Black Madonna s-20

by Carl Sargent

  “Unfortunately it was destroyed by the French in 1494,” he continued, summarizing the next paragraph.

  “Wouldn’t you just know it? Bloody French.”

  “Somehow I don’t think this is it,” Serrin fretted, then scrolled the screen down. “Ah, but this-”

  “Lady with Primroses,” Geraint read. “Erm, ascribed to Andrea del Verocchio, circa 1475. In the Baptistery, Florence. having been relocated from the Museo del Bargello in 2048. Suggestions that Leonardo assisted his master with this work were confirmed by the discovery of working sketches and notes in a fragment of a Leonardo codex discovered in 2037 in the papers of a member of the Savoy family. Currently and for the last 150 years or more this work has been regarded as the only surviving statuary by Leonardo.

  “So that’s it,” Geraint peered at the image that formed on the screen.

  Not much to look at, is it?” said Streak from over his shoulder. Curiosity had got him up to see what was going on. “Wouldn’t have thought he was a genius from that.”

  “The hands,” Geraint mused. “Look at the hands. That’s remarkable work.”

  They’re too big,” Streak said simply. “Women don’t have hands that big. Look, they’re longer than her head is tall.”

  “You know, you’re right,” Geraint said.

  “The Shroud,” Michael said suddenly with a dramatic snap of his fingers. “The Shroud is too tall.”

  “What do you mean?” Geraint asked.

  “The figure on the Shroud is nearly two and a half meters tall. What’s more, the front and reverse images of the torso are different sizes by about five centimeters. One of the reasons why it’s hard to claim that it’s anyone’s winding-sheet, let alone that of a specific person”

  “So?” Streak said laconically. “So our great genius can’t draw proportion. So much for genius.”

  “There’s more to it than that,” Michael began, but he couldn’t crystallize his thoughts. Something still eluded him.

  “Then Gianfranco is telling us to look in Florence?” Serrin asked, squinting a little to study the image closely. With a mere laptop, the printer would take some time to produce a high-res printout of the archive photograph.

  “Merlin says he may have moved on,” Geraint added. “Somewhere close.”

  “Okay, but let’s consider Florence first,” Serrin insisted. “What’s Leonardo’s history in Florence?”

  “He spent some four years there, if I recall correctly,” Michael told him. “He wasn’t happy. He had left his master’s studio after he was, I seem to remember, accused of high-jinks with some seventeen-year-old. But the Medicis, effectively the ruling family, don’t seem to have rated him much. He headed for Milan, where he spent maybe twenty years. After that, there were spells back in Florence, Venice, Milan again, and then he died in France. In the arms of the king, the story goes.”

  Geraint laughed. “You’ve been reading up.”

  “If someone’s seriously into a Leonardo persona, it seemed like a good idea,” Michael replied.

  “So what now? We go to Florence and put ads in the papers and on the bulletin boards saying, ‘Tasty bird wants to meet Leonardo for a bit of artistic experimentation’?” Streak said sarcastically.

  “I don’t think so. The seventeen-year-old wasn’t female,” Michael said sagely.

  “Ah,” the elf said.

  “Not that anything was proved. Such accusations were often made for political reasons. Anyway-Michael got up and gave his hair a distracted ruffle-I’ve got a report to file for Renraku, but at least this gives me something solid to give them at last. I can say where we’re going next and make up an ingenious set of lies to embroider the story a bit, and they’ll send me a comfortingly large sum of money by return. At the very least, that’ll pay for the neurologist I’m going to need if I get my brain scrambled by gas or falling on rocks again, or anything else. Coffee?”

  ‘Please,” Serrin asked.

  “What amazes me,” Streak said as Michael went into kitchen, “is how come we’re alone in this. There must other people after this guy.”

  “Michael and I wondered about that, too.” Geraint said. There probably are. But Renraku was the only corp to get the icon. They’ve probably hired a couple of other teams, but they’d stick with the best. Michael certainly qualifies as that, and there aren’t many, not for something on this scale. I bet we’re a jump ahead of any other team. We’re not alone, but we must be a short head in front.”

  “Eh?” Kristen was baffled.

  “A horse racing term,” Geraint explained.

  “Geraint,” Michael said innocently as he returned from the kitchen with a ceramic tray bearing mugs of steaming coffee. “I wondered why you mentioned our man moving on when Florence was suggested. You know someone there, don’t you?” He grinned mischievously.

  “I was rather hoping you’d forgotten,” Geraint said, obviously ruffled and embarrassed.

  Streak saw his reaction immediately. “Tell us,” he said with an evil grin. “My Lordship, we have to save the world from the forces of chaos and discord and we need every friendly face we can find.”

  “Frag off,” Geraint said pointedly. “I know a certain noble in Florence, yes.”

  “More than that.” Michael twisted the knife.

  “Very well, I had a relationship with a certain countess from the city some years ago,” Geraint admitted to them all with an acknowledging sweep of his hand.

  “Come now, my lord. So modest! There was a duel,” Michael said grandly.

  “That was blown all out of proportion,” Geraint grumbled.

  “The pistols were loaded,” Michael continued with relish.

  “He only suffered a flesh wound.”

  “I’m afraid,” Michael announced to Serrin and Kristen in an excellent impersonation of a regretful English butler, that our friend had an affaire d’amour with a married lady. The duel was at dawn in the garden at-”

  “Yes, yes, all right,” Geraint said irritably.

  And I believe her husband is dead, killed n a car crash,” Michael said. “So the lady Cecilia is a widow now. I’m sure she’d be more than happy to receive a visit.”

  “I’m sure she wouldn’t,” Geraint countered.

  “Cecilia? That’s an Italian name?”

  “Lady With an Ermine,” Michael said mysteriously.

  “With what?”

  “One of Leonardo’s paintings. The woman was Cecilia Gallerani, a young Milanese-a teenager when Leonardo painted her. I recall vaguely that she had a somewhat interesting romantic life. Rather like your Cecilia, Geraint. Now there’s a femme fatale.”

  Geraint shrugged wearily. “Yes, I had an affair with a rather tempestuous married Italian countess. I wasn’t the first and I dare say I shan’t he the last. We did part on good terms, but I will not use this contact to get us into Florentine high society.”

  Four pairs of eyes turned as one to look at him. Throats were cleared, voices prepared to go into cajole-and-beg mode.

  He never would be sure exactly how they managed to persuade him to change his mind, but within ten minutes he made the call.

  “We leave tomorrow,” Geraint told them. “Fortunately, Cecilia is about to set off on one of her jaunts. She’ll receive us for lunch, and then she’s off to the mysterious Orient. Her words, not mine.”

  There was clearly some relief in his voice. Michael had had time to develop some guilt about digging at him. He now recalled the events of that time more clearly, and although he hadn’t been spending much time in London then, he remembered that Geraint’s entanglement with the Countess, whom he’d never himself met, had seemed to hit the nobleman rather hard. It hadn’t been one of the litany of short-term affairs with glamorous, often aristocratic women that Geraint had these days. But Michael recalled that the woman was a dozen years or so older than Geraint, and despite his assuredly romantic leanings, the Welshman would have had the sense to realize that it could never have been anything mo
re than an affaire d’amour. Didn’t he?

  “Time is running out,” Michael said.

  The doctor said you need rest. He said you shouldn’t be undertaking any exertions for four days at the least and absolutely no decking until tomorrow. More haste, less peed, old man,” Geraint wagged a finger at him.

  “Yeah, but we could go tonight,” Michael urged. “Get sone groundwork done.”

  “That’s not what I arranged,” Geraint said smoothly. Serrin also needs rest.”

  “I do?” the elf said, surprised.

  “Yes, you do,” Geraint insisted. “And Kristen agrees with me.”

  Serrin looked askance at his wife, who gave him a grin and a raised eyebrow and that “Yes, we’ve been talking about you” look she could summon up impressively when the situation so required.

  “But-” Michael began, and then couldn’t suppress a big yawn. He looked surprised at himself, amazed that his body had betrayed him so easily. Fatigue and lassitude were, indeed, creeping up on him. His calves ached, and there was a stiffness in his shoulders and back that didn’t help him deal with his residual headache too well.

  “Well, stuff it,” he said amiably. “It feels like my body’s decided for me. Maybe you’re right, Geraint. Time for a siesta.” He shuffled off toward the bedrooms.

  “I just might do the same thing,” the Welshman said, yawning himself. “I’m whacked.”

  “It’s only just past noon,” Serrin said.

  “It’s all right for some people, they slept in the car on the way back from Clermont. Not to mention most of the flight home,” Geraint observed.

  “Oh. right, sorry.” Serrin had already picked up a sheaf of notes from Michael’s stack and was apparently beginning to contemplate searching through them. Kristen didn’t look too pleased.

  “Have a kip, Your Lordship, and I’ll wake you for tea,” Streak said, flipping open a Zippo to light a cigarette.

  “I didn’t know you smoked,” Geraint observed.

  “I don’t,” Streak said, taking a massive drag and holding it in his lungs for some time. His grin grew a little broader.

  “Oh, I see. I think I’ll set the alarm clock,” Geraint said sagely arid stretched his arms above his head.

  Nearly a thousand miles away, a young man smiled broadly as he jacked out of the Matrix and turned to his companion with an expression of satisfaction.

  “They’ve made reservations on a flight to Florence,” he said.

  “That seems about right,” the older one said. “They should be in the right place at the right time, I should think.”

  “There may be others there.”

  “Then perhaps you should be there to meet them. They may need a little gentle steering. It won’t be easy for them to make further progress. And, of course, they’ll almost certainly meet opposition.”

  “I may need to return here in a hurry,” the young man frowned. “I mean, Master, in a real hurry.”

  “That shouldn’t be a problem, and no, Salai, I haven’t forgotten that there are those who might seek to interfere with that. Nor what they can do. Be gone, then”

  “Shall I take a direct approach?”

  A pause. “Give them one day and see what they do,” came the considered reply. “Then use your own initiative.”

  “Ah, you say that to me so rarely,” the young man said.

  “But you so rarely do what I tell you.” he was gently chided in return.

  “Which is why you keep me with you.” The young man laughed happily. “Take care, then. It will be soon now.”

  “It will, Salai, it will indeed.”

  Give them a day? the young man thought as he collected his already-packed cases. I think not. We do have a very good idea of who’s already there. No delays this time. I shall need to move swiftly.

  Besides, I was told to act on my own initiative.

  Within minutes, the chopper rose over the lagoon and headed westward into the darkness.

  19

  They gave up any hope of getting their biological rhythms synchronized. At midnight, Michael was wide awake and lively while Serrin and Geraint were tired. Streak seemed inexhaustible but was keeping his own counsel. Kristen was excited at the prospect of seeing the great city of Florence, so it was difficult to determine how tired she actually was. Further delay seemed pointless. Only slightly over eighty hours remained before Michael’s deadline was up.

  “At least Renraku seemed happy enough,” Michael told the others. “That is, they’re in a state of barely controlled hysteria. It’s when the control breaks down that they’ll start screaming. In the meantime I got the money. The rewards gone up, too.”

  “Reward?” Streak sniffed the air like a well-trained bloodhound. “Someone mentioned a reward?”

  “If I play a determining role in keeping Renraku from getting wiped I get the reward,” Michael grinned. “You’re on a retainer. I may cut you in for some of the deal if we succeed.”

  “Very generous,” Streak said with feigned nonchalance. “What’re we talking about here?”

  “I could stretch it to a hundred,” Michael said.

  “A hundred nuyen? Oh, wow, like, carry me out on a gilded-”

  “A hundred thousand, slot,” Michael retorted sharply. Before the astonished elf had time to reply, he’d picked up his suitcase and left the room.

  They made the small local airport at two in the morning. A security squad had delivered everything they thought they might need from Geraint’s apartment and a no-name, no-number, ex-SAS rigger was along for the ride in the pilot’s seat, hitching a lift, as it were, on his way to other business in Italy. The small private jet rose into British airspace at two-fifteen AM. and entered Florentine airspace at four-forty. The sky was just beginning to hint that the black of night was really only a deep blue deprived of light.

  “Airport breakfast and we get collected at six,” Geraint told them. “We have a villa at our disposal.”

  “What about security?” Streak asked.

  Michael threw up his hands in amazement. “We’re staying with a member of the de Medici family and you ask about security?”

  “I don’t know no de Medicis. I’ll need to check it out when we get there.”

  “I don’t think so,” Geraint said in his best “We’re paying you, so just for once do what I say” voice. Streak frowned and fell silent.

  “There are one or two people I might talk to here” Serrin offered.

  “Yeah?’ Michael asked casually.

  “Yes.” Serrin apparently wasn’t giving anything away. “And we’d better be careful. The NOJ has force in the city. We need to keep a very low profile.”

  “Actually, I’m not even sure what we’re doing here.” Michael said.

  Serrin ran it down for him. “One, we’re out of London, where a bunch of watchers are currently taking a very active interest in Geraint’s flat. Two, as I said, there are people I can talk to here. Three, Merlin seemed happy about it. Four, why not? It’s a lovely city.”

  “Okay. Just get me through breakfast and let me get my deck set up. I want to snoop around the corps today. Find out who else is onto this and what they’ve got so far.”

  “Breakfast in the airport,” Geraint said as they disembarked, “is a depressingly imminent probability. Let’s get it over with, shall we?”

  The sky was bright and clear as the horse-drawn carriage took them along the convoluted Viale Machiavelli, through the riotous Boboli gardens, past the Belvedere fortress with its looming clock-tower, toward the Arno River. The air was clear and fresh, the scent of flowers and blooming trees sweet but not cloying. Unlike Venice, a city that had virtually rotted from within around its toxic lagoon and in the deep chemical-soup slurries at the bottom of its canals, Florence had remained more or less beautiful over the centuries. The carriage headed toward the old Roman gateway to the inner city, and then along the broad, straight Via de Serragli toward the Carraia Bridge.

  “We’re staying in a vi
lla along the Via Cavour,” Geraint told them, “not far north of the river.”

  “Not far from the Baptistery either,” Michael murmured. “A place we should go and see, I think.”

  “I’d sure like to take Kristen there,” Senin said.

  “Be my guest,” the Englishman replied. “I’ll leave you to it and stick with my deck. Just who’re you going to see here, anyway?”

  “I’m not absolutely sure,” Serrin admitted. Michael looked curiously at him, but didn’t press the issue.

  “I’ll leave you to your own devices,” Geraint told them. “I decided to get measured for some suits as long as we’re here. My appointment’s at midday.”

  “You want me to stay with Mikey boy or tail Serrin and Kristen in case they’re being tracked by any interested parties?” Streak asked.

  Geraint looked to Michael. “What do you think?”

  “Go with them,” Michael said. “So long as the villa security is good enough.” He looked out the window at the swift-flowing river down below.

  “It will be,” Geraint promised. “Trust me. I’ve been here before. Someone tries to kidnap a Medici every week of the year, or so it seems. Quite often it’s one of the other Medicis. The descendants of Cosimo and Lorenzo have some exciting internecine feuds.”

  “They run the whole city?” Streak asked.

  “More or less,” Geraint said. “The city council is absolutely dominated by them and their proxies. It really isn’t so very different from the fifteenth century-except that they don’t have to worry about being invaded by the French or Spanish.”

  One of the black horses whinnied as the carriage halted outside the villa. The title was somewhat misleading; the house was narrow and several stories towered high above the narrow terraced street. If Serrin had imagined a small white building set off in its own gardens, he was disappointed. Liveried servants hurried to take the visitors’ baggage off the carriage and ferry it indoors.

  Geraint quietly and subtly handed one of the men a tip as the others milled in the hallway admiring the paintings and various busts.

  “Never mind those. There’s a genuine Donatello in the dining room apparently,” Geraint told them, opening the double doors to that room with a sweeping gesture. His gaze passed over the superb mahogany dining table and chairs, over the gleaming silverware and crystal, to the carved alcove at the far end of the room.