"You won't regret a decision to declare Rome an open city, Your Excellency," said Archbishop Ralph to the new master of Italy with a melting smile. He turned to the Cardinal, charm falling away like a dropped cloak, not needed with this beloved man. "Your Eminence, do you intend to be "mother," or shall I do the honors?" was "Mother"?" asked General Kesselring blankly. Cardinal di Contini-Verchese laughed. "It is our little joke, we celibate men. Whoever pours the tea is called "mother." An English saying, Herr General."
That night Archbishop Ralph was tired, restless, on edge. He seemed to be doing nothing to help end this war, only dicker about the preservation of antiquities, and he had grown to loathe Vatican inertia passionately. Though he was conservative by nature, sometimes the snaillike caution of those occupying the highest Church positions irked him intolerably. Aside from the humble nuns and priests who acted as servants, it was weeks since he had spoken to an ordinary man, someone without a political, spiritual or military axe to grind. Even prayer seemed to come less easily to him these days, and God seemed light-years away, as if He had withdrawn to allow His human creatures full rein in destroying the world He had made for them. What he needed, he thought, was a stiff dose of Meggie and Fee, or a stiff dose of someone who wasn't interested in the fate of the Vatican or of Rome.
His Grace walked down the private stairs into the great basilica of Saint Peter's, whence his aimless progress had led him. Its doors were locked these days the moment darkness fell, a sign of the uneasy peace which lay over Rome more telling than the companies of greyclad Germans moving through Roman streets. A faint, ghostly glow illuminated the yawning empty apse; his footsteps echoed hollowly on the stone floor as he walked, stopped and merged with the silence as he genuflected in front of the High Altar, began again. Then, between one foot's noise of impact and the next, he heard a gasp. The flashlight in his hand sprang into life; he leveled his beam in the direction of the sound, not frightened so much as curious. This was his world; he could defend it secure from fear.
The beam played upon what had become in his eyes the most beautiful piece of sculpture in all creation: the Pieta of Michelangelo. Below the stilled stunned figures was another face, made not of marble but of flesh, all shadowed hollows and deathlike.
"Ciao," said His Grace, smiling.
There was no answer, but he saw that the clothes were those of a German infantryman of lowest rank; his ordinary man! That he was a German didn't matter.
"Wie geht's?" he asked, still smiling.
A movement caused sweat on a wide, intellectual brow to flash suddenly out of the dimness.
"Du bist krank?" he asked then, wondering if the lad, for he was no more, was ill.
Came the voice, at last: "Nein."
Archbishop Ralph laid his flashlight down on the floor and went forward, put his hand under the soldier's chin and lifted it to look into the dark eyes, darker in the darkness.
"What's the" matter?" he asked in German, and laughed. "There!" he continued, still in German. "You don't know it, but that's been my main function in life to ask people what's the matter. And, let me tell you, it's a question which has got me into a lot of trouble in my time." "I clime to pray," said the lad in a voice too deep for his age, with a heavy Bavarian accent.
"What happened, did you get locked in?"
"Yes, but that isn't what the matter is."
His grace picked up the flashlight. "Well, you can't stay here all night, and I haven't got a key to the doors. Come with me." He began walking back toward the private stairs leading up to the papal palace, talking in a slow, soft voice. "I came to pray myself, as a matter of fact. Thanks to your High Command, it's been a rather nasty day. That's it, up here .... We'll have to hope that the Holy Father's staff don't assume I've been arrested, but can see I'm doing the escorting, not you."
After that they walked for ten more minutes in silence, through corridors, out into open courts and gardens, inside hallways, up steps; the young German did not seem anxious to leave his protector's side, for he kept close. At last His Grace opened a door and led his waif into a small sitting room, sparsely and humbly furnished, switched on a lamp and closed the door. They stood staring at each other, able to see. The German soldier saw a very tall man with a fine face and blue, discerning eyes; Archbishop Ralph saw a child tricked out in the garb which all of Europe found fearsome and awe-inspiring. A child; no more than sixteen years old, certainly. Of average height and youthfully thin, he had a frame promising later bulk and strength, and very long arms. His f-ace had rather an Italianate cast, dark and patrician, extremely attractive; wide, dark brown eyes with long black lashes, a magnificent head of wavy black hair. There was nothing usual or ordinary about him after all, even if his role was an ordinary one; in spite of the fact that he had longed to talk to an average, ordinary man, His Grace was interested.
"Sit down," he said to the boy, crossing to a chest and unearthing a bottle of Marsala wine. He poured some into two glasses, gave the boy one and took his own to a chair from which he could watch the fascinating countenance comfortably. "Are they reduced to drafting children to do their fighting?" he asked, crossing his legs. "I don't know," said the boy. "I was in a children's home, so I'd be taken early anyway."
"What's your name, lad?"
"Rainer Moerling Hartheim," said the boy, rolling it out with great pride. "A magnificent name," said the priest gravely. "It is, isn't it? I chose it myself. They called me Rainer Schmidt at the home, but when I went into the army I changed it to the name I've always wanted."
"You were an orphan?"
"The Sisters called me a love child."