Allan Folsom - Day Of Confession

Suddenly a loud chime from the hallway inside jolted Harry from his reverie. He swung around to look. So did Elena. There was silence and then the chime rang again. Someone was downstairs at the front door.

A half second later, Veronique entered and went to the intercom. Pushing a button, she spoke into it, listened, then pressed the buzzer, letting whoever it was into the building.

'Who is it?' Harry came into the hallway behind her. Elena followed.

Veronique looked up.

'Someone to see your brother,' she said quietly, then went to the door and opened it.

'Who knows he's even here?'

Harry could hear footsteps coming up the stairs. One person, maybe two. A man, the step was too heavy for a woman. Who was it? The blond man? A trick, set up by the Bellagio priests. Give the killer clear operating room away from Roscani's people. Or maybe they had made a deal with the Swiss police, and it was a detective coming up to check things out. Why not? – the priests were poor, and there was still a considerable reward for their arrest. Maybe the clergymen couldn't take the money, but Veronique certainly could, easily funneling a share back to them.

Harry glanced over his shoulder at Elena, nodding toward the upper floor. In an instant she had slipped past him, going up the stairs to where Danny was.

The footsteps were louder. Whoever it was had climbed almost to the top of the stairs. Harry started past Veronique to close the door and lock it.

'It's all right.' Veronique stopped him.

Then, whoever it was was there, almost to the top. One man, alone, mostly in shadow. Not the blond man – someone else, taller, dressed in jeans and a light sweater. Then he stepped through the door. And Harry saw the dark curly hair, the familiar black eyes behind black-rimmed glasses.

Father Bardoni.

Reverend Mother Carmela Fenti was sixty-three and petite. Her eyes sparkled and she was full of humor, and yet, at the same time, filled with deep concern. Sitting in her cramped, austere office on the second floor of the hospital of St Bernardine in Siena, she poured that concern out to Roscani, the same as she had earlier to the Siena police; telling him that early in the evening of Monday, July 6, she'd received a call from Sister Maria Cupini, Administrator of the Franciscan Hospital St Cecilia in Pescara, telling of an Irishman with no apparent kin who had been injured in an auto accident. He had suffered a severe concussion, burns, and other serious trauma. Sister Cupini was short of staff. Could Mother Fenti help?

Yes, and she had. And that was all Mother Fenti knew until the police had come to talk with her. It was not her practice to keep in touch with her charges when they were sent to other hospitals.

Roscani: Do you know Sister Cupini personally?

Mother Fenti: No.

Roscani: Mother Fenti [Roscani paused, studying the administrator, then went on], Sister Cupini told the police in Pescara that she never made the call. She also said, and hospital records bear her out, that she knew of no such victim admitted to Hospital St Cecilia during that time. She did concede, however, that an unnamed male patient had been admitted without her knowledge and stayed for approximately seventy-two hours, cared for by his own medical attendants. Quite conveniently, no one seems to know who admitted him or how the admission was arranged.

Mother Fenti: Ispettore Capo, I know nothing of the practices or operation of St Cecilia's. I know only what I was told and led to believe.

Roscani: Let me add that the Pescara police have no record of a serious automobile accident occurring at any point during that time period.

Mother Fenti: I only know what I was told by a Franciscan sister and led to believe. [Mother Fenti opened a drawer and took out a worn ledger. Turning several pages, she found what she wanted and pushed the book across to Roscani.] These are my own handwritten telephone records. There [she pointed a finger at mid-page] you will see that the call came to me on July sixth at seven-ten P.M. and ended at seven-sixteen. The caller's name and position are listed at the far right. Sister Maria Cupini. Administrator, Hospital St Cecilia, Pescara. It was written in pen as you can see. Nothing has been changed.

Roscani nodded. He had already seen telephone company records documenting the same information.

Mother Fenti: If the woman I spoke with was not Sister Cupini, why did she say she was?

Roscani: Because someone who understood the procedure was trying to find a private nurse to care for the fugitive priest, Father Daniel Addison. A nurse who turned out to be your Sister Elena Voso.

Mother Fenti: If that is true, Ispettore Capo, where is she? What has happened to her?

Roscani: I don't know. I was hoping you did.

Mother Fenti: I do not.

Roscani stared for a moment and then stood and went to the door.

Roscani: If you don't mind, Reverend Mother, there is someone else who needs to hear what I have to say.

Roscani opened the door and nodded to someone outside. A moment later a carabiniere appeared. With him was a proud, gray-haired man about Mother Fenti's age. He wore a brown suit and white shirt and tie. And though he was trying hard to look strong and impassive, it was clear he was shaken, if not afraid.

Roscani: Mother Fenti, this is Domenico Voso, Sister Elena's father.

Mother Fenti: We know each other, Ispettore Capo. Buon pomeriggio, Signore.

Domenico Voso nodded and sat down in a chair brought forward by the carabiniere.

Roscani: Reverend Mother, we have told Signore Voso what we believe has happened to his daughter. That she is somewhere now caring for Father Daniel, but that we believe she is a victim rather than an accomplice. Nonetheless, I want you both to know she is in a very dangerous circumstance. Someone is trying to kill the priest and will most likely kill anyone found with him. And this person is not only capable but extremely vicious.

Roscani looked to Domenico Voso, and as he did, his entire mood and body language changed: he became the father he was, knowing how he would feel if one of his own children were out there, the prey of Thomas Kind.

Roscani: We don't know where your daughter is, Signore Voso, but the killer very well might. If you know where she is, I beg of you to please tell me. For her sake…

Domenico Voso: I don't know where she is. I wish with the heart of all my family that I did. [His eyes flashed to Mother Fenti, pleading.]

Mother Fenti: Nor do I, Domenico. I have already said so to the ispettore capo. She looked to Roscani. If I hear, if either of us hears, you will be the first to know. [Now she stood.] I thank you for coming.

Mother Fenti knew where Elena Voso was. Domenico Voso did not. That was how Roscani felt as he sat at a desk in a back room of carabinieri headquarters in Siena twenty minutes later. She knew. And she denied it. Never mind that a father's heart was torn out.

Amiable and sparkly-eyed as she was, at heart she was a tough and very savvy old bird, strong enough to let Elena Voso be killed to protect whomever she was answering to. And she was answering to someone, because as prominent a figure as she was, by no means was she powerful enough to be doing this on her own. A mother general in Siena did not flaunt her authority in the faces of both the Catholic Church and the nation of Italy.

And even though he was certain the anonymous patient admitted to the hospital in Pescara had to have been Father Daniel, he knew Sister Cupini would stand by her claim of not knowing about it because it was the story Mother Fenti had invented for her. Clearly it was Mother Fenti who was running things here. And she would not give in. What he had to do, and quickly, was find a way around her.