The Key

118

Cardinal Clementi was at his desk, staring at his computer screen. His phone was ringing but he didn’t seem to notice. He was slumped in his chair, his head sunk down almost to his chest, his shoulders loose and sloping as if the great bulk of his body was pulling everything down. A cigarette dangled from his marshmallow lips, almost an inch of ash hanging from the end. On the screen was an opened email sent by Pentangeli: We are calling in our secured loans as of start of business on Wall Street tomorrow. Should you fail to honor these debts here is a facsimile of tomorrow’s city edition of the Wall Street Journal.

Beneath the text was a mock up of the front page with the splash headline:

CHURCH BANKRUPT

Through the constant sound of his ringing desk phone he heard footsteps approaching, hurrying towards him down the marble corridor, several people by the sound of it. The first arrived and started banging at the door. Clementi flinched at the sound and the ash finally fell from the end of his cigarette, spilling down the black expanse of his cardinal’s robes. The handle twisted but the door remained shut. At least he’d had the presence of mind to lock it. Not that it would keep them for long. It was designed for privacy not a siege. They would break through soon enough.

He reached forward and deleted the email, as if that might remove the news it contained, then levered himself out of his chair and walked over to the window.

There were already crowds gathering below in St Peter’s Square, looking towards the Apostolic Palace. But these were not crowds of the faithful, hoping to catch a glimpse of His Holiness, they were news crews, setting up cameras and equipment, ready to catch the breaking story — and this time they were looking for him.

Behind him the door continued to rattle and the phone continued to ring, but Clementi carried on smoking his cigarette and stared out at the view, as if it were a normal day. Despite everything that had happened, he still believed it had been a good plan. If he had gone public with the discovery of the site of Eden, the Church would have just ended up with another shrine in the middle of a country that now worshipped a different religion. What good would that have done them? The oil was different. It was a fluid commodity that could have flowed into the withered veins of the Church and changed everything. It could have been God’s gift to His mission on earth; a modern miracle — a myth turned into money. But, for whatever reason, it was not to be.

Clementi took a final puff on his cigarette then placed it carefully in the marble ashtray, leaving it to burn down to the filter. He stepped up on to the high ledge of the windowsill and looked down at the gathering crowds, hearing the gasps as they spotted him. He thought of the monk who had climbed to the top of the Citadel, over two weeks ago now, and started the unravelling of everything. He held his arms out in the shape of a cross, just as he had, and stood like that, head bowed, until he heard the doorframe splinter behind him.

Only God will understand, he thought as he tipped forward, his weight pulling him down to the marble courtyard four storeys below him.

And only God can forgive.