“All right,” James said reluctantly. “What time can you get back to me?”
“If all goes smoothly, within the hour. Should we meet here or at the airport?”
“Meet here. I’ll have Father Maloney drive us out to Kennedy in the Range Rover.”
Leaving the residence, Jack beat it back to the OCME by taxi and ran directly in to see Bingham. Unfortunately, Bingham was over at City Hall, meeting with the mayor. Instead, Jack ran up to the third floor and ducked into Calvin Washington’s office. Luckily, the deputy director was there, and Jack merely informed him that he was going to be away for a long weekend. Since Jack was already off the autopsy rotation, it didn’t make much difference. Still, Jack felt better letting the powers-that-be know he definitely was not going to be in the neighborhood. Jack then went down, unfastened the tangle of locks on his bike, and headed home. He knew he had some serious uphill convincing to accomplish.
By the time Jack picked up his bike and carried it into the foyer, he was excited about the trip. He’d loved Rome the four or five times he’d been there, and he’d never been to Jerusalem. Stashing his bike in its closet, he took off up the stairs. It was now afternoon, which meant there were only three or so hours to get ready. James wanted everyone who was going to be at the residence by three.
“Laurie!” Jack yelled as he reached the kitchen, but Laurie was not to be found.
Passing the kitchen, Jack headed down the hall toward the family room and the living room. Just when he was about to yell again, he almost collided with her coming from the family room, a child-rearing book in hand. She also had an index finger pressed to her lips. “He’s sleeping,” she whispered forcibly. Jack pulled his head in like a turtle, feeling guilty for yelling out as he had. He knew better than to do such a thing before finding out JJ’s status. He apologized effusively with the explanation that he was excited.
“What on earth are you doing home so early?” Laurie questioned. “Is everything okay?”
“It’s fine!” Jack said, pronouncing “fine” with emphasis. “In fact, do I have a deal for you.”
“For me?” Laurie questioned with a smile. She ducked back into the family room and regained her seat on the couch with her feet on the coffee table. She had a cup of honey tea on the side table. “Not bad, huh. Woman of leisure! JJ’s having another good day. This might be the longest nap he’s ever had.”
“Perfect,” Jack said. He sat down on the coffee table to be close when he talked with her. “First, I have to make a mini-confession. I have not told you the full story of this ossuary that my archaeologist friend and his wife had been working on. I have to say, it is fascinating. The reason I hadn’t told you was because my archbishop friend pleaded with me not to do so. Anyway, that injunction is no longer valid, and I’m looking forward to telling you the whole story.”
“Why the change?”
“That’s a story in itself. My archaeologist friend, Shawn, and his wife were both killed last night in a house fire, so that’s the end of the ossuary-contents examination.”
“Oh, no! I’m so sorry,” Laurie said with sincerity. “Was it the house where we visited them?”
“Yes, it was. Once those old wood-frame houses catch on fire, look out. They practically explode in flame.”
“What a terrible tragedy,” Laurie said. “And to think, you were just there getting reacquainted. Does this mean you are losing another diversion?”
“Not quite.”
“No? You just said the deaths have halted the ossuary examination.”
“That’s true, but the ossuary has to go back to where it came from. I’m afraid my archaeologist friend and his wife actually stole the relic literally out from under Saint Peter’s Basilica. It had been buried next to Saint Peter for almost two thousand years. I’ve promised the archbishop that I would help him take the ossuary back and replace it where it had been so that no one is the wiser. The archbishop and you and I will be the only ones to know of its existence, and you’ll have to promise not to tell anyone ever if you want to hear its alleged details.
“Now, here’s the deal. The three of us — you, JJ, and I — are going to fly tonight to Rome. Tomorrow night, I help James put the ossuary back. Then Saturday you, JJ, and I are going to fly on to Jerusalem so that we can meet with someone. Sunday we will fly home. What do you think?”
“I think you are nuts,” Laurie said, without so much as a moment of thought. “You expect me to fly all night tonight with a sick four-month-old child, to be in a foreign city for not even one full day and then fly on to another city, and then fly all the way home? How long would it take to fly from Jerusalem to New York, anyway?”
“I don’t know exactly. Probably quite a while. But that’s not the point. I want you to do this for me. I know it sounds crazy and that it will be very difficult, probably more difficult than I can imagine, but I feel it is important for me. I will help with JJ. I’ll hold him more than half the time. In Rome, we can hire a nurse to give you a little free time, same in Jerusalem. Also, he’s been better for the last three or four days, I’ve lost count.”
“It’s been three days he’s been better,” Laurie clarified.
“Okay, three days! We can do this and be back in four days. I will really help. I’d even breast-feed him if I could.”
“Yeah, sure,” Laurie scoffed. “That’s easy to say. So, on the plane you’ll hold him even if he gets antsy and excitable.”
“Yes, I will hold him. For the whole flight, if you’d like. Just say yes. You will understand more when I tell you the full story of the ossuary, which I’ll do on the plane tonight. Say yes!”
“In order for me to even consider such a nutty idea of flying to Rome and Jerusalem with a sick infant, you are going to have to tell me the full story of the ossuary right this second.”
“It will take too long.”
“Sorry, buster. That’s the deal. At least give me a synopsis.”
As quickly as he could, Jack outlined the events over the last number of days beginning with his surprise luncheon visit James’s residence and seeing the ossuary for the first time.
Although at first doubtful that she was going to find the story interesting enough to justify what Jack was demanding of her, Laurie became truly fascinated. “Oh, all right, damn you,” Laurie said suddenly, before Jack had completed has précis. “I’ll probably forget how you talked me into this moment of insanity, but you have yourself a deal, although you don’t have to hold him for the whole flight, just your share, and not just when he is sleeping, either. You are going to be holding him when he’s fidgeting as well as when he’s lying still. Is that understood?”
“Perfectly,” Jack said, his face lighting up. He leapt to his feet. “Now, I have some preparations to do and calls to make. We have to be at the archbishop’s residence by three.”
“You think you have preparations,” Laurie said, putting her book aside. “I hope we don’t regret this.”
In some ways Rome was a disappointment for Jack. On his other visits, which had all been in late spring, summer, and early fall, the weather had been bright, sunny, and warm. On this occasion in December, Rome was overcast, dreary, and damp, with some rain. On top of that, he’d anticipated some cloak-and-dagger intrigue involving sneaking the ossuary into the Vatican and then getting it from where they would be staying into the necropolis. Instead, what he learned was that the Vatican was more or less run like a gigantic club for the benefit of the cardinals. If you were a cardinal, anything but everything was okay.
Since James had used the same carton to take the ossuary back as it had arrived, it was naturally assumed by any handlers that the contents were his personal belongings. There had been no attempt whatsoever even to suggest opening it at the airport either on departure or arrival, or when they entered the Vatican. As James had made arrangements for all of them to stay within the Vatican at Casa di Santa Marta, named after the patron saint of hoteliers, Saint Martin, the ossuary and their checked baggage was there waiting for them when they arrived. After having claimed it all at the airport, it had gone ahead in a Vatican van, while James and his entourage had come into town on what James called, “the more scenic route.”