordered Earl Grey
tea with cucumber and smoked-salmon sandwiches.

"Just like a pair of Anglos," said Luisa, with a grin.

"Don't mock, young lady," Isabel admonished her lightly.  "This place
has a lot of happy memories for me.  My father and mother brought me
here when I was sixteen years old.  That was back in the late fifties
when Argentina was rich and Italy was very cheap to visit.  We came by
ship, a return trip on one of the big liners that were bringing Italian
migrants from Naples to Buenos Aires."

"And this place was here then?"

"This place has been here, if I remember rightly, since 1894.  It was
founded by a Miss Anna Babington, who was British, and Miss Isabel
Cargill, who came from New Zealand.  I remember her because her name
was the same as mine "Isabel'.  There's a lot more to the story, but I
won't bore you with it".

"No, please!  You're not boring me.  I love it when you share memories
with me.  It doesn't happen often enough these days."

"One loses the habit," said Isabel.  "I'm told one needs grandchildren
to bring it back."

The waitress came, laid out the sandwiches, poured the tea, wished them
good appetite and left.

"Please," Luisa begged her.  "Please finish the story."

"It's strange, how things arrange themselves in your mind.  Babington's
I remember as my mother's place.  The Anglo part of it appealed to her,
and the history fascinated her.  Anna Babington was descended from one
Anthony Babington who was hanged, drawn and quartered for treason
against Queen Elizabeth I of England.  Her friend, Isabel Cargill, was
descended from a Scots coven anter who preached against Charles II,
accusing him of tyranny and lechery.  He was executed in Edinburgh.
When times were bad in Argentina and Luca and I were at risk, I used to
dream about this place.  Your grandfather Menendez, on the other hand,
was never comfortable here.  He preferred the Gaffe Greco just across
the square on the Via Condotti.  All the great romantics went there:
Byron, Liszt, Wagner .. . And my father was a romantic -but he had the
heart of a lion.  When we were in hiding, after I'd shot the sergeant,
he went alone to Buenos Aires and bargained for our lives .. . He never
told me what happened, but when he died in the chopper crash, I
wondered whether it was a final pay-back from someone whom he had
threatened.  It was reported as an accident; but who knows?  We have
buried so many secrets over the past twenty-five years.  Still, here we
are, you and I, drinking tea and eating cucumber sandwiches at
Babington's on the Piazza di Spagna!"

"While your Luca and my new father is a Cardinal with a red cap, who
could even be our new Pope."

"How do you feel about him now?"

"I don't know.  You've had twenty-five years to get used to him.  I've
only had twenty-four hours.  Don't you understand how confusing that
is?  It's as though a figure has stepped out of a picture and is now
pacing about the most private room in my life.  You have to help me!
You have to explain him.  Where has Luca fitted in your life all this
time?  Where does he fit in your future?"

il

"The future?  That's easy.  I'll go home without him.  I'll die loving
him."

"My God, you can be brutal sometimes, Mother!"

"I killed a man, remember.  That's a brutal act.  I lived through
brutal times.  Forgive me!  You asked me to explain.  I'm trying.  But
this love for Luca doesn't explain itself in easy words.  I was young
then.  I adored my father, who was everything Raul was not.  He was
strong, adventurous, decisive.  He had himself seconded out of the army
because he hated what was happening in the forces.  I was still
learning that Raul was what he would always be, a spoilt boy, an
agreeable charmer, but a dead loss when you had to depend on him.  He
travelled a lot.  He played when he travelled.  When he was absent, I
used to visit my father wherever he was working.  That's how I came to
be in Luca's parish that morning.  I'd seen him a couple of times in
the village, long enough to say good-morning, to notice that he was a
good-looking young man, and to wonder why he was content to bury
himself in a no-place like that.  The day the soldiers came everything
changed."

"Please, Mother, I don't want to hear that part again.  How did Luca
behave?"

"You have to understand, nobody 'behaves' after a beating like that, he
just hung on the wheel, moaning and twitching, with the sergeant's
riding-crop stuck into his backside, while the sergeant unbuttoned his
breeches and prepared to sodomise him."

"My God!"

"Luca himself has blocked that part out completely.  In all the weeks
we were together, he never mentioned it.  The doctor said he might
suppress it till he died if his reason survived that long.  The
internal injury was not serious but the damage to his psyche was, as
the doctor put it, 'inadmissible' ..."

"So, you pitied him and fell in love with him?"

"No!  Quite the reverse.  I fell in love with the anger he still had,
the curses he could still summon up, the defiant soul of him.  I wasn't
seeing him as a victim, but as a man tormented yet unbroken in spirit.
He was my prize.  I had killed for him.  I, too, might be killed in the
end, but this man was mine."

"But you couldn't keep him?"

"No!  I healed him.  I nursed him through fevers and nightmares.  I
used every trick I had ever learned to stir his passion and restore the
ravages to his pride and his manhood.  My God, Luisa!  If ever there
were a love-child in the world, you were that child."

"So, why did you let Luca go?  Why did you stay with Raul?"

"Because that was the deal my father had to make with the Generals and
with the Church."

"And if he hadn't made it?"

"All three of us would have ended among the disappeared ones."

"How much of this does Raul know?"

"I can't say.  We have never discussed the matter."

"I can't believe that."

"It's true.  As soon as Grandfather Menendez confronted the Generals
and remember RauPs father was one of them!  they all saw the danger of
the situation.  There had been massacres and killings and
disappearances in the past.  This could be one too many.  A little
up-country priest he was a cipher!  But the daughter-in-law of a
general, wife of a well-known international playboy, daughter of a
well-known engineer in the oil business?  Enough, they said!  Get the
woman home to her husband.  Get the priest out of the country.  Let the
Apostolic Nuncio deliver him, gift-wrapped, to Rome.  But in silence!
One word out of place, and you'll never guess how bad it can get!  We
were all hostages to silence!"

"Why didn't you and Luca run away together?"

"Where could we have run?  Peru, Chile?  And don't forget there were
other hostages, too my father, Raul and his family.  There was no way
we could better the deal we had!  We both knew that."

"How did Luca react?"

"I have never seen him so enraged.  Our last love-making was wild and
desperate and wonderful but our goodbye was calm and quiet.  We stood
in the shade and watched the helicopter land.

We didn't kiss.  We didn't embrace.  We had decided there should be no
witnesses no official ones at least to our love for each other.  Two
people got out of the helicopter: a cleric and an army major.  Luca's
eyes were like dark stones.  His face looked like carved wood: I
remembered what he had said to me in the first hour of the false dawn:
"I love you.  I will always love you.  There will never be another
woman in my life."" He walked away, proud and silent between the two
men, without a backward glance.  I don't know whether he waved to me or
not when they lifted off.  I was blind with tears."

"But you still went home and made love to my father, and you had other
lovers.  How did you feel when you were with them?"

"They were the toys I played with.  They were my revenge for what Raul
was doing to me."

"But Luca, too, was part of your revenge."

"No!  He was my man."

"You said he was your prize.  Did you truly own him?"

"Not all of him."

"Do you own him now?"

"No.  Nobody owns him.  His love is a free gift from a free man."

"I'm sorry, Mother, but I'm trying to understand.  Do you think Luca
kept his promise about other women?"

"I'm sure of it."

"How can you be?  Did he feel so guilty about you that he lost all
taste for women?"

"On the contrary.  He refused to see me as a guilt in his life.  He
called me 'a saving gift', and he was right."

"But he's not saved yet, not altogether.  He's wrapped the Church
around him like a cloak of invisibility.  That hermitage of his tells
another side of the story.  He's still in flight.  He still needs a
refuge.  He won't admit it.  He's too proud to do that, but you are
still the lodestone which gives direction to his life.  What will he do
when you're not here?"

"Is that what you're afraid of, Luisa: that he will try in some fashion
to lean on you?"

"It's possible."

"It's impossible and it won't happen.  When Luca and I surrendered
ourselves to the inevitable, that chapter of our lives was closed.  The
affair was over.  Neither of us was prepared to accept a self-inflicted
torture.  Love was something else, a treasure, secret to both of us. We
didn't even begin to write to each other until your father and I moved
to New York and I was working at the Institute with an office of my
own.  I was the one who began the correspondence.  So, never think Luca
will intrude in your life!"

"But, like you, I can't ever shut him out of it."

"That's true.  So, why not welcome him?"

"And thank him for acknowledging me as his daughter?"

"That, too, if you want."

"It would make a big mess of his career if that news got out!"

"I doubt it."  Isabel signalled to the waitress to bring the check.

"How can you say that, Mother?"

"Because I think he may be on the verge of leaving the Church."

Luisa gaped at her mother in surprise.

"To do what?"

"I don't know, and I don't think he knows either."

"But why would he want to resign?  Unless they make him Pope, he's
climbed as high as any man can go in Rome."

"I don't think he sees it that way."

"How then?"

"He's come to a crisis of belief.  It may be that this is the form in
which the unresolved trauma in his life will work itself out.  The
beating, the violation, our love for each other, the conspiracy of
silence between the Church and the State in which, to save our lives,
we both consented to be joined.  It's a lot to wear, my dear daughter.
So, try not to judge either of us too unkindly.  By the way, what are
you doing with your afternoon?"

"I'll take our packages back to the hotel, then I'll write some cards
and letters.  What about you?"

"I have a meeting at two-thirty with the leader of the Mothers of the
Plaza de Mayo.  She's staying with the Missionary Sisters of Nazareth
over on Monte Oppio.  After the meeting, I'll pass by Luca's house and
spend a little time with him, provided he's home and will receive
me."

"Remember we're booked for dinner at the Embassy tonight.  They're
sending a car for us.  You should leave enough time for a rest before
we go."

"What time are we due?"

"Eight for eight-thirty oh, and since we're still in mourning for the
Pope, dress is informal."

"That's a blessing," said Isabel.  "Let's move.  We'll pay at the
desk."

"Before we go, Mother.  I know I sound like a bitch sometimes, but I do
love you and I do know it's very special to be your love-child as well
as your legal one."

"Do you know why?"

"Tell me!"

"Aunt Amelia used to say "Love-children are lucky when they're
welcomed.  They have better care and generally better manners than the
rest of the family'."

On his small roof-top terrace in the Via del Governo Vecchio, Rossini
was pouring coffee for Monsignor Piers Hallett.  He was also delivering
a short information piece on the conclave arrangements.  "... This
time, all the conclavists and their attendant staff will be lodged in
Saint Martha's House.  It isn't exactly the Grand Hotel, but it's an
all-new building with a hundred and eight suites and twenty-three
single rooms, together with dining and lounge areas.  The present
tenants will be moved out to accommodate the conclavists.  We're not
sure yet how many Cardinals will be present, but let's say anywhere
between a hundred and ten and the top limit of a hundred and twenty.
That doesn't leave too much room for attendant staff.  Each of us has
been asked to specify the personal staff we need and to justify their
presence in an accompanying memorandum to the Camerlengo.  Quite apart
from questions of space, the move is to cut down on the number of
clerical flunkeys who used to be trotting between various factions of
electors.  So, I've decided, my dear Piers, to present you as my
personal confessor."

Hallett burst out laughing.

"That's rich!  Piers Hallett, palaeographer, pedant, library mouse, now
private confessor to an eminence!  They'll never buy it!  They'll run
me out of the place by the scruff of my neck!"

"No, they won't," Rossini told him.  "I've already made it clear that I
have a personal problem and that I hope to sort it out during the
conclave, during which we are commanded to act 'having God alone always
before our eyes.  So, in fact, I do need a confessor and I'm nominating
you."

"You still have to be joking."

"No, I'm not.  You're a priest, yes?"

"Of course.  But look, friend to friend, I'm not a spiritual man.  I'm
a scholar in a dog-collar.  What counsel can I offer a man like you?"

"But you asked counsel of me, about a very spiritual matter, your own
identity, your own moral life.  I hope I can help you; I'm sure you can
help me."

"How, for God's sake?"

"By listening, by hauling me through the bramble patches into open
country.  All our talk will be under the seal.  We're free, either of
us, to grant or refuse forgiveness at the end."

"This is pure formalism."  Hallett was genuinely surprised.  "I never
expected to hear you talk like this."

"I know," said Rossini.  "But it's all I have left at this moment.  You
see, what I have to decide with your assistance, I hope is whether or
no I am still a believer, whether or no I should resign quietly and go
into the desert for a while."

"Where would you go?"

"That was Peter's question: "Lord to whom shall we go?""

"But Peter answered it for himself.  "You have the words of eternal
life.""

"Exactly; but Peter already had the answer.  I'm not sure I have any
longer."

"And I'm not sure either."  Hallett was suddenly moody.  "I'm not sure
where I fit in this pluperfect world of the moral absolutists.  Perhaps
we'll make some discoveries together while we watch the raree-show of
Peter's Successor!"

Luca Rossini was puzzled by the reference.  He asked: "What was it you
said?"

""The raree-show of Peter's Successor'.  It's a quotation from the
English poet, Robert Browning."

"But what, please, is a raree-show?"

"Oh dear!  In Italian or Spanish, I would guess the nearest word would
be carnival, although the expression in English suggests a fairground
with jugglers, sword-swallowers, bearded ladies and other freaks."

"With some comic ecclesiastics thrown in a Cardinal or two, or a
skeleton from the vaults of the Franciscans."

"Now you've got the idea," said Hallett happily.  "It's an
old-fashioned word, but it might raise some ghosts in Vatican City!"

Rossini was still chuckling over the image when his mobile rang.  He
answered brusquely; then his whole expression changed.  One moment he
was eager, the next dubious and concerned.  Finally, he said: "Very
well.  I'll see her with you.  I'll have my man drive her back
afterwards.  I need to talk with you alone for a while.  No, not at
all, I have a visitor with me, that's all."  He switched off and turned
to Hallett.

"I have people to see in about twenty minutes, so I'll have to throw
you out.  Are we agreed, then?  You will enter the conclave as my
personal confessor.  All our personal transactions henceforth are under
the confessional seal."

"We're agreed.  And thank you for the trust you're showing me."

"Come to think of it," said Rossini with a grin, "we're both putting a
lot of trust in each other.  If either, or both of us, becomes a
non-believer, none of the rules makes sense, except as tools for the
conduct of the institution."

"Which is why most of them were invented down the centuries," said
Piers Hallett.  "A well-ordered society is a splendid thing to see.
It's like a hot-house.  You can grow anything in it, but not everything
will survive the rough weather outside.  That's the real terror of the
world for me, Luca.  All us humans and so many are so bloody lonely!"

In the lounge of the Foreign Press Club, Fritz Ulrich, well primed with
a heavy lunch and two brandies, was dispensing wisdom and irony to a
group of newcomers from the Bavarian Catholic Press.

"... This is the smallest and most exclusive electoral college in the
world: a hundred and twenty male celibates appointed to choose an
absolute ruler for the largest religious constituency on the planet.
Think about that!  They, themselves, are not elected.  They are
appointed by a reigning Pontiff.  Whom, truly, do they represent?
Certainly not the vast mass of the faithful.  What are they charged to
do?  Find a universal man for a universal Church.  Impossible!  In
theory, they can elect any baptised male, and make him priest, bishop
and Pope in one ceremony.  In fact, they'll choose one of themselves:
one out of a hundred and twenty if they all turn up!  to hold the keys
of the kingdom for a billion believers and all the other benighted
souls whom they claim a mandate to convert."

"You're talking very loudly, Fritz!"  StefB Guillemin called to him
across the room.  "Some of us are trying to work."

"I apologise!  I will try to be more quiet.  Anyway, I have said my
piece.  These good people will make up their own minds."

"Thank you, Fritz."

Now that they were both under pressure to report a millennial event,
now that they were involved in pooling and syndication deals, their
relations were less abrasive.  Ulrich dismissed his audience,

heaved himself out of his chair and crossed to her table.  She frowned
and waved him away.

"Not now, please, Fritz.  I'm working."

"A few moments only, Steffi.  Home office has sent me a query."

"On what?"

"Your Aquino interview.  You know we bought the German language rights
to all those portrait pieces of yours."

"So, what's their problem?"

"You discuss the accusations brought against him by the Mothers of the
Plaza de Mayo.  My people ask do you have any notes on another aspect
of the situation: the involvement of former German nationals in the
dirty war, suspected war criminals and the like?"

"No, I don't, Fritz.  That's old ground.  I didn't want to walk over it
again.  Why do they need that sort of stuff anyway?"

"They're trying to build a background piece on candidates who may have
black marks against them for political or other reasons.  Italians who
have lived in the pockets of the Christian Democrats, South Americans
who turned too far left or too far right, that sort of thing.  I told
them I'd send some brief notes; but I didn't want to waste time on it.
It's filler material pure speculation."

"Well, tell them I'm sorry I can't help.  Now, if you don't mind ..."

"Just one more thing, then I'll leave you in peace.  What do you know
about the Janissaries?"

"The who?"

"Janissaries!"  He was happy to have surprised her, happy to be
launched on a new monologue.  "Shock troops of the old Ottoman Empire,
founded in the fourteenth century, they garrisoned all the Balkan
outposts of the Ottoman Turks."

Steffi Guillemin stared at him blankly.

"And what the hell have they got to do with a Papal election?  Are you
sure you're sober, Fritz?"

"No, I'm not sure.  I need another drink.  One more would prove it one
way or the other.  You wouldn't like to join me, would you?"

"No way!  And you shouldn't have one either.  Now, what's this garbage
about Janissaries?"

"Analogy."  He stumbled over the word, then took a run at it.
"Important historical analogy.  They recruited captive Christian
boy-children.  They enslaved them to Turkish families where they
learned the language and embraced Islam.  After that, they were
enlisted in the army as an elite corps.  They trained in special
barracks; they were celibate; they were debarred from trade or
commerce; their obedience was absolute.  Their badges of honour were
the old slave-names: pot-cleaner, wood-cutter, cook.  But they were a
feared and formidable force.  Now, my dear Steffi, do you see where my
little analogy is leading me?  All the prelates who are assembling in
this city now are like the Janissaries shock troops of a religious
empire."

"It's an interesting thought, Fritz.  But what are you going to make of
it?"

"A panel piece perhaps.  Would your people be interested in picking it
up?"

"I doubt it, but I'm willing to try for you when it's done.  The
problem we've all got is an overdose of information and not enough
educated readers to deal with it.  Now, get the hell out of my hair.
I've got a deadline to meet."

"I'm going!  I'm going!"  He scrambled awkwardly to his feet before
delivering his exit line.  "The Janissaries did well so long as they
had a regular supply of slave boys.  But once the fighting stopped, the
breeding had to begin; so they tossed celibacy out the window.  There's
a lesson in that, StefH - a lesson for the Church.  A lesson for you,
too, come to think of it."

"Thank God I'm not a breeder, Fritz, otherwise I could be stuck with a
child like you!"

As Ulrich wandered away laughing, Frank Colson came to the table.
Before he opened his mouth, Guillemin appealed to him:

"Why do I always fall for it?  I'm an intelligent woman, yet every time
he talks to me I fly off my perch like a demented parrot."

"Fall for what, Steffi?"

"Fritz Ulrich's bad jokes!  He's such a tasteless oaf."

"He knows you too well.  You always rise to the same lure.  Now, I have
a little news for your ears only."

"Good news, bad news, what?"

"The London tabloids are floating a story about the morals of the
senior clergy old stuff most of it: one Austrian Cardinal, a couple of
stalwarts in the Curia.  They're just trawling muddy waters; but one of
the names that came up was Luca Rossini's.  You interviewed him the
other day.  You called him the mystery man."

"I know.  I'm revising the story now and I still don't like the phrase.
I'd like to find a better one before I file.  Anyway, what are the
London tabloids saying?"

"They're sailing very close to the wind.  They're talking about a
mysterious crime with which Rossini was connected in Argentina, a
horrendous beating, a statement that he had been sodomised, a secret
arrangement to smuggle him out of the country and they're making smoke
signals about a love affair and the birth of a child after he had left
the country."

"My God!  They're taking a hell of a risk!"

"Of what, a lawsuit?  He can't sue except by permission of the Pontiff
whom we don't have at the moment.  And besides, what would it matter?
So far as election chances are concerned, Rossini will be dead in the
water."

"So, who loaded the cannon and fired the shot?"

"Good question, Steffi!  What's your answer?"

"There are two.  First, the Argentinians have had this information for
a long time.  The one thing they'd never want to see is one of the
victims of their dirty war enthroned in the Vatican, scars and all. The
second guess, which I don't like half as much, is someone inside the
Vatican who has access to the records and the motive to leak them
against Rossini."

"Cleric or layman?"

"Cleric.  It would have to be."

"Motive?"

"Jealousy or malice, either or both."

"So now I need your advice.  My office has asked me to advise whether
we should investigate the story or drop it cold and let someone else do
the autopsy."

Steffi Guillemin considered the question in silence for a few moments
before she answered.

"First of all, Frank, there's nothing there except the sodomy and the
illegitimate child which wasn't implicit in the Pontiff's diaries.  The
love affair is mentioned, if not described.  The child?  A birth
certificate would settle that question out of hand."

"You're right, of course.  I hate rummaging in dirty linen.  I guess
I'm looking for a good excuse to cry off."

"You know, Frank, that whatever advice one gives in a case like this,
is bound to be wrong.  You turn down a dirty story, it turns into
tomorrow's headlines.  You chase it and you're giving aid and comfort
to the bastards who floated it in the first place.  I'm keyed in to
both Aquino and to Rossini, and it wouldn't be too hard to prise some
comment out of the Argentinians.  But, as a friend, I'd say, don't
touch it.  You've got an easy out anyway.  You're bureau chief.  You
advise that any attempt to play up such a story on the eve of an
election could be construed as an attempt by an Anglo-Saxon Protestant
country to interfere in an election."

"That wouldn't wash, Steffi."

"So, invoke your conscience.  Tell him you refuse to be party to
scurrilous rumour-mongering at this crucial time."

"The plea might just appeal to him.  He has a taste for well-rounded
phrases.  I owe you a drink.  Ciao!"

Which left Steffi Guillemin face to face with her own dilemma: how much
treachery to a colleague would be involved if she took another look at
her story before she filed it, and perhaps only perhaps floated some
smoke of her own.  It took her at least two minutes to make her
decision.  She telephoned Rossini's office and asked that her call be
transferred to him wherever he might be.

Yes, the matter was quite urgent.  She needed to check a key passage in
her interview text before she filed it for publication.  There was a
longish wait before the answer was relayed to her.  His Eminence had a
very busy afternoon, but he would make time to see her at his apartment
at five-thirty in the evening.  He hoped she would not be offended if
she were kept waiting a short time.  Of course not.  Please convey
Mademoiselle Guillemin's thanks to His Eminence!

The woman whom Isabel presented to him that afternoon was more than
seventy years old.  Her name was Rosalia Lodano.  She was the leader of
the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, sojourning in Rome.

Her hair was snow-white, her skin like old ivory, seamed and scored by
time and bitter experience.  There was a strange sibyl line calm about
her, a formidable gravity beyond the reach of fear or malice.  Her eyes
were dark, hooded and implacable.  With Isabel at her side, she sat,
bolt upright, her clothing loose about her thin figure, her hands lying
flat and immobile on a thick folder of documents.  Her first utterance
was a surprise: a curt, imperious statement.

"I know your history, Eminence.  I know Senora Ortega.  I am prepared
to trust you."

"You understand I make no promises; but those I do make, I keep."

"You know why my friends and I are in Rome?"  "I believe so; but I want
you to tell me, simply and clearly."  "In 1976, I lost a son and a
daughter.  My daughter was arrested, questioned, tortured, raped and
finally killed.  My son was arrested.  We know he was taken to ESMA,
the School of Mechanical Engineering.  After that, no trace.  There are
thousands like him, the disappeared ones.  We know they are dead.  We
do not know where or how they died.  There is a torture in not knowing,
a torture that never ends!  We need to know and once we know,

perhaps we can bring the killers to justice.  But knowing is the first
step.  You understand?"

"I do."

"Understand something more.  At home, the regime has changed, yes.
However, our President has blocked all roads to the justice we seek. He
has granted amnesty to the senior officers who were responsible for the
years of terror.  He will not authorise the taking of testimonies and
depositions against them or other offenders in Argentina.  Vital
records have been sent out of the country we believe to Spain.  As
Senora Ortega has told you, we hope to lay hands on some of them in
Switzerland."

"But you have come to Rome.  Why?"

"We want to bring this whole dirty business to the International Court
in the Hague.  As individuals, we cannot do that.  The petition must be
made by a country through its legal government.  Our own country
refuses to act.  So, we address ourselves to Italy.  You and I,
Eminence, are of Italian origin, but we are not citizens.  Again, we
have no voice.  However, hundreds of the disappeared ones were Italian
citizens, holders of Italian passports, legally resident in Argentina.
They have no voice, because they do not exist any more.  So, we turn to
an Italian who knows what happened, the Pope's man, the Apostolic
Nuncio, Archbishop Aquino."

"But you discover you can't touch him either, because he is a citizen
of Vatican City State?"

"Precisely!  We beg him to abdicate that position so we may lay charges
against him in an Italian court, and there expose witnesses and
testimonies which may force the Italian government to bring the matter
to the International Court.  The Archbishop he is now a Cardinal
declines.  He claims we have no evidence.  He says he should not be
asked to convict himself.  Besides, he needs the consent of the Holy
Father to present himself in a civil court.  Now the Holy Father is
dead and whatever hopes we had, died with him.  I mean no disrespect.
You have received me in your house, but I have to say I have no faith
in the Church any more.  In Argentina, too many of the hierarchy made a
pact of silence with evil men.  It seems we shall have to wait to argue
the matter with God!"

"If you are looking for justice, Senora," said Luca Rossini "that's the
only place you'll find it.  I should be a liar if I told you
differently.  Listening to you, I myself feel guilty.  I suffered, as
you know.  Senora Ortega took a mortal risk to save me; but in the end
we owed our lives to that same conspiracy of silence.  A bargain was
made.  If we broke the bargain, others would suffer."

"But why are you still silent, now that things have changed?  Are you
still afraid?"

"I can answer only for myself," said Rossini.  "I have nothing to
fear."

"I have something to fear," said Isabel.  "I have a husband, a
daughter.  I cannot play dice with their lives."

"I understand," said the old woman.  "I know very well what fear means.
So, my brave Eminence, what do you think you can do for us?"

"Let's talk a little more, Senora.  We get one chance at this, we
cannot afford any mistakes.  I want to hear your whole case against
Aquino and remember it's against him, not against the local Church."

"I have the documents here ..."

For more than forty minutes they sat huddled together at the desk,
while Rosalia Lodano displayed the contents of her dossier and Rossini
questioned her closely on their authenticity and their provenance.
Finally, he broke off the conversation.

"I have seen enough.  I'll have Juan bring you tea or coffee.  I need
to be private for a few minutes."

He rang for the servant, ordered refreshments for the women, then
retired to his bedroom, where he made a telephone call to Aquino.  He
began abruptly.

"This is Rossini.  I am at my house.  With me is a woman from
Argentina, Rosalia Lodano, with whom you have been in correspondence. I
have just gone through the documents in her dossier against you."

"This is outrageous!  You have no right to intrude in this fashion."

"Be quiet, please.  Just listen.  I did not intrude, you asked for my
help.  Today, this woman came to me with the same request.  A couple of
days ago, you gave a rather mischievous interview to a journalist from
Le Monde in which you revealed our private conversations about the
Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo."

"I would hardly call it a revelation.  I thought it a good opportunity
to prepare the ground for any discussions we might have with the women
create an atmosphere of goodwill.  I saw nothing objectionable in
that."

"I found it gravely objectionable.  You represented me as your advocate
and defender."

"I did not."

"The lady said otherwise."

"Come now, Rossini!  Be fair!  You know how exposed one is to
misinterpretations, especially in a relaxed interview."

"And you know it, too!  You're an experienced diplomat.  You've been
weighing words all your life.  You weighed these, too, before you spoke
them."

"That's ridiculous utterly paranoid!"

"Is it?  Let me put it in context for you.  I consent, privately, to
mediate a discussion not arbitrate, not adjudicate, just mediate.  The
Guillemin woman is very intelligent, an accurate reporter.  You give
her a version of our agreement that immediately and irrevocably
compromises me and absolves you.  The victim himself is pleading the
innocence of the accused.  That does everything you need.  You don't
have to answer any accusation.  You walk into the conclave a clean-skin
candidate for an interim papacy.  And that's another thing please don't
recommend me to anyone."

"What are you talking about?"

"Another meeting, with a deputation of our colleagues.  You were
quoted: "Rossini gets about a lot.  He knows how to read the wind.  If
I were Pontiff, I'd make sure to keep him near me.""

"It was a compliment."

"It was conveyed to me as an inducement."

"And you were appropriately insulted!"

"Yes, I was."

"Then I suggest you cool off before we finish our business together."

"We can finish it this afternoon, if you wish.  Rosalia Lodano is still
here.  Mademoiselle Guillemin will be here at five-thirty.  I have all
the dossier material I need to take an intelligent role in the
discussion."

"To what end?"

"To give you the chance to state your case openly to the press -to a
woman with whom you were obviously comfortable.  To give the Mothers of
the Plaza de Mayo a chance to be heard in an open forum.  To give me a
chance to do what you asked in the first place, mediate a position of
minimal risk for you and for the Church."

"And if I decline?"

"Then I shall take the meeting and do the best I can."

"I can't decide immediately on this.  I need time ..."

"You have none."  He quoted ironically: ""Now is the acceptable time.
Now is the day of salvation.""

"Can you at least limit the scope of..  ."

"I believe I can limit the damage and still leave you some vestige of
reputation.  Tell me now, Eminence, yes or no?"

"Have you told the Secretary of State about this?"

"I remind you that it was he who arranged our first meeting at your
request.  I quote him verbatim: "You may even find some ground of
compassion which would encourage him to confront his accusers.  You may
perhaps break through to the real man behind the enamel.""

There was a longish silence on the line.  Then Aquino asked:

"How will you arrange this?"

"Rosalia Lodano is here.  You should speak with her first.  Then we
should all meet Mademoiselle Guillemin."

"Who else will be there?"

"Senora Ortega.  It was she who put me in touch with Rosalia Lodano."

"What is her standing in all this?"

"Rather like mine, a friend of the court.  Well, what do you say?"

"I'll be there as soon as I can."

"I think that's a wise decision," said Luca Rossini.  "Very wise."

When he went back to report the conversation to the two women, he found
Rosalia Lodano quite hostile.

"The more I think of this, the less I like it, a private talk in a
private room.  Afterwards, everyone has a different version.  This is
what happens always, here and at home: soft words, careful phrases, a
promise to study the matter further then nothing."

"We shall record the talks," said Rossini calmly.  "You shall have the
original tape.  Much more important, however, is what you will get out
of the meeting."

"We have to get him into court!"

"No, Senora!"  Rossini was curt.  "You will never do it.  I have seen
your documents.  You will bleed yourselves of money and of life, but
you do not have a case to bring to court."

"How can you say that?"

"Because it's a fact, clear from your own files.  In any legal sense,
Aquino is not a criminal; on what I have read in your dossier, you will
never get an indictment against him either in Italy or the Hague."

"So why am I wasting time here?"

"Because this afternoon you have the chance to bring the story once
again to world attention, implant it more deeply in world memory, so
that the shadow of guilt hangs always over the perpetrators.  As for
Aquino, his previous silence may yet be a powerful witness in your
cause.  If you can get him to admit to moral guilts, then you will have
won a great victory."

"Can you guarantee he will admit anything?"

"I believe he can be brought to it, yes.  His consent to this
afternoon's meeting puts him halfway along the road."

"And the rest of the journey?"

"I believe I can coax him further."

The two women stared at him in astonishment.  Isabel uttered a
warning.

"You've arranged the meeting, Luca.  Already that's a great deal.  Is
it wise for you to conduct the discussion?"

"I'm not sure.  That is, in any case, a choice for Senora Lodano.  The
fact is that I can use words and arguments which she would find too
bitter in her mouth.  I can judge the impact of those words on Aquino.
In their own context they may prove more potent than any reproaches
pronounced upon him in the name of the absent ones.  However, I am
equally prepared to be mute and let her conduct her own dialogue."

The old woman sat in silence for a few moments, then she said
abruptly:

"Why do you think you can plead our case better than we can?"

"I cannot plead it better.  I may deliver you a quicker result and
perhaps a better one than you will otherwise get."

"Convince me of that, Eminence.  Convince me that we should trust you
so far!"

Ten

THERE WAS A SUDDEN WINTER CHILL IN THE AIR WHEN Aquino entered the
room.  Rossini introduced the two women.  Aquino acknowledged them with
a bow but fearing a rebuff did not offer his hand.  Rossini seated him
on the opposite side of his desk while he took his own chair and laid
the folder of documents before him.  The women sat together, a pace
away from the desk.  A third chair was set beside them for Steffi
Guillemin, who was due to arrive within the hour.

Rossini was carefully formal.  He announced:

"I propose that we record our conversation so that there can be no
doubt about what is said here.  If either party wishes to speak off the
record, then I shall simply stop the machine.  Are we all agreed?"

They nodded assent.  Rossini switched on the machine and dictated the
time, date, location and names of those attending the meeting.  Then he
began:

"This conference is being held in the hope of settling certain problems
outstanding between the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo and His Eminence
Cardinal Aquino, formerly Apostolic Nuncio to Argentina.  Let me make
it clear that some days ago Cardinal Aquino had asked me to mediate
such a discussion.  The Secretary of State approved the idea.  Senora
Lodano, leader of a delegation of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo,
presently in Rome, had been trying to arrange a meeting for some time.
Nevertheless, all the discussions are without prejudice to the position
of either party, and they have no formal character.  My role is that of
mediator only.  I am not called upon to make judgments, only to
facilitate discussions.  My role does not exclude a certain advocacy
for either party, if such advocacy helps to bring about a solution.
Unfortunately, some solutions are beyond our reach.  We cannot bring
back the dead.  We cannot for this moment at least say where or how the
disappeared ones met their ends.  Justice for them, redress for their
sorrowing relatives are beyond our reach.

"Let me also say that it is not possible to render full justice to
Cardinal Aquino, who, as a diplomatic representative of the Vatican,
served in Argentina during a terrible period of its history.  Documents
which he sent directly to His late Holiness are now held in the Secret
Archive.  Others, held by the Secretariat of State, cannot be released
until a new Pontiff is elected.  Conflicting claims are made about the
actions of His Eminence in the context of the period.  It is not my
function to adjudicate those claims, but simply to elicit those facts
upon which both parties can agree at this time.  Eminence, are you
prepared to state that during your service as Apostolic Nuncio in
Argentina, there was a large-scale campaign of terror by the State
against certain classes of its citizens, and that this campaign
resulted in the arrest, torture and death of many thousands, and the
total disappearance of many others whose fate is still unknown?"

"Yes.  I do not have an exact number for the victims but I can state
that the numbers were in the thousands.  The government itself admits
to ten, I believe."

"Now, let us see if we can arrive at an accurate, if not all-embracing,
description of your functions as Apostolic Nuncio.  Please be as clear
as you can.  This is very important for Senora Lodano and the
colleagues whom she represents here."

"The function is a double one.  A Nuncio is a legate of the Holy See, a
permanent diplomatic agent of the Pope, who is Sovereign of Vatican
City State.  He carries the rank of Ambassador.  His second duty,
separate from the first, is to watch over the welfare of the Church in
the country of his mission."

"And what is his rank in the local Church?"

"He outranks all local clergy except a Cardinal Archbishop.  He is
responsible only to the Holy See."

"Can he direct the local clergy?"

"At the request of the Holy See, yes."

"But he does render regular advice to Rome on the state of the local
Church and, even if he doesn't use them, he has wide powers of
intervention."

"Yes, but he is expected to use those powers with prudence and
discretion."

Rossini turned to the two women.

"Any questions so far?"

"Only one," said Rosalia Lodano.  "It seems we have a watchdog with two
heads.  Which one was supposed to bark when our people were being
arrested, tortured and killed?"

"Would you care to respond to that, Eminence?"  asked Rossini.

"I admit that neither one made enough noise."  Aquino was surprisingly
subdued.  "An Ambassador can only work within certain protocols.
Normally, his exchanges with governments his own government and that to
which he is accredited are made in secret.  Much of his influence
depends upon the tactful handling of difficult situations."

"One understands that."  Rosalia Lodano was ominously cool.  "One asks
how tactful one must be about a young woman, a student, picked off the
street, imprisoned, tortured, raped, and then murdered.  That's what
happened to my daughter.  My son?  We don't know what happened to him
after his arrest.  How do you come to terms with that?"

"I heard many such stories during my term as Nuncio.  It was not
possible to determine whether they were fact or rumour."

"But you were very close to the Generals.  No one was in a better
position to ask for facts."

"I'm not sure what you mean, Senora."

"I think this is what she's talking about."  Rossini leafed through the
dossier and brought out three glossy photographs of a much-younger
Aquino dressed in tennis clothes, with a group of officers similarly
dressed.  Aquino glanced at them and waved them away.

"That, in hindsight, was an indiscretion.  On the other hand, I was a
diplomat.  One does not conduct diplomacy from an office chair.  One
tries to make friends, cultivate people.  I did that, I was able on
several important occasions to make deals for the release of prisoners
who might otherwise have disappeared."

"We have a record of at least one such deal."  Rossini leafed through
the file again.  "You were offered what was it forty detainees, who had
just been sent to Buenos Aires from other areas.  The local commander
did not want to handle them.  You were told that if you could arrange
to get them out of the country, they would be spared some very
unpleasant experiences, ending in death or disappearance.  You did
that.  You managed to persuade the Venezuelan government to receive
them.  These documents confirm it."

"Yes, I did.  It wasn't enough, but it was something."

"You did something special for me, too.  You gave me safe conduct out
of the country after my own experience."

"Again, it was a question of doing what one could in difficult
times."

"But there is an anomaly here, is there not?"

"What kind of anomaly?"

"Before and after these events, in public interviews with the press,
you denied any knowledge of what was being done under the system of
State terror."

"When one is walking a tight-rope, one slips sometimes.  It was, I
confess, a diplomatic lie."

"But the question arises, does it not: you knew and you were silent?"

"I explained to you, as a diplomat, I had to work in silence."

"Did it never occur to you, Eminence?"  Rosalia Lodano was implacable.
"Did you never ask yourself what might have happened if you had shouted
the truth just once to the world?"

"I asked myself that question many times."

"Did you seek advice from your supervisors in Rome?"

"I did.  The answer was always the same.  I was the man on the spot.
They had to rely on my judgment, and the judgment of the local
Church."

"Again," Rosalia Lodano challenged him harshly.  "Again, two dogs'
heads but neither barks!"

"No, Senora!"  Rossini rounded on her swiftly.  "Not true.  There were
many others who barked and shouted and fought, too.  There were many
good pastors killed.  There were nuns and monks among the disappeared
ones."

"But their leaders were silent!  They are still silent now.  They play
with words, trying to construct documents that will say yes and no at
the same time."

"Again, Senora, not all."  He leafed again through the dossier and came
up with a passage which he read slowly.  ""We, the members of the
Church of Argentina, have many reasons to confess our sins and to beg
forgiveness for our insensibilities, our cowardice, our omissions, our
complicities .. ."" He broke off and turned to Aquino.  "You know the
man who wrote this, Eminence?"

"I do.  He was he is a good bishop but that is his testimony and the
testimony of the clergy of his diocese.  His statement was not welcomed
by all the clergy.  They still do not welcome it."

"Why not?"

Aquino did not answer immediately.  He sat, hands clasped, head bowed,
staring at the desk, searching for words.  Then he pieced out the
answer with painful deliberation.

"It's the oldest and saddest story in the world.  Too little and too
late.  Evil bloats itself on silence.  Good people are seduced by
comfort into indifference.  Men of God flatter themselves that they are
empowered by the Church behind them.  They go out to sup with the
devil, confident that they will convert him in the end.  They are
always shocked when they see blood in the soup.  A few of them very
few, thank God seem to develop a taste for it."  He turned to Rosalia
Lodano and said with sombre pathos: "That's the best I can do for you,
I'm afraid.  We could go on for hours.  The rest would be more of the
same.  I wish I could bring back your lost ones, Senora.  I can only
beg your forgiveness."

Rossini switched off the recorder and the room was filled with silence.
Then, on a rising note of anger, Rosalia Lodano attacked again.

"This still stinks of conspiracy!  Both of you wear the same uniform,
say the same bland words.  You are both protected by the same
institution.  Has either of you ever borne a child; nurtured that child
in love, and then had it brutalised and killed.  Have you?"

"Enough!"  Isabel's voice sounded like the crack of a bullet.  "Now,
Senora, you will be silent and listen to me."

She reached for her handbag, opened it and took out a small
leather-bound folder the size of a passport.  She opened it and thrust
it at Rosalia Lodano.

"Look at that and tell me what you see."

The woman stared at it for a few moments, then asked:

"Why do you show me this?"

"You talked about conspiracy, protection, bland words.  Do these images
spell conspiracy to you?  Please pass it to his Eminence."

Aquino held up his hand to decline.

"Thank you.  I've already seen it.  I have my own copies."

Rossini asked:

"May I see it, please?"

Rosalia Lodano handed him the folder.  He opened it and found himself
staring at a series of plastic-covered photographs of himself, naked,
spreadeagled on the wheel like a flayed animal with the sergeant's
riding-crop dangling like a tail from his backside.  The sergeant was
shown in each shot, in a different position, now opening his breeches,
now displaying his penis, and finally lying on the ground with his head
exploded like a melon.

Rossini turned to Isabel.  He was pale as death.  His voice seemed to
curdle in his gullet.

"Why have I never seen these?"

"Because my father took them with him to Buenos Aires.  They were his
bargaining card with the Generals and with his Eminence here."

"But I spoke with him before I left the country.  I asked him why he
had let the beating go on so long.  He didn't say he was taking
pictures!  Why didn't he show them to me then?"

"Because he thought you weren't ready.  The doctor agreed with him.  So
did I. This was something you had blocked out completely.  We thought
you might have been unconscious when it happened."

"So, tell me the rest of it, for God's sake."

"He took the pictures as fast as he could, but carefully too.  Then he
tossed the camera on to the bed, handed me the rifle and told me: cAs
soon as you see me hit the square, kill the son-of-a-bitch and take a
picture of him dead."  That's what I did.  I killed him and took the
last shot.  You know the rest."

"I look like an animal."  Rossini was still staring at the photographs.
"They skinned me like a beast in a slaughter yard and raped me with a
riding whip."

He tossed the folder on the desk and fled the room.  The next moment,
they heard him retching his heart out in the toilet.  Isabel was on her
feet instantly; but the old woman held her wrist in an iron grip.

"No!  Better he deals with his own devils!"  She turned to Aquino.
"Even with those pictures in your hands, you did not speak out?"

"There were lives at stake.  That was the deal I had to make."

"That was the blood in the soup," said the old woman.  "How does it
taste now?"

"Be quiet, grandmother!"  There was vast weariness in Isabel's voice.
"There's no profit in anger any more.  Better you ask his Eminence to
say Mass to quiet the dead and give some peace to the living!"

Fifteen minutes later, Rossini emerged from his bedroom.  He had taken
off his clerical garb and put on a clean white shirt.  He was pale but
composed.  He walked straight to Isabel, laid his hands on her
shoulders and said plainly for all to hear:

"Thank you, my love, for the photographs.  They were the missing piece
of myself I did not dare to look for, did not want to find."

He touched his lips to her hair.  Aquino averted his eyes from the
intimate gesture and began toying with the paper-knife.  The old
woman's face was unreadable.  Isabel reached up to touch Rossini's
fingers with her own.  Then, he withdrew from her and sat down at his
desk again, turning to Aquino first and then to Rosalia Lodano.  He
said:

"Mademoiselle Guillemin will be here shortly.  I should like to spare
both of you any more interrogation.  I propose, therefore, that we let
her hear the tape and then address any questions to me.  You need
intervene only if you feel my answers are inadequate."

"I understand what you are doing," said Aquino, "and I thank you for
your consideration, but you may be opening yourself to a great deal of
criticism from our colleagues once this interview is published."

"After the deluge, what does one do?  Wait for the dove with an olive
twig in its beak?  How do you feel, Senora Lodano?"

"I'm an old woman with bitterness in my mouth.  I'm sorry for some of
the things I said not all, but some.  If this woman wants more
information, then I will give it to her directly, but not here.  We
have all had enough emotion for one day."

A few moments later, Steffi Guillemin was announced.  She was clearly
surprised by the group which confronted her.  Her comment was addressed
to Rossini.

"Two Eminences and two distinguished ladies.  That's quite a catch for
a journalist like me."

"And you will be appropriately grateful."  Rossini said it with a
smile, but she was instantly wary.

"And how am I expected to show my gratitude?"

"In our previous interview, I accepted to play by your ground rules
everything on the record.  Today, you are in my house.  I am giving you
an exclusive release on an important story.  Certain other subjects may
arise which will be off the record.  You have a high reputation as an
honest journalist.  If you can't accept that condition, then we should
go no further.  Do you agree?"

"I have no choice, do I?"

"You do have a choice.  You can give me your word and then find some
plausible excuse to break it.  Or you can give me your promise and keep
it."

She made him wait a few seconds for the answer.

"You have my promise."

"Thank you.  Please sit down.  I'm going to play you a tape made this
afternoon in this room.  You may copy it on your own machine.  Cardinal
Aquino will decline to make any further comment.  Senora Lodano is
prepared, if you wish it, to make another appointment with you for
further discussion."

"And you, Eminence?"

"I'm reserving my position until I hear the questions.  Shall we
begin?"

The playback held them all speechless.  It was only when it was
finished that they realised how far Aquino had committed himself, and
how adroitly Rossini had led him into the confession.  Even Rosalia
Lodano offered a reluctant compliment.

"I see now what you meant.  If this is published, it may well save us
money and grief."

"It will be published," said Guillemin.  "We will originate and
syndicate the material.  We need a document of authority and a
quit-claim."

"If everyone else is agreed, you can prepare them and send them to me
for execution," said Rossini.

The others made no objection.  Guillemin pressed on:

"Now, Eminence, may we dispose of the questions which brought me here
in the first place.  They relate to the interview which I had with you,
and to the material I have just heard."

"What are the questions?"

"The tabloid press in England is floating material which is still
vague, but which may balloon into something more substantive.  It
refers to a violent crime connected with your escape from Argentina, a
sexual assault on your person, a love affair and an illegitimate child
born after you left Argentina."

"We are now off the record," said Rossini.

"As we agreed," said Guillemin.

"I advise most strongly against any disclosures on this subject."
Aquino, at one stride, had put himself centre-stage.  "They are not
opportune.  No matter what Mademoiselle Guillemin promises, rumours
multiply.  You can never control them all."

"The deal stands," said Luca Rossini.  "Are we off the record,
Mademoiselle?"

"We are."

Rossini picked up the folder of photographs and handed it to Guillemin.
She, too, paled at the sight of the pictures.  She closed the folder
and handed it back.  Rossini said flatly:

"The man on the wheel is me.  The photographs were taken by Senora
Ortega's father before he ran down into the square to rescue me."

"Who shot the sergeant?"

"I did," said Isabel.  "My father took control of the troops, ordered
them back to the barracks and sent us both into hiding while he
negotiated amnesty for me and safe conduct for Luca."

"And you became lovers?"

"For those weeks only," said Rossini.  "Now, we have only love."

"But you, Senora Ortega, have a daughter, yes?"

"I do.  She was born in Doctors' Hospital, New York City.  She was
baptised Luisa Amelia Isabel Ortega in the Church of Saint Vincent
Ferrer in New York."

Guillemin turned to Aquino.

"I have some questions for you, Eminence."

"We are still off the record, I trust?"

"We are.  First question.  How much did you know about Luca Rossini
before you brought him to Rome?"

"Everything.  I, too, was given copies of the photographs.  I gave them
to the Holy Father when I presented my report."

"And you also told him of the association between Luca Rossini, an
ordained priest, and Isabel Ortega, a married woman?"

"I did."

"Yet, in spite of that, the Holy Father took him into his confidence
and promoted him steadily over the years.  Can you explain that?"

"It would be a presumption to try.  In such matters, the Holy Father
acted on his own absolute discretion.  May I ask why you are pursuing
this line of questioning with me?"

"Because two days before the conclave, we shall be publishing my
interview with Cardinal Rossini and the final section of the Papal
diaries.  There is a significant reference in the diaries which only
now makes sense to me.  The Pontiff writes: "I have never learned the
tenderness or the terror of love.  Rossini paid a high price for that
knowledge.  In the end, I think he is more fortunate than I.""

She turned to Isabel and offered an unexpected tribute of admiration.

"When I was a girl in convent school, I always admired the valiant
women of the Bible: Ruth, Esther, Judith.  I think you've earned your
place among them."

Isabel acknowledged the compliment with a smile and a shrug.

"You flatter me, Mademoiselle.  Killing is very easy.  The real art is
to stay alive."  To Luca Rossini she said: "I should be leaving now.
Luisa and I have a dinner engagement.  Will you call me in the
morning?"

"Of course.  Juan will drive you to the hotel and take Senora Lodano on
to Monte Oppio.

"She could come with me."  Steffi Guillemin never missed a move.  "We
could talk on the way."

"Thank you.  There is much more to say than we have covered here.
None-the-less, I am grateful to Cardinal Rossini for what he has done,
and for the good offices of Senora Ortega.  Neither do I forget that it
has cost Cardinal Aquino some pains to be here today."

At this moment, Rossini thought it prudent to intervene.

"Does your Eminence have transport?  If not, Juan can take you with
Senora Ortega."

"My own driver will come for me when I telephone; but I'd like to have
a private word with you before I leave."

Which was how, after the three women had left, Rossini found himself
entertaining his former adversary over a decanter of brandy.  Aquino
made the first toast:

"Salud!  You gave me a rough ride!  But you're a bigger man than I ever
believed, Luca Rossini."

"I'm glad, for both our sakes, it's over."

"It will never be over," said Aquino sombrely.  "But now, at least it's
in the open.  I'll still be looking at the same man in the mirror, but
I won't have to keep the door closed."

"You said you needed to talk with me," Rossini reminded him.  "I don't
want to seem inhospitable but I think I'm suffering from some kind of
delayed shock.  The sight of those photographs was like a punch in the
belly."

"I don't understand why she brought them to Rome in the first place."

"Unfinished business," said Rossini simply.  "We haven't seen each
other for a quarter of a century."

"I could see you were shocked.  I thought you recovered very
quickly."

"I knew what she was trying to do.  When we met for the first time, I
was like a shattered vase.  Shards of me were scattered everywhere."
Rossini seemed to be musing aloud.  "Day by day, piece by piece, she
put me together again.  When we parted and I came to Rome, there were
pieces still missing.  You were with me.  You remember how I was."

"I remember very well."

"Those photographs were the missing pieces.  I couldn't admit the
horror of the violation.  Isabel knew I would finally have to face
it."

"And you can now?"

"Yes, I feel I am whole; but please don't shake me too much before the
glue sets."

"I have to confess something to you."

"What?"

"When I brought you out of Buenos Aires and back to Rome, I made a
report to the Holy Father.  I told him that I thought you were a very
fragile case and that there were elements of scandal in your situation.
Before I went back to Argentina, he summoned me again.  He told me he
had thought much about the young man I had brought to him.  He gave me
a discourse about Saint Paul's letter to Timothy: "In a great house
there are vessels of gold and silver, some also of wood and earth."  I
didn't know quite where he was leading me until he said, "Our son,
Luca, he's a damaged vessel, but he will one day be a vessel of honour,
for the master's use."  It has taken me a long time to see what he
meant."  He broke off and then put a question to Rossini.

"Do you have any plans for this evening?  Would you consider dining
with me?  The rector of the Angelicum is entertaining a few of us
electors to dinner.  I'm sure he would be delighted to welcome you.
You're much talked about, but little known.  In a few days, we're all
going to be locked into Saint Martha's House.  It wouldn't hurt to
condition yourself a little.  I'll drop you home afterwards."

There was a refusal on the tip of his tongue, but he did not utter it.
The prospect of a solitary evening was too daunting.  He hesitated only
for a second and then said:

"It's a kind thought.  I'd like to come."

"Good!  Let me call the rector and alert my driver.  Then, we can make
ourselves comfortable for a while .. . This is an excellent brandy. And
later, if I can borrow a razor, I'll make myself presentable for our
colleagues."

The dinner-party was good for him.  It wrenched him out of his
isolation and forced him to assume the collegial function implicit in
his office.  It did more, it required him to match himself with a
tightly-knit group of Italian prelates, most of them graduates of the
institution which was entertaining them.

It was not only language and scholastic tradition which bound them
together.  Italians were now a beleaguered minority in the electoral
college.  They held only 17 per cent of the votes.  Certain key
positions in the Curia had been taken over by non-Italians, so that
they now depended for their power upon a curious little oligarchy of
highly political men, who were called the Grand Electors and sometimes
the night-fishermen.

Their nets were cast wide even in the least promising waters.  They
trawled patiently in intricate patterns, ignoring the minnows in the
surface stream, waiting for the big fish who must, sooner or later,
swim into their traps.

In the old days, not so long past, a candidate needed two-thirds plus
one of the votes to be elected Pope.  Basically, that meant that even a
popular candidate could fail if one-third of the voters refused him.
However, since 1996, a further provision had been in force.  If more
than thirty normal ballots had failed, then a simple majority would
suffice for election.  This meant that, if the balloting went on long
enough, a candidate could scrape by with a bare majority of one.  This
was not a matter of debate at the rector's dinner.  It was, like so
much else in Rome, taken as read, filed for reference until the moment
came to invoke it.  However, it did provide a sub-text for Aquino's
invitation.  In terms of nationality, Luca Rossini was an outlander, a
cultural hybrid.  In terms of the coming event, he was a collegial
voter and a long-odds candidate for office.  To the Grand Electors he
was a disposable but potentially useful piece in the chess-game which
would begin in a few days.

So, they courted him with small respects and flattering curiosities
about his missions.  They also tested him with subtle allusions to
matters with which a new Pontiff must deal: a married clergy, how it
might be addressed, how would it be received in this country or that,
how, in any case, could it be financed; the powers of the dicas-teries,
should they be limited or increased; a third Vatican Council, should it
complete the work of Vatican II or should it not be held at all?

They did not expect a text-book answer every time; they judged him by
his skill in fielding the questions, by the good humour which he
displayed when he saw the snares they had laid for him.  They wanted to
know how he would react in a crisis: could he be bullied, seduced or
blackmailed into conformity with a powerful group like the Grand
Electors.  There was one question to which a peculiar emphasis seemed
to attach itself.  It was framed like a conundrum.  "You travel much,
Luca, how do you see the Church: as one or many?  What shall we become
in the new millennium?"

Rossini, rendered less wary than usual by fatigue and fraternity and
the rector's Frascati, rose to the bait.

"Of all the men in this room, I am the least equipped to answer that
question ... I have travelled widely enough to know the diversity of
the world.  I have lived long enough in Rome to understand both the
truth and the fallacy of the claim that where Peter is, there is the
Church.  I think that's one of the historic notions which we accept
without examination.  There is a much older statement made by Jesus
Himself: "Where two or three are gathered together in my name there am
I in the midst of them."  In that sense, many churches one in faith,
yes.  It depends, does it not, on whose sign is over the lintel of the
door?  "By this shall men know that you are my disciples if you have
love one for another."  But what am I saying?  You didn't invite me
here to debate Petrine primacy."  He raised his glass in a toast: "To
the brotherhood we share, to the future we hope to shape together!"

They drank.  They gave him a good round of applause.  Some of them
laughed over his choice of the word fratellanza for brotherhood,
because that was a word coloured by many associations, good and bad.
However, after all, Rossini was an exotic and was not expected to
understand all the nuances of the mother tongue.

As they were driving home to Rossini's apartment, Aquino told him:

"You made quite an impression there tonight, Luca.  They gave you more
than the usual roasting but you came up smiling like Saint Laurence on
his gridiron.  That last little homily went down well, also, because it
was the last thing they were expecting."

"I hope I passed the test."

"Oh, you did, with high marks!  It will all help."

"Help what?"

The driver was just drawing up at Rossini's house when Aquino
answered:

"I fear you may be in for another roasting in Guillemin's article.
She's not going to forgive you too easily for keeping the best part of
the story off the record.  Not that she won't give you a fair run, but
she'll plant a few pics in your hide!"

"She could come straight over the horns for a kill."  Rossini was
bone-weary.  "I wouldn't feel a thing.  Thank you for the dinner and
the company."

"I wish you golden dreams," said Aquino.  "Goodnight."

At five in the morning, he was wakened from a dead sleep by the
shrilling of his telephone.  He groped in the darkness to find the
light-switch and the receiver.  Luisa was on the line.  She was
obviously in distress.

"I know it's an ungodly hour, Luca, but Mother's sick.  I wanted to
call the hotel doctor.  She refused to have him.  She told me to wait
until morning and call you.  She said you'd be able to recommend a good
doctor."

"How is she now?"

"The vomiting has stopped.  She still has a high fever.  She's drifting
in and out of sleep."

"Has this happened before?"

"Yes, but the intervals are getting shorter.  In spite of medication,
this was the worst attack I've seen."

"Where are you calling from?"

"I'm in the salon of her suite."

"She told me she carried a copy of her medical records."

"They're in her briefcase."

"I'll be with you as soon as I can.  Meantime, I'll get a doctor and
have him meet me at the hotel."

"I'm worried.  Whatever happened yesterday left her very stressed.  She
held up well during the dinner; but by the time we got back to the
hotel, she was in a state of collapse."

"But the medication helped?"

"Yes.  It always does.  One more thing, Luca.  I really don't want her
to go to Switzerland.  I know it's in a good cause, but she does not
have too much energy to spend.  Could you talk to her?"

"I will.  Now, order up some breakfast for yourself and some tea for
your mother.  I have to get busy.  I'll be with you as soon as I
can."

He rang off and then went into his study to find the private number of
Doctor Angelo Mottola, physician to the late Pontiff.  The good doctor
was less than happy to be wakened, but he also had a healthy respect
for this odd, peremptory alien who seemed to command spirits in high
places, as well as his own private demons.

He listened attentively as Rossini sketched what Isabel had told him of
her illness, then he said:

"I will examine her, of course.  It helps that she has her medical
records.  I'm not a specialist in oncology, as you know.  I can, of
course, bring in a specialist; but even without seeing her, I would
recommend an immediate return to New York, where they have much better
facilities than we do.  If she remained here, I would have to recommend
treatment in Milan rather than in Rome.  Does she have next of kin
here?"

"An adult daughter; the husband is in New York, but within easy
contact."

"Then shall we say eight this morning at the hotel?"

"Thank you, doctor.  I'm very grateful."

Eleven

DDCTOR ANGELO MOT TOLA HAD COME AND GONE.  HE HAD read the medical
reports.  He had examined the patient carefully.  His advice, which had
cost two hundred dollars, was simple.  "There is nothing I can do for
you, dear lady, beyond what your own physician has prescribed.  Your
condition will continue to deteriorate.  The remissions will be
shorter.  You should go home immediately and put yourself under proper
clinical care with your own doctor."

To which, as Luisa put it, there was only one sensible answer: pay the
man and get the hell back to New York.  Isabel protested.  Luisa
refused to listen.

"I've already made the arrangements, Mother!"

"What arrangements?"

"I've called Senora Lodano and told her you can't go to Switzerland.
She regrets that you are ill.  She thanks you for your help yesterday.
She tells you to go with God back to New York.  I've rearranged our
travel.  We leave tomorrow midday on a Delta flight to Kennedy.  The
concierge has done the ticketing.  I'll do your packing.  I've called
Father.  He'll pick us up at JFK."

Isabel was furious.

"I swore I'd never let this happen.  I refuse to surrender control of
my own life.  You understand what I'm saying, Luca!  Tell her!"

Rossini laid a soothing hand on her wrist.  She jerked away from his
touch.  He reasoned with her quietly.

"My love, your own body is telling you that it's time to surrender. You
know that.  Doctor Mottola explained to me and to Luisa that even if
you did stay on, you'd have to go to Milan for treatment, and it would
be no way comparable to the treatment you would get in New York. Please
believe me!"

"I was counting on doing so much with Luisa.  I'd made so many
plans."

"Mother, I'll settle for having you safe and cared for at home."

Isabel beat on the coverlet with clenched fists.

"You can't settle for anything!  This is my life!  Let me spend it the
way I want!"

"Please listen, my love."  Rossini was persuasive but firm.  "Do you
remember what you used to say when you were nursing me at the
estancicti "Save your angers.  Live on the strength others will lend
you.  Fight from friendly territory."  To stay here will only deplete
your strength.  Even among the kindest people, the traveller is always
a stranger.  If I could be with you, it might be easier, but I have
nothing to offer you.  I'm in bondage.  Even if I break the bonds which
I well may what am I?  A man in his fifties with no prospects.  What
can I offer you?"

Isabel closed her eyes and lay back exhausted on the pillow.  Luisa
drew the covers about her, kissed her and moved towards the door of the
bedroom.  Rossini followed, closing the door behind him.  Luisa said:

"That was the saddest thing I have ever heard, Luca."

"I had to say it."

"I know.  Can you stay a while longer?"

"Of course.  I'll talk to my office from here.  You should try to get
some sleep.  Hang out the "Do not disturb' sign."

"Promise you'll wake me before you leave the hotel.  We have to talk,
too.  This is our last chance."

"I promise.  Go!"

When she had left, Rossini called his office, the only urgent message
was from the Secretary of State.  When he phoned in, the

Secretary asked:

"Where are you now?"

"At the Grand Hotel.  Senora Ortega was taken ill last night.  I called
Doctor Mottola to see her.  He recommends her immediate return to the
United States.  She leaves with her daughter in the morning."

"I'm sorry to hear that.  When do you expect to be free?"

"About noon."

"Let's have coffee and a sandwich in my office at one o'clock.  There
are things we need to discuss.  Aquino called me this morning.  He told
me about your meeting yesterday with Senora Lodano.  Apparently it came
off well."

"Better than I expected; but, as always, there's a price-tag."

"Ah yes, the presence of the press!  A pity you didn't let me know in
advance.  I should have counselled against that."

"Then you would still have had the war on your hands, Turi.  This way
at least you have a truce and you can always blame me for any
backlash."

"In the circumstances, I wonder why you didn't ask Angel-Novalis to
monitor the meeting."

"Because their documents and ours, Turi cast certain shadows on the
conduct of Opus Dci.  Angel-Novalis is a good man.  I preferred not to
embarrass him or ourselves."

"You were probably right.  I'm told also you made a guest appearance at
the Angelicum last night."

"News travels fast in this town!"

"And there's a lot of it floating around just now.  We have a note from
our Nuncio in Brazil.  Claudio Stagni has surfaced in Rio.  He's living
in a rented apartment in a certain style.  He's accompanied everywhere
by a bodyguard."

"That does argue a certain style."  Rossini laughed.  "I wonder who
guards the bodyguard.  I'm told there are some very rough players in
Rio.  Is there anything else, Turi?"

"The rest can wait until we meet.  I'm sorry to hear about Senora
Ortega, but I'm sure it's wise that she get home as soon as possible.
Rome is fast becoming un liveable  Until later then."

When Rossini went back into the bedroom, he found Isabel awake and out
of bed.  She had put on a robe, brushed her hair, and smelt of lemon
flowers.  She kissed him but winced when he touched her.  He withdrew
instantly.  She explained.

"I'm better now; but my joints ache and my skin is very sensitive.  I'm
sorry I behaved so badly.  Where's Luisa?"

"Resting in her room.  She wants to talk to me before I leave."

"I'm sorry, Luca!"  She led him out to the salon.  "This was meant to
be a happy time.  Now look at us!  We're smothering you with
trouble."

"Please, my love.  My problem is that I'm working with one hand tied
behind my back.  I'm on call at all hours I have no practice in family
life."

Then, without warning, she cracked.  The words came out in a tumbling
rush.

"I'm scared, Luca!  I can't face going home!  All those hours in an
aircraft, all that waiting in line for passport check, all that
jostling for luggage.  My body hurts most of the time now, somewhere or
other.  The pain is not intolerable but it never leaves me.  When we
get home, Raul will be there.  He'll be charming and solicitous.  The
house will be full of flowers.  The staff will be careful of me."  She
gave a small shaky laugh.  "I tell you, my love, the Ortegas run a very
classy hotel!  But that's what it is, a hotel in which we all have
separate rooms.  Mine will have to be turned into a clinic until they
ship me out for terminal care.  And yet, come right down to it, what do
I have to complain of?  Nothing really!  Ever since I was young, I
grabbed the tree of life and shook it and gorged myself on the fruits
that fell into my hands.  Now, very soon, it will be time to go ...
What was the little Latin verse you taught me, "Satis something'..  .
?"

"Satis bibisti, satis ludisti tempus est abire."

"That's it!  The drinking's over, the playing's over, it's time to
leave.  That frightens me most of all, Luca.  Leave for what?  And who
will be waiting for me on the other side of the river?"

And there it lay, clear and unblinking as the eye of Horus, a question
from the loved one in terror of the final parting.  He would not lie to
her, yet he could not cheat her of the consolation of the Word, of
which he, Luca, Cardinal Rossini, was still a professing and accredited
servant.  She reached for his hands and held them as he talked softly
and persuasively.

"Nobody knows what happens after death, my love.  We have only symbols
and parables to express our desires, our hopes and our beliefs.  It is
not only the unknown which frightens us, but the loss of the known the
things to which we cling, as though they were given to us in perpetuity
instead of as temporary support.  When we are born, strange but loving
hands receive us into a strange new world.  When we die, we believe,
though we do not know, that we shall be received with love, into
another world altogether.  When he was dying, our Lord cried out in
agony and despair, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me!"  When he
died, it was with relief, commending himself into the hands of his
Father!"

"I'm not Jesus Christ."  There was a weary mockery in her voice.  "More
like Mary Magdalene."

"To whom many sins were forgiven, because she had loved much."

"Will you hear my confession, please, Luca?"

The request surprised him more than the declaration of her fears.  It
put him to a more stringent test.  From the winter of doubt in which he
dwelt, he was thrust back into the formalism of which Piers Hallett had
accused him.  Yet, once again, he could not refuse her.

"If you're sure that's what you want, yes.  But you should not tax
yourself with a long recitation.  Say simply what you think you have
done wrong.  Express your sorrow, your desire to change.  Then I'll
give you absolution."

Isabel frowned and shook her head.

"I know you want to make everything easy for me, Luca, but I have no
intention of reciting a list for you: how many lusts, how many rages,
how many lies.  I want to tell you the real truths: what I am to
myself, what I have been to Raul and Luisa yes, even to you who are
dearer to me than anything in the world.  Will you listen, please?  I
don't want ever to go through this again.  I couldn't ..."

"You won't have to."  Again, the ritual intonation coloured his own
voice.  "Each absolution is a new beginning."  He disengaged his hands
from her grasp, reached for the pectoral cross under his jacket and
held it up to her view like a rood-screen between their past and their
present relationship.  "Tell me what's troubling you."

This time, there was no panic rush of words, but a slow piecemeal
recitation, as if the tale tasted bitter on her tongue.

"As long as I can remember, I have always wanted to be a winner.
Whatever I did, I had to be the best and the cleverest.  If I couldn't
be that, then I lost interest in the game.  No, that's not quite true.
If I couldn't win today, I would wait until tomorrow or the next day,
until the moment when everyone else thought I had lost interest.  Then,
I would step up to the mark again and carry off the prize.  Looking
back, I realise that, like the old brigands and gangsters, I travelled
always armed and dangerous.  It wasn't malice, I think.  I had nothing
to be malicious about.  It was the jungle thrill kill or be killed.
That's why my father and I were so close.  He was a daring man.  When
he tossed me the rifle that day and told me to kill the sergeant, he
put his life and the lives of all the villagers in my hands; but he
knew I could do it!  That's not a boast.  It's part of the truth.  I've
said a lot of bad things about Raul and all of them are true.  The one
thing I haven't said, which is also true, is that he wouldn't play the
game I was playing, so I could never beat him.  Because I couldn't beat
him, I could never forgive him.  The terrible thing was that there were
moments, months even, when I knew that with a little generosity on my
part, we could have come closer together.  Even when I discovered that
I was very ill, I was too proud to plead for a truce, too angry to give
one more inch of ground.  You asked me the other day, did he know about
you and me.  He knew about the killing.  For the rest, he seemed ready
to accept that you were a broken man for whom I had been caring.  He
said simply, "That was the least you could do for a poor devil like
that.  Let's talk no more of it!"  And we never did, which was another
bitter pill to swallow.  You were important to me; but you were not
important to him.  I was furious when he sauntered off, like a duel
list refusing to engage an opponent whom he thought unworthy."

"If you were so desperate for revenge," said Luca Rossini "I wonder why
you didn't tell him about Luisa?  You said you always travelled armed
and dangerous, why did you surrender that weapon?"

"I knew that if I used it, I could lose both her and you.  I couldn't
face that."

Rossini made no comment.  He was still the minister conducting a
ritual.  The rest of him had retreated into a camouflage.  He asked:

"You are telling me, are you not, that you refused any reconciliation
with your husband?"

"Yes."

"How can you, therefore, ask to be reconciled with God?"

"That's why I need your help."

"Are you sorry for what you have done?"

"I am sincerely sorry."

"Do you remember the Act of Contrition."

"It's a long time since I said it."

"Say it now, please."

She recited the words as formally as he had prompted them.  "O my God,
I am sorry with all my heart for the of fences I have committed ..."
When the brief prayer was over, Rossini admonished her again.

"You must try now to mend, if you can, the damage you have done.  You
are required to do penance."

"I don't have too much time to do either."

"One act will suffice for both.  When you go home, tell your husband
what you have found the words to tell me."

"And beg him to forgive me?"

"Why not put it another way?  Can we at least forgive each other
-please?"

"That's the hardest part, isn't it?  One word: please.  Can you explain
me to Luisa?"

"No.  You must do that, too.  My guess is that she already understands
most of it."

"I'll try.  Now, please will you tell me I'm forgiven."

He raised his hand, made the sign of the cross and pronounced the words
of absolution.  "I absolve you for your sins, in the name of the Father
and the Son and the Holy Spirit.  Amen."

Isabel stood up.  Her face was drawn and pale.  Her eyes were moist
with unshed tears, but her voice was steady.

"Thank you; but haven't you forgotten something?"

"I don't think so."

"Shouldn't you say, "Go in peace."  We both know this is goodbye."

"There are no goodbyes," said Luca Rossini softly.  "Love is the only
thing we carry with us across the river.  We've done this before.
Remember what you said to me: "Let's do it in style, Luca.  Heads high,
no tears and no looking back.""

"Hold me gently when you kiss me, my love.  I hurt all over."

He found Luisa sitting at the desk in her bedroom writing postcards.
There were suitcases open on the bed.  He had to clear a space so that
he could perch himself on a corner of the mattress.  Luisa shifted her
chair so that she could face him; but she made no move to come closer.
She asked: "How's Mother?"

"She's calm now.  She's ready to go home.  She just needed some help
and reassurance."

"Thank you for giving it to her."

"She needs help from you, too.  She wants desperately to be reconciled
with Haul before she dies."

"Reconciled?"  Luisa seemed shocked.  "What exactly does she expect?"

"She wants to say she's sorry.  Her problem will be to find the moment
and the words."

"That's my problem, too, Luca.  I can't find the words I need to say to
you."

"Perhaps I can help."  This was not ritual any more.  There was no
formula to recite.  He continued with a grin.  "You don't know how to
cope with me.  I'm the pebble in your shoe that hurts when you walk. Am
I right?"

"Yes."

"And you love Raul, who is more of a father to you than I can ever be,
and soon there will be grief in the house when your mother goes.  So,
there's no time now to build anything between you and me."

"All of that, yes!  But it seems such a waste.  I like you, Luca.  I
think I could begin to love you.  I suppose I should read some history
and find out how Renaissance prelates got along with their sons and
daughters."

Rossini laughed.  "They enriched their sons and made important
marriages for their daughters.  It doesn't work like that any more.
Times have changed."

"But I don't have any time.  There's not enough me!  And you're owned
by that, that great big sprawling monster of a Church."

"It commands my services."  There was an edge to his reply.  "It
doesn't own me."

"I'm sorry.  I didn't mean that."

"I know what you mean.  I'm like the centurion in the Gospel.  They say
to me, "Come," and I come, "Go," and I go.  But tiiere's something
else, more important.  You have your own life to make.  If you want to
be a good artist, you'll need to travel, meet the old masters and the
new ones.  You'll need to travel light.  A Cardinal for a father is too
much baggage to carry but here or some other place, you may find him
useful."

"Please, Luca!  I don't want you to write me out of your life
altogether."

"How could I possibly do that?  You are my daughter.  I am written into
you for ever.  When you have children, I'll be written into them, too.
There'll always be a genetic inscription that reads "Luca Rossini his
mark!"  Quite awesome when you come to think of it!  Now, may I kiss my
daughter goodbye?"

"You've had a rough morning, Luca."  It was an observation, not a
question, from the Secretary of State.

"You might call it that, Turi.  I had hoped Isabel and I would have
some time together after the conclave; but we shan't have it.  We've
said our goodbyes.  I have a favour to ask you."

"Ask it, please."

"I know we're held incommunicado during the conclave.  I know also that
there's an open channel of communication from the Sacred Penitentiary
and the Vicar-General of Saint Peter's.  I'd like to be able to receive
news of Isabel.  Her daughter has agreed to keep me informed.  Can you
arrange a reliable intermediary to pass messages.  Doctor Mottola
warned me that the final collapse could occur quite soon.  I'd like to
give Luisa the contact details before she leaves in the morning."

"Leave it with me, Luca.  I'll make arrangements and call you this
evening."

"You're a good friend, Turi."

"Is this likely to be a painful exit for her?"

"It can be even with the best of palliative care.  We're back to the
old questions, aren't we?  When does palliation become positive
intervention, and does the Almighty demand death by crucifixion?"

"We all have a lot of questions to face during the conclave, Luca.
That's why I've asked you here."  Swiftly, as he had acknowledged the
subject, he was off it again.  "Coffee or tea?  And I've finally taught
them in the kitchen to make English sandwiches.  They're very good."

"I'll take tea, Turi.  But you won't play parlour games with me, will
you?  I'm not in the mood."

The Secretary of State moved briskly to the text of his agenda.

"You've already begun to see the electoral factions defining
themselves, Luca.  They'll shift, of course, during the conclave, and
they may shift quite dramatically, because no one is accountable,
except to God or his own self-interest, for any change of allegiance
during the voting processes."

"I've noted it."  Luca gave him a crooked grin.  " Our friend Aquino is
a master of the art of solicitation.  He reminds me of the pick-pockets
in Sri Lanka the ones they call 'finger dancers' because they surround
you and distract you by dancing their fingers all around your body
without ever touching you.  You never know where they're coming from
until your wallet's gone and they're away with it."

"That's our good diplomatic training!"  The Secretary of State laughed.
"At least you know the game .. . But to be serious, this election can
be in my view has to be a new beginning for the Church.  Our late
Pontiff God rest him!  has tried to pack the College and the episcopate
with men who, he thought, would continue his own policies like faithful
disciples.  If they vote that way, they'll go for an interim candidate
one with a low life-expectancy but enough experience to hold the boat
steady on course.  Personally, I don't think we can afford that time.
We are losing congregations too fast.  There are too many closed
issues, too many un debated questions.  Rome is losing relevance,
because the people are not being heard.  I was invited last night to a
small dinner at the English college.  The speaker was an elderly
Benedictine.  His text was a quotation from the English Puritan poet,
Milton: "The hungry sheep look up and are not fed."  His treatment of
the text was surprisingly frank.  "They are being fed," he said, 'but
we are feeding them paper instead of the bread of life!""

"So," said Rossini, quizzically, "you bring me here to feed me tea and
English sandwiches.  Come to the point, Turi."

"The point is this: we won't get the right candidate from wrangling and
dissension among partisan groups.  The dissension can arise, as it has
done in the past.  Even though the present system is designed to
prevent a prolonged conclave, a point may come where a simple majority
of voters will decide the election.  That's the danger: a divided
College, a divided Church, run by a compromise candidate.  Am I making
myself clear, Luca?"

"Admirably, my friend, and the tea and sandwiches are excellent; but
tell me what you expect of me."

"Please!  Be patient, Luca!  It's customary, as you know, at the
beginning of the conclave, to offer the electors an overview of the
whole Church: "Here we stand, who is the best man to lead us?"  By
custom, the Secretary of State delivers a statement on the political
situation as it affects the Church in every country.  Then, there is
the key-note speech, a meditation on the Church as the City of God,
witness of the Word to the World.  That is supposed to set the mood of
the electors, remind them of their duty to find the best Pontiff to
lead the People of God.  The Camerlengo offered a choice of speakers to
a committee of the Sacred College.  The committee has chosen you."

"This is a joke, Turi!"

"On the contrary, it's a heavy responsibility: to set the mood of a
historic moment, to open the minds of the electors to the promptings of
the Spirit."

"Turi, my friend, you know I hate to be manipulated.  You know I've had
more than one dose of it in the last few days.  So, please, not
another!"

"Calm down, Luca!  I'll tell you what our friend Baldassare told me.
Your request to have Monsignor Hallett attend you as a personal
confessor during the conclave was not kindly received.  Certain members
of the Curia felt it smacked of privilege.  Space in Saint Martha's
House is at a premium.  There are already confessors rostered for duty
in the conclave.  However, Baldassare thought he could stretch a point
if you were willing to preach.  You know the way it goes, Luca."  The
Secretary of State was savouring his own dry humour.  "In the eyes of
God, we're all equal but some have to work harder to stay equal!"

"You're blackmailing me, Turi."

"It's called a nice balancing of interests.  That's what diplomacy is
all about."

"I have nothing to offer, Turi."  Rossini was seized with sudden
passion.  "I'm the wrong man at the wrong time.  I'm flawed.  You know
that.  I'm going through a crisis of belief, which I can only describe
as a night journey under a storm cloud in a world from which God has
removed himself.  The woman I have loved all these years is being taken
from me, and I can't even blame God for it, because he isn't there.
This morning, she asked me to hear her confession and give her
absolution.  I could not refuse; yet I went through the motions like a
stage magician, knowing that the illusion would hold good for the
audience, but that I couldn't deceive myself.  That's why I want
Hallett with me.  He's got problems of his own with which I am trying
to help him, but he's also a sceptic with whom I can talk without
dissimulation, and perhaps just perhaps, Turi find myself in daylight
again.  And there's one more thing.  I have bled for this Church.  It
has nurtured me and promoted me far beyond my personal worth.  I do not
wish to divide it by anything I might say or do.  There is much, very
much that I disapprove in its politics and procedures.  If I cannot in
conscience accept to live in the house, I shall leave quietly after the
conclave.  In all the flurry of a new pontificate, no one will be
interested in the early retirement of Luca Rossini.  But this sermon
you want me to make is another matter altogether.  I cannot talk
platitudes.  I will not.  I am prepared to be silent; but if you call
me to speak, you must accept the risk of what I say, just as I must
accept the risk of saying it."

There was a long silence during which the Secretary of State poured
himself another cup of coffee, sugared it, stirred it slowly and then
with elaborate care inspected the meat in the last sandwich before he
bit into it.  Rossini watched and waited.  He was tempted to offer
applause for Pascarelli's familiar but beautifully timed performance.
One of the junior wits in the Secretariat had nicknamed him Fabius
Cunctator - Fabius the Delayer because of his talent for avoiding
awkward confrontations.  Finally, he finished his sandwich, took a sip
of coffee, dabbed at his lips and delivered judgment.

"Let us distinguish here, Luca.  I am not your confessor.  I do not
wish to enter the forum of your private conscience.  I pray for you in
my Mass, that you may be given the light you need.  For the rest, you
are attached to the Secretariat.  I am your legitimate senior in
office.  I could, if I chose, direct you to this service.  I seek
rather to persuade you that your speech may not be as divisive as you
fear.  If it raises contention, so much the better.  A Papal election
is no time for nuances and carefully edited proclamations.  Your
personal credit with your peers is much higher than you think.  You
were in the confidence of the late Pontiff, and you never betrayed it.
On the contrary, you fought for colleagues whom you deemed to have
suffered injustice, and for causes which were considered unpopular.
Your personal character is another matter.  There is a large black mark
against you: your adultery with Senora Ortega.  Your stoutest defender
was the late Holy Father.  But, it makes no matter who is for you or
against you.  You speak always with your own voice, Luca, out of an
understanding heart."

"I speak out of a darkness of desolation, Turi.  My heart is breaking,
yet I cannot even weep.  What do you expect me to say to my brothers in
the conclave?"

"Just that, perhaps," said the Secretary of State.  "Just that: I am
Luca, your brother.  Let me talk to you about the news we are charged
to deliver."  He made a small dismissive gesture and ended with a wry
smile.  "You do not need me or anyone else to write your sermon, Luca.
It will be enough that you speak from the heart."

Luca Rossini was not so easily moved.

"You're a very persuasive fellow, Turi.  Imagine what you could do with
a rack and thumbscrews!  But please, think a little further down the
road.  I make this eloquent appeal.  Then, one fine day, while you are
all basking in the light of a new Apostolic age, I am not there.  I
have found myself a retreat and become whatever I have become.  Then
you, my dear Turi, are stuck with a whole line of new scandal about the
hypocrite preacher, the traitor at the supper of the brethren.  You're
offering me a poisoned cup.  Why are you urging it on me so
strongly?"

"Because what you call poison, Luca, may well be the physic that cures
the sickness from which you are suffering so acutely.  When you stand
to speak, you will confront your brethren from all over the world.  You
will read yourself in their faces.  You will reason with yourself, as
you are reasoning with them."

"Turi, you still don't understand!  This is not a crisis of reason!  If
it were, I could argue Gottfried Gruber and his whole team of assessors
and inquisitors into the ground, and myself into instant serenity. This
is something else.  I am imprisoned in darkness, the darkness of an
empty house.  One day, Turi, His Holiness asked me did I never regret
my exile from my homeland.  I told him, no, I carried the coals from my
hearth-fire with me.  I had only to blow on them and they would blaze
again.  He knew I was telling him only half the truth.  He smiled and
asked me what would happen when finally the coals burned down to ashes.
 I couldn't answer him.  I can now.  The house gets very, very cold."

"So, you have to build a new fire.  You pray for the spark that will
set it blazing again .. . But I have to know now, will you address the
conclave?"

Now it was Rossini's turn to play the delaying game.  There was more to
this situation than the presentation of a homily to open the hearts and
minds of a hundred or more electors, all of whom were high men, settled
in their opinions, each jealous of his own principality.  He knew that
he was being palmed off to them as a prophet of a new age, who could be
as easily dismissed with contempt as welcomed with respect.  Either
way, one faction or another of the electors would be served; or all
could be served at once by uniting in a single condemnation of an
upstart.  So, he asked an apparently flippant question.

"When we call on the Holy Spirit to inspire us in conclave, does he
endow us automatically with the gift of tongues?"

"Regrettably, he doesn't, Luca.  And a lot of our prelates have lost
their skill in Latinity.  Whatever language you use, you'll lose some
of the conclave.  It's rather like an opera.  They'll share the melody
and struggle with the words."

"So, what's the point of the exercise?"

"The point is that we'll provide a polyglot text.  That's one of the
things we do well here, as you know.  That way, they get the music and
the words.  You have six days, Luca, and I need three of those for our
translating and printing."

"Which gives me three days to prepare my text?"

"Two and a half.  I need a morning to read and discuss your draft with
you."

It was then that the full light of revelation dawned.  Already, the
puppeteer was pulling the strings that moved the marionettes.  Rossini
leaned back in his chair and laughed.

"Turi, you are quite shameless.  There will be no drafts, no
discussions.  There will be no interpolations, no nuances, no marginal
comments.  I've agreed to speak.  This may be the last testimony I
offer in the assembly of our brethren, I insist that it be my own
utterance.  If they accept it, good!  If they reject it, then put it
through the shredder.  Simple.  Either way, no one outside the conclave
will ever know.  We're all under the oath of secrecy, are we not?"

"We are, of course," said the Secretary of State, "which makes one
wonder how so many columns of information leak out of the conclave.  I
concede the point.  You give your own sermon."

"And I get Piers Hallett, and my link with New York."

"Now, I think you're blackmailing me, Luca!"

"On the contrary, I think we've just arrived at a nice balance of
interests."

"I'd feel a lot happier, Luca, if you would discuss your text with me.
That way, I won't feel quite such a fool when the roof falls in."

At that moment, the telephone rang.  The Secretary of State answered
it.  A moment later, Angel-Novalis was ushered into the room, by a
young cleric who carried out the remains of the meal.  After a brief
exchange of greetings, Angel-Novalis explained the reason for his
visit.  He laid on the desk facsimile clippings of two pieces from the
New York Times.

"We're six hours ahead of New York.  These two items appeared in this
morning's edition.  I've shown them to the Camerlengo, and he
recommended that I discuss them immediately with you.  The first one is
the final instalment of the Pontiff's diaries."

Rossini leaned over the shoulder of the Secretary of State to read
it.

I am not well tonight.  I am plagued by a headache and by that strange
malaise, which in the past has signalled the onset of a small cerebral
incident.  I try not to let myself exaggerate the possibilities, but I
have been warned several times that this is how death may come for me.
I carry a time-bomb in my head and one day it will burst and kill me.
Still, I must work on "because the night cometh when no man can
work".

Living thus, in the shadow of judgment, I am forced to judge myself
most stringently.  I am still vested with authority, but the power to
use it is slipping from my hands.  For a long time now, I have been
forced to delegate more and more to men whom I have appointed, yet, in
the end, it is I who am responsible for what they do.  What troubles me
most in these grey hours, is the use of my power over the consciences
of men and women, the power of binding and loosing which, over the
centuries, we have inflated too often into tyrannies.

What I, myself, have thought to justify as a rightful exercise of
authority, I see now as a harsh and often an opportunistic
intervention.  I have acted more as a general deploying armies under
command than as a pastor watching his scattered sheep grazing over vast
hillsides, exposed to the incursions of predators.  I have condemned
brave minds to silence.  I have chosen to crush, rather than persuade,
rebellious spirits.  I have refused the counsel of our Lord, to let
weeds and wheat grow together until harvest-time.  Instead, I have sent
rough gardeners to root out the weeds and good grain has been torn out
with them.

In all this, I have invoked the counsel of men whom I myself appointed,
so it was always my own voice I heard.  To justify my decisions, I have
counted upon the tolerance of loyal Christians and upon the sheer
ignorance of the vast flock grazing in the distant pastures.  Why have
I succumbed to this most subtle betrayal?  Because I saw it as a means
to continue my policies for the Church long after my reign is ended.
There is an ingrained fear in all who govern, that to respect dissent
is to foment rebellion.  So, be our edicts good or bad, we let them
hang upon the walls of the city until the rain of centuries washes them
away.  So long as they are there, they can be invoked against the
incautious and the unwary.

It is easy to find collaborators in this continuance of power, because
I am seen to be their guarantor, their justification against all
attainder.  More, their power will continue after mine has dropped from
my hands.  Custom will only confirm it.  Challenge will only make its
exercise more rigorous.

The terror that invades me now is this: I am too old to change
anything.  I count my life, like a child, by sleeping and waking, by
bedtime prayers and thanks for each new day.  What shall I answer to
the God in whose name I govern, to the Lord Jesus Christ whose Vicar I
claim to be ... There was a long quiet between the three men, as each
finished his own silent reading of the text.  Then Luca Rossini gave a
long exhalation which ended in a whispered regret.

"Dear God!  That is what he was trying to say to me for weeks, but he
could never bring himself to utter the words.  The poor, lonely man."

"The cat is out of the bag," said the Secretary of State baldly.

"I think you should read the editorial," said Angel-Novalis
respectfully.  "There will be many others like it."

They read it in silence, Rossini leaning over the shoulder of the
Secretary of State.

Although the provenance of the Papal diaries is still clouded, there
appears to be no serious challenge to their textual authenticity.

These passages, written the night before he collapsed into a final
silence, constitute a document of singular importance.  It is the
confession of an old and powerful man at the end of a long reign. There
is a great sadness in it: a sense of guilt, a recognition that the
clocks are never turned back for any of us.

Too often, especially in this age of instant information, Vatican
authorities make themselves ridiculous and bring the faith into
disrepute by tardy reversals of decisions that should have been
scrapped centuries ago.  The Galileo affair is one notorious example.
Less evident, though perhaps more dangerous, are the exactions of new
professions of faith from teachers in Catholic universities,
professions which go far beyond the traditional propositions of the
Nicene Creed.

It is not enough to leave the cure of error or exaggeration to the
simple lapse of time.  The poignant record of the disquiet of the late
Pontiff under the threat of death acknowledges that souls must be
served in the here and now, because for them, too, time runs out
swiftly.

One hopes, however, that the electors, assembling now in Rome, will
read this final document and reflect on it while they consider their
candidate.  Their decision, too, will soon become irreversible.

The Secretary of State leaned back in his chair, locked his hands
behind his head and surveyed his visitors in silence.  Angel-Novalis
was the first to speak.

"I shall be asked for comment.  Do you gentlemen have any?"

"None from me," said the Secretary of State.  "The man is dead and
buried.  Comments are yesterday's snowflakes on the grave."

"Requiescat," said Luca Rossini.  "Let him rest in peace."

"With great respect," said Angel-Novalis, "I need more help than you
seem prepared to give me."

"Perhaps," the Secretary of State was deceptively mild.  "Perhaps we
have missed a point here."

"Then permit me to clarify it, Eminence.  In a private diary entry,
written just before his death, the Pontiff has recanted or at least
cast grave doubts upon policies which have taken him two decades to set
in place.  We understand his state of mind as he wrote.  He was an aged
and overworked man trying to cast up the accounts of his life before
the final audit.  You will remember that I addressed this question in a
public statement at the Foreign Press Club.  I voiced my personal
opinion that the diaries were, in fact, stolen property.  I did that,
if you remember, at your formal request.  This final extract is the
strongest piece of internal evidence to support that contention.  I,
for one, cannot believe His Holiness would have conspired with his
valet to destroy his own life's work.  I think that comment has to be
made and made strongly, otherwise those who,

in good faith, have executed the policies of the Pontiff will be left
without recourse in their congregations.  More, there will be a colour
able suspicion that the publication is condoned.  That is a gift in
hand to the liberals, a weapon against those of more conservative
views.  To let it pass without Vatican comment smacks of opportunism. A
crime is left without constant challenge because it conduces to a
change of policy."

The Secretary of State toyed with the paper-knife on his desk.  Rossini
made a flat statement.

"If you want to emphasise the theft, you need more evidence against
Stagni.  If you want to salvage any of the policies of His late
Holiness, you won't do it by polar ising the electors.  The whole
Church is in stasis at the moment.  The See is vacant.  We're all
sitting under that symbolic umbrella, waiting for a new sun to rise
upon us."

"Something has to be done."  Angel-Novalis was a man secure in his own
convictions.  "I shall be asked for comment.  I cannot refuse to give
it."

"Then you work within the conventions of your office," said the
Secretary of State.  "You are already on record with a personal and
public statement at the Press Club.  Repeat it, by all means, but
remember, you're playing entrance music here until the curtain goes up
on the big act, the election of a new Pope.  That act hasn't been
written yet.  It would be a great mistake if you, in your zeal for an
impossible justice, tried to meddle with the script."

"Let me be sure I understand, Eminence.  You are instructing me to work
within the discretions of my office?"

"Precisely."

"Then I had best be about my business.  By your leave, Eminences."

When the door had closed behind him, Rossini offered a mild protest.

"You gave him a rough ride, Turi."

"He has a good seat on a horse," the Secretary of State allowed himself
a grim smile, "but he was trained in the Spanish riding school: it's a
wonderful style for dressage, but it's not the best for a long
cross-country steeplechase."

It was late in the afternoon when Rossini left his office, walked out
of Vatican City by the Porta Angelica, and headed down the Borgo
Sant'Angelo towards the river.  It had been a long day.  Now, a black
depression had settled over him.  He was haunted by the childhood
fairy-tale of the boy who lost his shadow.  He had no point of
reference any more.  He was an empty man going nowhere.

It seemed an age, though it was only six hours since he had said his
farewells to Isabel and Luisa.  They were still in the hotel.  They
would be there until the morning.  He was consumed with desire to see
them again, but it was better not to revisit so soon the scene of their
mutual grief.  Their farewells had been said.  There was nothing to add
to the last halting words of tenderness.  The embraces that were meant
for solace had now become painful for Isabel.  He cherished the hope,
however faint, that he might visit her in New York after the conclave.
For the moment, he would walk silent and alone in his own darkness and
wait for sunrise, if indeed sunrise would ever come again.

Then he remembered, he had at least to contact Luisa and give the
instructions, which the Secretary of State had provided, for contact
with him during the conclave.  He had proposed to fax them to her at
the hotel, but the Secretary had demurred.  Security was involved.
Hotel message desks were places of notorious risk.

So, when finally he reached the river and stepped on to the Ponte
Sant'Angelo, he dialled the number of the hotel and asked to be put
through to Luisa's room.  He was relieved but embarrassed when she
answered.  He hurried to explain:.

"I've managed to set up a communication link which you can use while
we're in conclave.  It's quite official, but it depends on accurate use
of the time difference and direct access to the named person.  So, I
want you to copy it carefully as I dictate, then read it back to me,
then make sure you have it always with you.  The

Vatican's a big place; soon it's going to be a very crowded place.
Until the conclave is over, this is the only link I'll have with you.
Understood?"

"Understood.  I'm sitting here with pen and paper ready."

He dictated the information slowly, spelling out each word, repeating
each number.  Then, he had her call it back to him, making sure her
spelling and pronunciation were accurate.  It was only when it was all
done that he felt free to ask her:

"How is your mother?"

"She had a bad hour after you left, but she's better now.  I've just
been in to see her.  She's sleeping.  Later, I'll take her up to the
restaurant for dinner.  All the packing's done.  We won't have to
scramble in the morning."

"Would you like me to come and see her this evening?"

"Better not, I think.  Why put yourselves through it again?"

"You're right, of course.  Just tell her I called and give her all my
love."

"I'd like a small share of it for myself."

"You have it.  You will have it always."

"And how are you holding up, Luca?"

"I'm marching forward even though I'm not sure where I am going."

"I'm not either.  It is just beginning to dawn on me what losing a
mother means."

Instantly, he was filled with tenderness for her plight.  The loss of a
parent was like the cutting of a tap root.  The flow of nourishment
from the past ceased abruptly.  The future became an uncertainty.

"My dear girl, nobody is ever ready for anything.  The moment comes,
you deal with it.  That's the tax we all pay for being human.  And let
me tell you something else, which your mother has learned and I am
still trying to learn.  There are moments for all of us from which God
seems absent and we are left in darkness and terribly alone.  We work
our way forward like the blind tapping the way before us with a stick,
hoping the ground remains firm, and that whatever creatures we
encounter will be friendly.  There are no guarantees, ever.  We keep
ourselves open to love, because, without it, we become feral beasts."

There was silence on the line, so that he thought he had lost her.
Then, in an odd strained voice, she asked:

"Do you pray, Luca?"

"I say the words.  I do not know who hears."

"Will you say them for us for me and for Mother?"

"Of course."

"And we'll pray for you.  I'll be in touch from New York."  There was
another brief silence before she demanded: "Tell me you love me,
please!"

"I love you, my daughter."

"I love you, Papa."

The connection was broken.  He put his mobile back in his pocket, then
leaned against the stone balustrade, staring through a mist of tears at
the grey water.

Twelve

MON SIGNOR DOMINGO ANGEL-NOVALIS WAS A PUNCTILIOUS man.  He was also an
angry man.  There was no heat in his anger, only a frosty calculation.
Things were amiss; they must be set right.  Ideas were muddled; they
must be made clear.  Time was running out: there remained less than a
week before the Cardinal electors went into conclave.  After that, the
words and deeds of a dead Pontiff would be yesterday's news, fit only
for pulping.  Therefore, the record must be set straight immediately.
So, from the moment he left the office of the Secretary of State,
Angel-Novalis had been very busy.

First, he called a colleague in Rio de Janeiro, one of those laymen
who, in Opus Dci, were called "numeraries".  His name was Eduardo da
Souza and he was the editor of a large conservative newspaper.
Angel-Novalis asked him to call up from his files every available piece
of information on the lately arrived Claudio Stagni.  He would like the
information in three hours.  Possible?  Of course, according to the
blessed founder, nothing was impossible if the cause was good and God
was on your side.

His next call was more difficult, because he was a proud man and he
hated to be indebted to anyone.  The proper order of things was that
the media came to him for news.  He never had to beg for space or
attention.  Today, he was ready, if not to beg, at least to call in
some favours.  His most likely target was Frank Colson of the Daily
Tdegrafb, who had been his interlocutor at the Foreign Press Club.  The
Telegraph had missed out on the bidding for the Papal diaries.

Colson might well be disposed to file a final story, before the
forthcoming election blanked out the immediate past.  Colson was open
to the idea.  They arranged to meet at the Gaffe Greco at five-thirty.
Angel-Novalis spent the next two hours in his office putting together a
tersely reasoned story on the suspect provenance of the Papal diaries,
and the possibility that the texts would be used to change radically
the disciplinary policies of the late Pontiff.  It was nearly five
o'clock when the e-mail answer came from Rio:

Claudio Stagni has taken a three-year lease on an expensive apartment
in a high-security block on the Rua Lisboa.  His household staff
consists of a cook, a maid and a chauffeur-bodyguard, hired through a
bonded agency.  Given the moral tolerances of this city, there is
nothing to excite comment on Stagni's lifestyle.  He has a fondness for
handsome young men, readily available in this city, and is said to be
seeking acquaintances in literary and artistic circles.  He has begun
to frequent local art galleries and has been entertained by a couple of
local publishers who are interested in the work in progress dealing
with his life in the service of the late Pontiff.  He seems acutely
aware of the risks of a too public or too dissipated life in this city.
He presents the discreetly low profile of a literary gentleman of
substantial means.  On the other hand, he does not neglect the company
of women -provided they are of a certain age and addicted to
fashionable gossip.  In short, he is a very cool customer who knows
exactly what he wants, and is very clever at getting it.

There are, however, a couple of useful footnotes.  Brazil is on the
verge of signing extradition treaties with certain countries, like
Great Britain.  Stagni has consulted a well-known lawyer, with whom we
have connections, to advise whether he is at risk in any matter.  I do
not believe that Italy or Vatican City State are listed as treaty
prospects, but I can enquire, and it would do no harm to begin a small
campaign of harassment to unsettle him.

This is a common game in this country, which produced some sinister
by-products, like the "Squadrons of Death' and other forms of violent
vigilantism.  I do not for a moment suggest you could contemplate such
methods to achieve your aims.  However, there are simpler ways of
unsettling an undesirable resident.  If I get any good ideas, I'll let
you know.  Meantime, I'll keep digging.  Fraternally yours, Eduardo da
Souza

It wasn't much; but it provided a text for his discussion with Frank
Colson.  He printed it out, shoved it into his briefcase with his own
material, then tapped out a reply to da Souza:

Many thanks for your time and trouble.  Stagni seems to have built
himself a solid bunker.  One can only hope that one day he may be
flushed out.  There is no way one could condone violent harassment, but
a buzzing of insects can ; create an unease.

Fraternally yours, Domingo Angel-Novalis

When the message had been transmitted, he switched off the machine and
hurried out to his appointment with Colson at the Caffe Greco.

Colson sipped his coffee and read carefully through the documents. Then
he shook his head.

"There's nothing new here certainly nothing to warrant a story of any
size."

"You're missing the point, Frank!  Stagni has always been suspect, as a
thief of the Pontiff's diaries, as an utterer of forged supporting
documents."

"Suspect, yes; but never accused, because there's zero evidence on
either count."

"But obviously he's scared of something; else why would he consult a
lawyer in Brazil?"

"And why would that lawyer be ready to breach a client's confidence?"

"He's a friend of friends.  He was stretching a point to do us a
favour."

"God preserve us from such lawyers!  And you, Monsignor, should be
careful of such friends."

"You are still missing the point, Frank: the internal evidence of the
text; the Pontiff recanting his policies.  I've worked for him for a
long time.  I can't imagine his colluding with a valet on a project of
destruction."

"He wrote the text!"  Colson was testy.  "Why?  Surely not to have it
buried for centuries in the Secret Archive?  We all write to
communicate to someone.  The valet was the last human being he spoke to
at night.  He was the most natural mediator between the Pontiff and
whatever constituency he wanted to reach!"

"If you're saying that constituency is the Church at large, you're
mistaken!  All his efforts have been to confirm the authority of the
hierarchy and reduce the intervention of the laity.  Why would he set
out to damage his own life-work?"

"Because, in the end, he didn't like it!  Sculptors destroy their
works.  Painters slash their canvases.  To me, this reads like a
warning confession: "The structure I have built is faulty.  Don't put
too much more stress on it.  Extend in other directions.  Look to the
foundations.""

"I don't read it that way, Frank!"

"How, then?"

"A sudden failure of nerve on the part of a very old and overworked
man.  In panic, he confessed a private fear.  What he wrote fell into
the hands of a thief.  Now, it can be used to subvert the spiritual
life of the Church."

"Subvert?  That's a strong, positive word.  You are saying that the
Pontiff, himself, wrote the formula for subversion."

"I don't believe he intended it to be so used."

"The text is clear.  If that doesn't hold good, who is to interpret his
intention?"

"The new Pontiff.  Nothing changes while the See is vacant."

Colson could not restrain a smile.

"That, my dear Monsignor, is pure myth and fairy-tale.  Of course
things change!  Views, policies, colorations, they all change as we
speak, as the prelates gather in religious institutes all over the
city.  The world doesn't wait for a new resident in the Papal
apartments -it just keeps spinning and we, poor devils, hang on to it
by the skin of our teeth."

"I'm sorry you feel that way, Frank.  I had hoped .. ."

"Relax, my friend.  You'll get your story.  I'll have to re jig it a
little, use some of the things we've just been talking about; but, yes,
we'll give the subject a good airing."

"Thank you.  At least I can feel that I have performed a piety for him.
I shan't forget this service, Frank."

"I've never seen you eager to plant a story."

"I am furious.  A wrong has been done.  I want to see it righted."

"The best way to do that is to replay the event in the centre of the
stage and let the audience make up its mind.  Do you mind if I leave
now?  I've got to get this written and on its way to London."

"Will it make tomorrow's edition?"

"I hope so.  I asked them to reserve space."

"But I thought you said there was nothing new in it?"

"An old trick, Monsignor: make the narrator justify his plot-line. Your
text was good.  Your performance was much more eloquent."

Monsignor Angel-Novalis ordered himself another cup of coffee and a
piece of chocolate cake.  He was too intelligent a man not to know that
he had been jockeyed into an indiscretion.  He was no longer relaying
official Vatican opinion but adding personal commentary.  On the other
hand, what did it matter?  His time in office was running out.  Under a
new Pontiff, Opus Dci itself might well be due for a sojourn in the
deserts of official disfavour.  That was the nature of life in an
imperial Church.  Religious institutes were the duchies and baronies,
and marquisates and corporations of the commons, where property and
money, man and woman power were assembled at the disposition of a
Pontiff for the people of God.

Sometimes, they stood high in favour.  Sometimes, they fell from both
grace and favour.  It was rare, however, that their official patents
were rescinded.  It required a big blot on the escutcheon to have it
withdrawn altogether.

So, calm and patience, Domingo!  You have tried to protect the honour
of a man whom you served with honour.  If you stumbled in this final
service and spilt wine on the carpet, apologise and mop it up and
retire with as much dignity as you can muster.  If God grants it, there
will be a new day tomorrow.

Now that his own story was safely bedded down, Angel-Novalis thought he
might make a detour to the Foreign Press Club and see what other
stories were being floated around the globe, and how the betting list
on the new Pontiff was beginning to shape itself.  He checked his
wallet to see that he had cash enough for a couple of rounds of drinks
at the bar.  He himself drank only mineral water, but he believed that
a salaried cleric should pay his score like the rest of humanity.  He
noted with amusement that Frank Colson had left him to pick up the
check for the coffee.  He paid it and headed out into the noisy autumn
evening.

At the Press Club, Fritz Ulrich was jubilant over the editorial
presentation of his piece on the Janissaries of the Ottoman Empire.  An
astute editor had spotted the possibilities of the article and had
inflated it into a two-page spread with illustrations by a noted
satirical cartoonist, Georg Albrecht Kirchner.

Ulrica's simple analogy between the Janissaries and the celibate clergy
of the Roman Church, diminished in numbers, plagued by sexual scandals
and large damage suits arising out of them, had been interpreted into
the context of a global confrontation between Christianity and a
resurgent fundamentalist Islam.  It was a powerful piece, and there was
much praise for it.  Steffi Guillemin was generous in tribute.

"I confess, Fritz, I didn't give it enough attention when you talked
about it.  But with this display and with the cartoons underlining the
allegory, it's great.  There'll be lots of discussion points: Algeria,
Serbia, Indonesia, Pakistan ..."

"I am proud of it."  Ulrich was delighted as a schoolboy.  "And
Kirchner is so clever.  See how simple he makes it look: switch the
mitres for turbans, then emphasise the vestments on the one side and
the panoply of the Ottoman troops on the other.  Presto!  The theme is
clear, and my text makes the argument!  How is your own piece coming
the portrait of Cardinal Rossini?"

"I'm not sure.  Some of it is good, but there are shadowy areas in the
man I haven't reached yet.  But time's run out.  I have to file no
later than tomorrow morning."

"Do you mind if I take a look?  We're doing the piece in German, as you
know."

"Be my guest."

She punched it up on the screen of her lap-top.  As Ulrich sat down to
read it, Angel-Novalis came to the table, and nodded a greeting to them
both.  He asked whether he was interrupting anything.  Guillemin
assured him he was not and explained what she was doing.

"It's a final review of my portrait piece on Cardinal Rossini."

"Would you mind if I read over your shoulder?  I was there, remember,
monitoring the interview.  I'd love to see what you have made of it."

"You may be able to help me tidy it."

Angel-Novalis took up his position behind them and read the text as it
was scrolled up on the screen.  Guillemin sipped her drink and waited.
Whatever Angel-Novalis said might be valuable or irrelevant.  Ulrich,
however, was a professional and his people in Germany had paid good
money for the rights.  He had a clear interest in the final text.  His
first comment was a compliment.

"It's a good portrait, Steffi even though you had to chisel it out of a
very tough stone.  But one question you haven't answered."

"Tell me."

"His late Holiness was a black and white man.  "Intrinsically good,
intrinsically evil."  Those two phrases keep popping up all over the
documents of his reign.  So, why would he patronise a damaged man like
Rossini?  Why would he offer him the red hat?  Why would he send him as
his personal legate on missions of confidence all around the world?"

"I think I've answered that quite clearly," said Guillemin.  "If you go
back to paragraph three, you'll find it in the text.  Since his return
to Rome all those years ago, Rossini has lived a blameless life. He has
refused to deny his debt to the woman who saved his life, or his
affection for her.  The late Pontiff respected that.  How could he not?
That's what Christianity is about: reconciliation, growth, progress on
the pilgrim road and always love!"

This was the moment at which Angel-Novalis chose to intervene in the
discussion.  He asked:

"What is your final reading on Rossini?"

Guillemin frowned over her own admission.

"That's my problem.  I have no final reading.  You were present at the
interview.  You saw what happened.  He never refused a question.  He
answered everything I asked.  But he explained nothing, least of all
himself.  I understand it in part.  I've seen evidence of what was done
to him all those years ago.  It was a terrible violation."

"Twenty-five years ago," said Ulrich.  "How long does any man need to
heal?"

Guillemin rounded on him in sudden anger.

"Sometimes a lifetime isn't enough!"

"And how would you know that?"

"Because I had a brute for a father," said Guillemin curtly.  "He
turned me off men for life."

"I'm sorry," said Ulrich.  "I'm sorry for all my bad jokes.  I am truly
sorry."

"For the love of God, Fritz!  Go back to your cursed Janissaries and
leave me in peace."

Ulrich got up without another word and shambled towards the bar.
Angel-Novalis swung the talk swiftly to another subject.

"I understand the problem you have to define this Rossini.  For more
than a quarter of a century now, he has tried to make himself
invulnerable.  He has become how shall I say it?  like a great iceberg
at the heart of which a fire burns.  You can see the fire, but you
cannot get close enough to feel the heat.  You ask yourself whether one
day the fire will melt the ice or the ice freeze out the fire."

"Would you like to hazard a guess, Monsignor?  After all, you described
your own experience after the loss of your wife.  You found salvation,
or at least a safe harbour, in a religious fraternity.  Would you say
the Church has filled that need for Cardinal Rossini?"

"I would say it probably has not at least not to this point in his
life."

"Why not?"

"Because he has never entrusted himself completely to the Church, which
he saw in his own country all too often as a conspirator with military
governments.  It had its martyrs, to be sure.  Rossini himself suffered
for the faith, but its martyrs were what martyrs generally are,
outsiders who become heroes and heroines after their deaths.  In spite
of his rise to power and he does exercise power Rossini's surviving
self was built around the woman who truly was the tangible saviour, the
restorer of the shattered vessel.  You knew she was here in Rome?"

"I knew it.  I saw her but our talk was off the record.  I hear from
the hotel that she has been taken ill and is leaving tomorrow for New
York with her daughter."

"She is, in fact, mortally ill," said Angel-Novalis.  "Rossini called
the Papal physician, Doctor Mottola, to attend her."

"So, what will happen when she is gone from him altogether?"

"I don't know.  I've sometimes asked myself what would have happened to
me if all my supports had failed me.  Sometimes, I've wondered whether
I might have been a wiser man, a better man in the end if I had been
forced into another pattern of growth.  Other times, I've thought ..
."

"Thought what, Monsignor?"

"About the parable of the empty house, all swept and garnished and the
seven devils who moved in to live there."

"And you think Rossini has devils in his house?"

"We all have, but you're going to have to put your own names to
Rossini's demons."

Even as he uttered the words, he remembered that there was one
mischievous imp tapping at the window of his own soul.  His fraternal
colleague in Rio had introduced the small devil, not as a serious
tenant but rather as a jester in the house.  It was amusing to
contemplate Claudio Stagni, secure in his exile and his new wealth,
suddenly pestered by gadflies and stinging wasps.  Then, because he was
a man with a finely honed conscience, Angel-Novalis understood that
this was no jesting imp but a very gentleman of a devil, demonstrating
with clear reason how the perversions of power might serve the cause of
justice.  He gave a small involuntary shiver.  Steffi Guillemin cast
him an enquiring look.

"Is there something the matter?"

Angel-Novalis grinned in embarrassment.

"An untimely thought.  We were talking about devils.  I just caught a
glimpse of one out of the corner of my eye."

"Now, there's a thought!"  Guillemin turned back to her screen.
"Perhaps that's the key to him.  Rossini is a man who has seen the
naked face of evil and he can't look past it to any vision of goodness.
Belief in a beneficent creator is hard to sustain.  I understand that
very well."

"Have you ever read Don Quixote?"

"Years ago.  Why do you ask?"

"There's a sentence that sticks in my mind.  "Tems la cruz esta el
Diablo' Behind the cross stands the devil."

"I don't remember it.  But it makes sense.  Let me play with this for a
while.  Buy me a drink will you, please a gin and tonic and offer one
to Fritz Ulrich with my compliments.  He was trying to be nice and I
snarled at him.  But, for God's sake, don't bring him back here!"

2-49

She turned back to the screen and tapped in a new introductory
sentence:

"Luca, Cardinal Rossini, who is slowly emerging as a possible Papal
candidate is a complex man, not easily deciphered."

In the privacy of his own office, Frank Colson was putting together his
version of Angel-Novalis's subversion theory.  He knew that the
provenance and authenticity of the documents were dead issues, soon to
be buried under an avalanche of speculation over the election, and
picture journalism on the new incumbent of the See of Peter.  He had
two reasons for picking up the tag end of the story: Angel-Novalis
himself and the future of Opus Dci under a new pontificate.

Angel-Novalis was adequately explained by his own personal history.  A
bereaved man, he had committed himself to the point of obsession to a
fraternity which had given meaning and direction to his life.  He had
been trained in a bankers' world where every item in an audit must be
sedulously noted.  Opus Dci, therefore, presented itself as the last
and safest refuge of orthodoxy in a world going rapidly to hell in a
handcart.  The perilous notion of a remnant Church, faithful amid
universal decay, was etched into their thinking.  The emphasis on the
highly coloured word 'subversion' seemed to be the key to large areas
of their thinking, and to the sense of outrage in Angel-Novalis
himself.  Colson began, as he usually did, by jotting down a
lead-line.

The Papal diaries, believed to be stolen and published with forged
provenance, may well be something more: a blueprint for subversion of
the spiritual life and discipline of the Church.

This was the personal view clearly expressed today by Monsignor Domingo
Angel-Novalis, head of the Vatican Press Office and its official
spokesman.  It should be said clearly that this comment was not
solicited by us.  Monsignor Angel-Novalis asked that his personal point
of view be published.  He came to us because we were not one of the
publishers of the diaries.

Challenged by this writer on his use of the word "subversion",
Angel-Novalis insisted that it was accurate.  He claimed that the diary
entry made by the late Pontiff the night before his collapse was a
"panic revelation, a sudden failure of nerve on the part of a very old
and over-worked man".  He expressed the fear that this momentary loss
of confidence might be used to destroy the Pontiff's own policies and
disciplines.

It was pointed out to him that there was an inherent contradiction in
the argument, namely that the words were those of the Pontiff himself.
Angel-Novalis immediately took refuge in a legalism: The See of Peter
is vacant.  All existing determinations hold good until a new Pontiff
changes them.  He went further, asserting again that the documents had
been stolen, were in fact private utterances with no canonical
validity.

Pressed further, Angel-Novalis admitted that no evidence had been
brought against the seller of the documents, Claudio Stagni, now living
in some luxury in Rio de Janeiro.  Clearly, such evidence had been
sought, at least unofficially, by a colleague of Angel-Novalis in
Brazil.

For this correspondent, the most curious features of this situation are
the apparent indifference of Vatican authorities, who seem resigned to
writing off the diaries as an unfortunate incident which will be
forgotten in time, and the sudden burst of anger and zeal on the part
of Angel-Novalis himself.

His personal loyalty to the late Pontiff is well known.  His demeanour
has always been one of cool detachment from controversy and a purist
precision in the statement of Vatican views.

One asks whether he has become suddenly sensitive to the inevitable
partisanship of the sede vacante period, or has he, too, become
partisan enough to invent labels for those who disagree with the
prevailing policies and seek change through the electoral process?  My
own view is that, having founded his life on the fraternity of Opus
Dci, he is disturbed by any challenge to its rigid conditioning.  Those
who live close to the seat of power, grow restive when the power is in
abeyance or when it begins to pass into other hands .. .

The more he wrote, the more eloquent Colson became.  By the time he had
closed the story, he realised that what he had written was the obituary
of a loyal servant who had put his career at risk to defend a position
which his late master had already abdicated.  Still, Colson felt very
little remorse.  This was the name of the news game.  Everyone was
playing to win.  Someone had to lose.

He reread the piece and decided he would recant nothing of what he had
written.  This was, after all, the standard practice of the Vatican
itself.  "Quod, scripsi, scripsi."  What I have written, I have
written.  A change might be considered, but it would take centuries to
get around to it unless a new Pontiff intervened; but even his name was
still secret in the mind of God.

Frank Colson signed off on the piece and sent it to London.

Luca, Cardinal Rossini came early to his house that evening.  The black
winter mood was still on him, the sense of desolation and fruitless
endeavour.  He knew from long experience that the only remedy against
it was routine, a drudgery of habit with no expectation of relief.

He greeted his staff, asked that a light supper be prepared for him,
then retired to his bedroom to bathe and change into pyjamas and
dressing gown.  Next, he read the last hours of his breviary -vespers
and comp line  The cadences of the psalms were familiar on his tongue,
soothing to the ear; but it was as if they were spoken by another. They
were incantations, not prayers.  It was almost as though his will
stiffened itself against them, as it might against pounding drums and
clashing cymbals in the temple of unfamiliar gods.

He ate his supper to the sound of music, Haydn's Oxford Symphony played
by the Vienna Philharmonic.  The music did for him what the psalms
could not.  It laid the chattering ghosts to rest.  It silenced
argument and imposed the structured unreason of pure sound on the
convoluted reasonings of theologians and philosophers, and the obdurate
legalisms of canonists.

When the music ended, and his meal was finished, he carried his tray
out to the kitchen, said goodnight to his staff, and settled himself
back at his desk with pen and paper in front of him.  Normally, he
would have used his word processor, but the task on which he was now
embarked was an intimate and private venture in which the machine
became suddenly an intruder.  He did not stumble or hesitate over the
beginning, but set down the words the Secretary of State had suggested.
"I am Luca, your brother ..."

Even as he wrote them, he knew they would not be acceptable to all his
audience.  At second glance, it was perhaps not so good a beginning.
Brotherhood and sisterhood were loaded words even in the millennial
Church.  The taint of populism still hung about them.  Orders and
hierarchies were a more stable and more recognisable currency.  Even in
the electoral college itself, there were grades and degrees: Cardinal
Archbishops, Cardinal Bishops, Cardinal Priests, Cardinal Deacons and
not so long ago, laymen, too, carried the title and the benefices of
the rank.  In the electoral college all men were equal but in the order
of being, some were more equal than others.  So, he changed the phrase
a little: "I am Luca, your brother.  Like you, I am a servant of the
Word."

What next?  What of value could he say to this assembly of hinge-men
that they had not heard and preached a thousand times over?  What could
he, the doubter in darkness, offer them of light and energy to direct
their choice of the Servant of the Servants of God?  So, begin again.
"I am Luca, your brother.  Like you, I am a servant of the Word.  I
want to open my heart to you.  I am not here to teach you anything. You
know it all, better than I. Allow me simply to declare my thoughts to
you, as a brother in that huge family of the faithful who do not know
even our names, who would not recognise us if they bumped into us in
the street."

He paused there.  He asked himself again what he was trying to do in
this address.  He wanted them to feel vulnerable, responsible,
self-doubting, self-searching.  They had lived so long under the
protection of the institution, that many were afraid or unwilling to
venture beyond it.  For these, the formal obediences were like the old
Roman testudo: a canopy of shields under which they retreated from
dangerous or threatening decisions.

So long as one remained in obedience, one lived safely and
meritoriously under the system.  Protest it, however, and one was
marked, or thought oneself to be marked, as a disturber of the peace.
Subtle penalties were exacted.  Direct access to the Pontiff was
curtailed.  Visits to him were difficult to arrange and reduced, in any
case, to formal exchanges.  The Vatican was still a court, and if one
did not learn the manners of the court, one should expect to be
disadvantaged.  So, forget the brotherhood then.  Think your way again
through the maze.  Prepare yourself for blind alleys and
water-tricks.

He wrestled with the text for a long time, filling his waste-basket
with crumpled sheets of rejections.  Finally, the humour of the
situation dawned on him.  The Secretary of State, his good friend, Turi
Pascarelli, had presented him with the spiky end of a pineapple an
unsympathetic role in the most boring stretch of ritual drama.

Turi himself had the easiest part: to demonstrate the demography, the
geography and the geopolitics of a millennial Church.  He had all the
facts in his head and in his files.  He could, on his own confession,
demonstrate them with a globe and coloured lights.

But the mind of the pilgrim assembly, the disposition of all the
Churches everywhere, their loyalties, their griefs, their angers, these
were not easy to grasp.  They were most damnably difficult to
communicate to this polyglot group of electors, each jealous of his own
corner of the vineyard and the quality of the wine it produced.

There was more, much more to the joke, however.  In this celibate
assembly, there was no voice for women, who held up more than half the
sky.  There was no one to speak their language, express their growing
concerns, their relationship to God, who was expressed only in
masculine gender.  Luca Rossini, laconic and stumbling to express the
passion of his own life, would have to remind them of their duties and
shortcomings.  He, the doubter in darkness, was nominated lamp bearer
to this assembly of electors who would appoint a pontifex, a
bridge-builder to span the vast gap between the sexes.  And, for a
final dash of vinegar in the joke, Turi Pascarelli had given him two
days to come up with a text.

It would certainly not be written tonight.  He poured himself a glass
of mineral water, switched on the CD player and surrendered himself to
Mozart's Oboe Concerto.  The piece was almost ended when Isabel called
from the hotel.  His heart lurched at the sound of her voice.  He
stammered like a schoolboy:

"I wanted to see you; but Luisa thought I shouldn't ..."

"She was right.  I was very fragile after you left; but I'm calm now. I
wanted you to know that I've spoken to Raul.  I told him I blamed
myself for much of our unhappiness, that I wanted us to live in peace
for whatever time I have left.  I told him I didn't expect him to
change his life, just to keep our part of it in a separate compartment.
He was grave and quiet and tender which proved your confessional advice
was right.  Also, it makes the homecoming easier for me and for Luisa. 
How are you, my love?"

"I'm sitting here listening to Mozart and trying to make sense of an
assignment that's been handed to me.  It's a real poison cup.  I, of
all people, have to address the electors at the beginning of the
conclave and direct their thinking to the consequences of their choice.
My waste-basket is full of my failures.  I've given up for this
evening."

"Why did you take it on?"

"I was pressed into it."

"Forgive me, Luca, my love, but you were never pressed into anything
except your flight from Argentina."

"And you would never let me lie, even a little.  Very well, then!  I
was willing to speak.  For a short while, there were things I thought I
wanted to say.  Now, they've all flown away like pigeons from a
bell-tower."

"That means it's time to stop thinking and let your heart speak."

"I have to write the words.  The translators need a text."

"Then, go back to your desk and write what we thought and said and
argued in those few weeks we had together in the countryside near
Cordoba, when we tossed our caps in the air and let the pampas wind
whirl them away.  You were so angry then, so passionate.  I remember
one thing you said: "We have to summon Christ back out of his nowhere
and have him talk and walk among us again.  If he doesn't we're all
lost beasts lowing in a slaughter-yard, waiting for the butchers." That
was was the first night we made love .. . You were a boy priest then. 
Now, you are an Eminence.  Does his Eminence remember?"

"I remember," said Luca Rossini.

"Then, tell it!  Tell it as your heart remembers.  Tell it for me."

"But you will be gone."

"I shall never be gone from you, nor you from me.  Pick up your pen and
write!"

Thirteen

NOW ISABEL WAS GONE AND LUISA WITH HER.  THE LABOUR she had enforced on
him to write the experience of their love into a passionate plea for
change had cushioned, for a while at least, the impact of loss, and the
fear of a future devoid of her presence.  While he was grateful for the
brief mercy, he knew that the agony would follow, as surely as night
followed day.

At ten in the morning, dog-tired but bathed and shaved and spruce as a
guardsman on parade, he presented himself to the Secretary of State and
laid the manuscript on his desk.  The Secretary acknowledged it with
careful respect.

"Punctual as always, Luca!  Thank you.  I'll read it later, if you
don't mind.  Have you timed it?"

"Fifteen minutes give or take thirty seconds.  I hope the roof doesn't
fall in while I'm delivering it."

It was a small joke, but the Secretary chose to take it seriously.  He
frowned and shook his head.

"They'll be a hard audience, Luca.  You'll be addressing them in your
mother tongue.  The Nordics are sceptical of Latin eloquence; so
they'll be reading the text in translation.  Don't be too discouraged
if their reaction seems tepid.  There is much uneasiness, much
discontent with the workings of the curial bureaucracy of which you and
I are a part."

"And of which certain ambitious members will try to maintain
control."

"As the list looks at the moment, they may well succeed."  The

Secretary of State was sombre.  "We have arrived, my dear Luca, at a
critical moment in history: the end of a very long Papal reign, the end
of a century, the beginning of a new millennium.  It is idle to pretend
that such events do not affect people.  They do, most profoundly.  They
affect us also, much more than we are prepared to admit.  We are the
mandarins of the bureaucracy, but we are just as vulnerable as the
lowliest peasant to the changes of times and of manners."

"It would help me, Turi, to have your reading of the conclave as it is
now constituted."

"Well!"  The Secretary of State took time to order his thoughts.
"First, we shall be a deeply divided assembly.  It is not easy to label
the divisions because they are not all based on religious belief or
disciplinary policy.  Some are based on pure self-interest.  Not all of
us are good men.  Not all of us are halfway good.  A few of us are
secret villains who have made their own pacts with greedy and tyrannous
men.  You know that.  We all know it, even if we can't confess it. Most
of the men of goodwill admit that change is necessary.  They all face
two basic questions: what change and at what speed?  The larger the
ship, the harder and the slower it is to alter course.  Our late
Pontiff tried though he would never admit it to reverse the course set
by the Second Vatican Council towards a collegial government and a
compassionate assembly.  He almost succeeded; but he put the ship in
stays, stalled its progress so that, at this moment, it sits dead in
the water.  The crew is discouraged; there are murmurs of mutiny
between decks.  The officers you, me and all the thousands of others
try to maintain good order and discipline and confidence in our
celestial navigation.  Many of us have found ourselves changed into
officials, sceptical of our own priesthood.  The people, too, are
sceptical of the ministry we offer.  We are commanded to silence on too
many questions which should be open for active discussion.  You and I
can talk ourselves through a whole catalogue of other questions
clamouring for attention: celibacy of the clergy, an imperial Church or
a collegial one,

the theology of sex and marriage, the persistence of inquisitorial
practices within the Church, the imposition of new oaths and
professions of faith on educators in our schools and universities.
Suppression of debate is an untenable position in today's world.  The
people ask for light.  We condemn them to darkness.  They cry for
warmth.  We, who claim to be the keepers of fire, offer them a
penitential cold.  Sitting where I do, Luca, I am probably the least
constrained man in the Church but, God forgive me, I have felt the
straps of the strait-jacket tightening every year!"

"Suppose," Luca Rossini challenged him quietly, "just suppose, you
found yourself in my position not from frustration, but from the slow
erosion of belief itself what would you do, Turi?"

"I have no idea, Luca, because I have no idea how the problem presents
itself to you.  Mine is an unexamined faith.  I wear it as I wear my
own skin.  I accept it, as I accept my own genetic identity.  I claim
no merit in that.  It is a comfort I have done nothing to deserve."

"What I am experiencing," Luca Rossini chose the words with great care,
"what I have experienced for some time is like the threat of blindness.
I know that I may wake one morning and see nothing of what I see now.
Will it be dark for me then, or light?  I have no means of knowing.
What sense will I make of the world -the same world, Turi when all the
intricate apparatus of reason and revelation and myth and beautiful
legend, familial continuity even, has been dismantled, made to
disappear by a single magic phrase: non credo, I don't believe, I can't
accept to believe any more?"

"I don't know, my friend.  I don't know.  I suspect, however, that it
might make life a little easier, if one were absolved from all the
burdens of belief.  One could pursue any path one chose, adapt oneself
in any possible fashion to an accidental universe.  I could see certain
advantages, for instance, in a sceptic Pope, an opportunistic Secretary
of State.  We have had some of each down the centuries."  The slow
smile belied the irony of the utterance.  The after-thought took the
edge off the irony.  "I am not mocking you.  I read your suffering in
your eyes.  Your Isabel is gone.  You fear you may never see her again.
Yet, you will not ask me to share your mourning.  You deliver what I
ordered: fifteen minutes of homily, carefully timed.  I admire that.  I
envy you understand me well, Luca!  - I envy you the experience of
love, which I have never known but which you have had with Isabel.  I
cannot guess how you have managed to live, as I know you have lived,
all these celibate years without her.  I understand, or think I
understand, the emptiness you fear after she dies.  Belief, like sight,
is a gift that may be taken away.  But love will not fail you, as
Isabel did not fail you in the time of terror."

"I hope you're right.  I dare not think too far beyond today.  I have
never asked you this before, I had too much pride, I suppose.  How much
do you know of those early events in Argentina?"

"Most of it is in our files and those of the Holy Father, which are
consigned to the Secret Archive.  Our friend Aquino was a careful
recorder, if a self-protective interpreter.  The Argentine government
was also sedulous to report its side of the story including the birth
of a daughter to Isabel Ortega, by Caesarian section in a New York
hospital."

"You should know, in fact, Luisa is my daughter," said Luca Rossini.
"Isabel had never told me before this visit.  Luisa did not know.  As
you may imagine, our first encounter was somewhat dramatic."

"And how does Luisa feel about it?"

"Confused, I think, but she is kindly disposed to me.  More
importantly, she has seen her mother and me together.  Our love is open
to her.  She understands and approves it.  I may be able to offer her
some support when her mother is gone.  It's too early to tell."

"And Raul Ortega?"

"My understanding is that he loves her and accepts her as his child.  I
did not ask any more questions."

"I ask," said the Secretary of State calmly, "because, given this new
knowledge, you may like to revise your somewhat tepid recommendation of
Ortega as Ambassador to the Holy See.  The letter is still in my hands.
It has not yet been filed in the dossier.  If he were appointed, it
might make you and your daughter a little more accessible to each
other."

"You're a kind man, Turi."  His voice was unsteady and there were tears
pricking at his eyelids.  "But I couldn't let you do it.  My daughter
and I will find each other in due time."

"I'm sure you will."  The Secretary of State was suddenly brusque.
"Now, I need your help on a couple of matters.  First, I received this
message from our Nuncio in Brazil.  He pushed the text across the
desk:

At a social gathering last night, I spoke with a prominent editor,
Eduardo da Souza, whom I know to be a numerary of Opus Dci.  He talked
in guarded fashion about a communication from a Roman colleague on the
subject of Claudio Stagni and the disturbing effect of the Papal
diaries inside the hierarchy and outside it.  Apparently, there was a
suggestion that what he called "a discreet harassment" of Stagni might
be the first step towards discrediting the provenance of the documents
themselves.  I told him I had no knowledge of such a suggestion and
would counsel strongly against it.  Da Souza declined to reveal his
Roman source.  I recommend an enquiry at your end.

Rossini was still frowning over the document when the Secretary of
State pushed a second one towards him.

"This piece was faxed to me from London this morning.  It was published
in the Telegraph and is attributed to their Roman correspondent, Frank
Colson."

Rossini read the piece carefully and then asked:

"Do you have a problem with this, Turi?"

"Don't you?"

"At first glance, no.  I was here when you instructed him.  You told
him he was free to 'work within the discretion of his office' your
exact words, Turi.  It seems to me he's done just that."

"No, he hasn't.  I questioned him closely just before you arrived.  He
admits that he sought evidence on Stagni from a colleague in Rio de
Janeiro.  He admits that he had no brief to conduct investigative
procedures.  Secondly, he ascribes motives and states of mind to the
late Pontiff as the 'panic revelation ... of an old and over-worked
man'.  Already, this is too much.  Finally, he lays special emphasis on
a highly coloured word: 'subversion'.  That reflects on all of us!"

"You should remember, Turi, this is a reporter's version.  It does not
purport to be a verbatim interview."

"It was an occasion sought by Angel-Novalis to state his personal
convictions.  That is outside his official brief.  He claims he had a
moral obligation to defend the reputation of the Pontiff and to defend
the Church from damage arising out of the misuse of private documents.
He had grace enough to apologise for what he called the 'taint of
anger' in his actions."

"I think you were too hard on him, Turi.  He's like a thoroughbred
race-horse.  He runs best when he's wearing blinkers."

The Secretary ruminated on that thought for a while and then nodded a
cautious agreement.

"You could be right, Luca.  I was angry with him.  He remained in
control of himself.  He offered me his immediate resignation."

"Did you accept it?"

"No.  I told him that, as he had been appointed by the late Pontiff, he
should follow the common practice and offer his resignation to the new
man."

"A wise decision on your part, Turi."

"I'm glad you think so, Luca," said the Secretary of State in his
direct fashion.  "I have also told him that the last thing we need is
any involvement with his colleagues in Buenos Aires, or any involvement
by them in the Stagni affair."

"One has to presume Angel-Novalis has enough influence to prevent
it."

"Who knows?"  The Secretary of State shrugged in resignation.  "We
create our own sacred monsters in the Church, both individuals and
organisations.  The monsters create their own agenda, and stamp the
documents with their own seal of godliness or perversity.  There are
great saints, great institutions of piety, learning and charity.  There
are also witch-hunters, murderous crusaders, Jew-baiters, inquisitors
who will condemn a thinking mind to silence and solitude.  And now, my
dear Luca, having delivered myself of all these indiscretions, I have
to put you to the question.  The Camerlengo would like to see us both
in his office."

"About anything in particular?"

"I would guess your interview with Le Monde would at least be
mentioned."

"I haven't seen it, Turi."

"A lot of other people have."

"Do you have a copy?"

"I do."  He gathered up the other papers from the desk and offered
Rossini the article, clipped inside a folder.  He also offered a
cautionary comment.  "Take enough time to read it carefully while I
look over your text.  Then we'll stroll across to see Baldassare."

"What else does he want to talk about?"

"He hasn't told me.  The See of Peter is vacant.  We are simply invited
to sit under the Chamberlain's umbrella and drink morning coffee.  I'll
tell him to expect us in fifteen minutes!"

Steffi Guillemin's piece was much longer than he had expected.  It had
been laid out with great care, divided into two distinct sections, with
key portions of the text boldly boxed.  It was headed "Enquiry into an
Eminent Person".  The subheading read simply, "Portrait of a Papal
candidate".  The introduction was deceptively prosaic:

This portrait was composed during two sessions with the subject, Luca,
Cardinal Rossini, Italian by ancestry, Argentinian by birth and
nurture, who has lived in distinguished exile for a quarter of a
century, and was promoted steadily by the late Pontiff to curial
rank.

The first session was a formal one, supervised by the Chief of the
Vatican Press Office, Monsignor Domingo Angel-Novalis.  The conditions
were agreed in advance.  I was free to ask any questions I chose.  His
Eminence might decline to answer, but everything that was said during
the interview was on the record.  It is printed here in full and
without comment.

The second session was much less formal.  It took place in the private
apartment of His Eminence in Rome.  Present were His Eminence Cardinal
Aquino, former Nuncio Apostolic in Argentina, Senora Isabel Ortega, and
the leader of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, Senora Rosalia Lodano.
The conditions were changed also.  I agreed in advance that certain
subjects would be discussed off the record.  I consented to this
arrangement and I have observed it.  However, certain information
embargoed during the discussion was available to me from other
quarters.  This I have not scrupled to use.  What I hope to have
captured is the public and the private face of a complex man who,
though he is little known to the Church at large, will not fail to
impress himself on his colleagues in conclave.

The public man is easy to depict.  He is a presence in any company.  He
is tall, lean and handsome, with aquiline features and dark, observant
eyes.  When he smiles, his face lights up and he radiates an eager
interest.  When he is displeased, his features harden into an
unreadable mask.  He is always courteous; but, as I discovered at my
first meeting, he is impatient of tricks and professional ruses.  I
learned quickly to deal from the top of the deck.  In professional
terms I found him grave, occasionally humorous and always precise.  He
appreciated the fact that I had come well prepared and that I knew how
to spell the words.  He returned the compliment, with the well-turned
answers which you will read on this page.

The private man revealed himself by indirection.  First, he was engaged
in a delicate diplomatic enterprise.  The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo
want to bring Cardinal Aquino before an Italian court on charges of
complicity and collaboration with the Argentine military dictatorship,
in the death and disappearance of Italian nationals, both lay folk and
those in religious professions, who were tortured, murdered or simply
disappeared during the dirty war.  To accomplish this, they need a
waiver of immunities by Vatican City State.  This, one guesses, would
be unlikely to be granted.  So, enter Cardinal Rossini, himself a
victim of the dirty war who, as a young priest, was flogged and
violated in front of his own church.  He was rescued from further
horror by Senora Ortega and her father.

While her father went on to Buenos Aires to negotiate a deal for
Rossini's safe-conduct out of Argentina, Senora Ortega fled with him to
a country estate and nursed him back to health.

I saw photographic evidence which I have agreed not to describe in
these pages of what was done to Rossini.

I perceived then, very clearly, how Rossini achieved a personal
salvation through a woman.  I was privileged to see them together under
circumstances of extreme paradox.  Both are now in their fifties.  They
had not seen each other for a quarter of a century.  Even so, there was
no doubt in my mind that once, for however brief a time, they had been
lovers and that the same love still endured in them both.  It lit up
the sparse bachelor room in the Cardinal's residence.  One read it in
every glance and gesture.  It lent a special character to Rossini's
plea for a truce, if not a settlement between Aquino and the women who
were his accusers.

Isabel Ortega is married.  Her husband is a serving diplomat at the
United Nations.  She herself has pursued a successful career as a
specialist in Hispanic American relations.  Their daughter is an
artist, working on restorations at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Cardinal Rossini, on the other hand, stood high in favour with the late
Pontiff, who sent him on many missions abroad.  It is clear that Papal
favour brought its own penalties.  Some of his colleagues envy him.
Others are prone to gossip about his early history, carefully planted
from the earliest days by the military dictatorship through its Roman
Embassy.  But not even his most hostile judges have ever been able to
challenge the integrity and fidelity of his clerical life in Rome.

There is a size and stature about Rossini which impresses one
instantly.  This, one knows, is a man who has paid his dues.  This is a
man whom I would believe if he talked or preached about love.  I would
guess that he unlocks his heart very rarely, but when he opens it, one
sees the glowing coals inside.  I know for a fact that he is now facing
another tragedy.  Senora Ortega is returning immediately to the United
States for treatment of an illness already diagnosed as terminal.

How will Rossini be regarded in the conclave?  He will perhaps be
better known than he expects.  He is recognised as a man who travels
light, moves fast, sees and reports clearly.  Such a one tends to
underrate the impression he makes, because he does not concentrate on
himself but on the matters in hand.

I have heard both sides of the Aquino story: from the Cardinal, whom I
interviewed for this journal, and from the Mothers of the Plaza de
Mayo.  There is no love lost between Aquino and Rossini, who are as
different as chalk and cheese.  They are curial colleagues but
certainly not friends.  I would say that Cardinal Aquino was fortunate
to have found an advocate as strong and let me say it as generous, as
his colleague, Rossini.

The affair of the disappeared ones, and of all the other thousands
whose fate is known, will not go away.  No silence is deep enough to
engulf so many accusers.  It will not go away for Cardinal Aquino.  My
guess is that the new Pontiff, whoever he may be, will not hand him
over to a civil court -though more and more clerics are being handed to
civil courts for criminal abuse of the young, a tragedy much smaller in
scale than the brutalities of the dirty war.  However, Aquino will
still have to reckon with his own conscience, as Luca, Cardinal Rossini
will have to carry for the rest of his life the scars on his back and
in his psyche.

Now comes the new paradox.  Both Aquino and Rossini will enter the
conclave to elect a new Pope.  Both are, by definition, candidates for
office.  Given the climate of reaction which is already closing in,
neither can be too readily dismissed.  Aquino is mature timber,
seasoned some believe stained by long diplomatic and curial service.
Rossini, on the other hand, is the lone wolf, familiar with the
outlands and uplands, nursing his love and slowly transmuting his
griefs into service.  Of the two, I prefer him as an outside bet for
election.  Why?  Because I believe he could keep the coals of love
alive, even if he were elected and the great freeze of absolute power
came upon him.

There was more yet; but Rossini had read enough to know that his
attachment for Isabel was no longer a secret.  It would be picked up in
some form or other by all the world media.  He was glad that Isabel had
made peace with her husband and that he had helped towards their
reconciliation.  The revelation of her illness to the media was an
unexpected shock; but he had to admit that, by and large, Steffi
Guillemin had kept her promise and that her commentary had been more
than he expected.  He wondered what comments the Camerlengo would have
on the matter.  He was still musing on the possible fall-out from the
article when the Secretary of State looked up from his own reading and
said:

"I hope my translators can give a decent rendition of your text, Luca.
There is much more passion in it than I expected."

"Is that a bad thing, Turi?"

"No, I think it fits well with Mademoiselle Guillemin's portrait of you
as a very passionate man."

"Does that trouble you?"

"Not at all!  If there is no passion in this election, the chance of
change will be lost.  If we don't vote ourselves the right man, we're
all in trouble.  This is our one opportunity to make the barque of
Peter ship-shape for a millennial journey."

"I've always liked that metaphor," said Rossini simply.  "I used it in
my interview with Guillemin."

"I know.  Your words impressed me, too.  As you know, my father was a
sea-captain," said the Secretary of State.  "He could read the stars
and he loved the sea.  I am told his crews always respected him because
he ran a safe ship and cared for his men."

"Is he still alive?"

"No.  He died in the early fifties.  My mother brought up two girls and
two boys in her widowhood.  I entered the Church.  My brother became
head of the family.  He's an executive with Italcable.  Both my sisters
are married.  My mother is a moma six times over ..."  He gave one of
his rare smiles and made a gesture of surrender.  "There!  You have
finally coaxed me into family talk.  Anything else you'd like to
know?"

"Yes.  Why this meeting with the Camerlengo?  I hate walking blind into
a conference.  Your father would have understood that, I think."

"He would have understood very well.  He used to say to me, "The wise
men were given a star to lead them to the Christ child.  Every sailor
has to know the stars that lead him home."  Let's go, shall we?
Baldassare hates to be kept waiting, and just now he's carrying the
whole Church on his shoulders.  It makes him just a little
irritable."

The gathering in the Camerlengo's office was larger than either man had
expected.  The Archbishop of Los Angeles was there, the Prefect of the
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Maronite Patriarch of
Antioch, the Archbishops of Tokyo and Bangkok and the Archbishop of
Ernakulam in India, who was of the Syro Malabar rite.  Aquino was also
there, with the Archbishop of Seoul.  There were eleven people in all.
Rossini wondered why and to what special pattern they had been
co-opted.  The Camerlengo explained with his usual blandness.

"It was not possible nor even desirable to have a full consistory of
Cardinals before the conclave.  This is the last of a long series of
small gatherings, at which talks have taken place and our senior
brethren, excluded from the conclave, have been able to share their
views and their experiences with us.  Tomorrow, between four and five
in the afternoon, you will repair to Saint Martha's House where you
will be lodged I hope more comfortably than conclavists in other times.
On your arrival, your rooms will be allocated and you will be provided
with all necessary documents: the timetables, the orders of rituals,
the oaths of secrecy, the rules of the conclave, the names of the
various persons who will be there to assist you: secretaries,
confessors, a doctor, a surgeon, nursing orders, and so on.  If any of
you have special dietary problems, the kitchen staff will do their best
to accommodate you.  There will be room-to-room communication by
telephone, but no outside contacts at all, except in cases of extreme
urgency and then only with permission of the Marshal of the conclave.
There is, however, one matter on which a special briefing seemed
necessary.  Certain of our brothers have requested me to make known,
quite formally, that if by any chance they were elected, they would
decline the honour.  They made the point that by abdicating the
candidacy in advance, they could save the electors time and trouble.  I
have pointed out to them, of course, that all electors must be free to
cast their votes as they choose, even if they know the candidate has
abdicated in advance.  This may suggest an imperfection in the system.
However, the electors are free to use the system in any way they choose
to bring about the valid election of their own candidate.  I raise the
matter now, informally, because when you enter the conclave, you will
find a final complete list which falls under the oath of secrecy and
which applies to all conclavists.  However, certain of our brethren
have already made their intentions plain and public.  Our brother from
Westminster has already announced his intention of retiring to his
monastery to go fishing.  Matteo Aquino, who is here with us this
morning, has abdicated his candidacy so that there may be no fall-out
in the new pontificate from long-ago events in Argentina."

"One asks," the intervention was made by Gottfried Gruber, "one is
compelled to ask whether, in the same context and for the same good
reason, our eminent colleague Rossini might consider a public
withdrawal of his candidacy?"

There was a sudden deathly silence in the room.  Rossini rose slowly in
his place.  Ignoring Gruber, he turned to face the Camerlengo.  Very
quietly, very deliberately, he asked:

"We have known each other a long time, Baldassare.  Did you have any
knowledge that this challenge was to be put to me in this meeting?"

"No, Luca."

He waited for more.  The Camerlengo did not offer another word.

Rossini turned to Aquino.  "And you, Matteo, did you prompt the
question?"

Aquino shrugged off the challenge.

"In a manner of speaking, I suppose I did.  After I had read the report
of your interview in Le Monde I made a jocular remark to Gruber here:
something to the effect that we lived in less tolerant and more
scandalous times, and the press dominated our lives much more than we
are prepared to admit.  On the other hand, I said that you had survived
the scandal better than I."

"What scandal?"

"Your relationship, brief as it was, with Senora Ortega: a priest with
a married woman.  That's what it was, that's what it will become again.
Once we are in the history books, we can't step off the pages."

Rossini turned slowly to face Gruber.

"And you, Gottfried?  You're the watchdog of the Church, master of the
hounds of God.  You feel I should make a public abdication of my
candidacy, because of this episode in my young life?"

"In today's climate, yes."

"And you, Turi, you are my immediate superior.  What do you have to
say?"

"I have no comment," said the Secretary of State.

Rossini turned away from him and addressed himself once more to the
Camerlengo.

"With your permission, Baldassare, and with the consent of our
brethren, I should like to deal with this matter now."

The Camerlengo frowned but put the formal question:

" Pldcetne frlitres?"

The answer was unanimous: "Placet."

Rossini stood for a long moment in silence, gathering himself, settling
his turbulent emotions, searching for the appropriate words.

"My brothers.  We have all met before.  Sometimes, I came to you as
personal emissary of His late Holiness.  Sometimes, I received you in
Rome in my own house.  We have celebrated the Eucharist together.  Now,
you sit silent, while I am urged to abdicate rights and privileges
conferred upon me by our late Pontiff.  Why so?  Am I on trial here? Or
simply under challenge?  I will not defend myself to you because I have
nothing to defend.  I will not plead with you because I have no cause
to justify.  I did not plead when they strung me up on a cartwheel and
flayed me and violated me with a riding-crop in front of my own church
and my own people.  I screamed, I shouted, I prayed yes, I cursed my
tormentors but I did not plead.  But when Isabel Ortega killed a man to
save me, then took me into her care and fled with me into hiding, then,
I pleaded!  I pleaded man-child to mother, man to woman, whom I had
renounced unknowingly, make me whole!  Make a man out of this wreckage.
She did that.  She did it by the gift of herself and all her
womanhood.  She did it in daily risk of capture, torture and death.  Do
you find this scandalous?  I have never been able to see it as anything
but an act of love and of healing.

"How my brother Gottfried Gruber judges me, how his assessors might
rate my acts and my attitudes, is irrelevant to me.  I came to Rome
under no pretence.  I was brought here under a deal made by our brother
Aquino with the military dictatorship in Argentina.  I was delivered, a
package of damaged goods, to the Pontiff.  There was a price-tag
attached to the package, and the price was silence.  Isabel Ortega and
her family were held hostage to that silence.  I was held, too, a
bonded servant to Mother Church, whom I have served, not always with
joy or love, but fidelity and punctuality until this day.  I have made
myself a public advocate for our brother Aquino, who is still
vulnerable to the consequences of his service in Argentina.  The
Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo have a case against him.  I have tried to
mitigate their rage against him, although he now sits silent.

"His late Holiness befriended me.  I made my first confession in this
city to him personally.  I told him I repented whatever guilts resided
in my own acts, and that I would accept whatever penance he chose to
lay upon me, but I could not accept his absolution if it involved a
condemnation or a censure of the love and gratitude which I bore, and
still bear, to Isabel Ortega.  He did not exact that.  But the penance
he gave me was harsh enough: a life time of separation in honourable
exile, yes, but as a hostage none the less.  I have performed the
penance.  I have paid the debt.  Isabel Ortega came to Rome for a few
days to bid me goodbye.  She is terminally ill.  Her presence helped
you also, Matteo.  It softened the attitude of the Mothers of the Plaza
de Mayo in your regard.  I trust you will remember her in your prayers.
Now, let me ask you all: are we still crying scandal here?  I will not
tolerate it from you, my brothers!  If you want a Church of the
perfect, I see no place in it for me.  Peter betrayed his master, Paul
raised no hand or voice at the execution of Stephen, the first martyr,
Mary of Magdala was beloved of the Master because she had loved much,
Augustine was both a libertine and heretic before he came to belief.
Tertullian separated himself because he could not forgive those who had
quailed under persecution.

"At this moment, you are custodians of this our Church.  You do not own
it: you are responsible to God for the People of God.  Finally, I
answer our brother Gottfried here.  The office I hold was conferred
upon me, legally, with all its rights and privileges.  I will surrender
none of them to a false charge of scandal.  God forbid you should think
of making me Pope!  God forbid that any here should abridge my right of
candidacy.  I thank you, Eminences, for your patient hearing.  I beg
you to excuse me."

He was halfway to the door when the Camerlengo called him back.

"Wait, Luca!  Please resume your seat.  We have more business to
transact."

Rossini hesitated for a second, then turned back to the Camerlengo,
bowed and sat down.  The Camerlengo looked around at his audience and
asked formally:

"Does anyone wish to comment on the remarks of our brother Luca?"

No one answered.  Rossini knew he had won a victory: he had faced down
the Grand Electors, but the taste of triumph was like gall in his
gullet.  Aquino he could understand and Gottfried Gruber, but
Baldassare the Chamberlain and Turi, these were his friends, yet they
would not raise a voice to defend him.  Then, the Camerlengo gave the
floor to the Cardinal Archbishop of Tokyo, a small, smooth man who
looked younger than his sixty-eight years.  He spoke perfect Italian,
coloured only by the Japanese lilt to the phrases.  His tone was
deprecating and gentle.

"I have to say that I am troubled by what I have heard here this
morning and by what I have heard in other gatherings since my arrival.
There is a friction between brethren which I find alien and upsetting.
There is pressure to impose viewpoints and disciplines as if we were an
army and not a family joined in love.  Let me try to explain something.
We Christians in Asia live as exotics in huge communities who have
their own beliefs, much older than ours; but they are still our people,
our friends, our relatives.  We are forced, therefore, to carry out our
mission of spreading the Gospel with humility, discretion and great
charity.  To use the words of Pope John XXIII: "We seek always that
which unites us instead of that which divides."  This means that in our
teaching, we have to work through a large number of semantic barriers.
We have to cast our Christian thinking in the terms of other languages
and other cultures.  We have to examine, with an open mind, the
religious propositions of other great religions, always in the
conviction that whatever is true, by whomsoever said, is an authentic
revelation of the Spirit.  We need great care and great discernment to
put ourselves in this attitude of mind.  We have to concede emotionally
what we admit intellectually, that even the most refined perceptions of
theologians, the most precise prescriptions of canon law, will be a
barrier to religious understanding if they are not expressed in the
language of the heart.  The knowledge of God and of the truths of
salvation is offered to all; therefore it must be available in all the
modes of human communication.

"There is a great mystery here: the mystery of God's own secret
wordless working in every human life, which the Divinity itself
sustains in being.  It is always a dangerous enterprise to impose a
verbal definition on this mystery, or to condemn those who seek to
explore it with new tools or by unfamiliar paths.  Our faith is not a
series of propositions which we impose on people as a kind of entry fee
into the Kingdom.  Faith is an illumination which lights everything and
every happening in the world.  It is like a candle in a room full of
mirrors, repeating and reflecting itself to infinity.  We do not define
Christ in our creeds.  We proclaim him: "Light from light, true God
from true God, begotten not made of one substance with the Father."
That proclamation was put together by Mediterranean people.  How do I,
a Japanese Christian, explain it to my people?  I do it the only way I
can, by making myself the mirror which reflects the light, however
imperfectly.  We are met here to elect ourselves a Bishop of Rome.  He
will by tradition become the successor of Peter the Fisherman, who was
the first to deny his master but who was named by him as the
foundation-stone upon which he would build his Church.  We have to find
ourselves another Peter, sensible of his own frailty, sensible of the
needs of a vast, scattered flock.  We must not create myths about him.
We must not claim that all creation will be made plain to him the
moment he is elected.  We must choose a man careful of his people, open
to them, not seeking always to direct them in all the acts of their
lives, not using against them the powerful bureaucracies of the Church,
but trying to learn from them, through the daily parables of their
human experience.  Once we elect him, we cannot depose him.  We should
not, therefore, indulge in personal jealousies, but seek that one among
us whom we can trust to guide the flock towards new and more open
pastures."

"Amen," Luca Rossini's assent was strong, but, even as he uttered the
word, he wondered whether his own belief would survive the outcome.

The meeting went on for another half-hour.  When it was over, he
offered formal courtesies, pleaded another pressing engagement and left
in haste.

He wandered down the Via della Conciliazione and turned into a shop
selling pieties to the tourists.  He idled away a half-hour buying a
gold medallion of the Virgin and a handsome trinket box to hold it.  He
wrote, in a fine Italian ate script, the card which Isabel had ordered:
"The little Virgin you gave me has made me very happy.  I send you her
image, so you will not be lonely without her.  I send it in gold to
thank you for becoming my sister.  Pray for me as I shall pray for you.
Isabel Ortega."

He asked the sales assistant to take great care with the wrapping,
since he would be asking the new Pope to bless it.  He paid the bill,
acknowledged the fictional discount "for our distinguished prelates",
shoved the package in his pocket and strolled like any tourist down
towards the river.  As he walked, he found himself haunted by an
irrelevant tag of verse which Piers Hallett had tossed at him over a
dinner table:

Think you, if Laura had been Petrarch's wife.  He would have written
sonnets all his life?

Back in his own apartment, he began instructing his small household.
Tonight, at eight, he would dine at home with Piers Hallett for
company.  Tomorrow, he would enter the conclave.  His luggage should be
packed for what could be a week's sojourn more or less, according to
how well the electors co-operated with the Spirit working among them!

His daily uniform would be the black cassock with scarlet piping, the
scarlet skull cap, and his pectoral cross.  He would need enough
underwear to accommodate any breakdown in laundry services at the House
of Saint Martha.  He would need a pair of white surplices and his mitre
for the ceremonial aftermath, because, although he was a Cardinal
Presbyter by rank, he was also a titular bishop of the Church of San
Sebastian on the Palatine.

He would need his diary and some private stationery.  No mail could be
sent or received during the conclave, but private communication within
it was permissible, if possibly indiscreet.  On the heels of these
thoughts, came the vagrant impulse to write to Isabel and to Luisa.
Instantly, he suppressed it.  That, too, could be another indiscretion.
Raul Ortega had care of them now; all Luca Rossini could do was wait
for news.

His thoughts turned back to the events of the morning: the eloquence of
the Japanese Cardinal, and the unexpected silences of the Camerlengo
and the Secretary of State.  His own resentment had died as swiftly as
it had surged.  This was, after all, the name of the political game in
the hierarchy of a Papal court.  Silence had a thousand interpretations
and carried no penalties.  Words were subject always to gloss,
interpretation and altered emphasis.  They were weapons for the
hostile, but de fences frail as gossamer against a determined attacker.
Yet, neither Baldassare nor Turi had attacked him.  They had simply
withdrawn themselves to watch how their junior colleague might fare in
his joust with the Grand Electors.

There would be more jousts to come inside the conclave itself, when the
Grand Electors and the outsiders met together in the lounge and the
coffee bar and the smoking-room in the House of Saint Martha, or as
they walked in procession to the Chapel where the votes were cast, four
times a day, until a new Pope was named.

Alone, now, and cold at heart, Luca, Cardinal Rossini reasoned with
himself.  He had walked thus far on his own two feet.  He would walk
the last mile and leave the future to God provided God were still
present in the cosmos and the human chaos.

Fourteen

C3A, CARDINAL ROSSINI AND HIS PERSONAL CONFESSOR, MON SIGNOR Piers
Hallett, presented themselves at the reception desk of Saint Martha's
House at four in the afternoon.

Named for the bustling biblical housewife, sister of the resurrected
Lazarus, the building had been planned in 1993 as a hotel-residence for
visiting church officials and semi-permanent Vatican staff.  The funds,
according to report, had been furnished by the Knights of Columbus in
the United States.  Now, it was turned over to the conclavists and
their small army of attendants, from scullions to sacristans.  The
architect of the conclave and his technicians had been working
desperately to make it secure against intrusion by outsiders, or escape
by its inmates, who would be held there incommunicado until they were
able to announce the election of a new Pontiff.

The building had not been without its problems.  The Green Party of
Italy had protested that it would block the view of Saint Peter's dome
from the Via di Porta Cavalleggeri.  So, the architects had lopped off
one storey and built a sub-basement area.  Then came the difficulty of
providing a secure entrance and exit into the Vatican confines for the
sequestered Cardinals.  So, a temporary sealed passageway had been
provided through the Basilica itself to the Sistine Chapel where the
votes were cast.

When they came to register, with a long line of international
colleagues, Cardinal Rossini was assigned a chamber among his peers on
the second floor, while Hallett was relegated to the basement.  In this
place, some servants of God were more equal than others.

Their baggage, however, was searched with equal thoroughness by Vatican
security staff to make sure that neither was carrying a mobile phone, a
bugging device, or any other suspicious electronic item.  Clearly, the
Church had small trust in the ultimate integrity of its princes.  It
was specifically prescribed, for instance, in the Apostolic
Constitution that the crime of simony, the buying or selling of the
Papal office, would not invalidate the election.  It was further
prescribed that any promises made to procure an election were
unenforceable afterwards.  In earlier times, the office had been bought
and sold.  Sometimes, murder had been done for it.  It was clearly
acknowledged that ancient tricks might be repeated in this millennial
age.  Each guest was presented with a folder which contained all the
necessary information' for his stay: the facilities of the house, its
restrictions, the names and telephone numbers of its residents and
service personnel, a chart of its public rooms, precautions in case of
fire, the texts of the oaths of secrecy which would be administered in
public that same evening, both to electors and conclave staff, a list
of confessors, secretaries and medical attendants.  All these items
were embossed with the Sede Vncnnte symbol, the red and yellow striped
umbrella, called "the Pavilion."

There was a momentary confusion when Rossini sought to confirm the
special arrangements which had been made for him to receive news of
Isabel from New York.  There were the usual Roman shrugs, pursed lips,
fumblings through papers, misinformation punched up on computer
screens.  There appeared to be no record of such arrangements.

Rossini stood over the desk, menacing as an Andean condor, until the
relevant directive was located and the approved contact was presented
to him and to Hallett.  Then, he demanded that a copy of the directive
be provided immediately for himself and Piers Hallett.  Could it not
wait, Eminence?  No, it could not.  Tomorrow would be another day.
There would be someone else behind the desk and the conclavists would,
in any case, be denied access to this part of the house.  So, please,
my friend, just hand over the papers in duplicate.

When the documents were passed to him, he responded with a thin smile
of thanks; then permitted the porter to show them through the foyer to
elevators which led to their temporary prison house.  Piers Hallett
celebrated the moment with a Cromwellian quip:

"I like the way you do business, Eminence.  Trust in God and keep your
powder dry!"

"Your first duty, Piers, is to check the Vicariate office three times a
day.  I don't want messages lost or filed away until doomsday."

"Trust me, Eminence."

"I do, Piers!  It's the others I worry about.  We'll meet in my room
after the second afternoon ballot each day for a libation and a
chat."

"How long do you think the election will take?"

"Hard to say.  I have the feeling this could be a long process.  The
rifts between the parties are wide.  The stakes for the conservatives
are very high.  The fears of the liberals that we may have another
ice-age run very deep.  There's no way of making a forecast until the
voting begins tomorrow.  They'll be administering the oaths at seven
tonight.  The Secretary of State will deliver his message on the state
of the Church.  I'll say my piece.  Then, we'll dine like good brothers
together.  There will be one vote on the first morning and four a day
thereafter, morning and afternoon, until a new Pope is named.  You'll
have a lot of free time on your hands.  Keep your ears open and let me
know any gossip you hear below stairs!"

"For shame, Eminence!"  said Hallett with a grin.  "This is a sacred
enterprise.  What could there possibly be to gossip about?"

"As you say, Piers, what could there possibly be?"

"Meantime, apart from the gossip, what am I supposed to do with
myself?"

"Pray, if you can, and think a lot," said Rossini soberly.  "This is
the underside of the tapestry, my friend.  You'll see the best and the
worst of this Church of ours.  There are no illusions here and you have
a decision to make.  As, indeed, have I."

"I wish you light and courage, Eminence!"

The porter carried Rossini's luggage into the elevator while Hallett,
carrying his own bags, descended on foot to the lower depths.

After settling himself in his quarters, a compact but comfortable
bedroom with its own shower and toilet, a desk, an armchair and a
priedieu with a crucifix set above it, Rossini scanned the list of
conclavists, ticking off the names of those he had met in his travels,
making his own cabbalistic notations on the career background of each
one and the dispositions of each in terms of character and personal
loyalty.

They came from all over the world: Ethiopia and Africa, Lebanon, India,
China, the Philippines, the Americas, Asia and the East Indies and the
Pacific islands.  Their skins were black as ebony, yellow and brown,
and pale as old porcelain.  Their names made a polyphonic litany. Their
languages were a motley of tongues, helped out by the Latin of their
schooling, coloured by the vestiges of regional and tribal accents from
their mother tongues.  They were all high in dignity.  In normal times
their power was measured by the size of the populations they governed,
by their nearness to, or their distance from, the seat of power in
Rome, by the weight their counsels carried in the Papal court.

The courtiers themselves the Cardinals of the Curia moved among them
with a certain patronising ease.  They were, after all, the castellans
of this Roman fortress.  They knew all its winding passageways, all the
adits to all the congregations and councils and committees and where
the tentacles of power twined, and how -swiftly or by a lifetime of
slow circuits an outlander might arrive at a personal dialogue with the
Pontiff.  They were not all Italians, as they had been in the past. The
Curia had been internationalised to include British, Belgians, French,
Germans, Italians, Slovaks, Spaniards, South Americans, Africans,
Asians and Australians.

There was another group also, peripheral to this one, and smaller, but
still powerful the metropolitans of the big Italian Sees, Milan,
Bologna, Venice, Naples, Florence, Palermo, Turin.  They were clothed
with another kind of authority: pastors of great cities with long,
autonomous histories.  In the election itself, they were men to be
reckoned with because they were known as pastors and not as
bureaucrats, and their lives were set among ordinary folk.

The Archbishops from the United States were as one wag put it mutants
of earlier migrants from Europe: Irish, Italian, Polish.  Any one of
these was a possible candidate, but all were marked with an invisible
sign.  They were the offspring of a democratic revolution, which in
historic terms was still too recent for comfort.  More importantly,
they were members of an aggressively capitalist society, in which the
profession and practice of any religion was a free option, while its
imposition was outlawed.

Strangely enough, the largest contingent of electors came from the
former colonial territories of Africa: Angola, Benin, the Cameroons,
Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal and the rest.  The image of an African Pope was
a seductive one.  It would revive the image of a universal Church, a
House of all Nations.  It would rebut for ever the charges of a racist
religion, a Eurocentric Christianity.  But, in the cold light of modern
history, it could also emphasise the bloody tribalism which still
bedevilled the African continent.

For his own part, Rossini was convinced that they must find and elect a
man on his own visible merits and virtues, a good man, a simple man,
which did not signify a stupid one, but one who could speak from the
heart to the hearts of the people of God.  The politicians of the
Sacred College were a necessary evil, but their shifts and stratagems
matched ill with the stark simplicity of the Gospel.  The clerical
money-men were ever present in the precincts of every temple, but they
should not control the Holy of Holies.  The censors and inquisitors
should be held where they belonged: in service to the sacred deposit of
faith.  They should not not ever again be appointed as judges over the
people, or usurp the primacy of their consciences.

So, as he moved casually from group to group, saluting old
acquaintances, introducing himself to new ones, Luca Rossini tried to
decide on whom to cast the first vote in the first ballot the next
morning.  This first ballot was always a trial run to establish, if
possible, the spread of the candidates and to identify, if possible,
the voting blocs which were pushing them.  This evening, however, was
simply prelude and preamble: a reunion of the smallest but the most
powerful club in the world.  Drinks were served.  Canapes were offered.
The talk was temperate, the exchanges were tentative.  The members were
more eager to hear opinions than to offer them.

Rossini did not linger too long with any individual group.  He knew
that he was being courted, solicited, studied, not merely for his
single vote, but for what influence he might exercise after a quarter
of a century of survival inside the Vatican.  There were occasional
jokes about his recent notoriety in the press.  He could read them as
he chose: jibes or gestures of respect for a seasoned campaigner.  He
paused for a moment with a pair of prelates from the United States. One
was the Cardinal Archbishop of Baltimore, the other was the man from
Los Angeles who had been present at the previous day's meeting with the
Camerlengo.  The latter had a large constituency of migrants and
refugees from the South Americas and a fluent command of Castilian and
dialectal Spanish.  He seemed eager to make good his lost opportunity
with Rossini.

"That interview with Guillemin in Le Monde, a splendid performance.  I
liked your stand-up style on the sex question.  Muy vi rill It helps us
all.  You know the firestorm we've just been through on the sex issues!
I thought Gruber was way out of line when he suggested you resign your
candidacy.  I was tempted to intervene, but ..."

"As well you didn't," Rossini was smooth as honey.  "Our colleague from
Tokyo said what was needed, and still avoided contention."

"He's an impressive guy.  A shade exotic in his theologies, perhaps;
but that's a personal opinion.  We of the West are much more
comfortable with Aquinas, wouldn't you say?"

"It depends on how we teach him," said Rossini.  "We've had some
dangerously narrow theologies in recent years."

"Are you suggesting," the man from Baltimore intervened in the talk,
"are you seriously proposing we should change our teaching?"

"Rather that we be prudent in the choice of our new leader," said Luca
Rossini.

"How would you feel about a Pope from the United States?"  He said it
with a smile, but the smile was not in his eyes.  "This time, it's
probably too early; but the Americas, North or South will have to make,
sooner or later, a bid for the See of Peter.  After all, the United
States still holds the world in military and financial balance."

"Spiritually," said Rossini, "you seem often much divided.  You profess
freedom of speech and conscience, but you still train killers for
counter-insurgency in the South Americas.  You claim right to life, but
you still conduct state executions.  You claim freedom of conscience
but you conduct violent blockades of abortion clinics.  I should hate
to be the first American Pope."

"Someone has to make a start."  Lacey of Los Angeles had a sense of
humour.  Baltimore was less tolerant.  He challenged Rossini.

"So, whom would you propose to us?"

"I propose no one," said Rossini amiably.  "I cast my vote and let the
Spirit take care of the outcome.  Excuse me, gentlemen."

As he faded back into the gathering crowd, Baltimore said tersely:

"There's another arrogant son of a gun.  What does Rome do to these
people?"

"I don't think he's arrogant," said Lacey of Los Angeles.  "He's a hard
man who knows the name of the game.  He might be the best protection
we've got against Opus Dci and the Grand Electors."

"And what, pray, is wrong with Opus Dci?"  demanded Baltimore.  "We've
done very well working with them."

"I'm sure you have," said Lacey.  "But I'd reserve judgment until
you've seen their final bill."

Rossini's next encounter was a more agreeable one, with his former
professor and biblical scholar, who was now the Archbishop of Milan,
the most important diocese in Italy.  He was a man of quiet warmth and
rich scholarship who, when he was not on the road among his parishes,
conducted seminars in his own cathedral for Christians, Jews, Muslims
and secular scholars of all faiths, to whom he offered an open forum
for discussion and debate.  With him was the Archbishop of Montreal,
who had just put the question:

"Whom do we have who can overleap the centuries and take us back to the
simplicities of the Apostolic Church?"

"No one," said Rossini.  "We all carry too much history on our backs
and the history qualifies everything we do or say.  The Holy Father
went to Paris to greet the young.  Great demonstrations, great fervour
and enthusiasm until suddenly the massacre of Saint Bartholomew's Day
loomed up like a black cloud out of the past!"

"That's the whole point, I believe," said the studious man from Milan.
"We can't change history.  We make our worst mistakes when we try to
gloss it or rewrite it.  The captivities in Babylon and Egypt are as
permanent a part of Jewish history as the holocaust of our time.  Our
problem is that we believe that time will wipe some of the dirt off us,
before we have to acknowledge our own misdeeds.  It never does."

"Public confession is, to say the least, a disarming process."  Rossini
felt comfortable with these men.  His whole manner was different, open
and unconstrained.  "For myself, I know I could not have survived in
this city if I had tried to live by concealment and pretence.  But too
often we reduce ourselves to absurdities.  Now, it is proposed we have
glass-sided confessional booths, so that the faithful can monitor the
conduct of confessor and penitent!  At the same time, we try to
suppress the most ancient practice of a public reconciliation by all
the faithful at Mass!  I don't know what we or the people gain from
that."

"Little enough," said the man from Milan.  "Privacy is available to
those who need it.  Reconciliation has been a public act from the
earliest days when Christ came to the Baptist at Jordan ford.  The
problem is that we, the pastors, cannot be seen to break the Roman
rules and we can only bend them so far."

"That's one of the problems we're here to solve," said Luca Rossini.
"We have to open the windows again, let fresh air blow through the
House of God."

"The windows have been closed too long," said the Canadian.  "The
shutters are stiff and warped.  It will take a strong man to force them
open again."

"Or a simple one," said Rossini.  "A plain country carpenter who isn't
afraid to use a chisel and a crowbar to break through useless
timber."

When he drifted away a moment later, the two senior prelates looked at
each other.  Their looks conveyed the same unspoken question: "Could he
do the job?"  For Rossini himself, the question posed itself
differently.  The Church needed a conciliator, a man with an open mind
and an open heart and a sense of history.  Sixteen centuries before,
Milan had been the capital of the Western Empire and Ambrose, the
governor of Aemelia and Liguria had come to the city to mediate a
dispute between the candidates for the Christian Bishopric.  According
to the historians, he himself had been proclaimed the Bishop even
though he was not yet a Christian.  Ambrose had been a phenomenon in
his own time and perhaps, Rossini thought, a prophetic paradigm of the
future.  He had been born and bred to a senatorial service in the
twilight of an Empire; yet he had managed to preserve and pass on to
succeeding ages the best of the yesterdays: a belief in continuity, in
basic justice, a respect for civic order.  He was a man who had
straddled the world of spirit and the world of sense, and kept his
foothold firm in both.

Rossini found himself wondering whether his own one-time mentor, a man
of most eminent reason, wise in history, hopeful for the future, might
well be the man to lead the Church into the twentieth century.  It
would certainly be a battle to elect him.  He had no taste for
intrigue.  He was a Jesuit and the Jesuits had been a long time out of
favour.  The men of Opus Dci had been long entrenched in their posts of
observation and financial control.

Even so, this was a man to hope in, a man on whom to risk his own
personal vote.

By six-thirty in the evening, Saint Martha's House had been cleared of
all un authorised personnel.  The conclavists and their attendants were
locked inside and the members of the Vatican Vtgilanza were posted at
entrances and exits.  At seven o'clock, the first oath of the conclave
was administered to all participants and staff.

I promise and swear that I will observe inviolable secrecy about each
and every matter concerning the election of the new Pontiff which has
been discussed or decided in the Congregations of the Cardinals, also
about whatever happens in the conclave or place of election, directly
or indirectly, and finally about the voting and every other matter that
may in any way come to my knowledge.

I will not violate this secret in any way, directly or indirectly, by
signs, words or in writing or in any other manner.  Moreover, I promise
and swear not to use in the conclave any kind of transmitting or
receiving instrument, nor to use devices for taking pictures; and this
under pain of excommunication latae sententiae (that is, automatically)
reserved in especial manner to the Apostolic See.

I will maintain this secret scrupulously and conscientiously even after
the election of the Pontiff, unless special permission or explicit
authorisation be granted to me by the same Pontiff.

In like manner I promise and swear that I will never give any help or
support any interference, opposition or hostility or other form of
intervention by which the civil powers of any order or degree, or any
group of individuals might wish to interfere in the election.

So help me God, and these holy Gospels which I touch with my hand.

After this, the electors themselves made a separate oath to adhere to
the Apostolic Constitution, to defend the rights of the Holy See, to
refuse all vetoes by any secular power on the election.  Once again,
secrecy was enjoined and affirmed:

Above all, we promise and swear to observe with the greatest fidelity
and with all persons, including the conclavists, the secret concerning
what takes place in the conclave or place of election, directly or
indirectly concerning the scrutinies; not to break this secret in any
way, either during the conclave or after the election of the new
Pontiff, unless we are given explicit authorisation from the Pontiff.

At seven-twenty precisely, the Secretary of State rose to deliver his
formal report on the condition of the Church.  It began with a brief
valediction to the dead Pontiff: "... We have mourned him.  We have
prayed for him, we have commended him to God as a good and faithful
servant.  For us the work goes on.  First, we have to follow the
apostolic tradition and elect a new Pontiff.  Let me show you the world
he will face ..."

Briefly, he led them on a tour of the world's powder magazines:
resurgent Islam, China exploding into the twentieth century, America
watching jealously for incursions into her markets, Africa dying a slow
death by AIDS, India and Pakistan building their nuclear arsenals,
Arabs and Israelis still at war over pocket handkerchief patches of
dirt, the tribes of Europe battling still to maintain their ethnic and
religious identities, the resources of the planet -forests, oxygen and
water being consumed at a profligate pace while the Church still
refused to reason with the stark realities of over-population.  Then,
in the same dry fashion, he dropped a live grenade into the assembly:

"We, my brothers, bear our own share of blame for all this.  We, too,
have fomented our wars, compounded our massacres in the name of God. We
repent our misdeeds too slowly.  We make our reformations too late. We
have fostered within the Church a powerful organisation of clergy and
laity, a wealthy and secretive organisation, pursuing in the name of
God programmes which, however they are formulated in documents and
expressions, belie in practice the message of the Saviour.  We are not
a secret sanctuary.  We are not though some would like to believe we
are the privileged faithful of a remnant Church, persevering to the end
of an apocalyptic age.  We are a city seated on a mountain, visible to
the whole world.  Think on this!  Think on the scandals in which our
secret money dealings have embroiled us."

Listening to him, Luca Rossini was amazed at how little he had guessed
of the man, on how much he was prepared to risk in this charge against
the windmills.  His discourse took on a new tone as he thrust towards
the end.

"... Think on these things.  Try to discern the signs of the times,
which are God's continuing message to us.  Try to discern where we, as
the People of God, must repent and change.  I remind you that until you
elect a new Pontiff, the writ of the old one still runs.  There are
those who say it should run from here to eternity.  Not so!  It runs
until the wisdom of a later Pontiff and of his collegial bishops change
it.

"We have all been shocked by the publication of the diaries stolen from
the late Pontiff and sold to the press by his valet.  Yet, even here,
there is something to be discerned.  The Pontiff himself, old and ill,
was troubled about certain of his own decisions and policies, and
wished he could reverse them.  He has already passed beyond our
judgment into the merciful hands of God.  But we have our judgments
still to make and we must make them with sober wisdom.  God help us
all!"

He sat down in an unreadable silence.  The time was exactly twenty
minutes to eight when the Master of Ceremonies summoned Luca Rossini to
deliver his homily to his peers.  The text was already in their hands;
but none of them were reading it.  It was coming up to dinner time. The
Cardinal Electors were hungry.  Luca Rossini had the sudden macabre
thought that if he bored them or angered them, they might well eat him
for dinner.  He crossed himself and announced:

"In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.  I did
not seek to address you tonight.  I was commanded to it; but what I
speak to you, I speak from the heart.  I ask you a simple question:
Whom shall we choose for our Pope?

"In theory, it is any male Christian.  In fact, he is now sitting in
this room.  For good or ill, that is the way it happens in our Church
today.  It is a measure perhaps of the centralism into which we have
lapsed, of the ignorance of our own diversity.  Let me put to you the
questions I ask myself about our next Pope.

"How old a man?  If he is too young, he may last too long, and the
arteries of the Church will harden along with his own.  If he is too
old or infirm, we may have what we have just narrowly escaped, a
constitutional crisis in the Church, a crisis of conscience for
faithful Christians.  Already, we are a deeply wounded community.

"So, next we need a healer, a man of compassion, one who will have
compassion on the multitudes as Jesus himself did.  Unfortunately,
words of compassion and comfort have not been easy to decipher of late
in Vatican texts.  All too many have been more intent on dogmatic
exposition than on the confused but plangent cries of the human heart.
Our charge is to spread the good word, the simple word.  "Consider the
lilies of the field, how they grow' .. . "Many sins are forgiven her
because she has loved much' .. . "Love your enemies."

"For this so simple exposition, we need a man calm in his belief in the
ultimate good purposes of the Creator: "Now there remain these three,
faith, hope and charity; but the greatest of these is charity."  The
wisdom of love sees and accepts the whole mystery of creation, bright
and dark.  Love mediates the mystery with those who live in pain and
fear and unknowing.

"Our new Pontiff must be open.  He must listen before he pronounces. He
must understand that language is an imperfect instrument, that it
changes all the time and that it is the most inadequate means we have
to express the relations between human creatures and the God who made
them.  This is the crux of our problems.  Our people do not believe us
when we propound a morality of sex.  They know that we are ignorant of
its language and its practice; that we are forbidden to learn either in
a marital relationship.

"So, our man will be very careful whom he permits to speak in his name.
He will remember the respect he owes his collegial brethren whom, like
Peter, he is charged to confirm and strengthen.  He will remember that,
although the principle of Petrine primacy has been acknowledged down
the centuries, he is not and never has been a sole pastor in the
Church.  Those who, out of mistaken loyalty or partisan interest, have
sought to inflate the office or the authority of the occupant, have
always done disservice to the Church.

"Finally, secure in his own faith, he will respect the philosophers and
theologians.  He will encourage open enquiry on difficult questions. In
the freedom of family life, he will encourage debate between the sons
and daughters of the house.  He will put an end for ever to secret
denunciations and secret inquisitions into the orthodoxy of honest
scholars.  He will protect them in charity against detractors.

"Charity!  Love!  It all comes back to that, doesn't it?  "Charity is
long-suffering and kind.  Charity envieth not, charity boas teth not,
is not puffed up.  Charity bears all things, believes all things. 
Charity never fails."  Do you see this man of charity among us?  Do you
know him?  Do you, in the ancient sense of the word, discern him?  If
you do, elect him boldly and let us all be about God's business!"

Once again, there was a silence, out of which the Master of Ceremonies
recited the closing prayer.  Then, with a certain relief, he
announced:

"There will now be a five-minute toilet break before dinner is served.
There are no place cards, please sit where you wish.  You are all
welcome in Saint Martha's House.  Good appetite!"

Luca Rossini spent a restless night, haunted by a frustration dream in
which he wandered through the labyrinthine corridors of a hospital,
looking for Isabel.  All the doors were closed.  All his questions were
answered in dumb show by faceless people, who pointed him deeper into
the labyrinth.

He woke, sweating and gravel-eyed, at four in the morning, and decided,
as he often did, to banish the nightmares by an early-morning walk.
Then, for the first time, the situation became real to him.  There was
no place to go.  The House of Saint Martha was a prison-house, locked
down tight until the inmates had discharged their task.

As he lay musing in the darkness, he asked himself whether his sermon
had meant anything to anyone.  He doubted very much that it had.  These
elders in the assembly had heard all the words before.  They were
armour-plated against eloquence, as sceptical of simplicity as of
serpentine cunning.  He judged if a verdict at four in the morning had
any validity at all that Turi Pascarelli's calm impeachment of secret
partisan movements in the Church had shocked many in the audience. Turi
was not an augur studying the entrails of birds.  He was a man of
respect: a diplomat who read the large print and the small in every
document, then picked at every loose thread of argument or language,
and finally called for the dossiers on the negotiators themselves.

Perhaps Turi had left his intervention too late, or perhaps he had
timed it just right.  Technically, he was already out of office.  All
his functions were in suspense.  Factually, he was still subject to the
edicts of a dead man.  He had breached none of them, but he had called
them all in question.  Without doubt, he had made enemies; but he was
invulnerable to them.  He had no ambition to rule.  He was that most
powerful of persuaders the man with nothing to ask and nothing to
lose.

As he drifted back into sleep, Luca Rossini asked himself a more
radical question: once Isabel was gone from him, who would he be, what
could he be with any conviction or certainty?  Then, quite in
consequently he found himself thinking of Angel-Novalis.  On the death
of his wife, he had opted for the absolute certainty offered by the
authoritarian sectaries of Opus Dci.  He had served with a single mind
and a loyal heart; yet at a crucial moment he had betrayed himself into
a professional folly.  To defend the memory and the policies of a dead
man, he had begun an un authorised pursuit of the faithless valet who
had filched his papers.  He had sought the help of his own colleagues,
and thus set in motion events which he could no longer control.  It was
the problem of all intrigues.  It was also the tangled fabric of the
dream into which Luca Rossini lapsed in the pre-dawn hour.  He was a
fugitive now in the lanes and alleyways of a sinister city.  He was
stalked by assassins who laughed softly in the dark and called in
mockery: "Who'd like to fuck a priest?"

The ceremonies of election began with a celebration of the Eucharist
and an invocation of the Holy Spirit.  The Cardinal Electors then moved
in procession to the Sistine Chapel, where they sat, each in his own
stall, under the awesome gaze of Michelangelo's Christus, renewed and
revivified by modern restorers financed by the Nippon Television
Corporation.

Each elector was supplied with a small pile of ballot papers inscribed
with a preamble in Latin: "I choose as Supreme Pontiff .. ."  The
elector would write the name of his candidate in block letters.  He
would not sign the ballot paper.

The altar of the chapel was set with a gold paten and a large golden
chalice.  As each elector marked his ballot paper, he folded it in
half.  Then, in order of precedence by rank, each man advanced to the
altar, knelt for a moment in prayer, and declared: "I call as my
witness Christ the Lord, who will be my judge that my vote is given to
the man who in the sight of God I believe should be elected."  He laid
his vote on the paten, tipped it into the chalice and returned to his
stall.

When all the votes had been cast, three scrutineers, chosen by lot from
the electors, made the count.  Their count would be checked by three
others, similarly chosen.  Luca Rossini was one of the first group of
scrutineers.

There was a solemnity in the ceremony, and its setting, which touched
everyone; yet there was a paradox as well.  The repeated oaths, the
duplicated checks, the immediate destruction of paper after each
unsuccessful ballot, bespoke a distrust of human beings even when they
were acting, as they swore they were, in the Spirit, whose abiding
presence had been guaranteed until the end of time.

The first ballot was what everyone expected.  It showed a spread of ten
candidates, of whom the highest received eighteen votes and the lowest
eight.  The ballot was significant only in that it floated a raft of
possibilities, South American, North American, Spanish, Belgian,
Italian and African.  There were no middle Europeans, no French, no
Orientals.  None was within shouting distance of the required majority
of two-thirds plus one.  Two of the South Americans, the Spaniard and
the North American had been appointed by the late Pontiff.  The African
was a long-time Curia member.  The two Italian candidates were from
Venice and Milan.  The name of Luca Rossini was nowhere to be seen.

That afternoon, there were two more ballots.  By the end of the day,
the battle lines were drawn.  The number of candidates had been reduced
to eight.  One of the South Americans had dropped off the list, with
the African and the North American.  Luca Rossini made his first
appearance in the voting.

It had been a long dragging day.  By the time he returned to his room
at five in the evening, Rossini was convinced that one of the most
lethal threats in the life of any Roman Pontiff was the dead weight of
ceremony and protocol which he had to carry every day.  The thought was
prompted by his own unexpected appearance as a candidate, although he
knew or thought he knew that he was being introduced as a "spoiler",
whose presence would shake out other unlikely pretenders and
concentrate the minds of the electors on the strongest possibilities.

It was still too early to determine who they might be, but Milan had
strengthened to twenty-five votes, the Spaniard had risen to nineteen
and the man from Brazil had taken a three-vote lead on the Mexican
candidate.  Politically, both were positioned firmly on the right of
centre.

At five-thirty, Monsignor Piers Hallett came to the room with a bottle
of Scotch in one pocket of his soutane and a packet of peanuts in the
other.  He set them down with a flourish.

"Talk about a scramble!  Their Eminences make a lethal tribe at the
water-hole!  I'm afraid there's no ice!  Shall I pour?  You look as
though you could do with a drink."

"I have small taste for rituals.  How was your day?"

"Long, but full of interesting gossip.  The buzz-words now, courtesy of
Opus Dci, are stability, continuity, fidelity.  The Spaniards,
home-grown or colonial, are the standard-bearers.  No!  Don't take it
lightly!  Spain's the power-base, the money-base and it has a stable
monarchy that still makes a kind of sense to the traditional Arab world
which remembers Alhambra."

"They're taking a hell of a risk," said Luca Rossini.

"They're prepared to take it."

"Who is their favoured candidate?"

"Gossip says Chile.  The smart money says the Spaniard's already
ensconced in the Curia.  Word is that they'd like to run you as pacer
for the money horses."

"I'm on the wrong side, Piers.  They know that."

"That doesn't worry them.  They're sure you'll run out of steam just as
their own people hit the front."

Luca Rossini laughed.

"What can I say to that?"

"I wasn't expecting a comment," said Hallett, "but I'd welcome one on
my next item, which is me.  I know this is only day one and I'm stuck
here for the duration of the conclave; but the point is I've pretty
much made up my mind."

"To do what?"

"Quit the priesthood and go back to work as a secular scholar."

"Do you want to tell me why?"

"I do.  Your knowing is important to me.  You have always been my
eminently good friend.  You took me as I was, as I am: a scholar of
some worth, an indifferent cleric, passionless enough, I thought, to
stay out of trouble and enjoy the pleasures of learning and friendship.
So far, it has worked out well enough.  But it can't any longer.  The
clergy are too much in the spotlight now.  I'm vulnerable and one day I
could be too desperate for companionship to be discreet.  Besides, if I
want to seek gainful employment, now is the time to do it.  There are a
couple of jobs on offer: one at Harvard, one at the Getty in Los
Angeles.  The money's better at the Getty, but there's tenure at
Harvard.  So, that's where I'll address myself first.  Any comment from
my eminent friend?"

"Not too much.  I think it's a wise decision.  I'll do the best I can
to facilitate your laicisation; but if we get a hard-line Pontiff, you
may have some procedural headaches, which, on balance, I'd advise you
to wear and ignore."

"And that's all?"

"I can't think of anything else.  It's a simple situation.  You don't
have to turn it into a desperate one.  You might, however, pour me
another whisky."

"With pleasure," said Piers Hallett.  "I can't tell you how much I've
dreaded this moment."

"Which part of it?  The decision or the telling?"

"Both.  A lot of people would have fallen back to some prepared
position.  You know .. . take a little time, get some counselling, find
a wise confessor, take a cold shower!"

Luca Rossini smiled and shook his head.

"There are no prepared positions, none that last very long anyway.
Sooner or later, we come to a final standing-place from which we fight
or die.  Salud, amiga!"

When they had drunk the toast, Piers Hallett set down his glass and
remarked:

"I checked for messages, as you asked.  There were none."

"It's too soon," said Rossini.  "It's much too soon.  I'm praying we'll
be out of here long before anything happens to Isabel."

"And when it does?"

"That's my standing-place."

"To fight or die, you said."

"That's right."

"It's a drastic choice," said Piers Hallett.  "But you didn't offer it
to me.  Why not?"

"I have an argument with God that needs to be settled."

"And Jacob wrestled all night with the man," said Piers Hallett.  "And
Jacob came away limping.  If you don't mind, I'm going to have another
drink."

"It's your liquor," said Rossini.  He raised his glass in a toast.  "To
health, money and love and time to enjoy them.  I wish you every good
fortune, my friend!"

2-97

Fifteen

AER DINNER THAT NIGHT, LUCA ROSSINI WAS INVITED TO take coffee with the
Secretary of State and the Camerlengo in the Camerlengo's private
office.  Now that his name had suddenly shown up in the voting, he
wondered whether he was to be wooed or warned.  He decided to pre-empt
the question:

"Who's running me into the ballot?"

"Fifteen voters, according to the count."  The Camerlengo was suitably
vague.  "You're a scrutineer, you checked the figures yourself."

"Who are the voters?  Yours or theirs?"

The Camerlengo shook his head.

"No way to know; and it's the wrong question anyway.  Both sides see a
certain merit in your candidacy.  Your sermon moved a lot of people."

"You're also a splendid symbol," Turi Pascarelli said it with a smile.
"You're a penitent survivor, now leading a blameless life, uncorrupted
by power.  You'd be a very popular choice with the people."

"But the people have no voice in the election and imagine what the
press would do afterwards!"

"We're not thinking about afterwards," said Turi Pascarelli, "we're
thinking about now the next few days."

"What are you thinking?"

"Strategy," said the Camerlengo.  "The strategy for the Old Guard is to
push the conclave as far as it will go, without having to invoke the
rule of absolute majority which, in our view, they may not attain.
Their best chance is to hold out to the final stage of stalemate when
the electoral college will agree to an election by simple majority, in
effect, a simple head count, first past the post."

"How long before that happens?"

"With a small field and four ballots a day, it will not be too long
before the pressure builds up for a resolution.  Don't forget all those
people waiting in the piazza outside, all the millions watching
television around the world.  They are our constituents.  We're in a
fantasy land here.  We like to believe we're the arbiters of human
destiny, but we are not impregnable.  We never have been."

"So, tell me now, my friends, tell me plainly, what's your preferred
outcome?"

"This time around?  An Italian Pontiff, politically clean, calm enough
to settle things down and create an atmosphere of confidence in the
Church again."

"Milan, in other words."

"Yes."

"He's my own choice," said Luca Rossini.

"Would you step aside for him?"  It was the Camerlengo who asked the
question.  Rossini was astonished.

"Step aside?  I'm not even in contention.  There is no chance at all
that I can be elected.  All my history speaks against it."

"Your history speaks for you."  The Secretary of State was emphatic.
"Don't you see?  You're a charismatic man, Luca.  Your very weaknesses
recommend you.  Who is more appealing than the penitent Peter, or Saul
struck blind on the road to Damascus?  You're quite unaware of the
power you radiate, even among our most sceptical colleagues.  You are
much admired by many pastoral Cardinals with whom you have dealt in
your various missions.  I'll make a wager that your voting tally will
rise at each ballot from now on."

"And you, of course, will contribute to the inflation?"

"No guarantees, but yes, we'll contribute."

"And you're expecting Milan to rise, too?"

"We're sure he will."

"But you're equally sure he's a better choice as Pontiff than I am."

"Don't you agree?"

"Of course I agree.  So why bother playing out this comedy?  I've
already told you Milan is my candidate, too.  I have neither ambition
nor talent for the office.  If it helps, I'll withdraw my candidacy
before the next ballot."

"We beg you not to do that," said the Camerlengo.  "We need you in the
ballot.  We hope we can build around you a voting bloc that will
eliminate the old guard and bring us swiftly to a run-off between you
and Milan."

Rossini stared at him in total disbelief.  Then he burst into laughter,
a huge gusty bellow with a hint of gallows humour at the high end of
it.

"I can't believe what I'm hearing.  You know me better than any other
men in Rome.  You know my past, my present even the cloud of
uncertainty that hangs over my future in the Church, and in the Faith
itself.  Yet you are lobbying for me with the electors, even putting me
in a position to challenge Milan in a run-off ballot.  I can't take
this seriously."

"Why not?"

"Because you are risking too much on my fidelity.  Give me enough
voters, I could turn rogue and filch the Fisherman's Ring for
myself."

"We risk less on you than on the ambition of certain other colleagues,
who shall be nameless."

"Perhaps you judge them more stringently than you judge me."

"We believe," said the Camerlengo "that you would make a better Pontiff
than they.  Your faults commend you more than their virtues."

"But," the Secretary of State was swift to add the postscript, "we
still believe that Milan is the man who will do best for the

Church at this moment.  There is strong opposition to him.  He is a
scholar.  He is a Jesuit.  He has welcomed alien voices into his
pulpit.  He could bring new light and new hopes into the Church.
Nevertheless, we need more leverage to lift him to the chair of Peter.
We need you to remain a candidate until we tell you the time is right
to abdicate.  Will you do it?"

"Suppose you misjudge the situation?  Suppose Milan falls out of
favour, and I become the favourite?  Suppose my nearest rival is a man
we all disapprove, where does that leave me?"

"Alone on the Mount of Temptation."  The Secretary of State was sombre.
"With all the kingdoms of the earth spread below you like a carpet."

"And both of you would leave me there, alone?"

"You would not be alone, Luca, my friend."

"Why not?"

"Think about it," said the Secretary of State, and then abruptly
changed the subject.  "This is terrible coffee, Baldassare.  Can't you
do something about it?"

"It's tradition," said the Camerlengo cheerfully.  "Members of the
conclave must be kept in reasonable discomfort to encourage them to
finish their work!"

The coffee kept him awake and the conversation haunted the long,
sleepless hours until midnight and after.  For all his protestations,
there was a curious seduction in the thought that he, Luca Rossini,
might succeed to the See of Peter.  The seductive imagining turned
subtly into a temptation that insinuated itself like a vapour into the
closed fortress of himself.  This was where the vestigial hatreds
lurked, the long memory of unrequited wrongs, the revulsion from every
image of tyranny inside the Church and out of it.

He began to play a mind-game with himself.  He set the rules carefully.
I, myself, do not wish to become a tyrant or a brute.  I wish only to
balance the scales of justice.  As a putative Pontiff, I have power in
my hands.  I have seen how far that power stretches, how potently it
can be used, how good men and good women can be persuaded to serve it,
how others equally good can be oppressed by it.  Where do I begin? What
pieces do I remove from the board?  To whom do I grant patents of
power?  Who will be my counsellors, who my pursuivants?

He was surprised how much the permutations and combinations of the game
intrigued him.  He was shocked by the intensity of the primitive lusts
they evoked in him.

There was a moment when images of reprisal became so overpowering that
he could not close his mind against them, nor even summon any
resolution to do so.  His scarred back began to itch and burn.  His
heart was racing and he was sweating profusely.  He forced himself to
get out of bed, strip off his sodden pyjamas and take a long shower to
wash away the dirt of the past that still seemed to cling to him.  He
wished for music to charm out the demons.  There was no radio.  He
remembered that he was in prison, as much enslaved as the early Pope
Pontian, exiled to quarry-labour in Sardinia.

He picked up his breviary and tried to read.  The words swam before his
eyes.  He tried to meditate and the first text that came into his head
was that of Paul to the Romans: "O man, who are you to rail against
God?  Has not the potter power over the clay to make one piece into a
vessel of honour, the other into a vessel of dishonour?"

His late patron had urged him many times to think upon it.  He had
chewed it like a grass-stalk until there was no juice left in it; but
still he found himself in dispute with his maker.  Still he demanded to
know, "Why, why me?  Why her?  Why is Your world made thus and not
otherwise?  I have wrestled with You too long.  I'm going to call off
the bout and send You home wherever Your home is.  All that clutter of
galaxies and they tell me You extend to fill all the emptiness
between!"

Somewhere in the small, still hours, he lapsed into sleep.

The first two ballots on the following day showed a slight shift in the
voting pattern.  Milan secured more votes.  Rossini registered a modest
gain.  The Brazilian and the American lost support and retired.  The
losses and gains in the rest of the list reflected the overnight
discussions and manoeuvrings of the Grand Electors and a rival group of
mid-Europeans.

Gossip over the luncheon tables reflected certain anxieties.  A
prolonged election would underscore the rifts within the Church.  It
would suggest that the victorious candidate might be a compromise
choice.  It would make the task of reunification more difficult.  Like
it or not, every new Pontiff had to be provided with a public image,
which he would wear, perforce, for the duration of his reign.  If the
image-makers botched their job, or if the subject himself were
difficult, the faithful could be alienated even more.

As they left the dining-room, the Secretary of State passed a swift
word to Rossini: "The last ballot today should give us some reading on
how the currents are running."

"I'm glad someone can read them, Turi.  In spite of all the crowds
waiting in Saint Peter's Square, I wonder how relevant we really are to
the People of God."

The Secretary of State gave a very Roman shrug.

"Who knows?  I'll tell you one thing, Luca.  If we weren't here, and
all that we stand for, there'd be a big, blank space in human history
and a great empty well in the human psyche."

Then he was gone, and Luca Rossini strolled over to a private corner of
the Vatican gardens to read his breviary and offer the ancient prayers
for the beloved who was now beyond his care.

As the Secretary of State had predicted, the last ballot of the day
provided, if not an earthquake, at least a tremor strong enough to
shake out a batch of weaker candidates and confirm Milan and Rossini as
the front-runners, with the Belgian and the Chilean still possible
contenders.

Three hours later, Rossini was again bidden to meet with the Camerlengo
and the Secretary of State.  The Camerlengo delivered the first
instalment of the news.

"We can finish this tomorrow at the first ballot.  Chile and Belgium
will step down.  The decision between you and Milan will be made by a
simple majority of votes."

"Is that legal?"

"It's a de facto situation," said the Secretary of State.  "It doesn't
please everybody, but nobody in the electoral college is prepared to
challenge it."

"There is, however, a problem," said the Camerlengo.  "There is a solid
core of opposition to Milan.  There are people who don't like the
Jesuit connection.  There are others God help us!  who mistrust his
liberal scholarship and his openness to non-believers.  So, both Turi
and I judge it could be a close-run thing.  You could win the
election."

"And lay the responsibility on the Holy Spirit!"  Suddently he was
laughing, a happy, schoolboy laugh that welled up in his throat and
shone in his eyes.  "Forgive me, my friends!  I did warn you, didn't

I?"

"You did," said the Secretary of State.

"And you also made a promise," said the Camerlengo.

"Which I shall certainly keep."  Rossini was grave again.  "But you
must instruct me how best to do that.  Do I abdicate my candidacy
before the vote is taken?"

"In that case," said the Camerlengo, "you would have to ask that the
electors signify their agreement to Milan by acclamation.  It would be
embarrassing if they declined to do it."

"If, on the other hand, I am elected and I decline to accept?"

"Then a claim could be made that the process was tainted or rigged, and
we might have to begin it again.  Stranger things have happened down
the centuries."

There was a long moment of silence.  Then Rossini stood up.

"I have no solutions for you, gentlemen.  I shall do as I promised.  I
can say no more at this moment.  We should pray perhaps to be infused
with the wisdom of the Spirit while we sleep."

He was awakened by the shrilling of a telephone a suspect sound in the
House of Saint Martha.  He had to hunt to find the instrument, and rub
the gravel out of his eyes to read his watch.  It was eight in the
morning.  The voice on the line was that of Piers Hallett.

"Can I come up, please?"

"Of course.  I'm glad you called.  I had a bad night.  I over-slept.
Give me fifteen minutes to make myself presentable.  If it's not too
much trouble, bring me some coffee and a punino.""

"No trouble at all," said Hallett, and rang off.

Rossini hurried through his toilet, but he was still in his
shirtsleeves when Hallett came in with his breakfast tray on which was
a copy of the Ordo for the day.  There was nothing new in it: two
ballots morning and afternoon, the usual list of doctors, sacristans
and confessors.  Rossini scanned it quickly, then gulped down the
coffee.  It was a couple of minutes before he asked Hallett:

"Forgive me.  I'm still half-asleep.  You wanted to see me about
something?"

"This," said Piers Hallett and handed him a fax message for the
Vicariate office.  "It was received at seven this morning, sent at one
o'clock New York time."

Rossini stared at the paper for a long time, then read the message
aloud as if to assure himself that it was authentic.

Senor Raul Ortega and his daughter Luisa ask me to inform your Eminence
that the Senora Isabel Ortega, a patient in this hospital, passed away
at 2230 hours this evening.  She was under heavy sedation and her end
was peaceful.  The family will be in further contact with you in due
course.  Signed, Dr.  Olaf Wintergroen,

Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center

"I'm sorry," said Hallett.  "If there's anything I can do?."

"There is," said Rossini.  "Show the message to the Camerlengo and the
Secretary of State.  Ask them to keep the news to themselves.  Tell
them I'll see them at the first ballot."

"Yes, Eminence," said Hallett and went out, closing the door behind
him.

Rossini stood staring after him.  Then, slowly he turned to the
priedieu.  He did not kneel but stood, staring at the figure of the
crucified nailed to the white wall above it.  In a tone flat and almost
conversational, he addressed himself to the Christus.

"So, she went without pain.  Thank You for that, if You arranged it.
Now, if You're so disposed, I'd like You to talk to me given, of
course, that You are truly there and not a cosmic fiction.  This is our
last chance at a dialogue, You see.  I've run out of words, and blood
and tears.  I'm emptied out of everything.  If You have nothing to say
to me, let's not talk any more.  Let's make no more arguments.  I'll
play out this pompous drama and be gone from here.  I'm only human. You
know what that's like, don't You?  We're limited creatures.  You can't
blow us up like balloons to infinite dimensions.  Even You gave up at
the end, didn't You?  You said: "Enough is enough.  It's finished!" 
That's what I'm saying now.  Except I still owe You a debt for Isabel. 
I'd like to settle that.  So, if You're there, talk to me, please!"

"He's in shock!"  Monsignor Hallett, the languid Englishman, confronted
the two most senior prelates in the Universal Church.  "He won't admit
it.  He can't admit it.  You'll never read it in that great stone face
of his, but, gentlemen, you'd better believe it!  He needs help, and in
this Church of ours, we're not very good at giving it any more."

"You're out of order, Monsignor Hallett."  The Camerlengo was
offended.

"No, he's not," said the Secretary of State, "he's reminding us of
simple charity.  Rossini needs brothers and sisters to nurse him
through the loss.  We've lost the art of doing that.  Our sisters are
too busy claiming back the rights we've denied them.  Our brothers are
too busy putting the remnant Church together.  Listen to me, Hallett!
Stay close to him.  If you have to, break a few rules to do it look
after him.  Please!"

"I'll do the best I can, Eminence," said Hallett gravely, "but this is
a man who has had his heart torn out twice, while he's still alive.
What's the remedy for that in the Rituale Romanum?"

"There's a formula but no remedy," said the Secretary of State.  "Go
back to him.  Stay as close as you can all day.  Baldassare and I will
talk about this."

"I don't know what there is to talk about," said the Camerlengo curtly.
"People die every day.  We offer our sympathy, our support, our
prayers, our share in the saving merits of Christ.  What more can we
do?"

"For Christ's sake!"  Hallett cursed softly.  "For Christ's sweet sake!
How we Christians love each other!"

"You are dismissed, Monsignor Hallett."  The Camerlengo's tone was
cold.  Hallett bowed and walked away without a word.  The Secretary of
State shook his head.

"You shouldn't have done that, Baldassare.  He's a faithful friend.  He
spoke his mind for our friend, Luca."

"I know!  I know!  I'll apologise later.  I'm worried, Turi.  What
happens now at our ballot?"

"Perhaps," said the Secretary of State, "just perhaps this is the
intervention of the Spirit we have prayed for."

"What do we say to Rossini?"

"Nothing, until he decides to open himself to us.  He is a man of
steel, this one!  He will do what he has promised.  We should not try
to dictate how he does it."

"They'll be calling us to the Chapel in twenty minutes.  We have to
have some kind of plan."

Why not leave the outcome to God," said the Secretary of State.

"I wish I had enough faith," said the Camerlengo gloomily.  "I think
I've been too long in Rome."

Before the first morning vote began, the Secretary of the conclave made
an announcement:

"The Apostolic Constitution provides that if, after an extended series
of ballots, a candidate has not been elected, the election shall be
decided by a simple majority of the voters.  Now we have arrived at
another situation altogether.  Two candidates only remain in
contention.  I have a proposal to make to you which, I am advised,
conforms to the Spirit if not to the letter of the Apostolic
Constitution.  I propose that this ballot be decided by simple
majority.  You are free to decide otherwise, and to work strictly to
the rule of an absolute majority of two-thirds plus one.  However, with
two candidates it would seem to serve little good purpose.  I ask you
to signify your assent by a show of hands."

It took a little time for them to declare themselves, but finally all
hands were raised.

"Good," said the Secretary.  "The scrutineers will be his Eminence from
New York and his Eminence from Munich.  They will be assisted by their
colleagues from Sydney and from Paris.  Let us invoke the guidance of
the Holy Spirit."

Luca Rossini raised his voice with the others in the solemn invocation.
"Come, O Creator Spirit, fill the hearts of the faithful and kindle in
them the fire of Your love."

It was a prayer that reached deep into the heart of the most ancient
Trinitarian beliefs of Christianity, and stretched out to include the
most primitive apprehensions of a deity abiding in all creation.  It
called for light in darkness, fire in a cold world, healing for the
wounds of life.  Time was when Rossini related all that it signified to
Isabel.  Once, among the Greeks, he had preached a passionate sermon on
the feminine elements implicit in the mystery.  Now the memory of it
rustled like dead leaves in a parching wind.

The solemn exercise in which he was engaged was a theatrical
irrelevance.  He could hardly wait to be done with it.  He printed the
name of his candidate on the ballot paper and took his place in the
line to lay it on the paten and recite the affirmation that he had
chosen in good faith the best possible candidate.

He watched, dull-eyed and indifferent, as the four scrutineers checked
and rechecked the ballot papers, and when the count was agreed
initialled the figures and handed them to the Secretary of the
conclave.  The Secretary then turned to the assembly and announced that
his Eminence Cardinal Luca Rossini had been elected Bishop of Rome and
successor to Peter, Prince of the Apostles, by a majority of two
votes.

There was a moment of stunned silence, then a burst of clapping which
was stilled instantly by the Secretary of the conclave.

"Please!  Not yet!  There is still a necessary formality."

He walked down the nave and stood facing Luca Rossini, who sat rigid as
a carved figure in his stall.  Then, in a loud voice the Secretary put
the question:

"Acceptasne electioneml Do you accept election?"

Slowly, very slowly, Luca Rossini rose in his place and faced the
assembly.  The look of him, the rigid stance, the lift of his head, the
fall of the light on his lean and anguished face reduced them all to
silence.  His utterance was that of a doomsayer pronouncing his own
damnation.

"My answer is no!  I do not accept.  I can not accept.  I am not fit
for this office.  I know that I should crack under the burdens of it.
You may ask, as you have a right to do, why I presented myself as a
candidate in the first place.  The answer to that is very simple.
Certain of my brethren, your brethren, wanted me to withdraw, because
of a brief association with a married woman who saved my life in
Argentina, and for whom ever since I have had a deep and constant love.
The late Holy Father was aware of these things.  They were not secrets
of which I was, or am, ashamed.  I accepted the penances laid upon me a
permanent exile from my homeland, honours beyond my deserving, a
discipline of silence about what had been done in my country and the
connivance of my Church,

your Church, my brothers, in what was done.  My rank made me a
candidate in this election.  I would not consent to any further
abridgements of my rights in the Church or out of it.  I did not expect
to be chosen.  The anger you hear in my voice disqualifies me from the
office you offer me, because although I have learned to control it, I
have not purged it altogether.

"One more matter, the woman I have loved so long in absence died last
night in New York.  I was given the news at seven this morning.  In my
first agony many years ago, I had little time for healing and grieving.
Now, I confess, I need it.  That need is measure of my weakness and not
of my strength.  The very ground of my belief quakes under my feet. I
am not the man you want.  I am not the man you need.  He stands
opposite me: our brother from Milan.  I do not know what formalities
are needed to ratify him, but I know I have a right to acclaim him, and
to urge you to confirm him in the place you have offered to me.  He is
my old master.  He is a wise man.  I believe he can heal the wounds
which afflict the Church and reunite us all in the charity of Christ.
We need that.  We need to rule a line under the past and begin again
what is our true task to demonstrate in our own lives the saving
Gospel.  I beg you all to accept this man.  Give him the votes you
dedicated to me, who is so much less deserving.  Rise and proclaim your
acceptance.  Let yourselves be seen and heard."

The Camerlengo and the Secretary of State were the first to rise, then
the demonstration began.  The others rose by fives and tens and
twenties, until no one was left seated and everyone was applauding as
the Secretary repeated the question he had put first to Rossini.

"Acceptasne dectionem!"

To which the answer came back, firm and clear.

"I accept."

They applauded him again, but this time he stilled them with upraised
hands, conferred briefly with the Camerlengo and then announced:

"I should like this to be seen as my first act as head of this family.
Let us pray for our departed sister, Isabel Ortega, whom God has
already welcomed home.  Let us pray for our grieving brother, Luca
Rossini, that he may come soon to peace, through Christ our Lord."

The murmured "Amen" rippled through the chapel like a homing wave.
Then, the new Pontiff crossed the floor to embrace Rossini.  The
Secretary to the conclave hurried to intercept him.

"Please, Holiness!  There is still the question of the name by which
you wish to be called.  We have to make the announcement to the people
and to the world."

"First I need a moment for my friend, Luca."

The Secretary stepped back.  The other prelates kept their distance,
noting every detail of the scene, trying without success to hear the
quiet dialogue.

"How are you feeling, Luca?"

"Very strange!  Like the blind man in the tree, hearing the crowds
moving and shouting as Jesus passed, but seeing nothing."

"But He will see you and He will open your eyes again."

"I hope so.  I have no certainty any more."

"My door will be always open to you, as it was in the old days.  You
put me here.  I'm going to need your help."

"Thank you, Holiness, but for now I need to go away and be quiet and
unknown.  Will you grant me leave?"

"As much as you need.  Later, when you are ready to come back, tell
me."

"Thank you, Holiness."

"Is there anything else?"

"A speedy release for a cleric whom I have been counselling.  He's a
good man, but he is not happy in the ministry.  It will be better for
him and for the Church if he is out of it."

"Send me the papers.  I will expedite them.  Anything else?"

Rossini fished in the pocket of his soutane and brought out the package
with the gold medallion in it.

"Would you bless this, please.  It's just a medallion."

"For someone special?"

"You could say that, Holiness.  She's a campfire girl from the Via
Flaminia.  I'm sure she'll be back there one day; she's just as sure
the Madonna will protect her.  That's only part of the story."

"The rest of it you will tell me when you come back.  Be sure I am
expecting you.  Go with God and come safely home."

"Be kind to your people, Holiness," said Luca Rossini.  "They live in a
rough world.  They are often afraid and lonely.  They need a caring
shepherd."

Clareville 1996-8

MORRIS WEST, an Australian by birth, has lived in Italy, Austria,
England and the east and west coasts of the United States.  His novels
have been translated into 27 languages and have sold more than 60
million copies.

He has been honoured by the National Council of Christians and Jews'
National Brotherhood Award; he has won the James Tait Black Memorial
Prize and the Royal Society of Literature Heinemann Award.  West has
been awarded the Order of Australia, and doctorates in literature and
letters have been conferred on him by the National University of
Australia and by the Universities of Santa Clara and New York.

Jacket photograph: Angel by Bernini, St.  Peter's, Seme by Grant V.
Faint,

The Image Bank Photograph of Morris West by Brian Morris

ISBN 1 86046 527 7