Day Of Confession

132

11:30 p.m.

Scala came out of his apartment, glanced briefly around, then crossed to an unmarked white Fiat. Looking around once more, he got in, started the engine, and drove off.

A moment later a dark green Ford pulled away from the curb a half block down. Eaton was behind the wheel, Adrianna Hall beside him. Turning left onto Via Marmorata, they followed Scala through light traffic to Piazza dell'Emporio and then across the Tiber on Ponte Sublicio. Then, dropping back in traffic, they followed him north, along the river's western bank. A few minutes later Scala turned west through the Gianicolo section, only to go north again on Viale delle Mura Aurelie.

'He's not taking any chances about being followed…' Eaton dropped the Ford behind a silver Opel, keeping a guarded distance between himself and Scala's Fiat.

For the Italian detective to suddenly refuse Adrianna information was a cue in itself that something major and highly secret was going on. It was out of character for Scala to shut her out – it had been Scala himself who tipped Adrianna to Father Daniel's suspected presence in Bellagio hours before it was announced, meaning just days ago he was still including her. His deliberately evasive maneuvers now only added to a series of rapid-fire happenings that suggested whatever was going on inside the Vatican was fast coming to a head.

Eaton and Adrianna reviewed all of it: The sudden and mysterious illness of Cardinal Marsciano, last seen Tuesday leaving the Chinese Embassy seemingly in good health. Even their combined efforts provided little more information than the formal Vatican press release announcing his sickness and saying he was under the care of Vatican physicians.

The abrupt return of Roscani, Scala, and Castelletti to Rome from Milan.

The murder early this morning of Marsciano's personal aide, Father Bardoni. Not yet announced by the police.

Also this morning – Harry Addison's terse calls, traced to public telephones near the Vatican, alerting them to the situation in China. To which they had responded immediately, and which within hours resulted in the clandestine arrest and interrogation of a government water-quality inspector named Li Wen.

And again this morning – the surprising announcement of the suspected reemergence in Italy of the long-silent celebrated terrorist Thomas Kind, and the all-points arrest-and-detain order put out for him by Gruppo Cardinale.

Suddenly Scala took a sharp left ahead of them, turning right after a half block, and then making a quick left and accelerating off. Adrianna could see Eaton smile slightly as he kept up with him. Changing gears, accelerating, then dropping back, using the skill and training demanded of the professional spy he was. Up until tonight both he and Adrianna had had to sit back and wait, hoping Harry Addison would lead them to Father Daniel. Now the police were doing it. Why and what was unfolding, they didn't know, but with the disaster in China now seemingly interconnected with the Vatican intrigue, they were certain they were on the edge of monumental, breaking history.

'The police are going to make it difficult.' Eaton slowed. Ahead of them Scala made a sharp right down a darkened residential street.

Adrianna said nothing. She knew that at another time and in another situation Eaton would have called in two or three of his Italian operatives and had Father Daniel kidnapped. But not now, not in the presence of the police and not with a clumsy post-Cold War CIA under the stony-cold microscope of both Washington and the world. No, they could only do what they'd been doing all along, wait and watch and see what happened. And hope that something would happen, and that they could get Father Daniel alone.