During most of the more than 120-mile drive from Napoli to Rome, Roger sat with his head in his hands, moaning about what would happen to his car—and to him—when he never returned for it.
“This isn’t like you, Rog,” Augie said.
“Excuse me if I’ve never been an assassination target.”
“C’mon, man.You’re the only one with a clue as to where the parchments are. As long as you keep that to yourself ….”
“What happened to Klaudios was a message for me.”
“That’s why I’m here, Rog. Your life is my only priority.”
“Be real. You’re dying to see the memoir yourself.”
Augie’s phone vibrated. He put it on speaker and punched the connection. “Hey, babe.”
“I need news, Augie. Roger okay?”
He told her everything, interrupting himself only when he saw Roger’s terrified look. “This is secure, Rog. Untappable, guaranteed.”
“Nothing’s guaranteed anymore,” Roger muttered. “How about her phone?”
“Who would even know to tap it?”
“They discovered yours, Augie! I was calling her too, you know.” Augie winced.
“Do you need me there?” Sofia said.
Augie hesitated. He didn’t want to subject her to mortal danger, but neither did he want to make her decisions for her.
“I only want to help, love,” she said. “What can I do?”
“We’ve got a lot to do, and with Roger having to stay out of sight ….”
“Say no more,” she said. “I’ll book a flight and let you know when I’m arriving.”
“Keep track of your expenses and I’ll—.”
“Augie, stop! I’ve got this. Or at least my father’s got this.”
“You think it’s wise to tell him what’s going on?”
“If I can’t trust him, who can I trust? Anyway, he may have an idea or two.”
“Won’t he try to talk you out of coming?”
“I’m coming either way, Augie.”
“He’ll understand how crucial it is to—.”
“Please. He keeps confidences better than anyone I know. In his business, he has to. I’ll rent a car as soon as I get there. Where will I find you?”
Roger chimed in, telling her where Augie’s hotel was. “Just to be safe, you should stay somewhere else. I’m hiding out there too.”
“You sound better, Roger.”
“I don’t feel better, but it’s nice to not be alone in this.”
“You were never alone,” she said. “You knew we’d be there for you.” “I hoped.”
“Don’t be silly. We love you.”
The men agreed that when Augie checked in he should upgrade to a suite and add François Tracanelli to the account. “Then you can head out and round up clothes and stuff for me. After that it should be dark, and you can take the key to the train station. I don’t want that stuff in there a minute longer.”
“What’re we gonna do, put it in the hotel safe?”
“Got to be more secure than the train station. But at least there I didn’t have to fold it to make it fit.”
“Hadn’t thought of that,” Augie said. “No way we’re folding it. It’s protected, right?”
Roger nodded. “Klaudios sandwiched it between acid-free sheets and wrapped it with cellophane.”
“Can’t wait to see it. Gives me chills.”
Only when he was deep enough into Rome that he sensed he was nearing its northern border did Augie realize that Roger had never told him where to turn and was clearly no longer just gazing out the window.
He laid a hand on his stocky friend’s shoulder and said, “I’ve gone too far, haven’t I?”
Roger’s breathing was even and deep. He must have been drastically sleep deprived if even a touch didn’t rouse him. Eager as Augie was to get settled in and get his errands run, he couldn’t bring himself to wake the man. He entered Roger’s address into the navigation app on his phone and turned down the volume. As soon as his phone had geo-synchronized with the satellite, a woman’s voice said, “Fare una inversione a u quando possible.”
He knew enough Italian to know he had indeed ventured north of where he wanted to go. Augie switched the narration to English. “Make a legal U-turn when possible.”
It would have been safer to do this alone and at night, but with Roger asleep and unrecognizable, Augie followed the directions to Roger’s apartment. Was there a chance he could slip in and out without being detected?
But the place was crawling with men in suits and unmarked cars the same make and model as police cars. He drove past, wishing he’d paid attention when Roger had told Sofia. All he knew was that it was within half a mile of Roger’s apartment.
Augie pulled onto a side street and parked, reclining his seat and selecting a novel on his phone. He was determined to let Roger sleep, imagining how long it must have been since his friend felt safe enough to soundly slumber. Augie opened his window an inch and felt the cool air. Before he turned off the engine he noticed the temperature had dropped to 57 degrees.
The last thing Augie was aware of was that the words of the novel began to swim and he had to fight to keep his eyes open. He was startled awake by a gentle rap on his window and squinted up into the face of a female carabiniere.
“Identificazione, per favore.”
“Um, yeah, sorry. English, please?”
“Identification, please.”
Augie handed her his passport.
“And your companion?”
“Sleeping.”
“I see that. Also American?”
“Oh, no.” Augie gently reached into Roger’s bag and pulled out his wallet, from which he produced the phony driver’s license. “Need me to wake him?”
“That may not be necessary,” she said. “Excuse me one moment.”
When she went around the front of the car, Augie noticed her partner through the rearview mirror, standing near the left taillight. The female officer bent and compared the license photo to Roger’s face, which Augie guessed was mashed against the window. She went to her polizia car and returned several minutes later.
“Are you lost, Mr. Knox?”
Augie explained that his friend knew the way to his hotel but that he didn’t want to wake him.
“I see you have arrived in Italy today. We cannot have you sitting idle at the curb. Please wake your friend so you can proceed to your destination. And welcome to Rome.”
“Thank you.” Augie stared at her, wondering if she expected anything else.
“I’ll wait,” she said.
“Oh.” He shook Roger. “François,” he said. “The carabinieri need us to move along to our hotel.”
Roger sat up with a great heave, grunting. “What? Augie, what?”
Augie calmly referred to him as François again, hoping Roger would have the presence of mind to affect his French accent. “Just need you to tell me how to get to our hotel.”
“Sacrebleu!” Roger said, and the carabiniere immediately bent to stare past Augie at him.
“Sortez de la voiture, s’il vous plaît, Monsieur.” [“Step out of the car, please, sir.”]
“Oui. Certainement.” [“Yes. Certainly.”]
Roger quickly emerged as the woman approached, and they spoke in French. Looking none too pleased or sure she was doing the right thing, she marched back to her car.
“What was all that?” Augie said as Roger climbed back in.
“A colossal goof. When you woke me I was using my South African accent.”
“You seemed to recover quickly.”
“Yeah, but then I resorted to the first French thing that popped into my head.”
“ Sacrebleu, so?”
“Nobody in France says that anymore. Only foreigners who want to sound French. She asked why I had used such a clichéd idiom if I was really French. I told her it was an old family joke—that we all said that when rudely awakened. She’s running my name through the system.”
When the carabiniere returned, she handed Roger his documents. “Sacrebleu indeed,” she said with a wry smile. “No relation to the Olympic pole-vaulter of the same name? From the seventies?”
“No,” Roger said. “But I get that a lot. Just a coincidence.”
“Carry on.”
“We have to do better at blending in,” Augie said as he pulled away.
“You think? I get accosted by one more carabiniere, I’m going to just let them cuff me.”
Augie told him of his drive-by of Roger’s apartment.
“That was risky. What’d you expect? I can never go back. My car and my place, both history.”
“Don’t think like that. We’re smart guys. We’ll figure this out and get it fixed.”
“Glad you think so.”
Augie and Roger checked into the Terrazzo Hotel and as he stretched out on the bed, Roger scribbled a list of necessities. Augie headed out, finding clothes and toiletries easy, but the language barrier made finding Roger an electronic tablet tricky. He bought the best he could find, with every bell and whistle available.
Roger roused when Augie returned after dark, thrilled with the tablet and quickly connecting it to his own private network. He began downloading all his personal stuff, telling Augie, “Sardinia or the Tombaroli would have to be pretty sophisticated to crack my encryption.”
Roger gave Augie the locker key, directions to the train station, where to park, and the quickest route to the treasure. “And bring us back some food, man. There’s a meatball sandwich place in the terminal.”
Augie had just reached the rental car when he got a call from Roger. “Better get back up here.”
“What’s up?”
“Just hurry.”
Back in the suite Roger had the TV on and had triggered the English captions for Augie’s benefit. Every channel bristled with a nationwide manhunt.
“Michaels, a South African émigré, is an international tour guide by trade, sought for the murder of popular Vatican guide Klaudios Giordano. The carabinieri say the murder weapon and a sketch of the victim’s carport were found in Michaels’s Rome apartment and his car had been abandoned in Naples. While a witness identified the only suspect in the murder case as tall and dark and thin, police say the evidence points to Michaels as the one behind the slaying. The actual shooter remains at large.”
Roger looked more agitated than worried. “They didn’t find any weapon in my apartment. All I have is a nine-millimeter twin to the one I left for you in the locker. And it’s in my backpack.”
Augie felt a pang when he saw on the screen the rawboned, pointy, smiling face of the late Klaudios Giordano. The man had always been a delight. What could have caused such a rash choice? Did he really think he could get away with a monumental theft like that?
Then came the pictures of Roger. Fortunately, they were of the man the way Augie remembered him, buried under the bushy gray beard. Unfortunately, they’d already had an artist guess what Roger would look like with his beard dyed, with it short, and with it gone.
“They underestimated my chin,” Roger said, showing Augie how wide his was compared to what was depicted on television. “I guess that’s good.”
“There’s nothing good about this,” Augie said. “Sure there is! There’s a reward for my capture. I’m worth more alive than dead.”
“Are you serious?” Augie said. “If you’re right about Sardinia, he’s just multiplied the number of people looking for you. Once he has you in custody he’ll get what he wants and find a way to eliminate you.”
“Well, thanks for that encouragement,” Roger said. “I’m just wondering how anyone could think me smart enough to mastermind a murder and stupid enough to leave the evidence in my apartment.”