‘Would you mind repeating that? I have someone here who didn’t quite hear,’ Tarcisio said, looking an incredulous Adolph in the eye.
‘The church is in possession of Ben Isaac’s documents,’ Jacopo repeated.
‘Thank you. We’ll talk later.’ He hung up without taking his eyes off the superior general of the Society of Jesus.
He wanted to laugh in Adolph’s face, but the moment demanded seriousness. For the first time in a long time, Tarcisio felt good. ‘You’re too late, Adolph. Later I’ll communicate my demands. Now get out of my presence.’
57
The temperature rose that afternoon, and the day was sunny and pleasant. Jerusalem was a city that permanently swarmed with building cultural, artistic, and intellectual activity, the capital of eclecticism, with a people who adapted rapidly to the modern world and what it had to offer.
The Holy City knew how to prepare for the future. Every year it received millions of tourists eager to visit the places where Jesus walked. It was the most important city for two religions of the book, and the second most important for the followers of an equally important book. It was those books that gave meaning to all this history. Without them the world would be different.
The car was parked in the middle of a residential street. Francesco and JC were sharing the backseat. There was no sign of the cripple in the Armani suit. Francesco was afraid of JC. There was something about him, an invisible power, extrasensory almost — as ridiculous as it was to think — that radiated omnipotence more than any other person Francesco had known.
‘Now what?’ he asked suspiciously.
JC took something out of his jacket pocket — an airline ticket, a passport, some shekels — and handed them to Francesco.
‘Your participation has come to an end,’ JC declared firmly. ‘I don’t have to tell you that none of this ever happened.’
Francesco was puzzled. What kind of random plan was this?
‘Is that it? Call someone to instruct them to give some documents to Sarah to take to the Gare du Nord? Couldn’t you have done that?’ He wanted to understand, no matter what happened. ‘Why did you kidnap me in Rome and bring me here?’
JC looked at Francesco with a sardonic smile and raised two fingers. ‘Two reasons. The first, so Sarah would know everything was going as planned. Hearing your voice meant everything was under control. And there’s a second reason.’ But he said nothing.
Francesco waited for clarification, but he had to ask for it. ‘What is it?’
JC looked out at the street, calm in the midst of Jerusalem frenzy. ‘What are your intentions toward Sarah?’
‘What?’ What kind of question was that?
JC didn’t repeat himself. Francesco had heard him.
‘Are you her father?’ Francesco asked, irritated by the invasion of privacy. Although he did not personally know Raul Brandao Monteiro, retired from the Portuguese army, he knew who Sarah’s father was.
JC didn’t react, but only waited for an answer.
‘Sarah is an astonishing woman; discreet, professional, very responsible, and until recently I thought we might have a future together. But now, the truth is, I don’t know,’ Francesco confessed. It was not worth the trouble to make up a reason for the old man; besides, Francesco was afraid JC would have sensed the lie.
JC thought about Francesco’s words briefly. He was a practical man.
‘I’d like to give you a glimpse of what Sarah’s life is like. It’s not always luncheons at embassies and ministries, nights at the paper, a movie at the Odeon in Leicester Square or the Empire, a play at the Adelphi, lunches at Indigo or home to fuck all night.’
Francesco felt totally naked after that list of very specific, very real, intimate nights that he thought belonged to his private life.
‘Part of her life has no schedule or plan,’ JC continued. ‘Don’t expect that she’ll fulfill all your expectations, because she won’t. Or that she’ll come home after work every night, because there’ll be days she won’t. Or answer all your phone calls; some she’ll hang up on.’
‘Why are you telling me this?’ Francesco wanted to know, his heart full of foreboding.
‘So you’ll know how your future with her will be. I know about her morning sickness.’
This old man knows everything, Francesco thought.
‘If you’re thinking of continuing your relationship with her, you need to know these things. Marrying Sarah implies bringing me along. That’s why we’re having this conversation.’
‘You’re trying to dissuade me from having a relationship with her.’
‘Of course not.’ JC smiled and coughed. ‘I’m showing you the whole picture. I know it’s not common to do so in relationships. Only much later do you see the dark side of the one you marry. Consider this conversation a bonus. You can make a concrete decision about your future. Risk it or not, knowing all this implies.’
It was too much to digest at one time, and this wasn’t the place to do it.
He saw the cripple leave one of the houses on the other side of the street and come over to the car. He had a young man with him.
‘We’re going to take you to the airport. Don’t forget: you saw and know nothing. Only that will guarantee I forget about you,’ JC warned.
The cripple put the boy in the backseat with those already sitting there. He had dark bruises on his face and traces of dry blood in his nose and mouth. The rest were covered up by clothes.
‘Who are you?’ he asked fearfully.
‘Your father sent us. Don’t worry. Everything is fine,’ JC reassured him.
‘Where’s my father?’ he asked, looking around uneasily.
JC took his cell phone and dialed a number. A little later someone answered and spoke in French.
‘How did everything go?’ JC asked.
‘Just fine. The woman has the documents and is on the plane,’ someone responded.
‘Perfect. Can you get little Ben’s father on the line? His son wants to talk to him. Good work, Gavache.’ He handed the phone to the young man. ‘Talk to your parents. They’re very worried.’
While little Ben calmed parental anxieties, JC lowered the window of the door. The cripple bent down to listen.
‘Our work is almost concluded,’ JC whispered.
‘What about Jerome and Simon?’ the cripple asked, without looking at JC.
‘Thank them for taking care of the kid, and tell them to put in a good word for me when they meet their Creator.’
The cripple took a gun out of his holster, checked the chamber, and put it away again. ‘It’ll be done. I’ll be back in five minutes.’
Little Ben said good-bye to his father and gave the phone back to JC. ‘Thank you so much. That was terrible. I can’t thank you enough,’ he said breathlessly.
The old man smiled with satisfaction.
‘You’re going home now.’
‘What is your name, sir?’
‘You can call me JC.’
58
