The Fifth Gospel(7)

            “H-how . . . ?” I stammer.

            There are suddenly lights moving down the garden road toward us. Pairs of them, no bigger than BBs. When they come closer, they resolve into police cruisers.

            Vatican gendarmes.

            I kneel down, hands trembling. On the ground beside the body is an open briefcase. The wind continues to tug at the papers inside it.

            The gendarmes begin jogging toward us, barking orders to step away from the body. But I reach over and do what every instinct in my body requires. I need to see.

            When I pull back Simon’s greca, the dead man’s eyes are wide. The mouth is cocked. The tongue is stuffed in its cheek. On my friend’s face is a dull grimace. In his temple is a black hole leaking a pink nubbin of flesh.

            The clouds are pressing in. Simon’s hand is on me, pulling me back. Step away, he says.

            But I can’t take my eyes off it. I see suit pockets turned out. A bare patch of white skin where a wristwatch has been removed.

            “Come away, Father,” says a gendarme.

            Finally I turn. The gendarme has a face like a leather knuckle. From his needlepoint eyes, from his frost of white hair, I recognize him as Inspector Falcone, chief of Vatican police. The man who runs beside John Paul’s car.

            “Which one of you is Father Andreou?” he says.

            Simon steps forward and says, “We both are. I’m the one who called you.”

            I stare at my brother, trying to make sense of this.

            Falcone points to one of his officers. “Go with Special Agent Bracco. Tell him everything you saw.”

            Simon obeys. He reaches into the pocket of the greca for his wallet and phone and passport but leaves his coat draped over the body. Before following the officer, he says, “This man has no next of kin. I need to make sure he receives a proper funeral.”

            Falcone squints. It’s a queer statement. But coming from a priest, he allows it.

            “Father,” he says, “you knew this man?”

            Simon answers in a faint voice. “He was my friend. His name was Ugolino Nogara.”





CHAPTER 3





THE POLICEMAN LEADS Simon out of earshot to answer questions, and I watch the other gendarmes rope up the clearing. One studies the eight-foot fence beside the public road, trying to understand how an outsider penetrated these gardens. Another stares at a security camera mounted overhead. Most gendarmes were city cops in another life. Rome PD. They can see that Ugo’s watch has been stolen, that his wallet is gone, that his briefcase is pried open. Yet they keep working over the details as if something doesn’t square.

            In these hills, people’s love for the Holy Father is fierce. Locals tell stories about popes knocking at their doors, making sure every family in town had a chicken in its pot. Old-timers are named in honor of Pope Pius, who shielded their families from harm in wartime. It’s not the walls that protect this place, but the villagers. A robbery here seems impossible.

            “Weapon!” I hear one of the officers call.

            He’s standing at the mouth of a tunnel, a giant thoroughfare built for a Roman emperor as a covered path for after-meal walks. Two more gendarmes jog to the opening, guided by a pair of gardeners. There is grunting. Something large topples over. Whatever the police find, though, isn’t the gun they were hoping for.

            “False alarm,” one of them barks.

            My chest shudders. I close my eyes. A wave of emotion rolls through me. I’ve watched men die before. At the hospital where Mona was a nurse, I used to anoint the sick. Say prayers for the dying. And yet I have trouble swallowing back this feeling.