Дэн Браун - Angels & Demons

Langdon stammered, "I… thought…"

"Easy, Mr. Langdon. You’re in a hospital."

The fog began to lift. Langdon felt a wave of relief. He hated hospitals, but they certainly beat aliens harvesting his testicles.

"My name is Dr. Jacobus," the man said. He explained what had just happened. "You are very lucky to be alive."

Langdon did not feel lucky. He could barely make sense of his own memories… the helicopter… the camerlegno. His body ached everywhere. They gave him some water, and he rinsed out his mouth. They placed a new gauze on his palm.

"Where are my clothes?" Langdon asked. He was wearing a paper robe.

One of the nurses motioned to a dripping wad of shredded khaki and tweed on the counter. "They were soaked. We had to cut them off you."

Langdon looked at his shredded Harris tweed and frowned.

"You had some Kleenex in your pocket," the nurse said.

It was then that Langdon saw the ravaged shreds of parchment clinging all over the lining of his jacket. The folio from Galileo’s Diagramma . The last copy on earth had just dissolved. He was too numb to know how to react. He just stared.

"We saved your personal items." She held up a plastic bin. "Wallet, camcorder, and pen. I dried the camcorder off the best I could."

"I don’t own a camcorder."

The nurse frowned and held out the bin. Langdon looked at the contents. Along with his wallet and pen was a tiny Sony RUVI camcorder. He recalled it now. Kohler had handed it to him and asked him to give it to the media.

"We found it in your pocket. I think you’ll need a new one, though." The nurse flipped open the two-inch screen on the back. "Your viewer is cracked." Then she brightened. "The sound still works, though. Barely." She held the device up to her ear. "Keeps playing something over and over." She listened a moment and then scowled, handing it to Langdon. "Two guys arguing, I think."

Puzzled, Langdon took the camcorder and held it to his ear. The voices were pinched and metallic, but they were discernible. One close. One far away. Langdon recognized them both.

Sitting there in his paper gown, Langdon listened in amazement to the conversation. Although he couldn’t see what was happening, when he heard the shocking finale, he was thankful he had been spared the visual.

My God!

As the conversation began playing again from the beginning, Langdon lowered the camcorder from his ear and sat in appalled mystification. The antimatter… the helicopter… Langdon’s mind now kicked into gear.

But that means…

He wanted to vomit again. With a rising fury of disorientation and rage, Langdon got off the table and stood on shaky legs.

"Mr. Langdon!" the doctor said, trying to stop him.

"I need some clothes," Langdon demanded, feeling the draft on his rear from the backless gown.

"But, you need to rest."

"I’m checking out. Now. I need some clothes."

"But, sir, you—"

"Now!"

Everyone exchanged bewildered looks. "We have no clothes," the doctor said. "Perhaps tomorrow a friend could bring you some."

Langdon drew a slow patient breath and locked eyes with the doctor. "Dr. Jacobus, I am walking out your door right now. I need clothes. I am going to Vatican City. One does not go to Vatican City with one’s ass hanging out. Do I make myself clear?"

Dr. Jacobus swallowed hard. "Get this man something to wear."

When Langdon limped out of Hospital Tiberina, he felt like an overgrown Cub Scout. He was wearing a blue paramedic’s jumpsuit that zipped up the front and was adorned with cloth badges that apparently depicted his numerous qualifications.

The woman accompanying him was heavyset and wore a similar suit. The doctor had assured Langdon she would get him to the Vatican in record time.

" Molto traffico ," Langdon said, reminding her that the area around the Vatican was packed with cars and people.

The woman looked unconcerned. She pointed proudly to one of her patches. " Sono conducente di ambulanza ."

" Ambulanza? " That explained it. Langdon felt like he could use an ambulance ride.

The woman led him around the side of the building. On an outcropping over the water was a cement deck where her vehicle sat waiting. When Langdon saw the vehicle he stopped in his tracks. It was an aging medevac chopper. The hull read Aero-Ambulanza .

He hung his head.

The woman smiled. "Fly Vatican City. Very fast."

The College of Cardinals bristled with ebullience and electricity as they streamed back into the Sistine Chapel. In contrast, Mortati felt in himself a rising confusion he thought might lift him off the floor and carry him away. He believed in the ancient miracles of the Scriptures, and yet what he had just witnessed in person was something he could not possibly comprehend. After a lifetime of devotion, seventy-nine years, Mortati knew these events should ignite in him a pious exuberance… a fervent and living faith. And yet all he felt was a growing spectral unease. Something did not feel right.

"Signore Mortati!" a Swiss Guard yelled, running down the hall. "We have gone to the roof as you asked. The camerlegno is… flesh ! He is a true man! He is not a spirit! He is exactly as we knew him!"

"Did he speak to you?"

"He kneels in silent prayer! We are afraid to touch him!"

Mortati was at a loss. "Tell him… his cardinals await."

"Signore, because he is a man …" the guard hesitated.

"What is it?"

"His chest… he is burned. Should we bind his wounds? He must be in pain."

Mortati considered it. Nothing in his lifetime of service to the church had prepared him for this situation. "He is a man, so serve him as a man. Bathe him. Bind his wounds. Dress him in fresh robes. We await his arrival in the Sistine Chapel."

The guard ran off.

Mortati headed for the chapel. The rest of the cardinals were inside now. As he walked down the hall, he saw Vittoria Vetra slumped alone on a bench at the foot of the Royal Staircase. He could see the pain and loneliness of her loss and wanted to go to her, but he knew it would have to wait. He had work to do… although he had no idea what that work could possibly be.

Mortati entered the chapel. There was a riotous excitement. He closed the door. God help me .

Hospital Tiberina’s twin-rotor Aero-Ambulanza circled in behind Vatican City, and Langdon clenched his teeth, swearing to God this was the very last helicopter ride of his life.

After convincing the pilot that the rules governing Vatican airspace were the least of the Vatican’s concerns right now, he guided her in, unseen, over the rear wall, and landed them on the Vatican’s helipad.

" Grazie ," he said, lowering himself painfully onto the ground. She blew him a kiss and quickly took off, disappearing back over the wall and into the night.

Langdon exhaled, trying to clear his head, hoping to make sense of what he was about to do. With the camcorder in hand, he boarded the same golf cart he had ridden earlier that day. It had not been charged, and the battery-meter registered close to empty. Langdon drove without headlights to conserve power.

He also preferred no one see him coming.

At the back of the Sistine Chapel, Cardinal Mortati stood in a daze as he watched the pandemonium before him.

"It was a miracle!" one of the cardinals shouted. "The work of God!"

"Yes!" others exclaimed. "God has made His will manifest!"

"The camerlegno will be our Pope!" another shouted. "He is not a cardinal, but God has sent a miraculous sign!"

"Yes!" someone agreed. "The laws of conclave are man’s laws. God’s will is before us! I call for a balloting immediately!"