The taxi sped off.
Geneva, Switzerland
* * *
Michael McCarthy was walking out of the auction house when a tall, grey-haired man pushed past him. McCarthy’s instinct was to keep walking. He hoped he hadn’t been spotted.
‘McCarthy, what brings you here? Something in the catalogue I missed?’ The man was so loud.
McCarthy spun round and acted surprised to see Robert Hurst looking down at him. How long had it been since they’d seen each other now? Six months?
‘A tourist trip, here to take in the scenery, mainly,’ McCarthy said, gesturing to the backdrop of mountains and Lake Geneva shimmering in the sparkling sunshine.
‘I’m only sorry we couldn’t have carried on working together,’ Hurst offered.
‘You’re still there?’ McCarthy had asked the question, despite knowing the answer.
‘They love their meetings don’t they? Getting approval to acquire anything these days seems to entail tons of them. Not how I like to work at all. No wonder you decided to call it a day. Next time you’re in town give me some notice. I’m sure Maris would love to meet you. She was a big fan of the museum. Still is. If you’ll excuse me, I have a plane to catch.’ And with that, McCarthy was dismissed.
He watched as Hurst got into a black Range Rover, engine running. Behind the wheel was a woman, Hurst’s age, her face in a tight knot. If she was Maris Hurst, she didn’t look like the sort who would love to meet anybody.
Stephen and Elisabetta were walking across a pedestrian crossing outside Geneva airport, after their taxi driver had dropped them at the wrong terminal, when a Range Rover, with headlights on full beam, hurtled towards them, its engine roaring.
‘What the?’ Stephen said, pushing Elisabetta so hard, she sprawled onto the pavement, leaving him stuck in the middle of the crossing. He felt the impact as the vehicle clipped his hip. Limping, he tried to give chase on foot, but fell to his knees before he got very far. The Range Rover disappeared into the distance. As Elisabetta came rushing up to him, Stephen called out.
‘I didn’t get the number.’
‘Me neither. Reflective plates.’
‘Let’s pull the CCTV,’ Stephen said.
‘Let’s get you seen to by a paramedic first. You’re bleeding,’ Elisabetta said.
‘I’ll be fine. I want to go and talk to security.’
‘There’s no point. Those reflective plates don’t show on CCTV.’
Stephen fretted as he limped off to first aid. ‘Whoever was behind the wheel of that Range Rover knew we were here.’
Chapter 5
Rome, Italy
* * *
Stephen winced every time they hit an air pocket on the flight back to Rome. Landing had been excruciating and he struggled to walk off the plane unassisted. Elisabetta insisted he go to Accident and Emergency. ‘What about Alberti?’ Stephen said.
‘I’ll deal with him,’ she said firmly. ‘See you tomorrow.’
There seemed little point in arguing with her. And if hospital waiting times were as long as they were back home, it wouldn’t be worth going in to work. It took two hours to get through triage. And another two before he saw a doctor. Apart from a surface wound that needed cleaning up and a vivid purple bruise down one side, he would live. They sent him on his way with a prescription for painkillers. By the time he got back to the apartment, it was after six. He rang Elisabetta.
‘What did Alberti say?’
‘Nothing yet. He wants to see us both tomorrow. ’
The following morning, Stephen did his best to get out of the way as Elisabetta’s boss, Superintendent Alberti, strutted around, waiting for her to get off the phone.
He caught Alberti looking over his shoulder as he got on with sifting through the evidence bags found at Tony Sanzio’s apartment. He felt sorry for Elisabetta. At least his boss at the Met hadn’t been a micro-manager.
There was a receipt from a garage in Switzerland. He glanced down at it. It was for a replacement tyre. He’d been about to put it back into the evidence bag, when he got a call from traffic.
’The vehicle report on the grey Peugeot estate you asked for is ready. Sending it over to you now.’
‘Thanks,’ Stephen said. He clicked on the link and skimmed through the report. There were white paint scrapes on Sanzio’s Peugeot suggesting he'd been sideswiped by a white car. A witness reported seeing a white Fiat that failed to stop at the crash scene. Was it worth trying to find the driver? The Peugeot’s tyres weren't balanced and the treads were uneven. One of the four was new. Why replace one and not the rest?
Stephen picked up the phone.
‘Lieutenant Connor, carabinieri in Rome. You did a job on a Peugeot estate with Rome plates two weeks ago,’ Stephen said. ‘I’ve got an invoice number.’
There was a sharp intake of breath on the other end of the phone.
‘That asshole!’ the mechanic said. ‘He kept moaning about being forced to pay Swiss prices when tyres in Italy cost fifty percent less.’
‘Why didn’t he wait to get the job done when he got back over the border?’
‘He got caught with a bald tyre by the traffic police. You’d think we were the ones who’d given him the fine, the way he carried on.’
‘Okay, thanks. You’ve been very helpful.’ If Sanzio had caused a scene at the garage, the local police who had pulled him over might remember him. He dialled again. There was a delay while the officer on the duty desk pulled up the incident report.
‘Yes, Antonio Sanzio was pulled over for routine questioning and became abusive. He refused to tell us what he was doing in Switzerland. We read him the riot act and told him he was welcome to sit in a cell while he cooled off. Grudgingly, he told us he was delivering goods.’
‘Did the story stack up? The guy’s dead, killed in a fatal.’
‘He was a terrible driver. Changing lanes all the time.’
‘You tailed him?’
‘We wanted to know what he was delivering. This scruffy guy in his muddy and dented ten-year-old Peugeot turns out to be taking antiquities to an auction house.’
‘Let me guess. Denham’s in Geneva.’ Stephen said.
‘Correct.’ There was a pause on the other end of the phone. ‘Something about that guy didn’t add up,’ the officer observed.
‘You’re right there. Thanks for your help,’ Stephen said and hung up.
While Stephen was trying to figure out what his next move was, Alberti popped his head around the door.
‘You first, di Mascio,’ he said. Stephen winked at Elisabetta. She raised an eyebrow in reply. They went into the conference room and shut the door. It was an old building with poor soundproofing. Alberti talked at Elisabetta, raising his voice until it became a tirade. Stephen couldn’t make out what he was saying—he didn’t have to. The tone said it all. When Elisabetta finally did get the chance to say her piece, she spoke quietly and deliberately. This seemed to enrage her interlocutor. He started shouting over her and interrupting until something in Elisabetta snapped.
Stephen made out a few of Elisabetta’s shouted words and what he heard worried him. It sounded like she was saying something about Alberti being the one who had fobbed Stephen off onto her.
As the din of the argument reached a crescendo, Stephen no longer wanted to listen. He went back to the evidence bags from the raid on Sanzio’s apartment when a slip of paper with some scribbled notes on it fell out. On it was a list of names: Don Corleone, The Great Gatsby, the Lawyer, the Sales Rep, the Guardian, the Accountant, the Fixer (with three exclamation marks and a smiley face) and lastly, Nighthawks. Before he had a chance to consider what these names had to do with the case, Alberti strode out of the office and headed for the door. He glared at Stephen, with a face on him the colour of an Atlantic storm. Elisabetta came quietly out of the boardroom and pulled up a chair beside him. She looked drained.
‘I thought he wanted to see me,’ Stephen said.
‘I deal
t with it.’
‘I’d rather know. I won’t be offended.’ He was quaking as he said that.
Elisabetta hesitated. ‘You sure?’ He nodded.
‘He asked why we’d gone “gadding off” to Switzerland, as he put it. Then he proceeded to dismiss my explanation that you’d found those restored pots up for auction. Then he got angrier still that they were pulled from the auction at the last minute. And accused us of wasting money on a wild goose chase.’
‘I heard the shouting,’ Stephen said. ‘If I was in your position, the last thing I’d want is to have to babysit a new colleague.’
‘You heard that? You weren’t meant to. Sorry. Your Italian’s better than I thought.’
There was an awkward moment between them.
‘No offence taken,’ Stephen lied, trying not to show his feelings.
‘As you heard, he barely let me get a word in. He wanted to know why you’d hurt yourself. I told him you’d deliberately put yourself in harm’s way on my behalf. And that he should be thanking you for what you did instead of going on about budgets and deadlines.’
Stephen glanced up.
‘You said that?’
Elisabetta nodded. ‘And I meant it.’
Reynolds didn’t want him and neither did Alberti. He really was stuck between a rock and a hard place.
‘I owe you one,’ she said. ‘And that’s why I stuck up for you. He even had the gall to ask what would happen if you’d suffered a more serious injury. I don’t know why but he’s got it in for us. Every cent we spend he’s promised to scrutinise. And if we don’t get results fast…’
‘Let me guess. He’ll send me home anyway?’ Stephen said.
Elisabetta grinned. ‘That pretty much sums it up.’
Maybe coming here had been the right decision after all.
‘This might cheer you up.’ He slid the receipt from the Swiss garage across to her. ‘Our colleagues in the Swiss police pulled Sanzio over for a traffic infringement near Geneva a couple of weeks ago.’
Elisabetta raised her eyebrows one after the other in a so what gesture.
‘He wouldn’t tell them what he was doing there so they followed him. All the way to Denham’s where he was delivering antiquities for a forthcoming auction.’
‘Good work,’ she said.
‘‘There’s something else,’ Stephen showed her the hand-written list of names. ‘What do you make of it?’
Elisabetta shrugged. ‘By the smiley faces and the exclamation mark, it looks like Sanzio was rather pleased with himself.’
‘He could be bigging himself up, of course. To make himself appear more influential than he actually is. Or was, rather.’
‘I’d rather you pursued the Sanzio connection to the auction house,’ Elisabetta said.
‘I think it’s worth chasing.’ Stephen held Elisabetta’s gaze. ‘And Pasquale has triangulated where the call left on Tony Sanzio’s phone came from.’
‘Can I listen to it?’ Stephen played the recording.
‘Play it again?’
The accent was distinct, almost staccato. Stephen struggled to make out the words.
‘Pasquale traced the phone to a Geppo Corri. A small-time thief and petty criminal from Naples.’
‘Secondigliano to be precise,’ Elisabetta said, a frown creasing her forehead.
‘Something happen there?’ Stephen said quietly.
‘Someone close to me got caught in the cross-fire. I’ll tell you another time,’ she said. ‘Let’s just say it’s a rough part of town.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Stephen said, awkwardly. It was a platitude, but he didn’t know what else to say. ‘Corri could be one of the names mentioned in the list. Here,’ he pointed. ‘He could be the Sales Rep.’
‘Or he could be Batman. We need a good reason to justify spending money. Long investigations are expensive. That’s what the boss just said.’
Stephen felt the tension.
‘We need to be focusing our efforts at the top of the food chain, not going after the low-hanging fruit.’ Elisabetta stabbed the scrap of paper with the nail of her index finger so forcibly, Stephen thought she was going to tear it.
‘You get to the general by finding a weakness in the ranks.’
‘But these are the spear throwers,’ Elisabetta said, sighing.
‘You just heard the man. He hasn’t been paid. He’ll talk for money. And even with the Swiss intel about Sanzio delivering antiquities to the auction house, we don’t have any physical evidence of suspect looted items. Corri might be our only chance.’
‘I’ll give you one week. And you’d better come up with results or Alberti will be on my case.’
‘That’s what he said?’
‘No, but that’s what will happen. And I want no part of it. I’ve got enough to do as it is. Here’s the number for the Naples office. They’ll put a tail on him.’
Stephen felt elated and terrified at the same time. His fingers trembled as he made the call. They were polite and a little world-weary in Naples when he put in his request. It didn’t take long for them to get back to him.
‘Geppo Corri has got previous. As a minor,’ the officer in Naples said. ‘Juvenile detention at fifteen. Breaking and entering, burglary. That’s nothing compared with the kind of shit that goes on now in that part of town. What do you want me to do?’
‘Follow him. Every time he goes out. And keep me in the loop.’
‘Will do. What’s the authorisation on that?’
‘I’ll send it through.’ As Stephen put the phone down he realised that this was another department of the Italian police who would know if he messed up. He’d better be right.
Chapter 6
Near Naples, Italy
* * *
Paolo wrapped his scarf around his nose and mouth to quell the stench of diesel fumes. As he tried to straighten up, he hit his head on the earth above him. Even his slight, one-metre sixty frame was too big for this dank, fetid burial chamber. The visibility was barely more than half a metre in front of him in the ghostly half-light filtering from his head torch.
He switched off the engine of the mechanical digger. It spluttered to a stop. His fingertips were blistered from the effort of trying to keep hold of it, a machine as wild and unpredictable as a frightened animal; lurching off in one direction, then again in another.
An older, shorter version of him came over to check up on his work.
‘Not bad,’ Geppo said.
‘Not bad? It must be at least twenty square metres,’ Paolo grumbled.
‘You’re not getting extra money, if that’s what you’re thinking. If you don’t like it, you know what you can do.’
‘Get another job you mean?’ Paolo’s tone was bitter. ‘Except I can’t, thanks to you. If you’d kept your mouth shut about the cheap concrete, we’d both be in work.’
‘I didn’t have a choice. I owed it to the families. Ten people died on that bridge. And I’d do it again,’ Geppo said.
‘Do me a favour, Uncle. Next time, think of your own family first. It was you who got us blacklisted from every building site in the city.’
‘You were the one who hung around home, smoking weed, getting into fights. I gave you a chance, you cocky little shit. Or did all that skunk give you memory loss? Back to work.’
Paolo shrugged his shoulders, turning his back on his uncle and kept on digging, wiping the sweat off his face.
‘Guess how much they made selling that statue of that fit bird we dug up in November?’
Geppo shrugged. ‘You’re going tell me anyway.’
Paolo raised one eyebrow and gave his uncle a disdainful look.
‘A million dollars. And the same for that big vase with the handles. The one they glued together.’ Geppo’s lips moved, but he couldn’t seem to get the words out. He gulped and got a mouthful of dust churned up by the digger, lingering in the still air.
As his uncle started to choke, Paolo pulled the cap off his water bottle and pa
ssed the bottle over, but in his haste, managed to spill most of it all.
‘Two million dollars? We got 2000 euros for those two jobs.’ Geppo could barely get the words out, he was coughing so hard. As the fit subsided, he stared at his nephew.
‘How did you find out?’
‘The internet, Uncle. You’ve heard of that, right? Fat Tony better watch out. I’m going to give him so much shit for that,’ Paolo bragged.
‘Piss Tony off and we’ll have no takers for our stuff.’
Listening to Geppo and Paolo’s conversation, trying to pick up the odd word of Neapolitan dialect, was a group of young African men, barely out of their teens. Their job was to go over the newly dug ground, touching the surface area, feeling for any dips or mounds. Just at that moment, one of the workers hit the bottom of the tomb with his shovel. It sent out a sharp clang that reverberated around the cave in surround sound.
Geppo squatted down and pressed his hands into the dusty red clay. Paolo gestured to the kid, who passed him the shovel. As the sharp edge hit the ground, there was the unmistakable sound of steel on stone.
‘Pick-axe,’ Geppo said, pointing. It was passed silently, from one hand to another. Kneeling now on the hard ground, Geppo winced, as his knees made contact with the dry earth and stones. After three sharp blows in quick succession, he started to scrabble with his bare hands. He felt the outline of a large, raised circle.‘If this is what I think it is, payday could be sooner than you think. I hope it’s intact, though Tony doesn’t seem too bothered if they’re in one piece or two halves. Just not too many bits.’ A chink of daylight penetrated the dark tomb. ‘Damn these summer mornings. I’m not leaving here until we’ve dug this little beauty out. Get the guys to hide the digger and all the tools in the usual place. And we’ll need two of them to carry out that head. It weighs a ton,’ Geppo said, pointing to a large carved bust of a man with curly hair and a beard they had dug up the night before. 'I’ll take the rest of the stuff.’
Nighthawks Page 4