Gabriel looked at Donati. “They’ve got missiles, Luigi! Get everyone away from the Basilica!”

Gabriel leaped from the dais and lifted the throne. The Pope’s eyes were closed, and he was bleeding from several small cuts. As Gabriel reached down and cradled the Pope in his arms, he heard the distinctive whoosh of an approaching RPG-7. He turned his head, long enough to glimpse the missile streaking over the square toward the Basilica. An instant later the warhead struck Michelangelo’s dome and exploded in a shower of fire, glass, and stone.

Gabriel sheltered the Pope from the falling debris, then lifted him and started running toward the Bronze Doors. Before they could reach the shelter of the Colonnade, the second missile came streaking across the square. It struck the façade of the Basilica, just beneath the balustrade on the Loggia of the Blessings.

Gabriel lost his balance and fell to the paving stones. He lifted his head and saw the third missile on its way. It was coming in lower than the others and heading directly toward the dais. In the instant before it struck, Gabriel glimpsed a nightmarish image: Luigi Donati trying desperately to move the Curial cardinals and prelates to safety. Gabriel stayed on the ground and covered the Pope’s body with his own as another shower of wreckage rained down upon them.

“Is it you, Gabriel?” the Pope asked, eyes still closed.

“Yes, Holiness.”

“Is it over?”

Three bombs, three missiles-symbolic of the Holy Trinity, Gabriel reckoned. A calculated insult to the mushrikun.

“Yes, Holiness. I believe it’s over.”

“Where’s Luigi?”

Gabriel looked toward the burning remains of the dais and saw Donati stagger out of the smoke, the body of a dead cardinal in his arms.

“He’s alive, Holiness.”

The Pope closed his eyes and whispered, “Thank God.”

Gabriel felt a hand grasp his shoulder. He turned around and saw a quartet of men in blue suits, guns drawn. “Let go of him,” one of the men shouted. “We’ll take him from here.”

Gabriel looked at the man for a moment, then slowly shook his head. “I’ve got him,” he said, then he stood up and carried the Pope into the Apostolic Palace, surrounded by Swiss Guards.

THE APARTMENT HOUSE stood in a cobbled vicolo near the Church of Santa Maria in Trastevere. Four floors in height, its faded tan exterior was hung with power and telephone lines and contained several large patches of exposed brickwork. On the ground floor was a small motorcycle repair shop that spilled into the street. To the right of the shop was a doorway leading to the flats above. Ibrahim el-Banna had the key in his pocket.

The attack had commenced five minutes after el-Banna’s departure from the Vatican. On the Borgo Santo Spirito he had taken advantage of the panic to carefully remove his kufi and hang a large wooden cross round his neck. From there he had walked to the Janiculum Park and from the park down the hill to Trastevere. On the Via della Paglia a distraught woman had asked el-Banna for his blessing. He had bestowed it, imitating the words and gestures he’d seen at the Vatican, then immediately asked Allah to forgive his blasphemy.

Now, safely inside the apartment house, he removed the offensive cross from his neck and mounted the dimly lit stairs. He had been ordered to come here by the Saudi who had conceived and planned the attack-the Saudi he knew only as Khalil. It was to be the first stop on a secret journey out of Europe and back to the Muslim world. He had hoped to return to his native Egypt, but Khalil had convinced him that he would never be safe there. The American lackey Mubarak will hand you over to the infidels in the blink of an eye, Khalil had said. There’s only one place on Earth where the infidels can’t get you.

That place was Saudi Arabia, land of the Prophet, birthplace of Wahhabi Islam. Ibrahim el-Banna had been promised a new identity, a teaching position at the prestigious University of Medina, and a bank account with a half million dollars. The sanctuary was a reward from Prince Nabil, the Saudi interior minister. The money was a gift from the Saudi billionaire who had financed the operation.

And so the Muslim cleric who climbed the steps of the Roman apartment house was a contented man. He had just helped carry off one of the most important acts of jihad in the long, glorious history of Islam. And now he was setting out for a new life in Saudi Arabia, where his words and beliefs could help inspire the next generation of Islamic warriors. Only Paradise would be sweeter.

He reached the third-floor landing and went to the door of apartment 3A. When he inserted the key into the lock he felt a slight electric shock in his fingers. When he turned it, the door exploded. And then he felt nothing at all.

AT THAT same moment, in the section of Washington known as Foggy Bottom, a woman woke from a nightmare. It was filled with the same imagery she saw every morning at this time. A flight attendant with her throat slashed. A handsome young passenger making one final phone call. An inferno. She rolled over and looked at the clock on her nightstand. It was six-thirty. She picked up the remote control, aimed it at her television, and pressed the power button. God no, she thought when she saw the Basilica in flames. Not again.

7.

GABRIEL REMAINED AT THE safe flat near the Church of the Trinità dei Monti for the next week. There were moments when it seemed as though none of it had really happened. But then he would wander out to the balcony and see the dome of the Basilica looming over the rooftops of the city, shattered and blackened by fire, as if God, in a moment of disapproval or carelessness, had reached down and destroyed the handiwork of his children. Gabriel, the restorer, wished it was only a painting-an abraded canvas that he might heal with a bottle of linseed oil and a bit of pigment.

The death toll climbed with each passing day. By the end of Wednesday-Black Wednesday, as Rome ’s newspapers christened it-the number of dead stood at six hundred. By Thursday it was six hundred fifty, and by the weekend it had exceeded seven hundred. Colonel Karl Brunner of the Pontifical Swiss Guards was among the dead. So was Luca Angelli, who clung to life for three days in the Gemelli Clinic before being removed from life support. The Pope administered Last Rites and remained at Angelli’s side until he died. The Roman Curia suffered terrible losses. Four cardinals were among the dead, along with eight Curial bishops, and three monsignori. Their funerals had to be conducted in the Basilica of Saint John Lateran, because two days after the attack an international team of structural engineers concluded the Basilica was unsafe to enter. Rome ’s largest newspaper, La Repubblica, reported the news by printing a full-page photograph of the ruined dome, headlined with a single word: CONDEMNED.

The government of Israel had no official standing in the investigation, but Gabriel, with his proximity to Donati and the Pope, quickly came to know as much about the attack as any intelligence officer in the world. He gathered most of his intelligence at the Pope’s dinner table, where he sat each evening with the men leading the investigation: General Marchese of the Carabinieri and Martino Bellano of the Italian security service. For the most part they spoke freely in front of Gabriel, and anything they withheld was dutifully passed along to him by Donati. Gabriel in turn forwarded all his information to King Saul Boulevard, which explained why Shamron was in no hurry to see him leave Rome.

Within forty-eight hours of the attack the Italians had managed to identify all those involved. The missile strike had been carried out by a four-man team. The driver of the van was of Tunisian origin. The three men who fired the RPG-7s were of Jordanian nationality and were veterans of the insurgency in Iraq. All four were killed in a volley of Carabinieri gunfire seconds after launching their weapons. As for the three men who had posed as German priests, only one was actually German, a young engineering student from Hamburg named Manfred Zeigler. The second was a Dutchman from Rotterdam, and the third was a Flemish-speaking Belgian from Antwerp. All three were Muslim converts, and all had taken part in anti-American and anti-Israeli demonstrations. Gabriel, though he had no proof of it, suspected they had been recruited by Professor Ali Massoudi.