the highest priority,’ Felici emphasised, getting to his feet.
After Monsignor de Luca had left, Felici opened the second file he kept on Jennings and refreshed his memory on the reports he’d received. Satisfied there was more than enough to keep the monsignor in line, he moved to the rear wall of his office, his Italian leathershoes sinking into the rich pile of the crimson carpet. He reached towards St Jerome, Leonardo da Vinci’s priceless oil on wood, on loan from the Vatican’s Pinacoteca. In 393 AD, St Jerome had exhorted that ‘a woman should be submissive to a man. She should remain silent, and never be permitted to teach.’ Of all the saints, Jerome was Felici’s favourite. Felici swung the painting aside, dialled the combination of his wall safe and returned the file.
Felici crossed to the palace windows, contemplating how to manage his run for the papacy. It would need subtlety. Overt canvassing of voting blocs ran the risk of alienating the powerful Curia, but at the same time, he was determined his arch-rival, the Secretary of State, Cardinal Sabatani, be neutralised.
Chapter 7
Farid Jafari felt vulnerable and alone. A biting wind was blowing off the Potomac and the record snows of the previous week were still hugging the ground, albeit reduced to dirty clumps of ice. Short and swarthy, Jafari fitted the media’s stereotypical description of ‘a man of Middle Eastern appearance’, and he felt distinctly uncomfortable in the capital of a country his superiors routinely referred to as ‘the infidel’. Tehran’s traffic was more chaotic, he thought, as he walked briskly down 19th Street towards M Street, but at least Tehran was familiar territory. And now, Jafari was sure he was being followed.
Forcing himself to remain calm, Jafari tried to remember the instructions he’d been given for situations like this. He waited until the red numbers on the pedestrian intersection lights counted down the last couple of seconds before dashing across 19th Street. The tall, muscular man in the black overcoat stayed on the other side. Perhapshe wasn’t being followed at all, Jafari thought, but then the man picked a break in the traffic and crossed to his side of the road. Jafari abruptly turned left into L Street and then did a U-turn and doubled back. The man in the overcoat stopped, entered an office block and perused the occupant directory in the foyer. Jafari again turned down 19th Street just as the 929 bus pulled up at the stop on the corner. Jafari boarded, but the man boarded behind him and Jafari allowed him to pass. As the driver was about to pull out, Jafari leaned towards him.
‘Sorry … wrong bus. Very sorry …’
The driver shrugged, re-opened the door and Jafari leapt on to the sidewalk. He didn’t look back into the bus, but he could almost feel the frustration of the man in the dark overcoat as the bus disappeared down 19th Street. Jafari doubled back along L Street and down Connecticut Avenue to the Farragut North Metro. As instructed, he’d memorised the lines, and he made the change to the Orange Line without incident. Fifteen minutes later he alighted at the Foggy Bottom platform and took the escalators to the intersection of I Street and 23rd, emerging outside the George Washington University Hospital. The traffic was lighter here, and Jafari searched the streets. There was no sign of the man in the dark overcoat. He hailed a cab for the short ride past the Saudi Embassy and the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts to the Watergate complex.
The four-hectare complex on the banks of the Potomac River took its name from the western steps of the nearby Lincoln Memorial, which had originally been designed as a landing platform for dignitaries arriving by river from nearby Virginia. The five horseshoe-shaped buildings included office blocks and apartment blocks, many of the latter tenanted by congressmen and women, and ahotel–office complex that had been the scene of the
After Monsignor de Luca had left, Felici opened the second file he kept on Jennings and refreshed his memory on the reports he’d received. Satisfied there was more than enough to keep the monsignor in line, he moved to the rear wall of his office, his Italian leathershoes sinking into the rich pile of the crimson carpet. He reached towards St Jerome, Leonardo da Vinci’s priceless oil on wood, on loan from the Vatican’s Pinacoteca. In 393 AD, St Jerome had exhorted that ‘a woman should be submissive to a man. She should remain silent, and never be permitted to teach.’ Of all the saints, Jerome was Felici’s favourite. Felici swung the painting aside, dialled the combination of his wall safe and returned the file.
Felici crossed to the palace windows, contemplating how to manage his run for the papacy. It would need subtlety. Overt canvassing of voting blocs ran the risk of alienating the powerful Curia, but at the same time, he was determined his arch-rival, the Secretary of State, Cardinal Sabatani, be neutralised.
Chapter 7
Farid Jafari felt vulnerable and alone. A biting wind was blowing off the Potomac and the record snows of the previous week were still hugging the ground, albeit reduced to dirty clumps of ice. Short and swarthy, Jafari fitted the media’s stereotypical description of ‘a man of Middle Eastern appearance’, and he felt distinctly uncomfortable in the capital of a country his superiors routinely referred to as ‘the infidel’. Tehran’s traffic was more chaotic, he thought, as he walked briskly down 19th Street towards M Street, but at least Tehran was familiar territory. And now, Jafari was sure he was being followed.
Forcing himself to remain calm, Jafari tried to remember the instructions he’d been given for situations like this. He waited until the red numbers on the pedestrian intersection lights counted down the last couple of seconds before dashing across 19th Street. The tall, muscular man in the black overcoat stayed on the other side. Perhapshe wasn’t being followed at all, Jafari thought, but then the man picked a break in the traffic and crossed to his side of the road. Jafari abruptly turned left into L Street and then did a U-turn and doubled back. The man in the overcoat stopped, entered an office block and perused the occupant directory in the foyer. Jafari again turned down 19th Street just as the 929 bus pulled up at the stop on the corner. Jafari boarded, but the man boarded behind him and Jafari allowed him to pass. As the driver was about to pull out, Jafari leaned towards him.
‘Sorry … wrong bus. Very sorry …’
The driver shrugged, re-opened the door and Jafari leapt on to the sidewalk. He didn’t look back into the bus, but he could almost feel the frustration of the man in the dark overcoat as the bus disappeared down 19th Street. Jafari doubled back along L Street and down Connecticut Avenue to the Farragut North Metro. As instructed, he’d memorised the lines, and he made the change to the Orange Line without incident. Fifteen minutes later he alighted at the Foggy Bottom platform and took the escalators to the intersection of I Street and 23rd, emerging outside the George Washington University Hospital. The traffic was lighter here, and Jafari searched the streets. There was no sign of the man in the dark overcoat. He hailed a cab for the short ride past the Saudi Embassy and the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts to the Watergate complex.
The four-hectare complex on the banks of the Potomac River took its name from the western steps of the nearby Lincoln Memorial, which had originally been designed as a landing platform for dignitaries arriving by river from nearby Virginia. The five horseshoe-shaped buildings included office blocks and apartment blocks, many of the latter tenanted by congressmen and women, and ahotel–office complex that had been the scene of the
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