Counterplay

31

After her husband left for the office, Marlene spent most of the rest of the afternoon pacing and occasionally scowling at the rooftop of the building across the street where she could from time to time see the guys from the Homeland Security sniper team. Two more feds from the agency were stationed on the street outside the loft and another on the landing outside her door.

Jon Ellis had stopped by personally to ask that she and the rest of the family remain inside until it was time for her to go to the cathedral. “My guys have a lot on their hands today and, well, I’ve heard you’re more than capable of taking care of yourself,” he said. “But having you on the streets with the kids will make it that much tougher.”

Marlene had reluctantly agreed. The weather wasn’t so nice anyway. Indian summer had for the day anyway turned overcast and drizzly with wet gusts of wind blowing north from the harbor. Still, she didn’t like being kept like a tethered goat waiting for the tiger to show while the hunters sat in their blinds.

Whenever she got tired of pacing, she watched the pageantry leading up to the arrival of the Pope at St. Patrick’s Cathedral at about noon on the television. The twins had watched with her for a bit but quickly had grown tired of it, whined about not getting to go out, and retreated to their bedroom when she snapped at them to “quit driving me nuts.”

The ceremony wasn’t scheduled to begin until seven o’clock that evening, and the Pope was said to be resting in the archbishop’s residence attached to the rear of the cathedral. However, that didn’t deter the networks from wall-to-wall coverage of “The Pope Visits America.” They’d filmed every foot of his movements after he’d transferred into his bulletproof “Pope Mobile” following the initial drive in from LaGuardia so that he could wave to the faithful already lining the streets leading up to the police barricades several blocks from the cathedral. The white space between his arrival at St. Patrick’s and the evening’s event they were breathlessly filling with interviews with tourists and cuts to talking heads discussing various church issues, such as the impact the conservative Pope’s visit would have on wayward American Catholics who supported abortion rights and the ordination of female priests.

Some dignitaries-ranging from politicians, to stars of stage and screen, to the fabulously wealthy-began arriving in midafternoon. Perhaps thinking they might get a private audience with His Holiness if they arrived a bit earlier than the others. Their arrival gave the bored television reporters, who treated each occasion of a recognizable celebrity pulling up like Oscar night, something to do.

Marlene wondered if Lucy and Ned got in okay, but she hadn’t heard anything to the contrary. She was sure Father Dugan wouldn’t have a problem; he was resourceful that way. And she wished again that her father had been willing to get dressed up and attend.

Father Mike could get you in with Lucy and Ned, she’d told him the day before. Your one and only chance of a lifetime to get that close to the Pope.

Mariano Ciampi had been a good Catholic his entire life, rarely missing a mass, going to confession at least once a week, and arguing with his youngest daughter, Marlene, about being a pick-and-choose Catholic.

We aren’t Methodists…or New Agers. You don’t get to dabble a toe here and a toe there to see how you like the water. Being Catholic is jumping in feet first, he’d lectured her once during her college days. You don’t get to say, “I like the pretty music, so I’ll go to church, but I don’t like what the Pope says about premarital sex, so I’ll sleep around.”

Marlene had known better than to argue with him-though in her younger, self-righteous years she’d done plenty of that, as her mother, Concetta, clucked around, asking her to not rile your father. Later, she’d discovered the benefit of keeping her mouth shut on matters of religion, especially as it intersected secular issues like abortion rights. But as she’d grown older, she’d also found comfort in the steadfast, unbending, principles of her church.

In things secular, Mariano was a patriot. Even if he didn’t vote for him, the president of the United States was to be respected-at least the office, if not the man. But in things spiritual, the Pope was infallible. So she was surprised when he turned down the offer to see the pontiff in person.

Nah, it’s too much trouble, he said. I’m going to stay here with your mother.

Mom’s gone, Pops, Marlene said gently.

I know that, the old man scowled. I meant with her…memory. I think maybe she’d be jealous if I got to go see the Pope without her.

I’m sure she wouldn’t mind, Marlene said. Come on, I’ll stop by and help you get ready and you can sit with Lucy and-

No! I don’t want to go, Mariano said, standing up out of his easy chair, suddenly angry, or panicked, she couldn’t tell. I don’t deserve to go without your mother.

Okay. Okay, calm down, Marlene said, taking him by his shaking shoulders and easing him back into the chair. It’s going to be on television anyway. You’ll probably see more.

Yeah, yeah, we’ll be more comfortable here, Mariano said. He’d settled down then, but as she turned to leave, he’d grabbed her by the hand, which he kissed and held next to his cheek. Please, if you get the chance to speak to him privately, would you ask him to say a prayer for your mother…and for me.

She leaned over and kissed him on top of his head. Yeah, sure, Pops. A special prayer for Mariano and Concetta Ciampi…a special place for them to be together in heaven.

Mariano had laughed at the image. A small home in Queens with your mother when she and I were young, and all of you were babies…that’s what I’d call heaven.

Marlene managed to get to her car before she broke down and started crying. Recalling the discussion the next afternoon, she had to catch herself to prevent the tears from falling again. She turned back to the television where a reporter was describing all the extra-ordinary security precautions-helicopters overhead, police officers on horseback, plainclothes police officers working the crowds around the barricades, metal detectors for anyone going into the cathedral. “Even Russian president Vladimir Putin’s appearance at the United Nations later next week won’t be seeing this kind of attention,” the reporter gushed as he turned to a tall priest with a pitted, scarred face while the camera followed.

“I’m speaking with Father Aidan Clary, who is normally responsible for securing St. Patrick’s,” the reporter said. “A little different scenario today, eh, Father?”

The priest looked uncomfortable, like he didn’t want to look in the camera. “I’m really not supposed to talk about it, but yes, it’s different. Today will be different.”

Today will be different. Something about the way the man said it made Marlene take notice. The scarred face. Tall. Wasn’t that the description of the killer priest who’d murdered Fey and Flanagan?

Her mind raced ahead. So the plan is to kill Butch and me at the cathedral? The white king and white queen. She thought about calling her husband or Jaxon. But what? Tell them a priest who’d once had bad acne as a teenager and now spent his life as the custodian of a cathedral might be an assassin? Even if he was-and maybe whatever Kane or Azzam had planned was already in place-her daughter was in St. Patrick’s, and if something went down, Marlene was going to be there.

She picked up the telephone and dialed a number. “I need to talk to him,” was all she said to the man who answered.

A half hour later, the Homeland Security agent on the landing stood up as Marlene appeared at the door with her dog. “I know I’m not supposed to go outside until my husband arrives to take me to the cathedral, so would you mind giving Gilgamesh a quick walk before his bladder bursts?”

The agent looked at the dog like he’d just been asked to handle a rattlesnake. He was a big man, and well armed, but it was the biggest canine he’d ever seen in his life. Damn thing could take my arm off with one chomp, he thought.

Marlene noticed the hesitation and smiled. “Don’t worry, he’s well trained and really just a big baby. Come on, give him a pet.”

Nervously, the agent put out his hand and gave the dog a scratch behind the ears. Gilgamesh responded by leaning against the agent and moaning with pleasure.

Marlene smiled sweetly. “Please.”

“Sure, why not,” the agent said taking the leash. “Come on, boy, let’s go for a walk.”

As soon as the agent got on the elevator and it started down, Marlene rapped lightly on the door with a spoon. A moment later the door sprang open, a hanging ladder appeared, and then Tran pulled himself up onto the landing, followed by Yvgeny. Someone on the floor below removed the ladder as the three quickly slipped into the loft and shut the door.

Tran had formerly owned the Chinese restaurant food and equipment store on the first floor of the loft building, as well as the space on the second, third, and fourth floors. He’d used it as both a front for some of his nefarious activities, but more as a way of keeping an eye on his friends in the loft. He still owned the building but had moved in a new tenant on the bottom floor, an import company that did very little importing-at least nothing much that was reported to U.S. Customs. It came in handy when he wanted to use a secret way into the building from the basement and then up to the fourth floor below the loft.

After the twins had greeted the “guests,” Marlene had sent them grumbling back to their room. Then she explained to Tran and Yvgeny why she’d suddenly focused on the ceremony at the cathedral as the most likely time for an assassin to try to kill Butch and herself. “It might not be more than a woman’s intuition, but I want to get inside but stay in the background until I can figure out what’s going on…. I know it’s asking a lot, but I’d like some company if I can arrange this.”

Tran smiled. “I didn’t have anything better to do today.” He shrugged. It was the unspoken truth that he had a crush on Marlene and would have walked into the fires of hell if she was going.

Yvgeny nodded, too. “I have-how do you put it-a dog in this fight, too,” he said. “However, I have been troubled by how Kane was playing his game, and you might not be correct on who they plan to target.”

“What do you mean?” Marlene asked.

“Andrew Kane is supposed to be something of a chess master, no?” he began. “He buys elaborate chess sets and prides himself on his game.”

“Yeah, so?” Marlene said.

“Well, I was asking myself recently, Why is he playing like such a rank amateur game?”

“You’re losing me,” Tran said.

“Let me explain. Chess is not about how many of your opponent’s pieces you can take,” Yvgeny said. “The object is to place the other’s king in checkmate in as few moves as possible. Great players take pride in piercing to the heart of the enemy’s defenses without making it a war of attrition. And for the truly great players, taking your opponent’s king when the other side did not see you coming is an even more satisfying achievement.”

“I know you just said something important,” Marlene said. “But I still don’t get it.”

Ivgeney laughed. “Kane, who may or may not still be running the show, has played like a beginner. He kills the black bishop. He kills the black knight. He tries to kill the white bishop, kills a white knight, and tries to kill another. Then all those pawns, black and white. It’s sort of a ‘last man standing’ strategy that no chess master would pride himself on, unless-”

“Unless what?” Marlene and Tran said together.

“Unless he is using the Naranja gambit…once used by the Spanish chess master, Orlando Naranja, in a world championship match,” Yvgeny said. “Essentially, it entails sort of an all-out attack, a war of attrition in which he even sacrificed his queen. But it was meant to distract the opponent and force him to defend against, while Naranja’s real purpose was a simple three-move strike from another direction.”

“So what we think Kane or someone is trying to accomplish-the assassination of the district attorney of New York and his pesky wife,” Marlene said, “is really a distraction for the true purpose, which is to-”

“-place in checkmate the real white king, the Pope,” Tran finished. “And the white queen?”

Marlene looked at the television set. “Lucy,” she said.

Ten minutes later, the Homeland Security agent knocked on the door of the loft. “Sit, boy,” he said, pleased that the dog had followed his every command.

The door opened and Zak poked his head out. “Yes?”

“Oh, hi, where’s your mother?” the agent asked. “I brought her dog back.”

“She’s napping,” Zak replied, “and doesn’t want to be disturbed.” He took the leash from the agent and pulled the dog inside. “Thank you,” he said and shut the door on the bemused agent.