The Day After Tomorrow_ A Novel - Allan Folsom [298]
—Cardinal Umberto Palestrina, 62. A Naples street urchin and orphan become Vatican secretariat of state. Enormously popular within the Church and carried in the same high regard by the secular international diplomatic community. Massive physically, six foot seven and two hundred and seventy pounds.
—Rosario Parma, 67. Cardinal vicar of Rome, tall, severe, conservative prelate from Florence in whose diocese and church the mass was being celebrated.
—Cardinal Joseph Matadi, 57, prefect of the Congregation of Bishops. Native of Zaire. Broad shouldered, jovial, widely traveled, multilingual, diplomatically astute.
—Monsignor Fabio Capizzi, 62, director general of the Vatican Bank. Native of Milan. Graduate of Oxford and Yale, self-made millionaire before joining the seminary at age thirty.
—Cardinal Nicola Marsciano, 60, eldest son of a Tuscan farmer, educated in Switzerland and Rome, president of the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See; as such, chief overseer of the Vatican’s investments.
CLICK.
The gloved hand of S turned off the television, and he stepped again to the table in front of the window. Behind him Miguel Valera coughed and moved involuntarily on the sofa. 5 glanced at him, then looked back out the window. Police barricades had been set up to keep the crowd from the cobblestone directly in front of the basilica, and now mounted police on horseback took up positions on either side of its bronze central entrance gate. Behind them and to the left, out of sight of the crowd, S could see a dozen dark blue vans. In front of them stood a phalanx of riot police, also out of sight, but ready if needed. Abruptly four dark Lancias, unmarked cars of the Polizia di Stato, the police force protecting the pope and his cardinals outside the Vatican, pulled up and stopped at the foot of the basilica’s steps, waiting to take the pope and his cardinals back to the Vatican.
Suddenly the bronze gates swung Open and there was a roar from the crowd. At the same time seemingly every church bell in Rome began to ring. For a moment nothing happened. Then, above the din of the bells, S heard a second roar as the pope appeared, the white of his cassock standing out clearly against a sea of red as his men of trust walked close behind him—the group surrounded tightly by security men wearing black suits and sunglasses.
Valera groaned, his eyes flickered, and he tried to roll over. S glanced at him, but only for an instant. Then he turned and lifted something covered with an ordinary bath towel from the shadows beside the window. Setting it on the table, he took away the towel and put his eye to the scope of a Finnish sniper rifle. Instantly his view of the basilica magnified a hundredfold. In the same moment, Cardinal Palestrina stepped forward and fully into its circular frame, its crosshairs meeting directly over his broad grin. S took a breath and held it, letting his gloved forefinger ease against the trigger.
Abruptly Palestrina stepped aside, and the rifle’s scope came tight on Cardinal Marsciano’s chest. S heard Valera grunt behind him. Ignoring him, he swung the rifle left through a blur of Cardinal red until he saw the white of Leo XIV’s cassock. A split second later the crosshairs centered between his eyes just above the bridge of his nose.
Behind him Valera yelled something out loud. Again, S ignored him. His finger tightened against the trigger as the pope lurched forward, past a security man, smiling and waving at the crowd. Then, abruptly, S swung the rifle right, bringing the mesh of crosshairs full on the gold pectoral cross of Rosario Parma, the Cardinal Vicar of Rome. 5 gave no expression, simply squeezed the trigger three times in rapid succession, rocking the room with thundering discharge and, two hundred yards away, showering Pope Leo XTV, Giacomo Pecci, and those around him with the blood of a man of trust.