Paul Christopher: The Templar conspiracy

"Let's get out of here," said Peggy suddenly. "I need some fresh air."

Holliday paid the bill; then they slipped into their coats and headed home. It was finally snowing and the traffic on M Street had already begun to snarl. They made the walk back down M to Thirty-third in silence, both lost in their own thoughts, the whirling snowflakes settling everywhere. They finally reached Prospect and turned the corner.

Sitting on the top step of the old, wrought-iron stairs was a middle-aged man dressed in a plain black suit and a priest's collar. He was smoking a cigarette and he looked like he was freezing. There was spilled ash all down the front of his jacket, which was buttoned to the neck against the snow and the cold.

"My old Irish bones aren't used to this bloody arctic weather," he said in a heavy, almost theatrical brogue. "Maybe you could invite me in for a cup of tea in the hand or something a little stronger, Colonel Holliday?" Like most Irishmen, he made every statement a question.

"As I live and breathe," said Doc, staring up at the priest. "If it isn't Father Thomas Brennan." Holliday paused, thinking about the hell this man, the head of the Vatican Secret Police, had put both him and Peggy through not so long ago. Then his curiosity got the better of him. "Much as I'd like to put a bullet between your scheming, beady little eyes, hospitality prevents me. You're welcome to a cup of cheer and a seat by the fire while you tell us what brought you here."

"Ah, it's a grand fellow you are, Colonel," said the priest, standing up, his arms wrapped around himself, the stub of the cigarette dangling from his mouth. "And how are you, Ms. Blackstock?"

"Nauseated, since I saw you," answered Peggy.

"Now, isn't that a shame and all?" said Father Brennan.

The front living room of the house on the corner of Prospect and Thirty-third had probably been called a parlor by its original owners. It was a pleasant room, and since it was on the corner it had windows on two sides, making it very bright. There was a gas fireplace on the interior wall, and like every other room in the professor's house it was lined with bookcases all stuffed with volumes on every subject imaginable. The furniture was mostly leather dating back to the eighties, the rugs Ikea sisal and the art on the walls a mix of quite nice nineteenth-century landscapes and a serious collection of horses in battle, mostly from the Napoleonic Wars.

Holliday seated the priest on a couch in front of the fire and fetched him a good-sized glass of Irish whiskey, making sure it was the Catholic Jameson rather than Protestant Bushmills. He then settled into a chair on the priest's right, while Peggy took the one on the left. Brennan stared into the bluish flames of the fire and sipped daintily at the whiskey, holding it cupped in both hands.

"It's a myth, you know," said the priest at last. "Jameson was made by a Prod and so was Bushmills. Everyone thinks Bushmills is Prod because it's made in the north and Jameson is Catholic because it's made in Cork, down south. It's all mother's milk to me, mind."

"Get to the point, Brennan. My Christmas hospitality goes only so far."

"Ah, Colonel, brusque and right to the point as usual."

"So get to it."

"You are aware of the recent tragedy in the Holy See, I suppose?"

"Of course," said Holliday.

"Are you aware of the rituals surrounding the death of a Pope?"

"Among other things, he has to be interred within six days of Cardinal Camerlengo declaring his death," answered Peggy.

"Quite so, Ms. Blackstock. Four days from now, to be exact. Friday."

"I'm sorry for the loss of your boss," said Holliday, "but what does any of this have to do with us?"

"We've heard things," said Brennan.

"Don't be coy," said Holliday, his tone sharp. "What things?"

"We have a number of informants, one of whom is peripherally involved with the CIA."

"So?"

"Our informant tells us that the assassination was the work of a new terrorist group. Fringe Jihadists. Copycat Al-Qaeda."

"Do you believe it?"

"I think it's possible."

"Is it plausible?"

"Is blowing up a subway in Moscow plausible? The only motive for such things is madness."

"So why are you here on my doorstep?"

"Because I think the Pope is only the beginning."

"What makes you think that?" Holliday asked calmly. Every intelligence officer he'd ever dealt with had something of the paranoiac in him. James Jesus Angelton, counterintelligence head of the CIA at one time-whom Holliday had worked for briefly-was one of the worst, conducting a search for a mole within the CIA for twenty years and never finding one, and tearing the very fabric of the agency to shreds in the process. Holliday doubted Brennan was any different.

"Our source is a priest," said Brennan. He stared down into his empty glass. Holliday took the hint, stood up and fetched the bottle of Jameson. He poured a generous amount into the glass and set the bottle down on the priest's side of the coffee table. Brennan took another hefty swallow.

"Who is he?"

"Father John Leeson."

"This is like pulling teeth, Brennan. Who is Father John Leeson?"

"He was a visiting priest at St. John's Church in MacLean, Virginia. Old Dominion Drive. Father Connelly was off taking care of his ailing mother; Father Leeson was filling in. He normally worked at the office of the bishop."

"Okay, we've got the domestic background. Let's get to the assassination."

"Father Leeson was doing confessions after late Mass."

"And?"

"It makes me a little uncomfortable discussing matters of the confessional," muttered Brennan.

"Bull," answered Holliday. "I was born and raised in the faith, Brennan. The confessional is only sacrosanct to people who aren't priests. It's one of the best control and intelligence mechanisms the Church has. Subtle blackmail on an enormous scale. We know all your secrets but you don't know any of ours, including which of your children we're sodomizing."

"That's not fair, Colonel. The Church has done enough great works in its time to mitigate its foibles."

"The only group who have started more wars and killed more people in the name of their god was Genghis Khan's armies. Now, what about this confession your priest heard?"

"A parishioner entered the confessional but Father Leeson didn't recognize his voice. But why would he? He'd only been there a few days." Brennan hesitated.

"Go on," urged Holliday.

"According to Father Leeson the man was either drunk or on drugs. He was babbling about killing 'our father' and then the 'poor doomed bastard in the White House,' and there was nothing anyone could do about it now that the Crusader was in play. Then he said something very odd. He said the killing of the Holy Father was nothing but the thimblerig. For the entire project."

"What did this Father Leeson say to him?"

"He gave him absolution, of course. What else could he do? He thought the poor man was hallucinating. Whatever the case, he was terribly anguished." Brennan took another sip of his drink. "And then John telephoned me."

"In Rome?"

"Yes."

"Why would he do that?"

"We were old friends. We used to know each other. He knew what I did for the Church. He trusted me."

Holliday thought for a moment and then it dawned on him.

"He was one of yours, wasn't he? Once in, never out-isn't that it?"

"What are you talking about?" Brennan said.

"You were a mole in the IRA. You were working for Rome even then. What-the eighties, the seventies, even earlier?"

Brennan was silent for a long time, looking out at the falling snow, remembering. He poured more of the Irish whiskey into his glass, then sighed and finally spoke.

"I was already in before I was ordained," he said. "I was just a stupid boy with rocks in my pockets and in my head, as well. When you live on Dairy Street just off Falls Road all you can think about is getting a job in America, and failing that, climbing the ladder in the IRA. I had no one to go to in America, so I joined the Republicans and that was that."