The Heretic Scroll

by Will Adams

  Izzo ignored him. He ignored him because of the fifth man who now entered, instantly dominating the room with a charisma and force that Giuseppe Battaglia would never possess. Giovanni Bruno himself, boss of Herculaneum’s most powerful crime family, and far and away the man most likely behind that morning’s murder.

  II

  Naples’ Archaeological Museum lay only a short walk from the Cappella Sansevero, home of the Veiled Christ, that glory of sculpture so delicately and ingeniously wrought that for many years admirers had thought it possible only through the use of alchemy. Taddeo Santoro was good friends with the people there, and so had visited the chapel out of hours many dozens of times, sitting in quiet contemplation of that extraordinary masterpiece, the way it used the folds of marble to both hide and reveal the face and body of Christ, giving a glimpse of something utterly transcendent. Yet never, in all those visits, had he imagined he would be involved in something so similar himself. Never had he imagined it would fall to him to give the world a glimpse of the face of Christ.

  Yet here they were.

  ‘The project must go on,’ he said, pulling his Discovery in alongside Zeno D’Agostino’s white Mercedes sedan in the museum’s underground car park. ‘My heart breaks for Raffaele and Lucia, but we have to keep at it. We have a duty.’

  ‘You don’t have to convince me,’ said D’Agostino drily. ‘And I doubt Alberts will take much persuasion either. But we need someone in the chair. Otherwise we’ll get nowhere.’

  ‘Lucia’s tougher than you think,’ Taddeo told him. ‘But I’ll sit in if she can’t make it.’

  ‘Good. Tomorrow, then.’

  ‘Tomorrow.’ He saw D’Agostino into his car, then waved him off. He watched him until he was out of sight before summoning the staff lift. It had a large tinted mirror against its rear wall. He looked a mess. He dried his eyes, wiped his face and straightened his tie. It didn’t much help. The doors opened. Flavia and Maria were talking in urgent low voices. They fell silent when they saw him, faces filling with sympathy and concern.

  ‘We just heard,’ said Maria. ‘How horrible.’

  ‘Yes,’ he agreed. He was about to say more, only to be so overwhelmed by emotion that he had to press his handkerchief to his eyes.

  Flavia waited until he’d composed himself. ‘Do they know who did it?’

  ‘They have good people. Strong leads. That’s all I can say.’

  ‘And…? In the meantime…?’

  ‘In the meantime?’

  ‘Are we all at risk ourselves?’

  ‘Oh.’ He bit his lip. Maria was curator of their Villa mosaics. Flavia was an administrator with responsibility for the Villa’s affairs. Only human to fear for themselves and their families too. Weariness made his shoulders slump. He wasn’t up to this. Yet a man’s mettle was proven in adversity. He lifted his chin and met their eyes. ‘I’ll double security,’ he promised. ‘But we’ll all still need to play our part.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘Simple steps. Sensible steps. Watch out for anything unusual. Think twice before going out alone. Make sure your locks work. Don’t open your door until you know who’s there. That kind of thing.’ They looked perturbed rather than reassured, however, his message undermined by his own clear distress. He excused himself in order to smarten himself up properly in the loos before returning to his office. Then he composed a tribute to Raffaele, a recap of the morning’s events and a repeat of his call to vigilance. He rewrote it again and again until he’d captured the right mix of sorrow, seriousness and reassurance, then he put it in an all-staff email and sent it on its way.

  III

  Raffaele had apparently made it from Central Naples to Herculaneum in thirty-one minutes in his Lamborghini. Breaking pretty much every traffic law, and on his Harley, Cesco made it back in just twenty-three. He parked in the cobbled piazza below Raffaele’s apartment, let himself in through its main door and hurried upstairs, taking out Lucia’s keys as he went. The latch-lock proved a curse. He had to push it in all the way, then draw it back a fraction and jiggle it till it turned.

  He slipped inside. He had perhaps ten minutes before Messana arrived, so he needed to be quick. She hadn’t struck him as corrupt, but then you never knew. His father and grandfather had both been senior figures in the ’Ndrangheta, the Calabrian Mafia. Every policeman he’d known as a boy had been on the take. They’d turn up in the morning for their envelopes of cash, then they’d appear on TV later that night talking piously about the Mafia scourge. His grandfather had finally sickened of the life. He’d turned pentito. But they’d kidnapped Cesco and his twin sister to force him to kill himself before he could testify. Then, when his family had gathered at a restaurant for his wake, they’d sent gunmen in to massacre every last one of them too, even the children, though they’d supposedly been under police protection at the time. While he himself had survived, his faith in the police most certainly had not. Besides, corruption wasn’t the only danger here. There was always intense pressure to solve high-profile murders fast. Leaking unsavoury details about the victim was a common tactic to make it seem they’d got what they’d deserved and so take that pressure off.

  Not this time. Not to Raffaele. Not if Cesco could help it.

  Raff’s main room was a bachelor cliché, remodelled by him in a midlife spasm after Rosanna had taken their kids with her to Milan. The furniture was all chrome and white leather. The walls were decorated with his own photographs of gorgeous women in revealing clothes and atmospheric shots of his beloved Naples. And smoked-glass doors opened out onto a private roof terrace full of colourful blooms.

  Cesco briskly checked through all the drawers for drugs and other embarrassments. His friend had liked to party. He found a hand mirror speckled with traces of white powder. He ran it beneath a tap, then dried it thoroughly with loo paper that he flushed away. The fridge was full from a recent shop, the bin with pizza boxes and empty wine bottles. The second bedroom had a wooden bunk with touchingly small mattresses, and a barely-used exercise bike. A thin summer duvet was half off the king-sized bed, as if Raff had left in a hurry. Yesterday’s black Armani T-shirt sat atop the clothes basket. The home office next. Its small window offered an oblique view of the piazza beneath. No sign yet of Messana, but he still needed to hurry. If she found out he’d been inside, she might even suspect him of scrubbing the place of evidence against himself.

  A monitor, mouse and keyboard on the desk awaited Raff’s laptop, no doubt burned in the Lamborghini. A used espresso cup and saucer sat between a silver-framed photo of his two kids and a plastic bowl of memory cards. He checked the drawers. The upper one was empty save for an old mouse, a notepad and some pens. But the lower one was so crammed with papers that it was hard to open. He flipped through them in dismay. Bank statements, final demands, legal letters. Raff had always spent so freely, he’d taken his prosperity for granted. But if this was anything to go by…

  He checked his watch. Messana would be here any moment. He needed to get out. He put everything back, then hurried down to the piazza, where he sat side-saddle on his Harley for a few minutes until she appeared and pulled alongside. ‘Enough time?’ she asked wryly.

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘It’s not your friend we’re after. It’s his bastard killer.’

  He shrugged as if he didn’t understand, then led her upstairs. He unlocked the front door and stood aside. She stopped for perhaps ten seconds to film it on her mobile. She checked the call log on Raff’s landline. He’d received a call at 11:23 last night. She tried the number on her own phone. It rang and rang until finally a man answered, sounding doubtful and with an announcer’s voice audible in the background. She asked him where he was. Napoli Centrale train station, he told her. He’d been passing the bank of phones when he’d heard this one ring.

  There was a message pad beside the phone, and a ceramic pot of pens and pencils. Valentina ran a soft nib over the top page to reveal the impression of the last message.
>
  2G PMT 6.30

  ‘Mean anything to you?’ asked Messana.

  ‘A meeting?’ hazarded Cesco.

  ‘Maybe.’ She took a picture of it, then moved on. They visited the rooms in the same order as he had, though they lingered in his bedroom to finger his designer shirts and jackets.

  ‘Nice,’ she said.

  ‘He liked to look good.’

  ‘But not to feed his kids?’

  ‘I thought it was his bastard killer you were after.’

  In his home office, she too checked the drawers. She raised an eyebrow at all the bills, photographed a few with her phone. ‘Did you know?’ she asked.

  ‘No.’ He paused, then added: ‘I thought he was holding back on Rosanna out of animosity. She’s not as hard up as she makes out. She’s living with an accountant. Raff was convinced the only reason they hadn’t married yet was to keep milking him for alimony.’

  ‘Milking him? That’s nice.’

  ‘They were angry at each other. It happens with divorces.’

  ‘And you? He paid you okay? Your suppliers?’

  He nodded. ‘Raff was dyslexic. He found accounting hard. So all of that was handled by his bookkeeper.’

  ‘Contact details?’

  ‘In the studio.’

  She took a memory card from the bowl. ‘What are these for?’

  ‘He had his bag snatched a couple of times. Cameras can be replaced. Photographs can’t. He learned to zip copies away as he went.’

  ‘So these will have photos on them? Recent photos?’

  ‘If he hasn’t wiped them.’

  ‘May I take them?’

  Cesco hesitated. But any wrongdoing on them was likely other people’s. Besides, to his surprise, he found he’d come to trust Messana a little. Her stolidity was reassuring. ‘I’ll need a receipt. And your word you won’t use them against him.’

  ‘Who do you think we are?’

  ‘I know who you are. That’s why I’m asking.’

  She wrote out a receipt, then bagged the cards. ‘His studio?’ she said.

  ‘Sure,’ said Cesco. ‘Let’s go there now.’

  Chapter Seven

  I

  Romeo Izzo gazed at Giovanni Bruno across the empty bedroom. Four years ago, his investigation and testimony had got this man convicted of serious drug trafficking offences that should have seen him serving at least a dozen years, had he not, by all accounts, bribed the judge with a charming seafront villa just west of Terracina. Even so, he’d heard that on his release, he’d had to be talked out of coming after Izzo with a baseball bat. It was fair to say they did not much care for one another.

  ‘The fuck you doing here?’ demanded Bruno. ‘This is my property.’

  ‘Just looking,’ said Izzo.

  ‘Your place too big for you, eh? What with your wife dead, I mean?’

  Izzo allowed himself a moment before replying. ‘It suits me fine, thanks.’

  ‘I was sorry to hear about her. Truly.’ His lips twitched and his eyes grew mean and hard with malicious pleasure. ‘Looking forward to bending her over your kitchen table was the one thing kept me sane inside.’

  ‘You were never her type. She hated the smell of shit.’

  ‘Glad you’re not looking. Place is promised to my nephew. Getting married, he tells me.’ He glanced round at Giuseppe. ‘What was her name again?’

  ‘Margarita.’

  ‘That’s it. Margarita. A wedding present. What do you think?’

  ‘Makes sense. She’ll need some kind of bribe.’

  ‘Not what I hear. I hear she’s all for it. Apparently there’s this sad old pig won’t leave her alone.’ He advanced upon Izzo, snuffling loudly as he came, before stopping right in front of him. He was a short man, despite his lifts and heels, but far more powerfully built than Izzo, with broad shoulders and a barrel chest. His hair was almost all gone, but his jaw was blackly stubbled, like a wheat field after a harvest burn. And no silk suits for him. Baggy blue jeans, a plain T-shirt and a well-worn leather jacket, as if he’d come directly from his farm – which, for all Izzo knew, might well be the case. They said he’d spent hours there every day since his release, growing salad vegetables of which he was inordinately proud. Heaven help you if you made fun of his tomatoes or spurned his radishes. A man of Herculaneum through and through. Camorra through and through. Wealthy enough to live anywhere he liked yet instead he was knocking together all the top-floor apartments in the block in which he’d been born and raised.

  ‘Did you do it?’ Izzo asked him.

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘This morning’s murder.’

  ‘Trip up a lot of people with this kind of questioning, do you?’

  ‘This is your turf. Nothing happens here without your say-so. Either you ordered it yourself or someone just took a shit in your mouth.’

  Bruno stepped even closer to Izzo, so that their chests touched. He could feel the man’s breath on his face, hot and garlicky. ‘It is my turf,’ he agreed. He held up his meaty hands, turned them round for inspection. Izzo swallowed. Word was that Bruno had strangled at least half a dozen people himself. They said he got a kick from watching up close as the flailing slackened and the lights went out. ‘I could end you right here and now and no one would lift a finger,’ he told him softly. ‘I could pitch you from this window and have a dozen witnesses claim they saw you lean out too far and overbalance. I could have my guys drag you outside and kick you to death in plain view of everyone in all these houses, and not one of them would ever breathe a word. But I’m not about to. Not unless you push me. You know why not?’

  ‘Because you’re not an idiot.’

  ‘Because I’m not an idiot,’ agreed Bruno. ‘I don’t need the kind of grief that comes from shredding a suit, let alone a uniform like you.’

  ‘You wanted to send a message,’ suggested Izzo. ‘Not much point if no one hears.’

  ‘People hear what I want them to hear. Don’t worry about that. Like they heard about the damage the excavations have done my houses. Because bullshit it was those fucking tremors. The cracks were there long before those. I’ve got complaints from my tenants going back years.’

  ‘I’ll bet you do.’

  ‘A surveyor’s report too. Fifty pages documenting it all in detail.’ His eyes narrowed at Izzo’s snort. ‘You’re right,’ he acknowledged. ‘I can get a report to say whatever the hell I want. And yes, you’d better believe I’m angry with those Foundation arseholes. But let me put all this into context for you. I own these houses, sure. I also own five apartment blocks around town, including yours, plus stakes in God knows how many businesses. I own properties in Rome, Milan, Paris. In London, Cyprus, New York. I have a five-star hotel in Bali.’

  ‘Just ask me out already.’

  ‘I’m just saying, is it worth it for me to stir up some shit over the excavations? Sure. Did I bung a few of my tenants a few euros to kick off outside the Town Hall? Why wouldn’t I? Did I have the boys spray some paint, break a window or two? Fine, you caught me. But kill a civilian over it? For a few cracked walls that we both know I’ll get someone else to pay for in the end, one way or another? Fuck no.’

  Izzo nodded. ‘And the death threat letter?’

  ‘Did you even read that thing?’ said Bruno disgustedly. ‘It wasn’t from anyone in my line of work, believe me. We know how to frighten. This wasn’t that. This was some prick jacking off into his sock about how clever he was, how well read. It was written to impress.’

  ‘So you say.’

  ‘So I say. Which means you’re looking in the wrong place.’

  ‘And the right place would be?’

  ‘The fuck would I know? That’s your job.’

  ‘But if you hear anything…?’

  Bruno took another half step forward, pushing Izzo backward against the window despite his attempt to hold his spot. He clamped his right hand round Izzo’s throat, lifting him up so that he had to stand on tiptoes. Then he sque
ezed until Izzo found himself gasping for air. He tried to bat his hand away, but Bruno was too strong for him. ‘Three years you cost me,’ he snarled. ‘Three fucking years. If you think I’m ever going to do shit to help you with anything, think again.’ Then he let go so abruptly that Izzo stumbled to his knees. Bruno gave him a final scowl, then turned and stalked back out, followed by Battaglia and the rest of his crew, leaving him there alone, nauseous and shaken, massaging his sore throat and breathing gratefully of the restorative air.

  II

  Carmen took the train back to Porto Nolana, a bus down to Università, then walked in along Via Toledo. She usually loved this pedestrianised thoroughfare, thanks to its youth, vibrancy and chic; but today she found its boisterousness a nuisance, what with a difficult phone call to make to the museum, to pass on Lucia’s message about tomorrow’s meeting of the Philodemus project.

  To her surprise, when she gave her name and asked for Taddeo Santoro, she was put straight through. The great man himself came on, in equal measures distraught for Raffaele and solicitous for her welfare. She assured him she was fine and briefed him on Lucia, her burns, her treatment, and how she’d entrusted her with her keys so she’d be there tomorrow to open up for him, the professor and Father Alberts. Santoro hesitated a moment, then thanked her and assured her he’d notify the others himself and that they’d see her tomorrow at eleven. She ended the call, then slowed almost to a stop. In hospital, Lucia had referred to Alberts as Father rather than Rupert. Almost unconsciously, she’d repeated that to Santoro. And he hadn’t corrected her.

  She reached Piazza del Plebiscito and the Palazzo Reale. She showed her ID at the gate, then made her way to its rear wing, up its grand staircase to the first floor and Naples’ National Library. The staircase stopped here. The library didn’t. There was another floor above that few people even knew about. It was the old servants’ quarters, out of bounds to the general public, reachable only by well-hidden back stairs and a small lift. All the same, it was Carmen’s favourite part of the library, an Alice in Wonderland labyrinth of grand rooms cluttered with startling delights: antique globes, erotic sculptures, marble busts of forgotten or disgraced personages, all connected by eerie, long corridors narrowed by fat bookshelves filled with ancient journals, archives and almanacs, with inexplicable flights of steps and archways so low that even she had to duck beneath them.