47
Cloutard’s safe house, near Siena, Tuscany
Cloutard, angry, flung his phone onto his desk. He stood up and, muttering curses under his breath, prowled back and forth in his study. He’d been calling contacts for an hour or more, connections he had painstakingly built up over years, but he was running into brick walls at every turn. Everyone was telling him that plans had changed, and that from now on they would no longer be working with him. Slowly but surely, the true extent of what Ossana had been up to in the last twelve months, while pretending to be his girlfriend, dawned on him. She had undermined his complete network. All his contacts, his authority . . . his entire enterprise, in short, had turned against him.
At least he had managed to transfer the reserves from his bank accounts and put them out of harm’s way, because even his private bankers were giving him the cold shoulder. Without Karim, he felt lost.
What preoccupied him most, though, was the question of who was behind it all. Ossana could not be the mastermind. If the raids on the holy relics were tied to this, and if Ossana had managed to turn his business partners—people Cloutard had been working with for years—then he had no doubt that someone else, someone wielding great power, was behind it all. On this matter, though, the usual channels were silent, or denied outright that anyone else was pulling the strings. Cloutard was at a dead end, and a dangerous one at that. He couldn’t trust anybody anymore.
“Putain de merde!” Cloutard said, only half-aloud. Still, it was loud enough for Giuseppina to hear. She came into his study, in her hands a tray full of antipasti. Under her arm, a bottle of Chianti Classico Berardenga was pinned.
“Enough with all the cursing, Francesco. Make yourself useful and get some glasses.”
Cloutard went to the old cupboard and took out two large wine glasses and a corkscrew, and they sat out on the terrace. Cloutard uncorked the wine, and they spent a few silent minutes gazing out at the Tuscan countryside: the gently rolling green hills, the cypress-lined avenues, the narrow roads that twisted like snakes through the landscape, the wafts of fog that drifted through the area morning and evening. The region never failed to calm François and clear his head.
“Maybe you can’t remember it anymore, but let me remind you of something,” Giuseppina said after a while. “Innocento, God rest his soul, had just picked you up from the street; he brought you here and we fed you. It was the first time in months you had something proper to eat. Back then, Innocento felt the same as you do now. All his associates and even his consigliere at the time had turned against him. He had escaped an assassination attempt by the merest margin. He had his back to the wall, had nothing left. Nothing but his belief, which never wavered. And you know what happened next.”
Cloutard nodded. “I was still just a kid, but I remember it well. He won back the loyalty, respect and reverence of his people, every single one of them.” He looked at Giuseppina sadly. “But you know I am not like that. I am not as tough and ruthless as Innocento was. I’ve never met a man in my life so—”
“I don’t want to hear this,” she snapped, cutting him off. “You have no right to talk about Innocento with such disrespect. He was a good man.”
Cloutard had no desire to argue with her. His foster father had been many things, but a “good man” was not one of them. Still, Giuseppina had reminded him of something: of how hard he himself had worked to build his organization, and of the countless setbacks he had had to overcome. And most importantly of all, that he had always found some way to win respect without the need to pave his way with corpses.
“You are right, Giuseppina. I will get everything back.”
He got up, knelt in front of the old woman, and kissed her hand. She placed a hand on his cheek and patted him lovingly. But only for a moment. Taking him completely by surprise, she slapped his face so hard his ears rang.
“Avanti, Francesco. What are you waiting for?”
Cloutard jumped to his feet, startled, partly because of the slap, partly because his phone rang just then. He looked at the screen and the name he saw surprised him.
“Jacopo Merelli! It’s been a long time.”
Cloutard was pleased to find that, apparently, some people were still speaking to him after all.
“Ciao, François. You know I rarely call, but a package has been left with me, as arranged, and it has been here longer than usual. Three men I did not know delivered it yesterday and there has been no contact since. Do you know what it’s about? All they told me was that it was going to be picked up by a black woman.”
All Cloutard’s alarm bells began to ring. “Jacopo, if it is the woman I think it is, she is dangerous. I have no idea what is in that package, but it cannot be worth your life. Be careful. I am near Siena and I am on my way to you right now.”
Cloutard hung up and looked at Giuseppina.
“You see how quickly the tide can turn,” she said. “Think of Innocento and how sweet revenge always was for him.”
She turned her cheek to him in farewell. He kissed her and was already on the way to his car. Yes, maybe this time revenge really would be sweeter than what he was used to . . .
48
Villa on Lake Como
Hellen had toiled through the book page by page, but without success. She found nothing in the book, nothing at all, that she recognized as any kind of clue. With every page she turned, she could only shake her head in resignation. Only a few pages remained, and she had already given up hope. Once again, her fingers rose lovingly to her amulet, and she thought of her grandmother. She turned the next page . . . and was electrified at what she found.
Something in this book was different. Very different indeed. Here was a passage that she did not know from other versions of the Chronicle of the Morea. She found herself reading the account of Robert de Clari, a knight during the Fourth Crusade who had left behind his own chronicle of the times; the account had obviously been incorporated into this version of the Morea text. And not without reason, Hellen hoped. Robert de Clari was one the few who had actually witnessed and documented the existence of the Shroud of Turin in medieval times, so that in itself was a direct connection to one of the stolen relics. Perhaps, she hoped, he also had a connection to the sword, the sacred weapon itself. She skimmed over the lines where Robert reported on the shroud, and abruptly held her breath. There was more—not only Robert’s recollections of the Shroud of Turin, but about the Sword of Saint Peter.
The Sword of Peter. The sacred weapon. The very weapon she—and, apparently, her kidnappers—were searching for. The sword with which the Apostle Peter had tried to protect Jesus Christ in the garden of Gethsemane, and with which he had cut off the ear of one of the attackers, Malchus, a servant of the high priest Caiaphas.
“Put up again thy sword into his place,” Jesus had said to Peter. “For all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.“
According to legend, Jesus Himself had even touched the sword, and mystics had attributed an incredible spiritual power to it ever since.
Hellen held her breath and translated the next lines as if transfixed. Robert de Clari reported having been given the task of taking the countless relics that had been moved from the Holy Land to Constantinople to safety. At that time, Constantinople was besieged by the Turks. The city would soon fall, and the relics could not be allowed to fall into the hands of the infidels. If they did, they would be lost forever. Following Robert’s account was a detailed list of the relics and to whom they had been given. The majority of the treasures had been handed over to the Knights Templar, who were to take them by different routes and safe channels to the Pope in the Papal States. To Hellen’s disappointment, the Sword of Peter was not listed among them. She read on rapidly, and soon brightened.
According to the text, Robert’s brother Aleaumes de Clari was an armed monk who had been ordered by his Grand Master, Alfonse de Portugal, to bring the Sword of Peter to the Knights Hospitaller. Similar to the Knights Templar, the Kn
ights Hospitaller were an order formed during the Crusades. A similar number of myths and legends were entwined around the power of the Knights Hospitaller, which had later become known as the Order of Malta. The diplomacy of the Grand Masters, however, meant that the Knights Hospitaller had not been crushed like the Knights Templar had been; their order still existed to the present day.
Okay. We are one step further, thought Hellen. One of the Knights Hospitaller had handed over the sword taken from Constantinople to the Grand Master of the Order. Hellen was not an expert on the Middle Ages, to say nothing of the Crusades and their associated orders, but she did know that the Order of Malta had changed its headquarters often since the Crusades—from Jerusalem to Krak des Chevaliers in Syria, then to Acre in Galilee, then on to Cyprus, Rhodes, Malta, Saint Petersburg, Messina, and finally to the holy city of Rome. The Sword of Peter could be in any of those places. Hellen hoped there were more clues, otherwise the search for the sacred weapon would continue to be like searching for the proverbial needle in a haystack.
She read on and soon reached the end of Robert de Clari’s report. Nothing. She skimmed the remaining pages impatiently, but was quickly forced to admit that there was nothing else in the chronicle concerning the sword. She read through Robert’s section a second time, more carefully, but she had to face the facts: there were no more clues as to where Aleaumes had taken the Sword of Peter, much less where the sacred weapon was to be found today.
Exasperated, she slammed the book shut and stood up so rapidly that the chair tipped over backward, and slammed her fist on the table. No! This can’t be a dead end, she thought. It has to be in here. It has to be.
She opened the book once more and found the page with the list of relics and the references to the Knights Hospitaller. She read the text over and over again, but discovered nothing. She leaned back, defeated, and stared at the open double page. And then she saw it.
At the top edge of the book, close to the gutter, was a single faded word: “Meribah.”
Meribah. The name given to the Sword of Peter in the myths surrounding Saint George. According to legend, Joseph of Arimathea had taken the sword to Glastonbury, where Saint George had it to defeat a black knight. The symbolism suggested that Saint George had used the Sword of Peter to defeat the devil; the monks of Glastonbury, in gratitude, gave him the sword as a gift. Saint George was also said to have used the sword in his most famous victory, when he slew the dragon in the Holy Land.
Hellen’s heart was beating hard. This page did indeed contain a secret; it was no mistake that the ancient, mystical name of the sacred weapon was written here. She turned the pages forward and backward, scanning the margins for other faded words, and soon found the next one: “Cesare.”
“Cesare” meant emperor. The word was derived from Giulio Cesare—Julius Caesar, the first Emperor of Rome. But what did Caesar have to do with the sword? Did it mean that the sword was in Rome? Hellen doubted it. The notion was too far-fetched. But perhaps there were other words that would shed more light on the matter.
She searched on and finally found a third word, but when she read it, her heart literally skipped a beat. She read it over and over again, but simply could not begin to comprehend that this, of all words, should be printed on the page.
“Tifla,” she said aloud.
“Tifla” was the nickname her grandmother had given her. As a child, she had not attached any meaning to the word, and even today she had no idea what it meant.
“Tifla” and “Cesare.”
Two words that could show her the way to the long-lost sacred weapon, the Sword of Saint Peter. Two words, but she had no idea what they might mean. She needed access to the Internet. Somehow, she had to make that clear to the kidnappers. She stood and pounded on the door.
49
Villa on Lake Como
Tom crept through the woods to the entrance of the mausoleum, on the eastern side of the small peninsula. His phone, strapped to his forearm, showed five guards patrolling the grounds: one at the main entrance to the villa, one by the terrace, one in front of the outbuilding to the northwest of the villa, one patrolling the park on the east side of the peninsula, and one on the access road that led to the villa. He estimated he would need twenty minutes to make all his preparations without being spotted by one of the guards. Inside the villa were another five; he would have to put some of them out of action for his plan to work. The thermal imaging also showed a room with two people inside it, and he guessed that was where Hellen was being held prisoner. He hoped that the plan Noah had put together would come off, and also that the man watching Hellen would leave his post. Once he’d covered the entire area and put all his preparations in place, he was ready to go.
By rights Tom should have been on edge, but he was the picture of serenity. This was his element. Most importantly, he didn’t have to put his trust in anyone else. He only had to rely on one person, and that was someone he knew well: himself. Tom crept to the mausoleum’s entrance, swung the iron gate open noiselessly, and tiptoed down the stairs. Once he was deep enough into the crypt, he could safely turn on his flashlight. He oriented himself quickly. To his right was an alcove holding the vault that marked the final resting place of the villa’s former owner. At first glance, it looked as if the crypt ended there, but it was an optical illusion. Just beyond the columns that framed the alcove, a narrow passage led to another door. He tried the handle, but was not particularly surprised to find the door locked. He was retrieving his lock picks when he heard a noise at the entrance. He extinguished the flashlight instantly and held his breath. Someone was coming down the stairs, probably one of the guards on his rounds. A flashlight beam illuminated the crypt. Tom pressed himself against the column. The place smelled musty and damp. His nose tingled, and he put a hand over his mouth and scrunched up his face, trying not to sneeze. He hoped fervently that the guard was not conscientious enough to check the connecting passageway as well . . . but no, the flashlight beam swept once from right to left, then disappeared. Relieved, Tom could breathe again. The guard had only given the room a quick once-over and hadn’t come all the way down.
“Sector 3, all clear,” Tom heard the guard report into his radio as he moved away from the tomb.
Tom waited a few more seconds, turned on his own flashlight again, and went to work on the door. With a turn of his wrist, Tom felt the cylinder rotate in the lock. He snapped the flashlight off, and the crypt was once again pitch black. Slowly, he turned the door handle and opened the old door a fraction of an inch, but no light escaped through the crack. Tom smiled: so far so good. He swung the door open, turned on his flashlight again, and moved down the long passage toward the wine cellar.
At the end was another door, where he went through the same procedure. Now he was directly beneath the villa. He looked around, the flashlight beam sweeping the room, and inhaled sharply. So here they were! Tom was standing among the relics that had been stolen in the last few weeks. All of them, and many more besides. He hadn’t known exactly what had been looted, or how much of it—but he certainly hadn’t counted on such a hoard of stolen treasure.
This is going make Hellen and Palffy very happy! he thought. Some of the items, he guessed, had been stolen years ago.
Hellen was tapping away furiously on the laptop. Behind her, a man stood guard, watching closely to make sure she didn’t use it to contact anyone, but it didn’t matter: doing so would never have occurred to Hellen just then. She had caught the scent, and soon she would know exactly where the sacred weapon she had sought for so long was hidden. How she would get out of her current precarious situation was something she would deal with later.
After a few minutes she had already shed a little more light on things. She had also begun to put together a plan to throw her kidnappers off the scent.
“Get your boss. I’ve found something he’ll like.”
The guard looked at his watch and scowled. For a moment, he weighed the abuse he was sure to provoke if he
woke Guerra in the middle of the night against the obvious importance of the woman’s discovery. He handcuffed Hellen to the armrests, left the room with the laptop, and locked the door from the outside. Then he went out to one of the outbuildings, where the men slept.
Tom had moved on, following another connecting passage to the next cellar room. He glanced at his cell phone, checking the infrared satellite feed. Directly above him should be the room where they were holding Hellen—and at that moment he saw the guard step out of the room and actually leave the house.
Easier than I thought, Tom said to himself.
Now was the time. He dashed up the stairs from the cellar and found himself in a hallway next to the main drawing room. There were a lot of art objects and relics in here, too, but Tom had no time for them now. He went to the door, knocked softly and whispered:
“Hellen? Hellen? Are you in there?”
“Tom? What are you doing here?” Hellen said, taken completely by surprise. Her heart leaped. The lock pick was in Tom’s hand again, and he immediately went to work on the door.
On the other side of the door, Tom rolled his eyes and shook his head. “I was just down in Como. I dropped in to visit George Clooney and then I thought maybe I’d take a look at the villa where they filmed Star Wars and Casino Royale. What a question—I’m here to rescue you, of course. Why did you think?”
The Sacred Weapon: A Tom Wagner Adventure Page 16