The Vatican Rip (18 page)

Maybe my timing was a bit unfortunate, knowing what I now knew of Piero and Adriana, but I was on a tight schedule. You can’t keep Vaticans waiting. So while I was drying out some glued pieces after weighting them down I went into the yard to measure up for the beam, a plain girder with a pulley.

‘What are you doing, Lovejoy? Who said you could start on that?’

Good old Piero had come to check on me. He did this about twice an hour usually. Never said much, just gave a long glance, then went back in. This time he was inquisitive and suspicious.

‘Well, nobody, but—’

‘You were told your winch idea’s off. Listen.’ He came closer, casual as anything. I glimpsed Fabio’s delighted face at the rear window. ‘Your job here is to
take
orders. Understand?’

‘I know that. But it’s daft to waste—’

‘Piero.’

Adriana was standing at the top of the showroom’s back steps. An entirely new outfit. Lemon was today’s colour, a graceful suit and chiffon scarf. No gold, just enough silver to bend the bullion market. Her hair was lustrous. She looked straight out of Imperial Rome, a real blinder.

‘Eh?’ I realized she had asked a question, what was going on? ‘Oh. I thought I’d start measuring up—’

‘For a winch for the top floor,’ Piero said. He never took his eyes off me. If Adriana hadn’t arrived we’d have been having harsher words than this.

I shrugged. ‘If we can’t use it for upstairs, it’ll do for the showroom. A kid could use it to lift the heaviest furniture right into the ground-floor showroom. For God’s sake,’ I said, making out I was getting tired of it. ‘Even the ancient Romans had lifting devices. Go to the Colosseum. The mason there lifted those great blocks all day long with one finger, and we hump wardrobes and cabinets up and down those stupid steps, into the loading yard. Daft.’

‘Then he can make it for the showroom,’ Adriana told the middle distance. ‘Will it be safe?’

‘Perfectly.’ I smiled at her but not at Piero.

And I thought, like hell it will.

Fabio spent a contented morning after that, pouring oil on troubled fires. He took great pleasure in calling me into the showroom, innocently asking my advice on this or that antique. Twice I told him the stuff he was asking about was gunge, modern fakery, and each time he simpered with pleasure. It was only when I saw Piero’s thunderous expression that I realized what game Fabio was playing. They were ‘antiques’ Piero had bought in. Hey ho.

Adriana spent her time being exquisitely beautiful in the office and taking customers around. We were quite busy. I was brought up to play the tray dodge again, once with Piero and once – at some considerable distance – with Adriana.

The influx always fell off about half past twelve, and it was then I really got going. Instead of working feverishly in ten-minute dashes I could tear into my Chippendale with a single mind. Of course they didn’t look like tables, and if things went smoothly they wouldn’t for quite some time. Piero came into the workshop about one o’clock. I was pedalling like a maniac at the spindle lathe, running a polisher into action, when I felt him there. I let the spindle creak to a halt, thinking that this was it. I gave him a disarming grin, friendly old Lovejoy.

‘You rang?’

‘Those bits the rent table for Adriana?’

‘Yes. Want to see?’

‘Not really.’ He was quite casual again, in full control. I think it was then I understood what a dangerous opponent he could be. Give me somebody berserk, every time. ‘There seems a lot of pieces for just one table.’

‘I’m making the occasional duplicate piece,’ I explained casually. ‘It’s called templating. Then if the signora finds it sells quickly, I can easily make another. Saves working it all out every time.’

‘What I mean is, Lovejoy, you’re not making separates, are you? One for the signora, one for yourself? Because I wouldn’t like that, Lovejoy.’ He spoke like a boss.

‘No,’ I said, thinking I was getting quite good at lying. I’d lied my head off all morning and it felt marvellous. ‘I promise you, Piero. Everything here belongs to the signora.’

‘You know, Lovejoy,’ he said thoughtfully, inspecting me. ‘There’s something wrong with you, isn’t there?’

I didn’t like this. Piero the ape I could handle. Piero the thinker was an unknown quantity. ‘Wrong?’

‘You bend too easy. Yet I get the impression you’re just not bendable. And all this honesty.’

I shrugged uncomfortably. I don’t like being looked into. ‘Everybody’s different.’

And your gig here. Working on spec, when you’re a natural at the antiques game.’

‘Scratching bread, same as the rest.’

‘Maybe, Lovejoy.’ He was still quite calm as he left, but he said it again. ‘Maybe.’

* * *

When we started to break at two o’clock I received a type-written message. In an envelope with just my name on the front:
Lovejoy
. It read:

Lovejoy,

Please phone the number below, two-thirty.

It was a Rome number.

I asked Fabio, ‘Who delivered this?’

‘It was with the rest of the post.’

‘No postmark?’

‘Just as I passed it to you, Lovejoy.’ He grinned wickedly. ‘Some handsome admirer you haven’t told us about?’

I was on tenterhooks wondering, so I made sure I broke off on time. On the way out Adriana spoke to me as I was dismissed – turning approximately in my direction but speaking a mile over my head.

‘Lovejoy. Your lunch arrangements are altered.’

I’d forgotten my nosh money. ‘They are?’

‘Yes. I’ve phoned an account in, at the pizzeria across the street and the trattoria next to it.’

‘Er, thank you, signora.’

‘For one,’ she said absently. I felt the barb: no hungry partners share your dinners, Lovejoy.

‘Of course, signora.’

I made my farewells and hurried to the trattoria where they let me use their phone. My hands were shaking as I dialled. A bored bird announced a hotel’s name quite openly.

‘Look,’ I said with some puzzlement. ‘My name’s Lovejoy. I was asked to phone this number at two-thirty.’

It’s not that yet.’ She was bored and belligerent. ‘I’ll put you through but don’t blame me.’

It was Arcellano all right. I felt my flesh creep as soon as I heard the poisonous bastard. He asked, ‘How’s my old friend?’

‘I haven’t a bean,’ I complained. ‘I’m having to work on tick.’

He gave his cat-cough chuckle but I’ll bet without a proper smile. ‘Exactly as I like it, Lovejoy. Here’s my instruction. As soon as you’ve completed our transaction, you will ring this phone number, in Bonn. The very instant. You’ll be told where to deliver the item. Do you understand?’

‘Yes.’

‘And Lovejoy. No more accidents with cars.’

‘What do you mean?’ I was all innocent.

The phone went dead. I wrote down the number he’d given me and had a sombre meal.

I left the trattoria thinking resentfully that half of the people in Rome now seemed to be my bosses. I had Anna bellyaching that everything I did was wrong. I had Adriana telling me where and when I could eat, and now who to sleep with. There was Piero fighting me every inch of the way. Fabio was stirring it. And Arcellano, probably having me watched now even as I walked through the Piazza Navona towards Anna’s.

It was then that I got the other half. A familiar motor was waiting as I emerged on the south side of the Navona. Familiar because you don’t get many of them that ghastly purple colour. The chauffeur stood out as I crossed over.

‘Signor.’

Like a fool, I was smiling as I got in, but the thing was empty. I sat, puzzled. Adriana had said nothing about sending her car for me.

We rolled like a mobile cathedral into the river road. I listened carefully. There was not a cheep out of the clock.

‘Where are we going?’ I asked the driver, peering out at the car roofs. I’d never been this high without a ladder. ‘Look. I have to be back at work—’

‘One moment, signor.’

That was all I got from him. The interior of the car was carpeted and there were more cupboards around than I had in my cottage. It was lovely. With my B-movie memory I tried the door handle at a traffic light. It wasn’t locked, so I wasn’t going to be gassed. Only Adriana, probably, wanting to talk.

We were only a few minutes reaching the block of apartments. Not too tall a building, and very discreet. The ground floor was occupied by a suite of offices, some kind of property development company by the looks of things. I’m thick sometimes. I was still smiling in anticipation when I realized the place was Signor Albanese’s, not Adriana’s.

A suave young bloke showed me in. Signor Albanese was reading documents behind a rosewood desk. I trudged the mile between the door and the chair. He had more sense than keep me waiting by pretending preoccupation, and looked up immediately with a smile that told me once again it was not my day.

‘There you are,’ he said, smiling at the secretary to bring a sherry. ‘You are much younger than I’d imagined, Lovejoy. I put you in the mid-forties.’

‘Some of us never make it.’

He smiled and invited me into the chair.

‘You can leave us, Ernesto.’

‘I’m afraid I don’t have much time,’ I said.

‘I know. You must be back at the emporium fairly soon.’ He nodded as though that side of things was of the slightest importance.

I sussed him. He was a calm, immaculate sort. You immediately received the impression that nothing could possibly take this man by surprise. It was a troublesome world, clearly, but controllable. His thinning hair was flattened, his suit brand new. Behind all that cleanliness and order he was tough, and in charge.

‘About your presence in Rome, Lovejoy.’ He raised a podgy palm to arrest my run of falsehoods. ‘No fabrications, please. Save those for others. You are, I believe, a divvie?’

‘Yes.’

‘An impressive attribute.’ A pause. ‘For one so poor.’

‘My stuff was stolen. I got dipped.’

‘So you say.’

‘It’s the truth. I’m earning my wages in antiques. Signora Albanese decided the deal, not me.’

‘I heard. But that still leaves a gap in your story, no?’

‘Not that I’m aware of.’

‘Perhaps I should explain, then. You come here, ostensibly as a tourist. You are relieved of your wallet. So you gravitate to a job in an antique shop, simply to earn your fare home.’

‘That’s it.’

He continued smoothly, ‘I am reliably informed that your country’s authorities have an enviable record in establishing administrative systems the world over. I am further informed that they can cope with a stranded tourist.’

‘I never thought of it.’

He leant forwards, shaking his head.

‘Lovejoy. I swear to you. I do not intend to destroy you, or any plans you might have. And whatever you say will go no further. But I must know. Do you understand?’

I was getting sick of people uttering threats at me and then demanding if I understood. They’d all been at it today and it was getting on my wick.

‘No, I don’t understand.’

‘You were merely one of the crowd,’ he said gently. ‘At first, that is. Until now. When you and Adriana . . .’ He paused to make certain it sank in. ‘Naturally my wish for Adriana is that she enjoys a stable relationship. I condone it. And, until now, that which has existed between Adriana and Piero Peci has been eminently suitable. I am naturally very concerned when Adriana shows signs of changing her arrangements.’

I was. lost. It was all too liberated for me to take in at one go. ‘You mean I’m sacked? Or I’m not to see Adriana?’

‘Not at all. Some relationship, of the kind Piero has previously provided, is essential. All I want to know is what your game is.’

I drew breath. He didn’t mind Adriana having another bloke, even if it was in the plural, and all he wanted was for me to be frank about my presence in Rome? I began to get a headache.

It’s . . .’ I hung my head, as if in shame. What the hell could I tell him? Tinker always says you should get your lies in first. Second and you’re sunk. I started to talk, praying something would come. ‘It’s . . . somebody I’ve met.’

‘Adriana?’

‘No.’ That road might be even more dangerous. ‘I admit I have some motive for staying . . .’
Anna
! Anna! I burbled, ‘I . . . I want to stay for a while, at least until I’ve worked things out. She . . . she isn’t free. She has obligations. I’m not at liberty . . .’

‘Somebody else? Not Adriana?’ There was a dry rasp. I looked up. The blighter was laughing, heaving up and down in his chair. ‘So. It isn’t really Adriana at all? By acquiescing to Adriana you were merely demonstrating unfailing obedience to your employer?’

‘Well, if you put it like that . . .’

He took off his specs and wiped his eyes. I didn’t think it was all that funny but he was rolling in the aisles.

‘I’m sorry, Lovejoy,’ he said, wiping his eyes with his glasses lifted on to his forehead. ‘Very remiss of me. But if you only understood the context . . .’

‘Is that all?’ I rose, trying for a bit of dignity. It can be useful in the right place.

‘My abject apologies, signor,’ he said, still falling about. He came with me to the door. ‘But Adriana playing second fiddle to some other woman is delicious.’

I went frosty. ‘Can I go now?’

‘The car will be at the entrance for you. Don’t be too offended, Lovejoy. Let’s say it’s our little secret, shall we?’

‘Look, signor.’ I had to get one thing straight. ‘What if the signora says I’m to dine with her again, and . . . ?’

‘Be her guest, Lovejoy.’ He smiled and patted my arm. ‘After all, everybody’s different. And you are merely . . . what’s the expression? . . . scratching bread, same as the rest. Isn’t that so?’

‘Yes,’ I said, wondering where I’d heard those words spoken recently.

It was returning in the Rolls, wondering about the rum world we live in, when I remembered where I’d heard those words before recently. And who spoke them.

It was me, to Piero. Word for word. My headache got worse. Well, whatever they were all up to, Piero, Adriana, the signor, and Fabio, the rip had to go ahead.

I made the driver drop me near the emporium, seeing it was getting on for four o’clock. The three cafeteria tables were delivered on time, to my satisfaction. I’d told Adriana two, and instead had ordered three. I was very, very pleased, because two from three leaves one. Smiling at last, I covered them with a sheet of plastic and walked home to see Anna.