The Venice Conspiracy (41 page)

Valentina hesitates before asking the next question. ‘And would the blood of a priest, or the liver of a priest, have ritualistic significance as well?’

‘Of course,’ snaps Alfie. ‘To shed the blood of a soldier of Christ is always a triumph for these people. Given that Teucer himself was a netsvis – a priest of sorts – you can see how this might also be of value to them in some ceremony to celebrate bringing the tablets together and opening the gates of hell.’

‘And that would go for an
ex
-priest, too?’

‘It would,’ confirms
Alfie, frowning. Vito’s sure he’s about to ask
why
she posed the question when the door opens and Nuncio di Alberto sticks his head into the room.

‘
Scusi
. Major, I am sorry, but I need to talk to you urgently.’

Vito excuses himself and steps outside.

Nuncio is holding a wad of papers. He looks anxious. ‘I think I’ve managed to trace the ownership of one of the tablets.’

Vito looks surprised.

‘The curator at the Scuola Grande della Misericordia in Venice told me he’d heard of a silver Etruscan artefact with the image of a young priest on it being traded in Austria or Germany about five years ago.’

Vito dredges his memory. ‘That was the middle tablet.’

‘
Si
. It was a good lead. Look—’ He holds out a photocopy of what appears to be a page from an auctioneer’s brochure with a drawing of the silver tablet.

Vito’s eyes light up as he takes it from him. ‘
Bene
. You’ve done well. Wait here while I show this to the priest from the Vatican.’

He walks straight back into the room. ‘Father, please look at this—’ He hands over the photocopy. ‘What would you say it was?’

Alfie instantly recognises it. ‘It’s the middle tablet, the one depicting the netsvis Teucer. Where did—’ Alfie never gets to finish asking his question.

Vito walks out and returns the paper to Nuncio. ‘The priest confirms it’s the tablet. So who owns it?’

Nuncio is not about to give an abridged version of his story. He wants to milk his success for all it’s worth. ‘The curator was right. I found it had been traded in auction at the Dorotheum in Vienna – one of the oldest art houses in the world, renowned for its discretion.’

‘Who?’ says Vito, impatiently.

‘It had been bought anonymously by a German art collector for a cool one-point-one million dollars. After his purchase, the trail gets complicated. It turns out the anonymous buyer sold it the next day to another trader, this time in America. He in turn sold it on
again
, within a week of the first transaction. Each time a sale took place, the price rose by exactly twenty per cent, almost as though an agreed commission was being paid. No further auction houses were involved.’

Vito still wants to get to the name of the owner, but he can see why the trail is important; whoever stumped up the cash wasn’t just shy of being identified – ownership of the artefact had been systematically laundered.

‘So – now to the owner.’ Nuncio’s eyes brighten. ‘The tablet was eventually purchased
not by an individual but by an offshore company registered in the Cayman Islands.’ He slips a sheet of paper to his boss. ‘A company owned by our hippy-loving billionaire, Mario Fabianelli.’

Vito feels his heart quicken as Nuncio hands him copies of the bank transfer and the incorporation of the offshore company. He taps the papers. ‘You’re sure of the trail? Certain this payment ties all the way back to the artefact?’

Nuncio feels a jangle of nerves. ‘
Si
. I’m certain.’

‘
Va bene
. I’ll finish up with the man from the Vatican, then we go and get a warrant to see Mario Fabianelli and his commune of happy campers.’

When Tom wakes, all he sees is an unnerving blackness.

They’ve re-bandaged his eyes.

Cuffed him as well. But left his feet untied.

He has an awful headache. But he’s thinking clearly. More clearly than he’s done for weeks.

He’s been moved again.

Things are different.

The air is fresher. He can smell things. Grass. Wild garlic. Catmint.

And he can hear different things, too. Birdsong. Leaves rustling.

He knows he’s still lying down.

Flat on his back. On something hard. Outside somewhere.

But where?

And why?

Why have they moved him from that room?

Possibilities – and fears – tumble into his head like a game of Tetris.

Mera Teale – Lars Bale – the
Gates of Destiny
– Monica Vidic – the sixth of June – Venezuela – Little Venice.

Suddenly he’s being lifted into the air.

He’s on a hard stretcher. Several people carrying him. By the sound of their feet, four rather than two.

Moving him forward, then
lowering him to the ground.

Mutterings in Italian.

No!

Not Italian. Latin. They’re mumbling something in Latin.

A mass?

His stretcher is lifted again. It wobbles. Someone’s shoulder braces it.

‘Satanus …’

Tom hears it clearly. Satanists – rehearsing a ceremony of some sort.

Preparing themselves – and him – for a ritual that’s going to happen soon.

A
sacrificial
ritual.

And Tom is pretty sure he knows who the sacrifice will be.

But when?

The stretcher moves again. The air changes. They’re going back inside.

Not now.

Not yet.

Thank God for that.

They lower him into a place that he’s never seen, but knows intimately.

He’s back in his room.

They mumble softly then walk away.

Clat-clat, clat-clat, clat-clat, clat-clat, clat-clat.

Ten steps.

Clii-ck-kkk.

One lock. Old and slow to close. Not heavy-duty. Not bolted.

He hears his jailer’s footsteps disappear down the corridor. Heading away from his feet. To his right.

He has some sense of direction. A mental map of where they come from and go to.

They’re growing careless.

It would only take three seconds to reach the corridor outside. The lock is light, single-levered and breakable.

He tries to sit up, and realises something else.

He can’t.

He’s still too weak to swat a fly, let alone try to escape.

1778

Lazzaretto Vecchio, Venezia

‘Get them to their feet!’

Gatusso’s command brings
hooded acolytes out of the shadows.

A large man bends and picks up Efran’s corpse. His dangling head brushes Tanina’s lap. She’s too frightened to scream. An acolyte pulls her to her feet and drags her away. ‘Ermanno!’ she shouts, then her eyes catch Lydia’s. ‘Please, don’t hurt him!’

‘Sweet, how she still cares for her lover,’ says Gatusso, sarcastically. ‘Who would have thought a Jew could provoke such emotion.’ He puts a booted foot against the young man’s chest and pushes the unconscious body. ‘Take him outside. He may still be good for something.’

Tommaso watches it all, his mind reeling from the multiple shocks the day has dealt him.

‘Stand up, Brother.’ Gatusso grins. ‘You are the star of the show. We must ensure you make a proper entrance.’

He gets to his feet. ‘You’ll burn in the fires of eternal hell, Gatusso. What you’re doing is beyond evil. You will suffer for ever for your sins.’

‘Tut. Tut. Such anger.’ He mockingly brushes Tommaso’s shoulders to tidy his attire, then waves to a pair of acolytes. ‘Make him watch everything. Hold his eyes open if necessary. I want him to act as witness for his precious and all powerful God.’ He turns to Tommaso, a wide smirk on his face. ‘Do you want to pray, Brother? You can get down on your knees if you like. Go on. We don’t mind. Feel free to call upon your glorious Jesus to save you.’

Tommaso says nothing. He has no strength – neither physical nor religious.

‘Good decision,’ says Gatusso. ‘Why waste your breath. You don’t have much of it left.’

Lydia and the acolytes manhandle Tommaso away.

As he’s brought
into the open, he instantly sees the area outside has been well prepared.

A perfect rectangle has been drawn and divided into three, each section accommodating a libation altar made from virgin wood.

Three places to shed fresh blood.

Ermanno is already tied to one.

Tanina is stood next to another.

A third lies empty. Presumably reserved for him.

Two acolytes now attend each altar.

Torches are being lit around the rectangle.

In the centre there is a silver stand. On it are the three Tablets of Atmanta. The Gates of Hell are ready to be unlocked.

Lydia stands close to Gatusso. Tommaso notices that their red-lined, black capes bear different markings from the acolytes’. They are clearly the leaders of the coven.

He looks to Tanina.

She’s gazing back at him.

Her eyes ask so much. Say so much. He wishes there was time to get to know her. To talk of their mother, their lives, their feelings.

She smiles. It’s as though she can tell what he’s thinking. As though she understands.

Gatusso sees them gazing at each other, forming non-verbal bonds, bridging the gap caused by their segregation.

He walks towards Tanina. ‘Brother Tommaso, contrary to the beliefs of the Catholic Church, my lord Satan is a merciful god. And though I am commanded to shed
your
blood in his honour, I am also able to bring you great joy and happiness.’ He puts a hand in Tanina’s hair. ‘I have a proposition for you. I will let your sister live. But in return, you must renounce your God – the God that has so obviously forsaken you – the God you do not even feel worth praying to. Renounce him – renounce the so-called Holy Trinity. Proclaim your baptism a blasphemy against the true lord, Satan.’ He touches the young monk’s face. ‘Tommaso, if you get down on bended knee and pledge your soul to Satan, the true lord of everything, I will spare her life.’ He walks to an acolyte, picks a thin blade, like a sculptor’s clay knife, from a silver tray and paces up to the first altar. ‘One other condition. You must take the life of her lover instead.
You
take it, Brother, and in return
I
will give you her life.’ He turns the handle of the knife towards Tommaso. ‘What is it to be – your sister, or a man who means nothing to you?’

Present Day

4th June

San Quentin, California

FBI Supervisory Agent
Steve Lerner and his partner Hilary Babcock are escorted along the prison landing to the interview room where Lars Bale is waiting, chained hand and foot, in his orange uniform.

Lerner is a small, gentle man with the frame of a sparrow and a well-trimmed greying beard that he can’t help but continually stroke. Babcock is his opposite. She’s tall with lightbulb eyes, hair that looks like a wild, black cleaning mop and a vocabulary that can scorch earth.

‘I remember this motherfucking son-of-a-bitch when I was first at Quantico,’ she says. ‘A poisonous and pontificating prick if ever there was one. I’ll be switching my lights off come June sixth, just so they get some extra juice to toast the bastard.’

‘That’s very considerate, Hilary,’ says Lerner, sarcastically. ‘But not at all necessary – they don’t electrocute people at SQ.’

‘Then they damned well should for this scumbag. I’m sure the families of his victims will love that, after everything he did, he gets a humane exit – a lavish last meal, a cosy lie-down and then a little scratch on his arm before sleepies.’

The banter continues until a prison guard lets them into the lock-up and goes through the safety routine. ‘There’s an alert button on the table and another by the door. Press one if you’re in trouble or when you’re done, and I’ll come and get you out.’ They nod and he relocks the door as he leaves them.

Lerner and Babcock settle in screwed-down chairs at a screwed-down table. ‘Mr Bale, I’m Agent Steve Lerner, this is Agent Hilary Babcock, we’re from the FBI’s Behavioral Science Unit and we’d like to ask you some questions. Is that all right?’

‘Ask what you like,’ says Bale, his stare fixed on Babcock. ‘But unless it amuses me, you won’t be getting any answers.’

‘I understand,’ says Lerner,
gently. He opens his jacket and takes out a small brown notebook and a pen. He slowly uncaps the yellow plastic pen and scribbles on a page to get the ink flowing.

‘You best hurry, mister,’ says Bale, poking fun. ‘The speed you’re moving at they’re going to have executed me before you’ve started.’

Lerner continues as though he’s not even heard the remark. ‘You’re an artist, I understand. Very admirable. Who was your inspiration?’

Bale’s eyes flicker with fun. ‘The death of Christ and the slaughter of the innocent. I find both motivating and thrilling.’

‘I meant painter. Which artist do you most admire? Picasso? Dada? Dalí?’

‘Oh, I see,’ answers Bale contemptuously, ‘you’re using that old find-some-common-ground trick to get the prisoner to loosen up and talk. How resourceful and intelligent you are.’

‘And the answer?’

‘Picabia.’ Bale all but spits out the name. ‘Picabia. I’ll spell it out nice and slow so you don’t make a mistake in your writing there. Pi-ca-b-ia. He was my inspiration. Does that help you? Or, do you not have a fucking clue who the hell I’m talking about?’

The FBI man methodically writes out the name, then strokes his beard thoughtfully. He looks up casually at the ceiling and feigns searching for an answer. Finally, he smiles at Bale and holds his attention. ‘François Marie Martinez Picabia. I should have known he would be your guide. His 1929 piece
Hera
is full of facial imagery so similar to yours.’

Bale flaps his cuffed hands in mock applause. ‘Congratulations. So you’re not quite as pig ignorant as cops usually are.’ He lets out a sarcastic huff of air. ‘Most queers in professions like yours are both sensitive and smart. It comes with the introversion. Was art a comfort to you, Agent Lerner? Did you seek solace in it while you hid your sexuality from all your macho colleagues?’