Pandora's Ark (7 page)

CHAPTER NINE

Vatican City
,
Domus Sanctæ Marthæ

On the edge of Vatican City but
adjacent to St. Peter’s Basilica lies the
Domus
Sanctæ Marthæ,
the residential quarters of the Cardinal Electors who
are housed there prior to entering the conclave to elect a newly appointed
official upon the passing of the pope.

Three days after
his arrival, Cardinal Bonasero Vessucci took up residence in a dormitory room
overlooking the Basilica.

To be back at Vatican City held something special for him, the air of the plaza bearing its own
uniqueness unlike anywhere else in the world. Or so he believed.  

In the days that
followed his arrival, politicking began, the camps congregating with
discussions as to who would provide the best possible leadership and guidance,
and whether or not the names bandied about were more conservative or liberal in
ideology. Like last time, Cardinal Vessucci’s name entered discussions as a
leading candidate alongside
Cardinal
Giuseppe
Angullo, whose camp banded with the late Pope Gregory’s in the last election
and caused Vessucci to lose by a marginal count and ultimately his exile by
Gregory. In exchange for Angullo’s collusion entitling him the papalship, Pope
Gregory would grant Angullo Vessucci’s old post as the Vatican’s secretary of state, the second highest position in the Church.

Now with less
than a year under his belt and the leading title as the Church’s secretary of
state, Cardinal Angullo was positioned to take it all despite talks amongst the
Electors that members within his camp had defected. No reasons were given other
than that his position had been severely weakened with his major components of
support now gone.

Nevertheless, Angullo’s
camp remained strong with Vessucci trying to corral as many of the cardinal’s
defectors with powerful politicking.

Vessucci was
gathering momentum.

By the end of
the third day as the sun was beginning to set, Bonasero Vessucci made his way
to the papal chamber. The doors were guarded by two members of the Swiss Guards,
who were holding traditional halberds. When the cardinal stood before the doors
the guards, out of obligatory courtesy, opened them and allowed the cardinal passage
into the chamber.

The doors closed
softly behind him, the snicker of the bolt locking into place barely
perceptible to the cardinal’s ears.

The room was
large and vast, the scalloped drapery hanging still as Vessucci crossed the
floor in a room that appeared more sepulchral than hallowed.

He stood at the threshold
of the balcony that overlooked the city in its glory with the Egyptian obelisk
and the colonnades within clear view. People milled by the thousands; vacationers
mostly, with their digital cameras and touristy attire. And the sky was a
perfect blend of reds and yellows with the onset of a darkening sky.

He quickly made
his way to the stone guardrail, lifting the hem of his garment as he did so,
and then laid a hand on the railing. The drop to the street below appeared farther
simply by illusion alone. The height was no more than thirty feet. But for some
reason it looked twice that.

He looked over
the edge and noted that the blood was gone, the bricks no longer holding any
tell-tale sign that the pontiff’s life had leeched out onto the surface below.

“A shame, isn’t
it? That the pontiff should lose his life so early during his tenure.”

Vessucci
started. He did not hear Cardinal Angullo enter the chamber, nor the closing of
the doors after the guards let him in. The face that measured Vessucci was oddly
hatchet-thin with a snout-like nose and grim lips fashioned above a weak chin. His
eyes were so dark they seemed without pupil. And when he spoke, he did so in a discordant
twang similar to the strings of an instrument being plucked.

Vessucci
returned the same arduous glare. “Quite,” he simply said.

“Are you here to
reminisce of a time that once was? When you and Pope Pius once stood here talking
about the Church . . . And of the dark secrets it held during his reign.”

Vessucci
immediately understood the cardinal’s insinuation. He was talking about the Vatican Knights. The Church’s clandestine op-group of elite commandos who were summarily
disbanded under Gregory’s rule, the pope declaring them an abomination to the
Catholic faith despite the good they proffered to those who were weak and
innocent. “The only darkness is the truth of what really happened to Pope
Gregory,” he returned.

“Oh?”

Vessucci turned
his gaze upon the plaza of Vatican City, then patted the railing with his hand.
“I have stood here many times overlooking this city with Pope Pius,” he said.
“As I’m sure you have with Pope Gregory.”

“I have, yes.”

Vessucci looked
at the railing, and at the carvings of angels and cherubs. “Then you know as
well as I do that it is quite difficult for a man to fall over this railing,
since it is raised to a level to bar a man from leaning too far forward.”

“It is quite obvious
to me, Bonasero, that the railing is not high enough.”

The cardinal
drew closer. The railing reached to the point of his abdomen.

But Angullo
intuited his action. “Pope Gregory was taller than you,” he said.

“True. But not
tall enough for the brunt of his weight to carry him over the side.” He turned
to Angullo. “Unless he was pushed, perhaps?”

The cardinal
cocked his head to one side the same way a dog would when trying to grasp the
meaning of an uncertain moment. “If I didn’t know better, Bonasero, I would say
that you were insinuating that the good pontiff was murdered. And that you, at
least by the tone of your voice, believe that it was by my hand.”

Vessucci stood
back from the railing. “Every shiny surface has a little tarnish underneath,
Giuseppe. All I’m saying is that the case was closed much too quickly without
the benefit of a full objective examination, simply for the belief that nothing
truly reprehensible can happen at the Vatican.”

“Come on,
Bonasero. Do you really believe that Pope Gregory met his death by the hand of
another rather than by the hand of Fate? He fell. Accidents happen.”

“To fall over
this railing is highly improbable, since the railing was constructed exactly
for that reason—as a safeguard to keep one from falling over its edge.” He
shook his head. “No, Giuseppe. Either he took his own life . . .” He let his
words trail. But a heartbeat later, said: “Or someone aided him in his fall.”

The cardinal was
taken aback. “What you say, Bonasero, is nothing but absolute nonsense—this talk
of murder and suicide. Gregory was sound of mind the night of his death. He
would never put the Church in such a position by taking his own life.”

“Exactly. And
that leaves us with the other option, doesn’t it?”

Cardinal
Angullo’s nostrils flared the same moment his brow dipped sharply over the
bridge of his nose in anger. “The days of heresy have been abandoned by
rational thought over the years, Bonasero. But if anything provides a strong
case for such profanation, it’s what you just stated.”

“Is your memory
so short, Giuseppe? Have you forgotten the attempt on the life of John Paul the
Second?”

The cardinal bit
his lower lip.

“What I say
holds a measure of probability. Therefore, I will not turn a blind eye to the
reality of what might have been.”

Cardinal Angullo
turned away from Bonasero, his eyes alighting on the landscape of Vatican City. “So what will you do?” he asked. “Open an investigation when there are less
than ten days left before we enter the conclave to vote on the successor?”

“Hardly. I’m
simply voicing my opinion.”

“But you believe
the pontiff was murdered?”

Bonasero
remained quiet.

“You do realize
once the newly elected takes the Papal Throne, then you will return to Boston along with your foolish notion.”

“Unless,
Giuseppe,” he faced the cardinal directly, “I’m elected to the pontifical post.”

There, a
laryngeal microexpression, a quick bob of the Adam’s apple, was a sign of fear
from Angullo.

“And if you
are,” Angullo returned dispassionately, “then what? You’ll spearhead a quest to
find something that does not exist? You’ll just end up like a dog chasing after
its tail, Bonasero. There’s nothing out there for you to find. And if you are
elected, don’t you think you’d be better suited to apply yourself to the needs
of the Church rather than the needs of yourself, since you are newly
appointed?”

 “To seek the
truth, Giuseppe, is always the need of the Church.”

Whether Cardinal
Angullo shook his head in disagreement or disgust, Vessucci could not
determine.

The cardinal
then looked over the railing, then back to Vessucci. “Do what you must,” he
told him. “Chase your foolish notions while I seek to better my position with
the Electors. If I take the throne, Bonasero, let it be known right now that
you will return to Boston and seek the truth from there. And believe me when I
say that such notions will fall on deaf ears.”

Vessucci smiled.
“God is never deaf or blind to the truth, Giuseppe. And the truth will always
find its way, whether I’m at the Vatican or across the ocean.”

Angullo began to
circle the cardinal, and Vessucci took a conscious step back away from the
railing.

“Perhaps you
think me the killer, is that it? Is that how you plan to win the Electors
votes, by politicking with foolish and unfounded theories—that the good
Cardinal Giuseppe Angullo murdered the pope? Is that your strategy, Bonasero?”
The cardinal was now standing directly behind Vessucci, who could not see the
man through either corner of his eyes.

Vessucci turned
enough to offer a sidelong glance. “I politick with the strengths I offer as a newly
elected and nothing more,” he said.

“I see.” Angullo
maneuvered back toward the railing. And then: “I understand that your camp
remains strong, even after Pope Gregory sent you to America.”

“And yours a
little less powerful.”

Angullo smiled,
nodded. “It will be interesting when the Electors take to the conclave. But
tell me, Bonasero, should you be selected to the papal throne, will you bring
these Vatican Knights, these abominations, back to the Church?”

“Whatever I do,
Giuseppe, you will have no knowledge of my stance in any position within the
Church, believe me.”

“As the Vatican’s secretary of state, I’m afraid you’d have no choice.”

“Oh, but I do,”
he returned adamantly. “In the same manner that Pope Gregory has seen me fit to
leave my post that you now hold, I would yield the same power of authority to
see the same. Perhaps, Giuseppe, Boston would suit you well.”

The cardinal
nodded. “You forget one thing, Bonasero. You seem overly confident when
everyone within the Church knows you were summarily sent to the Boston as something punitive. Your camp will dissolve on that tainted issue and your bid
to seek the papal throne will end before it even begins.”

“Is that how you
plan to politick?”

The right corner
of the cardinal’s lip lifted into a sardonic grin. “Would I be lying if they
learned why you were truly dismissed to America to begin with? That you were
summarily dismissed from your post because of these Vatican Knights and the
Society of Seven. These clandestine organizations within the Church nobody knew
about?”

He had just
played his trump card and the cardinal immediately picked up on it.

“I see,” said
Vessucci. “But you forget one thing.”

“And that would
be?”

“These Knights
were highly beloved by every pope going back to World War Two. And no one loved
them or pressed them more into duty than Pope Pius and John Paul the Second.”
He now stood before Angullo so that he faced him directly, almost toe to toe
with his back to the railing. “Should you use this as a tactic, then you’d be besmirching
the good name of John Paul, a man who is being sent up to sainthood.”

Angullo’s smile
widened. “Bonasero-Bonasero-Bonasero, are you listening to yourself? When you
speak you do so as a hypocrite.”

Vessucci
appeared quizzical.

“Did you not just
say that ‘the truth will always find its way’?”

“I did.”

“Yet it’s all
right to keep the truth of the Vatican Knights from the members of the entire
College of the Cardinals for fear that they may think of them in the same light
as Pope Gregory, as mercenary abominations.”

Touché
.

Angullo turned
away and headed for the chamber door. “There’s no place in the Church for a
hypocrite,” he said over his shoulder. “I suggest you think your position over
clearly and bow out before your image is so badly tainted that you’ll end up in
a parish somewhere in East Africa.”

“Is that a
threat?”

Cardinal Angullo
hesitated at the chamber door, his hand on the knob, and studied Vessucci
through obsidian eyes. “My stance with the Church is clear. What I want is
clear. If you stand in my way, then I will destroy you.”

“The same way
you destroyed Pope Gregory?” As much as he didn’t want to, he said it. 

Cardinal Angullo
let his hand fall and took two steps back inside the chamber. He shook his
head. “Think what you will,” he told him. “But the man died by accident and
nothing more. Worse, you’re beginning to sound like a man of desperation, which
is sad since at one time you were highly esteemed.”

“I still am,
otherwise you wouldn’t have come here to share your game plan and intimidate me
to fall out.”

“I came here to
talk about politicking, which we did. But you also accused me of possible murder.
And that, Bonasero, is stepping over the line. Politicking is one thing, wild
accusations are another.”