by Thomas Locke
“So it is. One moment.”
Alessandro continued his cleaning until Edoardo arrived and declared, “I race up here with lights flashing and sirens screaming, only to have you two lock me out?”
Alessandro replied, “Just the man I need. Help me lift this thing down. Take great care. The surface is coated in mold slick as soap.”
“What’s inside?”
“I have no idea.”
Edoardo snorted. “And people wonder why Italy’s justice system is in such shape.”
The two of them were puffing hard by the time the locker rested on the stone floor. Alessandro’s penknife had been made for him by a locksmith friend and contained special implements not normally found on the end of a policeman’s keychain. Edoardo and Luca watched as he picked the lock and opened the case. The interior had remained pristine. The hinges were brass, as Alessandro had suspected, and not gold. They shone ruddy in the chamber’s fluorescent lighting.
The two men leaned over his shoulder. “Are they rifles?” Luca asked.
“They are,” Alessandro replied.
“I have never seen the like.”
“They are very rare.”
Edoardo asked, “May I?”
“Careful. Those scopes make them quite heavy.”
Edoardo lifted one of the rifles from the special felt-covered hold. The nightscope was as long as the stubby barrel. “You know this weapon?”
“I do. What is more, I am probably the only person in Como who does.”
Luca said, “This is very spooky.”
“You don’t know the half of it,” Alessandro said. There were four rifles laid end to end. “These are made by a company called Wahler. The factory is located in the borderlands between Germany and Austria. It is a pneumatic rifle, accurate to two hundred meters, or so they claim. Powered by special gas canisters. I imagine if we lift the rifles out, we will find beneath that flooring both the canisters and the darts. Perhaps some pistols as well for close-quarter work.”
“Who would use such a thing?”
“Oh, any number of people. Researchers tagging animals after anesthetizing them. Game parks. Wealthy sportsmen.”
Edoardo settled the rifle back into the case. “Expensive?”
“On the open market, the contents of that box would probably bring half a million euros.” Alessandro stared at the locker a moment longer, growing accustomed to the dual facts that Charlie Hazard had told him the truth and that he himself was going to help them. He turned to Luca and said, “I need to borrow this for a time. Without any record being made that this has left with me.”
Luca gave an easy shrug. “How can I make a record of something that does not exist?”
“I will bring it back. In the meantime, I need you to find out where it came from.”
“Consider it done.”
Edoardo asked, “Does this have anything to do with the thugs parked inside the Bar Azzurra?”
“I think yes. Most probably there is a direct link.”
“Will you tell me when you know for certain?”
“Of course.”
Edoardo turned to Luca and said, “Old friend, I must ask that you leave us alone for a time. Alessandro and I must have ourselves a discussion that never took place.”
Edoardo was a squat man, solid and immensely strong. He had a gaze that could probe deep as a bullet. “Tell me how you know about this rifle.”
“A Camorra boss we went after was a collecting fiend. He had every rifle ever made, or so it seemed at the time. Including two of these. When they went up for auction, they were bought by Cambridge University’s veterinary school.”
“Is your current interest tied in any way to that old Camorra case?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Will you tell me what you’re working on?”
Alessandro had expected the question. And still was uncertain how to answer it. “You would not believe me.”
“Tell me anyway.”
So he did. The meeting outside his church. Turning on his phone. Speaking with Edoardo. Everything the Americans told him.
Edoardo mulled that over, then said, “If I did not know you as the most honest man in Italy, I would say you should have worked up a better lie.”
“I admit, it sounds insane even as I tell you. Then again, we have no reasonable means to explain how the nine came to be trussed with Super Glue and parked in the bar.”
Edoardo nodded slowly. “Tell me about this American. What was his name again?”
“Charlie Hazard. He is so still, you could easily ignore him. He compresses himself into a space smaller than his own body.”
“Sounds to me like a professional assassin.”
“He could be, and a good one, were he not so principled.”
Edoardo gave him a skeptical look. “You’re certain of this, are you?”
Alessandro spoke very slowly. “I have earned a doctorate in the art of lies. After all, I have been an Italian bailiff for over thirty years. I have been lied to by the finest. I know all shades and permutations. And I am absolutely certain Hazard told me nothing but the truth.”
Edoardo shut the locker and set his briefcase on top. He extracted a laptop and turned it on. “As I told you on the phone, the attackers your American faced were two squads. One was led by a punisher for a Ukrainian known as the Prince, who handles most of the Natashas in northern Italy. The other was led by this man.”
“I know him.”
“Of course you do. His name is Montefiori, and his uncle runs the Como club scene. The three men with him are employees of a professional bodyguard and corporate security group. We have long suspected the security firm of criminal connections. But this is the first concrete evidence we have ever obtained. Which means this case has moved far beyond a simple assault on a bar.”
“I understand.”
Edoardo tapped the face on the screen. “This morning, Montefiori slit his own throat. Inside the prison. After being skin-searched by pros.”
As Alessandro absorbed this news, Edoardo ran his thumb over the laptop’s fingerprint scanner and coded in a lengthy password. He entered a file name and said, “What I am about to show you, you have not seen. How could you, since it does not exist? We have wired the prison room used by defendants and their lawyers. We can’t use anything from this surveillance in court. We can’t tell a judge we’re doing this. Permission has come from the absolute highest levels—verbally. Anything we learn, we never use unless it is first discovered by some other source. One that we can make known publicly.” Edoardo hit the switch. “This happened earlier today.”
As soon as the image appeared, Alessandro cried, “That lawyer was in my office!”
“When?”
“A little over six hours ago.”
“Which means he went straight from you to the prison.”
Alessandro watched as Antonio D’Alba entered the grey room and seated himself at the metal table across from a brute with a killer’s face. Antonio said, “The Prince wants to know who did this.”
“We were ambushed inside the wall. I don’t even know how many there were. Many.”
Alessandro said, “Actually, there were only—”
“Shh. Watch.”
Antonio said, “Tell me where this happened.”
“I can’t.”
“This is the Prince asking.”
“The man has my highest respects. But I cannot give what I don’t know. All I can say is, we were in Brunate.”
“The village above Como.”
“The same. You know how it can be in the mountains. It was the middle of the night and raining hard. The clouds were a blanket. We followed Montefiori’s car. I could hardly see the building from inside the wall. It was a villa. There was a gatehouse. More than that I can’t say.”
“The Prince will be displeased.”
The brute shrugged massive shoulders. “Ask Montefiori.”
“I can’t. He’s dead.”
&nb
sp; The brute smiled. “Pity. I was looking forward to doing him myself. Slowly.”
“Montefiori’s men claim they knew nothing more than you. There was a woman being held in Como, a dancer. They learned of this group through her mother, who was the villa’s cleaner. Both the mother and the daughter have vanished.”
“Perhaps Montefiori’s men know more than they are saying. I could ask them myself.”
The lawyer rose to his feet. “First we have to get you out.”
Edoardo stopped the video feed. “That will prove more difficult than he expects, now that we have evidence of criminal collusion. Not to mention how one of their own has managed to kill himself while in solitary lockup.”
Alessandro straightened. “Will you help me shift this case to my car?”
After they settled the crate onto a wheeled cart, Edoardo asked, “What was the name of the Orlando policewoman?”
“Irma Steeg.” Alessandro spelled the name. “Senior detective, retired from Homicide.”
“I’ll see what I can learn.”
As they passed the front barrier, Luca looked up from a dusty file and announced, “I think I know where your locker came from.”
“Tell me.”
“The year before I started here, there was a conviction.” Luca read from a mildewed file open on his counter. “Europe’s biggest importer of forbidden animals.”
Edoardo grinned. “I remember that. He had clients everywhere. Even inside the president’s palace.”
“And the Mafia,” Alessandro recalled. “They love to collect wild animals for their private zoos.”
Luca read off the screen. “The court ordered all his assets seized.”
“Let me guess,” Alessandro said. “The records show he went to prison a pauper.”
“Hardly a penny to his name.” Luca tapped the page. “It says your box should contain four air rifles and two air pistols. Purpose: target shooting. Total estimated value: five hundred euros.”
Edoardo said, “Someday soon, he’ll be freed on parole. The lost items will suddenly be discovered. An auction will be held at midnight. Few people will bother to come. His old friends will reward his silence by restoring his possessions.”
“It’s a familiar tune,” Luca said.
“I hate it all the more for that reason,” Alessandro said. “May I also borrow the file?”
Once they had bid Luca their farewells and were safely inside the elevator, Edoardo said, “Warn your Americans that the attackers will return. Of that I am utterly certain. And sooner rather than later.”
“I think,” Alessandro replied, “Charlie Hazard already knows.”
When they had loaded the locker into Alessandro’s car, Edoardo warned, “Be careful, old friend. We don’t want the enemy to know of our interest until we have already left the beast’s lair.”
38
Charlie and the ladies took a taxi from the Statale back to Milan’s main train station. Julio followed in a car owned by one of the students. Three minutes into the journey, Charlie turned around and asked, “Did anyone see the housekeeper this morning?”
“I don’t . . . No. But my mind was on other things.” Gabriella blinked. “Charlie, is this something we have to discuss now?”
“Maybe.” He asked the two Tibetan women, “What about you?”
“No,” Daisy replied.
He said to Gabriella, “Call the house. Ask around.”
Two minutes later, she hung up and said, “No one has seen her since last night.”
Charlie watched the windshield wipers thunk back and forth. The fact that he had not thought of this before left him feeling vulnerable. He had been too focused on what the ascents revealed, on the prescient. He had not maintained his standard hyper-alertness. Mistakes like this could get them all killed. He did not speak again until the taxi stopped before the train station.
Charlie sent Julio and the Tibetans to the café on the platform, then walked Gabriella over to where the students were clustered by an empty bus stop. “I’m winging it here, so if you think differently, just sing out, okay?”
“Do what you think is best, Charlie.”
The seven students were clearly freaked to the max by being drawn into the mystery of now. But something they saw in Charlie’s face was enough to calm them. Charlie asked the tall young man, “You speak English, yes?”
“I have been to two basketball camps in your country,” he declared proudly. “One in Miami, the other in Chicago.”
“What’s your name?”
“Massimo.”
“Okay, Massimo. I want you to translate exactly what I am going to say. If you don’t understand something, stop me. Don’t guess. Don’t approximate.” Charlie gave each of the students a ten-second inspection, boring in deep. “My name is Charlie Hazard. I am a former Army Ranger. Right now I am handling security for the scientists. You don’t need to come any farther than here with us. I’m sorry to have dragged you away like that, but I had to get Gabriella out of there. You need to vanish. Right now. Don’t go back to the university. Don’t go home. Give Gabriella your names and contact details. As soon as the danger eases, she’ll be in touch.”
To their credit, none of them gave him lip. Instead, when Massimo finished translating, they clustered in closer. One of the students, a young woman whose rectangular glasses framed eyes of black fire, spoke in Italian. All the others nodded. Massimo translated, “We cannot come with you?”
Charlie glanced at Gabriella, but the woman simply gave him a trusting gaze. He said, “You can, if you are certain that’s what you want. It may be dangerous. Last night we were attacked. We defeated them. This time.”
Massimo said, “Please, excuse me. But you are certain this threat is real?”
“They sent in two hit squads, one of four men, one of five.” Charlie watched their features go as grey as the rain. He was sorry to kill their smiles. But it had to be done. “If you want to take off on your own, that’s fine. It would probably be safer. But you need to make yourselves scarce. You represent the threat they are trying to extinguish. You’ve taken the basic deal and . . .” He stopped because they were talking among themselves. He glanced at Gabriella. She raised one finger. Wait.
Massimo collected firm assents from the entire group, then said to Charlie, “We can help, yes?”
“I have no idea.”
Gabriella addressed them in English. “This morning Charlie and I could not ascend. We were trying to determine where the next attack might come from. Neither of us could do it. So yes, we could use your help identifying the threat and the timing. But remember what happened to the woman banker. What if the reason Charlie and I cannot ascend is because of what we have been doing? There is a risk that if you get involved with us, you might find yourselves in the same state.”
A shudder ran through them. Even so, when Massimo asked the others, they all agreed. He said, “We want to fight your fight.”
Charlie offered the student his hand. “Welcome to the club.”
Gabriella remained intently withdrawn during the journey back to Como. Her gaze was fastened upon the night beyond their window. Occasionally she made terse notes on a pad she held in her lap, then returned her attention to the stream of streetlights and rain. When they arrived back at the villa, she asked Charlie to assign the students rooms for the night, said they all should meet at noon the next day, then vanished before Charlie could ask her what was the matter.
On Sunday Alessandro phoned Charlie and made arrangements to meet him that afternoon. He then walked with his wife through the center of town, taking aim for the lakeside ferry port. The weather played the Italian temptress, promising much, giving little. Tiny slivers of daylight played among the clouds, brief glimpses into a different season, a different world. The ferries all left from piers along the Lungolago, the broad avenue rimming the lake. The street actually changed names seven times as it meandered along the city’s waterfront. Alessandro had made it a point to learn such items
upon his arrival, part of acclimating himself to this new posting. Carla neither knew nor cared. For her, like for most of Como’s residents, the one name was more than sufficient.
Sunlight played upon the lake as the ferry departed. The passengers were all bundled against the chill and the damp, and much of the conversation was about the lost season. Carla was content to silently hold his hand and drink in the morning. Ancient villages climbed the steep slopes, eventually giving way to the emerald green of Alpine forests. And everywhere rose the lakefront palaces, Medici and Gothic and medieval and Renaissance jewels.
On the best of Sundays, Alessandro watched the shadows dissolve from Carla’s features. She had been deeply stained by his work in Naples, and by her own. Until threats against their son had forced her to relocate to Rome, Carla had served as administrator in a church-sponsored orphanage. Many of her charges had been indirect victims of mob violence. That morning, Alessandro studied his wife’s lovely features and felt he could assign a child’s tragic story to every line.
Novara was one of the lost villages, largely ignored by tourists and thus a delight to visit. The hill was too steep for easy access, the stone cottages too somber. Most tourists preferred the glitz of Bellagio and Cernobbio, with their palatial hotels and ten-dollar coffees. They climbed a rain-slick cobblestone path up into a silence that could only be described as medieval.
Afterward they had lunch in the Imperial Hotel, a distinctly Italian fixture from the age of Victorian travelers. The lakefront dining room had once hosted the likes of Byron and Shelley and Twain.
The clouds were thicker now, the color a more uniform slate. But the atmosphere remained warm and genteel, the chamber filled with the music of Italians determined to wrest a good time from the grey day.
Carla waited until they had ordered to ask, “Are we being sent back to Naples?”
“What? Don’t talk silliness.”
“It is not anything of the sort. You would only bring me here to celebrate or to soften me up for very bad news. Is everything all right with our son?”
Their only child was a banker in La Spezia. “So far as I know, he is happy and well, as is his wife and our granddaughter.”