‘That’s not the only thing,’ Allegra added excitedly, a thought having just occurred to her. ‘Cavalli’s not the first person to have been killed here.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘A noblewoman called Beatrice Cenci was tortured and put to death on the Piazza Ponte Sant’Angelo in 1599,’ she explained. ‘It was one of Rome’s most notorious public executions.’
‘What had she done?’
‘Murdered her father.’
Tom nodded slowly, remembering the deliberate violence with which Cavalli’s house had been ransacked.
‘Patricide. Treason. Maybe that’s it. Maybe Cavalli had betrayed the League and this was his punishment?’ He gave a deep sigh, then turned to her with a shrug. ‘Your guess is as good as mine. Come on, let’s try and call Archie. He should have landed by now.’
They turned and walked to the end of the bridge, Tom reaching for his phone as they waited for a break in the traffic. But before they could cross, a large armoured truck gunned down the road towards them. Two men jumped down holding what Tom recognized as what the Sicilian mafia called a Lupara-a traditional break-open design shotgun, sawn off a few inches beyond the stock to make it more effective at close range and easier to manoeuvre and hide. The weapon of choice in old-school vendettas.
A woman behind screamed and Tom could hear the fumbling scramble of panicked feet behind him as people scattered.
‘Get in,’ one of the men barked.
FORTY-SEVEN
Lungotevere Vaticano, Rome 19th March-11.53 a.m.
Looking around him, Tom could see that the truck’s interior had been furnished like an expensive office, the floor laid with thick carpet, the sides lined with a cream wallpaper decorated with tropical birds. To his left a red leather sofa abutted what he assumed was a toilet cubicle, its door latched shut. In the far right-hand corner, meanwhile, stood an elegant cherrywood desk on which a brass banker’s lamp illuminated a laptop and a police scanner spitting static. Overhead were four flat-panel screens, each tuned to a different news or business channel. Most telling, perhaps, was the gun rack opposite the sofa, which contained four MP5s, half a dozen Glock 17s and a pair of Remington 1100s. Neatly stacked on the shelves below were two dozen grenades and several boxes of ammunition. Enough to start and win a small war.
The gears crunched and the truck swayed forward with a determined snarl. The gunman who had followed them inside waved at them to sit down and then instructed them to handcuff themselves to the hoop bolted to the wall above them so that their arms were held above their heads. Stepping forward, he made sure that the ratchets were tight against their wrists and then emptied their pockets and Tom’s bag, pausing over the FBI file and the Polaroid of the ivory mask. In the background, Tom could make out the opening aria of the
There was the muffled sound of the toilet flushing. The latch clicked open and a man walked out, placing a folded newspaper down on the desk as he turned to face them. Tall and square faced, he had a thinning head of hair that rose in white waves at the front and then foundered into a black expanse at the rear. He was smartly dressed in a grey Armani suit and gaudy Versace tie with matching pocket handkerchief. The collar of his white shirt, however, appeared to be several sizes too small, as if he had gambled on not buying a new one in the belief that he would lose some weight. If so, it was a bet that he appeared destined to lose, his once sharp cheekbones sinking into his face like smudged lines on a charcoal drawing, a fleshy crevice forming in the cleft of his chin.
The guard handed him the file and the Polaroid. He glanced at each of them, then sat down. Swivelling to face them, he adjusted his cuffs, carefully covering his watch.
‘Welcome to Rome, Signor Kirk.’ He spoke in a thick accent, his eyes fixing them with a cold, mortuary gaze.
‘You know him?’ Allegra’s voice was both angry and disbelieving.
Tom frowned as he tried to place the face, then gave a small shake of his head.
‘Should I?’
‘Should he?’ the man asked Allegra, his face creased into a question.
‘He’s Giovanni De Luca,’ Allegra replied unsmilingly. ‘The head of the Banda della Magliana.’
Tom’s eyes flickered in recognition. So much for tracking the Delian League down and the element of surprise. Instead, one half of it had come looking for them and sprung its own trap.
‘Felix doesn’t know me,’ De Luca said, his flickering smile suggesting he was pleased that she had recognised him. ‘But I had the pleasure of meeting his mother once.’
‘My mother?’ Tom breathed, not knowing whether to sound angry or astonished.
‘A fundraising dinner many years ago. A beautiful woman, if I may say so. A terrible loss. Of course, it was only many years later that I heard of you.’
‘Heard what, exactly?’ Allegra asked, eyeing Tom with the same suspicious look she’d had back in Cavalli’s house when she’d first met him.
‘It’s hard to be good at what Felix does without word getting out. He has a special talent.’
‘Had,’ Tom corrected him. ‘I got out a few years ago.’
‘And yet, from what I hear, you’re still running.’ He nodded towards the scanner.
‘Is that what this is about?’ Tom asked impatiently. His arms were beginning to ache and every gear change and bump in the road was making the cuffs saw a little deeper into his wrists.
‘What’s this?’ De Luca waved the photo at him.
‘We found it in Cavalli’s car,’ Tom explained. ‘We think he was trying to sell it.’
‘What do you know about Cavalli?’ De Luca shot back, spitting the name out in a way that revealed more than he had probably intended.
Tom nodded slowly, immediately guessing at the truth.
‘Why did you kill him?’
De Luca paused, then inclined his head in a small bow, as if acknowledging applause.
‘Strictly speaking, the river killed him.’
‘Did he work for you?’
‘Pfff! He was one of Moretti’s.’
Moretti. Tom recognized the name as the person Allegra had identified as supposedly heading up the
‘What had he done?’ Allegra asked.
‘I only kill for two reasons. Theft and disloyalty.’ De Luca counted them off on his fingers as if he were listing the ingredients for a recipe. ‘In Cavalli’s case, he was guilty of both.’
‘You mean he’d betrayed the League?’ Tom asked.
‘It seemed fitting to mark his treachery on the spot of an earlier treason,’ De Luca nodded, confirming what they’d already guessed on the bridge.
The van turned sharply left. Allegra slid across the seat, pressing up against Tom.
‘And Ricci?’ Allegra asked.
‘I took care of Cavalli to protect the League. But Moretti, the old fool, got it into his head that I was about to make a move on the whole operation.’ De Luca’s tone hardened, his jaw clenching. ‘He had Ricci killed to warn me off. Argento was me evening the score.’
Tom nodded as the realisation dawned that far from being a conversation the careful echoing and symbolism of the various deaths had in fact been the opening shots of a very public, very acrimonious divorce.
‘And now it seems my accountant in Monaco has disappeared,’ he continued angrily. ‘Well, if Moretti wants a war, I’m ready for him.’ He struck his chest with his fist, the dull thud revealing that he was wearing a bullet-proof vest under his shirt.
‘What did Jennifer Browne have to do with your war?’ Tom demanded angrily.
