Day of Confession (31 page)

90

Rome. Ambasciata della Repubblica Popolare Cinese

In Italia—Embassy, People’s Republic of China.

Still Tuesday, July 14. 2:30
P.M
.

THE DARK CADILLAC LIMOUSINE TURNED ONTO Via Bruxelles and drove past the nineteenth-century stone wall surrounding the grounds of the old Parco di Villa Grazioli, now a subdivision of apartment buildings and large private residences.

The limousine slowed as it approached an armored
carabinieri
car backed across the sidewalk. Farther down was another. In between was number 56. Turning in, the Cadillac stopped in front of a high green gate. A moment passed and then the gate slid back and the limousine entered, the gate closing again behind it.

Moments later United States ambassador to Italy Leighton Merri-weather Fox walked up the front steps to the four-story, beige brick-and-marble structure that was the Embassy for the People’s Republic of China. With him were Nicholas Reid, deputy chief of Mission; Harmon Alley, counselor for Political Affairs; and Alley’s first secretary, James Eaton.

Inside, the mood was somber. Eaton saw Fox bow and shake the hand of Jiang Youmei, Chinese ambassador to Italy. Nicholas Reid did the same with Foreign Minister Zhou Yi, while Harmon Alley waited in turn to meet deputy Foreign Minister Dai Rui.

The topic among them, the discussion in every corner of the large light-green-and-gold reception room, was the same, the disaster in the Chinese city of Hefei, where the death toll from polluted drinking water had risen to a horrific sixty-two thousand and was still increasing.

Health officials had no estimate of where or when it would end. Seventy thousand. Eighty. No one knew. The filtration plants had been shut down. Fresh water was being flown, railroaded, and trucked in. But the devastation had already been done. The Chinese Army was on scene but was overwhelmed by the immensity of the task, by the most rudimentary logistics of dealing with so much sickness and death. And despite attempts at media control by Beijing, the whole world knew what was happening.

Leighton Merriweather Fox and Nicholas Reid were there to offer condolence and aid. Harmon Alley and James Eaton to assess the politics of the situation. It was the same worldwide: ranking diplomatic officials visiting the Chinese Embassy in the country to which they were assigned, offering help on one hand, assessing the political implications on the other. The speculation was whether Beijing was capable of safeguarding its people, or whether the fear that a simple drink of water could kill you, your family, and thousands of your neighbors in a single stroke would be enough to cause the provinces to pull away, choosing to rely upon themselves instead. Every foreign government knew Beijing was hovering on the precipice. The central government might weather Hefei, but if the same thing happened again anywhere else in the country, tomorrow, next week, or even next year, it would be the clap of thunder that would leave the People’s Republic on the verge of total collapse. It was a nightmare every foreign government knew was China’s deepest and most profound fear. Water had suddenly become her greatest weakness.

Which was why, in the name of human suffering and tragedy, the diplomats were gathered here at number 56 Via Bruxelles and in Chinese embassies around the world, hovering to see what would happen next.

Bowing politely, taking a cup of tea from a tray proffered by a young Chinese woman in a gray jacket, Eaton made his way across the crowded room, stopping now and then to take a familiar hand. As first secretary for Political Affairs, his presence here was not so much to offer sympathy to the Chinese, but rather to determine who else was there and doing the same. And now, as he chatted with the counselor for Political Affairs from the French Embassy, there was a stir at the main entry, and both men turned toward it.

What Eaton saw was not unexpected: the entrance of Vatican Secretariat of State Cardinal Umberto Palestrina, dressed in his emblem simple black suit with white clerical collar, and followed immediately by three others of the Holy See’s ranking nobility, wearing their robes of office—Cardinal Joseph Matadi, Monsignor Fabio Capizzi, and Cardinal Nicola Marsciano.

Almost immediately the din of conversation faded, and diplomats stepped aside as Palestrina approached the Chinese ambassador, bowed, and took his hand as if they were the oldest and dearest of friends. That relations between Beijing and the Vatican hardly existed made little difference. This was Rome, and Rome represented nine hundred and fifty million Roman Catholics around the world. It was those millions Palestrina and the others represented in the name of the Holy Father. They were here now to offer sympathy to the people of China.

Excusing himself from the French diplomat, Eaton crossed the room slowly, watching Palestrina and the clergymen with him as they talked with the Chinese. Watching with even greater interest as the group of seven left the room together.

This was the second public interaction between the Vatican and ranking diplomats from China since the assassination of Cardinal Parma. More than ever, Eaton wished Father Daniel Addison were there to tell him what it meant.

91

TRYING TO KEEP HIS SANITY AND AT THE same time praying to God to show him some way to stop the horror, Marsciano entered the small pale-green-and-beige parlor and sat down with the others—Palestrina, Cardinal Matadi, Monsignor Capizzi, Ambassador Jiang Youmei, Zhou Yi, and Dai Rui.

Palestrina was directly across from him, sitting in a gold-fabric armchair, speaking Mandarin to the Chinese. Every part of him, from the plant of his feet on the floor to the look in his eyes to the expressive way he used his hands, conveyed heartfelt empathy and vast concern for the tragedy playing out halfway around the world. He made his entire outpouring intimate and very personal, as if he were saying that if it were at all possible, he would go to Hefei and minister to the sick and dying himself.

It was a posture and generosity the Chinese took courteously and appreciatively, if not gratefully. But Marsciano—and, he knew, Palestrina as well—could see they were merely going through the motions. As much as their thoughts and concerns were with the people of Hefei, they were first and foremost politicians, and the focus of their attention was their government and its survival. Beijing, and what it did, was clearly under a world microscope.

Yet how, in their wildest nightmares, could they know, or even consider, that the prime architect of the disaster was neither nature nor a decaying water-filtration system, but instead the white-haired giant who sat only inches away, consoling them in their own language? Or that two of the three other highly distinguished prelates in the room with them had, in the last hours, become that architect’s steadfast disciples?

If Marsciano had held any secret hope—now that the horror had started and Palestrina’s “Protocol” was exposed for the awful and savage reality it was—that either Monsignor Capizzi or Cardinal Matadi would be rocked to his senses and take a forceful stand against the secretariat, it had been quashed by an internal letter of support, hand delivered that morning by both men to Palestrina personally (a letter Marsciano was asked to sign but refused), fully backing the secretariat’s rationale for his actions. A rationale maintaining that Rome had sought rapprochement with Beijing for years, and for years the central government had spurned it; and would continue to spurn it for as long as they remained in power.

To Palestrina, Beijing’s stance meant one thing—the Chinese had no religious freedom at all and never would have it. Palestrina’s answer to that was simply that he was going to give it to them. The cost was irrelevant, those who died would be martyrs.

Obviously Capizzi and Matadi wholeheartedly agreed. Pursuit of the papacy was everything, and either would be foolish to defy the man who could put him there. In result, human life became merely a tool in that pursuit. And vile as it was now, it would get infinitely worse, because there were two more lakes yet to be poisoned.

Knowing what was to come, sickened by the awful hypocrisy and obscenity before him, unable to participate in it further, Marsciano suddenly stood. “If you will excuse me.”

Palestrina started and looked up sharply in surprise. “Are you ill, Eminence?”

Palestrina’s startled reaction made Marsciano realize how deranged the secretariat had become. He was playing his part so well he actually and truly believed what he was saying. At that moment the other side of him simply did not exist. It was a marvel of supreme self-deception.

“Are you ill, Eminence?” Palestrina said again.

“Yes…,” Marsciano said quietly, his gaze swinging directly to Palestrina and holding there for the briefest second, his profound contempt for the secretariat made explicitly clear but at the same time kept wholly private between them. Immediately he turned away and bowed graciously to the Chinese.

“The prayers of all of Rome are with you,” he said and then left, crossing the room alone and walking out the door, knowing Palestrina watched him every step of the way.

92

MARSCIANO MIGHT HAVE LEFT THE ROOM alone, but that was where his freedom ended. Protocol forced him to wait for the others, and now, inside the limousine, there was silence.

Marsciano looked purposely out the window as the green gate closed behind them and they turned onto Via Bruxelles—knowing, with the investments already in place, his actions inside had all but sealed his fate.

Once again he thought of the three lakes Palestrina had promised. Which two were to come after Hefei, and when, only the secretariat knew. Palestrina’s sickness and cruelty were beyond comprehension. His just-witnessed act of self-deception, incredible. When and how had an intelligent and respectable man turned? Or had the monster always been there and only sleeping?

Now the driver turned onto Via Salaria and slowed to a crawl in heavy afternoon traffic. Marsciano could feel Palestrina’s presence beside him, and the eyes of Capizzi and Matadi as they sat opposite watching him, but he acknowledged none of it. Instead his thoughts went to the Chinese banking head, Yan Yeh, remembering him not as an astute businessman who was, at the same time, an autocratic lifelong member of the Chinese Communist Party and prominent adviser to the party chairman, but rather as a friend and humanitarian, a man who could produce a cursory political diatribe one minute and in the next, talk about his personal concerns for health care and education and the well-being of the poor around the world; and then in the next, smile warmly and laugh and make small talk about Italian wine makers coming to the People’s Republic to show them how it was done.

“—Do you often make telephone calls to North America?” Palestrina’s voice echoed suddenly and sharply behind him.

Marsciano turned from the window to see Palestrina staring at him, his huge frame taking up most of the seat between them.

“I don’t understand.”

“Canada, in particular.” Palestrina kept his eyes on Marsciano. “The province of Alberta.”

“I still don’t understand…”

“1011 403 555 2211,” Palestrina said from memory. “You don’t recognize the number?”

“Should I?”

Marsciano could feel the lean of the car as they turned onto Via Pinciana. Outside was the familiar green of the Villa Borghese. Abruptly, the Mercedes accelerated. Moving toward the Tiber. Soon they would be across it, turning onto Lungotevere Mellini, going toward the Vatican. Somewhere not far behind them was Marsciano’s apartment on Via Carissimi, and he knew that he had seen it for the last time.

“It is the number for the Banff Springs Hotel. Two calls were made to it from your office on Saturday morning, the eleventh. Another, that afternoon, from a cellular phone signed out to Father Bardoni. Your private secretary. The man who replaced the priest.”

Marsciano shrugged. “Many calls are made from my office, even on a Saturday. Father Bardoni works long hours, so do I, so do others…. I do not keep track of every telephone call…”

“You told me in the presence of Jacov Farel that the priest was dead.”

“He is…” Marsciano’s eyes came up and looked at Palestrina directly.

“Then who was brought to Bellagio, to Villa Lorenzi two days ago? On Sunday evening, the twelfth?”

Marsciano smiled. “You have been watching the television.”

“The calls to Banff were made Saturday, and the priest was brought to Villa Lorenzi on Sunday.” Palestrina leaned forward into the face of Nicola Marsciano, stretching the material of his jacket tight across his back.

“Villa Lorenzi is owned by the writer Eros Barbu. Eros Barbu is vacationing at the Banff Springs Hotel.”

“If you are asking if I know Eros Barbu, Eminence, you are right. We are old friends from Tuscany.”

Palestrina watched Marsciano carefully for a moment longer. Finally, he sat back. “Then you should be saddened to hear he has committed suicide.”

93

Lake Como. 4:30
P.M
.

BANGING AND PITCHING, HALF SLIDING, Harry worked the farm truck down the rutted and overgrown forest road toward the inlet where he hoped Elena and Danny were. Two hours had passed since he’d climbed up from the lake looking for the truck, and much of the terrain was now in late-afternoon shadow, and this changed the look of everything.

The going was not only slow and difficult, but also dangerous; the old truck had bad brakes and nearly bald tires, making it hard to control as it rattled and bounced, pitched and slid over the road that was barely a road at all. Almost every turn was a hairpin switchback, and at each he was certain he was going over the side, to be sent plunging through heavy undergrowth into a steep ravine on one side, or dropping like a stone to the lake several hundred feet below on the other.

It was at a high point that he saw the flotilla to the north, maybe thirty or forty boats at anchor or cruising slowly back and forth, held offshore by three larger craft that looked like cutters or guard boats, and he knew the police had found the grotto. Then, as he was starting down, negotiating the hairpin, he saw a helicopter suddenly rise up to circle over the top of the cliff where he’d been less than twenty minutes earlier.

Abruptly the entire scene vanished as the truck slid forward on the loose gravel. Pumping the brakes wildly, Harry swung the wheel back toward the road. But it did no good. The truck continued to slide. The edge was coming up. After that there was nothing but air and the water below. And then the right front wheel caught in a rut. The steering wheel snapped out of his hand. And, as if it had suddenly been mounted on a track, the vehicle swung sharply back and followed the path of the road, dropping behind a steep ridge and in under an umbrella of trees.

For another five minutes Harry fought both the truck and road, and then he was at lake level, where the road went on for another twenty yards, then ended abruptly in a growth of brush and high trees at the water’s edge.

Parking on a hill behind a row of trees and making sure the truck couldn’t be seen from the lake, Harry got out and walked along the water’s edge, then pushed through the undergrowth to where he could see the dark shadow that was the entry to the cave. In the distance he could hear the helicopter circling. And he prayed that’s where it would stay.