The Fallen Angel

darkness beyond was absolute. He removed a small Maglite from the pocket of his thobe and, switching it on, illuminated the first fifty feet of an ancient tunnel no wider than the width of a man’s shoulders. Dug during the time of the First Jewish Temple, it was but one of many ancient wonders unearthed by Palestinian workers during the construction of the mosque. Darwish had informed neither the Israel Antiquities Authority nor the United Nations of the tunnel’s existence. No one knew about it—no one but Imam Hassan Darwish and a handful of laborers who had been sworn to secrecy.
    Some men might be naturally apprehensive about entering an ancient tunnel at night, but not Darwish. As a child, he had spent countless hours happily exploring the Noble Sanctuary’s hidden caves and passages. This one descended at a treacherously steep angle for several hundred feet before finally leveling off. After that it ran largely straight and flat for approximately a quarter-mile and then rose sharply once again. At the terminus was a newly installed steel ladder. Slightly winded from the arduous walk, Hassan Darwish took hold of the handrails and climbed slowly toward the wooden trapdoor at the top. Opening it, he found himself in the bedroom of an apartment in Silwan, the neighborhood of East Jerusalem adjacent to the City of David. On one wall was a poster of a French soccer star; on another, a photograph of Yahiya Ayyash, the master Hamas bomb maker known as the Engineer. Darwish opened the closet. Inside were the “Korans” that Mr. Farouk had mentioned in his message—several hundred pounds of high explosives and detonators that had been smuggled across the Egyptian border by Hezbollah and Hamas and carried into Israel by Bedouin tribesmen. There was more elsewhere in Silwan. Much more.
    Darwish closed the closet door. Then he slipped out of the bedroom and made his way through the cramped rooms of the apartment to a tiny balcony overlooking the Kidron Valley. On the opposite side, floating above the soaring honey-colored walls of Herodian stone, were two enormous domes, one silver, the other gold. “Allahu Akbar,” the imam said softly. “And may he have mercy on my soul for what I am about to do in His name.”

38
     
    VATICAN CITY
     
    F OR THE NEXT WEEK , G ABRIEL’S turbulent life settled into a pleasant if cloistered routine. With the flat on the Via Gregoriana now off-limits, he took refuge in a small priestly apartment inside the Apostolic Palace, one floor below Donati and the pope. He rose early each morning, ate breakfast with the Holy Father’s household nuns, and then headed over to the conservation lab to spend a few hours working on the Caravaggio. Antonio Calvesi, the chief restorer, rarely strayed from Gabriel’s grottolike workspace. On the second day, he finally screwed up the nerve to ask about the reason for Gabriel’s absence.
    “I was visiting a sick aunt.”
    “Where?”
    “Palm Beach.”
    Calvesi gave a skeptical frown. “Rumor has it you’re going to accompany il Papa on his pilgrimage to the Holy Land.”
    “Actually, we prefer to call it Israel,” said Gabriel, tapping his paintbrush gently against the flowing red mantle of John the Evangelist. “And, yes, Antonio, I’m going with him. But don’t worry, I’ll finish the Caravaggio when we get back.”
    “How long?”
    “Maybe a week, maybe a month.”
    “Do you do that just to annoy me?”
    “Yes.”
    “Let us hope your aunt remains healthy.”
    “Yes,” said Gabriel. “Let us hope.”
    At ten o’clock sharp, Gabriel would depart the lab and walk over to the Swiss Guard barracks for a daily briefing on the security arrangements for the pope’s trip. At first, Alois Metzler seemed annoyed by Gabriel’s presence. But his misgivings quickly evaporated when Gabriel pointed out several glaring problems with the protection plan that no one else seemed to have noticed. At the conclusion of one particularly long meeting, he invited Gabriel into his office.
    “If you’re going to serve with us,” he said, glancing at Gabriel’s blue jeans and leather jacket, “you’re going to have to dress like us.”
    “Pantaloons make me look fat,” said Gabriel. “And I’ve never been able to figure out how to get a halberd through an airport metal detector.”
    Metzler pressed a button on his intercom. Ten seconds later, his adjutant entered carrying three dark suits, three white shirts, three ties, and a pair of