Steve

Barelli met them outside the church together with a priest who Barrelli introduced as Father D'Allesio. Peter introduced Neal as a consultant and to Peter's relief, no further questions were asked about it. Father D'Allesio showed them into the church where Cruz and Jones were already at work.

"The Bible belonged to the Church of St. Camillus de Lellis in Naples" Father D'Allesio told them as they walked down the aisle to the display case where the Bible had been. "It was brought here in 1903. Been the heart of our parish. Now, this." An empty case with smashed glass.

"No alarm, no witnesses. No sign of a forced entry," Cruz told them. "It looks like a smash and dash."

Simple, risky and uncomplicated.

"Anything unusual that night, Father?" Peter asked the priest.

"No. Not that I recall."

Peter turned to Cruz and Jones.

"Have ERT run the prints against the parish roster. Something tells me we'll get a few matches." The whole community had probably done time in prison.

"Nobody from this parish stole that Bible," Barelli pointed out with certainty.

"Oh, sure. You guys are all choirboys, right, Barelli?"

"No surveillance cameras," Neal pointed out. The kid had as usual been by his side the whole time, watching, scanning, noticing things.

"The Lord sees all," Barelli answered, pointing a finger to the sky. "And that's good enough for us."

"I'm getting my St. Whatevers mixed up. But didn't you used to run a soup kitchen here?" Peter remembered. Father D'Allesio glanced at Barelli before he answered.

"Not anymore."

Barelli made a face and looked in the other direction without comments. Peter exchanged a look with Neal. The kid had not missed the tension either.

"Who steals a Bible?" Neal asked Mozzie. They had been on the rooftop terrace and Mozzie had not come further with the bottle. Now Neal was returning inside with their empty whiskey glasses.

"People steal everything," Moz returned.

"Why would we steal one?" Neal asked and his friend stared at him. "In theory."

Mozzie shrugged.

"They're rare."

"Yeah, it makes them valuable, but not like a Picasso." He crossed the room and poured some more whiskey in their glasses. "It's definitely a niche market. It's tough to fence. People get weird about buying stolen religious artifacts."

"I think it's an irony thing. That pesky eighth commandment." Neal handed a glass to Moz and took a sip from his own.

"Thou shalt not steal."

"It depends what's important to people. Did you know that an original Star Trek dome lunchbox goes for 600 bucks?" No, he did not. And it was not like he was going to steal those. "I don't try to explain it."

"Well, I can appreciate that," Neal answered. The world was weird enough as it was. "But why this one?"

"Well, you're missing book is famous. It's known as the Healing Bible." Mozzie held a couple of sheets with printouts.

"Really? Attribution." That could explain a lot.

"'In 1588, the plague passed through Naples. Father Camillus carried the book into disease-stricken ships in the harbor. Not a single person who touched the Bible died,'" Mozzie read.

"Good story," Neal nodded, taking another sip.

"Twenty years later a blind girl regained her sight when she rescued the book from a fire. I could give you many more examples."

"No, I'm sure you could." An idea formed itself in Neal's head. "Look, maybe you don't steal it for the money. You steal it because you're a true believer."

The next morning Neal did some more research and then approached Peter.

"I think the one who stole the Bible is a true believer," he told him.

"A true believer?" Peter sounded skeptical. Like you did not become a crook if you believed in God.

"You got something better?"

"Every person in that church has a felony record," Peter sighed. "The people I don't suspect are the ones in prison."

"So let's start with the faithful," Neal suggested.

Peter read from what he had in his file.

"'It cures blind nuns and lepers.' It sounds like every story in Sunday school."

"Look at this." Neal took his research from his desk and showed it to Peter. "In 1918, 30,000 people in New York died from the Spanish flu. No one in this parish even caught a cold."

"Maybe whoever took it thinks it's gonna heal them," Peter concluded. He had bought the idea.

"It's worth looking into."

Neal was back in the church with Peter.

"Nobody in this church caught the flu?" Peter asked with disbelief.

"It's true," Neal confirmed. The source was as reliable as it could be considering no one any longer lived to tell the tale.

"Why these guys and not the church down the block? Because of a book?" Peter was not convinced. "Tough to swallow."

"I thought you were Catholic."

"Lapsed."

"Oh, so you don't think some higher power could've saved the congregation?" Neal could not say he had an opinion about miracles but he loved to discuss different angles of a problem. And since this was a problem he did not have to solve, just believe that others could believe it, he gladly took the opposite opinion of Peter. Especially when he picked up an attitude from Peter that criminals could not be faithful to God.

"I'm more inclined to think they kept the door shut and loaded up on vitamin C," Peter explained the event.

"Maybe God works with what he's got?"

"And God said, 'Shut thine doors and eat thine oranges?'"

"Why not?"

"All right, look, when they dug up King Tut everybody made such a big deal out of the curse of the pharaoh," Peter began.

"People who entered the tomb ended up dead," Neal added. Not all of them, but enough to cause a rumor. Rumors could be useful things.

"Yeah, they probably caught some old bacterial infection," Peter stated. "Germs. There's your divine intervention."

"God can't use bacteria?"

"I prefer my miracles with a little more smiting and lightning." The classical attitude, Neal thought. Without imagination. A boring side of Peter he did not admire. Be as it may with God, this was a question about the attitude towards what you could not understand. It was so boring to explain everything. Neal preferred just to let things be as they were and see the good in things.

"Can I help you?" Father D'Allesio walked up to them.

"Thanks for seeing us again, Father," Peter greeted the priest. "We wanted to run down one thing. You didn't tell us your Bible was also known as a healing Bible."

Father D'Allesio shrugged.

"I didn't think it was relevant," he replied. So he knew but did not consider it relevant. He likely did not believe in the Bible's attributed powers, Neal figured.

"Could be. Anybody in your church who was a true believer of the healing power of the Bible?"

"Someone who was terminally ill?" Neal added. "Someone who had a sick family member?"

The priest sighed.

"I was afraid this might happen."

"What?" the agent prompted.

"Mr. Barelli has discouraged the homeless from the church."

"He made you shut down the soup kitchen?" Peter asked and Father D'Allesio nodded. "How Christian of him."

"The night of the theft, I let a homeless man sleep in the sanctuary."

"You know him?" Peter asked and the priest nodded but seemed unwilling to tell anything more. "Father? I'm here to get the Bible back." He did not promise to keep someone out of prison, but Neal was sure Peter hoped it would not come to that.

"His name's Steve. Please," the priest begged, "be gentle with him."

"Is he sick?"

"No." Father D'Allesio shook his head. "But someone very close to him is."

"What does he look like, and where can I find him?"

They found a man matching the description from Father D'Allesio in the park not far from the church. A black man in a military cap, probably not past forty. He sat on a bench with his dog.

Peter put on his gentle face and approached.

"Steve?" The man looked up. "Hi. My name is Peter. This is my friend Neal." Peter knew he should introduce himself as an FBI-agent, that this was against protocol, but he had no intention to hide his identity. Just make things less complicated.

"Hi," Neal gave a little wave.

"Do you mind if we ask you some questions?" Steve did not reply. He looked away. Not in a way as if they were not there or as he had not heard. Just as… he lost focus.

"The church you stayed in last week, they're missing a Bible," Peter tried. "You know anything about it?"

Steve's eyes returned to Peter's. Or rather to his shoulder or chin. It felt like they did not make real eye contact.

"Yeah. I took it."

Peter was speechless for a second and then turned to Neal who could not hide a smile at the honest confession.

"Great," he exclaimed with an easy tone. "We need it back."

"No," Steve objected. "No, I need it back."

"What do you mean?" Neal frowned. "Where is it?"

"I took it from the church like he asked me to. He said that he'd show me how to help Lucy get better. Then he took it from me. Now, he has not brought it back. Do you know where he is?"

"Nooo," Peter sighed. "I wish I did."

"Who asked you to take the Bible from the church?" Neal asked. Worth a try but not likely to get an answer, Peter figured.

"Look, he said that he would help Lucy get better," Steve reminded them. "She's not getting better. She's getting worse."

Neal knelt, patting the dog. Steve's hand had not left the dog the whole time.

"What's wrong with her?" the kid asked.

"She's tired all the time," Steve mumbled as if he was about to cry. "She don't eat nothing. If I get that Bible back, she'll get better."

"The man who asked you to take the Bible," Peter began testing an idea. "Did you meet him at the church?"

"Yeah," Steve nodded.

"Steve, if we showed you some pictures, do you think you could recognize him?" Peter was not sure if Steve nodded to the question, but he did not object either.

"We just need to get the Bible back, okay? Because she's fading."

Neal and Peter watched Steve and Lauren in the conference room. Lauren had a pile of albums with mugshots.

"I'm glad we followed your hunch," Peter told him. "Hope it takes us somewhere." Neal smiled, pleased by the praise.

"Oh, ye of little faith," he returned with a grin.

"You've been waiting to trot that one out," Peter guessed.

"Been holding onto it since lunch," Neal admitted.

They turned to the coffee peculator and Peter got a mug and poured himself some coffee. Neal had not bothered to try it since last time four years ago, during Peter's interrogation of him.

Lauren left the conference room and came up to them. She looked like a worn rug.

"That bad, huh?" Peter noted.

"Yeah, that bad was about an hour ago." Lauren stared at Peter taking the last coffee. "Just give me the damn thing." She grabbed the coffee pot.

Peter gazed into the conference room and walked inside. Neal followed.

"No luck, huh?" his handler asked, sympathetic.

"No. Not really, no. Look, I'm- I'm sorry I'm not more help to you. My bell got rung pretty good in Fallujah."

"You were in Iraq?"

"Yeah. It's where I found Lucy. We called in this predator strike on this trigger house," Steve told them, eyes wandering afar as he returned to the was. "Two hellfires came in and just destroyed everything. Then I hear this little whimpering. So I lift up this piece of roof. And there she was. Just wagging her tail."

The dog was essential for this man's life, this much was clear, Neal thought. This situation was also one where Peter showed himself as the admirable man Neal knew he was. He had the thief but did not arrest him, knowing there was so much more behind the theft.

"Well, you think you could look at one more book?" Peter asked, gentle. Steve was not stupid, even if he was slow. He knew he needed to pinpoint the one who told him to find the Bible. He nodded.