The Omega Scroll (6 page)

‘Eminence, a terrible thing,’ Petroni said smoothly. The Cardinal Secretary of State, also fully dressed and clean-shaven, hurried into the room. He was followed a little later by the Papal Physician, Dr Renato Buzzonetti. While Dr Buzzonetti examined the body, Archbishop Petroni systematically removed the papers and the file from the bed, as well as the dead Pope’s glasses, his slippers and his medicine. He crossed to the Pope’s desk and removed the file on the impending sackings and transfers, as well as the Holy Father’s appointment book.

Later in the morning Giovanni, still trying to come to terms with both his and the Church’s loss, was stunned to hear the official announcement of the Pope’s death on Vatican Radio:

This morning, 29 September 1978, at about five-thirty, the private secretary of the Pope, not having found the Holy Father in the chapel of his private apartment, looked for him in his room and found him dead in bed with the light on, like one who was intent on reading. The physician, Dr Renato Buzzonetti, who hastened to the Pope’s room, verified the death, which took place presumably around eleven o’clock yesterday evening, as ‘sudden death’ that could be related to acute myocardial infarction.

‘The Vatican Radio has got it wrong, Excellency,’ Giovanni remonstrated with Petroni.

‘The Vatican Radio has got it absolutely correct, Father Donelli. Their statements are in accordance with the official press release, which is going on the wire as we speak. All press inquiries are to be handled by the Vatican Press Office and should anyone else ask, the Holy Father was found reading a copy of the devotional
The Imitation of Christ
. Do I make myself clear?’

‘Excellency,’ was Giovanni’s only response, a touch of steel in his own voice.

Petroni watched the young priest leave his office and wondered how much of the brief on the Omega Scroll he had seen. Time enough to deal with him after the conclave elected the next Pope. Hopefully this time, the Curial Cardinals would get it right and the Church could return to the right path.

Tom Schweiker prepared to go to air, adding to the growing calls for the truth about the death of John Paul I. Up until now the CCN network had not had a reporter dedicated to ‘religious affairs’ and although Tom Schweiker was CCN’s correspondent across the Mediterranean in the largely Muslim Middle East, given the relative proximity to Rome, management had not objected to Tom’s request to cover the Holy See. Management had no idea the request was part of Tom’s search for his own haunting truth, something that had driven him since his youth.

‘And this evening we cross live to Tom Schweiker reporting from outside the Vatican. Tom, there are growing calls for an investigation into Pope John Paul’s death.’ The anchor in New York was the grey-haired, avuncular Walter Casey, a household name in the United States.

Tom nodded as the satellite cross from Washington reached his earpiece. ‘That’s right, Walter. The respected Italian newspaper
Corriere della Sera
has been just one of those in the forefront of calls for the Vatican to come clean.’

‘Do you think the Vatican is hiding something?’

‘That’s very clear. The Vatican has lied about this from the outset, Walter, and the web of fiction has been almost childish. Pope John Paul I was not found by his private secretary, as claimed in the Vatican’s initial press release. We now know that the body was found by a member of the Papal household, Sister Vincenza, who has been spirited away, and the Vatican is refusing to say where she is.’

‘And there is a question about the documents the Pope was reading when he died?’

‘Initially the Vatican claimed he was reading a devotional book,
The Imitation of Christ
, but that claim fell apart when the book couldn’t be found in the Pope’s apartments in the Vatican but turned up in his old apartments in Venice. The Vatican has now claimed the Pope was studying a list of new appointments but there are claims that this is also not true, and that he may have been reading a brief on the legendary Omega Scroll.’

‘Will there be an autopsy do you think, Tom?’

‘There is enormous pressure for that, Walter, but the Vatican are resisting it on the basis that Canon Law forbids it. The problem with that argument is that several theologians have confirmed that Canon Law doesn’t say anything about autopsies. As far as Italian law goes the injection of embalming fluids is not allowed within twenty-four hours of death without the express permission of a magistrate, yet Pope John Paul’s body was injected immediately. There is now a very strong sense that Pope John Paul I was murdered, possibly by the addition of digitalis to a regular medicine he took for low blood pressure.’

‘Do we know if he was in good health?’

‘He was examined by Dr Giuseppe Da Ros only a few days before his death and Dr Da Ros said, “
Non sta bene ma benone
– he is not well but very well,” and his personal doctor in Venice says Albino Luciani was a very good mountain climber with absolutely no history of heart problems.’

‘Tom, thank you for joining us tonight. That was Tom Schweiker reporting from the Vatican on the suspected murder of Pope John Paul I. In news just to hand the Vatican has announced that the conclave for the election of his successor will be held on 14 October, the earliest possible date that such an election can be called. Now to the news from the White House. President Carter today expressed confidence for peace in the Middle East after the signing last week of the Camp David Accords between Egypt’s President Anwar Sadat and the Prime Minister of Israel …’

Later that night in his hotel room Tom Schweiker tossed in his sleep, haunted by the day’s coverage of the Vatican. The nightmares had been with him ever since his boyhood days, spent on a dirt-poor potato farm in Idaho; nightmares that continually motivated Tom’s search for peace, taking him back to 1960 when he was twelve, missing a father who had died six years earlier. A time when a new priest, Father Rory Courtney, had arrived in their little parish out on Snake River Plain.

The big car pulled up outside the house, scattering the chickens. There was a knock on the old wooden fly-screen door.

‘I’ll get it,’ Tom called to his mother, taking the wooden stairs two at a time.

‘Father! Please come in,’ Tom said, getting used to seeing their priest at the door. Rory Courtney was a big man in his mid-twenties but his reddish hair had started to thin and he was putting on weight. A deep scar ran almost the length of his left cheek, the result of a whisky-induced brawl in his earlier days as a young mining geologist.

‘Thank you, Tom. Is your mother at home?’

‘Who is it, Tom?’ his mother called from the kitchen.

‘It’s Father Courtney, Mom.’

Tom’s mother came hurrying into the front room, wiping flour from her hands as she untied her apron.

‘Oh Father, excuse the mess. Please, have a seat.’ Eleanor Schweiker hastily cleared her sewing from the old couch, somewhat dismayed that their priest should find her in anything but her one good dress that she kept for Sundays.

‘Not at all, Eleanor, not at all. I won’t stay long. I’m just doing my rounds, checking on my flock.’ Rory Courtney had an easy manner and Tom had begun to look forward to his visits. Father Courtney always managed to find time to throw a football around the back paddock with him. It went some way to easing the pain of missing his dad.

‘Would you like coffee, Father?’

‘Perhaps next time, Eleanor. I was wondering, if Tom is not doing anything next Sunday afternoon we could take a drive down to the river. I’ve found a great little place where we can pan for gold.’

‘I don’t know how to, Father,’ Tom said awkwardly.

‘Ah, but I do and I’ll teach you. Just bring your rubber boots and I’ll bring the rest of the things we’ll need.’

‘Oh, Father, that would be so kind,’ Eleanor Schweiker responded gratefully. Tom had lacked a father figure for too long. ‘I’ll pack you both a picnic lunch.’

‘Thank you, Eleanor. I’ll call by after Mass in the morning,’ he said, getting up to leave.

‘Bye, Father.’ Tom and his mother waved from the front porch. Father Courtney’s big old Buick left a trail of dust as he headed down the hill.

The winter sun had reached the zenith of a low arc above the thickly wooded mountains. The Buick rocked gently as Father Courtney drove across the clearing bringing the car to a halt near the bank of the swiftly flowing river. The cold clear mountain waters, swollen by the early rains, gurgled over the rocks.

‘Is there really gold in this river, Father?’ Tom asked excitedly, munching on a bread roll his mother had baked earlier that morning.

‘Bound to be.’

Tom helped Father Courtney unpack a shovel, a pick and two buckets to collect the gravel, a bright blue plastic dish fitted with a small screen and a strange ribbed oblong box about 5 feet long made out of lightweight aluminium.

‘What’s this, Father?’

‘A sluice. Give me a hand and we’ll set it up.’

Tom followed Father Courtney through the tumbling waters of the river to the opposite bank. This new priest, Tom thought, was really nice.

‘The gold is heavier than the gravel so it sinks to the bottom while the gravel runs over each of the riffles and back into the river.’ Father Courtney propped two large rocks on either side of the sluice to steady it, picked up the shovel and gave Tom the pick. Tom grinned and swung on the pick with gusto. They took it in turns to shovel and pick, and after ten minutes of hard digging both large buckets were full of gravel.

‘The most important thing is not to dump too much gravel into the top of the sieve, otherwise it will run out the other end taking the gold with it. You’ve always got to be able to see the tops of the riffles,’ Father Courtney explained, feeding the gravel slowly into the top end of the sluice. Tom watched as the gravel washed over the riffles, leaving the concentrate behind.

‘OK, Tom, now we get to see if we’re rich,’ Father Courtney said with a big smile, filling a pan with the black concentrate. Holding the pan just under the water, he shook it gently to get the lighter dirt to the surface and then swirled it over the lip. Suddenly a small flash of yellow appeared in the bottom of the pan.

‘Father! Look!’ Tom pointed. Father Courtney picked the small nugget out of the black sand. It was about the size of a pea, but as far as Tom was concerned it could have been the mother lode.

‘There you are, Tom. I told you we’d find gold here.’

It was the only ‘nugget’ of the day. After two more hours the pan yielded about half an ounce of gold flakes, which Father Courtney put into a small plastic cylinder. Tom couldn’t have been happier.

‘Can you drive, Tom?’ Father Courtney asked as he finished loading the car. Tom shook his head.

‘Well, get in this side and you can steer some of the way back.’ Father Courtney held the driver’s door open and Tom stepped onto the running board and slid under the white bakelite steering wheel with its shining chrome horn.

‘Nice car, Father.’

‘It is, isn’t it. Grab the wheel,’ he said, putting his arm around Tom. For about a mile they drove up from the riverbank, Tom grinning as he piloted the big car around the potholes and puddles.

‘If you like I’ll teach you to drive. I’m generally free after Mass on a Sunday.’

‘Thanks, Father. That would be terrific,’ Tom said, his eyes shining as Father Courtney took the wheel. His excitement turned to confusion when Father Courtney took one hand off the wheel and rubbed the inside of Tom’s thigh.

‘It’s a good thing to be close to your priest, Tom. God meant it to be this way.’

Father Courtney pulled Tom’s hand across and put it down the front of his trousers. It hadn’t occurred to Tom that Father Courtney might have loosened his black priest’s belt, or the fly on his black priestly trousers. Black. Priestly black. Sinister, evil black. Father Rory Courtney had planned the whole outing meticulously, right down to the loosening of his belt. A simple manoeuvre as Tom had turned his back and clambered excitedly into the car. Father Courtney’s timing was the result of years of practice. Each time there had been complaints and each time the Vatican had hushed them up and moved their priest to prey on another unsuspecting group of children. This was Father Courtney’s third parish in three years.

Tom tried to pull his hand away but Father Courtney held it on his erection. With an expert flick of the wheel he pulled the big car over onto the side track he had reconnoitred earlier in the week and they drove back towards the river. When the track finally petered out in thick brush he turned off the engine and with both hands free he started to fondle Tom. To Tom’s horror he found himself getting an erection as well.

‘There see. Isn’t that good?’ In one movement Father Courtney slipped his own trousers down, grabbed Tom’s hand again and masturbated with it until he came with a high-pitched cry.

Stunned, Tom sat pressed up against the passenger door, putting as much of the big bench seat as possible between himself and the priest.

‘It won’t do any good to tell your mother, Tom. She would never believe you, but we can still do the driving lessons, eh?’

‘No thanks,’ Tom said sullenly. Angry. Ashamed. Confused. Betrayed. A whole mix of emotions that even his weekly bath that night could never remove.

When Tom refused Father Courtney’s invitations to pan for more gold from the river, his mother had been puzzled.

‘It will do you good, Tom. Besides he’s our priest, you should be grateful he wants to spend time with you.’

‘No thanks.’

‘But why?’

Tom wouldn’t answer. His response had been to run upstairs, slam his bedroom door shut and refuse to come out for hours. His mother had become angry, very angry. For weeks there had been a cold distance between them. Then the rumours started. Big Mitch Coburn, a fourth-generation potato farmer and elder of the Church, his complexion more florid than usual, outlined the complaints to the little gathering in his front parlour. Eleanor Schweiker listened with a growing sense of horror as realisation dawned on her.