“Our monastery? Fenelli’s monastery?”
“Except it’s not a monastery anymore.” He didn’t wait for anyone to ask. “It’s an Islamic study center. I mean, ‘was.’ It was an Islamic study center. Someone burned it down last night. After beheading the caretaker. They got here before us. Whoever they are.”
No one said anything for what seemed a long time. Then Professor Richman said, “I’m going back to Monte Piccolo. I urge you to show the good sense to come with me.”
Moto wasn’t crying anymore. He met Lucia’s gaze.
“I’m not giving up,” she said, hoping to convince him she had a reason for what she was going to say next. “I spent a night staring at that painting, getting ready to die. I know what that painting feels like in the night. There’s nothing for us here now. But I can’t go home.” A deep breath, then, “I have to go to Malta.”
“Malta?” Moto’s face was a mask of bewilderment.
“The Beheading of St. John. In the cathedral in Malta.” She shrugged. “I know. Another beheading. I sound like a ghoul. But The Beheading of St. John might be Caravaggio’s greatest painting. I have to know what it feels like, face-to-face. I can’t explain it any better than that.”
There was too much tangled up in her mind for her to even try to explain. Her fierce need to defend Te-Te—even though it made no sense to her—to save him from being savaged as an old fool who died for a fraud. Her haunted suspicion that death was waiting, peering over her shoulder, reaching out to touch anyone who got too close to her. Her feeling that if she just kept moving, she could leave that haunting behind. And the emotion that had filled her when she’d stood for hours in the near dark with The Judas Kiss.
She held Moto’s gaze. “You don’t have to come with me. You shouldn’t come with me. But I have to go.”
Moto looked back at her, then at the professor. He took a deep breath. “If you’re going, I’m going.” No tears. No smiles. Just a grim determination that seemed to match hers.
They stood in silence and then Professor Richman said, “You are as foolish—as recklessly stupid—as Caravaggio. Every time he had a chance to stay out of trouble, he made the worst possible decision. Why are you doing this?”
Lucia didn’t have any answer except a tight-lipped shrug.
The professor reached out and put his hand on her shoulder.
“Nec spe. Nec metu.” He spoke the words as if they were a benediction.
Lucia frowned. “What’s that?”
“Without hope. Without fear. It’s Latin. They say it was Caravaggio’s personal motto. And right now I suppose it ought to be yours.” He shook his head. “But if you had any sense . . .” He trailed off into silence.
A moment later, determined to break the spell of that silence, Lucia grabbed the professor, kissed him on both cheeks, turned, gave Moto a hug, and declared, “Nec spe. Nec metu it is! Let’s go!”
She told the professor to forget about taking the bus back to Monte Piccolo, and they drove him to the Milano Centrale train station, waited while he bought a ticket, and then walked him to the platform. Side by side, Lucia and Moto stood and watched as he headed toward the train. For a moment, he was lost in the surging crowd. Then he reappeared, standing alone. For a moment, Lucia thought how old and lonely he looked, then he turned, caught her eye, smiled, gave a jaunty wave, checked his ticket, and disappeared into the crowd again.
The room was filled with the musk of the thousands of old books that lined its walls. The small man breathed in the scent as if it were the aroma of a fine wine. After long minutes of silence, the tall man ventured to speak first.
“I have spoken to three of your old classmates, sir. Their admiration for you runs deep.”
“Three? I gave you seven names.”
“Yes sir. But my first contacts with the other four indicated that they might not support our cause, and I thought it best to go no further.”
“Well done, Fra Lupo. Discretion is the better part of valor.”
Lupo nodded. After all these years, he knew his commander’s citations well.
But the small man raised a finger of warning and added, “Sometimes. Only sometimes.”
Then he rose from behind the desk and walked to a corner of the room where two comfortable armchairs faced each other. He gestured to the tall man, who remained at attention in front of the now unoccupied desk.
“Come, join me. You have done well. I have said you are like a son to me. Let us sit and discuss these matters.”
“Thank you, sir. I am honored.”
The two sat, facing one another. The small man lounged back in the leather chair. The other sat straight at the edge of his seat.
“So! What have you found, Fra Filippo?”
“It was your friend in Milano, Professore—”
The small man raised an eyebrow. Fra Lupo nodded and did not say the name. He started again.
“Your friend in Milano put me in contact with a man in Palermo.”
“Palermo?”
“Yes sir. He was very careful about what he told me, but he was certain that people behind the action, the explosion, at the warehouse were . . . well, all he would say was they were Sicilian.”
“So, mafiosi.”
“He was very discreet. He didn’t use that word, but I am certain that is what he meant. It makes sense, sir. Who else could put that much fear into our usually helpful contacts?”
“I believe you are right.” A moment of thought. “We must be careful.”
“They are formidable opponents, sir.”
“No, figlio mio, that is where we must be careful. The mafiosi are not our allies—sometimes I think the Sicilians are more like Turks than true Italians—but they are not our opponents. We must never forget who our real opponents are.”
Comandante Pantera stood up and walked across the room to the book stand where the ancient manuscript lay open under its glass cover.
He looked down at it and read aloud—first in the original Greek and then in Italian—“‘Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, most certainly his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.’”
Lupo nodded. He could have recited the passage from memory. It had been the opening lines of the commander’s thesis for his Dottorato di ricerca in Storia. The thesis, titled “Things Only Evil and Inhuman: A Scrupulous Examination of the Cult of Islam,” had been savagely rejected in a clearly political act, which had ended Gran Comandante Militare Pantera’s academic career.
The comandante brought his hand down gently, hovering over the glass protecting the manuscript, and said, “These are the words of Emperor Manuel II Palaeologus of Byzantium.” He turned, took a step back toward Lupo, stopped, bowed his head, and said, “And may God bless His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI, our last true pope.”
He raised his head and the two men shared a secret smile, for they alone knew—with doctrinal certainty—that it had been the gran comandante’s strong intellectual influence that had led Benedict to quote that exact paragraph in a speech at the University of Regensburg, a clear signal of his support for the gran comandante’s campaign to free the world from the danger of Islam.
Lupo clenched his fist and struck his chest over his heart. “I shall not fail our Holy Father, sir.”
“And you shall not fail me either.”
“Comandante.”
“You have done well so far, but there is yet much further to go. The girl is the key to the painting. I am certain. Stay as close as you can. Do whatever you must. We shall know more. It is imperative. We may have to talk with her.”
Chapter 16
MILAN
Moto chewed on a croissant and narrowed his eyes as he sipped a caffè doppio from a paper cup. He glanced left and right around the crowded Milan train station café. His eyes strayed up to the mirrored wall behind Lucia, where the café entrance and the busy hallway outside were reflected. He ducked his chin and spok
e, so quietly that Lucia had to lean closer to hear him.
“Lulu—” he started, then stopped and twisted his face into a look of disgust as he held up the pastry and the coffee. “I don’t know which of these is worse.” He choked down the last bite of the croissant and followed it with the dregs of the coffee. Then he started again. “Lulu, we’re going a long way out on a very thin branch, aren’t we? No matter what we find, we’re going to have a hard time convincing anyone else that we’ve got proof, any real link between the painting, between our painting, and . . . well, anything. I mean, Aysha had her research, her thesis, her footnotes. But she’s . . . gone. And that book, the poetry, the notes, whatever was in it. It’s gone too. There’s nothing left.”
“So?”
“So we don’t have any proof. We don’t have any evidence. Who’s going to believe us if we decide it really is . . . you know, what we think it is?”
Lucia’s dark eyebrows knitted, folding a deep crease between them. It was a scowl that usually preceded a storm. But the storm warning cleared, and she offered Moto an off-kilter grin.
“We can get there. But first I have to convince myself. I know what I saw, what I felt that night in the dark. And in Rome at San Luigi dei Francesi. But I need to see more.”
Moto nodded. “As long as I don’t have to drink any more of this motor oil.” He gestured at the paper cup.
“Fair enough.”
“What now?”
She dropped her voice. “I told you. The Beheading.”
“I hate that word. So . . . Malpensa?”
“It’s too far to walk.”
“And too wet to drive.” He fell silent for a long minute. “Let me make a phone call first.”
As they pulled into Malpensa Airport, Moto told Lucia to drop him at the terminal so he could go to Alitalia and buy their tickets while she parked the car.
With a prayer to the Saint of Lost Cars, Lucia left her battered Fiat in a vast airport parking structure, half expecting she’d never see the old wreck again—and as she walked to the terminal, she found herself compulsively glancing over her shoulder, checking to see if anyone was following her. She forced herself to stop looking. And then she forced herself to stop: Stand still and think. Crowds surged past her, racing to catch planes or meet family or heading to that concrete jungle she’d just left in hopes of finding their cars. Stepping close to a light pole, a rock in a strong current, she tried again to understand what she was doing. It didn’t make any sense. This had all started with Te-Te, and Te-Te was nothing to her. A scrap of memory from a past that had never given her anything but pain. And the path she was following was obviously, ridiculously dangerous. So many people had died so fast. Why wasn’t she running in the other direction? Death-defying, for her, had never meant anything more dangerous than jaywalking in midtown Manhattan.
Someone lurched into her, and she recoiled with a gasp—but it was just a clumsy tourist with too much luggage.
And that wasn’t her either. Cowering in fear. She had to make up her mind right now. It was either go all in or go home. Turning around was tempting. Back to Monte Piccolo, finish the semester, then back to New York and back to her life.
That was a comforting thought, but part of her felt more alive right now than she ever had before. She liked that. No, she loved that. And she couldn’t feel alive if she was constantly worrying about winding up dead.
So she had to keep going, and she had to stop worrying, and she had to stop looking over her shoulder.
Just then, the little man on the pedestrian crossing sign began to flash green.
Lucia laughed and stepped off the curb. Nec spe. Nec metu! She was all in.
She had no trouble finding the Alitalia counter—or Moto. He was screaming at the ticket agent, his voice at a pitch that cut through the normal hum of airport noise. She heard the voice. She could see it was Moto. But it didn’t sound like him at all.
“You son of a bitch! That’s it! Fuck you!” That couldn’t be Moto. But it was. “We’ll fly on Meridiana. They’ll get us to Naples!”
The clerk offered an official airline smirk. “Not from Malpensa, they won’t.”
“I don’t care! Fuck you!”
He spun away from the counter and grabbed Lucia’s arm as the agent shrugged and called, “Next!”
“Come on! Let’s get the car. We’ll fly out of Linate.”
She started to object. None of this made any sense. But Moto was marching away too quickly for her to do anything but hurry after him, wondering what had just happened.
When they got to the parking garage, she tried to tell him the car was on Level 3, but he wasn’t paying any attention. He strode into the crowded elevator, then stepped back out, pulling her with him as the doors closed. He jogged up the stairs instead, with her following, deeply confused. On the next level, the doors of another elevator were opening, and as the only passenger stepped off, Moto rushed into the empty car and pushed the button for the top level.
Lucia didn’t bother to say anything. She wondered if the bad coffee had blown some kind of circuit in his finely balanced Italian mind.
When the elevator doors opened, they were blocked by a Biancheria Biancaneve—Snow White Linen—delivery van, backed up so close to the elevator doors there was barely room to squeeze by. But Moto didn’t squeeze by. Instead, without hesitating, he opened the rear door as far as he could in the tight space between the van and the elevator and climbed inside, pulling Lucia in after him.
Almost the instant he closed the door, the engine roared and the van pulled away.
“Moto! What the—”
He put a finger to his lips and gestured for silence as the van rumbled and bumped down the twisting ramps of the parking garage and onto the highway.
Lucia let the silence stretch out in the thick air and windowless dark as the tires hummed down the autostrada and the van swerved through traffic. Little by little, her eyes adjusted to the faint light that seeped in through the gap in the ill-fitting rear door. The van gave a violent lurch and her stomach lurched in sympathy. She considered whether to throw up on the clean linen—the snow-white linen—that surrounded them or, perhaps more appropriately, on Moto.
She wrestled her stomach under control and finally broke the silence.
“Moto”—she kept her voice low—“che diavolo stiamo facendo?” What the hell are we doing?
Even in the dim light, his smile was nearly dazzling—broad and gleaming white. That, at least, was the Moto she knew.
“Cara mia, if someone is following us, there’s no reason why we should make it easy for them.”
She considered that—but not for very long. “So why were you shouting where we were going for everyone in the damn airport to hear?”
The smile didn’t waver. “I said Naples, didn’t I?”
“Yes. But you also shouted we were going to Linate. Don’t you think they can figure out where we’re going once they catch us there?”
“But we won’t be there, will we?”
“Damn it, Moto! Don’t play any more games with me.”
“This luxury limousine is on its way directly to Aeroporto Il Caravaggio. Not Linate.” And before she could say anything, he added, “Don’t you think that’s appropriate? Given our mission? Really, Lulu, don’t we have to remain faithful to our hero, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio?”
Lucia refused to be amused. “And what’s going to happen when we get there and the driver finds us in the back of his van?”
“He won’t.”
“How can he—”
“Don’t worry. He won’t see us.”
She puzzled over that for a long minute. Then, finally: “Who are you? And what have you done with Moto? He was my best friend. I loved him.”
The dazzling smile. “And he loves you. But he thinks you shouldn’t ask any more questions right now.”
They sat in silence for a while, and then Lucia started talking, her voice subdued, almost as if she were talki
ng to herself.
“We need to find our way. From Caravaggio to the painting. From the painting to Caravaggio. Meet in the middle. Once we know for sure, we can fill in the missing pieces. Look”—her voice got stronger—“we have the painting at the orphanage. We have that. It’s a fact. And we know the orphanage got it from the contessa’s family. And we know they had it because some thieving Dei Marsi ancestor stole it from that idiot in Siena, Cavaliere d’Estrato. That’s all solid. We’ve got the evidence, the dowry inventory. That’s clear too. So we have both of those. The painting. The trail to Siena. That’s solid. And Aysha had her research. It’s all gone. But she had it. She was certain of it. And that takes the painting all the way back to Porto Ercole. From the orphanage”—she wanted to say “from Te-Te,” but she didn’t—“to the contessa. From the contessa to D’Estrato. From D’Estrato to Fenelli and back to Porto Ercole. In the summer of 1610—the last time and place that anyone saw Caravaggio. Even if the evidence is gone, we know that happened.”
The van rocked on its tired springs, lurched, and slammed into a pothole.
“I know. There are gaps. Big gaps. And we’ll never fill them because it’s all gone. Lost in the fire. But we know—we know—and we can keep following the story. If we’re right, we’ll find the trail again.”
Professor Richman settled into the first-class compartment with a smile. The Santa Maria Novella station in Florence was much smaller and simpler than Milano Centrale, and he’d had no trouble finding the train to Siena—which was not the train back to Monte Piccolo, where Lucia and Moto thought he was headed. He’d been perfectly sincere when he said that he was disinclined to risk death by fire or beheading. But now that the two reckless young fools were charging off on their own, he felt reasonably safe returning to Siena to do his own research. He didn’t need anyone holding his hand. He was going to enjoy working on his own.
If there was any substance to the story that poor young woman had spun for them, then there ought to be some hard evidence remaining in Siena. The fact that the girl hadn’t been able to find her poet’s burial site seemed more likely to reflect shortcomings in her research skills than the actual absence of a grave. If Mario Fenelli had existed, if he had died in Siena, if he had been buried there—then Professor Aristotle Rafael Richman was certain he could find some evidence. And even if he didn’t find anything, well, a few days on his own would be a pleasure. Keeping up with Lucia and Moto was exhausting.
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