As it turned out she was one of the best alibis I've ever had. I got back to Anna's at three in the morning. Anna was in her alcove with the curtains drawn back. She clicked the light on and told me to wipe that smile off my face. It was a nasty little scene, straight out of marriage. She played merry hell, wanting to know where I'd been. I said for a walk, and like a fool said down by the river not knowing that one of the riverside walks is a knocking-shop, and had to endure an hour's unrelenting abuse while she reminded me I was in Rome to do the Vatican rip, not to whore about the city all night, which was a bit unfair seeing what I'd gone through. Her invective was a lot worse than I've managed to make it sound. She was a world expert. What I didn't know was a worse eruption was impending.
I undressed as usual beneath my blanket, as usual. And as usual she didn't rape me during the dark hours.
Next morning she'd got a paper at breakfast and looked at me in silence while I cleared a whole bag of fresh rolls. The news was of a fantastic accident which had occurred the previous night. A man innocently standing on the Tiberina had been crushed by a car.
Its handbrake had unaccountably slipped.
I'd honestly have felt sorry for him if he hadn't been one of Arcellano's goons, the one who had pressed me down in the chair when Arcellano did me over. And it honestly was an accident, almost completely one hundred per cent accidental. That's the truth. I hadn't realized the wheel would lock that way once I'd released the car and set it rolling. Hand on my heart.
What gave me heartburn was the headline. The newspaper described him as a Vatican guard. Museum detail.
CHAPTER 16
The football magazine was engrossing, especially as it told me the date of the Vatican rip. No drawing back now.
'I'm going to need a van, Anna. Something the size and shape of a closed ambulance.'
It had to hold two tables.
'Ambulances have windows.'
'Make them opaque, then. And a good engine. If it breaks down I've had it.'
'Right.' She was quite assured. 'Can it be a copy?'
'Yes.' I looked speculatively at her. 'Who can copy an ambulance for heaven's sake?'
'Carlo.' I pulled a face. She said cryptically, 'You've been in Rome less than a week and Carlo's in hospital, a Vatican Museum guard is probably dead by now, and you've lost a friend.'
She waited but I said nothing. 'Who was he, Lovejoy?'
'A bloke I met, er, accidentally. He has—had—a wife and two kiddies.'
'Are you in love with her?'
It was an unlikely question. I was coming to the notion that Old Anna was infinitely preferable. 'Never even met her.'
'How was he lost?'
'Killed. In the Colosseum.“
Her eyes wrinkled as she thought. 'Funny I didn't hear. It wasn't even in the papers.'
We stared at each other for quite some time. 'How odd,' I said at last. And it was.
* * *
The workshop was in some sort of order now. You can't start anything worthwhile till you get a place straight. The shelving was mended and in position. I'd gone at the toolracks baldheaded. The electric hand drill was on the blink, so I'd knocked up an old-fashioned foot-treadle spindle out of a bicycle wheel from somebody's dustbin. The one-third horsepower single-phase motor on the wood-turning lathe was crudded up to extinction. I had it off and sawed into the bench to get a foot-powered band through.
Adriana graciously allowed Piero, my silent watcher, to collect a derelict Singer sewing-machine from a junk dealer.
I slogged a whole day, tidying and sorting. Somebody ambitious had once bought in a few lengths of various woods including walnut, small pieces only, but at least a start.
Nowadays, when an old walnut tree is worth twice the value of the house in whose garden it grows, any piece is worth a fortune. Adriana and Piero came to look at the workshop when I'd rigged up the last toolrack.
Adriana exclaimed. 'You've created so much space, Lovejoy!'
'It was there all the time, signora.'
'Isn't this marvellous, Piero?'
'Not as marvellous as all that,' I corrected. 'Think of upstairs. Your showroom should be extended. Why not a winch?'
Adriana glanced quickly at Piero. 'Upstairs?' I looked at them, suddenly more alert. You can't help wondering, can you?
'The lifting problem,' Piero snapped, which is all very well if you're willing to be snapped at. I wasn't.
'There is no lifting problem, Piero. I could build a winch for practically nothing.'
A winch was part of the rip, so to me there was no question. Piero glared, nearly as determined as me. 'You
