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of the screens in the sister’s office, the way into the corridor and the entrance to the stairs. The new duty nurse had switched on the neon lighting and settled into her seat in the porter’s lodge, the blue of her freshly ironed nurse’s uniform clearly visible in the darkness as she poured herself a hot drink from a thermos. She gave Salazar a vacant look and opened her newspaper out on the table.
    Kept awake by the patients’ moans, Salazar spent a sleepless night. He timed the movements of the night-watch, the comings and goings of the lifts, even the movements of the buses in the street below. He kept his eye on the video-surveillance system in the prayer room and on the occasionally nodding head of the nurse in the porter’s lodge. From time to time he glanced at the clock on the wall, noting the all too slow passing of the hours. He saw the traffic on the avenue thinning out, and the last empty train on the overground slipping over the railway bridge. At seven on the dot the night-watch went off duty and the nurses on the new shift started pushing the medicine trolleys along the corridor. Salazar folded up his bedclothes, closed up the camp-bed and went into the bathroom to wash his face. He met the new sister on the stairs; she was out of breath, and her cheeks were pink with cold.
    â€˜Up already, father? At least come and have a coffee. Real coffee, not that stuff from the machines. We nurses have our own mocha, and I’ve brought some croissants!’ she said, pointing to the bag on her arm.
    â€˜Thank you, sister, but I’m in a bit of a hurry,’ he said, and scuttled off down the steps. Outside, the wind had got up again. He breathed in the damp air with a sense of relief; after a night spent with the smell of warm plastic and disinfectant in his nostrils, even the stench of diesel from the buses on the square was welcome. He didn’t feel like joining in the rough and tumble of the overground quite yet, and decided to walk on to the next stop. Once he got on, he soon dozed off, and was awoken by a sudden jolt just before the bridge over the Tiber. In front of the convent, the newspaper kiosk was already open. He bought a copy of the Osservatore Romano and went up to his room, where he filled his pipe, lit the table lamp, opened the newspaper and, taking his first puff, read the front page headline: ‘Death penalty for abortionists’.
    Yesterday at the Angelus the Holy Father once again called for those found guilty of abortion, whether practitioners or advocates, to suffer the death penalty. By so doing, the Pope is giving his explicit support to the Ministry of Justice of the Italian Catholic Republic, which has already proposed a similar law on two occasions. As is well-known, the proposal was both times rejected with an adverse vote by the Justice Board of rank and file Catholics. Their ideological tenacity has been repeatedly criticised by their own allies in the government, but to no avail. Today, many observers are wondering what credence can be given to a movement which is now politically isolated, and which is adopting a position of questionable theological severity in defence of the enemies of the Church. The essence of Faith does not lend itself to succinct interpretations, but is nonetheless crystal clear, as the Holy Father has emphasised over the last few days. Buoyed up by the arrest, last month, of yet another unit of backstreet abortionist doctors, the government is now launching a new offensive to storm the last bastions of recalcitrance, and hence to endow our country with this invaluable juridical instrument for the defence of all our citizens. Monsignor Damiani has already drafted a third bill. It is to be hoped that on this occasion the rank and file Catholics will give their support to this long-awaited measure. Number 2267 of Joseph Ratzinger’s catechism of the Catholic Church reads as follows: ‘Always supposing that the identity