The Palace of the Tribunal sits catercorner to the Casa, sharing views of the Vatican gas station, but with the additional insult of being directly behind the tailpipes of the cars, which has contributed a sfumato of petroleum gray to the chipped Vatican beige of the building’s exterior. The Rota normally operates out of a historic Renaissance palace across the river, closer to Mignatto’s office, but today three of its judges have been forced to come here. In the old days, our canonical trials were held outside the Vatican walls, and this palace was reserved for civil trials. But John Paul, the only pope ever to revise both codes of canon law—one for Western Catholics, one for Eastern Catholics—decided to change the venue as well.
This palace often seems permeated with an air of languid underemployment. Judges loiter outside, leaning against the walls with wigs in their hands, whiling away time between cases. Like our Vatican doctors and nurses, our civil magistrates are volunteers imported from the outer world, part-time lawmen whose real jobs are in Rome. Today’s judges, though, will be different. The ancient tribunal of the Sacred Roman Rota is the second-highest judicial authority in the Church. On the merits of a case, they can be overruled by no one but the pope. The Rota is the final appeals court for every Catholic diocese on earth, and each year its justices try hundreds of cases, annulling a Catholic marriage almost every workday. This endless churn takes its toll. I’ve known monsignors from the Rota who aged faster than dogs. The job made them grim, methodical, impatient. In this courtroom, there won’t be any lackadaisical Italian-style justice.
Mignatto is waiting outside the courtroom when I arrive. He looks especially elegant, his monsignor’s cassock tied around his waist with a sash that ends in two knotted pompoms that dangle just so, calling to mind the censers that priests and deacons swing on chains to spread the smoke of incense. Tassels like these were outlawed thirty years ago when the pope simplified the dress code for Roman priests, but either Mignatto was grandfathered in, or else there’s a subtle nod to traditionalism here that he thinks will curry favor with someone in the court. As a Greek priest, I’m an outsider to these nuances.
“Is Simon coming?” I ask.
His tone is strictly professional, expressing no emotion at all. “He’s on the list. Whether Cardinal Boia lets him go is another matter.”
“There isn’t anything we can do?”
“I’m doing everything I can think of. In the meantime, please explain your uncle’s decision to me.”
“What decision?”
Mignatto waits, as if he expects the answer to come to me. Finally he says, “His Eminence is already inside the courtroom. He informed me an hour ago that he’ll be sitting at the table today as procurator.”
I glare at the courtroom doors and bite my tongue.
Mignatto is doing his best not to look aggravated. His impression of our family is not improving. “I thought he might’ve spoken to you about it. In any case, I submitted a mandate to make him locum tenens. In your absence, I’m afraid.”
Locum tenens. Latin for “substitute.”
“I can’t come inside?”
“Not today.”
“Why’s he doing this?”
Mignatto lowers his voice. “He told me it was to embolden your brother to testify. He thinks two nights of house arrest may have changed his attitude.”
I’m angry at Lucio for making me look like a fool. But if he thinks he can make Simon talk, then he must have a reason. And his decision gives me the opening I needed.
I reach into my cassock for Ugo’s mobile phone and say, “There’s something I have to tell you before you go inside.”