Angelology(29)

Verlaine gave her his telephone number. “If you find anything, would you call me?”

Evangeline took the paper and looked at it. She did not know what to tell him. It would be

impossible for her to call him, even if she were to find what he was looking for. “I’ll try,” she said at

last.

“Thanks,” Verlaine said, gazing at her with gratitude. “In the meantime, do you mind if I make a

photocopy of this one?”

Evangeline picked up her necklace, refastened it about her neck, and led Verlaine to the library

door. “Come with me.”

Escorting Verlaine into Philomena’s office, Evangeline removed a leaf of St. Rose stationery from

a stack and gave it to Verlaine. “You may transcribe it onto this,” she said.

Verlaine took a pen and got to work. After he’d copied the original and returned it to Evangeline,

she could detect that he wished to ask her something. She had known him all of ten minutes, and yet

she could understand the turn his mind had taken. At last he asked, “Where did this stationery come

from?”

Evangeline lifted another sheet of the thick pink paper from the stack next to Philomena’s desk and

held it between her fingers. The top section of the stationery was filled with Baroque roses and

angels, images she’d seen a thousand times before. “It’s just our standard stationery,” she said.

“Why?”

“It is the same stationery that Innocenta used for her letters to Abigail Rockefeller,” Verlaine said,

taking a clean sheet and examining it more closely. “How old is the design?”

“I’ve never thought about it,” Evangeline said. “But it must be nearly two hundred years old. The

St. Rose crest was created by our founding abbess.”

“May I?” Verlaine said, taking a few pages of the stationery and folding them into his pocket.

“Certainly,” Evangeline said, perplexed by Verlaine’s interest in something she found to be quite

banal. “Take as many as you’d like.”

“Thanks,” Verlaine said, smiling at Evangeline for the first time in their exchange. “You’re

probably not supposed to help me out like this.”

“Actually, I should have called the police the moment I saw you,” she said.

“I hope there’s some way I can thank you.”

“There is,” Evangeline said as she ushered Verlaine to the door. “You can leave before you are

discovered. And if you are by chance found by one of the sisters, you did not meet me or set foot in

this library.”

St. Rose Convent, Milton, New York

Still more snow had accumulated while Verlaine was inside the convent. It drifted from the sky in

sheets, collecting upon the svelte arms of the birch trees and hiding the cobblestone walkway from

view. Squinting, he tried to locate his blue Renault in the darkness beyond the locked wrought-iron

gate, but there was little light and his vision could not compete with the thickening snow. Behind him

the convent had disappeared in a haze; ahead he saw nothing but a deepening void. Negotiating the

new ice under his shoes as best he could, Verlaine edged his way out of the convent grounds.

The crisp air in his lungs—so delicious after the stifling warmth of the library—only served to add

to the exuberance he felt about his success. Somehow, to his astonishment and delight, he had pulled it

off. Evangeline—he couldn’t bring himself to think of her as Sister Evangeline; there was something

too alluring, too intellectually engaging, too feminine about her for her to be a nun—had not only

given him access to the library but she had shown him the very item he’d most hoped to find. He’d

read Abigail Rockefeller’s letter with his own eyes and could now say with certainty that this woman

had indeed been working on a scheme of some sort with the sisters of St. Rose Convent. Although he

hadn’t been able to get a photocopy of the letter, he recognized the handwriting as authentic. The

result would surely satisfy Grigori and—more important—bolster his own personal research. The

only thing that could have topped this would have been if Evangeline had given him the original letter

outright. Or, better yet, if she had produced as many letters from Abigail Rockefeller as he possessed

from Innocenta—and given him those originals outright.

Ahead, past the bars of the gate, a sweep of headlights broke through the blur of snowflakes. A

matte black Mercedes SUV pulled into sight, parking next to the Renault. Verlaine ducked sidelong

into a thicket of pine trees, an act of instinct that sheltered him from the harsh headlights. From a

needling crevice between the trees, he watched as a man wearing a stocking cap followed by a