“Nah. I wouldn’t have said that we should go out for dinner if I didn’t mean it.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“So do you want to have dinner at Kuang’s?” she asked. “I’m not going to beg.”
“I’d love it but I really doubt… I doubt if we went over there this minute that we’d be able to get a table before nine.”
“I think I’ve got enough pull to find us a place to park,” she chuckled. “And I’ve got a couple things to do myself. 7:30?”
“How about eight?”
“Eight. See you there.”
“Okay. Bye.”
Samson hung up the phone and shut off the computer, thinking maybe tomorrow he’d discover where Silver Piece was hiding.
Leaving the Administration building wasn’t the production it was earlier in the day and there was little to give away that the Creek had been secured as he made his way home. There were more of the Guard on the streets than usual and they seemed more serious than they usually did, but aside from that his walk was about the same as hundreds of others he’d taken over the past few years.
The streets and sidewalks were broad, uncluttered and clean, the generous maintenance budget supplied by a numerous private trusts or grants pegging Sanctuary Creek as the sole beneficiary. The branches of the trees jittered, showing off the plumage that would grace them into the summer and through October when the leaves turned the gorgeous reds and yellows and orange Kim reveled in so lusciously. At each corner the kiosks, large and tubular—a touch Annie Knight insisted on, reminiscent of Paris—announced whatever was going on the next day or the next week or the following month. He lingered to catch up on the events in the Creek as a Jeep with four Vats breezed by, two of them nodding in his direction.
One poster announced a series of lectures on the history of the Church to be held for grade-schoolers at the community center in Residential. Another for a fish fry each Friday until September. Bus tours for the Sixty-Plus group to the Art Institute of Chicago, Summerfest in Milwaukee and Woodfield Mall in Schaumburg. And a large photo of Castro—grinning like he always used to—marking his birth and death dates.
Wake at Holy Name Cathedral, Chicago, Tuesday, 9:00 a.m.--5:00 p.m., Transportation available, contact Events. Memorial service, 6:00 PM, Holy Name. Funeral Mass, 10:00 a.m. Wednesday. Unfortunately for all who knew him here at SC, the Mass will be private. Please remember him in your prayers.
Private. That was the odd part. If Peter was going to say a requiem mass for anyone, Castro’s should have been open to all.
As Samson closed the door and then locked it, he was suddenly struck with what a lonely place his home had become. Ever since Kim’s death it hadn’t been the brightest of places, but now it seemed even drabber than before despite the pale blues and greens she’d decorated it in, which seemed to glow in the light of the early evening sunshine.
“I’ve gotta change,” he said aloud.
“You gotta change what?” a voice asked from the living room. Samson felt a rush of adrenaline and instinctively stepped in through the foyer, pretty sure it was Carter. His friend sat on the couch, a glass of wine in his hand. A question on his face. “You gotta change what, Cardinal?” he chuckled, toasting.
“Who let you in, Sherwood?”
“The maid.”
“Ain’t got a maid.”
“Maybe you ought to get one. Or get yourself a glass of grapes.” He paused. “You okay?”
“How do I look?”
“Like you’ve been through a couple world wars and a mugging for drill.”
“Good idea.”
He walked into the kitchen, topped the glass he’d used earlier, then made his way back, stopping to gaze at the Lionne-Demilunes.
Risk. It’s all about Risk.
“You really ought to get some manners,” he said as he sat at the piano and set the glass on the keyboard. “I wouldn’t just stroll into your house and help myself to whatever I wanted.”
“That’s `cause Chell would crack you one upside the head.”
“And she’d crack you one, too, if she knew about all your lousy habits.”
“That’s one of her missions. Keepin’ me in line when the pressures of the Party start warpin’ my mind.”
Samson shrugged. Took a sip. “I don’t know how you’ll take this.”
“Oh, shit!” Carter squealed. “Don’t tell me that Principal Peter is hanging it up and they’re gonna put you in charge.”
“Nothing that bad.”
“Then what?”
“He told me I ought to lay off affiliating with Party regulars until my stay in Administration comes to an end.”
“Cut the crap, Cardinal Anthead.”
“No, I’m serious.” He hesitated then took another sip. “And I told him that at least you were an exception…”
“And?”
“No lollipop.’”
“I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.”
“Why?”
“I told you, man. The pressure is getting to Pete.”
“He’s got a lot on his…”
“I’m serious,” Carter said, motioning in the direction of Compound. “Pete’s out on the wire. Last week was like a three ring circus around this place. The Diaries. He had the whole place in an uproar over nothin’. And we got nothin’ accomplished until he was satisfied with every fantabulous detail.”
Samson waited. Carter leaned into the cushions.
“First he decides there ain’t enough security over at the lab, which was pretty nuts, ’cause like the Guard had the top goon squad characters over there like we’re about to carve up the Hope Diamond. Mannbet was even there.”
“The Diaries are a pretty big deal.”
“They’re a big deal if they’re what the guys in Archives wish they were. But it’s pretty clear what we got on our hands is a pretty elaborate forgery.”
“Really?” Samson asked, disappointed. “How do you know? Party isn’t involved with that.”
“I got my sources. Just another dysfunctional ray of hope. To the washed and unwashed to keep ’em tossing those envelopes into the collection baskets every Sunday, not to mention major and minor holy days.”
Samson was taken aback by Carter’s coolness. While his friend was top-notch at pragmatism, brushing away the Diaries so easily was too chilly.
“They’re fakes?”
“Probably. Make that assuredly. Looks like we missed out in the Shroud Sweepstakes.”
The Shroud referred to was that of Turin, the most revered of the Church’s relics. For centuries it had been regarded as the burial cloth of Jesus of Nazareth. Then in the 1980s it was declared by some scientists to be an elaborate hoax cooked up in the mind of an unknown prankster of the Middle Ages with uncanny talent based on a few threads removed from its fringe areas. In the 1990s a re-examination of the previous findings demonstrated serious errors, and with the addition of further probing, especially as to pollen samples imbedded in the weave, the burial robe was pegged to the early first century. Set in or near Jerusalem. The only place on earth two particular weeds grew.
The critics weren’t convinced. Only a complete, no-holds-barred, take-your-chances-and-make-your-bets analysis would ever settle the issue. So Benedict XVI stepped up to the pit and rolled the ivories, conveying the Shroud to a neutral panel of 35 experts in fields from microgenetics to philosophy, a third of them Nobel Laureates. Nineteen months later the results were presented in a 414 page document supported by 79 exhibits ranging from maps to DVDs to recreations of ancient torture to metallurgic comparison.
How the image came to appear on the cloth wasn’t speculated on, but other facts were incontrovertible. A state-of-the-art sub-electron microscope employed on 82 distinct areas revealed the victim had been crucified on local wood with cheap local iron nails while also being held in place by cheap local rope. The entry wound in the victim’s abdominal area had been inflicted with a sword or spearhead ide
ntical in composition to examples used by Roman forces 15-40 AD, had been flogged with both rope and leather of the same period and the cranium evidenced penetration by a particular species of thorn abundant in the surrounding area. DNA blood analysis demonstrated the victim may have, but didn’t necessarily perish, of heart failure, probably due to a blow that fractured the left kneecap. Based on more than a dozen discrete markers, he was probably a male of Hebrew descent born between 150 BC-150 AD within a 300 mile radius of Jerusalem who showed early indications of liver disease and arthritis.
A curiosity then but a telling detail now: the man had recently come in contact with the feathers of a crow.
Benedict XVII accepted the results though never officially commented on them, a tradition respected by all his successors.
“So, anyway,” Carter continued, a mischievous grin making its way onto his face. “Pete decides that the lab’s got the wrong karma and can’t be secured properly so he orders that all the equipment and technicians and ol’ Sebastian’s papers and paperweight be relocated and says the rest of the testing ought to be done some place more conducive to such a priceless discovery, which he already knows is going right down the drain, so moves everybody and everything over to Nick’s!”
“He sent the Research drones over to Nick’s?” Samson asked—meaning the house where Nicholas VI had lived during his tenure at the Creek, the place revered with an eerie respect by Peter—structure no one was allowed to enter except in his company.
“You got it,” Carter replied. “Can you imagine the mess that caused for Calvello and the guys? Dragging all the equipment over was one thing, but then protecting the whole operation?”
“That doesn’t sound like Peter. He’d already have had half the Guard protecting the lab, and that thing’s about as secure as you can get around here.”
“And then,” he continued, standing and gesticulating. “The Main Man goes over to check it out—you know, he’s got all of them set up in the living room and the kitchen—looked like something out of the Marx Brothers—20… count `em… 20 of the Guard stationed outside of Nick’s like Pete and the President are inside having a cup of jasmine tea—and Pete takes one look at it and says, like, ‘Well this didn’t come out like I imagined it, I got the karma part wrong,’ and he tells them to pack it all up and ship the whole kit and caboodle back to the frigging lab!”
“What?” Samson smiled, picking up his glass and stepping across.
“So they move all of the stuff back to Research, and by now the cost in time and money for this little visit to Nick’s is goin’ off the chart, and Pete evidently decides now the juju has gotten worse so he has the Diaries and the Pebble brought over to the mansion and has all the Guards and the guys from Research gather in his chapel over there and he holds an impromptu mass for everyone! In the middle of the damn afternoon!”
“Were you there?”
“Hell, no, thank God. Calvello was, though. He said it was one of the nuttiest things he’d ever seen in his life. He said Pete set them right on the altar and kept lookin’ at ’em like he’d just seen the face of our Lord.”
“Maybe he knows something…”
“And this last part… this last part is really gonna go down in the books.”
“What?”
“So they have this command performance mass, you know, everybody’s got a hundred things to do with their time before spending a cozy afternoon with Pete and his fantasies—Rick told me old Pontiff Puss did a half hour sermon on faith—and they finally wrap the service, and Rick says ‘Okay guys, let’s bring the goodies back to the lab’ and Pete says—now if this doesn’t convince you that your favorite Numero Uno has been hittin’ the sacrificial grape too hard, nothing will—Pete says casually ‘Wait a second, troops. The Diaries and the Sacred Bauble are stayin’ with me.’”
“He kept them?”
“Still has ’em, Eminence.”
“Maybe he knows something that…”
“Now look, Ter,” Carter admonished. “I know you and Pete are tight. But shit! Now you can’t even talk to me?”
“You know damn well he’s always been leery about Party and Administration getting too…”
“Getting too what?” Carter barked. “Think about that one.” He paused. “Want some more wine?”
“Help yourself.”
“Wanna get something to eat? Chell’s playing Standoff! tonight.”
“No thanks.”
“That’s right. Can’t get together with your friends anymore. I forgot.”
“It’s not… I got plans.”
“With who?”
Samson hesitated. He remembered more than one occasion when he’d complained about Chell and Carter trying to set him up with somebody, always using Peter’s efforts as an example. “Mary Beth.”
“Mary Beth? As in Mary Beth Rehmer? As in Mary Beth—I’m The Pope’s Sister— Rehmer?”
“The same.”
“I get it now,” Carter frowned, setting his glass on the arm of the couch and walking to the door. “That how you got the gig with Admin? Screw your friends, then screw my little sister and I’ll set you up? Is that how the offer was made?”
“We’re just gonna have something to eat.”
“See you later.” He pulled the knob and stepped out, not saying good-bye.
Samson called after him.
“Carter! It’s just for a couple days!”
The man turned, his voice filled with what an objective observer would label contempt.
“You call me if you wanna talk, Ter. If you find the time.”
Chapter Twelve
Samson stared into the mirror as he looped the knot of his tie, wondering why he’d gone to the trouble of putting it on just to go over to Kuang’s. It wasn’t like it was a date or anything. After all, she was an old friend he happened to be seeing. Nothing to get dressed up about.
The phone chirped as he hit the bottom of the stairs. He moved into the den and picked it up.
“Hello.”
“Say listen, your Eminence,” Carter cackled through. “Don’t go getting formal on me, okay?”
Samson chuckled. Carter could always be counted on to get back in touch after he’d copped an attitude. “You’re forgiven, my sunshine.”
“Your only sunshine, Anthead! And don’t you forget it.” He paused. “Got a minute?”
Samson glanced at his watch. Past seven. “Sure, Mr. Sherwood. What now?”
“Okay, I got a little out of line, huh? Gimme a break here, you poor excuse for an Admin lackey. I’m just a… frazzled today. This has been one of the longest of my life and it’s gonna be a lot longer by the time I hit the pillows.”
“You’ll live.”
“Anyway, I just wanted to tell you that you’ll still have a warm desk over at Party when you get this ego trip outta ‘yo system.”
“Something wrong?”
“As a matter of fact there is. But I don’t want to worry your pointed head with it ’cause for one, you got a lot of other shit to worry about, and for two you’re under a gag order from the big guy, and for three, I don’t want any of what I just found out from Jeff gettin’ back to those pinheads you’re workin’ with now.”
“You talked to Jeff?”
“I told you things were getting crazy around here, my man. And after what he just laid upon me, I got a feeling they gonna get a lot crazier in a very short period.”
“What’s… ?”
“Can’t tell you. Gag order. The phone’s probably tapped already.”
“Come on.”
“Listen, man. I indicated to Jeff that I thought maybe you were given the word from the top to steer clear of Party types and he understood because he’s already gone through that with Pete a couple times before. But he also indicated to me that if that was the case, I ought to steer clear of you, too.”
“Jeff wouldn’t say that. I know him better.”
“You do, huh? Then why don’t you give him a call.
He’s over at that place you used to call home. Go ahead.”
“Wait a second. Didn’t you tell me earlier he was stuck in Washington and wasn’t going to be back until tonight or tomorrow?”
“Did I?”
“I thought so.”
“You near a window?”
“Yeah.”
“Does it look like it’s gettin’ dark?”
“Yeah.”
“There you go. And if I indicated something else, you bein’ Admin now. I was probably unconsciously just giving you a little of that built-in misinformation we’re programmed to spew.”
Dead-center cold again.
“You’re serious, aren’t you?”
“Yup.”
Samson waited for Carter to continue but the line remained silent. It was one thing for Peter to give a directive like the one he’d given him; quite another for Jeff Gayle to respond in kind. That wasn’t the way it worked. While Gayle was certainly loyal to Peter—one of his biggest supporters—his first loyalty was to Party. Popes might, always did in fact, come and go like kings and presidents and pop stars. But the Party remained to continue the work. If it wasn’t Peter, it would be somebody else. It was the position, not the man, that mattered. It was the process, not the event, that endured. Peter could drop dead the next moment but the papacy would still be there. And Party, plus its 16 international counterparts, was the mechanism that made the ultimate choice about who got to wear the ring.
“What’d Jeff tell you?”
“Can’t tell.”
“Sure you can.”
“Only, but only if you promise not to turn me in to Pete and Mitch. Mitch finds out we’ve been talkin’, he’ll have my baptism and confirmation names revoked. That little mongrel.”
“Okay. I promise.”
“Not on the phone. Pour me another glass of that lighter fluid you keep in the wine bottle, pour one for yourself and I’ll be over in three. Back door.”
“Right.”
Carter knocked a few minutes later, then walked to the front of the townhouse, Samson tagging behind. They both glanced out the window in the living room. No one was on the street. Carter walked back into the kitchen, leaned on the island, emptied one of the two glasses and motioned Samson to get a refill from the refrigerator. Carter drank half of his second, then let out a moan. “What we’ve got looming before us is a crisis, Ter.”
Sanctuary Creek Page 13
