Magnificat (66 page)

“Of course,” said Raccolto, then looked down at the body of Pope An just as Cardinal Llanos brought the robes from the statue of Saint Peter and draped them over her, covering the ruin of her face.

Cardinal Cadini had come to the foot of the Papal Altar; slowly he climbed the shallow steps, paying no heed to the tumult and distress around him. He looked once at Maetrich as if asking permission, then knelt, heedless of the spreading blood beside Pope An, pulling back the robes that covered her face long enough to begin the rites for the dead.

Epilogue

Below in Saint Peter’s Square an altar had been set up for the celebration of the Feast of Saint Jude. It was against all the recommendations of Vatican Security, the Swiss Guard, the Eurocops and Interpol; in the year and a half since the assassination of Pope An the public events permitted at the Vatican had been scaled down severely. This gesture of the former Vitale Benedetto Cadini was viewed as inexcusably risky, an assessment which amused him.

Sylvestre, Cardinal Jung, his petulant baby’s-face now constantly ruddy, stood in the window of the reception room where the press would gather after the Mass, in the company of a dozen other Cardinals who would be part of those answering questions for the Church. “It’s bad enough that he took the name of Jude. Jude! What sort of name is that for a Pope? It was not correct of him to use such a name for his reign.”

“It was his decision to make,” said Cardinal van Hooven, not bothering to look up from the newspaper he was reading.

“Jude was an apostle,” Cardinal Llanos reminded Cardinal Jung, pleased when the rotund Swiss swung around and glared at him.

“It was disrespectful,” Cardinal Jung insisted.

“And what if it was?” Cardinal Mendosa grabbed the wheels of his chair and rolled toward the windows; the bullet he had taken in his efforts to save Pope An had left him a paraplegic. His hair was white. “It was still Cadini’s right to choose the name.” His paralyzed legs were held in place with a wide leather belt just above the knees; he continued to wear his cowboy boots. He had returned to the Vatican less than a month before, after surgery and prolonged physical therapy.

“You would defend him. You defend all disruption.” Cardinal Jung had difficulty looking at Cardinal Mendosa, as he had looking at anyone with obvious physical problems.

“Someone has to,” said Cardinal Mendosa, and moved a little nearer so that he could see what was going on below. “We cling too much to the past.”

Cardinal Jung moved away from the window, his portly body stuffed with disapproval. He directed his steps toward the far side of the room where Cardinal O’Higgins occupied himself with crossword puzzles. He halted near the Mexican, his manner portentous. “O’Higgins. Are you planning to attend the Mass? Would you want—”

“Yes,” said Cardinal O’Higgins in a tone of voice that encouraged no further conversation.

With a contemptuous sniff, Cardinal Jung selected a chair some distance from the rest. “I do not know,” he said to no one in particular, “how you can promote such a foolish venture as this Mass. His Holiness ought to listen to the advice of those whose work it is to protect him.”

“He has listened,” said Cardinal Mendosa, equally indirectly. “And he has chosen to ignore them. Pope Jude is permitted to have his own opinion, isn’t he? or aren’t interim Popes supposed to have opinions? If all you wanted him to do was keep Saint Peter’s seat warm, you chose the wrong man.”

“Stop it, both of you,” said Cardinal van Hooven at his mildest, still caught up in his book. “This isn’t the time or the place. If you two want to sling insults, do it where it will trouble no one but yourselves. Do not bring your private rancor to this occasion.”

Cardinal Jung pulled a small book of essays by Benedictine monks from a pocket concealed in his cassock and made a point of reading.

After watching out the window for another ten minutes, Cardinal Mendosa rolled toward Cardinal van Hooven. He set the brakes on his wheels and turned toward the little Dutchman. “You’re right about arguing; sometimes I can’t help it,” he admitted, then said more softly, “I never thanked you for what you and…your friend did.”

“It isn’t necessary. The men responsible have been arrested and will be punished. Their South American backers are known and discredited. That is thanks enough.” His sternness did not reach his eyes, which were filled with sympathy. “You did more than any of us.”

“It wasn’t enough,” said Cardinal Mendosa with a sigh. There were days he still felt responsible for Zhuang’s death, no matter what his visions revealed to the contrary. “Let him know what he did is appreciated. I’ve tried to do it, but I can’t find anyone who.… With Professor Bell back at Stanford, I have no…direct route to him to do it myself”

“I’ll convey your message,” said Cardinal van Hooven with the suggestion of a smile. “He could use a good word or two, these days.”

“Are things as bad for him as they’re saying in the newsmedia?” Cardinal Mendosa asked.

“They are very likely worse. This most recent change of upper government has already brought down Anatoly Sava, though they’ve managed to keep that quiet. This new group of men could easily make the same decision about others. They’re a very knowing lot, most of them, with international experience.” He folded his newspaper and looked Cardinal Mendosa directly in the eyes. “I’ve told him that we will be at his disposal if he requires our assistance.”

“Did he have anything to say to that? Did he want anything?” Cardinal Mendosa inquired, aware that two of the other Cardinals in the room were half-listening to them.

“Actually, he did. He asked if you could contact your brother-in-law on his behalf.” He gave Cardinal Mendosa a few seconds to consider his answer. “I hope you’ll be willing to do this for him.”

“After the information he supplied? You bet. There’s no way to pay what I owe him. I’d go and carry him out on this contraption if that’s what he wanted.” He slapped the arms of his wheelchair.

“I don’t think he’ll require that,” said Cardinal van Hooven. “Or I hope he won’t.”

“For his sake or mine?” asked Cardinal Mendosa lightly. He pressed his hands on the arms of his chair and adjusted how he sat. “I wonder, sometimes, what might have happened if I had let well enough alone? What if I hadn’t gone to China? What if we’d gone ahead and elected someone else?”

“There is no way to live a life twice, Charles,” said Cardinal van Hooven. “You did what you believed was the best thing.”

“The will of the Holy Spirit. It was so clear when we elected her twice. But she died, and for something that wasn’t hers to die for,” said Cardinal Mendosa, a deep, hidden pain in his eyes.

“Are you sure of that? You, of all people?” Cardinal van Hooven had lowered his voice so that the rest could not eavesdrop. He paused. “You know better than all of us.”

Cardinal Mendosa rounded on him, his face suddenly pale. “What do you mean by that?”

“Why, nothing,” said Cardinal van Hooven with grave innocence. “Only that you had more opportunity to know her than most of the rest of us. You found her. You convinced her.”

“More fool me,” muttered Cardinal Mendosa.

“She was willing to do the work, Charles. You didn’t force her, and you certainly didn’t tell her what to do or say.” He let this gentle prompting work its charm. “You have no reason to suppose she regretted coming here.”

“But she was killed,” protested Cardinal Mendosa, haunted by his responsibility in her murder.

“And that could happen to her no place but here?” inquired Cardinal van Hooven. “No one was ever killed in China?”

“I didn’t say that,” Cardinal Mendosa growled. “I knew she would be in danger here.”

“Were you so certain?” Cardinal van Hooven did not look directly at Cardinal Mendosa but directed his gaze to a spot over the Texan’s right shoulder about halfway down the room. “You knew she might not be popular, and that she would not have the general approval of Catholics everywhere. But you speak as if you were aware of something much more specific. You’re behaving as if you knowingly brought her into danger. Isn’t that hindsight, because of all the conspiracies?”

“No!” said Cardinal Mendosa with heat, and put his hand to his mouth as the others in the room turned to stared at him.

“What about the others? What about Cardinal Walgren and Archbishop Fuentes? Do you feel responsible for their imprisonment and upcoming sentencing? You surely aren’t upset about breaking the backs of the four cartels, are you?” He kept his voice just above a whisper, loud enough for Cardinal Mendosa to hear, but softly enough to remind the others that their conversation was private.

“Talk about such things we should save for later,” said Cardinal Mendosa.

“Let’s talk about it now, anyway,” said Cardinal van Hooven. “There’s time before the Mass.” He looked at his watch. “Twenty minutes before we must leave this room.”

“Jesus and Mary, Piet, you’re worse than a trail-drive ramrod.” He shifted his position in the wheelchair again. “Okay, okay. What the hell.” He leaned his head back and looked at the ceiling murals. “You know damn well I don’t feel bad about Walgren and Fuentes. Shit, I feel great about the drug lords. I try to sympathize with them, to have compassion for them, and all I can think of is that they killed her because she was a woman who would not tolerate their privateering. They hated her for being a woman and for changing the Church, but they killed her because they were afraid she’d find out about the money they were making off the gangs they had supposedly reformed; it was so petty a reason. They were using the Church to promote the worst kinds of crimes, which is nothing new, historically. That offends me, nevertheless. But to kill her because of their own fear that her reforms would make it harder to hide what they were doing.… The only thing that gets to me is that I didn’t spot them sooner. I thought that if it was any of them, it had to be the Latin Americans, not someone like Walgren and Fuentes, no matter how they talked about Pope An. I keep saying they were too obvious, that I didn’t think anyone with such obvious malice could possibly be part of a real conspiracy.”

Cardinal van Hooven accepted this readily. “And what about Reverend Williamson? Do you think you did the wrong thing in testifying against him? because it was your testimony that put the seal on Cardinal Hetre’s psychiatric detention.”

“That doesn’t bother me. Dominique Hetre needs psychiatric detention if anyone ever did.” He shook his head for emphasis. “He tried to find it in the Church, after all.”

“And your visions? What about them?” He asked the questions quickly and very quietly.

Cardinal Mendosa jerked in his chair. Then he said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Cardinal van Hooven made a gesture of dismissal. “It’s in your records, Charles. Well-hidden and buried, but it’s there. Half a dozen episodes in youth, and then a history of nightmares and prophetic dreams. You’re feeling guilty because you followed a vision. You did something quite irrational. At the time you didn’t question it, but now—That’s it, isn’t it?”

“I…it’s not what you think,” he said, looking around furtively, afraid now that they were overheard.

“I think you’re a visionary, Charles.” Cardinal van Hooven reached into the rack beside the chair and drew out the latest issue of
Oggi
. “So does our new Pope Jude. He’s said you had the talent for years. He suspected it was one of the reasons the old guard dislikes you—you could see through them, to use that very American expression.”

“God, I hope he hasn’t blabbed it all over,” said Cardinal Mendosa in an undervoice.

“You would have known it long before now if he had,” said Cardinal van Hooven. “Sometime—it needn’t be at once, you understand—I’d like to know more about it.”

“Maybe,” said Cardinal Mendosa, and released the brakes on his wheelchair, rolling back toward the windows to watch the gathering crowd. “It’s too bad,” he said, his voice a bit louder than conversational, “that they have to take so many security measures now. I don’t like having to send worshippers and tourists through metal and plastic detectors.”

Cardinal Bakony, who had made a point of not listening to the conversation between Cardinal van Hooven and Cardinal Mendosa, made a second point by joining him by the window. “We’ve grown accustomed to them in airports and train stations,” he said. “In fact, to be truthful, I’m relieved that they have them in airports and train stations.”

“And here?” asked Cardinal Mendosa.

“Not as much,” said Cardinal Bakony, “but that’s my pride speaking, not my good sense. I am cognizant of the risks we have attempted to ignore. We ignore them no longer. Such prudence. I would never want to have another such tragedy touch the Church the way that one did.” He put his hands behind his back and pursed his lips. “If my pride must take a bruise or two in order to make such a disaster unlikely, then I will count myself and the Church lucky.”

“Yes,” said Cardinal Tsukamara, looking up from his Japanese printouts for the first time, “Dreadful as her murder and your wound were, I have been grateful that day was no worse than it was. When I heard that shot, I feared at first there were several terrorists in the congregation and that the people would be sprayed with bullets, or worse.”

“Or worse,” agreed Cardinal O’Higgins.

Cardinal Jung could stand no more of this. He stumped back to the window. “It was no more than we deserved, having desecrated the Church with her presence.”

“Shut up, Sylvestre,” warned Cardinal Mendosa.

But Cardinal Jung was not impressed by the threat. “You were the worst of the lot, foisting her on us. You and your hunt for her, as if you sought the Grail. You showed her reverence worthy of a savior. You spoke of her as if she was the choice of the Holy Spirit because of that travesty of two elections. And then you behaved as if she—a Chinese woman, a Communist—was the Second Coming.”

There was an odd light in Cardinal Mendosa’s face as he stared down Cardinal Jung. When the Swiss dropped his eyes, Cardinal Mendosa asked him very gently, “What makes you think she wasn’t?”

THE END

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