The Lucifer Gospel

17

Venosa is a town of some twelve thousand citizens scattered around a volcanic hilltop in the district of Basilicata, a small, out-of-the-way regione that lies roughly in the arch of Italy’s boot, bounded by the Gulf of Taranto to the south and the marble spine of the Apennine Mountains to the north. The architecture is bland, whitewashed stucco competing with beige stone and dusty, red-tiled roofs. Few tourists go there; it has none of the flavors of Tuscany or the grandeur of Rome, but once, a long time ago and under another name, it was one of the assembly points along the Appian Way for the great legions of Rome as they went out to conquer the world. Today it has a number of relatively unimportant churches, several sets of catacombs, a fort, and one good restaurant, Il Grifo, located in the center of town, just off the small central square.

Finn parked the little blue Fiat Panda in the cramped town square and switched off the engine. The only difference between the square and a utilitarian cobblestone parking lot was a medium-sized statue of an old Roman in a toga with a scroll in one hand and wearing an olive wreath on his half-bald head. Presumably this was the town’s best-known famous son, Quintus Horatius Flaccus, better known in literary history as the poet Horace. Finn was the one behind the wheel because she spoke the language fluently, having spent a year in Florence gathering research for her master’s thesis on the drawings of Michelangelo. It was also a practical way of dealing with the relentlessly chauvinistic polizia on the highways, who were always willing to give a pretty red-haired tourist a break; especially one who could say per favore and grazie with such a charming accent.

Finn popped open the door of the miniscule little vehicle.

“Stay here,” she instructed.

“Why?” asked Hilts, undoing his seat belt.

“In this country a woman asking questions by herself works better than if she’s with someone,” Finn answered. “Italian men are all the same-they think they were born to please women and that we’re all damsels in distress and desperate for a man’s attention. You’d be competition, at least in their minds.”

“What if it’s an old guy?”

“Even better,” she said and grinned. “Something to prove.”

“What if he’s gay?”

“He’d still want to pinch me, just to keep up the national honor.”

“Doesn’t say much for the feminist cause.”

She laughed. “There’s the feminist cause and then there’s Italy.”

Finn climbed out of the car and crossed the claustrophobic little square. She entered the local Municipio, or City Hall, a square, crumbling stone building with an entrance like a missing tooth and no distinguishing architectural features of any kind. Hilts settled back in his seat and picked up the guidebook they’d bought twelve miles back at a gas station in Rapolla.

According to the book the town had been called Venusia a couple of thousand years ago, named after the Roman goddess of beauty. These days the most important thing in town was the tomb of the wife of Robert Guiscard, the man who conquered Sicily, the reason the Mafia was invented in the first place and the origin of the word “wise-acre.” As far as Hilts could tell there was nothing here to connect with Lucio Pedrazzi and a cave full of late-model mummies in the Libyan Desert. On the other hand, it was the only clue they had.

Five minutes later Finn reappeared and got back into the car.

“So?” asked Hilts.

“Believe it or not, his name was Alberto Pacino and he insisted on doing bad imitations from Scarface in an Italian accent.”

“So other than saying hello to his little friend, did you find out anything?”

“I didn’t say hello to his little friend, but I found out who the resident history guy is in the town. His name is Signore Abramo Vergadora. He’s a retired professor and he lives in a place called Villa Embreo Errante, a few miles north.

“Embreo Errante?”

“The Wandering Jew,” translated Finn.