Warburg in Rome (49 page)

He said, “What do you need?”

She laughed. “Nothing. Nothing at all. I have train fare to London. I have a hundred pounds. I have the rest of my life.” She lifted her bag. Then she asked, “And you, Monsignor, what do you need?”

He stopped himself from saying “Nothing.” That, indeed, would have been his uncouth lie. He said, “I need for you to be well and happy.”

“And for yourself?”

“I need to be what I am.”

“That’s happiness, then,” she said.

“I suppose.”

“If you need to be promoted to bishop, you’d better forget that Vatican scandal report you’re writing.”

“I’m giving it to Mother Pascalina and to Cardinal Spellman.”

“They will bury it.”

“I know.”

“And then
you’ll
be buried in some parish in—what’s that awful place in New York?”

“The Bronx.”

“Right.”

“The Bronx, Jane . . . it’s the Irish Riviera. As for being bishop, why in the world would I want that now? I’m a priest. A priest, that’s all. I’ll do the sacraments. The Mass. Bread for the hungry, not the well fed. I know what it can be for people because I know what it is for me.”

“Broken servant to a broken world.”

“I guess so.”

Jane’s red eyes welled as she looked at him. “What I see in you is wholeness.”

He shook his head.

“That you don’t see it makes it real.” She stood. “May I call you Kevin?”

Deane did not move. “Yes,” he said.

“Goodbye, Kevin.” She hoisted her bag, leaving the newspaper and its burdens behind.

He watched her go until she disappeared.

When Deane got back to his office, there was a message waiting on his desk: “Call Father Boyle at NAC.”

Terry Boyle was the young Brooklyn priest Spellman had sent over from New York to manage the restoration of the North American College, once the refugees had been cleared out of it. Fumigation. Fresh paint. Kitchen refurbished. Lawns reseeded. Chapel reconsecrated. Now the college was up and running, the red-cheeked seminarians were back, reading Aquinas in Latin, and Boyle was the officially designated father procurator. Deane called him.

“There are a couple of people here, Monsignor,” Boyle said. “They say they’re friends of yours. They are waiting to see you.” Boyle’s tone was respectful. Deane knew that Boyle had been one of the young jocks who’d called him Auntie behind his back a long time ago. Now Boyle went on, with a curl of disapproval in his voice, “The man is outside shooting baskets. The woman is watching him.”

Less than half an hour later, Deane was there. Because it was morning, the seminarians were all in class, and the public spaces of the former palazzo were deserted. Deane cut through the marble-rich first floor toward the French doors that marked the building’s far wall. He moved swiftly, a couple of brisk pivots around columns, as if the breviary under his arm were a football.

When Warburg saw him approach, he ignored the basketball’s last bounce off the rim, went to the bench, took Marguerite’s elbow, and they walked toward Deane. In the distance, bright in the east across the Tiber, sunlight washed the panorama of bell towers and domes—a sight to which all three were now indifferent.

They met on the lawn, not far from a freshly installed statue of Mary, a small shrine to Our Lady of Lourdes that Spellman had ordered erected in thanksgiving for his Red Hat. Arranged before Our Lady in a small semicircle were kneelers and benches. Deane was all business as they greeted one another. He gestured at the benches. They sat, Warburg and Marguerite on one bench, Deane facing them on another. “What happened?” he asked.

“Vukas is dead,” Warburg answered.

“An attack on the convent? What?” Deane could not keep the urgency out of his voice, an edge of panic. The headline he had imagined. Explosions.

“I shot him,” a subdued Marguerite said, apparently understanding what Deane needed to know. “I acted alone. One shot.” She did not say she had loaded four bullets and left three behind in the rifle, on the floor, not caring whether she lived or died. Now she cared.

“There were two guards,” Warburg said, “as you warned there would be. I ran one over with my car, shot the other. They’re both dead.”

“Good God, David.” Deane had assumed he’d left surprise behind. Not so. “And the Irgun people?” he asked. “Haganah? Whoever the hell they are.”

“They were not involved,” Marguerite said. “They were never told of the convent. Vukas now comes off their list. The Franciscans will have removed his body. The Church, wanting no notice drawn, will control the police.”

Deane said, “But the Ustashe will notice. The Crusaders—whoever the hell
they
are.”

“Which is why we have to leave,” Warburg said. “To make sure it ends here. As if none of this happened.”

“But it did happen,” Deane said.

“A lot happened, Kevin,” Warburg said. “You broke your leg.”

“A long time ago. An innocent time.”

“The time of Fossoli?” Warburg said. “Innocent? That was when the Vatican newspaper canceled its edition rather than mention Jews being slaughtered.”

“Did you bring me up here to break my bones again?”

“No. Only to report. To thank you, and to say goodbye.”

“You know about Jerusalem,” Deane said. “The King David Hotel.”

“Of course. It’s why we must go there now.”

“What?”

“Did you see the reaction from London?” Warburg asked. “Churchill deplored the bombing, but said it was time to let the Jews emigrate to Palestine.”

“So you’re saying the King David bombing worked?”

“No. It was a brutal, unnecessary, and criminal act. It must not be repeated. From what I hear of Jewish reaction, it
will
not be repeated. But the time for the Jewish nation has come. We’re going to be there.”

“A Jewish nation born in blood?”

“A nation, therefore, like every other nation, Kevin. That was always the only Zionist dream.” Warburg put his arm through Marguerite’s. “I sense your Catholic skepticism.”

“No. If there’s one thing I’ve left behind, it’s the Wandering Jew bullshit. I’m with you as far as the Jewish homeland goes. Refugees deserve refuge. But”—he thought of Thomas, Jane Storrow—“the Brits brought trouble on themselves in Palestine. Not so the Arabs. What about them?”

“The Arabs will be respected, Kevin.”

“It would be lovely to think so, David. But the Arabs are screwed.”

Warburg said nothing to that.

Deane asked, “What about America?”

“That’s a Jewish homeland too,” Warburg said. “Thank God for it.”

“General Mates and all? Americans helping Nazis escape?”

“Yes. Not so different, I gather, from the Catholic Church, Pope Pius and all. No question anymore of the Church’s being sinless. At least that’s cleared up.”

“So the Church is”—Deane paused to let the word echo—“a homeland.”

“For?”

“Sinners,” Deane said.

“Like you,” Warburg said with a slow smile.

Deane again thought of Jane Storrow. He said, “In point of fact, yes.”

After a moment Warburg asked, “What will you do now, Kevin?”

Deane shrugged. “I’ve written the whole thing up. A report. The whole damn thing.
Accusatio
. Italian for
J’accuse
.”

“Report for whom? Clark was right. Henry Luce wouldn’t touch it.”

“I’m giving it to Spellman.”

“He’s the Pope’s lapdog.”

“I know. And to the Pope’s Doberman pinscher—I’m giving it to her, too. It’s all I can do.”

After a moment’s thought, Warburg said, “Roncalli.”

“What?”

“Archbishop Roncalli.”

“The papal nuncio?”

“You know what he did for us in Budapest. He’s still helping us. The only Catholic bishop in Europe who has agreed to the return of Jewish children.”

“What children?”

“The ones who were hidden by Catholics when their parents disappeared. Most were subsequently baptized, but Roncalli accepts that they are still Jews. Orphans, obviously. To let the Jewish community take care of them, he has to operate under Vatican radar. The guy has guts. Get your report to Roncalli. Forget Spellman.”

Deane took this in, then said, “I’ll get it to both of them. Roncalli to do something, maybe. Spellman because I owe him the truth.”

“Spellman will screw you.”

“Nothing he can do will touch me, David. I’m beyond that bullshit. I apologize for it.”

Warburg gently put Marguerite’s arm aside and stood. From her bag he took the folded white cloth with black stripes and held it out to Deane. “Would you bless this for me?”

“What?” Deane stood.

“This
tallit
.”

“I know what it is. But surely, I—”

“Who has been my rabbi, Kevin, if not you?” Warburg held Deane’s eyes.

Deane took the shawl, opened it, let its folds and fringes fall from his left hand. His right hand hovered above. After a long silence, the priest said, “Blest art Thou, Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Blest art Thou. From Thy goodness comes this
tallit
with its
tzitzit
. May the one who wears it do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with Thee.”

Deane lifted the shawl, kissed it, and, with Marguerite helping, draped it across Warburg’s shoulders. Firmly pressing Warburg’s upper arm, Deane said, “Through . . .” But he paused, the point in every blessing at which a priest invokes the name of Jesus and signs the cross. Instead, he said, “Through Thy commandments we are sanctified.” Then he added “Amen,” a word that David and Marguerite softly echoed.

Author’s Note

The lines of this book are fiction, but the dots they connect are history, from the War Refugee Board to the Vatican ratline. The novel’s main characters and their story are inventions of my imagination, though nothing in the account contradicts what happened in Rome at the end of World War II. If actual events or figures are referred to, it is in ways consistent with the historical record.

Many years ago I began a novel set in wartime Rome. Realizing that I knew too little about the true relationship between Christians and the Holocaust, I abandoned that work. Instead, in nonfiction, I took up the question of the Church’s long conflict with the Jewish people. I acknowledge all of the scholars, religious figures, and dialogue partners whose work has informed my own over the years. Christian self-criticism for the crimes of religiously justified anti-Semitism has been powerful in the decades following the war. It was advanced by no one more forthrightly than Pope John XXIII, who, as Angelo Roncalli, was papal nuncio to Turkey during the Holocaust. His brave support of Jewish survival is noted on the margins of this novel. My conceit is that Monsignor Kevin Deane forwards a copy of his final
J’accuse
to Roncalli. In fact, Roncalli knew enough of the Church’s failures to force a reckoning with them as Pope. For that, above all, I acknowledge John XXIII.

I am grateful to the many people who helped me with this book. Donald Cutler was the first person with whom I discussed it, and a first reader. His support, over many years, remains precious. Early readers of my first drafts included Bernard Avishai, William Phillips, and Roberto Toscano, each of whom helped me in important ways. Thank you, dear friends.

Thanks to my colleagues and students at Suffolk University in Boston, where I am privileged to be a scholar-in-residence. I especially acknowledge Dean Kenneth Greenberg, Fred Marchant, George Kalogeris, Jennifer Barber, Gregory Fried, Bryan Trabold, Nir Eisikovits, Marilyn Plotkins, Wesley Savick, and my fellow scholars-in-residence, Robert Brustein and David Ferry. As an associate of the Manhindra Humanities Center at Harvard, I have received generous support from Homi Bhabha, Mary Halpenny-Killip, Kiku Adatto, and Michael Sandel. At Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, my editor and friend Deanne Urmy brought this book to life. Ashley Gilliam and Larry Cooper aimed their laser focus on the manuscript, helping improve it a lot. The Houghton Mifflin Harcourt team brought the book to the world with style. I am profoundly grateful to you all. And thanks to Tina Bennett for sage advice.

At the center of my life and work is my family. Patrick, Lizzy, James, and Annie define my happiness and hope. My wife, the novelist Alexandra Marshall, deserves special thanks for being my first and most careful reader. But that’s the least of what she gives me. I dedicate this novel to Lexa, with love.

Among the works from which I drew instruction for this novel are:

Aaron, Mark, and John Loftus.
Unholy Trinity: How the Vatican’s Nazi Networks Betrayed Western Intelligence to the Soviets
. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1992.

D’Este, Carlo.
Fatal Decision: Anzio and the Battle for Rome
. New York: HarperCollins, 1991.

Eizenstat, Stuart E.
Imperfect Justice: Looted Assets, Slave Labor, and the Unfinished Business of World War II
. New York: Public Affairs, 2003.

Godman, Peter.
Hitler and the Vatican:
Inside the Secret Archives That Reveal the New Story of the Nazis and the Church
. New York: Free Press, 2004.

Gruber, Ruth.
Haven: The Dramatic Story of 1,000 World War II Refugees and How They Came to America
. New York: Three Rivers Press, 2000.

Hilliard, Robert L.
Surviving the Americans: The Continued Struggle of the Jews after Liberation
. New York: Seven Stories Press, 1997.

Judt, Tony.
Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945
. New York: Penguin, 2005.

Katz, Robert.
The Battle for Rome
. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2003.

Kertzer, David I.
The Pope and Mussolini
. New York: Random House, 2014.

Morgenthau, Henry, III.
Mostly Morgenthaus: A Family History
. New York: Ticknor & Fields, 1991.

Phayer, Michael.
Pius XII, the Holocaust, and the Cold War
. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007.

Wyman, David S.
The Abandonment of the Jews
. New York: Pantheon, 1984.