The Vatican Rip (10 page)

I slid my left arm into the basket for a shield and gave him a double prod – the shield at his knife and my instep in his balls. My right knee caught under his chin as he oofed forwards, then it was only a matter of kicking a couple of his ribs in while he slumbered gently on the cobbles.

Anna was staring in astonishment, holding her cheek as I teased out her money. I tossed her the handbag.

‘Here, love. Buy a pizza.’

‘You bastard. That’s my money.’

So much for Carlo, I thought. ‘It’s not. It’s mine.’

‘Have you killed him?’

‘Carlo? No. He’ll just not play the tuba for a week or two.’

She was just drawing breath for a scream when I grabbed her and stifled it.

‘Listen, you octogenarian conner,’ I gritted. I’m as hard as nails with geriatrics. ‘I’ve lost my passport and air ticket, been dipped by you, been forced from my comfortable hotel, had a friend killed, got stranded, and get jumped by your threepenny nerk who’s too cackhanded to blow his own nose. I’ve had enough, hear? Enough.’

I released her and took off. I’d reached the end of the alley by the time she started screaming. Like a fool, I had assumed the old devil would only be able to manage a senile mumble but she put up a wail like the QE 2. Bloody hell, I thought, and in sudden panic hurtled along a few zigzaggy alleys until I came out into the Piazza Navona, a place I recognized from the famous pictures in the little guidebook I’d owned until this morning. I subsided in a chair on the pavement outside a restaurant to get my breath.

Well, somehow I’d messed up the chances of having Anna as a potential ally, but at least I had a bit of my own money back. In any case she was a doubtful quantity, and her sidekick Carlo scored a definite minus. I hoped I was better off, but didn’t feel it.

I celebrated my recovered wealth with a quick nosh and a glass or two of white wine, and felt much better. It was that which gave me courage to ring Marcello’s number. My hand was shaking.

‘Hello?’ A man’s voice, with that practised flintiness from a lifetime of encountering misery. A copper.

In the background a woman’s awful keening was just audible, some bird realizing she was alone now with two kids in a hostile world. I put the receiver down quickly in case calls were being traced. I desperately needed to ask who Marcello had contacted between the last time we’d spoken and six o’clock this morning when he’d been flung to his death in the Colosseum.

I could guess, though. The one person Marcello and I had in common was Arcellano, the hoodlum with enough aggro to waste a bloke like Marcello simply as a warning to me. Well, I felt warned all right.

Settling up with the waiter, there was no longer any doubt in my mind. Arcellano wanted the rip attempted. And by me. After what I’d seen of the Vatican I knew bloody well there was no way anybody on earth could pull it off. A million to one I’d be collared in the act, which must also be what Arcellano wanted – seeing he’d done me over, threatened murder and then finally committed that ultimate atrocity. God knows what I’d done to deserve all this.

But deep within me as I waited for my change there smouldered the small beginnings of a fire which I recognized with dismay.

If I tried the rip and got nicked, at least I’d know what the hell Arcellano really was up to.
But what if I pulled it off
? I’d not only know – I’d have Arcellano nailed. I’d have the priceless antique he wanted. Either way I could call the tune and make the bastard dance. The only way to reach Arcellano was to pull the Vatican rip.

It was the thought of nailing Arcellano that did it, made me walk on air. I couldn’t think of nailing a nicer bloke.

I’d do the rip all right.

To stay in Rome I needed to immerse myself safely among a mob of workers. What better work than antiques?

I found myself drifting instinctively among the narrow alleys not far from the Corso Vittorio Emanuele II, near where I’d had the dust-up with Carlo, and sniffing appreciatively at the luscious pong of mahogany being planed, mixed with the glues and varnishes which antique restorers use.

By now it was getting on for eight o’clock. Most shops were shutting along the Corso – so named by reason of the horse races held down those streets in ancient days. Lovely shops, handsome people, and antique shops every few yards. I felt good. My spirits were soaring under the influence of the grub and the wine. In my innocence I believed I’d seen the last of that ridiculous old woman. Vaguely at the back of my mind was the problem of where she’d intended leading me when I’d met her at the Ponte Sant’ Angelo, but I suppressed the worry. Antiques do that – leave me senseless.

So, when I saw a small mixed gaggle of tourists trooping into a small antique shop near the Vecchio I was in among them like a flash. It looked just about right for me. The tourists seemed a pleasant, talkative crew. They were being impressed by the elegant proprietress who was holding forth on the merits of her abundant antiques. She was gorgeous in her stylish fawn twin-set and pearl choker, and knowledgeable with it. I listened with some interest but more amusement as she delivered her spiel. With luck I’d be in here.

‘Silver,’ she was saying about a lovely tray. ‘Even after the Bunker Hunt fiasco, genuine hallmarked silver is the greatest investment you could hope for.’

Well, yes, I thought, but be careful, folks.

‘It’s really beautiful,’ an attractive blue-rinsed woman exclaimed.

‘What period?’ her husband asked. He was a benign portly gent in executive rimless specs and looked worth a groat or two.

‘George the Third. A London maker called Edward Jay.’ The woman noticed me. She obviously hated me on sight. Well, I’m no sartorial model. I never look well dressed, and what with the recent carry-ons I suppose she thought me a right scruff. As long as the other customers were there she could hardly sling me out.

‘It weighs heavy, George,’ the tourist said. ‘And so
old
.’

‘Over two hundred and twenty six ounces, madam.’

‘Is that right!’

‘And absolutely original, I assure you. Worth—’

Calmly I said, ‘Half.’

The proprietress maintained her pleasant smile at my casual interruption. Two goons instantly appeared, one definitely limp of wrist and highly perfumed, the other a handsome gorilla. They came smiling hard and stood to either side of me. I felt like a nut in a cracker. The Americans turned on me, still benign but with financial antennae quivering.

‘You say half, sir?’

‘Half. Look.’ I took the tray – a genuine, lovely job with applied reeded borders, handles and four panel supports – and tilted it at the strip-light. ‘See the centre? The reflection’s fine until you get to the middle.’

‘A forgery?’ the American woman said breathlessly.

‘Not really. It’s original all right. But the one thing which cuts the value of a beautiful tray like this is central engraving – coats of arms, monograms – done later.’

‘There
is
none,’ the proprietress snapped. Her smile wasn’t slipping, but it had definitely tightened.

‘Not now.’ I squinted along the tray. A definite margin showed around the centre. ‘Somebody’s machined it off. It’s visible from an angle, like oil on water.’

‘Wouldn’t it be thinner there, sir?’ asked the elderly American.

I was impressed. Politeness and common sense come rare.

‘Not if you electroplate it time after time in the centre with silver. Still genuine, you see. Still legal. But devalued.’

‘Ahem, this early saxophone,’ the dainty assistant crooned, sharp as floss, trying to distract attention.

‘Basset horn,’ I put in. It’s a weird looker, detachable spout and all.

Her mouth was a pale slit of fury. ‘I know it’s a horn, stupid!’

‘Wrong.’ I was enjoying myself. ‘It’s not a horn at all. It’s a woodwind. Basset as in hound, but horn after a bloke. Mister Horn made them in the Strand.’

The dealer was a woman after my own heart. To my astonishment she suddenly smiled and took the tray from me. ‘Well done,’ she pronounced smoothly, turning casually to her tourists. ‘Signor Giuseppe is a member of my staff, ladies and gentlemen. Our little ruse worked, as usual.’

‘Erm—’ I said uneasily, wondering what the hell. I hadn’t liked being Enrico for old Anna. I definitely hated the idea of being Giuseppe for this luscious bird.

She coursed over my hesitation. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, we arrange this demonstration to show our customers that antiques are fraught with risks. Now, with our warning in your mind, please allow me to give you a conducted tour of our excellent stock of antiques . . .’

The two blokes closed on me. I really wanted to cut out and try somewhere else, late as it was, but oozed along with the Americans for protection.

Once or twice I was drawing breath to point out the odd fact – that the
crystallo ceramico
she mentioned as being by the great Apsley Pellat was probably by a contemporary copier (his favourite best-selling trick was a porcelain medallion of some grand personage, set in glass), and that the pair of peasant love-spoons she claimed were Welsh had probably never been further north than Basle. It was no use. Her two goons were breathing hard in what can only he called a threatening manner. Anyhow, the bird was in full flight, posing thoughtfully at every painting, casually arresting everybody’s eye. And I’ll be frank about it. She had me as mesmerized as the Yanks, though I suppose after smelly old Anna any bird would have looked like Miss World.

She sold a cut-card silver sauceboat (the silver decoration is fretted on a silver slice which is then applied to the silverware. It’s not been done well for a good century). Knowing I was there, she wisely glossed over a piece of so-called Rafaello ware (in fact Raphael did none of these; they’re simply forged nineteenth-century tin-enamel porcelain maiolicas) and instead sold a little harlequin table of about 1790.

The tourists made to leave after half an hour. Uneasily I realized her two blokes were between me and the exit.

‘I’ll walk part of the way—’ I was saying with a sickly smile, but the bird was too quick.

‘Signor Giuseppe,’ she crooned. ‘Would you mind waiting a moment, please? Good night, ladies and gentlemen! And thank you!’

The door closed. I kept my smile up but my hands were wet and my heart was thumping. I couldn’t help thinking what a bastard of a day it had been. I wanted a job, not a float in the Tiber.

The proprietress stood, hands on her elbows. Her foot tapped. ‘Well? What’s the game?’

She snapped her fingers and her bigger ape gave her a cigarette. She was bending forwards to accept his light, her gaze on me, when I saw her eyes widen in astonishment. That was because I had taken her cigarette and crumbled it into an ashtray.

‘No smoking where you’ve pewter or paintings, love.’

‘
Wait
!’

The ape was coming for me when her command froze him. It was just as well because the Stangengläser ‘pole’ glass I was innocently holding was worth about ten times the lot of us. Their long cylindrical form isn’t to my liking, but I’d have crowned him with it if I had to.

‘Look, folks,’ I said as reasonably as I could. ‘You’ve a choice. I’ll bring you a fortune, or you can simply go on in your old ignorant way.’

‘Explain,’ the bird commanded.

I drew breath. This was my pitch. ‘If I hadn’t been here you’d maybe have sold that tray.’

She smiled like a moving glacier. ‘But thanks to you, I didn’t.’

‘No,’ I said affably. ‘Thanks to me you sold a hell of a lot more. That tray dodge can be repeated ten times a day. You need somebody here who knows the difference between an antique and a telly.’

‘No, Piero!’ Her voice was like a whiplash. The ape halted and smouldered silently. ‘Go on.’

‘A third of your stock’s labelled wrong.’

‘And you could do it right?’

‘Without a single reference book.’

She was eyeing me up and down, I felt to let. ‘It’s not a bad idea . . .’

‘He’s repellent!’ the petulant nerk hissed, stamping his foot.

I admit I wasn’t looking very affluent, but I thought that was a bit much. She ignored the three of us, simply speculated away behind her hazel eyes.

‘Are you in trouble with the police?’

‘No, but you would have been if you’d sold that crappy piece of carpet as a genuine Khilim.’ I nodded to indicate the labelled rug placed centrally on the floor. A real Khilim is too light to put on the floor. It’s properly used for divans or as a wall decoration. ‘Khilims have no pile. That things a foot thick. Who made it for you?’

There was a pause, also a foot thick. Finally she nodded as if reaching some inner agreement.

‘Come back tomorrow morning,’ she said. ‘I’ll consider you. Nine o’clock. And be presentable.’

I left, backing out nervously. Not much of a promise, but I was becoming used to very little. So long as I hung on in Rome some way, any way at all.

I slept that night in the park near the great Castel Sant’ Angelo. Edgy as hell, I kept imagining there was somebody standing watching me under the trees but when I crept over to see who it was I found nobody. I didn’t sleep well. The castle’s brooding bulk added nothing to my slumber, but at least it didn’t rain. Most of the night I thought about popes.

Now, popes have a very chequered history. They haven’t always been sweetness and light. If you crossed them – and sometimes even if you didn’t – you finished up stabbed, poisoned, burned, garotted, buried, castrated, starved, or if you were lucky simply ignored to death. Even an innocent joke could earn a horrible joke in return.

I couldn’t get out of my mind that whizz-kid Sixtus V. His sister had once been a washerwoman, and he considered himself ridiculed when some wag pointedly stuck a dirty shirt on one of Rome’s many battered statues. Cunning as a fox, Sixtus pretended great hilarity and offered a reward to the anonymous wag – and cut off the joker’s hand when he came to claim it. ‘I never said I wouldn’t,’ the Pope calmly pronounced afterwards, the ultimate infallible theological argument. Well, my worried mind went, if a laugh gets you maimed for life, ripping the Vatican off won’t exactly go over as a comedy act. And don’t try telling me we don’t live in the Dark Ages any more – poor old mankind is
always
in the Dark Ages, and that includes today. No mistake about that. If you don’t believe me, walk around any city at nightfall, or just read tomorrow’s morning newspaper. And I had even better evidence than that. I’d met Arcellano.