at the shingle-Overhead, the sky had cleared. Stars, brilliant as Byzantine lamps, blazed down in splendor through the last wispy tendrils of mist. A stiffening breeze lifted stray tendrils of hair from her face, streaming them behind her. Her heart beat fast, but she felt lighter than she had in some time. She had her mission, and for the first time, it seemed, she was sure about who she was.
She ran toward the light that streamed from the cabin, toward the sharp odor of diesel fumes that billowed into the night. The motoscafo was still there. She saw Zorzi and several others in the last stages of preparing for its departure. For some reason, they had transformed the motoscafo into a police vessel, complete with decals and flag flying from the bow. As she entered the black water, the lines were cast off, and the burbling of the engines deepened in pitch.
She swam powerfully, her arms reaching out, her legs scissoring, and she came up alongside just as the engines produced a throaty roar. The bow lifted and she grabbed hold of one of the bumpers on the side as the boat got under way. She felt the sudden pull on her shoulder sockets and compensated, relaxing. She should have been out of breath, but she wasn't. She had taken control of her own life, just as Arcangela had meant her to do, and she was exhilarated.
Chapter 20
Bravo and Rule came ashore on the jutting square of Lazzaretto Vecchio that was fully forested. The night was very dark, but some stars were out, and to the west a cloud was illuminated from behind in theatrical fashion by the moon. The cloud looked veined and muscled, like an ancient god awakening from the sleep of eons.
'The traitor has laid low for quite some time,' Rule said, 'funneling information slowly but surely to the Knights of St. Clement. But now, with you on the hunt for the Testament, he's had to show his hand.'
'You mean Zorzi.'
Rule nodded. 'I'm afraid so.' He switched on a flashlight he had found in the cabin of the boat. 'He was one of your father's closest associates. He knows almost as much about Dex as I do. He's after you now. He's cunning, devious and extremely dangerous. In fact, there's mounting evidence that he's quietly turned all his Guardians against the Order. They obey him and only him. I'm afraid you can't trust any of them.'
Rule spread a tarp used to protect the foodstuffs the Franciscans brought to the island over the motoscafo.
'We were lucky on the way over here,' Rule continued. 'The monks surely must have reported the theft of this boat to the police. We'll have to keep a sharp eye out for them when we leave.'
They turned away from the motoscafo. It was sufficiently hidden from a cursory sighting from a passing patrol boat but certainly would be found by a closer search. They would have to be well away from here before that happened, Bravo knew, which meant he had very little time to find his father's next cipher.
'I'll show you where the ruins of the old church are,' Rule said as they struck out for the interior.
'How did you know where I'd been taken?' Bravo said.
'I followed my suspicions. I've had my eye on Paolo Zorzi for some time.'
'Now this is just like old times.'
Rule smiled, his eyes briefly touching Bravo in that familiar way.
The trees were thick in this area, a lush wetness spread beneath them. The rich air smelled dank.
'I want to thank you,' Bravo said.
'I should thank you for saving my skin with Zorzi.'
'You would've found your own way out,' Bravo said, 'but that's not what I mean.'
Rule shot him a quizzical look.
'The winter Junior died I was royally pissed off at you.'
'As I recall, you made no bones about it.'
'I'm sorry about that.'
'Old news.'
'No, it isn't. I was angry at you for taking my father away.'
'Yeah, well-'
'No, listen, Uncle Tony, I need to say this. I was a kid then, I was only thinking of myself, my own pain. I wasn't thinking of how bad it must have been for my father.' There was a small silence. He wished Uncle Tony would say something, add an affirmation. 'You knew he needed to get away, didn't you? You knew he would break down if he didn't.'
'He sounded so bad when he called I knew I couldn't let you see what might become of him. A child shouldn't see his father in such grief, it was hard enough on you as it was.'
'Where did you go?'
'Norway. We went hunting, moose and red deer mostly. Your father was some crack shot. One day-it was snowing, I remember-we came across some tracks that were unfamiliar to me. Very fresh they were, otherwise the snow would've covered them. Anyway, Dex got excited. He made us track the damn thing until the snow grew blue as the sun neared the horizon. Just for this one look we got of it-a wolverine. Even in those days they were rare enough.'
'Did you shoot it?'
'Are you kidding? Dexter was in awe of it, he put up his gun and just sat in the snow like a little kid, watching. And you know I think the beast knew we were there-or at least that Dex was there, because once it looked in our direction and flinched. But it never bared its teeth and it didn't run.' They were in a small grove of slender, wind-whipped pines now, and Rule pushed a springy branch out of their way. 'That was one memorable trip. I saw your father sink down to the depths and then rebound. Out there in the whiteness, communing with that wolverine, he found the salt of life again.'
Bravo felt once again the terrible weight of his father's passing, but this time it was leavened with a brush as if from the wings of a great bird that had swooped out of the blackness of the night. I guess you could call us outsiders-it's far more difficult for us to find ourselves. Sometimes I ask myself what I have to do in order to be saved. Revealed to him now was yet another layer of what his father had told him that summer afternoon in Georgetown-the difficult truth that he himself had learned about human connection and the world of the outsider.
'You were always a good friend,' he said, his throat and his heart full, 'to my father and to me.'
Rule cuffed Bravo affectionately. 'Sometimes you remind me so much of Dex it's uncanny.' He paused, then, sobering, 'I know how Junior's death affected all of you-especially you. You did everything you could. It wasn't your fault.'
Bravo shivered, hearing an echo of Jenny telling him the same thing. For a moment, he flashed on her as she had been in Venice-the hotel room, the shower, the bed. He heard again the voices of the deliverymen, floating up from the canal like morning vapor. He felt her caress, heard her whispering in his ear. Then he heard again the eerie, evil report of the ice cracking beneath his feet. She had caressed his father, had whispered in his ear just as she had with him. He felt a certain horror, a creeping along his spine, and he shivered again as they pressed on.
They came to the crumbling stone foundation of the church without seeing another soul. Part of the building had latterly been turned into the dog kennel. One wall of the old church reared up, black and glistening, as crevassed as an old soldier's face. It had been broken in two.
'Now what? There's not much here,' Rule asked as they surveyed the scene.
Bravo stared at the wall. Remember where you were the day you were born. Remembering St. Mary of Nazareth Hospital had brought him this far. Where was the hospital in Chicago? He strained to recall. Then he had it: 2233 West Division Street.
He went to the break in the wall-the division-and walked ten paces west, ten being the sum of the four numbers of the hospital's address. He knelt on the grassy ground at the base of the wall. Rule joined him and together they began to dig with their hands. Three feet down they found a parcel wrapped in oilskin.
Far out across the water, trembling lights from the Lido pointed like a crooked finger toward them. A gull cried several times, the plaintive sound diminishing into a sudden rush of air.
