by Jon Tracy
Nine books that would have secured the safety and success of Rome until the end of time.
Nine volumes that would have protected his throne, his people and himself.
But the old fool laughed in Her face.
He held his fat belly like it had been freshly filled from royal feasting and he roared like a drunkard in the Aventine.
Mother says She’d never been so humiliated.
All She’d asked for was a small share of the riches She’d helped create.
A meagre portion of the prosperity Her prophecies had produced. But he waved Her away like he would a kitchen skivvy.
My sisters and I can feel Mother’s pain. Even now it hovers in Her spirit as she tells us how She refused to go. How She stared the King down and set aflame the first three volumes of Her treasured work.
He showed not a hint of concern.
Indeed, he even smiled as the fire’s flame-red lips greedily chewed their way in blackening bites through Her sacred works.
Poor Mother.
She says some madness must have visited the monarch, for he laughed uncontrollably and even warmed his hands in the heat of the hearth as the pages turned to ash.
And so Mother left.
In Her absence, the winds of pestilence and the rains of plague began to gather in the Roman skies. From the dark holes of the underworld, the goddess Proserpina and her minions slowly turned their heads with great expectancy towards the Eternal City.
The King’s augurs could see the dark clouds of calamity gathering and they urged Mother to return.
But still She was not welcome.
We ask Her why She subjected herself to such indignation. Mother tells us everyone makes mistakes.
Even kings.
Everyone deserves a second chance.
Even fools.
And so the foolish King was given his second chance to secure the remaining six books at the same price that Mother had originally demanded for all nine.
But the wisdom of Minerva was not with him.
He said the price was too high – far too high for something of such little worth.
Mother told him his foolishness bordered upon blindness.
She decided to show him the light.
She burned three more books.
It seemed to work.
Now, while he watched the flames grow, the gods whispered in his ear. It was as though fleet-footed Mercury had rushed to the King’s side with words straight from Jupiter and Juno.
‘Stop!’ shouted the King.
Mother smiles and we hang on every syllable of Her story.
She tells us that with six of the books gone, the King now begged for the remaining three.
We all cheer!
Mother bids us be quiet.
She explains that although She was now offered all She’d wanted – recognition, power, land and much coin – She was filled with great sadness.
Sadness and a doubt that the King and his descendants would properly use and protect the knowledge they’d been given.
We bow our heads, because we know of Mother’s gifts of prophecy and that Her fears would come true.
The last three of the nine books would eventually meet a similar end to the first six.
She smiles at us.
‘Worry not, my sweet ones,’ She says. ‘It is because of these doubts and these fools that you are so treasured, that your innocence is of such import. It is why the Tenth Book was created. And it is because of these reasons and our enemies that its contents and whereabouts must never be known to anyone.’
29
Major Armando Caesario sits attentively behind his old walnut desk in a high-backed leather chair, with his chin resting on his folded hands.
It’s quite a story that his new capitano is telling him, and he can’t wait for her to leave so he can ask Assante if she’s gone completely mad.
Female captains are not a good idea.
Never have been. Never will be. High Command, in all its forward-thinking wisdom, seems to believe it’s wise to promote more women.
It isn’t.
It’s a big mistake, and one day they’ll realise it.
Until then, long-suffering officers such as Caesario have to suffer the likes of Valentina Morassi and her meandering report about churches, severed hands, hooded gowns and ancient swords.
What rubbish.
He blames himself.
He sent her out to Cosmedin because she’d come from Venice with a reputation for working some big case with juicy headlines about Satanism, and he thought it amusing to send her back to a church again.
Now he wishes he hadn’t.
‘No,’ he says out loud. ‘No extra resources. No extra manpower. No extra anything.’
Even Assante looks shocked.
‘I’m saying no because you don’t even have one victim, let alone two.’ Caesario scratches an ear. ‘All this might be some crazy joke. Maybe this madwoman got the body part from a hospital and it was a sick prank that went wrong and traumatised her.’
‘The blood on what you call the madwoman’s gown didn’t come from the hand,’ stresses Valentina, annoyed at his tone and that he’s missed the point of her lengthy explanation. ‘It’s probably from another victim.’
‘I know,’ says Caesario angrily. ‘None of this makes sense, and I’m not about to waste any more precious hours and money on what so far is a crime without a body.’
Valentina is about to press her case.
Caesario doesn’t let her. ‘Captain, you’ve got forty-eight hours to come up with a victim – or victims – or I shut this case down. Now could you leave me, please? I have another matter to discuss with Lieutenant Assante.’
Valentina’s out of the room in a flash. She’s angry enough to punch a hole through a wall.
Body parts from hospitals?
Is he serious?
Her heart is pounding and she can’t bear the thought of waiting at her desk for Assante to reappear with a sexist grin on his face.
She grabs her coat and car keys and heads outside, wondering why on earth she didn’t stay in Venice, where she was known and respected.
In less than fifteen minutes, she’s zipped in front of a number 30 tram grinding its way down Via Regina Elena, parked the Fiat inside the grounds of the Policlinico Umberto and is opening Louisa Verdetti’s office door.
‘Oh no, really no.’ Louisa gets up from her desk. ‘Captain, please, I’m having a morning straight from hell, and-’
‘So am I,’ interjects Valentina, ‘and mine is to do with short-sighted, narrow-minded men who can’t see further than their diminutive penises and even smaller brains.’
Louisa starts laughing. She recognises the symptoms. ‘Our afflictions appear remarkably similar.’ She gestures to a sofa. ‘Would you like a coffee? I’m really up to my neck in work, but I have ten minutes for a fellow sufferer.’
‘That would be great. Espresso. No sugar. Grazie.’ Louisa phones it through and takes a seat on a sofa opposite her surprise guest. ‘So, how can I help? Suzanna Grecoraci, I presume.’
‘ Si.’ Valentina struggles out of her short wool coat and wishes she’d taken it off before sitting down. ‘We still haven’t found a victim to connect to the blood found on her, and my boss will shut the inquiry down if I don’t come up with something tangible in forty-eight hours.’
‘I have a similar gun to my head. My administrator is talking about releasing her. Putting her out on the street so you’d have to look after her.’
Valentina runs her hands through her hair. ‘If he does that, we’ll just lock her in a hospital ward inside the barracks without any proper treatment. That’s assuming I can even find a charge that would stick.’
Louisa lets out a pained breath. ‘How do these guys get to such positions? They’re not idiots, obviously, but it seems like they’re capable of behaving like them.’
‘One of life’s mysteries.’ Valentina ventures to mention a notion she’s been
considering. ‘I remember in psychology at college reading about the Cassandra Complex. Could that be anything to do with Suzanna?’
Louisa looks surprised. ‘Interesting notion. Cassandra because of the story she wrote?’
‘Yes.’
The doctor remembers, ‘The Cassandra Complex was a term coined in the late 1940s by the French philosopher Gaston Bachelard to deal with patients who believed they had the power of premonition.’
‘So it fits?’
Louisa flinches. ‘Not really. Suzanna’s alter called herself Cassandra but she didn’t predict anything. In the account, she wrote down that she was publicly punished and humiliated because she was hiding something.’
‘A secret. She said she’d rather die than disclose what she was involved in. What if the secret itself was a premonition, a prophecy or warning of some kind?’
Louisa doesn’t say anything; she’s silently sifting through her dusty back files to recall lessons from long ago.
Finally, something comes back to her. ‘There’s a Jungian analyst called Schapira who wrote a lot about the Cassandra Complex in relation to very disturbed patients who were disbelieved when they disclosed the true cause of their problems. Let me look it up online.’ She moves back to her desk and talks as she types into a medical search engine. ‘From what I can remember, all of this metaphorical referencing is linked back to Greek mythology. Hang on, here we are.’ She reads silently, then paraphrases the text for Valentina. ‘Schapira says that Cassandra women see something dark that isn’t apparent to others and can’t be corroborated by facts. They envisage negative or unexpected outcomes to situations and disclose so-called truths that apparent authority figures find hard to accept.’ She turns to her guest. ‘Sounds like she encountered a lot of sexist men as well.’ Louisa returns to the monitor and adds, ‘In frightened, ego-less conditions, Cassandra women shout out whatever vision they are having, unconsciously hoping that others might understand. But of course they don’t. To them, the disconnected words are just melodrama or nonsense.’
Coffee arrives on a plastic hospital tray brought in by a skinny assistant in her late thirties. She’s in and out so quickly she could pass as an apparition.
Valentina cradles the warm cup in her hands. ‘Is it possible for me to speak to the patient?’
Louisa returns to the sofa and picks up her drink. ‘Suzanna, you mean?’
‘No. Not Suzanna. Could you help me speak to Cassandra? Get Suzanna to persuade Cassandra to talk directly to me?’
30
There are a hundred good reasons why Louisa Verdetti shouldn’t be doing what she’s doing.
But she’s still doing it.
Going against the norm. Taking risks. Being unorthodox. They’re all things that past mentors and paternal tutors have tried to knock out of her, but none of them have ever succeeded.
She goes with her gut.
It’s part of what makes her a great clinician. Theory and reading can only take you so far. Experience can carry you another lap. An unorthodox approach nudges you over the finishing line.
Or gets you sacked.
She shuts the last thought out as she finishes introducing Suzanna to Valentina and makes sure the bedroom door is locked.
Valentina carefully follows the brief she’s been given. Go slowly. Be gentle. Back off if the patient is the least bit distressed.
She leans slightly forward as she speaks in a gentle tone. ‘Suzanna, I need to talk to Cassandra. Could you please see if she will speak to me?’
The pale young thing sitting in the chair next to the cream metal bed gives her a pained look. ‘I can try, but I know Cassandra is in a bad mood. When she’s in a bad mood, she doesn’t like to see people.’
‘Will you try for me? It’s really important.’ Valentina’s now close enough to take Suzanna’s hands in hers.
‘What are you doing? Don’t you dare touch me!’
The voice is no longer Suzanna’s. It’s stronger. Deeper. Far more confident.
‘Impudent girl. Who are you? Do you not have whoring to attend to?’ She almost jumps out of her seat and huffs indignantly. ‘Where did you come from? Some brothel, no doubt. Dear gods, why have you vexed me with such poxed company?’
Valentina watches the woman pace. She’s completely different to the mouse who was there seconds earlier. There’s anger in her every step. Tension chiselled across her brow. She juts her jaw challengingly towards Valentina. ‘What do you want, girl? Speak up now or be gone.’
Valentina remembers what she’s supposed to say. It’s going to sound strange, but it’s meant to be a bridge, a psychological route into the unknown. ‘Cassandra, we have been sent to you.’ She nods towards Louisa. ‘My friend and I are here because we are believers. We know you have things that you want to tell us. Things that others don’t believe.’
Cassandra looks as them curiously. She regards them much as a mother might watch a child taking its first unsteady steps. ‘What do you speak of? What things? Pray tell.’
Valentina is well versed in games of interview bluff. ‘You know we can’t simply speak openly. We must be guarded. Mustn’t we?’
‘Indeed.’ Cassandra settles back into her chair and puts her hands on its arms as though it were a throne. ‘What is your dedication to Mater?’
Valentina doesn’t know what to say.
‘I asked you a question, girl.’
She has to bluff. ‘How do I know I can trust you?’ She frowns. ‘You may be a fraud, you might be lying.’
Anger flares in Cassandra’s eyes. ‘Lying? You accuse me of lying? Some runaway who smells of the forica has the gall to suggest I am a fraud and a liar. Be gone before I have you whipped and thrown back into the latrine.’
Valentina turns around to Louisa. She needs help. There’s only so long she can keep shooting in the dark.
The clinician steps in. ‘Cassandra, I think it is time for you to be quiet now. Time to give way to Suzanna. Let Suzanna come back and talk to us.’
In the split second that Louisa looks to Valentina to signify that the interview must come to an end, things go horribly wrong.
A bony hand grabs the doctor by the throat and runs with her until her head bangs against the far wall. ‘ Domina! Dominus! Templum! Libera nos a malo! ’ The patient squeezes hard. A vice-like choke hold. ‘ Domina! Dominus! Templum! Libera nos a malo! ’
Valentina moves quickly. From behind, she loops her left arm around Cassandra’s neck and smashes her left forearm downwards to break the grip on Louisa. The doctor falls free.
Valentina sweeps her right knee behind Cassandra’s legs to unbalance her. She goes down shouting.
Valentina pins her to the floor, rolls her over and cuffs her hands. ‘Suffragio! Le anime nel purgatorio. Suffragio!’
‘Be careful. Don’t hurt her.’ Louisa is purple in the face but still worried about the patient.
Within a second, Valentina has Cassandra upright and is manoeuvring her backwards on to the bed.
The two women’s eyes meet.
She’s changed again.
Cassandra has gone.
31
Neither Valentina nor Louisa ever drinks in the middle of the day at work.
Except today.
A bottle of rough red given to the doctor last Christmas is uncorked and half consumed in Louisa’s office before either of them can really talk.
‘I’m sorry,’ says Valentina, back on the sofa where her ill-conceived plan was outlined. ‘I feel really bad about her attacking you like that.’
Louisa bolts down the vinegary wine and tops up her glass. ‘My fault. I knew better than you that she could have a violent mood swing.’ She touches her neck. ‘I think I’ll have to wear a scarf for a few days, or else there’ll be jokes about me dating vampires.’
Valentina laughs. She likes the clinician and wishes she could make amends. ‘I owe you one. Any time I can do anything for you, don’t hesitate to ask.’
Louisa holds up
her hand. ‘No need. I know you have a tough job. We can’t always help, but when we can, we’re usually very willing to do so.’
‘ Grazie.’ Valentina wonders whether Cassandra, or Suzanna – or whoever she really is – would have killed Louisa if she hadn’t stepped in. She concludes that she probably would. ‘Can I ask you to do me a final favour? Nothing risky this time.’
Louisa is wary. ‘Perhaps.’
‘Cassandra shouted out some words in Latin and Italian. I’ve made a note of them. If she says anything else, could you write it down and maybe call me?’
‘Sure. I can do that.’
Valentina scribbles her private cell phone and home numbers on a business card and hands it over. She notices Louisa’s fingers are shaking. ‘Can you take the rest of the day off?’
The clinician smiles. ‘No. Can you?’
‘Maybe.’ Valentina glances at her watch. Almost three p.m. She knows she should go back to the office, but she has no intention of doing so. Forty-eight hours. That’s all Caesario gave her, and the clock is already ticking faster than she’d like. ‘I have to go.’ She drags herself from the comfort of her seat. ‘Call me if you want. Even if you just feel the need to chat.’
Louisa nods and watches the policewoman leave. She puts her hand to her throat and tries not to cry. She got it wrong. Badly wrong. Maybe Valducci was right. Maybe she is guilty of jumping to conclusions, looking for a rare disorder when there isn’t one. Perhaps the woman who had her hands around her throat is just a wild psychotic killer after all.
32
Tom’s surprised to see her.
Pleasantly surprised.
But then the look on Valentina’s face gives away the fact that she’s not come home early for recreational purposes.
‘Are you all right?’ He puts down the book he’s reading and gets up from the sofa to go to her.
‘Depends on your definition of all right.’ Valentina is already at the fridge, pulling out a bottle of water. ‘I’ll tell you in a minute.’ She pours a glass, drinks and tops it up before putting the bottle back in the fridge. ‘If I don’t drink water as soon as I come in, then I eat like a horse.’ She slips out of her coat and goes to hang it up.