or felt bitter about being ignored. On this cool night when Sergeant Hans Roggan couldn’t sleep, he was the one in charge of the Swiss Guard.
The vivid colors of his uniform, based on those in Michelangelo’s frescoes, contrasted with his mood on this day. He felt deeply uneasy, an inexplicable anxiety like a premonition. Such a concern, for the moment at least, seemed totally baseless.
Hans Roggan had his dream job, the one he had yearned for since his earliest years: to be serving the pope as part of the Swiss Guard. He had had to pass many tests and lead a very disciplined life, in strict adherence to the Lord’s teachings. Most important, though, he was graced with the basic requirements: being Swiss, unmarried, having the appropriate moral and ethical values, measuring more than five feet, nine inches tall, and above all, being Catholic.
Hans would never dishonor the image of the valiant soldiers of Pope Julius II. If need be, he was willing to die protecting his pope, as did the 689 Helvetian founders of the Swiss Guard, who, on the sixth of May 1527, protected Clement VII against a thousand Spanish and German soldiers during the sack of Rome. Only forty-two of them survived, but under Commandant Göldi, they had led the pope to safety in Castel Sant’Angelo. They took him through a secret passageway, the passetto, that linked the Vatican with the fort. The others perished heroically, but not before claiming the lives of almost eight hundred enemy invaders. That was the heritage Hans carried on his shoulders every time he wore his uniform, a pride that filled his soul every day. But today, for no apparent reason, he felt disturbed.
He was responsible for the security of Vatican City. The protection system of the city consisted of only a few inner patrols and a few guards at the most relevant, emblematic posts. Pope John XXIII had abolished the practice of posting two soldiers nightly by the door to his private quarters. The closest guard now was at the top of the stairs of the terza loggia. This was just a symbolic post, since the third floor was little used even during the day. Anyone could see that someone with bad intentions could easily enter Vatican City, and he would be right.
Hans went into his office and sat at his desk. He opened a dossier and leafed through it. It was just a list of bills that he had to pass on to his superior in the morning. He closed it after a few seconds. It was useless. He couldn’t concentrate.
“What the hell!” he grumbled, “I need to get some fresh air.”
He left his office not bothering to close the door and walked out of the Swiss Guard building, wandering through the inner gardens and then to the plaza. He passed two soldiers sitting on the steps. Both had dozed off.
I seem to be the only one who can’t sleep, he thought as he woke them with a tap on the shoulder. The startled guards jumped up.
“Sir, pardon me, sir, excuse us,” they both said.
“Don’t let it happen again,” Hans warned. He knew his men had just been through a very intense period of work. A little more than a month earlier, on the sixth of August 1978, Giovanni Battista Montini, better known as Pope Paul VI, had died in Castel Gandolfo, the papal summer residence. The funeral rites of a pontiff lasted several days, and the Swiss Guard did not leave the body of the deceased pope unattended for an instant. Four men stood in stationary guard, one on each corner of the catafalque. Numerous world leaders and heads of state paraded by, paying their last respects to His Holiness.
Once the funeral ended, preparations began behind closed doors for the conclave. Days off were canceled and the amount of work doubled. The last conclave was held on August 25, exactly twenty days after the pope’s death, close to the allowed limit of twenty-one days. Despite the brevity of the conclave, lasting only one day, the habitual frenzy around the new pope had begun. Only a few days before had things returned to normal.
Taking leave of the two sleepy guards, Hans continued his walk.
He couldn’t avoid a feeling of ownership about everything around him. At a distance he saw Caligula’s obelisk, in the middle of Saint Peter’s Square. How ironic: a tribute to a psychopath right in the center of the most sacred place in Catholicism. He continued slowly,