Chapter 23
CHAPTER 23
J ASON LEARNED NOTHING IN THE V ATICAN ARCHIVES .
He wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting. A specific reference to some Pledge of Christ given to the Medici family? Highly unlikely. Any such document would have been long since discovered and surely destroyed. Why keep it? No good reason existed in his mind.
He’d taken a chance asking the clerk about the pledge, but he had no choice. It would not be long before the entire Curia knew of his suspension and began the whispers that had destroyed many a career. Ascolani would make sure that fact was widely known. He estimated he had until morning before that happened, so he needed to make the best of the next few hours.
The time was approaching 10:00 P.M.
He had many friends within the Curia, but one of his closest was Charles Cardinal Stamm, an Irishman, the man once in charge of the Entity. He’d served for decades, reappointed by pope after pope until the current pontiff, when he’d been asked to retire. The talk had been that Ascolani had championed that effort, wanting the Entity for himself. But as with every other rumor, nobody knew for sure. Even so, Ascolani most definitely ended up in charge of the Entity.
Jason had left Vatican City and made a quick stop at his apartment to change clothes, losing the clerical garb and donning plain pants, a pullover shirt, and casual shoes. Things he normally wore either at home or on the weekends. He then walked the streets of Rome toward an apartment building about three kilometers away, one of many the Holy See owned across the city. The apartments inside provided affordable housing for various cardinals, bishops, and priests who worked in the Vatican. Stamm had been allowed to keep his residence, most likely as an offering so he’d stay quiet in retirement—an offering that could just as easily be taken away.
He’d called ahead and Stamm was waiting up for him. His old friend was a tiny man, rail-thin, pinched in the cheeks, with a pockmarked face and a hooked nose. The hair was a trademark close-cropped frizz of silver. His age? Hard to say. But based on longevity it had to be approaching ninety. He’d been known for wearing only a trace of a scarlet bib below a white clerical collar just above the top button of a plain black cassock. No signet ring. A simple brass pectoral cross the only sign of his high office. Scarlet was reserved solely for mandated occasions. True to the nature of the Entity, Stamm had always kept an extremely low profile. But his prickly humor, boundless vigor, and suspicious nature had not made him a favorite within the Curia. For all his faults, though, Stamm was noted as calm and precise, his words always ringing with reason. He possessed a legion of friends, but also a large quantity of enemies.
Ascolani chief among them.
They sat, the entire apartment the picture of austerity. Nothing flashy or extravagant. More what you’d find at a secondhand store.
He explained all that had happened.
“Quite a day you have had,” Stamm said.
“An understatement.”
The cardinal chuckled. “I know what you mean. I had one of those days myself a few years ago when I was unceremoniously let go. You are being herded, Jason, along a predetermined path, like a rat in a maze.”
“By who?”
“There is a host of likely suspects, but one shines above all others.”
He knew. Ascolani. “Why? I am no threat to him.”
Stamm sat back in his chair, head angled to the ceiling. “But the Pignus Christi is.”
“Is there something to it?”
“No one has actually ever seen one. Supposedly, they were common in the early days, just after Constantine sanctioned Christianity and made it the empire’s religion. It was all those bishops and early popes had to offer to get anything. A promise before their God. But its use faded away as the church’s secular power and wealth grew. No need to make any sacred promises. The church came to be able to do whatever it wanted, whenever it wanted, however it wanted, without repercussions.”
“Is it true what Casaburi said about the Medicis loaning ten million florins to Julius II?”
“It is certainly possible. The Warrior Pope spent a lot of money, and the Medicis had the funds to lend.”
“What does it matter any longer?”
Stamm pointed a thin, gaunt finger his way. “It matters a great deal. The pope swore before God that a promise would be kept. He placed that promise in writing, under papal seal. To breach that would be a mortal sin.”
“Since when do popes care about committing mortal sins?”
“I agree. They had no problem denying that some of our priests were pedophiles. Lie after lie after lie. The church cannot afford another blow like that to its credibility, no matter how ancient the threat may be.”
“You’re saying that if such a document exists, we would honor it?”
“The pope would have no choice. Either that or openly breach the promise. Either one is bad. I suspect an ecclesiastical court might even uphold the validity of that pledge.”
“Why would Ascolani care about this?”
“He fashions himself as a savior. I suspect this would be another grand gesture on his part. Saving the Holy See, and all that. It is no secret that the current Holy Father’s mind is not his own. And I mean no offense. I know he is your friend. But Ascolani controls the information flow, so he controls him. Totally. That is why Ascolani wanted the Entity. He can now feed the pope whatever information he wants. He is the gatekeeper and, from what I am told, the pope’s personal secretary is close to the secretary of state.”
He’d heard the same thing.
“Ascolani is nothing but trouble,” Stamm said. “I tried to warn the pope when he asked for my resignation, but he would not listen. The Secretariat of State demands a more moderate personality, somebody who is a diplomat as well as an administrator. Who inspires trust, not controversy. And under no circumstances should that same man head the Entity.”
“I have to find that document,” he said to Stamm.
“No, Jason. We have to find that document.”
He realized that a man like Charles Stamm would not take rejection lightly. By all accounts he’d run the Entity masterfully for nearly five decades. Other popes had bowed to his expertise. This one had rejected it. The difference? Ascolani.
“You hold a grudge?”
“I do.” Stamm sat silent for a moment. Finally, he said, “Your meeting with Eric Casaburi was monitored. So Ascolani knows that a Pledge of Christ was mentioned. He will dispatch assets to investigate. He will not be able to resist.”
“I am not going to Munich.”
“I certainly hope not. But once you do not go, you are a marked man. You have intentionally ignored a direct papal order. They will come to arrest you, and charge you with bribery. Munich was a way to get you out of sight and avoid that. Your conversation with the clerk in the archives will also alert them that you have taken an interest in the Pledge of Christ.”
A mistake on his part, for sure. But at the time, he felt it the only play.
“The good thing is that Ascolani will not assume you would come here,” Stamm said. “For a while, after I resigned, I was watched continuously. But that stopped about a year ago.”
“Is there that much paranoia?”
“A man like Sergio Ascolani has many enemies. The Entity has now become his personal information and protection force.”
Not necessarily what he wanted to hear.
“I have a confession,” Stamm said. “I was aware of the allegations made against you. The head of the Swiss Guard is an old friend. When the trial prosecutors asked for verification on the information they received, he called me and I connected them with a woman I know in the United States Justice Department, who provided him one of her retired operatives. He’s the one who took the photograph of the money in the priest hole. I worked with both of them, right before the last conclave, on a matter out of Malta. His name is Cotton Malone.”
“Why didn’t you tell me before now?”
“I could not. But I also believed that if any money was found, it had to be planted. I was hoping you would come this way and ask for help.”
He appreciated the confidence and felt better with this old warrior on his side.
“As Cardinal Ascolani is about to find out,” Stamm said, “I am not dead yet.”