The Lost Testament Read Online Free Page A

sit on a chair in one corner.
    Morini crossed the short distance to the head of the single bed and looked down. He reached out and took hold of Gianni’s right hand and applied gentle pressure.
    The dying man opened his eyes and looked up, summoning a weak smile.
    “Thank you for coming, Antonio,” he said.
    Then he glanced around the room and noticed the two other people in attendance there. He gestured to Morini to bend forward slightly and murmured into his ear.
    “You must be my confessor, Antonio, and what I have to tell you is for your ears alone,” he muttered. “Please ask the others to leave the room.”
    Morini nodded. Like every other Roman Catholic priest, he fully appreciated the sanctity of the confessional.
    “The Father would like me to take his confession,” he said, turning to Gregory. “Can you and the Sister please give us a few minutes alone?”
    When the door closed behind Gregory and the nun, Morini again turned to face the old man, and knelt down beside the bed so that his head was as close as possible to Gianni’s.
    “We are quite alone now, my old friend—just you and me and the heavenly Father. I will gladly hear your confession and grant absolution.”
    Gianni nodded, the movement of his head barely perceptible.
    But what he said next was not at all what Morini had expected.
    Gianni clutched the younger man’s hand with a grip that was surprisingly firm and began to speak in a low and weak voice.
    “I am not confessing my sins, Antonio. I attended to that matter regarding my departure from this world some two weeks ago. I didn’t believe I could commit any important sins just by lying here, except perhaps being guilty of sloth.”
    Morini smiled at the feeble joke.
    “So how can I help you?” he asked.
    “What I have to tell you is a confession of sorts, I suppose, but it is far from personal, and involves my professional position here in the Vatican hierarchy, a position that you now occupy. I have some important information to impart to you, and you must solemnly swear never to share what I have to say with anyone else, inside or outside the Vatican.”
    Gianni sank backward onto his pillow. The effort of speaking at all was clearly taking its toll on his ravaged body.
    Morini stared at him, wondering if the opiates—or even the disease itself—had deranged the old man, if he was hearing drug- or pain-induced ramblings with no basis whatsoever in fact. But Gianni neither looked nor sounded as if that were the case. His voice was weak and slightly slurred, but his eyes were bright with intelligence.
    “What information?”
    “First you must swear never to reveal what I’m about to tell you.”
    Morini shook his head in slight irritation, then did as the old man asked.
    “I swear by Almighty God that I will tell no one anything I learn in this room. I would never breach the secrets of the confessional under any circumstances, and I will accord whatever you tell me here exactly the same status.”
    “Good. How long have you been here, in the holy city?”
    Morini looked slightly taken aback at the question.
    “Just under twenty years,” he replied. “Why?”
    “I arrived here in the mid-seventies, and I became Prefect at the end of the nineties. Even now I still remember having an interview, a very similar interview to this one, in fact, with my predecessor. Who also, if I recall correctly, had contracted a form of cancer. Perhaps the disease is one of the risks of this particular job.”
    Gianni paused for breath, and perhaps to order his thoughts before he continued.
    “I have a good idea what you’re thinking at this precise moment, because when I was in your position I, too, wondered if my predecessor as Prefect was deluded or suffering from some kind of mental instability in addition to his other infirmities. But he wasn’t, and neither am I.
    “I’m quite sure, Antonio, that you know most of the history of the Vatican and of the Church that we both serve, but