“If we can agree. Who would you recommend?”
Father Jean shook his head, and drew the chair closer to the bed.
“How about Father Bertrand?” he asked. “A man of no known political views and a good administrator.”
“And someone dedicated to his hospital in Bulgaria. You’d never get him to agree to come back. A good man, of course, but not for us. I thought maybe Father Luc.”
Father Jean laughed. “Oh no. A saintly man, I admit. But he makes me seem radical. We’d be up all night flagellating ourselves with birch rods again if he took over. No, sir. Spare us from Father Luc.”
“Marc?”
“Too old.”
“He’s younger than I am.”
“Still too old.”
“Francois?”
“Terrible administrator. We’d be bankrupt in a year. More bankrupt.”
They paused for thought.
“Difficult, isn’t it?” said Father Xavier.
“What we need is someone new, not wedded to any faction, who could bring in fresh ideas. All these people we’ve been suggesting, they’re no good at all. We all know exactly what they’d do. We need someone from the outside, in effect. Someone as different as Father Paul.”
Father Jean made the suggestion carelessly, but once it was made, the name reverberated around his brain. It was a shocking idea, he knew.
“He’s in his thirties, has no experience of administration, no constituency in the order, he won’t want the job and he’s an African.”
“Exactly,” Father Jean said. Now the idea had occurred to him it suddenly gripped his imagination almost irresistibly. “He’s neither a reformer nor a traditionalist. The reformers will like him because he’s enthusiastic about missions. The traditionalists will like him because he’s very orthodox liturgically. When he’s not in Africa, anyway. Heaven knows what he gets up to there. And he’s a good man, Father. He really is.”
“I know. Father Charles spotted him, did he not? Brought him in? I was doubtful, I must say, but I’ve grown to like him.”
“The only hesitation I have is about what people will think,” Father Jean said. “An African? The youngest superior we’ve had for three centuries?”
“Perhaps it’s time not to think of such things. Besides, I hate to be practical, Jean, my friend, but it’ll make us the most talked-about order in the church. Think of what that will do for recruitment.”
“Is he up to it, do you think? I must say, I believe he is. More than anyone I can think of. He has dedication and integrity. And common sense.”
Xavier folded his hands on his stomach with satisfaction. “He will do very nicely,” he said with finality. “Especially if we give him our support.”
“Will you?” Father Jean asked, conscious that a momentous decision was on the verge of being taken. “Give him your support?”
Father Xavier paused for a fraction of a second, then nodded. “With my whole heart.”
“And so will I, then.”
Father Xavier chuckled for the first time in days. “In that case, we have a new leader. We need to draft some memoranda for the committee. For my sake, I would like it done as quickly as possible. This afternoon, even. A letter from myself stepping down, and a joint note from both of us recommending Father Paul. I will make a few phone calls when you leave, but you will have to run the meeting. The problem is Father Paul himself.”
Jean shook his head. “I think it would be best not to tell him in advance. He would only refuse to stand. If it’s sprung on him in the meeting and we have a quick vote … well, he won’t have any choice.”
Xavier lay back in his bed. “My goodness, Jean, my goodness. This’ll make the Jesuits sit up and take notice.”
Father Jean stood up to go, feeling as though an immense burden had been taken from his shoulders. With a small tear in his eye, he clasped his former leader’s hand, and shook it firmly. “I’m so glad,” he said. “Do you know, I believe we have been guided?”
17
Menzies sat on his sofa contemplating his handiwork. He was an egotistical man in all areas of life except where his work was concerned; in that he was extremely self-critical, to himself if not to the outside world. But even he, as he sat and looked, then got up and picked up the icon, turning it over, brushing it with his finger, then looking at it critically once more, was satisfied. Was it perfect? he thought as he wrapped it carefully in a cloth. No. Could he tell there was something wrong? He wondered as he covered this in newspaper and tied it with string. Certainly, although it would have taken him some time to figure it out. Would anyone else? He paused reflectively. He didn’t think so; really he didn’t. It was a decent piece of work. In the circumstances, a brilliant one.
He was still judiciously congratulating himself when Mrs Verney, posing as a police messenger, came to pick it up. Would she notice anything wrong? he wondered anxiously.
“You’d better check it,” he said with concern as she took the carefully wrapped parcel. “I don’t want it damaged and you coming back and saying it was like that when you picked it up.”
“I’m sure that won’t be necessary.”
“I insist,” he said. “And I want a receipt.”
She sighed heavily. “Very well.” And began to unwrap it.
“Fine.”
“Look at it carefully,” Menzies said.
She looked it over. “Seems OK to me. Have you done any work on it?”
“Some,” he said. “I was just starting.”
“I’m sure you’ll be able to finish later.”
“You’re satisfied?”
“Oh, yes. Now I must go. I’m late.”
“My receipt …?”
With barely concealed impatience, she put the parcel down and hurriedly wrote out a note. Received from Sig. D. Menzies, one icon of the Virgin belonging to the monastery of San Giovanni. Menzies took it and regarded it with amused satisfaction. A certificate of competence, he thought. Something to show his friends.
“Now, I must go.”
“Splendid,” Menzies said. “Take care of it. It’s caused enough trouble already, that has.”
“Don’t I know it.”
And Mary Verney, with the icon under her arm, walked out of the apartment block and turned left up the street. A man sitting at the little cafe over the street saw her come out, and picked up his phone.
“You can add impersonating a police officer to your list of crimes and misdemeanours,” he said quietly. “She’s got it, and heading into the Campo dei Fiori. I’m right behind her.”
Mary Verney took a taxi from the rank outside San Andrea; it was busy, as the market was still in full flood, but the rush hour was over, and she didn’t have the alarming problem of having to stand in the open with a stolen icon under her arm for too long. She got off to a good start by giving the driver 100,000 lire.
“Now, listen carefully,” she said. “This will be an unusual drive. I want you to do exactly what I say; if you do, I’ll give you another 100,000 at the end. Is that understood?”
The driver, a young man with a malevolent smile and a bad squint in one eye grinned horribly at her. “As long as you’re not going to shoot someone.”
“You’d object?”
“Charge you more.”
“I see I picked well. Now, at three o’clock exactly, I want you to be driving south down the Lungotevere Marzio, towards the crossing with the ponte Umberto. Fifty metres up, there is a bus stop. Near it, there should be a man standing. You with me so far?”
The driver nodded.
“You will get into the lane closest to the pavement, and slow down. When I say stop, you stop; when I say go, you go again as fast as possible. Then I’ll tell you what to do next. Got it?”