"Because I've devoted my life to studying and preserving the history of Jews in this part of Italy, and I've never seen any evidence to suggest that Jews were provided sanctuary at that particular convent. In fact, the evidence suggests quite the opposite occurred-- that Jews requested sanctuary and were turned away."

"You're absolutely sure?"

"As sure as one can be in a situation like this."

"A nun at the convent told me that a dozen or so Jews were provided sanctuary there during the war. She even showed me the rooms in a cellar where they hid."

"And what is this good woman's name?"

"Mother Vincenza."

"I'm afraid Mother Vincenza is sadly mistaken. Or, worse, she's deliberately trying to mislead you, though I would hesitate to level such an accusation against a woman of faith."

Gabriel thought of the late-night call to his hotel room in Bren-zone: Mother Vincenza is lying to you, the same way she lied to your friend.

The rabbi leaned forward and laid his hand on Gabriel's forearm. "Tell me, Signor Delvecchio. What is your interest in this matter? Is it academic?"

"No, it's personal."

"Then do you mind if I ask you a personal question? Are you Jewish?"

Gabriel hesitated, then answered the question truthfully.

"How much do you know about what happened here during the war?" the rabbi asked.

"I'm ashamed to say that my knowledge is not what it should be, Rabbi Zolli."

"Believe me, I'm used to that." He smiled warmly. "Come with me. There's something you should see."

THEY CROSSED the darkened square and stood before what appeared to be an ordinary apartment house. Through an open shade, Gabriel could see a woman preparing an evening meal in a small, institutional kitchen. In the next room, a trio of old women huddled round a flickering television. Then he noticed the sign over the door: casa israelitica di riposo. The building was a nursing home for Jews.

"Read the plaque," the rabbi said, lighting a match. It was a memorial to Venetian Jews arrested by the Germans and deported during the war. The rabbi extinguished the match with a flick of his wrist and gazed through the window at the elderly Jews.

"In September of 1943, not long after the collapse of the Mussolini regime, the German Army occupied all but the southernmost tip of the Italian Peninsula. Within days, the president of the Jewish community here in Venice received a demand from the SS: hand over a list of all Jews still living in Venice, or face the consequences."

"What did he do?"

"He committed suicide rather than comply. In doing so, he alerted the community that time was running out. Hundreds fled the city. Many took refuge in convents and monasteries throughout the north, or in the homes of ordinary Italians. A few tried to cross the border into Switzerland but were turned away."

"But none at Brenzone?"

"I have no evidence to suggest that any Jews from Venice--or anywhere else, for that matter--were given sanctuary at the Con-Vent of the Sacred Heart. In fact, our archives contain written testimony about a family from this community who requested sanctuary in Brenzone and were turned away."

"Who stayed behind in Venice?"

"The elderly. The sick. The poor who had no means to travel or pay bribes. On the night of December fifth, Italian police and Fascist gangs entered the ghetto on behalf of the Germans. One hundred and sixty-three Jews were arrested. Here, in the Casa di Riposo, they hauled the elderly from their beds and loaded them onto trucks. They were sent first to an internment camp at Fossoli. Then, in February, they were transferred to Auschwitz. There were no survivors."

The rabbi took Gabriel by the elbow and together they walked slowly around the edge of the square. "The Jews of Rome were rounded up two months earlier. At five-thirty on the morning of October sixteenth, more than three hundred Germans stormed the ghetto in a driving rainstorm--SS field police along with a Waffen SS Death's Head unit. They went house to house, dragging Jews from their beds and loading them into troop trucks. They were taken to a temporary detention facility at the barracks of the Collegio Militare, about a half mile from the Vatican. Despite the horrible nature of their work that night, some of the SS men wanted to see the dome of the great Basilica, so the convoy altered its route accordingly. As it moved past St. Peter's Square, the terrified Jews in the back of the trucks pleaded with the Pope to save them. All evidence suggests he knew full well what was taking place in the ghetto that morning. It was, after all, under his very windows. He did not lift a finger to intervene."

"How many?"

"More than a thousand that night. Two days after the roundup, the Jews of Rome were loaded onto rail cars at the Tiburtina station for the journey east. Five days after that, one thousand and sixty souls perished in the gas chambers at Auschwitz and Birkenau."

"But many survived, did they not?"

"Indeed, remarkably, four-fifths of Italian Jewry survived the war. As soon as the Germans occupied Italy, thousands immediately sought and were provided shelter in convents and monasteries, as well as in Catholic hospitals and schools. Thousands more were given shelter by ordinary Italians. Adolf Eichmann testified at his trial that every Italian Jew who survived the war owed his life to an Italian."

"Was it because of an order from the Vatican? Was Sister Vincenza telling me the truth about the papal directive?"

"That is what the Church wishes us to believe, but I'm afraid there is no evidence to suggest the Vatican issued instructions to Church institutions to offer shelter and comfort to Jews fleeing the roundup. In fact there is evidence to suggest that the Vatican issued no such order."

"What sort of evidence?"

"There are numerous examples of Jews who sought shelter in church properties and were turned away. Others were told they had to convert to Catholicism in order to stay. Had the Pope issued a directive to throw open the doors to Jews, no mere nun or monk would have dared to disobey him. The Italian Catholics who rescued Jews did so out of goodness and compassion--not because they were acting under the orders of their Supreme Pontiff. If they had waited for a papal directive to act, I'm afraid many more Italian Jews would have died at Auschwitz and Birkenau. There was no such directive. Indeed, despite repeated appeals from the Allies and Jewish leaders around the world, Pope Pius never found it in his heart even to speak out against the mass murder of Europe's Jews."

"Why not? Why did he remain silent?"

The rabbi raised his hands in a helpless gesture. "He claimed that because the Church was universal, he could not be placed in the position of taking sides, even against a force as wicked as Nazi Germany. If he condemned the atrocities of Hitler, Pius said, he would also have to condemn any atrocities committed by the Allies. He claimed that by speaking out, he would only make matters worse for the Jews, though it is hard to imagine what could be worse than the murder of six million. He also saw himself as a statesman and diplomat, an actor in European affairs. He wanted to play a role in bringing about a negotiated settlement that would preserve a strong, anti-Communist Germany in the heart of Europe. I have my own theories as well."

"What are they?"

"Despite public professions of love for the Jewish people, I'm afraid His Holiness did not care much for us. Remember, he was raised in a Catholic Church that preached anti-Semitism as a matter of doctrine. He equated Jews with Bolshevism and bought into all the old hatreds that Jews were interested only in the material. Throughout the nineteen thirties, while he was the Secretary of State, the Vatican's official newspapers were filled with the same sort of anti-Semitic filth one might have read in Der Sturmer. One article in the Vatican journal La Civilta Cattolica actually discussed the possibility of eliminating the Jews through annihilation. In my opinion, Pius probably felt the Jews were getting exactly what they deserved. Why should he risk himself, and more importantly his Church, for a people he believed were guilty of history's greatest crime--the murder of God himself?"

"Then why did so many Jews thank the Pope after the war?"

"The Jews who stayed in Italy were more interested in reaching out to Christians than raising uncomfortable questions about the past. In 1945, preventing another Holocaust was more important than learning the truth. For the shattered remnants of the community, it was simply a matter of survival."

Gabriel and Rabbi Zolli arrived back at their starting point, the Casa Israelitica di Riposo, and once more stood side by side staring through the window at the elderly Jews sitting before their television.

"What was it Christ said? 'Whatsoever you do to the least of my brothers'? Look at us now: the oldest continuous Jewish community in Europe, reduced to this. A few families, a few old people too sick, too near to death, to ever leave. Most nights I say Ma'ariv alone. Even on Shabbat, we have only a handful who bother to attend. Most are visitors to Venice."

He turned and looked carefully at Gabriel's face, as though he could see the telltale traces of a childhood spent on an agricultural settlement in the Jezreel Valley.

"What is your interest in this matter, Signor Delvecchio? And before you answer that question, please try to remember you are speaking to a rabbi."

"I'm afraid that falls into the category of an uncomfortable question that is better not asked."

"I feared you might say that. Just remember one thing. Memories are long in this part of the world, and things are not so good at the moment. The war, the suicide bombers.... It might not be best to stir up a hornets' nest. So tread carefully, my friend. For us."

ROME.

L'Eau Vi was one of the few places in Rome where Carlo Casagrande felt at ease without a bodyguard. Located on the narrow Via Monterone, near the Pantheon, its entrance was marked only by a pair of hissing gas lamps. As Casagrande stepped inside, he was immediately confronted by a large statue of the Virgin Mary. A woman greeted him warmly by name and took his overcoat and hat. She had skin the color of coffee and wore a bright frock from her native Ivory Coast. Like all the employees of L'Eau Vive, she was a member of the Missionary Workers of the Immaculate Conception, a lay group for women connected to the Carmelites. Most came from Asia and Africa.

"Your guest has arrived, Signor Casagrande." Her Italian was heavily accented but fluent. "Follow me, please."

The humble entrance suggested a dark, cramped Roman charn with a handful of tables, but the room into which Casagrande was shown was large and open, with cheerful white walls and a soaring open-beam ceiling. As usual, every seat was filled, though, unlike other restaurants in Rome, the clientele was all male and almost exclusively Vatican. Casagrande spotted no fewer than four cardinals. Many of the other clerics looked like ordinary priests, but Casagrande's trained eye easily picked out the gold chains that marked bishops and the purple piping that revealed the Monsignori. Besides, no simple priest could afford to eat at L'Eau Vive, not unless he was receiving support from a well-to-do relative back home. Even Casagrande's modest Vatican salary would be pushed to the breaking point by a meal at L'Eau Vive. Tonight was business, however, and the cost would be covered by his generous operational expense account.

The conversations fell virtually silent as Casagrande made his way toward his usual corner table. The reason was simple. Part of his job was to enforce the Vatican's strict code of silence. L'Eau Vive, despite its reputation for discretion, was also a beehive of Curial gossip. Enterprising journalists had been known to don cassocks and reserve tables at L'Eau Vive to try to pick up tasty morsels of Vatican scandal.

Achille Bartoletti stood up as Casagrande approached. He was twenty years younger than Casagrande, at the peak of his personal and professional power. His suit was restrained and carefully pressed, "is face tanned and fit, his handshake firm and proper in duration. there was just enough gray in his full head of hair to make him look serious but not too old. The tight mouth and the rows of small, uneven teeth hinted at a cruel streak, which Casagrande knew was not too far from the truth. Indeed, there was little the Vatican security chief did not know about Achille Bartoletti. He was a man whose every move had been devoted to the advancement of his career. He had kept his mouth shut, avoided controversy, taken credit for the successes of others and distanced himself from their failures. If he had been a Curial priest instead of a secret policeman, he would have probably been pope by now. Instead, thanks in large measure to the generous patronage of his mentor, Carlo Casagrande, Achille Bartoletti was the director of the Servizio per le Informazioni e la Sicurezza Democratica, Italy's Intelligence and Democratic Security Service.

When Casagrande sat down, conversation at surrounding tables carefully resumed.

"You do make quite an entrance, General."

"God knows what they were talking about before I arrived. But you can rest assured the conversation will be less stimulating now."

"There's a lot of red in the room tonight."

"They're the ones I worry about the most, the Curial prelates who spend their days surrounded by supplicant priests who say nothing but 'Yes, Excellency. Of course, Excellency. Whatever you say, Excellency. "

"Excellent, Excellency!" Bartoletti chimed in.

The security chief had taken the liberty of ordering the first bottle of wine. He poured Casagrande a glass. The food at L'Eau Vive was French, and so was the wine list. Bartoletti had selected an excellent Medoc.

"Is it my imagination, General, or do the natives seem more restless than usual?"

Casagrande thought: Is it that obvious? Obvious enough so that an outsider like Bartoletti could detect the electric crackle of instability in the air of L'Eau Vive? He decided any attempt to dismiss the question out of hand would be transparently deceptive and therefore a violation of the subtle rules of their relationship.

"It's that uncertain time of a new papacy," Casagrande said, with a note of judicial neutrality in his voice. "The fisherman's ring has been kissed and homage has been paid. By tradition, he's promised to carry on the mission of his predecessor, but memories of the Pole are fading very quickly. Lucchesi has redecorated the papal apartments on the terzopiano. The natives, as you call them, are wondering what's next."

"What is next?"

"The Holy Father has not divulged his plans for the Church to me, Achille."

"Yes, but you have impeccable sources."

"I can tell you this: He's isolated himself from the mandarins in the Curia and surrounded himself with trusted hands from Venice. The mandarins of the Curia call them the Council of Ten. Rumors are flying."

"What sort?"

"That he's about to launch a program of de-Stalinization to reduce the posthumous influence of the Pole. Major personnel changes in the Secretariat of State and Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith are expected--and that's just the beginning."

He's also going to make public the darkest secrets in the Vatican Archives, thought Casagrande, though he didn't share this with Achille Bartoletti.

The Italian security chief leaned forward, eager for more. "He's not going to move on the Holy Trinity of burning issues, is he? Birth control? Celibacy? Women in the priesthood?"

Casagrande shook his head gravely. "He wouldn't dare. It would be so controversial that the Curia would revolt and his papacy would be doomed. Relevancy is the buzzword of the day in the Apostolic Palace. The Holy Father wants the Church to be relevant in the lives of one billion Catholics around the world, many of whom don't have enough to eat each day. The old guard has never been interested in relevance. To them, a word like 'relevance' sounds like glasnost or perestroika, and that makes them very nervous. The old guard likes obedience. If the Holy Father goes too far, there will be hell to pay."

"Speak of the devil."

The room fell silent again. This time Casagrande was not to blame. Looking up, he spotted Cardinal Brindisi making his way toward one of the private rooms at the back of the restaurant. His pale blue eyes barely seemed to acknowledge the murmured greetings of the lesser Curial officials seated around him, but Casagrande knew that Cardinal Brindisi's faultless memory had duly recorded the presence of each one.

Casagrande and Bartoletti wasted no time ordering. Bartoletti perused the menu as if it were a report from a trusted agent. Casagrande chose the first thing he saw that looked remotely interesting. For the next two hours, over sumptuous portions of food and judicious amounts of wine, they swapped intelligence, rumors, and gossip. It was a monthly ritual, one of the enormous dividends of Casagrande's move to the Vatican twenty years earlier. So high was his standing in Rome after crushing the Red Brigades that his word was like Gospel inside the Italian government. What Casagrande wants, Casagrande gets. The organs of Italian state security were now virtual arms of the Vatican, and Achille Bartoletti was one of his most important projects. The nuggets of Vatican intrigue that Casagrande tossed him were like pure gold. They were often used to impress and entertain his superiors, just like the private audiences with the Pope and the front-row tickets to the Christmas Midnight Mass in St. Peter's.

But Casagrande offered more than just Curial gossip. The Vatican possessed one of the largest and most effective intelligence services in the world. Casagrande often picked up things that escaped the notice of Bartoletti and his service. For example, it was Casagrande who learned that a network of Tunisian terrorists in Florence was planning to attack American tourists over the Easter holiday. The information was forwarded to Bartoletti, and an alert was promptly issued. No American suffered so much as a scratch, and Bartoletti earned powerful friends in the American CIA and even the White House.

Eventually, over coffee, Casagrande brought the conversation round to the topic he cared about most--the Israeli named Ehud Landau who had gone to Munich claiming to be the brother of Benjamin Stern. The Israeli who had visited the Convent of the Sacred Heart in Brenzone, and who had shaken Casagrande's surveillance men as though he were brushing crumbs from the white tablecloth at L'Eau Vive.

"I have a serious problem, Achille, and I need your help."

Bartoletti took note of Casagrande's somber tone and set his coffee cup back in its saucer. Had it not been for Casagrande's patronage and support, Bartoletti would still be a mid-level apparatchik instead of the director of Italy's intelligence service. He was in no position to refuse a request from Casagrande, no matter what the circumstances. Still, Casagrande approached the matter with delicacy and respect. The last thing he wanted to do was embarrass his most important protege by making crass demands on their relationship.

"You know that you can count on my support and loyalty, General,"

Bartoletti said. "If you or the Vatican are in some sort of trouble, I will do anything I can to help."

Casagrande reached into the breast pocket of his suit jacket and produced a photograph, which he placed on the table and turned so Bartoletti could see it properly. Bartoletti picked up the photo and held it near the flame of the candle for a better view.

"Who is he?"

"We're not sure. He's been known to use the name Ehud Landau on occasion."

"Ehud? Israeli?"

Casagrande nodded.

"What's the problem?" Bartoletti asked, his eyes still on the photo.

"We believe he's intent on killing the Pope."

Bartoletti looked up sharply. "An assassin?"

Casagrande nodded slowly. "We've seen him a few times in St. Peter's, acting strangely during the Wednesday general audiences. He's also been present at other papal appearances, in Italy and abroad. We believe he attended an outdoor papal Mass in Madrid last month with the intention of killing the Holy Father."

Bartoletti held up the photo between his first two fingers and turned it so the image was facing Casagrande. "Where did you get this?"

Casagrande explained that one of his men had spotted the assassin in the Basilica a week earlier and had snapped the photograph outside in the square. It was a lie, of course. The picture had been taken by Axel Weiss in Munich, but Achille Bartoletti did not need to know that.

"We've received several threatening letters over the past few weeks--letters we believe were written by this man. We believe he constitutes a serious threat to the Holy Father's life. Obviously, we would like to find him before he gets an opportunity to make good on his threats."

"I'll create a task force first thing in the morning," Bartoletti said.

"Quietly, Achille. The last thing this pope wants is a public assassination scare so early in his papacy."

"You may rest assured that the hunt for this man will be conducted so silently it might seem that you yourself were in command."

Casagrande dipped his head, acknowledging the compliment from his young protege. With an almost imperceptible flick of his wrist, he signaled for the check. Just then the hostess who had greeted Casagrande at the beginning of the evening walked to the center of the dining room with a microphone in her hand. Bowing her head, she closed her eyes and recited a brief prayer. Then the waitresses gathered around the statue of the Virgin and, with hands clasped, began singing "Immaculate Mary." Soon the entire restaurant had joined in. Even Bartoletti, the hard-bitten secret policeman, was singing along.

After a moment, the music died away, and the cardinals and bishops resumed their conversation, flush from the soaring hymn and good wine. When the check came, Casagrande snatched it before his dinner guest had a chance. Bartoletti issued a mild protest. "If memory serves, it's my turn this month, General."

"Perhaps, Achille, but our conversation has been especially fruitful tonight. This one is on the Holy Father."

"My thanks to the Holy Father." Bartoletti held up the photograph of the papal assassin. "And you can rest assured that if this tman gets within a hundred miles of him, he'll be arrested."

Casagrande fixed a melancholy gaze on his dinner guest. "Actually, Achille, I would prefer he not be arrested."

Bartoletti frowned thoughtfully. "I don't understand, General. What are you asking me to do?"