I
It was, perversely, Dieter himself who saved Cesco. Specifically, the rich sputter of his Harley as he pulled up alongside the SUV, flanked by his three mates. The man with the shotgun frowned at them, puzzled rather than alarmed by their arrival. But even that short delay gave time for balcony doors to open and residents to step out, drawn by the noise of the crash. The sheer number of onlookers seemed to decide him. He turned back to Cesco. ‘Midnight,’ he said. Then, with the shotgun still pressed against his leg, he climbed back into the SUV which promptly reversed out onto the road then sped off up the hill.
Cesco had no time to celebrate. Dieter was after a reckoning of his own, and was indifferent to witnesses. Cesco released himself from his seat belt and scrambled out through the empty windscreen. His van was lying across the full width of the track, blocking the bikes from passing. He clambered over it to put it between him and them. His left arm and shoulder were throbbing violently. His sleeve was wet with blood. He stumbled onwards along the track to an iron footbridge across a mountain stream that fed into the Busento a hundred yards or so to his left.
A glance behind. Knöchel was chasing him on foot while Dieter and the others roared away on their bikes to cut him off from the other end. He briefly contemplated trying to take Knöchel on, but the man was way too big for him, even without his injuries. He reached a footpath. It took him down to the Busento. Dieter and his mates were racing along its far bank towards the next bridge up. He unbuttoned his shirt and pulled it down over his shoulder to check the damage, but there was too much blood for him to see the—
Footsteps sprinting behind. He turned to see Knöchel almost upon him. He lunged for Cesco, but Cesco ducked and twisted and somehow got away. Knöchel had given his all to catch him and now staggered to a halt, hands upon his knees. But he was still blocking Cesco’s retreat, while Dieter, Rudolph and Oddo had by now crossed to his side of the Busento and were roaring back towards him. He fled into the grounds of a council building. It was closed for the weekend but had a small recycling area on one side. He jumped up onto a bin, hauled himself over the brick wall behind. He fought through a hedge, crossed a road, ran up a flight of steps. A pair of women stepped back to let him pass. He yelled at them to call the police. He emerged onto another road as a blue Fiat trundled by, a scaffolding pole strapped to its roof like a jousting knight. Two of the bikers appeared to his right. Cesco fled the other way along a derelict alley of bricked-up doorways and boarded windows. Rusted bars protruded from where balconies had once been, and purple wisteria draped tumbledown walls like wanton vines.
He emerged into Cosenza’s old town, a labyrinth of cobbled alleys flanked by buildings tall enough to make the neck ache, and narrow enough that you could shake hands across the balconies. A nightmarish game of fox and hounds now took place, in which he used the numerous short flights of steps to gain respite, while Dieter, Oddo and Rudolph used their numbers like a net. He dodged by a cement mixer and a wine barrel, ducked beneath a washing line strung with rugs for sale. His lungs were aching, his legs sacks of rice. He stumbled into a moped and sent it clattering.
He staggered down more steps out onto the Piazza Duomo. Dieter appeared to his left, Oddo and Rudolph to his right. He turned down a slick cobbled ramp into an archaeological park protected by a patchwork of triangular glass panes set at odd angles to one another, to offer tourists good views of the Roman ruins beneath. He ran by a pair of elderly tourists studying a street map, grabbed a railing and swung around to stop himself tumbling down a flight of metal steps. Behind him, Oddo wasn’t so fortunate. In swerving to avoid the two tourists, he went rattling down the steps before crashing into the viewing platform at their foot. Right behind him, Rudolph also went skittering; while Dieter hit a metal railing so hard that his back wheel kicked up like a bucking horse and sent him flying over its handlebars. He put his arms up to protect his head but the pane shattered when he hit it and he tumbled in a shower of broken glass down into the ruins beneath, while his helmet pinballed across the other panes before rolling back down again for Cesco to trap beneath his foot like a cocky midfielder.
The Harley was somehow still running. Its guard was buckled but its front wheel looked fine. He picked it up, straddled it, gave it revs. Dieter glared pure hatred up at him from the ruins below. The woman tourist was crying in pain and clutching her elbow. Sirens were closing fast. Cesco strapped on the helmet then nodded down at Dieter and set off along a narrow alley even as police lights lit the piazza behind him blue.
II
The sound of sirens above got Dieter pushing himself to his feet, shards of broken glass spilling from him and crunching beneath his feet. But the moment he put weight upon his left leg, he felt his knee go pop and a spike of pain shot up from it as though someone had swung at it with the pointed end of a pickaxe. He gave a cry and fell back down.
Shouting above. A scuffling noise. Rudolph was trying to make a break for it across the glass roof. But he was collared a moment later by two burly cops. Dieter swore and dragged himself along the concrete floor to the exit, but the fucking door was locked. Ancient stones were scattered across the floor. He picked one up and smashed the handle until the lock gave. He hobbled out and off, clutching his knee. A man shouted to alert the police to his escape. Thankfully, he was still in the old town with its labyrinth of alleys. He put his hand against the wall to hold himself up, then turned this way and that to shake pursuit. An old hag came out onto her porch to check on the commotion. She saw him and immediately took out her mobile. He punched her hard and her head smacked against the frame of her door. She fell onto her back. Blood poured from her nose and mouth and from a gash on her temple. He staggered on, taking out his own phone to call Knöchel. He answered on the second ring. ‘Where the fuck are you?’ he demanded.
‘On my way. Why?’
‘It’s gone to shit. Everything’s gone to shit. The police are everywhere.’
‘Hell.’
‘You need to dump your bike right now. They’ll be looking for it. Go jack a car or a van. Come pick me up.’ He sent him his coordinates as he limped into an alley. He pulled out a large green wheelie bin overflowing with black refuse bags then sank down behind it, his back to the wall, his leg stretched out in front of him. Now the pain started in earnest. It was all he could do not to cry out. Sirens screeched by. Footsteps pounded cobbles. His left knee was swelling visibly. Gingerly, he peeled down his jeans to look. It was the size of a fucking football already, and turning storm-cloud colours. He was about to call Knöchel again to tell him to get a move on when suddenly the man himself pulled up across the mouth of the alley in a battered blue minivan.
Dieter struggled to his feet and hobbled across. He banged his knee on the frame as he climbed into the back. He howled in agony, he couldn’t help himself. ‘Shit,’ said Knöchel, turning a touch pale when he saw the damage. ‘You’ve done your ACL for sure. I’ll get you to a doctor.’
‘Fuck that. We clear the house then you drive me home.’
‘But—’
‘Home, fuck it.’ That woman he’d punched, who could say how badly hurt she was. No way was he doing time for some old hag like that. Their clinic back in Stuttgart had doctors who not only knew better than to blab, they’d give him an alibi too. He stretched out along the back seats still clutching his knee, trying vainly to find an angle for it that didn’t hurt so much. They set off. The road was cobbled and uneven. He bellowed in pain at every jolt. But when Knöchel slowed down in response he yelled at him to keep going. They reached their rented house. Knöchel parked outside and ran on in. He grabbed all their belongings, tossed them in the back of the van. He went back in to wipe the place of fingerprints before reappearing with a blister pack of ibuprofen, a bag of ice cubes for Dieter’s knee and a towel to wrap around it. Then he got behind the wheel again and set off north.
The painkillers took a while to work. Even then they only made space in Dieter’s head for a different kind of pain
to make itself felt. Twice now he’d been humiliated by that shit Cesco Rossi. It couldn’t stand. It couldn’t stand. He punched the roof of the minivan. He’d thought he’d hated the bastard before, but that was nothing compared to the black rage that now boiled inside him like a cauldron of tar. He closed his eyes and brought that little fucker’s face to his mind’s eye, that cocky little nod he’d given before setting off on his bike. He clenched his fist and kissed it and made a solemn vow. He’d get himself out of this shithole country one way or another. He’d fix his knee. Then, when he was ready, he’d come back for Cesco Rossi. He’d come back and visit such pain on him that he’d have him begging for the knife.
III
The black SUV stayed carefully beneath the speed limit as it wound up the hill roads to Moccono. In the passenger seat, Tomas Gentile switched between the various channels used by Cosenza law enforcement. It seemed as though their good friends in blue uniforms were unaware of their own earlier escapades. Indeed, they had their hands full chasing a pack of bikers through the city’s old town.
‘You think it’s those same fucks?’ asked his brother Guido, behind the wheel.
‘It most certainly sounds like it,’ said Tomas.
‘They were after Rossi too. That’s why they spread out on that bridge.’
‘You don’t say.’
‘Yeah. I’m pretty sure.’ He glanced across at him. ‘You think he’ll give us to midnight, like you asked?’
‘I don’t think we should count on it.’
‘Then what?’
‘Let us start with some silence, oh my brother. I need to think.’
They passed through Moccono, reached the entrance to their drive. It wound through olive groves to a paved forecourt bordered by shrubberies and pines. It was one of their own properties, held through an offshore company that not even the Critelli brothers knew about.
Tomas got out. He went down the garage ramp to unlock and raise its door. There was a silver Range Rover parked inside. He reversed it out to make space for the SUV, where no one would find it unless things had already gone to shit. Guido parked it and came out again. He lowered and locked the garage door then joined him in the Range Rover. Tomas slid across to let him take the wheel. He always let Guido drive, if he could. It wasn’t that he disliked driving as such. It was that it made it easier to think.
‘Well?’ asked Guido.
‘We go back,’ said Tomas. ‘We watch the house for any sign of our good friends in blue uniforms.’
‘And if they turn up?’
Tomas spread his hands. ‘Then what choice will we have, oh my brother?’
IV
Cesco waited until he reached the open roads outside Cosenza before opening the Harley up. Its acceleration almost blew him off the back. He didn’t much care for Dieter, but the man knew how to buy a bike. His mind raced as he sped along. He replayed his brief conversation with the man from the black SUV. He knew better than most the nature of such men. They’d weep salty tears about the importance of honour. Then they’d chop up puppies for their parts. So he didn’t for one moment believe his midnight promise. Yet it had been so oddly specific that it didn’t just offer Cesco a window, it offered him a clue.
The roads were so improved since he’d been here last that he barely recognised them. New housing developments had sprung up everywhere. He almost missed his turning. But the road up to the hilltop was unforgettable, scoring its way upwards in sharp zigzags. He took the last hairpin and there it was, the high perimeter wall exactly as he recalled, only recently whitewashed and fitted with new CCTV cameras. Men in khaki slacks and short-sleeved blue shirts stood on either side of a security booth, their Beretta sub-machine guns raised high enough to warn rather than threaten. He let gravity slow him to a halt some ten paces shy of them, then stood up the Harley and spread his hands wide.
One of the men gestured him off. He dismounted, slowly unstrapped and took off his helmet. He set it on the seat then took a couple of steps towards them with his arms still outstretched, despite the fearful throbbing from the shotgun pellets. ‘I need to see your boss,’ he said.
The man grunted. ‘Sure you do.’
‘Please. I’m begging you.’
‘Not today. No chance. No visitors, not under any circumstances.’
‘A life’s at stake.’
‘So go to the police. That’s what they’re for.’
‘The police can’t help. Not with this. Only Judge Mancuso.’
‘Then come back tomorrow.’
‘Tomorrow will be too late.’
‘That’s quite a problem then.’
‘How about a message?’ pleaded Cesco. ‘Can you at least get him a message?’
The men glanced at one another. His obvious desperation was getting through. ‘Saying what?’ asked one.
Cesco gave himself a moment. He had one shot at this. Carmen’s name might get Baldassare’s attention. But there was another that was sure to. And fuck it, it was time. He stuck out his chest, he lifted his chin. For the first time in fifteen years, he felt a certain pride in himself. ‘Tell him that Giovanni Carbone is here to see him,’ he said. ‘And that this is my home you bastards are all living in.’
V
Baldassare looked up irritably from his work when Sandro knocked and entered. ‘What is it now?’ he asked.
‘There’s a man here to see you, sir,’ said Sandro.
‘Didn’t I make myself clear?’ scowled Baldassare. ‘No disturbances. No exceptions.’
‘Yes, sir. But he’s claiming… Forgive me, sir, but he’s claiming to be Giovanni Carbone. You know. Federico’s grandson.’
Baldassare stood up, electrified. ‘Giovanni Carbone is dead. He was murdered fifteen years ago with his twin sister, then dumped at sea.’
‘Yes, sir. I know. But that’s what he’s saying. And he’s about the right age and they sent up a photograph from the gate, and I have to tell you…’ He came over to the desk holding out his phone.
Baldassare saw instantly what Sandro meant: the man unquestionably had Federico’s strong chin and bright blue eyes. There was something else too. He could have sworn he’d seen him recently, though he couldn’t work out where. ‘Have him brought up,’ he said. They went together to the front door. Carbone arrived a minute later in the back of one of their Toyota Land Cruisers. The moment he stepped out, Baldassare knew it to be true. It was the proud way he held himself, despite his ruined shirt and the blood dripping down his arm. In a daze, he went down the steps to greet him. ‘Your sister?’ he asked.
Carbone shook his head. ‘No.’
‘I’m so sorry.’
He waved it aside for more urgent matters. ‘The American woman Carmen Nero. The one you visited in hospital yesterday morning. The ’Ndrangheta have her.’
Baldassare stared at him. ‘What do you mean, they have her?’
‘They’ve taken her hostage,’ he said. ‘What do you think I mean?’
‘Hostage? Are you sure?’
‘Of course I’m fucking sure.’ He gestured at the sleeve of his shirt, caked with blood. ‘They’ll kill her unless we can find her.’
‘Tell me. Tell me everything.’
‘I will. I swear. Once we’re on our way.’
‘Our way where?’
‘To their base. We need to get there before they move her.’
Baldassare stared at him. His heart longed to believe but his head yelled caution. Carbone should be dead. Maybe he’d survived by vowing loyalty to the Critellis. Maybe this was some kind of elaborate trap. ‘We’re not going anywhere,’ he said. ‘Not until I understand. How do you even know this woman?’
‘I was the one who found her.’
‘You? Cesco Rossi? The archaeologist?’
‘Yes. No.’ His frustration was palpable. ‘Rossi is the name I’m going by at the moment. I can hardly use my real one, can I? But no, I’m not an archaeologist.’
‘Then what are you?’
‘I’m
a conman,’ he said flatly. ‘A conman and a thief.’
Baldassare stared at him. He’d taken countless confessions in his time. None quite like this. A sudden glimpse of a fourteen-year-old-boy who’d somehow survived the slaughter of his family, traumatised and alone. Who could blame him for doing whatever it took to survive? ‘Tell me more.’
‘I was down in Scilla,’ said Cesco. ‘I got rumbled. I had to get out fast. Giulia Surace had invited me to stay. I arrived to find her and her father already dead, but Carmen still alive. Then I learned that the Suraces had been closing in on Alaric’s tomb. So I thought, why not? I went to the hospital to chat Carmen up, thinking she might know something. You and I actually passed in the corridor.’
Baldassare nodded. He had him now. ‘You had long hair and a beard.’
‘Yes. Anyway, I hooked up with her. She figured out what had got the Suraces so excited: some kind of feature revealed by Google’s latest set of satellite photos. It looked so promising that Giulia took the first train down, bringing a drone camera with her. This made no sense to me. Why take more photographs? Why not go straight there with a metal detector and a spade? But Carmen worked out why. It was because they couldn’t. It was because the feature in question is on a plot of land protected by high walls, thick hedges and CCTV. We parked right by it this morning.’
Baldassare pinched the bridge of his nose, the better to get it clear in his mind. ‘Go on.’
‘I’m guessing now, but I’m sure I’m right. The Suraces flew their drone over the site in question, in order to make sure that there really was something there. There was. So they moved on to the next stage, which was to run a ground-penetrating radar over it, to see exactly what they were dealing with before they started to dig. The Suraces saw themselves as amateur archaeologists rather than treasure hunters, you see. They wanted to do it properly. So Giulia invited Carmen to stay for the weekend as a pretext for having her bring down the GPR down. She invited me too, because she thought I knew how to use it. Then they went to see the landowners to ask permission to run the survey, explaining to them that they believed they’d found Alaric’s tomb on their land. Unfortunately, the landowners were ’Ndrangheta. Now imagine telling the ’Ndrangheta that they’ve got a fabulous lost tomb buried on their land, and that only you know about it.’
The Sacred Spoils Page 16