“The Holy Father will see you now. Please enter,” the Pontiff’s assistant announced at the study door. Alice, followed by Marius and Carel Rostand, filed in, each bowing respectfully as they approached the desk.
“Sit, if you will.” They obeyed, sitting on three hard chairs — Clément did not like his visitors to feel too comfortable.
Wearing his house dress of a white cassock, its symbolic plainness broken by a pectoral cross suspended from a gold cord, he gave them a forcibly affable, unsettling smile when, to his left, as if from nowhere, appeared Cardinal Albornoz, his face indicating not the slightest emotion.
‘I don’t like Clément’s countenance; it’s too friendly, and I wasn’t expecting this fellow, Albornoz. What’s this all about, I wonder?’ Marius thought.
‘I don’t like Clément’s
