Gregg Loomis - The Coptic Secret

Yes, he had had fun, but when was Daddy coming to take him back to Grumps?

Soon, Lang assured him.

With a child's insight, Manfred insisted on a specificity Lang was unable to give.

Gurt rescued Lang by taking the phone. "I also would like to know when you will be able to come."

Lang told her what had happened since their last conversation.

"You are without a clue," she observed.

"I should know something more when I get the translation back tomorrow," he said with an optimism he did not entirely feel.

The conversation ended with more promises to Manfred than Lang felt he could keep.

When he hit the end button, he sat morosely on the bed. When would he see his son again? Would Gurt legitimize the child by marrying him? With his home destroyed, where would they live? All of these seemed far more important than some ancient gospel the collators of the Bible had decided not to include. Lang wanted nothing more than a peaceful life with the family he had found so suddenly.

But there could be no peace as long as someone wanted him dead. Anger at these unknowns who had threatened not only him but his son began to grow, a rage made greater by lack of a specific target. The only real clue was the murders of Eon and Klaus, each with biblical overtones. Who but some fanatical religious group would take the pains to relate cold-blooded killings to the martyrdom of saints?

If only…

He forgot everything he had been thinking of and stared at one of the two small chests of drawers against the far wall. The pulls were plain, round copper or brass disks.

But one was slightly larger than the others.

Intrigued, he sat on the floor, staring at what, moments before, had been a mundane, ordinary piece of metal. He opened the drawer. Each pull was secured to the inside by a bracket and a screw. He fumbled in his pocket for a moment before he came up with a dime. It fitted the screw head well enough to turn it.

Moments later, he was looking closely at the bit of metal in his hand, a fine mesh rather than solid like the others. Using a thumbnail, Lang pried up part of the tiny screen. He was not surprised to see a miniaturized listening device.

He instinctively glanced around the room. The thing could have been installed at any time but the battery life on something that small would only be a day or so. It was a safe guess the very unknowns against whom he had been raging had put it there. He resisted the impulse to grind the tiny thing under his heel. To do so would only alert its installers it had been found and encourage replacement with one he might not locate.

Instead, he carefully reinstalled it.

Then he began a meticulous sweep of the room. The phone was dis- and reassembled. The plates on all three electrical sockets were removed and replaced. Even the overhead light fixture received attention. There are only a limited number of places a bug can be placed and escape notice.

Satisfied, he took another longing look at the beds. No nap now. With doors without locks and his unidentified enemies aware of his location, sleep could be suicidal. He yawned. One of the little bureaus could be placed in front of the door and… and what? Without a weapon, it mattered little whether he heard a potential assassin or not.

Then he remembered something Francis had said just before he left.

Lang went back out, this time turning east toward St. Catherine's Gate. He crossed the area where he had seen the guards from his window and entered a building distinguishable from its neighbors only by a flat roof rather than the sloping red tiles common to the Vatican's buildings. Long wooden tables ran the length of a beamed room, reminiscent of a medieval banqueting hall. Clearly the mess. Across a hall was a smaller room, one stocked with the sort of general wares one would expect in an American drugstore, the commissary. Lang selected a baseball cap emblazoned with a helmet and what he guessed was a Swiss Guard logo. It was the smallest one he could find, one he hoped would fit a certain three-year-old head.

As he paid for his purchase, he asked the young, crew- cut man behind the counter, "Where's the armory?"

The kid didn't even look up from counting change. "Outside, turn left. Second door, first room on the right."

The armory was perhaps fifty feet long, its walls hung with halberds, swords and shields. An open gun rack ran down the middle containing enough rifles to start a small war.

As long as that war was fought in the first half of the last century. The rifles were bolt-action Mausers, the standard weapon of Germany's World War II infantryman.

A lone Schmeisser, automatic pistol, of the same vintage lay on top of the rack.

Lang stared stupidly at the far wall where a rack held both matchlock blunderbusses and flintlock muskets. The modern-day Swiss Guard must keep their own weapons instead of drawing them as needed from the armory. It made sense: The contemporary guard was unlikely to find itself opposing a siege by an enraged European monarch. These days, even royalty had to contend with budgetary constraints. A war of aggression would have to compete with national health care, an increasing dole and a parliament unlikely to reduce a litany of benefits to which voters had become accustomed. Rifles and heavier small arms weren't needed for the required duty, guarding the person of the pope rather than the bulk of the Papal States that had finally succumbed to the unification of Italy in the nineteenth century. Easily carried and concealed weapons would be all the modern guard required. The very sort of weapon Lang had planned on "borrowing."

Short of mugging one of the men in uniform, he clearly wasn't going to succeed.

With a sigh, he left the room and walked out into the increasing heat, which seemed to aggravate healing muscles already cramped by the long flight.

Outside the Vatican's walls, he stopped to buy a bottle of water. He all but emptied it before covering two blocks. He stuffed it into a back pocket. Since Rome was connected to a series of aquifers, even the little fountains, those consisting of no more than a pipe a foot or so above the street, provided sweet, cool and potable water.

The crowd around St. Peter's made it impossible to notice a possible tail.

Crossing the turgid green Tiber by the bridges over the Isola Tiberina, he could see the ruins of the massive Theater of Marcellus in the ghetto, the area in which medieval Rome's Jews were required to live and be locked in each night. There was much less foot traffic and he took his time, pretending to marvel at the old buildings. He even doubled back a couple of times without revealing anyone interested in his destination.

He hoped his memory held up because he knew his destination would be difficult to find. He turned left onto the Via del Portico, a convoluted route but one that would reveal anyone following him.

Navigating largely by the sight of the synagogue, one of the area's tallest buildings, he turned south, back toward the river. Every time he visited this part of Rome, he was impressed with the diminishing number of Jews. The narrow, winding streets, some of the oldest habitable quarters

and location had made the neighborhood desirable to the city's young and affluent. He could only hope the man he had come to see still lived at the same address. He would be well past ninety by now.

He turned north on the broad Lungotevere dei Cenci and walked two blocks along the river before stopping to admire an apartment building that had maintained its ancient facade while the interior had been renovated. Still nobody paid him attention. Two quick steps carried him into a narrow alley. At the end stood a three-story structure he remembered from years ago.

Lang was relieved to see the name still beside the list of doorbells, faded but legible: benscare. Lang pushed the button and waited. He tried again with the same result.