The archbishop blinked at Quart in silence, his pipe in his mouth, as if he hadn't heard the question. "Yes," he said at last. "Because this time there were no witnesses, and I took it Well personally." He laid his hand on his chest. Quart thought of Spada's words: He's sworn not to leave a single stone standing. "But the investigation concluded that there was no evidence of murder."
"Did the report rule out the possibility of foul play?"
"No, but technically that would have been almost impossible. The stone fell from the ceiling. "Nobody could have thrown it from there."
"Except Providence."
"Don't play the fool, Quart."
"That wasn't my intention, Monsignor. I'm only trying to test the truth of Vespers' claim that the church itself killed Father Urbizu. And the other man."
"That's outrageous and absurd. And exactly what I'm afraid of: that people will start muttering about the supernatural, with us involved, as if this were a Stephen King novel. We've already got a journalist hanging about. An unpleasant character who's been digging into the story. He works for a gossip magazine called Q amp;S. They've just published photos of Macarena Bruner in a compromising situation with a bullfighter. Be careful if you come across the journalist. His name is Honorato Bonafe."
Quart shrugged. "Vespers pointed a finger at the church. He said it kills to defend itself."
"Yes. Very dramatic. Now tell me, to defend itself from whom? From us? The bank? The Evil One? I have my own ideas about Vespers."
"Would you care to share them, Monsignor?"
When Aquilino Corvo lowered his guard, his dislike of Quart was clearly visible. It showed in his eyes for a few seconds and was then hidden behind the pipe smoke. "Do your own work," he said. "That's what you're here for."
Quart smiled, polite, disciplined. "Well, would Your Grace care to tell me about Father Ferro, then?"
For the next five minutes, puffing on his pipe and showing little sign of pastoral charity, Corvo told the parish priest's life story. From his twenties to the age of fifty-four, a rough village priest in a remote part of the Alto Aragon, a godforsaken place where all his parishioners gradually died, until he was left without a congregation. Followed by ten years at Our Lady of the Tears. Uncouth, fanatical, uneducated and stubborn as a mule. Without the slightest sense of what was possible, the sort who believed omnia sunt possibilia creienti, who couldn't distinguish between their own point of view and the reality surrounding them. Quart ought to go and hear one of his Sunday sermons, the prelate said. Quite a show. Father Ferro dealt in the torments of hell with the ease of a Counter-Reformation preacher; he kept his parishioners on the edge of their seats with the old tale of eternal damnation
that nobody dared use any more. A sigh of relief swept through the pews when he finished his sermon.
"And yet, in complete contradiction," said the archbishop, "in other respects his views are highly modern. Inappropriately so, I would say."
"Such as?"
"His stance on contraception, for one thing. He's unashamedly in favour. Or his views on homosexuality, divorce and adultery. A couple of weeks ago he baptised a child whose parents weren't married. A priest from another parish, who had refused to do the baptism, came to demand an explanation. Father Ferro told him that he baptised whomever he wished."
His Grace's pipe had gone out. He struck a match and glanced at Quart over the flame. "To sum up," he said, "Mass at Our Lady of the Tears is like travelling in a time machine that jumps backwards and forwards."
"I can imagine," Quart said, suppressing a smile.
"No. I assure you, you can't. You have to see him in action. He performs part of the Mass in Latin, because he says it inspires more respect." Corvo managed to relight his pipe and sat back in his chair, relaxed. "Father Ferro belongs to an almost extinct species: the old-style country priest without training or vocation, ordained simply to escape a life of poverty, who turned even wilder in a godforsaken rural parish. He also has tremendous pride, which makes him quite intractable In the past we would have excommunicated him immediately, or sent him to America, to see if God the Father could get him to return to the fold thanks to a fever in the Gulf of Darien, and then convert the natives by beating them on the back with a crucifix. But nowadays we have to be very careful. All the journalists and the political manoeuvring complicate things.''
"Why hasn't he been suspended ex informata conscientia? That would allow Your Grace to exclude him from the ministry for confidential reasons, without publicity.'
"He would have to have committed some civil or ecclesiastical offence, which isn't the case. Anyway, that might only strengthen his resolve. I would rather things followed the usual course in the case of ab officio"
"In other words, Monsignor, you would prefer it if Rome dealt with this."
"You've said it, not I." "What about Father Oscar?"