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A tattered Ford Fiesta coupe was parked down the street. He followed her to it and she drove out of town, stopping at the base of a darkened mound in a parking lot devoid of vehicles. A sign revealed by the headlights read CROSS MOUNTAIN.
"Why here?" he asked.
"I have no idea."
He wanted to ask her who did, but let it go. This was obviously her show, and she intended to play it out her way.
They climbed out into the rain and he followed her toward a footpath. The ground was spongy, the rocks slippery.
"We're going to the top?" he asked.
She turned back. "Where else?"
He tried to recall the details of Cross Mountain the guide had spewed out on the bus trip. More than sixteen hundred feet tall, it held a cross atop that had been erected in the 1930s by the local parish. Though unrelated to the apparitions, a climb to the summit was thought part of "the Medjugorje experience." But no one was partaking tonight. And he wasn't particularly thrilled about being sixteen hundred feet up in the middle of an electrical storm. Yet Jasna seemed unaffected and, strangely, he was drawing strength from her courage.
Was that faith?
The climb was made more difficult by rivulets of water gushing past him. His clothes were soaked, his shoes caked with mud, and only lightning illuminated the way. He opened his mouth and allowed the rain to soak his tongue. Thunder clapped overhead. It was as if the center of the storm had settled directly above them.
The crest appeared after twenty minutes of hard climbing. His thighs ached and the back of his calves throbbed.
Before him rose the darkened outline of a massive white cross, perhaps forty feet tall. At its concrete base, flower bouquets were buffeted by the storm. A few of the arrangements lay strewn about by the wind.
"They come from all over the world," she said, pointing to the blossoms. "They climb and lay offerings and pray to the Virgin. Yet she never once appeared here. But they still come. Their faith is to be admired."
"And mine is not?"
"You have no faith. Your soul is in jeopardy."
The tone was matter-of-fact, like a wife telling a husband to take out the trash. Thunder rumbled past like a bass drum being worked to a beat. He waited for the inevitable flash of lightning and the burst splintered the sky in fractured bolts of blue-white light. He decided to confront this seer. "What's there to have faith in? You know nothing of religion."
"I only know of God. Religion is man's creation. It can be changed, altered, or discarded entirely. Our Lord is another matter."
"But men invoke the power of God to justify their religions."
"It means nothing. Men like you must change that."
"How would I possibly do that?"
"By believing, having faith, loving our Lord, and doing as He asks. Your pope tried to change things. Carry on his efforts."
"I'm no longer in a position to do anything."
"You are in the same position in which Christ found Himself, and He changed everything."
"Why are we here?"
"Tonight will be the final vision of our Lady. She said for me to come, at this hour, and to bring you. She will leave a visible sign of Her presence. She promised that when She first came, and now She will keep that promise. Have faith in this moment--not later, when all will be clear."
"I'm a priest, Jasna. I don't need to be converted."
"You doubt, but do nothing to relieve that doubt. You, more than anyone, need to convert. This is the time of grace. A time for a deepening faith. A time for conversion. That's what the Virgin told me today."
"What did you mean by Bamberg?"
"You know what I meant."
"That's not an answer. Tell me what you meant."
The rain quickened and a fresh burst of wind whipped drops like pinpricks across his face. He closed his eyes. When he opened them, Jasna was on her knees, hands clasped in prayer, the same faraway look from this afternoon in her eyes as she stared up to the black sky.
He knelt beside her.
She seemed so vulnerable, no longer the defiant seer seemingly better than everyone else. He looked skyward and saw nothing but the blackened outline of the cross. A flash of lightning momentarily gave life to the image. Then darkness reenveloped the cross.
"I can remember. I know I can," she said to the night.
Thunder again rolled across the sky.
They needed to leave, but he was hesitant to interrupt. It might not be real to him, but it was to her.
"Dear Lady, I had no idea," she said to the wind.
A bright flash of light found earth and the cross exploded in a burst of heat that engulfed them.
His body rose off the ground and flew backward.
A strange tingling surged through his limbs. His head slammed into something hard. A wave of dizziness swept through him, then sickening nausea claimed his gut. His vision swirled. He tried to concentrate, to force himself to stay awake, but couldn't.
Finally, everything went silent.
FORTY-FIVE
VATICAN CITY
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 29
12:30 A.M.
Valendrea buttoned his cassock and left his room in the Domus Sanctae Marthae. As secretary of state he'd been provided one of the larger spaces, normally used by the prelate who managed the dormitory for seminarians. A similar privilege had been extended to the camerlengo and the head of the Sacred College. The accommodations were not what he was accustomed to, but a big improvement from the days when a conclave meant sleeping on a cot and peeing into a bucket.
The route from the dormitory to the Sistine was through a series of secured passages. This was a change from the last conclave when cardinals were bused and escorted when traveling between the dormitory and the chapel. Many had resented having a chaperone, so a sealable route had been created through the Vatican corridors, available only to conclave participants.
He'd quietly made clear during dinner that he wanted to meet with three of the cardinals later, and the three now waited inside the Sistine, at the opposite end from the altar, near the marble gate. Beyond, past the sealed entrance, in the hallway outside, he knew Swiss guards stood ready to throw open the bronze doors once white smoke seeped skyward. No one really expected that to occur after midnight, so the chapel would provide a safe place for a discreet discussion.
He approached the three cardinals and did not give them a chance to speak. "I only have a few things to say." He kept his voice low. "I'm aware of what the three of you have said in previous days. You assured me of support, then privately betrayed me. Why, only you know. What I want is for the fourth ballot to be the last. If not, none of you will be a member of this college by this time next year."
One of the cardinals started to speak and he raised his right hand to silence him.
"I don't want to hear that you voted for me. All three of you have supported Ngovi. But that will change in the morning. In addition, before the first session I want others swayed. I expect a fourth-ballot victory and it's up to you three to make that happen."
"That's unrealistic," one of the cardinals said.
"What's unrealistic is how you escaped Spanish justice for embezzling Church funds. They clearly believed you a thief, they just lacked proof. I have that proof, gladly provided by a young senorita you're quite familiar with. And you other two shouldn't be so smug. I have similar files on each of you, none of the information flattering. You know what I want. Start a movement. Invoke the Holy Spirit. I don't care how it's done, just make it happen. Success will ensure that you stay in Rome."
"What if we don't want to be in Rome?" one of the three asked.
"Would you prefer prison?"
Vatican observers loved to speculate about what happened within a conclave. The archives w
ere replete with journals depicting pious men wrestling with their consciences. He'd watched during the last conclave as cardinals argued that his youth was a disadvantage, since the Church did not fare well with a prolonged papacy. Five to ten years was good. Anything more created problems. And there was truth to that conclusion. Autocracy and infallibility could be a volatile mixture. But they could also be the ingredients of change. The throne of St. Peter was the ultimate pulpit and a strong pope could not be ignored. He intended on being that kind of pope, and he wasn't about to let three petty fools ruin those plans.
"All I want to hear is my name read seventy-six times in the morning. If I have to wait, there will be consequences. My patience was tried today. I would not recommend a repeat. If my smiling face does not appear on the balcony of St. Peter's by tomorrow afternoon, before you make it back to your rooms in the Domus Sanctae Marthae to retrieve your things, your reputations will be gone."
He turned and left, not giving them the chance to utter a word.
FORTY-SIX
MEDJUGORJE, BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA
Michener watched as the world spun in a blurry haze. His head pounded and his stomach flip-flopped. He tried to stand but couldn't. Bile pooled in his throat and his vision winked in and out.
He was still outside, now only a gentle rain soaking his already saturated clothes. Thunder overhead confirmed that the nocturnal storm was still raging. He brought his watch close to his eyes, but multiple images swirled before him and he could not read the luminous dial. He massaged his forehead and felt a knot on the back of his head.
He wondered about Jasna and was just about to call her name when a bright light appeared in the sky. He thought at first it might be another bolt of lightning, like what surely had happened earlier, but this ball was smaller, more controlled. He thought it a helicopter, but no sound preceded the blue-white splotch as it drew closer.
