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Jimmy came to the top of the narrow staircase and looked down the dingy corridor. Nothing had changed. This building, one of many behind St Peter’s Basilica in Rome, looked magnificent from the outside but inside, at the top of the stone staircase, the rooms were small and shabby. He walked to the door he had come to many times during his stay in Rome, when he thought he was a mature student in training for the Catholic priesthood. In those days a small plaque hung on the door – Rector, Duns College. There was no plaque now. That elusive, Brigadoon-type institution was in dormant mode. Jimmy knocked. A woman’s voice told him to come in. Inside it was still the same. The small, grimy window that wouldn’t open. The big old desk with the antiquated phone. One chair facing the desk, and behind the desk an immaculately turned-out Professor Pauline McBride looking as if her dark suit and white blouse had just been returned from an upmarket dry cleaners.
‘Welcome back, Mr Costello. Please take a seat.’
Jimmy sat down.
‘Apparently I work for the Vatican now.’
‘Good heavens, Mr Costello, what on earth makes you think that?’
‘The passport for one thing.’
‘No, Mr Costello, at the moment you are a free agent or, if you prefer, unemployed.’
‘So I never worked for the Pope? Pity. Just a fairy story to take the Israelis off my back and get me out of Denmark.’
‘I would call it an engineered outcome using available resources. However, if you are looking for employment, there may be some work you can do for me.’
She hadn’t changed. Still no straight answers.
‘Tell me, how do I get the job? Do I fill in forms, or am I being asked? Or was that passport business your version of a snatch and I don’t get any choice?’
‘Would you rather I had left things in Denmark as they were?’
‘Oh no. I’m very glad you saved my life. I’d be grateful even if I didn’t know there must be something you wanted doing that needed me alive to get it done.’
‘What a terrible cynic you have turned into in the short time since you left Rome.’
‘You’re wrong. I was a cynic when I left Rome. Maybe it was Rome that made me that way.’
‘Just as you like. I hope you haven’t changed too much since we last spoke. If we work together I want you to be the James Costello I knew, not some new variety.’
‘I haven’t changed, not much anyway. A bit wiser, maybe. A bit older certainly. And a bit less sure of what everything is all about. Udo was right when he told me people don’t change.’
‘You liked Fr Mundt?’
‘Yes, I liked him a lot. He saved my life as well. It’s been a big time recently for saving Jimmy Costello’s life.’
‘I’m glad you two got on. I chose him with some care.’
‘Out of interest, why did you choose him? Apart from the fact that Denmark was almost a good place to hide.’
‘I wanted someone who, how shall I put it? Someone whom I knew would cooperate and not feel like asking awkward questions.’
‘In other words you knew about his past so you had him over a barrel.’
‘He was asked and he agreed to have you as a placement. Fr Mundt was at no time put under any duress, I assure you.’
‘Then I’m assured, aren’t I?’
‘I also wanted someone with the right kind of experience if certain circumstances arose.’
‘You chose well, they arose all right and Udo did bloody marvellously.’
She ignored the comment.
‘Mr Costello, please try to understand. Fr Mundt, once he was made aware of what was needed, a discreet place for a special candidate, was more than willing to cooperate. No pressure of any sort was necessary. I want you to feel the same way if you decide to accept the offer of being in the employ of the College I work for. I do not want you to feel you are in any way coerced.’
‘So it’s definitely not the Vatican?
‘No. Not the Vatican.’
‘Pity. And if I worked for you, I’d really get a choice? It would be because I want to? Not because you have me over a barrel?’
‘You can put it that way, although now the Israelis and the Americans have decided to be sensible I don’t see how you can think I could bring any undue pressure. If you work with me there must be mutual trust.’
‘With you, not for you? There’s a difference.’
‘I know the difference. We will be working together.’
‘At what?’
‘From time to time situations arise in the Church in various parts of the world that need to be looked into.’
‘What sort of “situations”?’
‘We’ll get to that. You said Fr Mundt told you people don’t change. In a way he’s right and he’s a good example. He is a man lost without a strong system to serve. In the Stasi, his job was to persuade people, to talk, to spy, to do all sorts of things, but essentially his job was to persuade. The methods he used were often immoral, criminal in any civilised society, and sometimes inhuman. Now he works for the Catholic Church and he still tries to persuade, but he only uses words, patient listening and good example. Alas, it doesn’t get the same results but he sleeps at night and now he can live with himself.’
‘And me?’
‘You were a detective, a detective sergeant in the London CID. Maybe the best of your generation. Don’t change that, use it. Use it to help the Church.’
‘Be your own special private detective?’
For the first time ever, he saw her smile a genuine smile. It lit up her black face.
‘It is not the way I would have put it, but, yes, it sums up what is required.’
‘Rome’s own Sam Spade.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Or Philip Marlowe if you prefer Raymond Chandler to Dashiell Hammett.’
Now she understood the reference.
‘Ah, yes, a shamus, a private eye. It will not be that exciting or glamorous, Mr Costello, and it will not pay well. The Collegio Principe is more than adequately funded from the original bequests of its founder, but finance for the special work we are sometimes asked to do is always in short supply. All expenses need to be accounted for. Are you still comfortably situated for money?’
‘Not as well as I was. Lübeck put a dent in my savings but I’ll be OK.’
‘You will receive a small monthly retainer.’ She mentioned a sum. It wasn’t small, it was almost invisible. ‘But all expenses, if you are required to travel, will be reimbursed.’ She paused. ‘Well, Mr Costello, will you join me?’
Jimmy didn’t need to think about it. What else was he going to do now that he wasn’t busy running and hiding full-time, trying to stay alive?
‘Sure. Why not?’
‘Good, I think you’ve made the right decision. I’m glad we will be working together again. But before we begin could you give me the passport the Monsignor gave you. You have it with you, I hope?’
Jimmy had it with him. He wasn’t about to let a Vatican diplomatic passport out of his possession, not even when walking around Rome. He took it out and handed it over. She put it into her desk drawer.
‘Does that mean I’m not a Vatican diplomat any more?’
‘You never were. The passport you used was a forgery, not even a very good forgery, but I needed it quickly and people don’t look closely at Vatican diplomatic passports for some reason. I felt it would pass muster under the circumstances. It obviously did.’
Jimmy couldn’t help smiling. She was a live one, no question, and would certainly bear some watching.
‘So, now I’m working again, what have you in mind? Is there something on at the moment?’
‘Actually, there is.’
And he sat and listened as Professor McBride told him what she wanted done. It sounded interesting.
Jimmy Costello, the detective, was going back to work.
James Green
The Road to Redemption Series
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© 2010 James Green
The right of James Green to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
The story contained within this book is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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Originally published by Luath Press Ltd 2010
This edition published by Accent Press Ltd 2016
Paperback ISBN: 9781909624573
Ebook ISBN: 9781783750337