‘I liked him too. He was a force for good.’
‘He was skinned alive. It doesn’t end there. Valeria brought Alma to Rome, and she shouldn’t play her games with children. That’s why I’m about to disobey orders. I have daughters of my own.’
‘Thank you,’ Gallio says. ‘I think. Just checking, but it has nothing to do with me?’
‘You’re not wrong as often as Valeria thinks you are. Let’s leave it at that.’
‘What happens if I do find John, and bring him to the Circus?’
‘Everything is mapped out. After Peter is dead I make the payment to Paul at a drop-site outside the city, where fewer people are likely to recognise him. Just me and him and the bodyguard, and Valeria will be there too if you’ve found John.’
‘Then what happens?’
‘I hand over the envelope to Paul, no one the wiser. Valeria takes John off your hands. I doubt the two of them will be going on holiday.’
‘I mean what happens to me?’
‘You could run before we get there, between the Circus and the pay-off. I’ll say I couldn’t stop you.’
‘She has Alma.’
‘Tricky. Depends how much revenge she feels is adequate, but I doubt we can rely on her compassion. Anyway, never pays to look too far ahead. Maybe Jesus appears at the Circus Maximus to save Peter’s neck. He genuinely comes back from the dead, not once but twice, and the world as we know it ends and neither of us has to worry about Valeria or John or the CCU. Silver linings.’
‘Could happen.’
‘Could do. But if it doesn’t, you’re in luck. I know where they’re holding Alma.’
The SOS Children’s Village is to the south-west of the city, about half an hour by Fiat minicab door-to-door from Claudia’s villa. The sign on the driveway reveals what the village really is: an orphanage. Valeria is looking to the future, and Cassius Gallio is suddenly as concerned for Judith as he is for poor fatherless Alma. Though he mustn’t rush to judge.
The orphanage is eight bungalows grouped between large houses in a leafy residential area. Six children live in each building, and the orphanage is full. Cassius has borrowed a yellow high-vis waistcoat from the coat stand inside Claudia’s front door, and he walks slowly through the compound acting as if he belongs. Keep it slow, he thinks, and a fluorescent jacket makes him invisible. Don’t mind me, I just work here.
Through the windows the furnishings in each bungalow look sparse but clean. The kids inside play computer games or they’re on Facebook, while others enjoy the fresh air at the play area. Gallio is impressed, and would like to know who pays for this.
At the playground Alma is catching smaller children as they come down the slide, and her leg is visibly more flexible than it was. The physiotherapy is working, and Judith was right — Alma can receive better treatment in Rome than Jerusalem. Maybe. Gallio doesn’t know what Valeria is thinking, not when she makes unspoken threats to feed Alma to the Circus, but he believes people are basically good, or have good intentions. He looks at the bungalows constructed for forty-eight orphans: the world is full of unintended results.
A flurry of children run for the gate. Not again, Gallio thinks, but yes — Jesus is also here. He’s carrying sweets in his fists and an armful of DVDs. Gallio watches him hand out his gifts and, predictably, with children Jesus is funny and approachable. As one of the older ones, Alma mocks a bow and links arms with Jesus as far as the orphanage office, and while they’re inside Cassius Gallio threads himself into a picnic table and settles down to wait. Time goes by, and he notices a change in the weather. Clouds are moving in, grey and elegant, the colour of Claudia’s sweater.
Before too long Alma and Jesus reappear from the office. They seem inseparable, his hand in hers, and she brings him to Gallio’s picnic table. Alma and Jesus sit down on the opposite side to Cassius Gallio. Alma pushes a straw into a lunchbox carton of orange juice, sucks the juice through to check the straw works, then hands the carton to Jesus. He drinks, one big suck and swallow, smacks his lips with satisfaction. Alma settles her head on her hands on the tabletop, gazes up at his luminous face.
‘Hello John,’ Gallio says. He hadn’t been looking, but here John is. It must be.
‘Matthew, is that you?’
John has an unconvincing beard, as in the images pinned to the incident-room wall in Jerusalem, but his Jesus-look radiates from sharp cheekbones and a faraway gaze. He sucks on the straw, more cautiously this time.
‘I’m sorry,’ Gallio says. ‘I’m not a disciple. Matthew is dead.’
‘I hadn’t heard,’ John says, ‘but I’m not surprised. Another one gone ahead. Who are you?’
John peers intently, straining his Jesus-brown eyes, and only now does Gallio realise that John can barely see. He blinks hard, leans forward, grasps Gallio by the elbows. He stares at the grain of Gallio’s face, and Gallio must be more obviously himself, up this close.
‘I’m sorry I couldn’t be Matthew.’
Years ago in Jerusalem John had been first to arrive at the empty tomb with Peter, and these two disciples let the others know that Jesus had disappeared. Maybe John’s eyesight was failing even then.
‘John, I have a question to ask you. It’s important. When did you last see Jesus?’
‘I’m nearly blind,’ John says. He releases Gallio’s elbows. ‘I see him all the time. Is it Jesus you’re looking for?’
‘I don’t know. I was.’
John fumbles for his juice, and Alma places the carton in his hand. He sucks at the straw and swallows until the carton pulls in on itself. When he puts the carton down it falls over. John takes Alma’s hand, leans forward and aims his gaze vaguely over Gallio’s shoulder. ‘Have you come to kill me?’
‘I’m not an assassin.’
‘Someone wants to kill me, though? You wouldn’t be surprised if I died?’
‘Presumably you’ll die at some point. Like anybody.’
Gallio looks at his daughter, ear squashed against her arm, her thumb rubbing across the top of John’s hand. He wishes he could make himself known to her, but there’s so much to explain. She deserves someone who can take care of her, who isn’t unstable and doesn’t tell lies.
‘Jesus is dead.’
‘You’re mistaken,’ John says. ‘Jesus is coming back.’
‘So Andrew told me. As did Bartholomew, and also Jude. None of you know when or how.’
‘Jesus never went away. This is an orphanage run for the state by the Church. The children here are safe in the hands of Jesus.’
Cassius Gallio knows from Jude that Jesus promised to return while at least one of his disciples was still alive, whichever one he loved most. He’s running out of options, the disciples now down to the last pair standing, with Peter’s execution scheduled for later that day. Gallio checks his watch, but he hasn’t worn a watch in years. He reads the time off his phone. A couple of hours until trumpets, when the Circus Maximus will open for public gratification.
‘Is Peter the beloved disciple?’
‘Jesus loved us all.’
‘But one of you he loved more than the others. Jude said so without my prompting.’
‘He gave Peter the keys,’ John says. ‘He singled him out and called him the rock. Is that what you mean?’
Yes, that would be enough. For Cassius Gallio the story of Jesus is finally coming together, and Valeria has shown too little respect for the subtlety of her opponent. Jesus predicted that Gallio would seek out Alma, his only daughter, so he sent John to the orphanage where the two men were most likely to meet. This is the work of the same Jesus who arranged the fire of Rome to create the conditions for Peter’s public execution. In the years since the alleged resurrection the world’s most modern secret service hasn’t managed a sniff of him. Jesus could be in Rome right now, and Valeria wouldn’t have a clue, because no one can appear and disappear like Jesus.