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“Y ou misled me.”

“Not true.”

“How would you describe it?”

“I lied to your face.”

Calvesi swiped his card through a reader, and a door opened before them. “Why?”

“The unusual nature of my inquiry required a modicum of deception.”

“Your specialty.”

“Forgive me, Antonio. But I needed to know what she found while she was working here.”

“And you were afraid that I wouldn’t tell you if I knew she was dead?”

“Would you have answered my questions if I had told you the truth?”

“Not without a lawyer present.” They passed through the doorway and headed down a flight of steps. “Who are you working for this time? General Ferrari or your friend the Holy Father?”

“Both, I suppose.”

“In that case, I’ll light a candle for you. ”

“Light one for Penelope Radcliff instead.”

“Do you really think she was killed because of that painting?”

“Someone turned over her apartment not long after she was murdered. I have a feeling they were looking for copies of those infrared images.”

“She had a complete set of printouts. The last time I saw them, they were tucked inside her copy of Giorgio Montefiore’s Leonardo monograph.”

The indispensable Complete Paintings and Drawings of Leonardo da Vinci . “That would explain why the book wasn’t in her apartment,” said Gabriel.

“Could she have taken it with her to Venice?”

“Unlikely. That thing weighs about a ton and a half.”

At the bottom of the stairwell they were confronted with another locked door.

Calvesi opened it with his keycard and together they set off along a brightly lit corridor.

By Gabriel’s calculation they were now two levels beneath the Picture Gallery.

The public exhibition rooms held only a small percentage of the vast papal collection of paintings, sculptures, and other objets d’art, the fair market value of which was so incalculable the Vatican listed it as a symbolic single euro.

Gabriel reckoned it was about to increase substantially.

Antonio Calvesi slowed to a stop at a door labeled camera iv . He unlocked it with his keycard and led Gabriel inside. Overhead fluorescent lights flickered automatically to life.

“Motion detectors,” explained Antonio. Then he pointed to a surveillance camera and added, “Say hello to the boys in the control room.”

“Since I’m not actually here, I’d rather not.”

“Your inquiry is of an unofficial nature?”

“Is there any other kind? ”

“Not at the Vatican.”

The room was approximately the size of the Sistine Chapel.

Arrayed along the walls were pullout storage racks.

Gabriel grasped the handle of one of the racks and wheeled it into view.

It was hung on both sides with paintings, all of Italian origin, most in need of conservation.

The best of the lot was a picture of the resurrected Jesus.

“If I’m not mistaken,” said Gabriel, “that’s a Botticelli.”

“You’re not.”

“Why is it down here?”

“Long story.”

Gabriel rolled the rack back into place. “Where’s my Leonardo?”

“Our only Leonardo is upstairs in the Picture Gallery,” replied Calvesi, and set off toward the back of the room.

With Gabriel looking on, he seized the handle of a rack labeled 27 and rolled it away from the wall.

There were eight paintings on one side of the wire mesh and six on the other.

There was more than sufficient space, thought Gabriel, for a seventh picture measuring, say, 78 by 56 centimeters.

“Perhaps this is the wrong rack.”

“It isn’t.”

“You’re sure?”

“I placed it here myself.”

“Could someone have moved it?”

“Only someone with no sense of self-preservation.”

Calvesi rolled the rack back into place and pulled its neighbor into view.

Nine paintings on one side, seven on the other.

None bore any resemblance—in size, support, or subject matter—to the painting they had come to see.

The same was true of the adjacent rack and every other rack in the storage room.

At which point Gabriel reached the unsettling conclusion that Penelope Radcliff, twenty-seven years old, graduate of Cambridge University and the Courtauld Institute of Art, had discovered a lost portrait by Leonardo da Vinci. And now the Leonardo was gone.

***

Gabriel returned to the conservation lab long enough to collect hard copies of the photographs and infrared images of the painting, then slipped out of the Picture Gallery through a seldom-used rear door beneath the Sala della Biga. He rang Father Mark Keegan while crossing the Belvedere Courtyard.

“We need to talk.”

“I’m listening,” said the priest.

“Not on the phone.”

“That bad?”

“Ten on the Richter scale.”

They met five minutes later on the steps of the Basilica.

“A real Leonardo?” asked Father Keegan.

“A perhaps Leonardo at this point.”

“Where is it now?”

“Gone.”

The usually unflappable papal private secretary looked suddenly unwell. “It was stolen? Is that what you’re saying?”

“It didn’t grow a pair of legs and walk out of that storage room on its own. Someone carried it out. Someone who knew it was there in the first place.”

“Someone who works for the museum?”

“Undoubtedly.”

“Is that why Penelope Radcliff was murdered?”

Gabriel nodded. “She knew the painting had been pinched and took it upon herself to try to warn the art world.”

“But why didn’t she simply tell Antonio Calvesi that the painting was missing?”

“You’re a sneaky little Jesuit. You tell me.”

“Because she thought Antonio might be in on the job?”

“Correct.”

“Do you think—”

“That Antonio Calvesi is involved?” Gabriel shook his head.

“What a trusting soul you are.” They set off together across St.Peter’s Square. Father Keegan’s black cassock billowed and snapped in the gusty afternoon wind. “What now?” he asked.

“The Holy See shall bide its time and say nothing.”

“We’re rather good at that around here.”

“So I’ve noticed.”

“And when the authorities in Venice release the identity of the young woman whose body was discovered in the laguna ?”

“The Vatican Press Office will express deep sadness over her death. It will remain silent, however, on the issue of the missing painting, which will allow me to continue my investigation unhindered by the glare of publicity.”

“Fact-finding mission,” said Father Keegan. “Since no crime has been committed, there can be no investigation.”

“Well played.”

“I’m a sneaky little Jesuit, remember?” Father Keegan slowed to a stop at the foot of the Egyptian obelisk. “Are you free for dinner, by any chance?”

“Why do you ask?”

“The Holy Father was wondering whether you might like to join his table at the Casa. ”

“As tempting as that sounds, I think I’ll dine elsewhere.”

“Allow me to suggest a quiet little place off the Via Veneto.” The priest handed Gabriel a slip of paper. “The food is quite magnificent. And best of all, it’s very discreet.”

Gabriel looked down. He recognized the address. “What time am I expected?”

“Eight o’clock.”

“Table for two?”

“I couldn’t say.”

“Dress code?”

Father Keegan smiled. “No cassocks.”