The Fallen Angel ga-12 Read online

  “The entire incident seems to have slipped Paola’s mind.”

  “I’m not surprised she didn’t tell you. It’s not something a daughter likes to think about. Unfortunately, most of us have a criminal somewhere in the family tree. I’m afraid it is the curse of Italy.”

  “Rather ironic, don’t you think?”

  “That the daughter of a tombarolo dedicated herself to the care and preservation of antiquities?”

  Gabriel nodded.

  “Actually, it was no accident. Claudia was deeply ashamed of her father and wanted to make up for some of the damage he had done. Needless to say, she guarded her past carefully. If it ever became known in the curatorial community that her father was a thief, it would have hung over her like a cloud.”

  “But you knew.”

  “She told me during the Medici investigation. She felt that she had to because we were working with General Ferrari.” Veronica Marchese paused, then added, “Claudia had an exaggerated sense of right and wrong. It was one of the things I loved most about her.”

  “Do you know what Falcone told her?”

  “She wouldn’t tell me. She said it was necessary to protect the integrity of her investigation.”

  They walked past the shuttered museum bookshop and emerged from the front portico. The rain was coming down in torrents. She fished a set of keys from her handbag and with the click of her remote started the engine of a gleaming Mercedes SL coupe. The car looked out of place at the museum. So did Veronica Marchese.

  “I’d offer you a lift,” she said apologetically, “but I’m afraid I have another appointment. If there’s anything more I can do to help, please don’t hesitate to call. And do give my best to Luigi.”

  She started toward her car, then stopped suddenly and turned to face him. “It occurs to me you have one thing working in your favor,” she said. “General Ferrari just took millions of euros worth of antiquities from the men who killed Claudia. That means they’ll be anxious to replenish their stock. If I were you, I’d find something irresistible.”

  “What then?”

  “Smash it to pieces,” she replied. “And feed it to them slowly.”

  She lowered herself into the car and then guided it into the frenetic traffic of the Roman evening rush. Gabriel stood there for a moment wondering why Luigi Donati had neglected to mention that he was acquainted with Claudia Andreatti’s best friend. Priests sin, too, he thought. Even the good ones.

  13

  APOSTOLIC PALACE, VATICAN CITY

  “WHAT’S THE SOUP OF THE DAY?” asked Gabriel.

  “Stone,” replied Donati.

  He raised a spoonful of the thin consommé to his lips and tasted it warily. They were seated in the Holy Father’s austere dining room on the third floor of the Apostolic Palace. The tablecloth was white, as were the habits of the household nuns who floated silently in and out of the adjoining kitchen. His Holiness was not present; he was working at the desk in his small private office located directly across the hall. It had been fourteen years since the diminutive Patriarch of Venice ascended to the throne of St. Peter, yet he still maintained a crushing daily schedule that would exhaust a far younger man. He did so in part to preserve his power. The Church faced too many challenges for its absolute monarch to give the appearance of being incapacitated by age. If the princes perceived that His Holiness was beginning to fail, the positioning for the next conclave would commence in earnest. And the papacy of Pope Paul VII, one of the most turbulent in the history of the modern Church, would come to a grinding halt.

  “Why the punishment rations?” asked Gabriel.

  “As a result of our reduced financial circumstances, the fare at some of the colleges and religious houses in Rome is starting to suffer. His Holiness has asked the bishops and cardinals to avoid lavish dining. I’m afraid I have no choice but to lead by example.”

  He held his glass of red wine up to the sunlight slanting through the window and then took a cautious sip.

  “How is it?”

  “Divine.” Donati placed the glass carefully on the table and then pushed a thick black binder toward Gabriel. “It’s the final itinerary for our trip to Israel and the Palestinian territories. We’ve decided to do it over Holy Week, which will allow His Holiness to take the unprecedented step of celebrating Christ’s death and resurrection in the city where it actually occurred. He will commemorate the passion on the Via Dolorosa and celebrate Easter Mass in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The schedule also includes a stop in Bethlehem and a courtesy call at the al-Aqsa Mosque, where he intends to issue an unequivocal apology for the Crusades. The soldiers of the cross killed ten thousand people on the Temple Mount when they sacked Jerusalem in 1099, including three thousand who had taken shelter inside al-Aqsa.”

  “And they warmed up along the way by killing several thousand innocent Jews in Europe.”

  “I believe we’ve already apologized for that,” Donati said archly.

  “When do you plan to announce the trip?”

  “Next week at the General Audience.”

  “It’s too soon.”

  “We’ve waited as long as possible. I’d like you to have a look at the security arrangements. The Holy Father also asked whether you would consider serving as his personal bodyguard during the trip.”

  “Something tells me it wasn’t his idea.”

  “It wasn’t,” Donati conceded.

  “The best way to place His Holiness in danger is for me to stand next to him.”

  “Think about it.”

  Donati raised another spoonful of the consommé to his lips and blew on it pensively—odd, thought Gabriel, because his own soup was already lukewarm.

  “Something else on your mind, Luigi?”

  “Rumor has it you paid a visit to the Villa Giulia yesterday.”

  “It’s filled with many beautiful objects.”

  “So I’ve heard.” Donati lowered his voice and added, “You should have told me you were going to see her.”

  “I didn’t realize I needed your permission.”

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  “When I took this case,” Gabriel said, pressing him gently, “you assured me that all doors would be open.”

  “Not the doors to my past,” Donati said evenly.

  “What if your past had something to do with Claudia’s death?”

  “My past had nothing to do with her death.”

  The monsignor’s words were spoken with an air of liturgical finality. All that was missing was the sign of the cross and the benedictory amen.

  “Would you like some more soup?” he asked, trying to ease the tension of the moment.

  “I’ll resist,” replied Gabriel.

  Two nuns entered and cleared the dishes. They returned a moment later with the entrée—a thin slice of veal, boiled potatoes, and green beans drizzled in olive oil. Donati used the change in course as an opportunity to gather his thoughts.

  “I asked for your help,” he said at last, “because I wanted this inquiry handled with a certain discretion. Now General Ferrari and the Carabinieri are involved, which is exactly the outcome I had hoped to avoid.”

  “They’re involved because my inquiry led me to a dead tombarolo named Roberto Falcone.”

  “I realize that.”

  “Would you have preferred it if I had fled the scene?”

  “I would have preferred,” Donati said after a moment of deliberation, “that this mess not end up in the lap of Italian authorities who do not always have the best interests of the Holy See in mind.”

  “That would have been the outcome regardless of my actions,” Gabriel said.

  “Why?”

  “Because it wouldn’t have taken General Ferrari long to connect Falcone to Claudia through their phone records. And his next stop would have been Veronica Marchese. Unless she was prepared to lie on your behalf, she would have told the general that, after Claudia’s death, you asked her to remain silent. And then G
eneral Ferrari would have been knocking on the Bronze Doors of the Apostolic Palace, subpoena in hand.”

  “Point taken.” Donati picked at his food without appetite. “Why do you suppose Ferrari suggested that you meet with her?”

  “I’ve been asking myself the same question,” Gabriel said. “I suspect that like any good investigator, he knows more than he’s willing to say.”

  “About my friendship with Veronica?”

  “About everything.”

  Outside a cloud passed before the sun, and a shadow fell across Donati’s face.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about her, Luigi?”

  “This is beginning to sound like an interrogation.”

  “Better me than the Carabinieri.”

  Donati, still in shadow, said nothing.

  “Perhaps it would be easier if I answered for you.”

  “Please do.”

  “This entire affair falls under the category of no good deed goes unpunished,” Gabriel began. “It started innocently enough when Veronica suggested you undertake a review of the Vatican collection. But Claudia’s death presented you with two problems. The first was the motive for her murder. The second was your relationship with Veronica Marchese. A thorough investigation of Claudia’s death would have revealed both, thus placing you in a precarious position. So you encouraged an official finding of suicide and asked me to find the truth.”

  “And now you’ve discovered a small piece of it.” Donati pushed his plate a few inches toward the center of the table and gazed through the open door toward the private office of his master.

  “How much does he know?” asked Gabriel.

  “More than you might imagine. But that doesn’t mean he wants it spilling out in public. Gossip and personal scandal can be fatal in a place like this. And if I am tainted in any way, it could harm his papacy.” He paused, then added gravely, “That is something I cannot allow to happen.”

  “The best way to prevent that from happening is for you to start telling me the truth. All of it.”

  Donati exhaled heavily and contemplated his wristwatch. “I have thirty minutes until the Holy Father’s next meeting,” he said. “Perhaps it would be better if we walked. The walls have ears around here.”

  14

  THE VATICAN GARDENS

  IT IS SAID THAT THE Vatican Gardens were originally planted in soil from Golgotha transported to Rome by St. Helena, mother of the Emperor Constantine and, according to Christian legend, discoverer of the True Cross. Now, seventeen centuries later, the gardens were a fifty-seven-acre Eden dotted with ornate palaces housing various arms of the Vatican administration. The overcast weather suited Donati’s mood. Head down, hands clasped behind his back, he was telling Gabriel about a serious young man from a small town in Umbria who heard the calling to become a priest. The young man joined the intellectually rebellious Society of Jesus, the Jesuits, and became a vocal proponent of the controversial doctrine known as liberation theology. In the early 1980s, during a period of violence and revolution in Latin America, he was dispatched to El Salvador to run a health clinic and a school. And it was there, in the mountains of Morazán province, that he lost his faith in God.

  “Liberation theologians believe that earthly justice and eternal salvation are inexorably linked, that it is impossible to save a soul if the vessel in which it resides is bound by chains of poverty and oppression. In Latin America, that sort of thinking placed us squarely on the side of the leftist revolutionaries. The military juntas regarded us as little more than Communist subversives. So did the Pole,” Donati added. “But that’s a story for another time.”

  Donati stopped walking, as if debating which direction to proceed. Finally, he turned toward the ocher-colored headquarters of Vatican Radio. Rising above it was the city-state’s only eyesore, the transmission tower that beamed Church news and programming to a worldwide flock increasingly distracted by terrestrial matters.

  “There was a priest who worked with me in Morazán,” Donati resumed, “a Spanish Jesuit named Father José Martinez. One evening, I was called away to another village to deliver a child. When I returned, Father José was dead. The top of his skull had been hacked away and his brain scooped from its cavity.”

  “He was killed by a death squad?”

  Donati nodded slowly. “That’s why they took his brain. It symbolized what the regime and its wealthy supporters hated most about us—our intelligence and our commitment to social justice. When I asked the military to investigate Father José’s death, they actually laughed in my face. Then they warned me I would be next if I didn’t leave.”

  “Did you take their advice?”

  “I should have, but his death made me even more determined to stay and complete my mission. About six months later, a rebel leader came to see me. He knew the identity of the man responsible for Father José’s murder. His name was Alejandro Calderón. He was the scion of a landowning family with close ties to the ruling junta. He kept a mistress in an apartment in the town of San Miguel. The rebels were planning to kill him the next time he went to see her.”

  “Why did they tell you in advance?”

  “Because they wanted my blessing. I withheld it, of course.”

  “But you didn’t tell them not to kill him, either.”

  “No,” Donati admitted. “Nor did I warn Calderón. Three days later, his body was found hanging upside down from a lamppost in the central square of San Miguel. Within hours, another death squad was headed toward our village. But this time, they were looking for me. I fled across the border into Honduras and hid in a Jesuit house in Tegucigalpa. When it was safe for me to move, I returned to Rome, whereupon I was immediately summoned by the head of our order. He asked me whether I knew anything about Calderón’s death. Then he reminded me that, as a Jesuit, I was sworn to be obedient perinde ac cadaver—literally, to have no more will than my own corpse. I refused to answer. The next morning, I asked to be released from my vows.”

  “You left the priesthood?”

  “I had no choice. I’d allowed a man to be killed. What’s more, I no longer believed in God. Surely, I told myself, a just and forgiving God would not have allowed a man like Father José to be killed in such a gruesome manner.”

  A group of Curial cardinals emerged from the entrance of the Vatican Radio building, trailed by their priestly staffs. Donati frowned and led Gabriel toward St. John’s Tower.

  “I can only imagine that leaving the priesthood is a bit like leaving an intelligence service,” Donati resumed after a moment. “It’s a deliberately long and cumbersome process designed to give the wayward priest ample opportunity to change his mind. But eventually I found myself back in Umbria, living alone in a village near Monte Cucco. I spent my days climbing the mountains. I suppose I was hoping to find God up there among the peaks. But I found Veronica instead.”

  “She’s the kind of woman who could restore a man’s faith in the divine.”

  “In a way, she did.”

  “What was she doing in Umbria?”

  “She’d just completed her doctorate and was excavating the ruins of a Roman villa. We bumped into each other quite by accident in the town market. Within days, we were inseparable.”

  “Did you tell her you’d been a priest?”

  “I told her everything, including what had happened in Salvador. She took it upon herself to heal my wounds and to show me the real world—the world that had passed me by while I was locked away in the seminary. Before long, we began talking about marriage. Veronica was going to teach. I was going to work as an advocate for human rights. We had everything planned.”

  “So what happened?”

  “I met a man named Pietro Lucchesi.”

  Pietro Lucchesi was the given name of His Holiness Pope Paul VII.

  “It was shortly after he was appointed Patriarch of Venice,” Donati continued. “He was looking for someone to serve as his private secretary. He’d heard about a former Jesuit who was living like a re
cluse in Umbria. He arrived unannounced and said he had no intention of leaving until I agreed to return to the priesthood. We spent a week together walking in the mountains, arguing about God and the mysteries of faith. Needless to say, Lucchesi prevailed. Breaking the news to Veronica was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. She is the only woman I ever loved, or ever will.”

  “Any regrets?”

  “One wonders from time to time, but, no, I have no regrets. I suppose it would have been easier if we’d never seen each other again, but it didn’t work out that way.”

  “Please tell me you’re not romantically involved with her.”

  “I take my vows seriously,” Donati said dismissively. “And so does Veronica. We are good friends, that’s all.”

  “I take it she’s married.”

  “Infamously. Her husband is Carlo Marchese. He’s one of the most successful businessmen in Italy.” Donati paused and looked at Gabriel gravely. “He’s also the reason Claudia Andreatti is dead.”

  Somewhere beyond the walls of the Vatican a car backfired with the sharp report of a gunshot. A squadron of rooks whirled noisily in the trees before flying off in formation toward the dome of the Basilica. Gabriel watched them for a moment as he pieced together the implications of the story Donati had just told him. He felt as though he were wandering beneath the surface of an altarpiece, stumbling upon partial images concealed beneath layers of obliterating paint—here a woman lying dead on the floor of a church, here a tomb robber suffering for his sins in a cauldron of acid, here a fallen priest searching for God in the arms of his lover. He had questions, a thousand questions, but he knew better than to break the spell under which Donati had fallen. And so he walked at the monsignor’s shoulder with the austere silence of a confessor and waited for his friend to make a full accounting of his sins.

  “Carlo descends from the Black Nobility,” Donati said, “the aristocratic Roman families who remained loyal to the pope after the conquest of the Papal States in 1870. His father was part of Pius the Twelfth’s inner circle. He was close to the CIA as well.”