The Vivaldi Cipher

by Gary McAvoy

  “It’s ‘concrete shoes,’ Eminence,” Gallucci rectified. “And that’s an unfounded legend. Nobody uses them. It takes too long for the concrete to dry with the person standing in—”

  Abruzzo slammed a fist on his desk. Gallucci clamped his mouth shut. Abruzzo scowled at the Don, unaccustomed to being corrected, especially for such minor semantics. After a moment’s silence in the room, he continued, “We need to move our current project from Feudatario to someplace safe, lest they attempt a raid on our studio. Renzo, is your gallery large enough to accommodate secure work on the Raphael? That is my chief concern at the moment.”

  “Yes, Eminence, we can handle that. I will have to clear space for it, but we could have it ready in two days’ time.”

  “Good. Now, as for what to do with Rome….”

  The Vatican Museum’s records room was tightly packed with gray and black filing cabinets of varying sizes, some with key locks, others with combination dials, most others unsecured. Marcello Sabatini knew right where to go for the records he sought: the restorations section.

  Opening the cabinet containing documentation for artworks that were sent to or scheduled for restoration by Feudatario, he pulled out several thick folders and laid them on the spacious reading table behind him.

  Pulling out a chair for the time-consuming project, he began his work, starting with the most recent dates.

  He was unsettled to find that just this past week one of the Museum’s most highly prized Raphael paintings had been shipped to Venice. He set that shipping document aside. Next up for restoration, in fact the very next week, was a priceless Caravaggio that had a small tear in a lower corner. He put that aside, too. There was no way he would allow that painting to leave the Vatican until they sorted this matter out.

  Working his way backward in time, he came across the six forgeries he had previously discovered. Though he already had forensic evidence in hand, he pulled those out as backup for Cardinal Petrini and the Art Squad’s review. Italy’s dedicated squad of the Carabinieri entrusted with protecting the country’s artistic treasures would have to be called in on this matter.

  As he sat there thinking of the bold daring such a project entailed, especially involving the Vatican, it occurred to him that more prominent institutions might also be involved, since Feudatario serviced other museums and galleries throughout Italy. It would be a delicate task informing them.

  He would contact his colleagues at those organizations and advise them of his discoveries—in confidence, of course, since no institution wanted adverse publicity like this. And this was the worst kind of publicity imaginable.

  His first order of business would be to demand return of the Raphael.

  Sabatini called his friend at the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, home to many of Italy’s finest artworks: Giotto, della Francesca, Botticelli, da Vinci, Michelangelo and Caravaggio, among so many others. All prime bait for an operation as sweeping and repulsive as Feudatario’s.

  “Ciao, Giancarlo, this is Marcello Sabatini from the Vatican Museum. Yes, I’m fine, grazie. But I call with an important matter of some discretion, and I need your full attention. Is this a good time?”

  Chapter 30

  It was midnight, and after watching the building from the rear alley for an hour, Marco determined that only a single guard was on duty, sitting at the reception desk on the ground floor, glued to his cell phone and drinking coffee.

  All seasoned rappellers, Marco, Karl and Lukas made quick work of scaling the back of the building to reach the roof above the fourth floor. While it provided abundant natural light for the studio beneath it, the large, angled eight-paned glass ceiling proved to be the best way to break into Palazzo Feudatario.

  Lying on the red brick roof tiles, the three men peered over the glass panels, watching for signs of any activity in the studio before they began their work. The room was dark and empty.

  Karl, the most talented at picking locks—skills taught to him by his fellow Swiss Guard Dieter Koehl and a gypsy he had encountered in earlier adventures—got to work on the locking hasp of one window. With some effort, he finally disengaged the hasp; the hinged window popped open. No alarm sounded.

  Tying off their rope to a sturdy chimney on the roof, each man rappelled down into the studio, quietly dropping onto the floor. Spotting two CCTV cameras in opposite corners, Marco removed a powerful Class IV laser beam penlight from his jacket, aiming it at each camera while remaining in the shadows.

  He passed the green laser beam over the entire circular lens of each camera, knowing the action would burn the CCD sensors, creating dead pixels on the recorded image. They were now clear to proceed with their work.

  The entire fourth floor studio was a massive room filled with easels and canvasses in various stages of restoration. A wide variety of specialized tools, pigment jars, solvents, thinners, and scores of brushes were spread across many tables.

  Each man slipped through the cluttered moonlit room searching for their prize. A few moments later, Lukas let out a light whistle, motioning for the others to join him.

  And there it was. Surrounded by many other paintings hanging on the high wall, Raphael’s Madonna of Foligno held a prominent place.

  As they had expected, standing next to it was a massive easel with a nearly finished duplicate of Raphael’s masterpiece. Marco took out a small LED torch from his jacket to better examine the forgery. Comparing the two paintings, he was startled at how perfectly matched they seemed to be. To his eye anyway. Whoever the artist was, he excelled at his work. He took out his iPhone, snapped photos of both paintings along with several shots of the studio, then pocketed the phone.

  Then, reaching for his belt, Marco pulled out his Gerber LMF Combat knife, raised it high above his head, then swiftly brought it down, ripping a long gash from the top of the canvas to the bottom, destroying the forgery. Though moved by its artistic competence, he had no qualms about doing so.

  The guard on the first floor had just set down his coffee cup on the counter when he fell silent. He was certain he’d heard something upstairs, a sound echoing through the tall open atrium. A kind of ripping sound.

  Unlocking the digital keypad on the stairway door, he pulled out his Glock 19 and quietly made his way up the staircase.

  Needing further evidence to press their case with the Vatican, Karl and Lukas found filing cabinets behind the main door to the studio and rifled through various folders, seeking sales documentation for past orders and restoration consignment invoices. If they could find buyers’ names and addresses, they could turn it all over to Italy’s Art Squad for further disposition.

  Just then the door to the studio opened and the guard burst in, his Glock raised and aimed at Marco standing in the moonlit center of the room next to the easel. Pointing his flashlight at him, he got a good look at the Frenchman’s face just before Karl, moving swiftly from behind the open door, dove for the guard’s gun, then suddenly twisted, taking the man face down on the wooden floor. With the wind knocked out of him, the Glock fell out of his hands, skidding across the floor. Karl quickly moved on top of him into a shime-waza judo position, a strangling technique intended to render his opponent helpless. His right arm circling the guard’s throat, Karl flipped him over, pulling his own arm in tighter, applying pressure to the man’s neck. The guard’s arms and legs flailed about, but Karl’s powerful arm clamp made it impossible to escape.

  Fifteen seconds later, the man lost consciousness. His struggling ceased.

  Karl heaved the man’s heavy body off him and stood up, gasping for breath.

  “Are you alright?!” Lukas asked, his hands on his partner’s shoulders.

  “I’m fine, Lukas,” Karl said, panting.

  “Well, it seems we now have the run of the place, at least while he’s out,” Marco said. “See if you can find those documents, then let’s get out of here. Be looking out for that Coscia Journal, too, while you’re at it. We need that as the ultimate proof.”

 
; Karl and Lukas stuffed as many seemingly relevant folders as they could into their backpacks until they were filled. They all looked around the studio for anything else that might be useful, but there was nothing that looked like a journal of any kind, something they would likely keep in a safe, anyway.

  Finding nothing more of interest, each man shimmied back up the rope’s ascender clamps. Back out onto the roof, Karl closed the hinged glass window behind them.

  When the guard regained consciousness a few minutes after his attackers left, he called Angelo Gallucci to report the break-in. He dared not call the Carabinieri, for obvious reasons. The guard failed to notice the damage to Giuseppe’s Raphael canvas, but said the thieves had been looking at folders in the filing cabinets, and as far as he knew, that was the extent of it. He also said he got a good look at one man before he was subdued from behind and would recognize him again. Though angry, Gallucci said there was nothing to be done now. He would be there first thing tomorrow.

  When Giuseppe Franco arrived at the studio in the morning, however, he was devastated, reduced to tears when he found the destruction of his painstaking work on the faux Raphael. Nearly a full week of long days and weary nights vanished in the slash of a blade. Who could do something so vulgar to such a profound work of beauty?!

  Don Gallucci had no doubts at all about who had done this. He was now more determined than ever to rid himself of Dominic and his meddling friends.

  Taking out his phone, he made a call.

  Chapter 31

  Housed in a four-story Baroque palazzo on the Piazza Sant’Ingazio, across from the Jesuit Church of St. Ignatius, Italy’s Tutela Patrimonio Culturale, a special unit of the Carabinieri known as the Art Squad, is headed by Colonel Benito Scarpelli, a precise man in his sixties who, before the current post he has held for some twenty years, worked as curator for antiquities at Sotheby’s in London.

  The phone call he had just gotten from Cardinal Petrini was unwelcome, though hardly surprising, news. Scarpelli had worked with the Vatican many times before, being the repository for some of the world’s most valuable artworks. But forgeries replacing originals in the Vatican’s own museums? That was a new one. He needed to assign one of his best men to this case, someone expert in Old Master paintings with an eye for detecting the unique signatures of the most capable forgers. And there was only one man for this job: Special Agent Dario Contini.

  Contini was a seasoned expert in extracting vital details of how and when a painting had been created. Using a variety of methods and specialized equipment, he could pick out constituent chemicals used on the canvas, identify old and modern pigments and binders, and even determine how many layers of paint and washes of color had been applied.

  He was also an inveterate gum chewer, favoring the spicy tang of anise in Black Jack chewing gum. He was convinced it helped his mind focus on the task at hand.

  Contini had worked with Marcello Sabatini before, the two of them sharing similar idiosyncrasies in their respective fields. But as Sabatini had now recused himself from this case out of fear for his life, as Colonel Scarpelli had informed him, Contini was now on his own.

  Cardinal Petrini had couriered over Sabatini’s package of evidence he had assembled, so he began with that. To ensure for himself that Marcello’s findings were accurate, Contini put the extracted sample from Giulia Lama’s painting through his own routine inspections.

  The one device he knew had not been used yet in Sabatini’s work was a Fourier-transform infrared microscope, an expensive and uncommon piece of equipment used to obtain an infrared spectrum of absorption while collecting high-resolution data over a wide spectral range. As he had surmised, the sample grain provided from the Contessa’s version of the Lama painting proved to be authentic for the period. So Contessa Vivaldi’s painting was indeed the original. His mind eased, he accepted Sabatini’s remaining determinations about the other six forgeries in the Vatican’s inventory, deciding now to move on to the broader investigation of Feudatario to understand how deep and wide this operation might be.

  And since the Camorra was involved, he would need his own security detail. From experience, he never took chances with the Italian Mafia.

  Conscripting two capable agents to join him, he had his assistant book passage on the next train to Venice.

  “Signora Calabrese, I must insist that our Raphael be returned to the Vatican at once,” Cardinal Petrini said to Feudatario’s manager on the phone. “We have grave concerns about your services at the moment. I have two Swiss Guards in Venice now; they will assist you with the repacking and return of the painting this afternoon.

  “Whether we do further business with your firm remains to be seen.”

  “But, Your Eminence, is there some reason I can give our owner as to your reasoning in this matter?” Valentina Calabrese asked. “Is there some way we might make other accommodations for you?”

  “That won’t be necessary. And as I said, we simply have private concerns. Kindly do as I ask. My men will be there at ten o’clock tomorrow morning. Arrivederci.”

  Calling Dominic now, Petrini waited for him to answer.

  “Michael, I need you to have Sergeant Dengler and Corporal Bischoff go to Palazzo Feudatario at ten tomorrow morning to oversee the repacking and return of our Raphael painting. We cannot take a chance those scoundrels will try to replicate it. I’ve arranged for an armored truck in Mestre to meet them at the Tronchetto.”

  “As it happens, Eminence, we’ve already taken care of that. We discovered they were in the process of forging a copy. Marco Picard from Baron de Saint-Clair’s security team is with us here, and he and the Guards, um… mitigated the situation. You don’t want to know the details.”

  Petrini knew better than to ask. “Please thank them for me, Michael, and yes, it’s best I don’t know the ways and means of your operations. When might you be returning?”

  “Frankly, there is still much to be done here. I was just told that Colonel Scarpelli of the Art Squad is sending Dario Contini, their best forgeries expert, to Venice to give us a hand. We also now have some of Feudatario’s files on past restorations and Hana and I will go over those with Agent Contini. I’ll keep you apprised of our activity.”

  It was a nearly full moon when Marco and Hana were seated for dinner at the Gritti Terrace that evening. With views of Punta della Dogana and the Santa Maria della Salute Basilica across the majestic Grand Canal, the moonlight shining off sleek black gondolas as they glided through the water made for a perfect setting. One gondolier began singing a romantic aria as he gently rowed his craft, with two lovers bundled together beneath a red blanket as they took in their dream tour of Venice.

  Marco had ordered a bottle of Bruno Rocca Barbaresco before they arrived, which the server had already opened to breathe and poured just after they sat down.

  “I must admit I was surprised that you asked me to dinner,” Hana said, her hand brushing back her chestnut brown hair, “but I was hoping you would.”

  “And I hope your grandfather won’t mind,” Marco confessed, grinning. “I am supposed to be doing my job here, you know, keeping you out of harm’s way.”

  “And who says you aren’t? For what it’s worth, I couldn’t feel any safer than I do right now.” She smiled.

  Their eyes met, and Marco raised his glass. “To one who halves my sorrows and doubles my joys.”

  Moved by his chivalry, Hana smiled a bit nervously, then took a long draw on her wine for fortification.

  “I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve ordered for us already,” he said. “I spoke to the chef earlier and asked him to prepare his most special off-menu choices. For you he’s preparing duck breast with orange fregola and carrot puree. Does that sound appealing?”

  “My God, you’ve thought of everything! Yes, that sounds divine. And what are you having?”

  “He insisted I have his beef sirloin with artichokes, shallots and Amarone sauce. What could I say but, oui?”

  “You Fren
chmen sure know the way to a girl’s heart.”

  “Speaking of which, I have a little surprise after dinner. I rented one of those classic mahogany boats to cruise the Venetian canals under the moonlight. It seems such a perfect night for it. I will be your chauffeur for the evening, mademoiselle.”

  Hana’s hands trembled slightly as she reached for her wine glass. This may be an endless night… she mused, sighing.

  The server brought their meals, and as they enjoyed the food their conversation ranged from where and how each grew up to their lives before they met. It had been a long time since Hana had any romance in her life—apart from her undeclared longing for a certain unavailable priest—and she found Marco’s company refreshing and hopeful.

  And while he was also enjoying his time with Hana, Marco, ever-vigilant to his surroundings, was aware they were being watched. As they were eating, he noticed the guard Karl had taken down at Feudatario was walking in the shadows on the fondomento along the canal, occasionally glancing in their direction. Another man was with him; both were smoking cigarettes as they ambled along the walkway. Later, he noticed they had gone from one end and back again to the restaurant. It was obvious their presence was not coincidental.

  With dinner finished, Marco and Hana walked hand-in-hand to the boat rental service on Fondamenta Cannaregio, not far from the restaurant. Having already planned beforehand, Marco escorted his date to their waiting Aquariva Super, an elegant 40-knot runabout with mahogany deck panels, maple inlays, and sumptuous ivory leather seating. It was a stunning classic, one of Italy’s finest.

  Looking around, it seemed they had lost their followers, but experience and intuition kept Marco’s guard up. He started the powerful engine, revved it a bit, then backed away from the dock, heading out onto the Grand Canal. With a posted speed limit of just seven kilometers per hour, they slowly cruised the waters, taking in the gorgeously lit palazzos and weaving their way between gondolas and other watercraft. Marco turned into one of the smaller canals heading into the interior of the island for a glimpse at the real Venice most tourists never see. With no alley lamps and only the moonlight to guide them, it was an ideal romantic setting.