Project Pope

Fourteen

When Tennyson returned to his suite, Jill was sitting in front of the fireplace. He hurried across the room to her. 'I've been wondering about you. I was about to track you down.

'Hubert is fixing dinner, she said. 'I told him I could stay. Is that all right with you?

He bent to kiss her, then sat down beside her. 'That's fine, he said. 'How are things going with you?

She made a face. 'Not well. They won't stand still for a story. They offered me a job instead.

'And you accepted?

'No, I didn't. I'm not sure I will. I hear you are staying on.

'For a time at least. A good place to hunker down. She gestured at the single rose in the vase standing on the coffee table. 'Where did you get that?

'A gardener gave it to me. I found the garden this morning. I'd like to show it to you.

'They offered me a place to stay, said Jill, 'and I moved in this afternoon. Four doors away from you. The robot who moved me told me you were here. You have a drink around?

'I think there is, he said. 'But first let's look at the garden.

'Well, all right, she said.

'You'll like it, he assured her.

When they reached the garden, she asked, 'What's all this uproar about the garden? It's just an ordinary garden. What's going on?

'It's not the garden, he told her. 'I imagine Hubert, in the kitchen, had his ears stretched out a foot or so. Do anything in this place and in ten minutes everyone has heard about it. I won't bet they can't hear us in the garden, but a least we have a chance. We have things to talk about.

'It's your Gutshot conditioning, she said. 'The cloak-and-dagger business.

He shrugged. 'Maybe. Maybe you're right.

'You jumped at the chance, apparently, to stay here. So there can't be too much wrong.

'Maybe nothing wrong, he said. 'But strange. Damn strange. There's a woman here — she's the one Ecuyer came to get me to treat. She claims she has found Heaven.

'Heaven?

'That's right. Heaven. You see, they have this program going on. People going out in their minds to other places, bringing back the data to be fed into the Pope. Although I have a feeling it may be for other reasons than the feeding of the Pope. From something Ecuyer said the other night, it sounds if there may be some differences of opinion between the Search Program and Vatican.

'Heaven? she asked. 'You mean the honest-to-God Bible Heaven with the golden stairs and the trumpets blaring and the angels flying?

'Something like that.

'But, Jason, that's impossible.

'Perhaps, but Mary thinks she's-found it. Ecuyer half believes in it.

'Ecuyer's a fool.

'No, not a fool, he said. 'Jill, tell me. Did they use muscle on you?

'Muscle?

'Yes, muscle. Ecuyer hinted rather broadly I might not be allowed to leave the planet.

'No. No one mentioned that. I talked with a cardinal. Purple robes and scarlet skullcap. A single candle burning. Now, wait a minute. Is that why you're staying? Because they won't let you leave?

'No, not that. They might even let us go. But the threat is there. This place is run by Vatican and what Vatican says is law. But I'm staying because I want to-for the moment. I have no place else to go. Besides, it's comfortable. And I might as well confess it — I'm considerably intrigued.

'So am I, said Jill. 'The cardinal wouldn't listen to my writing articles or a book about this place. He said nothing about not allowing me to leave. As a matter of fact, I thought that he would throw me out. Then he offered me a job.

'The iron fist in the velvet glove.

'That could be it. He's a pleasant-enough robot — I almost said a pleasant-enough old man. Pleasant enough, but stubborn. I argued with him and he didn't budge an inch.

'This job?

'They want a history of Vatican written. The cardinal claims they have no one who can do it; hinted that a robot could not be trained to do it. Would you believe it — they have a complete record of everything that's happened here, all that's been done here, since the first ship arrived. All stored and waiting for retrieval. I said no, of course. Maybe, come to think of it, I didn't say a flat-out no. Actually, I think I said I'd have to think about it. I probably gave the impression I was going to say no.

'And are you?

'Jason, I honestly don't know. Think of it! The story is all there. Waiting for someone to dig it out. It's been there all these years and not been touched by anyone.

'But what good will it do you if you can't get it out?

'That's right. No good at all. Jason, do I look like a dirty sneak?

'Well, yes, now that I think of it.

'I'd never be able to live with myself, said Jill, 'if I didn't have a shot at it. 'Jill, it doesn't track. First they refuse to let you write about this place, then they hand the story to you on a silver platter. Unless, of course, they do badly want the history written and are convinced they can keep you here.

'If so, she said, 'they must be awfully sure of themselves.

'That's what Ecuyer said the other night. That they are sure of themselves.

'Jason, we may have been a pair of fools to come here. If Vatican wants nothing to leak out, the one sure way to do it would be to make sure that no one, once they got here, could leave.

'But there are all the pilgrims. The pilgrims come and go.

'The cardinal half-explained that to me. The pilgrims, it seems, don't count. They come from scattered planets, only a few from each one. Apparently they are tied up with screwball cults that have little standing. No one would pay attention to what any cult member said, even to the cult, perhaps, if it was said collectively. Whatever word the pilgrims carry back would be put down as religious ravings.

'Vatican has a lot to hide, Tennyson said thoughtfully. 'There is Ecuyer's Search Program, which the pilgrims might not know about, might have no inkling of. Maybe it's the Search Program, not Vatican itself, that is important. The searchers are milking knowledge from the universe, from all of space and time — and maybe other places outside of space and time. If there's any such place.

'Heaven could be. If there's a place like Heaven.

'The point is that no one else has anything like it. The Search people have miles of files crammed with the information they've pilfered. It's all there. What are they going to do with it?

'Maybe they really are feeding it to the Pope.

'Some Pope, Tennyson remarked. 'No, I can't think that's entirely it. Ecuyer said something else. I'm trying to remember exactly what. I think it was that Project Pope had become, over the years, no more than an excuse for keeping on with the Search Program. I think that was it. He suggested that I not mention it to Vatican. Gave the impression that some of the old Vatican crowd might be stuffy.

'Vatican has its worries, said Jill. 'The cardinal let some of them out. Sort of talking the worries out to me, although I doubt he thought of it that way. He, and possibly some of the other cardinals, think someone is stealing from Vatican. "Nibbling away" was the way he put it. What seemed to worry him the most was no one knows who or what it is that is doing the nibbling.