A WEEK LATER, I STOOD INSIDE THE FIUMICINO AIRPORT WITH MY luggage and forty-two cardboard boxes containing Asher’s journals. The government had been delighted to get its hands on Asher’s estate and agreed to give me what the court-appointed appraiser called “a heap of dusty diaries.” After I found people to translate the foreign journals, I planned to study them carefully, beginning with the earliest entries.
I could already think of a hundred uses for Asher’s writings. The journals were priceless for their historical value alone and would bring forgotten eras and peoples to life. Asher’s testimony would also shine the bright light of truth upon certain dark episodes in the history of civilization—his experience in the Inquisition alone would make any churchman cringe. And what politician would not be interested in Asher’s encounter with Hitler? In his misguided enthusiasm to find the Antichrist, Asher had encountered one of the most occult-driven personalities of the twentieth century.
Yes, his history would have much to teach anyone with a heart of faith. Most important, Asher’s experiences could expose all the dead-end roads man has traveled in an effort to reach God. I planned to condense his story, close with his final letter to me, add a postscript about his release, and let the record speak for itself. After all, his journals had made a believer of me.
The airline attendant waved me forward to the desk. I checked my luggage and the boxes, picked up my boarding pass, and made my way to the gate. As I settled down to wait with a book I had picked up in the airport bookshop, an image on the overhead television caught my eye. The screen featured a photograph of Santos Justus, with the words Morti in scontro automobilistico superimposed across the bottom of the screen.
“Morti . . .” My breath caught in my throat. Morti meant dead.
Trembling, I stared at the television screen in hypnotized horror. Santos Justus was dead?
Clutching the armrest of my seat, I strained to follow the news report. Footage of Justus and Synn rolled across the screen, then I saw a video clip of Angelo pulling the blue Alfa Romeo away from the curb. The next clip revealed an accident scene along a deserted country road. The Alfa Romeo was a mangled mess, a grisly metal sculpture wrapped around a tree. Two sheet-covered bodies lay on the ground. Darien Synn, however, was shown upon a stretcher being lifted into an ambulance.
I felt a sharp pang of sorrow for the people at Global Union. Some of them I had liked, others I had tolerated, but they had all been bound together by a shared wish for peace. Now Il Presidente was gone, and Il Direttore would have to carry on . . . if I couldn’t have him arrested.
A thought suddenly froze in my brain. Asher had risked spending the rest of his immortal life behind bars because he was convinced that Santos Justus would become the Antichrist, but Asher was . . . wrong.
The thought was so absurd I couldn’t stop a smile, though I felt a long way from genuine humor. “Ah, Signor Pace,” I murmured, lowering my gaze from the carnage on the television screen. “You were right. It does us no good to look for evil when we ought to be looking for those who are lost.”
As the flight attendant began to call for first-class passengers, I pulled out a photo of the brass plaque I had commissioned for the entry of the Sole al Pantheon, Asher’s home. For as long as the hotel remained in the heart of Rome, all who entered would read my tribute to the man who had lived in the city longer than any other:
Grace comes into the soul, as the morning sun into the world: first a dawning, then a light; and at last the sun in his full and excellent brightness.
–Thomas Adams
I tucked the photo into my purse, dashed a tear from my eye, then stood to follow the line of passengers down the ramp to the plane. As I settled into my seat and fumbled for the safety belt, the woman next to me twiddled her fingers to get my attention.
“What a lovely necklace,” she said, pointing to the watch dangling from the gold chain around my neck.
“Thank you.” I snapped the seat buckle, then looked at my traveling companion. “It was my mother’s. She always loved Rome.”
“So do I,” the woman answered, giving me a relaxed upper smile that indicated friendliness and honesty. “But I was only able to visit for the weekend. There was so much more I wanted to see.”
I tilted my head, returning her smile in full measure. “I was in Rome ten weeks,” I told her. “And I saw things you wouldn’t believe.”
“Will you tell me?” Her pupils dilated with interest. “It’s a long flight, and I don’t have anything to read.”
I smoothed my skirt, then touched my watch, remembering the inscription, Do not squander time, for that’s the stuff life is made of . . .
“I’d be happy to tell you all about my trip,” I said, nodding. “I have a hunch you’ll be a good listener.”