The Road to Gandolfo

by Robert Ludlum

  “Oh, Mr. Dellacroce knows better than that, boy.” Hawkins patted Devereaux’s cheek with his right hand while, with his left, he kept an iron grip on the base of Sam’s skull, inhibiting any movement above the waist. “Dellacroce’s a very religious man, most of these Italian fellas are; doesn’t make any difference what they do for a living. That’s separate. He knows I told him the truth.”

  “What the hell are you talking about? What’s religion got to do with anything? Get off my neck!”

  “Religion helps a man recognize the truth. He may not like it; his religion may not like it, or even admit it is the truth, but because he’s contemplated, the religious man can separate what’s real from what’s horseshit. You follow me?”

  “Not for a goddamned second! My neck hurts!”

  “Sorry. I’ll ease up, but it’s time we talk.” MacKenzie removed his hand. Instantly Devereaux bolted, but the Hawk merely rolled with him, pinning him back to the earth. “I said we’ve got to talk, boy. You’re a reasonable person; you can see the logic in that.”

  “The problem,” whispered Sam, straining on the ground, “is that you’re not reasonable or logical! Do you know what you’ve done? Guys like that—” He gestured with his head; somehow, he could not use his hands. “They freeze people for welching on their bookies! They think nothing about paying for the biggest funeral in town—for a paisan who held out on a skim! I know. I’m from Boston.”

  “You’re overreacting again. Mr. Dellacroce won’t do anything like that. He knows where he stands—which is roughly in twenty feet of lye if he doesn’t behave. That account in Geneva. He stole from his own people.”

  Grudgingly, suspiciously, Devereaux stared at Mac in the moonlight. “You’re sure of that?”

  “It was all in the G-two files. Trouble was nobody put it together. I don’t think they wanted to; Dellacroce’s crowd are big Pentagon supporters, what with government contracts and union affiliations—. Now, will you listen to me?”

  With a reluctance born of fear, but with an assent formed in necessity, Sam nodded. The Hawk helped him up and the two men walked into the rough off fairway six. There was a large oak tree whose leaves filtered the moonlight. Sam sat down against the trunk; Mac fell to one knee in front of him, the line officer clarifying orders at a fire base.

  “Remember a couple of weeks ago my telling you how I was looking into things I hadn’t thought much about before? God and the church and things like that.”

  “I remember saying I wouldn’t laugh—–” Devereaux’s reply was flat, wary. A monotone.

  “That was very thoughtful, boy. Well, I was doing some thinking, but not quite in the way you maybe considered. You and I know that ninety-nine percent of all Commie propaganda is horseshit; everybody knows that. Ours is only—say, fifty to sixty percent, so we’re way ahead on that score. But that one percent of the Bolshie feedback got me to wondering. About this Catholic situation. Not what people believe, that’s their business. But how the organization operates. And it seemed to me that these Vatican fellows got such a good thing going they should spread a little more around. I mean, they got investments, son. When the stock market goes up a couple of points anywhere in the world, they make zillions.”

  “And if it goes down, they lose zillions.”

  “Not so! The brokers get ’em out in time or they get canned from the Knights of Malta. It’s part of the arrangement. And they can’t get their pictures taken with the pope.”

  “That is horseshit.”

  “If it is, why do all the Catholic brokers on Wall Street have all those initials after their names. You know of any college degrees that start with the letter K? Malta, Columbus, Lourdes. And the saints! Jesus! Knights of Assisi, Knights of Peter, Matthew—it goes on for pages. It’s kind of a social order. The more a fellow on the stock exchange does for the Vatican, the better the K after his name. And Wall Street’s only one example. It’s the same all over the place.”

  “I think you’ve been reading some pretty strange books. The Ku Klux Klanner, maybe. Nineteen twenty edition.”

  “Hell, no. I don’t cotton to that shit. A man’s got a right to believe anything he likes. I’m only talking about the financial part. Then there’s real estate. Do you know the sort of real estate the Vatican boys have? I swear they pick up rent from the Ginza to the Gaza strips and most places in between. They own the prime properties in New York, Chicago, Hartford, Detroit—’most every place where the micks, the wops, the Polacks and all those kind of people migrated. They always do it the same way. They go in early—before all the ethnics get settled—and buy up land and build a big church. Naturally, all these Ellis Islanders are nervous being in a strange place and all, so they build their houses near the church. In a generation or so their kids are lawyers and dentists and own automobile dealerships. So what do they do? They move out to the suburbs and go to work where they once lived, which is now the center of town, the business district. And the church property skyrockets! It’s a regular pattern, boy!”

  “I’m trying to find something negative here and I can’t,” said Sam, staring in the shadows at the excited Hawkins. “What’s wrong with the pattern?”

  “I didn’t say it was wrong. I said it made for one hell of a centralized portfolio.”

  “ ‘Centralized portfolio’? You’ve got a new vocabulary.”

  “Like you said, I’ve been reading. And not such strange books as you might think. You see, Sam, the product these Vatican boys manufacture—that’s not meant disrespectfully, only in a business sense—doesn’t change. It may have to adjust a mite now and then, take a tuck here or a nip there, but the basic merchandise stays the same. That reduces a major cost factor and allows for a continuous profit figure with no chance of negative entry—–”

  “ ‘Negative entry’?”

  “That’s an accounting term.”

  “I know it’s an accounting term. How do you know—don’t tell me. Your reading material.”

  “Maggie’s drawers, son.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind. You’re on target, that’s all. Now, you take an economic situation where the stock exchanges and the real estate markets hold firm, and that means you got the banks, because you control both money and land. Prime economic resources. And you add to that a product that requires minimum assembly alterations with maximum purchase growth—hell, boy, it’s a worldwide gold mine.”

  “You have been reading. But if you’re right, why’s there’s so much hassle over the parochial schools and their costs?”

  “That’s services, Sam. That’s an entirely different entry column. I’m talking about basic portfolios, not annual operating expenditures; they fluctuate with economic conditions. Anyway, it’s mostly blackmail.”

  “That’s succinct. They wouldn’t like you in Boston.”

  The Hawk shifted his weight and spoke a little more softly, but with no loss of emphasis. “You mentioned before about something wrong. Well, I don’t like to mention it because it only applies to the pricky-shit high brass and not the troops, but there is something that’s got a bit of stink to it.”

  “You found a moral position?”

  “Morality and economics should be more related than they have been; everybody knows that. You take this political thing. Nobody’s traded fire power with the Reds any better’n I have. Goddamn, nobody’s going to bury me! But it strikes me that these Catholic fellas in the Vatican—and that means all the powerful dioceses—use the Bolshie excuse a mite too freely to oppose a lot of reforms that could make things easier for the peasant slobs scratching a life out of very tough ground.”

  Devereaux eyed Hawkins skeptically. “That position’s a little dated. A great many changes are taking place in the Church. This new pope is opening a lot of windows. Like John the Twenty-third did.”

  “Not quick enough, Sam. What the Vatican brass needs is a good shake-up in command!”

  “You can’t change a two-thousand-year pattern overnight—
–”

  “Oh, I understand that,” interrupted the Hawk. “And I’m glad you brought up this new pope. This Francesco. Because he’s a very popular fellow. Even those who hate his guts—for doing what he’s doing—know he’s the biggest asset they’ve got in the whole damn church—–that’s not meant in a religious sense, of course. I don’t take positions that way.”

  “What positions? What sense?”

  “This Francesco,” continued Mac, overlooking Devereaux’s questions, “is more than just the pope, which is enough to begin with. He’s a beloved individual, you know what I’m driving at?”

  “I wish you wouldn’t say that.”

  “He’s the sort of person every man jack of a Catholic would really sacrifice for, you see what I mean?”

  “I don’t like that phrase, either.”

  The Hawk changed knees rapidly; it was good to redistribute weight as often as possible when in an immobile position. “Do you know the estimated total communicant membership of the Catholic Church?”

  “The what?”

  “How many Catholics there are in the world? Never mind, I’ll tell you. Four hundred million. Now, taking the median figure of one American dollar—setting a specific date for the rate of exchange; some giving more, most less—that comes to four hundred million dollars.”

  “What does?”

  “The projected gross.”

  “What projected gross?”

  “Of the Shepherd Company’s business services. This here ‘brokering the acquisition of religious artifacts.’ It’s a clear ratio of ten to one in terms of capitalization, but naturally the profit ratio, as opposed to the gross figure, will be affected by the necessary outlay for equipment and support personnel.”

  “What the hell are you babbling about?!”

  “We’re going to kidnap the pope, Sam.”

  “Whaat!”

  “I’ve got a trunkful of books, boy. I’ve really been studying the tactical problems and I think I’ve got ’em licked. You see, there’s this place called Chiesa di San Tommaso di Villanova in Gandolfo—pardon my lousy Italian—and the route from the Vatican is over a kind of country thoroughfare called the Via Appia Antica. It’s the road to this here Gandolfo—Castel Gandolfo, they call it. These Italians, they never use one word when they can use two.”

  “Whaaat?!”

  “Now, don’t go overreacting. You’ll wake up Dellacroce.”

  “Whaaat?”

  “But first we have to corral the remaining capitalization. There’s thirty million more coming. I believe I’ve almost narrowed down the three investors, but I’ve still got some refining to do.” The Hawk clapped his hand over Devereaux’s open mouth. “Now, don’t start that again. You keep repeating yourself.”

  Devereaux’s eyes bulged above MacKenzie’s spread hand, but the rest of his body was frozen. Sort of a form of comatose shock, thought Hawkins. He’d seen a lot of that kind of thing when raw recruits got their first taste of a fire fight. At least Sam wasn’t screaming. Or struggling. He was just plain still and kind of cold. The Hawk continued; he had only a few words left to say. The in-depth command analyses would come later. In a way he was glad Devereaux’s overreaction was so extreme. In his enthusiasm he had nearly given Sam some tactical information he was not sure he wanted Devereaux to have.

  “I didn’t choose you lightly. No superior-adjutant is an easy choice for a commander to make, for in many ways the SA is an extension of himself. You got it on merit, boy. I don’t say you’re ideal, you’ve got deficiencies. I’ve told you that. But goddamn, your assets outpoint your liabilities. I say that as an honest friend as well as a superior officer.

  “Now, there’ll be certain executive orders that you’ll be asked to carry out, not always knowing precisely why they’re vital. You’ll just have to accept them. Command is a lonely responsibility; there’s not always the time to share the reasons for one’s decisions. Ask any frontline officer who sends a battalion into fire. But you’ll do splendidly I just know you will. And if by any chance you’re tempted to question the orders of your superior officer, or feel that you cannot in conscience implement them, I think you should know that our investor, Angelo Dellacroce, believes that you alone, as the attorney and secretary-treasurer of the Shepherd Company, compiled that list of his illegal activities and furnished me with them. I believe that’s why he didn’t care to shake hands with you. Coupled with your G-two espionage violations, I’d say your position was somewhat untenable. But if I were you and had my druthers, I’d choose to fight the government treason charges rather than our investor, Mr. Dellacroce. I think that Mafia bastard would cut your balls off, grind ’em up in a blender, and serve ’em as a fancy pâté at your funeral. Like you said earlier, it’d probably be an expensive funeral.”

  There was no point in the Hawk holding his hand over his superior-adjutant’s mouth any longer. Sam had merfed and gleefed in a spasm of panic and passed out cold.

  The moonlight, filtering through the leaves of the large, sturdy oak in the rough off fairway six, cut shafts of yellow and white across Sam’s young, peaceful, unmistakably strong features.

  Goddamn, thought MacKenzie, the boy’s going to be fine! He just needed a little time to absorb the facts. Of course, if a person didn’t know any better, he’d think the son of a bitch was dead.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Sam Devereaux sank despondently into the hotel chair and wished he were dead.

  Well, not really, but it certainly would solve a lot of problems. Of course, it was entirely possible that the state of his demise might come about whether he desired it or not. Which brought his eyes back to the insane, unfiled but filled-out limited partnership agreement between the Shepherd Company, MacKenzie Hawkins, President, and the North Hampton Corporation, Mrs. Angelo Dellacroce, President; Depository; the Great Bank of Geneva, Switzerland. He held the legal document in his hand and wondered absently where his fingernails had gone.

  Prominently on the first page, directly under the title of president and above the line reserved for the secretary-treasurer, was his name.

  Mr. Samuel Devereaux, Counselor-at-law, Suite 4-F, The Drake Hotel, New York City.

  He speculated for a moment whether he could alter the Drake’s registry and then abandoned the idea. What was the point? On one flank (flank?) was the United States government with very specific espionage laws, and on the other was Angelo Dellacroce and his guards-of-honor with their white ties on white shirts and dark glasses and black suits and very unspecific methods of dealing with the likes of “squeals” such as S. Devereaux, counselor-at-law.

  Sam wondered what Aaron Pinkus would do. Then he realized what Aaron would do and abandoned that thought, too.

  Pinkus would sit Shiva for him.

  He got out of the chair and wandered aimlessly through the hotel suite. What the hell was he going to do? What in God’s name could he do? His gaze fell on the unsigned, typewritten note on the desk.

  Copies of this limited partnership agreement have been sent by messenger to MacKenzie Hawkins, Esquire, President, the Shepherd Company, % The Watergate Hotel, Wash. D.C. Instructions cabled: Great Bank of Geneva. Funds transfer awaits presence Sec.-Treas., Shep. Co., Samuel Devereaux in Geneva.

  He had been cabled—internationally.

  In some marble banking hall in Switzerland, a powerful broker of international finance had no doubt already listed him as the bona fide overseer of the transfer of ten million dollars into an account of a nonfiled but very much existing company named Shepherd.

  That’s what he was going to do whether he liked it or not. It was Geneva, or a lifetime of cracking rocks at Leavenworth, or Dellacroce justice—feet-in-cement style.

  Kidnap the pope!

  My God! That’s what the crazy bastard said. He was going to kidnap the pope!

  All of Mac’s other insanities paled by any stretch of comparison! World War Three might be more acceptable! A simple war would be so much—well, simpler. Borders were d
efined, objectives properly obscured, ideologies flexible. A war was duck soup compared to 400 million hysterical Catholics; and heads of state moaning and groaning their obsequious platitudes, blaming every conceivable inimical faction, extremist or not (secretly glad to be rid of the meddling nuisance in the Vatican) and …

  My God! World War Three could be a very logical consequence of Hawkins’s act!

  And with that realization Sam knew what he had to do. He had to stop MacKenzie. But he could not stop him if he were in a maximum security cell in Leavenworth; who would believe him? And he certainly could not stop him if he were at the bottom of one of the deeper sections of the Hudson River, probably upstate, courtesy of Angelo Dellacroce; who would hear him?

  No, the only way he could push the Hawk’s insanity out of the realm of reality was to find out how the hell MacKenzie intended to pull off his papal score. The most foolish thing here would be to assume he couldn’t do it. The Hawk was no joke; anyone who thought he was need only look at a few of Mac’s accomplishments—including four extraordinary ex-wives who adored him, and a little matter of an initial capitalization of ten million dollars, to say nothing of military exploits spanning three decades and the same number of wars.

  What the Hawk was bringing to the profession of crime were all the strategic resources, the finely honed discipline, and the leadership of an experienced general officer. MacKenzie was starting at the top; no graduate of the lineup he, but instead, a full-fledged criminal commander who had already outsacked a Mafia don in his own backyard.

  The son of a bitch had flare. Christ! He had the balls of King Kong smashing the concrete off the Empire State Building as he climbed up the sides.

  Kidnap the pope!

  Who the hell would believe it?

  Samuel Devereaux believed it, that’s who believed it. What was left was for S. Devereaux, counselor-at-law, to figure out how to stop it. And stay both alive and outside prison walls so doing. A vague idea was coming into focus, but it was still too blurred to make sense. Yet there was a core of possibility within the outlines.