I picked up my room key at the front desk of the hotel lobby, excused myself from my new partners, and headed up to try to sleep off the fatigue of that twenty-eight-hour flight. The room had a balcony, so I stepped outside to let some of the travel buzz clear from my head. Saint Peter’s Basilica, an easy walk from the hotel, stood prominent in the light haze of the late Roman morning. It should have been an awe-inspiring sight, but the uncertainty swirling around Marion, along with the twinge of guilt I felt for being there without her, made it a little depressing.
I let out an exhausted breath that accomplished nothing satisfying. Too tired to sleep, I stepped back into the room, kicked off my shoes, snatched up the laptop, and climbed into the bed to begin the banal task of transferring my longhand notes onto the computer.
There was a knock on the door.
“Yeah?” Probably Barnes, I thought, not bothering to get up.
“Mr. Adams, are you awake?”
It was the muffled voice of Dr. Mikos.
What the hell does she want? I rolled off the bed and pulled open the door. She stood in the hallway, barefoot, wearing a white, calf-length bathrobe—I wasn’t sure what else. Her hair, free of the ponytail and the baseball hat, fell partially over one eye and spilled down over her shoulders. Her eyes—softer now, even warm, quizzical, almost playful—again evoked that odd sensation of familiarity. The stern scientist was gone, had given way, amazingly, to a woman that was actually attractive.
“I hope I did not bother you,” she said, pushing the hair away from her eye, “but I believe I owe you an apology.”
“Apology?”
“I fear I did not make a good first impression. As I told you, I am deeply concerned about the plight of the Pialigarian people. But there is more. You may know that my father is dead because someone believed he was in possession of the scroll. Perhaps I am overly concerned about how you will handle this artifact once we find it. I apologize if I came across as arrogant.”
“Arrogant? You didn’t strike me as arrogant,” I lied. “A little anally retentive, maybe. But hey, we all have our faults.”
“For what we wish to accomplish with the Pialigarians, a novelist of your stature is certainly the best approach.”
An acceptable apology. “Thank you.”
“The hotel, it has a wonderful hot tub, quite soothing after a long flight. Perhaps you would care to join me?”
“Join you? In the hot tub?”
Her tone was matter-of-fact, as innocent as if she’d just offered me a slice of pizza. I figured it must have had something to do with that notoriously loose European lifestyle, though she didn’t exactly strike me as the loose type. I had to admit that I did have an unexpected curiosity about the landscape beneath that white robe, but my monogamous inclinations immediately ushered an image of Marion—frowning, arms crossed—to the forefront of my mind. And that was reason enough to decline the invitation.
But there was more: I loathed hot tubs. I didn’t even know it until Alyssa and I were honeymooning at the Colorado Hotel, in Glenwood Springs. We were on our way to the hot springs pool when I caught my first whiff of the rotten-egg smell of sulfur dioxide. I couldn’t get in the water. I started trembling; beads of perspiration broke out across my forehead. The combination of steam and the stink of sulfur was so nauseating that I had to go back to our room.
“Thermophobia.” Alyssa’s doctor explained it when she mentioned the incident at her next visit. “Fear of heat. Your husband might have accidentally gotten burned in a bath when he was a baby.”
I had no recollection of any such incident, but it was a fact that my bathing choice had always been the shower. There might have been some truth to the doctor’s explanation.
“Do you not enjoy the hot tub?” Dr. Mikos asked.
“No, I don’t enjoy them. They make me sick.”
“The hot tub makes you sick?”
“Especially after a long flight. Jet lag, I think. Probably something to do with circadian rhythms.”
“Circadian rhythms?” She considered my response with the furrowed brow of a puzzled scientist. “That sounds quite serious. You should probably get some rest. Perhaps another time.” She started to walk away and then stopped. “Melatonin.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Melatonin,” she said again. “It is a hormone produced in the pineal gland that aids in the regulation of circadian rhythms. Perhaps you should consider trying it as a dietary supplement.” She turned and walked down the hall. “I will see you in the lobby at one thirty,” she called over her shoulder.
“One thirty,” I called back.
I closed the door and leaned against it. Jet lag? Circadian rhythms? How in the hell did I come up with that? I hadn’t thought about circadian rhythms since I’d learned to pronounce the word in freshman biology. Was I afraid to admit that I had a girlfriend who might take a pretty dim view of me splashing around in a hot tub with a half-naked female, even if she was an archaeologist?
I pushed away from the door and sunk back into the bed. Maybe my biological clock was experiencing a serious synchronizational malfunction.
Or maybe Barnes was right; the woman really was having a serious effect on my IQ.
I stood in the glass-enclosed hotel lobby, hands thrust in the pockets of my slacks fondling loose change, scanning the busy street in front of the hotel. 1:25 PM. The Vatican limo had been scheduled to arrive within the next five minutes. If my calculations were correct, Dr. Mikos, Barnes, and I would be leaving for our meeting with Cardinal Sorrentino at about the same time the 5:30 AM alarm in my bedroom in Colorado would go off. Marion would be there. She’d slap the clock into silence and snuggle deeper into the warmth of the feather comforter. She’d lie there for a while, thinking. About us? By mid-afternoon, she’d be back at her apartment in Dallas. In two days, it’d be San Francisco, bidding another job. That was all I knew of her schedule.
I tugged at the collar of my shirt and coaxed a little more slack into the knot of my necktie. Vatican dress code required that I break a several-year abstinence from wearing my navy blazer and tie. Not that I had anything against dressing up, but T-shirts and jeans usually sufficed for my life in the mountains.
Wes Barnes sat in perfect ease at the other side of the lobby. He was calm, legs crossed, the full spread of a newspaper draped like a drying dish towel between his extended arms. His tie was drawn neatly in place, his hair brushed back in a white wave that fell over the shoulders of his olive green business suit.
The melodic dong of the elevator sounded. A dark-haired woman, her eyes alert, brimming with intelligence, emerged. She walked with her head high and confident. She was dressed in a well-tailored burgundy business suit with a white blouse and a skirt cut a few inches above her knees. She wore burgundy heels and had a matching handbag slung over one shoulder. Her hair was swirled into a tight bun. Burgundy highlights blended into her cheeks and full lips and around her dark eyes. I swear I didn’t know until the woman crossed the lobby and stopped directly in front of me that I was looking at Dr. Mikos.
“It would appear that your circadian rhythms are more properly synchronized,” she said, a surprisingly playful glint of mischief dancing in her eyes.
“I think they’ll be fine, Doctor,” I said, wondering how I could have so badly misjudged this woman’s potential.
In a surprise move, she reached up and retightened the knot of my tie. “Since we are going to be working together,” she said, “would it not be more appropriate to drop the formalities? I would prefer that you call me Niki.”
“Niki. All right. Come to think of it, the last person that called me Mr. Adams was my ex’s attorney. I have no fond memories of that particular form of address.”
“Good,” she said, smiling. “Then I will call you Stuart.”
“Well, well,” Wes Barnes said, stepping up to join us. “Rome has never seen a more beautiful woman.” He clutched Niki by the shoulders and gave her a light peck on the cheek. “Niki darling, you are a walking dream.”
“Thank you,” she said through a confident blush. “And I have to say that it is a pleasure to be accompanied by two very handsome men.”
A black stretched Mercedes whisked into the pickup area and stopped. The driver stepped from the idling car, pulled open the back door, and stood waiting.
“Your limousine has arrived, Madame,” Barnes said in a humorous attempt at formality. Extending an elbow toward Niki, he added, “May I have the honor?”
“It is my pleasure,” Niki said, slipping her arm through Barnes’s. When the two started for the door, she tossed me a glance over her shoulder. A strange thing happened. An image of the wind-beaten cliffs of an ocean island suddenly flashed through my mind—clear as day.
Who the hell is this woman?
For a few seconds I lingered, pondering the question. With no answer, I hoisted the backpack to my shoulder, and I followed my two companions into the rising heat of the Roman morning.
The air inside the office of Cardinal Salvatore Sorrentino was oppressive, warm, and close, steeped in a smell reminiscent of mothballed leather. Only a needle of the afternoon sunlight managed to penetrate drawn, heavy velvet curtains and illuminate a single spot on the wine-colored carpet. On the far wall, a huge painting of Christ, captured in the agonizing moment preceding his death, hung in pleading silence under a single dim light. I was sure that the tortured eyes of Palol Morelli’s fourteenth-century rendition of the Nazarene followed my every move.
Sorrentino, dressed in the black suit and white collar of a priest, stood from behind a fortress of a desk.
“Welcome, my friends,” he said offering handshakes, and with a sweeping gesture, he urged us to three leather and brass-tacked chairs fanned before his desk.
Niki took the center seat. Barnes sat to Niki’s right, I to her left.
Cardinal Salvatore Sorrentino was a hawkish man, thinned by age, with sparse brown hair combed away from his pallid, liver-spotted forehead. He had penetrating brown eyes that peered from beneath a tangled brow—an appropriate character, I thought, for a man in charge of the Vatican’s Secret Archives.
Another man—dark-haired, probably in his early forties, wearing an exquisitely tailored gray and pinstripe business suit—stepped into the room. Sorrentino introduced the man as Inspector Roberto De Santis, “appropriately charged,” he assured us, “with security in this department.” When the inspector leaned over to kiss Niki’s hand, the phrase “appropriately charged” became clear. Through the opening of his buttoned jacket, I spotted an automatic pistol holstered beneath his left arm. De Santis didn’t take a seat. Instead, he stood by the door, hands folded in front of him, observing.
When Niki settled into her seat, she crossed her legs, bringing the hem of her skirt several inches above her knee. I masked a stolen glance by scribbling the date at the top of the page in my notebook. She had one hell of a great pair of legs.
“Our interest in this scroll is twofold,” Sorrentino said, opening the meeting. “Our most serious concern, Mr. Barnes, is the one that I outlined in my letter to you.”
“Heretical Atlantean lore,” Barnes said, “might pose a threat to the holy mission of the Church. I believe that’s how you put it.”
“Your recollection is accurate,” Sorrentino said. “However, there is another, shall I say, more academic reason for our interest. As you are aware, the archives teem with fascinating artifacts and literary works, many of which I have been fortunate enough to acquire under my watch. We are most interested, of course, in those relics that concern the affairs of the Church. But we have also managed to acquire many that have little or nothing to do with our history. Some of these represent heresies that are counterproductive to the Church’s mission. Apart from these, how shall I say, substandard specimens, I am pleased to tell you that we make our extensive collection available to qualified students and scholars of whatever faith they may be.”
“And if you deem our scroll a ‘substandard specimen,’” Niki asked, “you will keep it away from public and academic view? With all due respect, Cardinal, we feel strongly that whoever houses this scroll must make it available to all scholars, as well as to the general public—with security restrictions, of course. We believe the future of the Pialigarian people depends on it.”
“Indeed,” Sorrentino said, tapping his tepeed forefingers together. “I understand your need as a scientist, as a humanitarian, to make everything available to all interested parties. I am, however, only in a position to assure you that, in the event that your scroll becomes our property, the acquisitions committee will give utmost consideration to your wishes. There are sections of the archives, however, that are of concern only to us. Would one expect less? Now, does your scroll fall into this category? Only a thorough examination of the document will tell.” He chuckled coolly. “I pray, Dr. Mikos, that you have not succumbed to the proliferation of rhetoric from conspiracy mongers bent on tarnishing the face of the Church. Show them nine doors, issue complete access to them all. But show them a tenth, put it off-limits for this or that reason, and the conspiracies roll.”
“So,” said Niki, “you can offer no assurance that the public will be granted access to the scroll?”
She was good.
“Do not be unfair, Dr. Mikos. I have yet to see this scroll of yours. Let us proceed with the intended purpose of our meeting, and then we will discuss the finer details.” Sorrentino turned to Barnes. “I assume that you have brought the scroll?”
Barnes nodded to me, my cue to pull a copy of the photograph and the translation from my backpack. I handed the items to Barnes, who then pushed only the photograph over the desk to Sorrentino.
“For security purposes,” Barnes said, “this is the best I’m gonna do for now. And since I doubt that you can read this thing,” he slipped him the translation, “this might help.”
Sorrentino, his brow wrinkled into a puzzled frown, gathered the pair of documents into his arthritically gnarled fingers. He glanced at the pages and then at Barnes. “Security purposes?” Waving a hand toward De Santis, he asked, “Did you … did you not assume that we would have proper security? I expected to see the scroll, Mr. Barnes. I … I thought that I made this rather clear.”
A brittle moment passed before Sorrentino’s eyes dropped to the impoverished copy of the artifact. He started with a perfunctory scan, but I could see that something in the photograph quickly narrowed his gaze. Shifting his eyes to the translation, I noticed that his lips moved slightly with every word. Something was going on in the secret archives of the cardinal’s brain that he had no intention of revealing. His eyes suddenly hardened. With a quick, indignant breath he said, “I do not know what you are trying to accomplish here, Mr. Barnes. A photograph is nothing. Nothing.” Sorrentino stood and motioned for De Santis to step over. De Santis studied the photograph, shrugged with indifference, and returned to his place by the door. “You see?” Sorrentino said. “It is impossible to talk business without the scroll.” He tossed the photograph on the desk, his eyes filled with suspicion. “You do have the scroll, Mr. Barnes?”
“Be kind of hard to photograph a scroll you don’t have, wouldn’t it, Cardinal?”
It was a standoff. Sorrentino’s thin lips trembled as he held a long, scorching glare on Wes Barnes. I knew Barnes would outlast him. I was right. The frustrated cardinal turned to Niki. “I presume that you, Dr. Mikos, have authenticated this document with a thorough examination.”
“Unfortunately,” Niki said with a professional face that continued to reveal no hint of deception, “I have not yet had the opportunity to view the scroll.”
“What!” Sorrentino’s right cheek began to twitch with the promise that a full-fledged spasm was imminent. “But I thought—”
“I did not come on this project until recently, after my father’s untimely death. However, he believed that the scroll is authentic, and I support his belief.”
“With all due respect to your father,” Sorrentino said, “you are prepared to declare as authentic a document that you have not subjected to even one of your … your scientific tests?”
I was sure the old boy was going to suffer a stroke.
Niki was casual. “Cardinal Sorrentino, have you seen an original copy of even one book in your beloved Bible?”
“I beg your pardon.”
“A fair question, I think.”
“Of course I have not. The originals have long been lost.”
“I see. Perhaps the cardinal has seen a photograph of the originals?”
“You know the answer to this,” he snapped.
“Indeed. And yet you are prepared to declare as authentic these documents upon which you base your faith in God? What is the basis of their authenticity, Cardinal?”
“Young lady,” Sorrentino’s tone rose with the blood in his cheeks, “have you any idea what you are suggesting? To even consider this question is to challenge the very authority of the Church. No, this is worse. It challenges the very authority of God!” He jabbed an unsteady finger toward the ceiling.
Niki, unmoved by the outburst, smiled with the composure of Buddha. God, she was cool.
Sorrentino glanced at his own finger as though he wasn’t sure how it had gotten there. He lowered his arm with a deep sigh. It reminded me of someone pulling a lever to release the air from a compressor tank.
“Forgive me, Dr. Mikos, if I have offended you, but you are treading on ground that is very sacred to my heart. You must understand that to question the authenticity of scripture would render meaningless every spiritual value that I have devoted my entire life to upholding.”
“Believe it or not, Cardinal Sorrentino, I understand the sensitivity of this matter, but as a scientist, I cannot afford to be chained by dogmatic precedence. My interest lies in uncovering the truth. A spiritual value that can be shaken by truth is, in my estimation, a mere dogma that does not rest on truth.”
“Truth? Ah yes. What is truth? Pilate asked this question of the Master himself. Do you know how he, the Master, responded to this question, Dr. Mikos?”
“With silence.”
Sorrentino nodded. “Indeed. Perhaps some questions are best addressed with silence.”
“Perhaps. But I, Cardinal, have not heard of such a question. You are satisfied to take your scriptures at their face value. I choose to examine them with the same objectivity, the same scrutiny that I will use in examining the scroll.”
Sorrentino, suddenly exhausted with the exchange, turned away from us. He had to regroup his thoughts, his composure.
I glanced at Niki, hands folded in her lap, a virtuous air enshrouding her like a white lace veil. Her smile of innocence gave no hint of the fact that she’d just brought a cardinal to his knees. Something told me that he would have found it less humiliating if she’d just stood up and kicked him in the balls.
Clasping a wrist behind his back, Sorrentino stepped toward the portrait of Christ and studied it as though he were considering an invitation to join his Master on the cross. “Well then, I suppose we must deal with matters as they stand.” He lingered a moment longer before turning and taking a seat on the edge of his desk. “Mr. Barnes, assuming that you do possess this scroll and assuming that the Vatican would offer to purchase it from you, how would I know that I was purchasing an antiquity legally extracted from Greek soil? You can show me the proper permits, I assume?”
That got my attention. I looked up from my note taking, the zing of adrenaline forcing me to shift slightly in my chair.
“You can assume that.” Barnes’s business amenities were beginning to wear a little thin. I could see his tongue searching his cheek for a fresh wad of tobacco.
“I can check, you know,” the cardinal said sternly. “The law, it is quite severe on smugglers.”
“I imagine you’d be right about that.” Unfazed by the threat, Wes Barnes stood, collected the photograph and the translation from the desk, and handed them to me. “If I ever run into one of them fellows, I’ll pass on your warning.”
The cardinal’s face went white. “You are … you are leaving? But, we have discussed none of the details of a … of a possible—”
“You know where we’re staying,” Barnes said. “We’ll be checking out this afternoon.” He removed his tobacco from an inside pocket and stuffed a wad deep into his cheek. “You get any revelations about what you think a scroll like this might be worth, you give me a call.”
With a nod to the cardinal, Wes Barnes headed for the door. Niki and I followed.
J Douglas Bottorff 