Day Of Confession

47

The photograph on the passport in front of him was Harry's, showing him bearded, as he still was. The passport itself was worn, its stiff cardboard covers bent, softened as if it had been carried around for years. It had been issued by the U.S. Passport Agency, New York. The inside pages showed the entry stamps of British, French, and U.S. immigration authorities, but beyond that there was nothing to indicate the course of the traveler's movements because few western European countries stamped passports anymore.

The name beside his photograph was JONATHAN ARTHUR ROE - born 18/SEP/65 – New York, U.S.A.

On the table next to the passport was a District of Columbia driver's license and a faculty membership card for Georgetown University. The driver's license listed his residence as the Mulledy Building, Georgetown University, Washington, D.C. Both pieces carried his photograph.

In fact, all three photos were different. With Harry wearing either one or the other of Eaton's shirts or his sweater. None looked as if it could have been taken at the same place – the room in which he now stood – or at the same time, yesterday evening.

'That's the rest of it.' Adrianna Hall slid a letter-sized envelope across the coffee table in front of her. 'There's cash there, too. Two million lire, about twelve hundred dollars. We can get more if you need it. But Eaton said to warn you – priests do not have money, so don't spend it like you do.'

Harry looked at her, then opened the envelope and took out its contents – the two million in Italian lire, in fifty-thousand lire notes, and the lone sheet of paper with its three neatly typed, single-spaced paragraphs.

'It tells you who you are, where you work, what you do, all of it,' Adrianna said. 'Or enough for you to fake your way through if someone asks. The instructions are to memorize what's there, then destroy it.'

Harry Addison was now Father Jonathan Arthur Roe, a Jesuit priest and associate professor of Law at Georgetown University. He lived in a Jesuit residence on the campus and had taught there since 1994. He had grown up an only child in Ithaca, New York. Both his parents were deceased. The rest gave his background: the schools he had attended, when and where he had joined the seminary, a physical description of Georgetown University and its environs, the Georgetown section of Washington, down to the detail that he could see the Potomac River from his bedroom, but only in fall and winter when the leaves were off the trees.

And then there was the last, and he looked up at Adrianna. 'It seems as a Jesuit, I've taken a vow of poverty.'

'Probably why he didn't give you a credit card…'

'Probably.'

Harry turned and walked across the room. Eaton had promised and delivered, giving him everything he needed. All Harry had to do was the rest.

'It's kind of like Charades, isn't it?' He turned back. 'You totally become someone else…'

'You don't have much choice.'

Harry studied her. Here was a woman, like many, one he'd slept with but hardly knew. And except for that one moment in the dark when he'd sensed that some part of her feared her own mortality and was genuinely afraid – not so much to die as to no longer live – he realized he almost knew her better from seeing her on television than he did standing in a room with her.

'You're how old, Adrianna? Thirty-four?'

'I'm thirty-seven.'

'All right, thirty-seven. If you could be someone else,' he asked seriously, 'who would you choose?'

'I never thought about it…'

'Take a stab at it, go on. Who?'

Suddenly she crossed her arms in front of her. 'I wouldn't be anyone else. I like who I am and what I do. And I've worked like hell to get there.'

'You sure?'

'Yes.'

'A mother? A wife?'

'Are you kidding?' Her half laugh was both droll and defensive, as if he'd touched some nerve she didn't like touched.

He pushed her. Maybe more than he should have and unfairly, but for some reason he wanted to see more of who she was.

'A lot of women do both, have a career and a home life…'

'Not this woman.' Adrianna held her ground, if anything becoming more serious. 'I told you before, I like to fuck strangers. – You know why? It's not only exciting, it's total independence. And to me that's the most important thing there is because it lets me do my job the best way I can, lets me go as far as I have to to get to the truth of the stories… Do you think as a mother I'm going to stand out in the middle of a fucking field under artillery fire covering somebody's civil war? – Or, bringing it a little closer home, risk spending the rest of my life in an Italian prison because I provided one of the most wanted men in the country false identity papers? – No, Harry Addison, I would not, because I wouldn't do that to children… I'm a loner who likes it… I make good money, I sleep with who I want, I travel to places even you could only dream of and have access to people most of the world's leaders don't… I get a rush from it, and that rush gives me the balls to cover history like they used to but like nobody but me does anymore… Is it selfish? I don't know what the hell that means… But it's no charade, it's who I am… And if something happens and I lose, the only person who gets hurt is me…'

'How does that play when you're seventy?'

'Ask me then.'

Harry watched her a moment longer. It was why he felt as he had, that he knew her better on television than here. Her life and her intimacy were right there on the screen. It was who she was and all she wanted to be. And she was very good at it. A week ago he would have said something of the same about himself. Freedom was everything. It gave you incredible opportunities because you could take chances. You trusted your skills and ability and played everything on the surface as hard and fast as it came. And if you lost, you lost… But now he wasn't sure. Maybe it was because he no longer had freedom at all. Maybe there was a price for it he'd never realized. Maybe it was as simple as that… But maybe it wasn't… And there was something else, something he knew he had yet to learn and understand… And all this was a journey to help him find it…

'Where do I go from here… and when…' Harry suddenly found himself saying, 'who do I communicate with – you or Eaton?'

'Me.' Opening her purse, Adrianna took out a small cellular phone and handed it to him. 'I know what the police are doing, and I make a hundred telephone calls a day. One more won't raise an eyebrow.'

'What about Eaton?'

'When the time is right, I'll let him know…' Adrianna hesitated, then turned her head slightly, the way she did on camera when she was about to explain something.

'You've never heard of James Eaton… and he's never heard of Harry Addison, except for what he's read in the papers or seen on TV, or maybe had passed through the embassy about you… You don't know me either, except for that one time we were seen in the hotel together and I was trying to get a statement from you.'

'What about all this?' Harry leaned forward and spread the Jonathan Arthur Roe passport, the Georgetown ID, the driver's license across the table. 'What happens if I turn left instead of right and walk into the arms of Gruppo Cardinale? What am I supposed to tell Roscani, that I always carry a second set of identification? He's going to want to know how I got it and where.'

'Harry.' Adrianna smiled warmly. 'You are a very big boy. By now you should know your left from your right… If you don't, practice, huh?' Leaning forward she kissed him lightly on the lips. 'Don't turn the wrong way,' she whispered, and then she left. Turning only at the door to tell him to stay where he was, and when she had news she'd call him.

He stood there and watched the door close behind her. Heard the click of the latch as it did. Slowly his eyes went to the table where the IDs were spread out. For the first time in his life he wished he had taken acting lessons.