Light in the Shadows

by Linda Lafferty

  No, she didn’t have to. Even in her turmoil, she knew she didn’t have to.

  But she knew she would.

  She would put herself in harm’s way, just as she had put others there.

  She would stand, teetering at the very edge of the world.

  And he would be there.

  He had always been there, everywhere, one step ahead of her.

  He always knew where she was. He always knew when she was weak.

  And Roero would know that tonight she stood in the dark.

  Alone.

  She was ready to accept whatever the night brought her way. She wasn’t frightened. She wasn’t brave. She was just sick of it. All of it. It wasn’t clear how it would end. But she didn’t care. As long as it ended.

  An enormous wave crashed, the foam somehow catching light even in the darkness. The spray slapped her face.

  She stood on the rocks, tall against the wind and waves, and shouted, “I am not Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, and I am not going to spend my life running away from assassins from the House of Roero!”

  And no one heard her.

  Not the young man tucked in the lee of an enormous rock, as near to her as he dared get, one hand clutching the cold steel of a pistol in his pocket, the other pulling the collar of his leather jacket tighter against the biting wind.

  Nor did the sound of her voice reach a second man, in a gray tunic, concealed higher up in the rocks, almost at the foot of the castle walls. But now, seeing her standing at the edge of the water, he rose and moved down toward her, slowly. He had a gun. He had a knife. But all he expected to need right now were the handcuffs and the length of chain in a bag at his side. He would capture her and punish her tonight—slowly, painfully, the punishment she deserved—before returning tomorrow to deal with the painting.

  Time passed, burrowing into the deepest part of the night.

  Lucia leaned against a boulder, shivering, her mind raging like the Tyrrhenian Sea, the Mare Tyrrhenum, stretching out before her into the dark. She thought again about what a fool she was, to be here alone. Unarmed. Before she had left the hotel to head into the night, she had considered finding some kind of weapon—perhaps a knife from the restaurant kitchen. But then, fool that she was, she had decided she had to remain true to her motto, Caravaggio’s motto: Without hope. Without fear.

  And arming herself would somehow be cheating.

  A faint glimmer of moonlight found its way through the clouds, and the young man in the leather jacket thought he might get closer. He leaned slowly, silently, out of the shelter of the rocks, just as the moon broke free for an instant, lighting a ragged circle of clouds.

  And a scream tore like lightning through the black of the night.

  The young man leapt into action. Already moving, he tried to move faster and his foot slipped on a wet rock. He skidded down to the beach but landed on his feet and ran, pistol in hand, to find another path up through the rocks.

  But then he stopped.

  Through a break in the rocks, he could see her, standing alone, standing strong, arms reaching up as if she would embrace a fading shaft of moonlight. And then in an instant, she crouched down, hugging her knees, staring into the dark.

  So he stopped and waited where he was. Watching.

  And still above them both, the man in the gray tunic also stopped and stared down into the night. In that brief moment of moonlight, he had seen the younger man and seen the glint of the pistol in his hand.

  His shoulders sagged, his gray tunic blending into the rocks. “Siciliano,” he hissed under his breath.

  He knew he could go no further tonight if they were still guarding her. But his military mind had another plan. Always. And unlike the cowards who had deserted him, he was not going to turn away.

  The vision that had wrenched the scream from her was a single image: an enormous face, floating above her, peering down at her, with great bloody gouges running from beside the eyes down across the cheeks. It was a dark, brutal face, and the wounds made it more terrifying, more dangerous.

  That was when she had screamed.

  But the scream didn’t shatter the vision, it drove her deeper under its spell.

  The face disappeared. There was a fleeting moment when she saw herself, as if from a distance, one of the two prisoners, peering out through the barred window at the beheading of Saint John, at the fate that might soon be theirs.

  And then she was seeing as they saw, seeing a scene that played out in the dark: blood and death. And like those prisoners, she was powerless to do anything but watch.

  But what she was watching wasn’t the martyrdom of Saint John. It was the scene seared into her mind by the explosion that had rocked her as she looked at Judith Beheading Holofernes. She felt the world tilt and spin, as it had then, but now there was so much more to see.

  She saw the man lying bloody and torn, Holofernes’s look of horror and surprise on his face. But it wasn’t Holofernes. Now she knew. It was Lucia’s father.

  And the woman racing to him, arms outstretched, face an incomprehensible blend of puzzled horror and concentration, wasn’t Judith reaching out to kill. It was Lucia’s mother, reaching in desperation to save what was already hopelessly lost.

  And now Lucia was there too, lying on the floor amid the swirling dust and debris, knocked sprawling by the blast. Voiceless, helpless. She was only five, what could she do?

  She could see her baby sister’s crib, crushed under the rubble from the explosion. One tiny hand lay uncovered. Motionless.

  There was a moment of silence. Untouched by the explosion, a clock in the next room began to chime the useless hour.

  With a sudden crash—almost a second explosion—the door was kicked in, and an enormous man leapt into the room, a shotgun held ready, sweeping from one figure to another: mother, father, Lucia.

  He paused for a moment at Lucia. The shotgun wavered. Then he looked down at the tiny hand under the rubble.

  “No!”

  He threw the shotgun violently, as far from himself as he could, and ran back toward the door, waving his arms and shouting.

  “No! Stop! It’s wrong!”

  A volley of shots from men outside, men who had been his companions up until that moment, sent him reeling back into the room, and as he caught his balance, Lucia’s mother was at him like a cat. Her face hideous. Her fingernails clawing at his eyes, gouging his cheeks. Her arms, her blouse, her face—everything smeared with her husband’s blood.

  “Assassino!”

  He threw her off and she fell to the ground sobbing. There was shouting outside.

  The man, blood running down his face from the woman’s attack, looked wildly around the room and then ran toward Lucia. She knew she was going to die, even though she was too young to know what that meant. But he swept her up and cradled her in his enormous, soot-covered, surprisingly gentle arms.

  And through the darkness and the years, she distinctly heard him say, “What bastards we are.”

  And she looked up, and there it was again, the enormous face floating in midair, the bloody gouges running down his cheeks.

  And now it wasn’t terrifying. It was Te-Te.

  She tried to say his name, but she couldn’t.

  There were shouts outside. More shots.

  She felt herself spinning as Te-Te turned one way, then the other, with her in his arms. A moment of hesitation—the world stopping, hanging in the balance—and then Te-Te ran into the darkness, breathing hard, holding her tight, sheltered against his chest.

  There was a shattering explosion behind them.

  Te-Te stumbled, but he didn’t fall.

  The sea threw a bucket of cold water in her face. She blinked hard to clear her eyes and worked her way back across the rocks in the half dark—stiff and sore, half-frozen and limping. She had no idea how long she’d been lying there or whether she’d been awake, asleep, or unconscious.

  She’d gone out to face Roero, ready to die, half expecting
to. Thinking she didn’t care. Prepared to die, she had been battered instead by a vision of death, a bolt that seared her.

  How was she still alive?

  After last night. After that other night, so long ago, that she had now faced for the first time.

  Te-Te had saved her. She didn’t know how he had smuggled a five-year-old out of the village, out of the endless Mafia war for territory, pitting neighbor against neighbor, out of the country and far beyond, to her nonna and nonno in the United States.

  She didn’t know and there was no one to tell her. There was no one alive who knew. But he had saved her.

  And she was saving him.

  Too late, but still.

  “Lulu!”

  Moto came running toward her, careful of his balance on the rocks. He hugged her fiercely and wrapped her in a blanket. In a moment, she realized he was as wet and cold as she was, so she pulled him closer and they shared the blanket.

  By the walls of the castle, the man in the gray tunic was still watching. He saw the slim, graceful figure of the young man in the black leather jacket, and although he hadn’t seen him before, he knew who he was. “Checca,” he spat. “Fottuto bardassa e puttana di Babilonia.” Faggot! Fucking faggot and the Whore of Babylon.

  Down below, on the rocks, Moto caught his breath. “Standing out there all night alone. Were you trying to get yourself killed?”

  Lucia turned to face him. The blanket wrapped tighter and pulled them closer together, face-to-face. And she answered him with the same words she had shouted into the wind hours—a lifetime—before. But this time she whispered them, fervently.

  “I am not Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, and I am not going to spend my life running away from assassins from the House of Roero!”

  Chapter 53

  Palo

  1610

  The men in the rowboat emerged from the midnight darkness and mist just as the moon rose in the east, spilling light across the water.

  They rowed up to the Gabbiano and rapped sharply on the hull.

  The captain looked down at them. In the shadow of the hull, he couldn’t make out their features.

  “What are you doing out in the middle of the night?”

  “Special orders,” said a hoarse voice. “Send down your passengers. The customs officer expects them.”

  The captain said nothing. He disappeared from sight.

  “Don’t keep us waiting!” shouted the hoarse voice again. “We are under orders to deliver the passengers immediately to the customhouse.”

  When the captain appeared again, he leaned over the deck, a big oil lantern swinging from his fist.

  “Show yourselves. Come under the light.”

  Murmurs and curses were whispered, but the oarsman rowed the boat into the pool of light.

  The captain studied the man standing at the bow. He wore a dark tunic under a maroon cloak, but the hood of the cloak was pulled up and his face was still in shadow.

  “Hand over the passengers,” growled the hoarse voice from the shadowed face. “If you don’t comply, we’ll impound your boat.”

  If you can catch me. I don’t like the looks of this.

  “You show me your documents first,” said the captain. “Or we will wait until morning.”

  “You are tempting fate,” answered the man. He jerked his head to his assistant, who fumbled through a leather satchel and drew out a paper. The man in the bow handed the paper up to the captain, and in that moment, the hood of his cloak fell back. A broad scar ran across his cheek.

  The captain knew this face. A cold shiver ran through him. He had faced without fear the worst the seas could throw at him, but this man was not someone he would willingly battle. He pictured the man as he had seen him before, in a black tunic with a white eight-pointed Maltese cross on his chest, a sword by his side, radiating the power of the knights of the Order of St. John.

  And now he saw, in the brief looks they exchanged, that this man recognized him as well.

  The captain gave the paper in his hand a brief glance. It no longer mattered. He handed it back with a nod, as if the paper’s authenticity had convinced him, though they both knew better.

  “All right,” he said. “I’ll rouse them. They’ll be sleeping at this hour.”

  “Get them!” snarled the scar-faced man.

  Caravaggio and Fenelli stood in the shadows. When the captain walked back, he whispered to them.

  “I have no choice, Maestro,” said the captain.

  Fenelli shivered. Caravaggio looked up, studying the rising moon. For a long time, he was silent. The captain watched, saying nothing more.

  This is a death sentence, thought the captain. Why?

  Finally, Caravaggio drew a deep breath and nodded. “I’ll go,” he said. “But you see that my chest is protected. Promise me that.”

  The captain shook Caravaggio’s hand. “I will. I am a man of my word.”

  Caravaggio walked to the sea ladder. The captain watched from the rail.

  See how he walks without fear, accepting his fate. Has some angel whispered in his ear? Caravaggio will look upon God’s face this morning.

  Below, the scar-faced man’s nostrils flared, and an ugly smile of triumph stretched his lips.

  As Caravaggio descended into the boat, he said, “We meet again, brother Roero.”

  The man yanked at Caravaggio’s shoulder, sending him sprawling into the gullet of the boat.

  Then he held up a hand, signaling to the captain. “We approve the entry of your second passenger.”

  “What do you mean?” said the captain. “He needs a stamp of entry.”

  The assistant threw a jute sack over Caravaggio’s head, and the scar-faced man lashed out with the butt of his gun. The form in the bag sagged in silence.

  The captain watched the rowboat disappear into the luminous mist. There were four figures in the boat: The oarsman, bent hard to his work. The two knights, standing tall. The shrouded form in the jute sack.

  Chapter 54

  PALO

  The room was filled with the happy buzz of scholars and experts meeting and greeting friends, cronies, allies, and enemies, all filled with breakfast and ready for the start of a daylong program that might be educational, entertaining, profitable, or simply boring.

  Moto leaned closer to Lucia. “I’m sure the carabinieri are here. Somewhere.” His voice trailed off into a shrug.

  Professor Richman strode into the room and, with a cordial wave to Lucia and Moto, joined a cheerful chatting circle of experts. Dressed in a finely tailored blue pinstripe suit, his silver-headed cane lending exactly the distinguished air he had hoped for, the professor was clearly in his element.

  The room lights dimmed slightly, and there was the scratch of a fingernail on a microphone, followed by an instant of feedback, instantly squelched.

  “If I may have your attention, please.”

  The room quieted, if not completely. People turned toward a man standing behind a podium at the front of the room.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” he began, “I am honored to present the scholar who organized this symposium, the distinguished professor emeritus of art history at the Sapienza University of Rome, Massimiliano Antonelli.”

  There was a polite scattering of applause as a tall, cadaverous man, his bald pate balanced by an impressive mustache, spent endless moments fiddling with the microphone, blowing into it, trying to raise it, and finally shrugging.

  “Welcome, distinguished guests. I do have a few words of introduction and orientation to begin our time together. However, before we formally open today’s session, I would like to note that we have a very special guest with us today. A surprise guest. And I would like to introduce that guest to you right now. So if I could please have your full attention for a moment.”

  The last chatterers quieted.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, signore e signori, may I present . . .” He gestured and an assistant drew back a curtain that had covered a space next t
o the podium.

  And there it was.

  The painting. Their painting. Te-Te’s painting.

  “. . . Il bacio di Giuda. Attributed to Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio.”

  Two uniformed guards emerged from the shadows to stand by the painting.

  The room was filled with a hum, at first eager, then trailing off somewhat into puzzlement. The man at the podium continued, “As you may have noticed, our ‘guest’ is not quite ready to receive the general public. But we knew that this distinguished group of scholars would understand.”

  The painting had been mostly cleaned. The rich shadows now had hidden depths and mysteries, shafts of light picked out hands, arms, swords—gestures, embraces, threats.

  But the faces still weren’t clear. The capable, bland images painted by Fra Federico Fenelli had been cleared away, but beneath each one, the restoration team had encountered a thick layer of tenacious opaque white.

  One presenter on the day’s schedule was advancing the theory that when Fra Fenelli had painted over the faces, he had used that thick, opaque layer in an effort to protect the work of the criminal genius, Caravaggio. A holy man rescuing the work of a lost soul.

  Whether or not that white paint had been intended as protection, it was certainly a challenge to the restorers, who had struggled to remove it without damaging the priceless brushwork beneath. For now, the faces were barely visible, emerging slowly, strangers in a fog.

  Lucia left Moto behind and slipped through the crowd, working her way as close to the front as she could. A velvet rope held her back. The guards stood at a careful distance to avoid interfering with the scholars’ eager inspection of the painting. Very civilized.

  Lucia had watched that painting carried past the dead body of the man who had saved her life. She had been alone with it through one very long and dangerous night, locked in a warehouse. She had woken up to it one very difficult morning in her apartment. It had been the focus of her life for months.

  Now, just to see it, she had to fight to hold her place as an overweight, overeager expert tried to elbow her aside.