That morning, the streets of Ágreda were as damp and devoid of people as those of Laguna de Cameros. The windshields of the cars parked on either side of the Avenida de Madrid were caked with a thick coating of ice, and the town’s roughly three thousand inhabitants had taken refuge from the cold inside the thick stone walls of their houses.
“Where are you thinking of going?” Txema inquired gently. His companion was still shaken by their incredible geographic blunder.
“To the main church, where else? If once upon a time a nun had the power of bilocation, the ability to be in two places at the same time, and flew over to America God knows how, the priest ought to know about it.”
The small Ibiza snaked swiftly down the town’s deserted streets. Ágreda turned out to be larger than it appeared from the highway. Fortunately, the church they were looking for soon came into view; it sat right next to a building that appeared to be the city hall, which stood on the west side of a great rectangular plaza. Carlos drove past the church slowly, parking the car a short distance from its main entrance.
“Closed!” Txema blurted out as his breath enveloped him in a little cloud of fog.
“Maybe another church is open. . . . Look over there.”
Looming immediately behind them, next to a four-story building, was the unmistakable silhouette of another baroque bell tower. They slowly crossed the plaza to knock on its magnificent door.
“Also shut tight.” The photographer sighed a second time. “No one’s around, and it’s colder than hell.”
“Pretty strange, eh? Even the bars are closed.”
“Nothing unusual for the north. Today is Sunday, and with a temperature like this, I’d be at home, too. Maybe we’ll have luck at noon, when they ring the bells for the main Mass.”
Txema’s hint was enough to kick the journalist into high gear.
“Noontime? We’re not going to hang around here at a standstill till then!”
“Sounds good to me.” The photographer was already quickening his pace toward the heat. “Let’s get back in the car.”
Once inside, with the heater going full blast and the windshield wipers scattering ever-fewer chunks of ice, Txema mumbled, “Probably nothing would have come of it.”
“Probably,” Carlos replied laconically. “But you wouldn’t deny that a lot of random events led us to this town.”
“And those kinds of random events really exasperate you, right?”
“Did I ever tell you about that old professor of mathematics who believed that chance was one of God’s disguises?”
“A few hundred times! For two weeks you talked about nothing else!” Txema laughed. “What I fail to understand is why you put so much effort into resisting situations in life that, maybe, just maybe, are arranged in advance, no matter by whom, and are out of your hands. Is it because you’re still hoping to ‘catch’ God behind one of your random events?”
Carlos gripped the wheel of the car as hard as he could, trying to stay in the middle of the narrow street and not brush against one of the unevenly parked cars. One lousy sheet of ice could send them skidding into the cars on either side.
“What kind of question is that!” he said at last. “To agree to what you’re saying is the same as accepting that, to at least some degree, someone exists who has traced the blueprints of our lives. And from there to accepting God’s existence is but a single step.”
“So why not go ahead and believe it then?” the photographer pressed on.
“Because it’s my impression that God is the formula people apply to everything beyond their understanding. Belief in God gets us out of the hard work of thinking.”
“And what if after all your hard work you conclude that he exists?”
Carlos was silent and stopped the car, putting the engine in neutral.
“So what now?” the photographer asked.
“This is the wrong road,” he said just above a whisper.
Txema was concerned. Something was wrong.
“Are we really lost?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
When Carlos’s limbs had regained their feeling, he drove the car toward the road sign that announced Ágreda’s city limits. As they had passed the sign, he noticed across the narrow road a stone building that sat next to a small bell tower. He made a show of shutting off the car and undoing his seat belt. A quick glance was enough for Txema to realize they were no longer on Route N-122. This was a badly paved road, full of holes and barely wide enough for one car to pass, much less two.
The photographer watched his friend without knowing where he was headed.
Once out of the car, Carlos slammed the door shut and walked toward the building. “You could use some fresh air,” Txema advised from the car, observing his friend’s hesitant steps.
“Here it is! Over here!” he heard Carlos shout out of nowhere.
The photographer’s heart was racing. He grabbed the bag of cameras from underneath his seat, and jumped out of the car.
“What’s going on?”
“Look!”
Txema was shaking in the cold while his companion, who was exhaling puffs of air like a dragon in a cave, was enthusiastically gesturing toward the building behind him. Or, to be more precise, at a kind of moat that lay between the highway and the building, at the very bottom of which they could see a pair of oak doorways with an unusual escutcheon carved in stone over one; and the other, set apart, with a quatrefoil blocked off by thick iron crossbars.
“What is it you want me to see?”
“Down there.”
Txema looked down a second time into the moat scooped out of the earth. A statue, rendered in stone, of a nun, her arms spread and a cross in one hand, jumped out at him, as if it had just appeared.
“This is a monastery! You see? What better place to ask about a nun?”
“Sure . . . of course,” Txema said under his breath. He was losing confidence in his friend. “Are we going down?”
The two men descended the steep, snow-covered ramp that led to the flat stretch of land in the center of the clearing, and then stood in front of the wooden doors. They soon realized that the building was much larger than they had thought. In fact, it looked a bit like a fortress. Its façade was dotted with tiny wooden windows and a primitive depiction of Christ on the way to Calvary, which time had darkened with soot.
“You’re right. It must be a monastery,” Txema said just loud enough for Carlos to hear.
But Carlos was no longer listening. He was on his knees in front of the cement pedestal on which the statue stood. He was writing in his notebook, copying down the inscription carved into the base of the statue.
“See?” he said when he was done. “Read the engraving yourself.”
Txema directed his attention to the foot of the statue, where he read:
To the Venerable Madre Ágreda,
with reverent pride.
From your townspeople.
“So you think it refers to your nun?”
His question was clearly a trap.
“Who else?”
“You know what?” he said as he held his camera. “Forget everything I said earlier about destiny. We need to remain cold-blooded now.”
Carlos nodded, without saying a word.
“You yourself explained to me that it was customary to give the name of the town to the outstanding personages born there. It would be a highly unlikely occurrence if this nun were the exact person you were looking for. . . . A highly unlikely occurrence,” he said emphatically.
“Just one more.”
Carlos looked at the photographer out of the corner of his eye. Txema was not about to let up.
“And furthermore, if it is a question of the nun who so tried your patience when you were working on teleportations, we will soon know one way or the other. But if this is a different lady, do me a favor: let’s forget about this and hightail it back to Madrid, without a word to anyone. Agreed?”
“Agreed.
”
Carlos got to his feet, and with an energetic stride walked over to the door nearest him and tried it. It was open.
“Go in!” Txema encouraged him.
Once he had crossed the threshold and his eyes adjusted to the darkness, his first suspicions were confirmed. They were standing in a small waiting area whose walls were adorned with heavy blocks of wood on which religious scenes had been carved in relief. A carousel, through which a person inside could speak to someone in the waiting area, built into the wall on the right, left no doubt: this was a monastery.
A small table draped with a crocheted cotton tablecloth, on top of which were deposited slowly yellowing religious pamphlets; a small bell and an ancient light switch screwed into some tiles on the wall at eye level; the unmistakable wooden cylinder that connected the cloister to the exterior world: these were the sum total of the antechamber’s decorations.
“Are you going to call them?” Txema asked him quietly. The silence all around him and the cold inside the unheated waiting room had taken their toll.
“Of course.”
Carlos pressed his finger down on the buzzer. A piercing whine reverberated throughout the building.
A few seconds later, a door creaked on its hinges somewhere on the other side of that wooden carousel. Someone was walking toward them.
“Hail Mary, full of grace,” said the voice that broke the silence. Its echo bounced around the waiting area.
“Conceived without sin, Sister,” Carlos said doubtfully in the standard reply.
“How can I help you?”
Their invisible respondent interrogated him with extraordinary gentleness. For a moment, Carlos considered the possibility of throwing together an innocent story that would justify their visit while concealing what was already beginning to be an astounding series of events, but instead he offered a small part of the truth.
“You see, Sister, we are journalists on assignment from Madrid, writing a story on the holy objects that parishes in the Cameros have in their possession. The snowfall and the bad road conditions have deposited us here at your doorstep. What we’d like to know is if a certain nun named María Jesús de Ágreda lived here. She took her vows in the seventeenth century, and we were wondering if you have any record of her. A few weeks ago I mentioned her by chance in one of my articles without knowing if—”
A poke in the ribs from the photographer left the phrase unfinished.
“Why wouldn’t we have heard about her! She founded our order!”
Txema and Carlos exchanged mute looks of astonishment. The nun, unaware of their reactions, went on:
“If you’re here, it is because she led you here. Of that you can be certain,” she said, and a pleasant little laugh passed through the wooden cylinder. “She is famous as a miracle worker, and certainly something about you must have interested her. With all that is happening right now, the Venerable María must have wanted you for some important purpose. She can be very persuasive!”
“Can be?” Carlos asked, in an alarmed tone.
“Very well, she was very persuasive,” the nun conceded.
“And what did you mean when you said that she had ‘led us,’ Sister?”
“Nothing, nothing at all.” The nun was laughing. “There’s a key in the carousel. Take it and open the small door on the right. Walk all the way down the hallway to the end. When you get there you’ll be standing in front of a glass door with a key in it; go inside and light the stove. I will send one of the sisters to assist you straightaway.”
The orders, delivered with such sweetness, were so precise they had no choice but to obey. In fact, before they even had a chance to think about it, the carousel had spun around, revealing a small key secured to a yellow key chain. It was their passport into the monastery.
NINETEEN
ROME
At exactly 8:30 PM, Father Baldi returned to Saint Peter’s Square. He felt reasonably secure in those environs. A taxi left him on the corner where Borgo Pio meets Porta Angelica, in front of one of the Vatican’s busiest “service entrances,” used with great frequency by those who work inside the papal state. By that hour, most of them had already left their offices.
After giving it some thought, Baldi decided to play tough.
He understood that this was his one opportunity to avoid returning to Venice empty-handed. The unfortunate death of Saint Matthew had left him in a compromised position, which he needed to clear up at the earliest possible moment. And right there, inside God’s fortress, he sensed that a few answers awaited him.
Without giving it further thought, Baldi plunged into the stream of employees, hurried past the Swiss Guards’ sentry boxes, and entered the labyrinth of buildings en route to the Vatican’s Secretariat of State. The Secretariat’s façade, which stretched the entire length of that short block, was covered with gray wooden shutters and black iron grates. The building had recently undergone a restoration, and its copper plaque etched with a tiara and Peter’s keys to the kingdom gleamed brightly in the glare of the streetlights.
The interior of the building was another matter: hallways the color of lead and thin plywood doors with the names of cardinals and other members of the Curia taped on, serving to indicate that their status at any moment was merely superficial. The building was practically empty.
“How may I help you?”
A round-faced nun, dressed in a dark blue habit and crocheted head scarf, approached him from behind a large desk.
“I would like to see His Eminence Stanislaw Zsidiv.”
“Do you have an appointment?”
“No, but his Eminence knows me very well. Tell him that Father Giuseppe Baldi is here to see him from Venice. It is urgent, and furthermore,” he said as he waved the letter he had received from Zsidiv two days before, “I know he will be pleased to see me.”
The nun barely wasted a second before pushing the appropriate keys on her switchboard and conveying the message to the party at the other end of the line. After a perfunctory “Very well, he’ll see you,” which Baldi accepted with satisfaction, the nun guided him through the corridors leading to the Polish cardinal’s office.
“Here we are,” she said as she stood in front of yet another unremarkable doorway. “You may enter without knocking.”
No sooner had he crossed the office’s threshold than Baldi’s attention was caught by the fact that from his windows Zsidiv could see the lighted dome of Saint Peter’s, as well as a good number of the one hundred and forty statues in Bernini’s colonnade. His survey of the room ended with a set of splendid Renaissance tapestries, overflowing with pagan symbolism, which hung in well-lighted splendor in one corner of the room.
“Giuseppe! My God! How many years has it been!”
Zsidiv was a man of medium height. He was dressed in the red-trimmed robe of his rank, but his face was that of a clean-shaven Polish woodcutter who had about him all the warmth of a grave, while his blue eyes, hidden behind the thick lenses of his glasses, carefully scrutinized everything around him. The Cardinal rose from his black leather armchair and with a few imperious strides crossed the barely five feet separating him from his guest. Baldi took in the room’s odor, a peculiar mixture of expensive cologne and the Vatican’s cleaning service.
Baldi bent down on one knee, kissed the Cardinal’s ring and the cross around his neck, and the two men embraced. He took the seat directly in front of Zsidiv’s desk, straightened his priest’s robe, and cast a quick glance over the files and envelopes that lay spread out between the Cardinal and himself. The truth was they had no need of introductions. His Eminence and the Benedictine had known each other for years, since they were seminarians together in Florence. They had shared an interest in pre-polyphony, as well as the most noble ideals of their lives. It had been Zsidiv, born in Cracow and a personal friend of the Pope, who introduced Baldi to the organizers of Chronovision in the 1950s, when the project was just getting off the ground.
He later learned that Zsidiv
was “Saint John,” the project coordinator, who was in charge of overseeing the team’s activities and making sure the Chronovision project remained solely a Vatican affair. Although there was no need for secrets between the two men, they existed nonetheless.
“A stroke of luck that you came to see me, Giuseppe,” the Cardinal said. Zsidiv lowered his voice. “I had no idea how I was going to bring you up to date with what happened to Saint Matthew, our Father Corso, earlier this evening.”
“That is precisely what I wanted to speak to you about.”
“Indeed?” The Cardinal was surprised. His subordinate maintained a tone of absolute obedience. “You already know what happened?”
“I found out an hour ago. I saw the police cars in front of his house.”
“You went by his house?” Zsidiv’s expression changed. Baldi’s action was a clear violation of the rules and regulations governing the Four Evangelists.
“Well, I could say that your letter was in some way responsible for that. As well as the curt order to come to Rome to give an explanation for what happened with the Spanish journalist. That is what the request was about, no?”
“I’m afraid so, Giuseppe. Once again.”
“But I swear to you that I never—”
The Cardinal brought him to a swift halt.
“No excuses!” he said, and then leaning across his desk, lowered his voice. “The walls have ears.”
Zsidiv leaned back in his chair, and his voice returned to normal. Baldi knew what had just happened. Even if he was Chronovision’s coordinator, and a personal ally, the Cardinal played an important role among the guardians of orthodoxy. His part was that of a double agent. Difficult. Ambiguous. Which was why Baldi never completely trusted him.
“I am not the one who demanded your presence here,” he went on. “Your hangmen await at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The Sant’Uffizio. But you know what? None of that is important anymore, my friend. With the death of the First Evangelist, many changes are in the offing. The Pope is preoccupied by Chronovision. I fear that it will be taken out of our hands and they will uncover things better left buried. Do you follow?”
The Lady in Blue Page 8
