but if he’d delayed any longer he would have lost Gallo. Hopefully the guard would understand.
He was tired, his face deep in stubble and in need of a shave. Some sleep and a good meal would be great, too. Stamm’s office seemed the picture of efficiency. Nothing fancy. Just what he needed to get the job done. Which seemed to fit the man. No nonsense, but fully capable. Cotton was glad this was over. Time to head to southern France and a few days with Cassiopeia. Strange that his thoughts now included another person. He’d been a loner a long time. But not anymore. A woman was again part of his life.
Which wasn’t a bad thing.
Stephanie entered the office. “I really appreciate what you did.”
“All part of the job, and I got paid.”
“Speaking of that. James Grant’s body was found in the Ligurian Sea, with a hole in his head.”
“Gallo?”
“No doubt.”
“Lot of dead people,” he said.
“I agree. This one came with a cost.”
“What about the Churchill letters?”
“Disappeared. But the Knights of Malta are cooperating and conducting searches of Gallo’s rooms. He most likely has them hidden somewhere. They’re appalled that all this has happened. But Gallo was working rogue. He recruited his Secreti on the promise of Vatican positions. Proof positive that you can hire anybody to do anything.”
“I understand that concept fully,” he said, adding a smile.
“I know you do.”
Stamm reentered the office and walked behind his desk, sitting in a plain, high-backed wooden chair, which had to be uncomfortable. But the guy seemed right at home.
“The situation is control. The Vatican press office is dealing with the conclave interruption. The cardinals are tucked away. The two guards at the railway gate have been told that this was an internal matter and that you were working with us.”
“The guy I tossed from the car okay?”
“He’s fine.” Stamm paused. “We were lucky today. An untenable situation has been resolved. Thanks to you, Mr. Malone.”
“And a guy named Luke Daniels on Malta,” Cotton added.
“I’ve already told him the same thing,” Stephanie added. “Luke is on his way here with a prisoner. They landed a couple of hours ago.”
He was perplexed. “Why here?”
“It was at my request,” Stamm said.
Cotton realized the implications. He was sitting on sovereign soil. Stamm intended on treating both Gallo and Hahn as Vatican prisoners and dealing with them per canon law.
“For obvious reasons, we cannot allow the Italian, Maltese, British, or … Americans to deal with these crimes.” Stamm stood. “Would you come with me?”
They left the office and walked to the elevator. Once inside the car, Stamm inserted a key into the control panel then pushed an unmarked button. The building had four floors and a basement. The button that lit up was below the one for the basement.
“This is an old building,” Stamm said. “Built in the 1970s over a part of the grottoes.”
They descended and came to a stop. The elevator doors opened. They were underground, a tall, well-lit corridor stretching ahead. All painted concrete with a tile floor.
“These subterranean chambers have proven useful,” Stamm said.
The cardinal led the way and they followed him toward an iron door. Stamm approached and rapped twice. A lock was released from the other side and the panel swung inward. They stepped into a long room, one side lined with bars separated by stone pillars.
Cells.
Stamm dismissed the man who’d been stationed inside.
A table stood before one of the cells. The reliquary from the Church of St. Magyar’s sat on it with parchments inside and another roll lying outside. Cotton walked over to see Pollux Gallo behind bars. The cardinal and Stephanie joined him.
“These cells have been used by us for a long time,” Stamm said. “Mehmet Ali Ağca was held here for a time after he tried to kill John Paul II.”
Cotton couldn’t help but think of the infamous Lubyanka prison in Moscow beneath the old KGB headquarters building, where political dissidents, artists, writers, and reporters had been tortured. He wondered why the Roman Catholic Church would need underground cells with restricted access.
“Is that the Constitutum Constantini?” he asked, pointing to the parchment.
“It is,” Stamm said.
“I don’t suppose you’d tell me why it’s so important?”
“It proves that all of this is a fraud,” Gallo said, approaching the bars. “The Roman Catholic Church is fake. Tell him, Cardinal. Tell him the truth.”
He waited for more.
“There’s an African proverb. Until the lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunters. It’s so true. In our case,