"Then we've got a problem," Saul said. "I have to go to Gallagher and the priest, but I don't know what questions to ask. You're here to find the cardinal and whoever's trying to destroy the Fraternity. I'm here to find Erika and her father. I'm sure your search and mine have something to do with each other. I think the answers to your questions might help me answer my own. But if you won't let the Agency know you're involved, how can we both question the priest?"

25.

Saul knocked on Gallagher's door. He heard the scrape of a lock being freed. In a moment, the door was opened, and he stepped inside, his nostrils feeling pinched from the smell of medication. He approached

Father Dusseault, who was lying on the bed. The priest looked pasty.

His broken nose had swelled. So had the bruised skin along his eyebrows. His jaw was puffy. The priest's black suitcoat had been removed, his shirt opened, his sleeves rolled up. Sensors attached to his chest and arms transmitted signals to portable heart and blood-pressure monitors that sat on a bureau shifted close to the bed.

Saul surveyed the rest of the room. The bathroom door was open. The doctor and his assistant were gone. "Where--?"

"I sent them out to eat breakfast," Gallagher said. "What they don't hear won't burden them with something else to forget. I can have them paged in the restaurant if we have an emergency. They'll phone in an hour to find out when it's time to come back." Saul turned again toward

Father Dusseault, studying the IV that controlled the flow of Sodium

Amytal into the priest's arm. "He's still asleep," Saul said. "Does that mean he had a concussion?"

"No. In fact, he came around two hours ago. The doctor had to sedate him."

"But he can answer questions?"

"The monitors show he's at an ideal semiconscious level. He's primed to tell you anything you want to know."

"Good. Now I've got a favor to ask." Gallagher shifted his weight.

"You've had plenty of favors as it is. In case you've forgotten, this started with your promising to do us a favor if we let you come out of exile. But little by little, you've maneuvered us so we keep giving you favors. It's getting tiresome."

"One more. What's the harm?"

"I'll know when you tell me what you want."

"To be alone when I question the priest." Gallagher stopped moving.

"Jesus, you've got more nerve than--!"

"It's for your own benefit. If something goes wrong, if he dies, do you really want to be present when it happens? Do you want the Agency implicated in the death of a Vatican official?"

"Bullshit, Romulus. If he died, who'd know except you and me?"

"That's the point. Both of us would be one too many.

You'd worry if you could trust me with what I knew if the priest didn't survive the interrogation. Maybe you'd decide I'm too dangerous a liability. I'm not anxious to sell my soul to the Agency again or have an unexpected accident. So do yourself a favor and join the team for breakfast. Do me a favor by letting me take as many risks as I have to when I question the priest. I'll tell you everything I learn."

"How can I be sure of that?"

"Because I need you. I wouldn't have been able to come this far without your help. And with more help from you, I hope to go a lot farther.

It's for sure he'll tell me things I can't follow up without the resources of the Agency. You have my word. You'll be told everything I learn about the Fraternity. All I want to know is what happened to my wife and her father." Gallagher pursed his lips. "I know I'll be sorry for this. Your word?" Saul nodded. "You always played straight,"

Gallagher said. "It's one of the reasons I went along with you this far. I hope you haven't changed--because in that case you will have an accident. Two hours. After that, no matter what excuses you make, I'm coming back."

"You've got a deal." Gallagher left. Saul waited long enough for

Gallagher to have gone downstairs, then picked up the phone. He dialed as silently as possible, let the other end ring once, then hung up. He swung toward Father Dusseault. Two hours. He had to cram as much as he could into them. In a rush, he disconnected the sensors from the priest's chest and arms. He buttoned the priest's shirt but lifted the

IV tube in his arm. Raising the priest off the bed, Saul grabbed the bottle of Sodium-Amytal solution and supported the priest toward the door. He managed to free the lock. Someone opened the door from the other side--Drew, who'd been alerted to hurry from Saul's room down to this one as soon as he heard a single ring on the phone. Wordlessly,

Drew helped Saul bring Father Dusseault into the hallway, then gently shut the door behind them. Silence was mandatory. It wasn't sufficient for Gallagher to have left the room so that Saul could protect Drew and

Arlene from the Agency, because Saul was certain the room had electronic eavesdropping monitors. Gallagher was thorough. He'd want a record of the interrogation, a tape to listen to while he sifted through the information the priest supplied. In fact, Saul had counted on the microphones in the room to give Gallagher a rationalization for going downstairs. After all, from Gallagher's point of view, what difference did it make if he wasn't in the room during the interrogation as long as he had a recording of what was said? But if the interrogation had taken place in the room. Drew and Arlene would have had their voices on the tape, and Gallagher would next have interrogated them. Saul felt exposed in the corridor, worrying that a guest or a member of the hotel staff would appear and notice Drew and himself supporting Father Dusseaull

There wasn't any way to eliminate that danger. Saul heard the elevator rising and muffled voices behind a door. A lock scraped open behind him. He and Drew got the priest to his own door, opened it, and stepped inside just as a door came open down the hall and someone stepped out.

But by then Arlene was already closing his own door, locking it while he and Drew carried Father Dusseault to the bed. They set him down gently, placing a pillow beneath his head and stretching out his legs.

"Gallagher gave me only two hours."

"It's not enough time," Drew said. "It'll have to be enough."

"What if Gallagher has a team listening to the microphones you think are planted in the other room?" Arlene asked. "When all they hear is silence, they'll know you're not questioning the priest. They'll warn

Gallagher that something's wrong."

"I don't think there is a team," Saul said. "When Gallagher found out

I'd kidnapped a Vatican official, he started worrying about his involvement with me. If this goes wrong, he knows he could lose his job. He's already concerned about the doctor and his assistants learning too much. He told them to leave before he sent for me. My guess is he doesn't have anyone listening to the microphones. The recording he hoped to get from the interrogation would have been for his ears only."

"Then at least we can count on the two hours we've got."

"Less than that now," Saul said. "We'd better get started." Drew held up the bottle of Sodium-Amytal solution. Arlene inserted the needle from its tube into the valve mechanism of the tube leading into Father

Dusseault's arm. Saul leaned close to the priest. "We're your friends.

You're safe. You don't have anything to worry about. Relax."

"Relax..." Father Dusseault's voice was faint, scratchy, as if his throat were dry. "You feel at peace. Tell us everything we ask for.

Hold nothing back. You can trust us." 'Trust you..." Saul hesitated, trying to decide what his first question should be. There were many to choose from, but if he asked them at random, it would take too long to fit the priest's disparate responses together. He needed to construct a sequence in which the questions would lead logically from one to another. But Drew intervened, going directly to the core of his own problem. "Do you know what happened to Cardinal Pavelic?"

"I killed him... cremated his body." In shock. Drew glanced at Arlene and Saul. "Why?"

"He found out what I'd done."

"What was that?" Told the Jews." Saul stiffened. "Jews?" Arlene asked,

"What did you tell them?"