Blood of the Lamb (34 page)

Giulio’s own faith was simple: that he loved his wife and kids, and they were worth loving; that he was good at his job, and his job was worth doing. Anything else—the next life, or the one after that—would have to take care of itself.

What Luigi Esposito was devoted to, Giulio didn’t know. But the young Gendarme had impressed Giulio with his energy, pleased him with his thoroughness, and more or less convinced him with his theory. More or less because hard evidence was the only thing that ever convinced Giulio Aventino of anything. But Esposito’s stolen-art-ring idea intrigued him, and tentatively answered some otherwise confounding questions: What had gone on this morning at the Vatican Library? How was it connected to what had happened at Santa Maria della Scala? And why had Raffaele’s cardinal uncle requested a surveillance of
Professoressa
Livia Pietro?

That last would have been easier to answer if the cardinal uncle would answer his cell phone, but even his secretary, Father Ateba, when reached at the Vatican, had no idea where Lorenzo Cossa might be.

Giulio nodded his thanks as the new coffees were delivered and dialed the next source on his list, the owner of a fine-art framing shop whom Giulio was sure, but had never tried hard to prove, had a sideline in forged Old Masters. The shop owner was grateful for Giulio’s lack of diligence, and Giulio had long since calculated that the man’s value as an informant vastly outweighed any potential gain from shutting down his operation, which, after all, only made fools of people drooling after bargains anyone without larceny in his heart would recognize as too good to be true. On this occasion the shop owner had nothing to add, though, beyond promising to contact Giulio immediately should the street start buzzing with tales of audacious, highly professional art thieves.

Giulio thumbed off the phone and grunted. “That makes seven,” he said to Raffaele, whose phone was likewise temporarily idle. “And they all claim they haven’t heard a thing. You finding anything?”

“
Niente di niente.
I’m beginning to wonder if Esposito’s wrong. Or are these people just really good?”

“I’ve never known Roman crooks to be adept at hiding their traces.”

“Well, only one of these three is even Italian.”

“Supporting Esposito’s international-gang theory. Though you might expect Interpol would’ve had something on them, then.” Which Esposito had said they didn’t. The young Gendarme had searched the relevant databases—interesting to find someone so apparently techno-savvy in those hidebound holy halls—and found nothing. Giulio himself, a Luddite, nothing to be proud of but he was too old to change, had done some old-fashioned research: he’d called a friend, Paolo Lucca, who’d been promoted out of general larceny to the elite
Nucleo Tutela Patrimonio Artistico, the Carabinieri’s own stolen art bureau. Paolo was no help: none of the suspects were known to Il Nucleo
.
He was interested, but the only actual theft had occurred at the Vatican, outside Carabinieri jurisdiction. He’d promised to sniff around, and also, at Giulio’s request, to look into unsolved cases involving Church-related art anywhere in the country.

“Around the world, come to that,” Giulio told him. “These people may be new to Italy. You’re buddy-buddy with the hotshots at Interpol, I assume.”

“I thought you said you’d already checked with them.”

“Checked their database. The Gendarme did. But—”

“But he doesn’t know anyone over there and you’re afraid if he calls them they won’t give him the time of day.”

“Am I wrong?”

“No. They’re worse than we are. Though I have to admit, the last Gendarme I worked with was a bona fide idiot.”

“This kid’s sharp, Paolo. He’s wasted over there.”

Giulio sat back now and sipped his coffee. “I wonder what the point is.”

Raffaele looked up. “Point of what?”

“These particular thefts. They’ve obviously got a specific agenda. And they’re in a hurry.”

“That could just be because they screwed up this morning and now they’re exposed.”

“Then why didn’t they lay low for a while instead of heading over here? I wish I knew what they were looking for. A notebook from the Vatican Library, some target in the Reliquary Chapel . . .”

“Monsignor Conti said nothing was missing.”

“That only means they failed. Possibly because they didn’t want that irritating historian to know what they were up to and they couldn’t get him to leave.”

Raffaele grinned. “If that’s it, I sympathize with them.”

“What is it they’re doing, Raffaele?” Giulio leaned back, staring at the sky. “What’s the connection? Come on, you’re the church guy. What do you see?”

“Nothing,” Raffaele admitted. “But I wonder if they do.”

“If they do what?”

“See the connection. Maybe all they have is a list.”

Giulio was silent for a moment. “They’re working for someone.”

Raffaele noddded. “Not just theft, theft to order. For a client who doesn’t want to wait.”

“All right. I’ll buy it. But that just makes the question: What’s the client after?”

“I wonder,” Raffaele said, “if the client’s impatient enough—or important enough—that they’re willing to risk going on now. Accident or not, they did kill someone.”

From the table beside his coffee, Giulio’s cell phone rang.

“
Ispettore
, this is Dispatch,” a woman’s voice said. “We’ve just sent two officers to a fight inside San Francesco a Ripa. There was a bulletin asking that you be alerted to—”

“Yes. Hold on.” Giulio looked over at Raffaele. “San Francesco a Ripa. Close, right?” Raffaele nodded. “Thank you,” Giulio told Dispatch.

He was about to click off when she said, “
Ispettore
? I have another report here, from an hour ago, before your bulletin came in. I didn’t handle the call but when I saw what you wanted I looked back through our files just in case. There was a disturbance in Santa Maria in Trastevere. Nothing seems to be missing but our reports are that a woman stood on the collection box and opened the aumbry. Were you told about that?”

“No. Opened the what?”

“The aumbry, it says. I don’t know either.”

“But nothing’s missing?”

“According to the priests, no.”

“Thank you. Good work.” By the time he said, “Keep me updated,” he’d jumped up and dropped ten Euro on the table. To Raffaele he shouted over his shoulder, “My car’s closest. Call Esposito.” They took off across the piazza, reached the Fiat, and yanked open the doors at the same moment. Raffaele was poking buttons on his cell phone as they climbed into the car. Giulio fired the engine and peeled out. To Raffaele, holding the phone between ear and shoulder and struggling to buckle his seat belt, Giulio added, “And what’s an aumbry?”

61

Livia Pietro tripped. Thomas, his heart pounding, had to grab her to keep her from falling as they ran down San Francesco a Ripa’s center aisle. She kept turning to look back; you’d think she’d never seen a fight before. He surveyed the narthex as they neared it. No one there but horrified tourists. The two officers were charging down the left aisle toward the Albertoni chapel, where the clerk and the other man were still brawling. He and Livia could make it out the door. Gripping her arm, he tried to pull her along, but she dug in her heels and said, “No!”

“No, what?”

“We can’t leave.”

“You made me leave Santa Maria della Scala, and you were right! This is the same. We can’t stay here. There’s nothing we can—”

“That’s not what I mean. There are more police coming. I can hear them. They’ll be pulling into the piazza any second.”

As if to prove her words, the wail of a siren and the screech of brakes reached Thomas. Livia, with a look of longing, had turned back toward the fight, which had expanded: now both the clerk—Ocampo, was that his name?—and the blond man were mixing it up with the officers. Thomas tightened his grip on her arm. He stared around desperately, then said, “Come this way!”

The Catholic Church had, over the centuries, evolved many different practices for the administration of its sacraments, and reasons and explanations abounded for each choice. The sacrament of confession, for example: some theologians thought it best that the penitent’s side of the confessional be open, with neither door nor drape. Thus the entire congregation could see a fellow believer offer contrition for his sins and seek absolution. They could be a support for him, he an example to them. There was an argument to be made in that direction, to be sure. Right now, however, Thomas was unutterably relieved that the designers of the ecclesiastical furnishings in San Francesco a Ripa had not shared this approach.

He hauled Livia down the center aisle toward the entrance and then over to the other side of the nave, about as far from the action as they could get. A confessional nestled between two chapels in the side aisle. The booth was of a weighty Baroque style, both priest and penitent hidden behind heavily carved wooden doors. Pulling open the penitent’s side, he told Livia, “Get in!” and then, since she seemed frozen, casting yet another look at the scuffling men, he shoved her inside and shut the door on her.
Ah, Thomas, now we’re forcing reluctant sinners into the confessional?
He yanked open the other door, jumped in, and pulled it to. Sitting on the narrow bench, he slid the panel, revealing the screen between them.

“What’s going on?” he whispered as he pulled his shoes on. When she didn’t answer he demanded, “The clerk—that was Ocampo, right?”

“Yes.” Livia’s own whisper was hoarse. “And Jonah.”

“Jonah? Who, the blond man? I thought that was just a good Samaritan, helping you.”

“No. Jonah.”

“The man—the . . . Noantri—who started all this? The one you’re looking for?”

He started to rise but she said, “Don’t. Listen, you can hear it. They’re both gone.”

Now her voice only sounded sad. He paused, and listened, and found she was right. He heard shouts and clamoring voices, people vying to tell their versions of what they’d seen, what they’d heard. Other voices tried to calm things down, sort them out. Nothing sounded like thrown punches, kicks, flesh striking flesh.

“How do you know they’re gone? Not just arrested?”

“Their footsteps when they ran.”

“You heard them?”

Wearily, she said, “Of course.”

Of course. Thomas sat back down. His skin felt oddly flushed and his heart still beat rapidly as he said, “What
happened
?”

“I don’t know. I turned and he was there. Ocampo. He must still be after the notebook because he grabbed my bag.”

“How did he find us?”

“I’m not sure. He might have caught my scent.”

“Caught your—” Thomas realized that through the confessional screen he was catching her scent, too. Or perhaps not hers—he was human, after all—but the perfume she wore: a deep, gentle fragrance, as of a tropical garden where night flowers bloomed. “All right, fine!” He shook his head to clear it. “And this Jonah? How did
he
find us?”

“I don’t know that, either. Or why. He must know what I’ve been told to do. And that the Conclave is prepared to . . . do it, if I fail. Why doesn’t he just stay out of sight?”

“Are they working together?”

“Jonah and Ocampo? You mean, because they’re both Noantri? If they are that’s some show they just put on.” She seemed to rouse herself, her voice beyond the screen taking on a sharper note.

Many questions elbowed one another in Thomas’s head, about Jonah, about Livia, about the Noantri; and he felt he didn’t want to ask them here, through the confessional screen. He wanted to see her face, look into her eyes. But another question had to be answered first. “Where are the police?”

“What?”

“Use your supersonic hearing! Are they still here?”

For a moment, silence from the other side of the screen. Then, “Yes. More of them. The two officers we saw, and also the man who called for the ambulance in Santa Maria della Scala. He’s with someone else. And the Gendarme! From the Colosseum station, I think he’s here, too.” She drew a sharp breath. “Two of them are heading this way.”

“All right,” Thomas said. He tried to ignore the odd sensations he was feeling, tried to concentrate on the immediate problem. “Do you remember how this goes?”

“How what goes?”

“Confession. ‘Bless me, Father, for I have sinned’? You said you were raised a Catholic. Or is even the memory of that something you’ve dispensed with?”

“Would you absolve a Noantri if one came to you?” she snapped. “Though in fact you probably have, more than once.” Without giving him a chance to answer she intoned,
“Mi benedica, Padre, perché ho peccato.”

She didn’t go on, so in soft, droning Italian, which he hoped was quiet enough to barely be heard by, and accentless enough to convince, any passing policeman, Thomas replied with the prompt. “How long has it been, my child, since your last confession?”

A pause; then, “Ninety-six years.”

Thomas tried to swallow the choking sound he found himself making. He wasn’t sure what to say, but this time, she didn’t stop.

“I don’t repent of the life I’ve lived or am living,” she said, speaking low. “I’m aware that you think I should—the Unchanged have always thought so—but that belief is born from fear and ignorance.”