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described the Lance of Longinus dripping a never-ending supply of blood into the Grail.”
    “Well, you got me there, Vivian.”
    She continued, “And apparently the Vatican believes in this—if you believe that part of Father Armano’s story. And I do.”
    Purcell pointed out, “The Vatican does not necessarily believe that the Holy Grail even exists, or that it somehow wound up in Ethiopia. But they decided to take advantage of the Italian invasion of Ethiopia and send a bunch of priests here with the army to check out something they heard or read—and while they were at it, grab anything they could find.”
    Mercado agreed and said, “The Italian army looted a great number of religious artifacts from Ethiopia.” He further informed them, “The steles sitting in front of the Italian Foreign Ministry in Rome were taken from the ancient Ethiopian capital of Axum.” He added, “The Ethiopians want them back.”
    “The spoils of war,” Purcell said, “go to the victors.”
    Mercado agreed. “Europe, the Vatican, the British Museum are filled with objects looted from the rest of the world. But those days are over, so even if we decide to look for this relic, and we find it, we have no right to try to… take it.”
    Purcell said, “You’re getting ahead of yourself, Henry. We’re not sure we’re going to look for it. And if we do look for it and we find it, what we’re going to do is take a few photos and write about it—not steal it.”
    Mercado clarified, “We don’t believe it is the actual cup used by Christ at the Last Supper, and we could not prove that in any case. And we most definitely do not believe it has any mystical powers, contrary to legend. But the priest’s story—the Vatican, the cardinal, the pope, the monastery, the monks, the Grail, and the lance—are the stuff of a great news story.” He added, “A human interest story. The dying priest who has been imprisoned since the Italian invasion—”
    “Correct, but we couldn’t write only about what the dying priest told us and then not report that we followed up by looking for the black monastery.” Purcell added, “We’d look like all those journalists sitting in the Hilton bar in Addis, rewriting government press releases.”
    Mercado replied, “We are certainly not that.” He added, “We’re
here
.”
    Purcell asked rhetorically, “So have we talked ourselves into this? Are we willing to risk our lives to look for the Holy Grail that probably says ‘Made in Japan’ when you turn it over?”
    Mercado forced a smile, then said, “I think the story is good enough to pursue to the end.”
    Purcell reminded him, “So did Father Armano.”
    No one spoke for a while, each lost in thought. Finally, Vivian said, “If we don’t do this, we’ll regret it all our lives.”
    “Which might be very short if we do,” Purcell pointed out.
    Mercado said, “Or even shorter if we can’t get out of here.” He reminded his companions, “Our immediate problem is that we are in dangerous territory. I don’t suggest we try to drive back to Addis. I have a safe-conduct pass from the Provisional government, so weneed to join up with the Ethiopian army, which is less than an hour from here. Or if that’s not possible, we’ll join up with the Royalist forces. What we don’t want to do is run into the Gallas.”
    “That’s not a good story,” Purcell agreed. He suggested, “We’ll spend a few days with the army, reporting on their victory, then we will offer them our Jeep in return for a helicopter ride back to Addis. Then when we come to our senses, we can decide over a drink if we want to come back here and look for the black monastery.”
    Vivian said, “I’ve already decided.”
    “Don’t be impulsive,” Purcell advised.
    Mercado said, “We can’t be sure this monastery still exists after forty years—or if it ever existed. We’ll need to do some research at the Italian Library in Addis, and we’ll need terrain maps