God's Spy (16 page)

A fleeting smile crossed Fowler’s face.
‘Thank you. You don’t know how important your words are to me, even though I lament the profound rupture that lies behind such an affirmation from a former Catholic.’
‘But you still haven’t told me why you decided to return to this work.’
‘It’s very simple. A friend asked me. And I don’t like to let my friends down.’
‘So that is what you are now, God’s spy?’
Fowler smiled. ‘You could call me that, I suppose.’
Dicanti stood up and walked over to the shelves near her desk. ‘Padre, this goes against my principles but, as my mother likes to say, you only live once.’
She pulled a thick volume of forensic analysis from the shelf and handed it to Fowler. He opened it. The first page had a signed dedication: ‘I hope this gift helps you to keep the faith. Maurizio.’ The pages of the book were cut out, creating three empty spaces, conveniently occupied by a half-litre of Dewar’s and two small glasses.
‘It’s barely nine a.m.’
‘Are you going to do the honours or do we wait for sunset, padre? I’d be proud to have a drink with the man who set up the Eisner Foundation – among other reasons, because that foundation provided the scholarship that enabled me to study in Quantico.’
This time it was Fowler’s turn to be astonished. He poured two whiskys and raised his glass. ‘What are we toasting?’
‘Those who are no longer with us.’
‘All right. To those who are no longer with us.’
Both of them drained their glasses. The liquid swirled down her throat and for Paola, who almost never drank, it was like swallowing nails soaked in ammonia. She knew her stomach would be throwing a tantrum all day, but she felt proud to have raised a glass with this man. There were some things you just had to do.
‘The thing we should worry about now is getting Dante back on the team. As you guessed, you owe this unexpected gift to him,’ Paola said as she gestured towards the photographs. ‘I’m wondering why he did it. What does he have against you?’
Fowler broke out into laughter. It surprised Paola that such a joyful sound could also seem wistful and sad. ‘Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed.’
‘I’m sorry, I don’t follow.’
‘Dottoressa, for someone so versed in applying reverse psychology to other people’s actions, you are showing a surprising lack of judgement in the case before us now. It’s quite clear that Dante has taken a romantic interest in you. And for whatever absurd reason, he believes that I’m his competition.’
Paola froze, her mouth half open. She could feel her cheeks turning a suspicious colour, and it wasn’t on account of the whisky. It was the second time this man had managed to make her blush. She wasn’t completely sure how he’d done it, but she wanted to feel it again, like a child with a weak stomach who insists on getting back on the Ferris wheel a second time.
As luck would have it, the telephone rang at exactly that moment. Dicanti grabbed it, pleased to have escaped an embarrassing situation.
Her eyes filled with emotion. ‘I’ll be right down.’
Fowler raised his eyebrows quizzically.
‘Let’s get a move on. Among the photos that the UACV developed from the Robayra crime scene, there’s one with our Brother Francesco. Maybe we have something.’

Thursday, 7 April 2005, 9.15 a.m.

It was only a blur on the computer screen. The photographer had captured the interior of the chapel and there in the background was Karosky, disguised as Brother Francesco. The investigator had enlarged that part of the image 60 times, but it was still hard to make out anything specific.

‘Not a whole lot there,’ Fowler interjected.
‘Slow down, padre.’ Troi barged into the room, his arms full of papers. ‘Angelo is our forensic sculptor. He’s an expert in image-upgrade and I’m sure he’ll find a way to give us a different perspective. Am I right, Angelo?’
Angelo Biffi, one of the UACV’s technical experts, rarely got up from his computer. He looked to be somewhere in his thirties and his thick glasses were crowned by a mop of greasy hair. He cloistered himself at a large, poorly lit desk that reeked of half-eaten pizza, cut-rate cologne and singed plastic. A dozen of the most up-to-date monitors took the place of windows. Glancing around, Fowler decided that Angelo probably preferred to sleep next to his computers than to go home. He looked as if he’d been a lab rat his whole life, but even so, he had a pleasant face and always wore a timid smile.
‘You see, padre, what I mean is – we, the department, or really I . . .’
‘Spit it out, Angelo. Here, have a coffee,’ Paola said, leaning forward with the cappuccino that Fowler had brought for Dante half an hour earlier.
‘Thanks, dottoressa. But it’s cold!’
‘Don’t complain; it will soon be hot outside. In fact, when you grow up you’ll look back and say, “This April is hot, but it’s nowhere near as hot as the year Pope John Paul died.” Just you wait and see.’
Taken aback, Fowler stared at Dicanti, whose hand was resting gently on Angelo’s shoulder. Even if she was going to pieces inside, Dicanti was trying to camouflage it by making a joke. She had barely had any sleep; the bags under her eyes were larger than a raccoon’s, and her emotions were torn between confusion, sadness and anger all at the same time. You didn’t have to be a psychologist or a priest to see it. And in spite of everything, here she was, trying to help that kid feel more comfortable around a priest who slightly intimidated him. At that moment Fowler loved her for it, but he quickly suppressed the thought. He couldn’t forget the shame she had made him feel just a short time earlier in her office.
‘Explain to Padre Fowler how you work,’ Paola said. ‘I’m sure he’ll find it interesting.’
When he heard that, the young man’s eyes lit up.
‘Take a look at the screen. We have – OK, I have designed special software for the interpolation of images. As you know, every image is composed of coloured dots called pixels. If a normal image contains roughly ,00 by ,70 pixels but we are only interested in a tiny corner of the photo, we’ll end up with a few pointless splotches of colour. Making it bigger simply turns it into the blurred image you see now. Normally when a conventional program tries to enlarge an image, it uses the bicubic method, which means it takes into account the colour of the eight pixels adjacent to the one you want to enlarge. So at the end you get the same splotch, but magnified. But with my program . . .’
Paola looked sideways at Fowler as he leaned toward the monitor, staring hard. The priest was trying to pay attention to Angelo’s explanation in spite of the ordeal he’d just gone through moments before. Seeing those photos from his past had been very difficult and had left him feeling deeply upset – it was obvious to anyone who cared to look; and in spite of all that he was forcing himself to be pleasant towards a timid young man he would never see again. Dicanti loved him for it, but she rapidly pushed the thought aside. The embarrassment she’d felt in her office that morning still played on her mind.
‘. . . and taking into account the variables in the points of light, let’s consider what a three-dimensional information program could bring to the project. It’s based on a complex algorithm that takes several hours to work itself out.’
‘Damn it, Angelo, you brought us down here to tell us that?’
‘But this – you’ll see . . .’
‘Don’t worry, Angelo. Dicanti, I suspect that what this intelligent young man is trying to tell us is that the program has already been working for several hours and is about to give us its conclusions.’
‘Correct. In fact, it’s coming out of the printer right now.’
The laser printer directly in front of Dicanti hummed as it produced a single piece of paper with an old man’s face on it, his eyes shaded, but all in all, a much more focused image than the original.
‘Nice work, Angelo. Not quite clear enough to identify the man, but it’s a starting point. Take a look, padre.’
Fowler examined the features in the photograph carefully. Troi, Dicanti and Angelo watched and waited.
‘I’d say it was him but it’s hard without seeing the eyes. The shape of the eye sockets and something else – something indefinable – tells me it’s him. But if this man had walked by me in the street, I wouldn’t have given him a second glance.’
‘So it’s another dead end?’
‘Not necessarily,’ Angelo suggested. ‘I have a program that can make a three-dimensional image out of a few pieces of information. I think we can infer enough with what we have. I’ve been working with a photo of the engineer.’
‘The engineer?’ Paola was puzzled.
‘Yes, the photo of engineer Karosky – the one who’s passing himself off as a Carmelite. You should see the look on your face, Dicanti . . .’
Troi went on full alert, making unmistakable gestures of alarm behind Angelo’s back. It finally dawned on Paola that Angelo had been left in the dark. Paola knew that the director hadn’t let the four investigators looking for clues at the Robayra and Pontiero crime scenes go home. What he had done was give them permission to call their families to explain, and then put them in quarantine in one of the rooms where people usually took their coffee breaks. Troi could be tough when he wanted to be, but he was also fair: he paid overtime at three times the hourly rate.
‘Ah yes, what was I thinking? Go on, Angelo.’
Troi was no doubt divvying up the information at every level so that no one had all the pieces of the puzzle. He didn’t want anyone to know that they were investigating the deaths of two cardinals. Still, this obviously made Paola’s work more difficult, besides which it gave her serious doubts that even she had all the pieces in play.
‘As I was saying, I’ve been working on the photo of the engineer. I think that in about thirty minutes we’ll have a three-dimensional image of his photo from 99, which we can compare with the threedimensional image we’re putting together in 00. If you come back in a little while, I’ll have something more definite.’
‘Perfect. If it’s OK with you, padre, ispettore, I’d like to go over everything in the conference room. Angelo, we’ll see you in a short while.’
‘Right.’
The three headed up to the conference room, two floors above. No sooner had Dicanti walked in than she was overwhelmed by the terrible realisation that the last time she’d been in the room was in Pontiero’s company.
‘May I inquire what the two of you have done to Superintendent Dante?’
Paola and Fowler exchanged quick glances. They shook their heads in unison.
‘Absolutely nothing.’
‘Good. I hope I didn’t see him storm by in a fury because of something you did. I hope he was just pissed off about Sunday’s football scores, because I don’t want Cirin all over me, or the Minister of the Interior.’
‘I don’t think you need worry. Dante is an integral member of the team,’ Paola lied.
‘So why don’t I believe you? Last night that guy saved your neck, Dicanti. Want to tell me where he is now?’
Paola didn’t say a word. She couldn’t talk to Troi about the group’s internal problems. She was just about to open her mouth when a familiar voice got there first.
‘I went out for cigarettes.’
Dante, wearing his leather jacket and ironic smile, stood in the doorway to the conference room.
Troi studied him sceptically. ‘It’s one of the very worst vices, Dante.’
‘We all have to die of something.’
Paola’s eyes followed Dante as he took a seat next to Fowler, acting as if nothing had come between them, although two fleeting, hostile glances were enough to convince Paola that things were not as smooth as they seemed. But as long as the two of them behaved in a civil manner towards each other over the next few days, everything would be OK. What she didn’t understand was how her Vatican colleague had recovered from his anger so quickly. Something had happened.
‘All right, then,’ said Troi. ‘This bloody case gets more complicated by the minute. Yesterday, in full daylight, we lost one of the best officers I’ve known in a long time, and nobody has a clue what will happen next. We can’t even hold a public funeral – at least, not until we come up with a reasonable explanation for his death. That’s why I want us to put our heads together. Tell me what you know, Paola.’
‘Since when?’
‘Since the beginning. A quick overview of the case so far.’
Paola stood up and walked over to the blackboard. She could think much more clearly on her feet.
‘Let’s see. Victor Karosky, a priest with a history of sexual abuse, escapes from a private, low-security institution where he was subjected to excessive quantities of a drug that chemically castrated him while raising his levels of aggression. From June 000 until the end of 00 there’s no trace of his whereabouts. In 00, under a false name, he surreptitiously assumes the identity of a Carmelite friar, using as a front the Church of Santa Maria in Traspontina only a few feet from Saint Peter’s Square.’
Paola drew a few lines on the blackboard and began to construct a calendar.
‘Friday, the first of April, twenty-four hours before the death of John Paul the Second: Karosky takes the Italian cardinal Enrico Portini hostage in the Madre Pie residence. Have we confirmed that traces of blood from both cardinals were found in the crypt?’
Troi nodded yes.
‘Karosky takes Portini to Santa Maria, tortures him and brings him back to the last place he was seen alive: the chapel in the residence. Saturday, the second of April: Portini’s body is discovered the same night as the death of the Pope, although the Vatican Vigilanza decides to “clean up” the evidence, believing it to be the isolated act of a madman. Purely by luck, word does not get out, in good measure thanks to the staff of the residence. Sunday, the third of April: Argentine cardinal Emilio Robayra arrives in Rome on a oneway ticket. Our theory is that someone met him at the airport or en route to the Saint Ambrogio residence, where he was expected on Sunday evening. We know he never arrived. Do we have anything useful from the airport’s surveillance cameras?’
‘No one has checked. We don’t have enough personnel,’ Troi said, by way of excuse.
‘We have more than enough.’
‘I can’t bring in any other detectives. The important thing is to keep a lid on this case, in accordance with the wishes of the Holy See. Let’s play it by ear, Paola. I’ll ask for the tapes myself.’
Dicanti pulled a face, but it was the response she’d expected.
‘Back to Sunday. Karosky kidnaps Robayra and takes him to the crypt. There, he tortures the cardinal for more than a day, leaving messages on his body and then also at the crime scene. The sentence that was left on the body is from the Gospels: “And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven,” referring to the moment when the first Supreme Pontiff of the Catholic Church was chosen. This and the message written in blood on the ground, added to the mutilation of the body, leads us to believe that the assassin has his eyes on the Conclave.
‘Monday, the fourth of April: the suspect drags the body to one of the chapels in the church and calmly calls the police in his role as brother Francesco Toma. To mock us even further, he wears Cardinal Robayra’s glasses the whole time we’re there. Vatican agents call the UACV and Troi calls Camilo Cirin.’
Paola paused briefly and looked directly at Troi.
‘When you picked up the phone to call him, I think Cirin knew who the criminal was, although he never suspected that he was a serial killer. I’ve given it a good deal of thought and I believe Cirin already knew the name of Portini’s killer by Sunday night. He probably had access to VICAP’s database, and the entry “severed hands” wouldn’t have pulled up many cases. His network of contacts put him in touch with Major Fowler, who arrived here on the night of the fifth. Probably the original plan was not include us, Director Troi. It was Karosky who brought us into the game, deliberately. Why is the real question.’
Paola drew the final line.
‘Wednesday the sixth of April: while Dante, Fowler and myself track down leads about the victims, Detective Maurizio Pontiero is beaten to death by Victor Karosky in the crypt of Santa Maria in Traspontina.’
‘We have the murder weapon?’ asked Dante.
‘Without fingerprints but, yes, we have it,’ Troi responded. ‘Karosky made several wounds with what could be a very sharp kitchen knife and he beat his victim repeatedly with a candelabrum found at the scene. But I don’t have high hopes for this line of investigation.’
‘May I ask why?’
‘Because it’s not our normal procedure, Dante. Our job is to find out who the killer is. Typically, when we’re sure of who he is, our work is over. But now we have to apply our knowledge to discern where the killer is, and knowing his name is just a point of departure. For that reason, Dicanti’s contribution is more important than ever.’
‘And I’d like to congratulate her. That was a brilliant chronology, Dicante,’ said Fowler.
‘Extraordinary,’ Dante added, mocking all the way.
Paola could feel the resentment in his words, but she decided that it would be better to ignore him – for now.
‘Good summary, Dicanti,’ Troi congratulated her. ‘What’s the next step? Have you found your way into Karosky’s head yet? Does the case bear any similarities to anything you’ve studied before?’
The profiler thought for a few seconds before she answered. ‘All sane people are alike, but every one of these bastards is unhinged in their own particular way.’
‘And what does that tell us, apart from the fact that you’ve read Tolstoi?’ asked Troi.
‘Well, we’d be committing a terrible blunder if we believed that one serial killer is exactly like another. You can try to search for certain rules of thumb, find equivalents, draw conclusions from similarities between cases, but in the end every one of these pieces of shit is a very solitary mind living millions of light years away from the rest of humanity. There’s nobody home. They’re not human beings. They don’t feel empathy. Their emotions are switched off. The thing that makes them kill, that leads them to believe their egotism is more important than anyone else’s, the reasons they use to excuse their insanity – none of that matters to me. I don’t try to understand them any further than is strictly necessary in order to catch them.’