Vani’s mind must have traveled a similar pathway. “I wonder what weapon will fell each of us when her time comes?”

“Living in twenty-first-century America,” Compton contributed, ever the ER doctor, “we’ll probably all be shot.”

“No. It will be a microbe, most likely,” said Kira. As if they’d coordinated it, everyone offered her an elbow and then dissolved in collective laughter.

“I do not understand,” said Isa, smiling in the way people do on the outside of an in-joke. “What is for the elbow?”

“Kira is afraid of germs, so she doesn’t shake hands,” explained Georgia.

“I’m not afraid of germs, I’m simply exercising good judgment when it comes to avoiding the transference of pathogens,” said Kira.

“So.” Isa swiveled. “I think you are each suggesting that death will come in some way related to what you see in your medical practice?”

“Hope not.” Georgia wrinkled her nose. “I’d hate to get taken out by a giant penis.”

A black-clad woman ahead of her in the line—a serious Russian, presumably—turned around. “Shhh!” she hissed.

Georgia appeared to be trying to stifle a laugh, but Hannah, chagrined, went mute as they entered the church. At the front of the sanctuary, a monk stood facing the congregation, singing what she presumed to be a Mass. A rough, slightly atonal quality marred his voice, but the song nonetheless conveyed an eerie beauty, reverberating within the dark walls of the basilica with the lilting, swoopy cadence of a bird. As he sang, an old woman, coughing, rose from a kneeling position in the back of the congregation. For a moment she swayed until a younger woman rushed to her side and guided her toward the door. As they passed, Hannah caught a glimpse of the old woman’s face, pale and mottled, almost cyanotic. She faltered; did the woman need help? She took a few steps in their direction as the monk finished his song; within seconds, people rose and flooded the aisles, blocking her view of the woman.

Vani nudged her and they passed through the sanctuary to a staircase on the right-hand side of the altar, where a bottleneck in the line backed them up again. In the distance, ahead of them, Hannah could hear a cacophony of coughing.

“This site”—Isa waved her arms to encompass the basilica—“has been of religious significance since the Romans built a temple to Venus here.” She stood one step above Hannah, leaning forward and whisper-speaking loud enough for all of them to hear. “Napoléon burned this church in the eighteenth century and Franco executed its resistant Catalonian monks in the twentieth.” She paused as they ascended the stairwell a few steps toward a bend, then indicated two glittery mosaics depicting female figures on either wall beside them. “These are important,” said Isa. “Do you know what they are?”