The Coptic Secret (20 page)

That was when she noticed the big Mercedes in the rearview mirror.

Rich people were fairly common in the area, so expensive cars were no surprise.

But this one was flashing its lights and blowing its horn as though to pass.

"Car make noise," Manfred observed, twisting his neck to look out of the rear window.

In itself, again no surprise. The wealthy were frequently in a hurry.

But pass?

The ribbon of asphalt had few straight stretches and fewer shoulders. The outside of each turn was lined with flimsy-looking Armco barrier and the inside tended to climb vertically.

There was a bump from behind that nearly tore the steering wheel from her hands.

Manfred began to cry.

Who is this maniac? Gurt wondered, fighting to regain control.

Then she remembered the hail of bullets at Lang's country place and the fiery ruin that was his condo. The man at the Atlanta airport. Whoever wanted Lang dead was perfectly willing to use his son to get to him. And her.

But how ... ?

She mentally kicked herself. Airline reservations were easily hacked. All someone had done was ascertain she had flown into Frankfurt. Her passport would have been registered at customs and immigration, a passport that listed Baden-Baden as her address.
Dumkopf!
Working and living in Frankfurt, she could have listed it instead. For that matter, her employer could have provided her with papers with any address in the world, rules notwithstanding.

Now these people had her actual address and were trying to either run her off the road or get her to stop.

Another not-so-gentle tap on her rear bumper emphasized her problem.

Reaching to the floor, she retrieved her purse with the agency-issued Glock she had stopped to pick up upon her arrival in Frankfurt to replace the one airport security mandated she leave in Atlanta. The people in the Mercedes wouldn't expect her to be armed. If they pulled out to push her to the edge ...

No, that would only invite return fire. No gunplay, not with Manfred in the car.

The BlackBerry? Doubtful she could take her eyes off the road long enough to dial. And the hilly terrain made the use of cell phones an iffy proposition.

Think.

Her agency training had taught her any number of mundane objects could be used for self-defense. She opened the glove box. Only insurance documents and a couple of road maps. Tire tools? In the trunk. The people in the Mercedes would be on her before she could even get to them.

She took her eyes off the road long enough to glance around the interior of the VW.

Then she had an idea.

VI.

Rome

It was obvious Lang's pursuers were gaining on him even if they were taking their time about it. He turned a corner and spied a trattoria, a small, usually single-family-operated eatery specializing more in home-type cooking than the formal fare of a
ristorante
. Outside, a waiter in an apron stained with tomato sauce was bussing the five tables with paper tablecloths.

Lang remembered his own lunch. It gave him an inspiration.

"Dove il cabinetto?"
he asked.

The waiter was still protesting that the restrooms were reserved for paying customers as Lang stepped around him and went inside.

Now Lang had to rely on luck. If this place was like a thousand others, the single-sex toilet, the kitchen and a few more tables would all be in the back. There might even be an exit to another street.

The downside lay in the local knowledge of the two behind him. If they knew there was no other exit, all they had to do was wait for him to come out.

His plan was to draw them in.

Sweeping aside a curtain, Lang was in the tiny kitchen. The chef, in grease-splattered white, looked up from a four- eyed gas stove on which artichokes were frying. He started to say something but then gaped as the waiter and the two workmen charged in behind Lang. Everyone was close enough to touch everybody else.

In a single motion, Lang snatched the wooden-handled skillet from the stove and heaved its sizzling contents into the face of the first man.

He screamed, clutching his face as though tearing away the frying skin would end his agony.

Lang continued a swing. The huge iron pan slammed against the head of the second man, who dropped to his knees with a moan, then collapsed to the floor and lay still.

The chef and waiter stared openmouthedly as Lang walked back to the front of the place where an older man stood behind a butlers' desk on which were several credit card machines.

"You might want to rethink your menu," Lang said as he went through the door to the outside. "Some people just can't tolerate fried food."

VII.

Baden-Baden

It was difficult to keep one eye on the tortuous road and the other on the rearview mirror but somehow Gurt managed.

"Manfred," she said as calmly as she could above the clatter of the VW's four cylinders at full rpm, "unbuckle your seat, get out of it and lay down on the floor."

"But Mommy ..." the terrified child protested.

"And do it
now."

Gurt was using that I-am-about-to-turn-you-over-my- knee tone that the little boy had learned meant the time for negotiation was over. She could only hope that small three-year-old fingers were equal to the task.

The Mercedes moved toward the left-hand lane, a position from which it could easily utilize its superior weight to push her into and perhaps over the Armco. She twitched the wheel to the left to block the move and took another jolt on her bumper. At the same time, she saw Manfred slip out of his seat and disappear onto the floor.

Just ahead was a sharp right hairpin around a hill, a turn so acute the Mercedes would lose sight of her for an instant.

Beyond that was a short straightaway at the end of which two driveways led to houses hidden from the road by conifers. If she could just slow the larger car a bit, she might make it to those driveways and someone might be home, someone with a landline telephone to summon the authorities. Or, if not, at least she and her child might find a place to hide in the woods.

It was a big
if.

One hand on the wheel as she entered the turn, she reached back and grasped the child seat. Manufactured to provide protection in case of a crash, the thing must have weighed a ton. The thought of what her pursuers might have in mind for her and her son gave her an extra boost of adrenaline and she tugged the seat free.

At that moment, the angle of the hairpin blocked her view of the Mercedes. She frantically rolled down her window. It seemed to move with glacial speed. Once open, she shoved the child seat through it, watching it hit the pavement and bounce just as the larger car exited the curve.

The result was far more spectacular than she had dared hope. The hood of the big auto dipped in a sudden application of brakes to avoid the object coming through the windshield. The violent locking of those brakes along with the centrifugal force of the corner broke whatever adhesion had existed between tires and pavement.

Gurt exhaled in relief as the front of the sedan spun to its right, too far over for the driver to correct in time. Panicked to stop the skid, he followed instinct rather than physics. He fought the wheel in the opposite direction instead of applying gas to regain lost traction. The car, already as loose on the pavement as a raindrop on a windowpane, simply swung the other way and planted its radiator into the Armco with a protesting shriek of metal that Gurt could clearly hear.

As she lost sight of the Mercedes behind the next rise in the road, a cloud of steam obscured the front end.

She was going to have to take the long way home and make an immediate departure, but, at least for the moment, she and Manfred were safe.

What was it she had been thinking? That she envied Lang the excitement? He always said to be careful what you wish for; you might get it.

VIII.

The Vatican

A Few Minutes Later

When Lang reached the top of the stairs on his way to the room he shared with Francis, the hall was packed with priests. They were excitedly chattering in at least four languages Lang recognized. As far as he could tell, the center of attention was in the direction of his room. Fearing something might have happened to Francis, Lang easily shouldered his way forward. He was somewhat more aggressive than your average priests.

When he reached, the front of the crowd, he almost slipped again. More water. The Vatican plumbing had struck again.

But water wasn't what had drawn all the attention. It flowed from the open doorway of the room next to Lang and Francis's. Standing on tiptoe, Lang could see it coursing down the far wall. The sheet of water had washed away the white plaster, revealing a painting, a fresco.

A large bearded man in biblical dress stood, poised to throw a rock. His face was twisted in rage. Hatred, pure and simple. His other hand held a large key. Around him, other men were in the process of throwing rocks, stones or anything else at hand.

Their object was another man who cowered against the walls of what Lang guessed was a palace or castle. One hand was raised in supplication while the other arm dangled at an angle indicating it was badly broken. His face was streaked with blood, yet he wore an expression of serenity hardly in sync with his situation. He was surrounded not only by rocks but also what could have been the contents of a nearby trash dump: pottery shards, sticks and even a seashell.

Lang was about to ask the man next to him a question when the entire hallway went silent as though some cosmic switch had been flipped off. Lang's eyes followed the turning of heads to the left. At the end of the hall stood a figure in a cardinal's red robes. Priests parted like a black sea as the newcomer approached the spot where Lang stood.

"Cardinal Benetti," Francis whispered at Lang's elbow. "The Holy Father's personal secretary."

Lang had not noticed his friend's arrival. "What... ?"

Francis put a finger to his lips as the cardinal spoke.

"There will be no word of this outside these walls," the man announced before repeating the message in French, Italian, German and Spanish and again in Latin. "I speak for the Holy Father," he added before closing the door to the room and disappearing in the direction from which he had come.

"What was all that about?" Lang asked.

"I'd say it was about letting what's here stay here," Francis said.

"Playing dumb doesn't become you," Lang observed. "You know what I meant."

Francis nodded toward their room as the priests began to disperse like spectators after the game is over.

Inside, Lang and Francis sat on opposite beds.

"Well?" Lang demanded.

Francis drew a breath and shook his head slowly. "I'm not really sure. A challenge to church dogma at best, heresy at worst."

Neither possibility particularly worried Lang. The Inquisition, indulgences, insistence the universe revolved around the earth had all come and gone, the greatest damage being a tad of soon-forgotten ecclesiastical egg on the church's face. It was obvious, though, that Francis took what they had seen seriously. The endless if friendly debate of the church might not be wise here.

"OK," Lang said, "let's start with the mural, fresco, whatever. What's so amazing about it?"

Francis gathered his thoughts and began. "You recall the discussion we had on the plane about saints and their symbols?"

"Sure. After all, it was just last night."

"Think about what you just saw."

"Looked like an old-fashioned lynch mob to me."

Francis nodded slowly. "Yes, yes I'm afraid it did."

Lang was taking off his shoes. "I still don't get it."

"The symbols, Lang. Remember what the symbol for James was?"

"A seashell, a scallop shell. Like the one next to the poor bastard being stoned." Lang's face lit up with recognition. "St. James! But he
was
martyred by stoning, right? What's blasphemous about that?"

Francis was staring at the floor. "The other man, did you see what he was holding?"

"A key, a big one. He was going to throw that, too?"

Francis managed a weak smile. "Hardly. The key is the symbol for St. Peter."

Lang paused, shoelace in hand. "St. Peter led the mob against James the Just? They were both Christians. That makes no sense."

Francis nodded slowly. "It does in a way, I suppose. See, at the beginning, right after the Crucifixion, Jesus's followers took up his ministry. Most believed Christianity was a sect, a subspecies of Judaism. That meant to be a Christian, you had to be a Jew, be circumcised, follow the dietary and other laws. James the Just opposed that idea, saying anyone, Gentile or Jew, could be a Christian as long as they ate no meat that had been bled out, sacrificed and avoided fornication."