The swirling blue lights of the unmarked Swiss Guard sedan into which Heinrich had directed Ben, Angelina and Thomás, together with himself and a driver, glowed brightly against the foreign darkness of the black sky. Behind them, three SUVs filled with armed Special Activities Teams – the Swiss Guard’s equivalent of SWAT – had their lights and sirens blaring and the whole enclave raced towards what Heinrich had assured them was the site that needed to be their point of immediate and complete focus.
They had taken little convincing.
‘The reason you’ve never heard of anything significant at the Piazza Mastai,’ he explained to Angelina and Thomás as the car rounded a corner, ‘is that what’s there is not meant to be known about. Lack of knowledge is a significant portion of its secure status.’
‘But it’s an empty square,’ Angelina protested, still baffled as to why they were speeding towards a location that, as far as she knew, was of no significance whatsoever.
‘Precisely. Nothing to see. Nothing to tempt you.’ Heinrich’s eyes were forward as he spoke from the passenger seat. ‘It’s what’s underneath that has value.’
‘Underneath?’
‘A vault,’ Ben said. He sat at Angelina’s left, Thomás at her right, on the bench seat in the back of the car. ‘A secure vault that’s been buried under the Piazza Mastai for over sixty-five years.’
Angelina stared at him with incredulity. ‘A vault? I’ve never heard about this.’
‘That’s not a surprise,’ Heinrich muttered.
Angelina was still staring at Ben. ‘But . . . you have?’ He nodded. ‘How, Ben?’
‘Presumably, the same way Emil Durré learned about it,’ he answered.
‘They both had the same access,’ Heinrich said from the front.
Angelina was getting irritated by how little she understood of what these two men were saying.
‘Ben, what the hell are you talking about?’
‘The records of the vault’s existence are kept in the Vatican Secret Archives,’ he answered. ‘There’s a lot in our collections that’s ancient, and a lot that’s considered “secret” in the modern sense, even though we make almost all of it available to researchers who have a legitimate interest.’
‘Almost,’ Angelina repeated the key word.
Ben nodded. ‘People always assume it’s the most ancient things that we keep restricted, but in fact it’s precisely the opposite. The only section of the Archives that is entirely forbidden for access, except by staff or members of the Curia, is the post-1945 collection.’
‘After ’forty-five?’ Angelina asked in surprise. ‘The modern stuff?’
‘Right. Modern records, details, plans.’
‘Such as plans for the bullion reserve,’ Heinrich interjected. He twisted round to face his three passengers. ‘It was a project created after the war, when the Vatican realised the political turmoil in Europe was significant enough that keeping its raw wealth in public banks was a risk no longer worth taking. Vatican City may be eternal, but it’s a few city blocks in the heart of a nation that rises and falls with Fascists, Communists, Nazis, Socialists. Too much risk.’
‘Hold on,’ Angelina interjected, raising a palm. ‘Bullion reserve? What are we talking about here?’
‘It’s a vault to hold the non-religious physical wealth of the Vatican,’ Ben said.
‘Non-religious?’ The question came from Thomás.
‘In the cathedrals and churches we have wealth of every kind,’ Heinrich answered. ‘There’s two hundred million euros worth of bronze and gold dangling above the altar in St Peter’s alone. The Vatican Museums house billions in artefacts. But most of that is potential value. Historical. Hard to convert into hard cash for thieves, which is why it’s relatively safe – though we guard it with absolute diligence.’
Angelina understood Heinrich’s meaning. The papal throne might be worth millions for its historical value and the inherent worth of its materials, but it wasn’t exactly something you could sell on eBay.
‘So the vault was conceived, and constructed, to house the bulk of the raw wealth that’s actually . . . usable,’ Ben said. ‘Nothing of historical or religious significance. Just raw gold, silver, cash.’
‘Shit,’ Angelina said. ‘I had no idea such a thing was under there.’
‘No one does,’ Heinrich said. ‘The vault isn’t a major target for crime precisely because there is so much more visible wealth above, and because almost no one knows it exists. We have hundreds of attempts every year at thefts from our churches and museums, but in all the years since it was completed we’ve never had a single attempted incursion into the vault.’
‘Durré must have learned about it during his period of work in the Archives,’ Ben added. ‘It’s the only way. And that would have included details on the construction, as well as its location and its contents.’
Heinrich said nothing, but Angelina could see his shoulders tense.
‘But obviously it has to be guarded?’ she asked. ‘The Swiss Guard presumably keep it protected.’
‘Of course,’ Heinrich snapped. ‘We have a presence there at all times. There’s only a single access point, guarded around the clock, and the vault itself is equipped with all the security features of a modern bank system.’
The car banked as the driver swerved around another corner, tyres squealing against the tarmac. In front of it, its two headlight beams were cones of light in the uncommon darkness.
‘We pay attention to it, just like we pay attention to everything else in our care,’ Heinrich said once they’d straightened out again.
But to Angelina, to whom their circumstances now made sense, he’d left off an important detail.
‘You pay attention to it,’ she said, ‘unless your attention is elsewhere.’
She could almost feel Heinrich’s skin go cold.