The Quest: A Novel

by Nelson DeMille

  Also, in retrospect, he realized that the good news they’d gotten from the British embassy in Cairo—that Henry Mercado was about to be released—had something to do with her departure. He’d had a brief thought that she had left to find Henry, but if that were the case, she’d have told him to his face in Cairo. Vivian was forthright and honest, and brave enough to say, “It’s over. I’m going back to Henry.”

  But Vivian knew that despite Henry’s forgiving her for her one-night indiscretion when they thought they were about to be shot, he would not forgive her for her week with Frank Purcell in Addis or for their month together in Cairo. Yet for some reason, she couldn’t stay in Cairo with him after Henry was free. He sort of understood that, but he also understood that she wanted the three of them to be together again, in some fashion or another, and to go back to Ethiopia together.

  Jean asked, “Is that your dinner date?”

  He looked at the entrance, where Mercado was standing, scanning the bar. Purcell caught his attention, and Mercado headed toward him. Henry still didn’t have a topcoat, and he was wearing what he’d worn last evening, except he’d added a scarf.

  They didn’t shake, and Purcell introduced him to Jean, whose last name Purcell didn’t know, along with not knowing her room number. They made small talk for a minute, and Purcell noted that Henry seemed to be in a better mood, and also that Henry could be charming to an attractive lady. He pictured him in the Addis Hilton bar, chatting up Vivian for the first time.

  Under normal circumstance Purcell might have asked Jean to join them for dinner, but tonight he needed Henry to himself, without Jean, and without the absent presence of Vivian. He said to Jean, “Try the Piazza Navona tonight.”

  Henry suggested, “Trastevere would be better.” He gave her the name of a restaurant.

  Jean thanked them and went back to her guidebook.

  Purcell led Mercado to a reserved table near the window and they sat.

  Mercado said, “I’m not actually staying for dinner. But let’s have a bottle of good wine.”

  “Whatever is your pleasure.”

  Mercado scanned the wine list, summoned a waiter, and they discussed vino in Italian.

  Purcell lit a cigarette and looked out at the city. He never quite understood why Peter, and then Paul, had traveled all the way from their world to Rome, the belly of the beast. Surely they knew that was suicidal.

  Mercado said, “You got off easy with a 150,000-lire bottle of amarone.”

  “I thought you were buying tonight.”

  “Let’s first see what you’re selling.”

  “Right.” Purcell pointed to the Forum. “What’s that building?”

  “That’s where the Roman senate sat and debated the affairs of the empire.”

  “Amazing.”

  “Truly the Eternal City. I think this is where I will end my days.”

  “Could do worse. Which is what I want to talk to you about.”

  “I am not going to Ethiopia.”

  “Okay. But hypothetically… if we could get back in, legally, as accredited reporters, would you consider it?”

  “No.”

  “Let’s say you said yes. Would you feel comfortable with the three of us going?”

  “I do not want to see her—or you—again.”

  “We’re making progress.”

  “Frank, none of us will ever be allowed back. So even if I said yes, it’s moot.”

  “Right. But if we could swing it—”

  “I’m facing a five-year prison sentence the moment I set foot on Ethiopian soil.”

  “Okay. Maybe we should sneak in.”

  “Maybe you should just step out into Roman traffic and save yourself some time and effort.”

  The waiter brought the wine, Mercado tasted it and pronounced it meraviglioso, and the waiter poured.

  Purcell held up his glass and said, “To Father Armano, and to God’s plan, whatever it is.”

  “I’m sure you’re going to tell me what it is.”

  “It’s coming to me.” Purcell informed him, “I actually have a private pilot’s license. Single-engine. Did I ever mention that?”

  Mercado swirled his wine.

  “If we could rent a bush plane in Sudan—”

  “You’re not making God’s plan sound attractive.” He asked, “What do you think of the wine?”

  “Great. So let’s think about false IDs. I have several sources in Cairo.”

  Mercado pointed out, “You don’t actually need me along. It would be easier for you to just apply for a visa and see what happens. The new regime may let you in.”

  “I want you with us.”

  “By us, I assume you mean Vivian as well.”

  “Right.”

  “But she’s left you, old boy. Or at least that’s what you seemed to have told me last night.”

  “Right. But I also told you she wants us to go back to look for the black monastery.”

  Mercado mulled that over, then said, with good insight, “There are easier ways for you to regain her affection.”

  Purcell did not reply.

  “If you, Mr. Purcell, want to go back, you need to go for the right reason. Your reason is not the right reason.”

  Purcell thought a moment, then replied, “I’m not going to tell you that I believe in the Holy Grail. But I do believe there is a hell of a story there.”

  “But Vivian, dear boy, believes in the Grail. You need to believe in it as well if you’re going to drag her back there—or if she’s dragging you back.”

  Purcell asked, “What do you believe?”

  “I believe what Father Armano told us.”

  “All of it?”

  “All of it.”

  “Then how can you not go back?”

  He reminded Purcell, “Father Armano seemed to think that the Grail should be left where it was in a Coptic monastery—and he’s a Catholic priest who was under papal orders to find it and take it for the Vatican.”

  “I’m not suggesting we should steal it. Just… look at it. Touch it.”

  “That would probably end in life imprisonment. Or death.”

  “But if you really believe, Henry, that we’re going back to find the actual Holy Grail, what difference does death make?”

  Mercado looked closely at Purcell.

  “Father Armano risked death by going on that patrol to find the black monastery. Because he believed in the Grail, and he believed in eternal life.”

  “I understand that. But…”

  “The Knights of the Round Table risked their lives to look for the Grail—”

  “Myth and legend.”

  “Right. But there’s a moral to that myth.”

  “Which is that the Grail will never be found.”

  “Which is that we should never stop looking for what we believe in. Death is not the issue.”

  Mercado did not reply.

  “Why did Peter come to Rome?”

  Mercado smiled. “To annoy the Romans with his arguments, as you are annoying me with yours.”

  “And to bring them the word of God. And why did Peter return to Rome?”

  “To die.”

  “I rest my case.”

  Mercado seemed lost in thought, then said, “Look, old man, get a good night’s sleep”—he nodded toward Jean who was still at the bar but settling her bill—“and if you’re still suicidal in the morning, give me a call.” He put his business card on the table and stood.

  Purcell stood and said, “Henry, this is what we have to do. We think we have a choice, but we don’t.”

  “I understand that. And I also understand that you’re not as cynical as you think you are or pretend to be. You are not going to risk your life for a good story—or for a woman. You’re not that much of a reporter or that romantic. But if you believe in love, then you believe in God. There may or may not be a Holy Grail at the end of your journey, but the journey and the quest is itself an act of faith and belief. And as we Romans
say, ‘Credo quia impossibile.’ I believe it because it is impossible.”

  Purcell did not reply.

  They shook hands and Mercado went to the bar, spoke to Jean, then left.

  Jean walked toward his table, smiling tentatively. Purcell stood, and thought: Good old Henry, up to his old tricks again, sticking me with the bill, the lady, and the next move.

  Chapter 16

  Rome was always crowded at Christmas with visiting clergy, pilgrims, and tourists, and even more so this year in anticipation of the pope’s Christmas Eve announcement of the coming Holy Year. The taxi driver was swearing at the holiday traffic and at the foreign idioti who didn’t know how to cross a street.

  Purcell had decided to stay in Rome for Christmas and he’d sent a short telex to Charlie Gibson in Cairo telling him that. The return telex, even shorter, had said, YOU’RE FIRED. HAVE A GOOD CHRISTMAS.

  He’d hoped that would be Charlie’s response, and he dreaded a second telex rescinding the first. But if war broke out, as it might after all the Christian tourists left Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and Nazareth, then the Cairo office would want him back. In the meantime, he was free to pursue other matters. Also, as it turned out, Jean needed to get back to England for Christmas, which further freed him to write, and to think about what he wanted to do about the rest of his life.

  He hadn’t called Henry the morning after as Henry had suggested, and Henry hadn’t called him, nor would he ever. So now, three days later, Purcell had made the call to L’Osservatore Romano that morning and he had a 4 P.M. meeting with Signore Mercado. It was 3:45 and the traffic was slower than the pedestrians, so Purcell asked the driver to drop him off at the foot of the Ponte Vittorio Emanuele, and he walked across the Tiber bridge.

  It was windy, and the sky was dark and threatening with black clouds scudding across the gray sky, and the Tiber, too, looked black and angry.

  Saint Peter’s Square was packed with tourists and with the faithful who were praying in large and small groups. In the center of the square stood the three-thousand-year-old Egyptian obelisk, and at the end of the square rose the marble mountain of Saint Peter’s Basilica, beneath which, according to belief, lay the bones of the martyred saint, and Purcell wondered if Peter, dying on the cross, had regretted his decision on the Via Appia.

  Purcell did not enter the square, but walked along the Vatican City wall to the Porta Santa Rosa where two Swiss Guards with halberds stood guarding the gates of the sovereign city-state. He showed his passport and press credentials to a papal gendarme who was better armed than the Swiss Guards, and said, “Buona sera. L’Osservatore Romano, Signore Mercado.”

  The man scanned a sheet of paper on his clipboard, said something in Italian, and waved him through.

  He’d been there once before and easily found the press office on a narrow street lined with bare trees. The windows of the buildings cast squares of yellow light on the cold ground.

  He was fifteen minutes late, which in Italy meant he was a bit early, but maybe not in Vatican City. The male receptionist asked him to be seated.

  The offices of L’Osservatore Romano were housed in a building that may have preceded the printing press, but the interior was modern, or had been when the paper was founded a hundred years before. Electricity and telephones had been added, and the result was a modern newspaper that published in six languages and was a mixture of real news and propaganda. And not surprisingly, the pope made every issue.

  A lot of articles focused on the persecution of Catholics in various countries, especially Communist Poland. Occasionally the paper covered the plight of non-Catholic Christians, and Purcell recalled that Henry Mercado had been in Ethiopia to write about the state of the Coptic Church in the newly Marxist country, as well as Ethiopia’s small Catholic population. Now Henry was writing press releases about the Holy Year. Purcell was sure that Mercado would like to return to Ethiopia to continue his important coverage. And hadn’t Henry promised General Getachu a few puff pieces about the general’s military prowess?

  Mercado came into the waiting room wearing a cardigan over his shirt and tie. They shook hands and Mercado showed Purcell into his windowless office, a small room piled high with books and papers, giving it the look of a storage closet. He could see why Henry was in Harry’s Bar at 4 P.M.

  Mercado shut off his IBM electric typewriter and said, “Throw your coat anywhere.” He spun his desk chair around and faced his guest who sat in the only other chair. Purcell asked, “Mind if I smoke?”

  Mercado waved his arm around the paper-strewn room and replied, “You’ll set the whole Vatican on fire.”

  But he did have a bottle of Boodles in his desk drawer and he poured into two water glasses.

  Mercado held up his glass and said, “Benvenuto.”

  “Cheers.”

  They drank and Mercado asked, “Are you here to tell me you’ve come to your senses?”

  “No.”

  “All right.” He informed Purcell, “Then I’ve decided to go to Ethiopia.”

  Purcell was not completely surprised that Mercado had changed his mind. In fact, he hadn’t. Whatever it was that had taken hold of him that night at the mineral spa still had him, and Henry, like Vivian, had been transformed by Father Armano and by that admittedly strange experience that Henry and Vivian took as a sign.

  Mercado continued, “But I can’t promise you that I will go any farther than Addis. I am not keen on going back into Getachu territory.”

  “I thought you wanted to write a nice piece about him.”

  “I do. His obituary.” He tapped a stack of papers on his desk and said, “I am calling in favors and pulling some strings to get you and Vivian accredited with L’Osservatore Romano.”

  “Good. I just lost my AP job.”

  “How did you do that?”

  “Easy.”

  “All right, we will be covering the religious beat, of course, and your starting salary is zero, but all expenses are paid to and in Ethiopia.”

  “And back.”

  “Your optimism amazes me.” He asked, “Should I finalize this?”

  “Where do I sign?”

  Mercado finished his gin and contemplated another, then reminded Purcell, “This will all be moot if we can’t get visas.”

  “It’s a good first step.”

  “And L’Osservatore Romano will look good on our visa applications.”

  “Si.”

  Mercado smiled, then asked, “Are you sure Vivian wants to go?”

  “She said so in her letter.”

  “Have you heard from her?”

  “I have not.”

  “Can you contact her?”

  “I’ll try her last known address. A P.O. box in Geneva.”

  Mercado nodded and said, “Tell her to come to Rome.”

  Purcell replied, “Tutte le strade conducono a Roma.”

  “Did you practice that?”

  “I did.” Purcell asked, “Are you all right with this?”

  “I told you, old man, I’m over it.”

  Purcell didn’t think so, and he had issues of his own with Vivian.

  Mercado, in fact, asked, “Are you all right with Vivian coming along?”

  “No problem.”

  “I’m not sure I’m understanding your relationship.”

  “That makes two of us. Probably three.”

  “All right… By the way, how did you make out with that lady? Jean?”

  “She had to go back to England.” Purcell added, “She did nothing but talk about you.”

  Mercado smiled.

  Purcell asked, “What do you think our chances are of actually getting a visa?”

  “I think you were right about the regime change. They seem to want to smooth things over with the West.”

  “They’re just playing the third world game—flirting with the West while they’re in bed with the Russians.”

  “Of course. But that could work for us.”

  Purcell asked, “
Would you be suspicious if those visas were granted?”

  “ ‘Will you walk into my parlor? said the spider to the fly.’ ”

  “Precisely.”

  “Well, if you want my opinion, old man, this whole idea is insane. But I think we’ve decided, so save your paranoia for Ethiopia.”

  “Right.”

  “And have you thought about why you are going back into the jaws of death?”

  “I already told you.”

  “Again, please.”

  “To find the Holy Grail, Henry, to heal my troubled soul. Same as you.”

  “Well, we should save this discussion for when Vivian joins us.”

  Purcell did not reply.

  Mercado poured two more gins and said, “I’m going to ask Colonel Gann to join us in Rome.”

  “Why?”

  “I think he’d be a good resource before we set out. Also, I’d like to see him and thank him.”

  “Me too.”

  “I want you to buy him a spectacular dinner at the Hassler.”

  “Don’t you have an expense account, Henry?”

  “Yes, a rather good one, which is why they’re putting me up at the Excelsior until I find an appartamento.”

  It seemed to Purcell that Henry Mercado had more influence at L’Osservatore Romano than his office or his job would indicate. The thought occurred to him that Henry had spoken to someone here about their Ethiopian adventure, including—contrary to what Mercado had told him—the appearance and death of Father Giuseppe Armano. If that were true, then someone here had probably gotten excited about pursuing this story. And maybe Henry had been stringing his bosses along, like the old trickster he was, sucking silver out of the Vatican treasury. And he’d been at it for a few months, and the time had come to put up or get out.