“That’s good,” Dan said. “I’m glad to hear it. Was that what you called about?”
There was the sound of papers shuffling again. Dan wondered if this were nervousness, or if the Cardinal meant for him to get the impression that whatever the object of this call was, it was official enough to require being written down like a script.
“No,” the Cardinal said finally. “If it had been just that, I wouldn’t have bothered you on what I knew to be a very bad day. I’m calling to ask for a meeting.”
“What?”
“I’m calling to ask for a meeting,” the Cardinal said again. “I would like the two of us to sit down and talk. In private. At a time and place comfortable enough for the both of us that we would not be constrained for time.”
“But—why?” Dan said. Then he blushed, even though the Cardinal couldn’t see him. He’d sounded like a ten-year-old, or worse. He’d sounded like an overemoting actress in a soap opera whose plot was headed for a major crisis. “Excuse me, Your Eminence. I’m sorry. It’s just that—”
“It’s just that this is highly irregular. Yes. I realize that. Tell me, there was nobody left dead last night, so I suppose your people are all right on that score, but what about serious injuries. Wasn’t one of your parishioners seriously injured?”
“A couple of them were.”
“And aren’t you going to have a service, a Mass, a memorial, to pray for those who were injured?”
“Well, yes,” Dan said. “We’re doing a couple of things, really. A small one tonight. And then the day after tomorrow, we’re going to do something more formal, invite the families, that kind of thing—”
“Yes, of course. We would do something like that, too, in similar circumstances. That’s what I want to talk about. The larger service you intend to hold. Do you think you could come here for dinner this evening? Is that convenient for you?”
“Dinner,” Dan said.
“We could make it later in the evening,” the Cardinal Archbishop said, “or, of course, I could come to you, or we could meet on neutral ground. The problem is that it’s almost impossible for me to travel in privacy. I’ve got too many people watching me. And if we met in a restaurant, half the city of Philadelphia would know within the hour. Of course, if you’d rather not come here, I’d be more than willing—”
“No,” Dan said. The two men who were polishing the pews were nearly obsessive about it. They polished and repolished. They were going to take all night. “No,” Dan said again. “It’s not that, it’s tonight. We’ve got something on tonight. Could it be tomorrow or—”
“I’d rather it be sooner than later. How about four this afternoon?”
There was really no reason why he should not go at four that afternoon. There was only the fact that the very idea of it made him tired.
“Four would be fine,” he heard himself saying.
“Excellent,” the Cardinal Archbishop said. “Would you like me to send my car?”
“Wouldn’t that defeat the purpose?” Dan said. “Your car isn’t exactly any more anonymous than you are.”
“I could send a different car. Let me do that. You sound ready to drop. Would you like to be picked up at your rectory or your office?”
“The office,” Dan said.
“Wonderful. Thank you very much, Father Burdock. I’m very sorry about that nastiness you were forced to endure last night. Let’s hope that Mr. Phipps is chastened enough by his arrest to lie a little low for the next few weeks.”
“He isn’t.”
“The car will be there promptly at three-forty-five. I’m looking forward to seeing you.”
“I’m looking forward to seeing you, too, Your Eminence,” Dan said, but the phone had gone to dial tone in his hand. There was nobody at the other end of the line. Dan flicked the switch that turned the cell phone off, folded it up, and put it in his pocket. Then he looked at his roll of soft mints, still in his other hand, and put those in his pocket, too.
He couldn’t see the Cardinal Archbishop for dinner because he was leading a service here. He didn’t want to see the Cardinal Archbishop at four o’clock because—why? Because, Dan thought, there had been a tone in that man’s voice as dangerous as any he had ever heard in Roy Phipps’s.
He leaned over the balcony rail, meaning to call down to the two polishers in the pews, and then thought better of it. They were all doing odd, obsessive things today. It wouldn’t hurt the pews to have them polished. He straightened up and headed back to the stairs.