Harry Addison

Father Daniel Addison – Harry's younger brother, a priest in the Vatican and private secretary to Cardinal Marsciano

Nursing sister Elena Voso

Hercules, a dwarf

THE VATICAN

Giacomo Pecci, Pope Leo XIV

The pope's Uomini di fiducia, 'Men of trust'

Cardinal Umberto Palestrina Cardinal Nicola Marsciano Cardinal Joseph Matadi Monsignor Fabio Capizzi Cardinal Rosario Parma

Father Bardoni, an aide to Cardinal Marsciano

THE VATICAN POLICE

Jacov Farel, head of the Vatican Police

THE ITALIAN POLICE

Homicide Detective Otello Roscani Homicide Detective Gianni Pio

Homicide Detective Scala Homicide Detective Castelletti

GRUPPO CARDINALE – The special task force set up by decree of the Italian Ministry of the Interior to investigate the murder of the cardinal vicar of Rome

Marcello Taglia, Gruppo Cardinale Chief Prosecutor

THE CHINESE

Li Wen, a state water-quality inspector

Yan Yeh, president of the People's Bank of China

Jiang Youmei, Chinese ambassador to Italy

Zhou Yi, Jiang's foreign minister

Chen Yin, a merchant of cut flowers

Wu Xian, general secretary of the Communist Party

THE FREELANCERS

Thomas Jose Alvarez-Rios Kind, international terrorist Adrianna Hall, World News Network correspondent James Eaton, first secretary to the counselor for Political Affairs, United States Embassy, Rome Pierre Weggen, Swiss investment banker Miguel Valera, a Spanish communist

Rome . Sunday, June 28.

Today he called himself S and looked startlingly like Miguel Valera, the thirty-seven-year-old Spaniard spinning in a light, drug-induced sleep across the room. The apartment they were in was nothing, just two rooms with a tiny kitchen and bath, the fifth floor up from the street. The furnishings were worn and inexpensive, common in a place rented by the week. The most prominent pieces were the faded velvet couch on which the Spaniard reclined and the small drop leaf table under the front window, where S stood looking out.

So the apartment was nothing. What sold it was the view – the green of the Piazza San Giovanni and across it, the imposing medieval Basilica of St John in the Lateran, the Cathedral of Rome and 'mother of all churches', founded by the Emperor Constantine in the year 313. Today the view from the window was even better than its promise. Inside the basilica, Giacomo Pecci, Pope Leo XIV, was celebrating mass on his seventy-fifth birthday, and an enormous crowd overflowed the piazza, making it seem as if all Rome were celebrating with him.

Running a hand through his dyed-black hair, S glanced at Valera. In ten minutes his eyes would open. In twenty he would be alert and functional. Abruptly S turned and let his gaze fall on an ancient black-and-white television in the corner. On its screen was a live broadcast from the mass inside the basilica.

The pope, in white liturgical vestments, watched the faces of the worshipers in front of him as he spoke, his eyes meeting theirs energetically, hopefully, spiritually. He loved and they loved in return, and it seemed to give him a youthful renewal despite his age and slowly declining health.

Now the television cameras cut away, finding familiar faces of politicians, celebrities, and business leaders among those inside the packed basilica. Then the cameras moved on, fixing briefly on five clergymen seated behind the pontiff. These were his longtime advisers. His uomini di fiducia. Men of trust. As a group, probably the most influential authority within the Roman Catholic Church.

– Cardinal Umberto Palestrina, 62. A Naples street urchin and orphan become Vatican secretariat of state. Enormously popular within the Church and carried in the same high regard by the secular international diplomatic community. Massive physically, six foot seven and two hundred and seventy pounds.

– Rosario Parma, 67. Cardinal vicar of Rome, tall, severe, conservative prelate from Florence in whose diocese and church the mass was being celebrated.

– Cardinal Joseph Matadi, 57, prefect of the Congregation of Bishops. Native of Zaire. Broad-shouldered, jovial, widely traveled, multilingual, diplomatically astute.

– Monsignor Fabio Capizzi, 62, director general of the Vatican Bank. Native of Milan. Graduate of Oxford and Yale, self-made millionaire before joining the seminary at age thirty.

– Cardinal Nicola Marsciano, 60, eldest son of a Tuscan farmer, educated in Switzerland and Rome, president of the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See; as such, chief overseer of the Vatican's investments.

CLICK.

The gloved hand of S turned off the television, and he stepped again to the table in front of the window. Behind him Miguel Valera coughed and moved involuntarily on the sofa. S glanced at him, then looked back out the window. Police barricades had been set up to keep the crowd from the cobblestone directly in front of the basilica, and now mounted police on horseback took up positions on either side of its bronze central entrance gate. Behind them and to the left, out of sight of the crowd, S could see a dozen dark blue vans. In front of them stood a phalanx of riot police, also out of sight, but ready if needed. Abruptly four dark Lancias, unmarked cars of the Polizia di Stato, the police force protecting the pope and his cardinals outside the Vatican, pulled up and stopped at the foot of the basilica's steps, waiting to take the pope and his cardinals back to the Vatican.

Suddenly the bronze gates swung open and there was a roar from the crowd. At the same time seemingly every church bell in Rome began to ring. For a moment nothing happened. Then, above the din of the bells, S heard a second roar as the pope appeared, the white of his cassock standing out clearly against a sea of red as his men of trust walked close behind him – the group surrounded tightly by security men wearing black suits and sunglasses.

Valera groaned, his eyes flickered, and he tried to roll over. S glanced at him, but only for an instant. Then he turned and lifted something covered with an ordinary bath towel from the shadows beside the window. Setting it on the table, he took away the towel and put his eye to the scope of a Finnish sniper rifle. Instantly his view of the basilica magnified hundredfold. In the same moment, Cardinal Palestrina stepped forward and fully into its circular frame, its crosshairs meeting directly over his broad grin. S took a breath and held it, letting his gloved forefinger ease against the trigger.

Abruptly Palestrina stepped aside, and the rifle's scope came tight on Cardinal Marsciano's chest. S heard Valera grunt behind him. Ignoring him, he swung the rifle left through a blur of cardinal red until he saw the white of Leo XIV's cassock. A split second later the crosshairs centered between his eyes just above the bridge of his nose.

Behind him Valera yelled something out loud. Again, S ignored him. His finger tightened against the trigger as the pope lurched forward, past a security man, smiling and waving at the crowd. Then, abruptly, S swung the rifle right, bringing the mesh of crosshairs full on the gold pectoral cross of Rosario Parma, the cardinal vicar of Rome. S gave no expression, simply squeezed the trigger three times in rapid succession, rocking the room with thundering discharge and, two hundred yards away, showering Pope Leo XIV, Giacomo Pecci, and those around him with the blood of a man of trust.