Fifty-Minute Hour (64 page)

‘The p-e-a-c-e of the Lord be with you always.'

Peace isn't something I know that much about – turmoil, yes; violence, yes; bloody scraps and battles all the time. Yet I've heard the word so often in this Mass: peace in life, peace in death, peace in hearts and minds. And now the Pope is sweeping round to face us, declaring to us all: ‘Let us offer each other the sign of peace.'

I watch, amazed, as he starts embracing all the bishops at the altar, and they in turn hold and clasp each other, arms around each other's necks, male enfolding male. I'm so moved, I just stand staring, until the woman on my right reaches out and clasps me in her own arms. I'm squashed right against her corset-bones, jabbed by her sharp brooch, her flowery tea-rose perfume lassoing me as well. Rose transmutes to aftershave as her husband changes places with her, pumps me by the hand. He's hardly let it go when the dark man on my other side squeezes it in his, no longer just flirtatious, but affectionate, respectful. The people in the row in front are also joining in, embracing one another, then turning round to us. A small boy in his father's arms leans across to tug my hair; his mother smiles apologies, laps my hand in hers. And it's not just our few rows. The whole vast congregation are swapping signs of peace, hands stretched out to hands, chairs scraping on the marble as people turn to either side, reach out to friends or strangers further down the rows. Two parents kiss their brood of five; two lovers almost smooch; an old crone in a see-through mac is cheek to cheek with a woman dripping mink. The Mass has broken up, or at least halted for a while, so that everybody present can greet his neighbour, offer him goodwill, display their fellow feeling and their trust.

My own hand feels quite tired. It's been pressed against great spiky rings, gripped by kids' hot fingers, snagged on old and horny skin, soothed by soft suede gloves. And people are still courting it, murmuring ‘Peace be with you'; making me accepted, one of their community, a member of their church. A small girl in a corduroy coat skids up to me and offers me her cheek. My own cheeks flame as I plant a clumsy kiss on it, rigid with embarrassment. I've never kissed a child before, don't know what to say. Yet underneath I'm thrilled; thrilled to be included, made one of this whole family, a loved and wanted sibling. I'd been envying them their ties – their families and pilgrim groups, their parish clubs and unions, which allow them to belong. Now, at last, I'm part of it, can share their bonds, their peace.

I shake a final friendly hand, subside back on my seat. It's only now I realise what peace means – that sense of stillness in my gut, instead of churning tension, that sudden ease of breathing as my chest and lungs unclench, and I remove my lethal camera-case from my shoulder to the floor. I know now I can't shoot, disrupt this precious peace, abuse my family's trust. I glance up at the sun, which is still streaming through the window, the lattice of the pane patterning its beam with furrowed lines. ‘Afterwards' is suddenly restored – a sunny lazy afternoon with normal things like shopping, strolling in the park, instead of Mass and morning aborted in one shot. I can even meet that Mary by the obelisk, invite her for a beer; let lunch merge into evening as I celebrate the fact there
is
an evening, and I'm free to spin it out, stay up the whole night, watch darkness switch to light again, and life.

I'm not betraying Seton – in fact I'm saving him. If I fired the shot, they'd be bound to hunt him down, hound him back for questioning, fling him in a cell. People here know that we've been lovers – Giuseppe's friends and neighbours, the couple in the flat above, that weird man in the wine-shop. I've given him his freedom, allowed him to escape. Or perhaps the plot was just a game, a symbolic killing, dressed up as a charade. I glance down at my far-fetched coat, my preposterous strappy shoes with silver diamanteé on the heels. Yes – fancy-dress, a children's game, as spurious as Saint Thecla, whose cult was suppressed more than twenty years ago, her life declared a total fabrication, her story a romance.

I remove my coat, fold it on my knees, feel miraculously unburdened in my silky-nothing dress, without the weight of murder pressing on my back. My salamander sparkles, seems to dart and writhe, alive. So it
was
a lucky talisman, kept me safe in the leaping flames of danger. I let my body sag, utterly exhausted after coming through the fire. I'm the only one still sitting. The whole church seethes around me as people throng and hustle towards all the different priests who are distributing Communion in each and every part of the basilica – a score in both the transepts, dozens in the aisle; others still processing to their stations, preceded by a marshal, and holding up their sumptuous jewelled ciboriums. An endless stream of worshippers is flowing up and back, weaving round the chairs, negotiating obstacles, dodging fractious children who have strayed from parents' laps; television cameramen recording the whole hubbub. I've often had a longing to receive Communion myself, to swallow a frail wafer and feel it turn to God, but I'm too weak to move a muscle, weak with sheer relief. We've reached and passed the moment when I should have fired the shot, and instead I'm simply relaxing in my seat.

I listen to the altos slam out a wild ‘
Exsulta
!', exulting still myself, even trying to pray – pray for Seton, for his peace. If Saint Edwin can grant miracles to dreary frumpy widows, then why not him, as well? I want us to meet up again – Seton and myself – with no sour recriminations, no anger, violence, fury, just closeness, even love. It feels really strange to pray, makes me flushed and almost randy, as if it's affecting not my soul, but my body and my cunt. I keep my eyes fixed on the Pope, watch him giving out Communion, an infinity of taut pink tongues thrusting out in front of him as he tops each with a Host. I'm glad it takes so long. Every extra minute he's alive and functioning increases my delight. I don't need a Host myself, or bread turned into God. I'm feeding on elation, which is miracle enough.

At last, he and all the other priests glide back to the altar, where he gives his final blessing, holding up his elaborate silver crozier. The blessing seems to leave its mark quite literally, as if the precise and solemn cross he's tracing in the air has imprinted on my flesh, even etched into my bone like letters on a stick of rock. I'm safe now and protected, my gun disarmed, its bullets merely playthings, harmless children's toys. The camera-case weighs nothing as I return it to my shoulder – having slipped my coat back on – then hold it close against me as I skim up to the front. The Pope's processing out now and I want the perfect view, want to follow right behind him, monitor each step. The priests all stride out first, followed by the bishops, and lastly
Sua Santità
, moving very slowly, blessing everyone, smiling, nodding, giving of himself. The church is going wild, everyone applauding, calling out his name, scores of people in the nave climbing on their chairs, busy with their cameras, or holding up their kids to him. I'm cheering, too, and clapping, my throat hoarse from all the crazy things I'm yelling, things about my father, him being still alive. A marshal stops me pushing any closer, keeps the goggling crowds back as Giovanni Paolo makes his stately progress down the aisle. I can hardly see him now, just a glimpse of golden mitre, a glint of his tall cross.

Suddenly, a shot rings out from further down the nave, and just a fraction later, a second shot seems to explode the church away. There's a moment's total silence when sheer reeling incredulity fights with sickened shock. Then everything is uproar – people tangling, howling, Swiss Guards flashing halberds, screams of pain and panic as seething pilgrims thresh towards the doors. I kick and claw my own way not towards the exit, but in the direction of the shots, hardly caring if I'm injured I'm so wild to reach the action. It's impossible to make it to the central wooden barrier, but I leap up on a chair so I can look down on the aisle; glimpse a sight so hideous it knifes into my memory, leaves an open wound: bodies, bits of bodies, blood and brains splashed everywhere – on the chairs, the wood, the marble, even on the innocent – a child's white coat red-splattered, an old man weeping crimson. I taste vomit in my throat as I focus on the details: the Pope's right foot turned inwards as he lies bleeding on the floor, the shoe scuffed and strangely modern in contrast to his flowing golden robes, now rucked up on one side and exposing a thin leg. His grey eyes are still open, dead eyes staring upwards, looking baffled and surprised.

The second corpse is just a hump, a hump beneath a coat. I recognise the coat – the missing middle toggle, the semen stain where we used it as a mattress. I seem to reel and fall towards it as a security guard thrusts me from the chair, gestures to the exit, where other guards and marshals are trying to calm the crowds, direct them safely out. I'm so appalled, so shaken, I can barely move at all, but I let the crowd walk for me, support me in their packed and jostling scrum. I listen to the babble, the brutal lying stories passed from lips to lips. ‘Shot the Holy Father, then shot himself, blew his brains out, blew his evil head off.'

I shake my head, keep shaking it, tasting blood now, not just vomit. ‘No,' I say to no one. ‘He wasn't even here. He left – he left this morning, before anyone was up. He's not in Rome at all.' It could be someone else's coat. Duffel coats are all the same, just clones of one another. And most of them have stains or missing toggles. I close my eyes a second, see the coat again, see something else I've been trying to blank out: a bulky golf umbrella being examined by the ashen man who was kneeling by the corpses – a bodyguard, a doctor? Its colours were distinctive, not easy to forget – stripes of cream and orange, with a sturdy fretted handle which left faint patterns on my palm when I held it through that endless papal audience.

I struggle to turn round, fight the tide of pilgrims pressing on all sides. I must get that umbrella, wrest it from the man; claim it as my own, so no one can blame Seton. Of course he wasn't here. He trusted
me
to shoot, relied on me to do it, so he could leave the country, start a safe new life. I think he's in Bulgaria with Stefan, or perhaps he's gone to France, to walk in the Auvergne, or follow lonely rivers …

A bad-tempered marshal blocks my way, heaves and prods me back towards the exit, swears at me for causing more disruption. There's enough chaos as it is. A television cameraman has had his camera trampled and is weeping with frustration, wrestling through the crowds to try to save his work; a second one is shinning up a ledge, face contorted, feet slipping on the marble, but still doggedly recording all the action. Cardinals, policemen, are pouring in from nowhere, bossy men in uniform, nurses in blue cloaks. They're bawling through loudspeakers now, in English and Italian, trying to keep order, stop everybody panicking.

I'm very calm myself, though I don't feel well at all. There's this fierce pain in my head and heart, and I keep fearing I'll throw up. I'm forced to stop a moment, rest against a pillar; glance down at the cherub sculpted near its base, a plump and smirking baby trailing clouds of gauze. I return his marble smile. He's the only one who's happy, the only one who's real, who knows it's all a game, just a charade, a masquerade.

That marshal's bearing down on me, really hurts me this time as he shoves me in the back. He's forgotten we're all brothers, all members of one family, one loving happy family, with no evil and no death.

‘P-e-a-c-e,' I tell him, smiling still, as I pass safely through the doors.

I struggle up the marble steps of the Grand Hotel Imperatore and into its huge foyer, which is like a smaller version of St Peter's, with mosaics, columns, statues, even romping cherubs. No one stops me this time, despite the fact I'm deathly pale and staggering. I'm dressed to fit the part, you see, dressed to match the hotel's pomp in my showy fur, my chic designer dress. The psychiatric conference is now well under way, judging by the notice-boards, the lists of members, lectures, the signs tacked up on pillars pointing out the meeting-rooms. It's a Sunday and it's lunchtime, so I doubt that there are lectures actually in progress, but I scan the board to check. According to their timetable, conference members should all be in the bar now – what's called the Bar Minerva, for a pre-lunch drink, reception. I follow the gold-lettered sign, turn right and right again, hear the buzz of conversation before I'm even at the door. Several hundred psychiatrists and analysts are huddled in small groups, swilling lavish drinks, gesturing with cigars, reaching out for canapes from loaded silver trays. They all look smug and shock-proofed, in well-cut pricey suits, their blue-chip voices modulated, their blank-screen faces polished, perfectly adjusted. The females seem more drab and somehow sexless – though expensive-drab like missionaries with money; their thin hair coiled or chignoned as if to give them height and power.

I slam the door behind me, stand trembling just in front of it, listening to their patter. My pain has turned to anger, my disbelief to bitter cold revenge. I sped here in a taxi, passing ambulances, police cars, all hurtling to St Peter's, a whole orchestra of sirens drowning my own sobs. I scrub my smarting eyes as I sweep between a would-be Freud with a beard and rimless glasses and a suntanned dapper socialite in a perky blue bow-tie. I don't bother to apologise as I spill the latter's drink. I'm furious with these hypocrites, who couldn't save Seton, couldn't even help him, just grabbed his money and paid him back with silence, wrote out receipts in jargon. They've all grown fat on patients' fees, which subsidise their double gins, their expensive foreign cars, their two-week cushy conferences at palaces like this one. What use are windbag lectures when their abandoned frantic patients are hoarding shotguns, blowing out their brains? These so-called experts on the mind have minds so convoluted they don't understand that suffering needs relieving, not classifying, analysing, turning into seminars.