Reacting violently, the tanker driver jammed on his brakes, jerking the wheel right. Wheels locked, tires shrieking, the enormous truck slid forward and sideways, at the same time knocking the Lancia off the bus like a billiard ball and sending the burning coach plunging off the highway and down a steep hill. Tilting up on two wheels, it held for a second, then rolled over, ejecting the bodies of its passengers, many of them dismembered and on fire, across the summer landscape. Fifty yards later it came to a rest, igniting the dry grass in a crackling rush around it.
Seconds afterwards its fuel tank exploded, sending flame and smoke roaring heavenward in a fire storm that raged until there was nothing left but a molten, burned-out shell and a small, insignificant wisp of smoke.
3
Delta Airlines flight 148, New York to Rome.
Monday, July 6, 7:30 a.m.
Danny was dead, and Harry was on his way to Rome to bring his body back to the U.S. for burial. The last hour, like most of the flight, had been a dream. Harry had seen the morning sun touch the Alps. Seen it glint off the Tyrrhenian Sea as they'd turned, dropping down over the Italian farmland on approach to Rome 's Leonardo da Vinci International Airport at Fiumicino.
'Harry, it's your brother, Danny…'
All he could hear was Danny's voice on the answering machine. It played over and over in his mind, like a tape on a loop. Fearful, distraught, and now silent.
'Harry, it's your brother, Danny…'
Waving off a pour of coffee from a smiling and pert flight attendant, Harry leaned back against the plush seat of the first-class cabin and closed his eyes, replaying what had happened in between.
He'd tried to call Danny twice more from the plane. And then again when he checked into his hotel. Still, there had been no answer. His apprehension growing, he'd called the Vatican directly, hoping to find Danny at work, and what he'd learned, after being passed from one department to another and being spoken to in broken English and then Italian and then a combination of both, was that Father Daniel was 'not here until Monday'.