Day Of Confession

35

Rome. Same time.

Cardinal Marsciano watched the press conference on a small television in his library. It was live, impromptu, and filled with anger. Marcello Taglia, the man in charge of Gruppo Cardinale, had been cornered as his car entered police headquarters, and he had stepped out to confront the mass of reporters and respond to their questions head on.

Where the videotape of the American attorney Harry Addison had come from he did not know, Taglia said. Nor did he have any idea who had leaked it to the press. Nor did he know who had leaked the photograph and speculation surrounding Addison's brother, Father Daniel Addison, a prime suspect in the murder of the cardinal vicar of Rome and thought killed in the bombing of the Assisi bus, but now possibly alive and in hiding somewhere in Italy. And, yes, it was true, a reward of one hundred million lire had been offered for information leading to the arrest and conviction of either of the American brothers.

Abruptly the cameras cut away from Taglia and went to the television studio, where an attractive anchorwoman behind a glass desk introduced the video of Harry. When it was over, photographs of both brothers were put on the screen and a telephone number given that anyone seeing either man could call.

CLICK.

Marsciano turned off the television and stared at the empty screen, his world darker yet. It was a world that in the following hours could become even more impossible, if not unbearable.

Shortly he would sit before the four other cardinals who made up the commission overseeing the investments of the Holy See and present the new, and intentionally misleading, investment portfolio for ratification.

At one-thirty the meeting would break, and Marsciano would take the ten-minute walk from Vatican City to Armari, a small family-run trattoria on Viale Angelico. There, in a private upstairs room, he would meet with Palestrina to report on the outcome. It was an outcome upon which rested not only Palestrina's 'Chinese Protocol' but also Marsciano's own life, and with it, the life of Father Daniel.

Purposefully he had fought to keep the thought from his mind for fear it would weaken him and show him as desperate when he went before the cardinals. But, as the clock ticked forward, and as much as he battled to keep it locked away, the memory crept forward, chillingly, almost as if Palestrina had willed it.

And then, with a rush, it was there, and he saw himself in Pierre Weggen's office in Geneva the evening of the day that the Assisi bus had exploded. The phone had rung, and the call was for him. It was Palestrina informing him, in one breath, that Father Daniel had been on the bus and was presumed dead; and, in the next – Father in heaven! Marsciano could still feel the awful stab of Palestrina's words delivered in a voice so calm they were like the brush of silk – 'the police have found sufficient evidence to prove Father Daniel guilty of the assassination of Cardinal Parma.'

Marsciano remembered his own shout of outrage and then seeing Weggen's quiet grin in response, as if the investment banker knew full well the content of Palestrina's call, and then the continuing voice of Palestrina as he went on unmoved.

'Moreover, Eminence, if your presentation to the council of cardinals should fail, resulting in the investment proposal voted down, the police will soon discover that the road from Parma's murder does not end with Father Daniel but leads directly to you. And I can safely surmise that the first question the investigators will ask is if you and the cardinal vicar were lovers. A denial, of course, would be futile, because there would be sufficient evidence – notes, letters of a lurid and very personal sort, found in the private computer files of you both… Think then, Eminence, of seeing your face and his on the cover of every newspaper and magazine, on every television screen around the globe… Think of the repercussions throughout the Holy See, and the utter disgrace it would bring to the Holy Church.'

Trembling and horrified, and certain without doubt who had been responsible for the bombing of the bus, Marsciano had simply hung up. Palestrina was everywhere. Twisting the screw, tightening his hold. Efficient, controlled, ruthless. Larger, more terrifying and detestable than Marsciano could ever have imagined.

Turning in his chair, Marsciano looked out the window. Across the street he could see the gray Mercedes waiting to take him from his apartment to the Vatican. His driver was new and a favorite of Farel's, the baby-faced plainclothes member of the Vatican police, Anton Pilger. His housekeeper, Sister Maria-Louisa, was new as well. As were his secretaries and office manager. Of his original staff only Father Bardoni remained, and only because he knew how to access computer files and understood the shared database with Weggen's Geneva office. Once the new portfolio was accepted, Marsciano was certain Father Bardoni would be gone, too. He was the last of the truly loyal, and his going would leave Marsciano wholly alone in Palestrina's nest of vipers.