Day Of Confession

36

Harry moved unsteadily in the darkness, his head still aching from the smack of the ricocheting bullet, his back against the rough of the tunnel wall, with his good hand stretched out along it trying to find Hercules' great door. He had to get out before the dwarf came back. Who knew what he would bring with him when he did? Friends? The police? What must sixty thousand dollars mean to a creature like him?

Where was the door? It couldn't be this far. What if he had gone past it in the dark?

He stopped. Listening. Hoping for the distant rumble of a Metro train that might give him some clue to where he was.

Silence.

It had taken most of his strength just to dress, collect Danny's things, and get out of Hercules' den. What he would do once he was out and away he didn't know, but anything was better than staying there and waiting for whatever Hercules had planned.

Behind and in front was blackness. Then he saw it. A pinpoint of light in the distance. The end of the tunnel. He felt relief shudder through him. Back against the wall he started toward it. The light became brighter. He walked faster. Now his foot touched something hard. He stopped. Put his foot up to feel it. Steel. It was a rail. He looked back. The light was closer. He flashed on the machine of torture his captors had used. It couldn't be the same. Where was he? Had he never left there at all?

Then he felt the ground rumble under him. The light was racing toward him. Then he knew! He was in a live tunnel. The light rocketing toward him was a Metro train. Turning, he ran back the way he had come. The light became brighter and brighter. His left foot slipped on the rail and he nearly fell. He heard the shriek of the train whistle. Then the scream of steel as the driver slammed on the brakes.

Suddenly rough hands grabbed him and threw him against the tunnel wall. He saw the lights inside the train as it slid past inches from him. The faces of startled passengers. Then it was past. Screeching to a stop fifty yards down the track.

'Are you crazy?'

Hercules was in his face, his hands on Harry's jacket, holding him in an iron grip.

Yells of trainmen came from down the track. They were climbing out, coming toward them with flashlights.

'This way.'

Hercules spun him around and into a narrow side tunnel. A moment later he shoved him up a work ladder, then followed himself, crutches thrown through one arm, swinging up behind him like a circus performer.

Behind them they heard the shouts and calls of the trainmen. Hercules stared angrily at him, then moved him forward down another narrow tunnel full of wiring and ventilation equipment.

They went on that way, Harry in front, Hercules directly behind, for what seemed like a half mile or more. Finally I hey stopped under the light of a ventilation shaft.

For a long moment Hercules said nothing, just listened, then, satisfied they hadn't been followed, looked to Harry.

'They will report that to the police. They will come and search the tunnels. If they find my place, they will know you were there. And I will have nowhere to live.'

'I'm sorry…'

'At least we know two things. You are well enough to walk, even run. And you are no longer blind.'

Harry could see. He hadn't had time to even think about it. He'd been in darkness. Then had come the light of the train and seeing the passengers inside. Not with one eye but two.

'So,' Hercules said. 'You are free.' With that he slung a small bound package from his shoulder and pushed it at Harry.

'Open it.'

Harry stared, then did as the dwarf said. Undoing the package, he unrolled its contents. Black trousers, black shirt, black jacket, and the white clerical collar of a priest, all worn but serviceable.

'You will become your brother, eh?'

Harry stared, incredulous.

'All right, maybe not your brother, but a priest. Why not? Already you are growing a beard, changing your appearance… In a city filled with priests, how better to hide than in the open…? In the pants' pocket are a few hundred thousand lire. Not much, but enough for you to gather your wits and see what you would do next.'

'Why?' Harry said. 'You could have turned me over to the police and collected the reward.'

'Is your brother alive?'

'I don't know.'

'Did he kill the cardinal vicar?'

'I don't know.'

'There, you see. If I had given you to the authorities, you could never have answered the questions: If your brother lives. If he is a murderer. How do you know unless you find out? – Not forgetting that you yourself are wanted for the murder of a policeman. It makes it twice as interesting, eh?'

'You could have had enough money to last you a long time.'

'But the police would have to give it to me. And I cannot go to the police, Mr Harry. Because I myself am a murderer… And if I had someone else do it and offered some sort of arrangement, they might take the money and never come back… You would be in prison, and I would be no better off than I am now… What good is that?'

'Then why?'

'Do I help you?'

'Yes.'

'To let you out, Mr Harry, and see what you can do. How far your wits and courage will take you. If you are good enough to survive. To find answers to your questions. To prove your innocence.'

Harry studied him carefully. 'That's not the only reason, is it?'

Hercules moved back on his crutches and for the first time Harry saw sadness in him. 'The man I killed was wealthy and drunk. He tried to smash my head with a brick because of what I look like. I had to do something and did.

'You are a handsome, intelligent man. If you use what you have, you have a chance… I have none. I am an ugly dwarf and murderer, condemned to a life beneath the streets… If you win your game, Mr Harry, maybe you will remember me and come back. Use your money and what you know to help me… If I am still alive, any Gypsy will know how to find me.'

A feeling of warmth and true affection crept over Harry, making him feel as if he stood in the presence of an extraordinary human being. And he cocked his head, smiling at the sheer curiosity of it. A week ago he'd been in New York on business, one of the youngest, most successful entertainment lawyers in Hollywood. His life had seemed charmed. He was on top of the world, with only higher to go. Seven days later, in a turn of circumstance beyond imagination, he stood bandaged and dirty in a cramped air shaft above the Rome Metro – wanted for the murder of an Italian policeman.

It was a nightmare that defied belief but all too real just the same. And in the middle of it, a man brutalized by life, who had little or no hope of ever being free again – a crippled dwarf who had rescued him and helped nurse him back to health – hung on his crutches inches away in a deep chiaroscuro of light, asking for his help. One day in the future, if he could remember.

By his simple request, Hercules had effected a grace Harry barely knew existed. Saying gently that he truly believed one person, if he wished, could use what he had learned in life to do something of value for another. It was pure and honest and had been asked with no expectation that it would ever be carried out.

'I will do the best I can,' Harry said. 'I promise you.'