The Fifth Gospel(35)

            “Come over here, my boy,” Lucio says, tapping his desk eagerly.

            The stroke paralyzed part of Lucio’s face, but he worked hard at rehab so that his appearance wouldn’t frighten Peter. While they embrace, I glance at the papers on the desk, looking for gendarme reports about Ugo or our apartment. But there are only the budget reports that are the oxygen of Lucio’s existence. He is the mayor of a small city that always needs updated facilities and new parking lots; the minister of culture to the world’s greatest collection of ancient and Renaissance art; the employer of more than a thousand workers who receive free health care, duty-free shopping, and subsidized food, without paying a penny in income tax; and the negotiator of a fragile relationship with secular Rome, to which our landlocked country owes all its petroleum shipments, garbage collection, and electricity. I try to remind myself, whenever I brood on the way Lucio neglected Simon and me, that he was busy honoring the promise he made to John Paul.

            “Do you want a drink?” he says to Peter now, managing to make both halves of his mouth move. “We have orange juice.”

            Peter’s face brightens. He almost leaps off my uncle’s lap to follow Diego out of the room to fetch it.

            “I trust,” my uncle adds in a lower voice, “there were no other incidents last night?”

            The question seems like a courtesy. Nothing happens in this country without his knowing.

            “No,” I say. “Nothing else.”

            But Simon jumps in. “The gendarmes don’t have anything,” he says with an edge. “Meanwhile Alex and Peter can’t even sleep under their own roof.”

            His tone takes me by surprise.

            Lucio gives him a long, unappreciative stare. “Alexander and Peter are welcome to stay under this roof. And you’re mistaken: I received a call from the gendarmes twenty-five minutes ago saying they may have caught an image of a suspect on one of the security cameras.”

            “That’s great news, Uncle,” I say.

            “How long before they have something definite?” Simon asks.

            “I’m sure they’re working as quickly as they can,” Lucio says. “In the meantime, what can you tell me about all of this?”

            I glance at Simon. “We found some things in my apartment this morning that suggest the two . . . incidents . . . were related.”

            Lucio adjusts the angle of a pen lying on his desk. “The gendarmes are examining that same possibility. It’s obviously very concerning. You told them about these things you found?”

            “Not yet.”

            “I’ll ask them to contact you again.” He turns to Simon. “Is there anything else I should be aware of ?”

            My brother shakes his head.

            Lucio frowns. “Such as, what you were doing at Castel Gandolfo in the first place?”

            “Ugo called me and asked for help.”

            “How did you get there?”

            “A driver from the car service.”

            Lucio clicks his tongue. The car service reports to him, but ordinary priests aren’t allowed to call for rides, and the boss’s nephews are expected to stay above reproach.

            “Uncle,” I say, “have you ever heard of someone getting through the gates at Castel Gandolfo? Or here?”

            “Certainly not.”

            “How would someone have known our apartment number?”