The Debt

by Glenn Cooper

  ‘It’s my pleasure, Holy Father.’

  ‘And congratulations are in order. I was informed by Monsignor Moller that Harvard has awarded you a prestigious professorship.’

  Cal laughed. ‘How did he find out?’

  ‘Our Moller seems to know everything. I don’t know what I would do without him.

  ‘So,’ the pope began, ‘you see the cat is partially out of the bag. I had a sense we would need to proceed quickly with our new foundation and my fears have proven to have a basis. There are elements within the Church, perhaps within the Curia, who will oppose us. They have planted false and half-true stories with the media. This is only the beginning of what will certainly become a larger and louder campaign.’

  ‘Do you have any idea where the leak came from?’ Cal asked.

  ‘I have no idea,’ Celestine said wearily. ‘Very few people know the facts. I am convinced that my most trusted advisors and confidants are blameless.’ He looked toward Gail and asked, ‘What do you think, Mrs Sassoon?’

  His penetrating gaze seemed to unnerve her. ‘I would never speak to anyone about this! I’m a huge supporter of the notion of the IFH.’

  ‘I only found out about this a couple of days ago,’ Julian added, pushing aside a curly lock that had fallen over one eye. ‘I’ve spoken to no one other than Gail and Professor Donovan.’

  The pope nodded. ‘I have no doubt that the three of you have been discreet, but there is another party.’

  ‘You mean Marcus?’ Gail said.

  The pope turned a palm upward. ‘He did strike me as unsupportive.’

  ‘I can’t believe Marcus would do such a thing,’ Gail said but she didn’t sound like she was totally convinced.

  ‘I think he’s perfectly capable of doing it,’ Julian said.

  ‘I don’t know Marcus Sassoon very well,’ Cal said, ‘so I’m not the one to comment but I’d like to point out that there was likely an earlier leak before anyone in the Sassoon family was even aware of the loan.’

  ‘You speak of the attempt on your life,’ the pope said.

  ‘That’s right. It suggests a Vatican source. Where there’s one leak others might follow.’

  ‘Well, this is troubling,’ Celestine said, ‘but we must not be diverted from the task at hand. I understand, Mr Sassoon, that your father in his wisdom has made you a significant beneficiary of his interest in the bank. You are therefore in a position to have a great deal of influence in the establishment of the foundation. That is why I wanted to meet you, to answer any questions you might have and to see if you are supportive.’

  Julian leaned in and said, ‘As you can see, I’m fairly young. I haven’t had all that much so-called real-world experience. I went from college to business school with only a year in between where I traveled and had a good time. Other than doing some part-time work at the bank I’ve never held down a job. But here’s what I do have. I have my father’s genes and I spent my life watching how he conducted himself. He was an honest, honorable man and I’d like to think that I am too.’

  ‘Wonderful, wonderful,’ the pope murmured.

  ‘He was a great fan of what you wanted to accomplish and so am I. You have my full support. I’ll be voting to accept your settlement terms for the debt and with my stepmother’s shares we’ll have the majority. My cousins may not like it but they’ll have no choice but to accept it.’

  Gail reached for a tissue to blot her eyes. Cal couldn’t tell whether she was proud of him or rueful of the stepmother tag.

  ‘What a mature young man you are,’ the pope said beaming his first smile of the day. ‘You deserve credit for the man you have become, although your parents and your teachers are owed some too.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Gail said.

  ‘Let me tell you a small personal anecdote,’ the pope continued. ‘When I was a young man, about your age, I too had little in the way of real-world experience. But I had a sense, an overpowering sense, that I had a calling to the priesthood. My parents and my friends argued that I should experience more of a secular life before making this spiritual commitment but I knew who I was. So I tell you, keep following your instincts, keep following your heart and your path in life will be a smooth one.’

  ‘I never thought a pope would be offering me life-coaching,’ Julian joked, ‘but I appreciate the advice. Here’s what my instincts are telling me. I need to move fast to take control of the bank so that, along with my stepmother’s shares, I can intelligently exercise my majority control. At the same time, I want to be intimately involved with setting up and governing the IFH, if that’s acceptable with you.’

  ‘It would be a pleasure to have your intimate involvement.’

  ‘What about school?’ Gail blurted out.

  ‘I don’t need the degree. It’s only a piece of paper. It’s time for me to step up and enter the ring.’

  The pope smiled again. ‘I would have thought that a degree from Harvard had a certain value, wouldn’t you say so, Professor?’

  ‘Maybe one from the Divinity School,’ he deadpanned.

  ‘You said I could ask you some questions?’ Julian said.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘OK, here’s the big one. I’ve been doing some research on the state of Vatican finances. Two things jumped out at me. First, you guys – sorry, I probably shouldn’t be referring to you as a guy – you gentlemen probably don’t have a good handle on the precise magnitude of your assets and liabilities. It looks like you’ve been fairly public about your frustrations on lack of financial transparency among some of your departments.’

  ‘Indeed I have. Go on.’

  ‘Second, from publicly available data, I’d be amazed if you have even a tenth of the liquid assets to satisfy a twenty-five-billion-euro debt. So here’s my question: how are you going to raise the money?’

  The kid’s a force of nature, Cal thought.

  ‘Mr Sassoon,’ the pope said, ‘if you hadn’t decided to work for your own bank I would have been pleased to offer you a position as a consultant to help us work through our financial issues. It seems you have – what do the Americans call it – the right stuff. Now, to the issue of funding the IFH. As you correctly surmise, we do not have the necessary cash on hand – nowhere near it. We will be obliged to sell certain assets.’

  ‘Which assets?’ Julian asked.

  Gail intervened. ‘For heaven’s sake, Julian! Marcus sat here two weeks ago and asked the same question. Isn’t that up to the Vatican? It seems to me it’s none of our business.’

  ‘I’m afraid I don’t agree, Gail,’ Julian said. ‘It’s an important question.’

  Cal thought he caught Celestine looking slightly startled at Julian’s use of her first name.

  Julian pressed on. ‘The Sassoon Bank – a Jewish bank – is going to have to deal with the public fallout over this arrangement. It’s one thing if the Vatican is going to be liquidating mutual funds and selling commercial real estate. It’s something very different if you’ve got to sell off art.’

  Cal never had the temerity to ask specifically how Celestine intended to raise the funds. But the kid was right. He’d certainly thought about it. Liquidating artwork was going to be a tough pill for the faithful to swallow.

  The pope folded his arms across his cassock and said, ‘In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus said, “Sell all that you possess and distribute it to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven.” We do have assets we can sell to acquire treasure in heaven. Some of them, including real estate and land, are not so controversial. Others are more so.’

  ‘Paintings,’ Gail said quietly. ‘Sculptures.’

  ‘Yes, these things,’ the pope said. ‘How much of it, I do not yet know. A valuation exercise is in progress.’

  ‘This could get ugly,’ Julian said, shaking his curly head.

  ‘Professor, do you agree?’ the pope asked.

  ‘I’m afraid I do but I’m sure Your Holiness has given the matter extensive thought.’

&nb
sp; ‘More than thought. Prayer as well.’

  ‘So where do we go from here?’ Cal asked. ‘How are you intending to correct the media representation that the Vatican intends to pay billions directly to the Sassoons?’

  ‘We must correct the record swiftly,’ the pope said, ‘before the misperceptions of the public harden. This means we have to quickly work behind the scenes to work through the parameters by which the IFH will function. We need to thrash out a foundation charter and recruit a nucleus of trustees. Then and only then can we offer full transparency as to our intention to satisfy the debt via the IFH.’

  Julian nodded vigorously. ‘My stepmother and I are both willing to serve as trustees.’

  ‘Excellent,’ the pope said. ‘Might I suggest two gentlemen to represent the Vatican, Cardinals Da Silva of Boston and Vargas of Toledo, Spain. This nucleus of four can help recruit future trustees with the necessary expertise along with the staff to manage a large foundation.’

  ‘I’m willing to roll up my sleeves and stay here until the job is done,’ Julian said.

  ‘I am too,’ Gail said.

  ‘Wonderful,’ the pope declared. ‘I will summon these cardinals to the Vatican.’

  ‘It looks like my work here is done,’ Cal said lightly.

  ‘Actually, Professor,’ Celestine said, ‘I would like to request your help with a necessary task to help us move forward.’

  Ever since her mother died there had been a tradition in Elisabetta Celestino’s family to come together once a week for supper at her father’s apartment in Rome. On this evening, she was the last to arrive and had to endure the taunts of her siblings for being late.

  Her sister, Micaela, laid it on thick. ‘I’m a doctor with a ward full of patients, Zazo’s the number two man in the Vatican Gendarmerie, which is up to its ass with protesters if you haven’t heard, and my sister, the archeologist, is the late one. What happened, did a skeleton try and escape from the catacombs?’

  Their father told Micaela to be more respectful to a woman of God then laughed at his own comment since no one was as irreverent as he. Carlo Celestino had been appalled when Elisabetta decided to throw in the towel on a promising career in archeology to become a nun, but ever since the pope had chosen her for a prominent position at the Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology and she had moved from her communal residence to her own apartment, he had calmed down considerably.

  ‘At least she’s essentially back in academia again,’ he had said.

  For him, academics had been his whole life. His mandatory retirement from the Department of Theoretical Mathematics at La Sapienza hadn’t gone down particularly easily. The family night was one way his children kept tabs on his mental and physical well being.

  ‘I’m starving,’ Zazo said. ‘If you were another minute longer I’d have passed out.’ Zazo couldn’t escape his childhood nickname around the supper table but his men knew him as Colonel Emilio Celestino.

  ‘Who cooked?’ Elisabetta asked, sitting down at the table.

  ‘Papa,’ Micaela said, rolling her eyes. ‘I was too busy.’

  ‘What’s with the attitude?’ Carlo asked. ‘I can cook.’

  ‘When you’re all clutching your stomachs later, just be grateful I’m a gastroenterologist,’ she said.

  ‘So, Papa,’ Elisabetta said, ‘how’s Goldbach?’

  It was a running joke. Carlo had been trying his whole career to solve the Goldbach conjecture, one of the thorniest problems in theoretical mathematics for over two centuries. His children were convinced that old Goldbach was one of the few things keeping Carlo ticking. If he ever solved it, or worse still, if someone else solved it, it might be a happy day for mathematics but a sad day for the Celestino siblings.

  ‘Goldbach is fine,’ Carlo said, ‘he says hello.’

  As Micaela was passing the platter, her brother’s mobile phone started ringing from his uniform jacket in the hall.

  ‘Leave it,’ Carlo said.

  ‘I can’t. It’s my work phone,’ he said, rising to grab it from the coat rack.

  ‘How can you tell?’

  ‘Different ring. If you couldn’t figure that out how do you expect to solve your Goldbach?’

  ‘That was so cruel!’ Elisabetta laughed.

  He came back in looking glum. ‘Looks like I’m going to be the only one who won’t need a stomach pump tonight.’

  ‘What’s the matter?’ Micaela asked.

  ‘One of my guys is waiting out front to pick me up. The pope’s private secretary, Monsignor Moller, seems to be missing. We’ve been asked to find him.’

  Micaela perked up. ‘Which one of your guys?’

  ‘She’s hoping it’s Vittorio,’ Elisabetta teased.

  ‘I am not,’ her sister said. ‘Well, is it?’

  ‘Yes, it’s Vittorio,’ her brother said, rolling his eyes.

  ‘You’d better ask him up,’ Carlo said, ‘or she’ll be impossible for the rest of the evening.’

  Major Vittorio Pinotti was a bit on the young side but Micaela didn’t view his age as disqualifying. From her perspective he had a lot going for him. He was quite good looking, although he wasn’t a genius, he wasn’t a dunce either, he was unattached, heterosexual, and most importantly, her brother vouched for him. Pinotti had been on the receiving end of Celestino’s promotions, backfilling the vacant slot.

  ‘Ciao, everyone,’ Pinotti said. ‘Sorry to break up a family meal.’

  ‘Ciao, Vittorio,’ Micaela purred.

  Pinotti seemed to get the hint. ‘I should give you a call sometime,’ he said. ‘Do I have your number? Is it OK if I call her, Colonel?’

  ‘What is this, the Middle Ages?’ Micaela said. ‘You need to get the permission of my brother?’ She gave him a business card and said, ‘This is maybe the fifth card I’ve given you. I’m running out of them.’

  ‘Come on, let’s go,’ Celestino said, pulling on his coat.

  Pinotti said, ‘I’ll call you.’

  Ludwig Moller lived in an unassuming apartment block on the Via Aurelia, a short distance from Vatican City. Since it was outside his jurisdiction, Colonel Celestino was obligated to work with the Roman Municipal Police to effect entry if necessary. From the street the apartment had its lights on.

  ‘We’ll try his number again,’ Celestino said to his fresh-faced municipal colleagues.

  ‘Hopefully he answers and we can go back to our warm car,’ the male officer said.

  ‘Call him, Vittorio.’

  There was no reply and Celestino said, ‘OK, let’s go.’

  Pinotti rang the doorbell of the first-floor flat and banged on the door a few times before Celestino declared that it was necessary to force entry for a wellness check.

  ‘Are you sure he didn’t just take a vacation?’ the female officer asked.

  ‘Look, his boss is concerned about him and we can’t leave until I know.’

  ‘Who’s his boss?’

  ‘Pope Celestine.’

  ‘Then you’d better break the lock,’ the male officer said.

  Celestino corrected him. ‘No, you’d better break it. First off, it’s your jurisdiction. Second, I outrank you. By a lot.’

  The female officer gave her colleague a ‘well, don’t look at me’ glance and he reluctantly put his boot to it until wood splintered around the lock.

  The hallway was dark but a light was coming from the lounge.

  Pinotti called out, ‘Hello? Monsignor Moller? It’s the Vatican Gendarmes.’

  The lounge was empty. Everything was tidy and in place. The small adjoining kitchen was immaculate.

  ‘I’ll check the bedroom,’ Celestino said.

  It was dark and when he switched on the light, there was a sealed envelope on the perfectly made bed. It was addressed to His Holiness, Pope Celestine.

  The male officer came in and began to reach for it before Pinotti warned him off. ‘Hey, get your gloves on,’ he said.

  The bathroom door was closed but
a light was shining underneath it.

  Pushing the door open, Celestino saw its reflection in the mirror above the sink.

  A bloated head the color of blueberries, dangling from the shower head by an electrical cord.

  To Cal, it seemed that the pontiff might have hardly slept; he appeared to have aged overnight, the flesh of his face loosened by grief.

  ‘It was a suicide,’ the pope said. ‘He was found last night but the authorities say he probably took his life the previous night. Here is the letter he left for me.’

  Holy Father,

  Please know that it has been the joy of my life to serve you. I have never known a man with so much wisdom, compassion, and spiritual grace. I have failed you and for this I offer my abject apology and my life,

  Yours in Christ,

  Ludwig Moller

  ‘How did he fail you?’ Cal asked.

  ‘My interpretation is that he was taking responsibility for the leak to the press. However, I have no idea how he learned about the debt or with whom he communicated. I excluded him from meetings where I discussed it. These may be secrets that poor Ludwig has taken to his grave.’

  ‘There must have been something else,’ Cal said. ‘Something else in his life.’

  The pope’s sadness was heartbreaking. ‘Perhaps. I saw him almost every day for two years yet I hardly knew him. Whose fault is that but mine? I understand he played the violin very well. I wish I had asked him to play for me.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Holy Father.’

  ‘Life must go on. We still have work to do, important work, before we are called to Christ’s kingdom – me, well before you. I wanted to talk to you about the assignment you agreed to undertake even before you knew what it was! You are indeed a dear friend. Remind me that I need to know you better, Professor – when we have more time, of course.’

  ‘I will.’

  ‘Now, the work. When we formally announce the debt repayment and the formation of the IFH we will need to issue a formal declaration of ecclesiastical principles, the foundation upon which we have made our decision.’

  ‘Historically, that could range anywhere from an ecclesiastical letter to a papal bull,’ Cal said.