More so even than yesterday, there were ghosts in the studio with Cesco. The whole place thrummed with memories. The jokes he and Raff had shared, the bantered insults. His impatience, rudeness, wit and generosity. The sheer talent revealed by all the photographs Cesco had never seen before, tucked away in private folders. Yet none of them were of the Philodemus scroll, and then it was too late anyway. Carmen would be at the library already. And he had other duties.
He locked the studio back up, set off for Raff’s apartment on the Harley. A white van pulled out after him. On edge as he was, he watched it in his mirrors. It followed him up Via Duomo and pulled up right behind him at the junction. He glanced round at the driver’s face. He didn’t recognise him, but he had that Hammerskin look: muscled, shaven-headed, neck tattoos and with a North European pallor. And deliberately not looking at him either. The lights changed. Cesco stayed put, to see what he would do. A second or two passed, then the man frowned irritably and gestured for him to get moving.
Cesco drove on, but away from Raff’s apartment rather than towards it. The van briefly followed, then headed left up towards Capodimonte. He waited until it was out of sight then circled around back to Rione Sanità, still feeling uneasy. He parked on the cobbled piazza outside Raff’s block and waited a minute, in case the van returned. It did not. He shrugged it off, went inside and upstairs, jiggled his key in the front door lock until it opened. He poured himself an orange juice and took it through to the office, where he pulled Raff’s bottom drawer all the way out and set it on the floor to begin the painful process of sorting through his finances.
It proved easier than he’d expected to work out. Until their divorce, Raff and his wife had been doing very well. They’d owned this place outright and had saved a healthy nest egg too. But then it had fallen apart. Raff had bought Rosanna out of the apartment by signing over their nest egg and taking out a new mortgage. Except he’d foolishly borrowed extra cash to remodel this place and buy his Lamborghini too – though he’d got that second-hand for well under half of what he’d claimed. Then, when he’d started to struggle with the payments, he’d taken out new loans and credit cards instead of cutting back, hiding the evidence away in this Dorian Gray drawer in the hope that everything would somehow resolve itself.
As, in a way, it just had.
Carmen returned to her studies in Rare Books & Manuscripts, while keeping half an eye on Father Alberts, hunched over his poisoned tome at the end table, his back to her and his elbows out like an exam student convinced his neighbours were spying on his answers. Ten thirty came and went. She gave up hope. Then to her surprise he rose abruptly, packed the Tertullian away in its archival box and carried it by her with a strained look on his face. No. It was more than strain. He looked aghast.
He returned the volume to Victor. She expected him to come back to wait for Taddeo Santoro and Professor D’Agostino. Instead, he pushed out through the swing doors and hurried off, perhaps to clear his head. As for Victor, he put the Tertullian onto his trolley for later return. Just like that, her window opened. She checked her watch. Nineteen minutes to eleven. It was tight. If Alberts came back, or Taddeo or Zeno arrived early, she was sure to be caught. Yet she stood anyway and walked briskly along the aisle to the Colonna room door, taking Lucia’s keys from her bag as she went. She could justifiably claim, after all, that she wanted to make sure the keys worked before Taddeo and the others turned up.
A glance over her shoulder. Researchers and librarians were milling about the shelves. None were looking her way. The door had twin locks: a mortice and a latch. She opened the mortice first. It made such a heavy, clunking noise that she couldn’t help but check again. Still no one was paying her any attention. She fitted in the latchkey. Almost in a daze she opened the door a crack and slipped on through, pulling it quietly shut again behind herself. It clicked as it locked on its latch.
It was much darker in here than outside. But then those other rooms all had French windows out onto the terrace, whereas this one had instead a pair of sturdy oak doors, each fitted only with a small pane of security glass whose light was further dimmed by the floor-length white cotton curtains that hung in front of them. Enough light still filtered through, however, to illuminate the galaxies of motes set swirling by her entry.
She looked around. The room was clearly designed for meetings rather than study or storage, with a round Formica table large enough for eight, but set with just four chairs, each equipped with a mouse, a keyboard and a large monitor connected to a server beneath.
There was supposed to be a safe. She found it beside a cheap pine desk next to the terrace doors. It had a stack of books on it, and another of CDs. She crouched before it. It was bolted to the floor, heavy, old, dented and scratched. It had clearly been here years rather than being specially installed. She found its key, opened its door, looked inside. It contained a pair of hard drives and a mahogany scroll-holder laid crosswise to make it fit. Her hands trembled as she reached in and drew it out. Heavier than she’d expected. Almost certainly the scroll was still inside.
But she needed to make sure.
She set it on the tiled floor, undid its catches, lifted its lid. And there it was, nested in specially cut soft cream foam, a charred cylinder perhaps eighteen inches long, chubby as an infant’s arm, along with the smaller fragment that had broken off, in a companion nest of its own. Some faded black ink was visible on the surfaces where the pieces had split, though it was impossible to read in this poor light, or even to make out an alphabet. Her breath caught all the same. If this was what she suspected, it would without doubt be the most precious artefact in the world – more valuable than any palace or regalia. Forget hundreds of millions. People would pay billions.
Not that it could ever be sold.
Not openly, at least.
She was still staring down at it when there came a knock upon the door. ‘Hey, Carmen,’ called out Taddeo Santoro. ‘Are you in there?’
Izzo was at his desk chomping at a cheese and salami panino when the call came through. He swallowed down the outsized mouthful, leaving an unpleasantly stretched sensation in his throat and chest. ‘Pronto?’
‘Hey, Romeo, old friend. Pietro here. Pietro Chiellini. Secondigliano precinct. Remember?’
‘How could I forget, you damned Juventus turncoat.’
Chiellini laughed. ‘What can I say? I got bored of losing. Come join us. You know you want to.’
Izzo grunted. ‘Over my cold dead body. What can I do for you?’
‘That thing of yours yesterday morning. The guy in the car. The Lamborghini, I mean.’
‘Oh, that guy in the car. I thought you meant some other one. What about him?’
‘You looking at the professor at all?’
‘The professor?’
‘Yeah. The history buff. From the TV. You know the one.’
Izzo set down the rest of his panino. In this city, in this line of work, you grew wary of using people’s names if you suspected any kind of connection to the Camorra. Particularly working in Secondigliano, as Chiellini did. Too many extended families, too many greased palms, too many ears. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘He just came in here to provide an alibi for one of our local thugs. Thing is, he’s lying.’
‘You sure?’
‘Ninety per cent, yeah. Maybe ninety-five. Our vic didn’t recognise the guy, but he’s got a very distinctive scar. So, you know, we pretty much had him. Until your guy pops up. And why would he risk his rep for a piece of shit like this, I ask myself. So I do a spot of checking. Turns out his cousin’s in the business. Not only that, this piece of shit thug is one of his crew. So maybe he’s just doing a solid for the family. But I can’t help but wonder…’
‘You’re thinking tit for tat?’
‘Gotta be worth a phone call, right?’
Izzo allowed himself a moment. Professor D’Agostino had been so angered by Raffaele Conte’s impersonations that he’d lobbied against him being awarded the museum contract. Hardly motive to burn the man alive, but feuds had a way of escalating. Then there was that odd coincidence of him appearing in the programme about the punishments. He took out his pen and notepad. ‘Tell me everything,’ he said.