House of Acerbi (god's lions) Page 7
Staring into his wineglass, the pope brought it up to eye level and swirled the red liquid around. “And the biohazard symbol we discovered today on the chapel wall … coincidence?”
“Obviously not,” Lev said. “I emailed the images to the villa in Israel. They’re being analyzed as we speak. Hopefully we’ll come up with a match in the code. Occasionally, a phrase or group of words jumps right out at you with startling clarity, while others seem almost hopelessly cryptic. It takes a lot …”
Lev’s cell phone erupted with the tune from the Hebrew folk song Hava Nagila.
“You’d better answer it, Professor. From the sound of your ringtone, I’m guessing it’s probably your team in Israel calling, and I’d like to hear what they have to say.”
Lev read the incoming number. “Yes it is, Your Holiness. Please excuse me.” Lev punched a button on the phone and walked out of the room to take the call.
The lull in the conversation provided Morelli with an excuse to begin exploring the pope’s wine cabinet, while Leo wandered over to the window to gaze out at the dome of Saint Peter’s Basilica. The iconic structure had remained virtually unchanged for hundreds of years, and the seemingly ageless presence of a building designed by Michelangelo was somehow comforting to him. When it came to matters of faith, it had always provided a timeless reference point upon which to guide his thinking, especially now that the world was experiencing yet another horror. Some men were capable of creating such beauty, he thought, while others seemed destined from birth to commit abhorrent acts of evil-a dichotomy within the human species that had been an unnerving paradox to philosophers throughout the ages.
Looking down into Saint Peter’s Square, Leo was suddenly aware that the entire area below was literally undulating with movement. Where only hours before the square had been deserted, now thousands of people were crowded shoulder to shoulder, staring up at the windows of the pope’s apartment, and in the distance, he could see the streets around the Vatican were also filled with people heading in their direction. “Your Holiness … the people … they are here!”
Rushing to the window, Pope Michael and Bishop Morelli saw the mass of humanity flowing into the square from all directions. In the face of an invisible menace that could already be drifting on the wind over the Eternal City, the faithful were obviously flinging aside their fear and venturing outside, leaving the safety of their homes so they could be together to pray on sacred ground.
“What’s going on?”
The men at the window turned to see a pale-looking Lev Wasserman walking toward them with his cell phone still in his hand. Moving in beside them, he leaned forward and gripped the window sill. “We’ve got to stop them!”
CHAPTER 8
None of the men in the room had ever seen Lev Wasserman display an ounce of fear before. They stood there dumbstruck, waiting for an explanation.
“I’m afraid I have some disturbing news. Daniel just found an encoded passage in the code that mentions Rome as being the next target for the same mysterious illness that just struck New York. All of those people down in the square should have stayed in their homes. We’ve got to warn them somehow!”
The pope began waving to the crowd below as he looked back over his shoulder. “Have we received any reports of illness in the city?”
“None in the city, Your Holiness,” Morelli answered, “but we’ve just received a report that a few people have fallen ill in a village nearby.”
“This man who called you from Israel, Professor … this man Daniel … is he usually reliable?”
“Yes, very reliable. His full name is Daniel Meir, and like the other members of our team, he’s an Israeli Christian. He’s also a brilliant mathematician and one of the world’s premier code breakers. Daniel is the one who was responsible for finding most of the encoded passages we discovered in the Bible last year.”
The Holy Father turned away from the window, his public smile slowly fading. “I would like to speak with Bishop Morelli in private for a moment.”
Leo felt his face flush. “Why yes … of course, Your Holiness.”
This sudden, matter-of-fact dismissal by the pope had taken Leo by surprise. After all, he was a cardinal, a Prince of the Church-a member of a select group from which the next pope would be chosen. Had he lost the pope’s trust for some reason?
The pope placed his hand on Leo’s shoulder. “Why don’t you and the professor go to my kitchen? Sister Marcella makes wonderful sandwiches and a decent cup of espresso.”
Sister Marcella was also known for her foul temper.
“Thank you, Your Holiness,” Leo said. “We wouldn’t want to put her to any trouble. We’ll just wait out in the hall.”
“Really, she makes delicious sandwiches, Cardinal … I insist. I have a feeling you’ll both need your strength in the hours ahead. This will just take a moment.”
Ten minutes later, Leo was watching a grumpy Sister Marcella make sandwiches as she glared at them from the kitchen. Sitting across from him, a very worried-looking Lev Wasserman stared down at a simple, white-painted wooden table and drummed his fingers. As a former Special Forces officer and member of the elite Israeli security service known as the Mossad, Lev had stared death in the face more than once, but he had always been the picture of calm and restraint, maintaining a thoughtful, almost relaxed demeanor in the face of danger. No opponent had ever seemed to faze him, except for one. Unbeknownst to others, Lev Wasserman had always harbored a secret fear-the fear of germs.
Ever since he was a young man, Lev had been acutely aware of the invisible foe that lived all around us-the unseen enemy that killed with the same indiscriminate finality of any gun or explosive. On the Israeli kibbutz where he had been raised, the constant threat of Arab attacks had forced him to confront terror on a daily basis, but nothing had frightened Lev Wasserman so much as one of mankind’s most insidious enemies-the microscopic bacteria that vastly outnumber all other living things.
At the age of nineteen, he had begun his mandatory service in the Israeli Army. After basic training, he had been standing guard duty one moonlit night along the Jordanian border when a soldier standing next to him was bitten on the leg by something neither one of them ever saw. Within days, the man’s leg had turned black from the knee down, prompting the army surgeons to amputate. But the infection had not been stopped in time. Within hours, it was obvious that the bacteria had continued up the body, and less than twenty-four hours later, Lev Wasserman found himself helping his fellow soldiers lift the young man’s plain wooden coffin into the back of an army truck for its journey back to his family in Jerusalem.
From that day forward, Lev had been left with a permanent fear of germs. He marveled at how divine providence had singled out the man next to him for an attack from a microscopic enemy that was invisible to the naked eye. There but for the grace of God go I-the phrase had played over and over in his mind ever since that fateful day.
Now, sitting at a table munching on a sandwich in the papal Apartments, Lev Wasserman suspected that the thing he feared the most was now already drifting silently through the air in their direction.
“Lev.”
Leo’s voice startled the professor.
“I’m sorry, Leo … did you say something?”
“Your phone is making a noise.”
“Oh.” Lev pulled the phone from his pocket and quickly read a text message on the screen. “It appears that Daniel wants to e-mail us some encoded phrases that he’s just discovered on a page from Leviticus, but he needs to send it on a secure network.”
Leo laid his sandwich on his plate. “I believe there’s a computer in the library.”
Both men pushed away from the table and crossed the hall to the pope’s private library. Lev spotted a black and silver laptop sitting on a small table next to a red wing chair.
“Is that a secure laptop, Leo?”
“Yes. All of the pope’s personal computers have military-grade encryption software installed.”
“Can we use it? Daniel will need the pope’s personal e-mail address.”
Without hesitating, Leo walked over to the computer and typed something in. “That should work.”
Looking down at the screen, Lev was unable to keep from smiling when he saw the address: headhoncho@vatican.gov.
“You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Morelli had too much wine one night and changed the pope’s e-mail address as a joke. Marcus … I mean, Pope Michael, got such a kick out of it that he left it like that. As it turns out, it’s a pretty secure address, because no one would ever believe that email address actually belongs to the pope.”
Lev began typing and fired off a short e-mail. They waited. A few minutes later, an e-mail with an attachment arrived. Lev hit the download button and soon they were looking at a page from Leviticus that contained several encoded phrases circled in red.
Running vertically on the page was the phrase-Same as New York. Running horizontally across the top of this phrase was a single word-virus. Then, at the bottom of the page, they saw another single word-Rome. Leo and Lev stood frozen in silence when they read the phrase next to it-many will die.
Lev hit print and grabbed the warm page off the printer. “We’ve got to show this to the pope.”
The sound of someone clearing their throat behind them caused both men to jump. It was Enzo Corelli. “His Holiness would like you to rejoin him in his study now.”
“Thank you, Enzo,” Leo said. “We’ll be right there.”
The old Jesuit started to leave, then stopped and turned around. “You’ll be saying a lot of Hail Mary’s for using that computer without his permission.” The old priest winked in their direction before turning back to leave the room.
Entering the study, Lev handed the printout to Pope Michael and watched as his blue eyes scanned the page. Removing his reading glasses, he handed the paper to Morelli.
“What would you like us to do, Your Holiness?” Leo asked.
“Nothing.”
Leo’s face turned ashen. “But … Marcus … I mean, Your Holiness … didn’t you say earlier that you wished we could have used the code to warn the people in New York? This is clearly a warning about the same virus striking Rome. We must do something!”
The pope remained silent as Morelli let the printout fall into his lap. “I’m afraid His Holiness is right, Leo. A warning now will only cause panic. People will want to know where we obtained our information, and when they find out we’re basing our actions on a hidden code in the Bible, they will only laugh at us. Most of them have never heard of the code, and those who have remain skeptical, despite the proof.”
“At least we could save some,” Leo said. He was thinking of the smiling children who had waved at him from the window earlier in the day.
“I understand your deep felt desire to preserve life, Leo,” the pope said, “but a warning from us now will only cause panic and confusion, and if the pathogen is already loose, then we are already too late.”
“How do we know unless we at least try, Your Holiness? It would be unconscionable for us not to act. We are men of God. If ever there was a time to stand and fight, this is it.”
“Spoken like a true Jesuit warrior, but I’m afraid the time for warnings has passed.” The pope’s eyes narrowed at Leo before he walked to the window and looked down at the square below. Raising his right hand, he made the sign of the cross before the thousands of people staring up at him. A loud cheer went up from the crowd as he waved and blessed them once more before turning away. Without speaking, he walked from the room and strode down the hall to his private chapel.
The men waited patiently for the pope to say his private prayers, and after several minutes of uncomfortable silence, the pope reappeared at the door looking totally exhausted. “Gentlemen, I fear it is only a matter of time before the city and the countryside around it is overrun by this invisible enemy. I must remain here in Rome to guide the Church, but you must all flee the city.”
“And just where are we to flee, Your Holiness?” Leo asked.
“I’ve given instructions to the Bishop. He knows where you must go.”
Leo glanced at Morelli, who was staring off into space, seemingly unfazed by the events unfolding around them.
“Naturally,” the pope continued, “I realize that a Jesuit’s first impulse is to stay and meet any threat to the Church head-on, and as much as I would like to have all of you here in Rome with me at a time like this, you are needed elsewhere. You must find whoever or whatever is causing this plague against humanity and bring an end to it with swift retribution. You are all sanctified combatants, and the time for battle is at hand.”
The men were spellbound by the tone of the Holy Father’s words.
“We understand, Your Holiness,” Leo said, straightening to his full height of six-feet-three inches. “We’ll begin making preparations to move out of the city right away.”
“What about the jet I flew in on this morning?” Lev asked.
“We already thought of that,” Morelli said. “Enzo called the airport and talked to the pilot. The crew is sick … it started an hour ago, shortly after they had lunch at the airport. If there is truly some kind of unknown pathogen circulating somewhere out there right now, then nowhere is safe. Any kind of public transportation could be a death trap, especially planes and trains.”
Pope Michael settled himself into a comfortable position on an oversized sofa and sipped his wine. His coolness seemed almost arrogant, but to those who knew him well, this seeming aloofness was a way for him to step back from an emotional situation so that he could think more clearly. An expression of total comprehension crossed his face, but behind the look of understanding there was also a secret, a secret that he was forbidden from sharing with anyone else, even his closest friends. Slowly, his aloofness seemed to fade as he sat forward and faced the others. “I’ve already made arrangements for you to travel overland. You’ll be taking one of the Vatican’s armored SUVs for your journey. Francoise is waiting for you downstairs.”
The emotional energy in the room was electric as the three men exchanged looks and set their glasses firmly on the table in a gesture of finality. They had been hand-picked by the pope himself and dispatched to an unknown location with orders to unravel an enigma-a mystery wrapped in a riddle, one they had very little time to solve. It was an impossible task.
Rising from the couch, the pope seemed to tower over everyone else. “Stay in touch, Gentlemen. I have no doubt that we will see each other again soon, whether it be in this life or the next. Now please, you must go. Time is growing short, and I fear that things will start to go very badly very soon.”
Reluctantly, the three men filed silently from the room without looking back. When they had gone, the pope’s secretary joined him in his study.
“Do you think they’ll be successful, Marcus?”
“Only time will tell, Enzo my old friend … only time will tell.”
CHAPTER 9
The weather had turned unseasonably cool as the three men exited the Apostolic Palace to find a blue-suited man with a short-cropped, military style haircut waiting for them by the entrance. All three were relieved to see Francois Leander, the legendary head of the Swiss Guard.
“Good morning, Gentleman. Father Enzo just called. I have a vehicle waiting for you.” Francois led the men through a darkened medieval passageway into a second courtyard that fronted the Swiss Guard’s barracks. “I’ve just placed my men on high alert. They haven’t been formally advised of the biological threat yet, but everyone knows what happened in America, so they put two and two together. They’re good men and they’ll follow orders, but I’ve never seen them so frightened.”
“Can’t say I blame them,” Lev said, brushing the sleeve of his coat, as though he were trying to brush away an invisible alien invader that had just landed and was burrowing into the fibers of his jacket. “Soldiers would much rather face an enemy they can see.”
Walking next to the Swiss Guard chief, Leo was watching a line of dark clouds flowing in over the Eternal City. “Unfortunately, Francois, a virus has no soul, and thus no conscience. In fact, a virus is barely considered a life form.”
“Good. Then we shall have no guilt when we kill it, Cardinal.”
Walking into the center of the courtyard, they spotted an ominous-looking, black Chevy SUV with a small forest of antennas sprouting from its roof.
“I’ll be driving and monitoring the radios,” Francois continued. “We’ll be in constant contact with the Swiss Guard units that have been moved into position along our route. They’ll be able to get to us relatively quickly should the need arise. I also stocked a few supplies in the back.”
“It seems like you’ve thought of everything … as usual,” Leo said.
Francois forced a tight smile as Morelli jumped into the front passenger seat and Leo and Lev slid into the back. Gunning the engine, he threw a departing wave to a group of uniformed Swiss Guards standing in front of their barracks before speeding through the tightly guarded Porta Sant’ Anna and squealing out onto a narrow street known as the Via Di Porta Angelica-the street of angels.
Behind them, Vatican City was still filling with people, leaving the medieval hodgepodge of alley-like streets in this section of Rome practically empty. The absence of people in the usually teaming streets was eerie as the SUV crossed the river Tiber and continued up the Via Pinciana, a wide boulevard that ran along the eastern border of a huge park that surrounded the famous Villa Borghese.
The Villa and the grounds around it were constructed in 1613 for the hedonistic Cardinal Scipione Borghese, nephew of Pope Paul V. It had been the first park of its kind in Rome, containing foreign academies and a school of archaeology, plus museums, art galleries, fountains, and even a zoo. Usually filled with gelato-slurping tourists, on this day the park stood virtually empty. Looking out over the beautiful grounds, Leo was once again struck by the duality between those who dedicated themselves to creating objects of beauty and those who seemed equally dedicated to depraved acts of cruelty.