‘Not when we’re dealing with traitors.’ He raised his voice and dropped his cool attitude, revealing the true Adolph under the cynicism.
‘I’m ordering you to stop what you’re doing immediately,’ Tarcisio demanded. He received a harsh laugh in reply.
‘We’re the guardians of the church,’ Adolph asserted, half laughing. ‘Don’t give us orders.’
Tarcisio got up suddenly, leaning on the desk. ‘Don’t defy me, Adolph. Guardians of what? Of some bones that could belong to anyone and some documents that, with all due respect, could have been forged by Loyola?’
‘I disagree,’ Adolph warned. ‘Everything was analyzed scientifically. Everything is proved.’
‘It that right? Then you have until tomorrow to show me those results.’
‘I told you not to give me orders,’ Adolph repeated.
‘Do you want to know what I think?’ Tarcisio didn’t wait for his reply. ‘I think everything was a fraud. I don’t believe that Loyola brought back the bones of Christ.’
‘But you believe in the Gospel of Jesus,’ Adolph argued.
‘Because it in fact exists and was proved genuine. Scientifically dated, and I can show you the results. Whether it is the Gospel of Jesus or not, we’ll never know. As far as I’m concerned, He died on the cross, and everything else is fiction.’
‘In any case, there’s nothing you can do. This operation can’t be stopped. Tonight the gospel will be in our power,’ Adolph informed him again, cynically.
‘You’re deceived.’
‘You might be in the larger chair, but that doesn’t give you superior insight. Tonight the documents will be in the possession of the Society of Jesus, and then I shall communicate our demands to you,’ Adolph said sarcastically.
‘Why later and not now?’ the secretary asked.
‘Haven’t you understood me?’ Adolph was angry.
‘On the contrary. I understand you. But we’re going to do things differently.’
He pressed the button of the telephone on top of his desk, and in less time than it takes to say God, the doors of the office opened to admit Cardinal William, talking on a phone with two Swiss Guards at the ready.
‘What does this mean?’ Adolph asked in astonishment.
‘Yes, yes,’ William responded to the person on the other end of the line. ‘Just a minute. I’m going to transfer you.’
The prefect pressed a button on the phone and handed it to Tarcisio.
‘Is it on speakerphone?’ the secretary asked.
William nodded yes.
‘Good afternoon,’ Tarcisio said.
‘Good afternoon, Your Eminence,’ Jacopo’s voice replied.
‘Do you have any news for me?’
‘Everything went as planned. The church is in possession of Ben Isaac’s documents.’
‘Would you mind repeating that? I have someone here who didn’t quite hear,’ Tarcisio said, looking an incredulous Adolph in the eye.
‘The church is in possession of Ben Isaac’s documents,’ Jacopo repeated.
‘Thank you. We’ll talk later.’ He hung up without taking his eyes off the superior general of the Society of Jesus.
He wanted to laugh in Adolph’s face, but the moment demanded seriousness. For the first time in a long time, Tarcisio felt good. ‘You’re too late, Adolph. Later I’ll communicate my demands. Now get out of my presence.’
57
The temperature rose that afternoon, and the day was sunny and pleasant. Jerusalem was a city that permanently swarmed with building cultural, artistic, and intellectual activity, the capital of eclecticism, with a people who adapted rapidly to the modern world and what it had to offer.
The Holy City knew how to prepare for the future. Every year it received millions of tourists eager to visit the places where Jesus walked. It was the most important city for two religions of the book, and the second most important for the followers of an equally important book. It was those books that gave meaning to all this history. Without them the world would be different.
The car was parked in the middle of a residential street. Francesco and JC were sharing the backseat. There was no sign of the cripple in the Armani suit. Francesco was afraid of JC. There was something about him, an invisible power, extrasensory almost — as ridiculous as it was to think — that radiated omnipotence more than any other person Francesco had known.
‘Now what?’ he asked suspiciously.
JC took something out of his jacket pocket — an airline ticket, a passport, some shekels — and handed them to Francesco.
‘Your participation has come to an end,’ JC declared firmly. ‘I don’t have to tell you that none of this ever happened.’
Francesco was puzzled. What kind of random plan was this?
‘Is that it? Call someone to instruct them to give some documents to Sarah to take to the Gare du Nord? Couldn’t you have done that?’ He wanted to understand, no matter what happened. ‘Why did you kidnap me in Rome and bring me here?’
JC looked at Francesco with a sardonic smile and raised two fingers. ‘Two reasons. The first, so Sarah would know everything was going as planned. Hearing your voice meant everything was under control. And there’s a second reason.’ But he said nothing.
Francesco waited for clarification, but he had to ask for it. ‘What is it?’
JC looked out at the street, calm in the midst of Jerusalem frenzy. ‘What are your intentions toward Sarah?’
‘What?’ What kind of question was that?
JC didn’t repeat himself. Francesco had heard him.
‘Are you her father?’ Francesco asked, irritated by the invasion of privacy. Although he did not personally know Raul Brandao Monteiro, retired from the Portuguese army, he knew who Sarah’s father was.
JC didn’t react, but only waited for an answer.
‘Sarah is an astonishing woman; discreet, professional, very responsible, and until recently I thought we might have a future together. But now, the truth is, I don’t know,’ Francesco confessed. It was not worth the trouble to make up a reason for the old man; besides, Francesco was afraid JC would have sensed the lie.
JC thought about Francesco’s words briefly. He was a practical man.
‘I’d like to give you a glimpse of what Sarah’s life is like. It’s not always luncheons at embassies and ministries, nights at the paper, a movie at the Odeon in Leicester Square or the Empire, a play at the Adelphi, lunches at Indigo or home to fuck all night.’
Francesco felt totally naked after that list of very specific, very real, intimate nights that he thought belonged to his private life.
‘Part of her life has no schedule or plan,’ JC continued. ‘Don’t expect that she’ll fulfill all your expectations, because she won’t. Or that she’ll come home after work every night, because there’ll be days she won’t. Or answer all your phone calls; some she’ll hang up on.’
‘Why are you telling me this?’ Francesco wanted to know, his heart full of foreboding.
‘So you’ll know how your future with her will be. I know about her morning sickness.’
This old man knows everything, Francesco thought.
‘If you’re thinking of continuing your relationship with her, you need to know these things. Marrying Sarah implies bringing me along. That’s why we’re having this conversation.’
‘You’re trying to dissuade me from having a relationship with her.’
‘Of course not.’ JC smiled and coughed. ‘I’m showing you the whole picture. I know it’s not common to do so in relationships. Only much later do you see the dark side of the one you marry. Consider this conversation a bonus. You can make a concrete decision about your future. Risk it or not, knowing all this implies.’
It was too much to digest at one time, and this wasn’t the place to do it.
He saw the cripple leave one of the houses on the other side of the street and come over to the car. He had a young man with him.