Vatican Ambassador (30 page)

“Watch where you’re going,” Hardwick cautions BC. BC’s been so busy looking up he didn’t notice the chair he was about to walk into. The chapel has been furnished for the affair: large, red velvet cushioned, oaken thrones are arrayed along the side walls, facing each other. BC looks around. Staring up at the ceiling he didn’t see the other Cardinals gathered around the altar. There aren’t as many as he’d thought there would be. He tries to make a quick count.
There are only about fifty people here… and a lot of them are pretty young to be Cardinals!

“Where’s everybody else? I thought we had over two hundred Cardinals in the College?” BC asks Hardwick and Terpa.

“We did,” Terpa says.

“We now have 59 Cardinals,” Hardwick says sadly.

“Counting me?” BC asks.

“Counting you,” Hardwick tells him.

“Oh. I see.”

“Have a seat,” Hardwick says, indicating a throne for BC.

“Thank you,” BC says. Hardwick nods. He and Terpa then continue on up to the altar.
A throne… a throne of my own…

BC sits down. He looks across the chapel at some of the other Cardinals, already seated.
I feel like I just walked into a party I was not invited to… Talk about not belonging
somewhere… what?

The Cardinal on the throne next to BC is talking to him in a soft voice. All BC hears is, “by the Cardinal Camerlengo, stand.”

“What?” BC asks in a hoarse whisper.

“Stand up!” the old man snaps back at BC.

Cranky old dude! Well, I guess this is it…

Cardinal Camerlengo Hardwick, Dean of the College of Cardinals, stands before the altar and swears them all to secrecy. Terpa and two other Cardinals walk down the rows of chairs and hand each of them a slip of paper.

“Please be seated,” Hardwick says as the last of the ballots is handed out. BC looks at his slip.

“Eligo in summum pontificem,” BC reads. Luckily, there is a translation underneath the words: I elect as supreme Pontiff...

BC looks around the room. He notices others doing the same.

I don’t even know any of these people! Maybe I’ll vote for myself… or Hardwick. Maybe
Terpa… this church could use a female pope, a first for the NcC and Christianity in general. This
is just the first ballot; it doesn’t mean anything anyway…

BC writes his own name down and laughs.

Why not? I’m sure we’ll find out who the real candidates are after this first vote.
Hardwick speaks from the altar.

“Please bring your ballot up, present it, and place it in this chalice,” he tells the assembly, indicating an ornate, oversized gold and silver chalice on the altar, covered by a thin gold paten. The Cardinals process up to the altar in an orderly fashion. BC tries not to smirk as he walks up to the altar, holds his vote aloft, and then slides it under the paten and into the cup. He is one of the last to vote. As he heads back to his seat, Terpa and the two other Cardinals line up with Hardwick for counting. The counting takes a while. Each name for each vote is read aloud three times: Terpa reads the name aloud and writes it down on a tally sheet in front of her, then hands the ballot to the next Cardinal. The next Cardinal reads the name aloud as well, and then hands the ballot to the third Cardinal. The third repeats the name again, and then runs a needle and thread through the ballot, creating a string of punctured votes.

“Bernard Campion,” Terpa says aloud, about halfway through the ballots. Her eyes lock with his briefly.
She does not look happy… guess she didn’t like my little joke…

“Bernard Campion,” repeats the second Cardinal.

“Bernard Campion,” echoes the third, and then he pokes the needle and thread through the ballot, adding it to his string.

One ballot for BC…

More names are called. It’s clear there won’t be a pope elected on this first vote, there are too many names for any candidate to have received a full two-thirds.

“Bernard Campion,” Terpa says again, his name echoed by her two colleagues.
Wait a minute… Another ballot? Who else would vote for me?

BC hears his name come up again on two other ballots, his name repeated three times each time, before the voting is over.

This is insane…

The first vote finally over with no winner, Terpa and the other two Cardinals assisting in the voting gather all other notes from around the room, and then head to the back to burn the ballots and notes. The black smoke will let the outside world know there’s been no decision. While they perform the ritual task, Hardwick addresses the rest of the assembly.

“We do not have a new pontiff yet,” he tells them, “but we do have four candidates who have received more than one vote. Cardinal Castellini of Turin has five in his favor. Cardinal Kibwe of Nairobi has four, as does Cardinal Hardwick, er, myself,” he says, pausing awkwardly, visibly uncomfortable. “And, finally, Cardinal Campion of the Vatican Mission on Lunar Prime has three votes.”

BC can feel the eyes of the other Cardinals on him. Luckily, Hardwick continues, drawing back their attention.

“We will vote again tomorrow, twice in the morning, and twice in the afternoon, if necessary,” Hardwick tells them. “I would like to ask now for a vote on the number of ballots we will have before we look for a simple majority rather than a two-thirds majority.

“As time is of the essence, I suggest six, in hopes that we can elect a new pope in our third day. All in favor?”

The vote carries.

“Good!” Hardwick exclaims.

“Please follow Cardinal Terpa. She will lead you to the
Domus Sanctae Marthae
, where you’ll be staying. It’s similar to a staff-less hotel. Everything you need is, hopefully, provided. If there
is
anything more that you require, please see Cardinal Terpa or myself. We reconvene at 6 am tomorrow morning. Thank you, God Bless You all,” he says, finishing.

“Amen,” the assembly answers back.

The Cardinals begin filing out after Terpa, heading for their rooms.

BC walks along behind the cranky older Cardinal.

“Well, Campion.”

BC hears a familiar voice he can’t quite place behind him.

“When I heard that you were elevated to Cardinal, I knew this church had dropped its standards even lower.”

BC turns and sees a familiar face… but again he can’t quite place…

Fortune Station! Kim!

“So, it’s
Cardinal
Kim is it, now?” BC asks.

Kim doesn’t answer the question. Instead he asks his own.

“So tell me, Campion, will you take the name ‘Pope Judas’ if you’re elected? That would be a first!”

Ouch!

That hurts because I deserve it…

“Look, Kim, I don’t know what to say. I filed a report. My superiors in the OPO at the time took my information right to the UTZ. I didn’t know they would come and herd you all off of there.”

“You didn’t?” Kim asks him. “You’re either lying or you’re naïve,” he says.

“Worse,” BC says. “I really didn’t think about it. I’m sorry it went down like that.”

“Come on you two,” Terpa says, coming back for the stragglers. “You two know each other?” she asks them.

“You could say that,” Kim says. BC just nods. They follow slowly behind Terpa.

“Since when are you regular NcC?” BC asks him. “And a Cardinal?”

Kim stops. BC hangs back with him.

“I became regular NcC again when they forced us to settle in Dubuque.”

“They resettled you in Iowa?” BC asks.

Kim mumbles under his breath, “…didn’t even bother to find out where we went…”

“I said I was sorry,” BC sighs. Kim just shakes his head.

“Cardinal Kim was made a Cardinal just in time to elect Pope Peter the Third,” Terpa says, coming back to them again. “Come on, you two. There’s dinner waiting for you in your quarters. You don’t want it to get cold, do you?”

Kim and BC follow Terpa into the Domus Sanctae Marthae. Instead of a front desk, there is a plaque with the names of all the Cardinals and their assigned room numbers. BC and Kim study the chart and find their respective lodgings.

“I’m on this floor,” BC notices. “Room 115.”

“I’m upstairs,” Kim says. “Third floor.”

BC and Kim stand in uneasy silence.

“How’s your daughter, Ruth?” BC asks Kim, breaking the silence.

“As if you care,” Kim says softly. “She’s dead, Campion,” he tells him. “She was one of the first to get the sickness in Dubuque.”

BC doesn’t know what to say.

“I… I’m sorry, Kim.”

“So am I,” he says. Kim presses the “up” button of a nearby elevator. The door opens and he walks in, away from BC. He turns to push the button for his floor, but stops.

“Hey, Campion,” he calls to BC. “I voted for you. By the way.”

“Thank you?” BC says, questioning.

“Don’t thank me,” Kim says. He pushes the button for his floor and the door begins to close. “I voted for you because the job appears to be fatal. Good luck!”

The elevator door closes. BC is left alone in the small lobby. He finds his way to his rooms, finds dinner waiting, a salad, Francesco Alfredo and green beans, with white wine.
Too bad… not enough to get drunk on… I could use a drink.

BC pours himself a large glass of wine and settles down to dinner and to sleep. He and the other Cardinals start again early the next morning, meeting in the chapel at six am. There are rounds of discussion before each vote is taken. Words of support are spoken for each of the prominent candidates. Candidates can bow out and throw their support behind other Cardinals. Cardinal Hardwick throws his support behind Castellini, but it isn’t quite enough. BC tries to throw his

‘support’ to Hardwick, but Hardwick declines. Cardinal Kibwe then surprises the college by throwing his support behind BC.

“He is a man of action who knows the world as it is today very well. He is a peacemaker, the first man to bring the opposing sides of the war together in years,” Kibwe says, explaining his move. BC sits in stunned silence.

I want to get up, wave my arms and shout NOOOOOOO!! But I don’t think that will play well
here…

After the final vote of the afternoon, Cardinal Castellini has the most ballots, but not the two-thirds he needs to get elected.

BC can’t sleep that second night of the conclave. He tosses and turns, gliding just above the surface of real sleep.

Well… at least I’m not getting a headache… knock on wood. Heh, plenty of that here. These
rooms are beautiful.

BC drags himself out of bed when the clock strikes five. He tries to wake up with a shower and some coffee. He makes his way back to the chapel for six.

The now familiar process rolls on ahead. BC wishes he could shrink down into nothing as he hears his name read aloud, over and over again. His and Castellini’s.

Neither he nor Castellini get two thirds of the vote. Castellini does have a simple majority, however, and the next ballot will be the seventh, and a simple majority will win it for him in that round of balloting as agreed to on day one.

Thank God!

The Cardinals mingle amongst themselves as they await the second ballot of the morning. BC tries to keep to himself, nodding politely but not engaging in conversation when approached. Castellini, on the other hand, is surrounded by supporters.

I’m too tired to even think my way out of this… hope being aloof helps get Castellini votes…

what’s that? Oh shit, something’s wrong!

One of the Cardinals in Castellini’s group has collapsed. BC approaches, only to be stopped by another Cardinal.

“Give him some air!”

“Stand back, please.”

BC hangs back. Murmurs surround him.

“Is it the plague?”

“He looks sick. He may have it.”

“I’ve seen this before; it’s the start of it.”

BC’s worst fears are confirmed as the crowd parts. Cardinal Castellini is on the floor of the chapel, with two other Cardinals attending to him. They help him to his feet, and lead him back to the Domus Sanctae Marthae. Cardinal Hardwick takes to the altar and asks for their attention.

“Cardinal Castellini has taken ill. We hope it’s just some bad fish, as he said to me just a moment ago,”

Hardwick says with a nervous chuckle. “Although he has been excused from the voting, he is still the prime candidate and remains so as we approach the next ballot. Please, return to your seats, and we will conduct the next ballot. Thank you. May the Lord guide us, and help us choose wisely. Amen”

“Amen,” the assembly responds.

The ballots are passed out once again. BC writes “Castellini” in the biggest allowable letters, folds his ballot, and then slides it into the chalice when his turn comes.

Terpa begins reading the ballots aloud.

“Castellini,” she says, echoed once again by the other two assistants. BC breathes a sigh of relief.

Thank God! There is no way I can…

“Campion,” she says, reading the next.

Oh no…

“Campion,” she says again. And again. Twenty-nine times.

BC wakes up on his back on the floor of the chapel.

“What happened?” he asks Terpa, who is hanging over him.

“You fainted, I think. At least I hope so. We can’t have two Cardinals struck down by the plague in one day, can we? Especially not when you’ve just been elected…”

“Don’t say it!” BC tries to shout.

“…Pope,” she finishes despite his protest. She extends her hand and helps him to his feet. “You okay?”

she asks him.

“Considering… I guess,” BC says.

“Bernard Campion! Approach!” Hardwick calls to BC from the altar.

BC can hear the bells of St. Peter’s ringing out as he walks up to the altar.
Must be white smoke, too. Maybe I’m still passed out… this can’t be happening.

“Do you accept this election?” Hardwick asks him.

“Do I have a choice?” BC asks.

“You can refuse,” Hardwick says. “But no one ever does. It could wreck the church.”

“Really? What do you think making me Pope over the whole NcC is going to accomplish?” BC says in response.

“Do you accept?” Hardwick presses him.