Where have I heard that before? Sarah asked herself, while she listened to the debate between Rafael and the barber.
They were seated at a narrow table, Sarah facing James Phelps and the barber facing the priest.
The conversation was between the latter two men alone. No one else was permitted to interrupt.
‘How did you get mixed up in this?’ Rafael wanted to know.
‘It’s Mitrokhin’s fault,’ Ivanovsky explained. ‘Have you heard of him?’
‘Of course. He worked in the KGB archives for forty years and put together his own archive transcribing the most important documents. Later he went into exile somewhere in the UK.’
‘Convenient, wouldn’t you say?’
‘You’re the ones who have to check for double agents. Naturally he quickly became the best friend of the British.’
‘He was anti-Russian, an idiot, a traitor.’
‘He passed your greatest secrets to the enemy,’ Rafael said provocatively.
Ivanovsky shrugged his shoulders, dismissing his importance.
‘Very few secrets. The British were the ones who took him in. The Americans didn’t believe him. After a certain point, we suspected him of duplicity and decided to give him misinformation.’
Rafael wrinkled his nose.
‘I don’t know if I believe that.’
‘Believe it.’
‘The powerful Soviet Union has an agent suspected of high treason and decides to give him false information instead of arresting and executing him?’
‘That’s exactly what happened. The majority of what is known as the Mitrokhin Archive is pure fiction.’
‘Bullshit,’ Rafael accused him. ‘He deceived them, and they made up this excuse.’
‘Don’t forget we are talking about transcriptions, not original documents. We don’t have to make up anything. Or even comment on the subject.’
‘But the British classified it as the most complete intelligence source in memory.’
‘And why wouldn’t they? Imagine that an agent of the CIA or MI6 transcribed documents, whether true or false, for thirty or forty years and passed them to us. Do you think we wouldn’t classify them as true?’
The two men looked at each other. Their scrutiny had ended, the analysis of each other’s words and character over. From here on nothing needed to be explained.
‘Everything begins with Mitrokhin,’ Rafael said as if thinking out loud, ‘who accuses you, among other things, of having planned and carried out the attack in 1981 in Saint Peter’s.’
‘With the help of the Bulgarians, Poles, and the now defunct East Germans,’ Ivanovsky added.
‘That’s where Mitrokhin caused problems,’ Rafael declared.
Ivanovsky frowned.
‘I see you’re well informed.’
‘I try to keep current. If Mitrokhin thought the USSR had something to do with the attempt, it was because he was led along.’ A meaningful wink.
‘That’s right. They tricked us.’
‘I know.’
‘We knew an attempt on the pope was imminent. We filled Saint Peter’s Square, and the blame fell on us.’
‘Who did you suspect?’
‘For two years we suspected the Americans.’
‘Why?’
‘The Polish pope at that time was enough to make anyone wet his pants with fear. It was Americans or the Iron Curtain. The Americans have done it before. They killed their own president in 1963.’
Sarah listened openmouthed.
‘Look who’s talking,’ Rafael observed sarcastically. ‘How many did your Stalin kill?’
‘Better not to go there.’
‘I agree.’
We all live in glass houses.
‘When did you stop suspecting them?’ Rafael returned to the subject.
‘When the girls disappeared in 1983.’
‘Emanuela and Mirella? Is that who we’re talking about?’ Rafael asked. There couldn’t be mistakes.
‘Affirmative.’
The wrinkled one, who a little while ago carried an AK-47, came into the room with a tray filled with four cups and a teapot, a sign the meeting was friendly… or not.
‘Who are those girls?’
The two men looked at Sarah with condescension. She couldn’t stand not asking. She’d heard of the girls. Phelps had called them girls but didn’t know who they were…
The wrinkled one put the tray on the table and left. Ivanovsky passed the cups around and served the steaming orange tea to everyone.
‘Mirella and Emanuela were two teenagers who disappeared in Rome in 1983. They were kidnapped by the same man at Marcinkus’s orders.’
‘Why?’ Sarah couldn’t believe it.
Phelps picked up his cup to drink the tea, but Rafael, without taking his eyes off Ivanovsky, placed his hand over Phelps’s cup.
‘The Vatican received three calls from a man who identified himself as “The American” and demanded the immediate release of the Turk in exchange for Emanuela’s liberty.’
‘And the Vatican didn’t give in?’ Sarah joined the conversation definitively.
‘The Vatican couldn’t do anything. The Turk was in Italian custody,’ the barber explained while sipping a little of his tea. ‘But that’s when we realized the attack could have been an inside job. That and other things we discovered later.’
Rafael lifted his hand from Phelps’s cup, permitting him to drink.
‘And he killed them?’ she asked.
The Russian looked uncomfortably at Rafael, a request for help the other understood.
‘They were already dead before the call,’ Rafael finally said.
‘How is that possible? Weren’t they the price of exchange for the freedom of the Turk?’
A new, heavy silence.
‘Let’s say they served other purposes and let’s not talk about it again,’ Rafael concluded peremptorily. He changed the subject. ‘Let’s talk about now. What was your man doing in London?’
‘Which man?’ the other asked evasively.
‘Grigori Nikolaievitch Nestov.’
Ivanovsky squirmed in his chair, disguising his unease.
‘I don’t understand,’ he stammered.
‘We’re past that phase, Ivanovsky,’ Rafael scolded him without altering his tone.
He took his first sip of tea, showing confidence. Every gesture counted. He let the silence spread through the room as the hot liquid went down his throat.
‘Grigori Nikolaievitch Nestov,’ Rafael repeated.
‘He was a good man. And a good friend,’ Ivanovsky confessed at last, his eyes looking into space and his memory providing vivid images of the dead man. ‘Tell me, have you heard of Abu Rashid?’
‘The name’s not unfamiliar.’
‘Who’s he?’ Phelps asked, wrapped up in everything being said.
‘Abu Rashid is a Muslim who lives in Jerusalem and sees the Virgin Mary.’
‘What?’ Phelps was scandalized.
‘It’s true,’ Ivanovsky confirmed.
‘Nonsense. I’ve never heard of such a thing,’ Phelps insisted.
‘It’s more common than you might think. Perhaps your friend from the Vatican can confirm it.’ The barber
