The Fifth Gospel(20)

            At the Academy, while other men studied Spanish or English or Portuguese, Simon studied the Slavic languages of Orthodoxy. He turned down Washington so that he could go to Sofia, capital of Orthodox Bulgaria. There, he bided his time until something came open in Ankara, the same nunciature where Michael Black was now working.

            I knew that Simon had taken up Father’s old torch, but what he intended to do with it, I thought even he himself didn’t know. Then, a week before I met Ugo for the first time, Uncle Lucio called.

            “Alexander, were you aware that your brother has been missing work?”

            I was not.

            Lucio clicked his tongue. “He was reprimanded for disappearing without cause. And since he won’t talk to me about it, I’d appreciate it if you would find out why.”

            Simon’s excuse was office politics: Michael Black had reported him, out of spite. A week later, though, my brother was unexpectedly in Rome.

            “I’m here with a friend,” he said.

            “What friend?”

            “His name’s Ugo. We met in Turkey. Come have dinner with us at his place tonight. He’d like to meet you.”



* * *



            NEVER IN MY LIFE had I been to an apartment like Ugolino Nogara’s. Most families who work for the pope rent Church-owned apartments around Rome. My parents, with Lucio’s help, had been lucky to win a flat inside the walls, in the employee ghetto. But here, before my eyes, was how the other half lived. Nogara’s apartment was inside the papal palace, right at the corner where the Vatican Museums met the Vatican Library. When Simon answered the door, Peter ran eagerly into his uncle’s arms, but my eyes drifted into the vast space behind them. There were no frescoes on the walls, or ceilings worked with gold, but from front to back the apartment ran so far that screens had been put up to divide it into smaller rooms, the way cardinals once did at conclaves. The west wall had a view of the courtyard where scholars from the Vatican Library sipped drinks at a secluded café. To the south, where the crown of trees parted, the rooftops made a path straight to the dome of Saint Peter’s.

            From deep inside the apartment came a boisterous voice.

            “Aha! You must be Father Alex and Peter! Come in, come in!”

            A man came loping at us, arms outstretched. At first sight of him, Peter tucked himself into the protective recess of my legs.

            Ugolino Nogara had the dimensions of a small bear, with skin so sunburned that it seemed phosphorescent. His eyeglasses were held together with a thick knot of tape. In his hand sloshed a glass of wine, and after he kissed me on each cheek, the first thing he said was, “Let me get you a drink.”

            Those would be telling words.

            Simon tenderly took Peter by the hand and spirited him away, offering him a gift from Turkey. I found myself alone with our host.

            “You work at the nunciature with my brother, Doctor Nogara?” I asked while he poured.

            “Oh, no,” he said with a laugh. He pointed to the building across the courtyard. “I work at the museums. I’ve just been in Turkey to put the last touches on my exhibit.”

            “Your exhibit?”

            “The one that opens in August.”

            He winked, as if Simon had surely told me. But in those days, no one knew yet. Rumors hadn’t circulated about the black-tie opening night, the reception in the Sistine Chapel.

            “So how did you meet?” I asked.

            Nogara loosened his tie. “Some Turks discovered a poor fellow in the desert, passed out with heatstroke.” He pulled off his eyeglasses to show me the tape. “Facedown.”