Amazing, Canidy thought, shaking his head and looking up at the twinking stars in the dark sky. Is the whole island on snooze?
He started walking again.
I don’t know.
But I do know that the last thing I’m going to do is let my guard down.
I plan on being back at that beach when the sub returns in six days….
Canidy came closer to the capital city and its glow of lights began pushing back the pitch-black night.
Now, as he entered the outskirts of town with its brightly painted modern buildings constructed of masonry, he finally saw some people. He passed a man, then another, then saw a couple holding hands as they walked across a piazza.
Not many, but at least it was some life.
He walked until he came to what he recognized from photographs was the Quattro Canti district. It was the city center, the medieval “four corners” area, and its ancient Norman-built stone buildings loomed in the night shadows.
He looked around, then walked on, heading in what he thought—hoped—was the direction of the University of Palermo.
I may as well check it out now, in the dark, with no one around.
Who knows? Maybe I’ll get lucky and bump into the professor.
He chuckled.
Yeah, right.
Fifteen minutes later, after covering five blocks and backtracking two, he found affixed to a street-corner wall a metal sign with an arrow and the word UNIVERSITÀ.
Voilà! Canidy thought.
Or is it “Eureka!”?
He reached the university after three blocks.
The school itself was a disappointment. There was no campus. And with no campus there were no fields for playing sports, no complex for housing students—nothing that gave a genuine sense of a school.
There was, instead, only more of the same masonry-style buildings he had seen in the modern parts of the city. Across the top of the main building’s façade was basic signage, the black block lettering on a white background proclaiming: PALERMO UNIVERSITÀ.
Canidy walked up and got a closer look in the big window of the main building.
There was a security guard inside, sitting on a wooden folding chair with a billy club resting across his knees—and sound asleep.
The funny thing to do would be to bang loudly on the window and watch this guy go flying.
It’d also be the stupid thing to do.
Canidy looked around some more and found that the lights were out all around the university’s building, the doors locked tight.
At a corner, he came to a coffee shop. Its door was open, and he could hear the sound of voices floating out.
He walked to the door and looked inside. There were eight students at the small round table and they had books with them. But judging by the fact that a couple of the girls were sitting in the laps of the boys, it appeared that the last thing they were there for was the study of academics.
One of the girls—a beautiful twentysomething with dark, inviting eyes, jet-black hair, and large breasts barely restrained by her sleeveless blouse—noticed Canidy at the door and smiled at him.
He grinned back, then walked on.
Love conquers all.
He turned onto a street named for Leonardo da Vinci—earlier, he’d passed one named for Michelangelo—and followed it downhill. He could see the port in the distance.
When he reached the bottom of the hill, he saw that there were a number of boats moored in the port. They were tied either to the long pier or to buoys in the harbor.
He also saw that there was absolutely no one around.
He surveyed the area.
At the pier was one large cargo ship, eighty, ninety feet long, with a flat deck that had large hatches and tall booms. It was the biggest vessel in sight. The rest were all fishing boats of various brightly painted wooden designs, six of them about forty feet in length, but the bulk of them were about twenty feet long and, interestingly, pointed at both ends. There were a half dozen more of these twenty-footers pulled up on the shore of pebbles, lying on their side, apparently in for repair of some sort.
Overlooking the port were apartments and homes built almost to the water’s edge. They were dark and quiet.
Dockside was a series of shops, including what looked to be a fish market, their doors and windows closed and locked. Lining the outside wall of the fish market were wooden tables painted in bright greens and yellows and reds. He had seen similar ones at the Fulton Fish Market. They were built at a thirty-degree angle, with deep sides to hold ice, for the display of fresh-caught fish.
Something on the dock moved and Canidy crouched behind a corner of an apartment.
He looked again, and saw a cat standing next to where one of the twenty-footers was tied. The boat was covered almost completely by a tarp, and as Canidy watched the cat leapt from the pier and landed in the middle of it.
Almost immediately, the cat came flying back onto the pier—and not by choice, Canidy saw.
The tarp was pulled back and an angry male stuck his head up. He slurred something in Sicilian at the cat, then threw a bottle for good measure.
Canidy chuckled softly.
Sounds like someone had a bit to drink tonight and had to sleep on the boat.
Or maybe that’s where he always sleeps.
I’ve had worse….
Canidy caught himself in a yawn.
I’d like to settle into one right now myself.
But no matter which one I pick, that’ll be the one where the owner is casting off lines at oh-dark-hundred—and finding me aboard, snoring, will not be the highlight of his day.
Or mine.
Canidy then looked back at the beached twenty-foot boats.
But no one’s going fishing in those anytime soon.
He walked down to the second-farthest one. It was turned on its starboard side, its hull facing the fish market and shops. He pulled back on its tarp and saw that the interior had been gutted. There was a very long, smooth area where he could crawl in and pull the tarp back for concealment.
He looked at his watch and saw that it was now almost one o’clock.
May as well get rest while I can.
He took a long leak on the pebble beach, then settled inside the boat, put his .45 under his duffel, rested his head on top of it, and yawned.
And the Gramercy Park has the nerve to call itself a luxury hotel….
The sound of small diesel engines came loudly across the water and almost echoed inside the boat hull where Canidy lay rubbing his eyes.
Judging by the light coming in the edges of the tarp, he figured it was just turning dawn and a glance at his wristwatch confirmed it. Both hands were on the six.
Men’s voices filled the air, and there was the sound of foot traffic on the wooden pier.
Canidy peeked out of the tarp, saw there was nothing but another boat hull looking back at him, and crawled out of the boat.
He peered around the boat. The piers were bustling with fishermen loading their boats for the day; some boats had already cast off lines and were headed out of the harbor.
Some of the shops were now open. Canidy noticed the smell of coffee on the salt air, and that someone had put ice in the display tables outside of the fish market. Customers were already coming and going.
Canidy turned around and relieved himself in what he thought was probably the same spot he had five hours earlier. He started to grab his duffel and throw it on his back but stopped. He made a close examination of the boat and the work done on it thus far and decided that the boat had not been touched in months.
No one’s coming in the next hour or so.
He slipped the .45 into the small of his back, adjusted his Greek cap, then headed for the shops, hoping he might get lucky sneaking a cup of coffee.
As he walked across the beach, he studied the steady traffic going on and off the pier. All of the men looked approximately the same—same dark pants and sweaters, same olive complexions, and p
retty much the same head of hair (though this varied greatly; some had beards or mustaches while others were clean-shaven).
Canidy stepped up on the pier and joined the line headed to the shops. He followed two men into one and saw that it wasn’t a shop so much as a bare-bones communal room. There were two wooden tables. On one were baskets of fruit and breads. On the other, in the corner, were two big coffeepots. One was being refilled by a tiny, wrinkled woman who Canidy guessed had to be eighty, eighty-five.
Hell, she could be a hundred and eighty-five, for all I know.
The fishermen were freely helping themselves, no one paying for anything.
The woman looked at Canidy and she moved her thin wrinkled lips into something of a smile. She poured coffee into a chipped and stained white porcelain cup and held it out to him.
Jackpot.
He smiled and nodded his thanks, then turned to leave, grabbing a fig from a basket on the way out.
Outside, standing beside one of the iced-down display tables, he took his first sip of coffee and looked out across the piers.
The boat with the drunk who’d thrown the cat off early that morning still had the tarp across it.
Sleeping in…must’ve been some bender he was on.
Canidy looked past that boat, to the end of the pier, where it made a T, and saw a good-sized fishing boat, about fifty feet, just arriving. Painted on its bow, just below the rusty anchor mounted there, was: STEFANIA.
Two more of the same-looking men—olive-skinned, dark clothes, dark hair, et cetera, et cetera—jumped off the Stefania and secured her lines to cleats on the pier.
Canidy took another sip of coffee—and almost blew it out when he saw a third man get off the boat.
It just can’t be…
He had to get a better look and quickly joined the line of fishermen walking out on the pier.
As he approached the Stefania, it became clear that he was not seeing things.
Although the guy had his back to him, there was no doubt whatever that this guy was not average. He was big and burly—easily six-two, two-fifty—and towered over everyone else.
And then Canidy saw who was onboard handing the big guy a wooden crate.
I knew it!
Canidy stepped closer and said quietly, “I don’t suppose there’s fish in that box, huh, Frank?”
Francisco Nola turned to look but did not appear to be particularly surprised to see Dick Canidy standing on a pier in Palermo.
The monster fishmonger, however, almost dropped the wooden crate into the sea.
Nola looked around the pier, then jerked his head toward the cabin of his boat.
“C’mon aboard,” he said softly in English to Canidy.
Nola said something in Sicilian to the monster fishmonger, then turned to go into the cabin.
Canidy hopped aboard and followed.
“So you couldn’t come with me,” Canidy said, “but here the hell you are.”
Nola was standing next to the helm of the Stefania, his arms crossed. He stared at Canidy but did not speak.
“What the hell is that all about?” Canidy said, his voice rising.
Nola glanced out the window before replying.
“This trip was planned before you were sent to me,” he said.
Canidy shook his head in disbelief.
A member of the crew came up from down below carrying another crate. He went out of the cabin without saying a word.
“What’s in the boxes?” Canidy said.
Nola did not immediately reply.
“Chocolates,” he said finally.
“Bullshit!”
“And medicine.”
Canidy stared at him.
“That I believe. What else?”
Nola shrugged.
“Does it matter?”
Canidy ignored that.
“Maybe weapons?” he went on.
Nola looked out the window, then back at Canidy.
“You know whose side I’m on.”
“How did you get this stuff into Algiers?”
“If you know who loads the Liberty ships in New York, you can figure out who unloads them here.”
Canidy nodded, and thought, And a crate here and a crate there that goes missing, or isn’t listed on a manifest…doesn’t exist. Nice.
“How do you get to come in and out of here? They let you?”
“Not everyone. We have to wait till a German named Müller is away or otherwise distracted.” He paused. “We have always run an import-export business. Olive oil, tomatoes, and more out. Merchandise in. It is overlooked now because you can always find someone willing to look the other way if it is to his advantage.”
He held up his right hand and rubbed his thumb and index finger together.
“Why didn’t you tell me you did this—that you ran boats here?”
Nola grinned.
“You didn’t ask.”
Canidy made a sour face.
“I don’t think it’s funny.”
“Look,” Nola said reasonably, “I would have. But you were interested in Porto Empedocle.”
Canidy stared at him.
Dammit. He’s right. That’s when I thought we were going to bring the professor out that way.
“I thought that that was where we’d bring out Professor Rossi.”
“Rossi?”
“Yeah. Know him?”
Nola shook his head.
Canidy said, “He’s at the university here—”
“Yes,” Nola said. “His sister is my cousin’s neighbor. They used to sometimes have dinners, then play cards. Dr. Napoli and Dr. Modica, too, but no longer. I hear both are dead.”
“I thought you said you didn’t know Rossi?”
“I don’t. I said his sister—”
“Jesus Christ!” Canidy exploded.
What is it with this guy?
He should be a lawyer!
Or maybe I should ask better questions…
I’d better start again.
“Sorry, Frank,” Canidy said, and took a deep breath.
“Can you get me to Rossi?”
[ FOUR ]
Port of Palermo
Palermo, Sicily
1805 25 March 1943
The Stefania, her diesel engine idling, was moored next to the huge cargo ship when Dick Canidy helped Professor Arturo Rossi aboard.
Rossi, carrying a suitcase packed with his papers from his office at the university, tried to move too quickly and nearly fell into the dark water.
Canidy took the suitcase and Rossi awkwardly rushed again to get aboard.
He made it, and Canidy then handed the suitcase over and hopped aboard with his duffel.
As he helped the professor into the cabin, Canidy thought, He’s been in high gear since the very second he understood that I could get him the hell out of here.
Keeping him under wraps the last few days has been tough.
And no wonder.
He loses two dear colleagues—one to a heinous disease, the other shot in front of him by that Müller from the SS—then is tapped to take their place in that hellhole of a villa.
It was the same as a death sentence.
Canidy helped Rossi get comfortable on a bunk down below.
At least the villa is history…or will be in two hours, when Nola’s men fire the fuses to the C-2 I set for them.
Canidy looked out the porthole at the harbor.
But I still don’t know what the hell Donovan meant about something bigger.
Maybe it was the viruses…
“Thank you,” Rossi said.
“You’re welcome, Professor.”
Rossi looked at him oddly.
“Something bothering you, Professor?”
He shook his head.
“Just what are you going to do about the Tabun?” Rossi said.
Tabun? Canidy thought.
He said, “Tabun, as in gas?”
“Yes. That’s also why you’re here, no?
”
Canidy did not answer.
“Why Tabun?” he said.
“You’ve seen how few Germans there are here,” the professor explained.
Next to none.
“Yeah.”
“Well, in anticipation of an Allied landing on an island it can barely hold because they’re stretched so thin, the Germans have very quietly brought in their first shipment of the nerve agent.”
Jesus! That stuff is worse than yellow fever. It targetsorgans, and it makes muscles twitch till the victim collapses from exhaustion—and dies.
“Where is it?”
Rossi pointed out the porthole, to the darkened cargo ship moored nearby.
Canidy dug into his duffel and came out with the last two pounds of Composition C-2, then went topside.
Nola stood at the helm.
“You ready?” Nola said.
“You have any men on the dock?” Canidy replied.
Nola shook his head.
“They are all aboard. There’s no one out there.”
“Give me ten minutes,” Canidy said, and reached to set his watch.
Nola touched his watch to adjust it.
Canidy said, “Mark.”
Canidy then went out of the cabin, jumped on the pier, and ran toward the cargo ship.
Nola looked at his watch. Nine minutes had passed since Canidy left.
He stuck his head out the door of the cabin.
“Cast off the lines,” he called to his men.
The men untied the bow and stern lines from the cleats on the pier, then leaped back aboard, coiling the lines as they went.
Nola checked his watch.
The second hand swept the face.
Ten minutes.
He looked back to the pier, saw no one, and frowned.
His right hand reached up and bumped forward the lever that controlled the transmission.
As the Stefania slowly moved ahead, Nola turned the wooden spoke wheel to port and her bow began to angle out toward the open sea.
Just as the transom cleared the end of the pier, Nola heard a heavy thump, thump aft of him.
He did not turn around to look.
It was the unmistakable sound of feet hitting the deck.
The Stefania was dead in the water—her engine off and all lights out—just north of Mondello, which was just below the Villa del Archimedes at Partanna.
The Saboteurs Page 36