77
   Robert Langdon staggered into the private bathroom adjoining the Office of the Pope. He dabbed the blood from his face and lips. The blood was not his own. It was that of Cardinal Lamassé, who had just died horribly in the crowded square outside the Vatican. Virgin sacrifices on the altars of science. So far, the Hassassin had made good on his threat.
   Langdon felt powerless as he gazed into the mirror. His eyes were drawn, and stubble had begun to darken his cheeks. The room around him was immaculate and lavish—black marble with gold fixtures, cotton towels, and scented hand soaps.
   Langdon tried to rid his mind of the bloody brand he had just seen. Air. The image stuck. He had witnessed three ambigrams since waking up this morning… and he knew there were two more coming.
   Outside the door, it sounded as if Olivetti, the camerlegno, and Captain Rocher were debating what to do next. Apparently, the antimatter search had turned up nothing so far. Either the guards had missed the canister, or the intruder had gotten deeper inside the Vatican than Commander Olivetti had been willing to entertain.
   Langdon dried his hands and face. Then he turned and looked for a urinal. No urinal. Just a bowl. He lifted the lid.
   As he stood there, tension ebbing from his body, a giddy wave of exhaustion shuddered through his core. The emotions knotting his chest were so many, so incongruous. He was fatigued, running on no food or sleep, walking the Path of Illumination, traumatized by two brutal murders. Langdon felt a deepening horror over the possible outcome of this drama.
   Think, he told himself. His mind was blank.
   As he flushed, an unexpected realization hit him. This is the Pope’s toilet, he thought. I just took a leak in the Pope’s toilet. He had to chuckle. The Holy Throne.

78
   In London, a BBC technician ejected a video cassette from a satellite receiver unit and dashed across the control room floor. She burst into the office of the editor-in-chief, slammed the video into his VCR, and pressed play.
   As the tape rolled, she told him about the conversation she had just had with Gunther Glick in Vatican City. In addition, BBC photo archives had just given her a positive ID on the victim in St. Peter’s Square.
   When the editor-in-chief emerged from his office, he was ringing a cowbell. Everything in editorial stopped.
   “Live in five!” the man boomed. “On-air talent to prep! Media coordinators, I want your contacts on line! We’ve got a story we’re selling! And we’ve got film!”
   The market coordinators grabbed their Rolodexes.
   “Film specs!” one of them yelled.
   “Thirty-second trim,” the chief replied.
   “Content?”
   “Live homicide.”
   The coordinators looked encouraged. “Usage and licensing price?”
   “A million U.S. per.”
   Heads shot up. “What!”
   “You heard me! I want top of the food chain. CNN, MSNBC, then the big three! Offer a dial-in preview. Give them five minutes to piggyback before BBC runs it.”
   “What the hell happened?” someone demanded. “The prime minister get skinned alive?”
   The chief shook his head. “Better.”
   At that exact instant, somewhere in Rome, the Hassassin enjoyed a fleeting moment of repose in a comfortable chair. He admired the legendary chamber around him. I am sitting in the Church of Illumination, he thought. The Illuminati lair. He could not believe it was still here after all of these centuries.
   Dutifully, he dialed the BBC reporter to whom he had spoken earlier. It was time. The world had yet to hear the most shocking news of all.

79
   Vittoria Vetra sipped a glass of water and nibbled absently at some tea scones just set out by one of the Swiss Guards. She knew she should eat, but she had no appetite. The Office of the Pope was bustling now, echoing with tense conversations. Captain Rocher, Commander Olivetti, and half a dozen guards assessed the damage and debated the next move.
   Robert Langdon stood nearby staring out at St. Peter’s Square. He looked dejected. Vittoria walked over. “Ideas?”
   He shook his head.
   “Scone?”
   His mood seemed to brighten at the sight of food. “Hell yes. Thanks.” He ate voraciously.
   The conversation behind them went quiet suddenly when two Swiss Guards escorted Camerlegno Ventresca through the door. If the chamberlain had looked drained before, Vittoria thought, now he looked empty.
   “What happened?” the camerlegno said to Olivetti. From the look on the camerlegno’s face, he appeared to have already been told the worst of it.
   Olivetti’s official update sounded like a battlefield casualty report. He gave the facts with flat efficacy. “Cardinal Ebner was found dead in the church of Santa Maria del Popolo just after eight o’clock. He had been suffocated and branded with the ambigrammatic word ‘Earth.’ Cardinal Lamassé was murdered in St. Peter’s Square ten minutes ago. He died of perforations to the chest. He was branded with the word ‘Air,’ also ambigrammatic. The killer escaped in both instances.”
   The camerlegno crossed the room and sat heavily behind the Pope’s desk. He bowed his head.
   “Cardinals Guidera and Baggia, however, are still alive.”
   The camerlegno’s head shot up, his expression pained. “This is our consolation? Two cardinals have been murdered, commander. And the other two will obviously not be alive much longer unless you find them.”
   “We will find them,” Olivetti assured. “I am encouraged.”
   “Encouraged? We’ve had nothing but failure.”
   “Untrue. We’ve lost two battles, signore, but we’re winning the war. The Illuminati had intended to turn this evening into a media circus. So far we have thwarted their plan. Both cardinals’ bodies have been recovered without incident. In addition,” Olivetti continued, “Captain Rocher tells me he is making excellent headway on the antimatter search.”
   Captain Rocher stepped forward in his red beret. Vittoria thought he looked more human somehow than the other guards—stern but not so rigid. Rocher’s voice was emotional and crystalline, like a violin. “I am hopeful we will have the canister for you within an hour, signore.”
   “Captain,” the camerlegno said, “excuse me if I seem less than hopeful, but I was under the impression that a search of Vatican City would take far more time than we have.”
   “A full search, yes. However, after assessing the situation, I am confident the antimatter canister is located in one of our white zones—those Vatican sectors accessible to public tours—the museums and St. Peter’s Basilica, for example. We have already killed power in those zones and are conducting our scan.”
   “You intend to search only a small percentage of Vatican City?”
   “Yes, signore. It is highly unlikely that an intruder gained access to the inner zones of Vatican City. The fact that the missing security camera was stolen from a public access area—a stairwell in one of the museums—clearly implies that the intruder had limited access. Therefore he would only have been able to relocate the camera and antimatter in another public access area. It is these areas on which we are focusing our search.”
   “But the intruder kidnapped four cardinals. That certainly implies deeper infiltration than we thought.”
   “Not necessarily. We must remember that the cardinals spent much of today in the Vatican museums and St. Peter’s Basilica, enjoying those areas without the crowds. It is probable that the missing cardinals were taken in one of these areas.”
   “But how were they removed from our walls?”
   “We are still assessing that.”
   “I see.” The camerlegno exhaled and stood up. He walked over to Olivetti. “Commander, I would like to hear your contingency plan for evacuation.”
   “We are still formalizing that, signore. In the meantime, I am faithful Captain Rocher will find the canister.”
   Rocher clicked his boots as if in appreciation of the vote of confidence. “My men have already scanned two-thirds of the white zones. Confidence is high.”
   The camerlegno did not appear to share that confidence.
   At that moment the guard with a scar beneath one eye came through the door carrying a clipboard and a map. He strode toward Langdon. “Mr. Langdon? I have the information you requested on the West Ponente.”
   Langdon swallowed his scone. “Good. Let’s have a look.”
   The others kept talking while Vittoria joined Robert and the guard as they spread out the map on the Pope’s desk.
   The soldier pointed to St. Peter’s Square. “This is where we are. The central line of West Ponente’s breath points due east, directly away from Vatican City.” The guard traced a line with his finger from St. Peter’s Square across the Tiber River and up into the heart of old Rome. “As you can see, the line passes through almost all of Rome. There are about twenty Catholic churches that fall near this line.”
   Langdon slumped. “Twenty?”
   “Maybe more.”
   “Do any of the churches fall directly on the line?”
   “Some look closer than others,” the guard said, “but translating the exact bearing of the West Ponente onto a map leaves margin for error.”
   Langdon looked out at St. Peter’s Square a moment. Then he scowled, stroking his chin. “How about fire? Any of them have Bernini artwork that has to do with fire?”
   Silence.
   “How about obelisks?” he demanded. “Are any of the churches located near obelisks?”
   The guard began checking the map.
   Vittoria saw a glimmer of hope in Langdon’s eyes and realized what he was thinking. He’s right! The first two markers had been located on or near piazzas that contained obelisks! Maybe obelisks were a theme? Soaring pyramids marking the Illuminati path? The more Vittoria thought about it, the more perfect it seemed… four towering beacons rising over Rome to mark the altars of science.
   “It’s a long shot,” Langdon said, “but I know that many of Rome’s obelisks were erected or moved during Bernini’s reign. He was no doubt involved in their placement.”
   “Or,” Vittoria added, “Bernini could have placed his markers near existing obelisks.”
   Langdon nodded. “True.”
   “Bad news,” the guard said. “No obelisks on the line.” He traced his finger across the map. “None even remotely close. Nothing.”
   Langdon sighed.
   Vittoria’s shoulders slumped. She’d thought it was a promising idea. Apparently, this was not going to be as easy as they’d hoped. She tried to stay positive. “Robert, think. You must know of a Bernini statue relating to fire. Anything at all.”
   “Believe me, I’ve been thinking. Bernini was incredibly prolific. Hundreds of works. I was hoping West Ponente would point to a single church. Something that would ring a bell.”
   “Fuòco,” she pressed. “Fire. No Bernini titles jump out?”
   Langdon shrugged. “There’s his famous sketches of Fireworks, but they’re not sculpture, and they’re in Leipzig, Germany.”
   Vittoria frowned. “And you’re sure the breath is what indicates the direction?”
   “You saw the relief, Vittoria. The design was totally symmetrical. The only indication of bearing was the breath.”
   Vittoria knew he was right.
   “Not to mention,” he added, “because the West Ponente signifies Air, following the breath seems symbolically appropriate.”
   Vittoria nodded. So we follow the breath. But where?
   Olivetti came over. “What have you got?”
   “Too many churches,” the soldier said. “Two dozen or so. I suppose we could put four men on each church—”
   “Forget it,” Olivetti said. “We missed this guy twice when we knew exactly where he was going to be. A mass stakeout means leaving Vatican City unprotected and canceling the search.”
   “We need a reference book,” Vittoria said. “An index of Bernini’s work. If we can scan titles, maybe something will jump out.”
   “I don’t know,” Langdon said. “If it’s a work Bernini created specifically for the Illuminati, it may be very obscure. It probably won’t be listed in a book.”
   Vittoria refused to believe it. “The other two sculptures were fairly well-known. You’d heard of them both.”
   Langdon shrugged. “Yeah.”
   “If we scan titles for references to the word ‘fire,’ maybe we’ll find a statue that’s listed as being in the right direction.”
   Langdon seemed convinced it was worth a shot. He turned to Olivetti. “I need a list of all Bernini’s work. You guys probably don’t have a coffee-table Bernini book around here, do you?”
   “Coffee-table book?” Olivetti seemed unfamiliar with the term.
   “Never mind. Any list. How about the Vatican Museum? They must have Bernini references.”
   The guard with the scar frowned. “Power in the museum is out, and the records room is enormous. Without the staff there to help—”
   “The Bernini work in question,” Olivetti interrupted. “Would it have been created while Bernini was employed here at the Vatican?”
   “Almost definitely,” Langdon said. “He was here almost his entire career. And certainly during the time period of the Galileo conflict.”
   Olivetti nodded. “Then there’s another reference.”
   Vittoria felt a flicker of optimism. “Where?”
   The commander did not reply. He took his guard aside and spoke in hushed tones. The guard seemed uncertain but nodded obediently. When Olivetti was finished talking, the guard turned to Langdon.
   “This way please, Mr. Langdon. It’s nine-fifteen. We’ll have to hurry.”
   Langdon and the guard headed for the door.
   Vittoria started after them. “I’ll help.”
   Olivetti caught her by the arm. “No, Ms. Vetra. I need a word with you.” His grasp was authoritative.
   Langdon and the guard left. Olivetti’s face was wooden as he took Vittoria aside. But whatever it was Olivetti had intended to say to her, he never got the chance. His walkie-talkie crackled loudly. “Commandante?”
   Everyone in the room turned.
   The voice on the transmitter was grim. “I think you better turn on the television.”

80
   When Langdon had left the Vatican Secret Archives only two hours ago, he had never imagined he would see them again. Now, winded from having jogged the entire way with his Swiss Guard escort, Langdon found himself back at the archives once again.
   His escort, the guard with the scar, now led Langdon through the rows of translucent cubicles. The silence of the archives felt somehow more forbidding now, and Langdon was thankful when the guard broke it.
   “Over here, I think,” he said, escorting Langdon to the back of the chamber where a series of smaller vaults lined the wall. The guard scanned the titles on the vaults and motioned to one of them. “Yes, here it is. Right where the commander said it would be.”
   Langdon read the title. Attivi Vaticani. Vatican assets? He scanned the list of contents. Real estate… currency… Vatican Bank… antiquities… The list went on.
   “Paperwork of all Vatican assets,” the guard said.
   Langdon looked at the cubicle. Jesus. Even in the dark, he could tell it was packed.
   “My commander said that whatever Bernini created while under Vatican patronage would be listed here as an asset.”
   Langdon nodded, realizing the commander’s instincts just might pay off. In Bernini’s day, everything an artist created while under the patronage of the Pope became, by law, property of the Vatican. It was more like feudalism than patronage, but top artists lived well and seldom complained. “Including works placed in churches outside Vatican City?”
   The soldier gave him an odd look. “Of course. All Catholic churches in Rome are property of the Vatican.”
   Langdon looked at the list in his hand. It contained the names of the twenty or so churches that were located on a direct line with West Ponente’s breath. The third altar of science was one of them, and Langdon hoped he had time to figure out which it was. Under other circumstances, he would gladly have explored each church in person. Today, however, he had about twenty minutes to find what he was looking for—the one church containing a Bernini tribute to fire.
   Langdon walked to the vault’s electronic revolving door. The guard did not follow. Langdon sensed an uncertain hesitation. He smiled. “The air’s fine. Thin, but breathable.”
   “My orders are to escort you here and then return immediately to the security center.”
   “You’re leaving?”
   “Yes. The Swiss Guard are not allowed inside the archives. I am breaching protocol by escorting you this far. The commander reminded me of that.”
   “Breaching protocol?” Do you have any idea what is going on here tonight? “Whose side is your damn commander on!”
   All friendliness disappeared from the guard’s face. The scar under his eye twitched. The guard stared, looking suddenly a lot like Olivetti himself.
   “I apologize,” Langdon said, regretting the comment. “It’s just… I could use some help.”
   The guard did not blink. “I am trained to follow orders. Not debate them. When you find what you are looking for, contact the commander immediately.”
   Langdon was flustered. “But where will he be?”
   The guard removed his walkie-talkie and set it on a nearby table. “Channel one.” Then he disappeared into the dark.

81
   The television in the Office of the Pope was an oversized Hitachi hidden in a recessed cabinet opposite his desk. The doors to the cabinet were now open, and everyone gathered around. Vittoria moved in close. As the screen warmed up, a young female reporter came into view. She was a doe-eyed brunette.
   “For MSNBC news,” she announced, “this is Kelly Horan-Jones, live from Vatican City.” The image behind her was a night shot of St. Peter’s Basilica with all its lights blazing.
   “You’re not live,” Rocher snapped. “That’s stock footage! The lights in the basilica are out.”
   Olivetti silenced him with a hiss.
   The reporter continued, sounding tense. “Shocking developments in the Vatican elections this evening. We have reports that two members of the College of Cardinals have been brutally murdered in Rome.”
   Olivetti swore under his breath.
   As the reporter continued, a guard appeared at the door, breathless. “Commander, the central switchboard reports every line lit. They’re requesting our official position on—”
   “Disconnect it,” Olivetti said, never taking his eyes from the TV.
   The guard looked uncertain. “But, commander—”
   “Go!”
   The guard ran off.
   Vittoria sensed the camerlegno had wanted to say something but had stopped himself. Instead, the man stared long and hard at Olivetti before turning back to the television.
   MSNBC was now running tape. The Swiss Guards carried the body of Cardinal Ebner down the stairs outside Santa Maria del Popolo and lifted him into an Alpha Romeo. The tape froze and zoomed in as the cardinal’s naked body became visible just before they deposited him in the trunk of the car.
   “Who the hell shot this footage?” Olivetti demanded.
   The MSNBC reporter kept talking. “This is believed to be the body of Cardinal Ebner of Frankfurt, Germany. The men removing his body from the church are believed to be Vatican Swiss Guard.” The reporter looked like she was making every effort to appear appropriately moved. They closed in on her face, and she became even more somber. “At this time, MSNBC would like to issue our viewers a discretionary warning. The images we are about to show are exceptionally vivid and may not be suitable for all audiences.”
   Vittoria grunted at the station’s feigned concern for viewer sensibility, recognizing the warning as exactly what it was—the ultimate media “teaser line.” Nobody ever changed channels after a promise like that.
   The reporter drove it home. “Again, this footage may be shocking to some viewers.”
   “What footage?” Olivetti demanded. “You just showed—”
   The shot that filled the screen was of a couple in St. Peter’s Square, moving through the crowd. Vittoria instantly recognized the two people as Robert and herself. In the corner of the screen was a text overlay: Courtesy of the BBC. A bell was tolling.
   “Oh, no,” Vittoria said aloud. “Oh… no.”
   The camerlegno looked confused. He turned to Olivetti. “I thought you said you confiscated this tape!”
   Suddenly, on television, a child was screaming. The image panned to find a little girl pointing at what appeared to be a bloody homeless man. Robert Langdon entered abruptly into the frame, trying to help the little girl. The shot tightened.
   Everyone in the Pope’s office stared in horrified silence as the drama unfolded before them. The cardinal’s body fell face first onto the pavement. Vittoria appeared and called orders. There was blood. A brand. A ghastly, failed attempt to administer CPR.
   “This astonishing footage,” the reporter was saying, “was shot only minutes ago outside the Vatican. Our sources tell us this is the body of Cardinal Lamassé from France. How he came to be dressed this way and why he was not in conclave remain a mystery. So far, the Vatican has refused to comment.” The tape began to roll again.
   “Refused comment?” Rocher said. “Give us a damn minute!”
   The reporter was still talking, her eyebrows furrowing with intensity. “Although MSNBC has yet to confirm a motive for the attack, our sources tell us that responsibility for the murders has been claimed by a group calling themselves the Illuminati.”
   Olivetti exploded. “What!”
   “… find out more about the Illuminati by visiting our website at—”
   “Non é posibile!” Olivetti declared. He switched channels.
   This station had a Hispanic male reporter. “—a satanic cult known as the Illuminati, who some historians believe—”
   Olivetti began pressing the remote wildly. Every channel was in the middle of a live update. Most were in English.


       “—Swiss Guards removing a body from a church earlier this evening. The body is believed to be that of Cardinal—”
       “—lights in the basilica and museums are extinguished leaving speculation—”
       “—will be speaking with conspiracy theorist Tyler Tingley, about this shocking resurgence—”
       “—rumors of two more assassinations planned for later this evening—”
       “—questioning now whether papal hopeful Cardinal Baggia is among the missing—”


   Vittoria turned away. Everything was happening so fast. Outside the window, in the settling dark, the raw magnetism of human tragedy seemed to be sucking people toward Vatican City. The crowd in the square thickened almost by the instant. Pedestrians streamed toward them while a new batch of media personnel unloaded vans and staked their claim in St. Peter’s Square.
   Olivetti set down the remote control and turned to the camerlegno. “Signore, I cannot imagine how this could happen. We took the tape that was in that camera!”
   The camerlegno looked momentarily too stunned to speak.
   Nobody said a word. The Swiss Guards stood rigid at attention.
   “It appears,” the camerlegno said finally, sounding too devastated to be angry, “that we have not contained this crisis as well as I was led to believe.” He looked out the window at the gathering masses. “I need to make an address.”
   Olivetti shook his head. “No, signore. That is exactly what the Illuminati want you to do—confirm them, empower them. We must remain silent.”
   “And these people?” The camerlegno pointed out the window. “There will be tens of thousands shortly. Then hundreds of thousands. Continuing this charade only puts them in danger. I need to warn them. Then we need to evacuate our College of Cardinals.”
   “There is still time. Let Captain Rocher find the antimatter.”
   The camerlegno turned. “Are you attempting to give me an order?”
   “No, I am giving you advice. If you are concerned about the people outside, we can announce a gas leak and clear the area, but admitting we are hostage is dangerous.”
   “Commander, I will only say this once. I will not use this office as a pulpit to lie to the world. If I announce anything at all, it will be the truth.”
   “The truth? That Vatican City is threatened to be destroyed by satanic terrorists? It only weakens our position.”
   The camerlegno glared. “How much weaker could our position be?”
   Rocher shouted suddenly, grabbing the remote and increasing the volume on the television. Everyone turned.
   On air, the woman from MSNBC now looked genuinely unnerved. Superimposed beside her was a photo of the late Pope. “… breaking information. This just in from the BBC…” She glanced off camera as if to confirm she was really supposed to make this announcement. Apparently getting confirmation, she turned and grimly faced the viewers. “The Illuminati have just claimed responsibility for…” She hesitated. “They have claimed responsibility for the death of the Pope fifteen days ago.”
   The camerlegno’s jaw fell.
   Rocher dropped the remote control.
   Vittoria could barely process the information.
   “By Vatican law,” the woman continued, “no formal autopsy is ever performed on a Pope, so the Illuminati claim of murder cannot be confirmed. Nonetheless, the Illuminati hold that the cause of the late Pope’s death was not a stroke as the Vatican reported, but poisoning.”
   The room went totally silent again.
   Olivetti erupted. “Madness! A bold-faced lie!”
   Rocher began flipping channels again. The bulletin seemed to spread like a plague from station to station. Everyone had the same story. Headlines competed for optimal sensationalism.

Murder at the Vatican
Pope Poisoned
Satan Touches House of God

   The camerlegno looked away. “God help us.”
   As Rocher flipped, he passed a BBC station. “—tipped me off about the killing at Santa Maria de Popolo—”
   “Wait!” the camerlegno said. “Back.”
   Rocher went back. On screen, a prim-looking man sat at a BBC news desk. Superimposed over his shoulder was a still snapshot of an odd-looking man with a red beard. Underneath his photo, it said:

Gunther Glick—Live in Vatican City

   Reporter Glick was apparently reporting by phone, the connection scratchy. “… my videographer got the footage of the cardinal being removed from the Chigi Chapel.”
   “Let me reiterate for our viewers,” the anchorman in London was saying, “BBC reporter Gunther Glick is the man who first broke this story. He has been in phone contact twice now with the alleged Illuminati assassin. Gunther, you say the assassin phoned only moments ago to pass along a message from the Illuminati?”
   “He did.”
   “And their message was that the Illuminati were somehow responsible for the Pope’s death?” The anchorman sounded incredulous.
   “Correct. The caller told me that the Pope’s death was not a stroke, as the Vatican had thought, but rather that the Pope had been poisoned by the Illuminati.”
   Everyone in the Pope’s office froze.
   “Poisoned?” the anchorman demanded. “But… but how!”
   “They gave no specifics,” Glick replied, “except to say that they killed him with a drug known as…”—there was a rustling of papers on the line—“something known as Heparin.”
   The camerlegno, Olivetti, and Rocher all exchanged confused looks.
   “Heparin?” Rocher demanded, looking unnerved. “But isn’t that…?”
   The camerlegno blanched. “The Pope’s medication.”
   Vittoria was stunned. “The Pope was on Heparin?”
   “He had thrombophlebitis,” the camerlegno said. “He took an injection once a day.”
   Rocher looked flabbergasted. “But Heparin isn’t a poison. Why would the Illuminati claim—”
   “Heparin is lethal in the wrong dosages,” Vittoria offered. “It’s a powerful anticoagulant. An overdose would cause massive internal bleeding and brain hemorrhages.”
   Olivetti eyed her suspiciously. “How would you know that?”
   “Marine biologists use it on sea mammals in captivity to prevent blood clotting from decreased activity. Animals have died from improper administration of the drug.” She paused. “A Heparin overdose in a human would cause symptoms easily mistaken for a stroke… especially in the absence of a proper autopsy.”
   The camerlegno now looked deeply troubled.
   “Signore,” Olivetti said, “this is obviously an Illuminati ploy for publicity. Someone overdosing the Pope would be impossible. Nobody had access. And even if we take the bait and try to refute their claim, how could we? Papal law prohibits autopsy. Even with an autopsy, we would learn nothing. We would find traces of Heparin in his body from his daily injections.”
   “True.” The camerlegno’s voice sharpened. “And yet something else troubles me. No one on the outside knew His Holiness was taking this medication.”
   There was a silence.
   “If he overdosed with Heparin,” Vittoria said, “his body would show signs.”
   Olivetti spun toward her. “Ms. Vetra, in case you didn’t hear me, papal autopsies are prohibited by Vatican Law. We are not about to defile His Holiness’s body by cutting him open just because an enemy makes a taunting claim!”
   Vittoria felt shamed. “I was not implying…” She had not meant to seem disrespectful. “I certainly was not suggesting you exhume the Pope…” She hesitated, though. Something Robert told her in the Chigi passed like a ghost through her mind. He had mentioned that papal sarcophagi were above ground and never cemented shut, a throwback to the days of the pharaohs when sealing and burying a casket was believed to trap the deceased’s soul inside. Gravity had become the mortar of choice, with coffin lids often weighing hundreds of pounds. Technically, she realized, it would be possible to–
   “What sort of signs?” the camerlegno said suddenly.
   Vittoria felt her heart flutter with fear. “Overdoses can cause bleeding of the oral mucosa.”
   “Oral what?”
   “The victim’s gums would bleed. Post mortem, the blood congeals and turns the inside of the mouth black.” Vittoria had once seen a photo taken at an aquarium in London where a pair of killer whales had been mistakenly overdosed by their trainer. The whales floated lifeless in the tank, their mouths hanging open and their tongues black as soot.
   The camerlegno made no reply. He turned and stared out the window.
   Rocher’s voice had lost its optimism. “Signore, if this claim about poisoning is true…”
   “It’s not true,” Olivetti declared. “Access to the Pope by an outsider is utterly impossible.”
   “If this claim is true,” Rocher repeated, “and our Holy Father was poisoned, then that has profound implications for our antimatter search. The alleged assassination implies a much deeper infiltration of Vatican City than we had imagined. Searching the white zones may be inadequate. If we are compromised to such a deep extent, we may not find the canister in time.”
   Olivetti leveled his captain with a cold stare. “Captain, I will tell you what is going to happen.”
   “No,” the camerlegno said, turning suddenly. “I will tell you what is going to happen.” He looked directly at Olivetti. “This has gone far enough. In twenty minutes I will be making a decision whether or not to cancel conclave and evacuate Vatican City. My decision will be final. Is that clear?”
   Olivetti did not blink. Nor did he respond.
   The camerlegno spoke forcefully now, as though tapping a hidden reserve of power. “Captain Rocher, you will complete your search of the white zones and report directly to me when you are finished.”
   Rocher nodded, throwing Olivetti an uneasy glance.
   The camerlegno then singled out two guards. “I want the BBC reporter, Mr. Glick, in this office immediately. If the Illuminati have been communicating with him, he may be able to help us. Go.”
   The two soldiers disappeared.
   Now the camerlegno turned and addressed the remaining guards. “Gentlemen, I will not permit any more loss of life this evening. By ten o’clock you will locate the remaining two cardinals and capture the monster responsible for these murders. Do I make myself understood?”
   “But, signore,” Olivetti argued, “we have no idea where—”
   “Mr. Langdon is working on that. He seems capable. I have faith.”
   With that, the camerlegno strode for the door, a new determination in his step. On his way out, he pointed to three guards. “You three, come with me. Now.”
   The guards followed.
   In the doorway, the camerlegno stopped. He turned to Vittoria. “Ms. Vetra. You too. Please come with me.”
   Vittoria hesitated. “Where are we going?”
   He headed out the door. “To see an old friend.”

82
   At CERN, secretary Sylvie Baudeloque was hungry, wishing she could go home. To her dismay, Kohler had apparently survived his trip to the infirmary; he had phoned and demanded–not asked, demanded—that Sylvie stay late this evening. No explanation.
   Over the years, Sylvie had programmed herself to ignore Kohler’s bizarre mood swings and eccentricities—his silent treatments, his unnerving propensity to secretly film meetings with his wheelchair’s porta-video. She secretly hoped one day he would shoot himself during his weekly visit to CERN’s recreational pistol range, but apparently he was a pretty good shot.
   Now, sitting alone at her desk, Sylvie heard her stomach growling. Kohler had not yet returned, nor had he given her any additional work for the evening. To hell with sitting here bored and starving, she decided. She left Kohler a note and headed for the staff dining commons to grab a quick bite.
   She never made it.
   As she passed CERN’s recreational “suites de loisir”—a long hallway of lounges with televisions—she noticed the rooms were overflowing with employees who had apparently abandoned dinner to watch the news. Something big was going on. Sylvie entered the first suite. It was packed with byte-heads—wild young computer programmers. When she saw the headlines on the TV, she gasped.

Terror at the Vatican

   Sylvie listened to the report, unable to believe her ears. Some ancient brotherhood killing cardinals? What did that prove? Their hatred? Their dominance? Their ignorance?
   And yet, incredibly, the mood in this suite seemed anything but somber.
   Two young techies ran by waving T-shirts that bore a picture of Bill Gates and the message:


       And the Geek shall inherit the Earth!


   “Illuminati!” one shouted. “I told you these guys were real!”
   “Incredible! I thought it was just a game!”
   “They killed the Pope, man! The Pope!”
   “Jeez! I wonder how many points you get for that?”
   They ran off laughing.
   Sylvie stood in stunned amazement. As a Catholic working among scientists, she occasionally endured the antireligious whisperings, but the party these kids seemed to be having was all-out euphoria over the church’s loss. How could they be so callous? Why the hatred?
   For Sylvie, the church had always been an innocuous entity… a place of fellowship and introspection… sometimes just a place to sing out loud without people staring at her. The church recorded the benchmarks of her life—funerals, weddings, baptisms, holidays—and it asked for nothing in return. Even the monetary dues were voluntary. Her children emerged from Sunday School every week uplifted, filled with ideas about helping others and being kinder. What could possibly be wrong with that?
   It never ceased to amaze her that so many of CERN’s so-called “brilliant minds” failed to comprehend the importance of the church. Did they really believe quarks and mesons inspired the average human being? Or that equations could replace someone’s need for faith in the divine?
   Dazed, Sylvie moved down the hallway past the other lounges. All the TV rooms were packed. She began wondering now about the call Kohler had gotten from the Vatican earlier. Coincidence? Perhaps. The Vatican called CERN from time to time as a “courtesy” before issuing scathing statements condemning CERN’s research—most recently for CERN’s breakthroughs in nanotechnology, a field the church denounced because of its implications for genetic engineering. CERN never cared. Invariably, within minutes after a Vatican salvo, Kohler’s phone would ring off the hook with tech-investment companies wanting to license the new discovery. “No such thing as bad press,” Kohler would always say.
   Sylvie wondered if she should page Kohler, wherever the hell he was, and tell him to turn on the news. Did he care? Had he heard? Of course, he’d heard. He was probably videotaping the entire report with his freaky little camcorder, smiling for the first time in a year.
   As Sylvie continued down the hall, she finally found a lounge where the mood was subdued… almost melancholy. Here the scientists watching the report were some of CERN’s oldest and most respected. They did not even look up as Sylvie slipped in and took a seat.
   On the other side of CERN, in Leonardo Vetra’s frigid apartment, Maximilian Kohler had finished reading the leather-bound journal he’d taken from Vetra’s bedside table. Now he was watching the television reports. After a few minutes, he replaced Vetra’s journal, turned off the television, and left the apartment.
   Far away, in Vatican City, Cardinal Mortati carried another tray of ballots to the Sistine Chapel chimney. He burned them, and the smoke was black.
   Two ballotings. No Pope.

83
   Flashlights were no match for the voluminous blackness of St. Peter’s Basilica. The void overhead pressed down like a starless night, and Vittoria felt the emptiness spread out around her like a desolate ocean. She stayed close as the Swiss Guards and the camerlegno pushed on. High above, a dove cooed and fluttered away.
   As if sensing her discomfort, the camerlegno dropped back and lay a hand on her shoulder. A tangible strength transferred in the touch, as if the man were magically infusing her with the calm she needed to do what they were about to do.
   What are we about to do? she thought. This is madness!
   And yet, Vittoria knew, for all its impiety and inevitable horror, the task at hand was inescapable. The grave decisions facing the camerlegno required information… information entombed in a sarcophagus in the Vatican Grottoes. She wondered what they would find. Did the Illuminati murder the Pope? Did their power really reach so far? Am I really about to perform the first papal autopsy?
   Vittoria found it ironic that she felt more apprehensive in this unlit church than she would swimming at night with barracuda. Nature was her refuge. She understood nature. But it was matters of man and spirit that left her mystified. Killer fish gathering in the dark conjured images of the press gathering outside. TV footage of branded bodies reminded her of her father’s corpse… and the killer’s harsh laugh. The killer was out there somewhere. Vittoria felt the anger drowning her fear.
   As they circled past a pillar—thicker in girth than any redwood she could imagine—Vittoria saw an orange glow up ahead. The light seemed to emanate from beneath the floor in the center of the basilica. As they came closer, she realized what she was seeing. It was the famous sunken sanctuary beneath the main altar—the sumptuous underground chamber that held the Vatican’s most sacred relics. As they drew even with the gate surrounding the hollow, Vittoria gazed down at the golden coffer surrounded by scores of glowing oil lamps.
   “St. Peter’s bones?” she asked, knowing full well that they were. Everyone who came to St. Peter’s knew what was in the golden casket.
   “Actually, no,” the camerlegno said. “A common misconception. That’s not a reliquary. The box holds palliums–woven sashes that the Pope gives to newly elected cardinals.”
   “But I thought—”
   “As does everyone. The guidebooks label this as St. Peter’s tomb, but his true grave is two stories beneath us, buried in the earth. The Vatican excavated it in the forties. Nobody is allowed down there.”
   Vittoria was shocked. As they moved away from the glowing recession into the darkness again, she thought of the stories she’d heard of pilgrims traveling thousands of miles to look at that golden box, thinking they were in the presence of St. Peter. “Shouldn’t the Vatican tell people?”
   “We all benefit from a sense of contact with divinity… even if it is only imagined.”
   Vittoria, as a scientist, could not argue the logic. She had read countless studies of the placebo effect—aspirins curing cancer in people who believed they were using a miracle drug. What was faith, after all?
   “Change,” the camerlegno said, “is not something we do well within Vatican City. Admitting our past faults, modernization, are things we historically eschew. His Holiness was trying to change that.” He paused. “Reaching to the modern world. Searching for new paths to God.”
   Vittoria nodded in the dark. “Like science?”
   “To be honest, science seems irrelevant.”
   “Irrelevant?” Vittoria could think of a lot of words to describe science, but in the modern world “irrelevant” did not seem like one of them.
   “Science can heal, or science can kill. It depends on the soul of the man using the science. It is the soul that interests me.”
   “When did you hear your call?”
   “Before I was born.”
   Vittoria looked at him.
   “I’m sorry, that always seems like a strange question. What I mean is that I’ve always known I would serve God. From the moment I could first think. It wasn’t until I was a young man, though, in the military, that I truly understood my purpose.”
   Vittoria was surprised. “You were in the military?”
   “Two years. I refused to fire a weapon, so they made me fly instead. Medevac helicopters. In fact, I still fly from time to time.”
   Vittoria tried to picture the young priest flying a helicopter. Oddly, she could see him perfectly behind the controls. Camerlegno Ventresca possessed a grit that seemed to accentuate his conviction rather than cloud it. “Did you ever fly the Pope?”
   “Heavens no. We left that precious cargo to the professionals. His Holiness let me take the helicopter to our retreat in Gandolfo sometimes.” He paused, looking at her. “Ms. Vetra, thank you for your help here today. I am very sorry about your father. Truly.”
   “Thank you.”
   “I never knew my father. He died before I was born. I lost my mother when I was ten.”
   Vittoria looked up. “You were orphaned?” She felt a sudden kinship.
   “I survived an accident. An accident that took my mother.”
   “Who took care of you?”
   “God,” the camerlegno said. “He quite literally sent me another father. A bishop from Palermo appeared at my hospital bed and took me in. At the time I was not surprised. I had sensed God’s watchful hand over me even as a boy. The bishop’s appearance simply confirmed what I had already suspected, that God had somehow chosen me to serve him.”
   “You believed God chose you?”
   “I did. And I do.” There was no trace of conceit in the camerlegno’s voice, only gratitude. “I worked under the bishop’s tutelage for many years. He eventually became a cardinal. Still, he never forgot me. He is the father I remember.” A beam of a flashlight caught the camerlegno’s face, and Vittoria sensed a loneliness in his eyes.
   The group arrived beneath a towering pillar, and their lights converged on an opening in the floor. Vittoria looked down at the staircase descending into the void and suddenly wanted to turn back. The guards were already helping the camerlegno onto the stairs. They helped her next.
   “What became of him?” she asked, descending, trying to keep her voice steady. “The cardinal who took you in?”
   “He left the College of Cardinals for another position.”
   Vittoria was surprised.
   “And then, I’m sorry to say, he passed on.”
   “Le mie condoglianze,” Vittoria said. “Recently?”
   The camerlegno turned, shadows accentuating the pain on his face. “Exactly fifteen days ago. We are going to see him right now.”

84
   The dark lights glowed hot inside the archival vault. This vault was much smaller than the previous one Langdon had been in. Less air. Less time. He wished he’d asked Olivetti to turn on the recirculating fans.
   Langdon quickly located the section of assets containing the ledgers cataloging Belle Arti. The section was impossible to miss. It occupied almost eight full stacks. The Catholic church owned millions of individual pieces worldwide.
   Langdon scanned the shelves searching for Gianlorenzo Bernini. He began his search about midway down the first stack, at about the spot he thought the B’s would begin. After a moment of panic fearing the ledger was missing, he realized, to his greater dismay, that the ledgers were not arranged alphabetically. Why am I not surprised?
   It was not until Langdon circled back to the beginning of the collection and climbed a rolling ladder to the top shelf that he understood the vault’s organization. Perched precariously on the upper stacks he found the fattest ledgers of all—those belonging to the masters of the Renaissance—Michelangelo, Raphael, da Vinci, Botticelli. Langdon now realized, appropriate to a vault called “Vatican Assets,” the ledgers were arranged by the overall monetary value of each artist’s collection. Sandwiched between Raphael and Michelangelo, Langdon found the ledger marked Bernini. It was over five inches thick.
   Already short of breath and struggling with the cumbersome volume, Langdon descended the ladder. Then, like a kid with a comic book, he spread himself out on the floor and opened the cover.
   The book was cloth-bound and very solid. The ledger was handwritten in Italian. Each page cataloged a single work, including a short description, date, location, cost of materials, and sometimes a rough sketch of the piece. Langdon fanned through the pages… over eight hundred in all. Bernini had been a busy man.
   As a young student of art, Langdon had wondered how single artists could create so much work in their lifetimes. Later he learned, much to his disappointment, that famous artists actually created very little of their own work. They ran studios where they trained young artists to carry out their designs. Sculptors like Bernini created miniatures in clay and hired others to enlarge them into marble. Langdon knew that if Bernini had been required to personally complete all of his commissions, he would still be working today.
   “Index,” he said aloud, trying to ward off the mental cobwebs. He flipped to the back of the book, intending to look under the letter F for titles containing the word fuòco–fire—but the F’s were not together. Langdon swore under his breath. What the hell do these people have against alphabetizing?
   The entries had apparently been logged chronologically, one by one, as Bernini created each new work. Everything was listed by date. No help at all.
   As Langdon stared at the list, another disheartening thought occurred to him. The title of the sculpture he was looking for might not even contain the word Fire. The previous two works—Habakkuk and the Angel and West Ponente–had not contained specific references to Earth or Air.
   He spent a minute or two flipping randomly through the ledger in hopes that an illustration might jump out at him. Nothing did. He saw dozens of obscure works he had never heard of, but he also saw plenty he recognized… Daniel and the Lion, Apollo and Daphne, as well as a half dozen fountains. When he saw the fountains, his thoughts skipped momentarily ahead. Water. He wondered if the fourth altar of science was a fountain. A fountain seemed a perfect tribute to water. Langdon hoped they could catch the killer before he had to consider Water–Bernini had carved dozens of fountains in Rome, most of them in front of churches.
   Langdon turned back to the matter at hand. Fire. As he looked through the book, Vittoria’s words encouraged him. You were familiar with the first two sculptures… you probably know this one too. As he turned to the index again, he scanned for titles he knew. Some were familiar, but none jumped out. Langdon now realized he would never complete his search before passing out, so he decided, against his better judgment, that he would have to take the book outside the vault. It’s only a ledger, he told himself. It’s not like I’m removing an original Galilean folio. Langdon recalled the folio in his breast pocket and reminded himself to return it before leaving.
   Hurrying now, he reached down to lift the volume, but as he did, he saw something that gave him pause. Although there were numerous notations throughout the index, the one that had just caught his eye seemed odd.
   The note indicated that the famous Bernini sculpture, The Ecstasy of St. Teresa, shortly after its unveiling, had been moved from its original location inside the Vatican. This in itself was not what had caught Langdon’s eye. He was already familiar with the sculpture’s checkered past. Though some thought it a masterpiece, Pope Urban VIII had rejected The Ecstasy of St. Teresa as too sexually explicit for the Vatican. He had banished it to some obscure chapel across town. What had caught Langdon’s eye was that the work had apparently been placed in one of the five churches on his list. What was more, the note indicated it had been moved there per suggerimento del artista.
   By suggestion of the artist? Langdon was confused. It made no sense that Bernini had suggested his masterpiece be hidden in some obscure location. All artists wanted their work displayed prominently, not in some remote—
   Langdon hesitated. Unless…
   He was fearful even to entertain the notion. Was it possible? Had Bernini intentionally created a work so explicit that it forced the Vatican to hide it in some out-of-the-way spot? A location perhaps that Bernini himself could suggest? Maybe a remote church on a direct line with West Ponente’s breath?
   As Langdon’s excitement mounted, his vague familiarity with the statue intervened, insisting the work had nothing to do with fire. The sculpture, as anyone who had seen it could attest, was anything but scientific—pornographic maybe, but certainly not scientific. An English critic had once condemned The Ecstasy of St. Teresa as “the most unfit ornament ever to be placed in a Christian Church.” Langdon certainly understood the controversy. Though brilliantly rendered, the statue depicted St. Teresa on her back in the throes of a toe-curling orgasm. Hardly Vatican fare.
   Langdon hurriedly flipped to the ledger’s description of the work. When he saw the sketch, he felt an instantaneous and unexpected tingle of hope. In the sketch, St. Teresa did indeed appear to be enjoying herself, but there was another figure in the statue who Langdon had forgotten was there.
   An angel.
   The sordid legend suddenly came back…
   St. Teresa was a nun sainted after she claimed an angel had paid her a blissful visit in her sleep. Critics later decided her encounter had probably been more sexual than spiritual. Scrawled at the bottom of the ledger, Langdon saw a familiar excerpt. St. Teresa’s own words left little to the imagination:

   … his great golden spear… filled with fire… plunged into me several times… penetrated to my entrails… a sweetness so extreme that one could not possibly wish it to stop.

   Langdon smiled. If that’s not a metaphor for some serious sex, I don’t know what is. He was smiling also because of the ledger’s description of the work. Although the paragraph was in Italian, the word fuòco appeared a half dozen times:
   … angel’s spear tipped with point of fire…
   … angel’s head emanating rays of fire…
   … woman inflamed by passion’s fire…
   Langdon was not entirely convinced until he glanced up at the sketch again. The angel’s fiery spear was raised like a beacon, pointing the way. Let angels guide you on your lofty quest. Even the type of angel Bernini had selected seemed significant. It’s a seraphim, Langdon realized. Seraphim literally means “the fiery one.”
   Robert Langdon was not a man who had ever looked for confirmation from above, but when he read the name of the church where the sculpture now resided, he decided he might become a believer after all.
   Santa Maria della Vittoria.
   Vittoria, he thought, grinning. Perfect.
   Staggering to his feet, Langdon felt a rush of dizziness. He glanced up the ladder, wondering if he should replace the book. The hell with it, he thought. Father Jaqui can do it. He closed the book and left it neatly at the bottom of the shelf.
   As he made his way toward the glowing button on the vault’s electronic exit, he was breathing in shallow gasps. Nonetheless, he felt rejuvenated by his good fortune.
   His good fortune, however, ran out before he reached the exit.
   Without warning, the vault let out a pained sigh. The lights dimmed, and the exit button went dead. Then, like an enormous expiring beast, the archival complex went totally black. Someone had just killed power.

85
   The Holy Vatican Grottoes are located beneath the main floor of St. Peter’s Basilica. They are the burial place of deceased Popes.
   Vittoria reached the bottom of the spiral staircase and entered the grotto. The darkened tunnel reminded her of CERN’s Large Hadron Collider—black and cold. Lit now only by the flashlights of the Swiss Guards, the tunnel carried a distinctly incorporeal feel. On both sides, hollow niches lined the walls. Recessed in the alcoves, as far as the lights let them see, the hulking shadows of sarcophagi loomed.
   An iciness raked her flesh. It’s the cold, she told herself, knowing that was only partially true. She had the sense they were being watched, not by anyone in the flesh, but by specters in the dark. On top of each tomb, in full papal vestments, lay life-sized semblances of each Pope, shown in death, arms folded across their chests. The prostrate bodies seemed to emerge from within the tombs, pressing upward against the marble lids as if trying to escape their mortal restraints. The flashlight procession moved on, and the papal silhouettes rose and fell against the walls, stretching and vanishing in a macabre shadowbox dance.
   A silence had fallen across the group, and Vittoria couldn’t tell whether it was one of respect or apprehension. She sensed both. The camerlegno moved with his eyes closed, as if he knew every step by heart. Vittoria suspected he had made this eerie promenade many times since the Pope’s death… perhaps to pray at his tomb for guidance.
   I worked under the cardinal’s tutelage for many years, the camerlegno had said. He was like a father to me. Vittoria recalled the camerlegno speaking those words in reference to the cardinal who had “saved” him from the army. Now, however, Vittoria understood the rest of the story. That very cardinal who had taken the camerlegno under his wing had apparently later risen to the papacy and brought with him his young protégé to serve as chamberlain.
   That explains a lot, Vittoria thought. She had always possessed a well-tuned perception for others’ inner emotions, and something about the camerlegno had been nagging her all day. Since meeting him, she had sensed an anguish more soulful and private than the overwhelming crisis he now faced. Behind his pious calm, she saw a man tormented by personal demons. Now she knew her instincts had been correct. Not only was he facing the most devastating threat in Vatican history, but he was doing it without his mentor and friend… flying solo.
   The guards slowed now, as if unsure where exactly in the darkness the most recent Pope was buried. The camerlegno continued assuredly and stopped before a marble tomb that seemed to glisten brighter than the others. Lying atop was a carved figure of the late Pope. When Vittoria recognized his face from television, a shot of fear gripped her. What are we doing?
   “I realize we do not have much time,” the camerlegno said. “I still ask we take a moment of prayer.”
   The Swiss Guard all bowed their heads where they were standing. Vittoria followed suit, her heart pounding in the silence. The camerlegno knelt before the tomb and prayed in Italian. As Vittoria listened to his words, an unexpected grief surfaced as tears… tears for her own mentor… her own holy father. The camerlegno’s words seemed as appropriate for her father as they did for the Pope.
   “Supreme father, counselor, friend.” The camerlegno’s voice echoed dully around the ring. “You told me when I was young that the voice in my heart was that of God. You told me I must follow it no matter what painful places it leads. I hear that voice now, asking of me impossible tasks. Give me strength. Bestow on me forgiveness. What I do… I do in the name of everything you believe. Amen.”
   “Amen,” the guards whispered.
   Amen, Father. Vittoria wiped her eyes.
   The camerlegno stood slowly and stepped away from the tomb. “Push the covering aside.”
   The Swiss Guards hesitated. “Signore,” one said, “by law we are at your command.” He paused. “We will do as you say…”
   The camerlegno seemed to read the young man’s mind. “Someday I will ask your forgiveness for placing you in this position. Today I ask for your obedience. Vatican laws are established to protect this church. It is in that very spirit that I command you to break them now.”
   There was a moment of silence and then the lead guard gave the order. The three men set down their flashlights on the floor, and their shadows leapt overhead. Lit now from beneath, the men advanced toward the tomb. Bracing their hands against the marble covering near the head of the tomb, they planted their feet and prepared to push. On signal, they all thrust, straining against the enormous slab. When the lid did not move at all, Vittoria found herself almost hoping it was too heavy. She was suddenly fearful of what they would find inside.
   The men pushed harder, and still the stone did not move.
   “Ancora,” the camerlegno said, rolling up the sleeves of his cassock and preparing to push along with them. “Ora!” Everyone heaved.
   Vittoria was about to offer her own help, but just then, the lid began to slide. The men dug in again, and with an almost primal growl of stone on stone, the lid rotated off the top of the tomb and came to rest at an angle—the Pope’s carved head now pushed back into the niche and his feet extended out into the hallway.
   Everyone stepped back.
   Tentatively, a guard bent and retrieved his flashlight. Then he aimed it into the tomb. The beam seemed to tremble a moment, and then the guard held it steady. The other guards gathered one by one. Even in the darkness Vittoria sensed them recoil. In succession, they crossed themselves.
   The camerlegno shuddered when he looked into the tomb, his shoulders dropping like weights. He stood a long moment before turning away.
   Vittoria had feared the corpse’s mouth might be clenched tight with rigor mortis and that she would have to suggest breaking the jaw to see the tongue. She now saw it would be unnecessary. The cheeks had collapsed, and the Pope’s mouth gaped wide.
   His tongue was black as death.

86
   No light. No sound.
   The Secret Archives were black.
   Fear, Langdon now realized, was an intense motivator. Short of breath, he fumbled through the blackness toward the revolving door. He found the button on the wall and rammed his palm against it. Nothing happened. He tried again. The door was dead.
   Spinning blind, he called out, but his voice emerged strangled. The peril of his predicament suddenly closed in around him. His lungs strained for oxygen as the adrenaline doubled his heart rate. He felt like someone had just punched him in the gut.
   When he threw his weight into the door, for an instant he thought he felt the door start to turn. He pushed again, seeing stars. Now he realized it was the entire room turning, not the door. Staggering away, Langdon tripped over the base of a rolling ladder and fell hard. He tore his knee against the edge of a book stack. Swearing, he got up and groped for the ladder.
   He found it. He had hoped it would be heavy wood or iron, but it was aluminum. He grabbed the ladder and held it like a battering ram. Then he ran through the dark at the glass wall. It was closer than he thought. The ladder hit head-on, bouncing off. From the feeble sound of the collision, Langdon knew he was going to need a hell of a lot more than an aluminum ladder to break this glass.
   When he flashed on the semiautomatic, his hopes surged and then instantly fell. The weapon was gone. Olivetti had relieved him of it in the Pope’s office, saying he did not want loaded weapons around with the camerlegno present. It made sense at the time.
   Langdon called out again, making less sound than the last time.
   Next he remembered the walkie-talkie the guard had left on the table outside the vault. Why the hell didn’t I bring it in! As the purple stars began to dance before his eyes, Langdon forced himself to think. You’ve been trapped before, he told himself. You survived worse. You were just a kid and you figured it out. The crushing darkness came flooding in. Think!
   Langdon lowered himself onto the floor. He rolled over on his back and laid his hands at his sides. The first step was to gain control.
   Relax. Conserve.
   No longer fighting gravity to pump blood, Langdon’s heart began to slow. It was a trick swimmers used to re-oxygenate their blood between tightly scheduled races.
   There is plenty of air in here, he told himself. Plenty. Now think. He waited, half-expecting the lights to come back on at any moment. They did not. As he lay there, able to breathe better now, an eerie resignation came across him. He felt peaceful. He fought it.
   You will move, damn it! But where…
   On Langdon’s wrist, Mickey Mouse glowed happily as if enjoying the dark: 9:33 P.M. Half an hour until Fire. Langdon thought it felt a whole hell of a lot later. His mind, instead of coming up with a plan for escape, was suddenly demanding an explanation. Who turned off the power? Was Rocher expanding his search? Wouldn’t Olivetti have warned Rocher that I’m in here! Langdon knew at this point it made no difference.
   Opening his mouth wide and tipping back his head, Langdon pulled the deepest breaths he could manage. Each breath burned a little less than the last. His head cleared. He reeled his thoughts in and forced the gears into motion.
   Glass walls, he told himself. But damn thick glass.
   He wondered if any of the books in here were stored in heavy, steel, fireproof file cabinets. Langdon had seen them from time to time in other archives but had seen none here. Besides, finding one in the dark could prove time-consuming. Not that he could lift one anyway, particularly in his present state.
   How about the examination table? Langdon knew this vault, like the other, had an examination table in the center of the stacks. So what? He knew he couldn’t lift it. Not to mention, even if he could drag it, he wouldn’t get it far. The stacks were closely packed, the aisles between them far too narrow.
   The aisles are too narrow…
   Suddenly, Langdon knew.
   With a burst of confidence, he jumped to his feet far too fast. Swaying in the fog of a head rush, he reached out in the dark for support. His hand found a stack. Waiting a moment, he forced himself to conserve. He would need all of his strength to do this.
   Positioning himself against the book stack like a football player against a training sled, he planted his feet and pushed. If I can somehow tip the shelf. But it barely moved. He realigned and pushed again. His feet slipped backward on the floor. The stack creaked but did not move.
   He needed leverage.
   Finding the glass wall again, he placed one hand on it to guide him as he raced in the dark toward the far end of the vault. The back wall loomed suddenly, and he collided with it, crushing his shoulder. Cursing, Langdon circled the shelf and grabbed the stack at about eye level. Then, propping one leg on the glass behind him and another on the lower shelves, he started to climb. Books fell around him, fluttering into the darkness. He didn’t care. Instinct for survival had long since overridden archival decorum. He sensed his equilibrium was hampered by the total darkness and closed his eyes, coaxing his brain to ignore visual input. He moved faster now. The air felt leaner the higher he went. He scrambled toward the upper shelves, stepping on books, trying to gain purchase, heaving himself upward. Then, like a rock climber conquering a rock face, Langdon grasped the top shelf. Stretching his legs out behind him, he walked his feet up the glass wall until he was almost horizontal.
   Now or never, Robert, a voice urged. Just like the leg press in the Harvard gym.
   With dizzying exertion, he planted his feet against the wall behind him, braced his arms and chest against the stack, and pushed. Nothing happened.
   Fighting for air, he repositioned and tried again, extending his legs. Ever so slightly, the stack moved. He pushed again, and the stack rocked forward an inch or so and then back. Langdon took advantage of the motion, inhaling what felt like an oxygenless breath and heaving again. The shelf rocked farther.
   Like a swing set, he told himself. Keep the rhythm. A little more.
   Langdon rocked the shelf, extending his legs farther with each push. His quadriceps burned now, and he blocked the pain. The pendulum was in motion. Three more pushes, he urged himself.
   It only took two.
   There was an instant of weightless uncertainty. Then, with a thundering of books sliding off the shelves, Langdon and the shelf were falling forward.
   Halfway to the ground, the shelf hit the stack next to it. Langdon hung on, throwing his weight forward, urging the second shelf to topple. There was a moment of motionless panic, and then, creaking under the weight, the second stack began to tip. Langdon was falling again.
   Like enormous dominoes, the stacks began to topple, one after another. Metal on metal, books tumbling everywhere. Langdon held on as his inclined stack bounced downward like a ratchet on a jack. He wondered how many stacks there were in all. How much would they weigh? The glass at the far end was thick…
   Langdon’s stack had fallen almost to the horizontal when he heard what he was waiting for—a different kind of collision. Far off. At the end of the vault. The sharp smack of metal on glass. The vault around him shook, and Langdon knew the final stack, weighted down by the others, had hit the glass hard. The sound that followed was the most unwelcome sound Langdon had ever heard.
   Silence.
   There was no crashing of glass, only the resounding thud as the wall accepted the weight of the stacks now propped against it. He lay wide-eyed on the pile of books. Somewhere in the distance there was a creaking. Langdon would have held his breath to listen, but he had none left to hold.
   One second. Two…
   Then, as he teetered on the brink of unconsciousness, Langdon heard a distant yielding… a ripple spidering outward through the glass. Suddenly, like a cannon, the glass exploded. The stack beneath Langdon collapsed to the floor.
   Like welcome rain on a desert, shards of glass tinkled downward in the dark. With a great sucking hiss, the air gushed in.
   Thirty seconds later, in the Vatican Grottoes, Vittoria was standing before a corpse when the electronic squawk of a walkie-talkie broke the silence. The voice blaring out sounded short of breath. “This is Robert Langdon! Can anyone hear me?”
   Vittoria looked up. Robert! She could not believe how much she suddenly wished he were there.
   The guards exchanged puzzled looks. One took a radio off his belt. “Mr. Langdon? You are on channel three. The commander is waiting to hear from you on channel one.”
   “I know he’s on channel one, damn it! I don’t want to speak to him. I want the camerlegno. Now! Somebody find him for me.”
   In the obscurity of the Secret Archives, Langdon stood amidst shattered glass and tried to catch his breath. He felt a warm liquid on his left hand and knew he was bleeding. The camerlegno’s voice spoke at once, startling Langdon.
   “This is Camerlegno Ventresca. What’s going on?”
   Langdon pressed the button, his heart still pounding. “I think somebody just tried to kill me!”
   There was a silence on the line.
   Langdon tried to calm himself. “I also know where the next killing is going to be.”
   The voice that came back was not the camerlegno’s. It was Commander Olivetti’s: “Mr. Langdon. Do not speak another word.”