The Medici Dagger

prologue

–1491–

But for God and the bakers, all of Italy slept through the sultry August night and the moment of the great discovery—that is, all except the inventor, who stood back from the heat of his forging furnace, astonished, holding the cooling, practically weightless dagger in his palm. The piercing blade glinted in the orange light as beads of sweat gathered like berries on the hairs of the man’s strong wrists.

Placing the dagger point-up in a vise, the man hefted a sledge and struck the blade’s tip with full force. The hammer’s iron mallet split like a ripe melon. Using his extraordinary powers of reason, the man struggled to account for this miracle. There was only one answer. An incalculable ingredient had been added to his experimental mixture of metals.

Gazing skyward out his window, the genius contemplated another question even more profound. Would his incredible discovery be used for good or for evil? As he solemnly watched the molten sparks from his furnace chimney race toward the velvety heavens, the man from Vinci made his decision.

And five centuries passed.

twenty years ago

one

Isank into the black leather sofa in my father’s spacious office, leaning against a pillow that looked like a big, silky Chiclet. Tension rippled through the room. I glanced up at my dad, who was slumped forward in his chair, elbows on his leather-topped desk, forehead in one hand. His face was six inches from the speakerphone—a boxy thing, separate from the telephone, that sounded even worse than they do today. Wedged between the fingers of his other hand was a number-two pencil that he nervously wiggled back and forth.

The voice coming out of the phone belonged to Ensign Hector Camacho, a representative from the Coast Guard. “I’m very sorry, sir,” Camacho said with professional dispassion.

My dad winced as if he’d stepped on a thumbtack. “You’re saying he could have gone down anywhere within a hundred-mile radius?”

“I’m saying that—”

“Can’t you find that plane? You cannot fathom the importance of this, the devastating consequences!” Sweat glistened on my father’s upper lip.

“Try to calm down, Dr. Barnett,” Camacho said. “I know how difficult this must be for you, losing, uh, Mr. Greer.”

“Henry!” Dad shouted, and then, as if in an afterthought, he said, “Oh, God . . . Henry.” I knew Henry Greer was the pilot and courier my father had sent to France to retrieve a page of Leonardo da Vinci’s notes.

“Was he a relation?” Camacho asked.

My father ignored the question. “So there’s no way at all to recover this airplane?”

“He went down in very deep waters, and probably at high speed,sir.”

My father snapped the yellow pencil and threw the two halves on the floor. “Jesus!”

I squirmed in my seat and thought maybe I should take a walk. But I stayed.

“I know,” Camacho said. “I’m very sorry.”

My dad was silent for what seemed like a full minute before I realized that he was crying. That got me, and I felt tears welling up, too.

Out of the little box, Camacho’s voice said,“Mister . . . um, Doctor?”

“You’ll call me if anything turns up?” Dad said desperately. “Anything. A piece of paper. A scrap of paper.”

“Of course, sir.”

“A document of any kind. Anything with writing on it.”

“We’ll call you immediately if anything at all is recovered, sir.”

My dad collected himself. “Thank you, Ensign,” he said. “ Goodbye.”

“Goodbye, sir,” Camacho said, and disconnected.

My father stared at the dead speakerphone. I got up and walked over behind him, my boot heels silent on the thick maroon carpet. When I placed a hand on his shoulder, I realized his shirt was damp from sweat.

“Dad?” I called softly.

He slowly raised his head and looked at me through watery eyes. “It’s gone, son,” he whispered. “It’s gone.”

On July nights the humidity in Georgetown was so thick it looked as if a plastic shower curtain had been hung in front of the moon.Sometimes, after my mom and dad had kissed me good night and closed my door, I’d get out of bed and kneel down in front of my second-story window, open it up, and poke my head out into the night. I’d squint up at the hazy yellow face of the moon and feel the air-conditioning going one way and the hot, sticky air going the other, until I’d start to sweat or a mosquito would nail me.

The night of the plane crash I lay on my back in bed, propped up on my elbows. My mother leaned over me, dressed in her light blue cotton robe, scrubbed clean, no makeup. I breathed in the scent of her favorite soap—apricot from Caswell Massey—hoping to ease some of my worry. I watched Mom’s eyes as she fluffed my pillow.Her eyes are the color of acorns,I thought. The serenity they normally radiated was absent that night. And my sheets were tucked in too tightly. I pried them loose with my toes.

“You did the wash today, huh.”

“Nothing like fresh sheets, is there?” Mom said, managing a smile. “Okay, there we go. You can cozy up now.”

There was no chance of that happening. I laid my head back and my mother pulled the covers under my chin.

“Is Dad coming up to give me a kiss?”

She sighed. “I don’t think so, sweetie. I don’t know when he’s coming up. He’s . . . you know, he’s pretty upset.” She covered her mouth with her hand. If she cried I’d have a nightmare for sure.

“But it was an accident,” I said. “It wasn’t his fault.”

“I know, but . . .” She sat down on the edge of the bed and placed her hand on my chest. I wanted to hold it, but my arms were stuck at my sides like a mummy’s.

“Dad feels responsible,” she said. “If he hadn’t bought the notes for the museum, or if he’d gone to get them himself, instead of sending the courier . . . He’s really . . . upset.”

“Is he going to feel better tomorrow? What about the museum party? Are we still going to have the party? We’re not, are we?”

Just the low hum of the air conditioner.

“Maybe now nobody’ll ever find the Medici Dagger.” I sighed. “What would Leonardo think of that?”

“It was a tragedy today. For a lot of people.”

“I could have helped. I could have done something.”

“Honey, you’re eleven. There was nothing you could have done. Now go to sleep. Everything’s going to be all right.”

She kissed my cheek and gave my earlobe a little tug. “Have swell dreams and a peach,” she whispered in my ear. “Swell dreams and a peach.”

“Big peach,” I said, taking a last whiff of her. “Oh, Mom . . .”

“I know. The night-light.”

She stopped by the door, clicked on the little light, and turned off the overhead.“Happy dancing shadows . . .” she began.

“. . . in Reb’s sleep-tight light,” I murmured, finishing our little ritual. She padded down the hall, creaking the old floor in all the usual spots.

Everything’s going to be all right. Everything’s going to be all right. I wish I could have done something—flown the plane maybe. Everything’s going to be all right. Everything.

I was dreaming about twigs crackling in a campfire when my mother’s scream woke me. I bolted up in bed and looked out the window, surprised by the brightness. The campfire? A second scream shook me out of my dream state. I smelled smoke and realized the light was from a real fire creeping up the outside of our wooden house.

“Mom! Dad!” I shouted as a window exploded somewhere downstairs. Smoke billowed up from under my door like a ghost coming to get me. I jumped out of bed; the rug felt oddly warm under my bare feet. Running to the window, I threw it open and punched the screen out. All around me flames licked the house. Looking up, I saw the shake-roof shingles burning, shooting cinders like a million fireflies into the night sky. The whine of fire engines pierced the roar of the blaze, and I heard my mother scream my name from somewhere deep in the house.

“Mom!” I yelled as I crawled backward, feet-first, out the window. I hung on to the sill with an iron grip, looking into my room, waiting forsomething—I didn’t know what. My hands began to tremble, but I held on tight.

Just as the first fire truck came racing down our narrow street, my bedroom door burst open and I saw Mom standing in the doorway, flames all around her. Our eyes met and she shrieked,“Reb! Jump!” Her nightgown was on fire. Men’s voices shouted at me from down below— echoes from a distant canyon. As my mother threw her arms out and took two steps toward me, the house shuddered and the roof collapsed, with a sound like a thousand bones breaking, crushing her into eternity.

I froze for a second, suspended in a place where the claws of horror couldn’t touch me. Then, scrambling my feet up the clapboard siding, a dozen splinters piercing my soles, I pushed off the wall and turned in midair, arcing over the walkway, going into a dive, reaching for the ground. I heard yelling as I hit the small patch of grass by the big elm near the curb and rolled smack up against the tree.

And then the world went black.

I don’t remember the name of the doctor who told me my parents had died in the fire. I know it was a man, though, because the voice was deep and had come from somewhere above little gold sea horses that floated in an ocean of royal blue tie.

“Can you look at me, son?” he asked.

I gazed at the strange, curly-tailed creatures, envying their silken inanimateness. “I am looking at you,” I replied flatly.

He cupped my face in his cold hands, swallowed audibly, and said again, softly, almost crying, “Can you look at me, son?”

I realized that he was probably thinking of his own kids. I felt sorry for him, having to be the one to tell me. I couldn’t look at him, though. I just let him deliver the news while I mingled with the sea horses. It wasn’t really news.

I’m nobody’s son,I thought.

the present

two

Icrashed through the third-story picture window of the huge chalet at the exact moment the entire floor exploded. Landing on my stomach on the snow-covered, second-story roof, I did a “Superman” down thirty feet of steep pitch. Gunfire erupted from the nearby woods, breaking off chunks of slate all around me. I scrambled to get my body turned around before I ran out of roof.

I slid over the edge feet-first, latching on to the big tin rain leader with my fingertips. One of the men in the forest yelled something in Russian. I heard two bursts of gunfire and felt the metal rip on either side of me. The section of leader I clung to groaned and broke off, and I fell twenty feet, barely managing to get the jagged piece of tin under my boots. I hit the steep, sloping ground in a crouch and slingshotted down the hill like a snowboarder on a double-diamond trail. Four guys jumped on two snowmobiles, roared their two-strokes to life, and took off after me.

I yanked my gun out of its shoulder holster, pointed it at the snowmobile on my far right, and squeezed off three rounds. The driver grabbed his chest, and the snowmobile smashed into a tree and exploded.

With the second sled closing in, I entered a steep, bumpy clearing. Fifty yards ahead, a single red and yellow hang glider launched off a sheer cliff. I aimed for the glider and crouched, feeling the spring in my thighs and the stir in my belly as I prepared for the dive. In an instant, the ground disappeared and my board dropped off into space; the snowmobile driver behind me swerved to a stop at the edge of the precipice.

I arched my back and stretched every fiber in my arms and fingers toward the glider, shot by the wing, and grabbed on to the frame at the front. The glider took a sharp dive. Some biceps and body English would have snapped it back up, but I leaned forward and to the right and we went into a spin. One, two, three, four, five electrifying, corkscrewing seconds ticked by before I countered with my hundred and eighty-five pounds, yanked the frame with all my strength, and pulled the glider straight to sail out over the icy blue lake.

The second unit director’s voice came over my earpiece. “Jeeeezusss, Reb! What the hell happened up there?”

I locked my harness to the glider frame. My hands were trembling, but not from the chilly mountain air. It was “the heights”—the shakes I get whenever I fly or take a fall. I don’t make the heights public.

“Did you get the shot?” I said into my lapel mike, feeling the ebb of adrenaline.

“Of course I got it! It was gorgeous. But major heart attacks are happening here. Who said spin? Did anybody say—”

“Marty, nothing bad happened, right?”

“Uh, right.”

“Then please just say ‘thanks.’ And ‘that’s a wrap.’ Don’t forget to say that.”

“Okay, okay,” he squawked. “Thanks, that’s El Wrappo!”

“You’re welcome,” I said.

I’d nailed it—the whole scene. It was over the top. I knew it would be. Knew it when I talked Charlie, the hang-glider pilot, into going for the spins. He didn’t want to, of course, but I swore to him it would be all right. “Think of the bragging rights,” I told him, “and besides, you can always break off and pull your chute.” Charlie didn’t know I left mine in my trailer.

Nine cameras rolling—one take. A good morning’s work andthe end of the picture for me. Later they’d punch in the close-ups of the star, the dapper and always cool Tom Sloane, apologizing to a beautiful hang-glider pilot:“Sorry to drop by unannounced.” Meanwhile, Charlie was giving me the thumbs-up. I grinned, unclenched a hand, and pulled my earlobe, hoping he didn’t see the heights.

There was major whooping and back-slapping when we got back to the set, followed by everybody thanking everybody and exchanging temporary goodbyes. I made the rounds fast, then changed out of my getup into a tight black T-shirt, faded jeans, brown leather bomber jacket, and custom-made Beatle boots.

I was getting ready to leave when the producer, a slim woman named Rhonda, all red hair and big lips, headed my way with the star himself.

Tom was about my size and looked remarkably like me—dark wavy hair and brown eyes—which kept me busy as his double. His best quality, though, other than his naturally good teeth, was his wife’s spinach and mushroom quiche.

I heard Rhonda telling him, “Are you kidding me? With this in the trailer we could show two hours of you sleeping and still rake in a hundred and fifty mil. And that’s just domestic.”

Today I’d fallenandflown, and still had a touch of the heights. I slipped my hands into my pockets.

Tom flashed me his famous smile. “Jesus, Reb, how’d I do that?”

“You had no choice,” I replied with a shrug. “They were trying to kill you.”

“Good line,” Rhonda said. “Very macho. But that spin, Reb. One of these days you’re going down. Don’t you know the meaning of the word ‘danger’?”

“Danger’s my maiden name,” I said, forcing a grin.

She laughed. “C’mon, let’s all go celebrate.”

“Can’t,” I replied, turning in the direction of my ’68 silver-blue Jaguar XK-E. “I left some wet towels in my washer.” I could feel my gut churning and knew I’d better get out of there fast.

Tom turned to Rhonda. “Towels?” he bristled. “What’s he talking about, towels?”

As I made my escape, I heard Rhonda smoothing him: “ Stuntmen . . . strangers in a strange land.”

I pulled off the road at the first deserted spot, sank to my knees, and threw up all over some wildflowers.Rhonda had it almost right. But I’m not going down one of these days. I already went down.

The warm western sun presided over a shiny sea as I pulled up the short driveway to my Malibu bungalow. I let the motor idle for a moment before turning it off, not wanting to hear the lonely crackle of the cooling exhaust system or the single cardinal singing to itself, as if it didn’t matter that I was alone again.

I reluctantly entered the house, quickly stripped, and threw on my old Speedo shorts, a holey T-shirt, and my Etonic something-or-other running shoes. I had to get out and take a run. Didn’t want to. Had to . . . breathe . . . sweat.

Sometimes when I run I forget where I am, evenwhoI am, and become a jungle man in a loincloth and bare feet—a vertical streak of blood and muscle racing through tall grass and wet trees, with monkeys oo-ooing and a slinking panther catching my scent and salivating.

My mind is clear and still in that jungle, and I can spot the black beast before it lunges, and dodge it or, worst case, catch its eye and get one laugh in before it sinks its long white teeth into my neck. I dodge for a living, and I already know what dying is like. I knew the second the roof caved in on my life, the second I let go of the sill. The last time I died I didn’t get to laugh. So getting the laugh in now, that’s important.

I did the 4.2-mile loop through the Malibu hills, stretched out in the driveway till I stopped sweating, then went in and showered. I cooked some scallops in ginger and fresh chives, opened a bottle ofwine, poured a glass, and moved into the living room carrying my dinner.

Beethoven’s “Pastoral” played softly in the background. My eyes glanced across the room, past the rows of art books that lined my bookshelves, to the dents in the recently laid carpet where a heavy Morris chair had been. I tried not to look at the empty space, but free will had all but eluded me since Emily left three weeks earlier, taking her chair with her. I didn’t ask her to leave, but we both knew our relationship was destined to fail. I came home from a shoot and found her packing her bags, dividing up the few things we’d bought together. Emily’s dents weren’t the first. At that moment I’d sworn, yet again, that they would be the last.

She’d said she wasn’t mad at me, she was mad at herself—being a therapist—forever thinking she could nest in a tumbleweed. I didn’t stop her from reciting the litany of my sins, though I’d heard them all before: risk-taking bordering on self-destruction, unresolved issues of pain and loss, fear of intimacy, inability to commit. Handing me the spare house key at the front door, she told me that I ought to look into my dreams, then closed with what she referred to as my “obsession with Ginevra de’ Benci.”

I apologized to Emily and meant it. I knew I wasn’t right for her— or for anybody. She patted my cheek tenderly, saying she took full responsibility for her own mistakes. I listened carefully to the sound of her shoes on the slate pathway, then to her car door opening and closing and the engine revving once and fading as she pulled away. Then I heard nothing but the cardinal’s song, to my ears forever the sad sound of being someone’s mistake.

I stepped over to the carpet dents and sat down cross-legged on the floor between them, cushioned by new Orlon and old grief. Tears pooled in my eyes. My gaze shifted to my framed print of Leonardo’s portrait of Ginevra de’ Benci—my dear friend Ginny—the only girl I’d ever been able to hold on to.

“Ginny . . .” I said. “Help me.” I squeezed my eyes shut, massagingmy throbbing temples as tears trailed down around my nostrils and over my lip. Their saltiness saddened me even more. I began drifting back to before time had stalled, and landed in the National Gallery in Washington, D.C., where my dad had been the curator of Renaissance Art, and I’d strolled with my parents through the oak-paneled Widener Rembrandt Room.

In front of the luxurious paneling hung incredible treasures, each painting a burst of emotion, capturing forever the innermost feelings of the subject, rescuing all but the painter himself from the dust of time and forgotten bones. There amongThe Lady with the Ostrich Feather Fan,The Philosopher,The Girl with the Broom, and the portrait of his beloved wife, Saskia, sat Rembrandt himself.

We’d stand there, my folks and I, three feet from the great master’s face—his doughy, wrinkled, sadder-than-the-weepiest-willow face— and my dad would point a long finger at different parts of the dense painting and tell us Rembrandt was fifty-nine at the time he’d painted it, Saskia had died, and he’d lost favor with the upper-crust, gone bankrupt, and was desperate. “But look at his hat,” Dad would say. “How delicate and soft it is, how the black isn’t just black, it’s fabric.”

My mom would grab my hand, as she always did when we stood in front of the self-portrait, and a sorrowful wind would sweep through us from three hundred years ago. Mom and I couldn’t move our eyes away from Rembrandt’s; we both knew we were staring into the old man’s soul.

I raised my wineglass. “To pain and loss . . . and ruination,” I said to Rembrandt and myself, taking a gulp. “And to you.” I nodded to Ginevra de’ Benci, remembering the many times I’d slipped away from my parents, my Beatle boots tick-tocking past all the tourists packed in like clumps of lobster roe, to see my Ginny.

Her portrait, the only one of Leonardo da Vinci’s paintings in the United States, had been the greatest acquisition of my father’s tenure as curator. He’d purchased her from the prince of Liechtenstein for fivemillion dollars, at that time the largest sum ever paid for a work of art. To Dad she was very special. To me, she was more than special; she had captivated my inquisitive heart long before I could touch the gilded, glassed-in frame that protected her from humanity’s grasp. And when I finally could reach her, Ginny became my sole confidante.

She listened patiently to my secret Christmas wish lists, never provoking the least nip of conscience. She was waiting to greet me the first day I soloed in on the bus, after third grade let out. And she was there every day after that when I came to meet my dad. Ginny and I hung out while he finished work, the two of us owning the whole place. We were a spectacle.

Leonardo painted Ginevra’s portrait in 1474 or so, when she was already twenty-six years old. My father told me that she called herself a mountain tiger, though Leonardo’s painting made her look as soft and sad as the last petal on a solitary rose.

I wondered what she must have talked about with him out there by the juniper tree. Leonardo had probably painted her hands—hands maybe even more beautiful than Mona Lisa’s—and it made me furious to think that someone had wantonly sawed off the bottom seven inches of the oil-on-wood painting. No one had the right to commit an injustice to Ginny—or to Leonardo. Nobody.

My scallops cooled. I pronged one, but laid my fork down, no longer hungry. I slugged the rest of the wine and a little dribbled down my chin and onto my shirt. The telephone rang. Setting my plate and glass down, I answered it.

A raspy voice whispered, “Rollo Eberhart Barnett?”

My first thought was Publisher’s Clearing House—a man with laryngitis.

“Is this the son of Dr. Rollo Barnett who was the curator at the National Gallery?”

“Yes . . .”

There was a harsh cough and some throat-clearing. “I knew your father.”

“Who is this?”

“I have some things to tell you. Important things.”

“What are you talking about?”

“There’s a ticket waiting for you at the American Airlines counter at LAX.”

“A ticket? Look, you’d better just tell me what this is all about.”

“It’s about the fire,” he said.

Bitter-tasting bile rose in my throat. My mother’s screams echoed through two decades.

“What about the fire?” I managed.

“At the counter,” the voice rasped, “under Rollo Barnett. Open ticket, but you’d better come first thing tomorrow.” The line went dead.

I stood for a moment with the receiver to my ear, looking blankly out at the backyard, confused and frightened.

A squirrel scampered up a tree by my deck. My eyes followed it.Squirrel, tree, darkness, stars. Where’s the moon? There it is.I peered at it till I saw the familiar face. The air filling my lungs couldn’t cool the embers in my mind. I realized I still held the phone to my ear and slammed it down.

I got the number for American Airlines and made the call. A sales representative named Kayla told me I had an open-ended, round-trip, first-class L.A.-to-Denver ticket waiting for me.

“Does it say who purchased it?” I asked.

“A Mr. Harvey Grant,” she answered.

“Harvey Grant,” I mumbled. “Who the hell’s Harvey Grant?”

“Sir?”

“Sorry. I was talking to myself.”

“Would you like to make a reservation?”

I finger-combed my hair; an uneasy tingle spread down my neck and shoulders.

“Sir?”

“Um, I’m just not that gung-ho a flyer is all.”

“Actually, me neither. Can I help you with a reservation?”

“Well, Kayla,” I answered slowly, “I guess you can. What’s the earliest-flight tomorrow?”

At eight-fifty the next morning, my car was parked in the short-term lot and I was in the terminal, with a ticket tucked in the back pocket of my jeans and an American Airlines envelope clasped in my hand.

I stood against the wall next to a nut stand with a red-and-white-striped awning and opened the envelope. My hand was shaking a little—early heights? Inside there was no note, just two faxes: directions to a Denver address and a photocopied article from the previous day’sDenver Post. The article read:

Venice, ItalyIn what is being called an extraordinary tragedy, Fausto Arrezione, the owner of an antiquarian bookstore, was killed today in a fire that destroyed his shop and all of its contents, apparently including a priceless page of Leonardo da Vinci’s notes. Earlier this week Arrezione had placed a call to the Gallerie dell’Accademia, a venerated museum and art school, to report his discovery of the page that purportedly included a drawing of what Leonardo described as the “Circles of Truth,” which he has, in several of his notebooks, referred to as the key to the whereabouts of the legendary Medici Dagger.

Mystery has surrounded the Medici Dagger since 1491 when Lorenzo de’ Medici commissioned Leonardo to produce the piece to commemorate the death of Medici’s younger brother, Giuliano, fatally wounded by enemies of the Medicis in an attempt to overthrow the family from Florentine power. Leonardo never delivered the Dagger. The legend surrounding it began with the discovery in 1608 of a manuscript called the CodexArundel, in which Leonardo wrote the following words next to a drawing of a magnificent dagger:

Through the din of the bustling airport I heard my father’s voice speaking Leonardo’s words in my head—words I’d memorized at my dad’s side, elbow to elbow on the living-room floor, his oxford cotton sleeve touching my flannel pajama top.

“Something has occurred which I cannot explain. While casting the dagger for Il Magnifico I have chanced upon a mixture of metals which once formed became almost as light as the air. Try as I might I could not return it to liquid form nor could I cause it to be deformed or dented in any way. And there is an edge to this blade which is sharper than any man has ever seen. The world is little prepared to receive a material that could be transformed into indestructible weapons of death. No good purpose could come of it. War is bestial madness. But I see beyond us to a glorious future with science the benevolent ruler, when man, unencumbered by ill intent, could utilize this extraordinary discovery for the noblest of purposes. So I will hold the dagger for that man of the future. And the Circles of Truth shall lead him to it.”

“The Circles of Truth,” I repeated aloud. The man from Vinci, who’d bought caged birds only to set them free, had discovered an indestructible alloy and felt a responsibility to keep it a secret for a man of the future. He’d hidden the Medici Dagger somewhere, almost five hundred years earlier, and had left the secret to its whereabouts in some sort of cryptic message he called the “Circles of Truth.”

I glanced at the remaining paragraph of the article, although I’d already guessed its content.In 1980, another page, found in Amboise, France, thought to contain the “Circles of Truth,” was tragically destroyed when the private plane transporting it to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., crashed into the Atlantic Ocean, killing the courier who was piloting the plane, traveling alone. Since that incident, all hope of recovering the legendary Dagger had been lost until this recent find, which experts say might have included a duplicate of the “Circles.” A spokesperson from the Gallerie dell’Accademia maintained that while the notes had been viewed by one staff person, a photocopy had not been made. Apparently the notes were lost in the blaze.

I fingered the envelope. There was nothing else in it but air. I folded the directions and the article, tucked them into my jeans pocket, and bought a small bag of roasted cashews. The bag was red and white, like the awning. I drifted over to a deserted gate, took a seat, and popped a few of the salty nuts in my mouth, grinding them into paste till my jaw hurt.

Leonardo. My dad. The Circles of Truth. The Medici Dagger. Who was Harvey Grant?

three

Three hours and fifty minutes later I parked my rented Mustang convertible under the portico of a beautiful, turn-of-the-century gabled mansion in a quiet neighborhood near Cherry Creek Lake. A carved and painted wood sign read:THE WILLOWS~A PEACEFUL PLACE.

Three wide brick steps led to a huge porch with maybe a dozen flowering plants in glazed ceramic pots, standing like sentries. I rang the bell next to the double oak doors. Moments later a middle-aged woman with a freckled face and half-glasses perched on her pointy nose appeared. She wore a white nurse’s uniform and rubber-soled shoes. Over her left breast was an ID tag that saidPEGGY.

“Hi,” she said. “Can I help you?”

“Hi, Peggy. I’m looking for . . . I don’t know, a patient?”

“We don’t think of people as patients here,” she said politely. “This is a hospice. Mister . . . ?”

“Reb Barnett,” I said.

“People come here to finish their lives in a tranquil atmosphere, Mr. Barnett.”

“I’m looking for Harvey Grant. Is he here?”

“Mr. Grant. Yes. He’s here.”

“Who is he?” I asked. “What do you know about him?”

Peggy covered her nose and mouth, and sneezed. She asked if I’d excuse her for a second. Before I could answer she stepped around adesk and returned holding a Kleenex to her nose. “Allergies. Happens to me every year.”

I stepped into the foyer and closed the door behind me. It was a large, cheery room that must have looked more austere at the turn of the century, when rich men in dark coats and derbies crossed its threshold. I repeated my question about Harvey Grant.

Peggy dabbed at her nose. “I’m not allowed to discuss our guests,” she said. “Sorry. It’s against policy. I’ll take you to his room.”

I accompanied Peggy up a wide wood staircase with lush gray carpet-and an ornately carved baluster. At the end of a long hall, she stopped in front of a room with a partially opened door, knocked, and walked in. Her white nurse shoes squeaked on the wood floor until she hit the Oriental carpet. The shoes looked brand-new. I stepped in behind her.

The curtains were drawn, the room dimly lit. Fresh-cut flowers stood carelessly in a vase on a table next to an old man lying in a brass double bed in the corner.

He was mostly bald save for a few scattered tufts of silver hair; pallid-skin covered the fragile bones of his face and shoulders like the membrane of a bat’s wing. His eyes were closed and still. I thought he was dead until his rib cage moved and a wheeze issued from his open mouth.

“Mr. Grant?” Peggy said, lightly touching the man’s shoulder. “Harvey?” The dying man’s eyelids lifted like garage doors on rusty hinges, and he looked at her with a milky gaze. She said, “Your visitor is here.”

Harvey Grant slowly turned his head till his eyes met mine. “Please go now, miss,” he rasped.

She withdrew without looking at me, but I was grateful for the faint scent of her perfume. I moved closer to the man.

“I’m Henry Greer,” he said. “The courier.”

I shook my head as if a bug had flown in my ear, then swallowed hard. My throat was dry and there wasn’t enough air in the room.

“You remember,” he said.

“But . . . your plane crashed. You were . . .”

Greer drew a deep breath, summoning energy. Then he raised a hairless arm from under the covers and laid it on his chest. A thick scar sliced diagonally across his forearm. He pointed a long-nailed finger toward a chair. “Please sit down. I have some things to tell you.”

I reached behind me, felt for the chair, and sat. Greer scanned me for almost a full minute.

I began to fidget. “I’m waiting.”

“Have you ever heard the name Werner Krell?”

“German billionaire. Munitions manufacturer.”

“Nolo Tecci?”

“No. You’re supposed to be dead, Greer. I was there when my father got the call from the Coast Guard.”

“Tecci worked for Krell,” Greer said. “Still does.”

I pulled the curtain back a little. A foot-wide band of sunlight cut across the bed. Greer squinted. His skin looked almost powdery in the light. I let go of the drape and it swished back in place.

“The day your father sent me to collect the Leonardo notes from France, Tecci approached me,” Greer said. “Krell wanted those notes, was obsessed with them. Had been for years. Was convinced that the Dagger was out there, just like your old man. Tecci offered me a great deal of money for the notes.Seriousmoney. It was my shot, kid. I took it and staged the crash.”

“You staged the crash?” My mind flashed back to my dad on the phone getting the news. It was the first time I’d ever seen him cry. The last time, too.

“I met up with them on a train,” Greer continued, licking his parched lips.“Krell had his own Pullman at the back. I was standing on the platform waiting for him to come out, but he didn’t. Instead, Nolo Tecci was there. Black hair, cut like Caesar’s. Tattoo of a cobra wrapped around his neck. He had the briefcase with the money. We were crossing a bridge—a high bridge in the Alps—through the St. RoddardPass. I was nervous. It didn’t feel right. And it wasn’t. Tecci pulled a knife and that was it; I knew I’d had it. I spit in his face and grabbed the briefcase.”

Greer lifted his arm an inch and dropped it. “He slashed me, right through the artery,” he said. “I kicked him, got a leg up on the railing, and jumped. Two hundred feet to the river. Crushed my legs.”

I observed what must have been a twisted mess under the blanket as the man restocked his decrepit lungs.

“I’d spent two years in a prison camp in Nam,” Greer said. “Knew how to survive. Got away down the river. They never found me. You were right, kid, when you said I was supposed to be dead. I stayed dead.”

Greer coughed, a sound like coal spilling down a chute. Almost a minute passed before he caught his breath.

“So I’m here for the confession before you die?” I said, barely containing my rage. “Or did you just get the urge to cheer me up? You bastard.”

Greer half-smiled. “Do you believe in destiny, Reb?”

“I’m here because you said you knew about the fire. What about it?”

“I believe in destiny,” he pushed on. “I’ve been keeping track of you for a long time. I was glad that widow college professor adopted you after your parents died. Mrs. Tucker, right? Martha Belle Tucker. She must have raised you right.”

“Yeah?” I seethed. “Why’s that?”

“You haven’t strangled me yet.”

“The fire, Greer . . .”

Greer’s smile vanished.

“I think Nolo Tecci came for your father and set fire to your house.”

Instantly, time cracked and I was sailing toward the ground through the smoke-filled air. I squeezed my eyes shut trying to focus, to stitch it back together. Voices pecked at me—whispering voices from rooms in neighbors’ houses.Arson? Do you think? I don’t know. Remote possibility, I suppose. That’s crazy. These old houses, they go uplike tinder. Besides, who in the world would want to harm the Barnetts? That’s absurd. Shh. Quiet. We don’t want the boy to hear us.

I opened my eyes and breathed in through my nostrils, anger and disgust swirling in my belly.

“Why?” I demanded. “Why would he do that?”

“Just in case I’d survived,” Greer said. “Gotten the notes to your old man somehow—double-crossed Krell. Your father didn’t have the notes, but Krell and Tecci didn’t know that. Tecci had to check. He probably tortured your old man before killing him and then burned your house down for fun. I saw the look in his eyes when he was about to kill me. I think he would have enjoyed it.”

I stared at the pathetic, rotted out, worm-eaten log of a human being. “And the notes?” I asked slowly.

Greer sighed. “You didn’t answer me when I asked you if you believe in destiny.”

“You’re playing me. Nobody plays me,” I said, rising out of my seat.

“Mmm,” he said.“No one’s immune from that.”

I headed for the door. “So long,” I spat. “I’m out of here.”

“No, you’re not,” Greer shouted after me. “This is your game now, Rollo Eberhart Barnett, Jr. Your parents’ killer is still out there. You find the bookseller’s notes, you’ll find Tecci.”

I stopped in my tracks.

Greer stared me down.

“But the notes were destroyed.”

“There is no way they burned,” Greer said, shaking his head. “No way. And whatever the bookseller in Venice found, they weren’t the original notes. Maybe da Vinci made a duplicate. Maybe it’s a second part of—”

“Leonardo,” I warned. “His name was Leonardo. Don’t call him da Vinci. It’s not respectful.”

“Mmm, just like your old man. That’s even better.”

My toes involuntarily curled in my boots; my palms began to sweat.

“Nolo Tecci killed the Italian,” Greer continued. “Burned him down for his notes. Just as he did your father.”

Something inside snapped and I sprang for the old man. I stood over him clenching and unclenching my fists, anger knocking the lid off the kettle. I drilled a look into his waxy eyes, my breath ruffling a wisp of his thin silver hair.

Greer arched his neck as if he wanted me to strangle him. After a minute he lay back and whispered, “Like I said, you were raised right. Your old man wanted that Dagger, but my greed got in the way. I’m not greedy anymore. Now what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to call the police,” I said, picking up the phone next to his bed, pointing the receiver at him. “And you’re going to tell them what you just told me.”

Greer shook his head.“No.”

I slammed the phone down. The little bell inside resounded in the dim room.

“For one, Krell is too powerful for the police,” Greer rasped. “For two, you don’t want police.”

“Don’t tell me what I—”

“The museum curator’s kid gets a degree in Art History and what does he do? Becomes a stuntman—a high flyer with no net. No, you don’t want to be a citizen,” Greer said. “You want risk. You want action. Maybe now you even want payback. This isyourquest, kid, don’t you see it? You can find the Medici Dagger. Avenge your parents’ deaths. This is your fate.”

I closed my eyes and began to tremble. Bubbling rage awoke my demons and they began to dance on my soul, a furious, thundering dance of wrath that shook the dank walls of the cave where I’d lain in a death sleep since the fiery night in 1980. The howling heat of a thousand suns suddenly switching on, blazing through a stunned universe, lighting the word:Fate!

I pictured the pointy tip of Leonardo’s dagger hurtling through history toward me. I felt crazy. Giddiness overtook me and for asecond I almost laughed out loud at the absurdity of the moment, the profundity of it. Coming from Henry Greer! The dead courier who wasn’t really dead.

He was right. I wanted revenge.

I opened my eyes.

“What happened to the original notes?”

Greer turned his head to the side. At that moment I caught sight ofa corner of yellowed paper barely sticking out from under the edge of the pillow.

“Take it,” Greer said, lifting his head with what little strength he possessed.

I gently removed the paper from under the pillow and drew a deep breath.

I was holding Leonardo da Vinci’s notes.

Turning the fragile document over and back, I held it up to the light. To one side was a drawing of a sleek dagger and a paragraph next to it, written in Leonardo’s precise backward handwriting. And on the reverse, a circular design that resembled a delicately drawn bull’s-eye composed of ten individual rings in decreasing size, each ring made up of seemingly haphazard tiny marks. The Circles of Truth? Next to that, another drawing, this one of three triangular-shaped tubes nested together like a closed sailor’s telescope interconnected with pulleys and supported by a leg on each side.

I pressed my fingertips to the dried ink—ink that had flowed from the quill of Leonardo’s pen. The pen that had been grasped by the hand that gave the worldThe Virgin of the Rocks,Mona Lisa—that had given me Ginevra de’ Benci.

I pried my eyes from the page, looked at Greer. “Why didn’t you try to solve it? Why didn’t you go after it?”

Greer surveyed the blanket that covered his ravaged body.

“You could have toldsomebodysomewhere down the line,” I said.

“I just did,” Greer whispered, closing his eyes.

“Greer,” I said, moving my face close to his. “Greer!”

The dying man opened his eyes; I could see a map of crisscrossing red capillaries.

“If it’s true,” I said slowly, “if this is all true . . . then you and Tecci are the ones who killed us.”

Greer coughed a visceral, painful cough. “Resurrect yourself,” he rasped.

I drove back to the airport with the radio off, one hand on the wheel, the other clutching Leonardo’s notes. On the flight home, I studied the page, thoughts tearing at me like a thousand vultures. Greed. Fire. Endless questions.My parents murdered? Werner Krell? A man named Nolo Tecci had been in my house? Burned down my life? For this? This is what we died for?I remembered my dad’s jubilation the day he’d sentHenry Greer for the notes, certain that they’d lead to the Medici Dagger. Our conversations about the glorious things that could be done with the Dagger’s alloy—indestructible bridges, automobiles lighter than air. And then his dreams reduced to smoldering ash in the wink of an eye—Nolo Tecci’s eye.

It was ten o’clock when I arrived home. A suitcase-sized package with no return address sat by the front door. I brought it inside, flipped on the lights, and opened it. The night sky was clear, and moonlight mixed with the amber of my mica table lamps. In the box was a beat-up leather satchel, the kind that yawns open at the top. I felt its weight as I hefted it out and laid it on the living-room table.

Inside was a bulky laundry bag cinched together at the top. Loosening the rope, I discovered bound wads of cash—hundred-dollar bills in ten-thousand-dollar stacks. With clammy hands I counted two hundred bundles—two million dollars. I reach for the page of Leonardo’s notes. His words, his thoughts, brushed my fingertips.

I called Denver information for The Willows. A woman answered after the second ring. “Hello, The Willows.”

“Peggy?” I said.

“Oh . . . yes, this is Peggy.”

I identified myself and asked for Harvey Grant. After a pause she said, “I’m sorry. Mr. Grant is . . . no longer with us.”

“Ohhh,” I said with remorse—not for his death, but at the loss of a resource. My utter disregard for the end of Henry Greer’s life registered briefly, but my heart was busy pumping icy vengeance through my veins.

There was an awkward silence as the interstate phone line hummed; then Peggy said, “Reb, take care of yourself. And good luck.”

I thanked her, hung up, and wandered back into the living room. A cool breeze swept in through the open window and mixed sweet night air with the foul smell of Werner Krell’s money.

I touched Leonardo’s notes to my cheek.

“Venice,” I said to nobody.

four

Near morning, I dreamt I was playing checkers with Julius Caesar in the middle of the Piazza San Marco. He was wearing a black toga and had a snake around his neck that kept whispering in his ear, telling him what moves to make. And Julius, the son of a bitch, was winning—getting kinged all over the place, stacking checkers up like a bunch of Oreos while the tourists and pigeons watched.

I sat there, red-faced, in the middle of the vast square, trying to grab the snake’s tongue when it stuck out and wiggled. Julius was throwing his head back, going “mwa-ha-ha” each time I missed.

It was a rotten dream. I woke up way too early, frustrated and pissed, thinking what the hell was I doing playing checkers.

The morning paper had the same article that had run in theDenver Post. I threw it out, fixed my usual breakfast of oatmeal with dried cherries and banana, and ate robotically at the kitchen table.

An hour later I was jogging through the foggy Malibu hills, moist, cool air filling my lungs, clearing my mind.Breathe in, breathe out. Focus. Don’t forget to laugh. At what? Life, death, fire, daggers, revenge, pain . . . searing pain. You’ve got a purpose. Get Nolo Tecci.

“Hah!” I yelled as the beams of an oncoming car flashed through the murky whiteness.“Hah!” I yelled again, the sound of the tires dissipating as the car vanished around a bend in the road. Then I stopped thinking and things got still and clear; I finished out the run in the jungle.

After a shower, I called my travel agent, Leah, who had a sexy voice that hardly matched her size-sixteen body. She booked me on a flight that night to Milan—first class—with a jumper to Marco Polo Airport in Mestre, just outside of Venice.

I put on a Credence Clearwater Revival CD and listened, while I packed, to John Fogerty howl about being born on the bayou. A bunch of socks and Jockey underwear, jeans, shaving and tooth stuff, some black T-shirts, running gear, and a dripless candlestick in a small brass holder.

No matter where I am, what hotel, what country, I always light a candle on my way to bed. The softness of the flickering light reminds me of a painting in the National Gallery by Georges de La Tour calledThe Repentant Magdalen—a picture of Mary Magdalen sitting at a desk in a room lit only by a candle.

Leaning on the table, chin resting in one hand, the delicate fingers of the other caressing a barely illuminated skull, Mary stares into a mirror, absorbed in thoughts of mortality and forgiveness. The softness of the light playing on her pensive face and billowing sleeve has entranced me since I was a kid.

Lying in hotel beds that have been dreamed in by countless strangers, I watch my candle flicker and search for comfort in my nightlight. Happy dancing shadows in Reb’s sleep-tight light. I can barely remember the sound of my mother’s voice.

I closed the suitcase, turned Fogerty off, and called Archie Ferris. Archie owns a specialty gun shop calledHoo-ah!that caters to the film industry. He knows how to use every kind of weapon ever made and owns most of them, too.

In addition to running the store, Archie makes a good living as technical advisor on action films, providing weapons as props and showing stuntmen and -women how to look authentic. He’s late fifties, five-ten, two-twenty, and stocky as a gorilla, with hairy arms and knuckles to match, and a five-o’clock shadow at elevenA.M.

Archie started out in South Boston. Joined the Army out of highschool. Went into Special Forces and made sergeant. Did two tours in Nam. He was a victim of that war, that was obvious to me, though he never took a bullet in hundreds of firefights. He’d come back to a country that spit on his loyalty, almost the worst thing that could happen to any veteran, but particularly Archie. Archie Ferris and loyalty mean the same thing.

After returning to the States, he drifted out to L.A., became a cop, and married the first girl who didn’t look sideways at the khaki T-shirt, battle fatigues, and jump boots he always wore. He wouldn’t tell me her name. Couldn’t say the word. All he’d said was “She was an empty-hearted woman who couldn’t love anybody, not even her own son.” This while sobbing into an Orange Crush.

The son he was referring to was Danny, who’d been raised mostly in the custody of Archie’s ex-wife and a succession of losers.

Archie loved Danny more than anything or anybody, even though the boy had inherited most of his personality from his mother. There was nothing Archie wouldn’t give him, even on the policeman’s salary he got after leaving the service. Actually, he’d never really left the service; he’d just swapped protecting the people of the United States for the people of L.A. County. He was a born protector, and would have kept at it, but Danny got shot dead in a bar fight. That was when Archie quit the cops, after taking the one bullet he couldn’t dodge.

He’d faded into security work on movie sets for a couple of years, his generosity, loyalty, and professionalism masking his depression and earning him nice credentials. At first, people were intimidated by him. His body was like a block of concrete and he had a look in his eyes that told the world he’d stood the watch few could stand.

A star-stalker pulled Archie out of his depression by making it through the rest of security and onto one of his sets—an action set with plenty of guns, all of them loaded with blanks except for Archie’s and the stalker’s. A foot chase, a screaming celebrity hostage, real gun-play, real heroism—a combat pro showing how it’s done.

Everybody got rescued, including Archie. He ended up with a newjob: teaching movie stuntmen how to use weapons. He had a new life and some of himself back, but not enough to fill the hole Danny had left in his big heart.

Archie got me started in the business by almost running me down in the street as I munched a vegetable burrito from La Cantina. I’d been thinking about getting into the movies and not getting salsa on my T-shirt when I’d caught him out of the corner of my eye, barreling down Santa Monica Boulevard in his black Land Rover, cell phone pressed to his ear. I was midstreet with the burrito sticking out of my face when I’d realized there was only one way to go to avoid becoming a tortilla myself, and that was up.

Archie had tromped on the brakes two feet from me. I’d jumped and rolled over his hood and down the back of his buggy, hitting the street in a crouch—all without dropping the burrito. Our eyes had met in his side-view mirror—his in horror, watching me chew and grin and pull my earlobe. He’d grinned back.

Over some blue drinks and a pu pu platter at The Golden China, he’d discovered I had a number of useful talents—hang gliding, rock climbing, karate, parachuting, and racing motorcycles—so he introduced me to some stunt directors he knew and that was that. I’ve been diving, driving, rolling, racing, flipping, and falling ever since.

On top of getting me my start, Archie gave me a Sig Sauer nine-millimeter handgun, taught me how to use it, and helped me get my carry license.

Because I was a fast learner and mastered every weapon Archie put in my hand, he quickly grew to respect me. But I knew it was more than that. We both did.

Archie answered the phone on the first ring. “Arch,” I said a little tentatively, knowing he’d have heard about the hang-glider spin and wouldn’t let it slide.

He blurted, “You want to kill yourself, you can use the Sig I gave you. That would be perfect. First Danny, then you. Aw, Christ. What’s up?”

“You’ve been such a good friend to me,” I said. “I need your help.”

“Been a good friend, huh? That doesn’t sound like a compliment. Sounds like last words. What is it—Emily? Come on over, we’ll drive up to my joint in Big Bear, talk it all out. What do you think, you’ll never fall in love again?”

“You know I wasn’t in love with her.”

“Yeah, yeah. You’ve never been in love with anyone. Me, too. So?”

“That’s not why I called. Look, I’m going to Venice—not the beach,Italy—and I . . . um . . . I’ll need a gun when I’m there.” The second I said it, I wanted to go back in time and not call him.

I filled the painful silence.

“I’m sorry, but I know you’ve got that buddy from Nam who sells guns. I can’t travel internationally with mine and I can’t wait for the paperwork to go through.”

“And?” he said. “You have my full attention. Don’t hold back.”

“It has to do with Leonardo da Vinci and my parents. That’s all I can say.”

“Come on,” he said angrily. “This is the real goddamn world. People actually getkilledwith guns.”

I knew it. I’d just triggered Danny memories. Archie would be watching a video ofShane,crying into a Crush, within ten minutes after we hung up. I hated myself for being so reckless.

“Look,” I told him. “Just forget it.”

“Forget nothing! Shit! Leonardo da Vinci and your parents . . . what the hell is this all about?”

“Did you get theTimesthis morning?”

He told me he had.

“You read it?”

“The Lakers lost. No, I didn’t read it. Christ, cough up.”

“Page three. Top.”

He told me to hold on. I heard rustling, then mumbling for a minute, then, “Jesus! So what are you going to Venice for? It says the page was lost in the fire.”

I told him everything—Greer, Tecci, the Dagger, the works.

There was a long pause.

I said, “So, will you set me up or not?”

“I’ll do you one better. I’ll come with you.”

That stunned me. “You would do that?”

“You sound surprised.”

I felt embarrassed, confused. It hadn’t occurred to me that Archie, or anyone, might place himself in danger for me. On a film shoot, yeah. For money. But this had nothing to do with that. Loyalty, selflessness—these were precious things that were hard for a shaky hand to hold. I sensed their great value, perhaps for the first time. I wanted to say,“Help me out.” But I couldn’t knowingly put Archie at risk.

“Arch,” I said. “Your offer means more to me than I can tell you, but I’ve got to do this alone. I need an answer on the gun.”

Tension prickled over the line.

“Goddamn you!” he shouted. “You turn me down, then you want me to make up my mind right this second?”

“Yes,” I stated flatly. “I’m sorry, but I need to know now.”

I heard a deep sigh. “I guess we’re both sorry, ’cause I can’t do it.”

Silence.

“Okay, then,” I said. “I shouldn’t have called. I apologize for getting you involved. I’ve got to go.”

“Wait. Please don’t go.”

“Really, I’ve got a plane to catch.”

“I mean don’t go at all,” Archie pleaded.

“I have to.”

“You have a choice.”

“No I don’t. It’s all there is.”

The fog had lifted and sunlight created dust corridors where it danced in through the open living-room windows.

I took fifty thousand dollars out of the laundry bag, wrapped it inbrown paper, and stuffed it in a red backpack I’d acquired in Boston when I was checking out the Museum of Fine Arts and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.

On top of the money, I packed a leather portfolio containing Leonardo’s notes and a handful of Boulder Bars, the one kind of energy bar that didn’t taste like window putty. Then I cinched the laundry bag and returned it to the old leather satchel.

I said goodbye to Ginny, stashed my bags in the trunk, and headed for Bank of America in Santa Monica. A red-faced account representative converted five thousand dollars to lire and rented me a family-sized safe deposit box, where I stashed the satchel.

I got back in the Jag and turned the key. The throaty purr made my spine shimmy as I headed for the airport.

Somewhere over the Rockies my hands steadied enough to use the air-phone. I called Lois van Alstine, a redhead with green eyes and long legs who could have writtenWho’s Whoby herself. Lois had used her schmoozing skills to develop a lucrative public-relations business representing some of the biggest names in Hollywood.

We’d spent one night together a couple of years earlier—amusing until she’d dug her long nails into my back. I told her to stop and she did, but the fun was over. There were no hard feelings.

Lois answered her phone after the third ring. “Bobby, I’m in the tub. I’ll be there in an hour.”

“Lois,” I said, “it’s Reb.”

“Spitfire! How are you? Tom’s heartbroken. Says you like your towels-more than him.”

“It’s true.”

“Oh. So what do you want? I’m guessing not a date.”

I told her I was looking for information on Werner Krell and Nolo Tecci.

“Krell, I know of, of course. Never heard of Tecci. Don’t tell me,” she said, “Krell wants to film you falling off his money.”

I said nothing.

“All right, wait a minute. I’ll check my database, see what comes up. Where are you? In a wind tunnel?”

I told her I was en route to Venice.

“You’re kidding. What, is Krell on the plane? No, can’t be. He’s got his own jet.”

“This call’s costing a hundred dollars a minute, Lois.”

“Uh-huh,” she said. “Okay, let’s see . . . I’m looking for Tecci. Is that T-E-T-C-H-Y?”

“Two c’s and an i, I think. Try it both ways.”

“I don’t think so. Nope, nothing comes up. Give me a second on Krell. He’ll come up. Here he is. Werner Krell. He’s a baldy, you know. A Yul Brynner. Not bad-looking. Born in Berlin, 1935, only child. Papa was a weapons manufacturer, too. Came up with a revolutionary design—the Gewehr 41W—first semi-automatic rifle to go into wide use in the Second World War. Oh, and he was a Leonardo da Vinci fanatic.”

“What?” I said.

“I said Papa Krell was a da Vinci fanatic. He had a museum-quality collection of models of Leonardo’s weapons and tanks, catapults and things. Was showing them at the Gem‰ldegallerie right before the war. Got a picture of him here, little Werner in knickers next to him. Oooh, Mother was killed during an Allied bomb raid when Werner was eight. Rumor is, that whacked him and his old man out. Both of them real eccentric, to put it kindly.”

I thought of the model that my dad and I had built whenIwas eight of an extraordinary bridge Leonardo had designed for Sultan Bajazet II to cross the Golden Horn in Istanbul.

Lois continued, “Uh . . . let’s see . . . little Krell kept pushing. When he was twenty, he graduated magna cum laude from the Berlin Polytechnic Institute with a degree in mechanical engineering, and begandesigning weapons himself for Papa’s company. By that time, he had taken over for his old man. Thought up the first submachine wraparound bolt system. Made huge shekels when that gun became the rage. Bottom line, he’s a billionaire with controlling interests or sole ownership of arms and munitions manufacturing companies in Germany, Austria, Belgium, Italy, Chile, and Mexico. Apparently sells to both sides. And he’s ruthless,” Lois added. “Whenever he wants something, like somebody else’s company, he gets it. Quirky as hell and getting quirkier as time goes on.”

“Is there anything else?” I asked her.

“When he’s not in his jet, he travels in his own Pullman car on the back of whatever train he wants. Orient Express–type thing. Fabulous. Got a picture of it right here. Must have cost millions. Really Art Deco. Elegant . . . deck I guess you’d call it—on the back. Brass railing. Remember Dumbo? At the end he was out on the deck of his own Pullman?”

I didn’t answer; I was picturing Henry Greer hopping the rail, plummeting into the St. Roddard Pass. I glimpsed a fragment of memory. I’d been through that pass myself, maybe ten years before, when I’d hitched a ride from Switzerland to Italy with a pasty-faced guy in a VW bus.

Lois said, “So . . . you’re awfully quiet for a hundred bucks a minute.”

“Sorry,” I said. “I guess I was lost.”

“And now you’re found?”

“I don’t know,” I replied. “Thanks.”

“Hey, Spitfire . . . before you go . . .”

“Yeah?”

“I’m, uh, tamer now. Maybe when you get back . . .”

A second’s hesitation on my part and she knew.

“Well then,” she finished. “I guess I’m entitled to hang up first.”

Before I could answer, she did.

I replaced the phone in its cradle. . . .Werner Krell and his father.Me and mine. Leonardo.There had been five men. There were two left. Under different circumstances, would Krell and I have drained an ale in honor of our dead fathers and Leonardo’s genius? Would we have wept together for our missing mothers, whose forgotten voices would never comfort us?

And if we’d met on a battlefield in the middle of the century, who would have pulled the trigger first?

It was dark and raining when my plane fell out of the sky onto the tarmac at Malpensa Airport in Milan. An hour later I was up in the ether again, eastbound for Venice on a miniature version of the aircraft I had just deplaned.

I steadied my nerves on the short flight to Marco Polo Airport by thinking about those carved Russian dolls that open up one inside the other until at the center is a tiny doll that looks like something from a Barbie tea set. I pictured myself on a plane that opened to reveal smaller and smaller planes, me shrinking and boarding until, at last, I climbed into a plane the size of a mallard, which headed skyward and got into formation with a flock of other ducks. Damn, I’d been in the air too long.

Soon, my luggage and I were on the ground and in a private taxi cruising through choppy water into the Grand Canal. It had rained and the air felt thick and electric.

Leah had booked me into the Gritti Palace—a regal hotel that overlooked the grand canal and was a home of the doge, in the sixteenth century, Venice’s most powerful official.

The door to my room was ajar, the bellhop just setting out a basket of fruit. The high-ceilinged suite was large and replete with antiques, a huge Oriental rug, and an ornate chandelier. I was pleasantly surprised, having stayed in hotels that boasted opulent lobbies but were otherwise ordinary. Leah had done well.

I slipped the bellhop some money and he backed out graciously.

After a shower I unpacked, lit my candle, and climbed into bed.

My mother and father would have loved Venice. We could have stayed right here. I would have dug my bare toes into the soft couch cushions, peered up at the patterns on the high ceiling, and listened as my dad delighted me and Mom with stories of the proud and the poor who had crossed these canals and streets, their splendid canvases tucked under their paint-stained arms.

My elegant room suddenly felt empty and the night too vast.

A piece of chocolate in the shape of a dove, wrapped in orange and white aluminum foil, sat on the oversized feather pillow next to me. I picked it up and sniffed: Grand Marnier.

I lay on my side flying the dove back and forth in the flickering light, aching for my stolen past, longing for daylight and a chance to lay a knee on evil’s chest. Nolo Tecci. Werner Krell.

The candle’s flame softened the chocolate bird.

Ahh, vengeance.

The next morning, I followed my only lead. At nine on the dot, I was standing in the marble-tiled reception area on the third floor of the Gallerie dell’Accademia, facing a sixty-year-old secretary with voluminous dark brown hair and thick eyebrows. Her excellent English accompanied a restrained professional demeanor that belied a tension which could not be concealed.

Though my pulse was pounding, I plowed ahead, smiling at her like I was hands-down the nicest guy she was going to meet that day. I explained that I’d come from California to speak to the person to whom Signore Arrezione, the bookseller, might have shown the page of Leonardo’s notes.

“Are you a reporter?” she asked, her face taut.

“No,” I answered. “I’m not.”

She eyed me warily, her big brows almost touching.

I opened my jacket. “See? No recorder, no paper, no pencil. I’m not a reporter. I’m not even a good speller.”

I detected a momentary thaw in her countenance.

“Are you with an official organization?” she asked. “The police?”

“Actually, I’m a stuntman.”

She looked puzzled. “In the movies?”

“Bad spellers don’t have many options,” I said, smiling. She thawed a little more.

The secretary glanced behind her at a man’s figure, still as a store dummy, curtained by a smoked-glass door. When her eyes met mine again I knew I’d lost my advantage. “I cannot help you,” she said.

I leaned in a little closer. “Signorina Rossi—”

“Signora,” she corrected, glancing nervously over her shoulder again at the figure behind the door, then back at me.

I had to get through to her.

“Signore Arrezione showed the notes to someone here. I’d just like to know his name, maybe have a word with him.”

The ghost behind the door turned the knob.

“No, sir, there is no one here who has seen the notes. I’m sorry. Please go.”

Anger and frustration began to surface. I forced myself to hide it. I knew she wanted to tell me, she was just frightened. I had to stay cool, find out why.

The glass door opened and a large, balding, grim-faced man wearing a brown suit and tan bow tie stepped out. He looked to be in his mid-sixties. Signora Rossi spun around in her seat. “Professore Corta.” She bowed her head deferentially.

I sized him up. Edgy came to mind. Unlikely to be forthcoming came to mind.

“Signore,” he said to me in a surprisingly high voice. “What is your business here? We have made our statements to the press and thepolizia.”

“I like your tie, Signore,” I said. “I’ve got one just like it, only mine’s more butterscotch than tan. I prefer yours.”

“Thank you,” he said, his face a little flush. “Now you will excuse me? I am late for a meeting.”

He dismissed me with a glance and blasted some Italian at Signora Rossi. Then he brushed past me and left through the door I’d come in.

Signora Rossi nervously straightened her blotter and pen.

“I can see how concerned you are, Signora. I haven’t come here to cause you more worry.”

I offered her the Denver newspaper article and gave her a minute to read it.

“My name is Reb Barnett, Signora Rossi. My father was the museum curator at the National Gallery in Washington. He and my mother died in a fire that destroyed our house immediately after he tried to acquire the last ‘Circles of Truth’ notes.”

That got her attention.

“You can look it up on the Internet,” I continued. “Washington Post. July 23, 1980. His name was Dr. Rollo Eberhart Barnett.”

“You could have looked it up also,” she said, scribbling the name and date on her blotter.

I pulled out my passport and pointed to my name. “I didn’t have to look it up. I was there.”

We were both silent for a moment while she regarded the passport, then me again.

“What is it that’s causing you so much worry?” I asked.

Her lips quivered. She put her hand to her mouth. I understood the feeling of having your foundation shaken and felt compassion for her. I waited, willing her to confide in me.

After a moment she said, “You are the second person who has been here asking to see . . . asking these things. And that isafterthe police and reporters.”

I asked her who the other one was. She said she didn’t know.

“What did he look like?”

Signora Rossi leaned forward and covered her face with her hands as if she were going to catch a sneeze. She peeped through her fingers. When I sat down on the corner of her desk, she didn’t object.

“Whatever you share with me,” I said, “I promise I won’t tell the professore. I mean no harm at all. In fact, I’ll help if I can. Look at my face. You’ll know I’m telling the truth.”

She lowered her hands, scrutinizing me thoroughly, introspectively, relying on a half-century of living to tell her whether I was the cup with the poison.

“All right,” she said tentatively.“He was scary.”

“In what way?”

“Every way. The way he dressed, the sound of his voice . . .”

“Was he American?”

“He spoke Italian, but not so good, and with an accent. American, maybe. He had the darkest eyes. His hair was brushed forward on the sides, like Caesar. And his hands,” she continued. “I remember his fingers were long and delicate like a surgeon’s, and his fingernails were—I don’t know how you say it—polished, that’s the word. Yes, they had clear polish on them.”

My stomach muscles tightened. Nolo Tecci was real.

“Anything else?” I asked, pointing to the side of my neck.

“Si, si,”Signora Rossi confessed animatedly. “He had a . . . how do you say . . .tatuaggio. . . on the side of his neck. The head of a snake.” I felt a tingling flush, heard my pulse in my ears.

Jesus. Tecci’s still here, after the bookseller’s fire. Did he have the notes or did they burn in the blaze?

“What’d you tell him?” I asked her as calmly as I could.

“Nothing,” she whispered. “He spoke with Professore Corta in his office. Corta’s been anxious ever since. Warned me not to speak with anyone regarding the notes. Has been trying to reach . . .”

“Who? The person who saw the notes? Did Professore Corta see them?”

“No. He never saw the notes. Only . . .”

“Who?” I prompted a little too strongly. She covered her quivering lips.

“You know where I can find him?”

She nodded almost imperceptibly. “Her. She is my friend. She is nervous since the fire. She feels in great danger and has . . . uh . . . taken a leave.”

“Is she at her house? Or apartment?”

“No.”

“But you can get a message to her?”

Frustrating silence.

“Signora Rossi, you said your friend thinks she’s in danger? Believe me, if the man with the snake tattoo is here, your friendisin danger. Grave danger. Tell her I must talk with her. I’m staying at the Gritti Palace. Have her call me at noon. That’s twelve—”

“I know whatnoonmeans,” she blurted, her eyes narrowing, boring-into me for any sign of deceit.

A moment passed.

“Noon,” I repeated.

She nodded.

“Thank you, Signora Rossi.” I offered her my hand.

“Francesca,” she corrected, taking it.

As I turned to leave, a man ran right into me. He let out a loud “oof” and fell backward, dropping his newspaper and losing his hat.

“Oh, jeez, I’m sorry,” I said, helping him up.“Spiace.”

He grabbed my lapels as I pulled him to his feet. He was short, maybe five-eight, and wore an expensive raincoat over a rail-thin body. As we both reached for his paper and hat, we clunked heads and I caught a whiff of Old Spice. He grunted as he picked up the paper, puffing out his sunken cheeks. His hat was a Borsalino, gray like his coat. He snatched it from my hand, scowling.

“Grazie,”he said brusquely, and walked off, folding his paper.

Out on the street again, I pressed the side of my head where it hurt. A little punishment for being clumsy, out of my element. But I’d succeeded in getting Signora Rossi to confide in me. I was closer.

I looked down at my Beatle boots. The soles had touched the same floor Nolo Tecci had tread on. I felt the heat of anger spread through my feet, up my calves, thighs, and chest, into my throat and out to my fingertips. I’d never felt this way before.I could snap. I could kill. Who the hell am I?

I squinted up at the sky. “Is there more than bone and gristle, God?” I whispered.Breathe, Reb.

I walked back to the hotel scraping my shoes on the cobblestone streets, urging myself into an easier groove.

five

Soft yellow fingers of sun massaged my face and neck through the open window of my room as I sat waiting at an intricately carved desk, daydreaming, steeping in time. I wondered if some doge, in a robe and leather sandals, had looked out this very window the day Leonardo composed the words and drew the mysterious circles on the page I had in my possession.

Maybe the doge sat in this very spot, digesting pheasant and pasta, some fruit. Perhaps he was writing something himself, a poem about an apostle or the curve of a slice of crenshaw melon, a quill pen in his steady hand, ink stains on his noble fingers.

I looked at my own fingers. They hadn’t written much poetry. Instead, they’d hung on to airplane wings and motorcycle grips, steering wheels, window ledges, rock walls, and elevator cables. Punched calculator keys, doing the physics of falls and crashes. Signed contracts and checks, even the odd autograph.Decent fingers,I thought, holding them up to the light.An occasional tremor, but overall reliable.

There was a knock at the door. I peeped through the brass fisheye: the maid—about four and a half feet tall, middle-aged, closely cropped salt-and-pepper hair, white gloves, light blue uniform. I let her in. She slid past me, eyes down, and hastily dusted the furniture with a real feather duster. I moved out of her way and stood at the window.

The splashing sun and aquatic activity drew me back to my daydreams, where I rummaged amid the spare parts of thought and fancy,unable to overturn anything resembling real cognition. The click of the door as the maid left brought me back from that intangible place.

I remained at the large window for a while, contemplating why Francesca’s friend from the Accademia would be hiding out, when my phone rang.

A throaty voice, a little deeper than the average female’s, spoke into the receiver: “Francesca Rossi gave me this number. With whom am I speaking?”

“My name is Reb,” I answered.

“What do you want, Reb?” She spoke perfect English without an accent. It threw me.

“World peace . . . and a pony,” I replied.

“I’m not laughing.”

“Why don’t you have an accent?” I asked. “I thought you were Italian.”

“I’m going to hang up in three seconds if you don’t tell me what you want.”

“I thought maybe you could help—”

“Youwant help? Who’s going to helpme?”

“What do you need?” I heard the maid’s hamper squeaking down the hall. A thousand dollars a day and they had squeaky hampers.

Silence. I was getting nowhere. “Okay,” I offered. “I’ll help you.”

“How?”

“I know who’s trying to find the Medici Dagger.”

A gasp and then a whispered “Who?”

“Look,” I said, “could we meet somewhere?”

I heard squeaking wheels again, closer. There was a knock at my door.

“How do you say ‘wait’ . . . in Italian?” I asked.

“Aspettare.”

I put the phone to my chest and shouted at the door,“Aspettare, per favore. Um, cinquecento minuti.”

The maid hesitated before saying,“Si, signore,”then squeaked away.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “The maid was at the door.”

“You told her to wait five hundred minutes.”

“I did? I meant fifteen.” We were both quiet for a few seconds while I figured out how to recover. Finally I said, “Do you think she’ll do it?”

I heard a mini-chuckle over the phone.

“I may not be able to help you,” I said.“But at least I’m not scared.” That wasn’t true, but she didn’t know it. “Will you meet me somewhere? I promise nothing bad will happen. Are you hungry? I could buy you some lunch. How about . . . what’s the name of that place on Torcello Island. That inn?”

“You mean Locanda Cipriani?”

“That’s the place. A ferry takes you there from—”

“In front of the Hotel Danieli, I know,” she said. I could feel her on the edge of commitment and didn’t dare say a word. “All right,” she said firmly. “I’ll meet you there in fifteen minutes. That’s not five hundred.”

She hung up.

I combed my hair, brushed my teeth, threw on my jacket, grabbed my red backpack, and headed out.

It was a short walk to the Danieli, a huge place that looked like a cake that had won a bake-off for the most intricate icing. All of Venice looked that way to me, as though a giant pastry chef had gone wild with a frosting bag. Spires and arches and bridges, double- and triple-deckers with cutouts and dollops and swirls. I could picture the chef in his baker’s whites leaning over his creation, eyes twinkling, squeezing the last of the icing out of the big cloth bag, then bellowing,“Mia bella Venezia!”

I took my post across the street from the Danieli, wishing I’d found out what my mysterious informer looked like, figuring that Francesca must have told her what she knew about me. I played a little game, trying to pick her out. Using the Sherlock Holmes method, I checked out the females in the crowd. Holmes just kept ruling things out until he arrived at a conclusion, and then, if there was only onething left, it had to be right—no matter how improbable. I had used this method countless times to find missing socks.

The teenage girl with the platform shoes? The tour guide with the red umbrella? The fiftyish lady in the elegant suit? Maybe. One of those two girls striding arm in arm? No way. How about bushy brows, like Francesca? I kept looking.

Then someone tapped on my shoulder. She was a slight woman, maybe thirty, in a long print skirt, light-blue jacket, and dark sunglasses, with a scarf nearly covering her straight, shoulder-length black hair. She had high cheekbones, a thin nose, and a wide mouth with full red lips. The hair on the back of my neck stood up.

“Reb?” she asked, fingering the strap on her huge shoulder bag.

I swallowed hard and stuck out my hand.

She gave it a rigid shake. Her small hand was cold from fear. I wondered what had motivated this frightened woman to come out in broad daylight to have lunch with a stranger.

I asked her name.

“Antonia.” Her voice had a smoky quality, like a young Lauren Bacall.

“Thank you for coming, Antonia,” I said, attempting to see her eyes through her dark glasses. “If you want to stand here and talk for a while . . . if that would make you more comfortable . . .”

“I’m in danger,” she whispered. “Serious danger.”

“I believe you,” I said, forcing myself to maintain eye contact, rather than check around for anyone who might be a threat. It was imperative to demonstrate that my real concern was for her safety. It was, but I was worried about me, too. And I needed to know what she knew.

“I want to know why you’re in danger,” I said. “So I can help you if I can. I’m not out to hurt you. Maybe you’d feel safer here than on a boat.”

I could sense her stare though I couldn’t see her eyes. She turned on her heel and started walking quickly across the street. “Let’s go.”

I noticed her running shoes as I caught up to her. Together we walked briskly to the boat dock. She looked nervously over her shoulder a couple of times.

After exchanging a few words in Italian with a uniformed hotel employee, Antonia said, “The boat for the restaurant left at noon. We can either take the ferry or get a private water taxi. A taxi is much more expensive.”

“Taxi,” I told the guy, handing him some money. One was just making its way in.

Antonia made a deal with the driver, a stocky man with a big nose and a cigarette hanging off his lower lip. We boarded and found seats at the back in the open air as we headed out into the lagoon.

“So . . . Antonia,” I said over the rumble of the motor. “Would you take your sunglasses off? I can’t see your eyes.”

She stared at me. Though masked by her shades, the penetration was palpable.

I looked away, scanned the other boats. Taxi, taxi, taxi, ferry. Black and silver yacht maybe three hundred yards off to the right.

“Well . . . are you hungry?” I asked her, trying to break ground. “I’m starving.”

“Whoareyou?” she asked, still staring. The disarming intensity of her presence cracked me wide open.

“I . . . I’m nobody.” The words burst from the marrow of my being. I was stunned.

“Do you always ooze melancholy?” she asked matter-of-factly.

“What are you talking about, melancholy?” I recoiled. “You don’t know me from the driver.”

“Uh-huh,” she said to herself. “All right, so tell me. What do you do?”

The yacht was closer now, maybe two hundred yards. Sharp-looking boat.

“I’m . . . a Hollywood stuntman. Please don’t give me grief about that.”

“What an odd thing to say.”

“What?”

“You have no sense of value in what you do.”

“I didn’t say that. In fact I may be the best in the whole damn business.”

“Oh great . . . an enigma. In Beatle boots, no less.”

The wind picked up. Antonia cinched her scarf down, slid away from me.

“Enigma. I’m not the one hiding out under the scarf and shades,” I said.

I needed to get what I could out of this girl and get the hell away from her. She was a pain in the ass. She hooked a finger over the bridge of her glasses and pulled them down a half inch. I still couldn’t quite see her eyes, but she looked mad. Good, but mad.

“So,” I said. “When Fausto Arrezione discovered Leonardo’s notes, he called you at the Gallerie.”

She pushed her glasses back with one finger. “That’s right.”

“But he died in the fire, which I think we can safely say at this point was not an accident. It had to do with Leonardo’s notes and somebody who wanted them very badly.”

The wind whipped up. We were accelerating.

“Tell me who,” she insisted. “Wait . . . why are we heading into the gulf?” She pointed to the left. “Torcello’s over there.”

The boat picked up more speed. I glanced at our driver. He was looking off the starboard bow, a walkie-talkie to his mouth. I followed the direction of his gaze. The black and silver yacht. It was pointed at us a hundred yards away and our boat was heading right for it. I squinted. Three men in dark clothes and sunglasses on the deck. A guy in an Aloha shirt at the wheel. Someone next to him with a handheld radio to his ear, looking through binoculars in our direction.

I stood up. Antonia looked up at me, terrified.“What’s happening?”

I made for the cabin.

“Reb!” she shouted after me.

“Get down on the deck now!” I ordered her. The yacht was fifty yards away.

“Oh my God!” she gasped. “What are you going to do?”

“Just get down!”

She hit the deck as I stepped into the cabin behind the driver. He spotted me and threw an elbow at my face. I caught it on my forearm, but he quickly launched a side-kick at my stomach. I saw it coming and stepped around it, laying a good straight-arm punch into his ribs. He groaned and dropped the walkie-talkie. It skittered across the floor, sputtering Italian.

I grabbed the wheel and started to spin it left. The driver swung a backhand at my nose and I caught it on the side of my face. My head rang for a second. He hit the boat’s kill button, yanked a gun out from under his shirt. I grabbed his wrist with my left hand, slamming my right elbow into his mid-back. He yelped and arched forward, dropping the gun. I kneed him in the face and heard his big nose break before he collapsed in a heap.

The huge yacht was now fifteen yards away, dwarfing us. The man with the binoculars held them casually against his chest and I could clearly make out his Caesar haircut. It was Nolo Tecci, under the same sky as me, smiling like a coyote with a paw on a groundhog.

I fumbled for the start button.

Antonia screamed. Two men on the yacht moved to the bow railing. I caught the gleam of a handgun.

“Get in here now!” I shouted. The driver groaned and turned his head toward me, his face streaked with blood. I kicked him as hard as I could from two feet away.

Antonia burst into the cabin and hit the floor facedown as if diving for home plate. She held up her hand, covered with Big Nose’s blood, and screamed again.

I found the black start knob and jabbed it; the motor roared to life. Turning the wheel left, I pushed full-throttle as the first bullets shattered the glass at the back of the cabin.

“Find his gun,” I barked.

Antonia looked around frantically. “Where? I don’t see it.”

“Lookunderhim.” The big boat followed, its bow lifting out of the water like a shark about to take a seal.No way we’re gonna outrun them. Think. Smaller boat, sharper turns. Maneuver.

Antonia reached around Big Nose but she couldn’t budge him. “He’s too heavy! I can’t—”

“Take the wheel,” I shouted.

She sprang to her feet and grabbed the wheel just as two more shots ricocheted off the roof. Instinctively, I put my hand on her head and pushed her down low. I hit the floor, pushed Big Nose over, and found his gun. A Beretta Tomcat, seven-shot. I lurched for the back door, grabbing the jamb. I took a wide stance, aimed at one of the guys on the bow, and squeezed off three rounds. He grabbed his chest and went over backward.

Our right window splintered. Antonia screamed and swerved the boat, covering her face with her arm.

“Are you hit?” I shouted.

“No, I don’t think so!”

I spotted a ferry three hundred yards off to the left. “Head for the ferry!” I yelled.

More shots chipped wood off the stern. I crouched, squinted, and squeezed off two more rounds at another shooter on the bow. His leg burst red and he grabbed it, lost his balance, and fell overboard.

Antonia screamed, “Reb! What do I do?”

“Give me a minute. I’m thinking!”

“We haven’t got a minute!”

Three more shots splintered the doorframe. I tore open a closet. A dented old gas can. I grabbed it, gave it a shake. More than half full. I spotted a screwdriver and quickly poked a dozen holes in the top of the can.

“What are you doing?” Antonia shouted.

“Give me your scarf,” I ordered, spinning the cap off.

“Why?”

“Just do it!”

Shots tore through the cabin, exploding the windshield. Warm liquid-splashed the side of my face and Antonia screamed again. I felt my cheek. Wet, but no pain. I checked out Big Nose. His neck was spurting like a burst garden hose.

Antonia glanced my way and saw the blood. “Oh my God!”

“It’s not me.” I pointed at Big Nose. “It’s him.”

Over Antonia’s shoulder, I could see we were closing on the ferry; its horn honked loudly. A crowd of tourists pointed at us.

I stuffed most of the scarf into the gas can. I reached into Big Nose’s pocket and found his lighter.

Antonia was at the wheel, crouching low, the wind whipping her straight dark hair. “What now?” she shouted.

“Go around the front of the ferry, close to it. Cut hard and come up behind the stern of the yacht, full speed.”

“But they’re shooting at us!”

“Full speed!”

“All right! Don’t yell at me!”

We were bearing down on the ferry and I could see people waving and screaming.

“Cut around it now!”

I staggered my way onto the back deck, Beretta in one hand, gas can in the other. The third man stood at the bow in a shaky firing stance with what looked like a submachine gun tucked into his armpit. He was taking aim. I raised the pistol and fired the last two shells at his midsection. He fell back out of sight. I dropped the gun.

Antonia gunned the motor and arced around the ferry, our boat throwing off heavy spray. The yacht slowed and started to follow, but there was no way for it to compete with Antonia’s tight turn. Just like that we were completing the circle, heading for the black boat’s low stern.

Out of the corner of my eye I caught Nolo Tecci rushing toward the back of the big boat, one hand going inside his black leather sport coat.

I lit the scarf, swung the gas can around like a discus, and let go. It sailed up and over the gleaming rail of the yacht, the scarf in flames, and crashed onto the deck, exploding with a gigantic whoosh.

Antonia straightened our boat and headed full throttle for the open sea.

When we were about five miles from anywhere, she cut the engine and stepped back onto the deck. We stood there looking at each other, bobbing in the Gulf of Venice, awash in blood, sweat, and adrenaline.

“You promised nothing bad would happen, you son of a . . .” She balled a small fist and punched me right in the stomach. It caught me totally off-guard and half-knocked the wind out of me.

“Jeez, why’d you do that?” I groaned. “I saved you.”

“Saved me? If you hadn’t taken me out here I wouldn’t have needed saving, you big jerk. Did that occur to you?” She rubbed her knuckles.“My hand hurts. What do you have, rocks in your stomach?”

“I guess I deserved that.” I slumped back on the seat, massaging my gut. “I did save you, though,” I huffed.

She placed her hand on my shoulder. “Well . . . maybe I shouldn’t have hit you. Are you all right?” She removed her shades.

I looked at her face, framed by the shot-up boat and pale blue sky. Almond eyes. Just a little eyeliner and mascara that had streamed down her lovely high cheekbones like black rain.

From the cabin, the walkie-talkie crackled and squawked: “You still there?” There was a pause and then: “Hey, you still there?”

Antonia looked up with panic. We both scanned the horizon. Not another boat in sight.

I stepped into the cabin, trying not to tread in Big Nose’s blood. It wasn’t easy. I spotted the radio, picked it up, and stepped back out on the deck. “Hey,” it squawked again, “Flame Boy.”

The voice on the walkie-talkie was the last voice my father had ever heard. Those vocal cords had vibrated in my house as I lay upstairs in bed. I wanted to cut them out, hang them on a chain around my neck. I was hotter than the center of the fucking sun.Get still. Now. A deep breath, then I slipped into the thick, damp jungle.

I pressed the talk button. “Well . . . Nolo Tecci.”

“Who? I don’t know anybody by that name. Who are you?”

“One of your goons accidentally nailed your man here,” I said.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, but if someone’s injured on your boat, we’ll come right over and pick him up. Procure him some restorative remedies. Where are you?”

“You mean you can’t see us?” I said. “Must be all the smoke on your boat. We’re right off your bow.”

“Hey,” he said, “I only wanted to chat with your lady friend.”

“You’re going to have to learn some manners first. The carabinieri will help you.”

“Don’t get too invested in them, Flame Boy.”

“Then I guess I’ll have to teach you myself,” I said through clenched teeth. “So long, Nolo.”

“For now,” he said. I clicked the radio off. A sensation of relief flooded me. I understood it. I had asked Satan to dance.

Antonia was sitting on the backseat, her hands over her mouth, eyes wide and blank. I sat next to her.

She said softly, “That’s the guy? Nolo Tecci?”

“Not just him. He works for Werner Krell,” I said.

“The German with all the money? He’s had a long affiliation with Professore Corta.”

“Tell me.”

“Corta knows Krell, brokers art for him, and did for his father before him. Both of them sought out Leonardo artifacts, especially the Circles of Truth and the Medici Dagger, which, of course, haven’t been found.”

“Of course.”

“Krell will pay any price for Leonardo pieces. Corta brokers to him for a fat fee. The competition for Leonardo artifacts is brutal.”

“I know that.”

“Do you also know that Krell’s father, and Krell, lost more than one piece to the National Gallery?”

I studied Antonia’s eyes as the implication of that statement sank in. Werner Krell and my father had known of each other, had been adversaries.

I suddenly felt the need to defend my father. “He was an honest man. A good man. My father wasn’t Werner Krell.”

“I didn’t say he was. I’m not making any assumptions about your father.”

We watched a lone sea gull swoop down near the boat and quickly flap away.

“I wonder if my father and Krell ever met,” I said. “Maybe not. Maybe Krell just sent Tecci to meet him. To exterminate the competition.”

This had happened when my only dream was to be Luke Sky-walker as I waved my Toys “R” Us lightsaber at a three-dollar poster. Now, here I was, six feet from a dead man; Fausto Arrezione, the bookseller, was also dead; and others had died, some of them at my hands.

Antonia’s face had turned ashen. She grabbed her stomach. “Oh, God, I’m going to throw up.”

She got to her knees and vomited off the back of the boat, then wiped her mouth on her sleeve. “God, they were trying to kill me! They’regoingto kill me.” She turned her face to me, her hair wet with sweat. Pushing it back with a finger, she tucked it behind her delicate ear.

“No,” I said, “they would have been glad to kill me, I think, but not you. You heard Tecci. He thinks you know something. Now tell me. What is it he thinks you know?”

I heard nothing but lapping waves while she stared at me for what felt like a week. Then she reached for her big leather bag, pulled out a blank manila 9 x 12 envelope, and handed it to me. Between two pieces of heavy cardboard was a cellophane sleeve.

Inside was a yellowed page that looked very much like the one Greer had passed on to me. My face flushed, the sensation rippling across the rest of my skin. The sound of the waves slapping the creakingboat dissipated until they vanished, leaving Antonia, Leonardo, and me in the yawning breadth of time.

I opened my mouth to speak. My tongue felt dry and I had to clear my throat.“This . . . is . . . the page the bookseller found.”

It was definitely different from mine. To one side, a large bull’s-eye of tiny marks in concentric rings similar to the one on my page and a drawing of what looked like an astonishingly sophisticated system ofpulleys. And on the other side, one line of Leonardo’s backward handwriting and a picture of a harness, like the kind of thing infants bounce up and down in to amuse themselves.

“Fausto Arrezione is my uncle. Was,” Antonia confided. “He called me the day he found the page. Leonardo is my specialty. I told Corta about it right away, and we set up a time the next day for Fausto to bring in the notes. It would have been a major acquisition for the Gallerie. I wasn’t really thinking much about the Dagger itself. But then something must have spooked Fausto, because he brought the page to me. He seemed unusually nervous and asked me to hold it for him. And later that night . . . oh God . . . Corta must have told . . .” She started to tense up, fear grabbing her, folding her in like a strand of rope. “Corta told Krell and Tecci and they . . . oh God. Itwasmurder.”

Antonia held her palms together, the tips of her index fingers just brushing her nose. She began to rock back and forth, staring intently at nothing, accepting that her uncle had been killed for the notes she’d been carrying in her bag.

“What am I going to do?” she muttered. “They want these notes and they’ll kill me for them.”

I wanted to grab her small wrists, feel her throbbing pulse, and tell her, “I’ve got you.” But I didn’t; I couldn’t.

Instead I extracted the leather portfolio from my red bag and carefully handed her my own page of Leonardo’s notes.

Antonia’s eyes went as wide as rainbows. Mouth hanging open, slowly shaking her head from side to side, she removed it from the large Ziploc Bag I had placed it in, turning the page over and back, the way I had with hers. She looked at me quizzically, awestruck.

It was my turn. I told her everything—Greer, Tecci, the Georgetown fire. I held the two pages of notes side by side. We sat silently, comparing what we hoped were the Circles of Truth.

“These pages could lead us to the Medici Dagger,” I said.“Leonardo wrote that the key to the Dagger was in the Circles of Truth.”

“They’re definitely not duplicates,” she said.

“No. They’re obviously different. Two Circles of Truth. We’ve got them both and Krell and Tecci must have nothing.”

“What should we do?” Antonia asked.“Should we go to the police?”

“Are you kidding me? Did Tecci sound scared of the police to you? Krell is connected. Besides, if you wanted to go to the police, why didn’t you call them after the fire?”

“I . . . because it’s Leonardo and I thought maybe I could . . .”

“Jesus,” I said. “You didn’t hand over the notes because you were working on them. You were hiding out and scared, but you didn’t want to let them go, did you?”

“Well . . . no,” she admitted.

I was impressed. I asked her if she’d translated the line on her page.

She nodded. “ ‘Let he who finds the dagger use it for noble purpose.’ ”

A shiver traveled through my body.

“He’s talking to me,” I whispered. “I can’t explain it, but I know Leonardo is talking to me.”

I could feel Leonardo’s strong hand on one shoulder, my father’s gentle one on the other.I’m the “he” who will find the Dagger.

I took a deep lungful of sea air.

“Well,” Antonia said, “what do we do now?”

In my mind I saw a collage of splintered wood, broken glass, the dead driver spreading red, heard Tecci’s threatening voice crackling on the walkie-talkie. I took in the sight of Antonia—the sunshine on her raven hair, the eager look on her face.

“Well?” she repeated.

“Simple,” I stated flatly. “You translate my page and lend me yours, and I’ll be on my way.”

“What? What about me, you prick? You brought me out here, got me shot at. You think you’re just going to send me home?”

She took her page of notes from my hand. “This stays right with me. And I stay right with you.”

“Antonia, you don’t understand. I can’t . . . do this with you. I . . . don’t . . . want you with me.”

Every cell in my brain knew that was a lie. I did want her. In that moment it didn’t even matter why. But I knew if I lost my focus one or both of us would get killed.

“Don’t want me, huh? And you think I want you? Like a horde of locusts, I want you. Listen to me, Mr. Reb Barnett. I came out to meet you and this happened. Now you’restuckwith me.”

She was right.

A shiny fish with an emotionless eye surfaced, then plunked back under the water. For an instant I envied that fish.

Antonia opened her bag to slip Leonardo’s page inside. “Hey,” she said. “What’s this?”

She held up a small, white envelope. On the front were three block letters:REB.

She looked at me suspiciously, her face flushing crimson. “When did you put this in my bag?”

“I didn’t touch your bag,” I said.“Not once.”

“Oh my God. Outside the Danieli, right before I met you. This guy bumped into me, practically gave me whiplash. Then he disappeared into the crowd. What’s going on here?”

“Did you get a look at him?”

“He practically knocked me down. Scared me half to death. No, I didn’t get a look at him.”

“Can I see the envelope?”

She gave it to me.

Inside was a small key labeled “104” that looked like it belonged to a lockbox, and an address written on a card.

“That’s near the Gritti Palace,” she said. “Do you have any idea who it could have been?”

“No.”

“Maybe we shouldn’t go.”

“We have to.”

“It could be a trap. Look, Reb, we have Leonardo’s pages. We can leave town. Once we’re safe, I can translate them. We can unravel the Circles of Truth.”

“Antonia, I have to check this out, alone.”

“Forget that! We both go. So . . . now what do we do, drive this damn boat back to the Danieli?”

Looking over at Big Nose I said, “I don’t think so.”

“Wait,” she said. “I’ve got access to a car.”

“Where is it?”

“In Chioggia. It’s a fishing village a little south of Lido.”

“Great.” I stepped over to Big Nose and hefted him by his armpits. “Could you give me a hand?” I asked.

Antonia looked as queasy as I felt.

“I really don’t think he needs to go to Chioggia today,” I said to her. “Do you?”

six

We tossed Big Nose overboard and washed down the deck with a bucket. It was rotten work. Ten years in a slaughterhouse wouldn’t have prepared you for it. I reluctantly threw the Tomcat in after him. Though I preferred to be armed, I couldn’t afford to be caught carrying the weapon that had killed Tecci’s men.

Antonia navigated us to Chioggia. As we wove our way through the collection of masts and booms, no one even noticed our shot-up boat. Ditching the water taxi at an open slip, we proceeded on foot into the crowded town.

On the way to where Antonia’s car was parked, I asked if she’d told anyone where she was meeting me.

“No. No one,” Antonia said. “You?”

“No.” I thought for a moment. “Corta saw me at the Accademia. He had to have leaned on Francesca, or been eavesdropping from the hall. He must have told Tecci where I was staying.”

“Cazzo, porco Dio,”she swore, waving her hand with an Italian flourish. “That son of a bitch!”

“No, wait,” I said. “That’s not enough. Tecci had the yacht in place, and the water taxi. How would he know we were going to take a taxi at the Danieli unless . . . damn . . . the maid.”

“What maid? At your hotel? But you asked her to wait five hundred minutes.”

I frowned at Antonia, winding my way to reason. “Not that one.The first maid. She came in earlier. She must have bugged my phone. Right in front of me. I’m an idiot.”

“You led them right to us!” Antonia shouted, slapping me hard on the shoulder.

I stopped in my tracks and faced her down.

“What’s with you? First you punch me in the stomach, then you hit me.”

She looked at me and laughed. “I thought you said you were a stuntman, for God’s sake! Can’t take a little hit?”

“You don’t know anything about what I can take, and I suggest you don’t make it your business to find out.”

“But I have to,” she said, a tear collecting in the corner of her eye. “I have to know.”

I felt as if I’d eaten a bag of nails. “Let’s both take it easy,” I said. “We’ve got a lot to do. All right?”

She nodded.

At the next corner we took a left down a narrow cobblestone street. Each house in Chioggia was a different color, red next to blue next to yellow; they all seemed slightly off-kilter, as if the road had sunk in places. Venice was like that too. I never knew if it was me reacting like a landlubber to the watery feel of the place, or if everything was literally askew. Antonia stopped in front of a garage next to a faded red house and lifted a noisy tin roll-up door. There, in the musty old shed, was a small blue Fiat that must have been twenty years old.

Antonia walked around to the driver’s door. “Good. The key’s in there.” She got in and started it.

“Shouldn’t I be driving?” I said. “You could translate the other page.”

“Reading in a car makes me sick. Come on.”

I stepped around to the passenger side. The Fiat was as roomy as an egg.

Antonia flipped on the windshield wipers and stepped on the washer button. Now each of us could see out through a clear wet patch the width of an open book. She ground the shifter into first, lurchedout of the garage, and swerved down the street in Keystone Kops fashion.

“Why do you keep your car out here?” I said over the whine of the engine.

“It’s not mine. It was Fausto’s.”

“Oh . . . your uncle. Could you slow down, please?”

“You didn’t mind my driving in the lagoon. Am I making you nervous?”

“Absolutely!”

She pulled over and hopped out. We switched places.

I scrunched in behind the wheel and pushed the seat back, practically into the trunk. The car still felt as if it were made for a Muppet.

We parked where everybody parks when they go to Venice and made our way by ferry into town. No one was overtly watching us. The address on the card was for a small Mail Boxes, Etc.–type shop.

We stopped across the street from the place. I pulled my Leonardo page from the red backpack and passed it to her.

“Why are you giving me this?” she asked, puzzled.

“I said before, you shouldn’t be going in there, and I meant it. If I’m not out in five minutes, take off.”

Antonia looked astonished. “You’re trusting me with this?”

“Yes,” I said. “I am. Now put it away.”

It hadn’t occurred to me that she might run.

“Here,” she said, practically forcing the page on me. “Keep it. I’m going in there with you. Don’t argue with me.”

A half-dozen people were going about their business in the building,sifting through mail, filling out forms. Two old ladies badgered the clerk, a young man with long dark hair.

Box 104 was large enough to hold a good-sized toolbox. The key fit. Inside was a brown, corrugated shipping carton that almost took up the entire space. I slipped my fingers in around it and pulled it out. It was unmarked and weighed at least ten pounds. I gave it a shake.

Antonia just about jumped out of her skin. “Are youcrazy?”she hissed, clutching my arm. “What if it’s a bomb?”

“If it was a bomb, they’d be blowing up Leonardo’s notes along with us. Now let go of me.”

“No.” Antonia looked at me pleadingly, her fingers bunching the fabric of my jacket. “I want to get out of here right now. We can open it at the car.”

I glanced at the clerk, who was trying to calm the old ladies. He had three more people waiting impatiently in line. I had intended to press him about the renter of box 104.

We headed out the door and hustled over to the ferry, again watching to see if we were being followed. Though the boat wasn’t crowded, Antonia stood right next to me, leaning against the rail and looking around nervously.

“Do you see that man over there?” she whispered. “The one with the windbreaker and black hat pretending to read the newspaper?”

“What about him?”

“He’s been looking at me.”

I checked him out as we chugged along the canal. He seemed like an ordinary guy reading a paper. I watched the other passengers. Either everyone looked suspicious—or I was just getting Hitchcocky. Out of the corner of my eye I caught the guy with the black hat steal another glimpse at Antonia.

“You see that?” she said.“He just did it again.”

I immediately understood the look.“He’s checking you out.”

“That’s it? That’s why he’s looking at me?”

“Yeah. He digs you.”

“Digs me,” she snorted. “Nobody says ‘digs.’ Not since the sixties. Where did you grow up, in a commune?”

“Almost. Berkeley, California.”

The ferry docked. As we made our way off, I pushed past the guy with the windbreaker, giving him a little shove with my shoulder. I couldn’t help it.

We caught the bus for the short ride to the parking lot. My pulse began to race as we approached the car. The second we got there, I tore open the package.

“Guns?” Antonia gasped.

“Guns,” I repeated, feeling excitement mixed with confusion.

There were two Sig Sauer P-229s, my gun of choice, and a Miami Classic woven double shoulder holster with extra ammunition. Beneath them was a purple, velvet-covered case and a brown box. I opened the case first. It held an extremely small handgun. It was light, but substantial—super-modern-looking, mostly handle. I checked out the barrel.

“Whatisthat?” Antonia asked.

“The tiniest bore I’ve ever seen,” I told her, astonished. “Looks like it shoots mini BBs.”

I opened the box. On top was a three-inch-long piece of rubber cut from a motorcycle inner tube. Under the tube was a word-processed note. Antonia grabbed it and read:

“You are holding a prototype microchip-driven automatic weapon. The magazine contains two hundred exploding pellets. The gun defaults to single shot. Press the button on the side of the trigger guard once and it will switch to semi. Press it again and it will go to full auto. The rubber forearm band will serve as a holster.”

“That’s it?” I asked after a second.“Nothing else? No name?”

“Nothing. What do you think?”

My mind was clicking like a card spinning in a bicycle spoke. Then it stopped on the only reasonable explanation:Archie changed his mind. Called Leah. Found out where I was staying.

I cursed myself again for raking his coals. I made a mental note never to put Archie in any compromising situation again.

Antonia listened intently as I explained.

I waited for her to say, “That’s crazy,” or “Your friend must benuts,” but she didn’t. She said, “Well, don’t just stand there, put them on.”

I loaded the guns, slipped the rubber inner tube over my wrist, and snugged the mini into it. I put on the double holster, then my jacket. With my sleeve unbuttoned I could reach right up and draw the weapon. I felt a sense of power and gratitude.

“Now let’s get out of here,” Antonia said, tossing me the car keys. “I’ve got some translating to do.”

“Where’s the best place for two people to be inconspicuous?”

She thought for a moment. “Milan. It’s close. It’s big. I know my way around. Milan doesn’t care. Do you have money? I only have a little.”

“We’re covered,” I said, getting behind the wheel, firing up the old heap. “Point me to Milan.”

Antonia directed me to the A4 and we settled in for the three-hour trip. It was a sunny spring day, cool enough to keep the windows closed so we could talk.

“So,” I said, my eyes on the horizon. “I told you about me; tell me something about you. You’re American.”

“What’d you tell me, that you used to live in Berkeley? Not exactly in-depth coverage. But I know plenty about you. You were going to ditch me.”

“Well I didn’t.”

“But you wanted to.”

My skin started to crawl. “Can’t you start translating now? Oh, I forgot. You get carsick.”

“And your glibness is a dodge, a protective device.”

“No,thisis a protective device,” I said, opening my jacket to reveal one of the Sigs.

“There you go again,” she said. “Being glib.”

“Stop trying to analyze me. I’m not a painting. Analyze Leonardo’s page, why don’t you, so we can find the Medici Dagger.”

“I intend to,” she huffed. “When we get to Milan.”

“And don’t pick on me because you’re scared. It doesn’t help. Fear is . . .” I felt suddenly inarticulate.“Well . . . it’s just fear.”

“Something you know a lot about,” she said to the window. She breathed on it and drew a little dagger through the condensation.

I checked the rearview mirror for Archie or any of Tecci’s goons. Neither. I caught a glimpse of myself in the glass.What the hell did she say, that I ooze melancholy? Brother.

The motor hummed like a Singer sewing machine.

“So,” I said again, “you’re an American.”

Antonia sighed. “I grew up in New York.”

“Where?”

“Staten Island.”

“Your parents are Italian? You look Italian.”

“My father was. First generation. My mother, second. We spoke Italian at home.”

“So, Italian neighborhood on Staten Island. Catholic school, right? Six kids?”

“Two brothers. Four and six years older.”

“Close?”

“Not really. I kind of split off from the family.”

“How come?”

A commercial van pulled up next to us on the right. I reached for a holster, checked the van. Two workmen. The driver blew Antonia a kiss. She responded with an expressive gesture involving her hand and her chin. He laughed and drove off.

“Italian men . . .” she grumbled. “Where were we?”

“Your family.”

“My father was an electrician. Very traditional.”

“And your mother?”

“A very bright woman. She went to college. Had big plans, wantedto be Jackie Onassis. They met while he was wiring her dorm or something and she just lost her senses. She’s a hopeless romantic. He was too handsome and captivating. So she dropped out and started having children and misery. You know, the man she gave up a future for.”

“And where did you fit in?”

“My brothers took after my dad. I was my mother’s great hope. The delegated academic with a scholarship to Vassar.”

“That’s an all-girls school.”

“So?” She looked annoyed.

“I thought girls who went to all-girls schools, you know, aren’t that into men.”

“Hah! Myth. Besides, it was a scholarship, toVassar.”

“What’d you study?”

“History, until I came to visit my uncle Fausto. I fell in love with art in Venice. That’s when I decided I wanted to be a museum curator.”

Just like my father, I thought, smiling at the coincidence.

“So you graduated and moved to Italy?” I asked.

“I went to graduate school here, got my Ph.D. I took a job at the Gallerie, where I’ve been under the sweaty thumb of Sergio Corta ever since. The man just keeps on not retiring, and instead of letting me do research, he has me giving lectures to visiting graduate students. It’s about a half-step away from handing out rental tape players for the museum tour. That imbecile.”

“What about men?”

“What are you talking about, ‘What about men?’ ”

“You said ‘Italian men’—they’re what? Too traditional for you, right?”

“They’re very romantic . . . at first.”

“I see. After the flowers stop coming, the apron’s next.”

Antonia didn’t answer.

“So what do you do for fun, other than drive boats?”

“Oh, scathing wit. You’re centimeters from me, practically a total stranger, and you’re engaging in repartee. That’s really good.”

“Okay. Can I just ask a real question, then? No snappy retort.”

She raised her eyebrows.

“Whatdoyou do for fun?”

She paused a second and said, “I sing occasionally. Don’t laugh.”

“That’s so cool. Like in clubs?”

“One. An out-of-the-way place, where no one from the Gallerie would ever go. On amateur night.”

“What kind of music?”

“Anything soulful as long as there aren’t too many notes. I don’t have much of a range. I wish I did.”

“You have a smoky speaking voice.”

“Three cigars a day. Going on twenty years now.”

“Everybody needs a vice,” I smiled. “So, what’s the first tune you ever sang in public?”

Antonia said boldly, “ ‘Like a Virgin.’ ”

I pictured her cooing that song—a good image of her full lips against a microphone.“Hot number,” I said, trying to clear my head.

“Madonna or ‘Like a Virgin’?”

“Yeah,” I replied.

“It’s not the song you sing or the notes you hit, it’s how you hit them,” she said, absently smoothing out her skirt.“It’s soul that counts.”

That made me smile. She was looking out the window and didn’t notice.

“It’s not the same with painting,” she continued.

“No. Of course not.”

“Painting requires soulandskill. Infinite soul, finite skill,” she said animatedly. “The two have to mix in just the right balance, which varies widely from artist to artist.”

“Definitely. Varies widely. Why are you looking at me that way?”

“Because you’re yessing me.”

“I am?”

“You’re no longer paying attention. I hate that when someone repeats what you say so you won’t think they’re really ignoring you.That’s so vapid. You don’t even know what I mean about soul and skill in painting.”

“No?” I said. “I think what you’re referring to is most evident in portraits. Let’s compare, say, Franz Hals and, um, John Singer Sargent. One splashes color into everything, brings out the nobility in the barmaid and the beer-swiller in the duke, and the other daintily goes about his business making the rich look richer. Both had amazing skill. Who had more soul? Tragic that old Franz died in the poorhouse, wasn’t it? Show me a vapid stuntman, I’ll show you a Vassar graduate in a torpedo bra.”

A quick sideways glance revealed Antonia’s surprised look. She began to speak, then sank back in her seat, folded her arms, and stared out the windshield.

“I’ve spent my life in museums,” I said.

“Touché,” she said softly. “One car ride, two myths dispelled. God I’m tired.”

She weakly waved a hand, signaling me onward.

After three hours, Milan was in sight. Antonia had slept the whole way, mouth open, face wedged in between the headrest and the window.

I had no intention of searching for a hotel without consulting her. As we closed in on the city I gave her a gentle shake. Sitting up, she wiped a little drool from the corner of her mouth with the back of her hand, then turned toward me, lids half open.

“We’re here,” I said, trying not to breathe on her. My mouth tasted like a gym towel.

Antonia blinked hard. “Where?” she asked, coming to.

“Milan. Remember?”

She squinted in the low afternoon sun and looked out the window, checking the signs. “Oh, yeah. Milan.”

“Pick a big hotel. A nice one.”

“How nice? Gritti-nice?”

“Sure. As long as they have a bathroom.”

She directed me to the Four Seasons, a medieval-looking manor surrounded by ancient walls. It was situated in the shopping district, Via Montenapoleone—the Rodeo Drive of Milan. I parked by the entrance, and extricated myself from the torturous little vehicle. A man in a white uniform and hat opened Antonia’s door for her. I tipped him and we headed into the building.

The lobby was not medieval, although impressive frescoes and columns intermingled with shiny new bronze, thick glass, and Murano chandeliers. In my soggy jacket I felt underdressed.

“I attended a day seminar on Leonardo’s influence on Raphael here once,” Antonia pointed out. “I always wanted to stay at this place.”

“Well,” I said, stuffing a wad of bills in my front pocket, “maybe today you’ll get lucky.”

We both did. In spite of having no luggage and looking as if we’d crawled out of a Dumpster—we had, albeit a small, blue one—we were offered adjacent rooms, the price of which Antonia was able to haggle down to just under five hundred dollars per night per room.

I pulled out the cash and gave the clerk what I thought was a pretty convincing line about having had our belongings stolen. He went right for the manager; ID is big in Italy. I repeated the story to him, grumbling about the two whole days we were going to have to suffer through before our new identification would arrive. “Thank God,” I told him, waving the thick handful of bills,“we’re prepared for anything.”

“Except for having no place to stay,” Antonia added.

It was a nice touch.

We signed in under assumed names. I was Chet Cook. I always thought Chet was a cool name, and Cook came to me because I was starving. Antonia’s nom de plume was Lisa Gherardini, which, she explained to me, was the maiden name of the woman many art historians thought to be the Mona Lisa.

I didn’t mention that I knew that.

Asking the Gritti to forward my clothes didn’t seem prudent. So, after converting some more dollars to lire at a money exchange and stopping for a pizza, we proceeded to pick up the things we needed at a couple of shops on Via Montenapoleone.

The busy city felt preoccupied with itself, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that we were being watched.

“Here,” I said, handing Antonia four million lire, about twenty-five hundred dollars, along with a thousand in U.S. currency.

She looked blank-faced at me, then at the money.

“Where’d you get it?”

“Just take it,” I said. “When you get low you can have more, no questions asked.”

“Just like that? I ask for money, you give it to me?”

“As often as you need it.”

She hesitated a second then took the bills, folded them, and stashed them in a change purse. She continued walking.

We stopped at the first men’s store we came to, where I purchased a change of underwear and some new running gear. Antonia stayed close by. A few stores down the road, she stopped at a lingerie boutique.

I said I’d wait outside.

She opened the stainless-steel and glass door, pausing. “Hey,” she said a little pensively. “Are you sure you don’t want to come in?”

“I’ll be right here,” I answered. “Go in. Panties await.”

She shrugged and entered. An eager clerk approached her.

I loitered under an expensive awning, watching Antonia through the window. A few hours ago she was a total stranger to me, someone I couldn’t pick out of a crowd. Since then I’d seen her drive a getaway boat with people shooting at her, cry and vomit, and snore in a beat-up car. I was chest-deep in the most profound adventure of my life with the very girl who was browsing through lingerie.

I recognized her now. I’d internalized the way the musclesbunched when she clenched her narrow jaw, memorized the tiny scar peeking out from the top of her right eyebrow. I had been hit by that girl—hard—and not just in the stomach. And I didn’t know what to do about it.

I shifted from foot to foot, hoping she wouldn’t spot me spying on her. I saw her pick out a bra and a handful of thong underwear.

I tried not to, but I began to fantasize. Alone in the store, illuminated by soft lamplight, Antonia stood behind the cash register in a lace-trimmed teddy. Her chin was down, her eyes in a lover’s gaze as she curled a beckoning finger at me. I locked the heavy door behind me.

She moaned my name as I approached her. The sound of her voice, the sight of her hard nipples behind the thin satin made my breath soft and my erection hard. She uncapped a cherry-red lipstick and slowly applied it, never taking her eyes from mine. Replacing the cover, she sensually ran the stick over each breast and then south and out of sight.

I stepped behind the counter, feeling the heat radiating from her damp desire. I heard the lipstick clink against the floor, felt her hot hands slide up under my shirt, then down to my belt, deftly unbuckling me, hungrily unzipping me, and then . . .

Someone tugged at my sleeve. A short, old Japanese lady stood practically toe to toe with me, breathless with excitement.

“Pahdon me,” she said in a heavy accent, thrusting a pen and paper in my face. “You are famous Amelican actor Tom Sroane?”

She might as well have thrown a bucket of ice water at me. “No,” I said firmly, backing away from her. “Definitely not.”

The woman looked devastated, as though her dream of a lifetime had just been dashed.

As she walked away, I wished I’d given her Tom’s autograph.

At least one of us would have been happy.

seven

Back at the Four Seasons, Antonia and I adjourned to our respective rooms, agreeing to meet in an hour to give her some time alone to translate the page. I dropped my things on the bed and tried Archie’s phone number, though I didn’t expect him to answer. He didn’t.Where is he? What’s he thinking? Is he hunting Tecci himself?

Pulling back the heavy Fortuny curtain, I looked out my window at the dots and dashes of cars and people, then over at the spires atop the Sforza castle, where Leonardo had lived at one time during the Renaissance—the rebirth—before floss and phones and mini machine pistols. Images of Greer and Tecci, Antonia and my father lay before me. Feelings poured on top of them, mixing too quickly for me to identify. The amalgam became a quicksand of thought and emotion into which I began to sink.

I jump out of windows this high. Pinocchio, diving into the whale’s belly for adrenaline wages and a chance to become a real boy. Well, today this puppet killed. No blanks, no director shouting “Cut! Great, Reb, let’s do it again.” In this moment, I feel . . . everything. Fear, hatred, lust. Who am I? I’m still your son, Dad. I’m more than wood and vengeance.

My phone rang, startling me like a fire alarm. It was Antonia telling me I was late. I splashed water on my face, tried to collect myself, sighing into a thick towel. Stepping into the hall, I knocked on her door.

“Antonia, it’s Reb.”

The door opened a crack, still on the sliding double lock. A vertical strip of Antonia was revealed.

“It’s me,” I repeated, “your boating buddy.” She closed the door, unlatched it, and let me in.

She was barefoot, wearing a man-sized, plush white terry-cloth bathrobe, courtesy of the hotel. Hair pulled back, with a couple of tendrils dangling. She looked like an angel.

Slipping my jacket off, I slung it around the writing-desk chair and plunked down on an overstuffed sofa.

“You, uh, translated?” I asked.

“The first half,” she answered. “It’s backward, you know. It takes time. We’ll get to it. Hey, anyone ever tell you Reb sounds like it’s short for rebel?”

“Nobody,” I lied. “Could we get to it now?”

As Antonia sat on the edge of the bed, the collar of her bathrobe fell open at the top, exposing the slope of a breast. She let me look for a second before bunching the lapels together. She was working me, and I suddenly felt trapped.

“I ordered up something to eat,” she told me. “Be here any minute.”

“Please tell me it’s a potato knish and a corned-beef sandwich from the Carnegie Deli. Light rye, heavy mustard.”

“Fifty-fifth and Seventh Avenue,” she laughed. “Bowl of matzo-ball soup . . .”

“Are you kidding me?” I said with mock derision. “You’re at the Carnegie Deli and you order broth?”

“With those big matzo balls,” she said defensively, showing me the size with her hands. “They’re the best!”

“You’re saying you’d actually go to the Carnegie Deli andnotorder corned beef?”

“Yeah, that’s what I’m saying.”

I got to my feet, threw my hands up.“Well . . . then I think I’ll leave.”

“What? Sit down, buster!”

I made for the door. “Later.”

“I saidsit,you son of a bitch!” she screamed.

I turned. Antonia’s lips were tight, her face lobster-red now. Then her composure crumbled and she started to cry. “Goddamn you,” she sobbed.

Shocked, confused, and embarrassed, I took a step toward her. She gestured with her hand for me to stop. “Don’t you come near me! Don’t you threaten to leave me.”

“Really, I was just—”

“All your guns and money—a magic fucking dagger!” she shouted. “I just want my life back!” She sobbed into her hands, her small shoulders shaking inside that big robe.

I stepped over to her. She sniffled, wiped her eyes, and grabbed my hand. I felt a spark, suddenly needing to kiss her to put out the fire or fuel it. Letting go, I backed away.

“I don’t like this either,” I said.

“Bullshit! You should have seen your face when you were talking to that Nolo Tecci on the walkie-talkie. Something was turned loose in you. And when you put on Archie’s guns? This is your world, and you . . . dig it!”

I pointed at myself, incredulous.“Idig it?”

She wiped her nose on her sleeve, leaving a trail that glistened in the lamplight. “Yes,” she stated emphatically. “There’s something about this you like, Reb—don’t deny it. I’m intuitive. I look at a painting and see every color, every nuance. As if I was standing there when the painter painted it, one stroke at a time, one color at a time. And you, you’re—”

“Here it comes . . .”

“Complex, multi-textured, totally abstruse. But the one thing that’s clear is youlikethis.”

I started to speak but all I could do was just stand there, pointing at myself, with my chin hanging down as if it were too loose a fit for my mouth. Antonia wiped her tears off on her other sleeve, glaring at me with an accusatory smile that said, “See, I’m right.”

I shut my mouth and made for the bathroom, more than a little confused. She asked where I was going. I didn’t answer, just closed the door. I turned on both gold spigots, put my hands on the edge of the sink, and leaned in toward the spotless mirror. There I was looking back at me, two semi-automatics hanging under my armpits.

But this time the cameras weren’t rolling, and the ammunition was real.

I closed my eyes, seeking sanctuary. The sound of the tap water summoned up images of a camping trip I’d taken with my folks in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. It was the Fourth of July, 1976. I was seven and the United States was two hundred. The temperature was half that and the air was as gummy as rubber cement.

We’d carried our packs for what seemed like two years up a steep grade and pitched our dome tent on a flat spot with a long view by a bubbling stream. I was picking my way from rock to rock to cross the creek when I heard what sounded like gunfire off in the distance. I looked up to see where it was coming from, forgetting what day it was and that you’ve got to pay attention when crossing streams. My boot slipped off a wet, mossy rock, and I sank halfway up my calf in the cold mountain water.

There was something about that scene I’d liked. The icy water enveloping my leg, the slippery rock that got me when I wasn’t looking, the unavoidable irony of humanity, blasting off fireworks when it was supposed to be quiet. It was nature, all right—unstoppable— totally imperfect in all its perfection.

Opening my eyes, I saw myself in the hotel mirror: imperfect, absolutely unstoppable, probably abstruse.

Antonia had changed back into her clothes, for which I was grateful. The dinner cart had arrived, too. It was laden with fruit, a silver bowlof cold jumbo shrimp that were fanned out side by side, leaning over the lip like tired tourists, a loaf of bread, a chunk of cheese, and a bottle of Chianti.

I poured us each a glass of wine, which Antonia immediately slugged down. She wagged her glass at me, without looking up. I filled it again and she knocked it back. I quietly fixed myself a plate of food. Antonia did the same, avoiding my gaze. She was a professional eater, digging right in with the delicacy of a pit bull.

“You know,” I said, trying to get back in her good graces, “I just realized I don’t even know your full name.”

“Antonia Ginevra Gianelli,” she said, a little chunk of cheese shooting out of her mouth onto my knee.

“Excuse me?”

“Antonia Ginevra Gianelli,” she said, brushing the cheese off my pants.

My knee felt warm where she’d touched it. “Ginevra?”

“Yeah, Ginevra. You’ve got a problem with that, too?”

“Ginny?” I repeated, closing my eyes. I was on a fault line over a heartquake.

“What’s thematterwith you?”

Antonia stripped some grapes from a stem, popped a half-dozen in her mouth, and offered me a few. I took them, still avoiding her gaze. “Ginevra de’ Benci,” I said to the grapes.

“Born in 1475,” she recited, “the second child of banker Amerigo de’ Benci. Wrote poetry, called herself a ‘mountain tiger.’ ”

“Leonardo’s friend,” I said.“Myfriend, too.” My face flushed.

“What do you mean?” Her eyes were on me, penetrating.

I looked away, slurping my wine. “What does the first half of the page say?”

Antonia pulled two pieces of lined paper from her pocket, and handed them to me.

The first looked like this:

Con gran diligenza lavorai per il Magnifico e per tutti quei che’l mio sangue hanno richiesto. Non sangue delle vene beninteso ch’esso ne son certo si rigenera ma sangue della mente.

La nostra feconda terra si farà arida e sterile nelle mani degli uomini che pare a nulla valgan se non a vanamente devastare la cosa stessa che lor dona sostento. Con i miei occhi vidi alla luce del sole e nell’ombra del crepuscolo la bontà degl’inani e la lussuria dei forti.

In solitudine nella mia bottega mi misurai con la ricerca dei segreti della vita ed ogni ostacolo vinsi con successo senza curarmi dello sforzo necessario. I cerchi e i cerchi. Ammiro il mio valor, ma sono stanco.

On the other piece of paper was her translation, which she read aloud.

“I worked most diligently for il Magnifico and for all those who have demanded my life’s blood. Not the blood from my veins for that multiplies I am certain but the blood of my mind.

“Our fruitful earth will unavoidably become dry and sterile at the hands of men who it seems cannot help but wantonly destroy the very thing which gives them succor. I have witnessed in the light of day and dimness of dusk the goodness of the weak and the lust of the mighty.

“Alone in my workshop I have sought to discover the secrets of life and have met with success for every obstacle no matter how great yields to effort. The Circles and the Circles. How clever I am but tired.”

No cars beeped in the city below, no hotel toilets flushed. The brilliant passion of Leonardo’s heart had been unleashed from the rusty cage of time to a man and a woman, in close proximity, eyes fully engaged.

“The Circles and the Circles,” I said. “See, the Circlesandthe Circles, right? He’s talking about two sets, One and Two. You agree?”

“Yes. And you intuit from that . . .”

“That Circles of Truth One and Two go together somehow. And that Krell and Tecci have nothing.” I picked up both pages, studied the two sets of ten concentric rings. “There must be some kind of pattern here.” At the word “pattern” some association poked at a memory that didn’t reveal itself. I ignored it. Nothing else jumped out at me save the limitations of my intellect.

“Leonardo was amused by his own genius,” Antonia said. “Ponder that for a second.”

“He doesn’t say anything about the Dagger.”

She yawned. “I just couldn’t keep going, had to give my eyes a rest.”

“Well, can I coax you to do a little more now?”

“Hey,” she snapped. “Using a compact mirror to read tiny backward handwriting takes time and a clear head. I haven’t exactly had a peaceful day. I’ll finish it in the morning, unless, uh, you want to.” She faked going for the compact, turned toward me, and smirked. Then she flopped into the desk chair.

“Leonardo sounds depressed,” I said.

“Definitely. And ‘alone in his workshop’ and ‘secrets of life’ sound to me like he’s referring to his anatomy studies.”

“What does that tell you?”

“By itself, not much.” Antonia studied Leonardo’s notes, pointing to the two drawings on the back of her page. “What do you make of these?”

“Well,” I said, “this one is a harness—you know, like for rock climbers or bouncing babies. But the other one, this complex hoist, isincredible. I’m sure this didn’t exist in Leonardo’s time. It couldn’t have.”

“That’s fabulous,” she said. “Did you see the picture of his bicycle inAtlanticus?”

“The one that Pompeo Leoni pasted on the verso, the back side of the page?”

“Your father taught you well,” she said.

“Well, actually I have a degree in Art History, too.”

“You do?” She looked surprised.

I didn’t respond.

“A stuntman with a degree in Art History? Hmm.” She moved from the desk and flopped onto the bed.

“A bicycle,” I said emphatically. “Leoni must have seen it, but he didn’t know what it was, and nobody else saw it until they took the book apart and turned the page over. If there were nothing else on these pages, we’d have Leonardo’s hoisting system. I wonder if it had anything to do with the Dagger?”

“Got me. Leonardo wrote and drew all kinds of things, many objects on the same pages, that had absolutely no relation to each other.”

I regarded the translation. “Il Magnifico was Lorenzo de’ Medici. At least we’ve got Medici on the same page as a set of Circles of Truth. Doesn’t exactly point us to the Dagger, does it?”

Antonia covered her face with a throw pillow. From under it she mumbled, “First thing tomorrow morning I’ll take a quick run and get back to the translation.”

“A run first?”

“Yeah. Helps me think.”

eight

Itook Leonardo’s notes and, stopping in my room to grab most of the money and the extra ammunition, went down to the lobby. Renting a box in the hotel vault, I placed everything in it for safekeeping. I returned to my room with the deposit-box key in my hand and Leonardo’s words repeating in my head: “Every obstacle yields to effort.”

Leaving the guns on my nightstand and my clothes in a heap on the floor, I climbed into bed.

It occurred to me I hadn’t bought a new candle when we’d shopped. No dancing shadows tonight, only the outlines of those in my own frozen heart.

I breathed in slowly through my nose, counting to four, and breathed out through my mouth to a count of eight. Soon my eyelids began to sag. My thoughts became syrupy and dripped into the waiting night.

I dreamt I was an abacus, or a billiards scorekeeping rack, I don’t know which. Faceless fifteenth-century soldiers, with dirty fingernails and knee-length tunics of chain mail, kept sliding my alabaster Life Savers over, keeping track of something. It hurt every time, but I had to take it, their grubby mitts, greasy with chicken fat, sliming up my counting stones. I knew I couldn’t ever get clean.

I woke up early with my face pressed into my pillow, my cheek and lips wrinkled like the crotch of a linen suit. The gray morning lightpeeked in around the curtains as the dream replayed in my mind. I rolled onto my back and scratched my head, trying to figure out what the hell it meant.

What would Freud have said, or Emily, my ex? That I was involved in a dirty business. That everyone was counting on me and somehow that hurt. Like Antonia, I wanted my life back. But I couldn’t get it back without going forward. Maybe that Dagger was out there. As far as counting on me, well, there was Antonia “Ginny” Gianelli for sure. My parents, or at least my dad, waving his virtuous fist. There was the late great Henry Greer, peering at me with rat eyes from memory’s trench. Then there was Leonardo. I was certain the master himself was counting on me. And who was I to say “I’m busy” to Leonardo da Vinci?

And what about Nolo Tecci?

Ah, yes, Tecci. We’ll dance.

The phone rang at a little past six-thirty. “Ginny?”

“That’s what you plan to call me?”

“Um. . . yes,” I said. “Ginny.”

“Do I have any choice in that?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Well, do you want to take a run with me or not?”

“Sure, sure,” I said, throwing off the covers. “I’ll be ready in a couple-of minutes. I’ll come knocking for you.” I hung up and plodded into the bathroom, brushed the stench out of my mouth, and took a look in the mirror. Whoa, a Tony Roma’s onion loaf on my head. I splashed some water on my hair, ran my fingers through it until it was passable, and toweled it dry.

I threw on yesterday’s T-shirt and my new running stuff, and did some stretches on the floor. I folded four five-hundred-thousand-lire notes into the top of each sock and doubled them over. Then I slungon the Miami Classic with the Sigs, and tucked the Mini into its holder. With roughly two thousand dollars and a small arsenal, I figured I was ready for a run.

Opening my window, I placed the key to the deposit box out on the granite ledge, and closed the window tight. Unless a tidal wave or a hurricane hit, the key wasn’t going to move. It’s one of those things about flat metal keys. Mass versus surface area, or something like that. Throwing on my new sweatshirt, I stepped into the hall.

A janitor with a small, pinkish ski-jump nose and a John Travolta chin lingered by the window across the hall, holding a spray bottle and a cloth. I said,“Buon giorno.”In a series of seamless moves, he took two steps toward me, pointed the spritzer bottle in my face, covered his mouth with the cloth, and sprayed me with a sweet-smelling mist. I blinked once, gave my head half a shake, and disappeared into a velvety black hole. In the distance I heard the janitor reply,“Buon giorno.”

My eyes were sightless, my mind gooey, stretchy gum. I heard the unmistakable sound of metal being tapped against metal. A coin? A voice followed—that of a cultured Englishman. It said, “I believe Mr. Barnett is just now reentering our atmosphere.”

I breathed in deeply through my nostrils, whiffing a hint of Old Spice, feeling my rib cage expand as if on spring-loaded hinges. The English voice called out again, with a musical lilt, “Oh, Mr. Bar-ne-ett. We eagerly await your arr-i-val.”

My nose itched, and I pawed it, but my hand felt like a catcher’s mitt.

“That’s it,” Old Spice said. “Open those eyes, Dorothy. You’re back in Kansas.”

Someone shook my shoulder and another voice, also English, though younger and more regional, added, “And we want to talk aboutyour ruby slippers.” Liverpool? Blackpool? One of the pools. Ringo wants to talk to me about ruby slippers. Slowly, neurons began firing again.

“The janitor,” I mumbled, somewhat surprised by the deep, anesthetized sound of my voice. I opened my eyes, seeing only a blur at first.

“That would be me,” he said, wiggling his brows once with pride. “That Windex’ll get ya.” He scrunched up his nose.

“Where’s my friend?” I managed.

“Friend!” the janitor snorted.

“That’s quite sufficient, Mobright,” Old Spice said. I turned toward the source of the voice, surprised to find I wasn’t restrained.

Sitting in a wingback chair, one thin leg draped casually over the other, dressed in an immaculate blue, double-breasted suit, was the short, slender man I’d klunked heads with outside of Francesca’s office at the Accademia.

The fog in my mind began to lift as I looked him over. He was only about fifty, but had thin silver hair that he’d combed up over the dome of his head from an inch above his left ear, and shellacked. His nose was long and straight, his face gaunt. His eyes were intense and matched the slate gray raincoat and Borsalino hat he’d been wearing when we collided. I speculated that the coat and hat were hanging neatly in a nearby closet.

The man absently tapped a coin against an engraved silver money clip that held a wad of bills.

“The Accademia,” I said, my voice still thick.

“Excellent,” he replied.

“Where is she?” I demanded.

“In the next room. She’s perfectly fine, other than being under anesthesia. So rest easy.”

I cleared my throat. “You have good taste in hats.”

“I agree,” he replied, an amused smile on his lips.

“If not cologne,” I added. His smile remained.

The one called Mobright poked me hard in the chest. “Shut it or I’ll shut it for you.”

I turned to him and did my best to scrunch up my nose like he’d done. He leaned in toward me with a look of menace. Actually, a little more Dennis than menace. The collar of his white shirt was too big for his pencil neck, and although it was buttoned behind his black-and-red-striped tie, there was enough room for me to reach my hand right in and rip out his chest hair, if he had any.

I returned my gaze to the man in the chair, who withdrew a monogrammed hanky from his breast pocket.AB, it read. He dabbed his thin lips and tucked it back into his pocket. On his third finger, he wore a gold ring with an emerald in the shape of a parallelogram. “Mobright,” he said, “I believe some tea would do nicely.”

“Yes, sir,” Mobright said with deference. He did the nose thing again and stepped over behind AB.

“Do you take tea, Mr. Barnett?” AB asked delicately.

I wiggled my fingers. They tingled, normal sensation returning. I ran my tongue across my teeth and sat up slowly. “I want to see her now.”

“That will be one Earl Grey,” AB said to Mobright, shooing him away. “Two sugars.” Mobright left the room through a side door.

I regarded the settee I was lying on. Red and tufted, it matched the decor of the room, which could have been the lair of a count.

My captor gently patted his caramelized hair. I stood up, carefully. “I saidnow,Mr. B.”

The name caught him off-guard for a second, and he gave me a puzzled look. Then it dawned on him. “Ah, you noticed the handkerchief. Excellent. Identifies me as a thoroughbred, don’t you agree? Although my father would take exception, damn his rectilinear, blue-blooded soul. Oh, don’t fuss, she’s not going anywhere,” he said, nodding toward the door Mobright had exited through. “Although I do suspect she’ll be coming to before very long. The latest central-nervous-system depressant. Extraordinarily effective. Twelve syllables or so. Don’t ask me to pronounce it.”

I made my way over to the door and turned the round brass knob. Locked. I listened. Nothing. I turned back to Mr. B, leaning against the wall for support. “Who the hell are you?”

He flicked an undetectable piece of lint from his sharply creased slacks and ignored the question. “If I do say so myself, Reb, you handled yourself quite well out in the Adriatic. I regret that we were unable to be of any assistance. Failed to anticipate your boat ride. I can say with certainty,” he continued, “that Mr. Tecci will actively seek retribution for being bested. Deliciously nefarious fellow, that one. Would you like to know his history? I found it quite fascinating.”

“Whoareyou?” I repeated.

“Why, an unnamed Englishman, of course,” he laughed. “Oxford man. So,” he plowed ahead. “Nolo Tecci. Born 1955 in Brooklyn Heights, New York. His father was Bruno Tecci, an executioner for one Nicky Arno until they both met their early demise in a steak house in Queens in 1968. Young Nolo turned juvenile delinquent as soon as he turned juvenile, and at the tender age of twenty was invited to Attica State Prison for five years for assaulting a bartender with an ice pick.”

Mobright reentered the room carrying a silver tray with a small teapot, matching sugar bowl with tongs, and a china cup and saucer. He closed the door behind him and set the tray down on a small cherrywood table next to Mr. B, accidentally kicking one of the table legs. “Sorry sir,” he said. “Here you are.” He eyed me. “Is he giving you any trouble, sir?”

“None, Mobright. Be a good chap and leave us now, would you?”

“Yes,” I copied, “be a good chap, Mo-dim.”

He glowered at me, then faced his boss. “Yes, sir,” he said, turning on his heel.

Mr. B called to him, “Oh, Mobright . . . do check in with Pendelton about our other guest. That methoxy et cetera et cetera should be wearing off presently.”

“Yes, sir,” Mobright repeated, shooting me one more look before leaving the room.

Mr. B picked up the tongs. “I told him to sugar the tea, did I not? And no spoon, to boot. Ah, well,” he sighed, pouring the tea, “bunglers all.” He removed a pill organizer from his pocket, opened a compartment, and popped half a dozen multicolored capsules in his mouth. He gulped some tea, knocked them back, and grimaced as he swallowed. He snapped the organizer shut and returned it to his pocket. “There,” he said disdainfully. “They don’t help, but at least they’re expensive.”

I peered around the room impatiently, looking for my guns.

Mr. B cleared his throat. “Now, while Tecci was in prison, he was suspected of killing fellow inmates on several occasions. Each of them had his throat cut in the shape of an ‘N.’ Nolo’s signature, not unlike Zorro. Gruesome, but one must express oneself to the fullest, I suppose. The authorities knew he had committed the murders, but none of the inmates were willing to inform on him. Two months after Nolo’s release, the pub in which he’d committed the initial assault was set afire, along with the bartender.”

Fire.

AB continued. “The only witness met his untimely demise before he could testify. He was found stabbed, the initial ‘N’ carved in the nape of his neck with a tiny surgeon’s laser. Tecci surfaced in Las Vegas, an enforcer for the Carbone family, but his disregard for authority and inability to play by the rules—even mob rules—made him a poor fit. So he moved on.”

“Who the hell are you guys?” I interrupted.

“Tut tut, Reb, language,” Mr. B chided, waving his ringed hand at me. He pressed on with his lecture. “Nolo Tecci is a sociopath. Devious, remorseless, clever, and very dangerous, as I think you’d agree, although I have it on good authority that he can be quite a charmer when he wants to be. He’s been implicated in half a dozen international murders in the last five years, although there has never been enough evidence to convict him.”

He returned the teacup and saucer to the silver tray. “Tecci issuspected of being a paid assassin for Werner Krell, an interesting if irksome man of deep pocket and shallow soul of whom you may or may not have heard. Krell shared an interest in Leonardo da Vinci with his father—a striking resemblance to your family situation, albeit with opposing motivations. Art versus power, if you will. Uneven parallel bars. One black, one white.”

The effect of the drug had now waned, and was replaced by anger. “What do you know about my family?”

“Not much,” B said casually. “But to continue, Krell has spent a lifetime in the munitions business. Recently, however, he shifted his focus to satellite communications. That is, he’s building satellites. Through his old KGB connections, he’s arranged to have the Russian Space Agency deliver his satellites into orbit.”

“So?”

“It’s a suspicious move from someone we believe has for some time been designing a new weapons system to use against a few of the more powerful English-speaking countries.”

“Why would Krell do that?”

“Oh, certainly profit, but also individual and family history, personal associations, psychological profile, genetics. Mother had a frightful case of borderline personality disorder with paranoid schizophrenic tendencies. Werner was suckled too long at a tattered tit, I would say. Mother died in an Allied bomb raid, and Father, whose fanatic footsteps Werner followed into the munitions industry, died an early, angry death.” B paused for a moment, then added, “Effectively, young Werner was orphaned at an impressionable age. Ironic.”

I savored my growing anger, locked eyes with him.

B continued, “Werner was misshapen by both designandcircumstance.”

“So you’re suggesting Krell’s the new Hitler; he wants to rule the world?”

“No, Krell’s not Hitler, we don’t think he wants torule,although we believe he would certainly take satisfaction in exacting personalrevenge against certain of our friends. Krell has been secretly developing a prototype laser-guided smart bomb, a number of which could be hidden within and launched from a satellite. Targeted with impunity from the ground, the bombs would be impossible to detect due to their unprecedented small size and extraordinary velocity, making the system the perfect terrorist weapon. Free-falling from space, these bombs could whip past any defense, thereby placing the bombee in great peril. Krell’s bombs could rain terror from the sky whenever he wanted rain, and no one on earth could do anything about it except tip St. Peter at the gate.”

“Go ahead,” I said. “Enlighten me as to how this involves me and my friend.”

“Krell’s primary munitions customer for the past few years has been Soon Ta Kee, premier of Taiwan, who has literally built his army with Krell’s products. Tacky—as we fondly call him—was apprised of Krell’s bomb design, became convinced Krell could actually deliver, and invested considerable assets to support its development.

“Tacky’s political conflicts have dramatically increased of late, to say the least. China wants control of Taiwan back, and because of China’s new PCL system . . . do you know what that is? The Passive Coherent Location system,” B said. “It’s an impenetrable air defense system. It cannot be jammed, unlike radar, and no missiles can be launched at its beams to destroy its transmitters, because there aren’t any beams or transmitters. This takes away the United States’ military advantage over China. The F-117 and even the futuristic stealth F-22 fighter are no longer invisible to them. Bravo, China.

“You see,” he continued, “Tacky feels that, with this sudden disadvantage, he can no longer rely on the United States to intervene militarily in a crisis. Tacky has his back against the wall and he’s miffed. So much so that he has dramatically increased the pressure on Krell to ready the weapon. Krell—believing he was millimeters away from success—settled on an actual date on which he would provide Kee with the bombs. Chap made a promise which he cannot possibly keep.”

I was sick of this pretentious prick and his outrageous story—if even a shred of it was true. “That’s a terrible shame,” I said. “I repeat my question.”

“Ah, but why can’t Krell do it?” B said to the room. “Why can’t he possibly come through?” He paused for effect. “I’ll tell you why. Because he’s completely stymied by the final ingredient—a material in which to house the bombs that would be capable of withstanding the extraordinary heat of high-speed atmospheric friction.” B sat back in his chair, smacked his lips.

Suddenly I was transfixed. My captor knew it, winked at me. “Your eyes just said, ‘Aha, the Dagger.’ Excellent. Listen to me now. There can be no doubt that Werner’s father told him wondrous bedtime stories about the Medici Dagger, as your own father did you. The indestructible alloy, stronger that any other, lighter than air. When Werner attained great wealth, he sought the Dagger as the ultimate trophy, not only his, but his dead papa’s as well—the Excalibur for the Knights of Krell’s Round Table. Here’s where the plot thickens. Intelligence informs us that Kee has vowed to destroy Krell should he not keep his word, and Kee has not one Nolo Tecci, but an army of them—each one caked with zeal—glad to carry out his wishes.”

“So what?”

“You casually say ‘so what’ but your words belie your interest. Here’s what,” B said, rubbing his palms together. “Werner Krell placed himself in a situation where if he doesn’t deliver his bombs he will be assassinated. And he cannot possibly deliver functional bombs. So what happens in his precarious mind? He leaps off the quivering lip of logic into total lunacy and begins to believe that Papa Krell’s bedtime stories were not fable, but irrefutable fact. And then presto! Out of a dusty old architectural anthology pops a page of Leonardo’s notes—possibly containing the Circles of Truth. Krell was foiled twenty years earlier when the first page of notes went down with the courier. Now he has a second chance and believes not only that the Dagger is out there, but that its alloy will provide hisbomb with the necessary indestructible housing that will save his miserable skin.”

B clapped his hands together. “If that’s not drama,” he said, “well then I just don’t know what is. Raise a glass for Werner bloody Krell and every last one of us for whom the bookseller’s bell tolled.”

I felt a bitter chill. “But no one really knows if the Dagger even exists,” I said. “Or if the alloy has the qualities Leonardo claimed it had. Maybe the man just discovered aluminum before Reynolds.”

“Perhaps,” B conceded. “But if it is as Leonardo stated and Werner Krell is able to obtain it, analyze its components, and duplicate it, he’ll complete his weapon system and the world will be at his mercy—and of course, that of Soon Ta Kee.”

“You think I give a shit about Soon Ta Kee? Or bombs free-falling on this or any other world in the stinking solar system?”

“Apparently not.”

“You’re damn right.”

“How about individual liberty?”

“That’s what I’m interested in,” I said. “Individual liberty. Mine.”

“You do have a rather myopic view considering your genealogy. Your father was a bit more a man of the people.”

“What do you know of my father?” I bristled.

“Oh, that he was the curator of one of the world’s greatest museums, while you take risks for money. Let me rephrase that. I can certainly appreciate taking risks for money, so I appeal to you on another level. You wouldn’t want your films to say ‘Made in Taiwan,’ would you? No need to reply, but tell me this: Have I not woven a spellbinder? Your baby blues tell me nothing, but inside I believe you’re having a little chat.” He sat back in his chair, drummed his fingernails on the gold-painted arms.

I wasn’t chatting; I was screaming like the signs in Las Vegas. The slot machine in my mind spun helter-skelter, finally stopping on the three familiar words it landed on so very often:Trust. No. One.

I stood and stretched. “So . . .” I said, feigning unconcern, “you’re quite a perceptive person.”

“Oh, I do enjoy praise.”

“You want to find the Dagger first, whoever the hell you happen to be.”

B pulled out his hanky and polished his ring. “It’s my turn for a compliment. You’re as perspicacious as you are handsome.”

“You want our help,” I said.

“Certainly.”

“You think we know something?”

“Let’s not be coy.”

“How much is it worth?” I asked.

“You wish to be compensated?”

“The Medici Dagger. What’s it worth?”

“Oh. That depends on to whom it is sold. An art collector would pay a substantial sum. Recall what the Japanese paid for a single Van Gogh? But Kee? What would he pay for a laser-targeted, nondetectable, satellite-launched smart bomb? Think of a large number. So . . . let us have a go at the Circles. We know you’ve got two pages of notes, two sets of Circles—”

“How’d you know—”

“Bugs. Electronic insects. A tiny microphone on your dinner cart. ‘Our fruitful earth will unavoidably become dry and sterile at the hands of men who it seems cannot help but wantonly destroy the very thing which gives them succor.’ Leonardo was quite a poet, wasn’t he? I’d like to have a look at those pages. Perhaps your lovely friend would be kind enough to translate the rest for us, although she is by no means critical to the translation. Coded Circles, hoisting system? Fascinating.”

“I want to see my friend right now,” I insisted. “I want to know she’s all right.”

“Your Ginny?” B said with a wry smile. I glared at him. He shrugged. “We bugged your phone at the Four Seasons as well.”

“So,” I said to the pompous bastard, “you’re the FBI or the NSA or no, MI-5, right? You’re a Tea Bag. MI-5.”

“Tea Bag, how homespun,” B said, remaining unruffled. “A Southernism you picked up from your mother? She was from Tennessee, was she not?”

I gnawed the inside of my lower lip.

“Reb,” he said, “I’m simply the best man to tidy up Dodge, now that John Wayne is deceased and you’ve been relieved of your six-shooter. Very interesting, that. Never saw the likes of it before. We should discuss its origin.”

I heard the sound of muffled voices emanating from the next room.

“I’m keenly interested in the Medici Dagger,” B went on. “I know you are, too. Cooperate with me now, won’t you? The key to your deposit box in the hotel vault would be appreciated, if something of interest lies within it. Rummaging through a room is one thing, including popping the odd wall safe. But opening safety deposit boxes, well, keys make the job so much more civilized. Be my buddy. Your father would most certainly have considered his Uncle Sam.”

“Why did you drug us? Why didn’t you just ask nicely? I’m a reasonable guy.”

B thought for a moment. “I admit Mobright got a bit overenthusiastic in bringing you in. The opportunity to have a look at the notes outweighed his more humane sensibilities. However, I pose to you this question: Would we have had your full attention otherwise?”

I paused and then gave him three looks: contemplation, conviction, concession. “I could be Doc Holliday,” I said, showing some team spirit.

B stood, looking self-satisfied, and walked confidently over to me, all five feet seven inches of him. Offering me his small, manicured hand, he said, “In answer to most of your questions, my high-flying friend, I am Inspector Arlen Beckett, chief of Global Affairs, Gibraltar.”

“And just what is Gibraltar?”

“Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, a specialized task force made up of senior agents from several Western members of the NATO alliance was formed for the purpose of preventing the proliferation ofweapons of mass destruction. Catchy name, Gibraltar. Come now, my boy, you’re bordering on being tardy for the inevitable handshake.”

I grinned and stuck my hand out. Then I balled a fist and gave him a quick stiff uppercut to the jaw that knocked him up, back, and out. He hit the thickly carpeted floor, feet flat, knees sticking up. His hair didn’t budge a centimeter.

“I’m not your boy,” I said.

There were more sounds from the next room. I checked Beckett for a gun. Nothing. I dropped his seat cushion on top of the teacup and stomped on it as quietly as I could, then picked up a piece with a nice sharp edge to it. I walked to the door, cinched my face like a proper Englishman, and, trying to sound like Beckett, called out,“Oh, Mobright?”

The door opened and Mobright stuck his face in. “Yes, sir?” he inquired. I grabbed him under the knot in his tie, hoping it wasn’t a clip-on, and jammed the shard against his throat. “Sir’s not necessary,” I said. “You can call me Reb.”

“Reb. Please, I—”

“Another fucking word and you bleed. You know I’ll do it.”

His pinched mouth opened as if he were about to speak and then shut again. I spun him around, and, with his body as a shield, stepped into the room where they had stashed Ginny.

She was sitting upright on a puffy satin couch, looking much as she had when I woke her up in the Fiat, only groggier. A wide-shouldered man I presumed to be Pendelton towered over Ginny with his back to me.

She spotted me through glassy eyes.“Reb,” she mouthed. Mobright kicked the door, either on purpose or because he was a klutz. Pendelton turned at the sound. He didn’t pull a gun, for which I was grateful. I patted down Mobright for his and maybe mine. Nothing but a small spray bottle.

“Anything left in there?” I asked.

He looked at me pleadingly. “You don’t understand.”

“You’re right,” I replied, then double-dosed him. “Sweet dreams and a peach, Mobright.”

nine

Idouble-dosed Pendelton, and Beckett, too. That gave us maybe four hours to do whatever we were going to do before Gibraltar was back on the snoop. I was confused and pissed, but at least I was in control. I had no idea where we were, but if Beckett was telling the truth, then we had to be in some sort of official building with other Gibraltar agents around, so I stripped Pendelton and put on his clothes to increase our chances of blending in.

Ginny was semi-anesthetized and couldn’t have cared less about clothes; she was still trying to figure out why we weren’t jogging. I got her to do some deep breathing, which seemed to clear her head some. Then I ran my knuckles up and down her spine and massaged her shoulders like she was the champ. This recharged her enough to prevent her from bumping into things while we were escaping.

When Ginny asked what was going on, I instructed her to just do what I said and everything would be all right. For once she put up no argument.

Before we left the room, I inspected the closet. Beckett’s raincoat and hat were in there, all right. I slipped the coat on Ginny and with our chins down, we entered the hall. We appeared to be in a hotel after all, and made our way down two flights of stairs, passing half a dozen people, none of whom seemed interested in us.

By the time we made it out to the street, adrenaline had replaced most of the evil stuff in Ginny’s system, and her eyes were clear andpurposeful. We quickly melted into the throng of Milanese and tourists on the sidewalk.

“All right,” Ginny barked, “what the hell wasthatabout?”

She’s back.“Check where we are,” I said. “Can we walk back to the hotel or do we need to get a cab?”

She regarded the street sign. “It’s two streets over. That way.”

I took her by the elbow. “Let’s go.”

“Hey, give me a second, will you? I’m dizzy.”

“Sorry,” I said, slowing down a bit.

“Who were those people?”

“Gibraltar,” I said.

“Gibraltar? That’s a rock . . . and a mutual fund.”

The lunch crowd provided us great cover.“It’s also some kind of government intelligence agency,” I said, “unless Beckett is an amazing liar. I don’t know. I’ve never heard of Gibraltar. How can we be sure they’re not working for Krell? And how’d they track us to Milan. Is Tecci here?”

“Who’s Beckett?” Ginny asked, way behind me.

“The top dog. I knocked him out with a tasty uppercut.”

Ginny stopped dead in her tracks. “You socked a government intelligence agent?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. An international one, actually.”

I tugged on her like a Central Park pony. She stumbled forward, staring at me. “And by the way,” I added, “nobody says ‘sock’ anymore. Not since poodle skirts went out.”

“Who cares?” she said. “The government will protect us from Krell. Governments protect people.”

“No they don’t. And besides, he called me homespun! The smug son of a bitch.”

“So, naturally, you socked him.”

“And drugged him. Mobright and his buddy, too.”

Ginny looked at me as though I had committed a grievous error. A tour bus honked loudly as it maneuvered toward us through the heavy traffic.

I shrugged. “Listen, I’m improvising, all right?”

We passed a busy fruit stand where a lady called out,“Mele, ciliegie, banane!”The deep red cherries caught my eye.

In my peripheral vision I spotted two grim-faced guys in wraparound shades, charging up the street, coats open.

Damn!

“I’m really sorry,” I said to Ginny, shoving her hard into a group of people, knocking over the stand, sending fruit flying. I whistled loudly at the two guys, waving at them with my other hand.

The bus was thirty feet from me. I dashed into the street right in front. The driver went wide-eyed, honked his air horn, and tromped on the brakes just as I dove under, watching the squealing tires to see if they were going straight or fishtailing. If they fishtailed I was dead. They stayed straight.

I heard screams from the crowd as the bus passed over me, stopping while I was still under it. The floor above reverberated with the tromping of feet and shouting passengers.

I feigned a scream of pain. Horrified faces appeared through the tire smoke. I scanned them for the two grim ones. I saw one. Then it disappeared. I watched his brown shoes rush toward the back of the bus. I spun my body around like a break-dancer and pulled my knee up for a karate kick. The shoes stopped. One big-knuckled hand touched the pavement. I saw a gun with a silencer in the other; then the emotionless face angled over. I launched the kick as hard as I could, heel out.

I heard the satisfying crack of bone, teeth, and sunglasses, as blood spurted from his nose and mouth. Then his unconscious head smacked on the pavement. The gun lay in his limp hand. I scanned around me. More faces.

I caught sight of the second guy, midway up on the fruit-stand side. He saw me look at him and smiled, then disappeared. His black shoes headed for the back. My only thought was to get to the other guy’s gun. As I lunged for it, the shoulder of Pendelton’s big jacketsnagged on a piece of the bus frame. I tugged at it frantically, once, twice, a third time before it tore loose.

The black shoes stopped next to the rear tire. I dove for the gun, but someone picked it up. I looked back at my pursuer. Sunglasses, sideways smiling face. Gun with a silencer pointing at me, finger on the trigger.Too late. It’s over. Then a “poof” sound like a fist hitting a pillow. For an instant I thought I was shot; then I saw the smile disappear, the face hit the road, the silvery glare of sunlight on spreading blood. Someone had killed him.

Rolling out from under the bus, I sprang to my feet, looking for the shooter, and saw Ginny. Then through the throng I saw a male figure wearing a cap and a big coat rushing toward her in the midst of confused people and scattered fruit.

“Ginny!” I shouted.“He’s got a gun!”

She turned toward the sound of my voice and covered her face in terror. The man reached into his pocket. Then, as if in slow motion, I saw him press something into Ginny’s hand and rush off, disappearing into the milling crowd. Astonished, I dashed over and dragged her away.

We ran as fast as we could, zigzagging through the tangled streets until we were out of breath and certain that no one had followed.

Sweat pouring, we stopped in an alley and leaned side by side against a dirty brick building.

I took in the sight of Ginny—drenched hair, heaving chest. I wanted to hold her and smother her with kisses.

Ginny wiped perspiration off her face, leaving a bright red streak.

“Are you cut?” I asked desperately.

“I-I don’t think so. I . . . it’s . . .” She checked her hand carefully and licked the red liquid. “Cherry juice. You pushed me into a goddamn fruit stand, you asshole!”

“Yeah,” I said, breathing a big sigh of relief. “I did.”

She frowned at me. “Please tell me what the hell just happened.”

I did, although I refrained from admitting that I would have let thebus flatten me or taken a chestful of bullets if it would have kept her safe.

“So the third guy—the one who ran toward me—he shot that other one who was going to kill you?”

“He must have.”

“And you thought he was going to shoot me? You know how much you scared me?”

“Yes I do. Did you get a look at his face?”

She shook her head. “You think it was your friend Archie?”

“I don’t know. I couldn’t tell. What did he put in your hand?”

“This,” Ginny said, handing me a crumpled business card.

I flattened it out. A phone number and the handwritten name Dracco.

The wail of police sirens several streets over made Ginny shudder. “Dracco?” she said. “Who the hell is Dracco?”

“I have no idea.”

Crammed into a telephone booth, Ginny standing on tiptoe next to me, leaning in to listen, I dialed the number. A gruff voice on the other end of the phone said,“Cosa vuoi?”

“Dracco?” I asked.

Silence.

“Sono un amico di Archie Ferris.”

Nothing, then click. He’d hung up.

Ginny and I looked at each other, puzzled. I dialed again.

Same voice.“Cosa vuoi?”

“Dracco? Um, io sono un amico di—”

Click. I was starting to get mad. So was Ginny.

“Give me this,” she said, ripping the phone out of my hand. She jabbed in the number. The same voice answered,“Cosa—”

“Ascolti, idiota!”Ginny yelled.“Qualcuno mi ha dato un biglietto da visita col suo nome. Io sono con un ragazzo chiamato Reb.”

I got the“Listen, you idiot”and“Reb”parts.

Ginny covered the mouthpiece and whispered to me, “I told him about the card.”

“Reb?” I heard the man on the phone say.

“Si,”she said into the phone. “Reb.”

“Hollywood Reb?”

“Si.”

“Well, put the fucker on, for chrissakes.”

Ginny raised her eyebrows, passed me the phone.

Everybody loves Hollywood.“Dracco?” I said.

“The same.”

“Why did you hang up on me?”

“Policy.”

“Uh-huh. Listen, a guy shot somebody on my behalf and then gave your card to my friend before taking off.”

“Shot a guy, gave the girl a card. I see,” he said flippantly. “How ’bout that.”

“Yeah. Then I say Archie Ferris and you hang up on me twice.”

“I’ve seen all your movies, Hollywood Reb.”

“Ar-chie Fer-ris,” I repeated slowly.

“You say those words like you wanna win something.”

“I’m hanging up,” I told him.

“Okay by me.”

“Come on, Dracco. Give me something.”

After a pause he said, “All right. Somebody knows me thinks you got cash and a reason to leave the country without a trace. Don’t bother asking me who.”

“So you’re in the travel business?”

“I got a Gulfstream Five and a forty-thousand-dollar opening in my schedule right now,” Dracco said. “Anywhere you wanna go. It doesn’t say so on my card, but it’s implied.”

“I see,” I replied, looking at Ginny. “Anywhere.”

“Pretty much, yeah,” he said.

His offer sounded good to me. “Can I call you back in a couple of minutes?”

“Why not.”

We rang off.

“Did you hear all that?” I asked Ginny.

“What do you think? Is this a setup?”

We both whipped around at the sound of footsteps behind us. An old man wearing a dirty apron emptied his trash and disappeared into his store.

I looked into Ginny’s eyes.

“I think these things: The two men at the bus must have been Tecci’s. Somehow they picked us up; I have no idea how. The man who saved us and gave you the card must have been sent by Archie. We’re in danger here and we no longer have any weapons, but unless someone’s broken into the hotel vault, we still have Leonardo’s two pages, which you need to finish translating. And, I believe we’re the only ones with the Circles of Truth.”

“Right. Well, whatever the rest of Leonardo’s writing says, I don’t have the first clue about the Circles themselves. They just look like elaborate graphic designs to me. I mean it would take a—”

“Whoa!” I said, a strange feeling washing over me. Thoughts snapped like thumbnails on wooden match heads.Mona Kinsky!Last night at the hotel with Ginny, something had sparked a memory when we’d talked about searching for a pattern in the Circles of Truth, but I hadn’t been able to identify it then. Now I did. Patterns, graphic designs.Mona Kinsky! Of course!

“What you just said,” I told Ginny excitedly. “Graphic design . . . the Circles of Truth are a graphic design. What we need is a computer graphics expert.”

“It’s got to be someone we can trust.”

“It is.”

“Who?”

“Mona Kinsky.” I fished a coin out of my pocket. “This is so weird . . . Mona . . . dear old Mona.”

“Dear—old—Mona?” Ginny asked, incredulous.

“I’m calling Dracco back. I’m booking him.”

“We’re hiring Dracco?”

“And his plane,” I added, my stomach getting queasy at the thought of flying. “As much as I hate to say it, we’re taking to the sky, Ginny.”

“You have forty thousand dollars?”

“Yes I do.”

“On you?”

“On me.”

“Wow. Okay, where are we going?”

“California.” I picked up the telephone receiver.

Ginny sidled up to me, looking anxiously around her. “What about Gibraltar?”

“Another excellent reason to get out of here,” I said. “Beckett and his bunch will be after us as soon as they come to, which is going to be sooner than we’d like.”

I was suddenly aware of how close our bodies were to each other, how her musky scent drew me in. I needed clarity, not inebriation.

“But they could be good guys,” Ginny argued.

“What?” I said, snapping out of it. “I thought we went over this.”

More police sirens Dopplered by us, heading for the bus scene.

“I’m dialing now,” I told her. “I’m booking the flight nonstop to L.A. It’s the same fare for one as for two.” Ginny slapped me on the shoulder as Dracco’s gruff voice answered,“Cosa vuoi?”

He told us to meet him in an hour at Linate Airport in his private hangar. Forty G’s American, two passengers.

Ginny and I made our way back to the Four Seasons, where we changed and gathered our clothes, which had obviously been rifled through by Mobright. As I’d suspected, my key-on-the-windowledge trick had worked. I thanked God and my high-school physics teacher. Retrieving Leonardo and the sundries from the vault, we were off.

Dracco was where he said he’d be. A swarthy, muscular man with a huge handlebar mustache, he wore what looked like an Armani pilot’s suit and mirrored aviator sunglasses.

I showed him the business card, which he glanced at and handed back to me. “Tell me about the guy who wrote your name on that card.”

Dracco smiled devilishly, revealing a gold canine tooth. “Relax,” he said. “There’s an old saying that everyone can keep a secret, it’s the people they tell who can’t. Only the first part applies to me. That means you don’t find out who gave her the card and nobody else finds out I took you to Tinseltown. Now show me some cash. I’m a busy man.”

I forked over the money. Dracco counted it, stating matter-of-factly that he had filed a phony flight plan, the jet was fueled, there was plenty of food and drinks, and we had nothing to worry about.

I could feel my hands begin to shake. Stuffing them in my pockets, I followed Dracco and Ginny onto the plane. He told us to enjoy the flight, then stepped up front and closed the pilot’s door. Ginny and I strapped ourselves into the luxurious leather seats. Within five minutes we were airborne. Within six, Ginny was dissecting me with her stare.

“What are you doing there, balling your fists in your pockets?” she prodded. “Are you cold?”

“Shouldn’t you start translating now or do you puke on planes, too?”

She crossed her legs, waited.

“Look,” I said. “I don’t like flying. That’s all.”

“That’s obvious. Why not?”

“Ginny,” I pleaded. “Leaves catch fire when you put them under a magnifying glass.”

“That’s an interesting reference,” she said. “All right, we’ll change subjects. Who’s dear old Mona?”

I looked out the window at the dwindling city below.

“Mona was Martha Belle Tucker’s best friend.”

“Who’s Martha Belle Tucker?”

“I knew it. After the fire there’d been no one to take me, so—”

“No one?” Ginny interrupted. “No aunts or uncles?”

“One uncle on my mother’s side. Dell. And he didn’t want any part of me.”

“Why not?”

“The only thing I knew about him was what my mother had told me. That he was a wild kid, had run away from home at sixteen or so to race cars, which hadn’t panned out, so he became a truck driver—a rambling man. My mother hadn’t seen him in years. Anyway, when they dug Dell up, he wasn’t . . .”

“Interested in rambling with an eleven-year-old.”

“No.”

“That must have felt terrible, to be unwanted.”

“By Dell? I didn’t know him. Besides, I was in shock. I didn’t feel . . . anything, I guess.” I hadn’t said those words before. They sounded solitary, like the single bounce of a basketball in an empty gymnasium.

“Of course,” Ginny said. “I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to be sorry for me,” I told her, shutting the door on my emotions. “Anyway, it looked as though I was going to end up a ward of the state. Then, out of nowhere, Martha stepped in.”

“And she was . . .”

“A mathematician. A college professor. My mother’s favorite teacher at Vanderbilt University. After my mother graduated, she kept up with Martha, called her every so often and sent her letters and pictures—first of my dad, then me.”

“And she just showed up?”

“Martha heard about the fire on the news, found out about my situation through an ex-colleague who lived in D.C., and decided to have a look at me to see if there was something she could do.”

“Was she married?” Ginny asked.

“Her husband had died of a heart attack, and she was living alone;she’d relocated and was teaching at the University of California at Berkeley. Martha hadn’t been able to have kids of her own, even though she’d wanted them, and she and George never adopted because he was against it.”

“So at eleven years old you became Martha Belle Tucker’s kid?”

“No! I was nobody’s kid,” I snapped. “I just lived in her house. Kept her company. That was it.”

Ginny didn’t seem satisfied.

“We had the same address,” I clarified.“That didn’t make me her son.”

“She was good to you?”

“She was a cranky old buzzard, though it wasn’t her fault. Her body ached from rheumatoid arthritis. Terrible thing to have. Make anyone cranky.”

“Was she strict, lenient, what?”

“Only strict about geometry. That was her passion. Shapes. Deducing their properties. Turning postulates into theorems. She made sure I got pretty good at it myself. That’s why she was friends with Mona Kinsky, you see. Because Mona was fascinated by shapes. Now you want to know about Mona.”

“No,” Ginny said. “What happened to Martha?”

I sighed. “After high school, I went on to Berkeley, majored in Art History. Martha died two weeks before I graduated. That’s it.”

“That’s it . . .”

“Well, yeah.”

“So when you swung your tassel, there wasn’t a single soul in the world to clap for you?”

I didn’t answer. Couldn’t.

A minute, then: “How did she die?”

“Heart. She just fell over in the backyard while taking the kitchen tablecloth down from the laundry line.”

“You found her?”

I fidgeted in my seat. “Can we talk about something else?”

“Martha was taking the tablecloth down and died.”

I looked out the window, touched it. Cold. “It was draped over her chest,” I said. “The corner of it was bunched up in her hand. She looked so serene lying there in the grass.”

“What did you do? I mean, right then.”

I felt a flush of embarrassment. I’d never spoken about my past with anyone, not even Archie, but this girl, this quirky pain in the ass, was scooping out my innards, sifting, exploring. Me—the guy with the shaking hands.

Closing my eyes, I was back there in the yard with Martha. The grass had needed cutting and I’d told her I’d do it on the weekend. She was lying on long grass.

“I sat down cross-legged,” I said. “Put her head in my lap, ran my fingers down her hair, and stroked her cheek with the back of my hand. It already felt cold.”

“Did you say anything to her?”

I whispered, “Now you’re going to be with George.”

I couldn’t bring myself to tell Ginny that I’d cried. Rocked and cried and stroked that silver hair I used to braid when Martha could no longer do it herself. Then after they’d taken her away, I’d cooked her favorite meal and laid it out for two and cried at the kitchen table until long after the food had gone cold.

I dragged myself from that dark place, straightened up in my seat, and opened my eyes. “So . . .” I said, “that was that.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean ‘cut and print.’ The end. Anyway, you want to know about Mona Kinsky. Graphic artist. Nice lady. Very sharp. Good calligrapher, too. Always had state-of-the-art equipment. Like I said, Mona was good with patterns. I’m sure she’s still designing things. You know how some people just never give up? Like Renoir, seventy-five, in a wheelchair with his brush strapped to his wrist? Hell, Mona couldn’t be more than mid-sixties at the most.”

Ginny eyed me silently. “Cut and print,” she repeated. “The end of Martha. I’m beginning to understand.”

“What?”

“Nothing. So . . . Mona. How do you know she’s even still alive?”

“When I left Berkeley I asked her to write in her will that I be informed when she dies. What? Why are you looking at me that way?”

“Reb, you’re not kidding, are you?” Ginny gaped.

She leaned forward, laid her chin on her palm, her eyes probing me.“Martha died so you just deleted that section of your past? You had Mona, someone who cared about you, write that in her will?”

I didn’t answer.

“Jesus,” she said.“How do you know where to find her?”

“She sends me cards. They have a return address.”

“Which you, of course, don’t answer.” There was no malice in Ginny’s tone. Just rueful comprehension. I hated the feeling of being ruefully comprehended.

“Where are Mona’s cards postmarked from?”

“Outside of Mendocino.”

“You’ve never been there,” she added. It wasn’t a question.

“Okay, now say something clever and pithy,” I said, trying to regain control. “Like you would if you were analyzing a painting. Be literary and poetic. Tell me the seeds of connection lay unsown on my barren soil.”

There was a pause.

“I don’t have to, Reb,” Ginny said softly. “You just did.”

The whine of the jet engines was the only sound. Carefully removing her page of Leonardo’s notes from her bag, Ginny abruptly swiveled her seat away from me and set about her task. Lying back, I closed my eyes and pictured burning leaves and barren soil. I fell asleep.

Somewhere over the Atlantic I heard Ginny laugh. “I ought to be bronzed.”

She slapped two pieces of paper in my hand and clicked her compact shut, dropping it into her bottomless bag. “Now, why couldn’t I have finished this last night? Read it, Reb.”

I blinked, shaking myself clear, and looked first at Ginny’s Italian.

Perché non mi fanno lavorare? Perché? Colui che dovrebbe di me fare tesoro mi nega i miei preziosi studi ché si rivela debole di stomaco. E ciò m’ha fatto male e mi tormenta giacché chi è mai costui se non sa fare ciò che Dio stesso lo ha chiamato a fare?

Per ventun anni l’ebbi con me e nessun altro neppure Giovan giammai poté vederla. Egli tornò alla polvere ora e giusto in quest’istante ho stabilito dove e come dovrà trovar riposo.

Brucia la mia furia con la forza d’un milion di candele e il suo baglior m’illumina’l cammino. De’venti cerch’il sentier che il possente viaggiatore ed egli solo giammai potrà veggente e del passato il vero alla daga condurrà’l sapiente.

I focused my overhead light on the second page and read her translation:

Why am I not allowed to work? Why? He who should treasure me denies me my precious studies for his stomach is weak. And this has made me ill and how that vexes me for what is this man if he cannot do that for which God has tasked him?

For twenty-one years I have kept this thing and no other man has seen it not even Giovan. He is gone now back to dust and in this moment I have just determined where and how it shall rest.