Jake awoke filled with a determination he had only known during the golden years after university, when he had soared to that improbable job on Fleet Street. He had often since marvelled at his escape from the local press. That had been before he began drinking every day of course, but now he felt the same single-mindedness.
He was going to succeed.
Jenny reckoned they would be best advised to fly back to the UK to launch the media assault. But Jake convinced her it was worth a visit to the tomb as it was nearby, claiming another discovery would give the story more legs.
The Pian di Civita was once home to one of the foremost Etruscan city states, and there were plenty of references online to the 1982 dig. But to frustrate grave-robbers exact coordinates were withheld. The most they had to go on was the disclosure that the tomb was found in a “cavity on the hill”. The expedition looked speculative, but at least there was a town nearby – perhaps the locals could point them in the right direction.
“Are you feeling all right?” asked Jenny once they hit open country. “You seem quiet.”
“I’m fine,” he said.
Jenny took her eyes off the road to study him, much as she had as they fled the Monastery of Debre Damo. “Sure?”
“Really. I had a bad dream and I didn’t get much sleep after that.”
“It’s understandable,” said Jenny, one hand resting on the steering wheel. “I’m scared too, you know.”
For a few kilometres neither of them spoke and Jake stared out across the Mediterranean, sparkling in the early spring sun. Presently they wound into the hills; he knew this landscape from his dreams. Poppies had turned the fields matt-scarlet, like blood seeping into the land, and the mountains in the distance were parabolas of violet.
“Beautiful world,” she muttered.
Jake glanced at Jenny, a fist in his stomach. Still the determination coursed through him, and he knew if he was to eradicate this accursed text from the face of the earth he might need her help. There was something he had to say – or at least try to say.
“This Charlie Waits of yours,” he began. “He’s one hundred and ten per cent convinced the Disciplina Etrusca is real, right?”
“Right.”
“And so is the Chinese Secret Service.”
“Uh-huh.”
“These are intelligent people …”
Jenny’s eyes flicked to her passenger. “What are you getting at?”
“I just think perhaps we need to keep an open mind.”
“You’re not going mad on me are you?”
Jake saw amusement in the corner of her mouth and he forced a laugh. “No, I’m not a carrier of the defective Roger Britton gene yet.”
A shadow moved across Jenny’s face.
“What is it?” asked Jake. “Did I say something wrong?”
Jenny shook her head. “No, nothing at all.”
They didn’t talk at all after that, but the mood in the car had changed – as though the melancholy of his dream was contagious.
*
Jenny hadn’t received an update on her mother for days, but neither had she sought one. Clearly the worst had not happened – Dad would have been in touch. The guilt was still there though, the suspicion that she was a bad daughter. And there was something else. The notion had occurred on reflex when Jake said the word ‘gene’, yet that didn’t lessen how daft she felt for even thinking it.
If the thing worked … she could find out whether she was a carrier too.
Jenny sighed. She shouldn’t be too hard on herself. She was under a lot of stress. But there was clearly something wrong with any job so involving that one could forget about a dying mother for days at a stretch.
Before you sign below the dotted line I want to make sure you’re ready to commit, regardless of any … emotional difficulties.
As the final miles peeled away Jenny made herself a promise. When she got through all this, she would realign her life. If the case had taught her anything, it was that people were more important than work.
The town was a hotchpotch of medieval houses, a lackadaisical air permeating cobbled streets. They bought bread, cheese and tomatoes from a small shop; Jenny watched with interest as Jake reached for a beer and then paused, hand wavering. Finally – some inner conflict resolved – he passed on.
At the checkout was a bespectacled girl in her twenties.
“Ciao bella,” said Jake as they left.
The girl went red.
“Do you know what you just said?” asked Jenny.
“It’s a polite way of saying goodbye.”
“No it’s not. You said ‘Goodbye, gorgeous’.”
It was Jake’s turn to blush. “Did I? Christ. How embarrassing. That’s really not my style, I promise.”
Jenny turned away, but Jake could tell she was grinning from the movement of the skin behind her neck.
Nobody had heard of Tages, let alone his grave. But they were pointed in the direction of the Pian di Civita at a shop selling chic and expensive kitchenware.
It was more in hope than expectation that they departed.
*
Maria Marcella returned to her window display. The spinster was proud of her little shop – to her mind it was certainly the most stylish in town, even if she rarely sold anything. She’d just found the spot for the Le Creuset when another group of tourists clattered in. Maria sighed and fixed her sales smile to her face.
But here’s the strange thing.
They were asking directions to exactly the same place.