Paul Christopher - Michelangelo_s Notebook

The motif of the cover was simple and explicit, one of the first such things he had attempted: a deeply carved cross, lines radiating out from it like beams from a star. Hanging upside down was the Virgin Mother, hands nailed to the upright, legs spread on the crosspiece, revealing her agony at both her crucifixion and the birth of the only child she would ever have-a child born ascending, not to earth, but to his place beside his Father. God’s child, his power killing her even as she died willingly on the cross to bear him, never to know the immensity of what she was birthing. The wonder of him and the fury, his commitment to a just and true revenge for the world. The naked man prayed briefly to the Mother then opened the book to the last page he had been working on and began a new verse.

Since it was the first of the column it would need to be illuminated as in any Bible. He opened the small glue pot, and, using his finest brush, he drew a faint line of the thin, sticky liquid along the penciled outline of the letter. He blew on it carefully then used a block of gold leaf, sliding a single sheet off the block with a cotton swab to cover the glue line.

He waited patiently, letting the tissue-thin leaf set with the glue, then used a wider and softer sable brush to remove the excess gold. He’d already chosen the color he would use for the interior of the letter: copper red, just like the girl’s hair, like the smell of fresh blood on a hot summer day, the way it must have been so long ago.

Finn sat huddled on the end of the couch as the paramedic dabbed at her temple with an alcohol swab. The woman was black and fat and very gentle.

“Must have used some kind of sap or something. Skin’s barely broken. There’ll be a bump but not much else. You were lucky, girl.”

Finn nodded slowly and tried not to look at the huge stain on the carpet runner closer to the door. She didn’t think she was lucky at all, but at least she was alive. Not like Peter. She felt the hot tears welling up in her eyes again and swallowed hard. The sound she’d heard before dropping down the dark well into unconsciousness had been Peter dying, his throat opened up in a single slashing sweep that had murmured past her like the wing of a night bird and then turned into that final, horrible liquid gurgle.

The apartment was crowded. Two paramedics, packing up now, at least three uniformed cops and two detectives. A crime scene technician was covering everything with fingerprint powder and whistling softly under his breath. The paramedic was speaking to her again.

“Sure you don’t want to come to the hospital, let the docs take a look at you. You maybe got a concussion. I don’t think so, but still, you never know.” The paramedic frowned. “There’s the other thing too, maybe you want to have that checked.”

“I’d know if I’d been raped,” said Finn. “I wasn’t.”

“Okay then, sweetie-pie,” the woman said. She snapped her plastic equipment case shut. “We’ll be on our way then. Sorry for your trouble and your loss.”

“Thank you.”

“You bet.” The paramedics edged out the door, skirting the bloodstain. One of the detectives came out of her bedroom, and she wondered why he’d been there in the first place. He’d introduced himself as Detective Tracker, which she’d thought was hysterically funny when he’d first said it. And it had been just that-a matter of near hysteria. He couldn’t seem to take his eyes off her boobs and he had bad breath. He was tall, broad-shouldered and had greasy hair.

“You and this Peter kid friends for long?”

“A couple of months.”

“Sleeping with him?”

“I don’t think that’s any of your business.”

“Sure it is. You were sleeping with him. Some other guy gets jealous, breaks in and waits, like that. You’re not sleeping with him, you got to wonder why, see?”

“I wasn’t sleeping with him.”

“So you didn’t know the guy who killed him.”

“No.”

“How can you be sure? You said it was dark.”

“I don’t know anyone who goes around killing people.”

“Anything taken?”

“I haven’t really looked.”

“Could have been a robbery then.”

“I guess.”

“Not much to steal.”

“No.”

“Student, right?”

“Yes. NYU.”

“Peter too?”

“Yes.”

“How’d you get together-same classes, mutual friends, what?”

“He’s… was in the fine arts program.”

“So? What’s that got to do with anything.”

“He took a life drawing class. I model.”

“Like, naked?” His eyes dropped to her breasts again. For the first time in years stares actually bothered her.

“Nude.”

“Same difference, sweetheart. You don’t have any clothes on.”

“It’s different, Detective Tracker, believe me.”

“You think maybe it could have been someone else in the class?”

“No.”

“Nuts everywhere in New York.”

Her head was pounding. All she wanted to do was curl up on the couch and go to sleep.

“It wasn’t anyone from the goddamn class, all right?”

“Slow down, honey, I’m not the bad guy here.”

“Then stop acting like it.”

One of the uniformed cops smiled. Tracker frowned. There was a knock at the door and it opened. A tall, very thin man stood there. He had dark hair that needed cutting and a pinched angular face with deep-set eyes that matched his hair color. He had a smear of five-o’clock shadow on his cheeks and chin. He looked Irish. The man stared down at the pool of blood congealing on the carpet runner and frowned.

“Who the fuck are you?” asked Tracker. “This is a fucking crime scene and you’re in the way.”

The thin man reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and brought out a small, worn leather folder. As he pulled it out Finn saw that he was wearing a shoulder holster. Tracker saw it too. The man flipped open the folder and pushed it into Tracker’s face.

“Delaney. Lieutenant Vincent Delaney, Special Action Squad.” He smiled. “You are?”

“Tracker, Twenty-third Precinct.”

“That’s nice. This is Miss Ryan?”

“That’s it, Loo.”

“I’d like to speak to her if you don’t mind.”

“I’m in the middle of an investigation here.”

“No, you’re not,” said Delaney. “Not anymore.”

Dawn was breaking over the Vatican, the secret city behind the high walls still deep in shadow, the trees along its winding paths and around its ancient buildings whispering between themselves in the faint morning breeze.

Lights were on here and there. The man in the long black soutane could hear the faint sound of chanting as he came out of the State Department offices in the papal palace and turned down the narrow gravel walkway that led between the Belvedere Palace and the old brick power plant.

He clutched the decoded message from New York in one hand and quickened his pace down the path, his plain black lace-up shoes making crunching sounds on the dew-damp gravel. Once, early in his career, he had been in awe of this place and saw it as the active seat of God’s will on earth.

Over the years his hair had thinned and his vision began to blur, but if anything, he now saw the Vatican with much clearer eyes. Once, he’d seen himself as a privileged priest, brought here for his piety and his love of Christ. Now he knew better; he’d been brought here for his facility with cryptography and his language abilities. If he’d gone to Harvard instead of Notre Dame he’d probably be working for the CIA right now.

Ah well, he thought, even God had need of spies, it seemed.

He continued down the path, then found a small entrance and went up into the library. It was not really the Vatican’s library, but rather a tourist showpiece with its dozens of frescoed arches and its display tables of manuscript artifacts that were more colorful than important. He found a second staircase and went up to the floor above.