The Omega Scroll (4 page)

Lorenzo Petroni’s housekeeper was petite with dark shining hair. Quiet but determined, Carmela was used to his odd hours and she was waiting for him. He would need to leave before the grey winter dawn reached the dome of St Peter’s, but that thought quickly evaporated. Carmela caressed Lorenzo gently with her tongue until he was wet and hard. She had a way of using the forbidden ‘
il preservativo
’ to heighten Lorenzo’s arousal and without losing the moment she fondled him as she reached for the already prepared condom in the bedside drawer. She murmured softly and took him inside her.

Back in his own apartment Giorgio Felici punched a code into the scrambler in his study and dialled a number for Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

CHAPTER SIX

Langley, Virginia

M
ike McKinnon closed the door to his office, put the file marked ‘Top Secret – Special Atomic Demolition Munitions’ on his desk and walked to the window of his office that overlooked the lawns and the fishpond of the New Headquarters courtyard in the CIA’s complex.

‘Jesus Christ,’ he muttered. ‘The world is going fucking mad!’ Osama bin Laden and God knows how many of his mad mullahs had the means to destroy Western civilisation, and now some equally wacky Bible basher from his own side had enough pull with the White House to have the President concerned about the recovery of a mythical Dead Sea Scroll. Hans Christian Andersen had moved into 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, he thought ruefully. Religion had a lot to answer for, and so did the politicians. At least his latest assignment would give him the opportunity to get out of Washington for a while. It had been years since he’d been to Jerusalem and apart from the constant bombings, neither the city nor his favourite hotel, the American Colony, would have changed. He made a mental note to look up his old buddy Tom Schweiker. They had got to know each other well during the years Mike had been posted to the Middle East, and Schweiker owed him one. After all, if it hadn’t been for him carrying on about a Dead Sea Scroll on CCN the White House knickers would still be in reasonable order. If there was anything to this scroll, he mused, journalists were often a good source of intelligence, particularly those of Schweiker’s calibre.

Mike McKinnon rubbed his eyes wearily and went back to his desk. Since the arrival of the new Director, the Central Intelligence Agency had been under siege and his own boss, the head of the powerful and covert Operations Division, had resigned. At fifty-four, Mike had also thought about chucking it in. With the wreckage of a couple of marriages well behind him, and being ruggedly fit and healthy with no ties, perhaps it was time to enjoy life. Yet he had decided to stay on, armed with the knowledge that this time the human race seemed to be on the brink of destruction. He reached for the top file in his tray. Unusually for Langley, it was a buff-coloured folder marked ‘Unclassified,’ containing a summary of Osama bin Laden’s speeches and remarks, aired on the Arab channel Al-Jazeerah as well as through major Western media outlets.

Praise be to God, who says, ‘O Prophet, strive hard against the unbelievers and be firm against them. Their abode is hell – an evil refuge indeed …’

I tell you the American, and your hypocritical allies, we will continue to fight you …

You attacked us in Somalia; you supported the Russian atrocities against us in Chechnya; the Indian oppression against us in Kashmir; and the Jewish aggression against us in Lebanon …

It is the Muslims who are the inheritors of Moses (peace be unto him) and we are the inheritors of the real Torah that has not been changed. Muslims believe in all the prophets, including Abraham, Moses, Jesus and Muhammad (peace and blessings of Allah be upon them all)…

If we are attacked, we have the right to attack back …

It is the duty of Muslims to prepare as much force as possible to terrorise the enemies of God, and I thank God for enabling me to do so.

Mike McKinnon felt a chill run down his spine. The last statement had been issued under the heading ‘The Nuclear Bomb of Islam’. McKinnon had no doubt that bin Laden had not only gone nuclear, he planned to attack at the first opportunity. At the top of his list were the United States of America and her two principal allies, Britain and Australia.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Jerusalem

T
he taxi dropped Dr David Kaufmann on the busy corner of King George V Street and Ha Histradrut. Just over six foot, olive-skinned, with blue eyes and thick, black curly hair, he strolled casually through the Friday night crowd and into Numero Venti, which took its name from nothing more imaginative than the street number. The small, intimate restaurant had not changed since the British mandate over seventy years before.

‘Good evening, Dr Kaufmann. Your table is waiting. I trust you’ve had a pleasant week?’

‘Not bad thanks, Elie. It’s been a pretty long one, so it’s good to have a night off.’

The wizened old waiter with the large hooked nose smiled. His smile held genuine warmth, his old grey eyes matching the colour of his receding curly hair.

‘Your colleague, Dr Bassetti. She is coming later?’ Elie asked, pulling out a chair.

‘At the hairdresser’s,’ David said, rolling his eyes.

‘Something from the bar while you’re waiting?’

‘A beer thanks, Elie.’ David stretched his long legs under the table and smiled to himself. Elie had been the head waiter for as long as David had been coming to Numero Venti and he never failed to make you feel as if you were the most important person in the restaurant. David had introduced Allegra on a very busy night and the next time they had come in Elie had greeted her as if he’d known her for years. He took the first mouthful of his favourite Maccabee lager and looked around. The restaurant was beginning to fill up. Over at the bar one or two members of the Knesset, as well as the odd prominent businessman, were in animated conversation. David glanced casually at the solidly built Arab reading at a table in one corner.

‘Shalom!’ The couple at the next table clinked their glasses. A toast of ‘peace’ in a land that had known only centuries of bloodshed and war. Always lurking behind the laughter and the camaraderie was a noise of a very different kind; the shattering sound of death and destruction at the hands of Hamas and the Palestinian Arabs.

Yusef Sartawi made it look as if he was engrossed in his book. The lone Arab at the corner table worked with Cohatek, the Israeli events company, but in reality he had a far more sinister role, of which neither Mossad nor the CIA was yet aware. He was now one of Hamas’s most experienced operations planners. It had been over twenty-five years since the Israelis had murdered his family in the small village of Deir Azun. The nightmares were still with him.

Were it not for the large sum of money being offered, Dr Allegra Bassetti would not normally have interested Hamas, especially given the curious origin of the contract. It had come from somewhere high up in the Vatican, but if the Christians wanted their own killed that was their business. What had caught his attention was the target’s partner, Dr David Kaufmann, the son of Professor Yossi Kaufmann. Both men were already on the Hamas target list. It was Hamas policy to become thoroughly familiar with the target of an assassination and Yusef Sartawi’s planning was always meticulous. Tonight’s reconnaissance was just the first step.

David Kaufmann took another sip of beer and reflected on Allegra’s breakthrough. Her DNA analysis had been nothing short of outstanding, but they were still only halfway through sorting the fragments. David glanced towards the door where Elie was taking Allegra’s coat. Allegra was slender with round, dark brown eyes and an oval face. In the lab Allegra normally wore her hair up, but tonight she had let it tumble to her shoulders, black and glistening in the light of the restaurant.

‘You look even more stunning than usual,’ David said, giving her a kiss as he pulled her chair out from the table.

‘Thank you, Sir. That sort of flattery will get you a long way.’

‘Beer? Gin and tonic? Champagne?’

‘I think champagne,’ Allegra replied, looking pleased with herself.

‘Better make that a bottle, Elie,’ David said, taking the menus.

‘Have you heard from your folks lately?’ Allegra asked.

‘Both fine. Yossi’s still juggling mathematics at the university with politics and Marian is quietly supportive, although sometimes I think she would rather Yossi just remain a professor.’

‘An impressive woman your mother. And neither of them look much older than sixty.’

‘Yes. The powers of the universe got it right when they put those two together.’

‘Except they produced you,’ Allegra responded quickly. ‘Yesss! I love it when you leave yourself open, David Kaufmann.’

‘You’ll keep. Shalom!’ he said with a grin. ‘A good week,
non è vero
?’ David said, mixing Hebrew with Allegra’s native Italian.

Allegra smiled. ‘A very good week. No wonder Monsignor Lonergan didn’t want anyone to have access to the fragments he had in that trunk of his in the Rockefeller vault. Once the Vatican gets wind of what we’ve got all hell will break loose.’

‘Yes,’ David agreed, suddenly serious. ‘It looks as if their greatest nightmare has finally surfaced, although ultimately it might not be a bad thing.’

‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning in the long run the Vatican may have to re-examine their dogma. You’ve always said that you left the Church because it was based on fear. Run by old men who refuse to shift their position no matter what the evidence.’ David picked up on the shift in Allegra’s body language.

‘As you know, that wasn’t the only reason,’ she replied, the bitter memory of the Cardinal and a Church she once loved shadowing the usual softness of her eyes.

‘Is there no one you can trust?’

Allegra shook her head. ‘Not in the Vatican. Their response will be ferocious and whatever it takes, they will bury it. But Giovanni Donelli would help. He is one of the few people at the top who would allow debate on this scroll within the Church.’

‘An impressive man, the Cardinal Patriarch of Venice,’ David observed with a small touch of jealousy, aware of the special bond between Allegra and the brilliant Catholic priest. ‘But even if he doesn’t help, couldn’t we release the information here on our own?’

‘Without someone like Giovanni supporting us,’ Allegra insisted, ‘the Vatican will simply denounce the scroll as a fraud. They’re masters of spin control, and this is arguably the most important discovery in the entire history of Christianity. This is the real message, David, a warning that civilisation has entered its final phase.’

‘Do you think anyone else knows about it?’

Allegra shook her head. ‘Lonergan’s trunk in the vault of the Rockefeller Museum was marked “personal” so I doubt if even the Director knows what was in it. We’re going to have to be careful of Lonergan when he gets back.’

‘Do you think he knows what he’s got, or rather had?’

Allegra looked thoughtful. ‘It’s hard to tell with him. He may know more than we think. Although he may not have had time to decipher any of the fragments, and without a DNA analysis to help that could have taken years.’

‘You think he’s on the Vatican payroll?’

‘He’s certainly one of Cardinal Petroni’s boys.’ Allegra shivered. ‘The Omega Scroll is going to shake them to their foundations.’

CHAPTER EIGHT

Venezia

F
ather Vittorio Pignedoli watched from his position in the chancel of the huge Basilica di San Marco as Cardinal Giovanni Donelli prepared to deliver his sermon to the packed congregation. This cardinal, he reflected, was like no other he had ever known and at fifty-two, one of the youngest. Thick black hair, deep blue eyes and a warm, infectious laugh, slim and fit – he even worked out in the gym. There was no hint of high office, and he was relaxed and accessible. Cardinal Donelli had only been in Venice for a short while and already everybody, both in the Church and outside it, was talking about him. There had been quite a few snide remarks from wealthy and powerful Venetians about Giovanni’s ‘lowly’ southern origins, the little town of Maratea on the west coast of Basilicata. Venetian society relished the pomp and circumstance of their ancient fiefdom and their patrician noses were put decidedly out of joint when Giovanni resisted invitations to the glittering and expensive events he was expected to attend. Giovanni’s distaste for excessive ceremony had Vittorio fielding indignant calls of complaint. The first was from an exasperated Chief of Police who had stumbled on the newly installed Patriarch of Venice out for a walk, dressed in the black soutane of a simple priest. The Polizia had found him in a trattoria near the Canal Grande happily chatting to some gondoliers and eating pizza
al taglio
.

‘What if something happens to him!’ il Capo di Polizia had complained. ‘The very least he could have done was accepted the ride home.’

Giovanni had politely refused the offer of a police escort and had unwittingly added insult to injury by accepting a lift from the gondoliers. The gondoliers, he reasoned, were a more than adequate and less pretentious substitute. The priest with the big winning smile – it was the first thing people noticed about him. The gondoliers, the fishermen and the rest of the working class of Venice loved him.

Vittorio glanced nervously around the congregation. His cardinal’s choice of a subject that questioned the very beginnings of life on the planet had attracted wide publicity, not all of it confined to the narrow streets and covered alleys of Venice. ‘Science and Religion’ reflected Giovanni’s educational background – a doctorate in theology and an honours degree in science majoring in biology and chemistry. Giovanni’s choice of subject had been prompted by an article in the
Corriere della Sera
– the respected Italian paper
Courier of the Evening
. Vittorio knew it was dangerous territory and that the Vatican would denounce any departure from the Church doctrine of Adam and Eve. As Giovanni climbed the marble stairs to his pulpit, a shadowy figure took a seat in the back row of the seats reserved for the clergy.

Giovanni had insisted on using the smaller of the two ornate pulpits. He rested his hands on the marble railing and smiled warmly.

‘
Buongiorno. È molto buono vi vedere!
Good morning. It is very good to see you! Some of you may have seen an article on bacteria last week in the
Corriere della Sera.
For those of you who may have missed it, don’t worry, it’s not a sin to have no interest in bacteria.’ The laughter reverberated off the gold tiled walls of San Marco and Giovanni’s fulsome smile permeated even the coldest and most sceptical of hearts.

‘This particular article was about a different type of bacteria known as archaebacteria, which thrive in boiling water. What, you may ask, has this to do with the Church and theology?’ Giovanni paused and looked around his congregation, drawing them to him.

‘I want to take you deep below the surface of the ocean. Imagine we are all inside the research submarine
Alvin
several kilometres below the surface. It is pitch black and the waters are very, very cold. Suddenly, the powerful lights on our submarine pick up molten lava spewing out of volcanic vents, and we watch as it comes in contact with the icy water. Deep beneath the seabed the lava and fluids cascading from the vents have been heated to temperatures well in excess of 300°C, but the crushing pressures at this depth prevent these fluids from boiling. Instead, they form tall, lava-encrusted chimneys known as “black smokers”. Imagine our surprise to find that the edge of this inferno is teeming with life. Worms and other forms of life that thrive in temperatures well above that of boiling water. Now, I’ve been wondering whether or not such a discovery is a problem for our theology.’

Giovanni realised he now had everyone’s attention. ‘Here on the surface of our planet we all know that the energy source of life is sunlight. Without it the plants would die, and without plants the animals, including our species, would die too. But at these depths there
is
no sunlight. In this part of the ocean these forms of life don’t need the sun; they feed on sulphur and hydrogen. There is now a growing body of scientific evidence that points to these oceanic bacteria being the very first forms of cellular life on Earth, from which all other forms of life, including humans, have evolved. It also means that there might be similar forms of life deep beneath the surface of planets like Mars and the moons of Jupiter and further away into the icy wastes of any one of the billions of galaxies like our own.’

It was as far as Giovanni was prepared to go. Already he sensed the unease that his challenge to the accepted biblical story of creation had created amongst the faithful and he dared not raise the issue of the origin of DNA. This was not the time to raise the possibility of a powerful spiritual force that he felt sure was driving the cosmos; one that encompassed the inadequacy of all of humanity’s attempts at religion.

‘So where does that leave the Bible and Adam and Eve?’ he asked. ‘Where does it leave us as Christians?’ Not a shoe shuffled. ‘As both your Patriarch and a scientist I see only positives in this. For me, this is just another revelation of “how” it was done. And such is the brilliance of the Creative Spirit I am certain that we have only scratched the surface.’

Vittorio listened, deep in thought. He had always believed in the creation doctrine that was laid out in the Catholic catechism:
The Lord God caused man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, He took one of the man’s ribs and closed up the place with flesh. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib
. Genesis was a beautiful story with no hint of bacteria, yet Vittorio felt a growing sense of trust for this intectually gifted man who was so willing to share his knowledge. It was as if the great cathedral had been opened up to an
aggiornamento
. A wind of modernisation was blowing hard through the portals of San Marco. In time it would become a gale.

Unseen by either Giovanni or Vittorio, the shadowy figure in the back row was quietly taking notes.

Night had descended on the Piazza di San Marco and the nearby stone alleys and narrow streets of Venice. The ever present gondolieri were competing for ‘sea room’ on the Grande along with a myriad of lesser
canali
, expertly guiding their seemingly flimsy craft amongst the
vaporetti
and the barges that waged a ceaseless battle to supply the water city’s needs.

Oblivious to Venice’s elegant pulse, Giovanni sat in his study overlooking the Piazza and reflected on his sermon. Francis Crick’s theory on the origin of DNA had threatened many in the Vatican’s corridors of power and the brilliant scientist had been successfully discredited. In the 1980s Università Ca’ Granda’s Professor Antonio Rosselli had revived Crick’s investigation with strong support from the Israeli mathematician Professor Kaufmann. But Kaufmann’s analysis of the codes in the Dead Sea Scrolls had gone a lot further than DNA. Had the final countdown begun? Rosselli had been convinced it had.

Giovanni’s thoughts went back to the time when he had studied under the great mind, a time when he and Allegra Bassetti, the stunning young nun from southern Italy, had been students together. A time when Rosselli’s theories had prompted passionate arguments over pasta and cheap red wine in La Pizzeria Milano. It had been over twenty-five years since they had been assigned to Milano’s Università but it seemed like only yesterday. If it hadn’t been for the extraordinary series of events in 1978, they might never have met and the proposal for them both to study at a secular university would have remained buried in the Vatican’s archives.