“Go ahead,” he told Celeste. “I’ll be in the kitchen.”
Noemi was quick to make him a coffee. He always got along well with the Pennestrìs, especially Noemi. She took a dim view of his drinking, but he stirred up her maternal instincts, and during the month he lived at the villa, he never refused her tender mercies.
“So, tell me, how have you been?” she asked.
“Surviving,” he said.
“Only surviving? Are you eating properly?”
He took that to be a veiled question about booze, not food. “No shortage of good food in New York,” he said.
“Ah, New York! No longer Chicago?”
“I moved on.”
She poured the coffee from the Bialetti. “Tell me, are the girls very sick?” she asked.
“They are. Mickey is taking them to Rome tomorrow. To the Bambino Gesù Hospital.”
“A very strong hospital,” she said. “The Pope’s hospital. I am praying for them. Even Giuseppe is lighting candles. How can it be that they haven’t changed? This seems impossible.”
“We don’t know,” he said. “I wish we did.”
“Who is this woman?”
“She’s a psychic. She wrote to Mickey. He thinks she can help.”
“A psychic? Like a gypsy?”
“She has visions.”
She crossed herself. “I don’t believe in this.”
“Neither do I.”
Giuseppe came in and complained that he saw Celeste opening drawers in the bedrooms.
“Mickey wants her to be here. There’s nothing I can do.”
“What if she steals something?” Giuseppe asked.
“That’s about the only thing I’m not worried about.”
He drank his coffee and chatted until Giuseppe pointed out the window. “She’s outside.”
Marcus joined her in sea-gazing by the Lucite fence.
“It’s a lovely family house. A friendly house,” she said.
“Until someone came for them.”
“Yes, until then. Look how beautiful it is here.”
He didn’t want to talk about the view. “Well? Have you solved the mystery?”
“No solution, but in the parents’ bedroom I had a brief vision.”
He wanted to hit her with a choice bit of snark but said only, “I’m all ears.”
“I sat on their bed and that’s when I saw Jesper and Elena. They were in the white room. They were alone. They were serene. That is all I saw.”
He made no effort to hide his scorn for her. “So, you think they’re in space too.”
“Very far away. I’ll tell you what I think, Marcus. I think the girls were returned to their house because they were sick. I think the beings who took them could not help them.”
“So, they showed compassion, but not enough of it to return their parents with them.”
“It’s my opinion, nothing more.”
“Noted.”
“You were uncomfortable with my vision about you, no?”
“No comment.”
“Was I correct?”
It had turned overcast. A front was advancing and the sea was a froth of white caps.
He refused to look at her. “You weren’t wrong.”
11
Marcus was back at the hotel when Mickey called to find out about Celeste’s experience at the villa. He gave him a just-the-facts debriefing.
“I don’t know what to say about that,” Mickey said.
“Neither do I.”
Mickey asked what he thought about her.
“You really want to know?”
“I asked, didn’t I?”
“I think she’s a bullshitter.”
“A bullshitter,” Mickey repeated. “I’m an engineer. I’m a businessman. I deal in facts. Here’s a fact: she was right about the girls’ version of what happened to them. Here’s another: I know your history. Years ago, I checked you out before I hired you. She was right about you.”
Marcus felt like hitting him for that. “My opinion stands.”
“She was right about the things the girls described.”
“I’ll give her an asterisk for that.”
“An asterisk?”
“It’s a footnote that says: Marcus Handler doesn’t understand something but he damn well is going to figure it out.”
“Where is she?” Mickey asked.
“At the hotel having a rest. These visions are tiring, apparently.”
“I’ve got another assignment that’s going to piss you off. Elena’s parents tell me that the Bishop of Catanzaro wants to see them. He’s got some theories about the girls. I want you to go with them. In case he’s also not a bullshitter.”
*
They traveled in Armando’s large Audi. Catanzaro was almost a two-hour drive from Reggio Calabria. The Cutrìs had heard about Celeste from Mickey and now, Armando demanded to know what she had to say about their daughter. Leonora cried in the back seat when he told them about her vision, then she closed her eyes for the rest of the journey. Marcus and Armando had little else in common, so they traveled in silence.
The bishop’s palazzo was in the city center, adjacent to the Santa Maria Assunta Cathedral. They were shown into the reception room where they waited for an uncomfortably long interval until Archbishop Taricco arrived, looking heavenwards and apologizing for the delay. He was elderly, a towering mountain of lard with a damp handkerchief in his hand to mop his sweaty forehead and bushy eyebrows. It seemed that the bishop and the Cutrìs knew each other because they exchanged lengthy pleasantries before Armando asked if they might switch to English for Mr. Handler’s benefit.
“And who is Mr. Handler?” the archbishop asked.
“An American investigator.”
“Italian is fine,” Marcus said.
“Good, because my English is weak. Welcome to Catanzaro,” Taricco said, shaking his hand. “Please, sit, sit. I am glad you made the journey.”
Marcus detected a whiff of alcohol on the cleric’s breath. He knew the syndrome.
A nun entered with a tray of orange juice and biscuits and the archbishop slid several onto his plate.
“Tell me,” he said, “how are the dear girls?”
“They are quite weak,” Armando said, “but the blood transfusions have improved their strength. Tomorrow, they go to Rome for specialist treatment at the Bambino Gesù Hospital.”
“Ah, good, good. I will make a call to the Vatican to make sure they have the very best care.”
“Thank you, Eminence,” Leonora said.
“Now, let me tell you why I wanted to see you. It involves the profound mystery of the appearance of the girls, the fact that they have not aged since their disappearance.”
Marcus was fully aware that leaks abounded, but he was determined that the family not be a conduit. He said, “Somebody told a journalist something about their appearance. We’re not confirming or denying anything
