CHAPTER 32
Thomas took the full force of the attack, crumpling to the arena floor under the weight of his assailant. For a moment he seemed incapable of thought or action, and then his old rage was back and he was punching and kneeing as the other man thrashed to get loose.
Until a week ago, Thomas hadn’t thrown a punch in anger since high school, but it all came back—the adrenaline, the panic, the blood in his eyes—only worse, because they were men and he knew, instinctively and certainly, that his attacker might be able to kill him, might try to do so . . .
The Japanese man was small and wiry but he was strong. He was also quick. His fists jabbed twice. Thomas felt his windpipe crunch, and for a moment he couldn’t breathe and thought he would throw up. He rolled to his knees as his attacker broke away. But he could not let it end like this.
With a surge of will, Thomas roared after him, sprawling and grabbing his ankle. He twisted and the man came down hard, unable to break his fall. As Thomas clambered on top of him, the other clawed at his face, reaching for his eyes. Thomas twisted his head back as far as he could, slammed his hand across the other’s Adam’s apple, and squeezed. The fingers still dug into his cheeks, and he felt the blood run. With his free hand he grabbed a handful of the sandy dirt and palmed it into the other’s open mouth. As he tried to spit it out, Thomas closed his hand over the man’s lips and pressed down as hard as he could.
Immediately the smaller man began to writhe and wriggle like a fish. For perhaps ten seconds he squirmed and flailed and then the wordless fury turned desperate, pleading, and his body went limp in surrender.
Thomas withdrew his hand and sat back, letting him twist his head and retch the grit out, heaving himself onto all fours as he spat into the earth.
Thomas, by comparison, was merely winded and bloody.
“Why are you following me?” he said, getting to his feet.
The man gargled and sputtered in Japanese.
“What?”
“Eigo ga hanashimassen,” he said.
“Like hell you don’t speak English,” said Thomas, his anger flaring again. He took a step toward the man, who flinched away, still incapable of standing.
He spat once more, and then seemed to calm.
“I knew your brother,” he said, his English flawless, almost unaccented. “My name is Satoh.”
“Go on.”
“We had a deal. He didn’t keep his part.”
“What kind of deal?”
“He acquired something for me and then refused to hand it over.”
Thomas squinted at him doubtfully. The Japanese man turned and sat heavily in the dust.
“What did he acquire?” said Thomas.
“Information.”
“About what? You’d better start picking up the pace with these answers or I’m going to lose my temper.”
Satoh grinned slightly. His lower lip was bleeding heavily.
“You ever heard of the Herculaneum cross, Mr. Knight?” he said.
“Yes. I’ve seen it.”
The other man’s smile broadened as he shook his head.
“No,” he said. “You’ve seen the imprint on the wall of a house where the cross once hung. I’m talking about the cross itself.”
“There is no cross,” said Thomas.
“Not till about three months ago, no,” said the other. His breathing was stabilizing now. In fact, it seemed that he was starting to enjoy himself. “A lawyer in Ercolano who lived about half a mile from the excavations was digging a swimming pool in his garden. He found a Roman road and part of a human skeleton. Without notifying anybody, he dug around it till the whole body was cut free of the rock. Clutched to the rib cage was a silver crucifix perfectly matching the shadow on the wall in the House of the Bicentenary.”
Thomas stared at him.
“Nonsense,” he said. “It would be in a museum. Its picture would be in every guidebook, on every website . . .”
“Not if the man who found it died shortly after confiding in a young American priest who was researching examples of early Christian symbols.”
Thomas stood there, staring in silence. The Asian man’s smile broadened still further. Its amusement was bitter.
“That’s right, Thomas,” said Satoh. “Your brother took it into safekeeping for ‘research purposes.’ Wanted to document it, study it, write about the little fish emblem in the center of the cross. But after he’d had it for a few days, he had a better idea.”
“Sell it?” said Thomas. He was trying to sound sarcastic, disbelieving, but the words sounded hollow, only a hair’s breadth from despair.
“Do you have any idea what that would be worth?” said Satoh. “The world’s first extant crucifix. Think of it. Think how much collectors would pay just to get a look at it. To own it? He could name his price. Tens of millions? More? Someone would pay. And I was the one to make sure it all went according to plan.”
“I don’t believe a word of it,” Thomas said.
“You don’t sound so sure.”
“My brother wouldn’t have done anything like that,” said Thomas, daring him to contradict a statement that was less about real conviction than it was about holding on to a version of the past.
“What would you know about it?” the Japanese guy fired back. “You barely knew him. I knew him as well as you did. Better.”
Afterward Thomas would think back on this and know he had been baited. At the time, the confusion and frustration coalesced into the anger that made him ball his fists and take two lunging strides toward where the smaller man sat.
Satoh timed his move perfectly. As Thomas got close he rolled to his left, pivoting on one hand as he sprang to his feet, the energy of the leap revolving him sharply. By the time he had completed the spin, his right foot was high enough to meet Thomas squarely on the jaw.
The impact stopped Thomas’s forward progress cold. His head snapped back so sharply that he thought his neck might break. He was unconscious before he hit the ground.