Turned to Stone

by Jorge Magano

  39

  “You have to give it to him: he has good taste in bikes,” Jaime remarked, his voice tense. “Who’d he steal that bike from?”

  “What does that matter?” said Paloma. “He’s coming after us!”

  “Don’t worry; he can’t get on the bus while it’s moving. And when we reach our destination, he’ll have to deal with the police.”

  “Sure, but that’s not our destination.”

  Paloma pointed ahead at the next stop. The driver had already begun to slow down the bus.

  “Oh, shit . . .” Jaime leapt up from his seat and ran to the front of the bus. “No! Don’t stop! Non si fermi!” But the driver gave him a look of disdain and halted the bus.

  Roberto and Paloma watched through the window as Clark jumped off the motorcycle and ran to the bus door. “Don’t let that man on!” Jaime cried. “He’s a murderer! Assassino!”

  Though his shouting unnerved the passengers, no one did anything but look back at him in surprise. As the driver opened the doors, Clark shoved the other people at the stop aside, climbed onto the bus, and advanced down the aisle like a shark swimming toward a school of fish. Jaime retreated to the back.

  “Eh! Il biglietto!” shouted the driver, even as the gunman ignored him and continued toward his victims. “Eh!”

  Clark stopped in front of his prey. “Nice try,” he said in a threatening tone. “Now get off the bus, unless you want a bloodbath right here.”

  Jaime’s lips were trembling with rage.

  “You wouldn’t start shooting here.”

  “Try me.”

  Jaime looked at his companions. Paloma looked spent and Roberto, though still defiant, might as well have had the word defeat tattooed on his forehead. Slowly, they began to stand. Then Roberto suddenly started screaming. “A gun! A gun!”

  The passengers gave him looks of incomprehension, but his message became clear when they saw a fat guy with a goatee lift his right arm and brandish a weapon—the one he had just extracted from Clark’s belt. Everyone froze, not knowing how to react, until Roberto pressed the trigger. At the sound of the loud bang, a bullet passed through the roof of the bus. This was enough to make all of the passengers leap out of their seats and scream as they rushed for the bus’s rear door. A torrent of people flooded down the aisle, knocking Clark to the ground. Jaime, Roberto, and Paloma were among those who trampled him as they made a sprint for the door.

  “The Ducati!” Jaime yelled, seeing the motorcycle lying on its side by the bus stop.

  Roberto, who was already on the street, understood what Jaime meant and took Paloma by the hand, though she didn’t need any guiding. The bike’s engine was still running. Between the two of them, they pulled it upright and Roberto sat his large frame on the front part of the seat. “Get on!” he shouted to Paloma, who jumped on behind him. Roberto sped over to the bus door, where Jaime was waiting.

  When they’d pulled up to a stop, Jaime straddled as best he could the tiny section of bike that wasn’t already occupied and clutched Paloma by the shoulders. “Go, Roberto!” he yelled, seeing Clark stumble from the bus. “Step on it!”

  Roberto did as he was told and the motorcycle, carrying three passengers, shot down the street.

  “Forget what I said earlier!” Jaime cried, sounding euphoric. “This is the perfect getaway!”

  As they bounced along the cobblestones, Jaime’s fingers dug into Paloma’s shoulders.

  “I’m pretty sure it’s illegal to have three people on a bike!” said Roberto.

  “I don’t know about illegal,” Jaime replied, trying hard to stay in his seat. “But it sure is uncomfortable!”

  Roberto rode with skill, occasionally swerving to dodge a pedestrian attempting to cross the lamp-lit street. Once he thought there was enough distance between them and Clark, he looked over his shoulder toward Paloma. “Which way to Castelvecchio?”

  “Just a bit farther. Follow the bus stops and—Look out!”

  Roberto turned back and had to steer sharply to the right to avoid an oncoming taxi. He swerved two more times before managing to get back into his own lane.

  For some reason, the bike felt lighter to him now, and he took the opportunity to accelerate hard.

  “Roberto, stop!” Paloma cried out desperately.

  “Stop? Why?”

  “We’ve lost Jaime!”

  Roberto hit the brakes and skidded toward the sidewalk in a small arc. He looked back and saw Jaime sitting on the road a short distance behind them. “You can’t be serious!” he exclaimed. “Can’t you even keep your butt on a seat? Good thing you’re a skinny runt; if you were my size . . .”

  Paloma jumped off the bike and ran to help Jaime up. He had hit his lower thigh hard, and he grimaced as he stood.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Honestly, I was more comfortable on the bus.” He answered through clenched teeth as he hobbled along, holding Paloma’s arm.

  Roberto tried to scoot up closer to the handlebars to leave more space in the back, but before Paloma and Jaime could get on, a gunshot rang out and a bullet struck the pavement a few centimeters from the bike’s rear wheel.

  Turning around, Roberto saw Clark approaching on an electric bicycle, his pistol aimed in their direction.

  “Motherfucker! Is this guy gonna steal every kind of vehicle in Verona?”

  Paloma leapt onto the motorcycle, but before Jaime could do the same, Roberto had already started to ride off.

  “What are you doing? Turn around! We don’t have Jaime!”

  Roberto made a U-turn, but Jaime was already running toward the sidewalk to escape the bullets.

  “Jaime!” Paloma called after him. “Come on, get on!”

  “There’s no time,” Roberto said as Clark pedaled toward them and fired again. He switched direction and rode away from the threat, ignoring Paloma’s cries of protest.

  “No! We have to go back for him!”

  “That bastard will blow our heads off if we do.”

  As if to support his hypothesis, a bullet whistled past them and shattered the bike’s rearview mirror. Cursing his bad luck, Roberto accelerated and steered away from the danger, in the direction of their designated meeting place with the police.

  From his hidden location behind a trash container, Jaime watched the red bike speed down the street, relieved to know that Paloma and Roberto were safe. But then he turned his attention to his own problems.

  Clark’s electric bicycle was drawing close and approaching at full speed. Jaime crouched down beside the container, but Clark jumped the curb and rammed him. The bike’s front wheel struck Jaime on the ankle, making him howl with pain as Clark circled back around to run him down again. Trapped between the container and the wall of a building, Jaime had no choice but to flip himself backward and sideways into the road, where a car driving close to the curb almost ran him over.

  The driver laid on his horn and spat a stream of insults out of the window. As Jaime shrugged and climbed to his feet, he saw something long and thin protruding from the garbage container. Just then, Clark rounded the container with the bicycle and took aim, but Jaime snatched the object out of the garbage and swung it at the killer’s head.

  The broom handle struck Clark full on the temple, knocking him clean off his bicycle. He hit the ground face-first.

  Jaime threw away the handle and, trying to ignore the pain in his leg, ran off down the sidewalk in the direction the motorcycle had taken. He was exhausted and injured, but adrenaline made him run faster than he had ever thought possible. No pain or fatigue would keep him from doing what he needed to do: lead Clark to the police who were waiting at Castelvecchio.

  Without slowing down, he turned his head to see whether the hit man was still in pursuit. Seeing that he was right on his heels, Jaime pushed his legs to go faster.

  Wh
at Jaime was seeing didn’t seem possible. He was about to keel over, and yet Clark looked like he could run all night without even breaking a sweat. Jaime was beginning to think the man wasn’t human. A bit farther, he told himself. Just a bit farther and you’ll be able to lie down and sleep in a hospital or a police interview room.

  The mantra spurred him on, but his lungs hurt and it was hard to catch his breath. His heart was beating like a Keith Moon drum solo, and he was breathing through his mouth now, but he kept on running, determined to stop only if he dropped dead—something that could very well happen if the psychopath behind him fired again.

  The psychopath fired again.

  The bullet whistled past Jaime and embedded itself in the glass of a shop window. He ran from one sidewalk to the other, dodging honking cars and seeking out the shelter provided by shadows, parked cars, and trash containers.

  His body was just about to give up when one of the towers of the Castelvecchio appeared in the distance. Unfortunately, he saw no signs of police lights and no trace of a red Ducati. He was still too far away. He ran a few meters more, but his legs failed him, and he was close to collapsing. This was enough to allow Clark to catch up and block off his route to the castle.

  “Stop right there!” the gunman yelled. “This is as far as you go.”

  “How about . . . we sort this out . . . like civilized . . . people?” Jaime gasped for breath.

  “Sure, that’s what we’ll do,” Clark gestured toward a narrow side street off to the right, beyond a classical-style building constructed of gray stone. “Down there.”

  “In that palazzo?”

  “No, you idiot. The street.”

  “I didn’t think you cared about witnesses.”

  “Witnesses, no. The police that your friends went to find, yes. Now move!”

  Clark gave Jaime a shove, and he had no choice but to obey. The narrow one-way street led to a little elevated park that ran alongside the river. Clark made him climb the marble steps and walk toward the low stone wall, beyond which flowed the dark waters of the Adige.

  Suddenly Jaime understood. “One bullet and into the river, huh?”

  “And good luck finding your body. A stroke of genius, don’t you think?” Clark nodded toward the wall. “Up there.”

  Jaime had run out of options. He was exhausted, sore, and saw no possibility for escape. He climbed the parapet and balanced there. He could sense, more than see, the river some distance below his feet. He considered jumping before Clark had a chance to fire. If he survived both the fall and the freezing water, perhaps he could then swim back to the riverbank. Then he lifted his gaze, and what he saw filled him with hope. He broke into a smile that developed into an actual laugh.

  “What’s so funny?” asked Clark.

  “Nothing. Have you noticed where we are?”

  “Oh, sure, another trick. Very funny. Listen, asshole: earlier it was three against one, and you caught me off guard, but now it’s over. Say good-bye.”

  “If you say so.” Jaime raised his arms in the air and waved them around as if he was doing stretching exercises. Then he started jumping up and down on the wall.

  “What the fuck are you doing?”

  “Can’t you tell? I’m waving at the camera.”

  Clark was fed up with being taken for a fool and aimed his gun to fire. Suddenly the area was lit up by a powerful beam, bathing victim and executioner in a blanket of yellow light that streamed from the back of the palazzo they’d passed on the way to the park.

  “What the fuck?”

  Two figures appeared silhouetted against the bright light, shouting in Italian. Clark shaded his eyes with his hand, trying to make out what was happening. As it turned out, they were standing in the lot behind the Banca d’Italia, and the security cameras had alerted the night guards to their presence. Looking shaken, Clark couldn’t decide what to do. He aimed the gun at the two approaching police officers and then at Jaime, who’d climbed down from the wall and taken cover behind a concrete pillar.

  “What are you going to do now, Clark?” Jaime asked. “Kill us all? Face down an entire city’s police force? Whatever the Carreras pay you, it’s not worth your life.”

  A carabinieri car emerged from a side street, and two more armed officers climbed out. Behind them, the roar of the red Ducati announced the arrival of Roberto and Paloma.

  Clark let out a curse, stuffed the pistol into his belt, and climbed onto the low wall.

  “Non si muova!” shouted one of the police officers.

  But Clark had already made his decision, and after a quick Iberian slap, he cast a defiant look at the crowd and threw himself from the wall. A moment later, a splash was heard and the policemen ran over and pointed their flashlights down at the water.

  Paloma and Roberto ran to embrace Jaime. One of the police offers approached them with an ill-tempered expression.

  “Qualcuno mi può spiegare cosa è successo qui?” he said.

  Even a person who didn’t speak Italian could tell what the man was asking. Jaime looked at his two friends.

  “You explain it,” he said, still trying to catch his breath. “If you don’t mind, I’m going to sit on this bench and rest.”

  PART IV

  CASSIOPEIA

  40

  Cagliari—Sardinia

  Though she took care of herself, Rosa Mazi was not a woman obsessed with her appearance. However, when she came out of the shower that morning and studied her reflection in the mirror, what she saw was a strong exterior that masked the weakness that had been growing inside. At that moment, as she watched the water drip from her hair onto her shoulders, she realized there might be three new corpses in the world. Rosa forced herself to smile, but she managed only a pathetic grimace. That morning would be the first day of the rest of her life, she had told herself. A life without stealing, threats, or killing. Those three dead bodies would be the last. She promised herself.

  Her father’s business and power had given her a life without limitations, one that had been hard to resist until now. She had a yacht, a luxurious apartment she never used, and the premises that had housed the former family art gallery and would now be used for a new initiative: Cassiopeia. All of this, she was aware, she owed to her father, but she had made a decision. As soon as she received her cut for the Medusa, she and Dino would buy another place and live solely from their trade. If her father objected, she would be forced to send him to a home or divulge the truth that he still lived. The one thing she was sure of was that she would never return to her old life. The criminal empire of Angelo Carrera would die with him.

  She dried her hair with a towel and pulled on a sweat suit before heading to the yacht’s main deck, where a servant had served her usual breakfast: freshly squeezed fruit juice, a bowl of high-fiber cereal, and a cup of coffee with skimmed milk. She had a view of the seafront promenade and the maze of narrow streets packed with restaurants and souvenir shops directly under the old citadel and the Rampart of Saint Remy. She was enjoying that moment of solitude when her cell phone vibrated on the table.

  “Hullo, Dino.”

  “How are you, my princess? Do you feel like having breakfast with me?”

  Rosa looked at her half-eaten bowl of cereal.

  “Sure, where will you be?”

  “I’m at La Loggia. I hardly slept last night, I was so nervous.”

  “Same here. See you in half an hour?”

  “Perfect. See you soon, gorgeous.”

  Rosa drank her coffee in two gulps, excited by the idea of meeting Dino. La Loggia was very close to the gallery, on Corso Vittorio Emanuele, just a ten-minute walk from the harbor. She was about to set off when her cell phone rang again. She thought it would be Dino again and was disappointed when she saw the screen.

  “Clark, I thought I told you not to call me again.”

  For
the next two minutes, she stood as still as a photograph: mute, expressionless, with an inscrutableness broken only by a slight elevation of the eyebrows.

  “And what do I care about your beginner’s mistakes?” she finally said. “Whatever you have to say to your uncle, say it to him. Don’t use me as the messenger for your screwups.”

  She listened for a while longer, until her pulse sped up and she began to feel dizzy. She held her hand to her forehead to keep her balance.

  “All right, I’ll tell him. But he’s not going to like it.”

  As she walked into the lounge on the bottom deck, she cursed under her breath. Clark had let the family down again, and now she would have to take the flak for it.

  “Failed?” asked the most irritated voice Rosa had ever heard.

  “Clark will live. He called from the airport, and he’ll be here in a couple of hours. Listen, Papà, there’s something I have to tell you—”

  “No, you listen to me, Rosa. These people have screwed everything up for us too many times. We can’t allow them to mess with us. I want you to wipe any evidence that might incriminate us from the yacht’s computers. Then come to the apartment and pack up the bust. As soon as Clark arrives, he can help you. We have to get it out of here and take it on board.”

  “I don’t understand. Why such a rush?”

  “We might have to leave, go somewhere else. I was going to tell you, but you got to me first.”

  “What’s going on?”

  “They’ve arrested Dr. Galliano.”

  “What?”

  “The police kept the operation secret, but one of my informers got news to me this morning.”

  “But how did it happen?”

  “Someone tipped them off. One of the men who hijacked the Artemis with your brother wanted to sell some sculptures to the doctor, and unfortunately the mansion was under surveillance. Now, with the doctor behind bars, our chance to sell the Medusa is significantly smaller.”