The Fifth Gospel (57 page)

“I love you, too.”

And for a second, my heart feels full again. Wherever this child is beside me, that's where I will call home.

MONA FOLLOWS ME BACK
to the kitchen. She runs a hand through her hair. She stands and takes down one of the cups from the cabinet, filling it with water from the tap. All this time, she doesn't speak.

Finally, she puts her cup down and sits beside me, wresting my hands from an open Bible that happens to be there. An open Bible she has been reading to our son.

“Alex, what are you about to do?”

“I can't talk about it.”

“It's not your job to save Simon. Do you understand that?”

“Please,” I say. “Don't.”

She nudges the Bible back at me. “Look in there, and tell me something. Who saves Jesus?”

I stare at her, wondering what she can possibly mean.

“Show me,” she says, “the page where he wins his trial.”

“You know he doesn't w . . .”

My words trail off. But she waits. She says nothing. She wants to hear me speak those words.

“Jesus,” I say, “doesn't win his trial.”

Her voice is quieter now. “Then show me where everything ends happily ever after because his brother comes to save him.”

“So I should abandon him? Just run away?”

Her expression is crimped. She hears the accusation. Her eyes slip.

“No matter what you do,” she says, “nobody's ever been able to control Simon. Nobody's ever been able to change his mind. If he wants to lose this trial—”

I rise from my chair. “We're not having this conversation.”

But for the first time since her return, she won't bow and scrape. “There is only one life in your hands, Alex. And it's his.” She points toward the bedroom. “But you've filled his head with stories about two people he never sees. You've let him believe that the two most important people in his life are never around. Even though the most important person in his life is
always
around.”

“Mona,” I say, “I have a chance to give Simon his life back. I owe him that.”

Her lip curls. “You don't.”

But she doesn't understand. “No matter what happens to me,” I say, “I'll still have Peter. If he loses his priesthood, he'll have nothing.”

She's about to say something awful, but I won't give her the chance.

“When I'm done tomorrow,” I tell her, “there are going to be consequences. One of them may be that Peter and I can't stay here anymore.”

She starts to ask why, but I push on.

“Before anything like that happens, it's important to me that I be honest with you. Ever since you left, there's nothing I've wanted more than to get our family back together.”

She's already shaking her head, trying to rewind the tape, trying to make this stop.

“I used to dream about the three of us,” I say, “living in this apartment. I wanted that more than I've ever wanted anything in my life.”

Suddenly she begins to cry. I have to look away.

“But when you came back,” I say, “everything had changed. It's nothing you did wrong. You did everything right. I love you. I always will. But everything else has changed.”

She is staring up at the ceiling, trying to dry her eyes. “You don't owe me an explanation. You don't owe me
anything
.” Her eyes come down, settling on mine. “But I'm begging you. Put yourself and Peter first. Just once. Forget about Simon. You've worked so hard to give Peter a good, happy life here. Whatever you're about to do, remember that this place is his whole world.”

I love her for these words. For this fierce defense of her husband and son. But I can't take much more of it. I need to finish this.

“Mona, I don't know where Peter and I will live if we have to move. All I know is, we would be somewhere outside the walls.” I hesitate. “And if you wanted, you could join us.”

She stares at me in silence.

“I'm not asking what your plans are,” I say. “But I realized, tonight, what mine are. I want my family together.”

She reaches over and folds her arms around me. She begins to sob, digging her fingers into my skin.

“Don't answer me,” I say. “Not tonight. Wait until you're sure.”

She tightens her grip. I close my eyes and hold her.

It's done.

I have loved this life. In the future, whatever it may hold, I will stare up at the walls of this country and thank God for the years He gave me inside them. As a child, I watched the sun rise over Rome. As a man, I will watch it set over Saint Peter's.

C
HAPTER
41

F
OR AN HOUR
she watches me pace the living room, knowing what I'm rehearsing in my thoughts. Finally she says, “Alex, you need to sleep.” And before I can refuse, she takes me by the hand and leads me toward the bedroom. She waits for me to follow her inside. Then she locks the door after us.

It has been almost five years since I slept with my wife. The old mattress sighs at the return of her long-forgotten weight. She doesn't undress. She just removes her shoes and makes me lie down beside her. She turns out the lights. And when they're off, I feel her fingers running gently through my hair. I feel her breath on the back of my neck. But her hand never strays. Her mouth never comes any closer.

All night, my dreams are violent. Twice I rise in the dark to pray. Mona sleeps so lightly that she gets up to join me. Then, in the darkest hours, I'm swallowed by a loneliness that makes me desperate to wake her. To tell her what I'm about to do. When I think of what Simon has done to keep this secret, though, I turn over and say nothing. I twist in the sheets, and when I hear her asking if I'm all right, I pretend that I'm asleep.

Before dawn I slip out of bed and begin to prepare. I lock myself in the bathroom and stand on the countertop. I wrap Simon's cassock in a towel, then put it in a garbage bag. I put the gun case in a small plastic bag from the grocery store. When I return to the kitchen, I place the small bag beside me on the table.

Then I work over my story, pouring cup after cup from the moka pot, paging through the Bible on the table to be sure I remember the verses well enough to leave no opportunity for anyone to second-guess me. I force myself to think back to the night Ugo died, searching for details I might've forgotten. It doesn't need to be perfect. It just needs to be convincing.

Mona appears a half hour later. Soundlessly she inspects my inner and outer cassocks, my best pair of shoes. On the kitchen table she lays out my keys and the summons from the cursore. She doesn't ask about the small plastic bag. She must see that it contains something hard and dark, wrapped in a length of cable, but she never says a word. Every time she glances at her watch, I check my own.

Peter is sleeping when I kiss him on the forehead. I sit on the edge of his mattress and stare across the room at the empty bed where Simon used to sleep long ago. Beside that bed I used to pray with my brother. Across the space between these mattresses we used to whisper in the dark. Before the memories can undo me, I leave the room.

By half past eight I'm outside, the small bag hidden under my cassock, the garbage bag left in a dumpster across the border in Rome. There's enough time for me to walk a final lap around my country. Instead I leave the gates and walk into Saint Peter's Square to mill with the early crowds and feel the kiss of spray from the fountains. I watch the Jewish peddlers set up carts and the sampietrini set out chairs for an outdoor event that must be coming later in the afternoon. Mainly, though, I watch the laypeople. The pilgrims and tourists. I want to experience this place as they do.

The sedan arrives promptly at nine thirty, driven by the papal butler, Angelo Gugel. Signor Gugel lives in our building. One of his three daughters used to babysit Simon and me when our mother was still alive. But there are no affectionate greetings, just a polite “Good morning, Father.” Then he drives me by the Sistine Chapel to the palace road. As we slip through, the Swiss Guards salute. When we reach the Secretariat, a folding wooden gate opens, revealing an archway. Beyond is terra incognita. John Paul's private wing of the palace.

The courtyard is small. The walls seem immensely high, giving me the sensation of standing at the bottom of a pit. The earth is crossed with
shadows. On the opposite side, two guards sit in a glass-paneled kiosk, watching us. But Gugel drives in a circle and returns to the archway, stopping so that my door is opposite an entrance in the wall. When he lets me out, he says, “Father, this way.”

The private elevator.

He inserts a key and operates it himself. When the car stops, Signor Gugel pushes aside the metal grate and opens a door. The flesh of my neck tingles.

We have arrived. I am standing inside the Holy Father's apartments. In front of me is a sitting room furnished with odd pieces of furniture and a few potted plants. No Swiss Guards anywhere. Leo says they aren't allowed inside here. Gugel leads me on.

We enter a library with walls of gold damask. Beneath a towering painting of Jesus there stands a single desk. On the desk is nothing but a gold clock and a white telephone.

Gugel points to a long table in the center of the room and says, “Please wait here.”

Then, to my surprise, he leaves.

I look all around me, tense with feelings. Every night of my childhood I stared at the windows of this top floor, wondering what these rooms contained. What it was like for a poor soldier's son from Poland, who grew up in a small room on the rented floor of another family's house, to live in the penthouse of the world's most famous palace. John Paul haunted so many of my thoughts in those days. Gave me strength against so many fears. He, too, had his parents die when he was young. He, too, once felt like an outsider in this city. For what I'm about to do, I am a traitor to my own guardian angel.

More men are ushered into the library. First comes Falcone, the gendarme chief. Then the promoter of justice. Lucio arrives with Mignatto in his wake.

Then, from a different door, Simon.

All the rest of us stare. Lucio's arms reach outward. He shuffles forward and raises his hands to Simon's cheeks.

But Simon's eyes are locked on mine.

I can't move. He seems cadaverous. His eyes are sunken. His ropy arms could encircle his torso twice. I feel the gun case pressed against
my ribs. Simon motions for me to come closer, but I steel myself and don't respond. I've prepared myself for this moment. It's important now for us to keep our distance.

A moment later, Archbishop Nowak appears at the door. “Father Alexandros Andreou,” he says. “His Holiness will see you now.”

I FOLLOW HIM INTO
a smaller, more secluded room. I recognize it as the private study where John Paul makes his appearances to the crowds in Saint Peter's Square. Bulletproof glass fills the enormous window, but behind the window is a modest desk littered with folders and papers to sign, the dossiers that arrive unstoppably from the Secretariat. They have so outpaced the pope's ability to return them that they now choke the room, standing in stacks around the desk. The mounds are so large that at first I don't see who sits behind them.

I freeze. He is only an arm's length away. But he looks nothing like the man I saw in the Sistine Chapel, who found the strength to kneel at patriarchs' feet. This man is frail and sunken, with small, narrow eyes that barely conceal his pain. He doesn't move except to breathe. He looks at me, but there's no moment between us. No connection, no greeting. Humans are thrown in front of him as fast as they can appear and disappear. He might as well be staring at a mannequin.

Nowak says, “Please be seated, Father.” He gestures to a chair opposite the desk, then sits beside John Paul, serving in a capacity I don't understand.

“His Holiness,” he continues, “has studied the evidence that the tribunal gathered. He wishes to ask you a small number of questions.”

The Holy Father doesn't budge in his chair. I wonder if he will speak at all.

“Yes, Your Grace.”

“Very well. Please begin by explaining how you knew Doctor No-gara.”

“Your Grace, I met him—”

But Archbishop Nowak makes a polite gesture of correction.

I force myself to meet John Paul's unwavering stare. “Your Holiness, I met Doctor Nogara through my brother. Doctor Nogara found a missing manuscript in the library, and I helped him read it.”

This registers as just another fact. Nowak doesn't pursue it. Instead
he asks, “How would you characterize your brother's working relationship with Nogara?”

“They were good friends. My brother saved his life.”

“Yet I have heard the voice message from Doctor Nogara. It indicates they were not on friendly terms.”

I choose my words carefully.

“When my brother began to travel on his missions to the Orthodox, he couldn't spend as much time tending to Nogara. It upset them both.”

I watch Nowak's expression. I need to make sure he remembers the demands on Simon's time. The source of Simon's obligations. Just a few feet from here is the private chapel where the Holy Father would've performed the rite of consecration to make Simon a bishop.

“But the voice message suggests,” Archbishop Nowak says, “that Nogara made a discovery which complicated their working relationship. Were you aware of this?”

I brace myself. “Yes. I was.”

“What was the discovery?”

“He found a manuscript of an ancient gospel called the Diatessaron.”

Nowak nods. “The one that is now missing.”

“I helped him to read the Diatessaron,” I continue. “Until that time, Doctor Nogara hadn't realized that the gospels have different testimony about the Holy Shroud. This was the origin of his problem.”

“Go on.”

Now I begin my own job of weaving verses. I must do it perfectly.

“The most detailed description of Jesus' burial,” I say, “is in the gospel of John. The other gospels say Jesus was buried in a
σινδόνι
, ‘shroud,' but John says
όθονίοις
, ‘cloths.' John also gives us the most specific description of the empty tomb, and it corroborates his first one: the disciples didn't just find the
όθονίοις
, ‘burial cloths'; they also found the
σουδάριον
, the kerchief or napkin, that had been wrapped around Jesus' head. This would obviously be problematic for any image on the Shroud.”

Archbishop Nowak frowns. He seems about to ask another question, but I push forward, heaping up evidence, burying him in Greek. At all cost, I must keep him away from the lance wound. I must keep him looking in the other direction, at all the minor details where John's discrepancies don't match the Shroud, because Nowak will know Ugo should've brushed them aside, since no one turns to John for hard facts.

“These problems are deepened by John's testimony about the
άρωμάτων
, ‘burial spices.' The other gospels suggest Jesus
wasn't
buried with spices, since the Jewish Sabbath had come and the burial took place in a hurry. But John says a huge weight of spices—
μίγμα σμύρνης καί άλόης ώς λίτρας έκατόν
, ‘a mixture of myrrh and aloes about a hundred pounds' weight'—was used. And this is a problem, because the scientific tests on the Shroud haven't found any trace of burial spices. Without belaboring the point, Your Holiness, Nogara felt that our most detailed testimony about Jesus' burial was John's, and that John's account did not support the existence of the Shroud. Nogara went to Castel Gandolfo to say as much to the Orthodox.”

Archbishop Nowak's soft features sag with concern. His brow is heavy. His hand is folded pensively over his jowls. “But Father, did you not explain to him about the gospel of John?”

“I did. I explained to him that it's the most theological. The least historical. That it was written decades after the others. But he knew the Orthodox would be less likely to apply a scientific reading to the gospel. He knew the Orthodox were more likely to feel that John needed to be taken at face value.”

Nowak rubs his temples. He seems pained. “That is what Nogara discovered? A misunderstanding?”

I nod.

He grimaces. When he begins to speak again, I detect a change in his voice. The question at the tip of his tongue is no longer legal, no longer scriptural. It is deeper than that: it is human. The worst, I hope, is over.

“Then why,” he says, “was Doctor Nogara killed?”

Now is the time to scratch at the old scabs. They bleed so readily. “My father spent thirty years here trying to reunite our Church with Orthodoxy.” I bow toward John Paul. “Holy Father, I know it's impossible to remember every priest who works inside these walls, but my father gave his life to a reunion. You invited him to these apartments once, before the carbon-dating was announced, and he was so honored. He was devastated when he heard the radiocarbon results.”

For the first time, there is a twinge in John Paul's mouth. It deepens his frown.

“My brother and I,” I continue, “were raised to believe in that work. It was upsetting to think that the Orthodox, on their historic visit here,
would be hearing something disturbing. My brother tried explaining that to Doctor Nogara. But it didn't work.”

Archbishop Nowak's brow casts shadows over his eyes. “Then I would like to understand the events of that night. You arrived around six thirty, after Nogara was already dead. Is that correct?”

Now the difficult part begins. “Not exactly, Your Grace.”

He shuffles papers on the desk, trying to sift facts from pages of testimony. “That isn't when Signor Canali opened the garden gate for you?”

I am tense in my chair.

“It is when he opened the gate,” I say. “But that's not when I arrived.”

He looks up darkly. “Please explain.”

My heart is with Simon. It has always been with Simon.

“Your Grace, I called Guido Canali in order to create the appearance that I had arrived at Castel Gandolfo later than I actually did.”

John Paul tries to turn his head to glance at Nowak but can't. His hand stays clamped on the arm of the chair. Only his eyes peer across at his old priest-secretary.

“What are you saying?” the archbishop asks.

“I was there before five o'clock,” I say.