The Swagger Sword

by David S. Brody

  Brian stepped from the behind a van. “Hey Cam.”

  “Brian,” he stammered, stopping midstride.” He turned his body in attempt to shield the duffel. “What, um, are you doing here?”

  “Same as you. Looking for the treasure.” As he spoke, two large men took up positions on either side of him.

  Cam nodded knowingly, as if just figuring out he had been made. “Okay. Good job. You got me to do your dirty work.” He lifted the duffel. “I found the treasure. Thing is, it’s not all that great. And it’s not even Templar.”

  Brian’s tongue flicked against his front teeth. He motioned his head. “Into the van.”

  “Okay.” So far so good. He had not asked about Amanda and Astarte, so maybe Astarte was right that he hadn’t seen them.

  They climbed into backseat as Brian’s cronies waited outside. “Let me see it,” Brian said from behind the driver’s seat, dropping an armrest between them.

  Cam pursed his lips. From the duffel bag on his lap, he pulled out the deed, the bones, and the jewelry. One by one, he handed the objects to Brian. “I think the bones are fingers or toes of Saint Bernard. I read once that all the Cistercian monasteries got some of his bones. The deed is some property in downtown Boston.” He gestured toward the bag. “And there’s cash, maybe ten grand. Not sure what the jewelry is worth.” He preferred not to have Brian examine the cash, lest he notice the modern dates on the bills.

  Brian sniffed. “That’s it, ten grand?”

  “That was quite a lot of money back in the day.”

  “What about the Templar shit?”

  “I’m guessing what happened is they took all that stuff with them went they moved to western Massachusetts in 1950, after the fire.”

  “So what’s this?”

  “A couple of monks stayed,” Cam lied, “to deal with the property after the fire. Maybe one of them put his personal stuff in the safe deposit box.”

  Brian again clicked his tongue against his teeth, studying Cam. “Hmm.”

  Cam decided to go on the offensive, to refocus Brian on this treasure rather than the Templar one. “So, old friend, now what? You going to steal the ten grand from me?” He lifted his chin. “Just like the old days?”

  But Brian would not be dissuaded. “I don’t give a shit about this,” Brian said, waving his hand over the duffel. “But what you said doesn’t add up. Why have all these clues, the map, all the bullshit, if there’s no treasure?”

  Cam shrugged. It was not his job to help Brian figure this all out.

  “Fuck me,” Brian said, opening the van door. He called to the two ruffians. “Get in. Find us a hotel.” He glanced at the duffel. “One that’ll take cash and not ask questions.”

  Wedged into the janitor’s closet with her mother, Astarte buried her nose in the crook of her arm. She didn’t like to sound whiny, but still. “What is that horrible smell?”

  “I think it’s Pine-Sol. They use it to clean the floors.” Amanda gestured toward a bucket on the floor next to them. “It’s coming from that.”

  “Is it supposed to smell like formaldehyde?” Astarte crinkled her nose. She had been hungry, but not anymore.

  “It actually used to smell like pine trees. A few years ago they ran out of pine tree stumps, so they switched to a synthetic product. Anyway, I think we can get out of here soon. I just saw the lights go out from under the door.”

  “Good. My throat is starting to hurt. Now I know how the wasps feel when Dad sprays their nest.”

  Amanda slowly pushed open the closet door, the creak of old hinges filling the abandoned bank.

  “Shush!” Astarte said.

  Amanda shrugged. “Let’s go on the offensive. If anyone asks, we were in the loo and came out to find the lights off and bank closed.” She clicked on her cellphone flashlight and peered out. “Hello,” she called. “Anyone here?”

  Astarte grabbed her mother’s shoulder and pointed at a red light glaring at them from the far end of the hallway. “I think that’s a motion detector.” Apparently the minor movement of the closet door had not been enough to register. “If we step out there, it’s going to go off.”

  Amanda tilted her head. “Like you said, that’s fine. We’ll stick to our story.” Presumably Cam had somehow lured Brian away.

  “I’ve been thinking, maybe I was wrong. If the alarm goes off, then there’ll be, like, a hundred police cars. Plus cops with guns drawn. And maybe reporters. Wouldn’t it be better if we can just sneak out?”

  “But that’ll set off the alarm also.”

  “But by then we’ll be out the door, not up here on the third floor.”

  “Okay.” Amanda smiled again. “You’d make a good spy.”

  Amanda peered down the hallway. “The camera looks like it’s angled so it covers the stairwell. Makes sense—nobody can get to this floor without coming up the stairs.”

  “Or down the stairs from the roof,” Astarte pointed out. She smiled. “As a spy, that’s what I’d do.”

  “Fine. Either way, you’d use the stairwell. I think we can get out of the closet without the eye seeing us.” She eased the door open. Nothing. Moving slowly, and keeping to the near wall, she slid out. Still nothing. “Okay, follow me.”

  Astarte did so, her heart thumping. It made no sense—they were in no real danger. But it was like those childhood hide-and-seek games, where the dark unknown created a sense of suspense and even fear. Probably an instinctive reaction to an age-old terror of being hunted in the night. “Where to?”

  Amanda gestured toward the elevator. “What are the chances it’s still on?”

  Astarte knew the elevator at school was always on. “I don’t think they ever turn them off.” She bit her lip. “But then why focus the motion detector on the stairwell?”

  “Probably because there’s another camera at the bottom, preventing anyone from getting onto the elevator from the first floor.”

  “So what do we do?”

  Amanda smiled. “You’re the spy. How do we get out?”

  Astarte took a deep breath. It shouldn’t be that hard. Banks were designed to keep people out, not in. “I have an idea.” She led Amanda to the elevator and pushed the button, calling the car. The whir of a motor responded as the elevator ascended to them. Doors opened and Astarte stepped in. She pushed the ‘B’ button. “Like you said, the cameras are on the main floor, where the money is. But I bet there’s nothing in the basement. Maybe in the vault itself, but not in the hallway.” Even if there was a security camera, and they were eventually identified on it, they could still use the excuse they had been locked in the bank after hours.

  The lift descended three floors. As the car came to a rest, the doors opened. Amanda began to step out slowly. Astarte restrained her again. “If you go left there’s a door at the end of the hallway. I remember it from when we were down here. I think it’s a fire door.”

  “It’ll be alarmed, but like you said, by then we’ll be out to the parking lot.” She cautiously stepped into the darkened hallway, both of them holding their breath. No alarm. Amanda smiled in the glow of the elevator light. “Once we get outside, run. And this time I won’t let you beat me.”

  Astarte grinned. “Bring it on.”

  Together they scurried down the darkened hallway, the neon exit sign beckoning them to freedom. As they passed the door marked ‘Maine,’ Amanda slowed. “Seems a shame to leave the scroll there.”

  The reality was they had no choice; the vault was locked. Astarte replied, “At least you’ve got pictures.”

  Amanda lurched ahead. With two hands she shoved down on the release bar, dipped her shoulder into the door and pushed through. Immediately the cawing of an alarm assaulted their ears. They stood a half-dozen steps below parking lot grade, in a concrete stairwell. “Up the stairs and we run,” Amanda yelled, her face lit by a nearby streetlight. “Only question is, which way?”

  Astarte didn’t have a chance to respond. A pair of hulking figures emerged at the top of
the stairs, blocking their path. Between them stood a tall woman, cloaked, a hood framing her familiar face.

  Astarte gasped. “Emmy!” What is she doing here?

  The woman-child nodded, her blue mismatched eye shining in the night. Roberto appeared, standing behind her, his hand on her shoulder. She lifted her chin, threw back her hood and shook out her hair. “Henceforth you may address me as Emanuela.” She lifted a black handgun from beneath her cloak and waved it menacingly. “Emmy is a little girl’s name. This is adult business.”

  Brian leaned against the motel room wall and stared at Cam, his tongue flicking around behind his teeth. Cam sat in the room’s lone chair, the two thugs on either side of him. One wore a black shirt, black leather jacket and a pinky ring, like an extra from The Sopranos. The other wore jeans and a grey hoodie with the words ‘Big Six Boxing’ on the front and smelled like he was still sweating out last night’s beer. As Amanda had pointed out, their adversaries in this venture—first in Ireland, now here in Providence—had the feel of organized crime. Marcinkus had been known to run in those circles, so perhaps, again, this all related back to the dead archbishop. Not that the realization gave Cam the warm fuzzies. He preferred his knee caps remain in one piece. But at least Amanda and Astarte were safe.

  Though decades had passed, Cam still knew how his childhood friend’s mind worked. Brian would feel some loyalty to Cam, but in the end greed would win out. Cam may be telling the truth about the treasure, or he may not be. But in Brian’s mind, the only way to be certain was to test the story under duress. In other words, torture.

  “Damn it, Cam,” Brian said. “You gotta tell me where the rest of the treasure is.”

  “That’s all there was, Brian. Sorry. You think I would have left some of it behind?”

  Brian gestured with his chin towards Cam’s satchel, which Cam had strapped over one shoulder while carrying the duffel bag out of the bank. “What’s in there?”

  “My insulin. A passport. Toothbrush. Phone charger.”

  “Don’t fucking lie to me.”

  Cam leaned forward and unsnapped the satchel, showing its contents. “See. Junk.” He sat back and raised his voice. “Look, I wanted nothing to do with this. You roped me in. I got beat up and thrown in a river and almost choked to death trying to find your treasure. Not to mention a sweet old woman gets murdered. Then, when I finally find the treasure, you complain that it’s not the right one. What the hell do you want from me?”

  Brian’s eyes narrowed. He shifted from one foot to the other, uncertainty evident in his body language. “Fuck it. I need to take a dump.” Cam guessed what he really needed was an excuse to buy some time.

  Brian stepped into the bathroom before leaning his head out to address his ruffians. “Make sure he doesn’t use his phone.”

  The door closed and Cam exhaled. He needed a plan. They were on the second floor, which meant going out the window was an option. And he had noticed an iron on the floor of the closet—he could use it as a weapon, and the cord potentially also. Plus he had his pocket knife. But the reality was he had little chance against two gangsters and the burly Brian in a physical altercation. He would need to rely on his cunning.

  Brian emerged from the bathroom, interrupting Cam’s thoughts. “I need to make a phone call,” he said to Cam. “Go in there and close the door. Leave your phone out here.”

  “Did you even flush?” Cam replied.

  “What are you, my fucking aunt? Just get in there.”

  Cam began to object, then swallowed the retort. It suddenly occurred to him that he actually wanted to spend time in the bathroom. He dropped his phone on the bureau, ducked inside, pulled his shirt collar up to cover his nose, and locked the door.

  Brian hadn’t even closed the toilet lid. Cam inched closer and peered down. A pile of darkened water and toilet paper filled the bowl. Using a pen from his pocket, he poked at the toilet paper wad, pushing it aside. Beneath it, resting on the bottom of the bowl, sat a pile of dark, intertwined turds. “I knew it,” Cam hissed.

  He closed the lid, flushed and tossed his pen into a wastebasket. When Cam’s grandfather had lived with them just before dying of pancreatic cancer, Cam had learned that one of the symptoms of the illness was that bowel movements were light in color and floated in the toilet bowl due to the diseased pancreas’ inability to digest fat. But Brian’s dark-colored shit sank to the bottom. Which meant he probably didn’t have pancreatic cancer. What a surprise: Brian had been lying to him about dying. Scumbag.

  Cam mulled it over. It was one thing for Brian to turn on him today, now that Cam had found the treasure. But the cancer fabrication indicated this was a long-term play, hatched before they went to Ireland. Which in turn meant the Ireland trip was not a bucket-list item but a ruse, a way to get Cam to begin sniffing around a treasure hunt which began in the Emerald Isle.

  And it also meant Brian’s visit to Milano Farm was more than a coincidence. Cam thought about Roberto and Emmy and their ties to the Vatican and Archbishop Marcinkus. The pieces were beginning to fit together, the picture coming into focus. What wasn’t clear was how this all ended.

  Standing at the bottom of the concrete stairs, Amanda made a split-second decision. She tucked her cell phone into a fissure in the bank building’s concrete foundation wall, maneuvering Astarte’s body in front of hers to shield the movement. Nobody else knew about the scroll, and there was no sense in forfeiting what may be their only advantage by allowing their enemies to find the image on her phone.

  Their enemies. How strange to think of the harmless Emmy and the hospitable innkeeper, Roberto, in those terms. But clearly things were not as they had appeared, beginning with Emmy being anything but harmless.

  Amanda stepped in front of Astarte to ascend the stairs. She had a million questions, but before she could voice them Emanuela spoke, rushing her words between the wailings of the alarm siren. “Tell us where the treasure is, and no harm will come to you.”

  Buy some time. The alarm will bring the police. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. We got locked in the bank.”

  “Don’t lie to me. I’m not a fool.” She paused for the alarm. “We knew once you found the key that you’d end up here. It was our clue, my clue, which allowed you to open the box.”

  It made sense. Emanuela and Roberto needed someone to decipher the clues and find the key. They apparently knew where the treasure was, but had not way to access it short of storming the bank vault. Amanda again played to buy some time, speaking over the alarm. “Okay. You’re correct. We did find a so-called treasure. Cameron has it. Astarte and I were hiding in the bank because that bloke Brian was outside waiting for us. Waiting to steal the treasure. Which wasn’t even a treasure, but just some old scroll. So we did the only thing we could to keep it safe. We put it back inside the bloody safe deposit box and handed Brian a fake treasure.”

  “A scroll?” Emanuela leaned forward. “What did it say?”

  “I don’t know. We didn’t have time to examine it. It was inside a clay tube.”

  “That must be it,” she whispered to Roberto in Italian, Amanda knowing enough of the language to understand. Emmy turned to Amanda and switched back to English. “Give me the safe deposit box key.”

  “Sorry, Cameron has it.”

  “We could easily search you, you know,” Emanuela said.

  “Go ahead. You won’t find it.”

  Roberto spoke, Amanda again able to understand the Italian. Just behind him, a dark SUV sat with its engine running in the otherwise empty parking lot. “I just received a call from Brian. He has Cameron.”

  “Tell him to stay where he is; we will come to him.” Emanuela waved her gun. “Whoever has the key, it is not going to do us any good now. We can’t get into the bank.” She leered at Amanda. “It’s going to be a long weekend, the four of us and Brian all together.” Police sirens echoed from a few blocks away. “Everyone into the vehicle.”

  Amanda took Astarte’s hand.
Brian was a greedy lecher, but at least his greed was rational. There was something feverishly frightening in Emanuela’s mismatched eyes. They would have been better off in the bank closet. Amanda needed to think quickly. She played a hunch. “So, when should we expect Monsignor Marcotte to arrive?”

  Emanuela’s eyes narrowed. “I … don’t know what you are talking about.”

  Amanda set her jaw. “He’s been puppeteering this from the beginning. Sending us to Ireland with Brian. Suggesting we stay at Milano Farm. What I don’t get is, why?”

  “Enough.” Emanuela nodded to the pair of henchmen next to her and again waved her handgun. “As I said, get into the vehicle.”

  Gabriella Difonzo stood in the doorway of a florist shop across the street, watching the scene unfold in the bank parking lot. First the SUV. Then the pompous British woman and her daughter sneaking out of the bank. Just as I suspected. A pair of headphones, similar to what the kids wore to listen to music, rested on Gabriella’s ears, the listening device she had quickly hidden near the bank’s basement door transmitting the conversation.

  She had guessed wrong the first time, convinced that the pushy couple had been using their daughter as a mule to sneak the treasure out of the vault. That’s why Gabriella had played along with their ruse and followed the girl to the restroom rather than stay in the vault. But she was back on the trail now. Thorne’s wife had just explained that they put the contents, the treasure she called it, back in the safe deposit box, apparently because some guy was waiting outside in the parking lot to steal it from them. Gabriella crossed herself. Whoever he was, he had been a gift from God.

  Twenty-two years she had spent working at the bank, all in anticipation of this single day. She thought back, more than two decades ago, to when her parish priest had asked her if she would be willing to serve in a job at a bank. That had been two years after Harold died in a car accident, widowing her. Not that she particularly mourned his loss; the marriage had been a mistake, a concession to her mother who longed for grandchildren. Gabriella should have listened to her heart and become a nun. We need someone we can trust, the priest had said. It is not exciting, but it is God’s work. And it pays well. I know your children are now off to school. But I need a firm commitment from you: You may not quit, may not even take vacation days other than when the bank itself is closed. And, of course, complete discretion is required. She had been content helping the priest with office work and other errands. But how could she say no to such a significant and mysterious assignment?