The Broker

16

The shops along Via Rizzoli opened at 10:00 a.m. on Saturday and Marco was waiting, studying the merchandise in the windows. With the five hundred fresh euros in his pocket, he swallowed hard, told himself he had no choice but to go in and survive his first real shopping experience in Italian. He’d memorized words and phrases until he fell asleep, but as the door closed behind him he prayed for a nice young clerk who spoke perfect English.

Not a word. It was an older gentleman with a warm smile. In less than fifteen minutes, Marco had pointed and stuttered and, at times, done quite nicely when asking sizes and prices. He left with a pair of modestly priced and youthful-looking hiking boots, the style he’d seen occasionally around the university when the weather was bad, and a black waterproof parka with a hood that rolled up in the collar. And he left with almost three hundred euros in his pocket. Hoarding cash was his newest priority.

He hustled back to his apartment, changed into the boots and the parka, then left again. The thirty-minute walk to Bologna Centrale took almost an hour with the snaking and circuitous route he used. He never looked behind him, but instead would duck into a café and study the foot traffic, or suddenly stop at a pastry shop and admire the delicacies while watching the reflections in the glass. If they were following, he didn’t want them to know he was suspicious. And the practice was important. Luigi had told him more than once that soon he would be gone, and Marco Lazzeri would be left alone in the world.

The question was, how much could he trust Luigi? Neither Marco Lazzeri nor Joel Backman trusted anyone.

There was a moment of anxiety at the train station when he walked inside, saw the crowd, studied the overhead schedules of arrivals and departures, and looked about desperately for the ticket window. By habit, he also searched for anything in English. But he was learning to shove the anxiety aside and push on. He waited in line and when a window was open he stepped up quickly, smiled at the little lady on the other side of the glass, offered a pleasant “Buon giorno,” and said, “Vado a Milano.” I’m going to Milan.

She was already nodding.

“Alle tredici e venti,” he said. At 1:20.

“Sì, cinquanta euro,” she said. Fifty euros.

He gave her a one-hundred-euro bill because he wanted the change, then walked away clutching his ticket and patting himself on the back. With an hour to kill, he left the station and wandered down Via Boldrini two blocks until he found a café. He had a panino and a beer and enjoyed both while watching the sidewalk, expecting to see no one of any interest.

The Eurostar arrived precisely on schedule, and Marco followed the crowd as it hurried on board. It was his first train ride in Europe and he wasn’t exactly sure of the protocol. He’d studied his ticket over lunch and saw nothing to indicate a seat assignment. Selection appeared to be random and haphazard and he grabbed the first available window seat. His car was less than half full when the train began moving, at exactly 1:20.

They were soon out of Bologna and the countryside was flying by. The rail track followed M4, the main auto route from Milano to Parma, Bologna, Ancona, and the entire eastern coast of Italy. After half an hour, Marco was disappointed in the scenery. It was hard to appreciate when zipping along at one hundred miles an hour; things were rather blurry and a handsome landscape was gone in a flash. And there were too many factories bunched along the line, near the transportation routes.

He soon realized why he was the only person in his car who was remotely interested in things outside. Those above the age of thirty were lost in newspapers and magazines and looked completely at ease, even bored. The younger ones were sound asleep. After a while Marco nodded off too.

The conductor woke him, saying something completely incomprehensible in Italian. He caught the word “biglietto” on the second or third try and quickly handed over his ticket. The conductor scowled at it as if he might toss poor Marco off at the next bridge, then abruptly marked it with a punch and gave it back with a wide toothy grin.

An hour later a rush of gibberish over the loudspeaker announced something to do with Milano, and the scenery began to change dramatically. The sprawling city soon engulfed them as the train slowed, then stopped, then moved again. It passed block after block of postwar apartment buildings packed tightly together, with wide avenues separating them. Ermanno’s guidebook gave the population of Milano at four million; an important city, the unofficial capital of northern Italy, the country’s center for finance, fashion, publishing, and industry. A hardworking industrial city with, of course, a beautiful center and a cathedral worth the visit.

The tracks multiplied and fanned out as they entered the sprawling rail yards of Milano Centrale. They came to a stop under the vast dome of the station, and when Marco stepped onto the platform he was startled at the sheer size of the place. As he walked along the platform he counted at least a dozen other tracks lined in perfect rows, most with trains waiting patiently for their passengers. He stopped at the end, in the frenzy of thousands of people coming and going, and studied the departures: Stuttgart, Rome, Florence, Madrid, Paris, Berlin, Geneva.

All of Europe was within his reach, just a few hours away.

He followed the signs down to the front entrance and found the taxi stand, where he waited in line briefly before he hopped in the backseat of a small white Renault. “Aeroporto Malpensa,” he said to the driver. They crawled through heavy Milano traffic until they reached the perimeter. Twenty minutes later they left the autostrada for the airport. “Quale compagnia aerea?” the driver said over his shoulder. Which airline?

“Lufthansa,” Marco said. At Terminal 2 the cab found a spot at the curb, and Marco turned loose another forty euros. The automatic doors opened to a mass of people, and he was thankful he had no plane to catch. He checked the departures and found what he wanted — a direct flight to Dulles. He circled around the terminal until he found the Lufthansa check-in desk. A long line was waiting, but with typical German efficiency things were moving quickly.

The first prospect was an attractive redhead of about twenty-five who appeared to be traveling alone, which was something he preferred. Anyone with a partner might be tempted to talk about the strange man back at the airport with his rather odd request. She was second in line at the business-class desk. As he watched her he also spotted prospect number two: a denim-clad student with long scruffy hair, unshaven face, well-worn backpack, and a University of Toledo sweatshirt — the perfect fit. He was well back in the line, listening to music on bright yellow headphones.

Marco followed the redhead as she left the counter with her boarding card and carry-on bags. The flight was still two hours away, so she drifted through the crowd to the duty-free shop, where she stopped to inspect the latest in Swiss watches. Seeing nothing to buy, she wandered around the corner to a newsstand and bought two fashion magazines. As she was headed to the gate, and the first security checkpoint, Marco sucked in his gut and made his move. “Excuse me, miss, excuse me.” She couldn’t help but turn and look at him, but she was too suspicious to say anything.

“Are you by chance going to Dulles?” he asked with a huge smile and the pretense of being out of breath, as if he’d just sprinted to catch her.

“Yes,” she snapped. No smile. American.

“So was I, but my passport has just been stolen. Don’t know when I’ll get home.” He was pulling an envelope out of his pocket. “This is a birthday card for my father. Could you please drop it in the box when you get to Dulles? His birthday is next Tuesday, and I’m afraid I won’t make it. Please.”

She looked at both him and the envelope suspiciously. It was just a birthday card, not a bomb or a gun.

He was yanking something else out of his pocket. “Sorry, there’s no stamp. Here’s a euro. Please, if you don’t mind.”

The face finally cracked, and she almost smiled. “Sure,” she said, taking both the envelope and the euro and placing them in her purse.

“Thank you so much,” Marco said, ready to burst into tears. “It’s his ninetieth birthday. Thank you.”

“Sure, no problem,” she said.

The kid with the yellow headphones was more complicated. He, too, was an American, and he also fell for the lost passport story. But when Marco tried to hand over the envelope, he looked around warily as if they might be breaking the law.

“I don’t know, man,” he said, taking a step back. “I don’t think so.”

Marco knew better than to push. He backed away and said as sarcastically as possible, “Have a nice flight.”

Mrs. Ruby Ausberry of York, Pennsylvania, was one of the last passengers at check-in. She had taught world history in high school for forty years and was now having a delightful time spending her retirement funds traveling to places she’d only seen in textbooks. This was the last leg of a three-week adventure through most of Turkey. She was in Milano only for a connecting flight from Istanbul to Washington. The nice gentleman approached her with a desperate smile and explained that his passport had just been stolen. He would miss his father’s ninetieth birthday. She gladly took the card and placed it in her bag. She cleared security and walked a quarter of a mile to the gate, where she found a seat and made herself a nest.

Behind her, less than fifteen feet away, the redhead reached a decision. It could be one of those letter bombs after all. It certainly didn’t seem thick enough to carry explosives, but what did she know about such things? There was a waste can near the window — a sleek chrome can with a chrome top (they were, after all, in Milano) — and she casually walked over and dropped the letter into the garbage.

What if it explodes there? she wondered as she sat back down. It was too late. She wasn’t about to go over and fish it out. And if she did, then what? Track down someone in a uniform and try to explain in English that there was a chance she was holding a letter bomb? Come on, she told herself. She grabbed her carry-on and moved to the other side of the gate, as far away as possible from the waste can. And she couldn’t keep her eyes off it.

The conspiracy grew. She was the first one on the 747 when they began boarding. Only with a glass of champagne did she finally relax. She’d watch CNN as soon as she got home to Baltimore. She was convinced there would be carnage at Milano’s Malpensa airport.

Marco’s taxi ride back to Milano Centrale cost forty-five euros, but he didn’t question the driver. Why bother? The return ticket to Bologna was the same — fifty euros. After a day of shopping and traveling he was down to around one hundred euros. His little stash of cash was dwindling rapidly.

It was almost dark when the train slowed at the station in Bologna. Marco was just another weary traveler when he stepped onto the platform, but he was silently bursting with pride at the day’s accomplishments. He’d purchased clothing, bought rail tickets, survived the madness of both the train station and the airport in Milano, hired two cabs, and delivered his mail, a rather full day without a hint of anyone knowing who or where he was.

And he’d never been asked to show a passport or any type of identification.

Luigi had taken a different train, the 11:45 express to Milano. But he stepped off at Parma and got lost in the crowd. He found a cab and took a short ride to the meeting place, a favorite café. He waited almost an hour for Whitaker, who had missed one train in Milano and caught the next one. As usual, Whitaker was in a foul mood, which was made even worse by having to meet on a Saturday. They ordered quickly and as soon as the waiter was gone, Whitaker said, “I don’t like this woman.”

“Francesca?”

“Yes, the travel guide. We’ve never used her before, right?”

“Right. Relax, she’s fine. She doesn’t have a clue.”

“What does she look like?”

“Reasonably attractive.”

“Reasonably attractive can mean anything, Luigi. How old is she?”

“I never ask that question. Forty-five is a good guess.”

“Is she married?”

“Yes, no children. She married an older man who’s in very bad health. He’s dying.”

As always, Whitaker was scribbling notes, thinking about the next question. “Dying? Why is he dying?”

“I think it’s cancer. I didn’t ask a lot of questions.”

“Perhaps you should ask more questions.”

“Perhaps she doesn’t want to talk about certain things — her age and her dying husband.”

“Where’d you find her?”

“It wasn’t easy. Language tutors are not exactly lined up like taxi drivers. A friend recommended her. I asked around. She has a good reputation in the city. And she’s available. It’s almost impossible to find a tutor willing to spend three hours every day with a student.”

“Every day?”

“Most weekdays. She agreed to work every afternoon for the next month or so. It’s the slow season for guides. She might have a job once or twice a week, but she’ll try to be on call. Relax, she’s good.”

“What’s her fee?”

“Two hundred euros a week, until spring when tourism picks up.”

Whitaker rolled his eyes as if the money would come directly from his salary. “Marco’s costing too much,” he said, almost to himself.

“Marco has a great idea. He wants to go to Australia or New Zealand or someplace where the language won’t be a problem.”

“He wants a transfer?”

“Yes, and I think it’s a great idea. Let’s dump him on someone else.”

“That’s not our decision, is it, Luigi?”

“I guess not.”

The salads arrived and they were quiet for a moment. Then Whitaker said, “I still don’t like this woman. Keep looking for someone else.”

“There is no one else. What are you afraid of?”

“Marco has a history with women, okay? There’s always the potential for romance. She could complicate things.”

“I’ve warned her. And she needs the money.”

“She’s broke?”

“I get the impression things are very tight. It’s the slow season, and her husband is not working.”

Whitaker almost smiled, as if this was good news. He stuffed a large wedge of tomato in his mouth and chomped on it while peering around the trattoria to see if anyone was eavesdropping on their hushed conversation in English. When he was finally able to swallow, he said, “Let’s talk about e-mail. Marco was never much of a hacker. Back in his glory days he lived on the phone — had four or five of them in his office, two in his car, one in his pocket — always juggling three conversations at once. He bragged about charging five thousand bucks just to take a phone call from a new client, that sort of crap. Never used the computer. Those who worked for him have said that he occasionally read e-mails. He rarely sent them, and when he did it was always through a secretary. His office was high-tech, but he hired people to do the grunt work. He was too much of a big shot.”

“What about prison?”

“No evidence of e-mail. He had a laptop which he used only for letters, never e-mail. It looks as though everyone abandoned him when he took the fall. He wrote occasionally to his mother and his son, but always used regular mail.”

“Sounds completely illiterate.”

“Sounds like it, but Langley’s concerned that he might try and contact someone on the outside. He can’t do it by phone, at least not now. He has no address he can use, so mail is probably out of the question.”

“He’d be stupid to mail a letter,” Luigi said. “It might divulge his whereabouts.”

“Exactly. Same for the phone, fax, everything but e-mail.”

“We can track e-mail.”

“Most of it, but there are ways around it.”

“He has no computer and no money to buy one.”

“I know, but, hypothetically, he could sneak into an Internet café, use a coded account, send the e-mail, then clean his trail, pay a small fee for the rental, and walk away.”

“Sure, but who’s gonna teach him how to do that?”

“He can learn. He can find a book. It’s unlikely, but there’s always a chance.”

“I’m sweeping his apartment every day,” Luigi said. “Every inch of it. If he buys a book or lays down a receipt, I’ll know it.”

“Scope out the Internet cafés in the neighborhood. There are several of them in Bologna now.”

“I know them.”

“Where’s Marco right now?”

“I don’t know. It’s Saturday, a day off. He’s probably roaming the streets of Bologna, enjoying his freedom.”

“And he’s still scared?”

“He’s terrified.”

Mrs. Ruby Ausberry took a mild sedative and slept for six of the eight hours it took to fly from Milano to Dulles International. The lukewarm coffee they served before landing did little to clear the cobwebs, and as the 747 taxied to the gate she dozed off again. She forgot about the birthday card as they were herded onto the cattle cars on the tarmac and driven to the main terminal. She forgot about it as she waited with the mob to claim her baggage and plod through customs. And she forgot about it when she saw her beloved granddaughter waiting for her at the arrival exit.

She forgot about it until she was safely at home in York, Pennsylvania, and shuffling through her shoulder bag for a souvenir. “Oh my,” she said as the card fell onto the kitchen table. “I was supposed to drop this off at the airport.” Then she told her granddaughter the story of the poor guy in the Milan airport who’d just lost his passport and would miss his father’s ninetieth birthday.

Her granddaughter looked at the envelope. “Doesn’t look like a birthday card,” she said. She studied the address: R. N. Backman, Attorney at Law, 412 Main Street, Culpeper, Virginia, 22701.

“There’s no return address,” the granddaughter said.

“I’ll mail it first thing in the morning,” Mrs. Ausberry said. “I hope it arrives before the birthday.”