The Da Vinci Deception

by Thomas Swan

  “They’re in a high-risk business,” Tony answered. “They don’t keep records and they don’t stay put for very long.”

  Jonas placed the envelope on his tray. “Remember that you can never be Tony Waters again. If they haven’t made the connection, they will soon. Have you picked a new name?”

  Tony rubbed his cheek where it still itched. “Yes. Before the day is over I’ll be Keith Habershon.”

  Jonas repeated the name several times. “That seems all right. Just handle everything carefully and don’t leave a new trail for your new friend at the Windsor police. One last thing. What have you done with your car?”

  “It’s in the public garage at Victoria Station. Cars are parked there for weeks.”

  “Clean it out. Now be on your way. I’ll see you at the bar in the Connaught at eight on Wednesday.”

  Tony swept the envelope off the tray and slipped it into his pocket as he rose from the table. Jonas watched him disappear into the crowd.

  Tony set off for Victoria Station at a half walk, half trot. He was about to lose all traces of his connection with Gregory Hewlitt, and his attention was fixed on creating a new personality and total change of appearance. At Belgrave Road he hailed a taxi. As he rode, he thought of the new character he was about to become. Experience taught him that when he assumed a new role, the fewer lies he must live, the more truthful his masquerade. But those thoughts did not block out the excitement he felt as he began piecing together all the parts that combined to make a new person. He knew what he would do to his hair and face. Now he thought of the clothes. The change would be quite different this time, he concluded.

  At the Victoria Station long-term parking area he walked past cars with many days of accumulated dust. He gave the old Morris a thorough search. Next he took the underground to Oxford Circle, transferred to the Central Line, and rode on to Chancery Lane. When he exited, he was at the northern edge of what once had been London’s newspaper district—two blocks east the Daily Mirror, nearby the Evening Standard, and to the south within short walking distance had been the Times and Evening News. This concentration of newspaper publishers had spawned numerous ancillary services, including typesetters, electroplaters, commercial photographers, and small printing companies. Near the Daily Mirror’s old offices, north of Fleet Street, he paused in front of a small shop with the name FLEET TYPESETTING, LTD. painted on a sign that hung aslant on two nails over the door.

  In the tiny office he waited for a man known to him as Morris. He didn’t know if it was his first or last name, and had never asked. Chances were it was neither.

  “This card. You printed it for me when you were on Salisbury Court.”

  “This here shop’s never been on Salisbury. Good you remember that.”

  “My mistake,” Tony replied. “I need more cards.” He handed Morris a business card on which was printed the name “Frank Pearson.” He had used the name frequently and in fact was using it when he first met Jonas Kalem.

  Morris examined the card. “Yes, how many?”

  “Fifty. Exactly fifty. But a different name.”

  “Costs as much for two hundred as fifty,” Morris said laconically.

  “Fifty is all I need. I doubt I’ll use that many.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Yes. One of these.”

  Morris took the passport and flipped through the pages. As he did, a hand dropped beneath the counter and pressed a button. His expression changed when he found a single identifying clue that proved the passport was his handiwork. A door opened behind Morris and two burly toughs came in. One went to the street and after several minutes returned, gave a hand signal, and disappeared through the door he had entered earlier.

  “A necessary precaution, Mr. Pearson.”

  “Habershon. Keith Habershon. Here’s the other information you’ll need.” Tony handed Morris a sheet of paper. “I’m leaving for New York on Friday.”

  “Where is your photograph?”

  “I’ll have it tomorrow. Before noon.”

  “You’ll leave a deposit of a thousand pounds. Another thousand when you pick it up.”

  “That’s a bloody fortune. I paid three-fifty for that old one.”

  “That’s the old price, all right. Inflation hits us all, Mr. Habershon. My competitors charge twenty-five hundred, but I see we have done business before. The balance must be in Swiss francs. Small-denomination notes.”

  “That may be awkward.”

  “Perhaps, but not difficult. Most times I require full payment in Swiss francs. Shall we proceed?”

  Tony placed a thousand pounds on the counter. “I expect everything to be ready on Thursday.”

  “It will be if your photograph is here by noon tomorrow. I’ll ask you to leave now.”

  Tony’s next stop was at Bermans and Nathans Costumers in the theater district in Soho. He went directly to the makeup department, where he bought a band of hair, a tube of spirit gum, and scissors. Next stop was a barbershop, where he had his hair cut in a conservative style with short sideburns. He then went to the Regent Palace Hotel, where, in a small dressing room in the men’s lounge, he fashioned a thin mustache, glued it in place, and neatly trimmed it.

  Off Piccadilly Circus he located a sleazy shop advertising triple-X-rated videocassettes, magazines, and passport photographs. He was photographed by an overly lipsticked girl who was surprised he actually wanted a passport photo. “Are you sure you don’t want to take Polaroids of me? I’ll do some tricks you ain’t seen, mister.” Her accent was thick and straight from Galway County. “Forty pounds plus film for ten minutes. For sixty you can have me for a half hour in a private room. Just me and you.”

  He thanked her agreeably and added a generous tip to the bill. “Later, perhaps. Yes, later.” He meant it. The tawdry girl excited him. He hadn’t slept with a woman for too long, and now suddenly he wanted this one. He lingered momentarily, then turned to the door and was soon absorbed by the commuters.

  Bright neon lights contrasted with the heavy gray sky. Long lines waited for buses and homeward-bound office workers clogged the entrances to the underground. Too late to buy a wardrobe, he thought, and so he fell into line and inched his way down to the platform where a train would take him to Bayswater and a short walk to Cordova House, a small tourists’ hotel.

  He bought an evening tabloid. On the train he unfolded the paper and saw on the third page that Sarah Evans’s death was being sensationalized. A headline screamed: WAS POLICEWOMAN RAPED?

  He ate at a neighborhood pub where he sat at the counter. He kept to himself and, after the meal, drank another pint of dark ale. All the while he was observing two men who were having an animated conversation. The younger man was Tony’s age and had an affected, nearly effeminate manner. He studied the way the young man waved his hands and how occasionally he would turn up his chin and shake his head vigorously. Tony was preparing for the role he would begin playing the next day.

  The next day was Tuesday, the day he would find a new suit to match the personality of Keith Habershon. Tony resisted the temptation to shop on Saville Row, but chose Harrods, where he would be unnoticed among the horde of shoppers. He also knew that the difference between a Henry Poole label and one from Harrods was several hundred pounds. The morning was nearly spent when he emerged from the giant store, hailed a taxi, and ordered the driver to the intersection of Fleet Street and Fetter Lane. He wore a dark blue suit and paisley tie and carried a small portmanteau filled with his other purchases. His scarred hand was covered with a black leather glove. In that hand he held his other glove and practiced the movements of a fine dandy. He slapped the glove against his thigh with a sharp thwack. He tilted his head slightly, then touched the peak of his new suede cap. All the while he rehearsed a new accent, conversing with the driver about the endless stream of tourists flowing in from Japan and more recently from Southeast Asia.

  He walked the short distance to the Fleet Typesetting shop. He waited several minutes
in the cramped office, certain that he was being observed from behind a wall blotched with peeling paint. Then Morris appeared.

  “You cut a handsome figure, Mr. Habershon. A successful businessman, are you now?”

  Tony answered dryly, “None of your bloody business. My calling cards. Have you printed them?”

  “All fifty of ’em right here.” Tony accepted the small package and slipped them into a pocket. He placed the new photograph on the counter.

  “We’ll have the rest of your order completed tomorrow. Two o’clock should do. And I was thinkin’ that if you’ll be travelin’ abroad, you might need a driver’s license. That’s a simple matter and I can have one along with the passport.”

  “How much?”

  “Eight hundred Swiss francs to our good customers.”

  “Do it. I’ll be here at two.”

  A walk from Fleet Street to Mayfair and the Connaught Hotel is two and a quarter miles. It is nearly a straight line with a jog at Trafalgar Square, then up Haymarket to Piccadilly, on to Berkeley, then Mount, and finally Carlos Place. Tony elected to take that walk, to practice his new role, and to buy a traditional black umbrella along the way.

  And he wanted to think. He knew that Greg Hewlitt would be discovered as a nonperson. Very quickly, perhaps even at that moment, the search for Anthony Waters was under way. If he were found, he would be linked to Sarah Evans’s fatal accident. But he had left no clues, and besides, why would he want to kill an assistant librarian?

  Now his thoughts centered on the full impact of being the object of a countrywide search, that his life would forever be played out in a masquerade, that for all time he would be a hunted man.

  At that instant a black police car sped by, its blue light flashing, the distinctive hooting horn blaring. He ducked into a doorway, stunned by an alien fear that swept through him.

  The sound of the bleating siren faded and he continued his walk. He breathed deeply and felt a sudden exhilaration course through every part of his body, and he smiled. Every sense was sharpened. He was obsessed by a single thought that he, the hunted, was prepared to play what would soon become an even more deadly game.

  Chapter 11

  The maroon Lancia sped through the curving narrow road and without slowing turned ninety degrees onto a graveled driveway, moved ahead two hundred yards, and skidded to an abrupt halt. Eleanor Shepard jumped from the car and ran across a pink-stoned patio toward what looked like a three-story stone house sliced in half. A phone was ringing.

  “I’m coming . . . I’m coming!” She leaned against the thick door, pushed it open, and continued her dash to the phone.

  “Steve, I’m here. You’re too damned punctual!” she blurted out.

  “You’re panting,” Steve Goldensen chided.

  “I’m out of breath . . . there’s a difference.”

  “You mean if I were there, you’d be panting?”

  “I mean if you had to fight the Florence traffic and a zillion tourists, you’d be out of breath. Tell me your news.”

  “I’m coming over. A problem came up in Paris and I drew the assignment. But I can tack on a long weekend in Florence. How’s that for news?”

  “Mille bene!”

  “Say again?”

  “That’s super news! When?”

  “End of next week. I have to meet with the client for a couple of hours. That means I’ll fly out of New York, damn it.”

  “Don’t say damn it. That’s good. You can pick up some books from the library in Jonas Kalem’s office. I can’t buy them over here and they’re important.”

  “Okay, but there’s a limit. I’m traveling light.”

  “I’m excited! You know it’s been six months? Half of the year I asked for.”

  “I damned well know. I keep a special calendar.”

  They talked for many more minutes. Their weekly conversations had become ritual; Steve placed his call every Tuesday at 5:00 A.M. Washington time. While it played havoc with her schedule, Ellie managed to scramble back to her villa to receive them.

  “We’ve talked enough,” Ellie said. “Save your money because everything costs a fortune over here.” She smiled at the phone as she put it down. She was dressed in white: slacks, shirt, espadrilles, and a bandanna tied over her red-brown hair. She retrieved several packages from the car, then climbed the curving stairs to the top of her half-house . . . her mezzo casa, she called it.

  The formulas for the inks were nearly completed and over thirty flasks and bottles lined a table set against a white-plastered wall. She sat on a high stool and set her day’s work in front of her. From her perch she was able to gaze out the window to the hills of Florence. The sun probed the haze and brightened the sea of red-tiled roofs.

  Memories of the past six months pushed aside all thoughts of proving out a recipe for an ink the Renaissance artists might have used. Half a year had flown by, and now it seemed like a terribly long time. Her hand reached out to touch a thick notebook that had become her diary.

  March 9

  I never want to forget the thrill of flying over France, then Italy when the air was pure and the early sun’s beams seemed to dance off a million little spots of water and made everything below look like I was above a fairyland. But Malpenza airport was more like a zoo with armed guards. I slept, but not well, and was dead tired when we landed. It took forever to get through customs, find my car, and get out to the highway.

  The main roads are incredible, and everyone passed me as if I were poking through an Alexandria school zone. By the time I reached Florence (I’ll learn to say Firenze) I was going a hundred and forty but that’s in kilometers. Try that on the Baltimore–Washington Pike!

  I know I’ll love Florence if I don’t have to drive around it. The motorbikes come at you from all directions and sound like three-hundred-pound wasps. Cecilia Grosso from the real-estate office was delightful and I hope we’ll be friends. She showed me some shortcuts from the city to my precious villa, and on the way pointed out I Tatti. I’m happy I knew about it and I plan to spend as much time there as I can. I fantasized that Bernard Berenson was still alive and had invited me to be his guest and browse among the eighty thousand books in his library.

  My villa is on a hill behind a home occupied by the Gambarellis. I met Jean Gambarelli, who is English. She’s tall and thin with white hair pulled back in a black ribbon. She must be sixty, but acts younger. She’s terribly friendly and had stocked the kitchen so I wouldn’t have to run out for food the first few days. Jean promised to help get a phone installed.

  I’m falling asleep as I write. More about my new home later.

  April 14

  Today it rained. The first rain in nearly two weeks.

  I thought I had fixed up everything the way I wanted it but spent the entire day doing all the things I kept saying I would do “tomorrow.” I learned that I’m living in a building that is over three hundred and fifty years old. It was built as a barn and stable with living quarters above, and was once twice the present size. It was built into a hill, and somehow it got sliced down the middle and that’s why there’s just one room on each floor. Except the first, where there’s a living room and a kitchen with awfully high ceilings. The second is my bedroom, which was the hayloft, and the third level is my studio and opens out onto the hill behind. Thank God they put in plumbing somewhere along the way. The water pump has a mind of its own and the hot water is either the temperature of lava or cold enough for iced tea.

  I’m brave now and drive into the city and park a few blocks from the Duomo. From there I can walk to the University of Florence, the Uffizi Gallery, and the library.

  May 2

  My English friend, Amy Howecroft, invited me to spend the day in the restoration rooms in the Uffizi Galleries. I met Amy in the checkout line in the new supermarket near the Piazza Nobili. She’s on academic leave and working on her doctorate. Amy’s been great! She helped me find the ancient paper Jonas asked me to locate. I found it in art and b
ook dealers in small towns, in out-of-the-way galleries, and the archives of cartieres, and small producers of handmade paper. A few of the small family-owned companies traced their origin to the Middle Ages and I saw paper being made in tiny factories along the Pescia River not far west of Florence. I saw a vat big enough for Jonas to take a bath in. It was four hundred and eighty-nine years old. I bought a centuries-old family ledger. I paid a hundred thousand lire (about sixty dollars) for it. The end papers are the perfect size and look new!

  June 17

  The saga of the telephone continues! To review: it took four weeks to get one installed, four more weeks to have it put where I wanted it in the first place (bedroom), but when I got home that afternoon, three men came to make the change but left and took the phone with them! Today it is back in the living room.

  August 6

  Steve warned me it could get hot in Florence and he was right! This afternoon I got home and changed into a two-piece bathing suit. Jean Gambarelli hovered over me like a sailor back from six months on the water. I rarely see her husband. Giuseppe is older and I wonder if everything is okay between them.

  August 18

  It’s frustrating to get phone calls from Jonas. They’re always so inconclusive and vague. I get the feeling that what I’m doing isn’t too important. But he keeps sending money and I continue collecting old paper and reformulating inks. It’s great I found Patzi at the University. She’s good company and I can send her on errands when I get tied up.

  September 5

  I never thought I’d go this long without seeing someone from home. I do miss Steve but I’m no closer to saying I’ll marry him than when I came over. Amy’s in Scotland for three weeks. I see a few new friends I met through Cecilia and I like the woman at I Tatti. Her name is Miriam Klein and she’s from Milwaukee. She’s employed by Harvard University. I’m homesick and the way I feel tonight I may tell Jonas I want to go to Washington for a while.