In The Name of The Father (16 page)

Gamelli shrugged but then gave one of those rare smiles.

‘Certainly better than fifty per cent. Maybe even eighty per cent.’

That smile gave Mirek an insight as to why this man worked such hours for a pittance. Perhaps he had just extended a life by thirty or forty years.

He was still reflecting on that as he walked across the Ponte Vecchio back to the safe house. It was twilight and the bridge was crowded. Noisy vendors selling trinkets and souvenirs to passing residents and tourists. There were beggars here and there. That had surprised him at first - beggars among such wealth - but Father Heisl had shaken his head and told him that here even the beggars were wealthy.

He was halfway across the bridge when he felt someone jostle him from behind. He turned and saw a black-haired youth darting away. With a curse he slapped at his back pocket. His wallet was gone. He started to give chase but a scooter pulled up and the youth jumped on to the pillion. He made an obscene gesture at Mirek as the scooter weaved away.

Mirek was next to the stall of a fruit vendor. Enraged, he grabbed a bright yellow lemon the size of a tennis ball but much heavier. He raced down the bridge dodging through the crowd. At the end of the bridge the scooter had been slowed down by traffic. Mirek saw the driver skilfully swing in between a small truck and the kerb and slip down the narrow gap. The scooter turned left off the bridge. Mirek was forty metres away broadside to it. He hurled the lemon.

It connected just behind the scooter-driver’s ear. The dull thud was clearly audible and the result immediate. He went off the scooter sideways. The handlebars twisted, the front wheel hit the high kerb and it reared up on to the pavement narrowly missing a woman and a young girl who screamed piercingly. The pickpocket was thrown against a plate glass window and bounced off on to his back.

When Mirek arrived on the scene the scooter driver was on all fours trying to push himself to his feet. Moving fast, Mirek swung his right leg and slammed his boot into the youth’s face. He heard and felt the crack of bone. As the youth rolled away unconscious Mirek turned to the other one. He was coming to his feet fast, his pretty-boy face showing fury, his right hand scrabbling in the pocket of his denim jacket. Mirek saw the glint of steel and then he was mindless as his recent training took over. He feinted with his left hand, saw the youth turn his eyes towards it, then pivoted and stabbed out with his right hand, two fingers extended like a cobra’s tongue. He felt the ends pulp into the youth’s eyes, heard the scream of agony. This time he swung with his left foot fast and high into the youth’s crotch, felt the contact; first soft, then hard. The youth went over backwards and down, his hands covering his eyes, his body curling into a ball of agony. In all it had taken less than five seconds. Mirek swept his gaze in a circle. People were standing like petrified rocks, shock on their faces. There was a crash and a tinkle of glass as a taxi bashed into a bus whose driver had stopped abruptly to see what was happening. A police whistle sounded from down the street.

The scooter was lying on its side with the front wheel spinning. Mirek’s wallet was on the pavement next to it. He scooped it up and walked rapidly away past the stunned faces, remembering the words of his instructor.

‘Don’t run unless you’re actually being chased. Walk quietly with head lowered, looking neither to left nor right. Use your ears rather than your eyes. You will always hear pursuit.’

He heard no pursuit.

There were three places set for dinner. Mirek wondered who would be joining them. Father Heisl was in the other room talking on the telephone. An appetising aroma drifted in from the kitchen. Heisl seemed to have a legion of little old ladies dressed in black who looked after these safe houses and happened to be culinary geniuses. He supposed they were nuns or members of a lay religious order.

He helped himself to an Amaretto from the bottle on the sideboard and sipped at it, liking the sweet almond taste. He heard the tinkle as the phone was hung up and turned as Father Heisl came in. His face was sombre. Mirek held up the bottle. Heisl shook his head and said:

‘One of them has his jaw broken in three places. It will have to be wired up. The other will certainly lose the sight of one eye. They are trying to save the other - that, and his reproductive organ.’ He looked down at the shiny tips of Mirek’s new shoes. ‘Don’t you think you over-reacted somewhat?’

Mirek drained his glass and poured himself another shot.

‘They were criminals. What should I have done? Stroked their cheeks and said, “Sorry, please return my wallet”?’

Heisl sighed and murmured, ‘Both only eighteen . . . you’re sure no one saw you come here?’

‘Positive. After about a kilometre I caught a taxi to Santa Croce. Then I walked again for ten minutes and caught a taxi to the railway station. From there a taxi to half a kilometre from here. I went around the block twice. I was not followed.’

Heisl nodded in satisfaction.

‘Well, the police will be looking for you . . . but I imagine not too diligently. Anyway you cannot take that route on foot any more. Some of the vendors might recognise you and they often supplement their income by being informers for the police. I would prefer to move elsewhere but there isn’t time. So for the next five days I will arrange for a car to pick you up and return you.’

He looked glum. Mirek drank and then said lightly, ‘Anyway, you know now that your fifteen thousand dollar investment wasn’t wasted.’

The comment did nothing to cheer Heisl up. Mirek gestured at the table.

‘Who’s the dinner guest?’

Heisl glanced at his watch. ‘Ania Krol. She should be here in a few minutes. Her training in Rome is complete. I’ll be working with her the last few days until you finish at the Institute.’

Mirek nodded but said nothing, although his anticipation was keen. Since his argument with the Bacon Priest over the woman, and his subsequent submission, his curiosity had been quickening. He wondered what sort of a nun would suspend her holy vows and take off across Eastern Europe with a strange man.

Heisl must have been reading his thoughts. He said sternly, ‘Mirek, you are to remember: she knows nothing of your ultimate purpose. She has been told only that you are a secret Church envoy travelling to Moscow. That is all.’

‘Does she know I’m an unbeliever?’

‘Yes, she knows that you’re an atheist . . . she was also informed by Cardinal Mennini that you are, by our lights, an evil man.’

He walked to an easy chair and sat down, his ears filled with Mirek’s laughter. Mirek drained the glass again but Heisl noted with satisfaction that he did not refill it. All too often men on the edge of danger turn to alcohol for comfort. Over the past days there had always been good wine on the table but Mirek had drunk in moderation. He said with a mocking smile: ‘So she must really be looking forward to the trip.’

Heisl spoke bluntly. ‘She is prepared to do her duty out of her love and devotion to Our Lord. She did express concern about her physical well-being . . . at your hands.’

Anger washed over Mirek’s face. ‘I’m not a bloody rapist! Does an atheist have to be a rapist? That bloody Mennini. . . what hypocrisy! Well, I’ve caught your priests shacked up with women! Last year I arrested one for molesting a ten-year-old girl!’

His dark eyes were bright with anger. Heisl held up a hand.

‘Mirek, calm down. We are hundreds of thousands around the world. Of course some are weak and some falter . . . very few, but it’s inevitable. We are human and sometimes we are lonely and we have human frailties. No one is accusing you of being a rapist. You are a dangerous man but I think you have your own code.’

Mirek was mollified. He turned to look out of the window through the lace curtains at the street below. A taxi pulled up on the corner. A woman got out with a small blue suitcase. She put it on the pavement and leaned towards the driver’s window counting out the fare. She was wearing a beige raincoat belted tightly at the waist. Instinctively Mirek noted the curve of her calves. The taxi pulled away and she picked up her suitcase and walked down the street towards the house. From his foreshortened view Mirek could not properly see her face. He could see the ebony black hair cut in a page-boy style, and the lithe swing of her confident stride. She paused, checking the house numbers. Mirek turned and said to Father Heisl, ‘You are right, Father . . . but that code will not stop me from accepting a woman who wants me . . . even a nun.’

Heisl opened his mouth to answer but was interrupted by the doorbell.

Dinner was
cannelloni
followed by
trippa alla fiorentina.
Father Heisl sat facing Mirek with Ania on his left. As usual the old lady served the food in silence, barely acknowledging the compliments to her skills.

By the time the first course was finished Heisl was a worried man. The atmosphere around the table was frigid. Every word of small talk was hung with icicles. Half an hour before he had been concerned that Mirek would be playing the suave seducer, not worried at the likelihood of success but not wishing to be made uncomfortable by the situation. The opposite had happened. Since being introduced to Ania Krol and shaking her hand Mirek had been morose and uncommunicative. He had picked at his food and had taken only a couple of sips of the excellent Chianti. His mood had communicated itself to her. She kept glancing at Father Heisl as if for assurance. She noted that the priest was perturbed and asked, ‘Is everything all right, Father?’

Before Heisl could reply Mirek said bluntly, ‘No, the Father is upset because this evening I badly hurt a couple of petty criminals.’

Heisl said irritably, ‘I don’t think it’s necessary for Ania to hear about that.’

‘Oh yes it is,’ Mirek responded, equally irritated. He turned to Ania. ‘They tried to pickpocket my wallet. I broke one’s jaw, very badly. The other one has lost an eye and maybe his manhood. Father Heisl thinks I over-reacted. I don’t.’ He leaned slightly towards her and waved a hand to his left. ‘If such an incident occurs over there during our travels I would kill them. Kill them so they could not give a description of us. Do you understand that?’

She nodded gravely. ‘I understand that our journey is dangerous. I hope you won’t have to kill anyone.’

‘And another thing,’ Mirek went on. ‘You ought to know that I was against you travelling with me. Very much against. I was overruled.’

‘Thank you for telling me. I will try to be a help to you.’ She spoke calmly looking him straight in the eye. ‘I believe that a couple travelling together will be less conspicuous. I am fluent in the languages of the countries we shall be travelling through. I am fit and I am not unintelligent. Before we reach Moscow you will be glad that I am travelling with you.’

Mirek grunted sceptically but before he could answer the old lady came in with the
trippa alla fiorentina.
After she had served them and left he said, looking at Heisl, ‘Everyone should understand, including you and the Bacon Priest, that my mission comes first.’ He gestured at the woman. ‘If she gets in my way I dump her. If we are chased and she cannot keep up I leave her. If she is wounded I abandon her . . .’

It was said abruptly. Heisl stirred uncomfortably in his seat. As he nodded he heard Ania’s husky voice.

‘That is understood, Mirek Scibor. Now, a wife should know something of her husband’s habits and tastes . . . do you like music?’

Heisl could see that Mirek was thrown by the sudden change of subject. He stroked his now well-grown moustache and then shrugged and said, ‘Some.’

‘Like what?’

He said almost defensively, ‘Our music. Good Polish music. Chopin; his sonatas and . . . yes, particularly his mazurkas.’

She smiled with pleasure. ‘Me too. I love his études. My favourite is “The Butterfly”. Do you know it?’

Mirek nodded. Father Heisl noted that for the first time there was some animation in his eyes. For the next twenty minutes until the meal was finished they chatted about Chopin and Polish music in general. Father Heisl, being tone deaf, had little interest in music and so was more or less left out of the conversation.

At the end of the meal, though, Mirek curtly refused coffee, announced that he would be having an early night and left the room.

Gently Father Heisl said to Ania, ‘Your task will be difficult, my child. He is not an easy man. However, although you may be in danger with him I am confident you will not be in danger from him.’

‘I think you are right, Father, but if he is prepared to kill so casually the mission must be of total importance to him . . . not just the Church. Do our interests completely coincide?’

She was pouring coffee into two cups. She remembered that he took two sugars and a little milk. As she stirred he collected his thoughts.

‘They do, Ania. For certain reasons which are operationally logical you cannot know the mission.’

‘In case I get caught?’ she interjected, pushing the cup towards him.

‘Well, yes.’

‘And not for my peace of mind?’

Father Heisl lifted his cup, thinking rapidly. This young woman was too intelligent for platitudes. He sipped and said firmly, ‘I am not permitted even to answer that. The Bacon Priest has already told you all that you are allowed to know. You must deal with your peace of mind with the power of prayer.’

‘Yes, Father,’ she said obediently, but Heisl knew that her intelligence would continue to stimulate her curiosity. He said, ‘You handled him well tonight, Ania. It will be easier when he has fully accepted you and realised that you can make a contribution.’

She smiled. ‘Don’t worry, Father. I can handle him. I’ll take care of my peace of mind and you take care of yours.’

In his room upstairs Mirek was troubled. The woman had unsettled him and he found that hard to understand. He usually unsettled women. He analysed his reaction and realised what had happened. Many men, perhaps most, have fantasies about nuns. Young, pretty, virginal nuns. He recalled having occasion once to question two nuns in Cracow. They were suspected of being in touch with dissidents. One had been middle-aged and plain, the other had been young, with an attractive face. He had questioned them separately and at length. With the young one he had felt that his looks and masculinity had affected her somehow. She had worn a long loose habit and he mentally undressed her, trying to visualise her hidden body. All he could see was her face from forehead to neck but he visualised a plump naked body attached to that face and had been sexually stimulated.