The Medici Secret

Chapter 23

Venice, present day It was dark by the time they reached Piazzale Roma and returned the hire car. The canalside cafes and bars were beginning to come alive as the water taxi glided along the Grand Canal. It took no more than ten minutes to reach the Ospedale Civile.

Roberto's room was quiet, the lights dimmed. A TV was on in the corner, the sound off. Roberto was awake and sitting up in bed. His face looked sore, the bruising more lurid than it had been the day before. 'Ah, my intrepid researchers,' he said, 'and the lovely Rose. I am honoured.'

Rose could not disguise her shock, but stepped up to the bed and kissed him gently on the cheek. 'How are you feeling?' 'Oh, pretty good young lady. And you?' 'I had the best time.' Roberto gave Edie and Jeff a quizzical look.

'Barone Niccoli has two boys, Francesco and Filippo. Identical twins. And they really are identical' said Rose excitedly. 'Ah.' Roberto obviously found it painful to smile.

'So, how are you bearing up?' Edie asked, taking his hand. 'Can't complain. Pretty nurses, good food, plenty of time to relax.' Edie frowned.

'Oh, and the most entertaining chats with Candotti. I sent him packing yesterday. Told him I wasn't up to talking. He came back this morning, rather contrite.'

'Doesn't sound like the Candotti we know and love.'

'I took the precaution of having a word with the Chief of Police, Prefect Vincenzo Piatti. I told him you two were being harassed.' 'Is there anyone you don't know?'

'I don't know him, actually. But it appears he knows me.' 'Won't that wind up Candotti even more?'

'Maybe… but frankly I don't care. I don't think any of us should trust anyone with what we know. Candotti is just doing his job, but the police can't protect us right now and I believe the best way to keep information from people like him is simply to avoid them. Anyway, enough of that. What did you discover?'

Edie told him about Barone Niccoli's library and the fate of the journals. 'It made for a fascinating read,' she concluded. 'But frustrating. It doesn't get us any further.' Roberto was silent for a moment, lost in thought. 'And you?'

'Well luckily, I at least have made some headway. The clue from the Gritti Badoer; I've had little else to think about'

'What about the nurses?' Edie said, smiling sweetly.

Roberto raised an eyebrow, then continued. 'That line of music is fascinating. On the surface it seems pretty obvious. Each note must refer to a letter which I thought would spell out a sentence.' 'It didn't?'

'No. The letters spelled out nonsense. Then I began to think about the Roman numerals, IV and V. It struck me I might need to transpose the notes into a different key and these numerals marked the way.' 'What do you mean?'

'Well, you can play a piece of music in any key. It's the intervals between the notes that creates the melody. The etching on the hemisphere was of a stave with a succession of notes. This series of notes can be transposed; all the notes can be moved up or down to change the key. The Roman numerals were telling us something. There were two bars of music in the clue and under the first bar was the number IV, under the second was V. It became clear that I had to transpose the notes in the first bar to the perfect fourth and the notes in the second bar to the major fifth.' 'And that gave you a series of notes that spelled out a readable message?' 'Er, no.'

'No?' Jeff was starting to feel irritated but realised that they had to humour Roberto because he was clearly enjoying teasing out the information bit by tantalising bit.

'I was surprised too. I thought I had it. But then it clicked. In the copy you made of the etching there was no clef in the notation.' ' And a clef is…?' Rose giggled. 'Oh Dad!' 'Sorry.' Roberto waved to Rose inviting her to explain.

'The clef is the symbol at the beginning of the musical stave. Most common is the G clef

'Thank you, Rose, a textbook description. I assumed the notation was written using this. Then I started to wonder. The next most common form is what's called the bass clef, or F clef. And hey presto, when I used this, it worked.' He paused for a moment. 'Could you possibly pass me some water?'

Edie handed him a glass. He took a sip and then rested his head back on the pillow.

'Where was I? Yes, the bass clef. The first bar of notes spelled out: G, A, B, followed by two rests, then an E, a rest and an F. 'GAB-E-,and F?'

'Exactly. The second bar read: A rest, an A, two more rests, an E, a rest and another A. In other words: -A-E-A.' 'A bit like hangman,' Rose said.

'That's right,' Edie responded. 'Fill in the gaps. Tafani mentioned that Vivaldi had entrusted the fragment of the letter from Contessina de' Medici to a friend, the painter Gabriel Fabacci. GAB-E-F? Gabriel. F, Gabriel Fabacci. Perfect!' 'OK, what about the – A – - E – A?' Edie asked.

'That took a little longer. But a smattering of local history goes a long way. In 1741, the year Vivaldi died, Gabriel Fabacci was commissioned to paint a fresco in a church called Chiesa di Santa Maria della Pieta. Vivaldi performed there almost every Sunday, and he was choirmaster for more than thirty years. Its popular name is La Pieta. Put in the missing L, P, I and T and you have it.'

'So, let me get this straight,' Jeff said, trying to keep pace. 'The clue at the Gritti Badoer must have been left by Vivaldi's friend, Fabacci, after Vivaldi's death and it leads us to his fresco in La Pieta? Why didn't he just take the information Vivaldi gave him, track down the journals of Niccoli and claim the so-called Medici Secret for himself?'

'You might well ask the same of Vivaldi,' Roberto replied.

'In his "confessional",' said Edie, 'he tells us that what he learned scared him so much he couldn't even contemplate taking things any further.'

'I thought initially that this might also have been the way Fabacci thought. Perhaps he too was a God-fearing man. But there were more prosaic reasons for his tardiness. Shortly after finishing his fresco, only a few weeks after he inherited his friend's documents, Fabacci was killed, drowned in the lagoon. All he managed to do was plant the clue in the Gritti Badoer. The knowledge of the Medici Secret died with him.'

'But why bother to leave any clue at all?' Edie asked.

Roberto sighed and shook his head. 'Who knows? Maybe he couldn't let go completely. Maybe he believed that in some better, brighter future someone would learn the secret and make good use of it' 'So what do we do now?'

'Well, it's all there, isn't it? We have Fabacci's clue linked with his fresco in La Pieta. He even tells us when any intrepid investigator should look for it: sunset.' Jeff was nodding, but he looked pained. 'Jeff?' Edie said. 'What is it?'

'This is all fine, but shouldn't we also be wondering who else is on the trail? Was that gunman after it, or is he just a hired assassin? If it's the latter, who's employing him, and why?'

The room was silent for a moment, lights from the TV flickered unfocused on the darkened walls and ceiling.

'I don't think any of us can answer those questions, Jeff. At least, not for the moment. But if it puts your mind at rest, at least a little, I have some people looking into who shot me.' And for a fleeting moment they could all see in Roberto's expression an aspect of him none of them had witnessed before, an aristocratic steeliness that verged on menace. 'Let's all concentrate on solving the central mystery,' he added softly. Jeff was just about to reply when Rose suddenly pointed at the TV. 'Look, isn't that the Medici Chapel?'

They all turned to see Jack Cartwright talking to camera with the cold stone of the crypt behind his head. Edie grabbed the remote and found the volume control.

'You are quite convinced of this?' A reporter was holding a mike close to Cartwright, who looked a little overwhelmed by the lights and cameras.

'Totally. We have confirmed our suspicions using DNA analysis,' Cartwright replied. 'The body assumed to be that of Cosimo the Elder, the first Medici leader of Florence is an impostor.' 'So who is it?'

'At the moment, we have no idea. We don't know when, why or how the body was switched, if indeed it ever was. Perhaps this unknown person was buried as Cosimo de' Medici; which of course begs the question: where is the real Cosimo? And why was he buried elsewhere?'

'I don't fucking believe this,' Edie said quietly. 'The bastard. I've got to get back to Florence… right away.' 'That's ridiculous,' Jeff said.

'Do you really expect me to just sit here while that conniving bugger steals my thunder? It was always my theory the body in Florence was not Cosimo's and, as soon as my back is turned, Cartwright gets in there.'

'So phone him. Yell at him, but don't go, not now.'

A few minutes later they were exiting the lift from the private ward and walking towards the doors leading to Campo SS Giovanni e Paolo. Edie plucked her phone from her shoulder bag and dialled. Rose looked worried and her father placed a reassuring arm around her shoulder.

'Look, before you start…' Jack Cartwright was clearly startled by Edie's call. 'It's not what it seems.' 'What is it then, Jack?' 'Did you see the whole broadcast?' 'Well, no…'

'I made it clear at the very start that the idea was yours.' 'But why did you have to say anything at all?'

'I didn't mean to,' Cartwright replied. 'You don't know what it's been like here since you left. The police have been here with forensics twice. They've brought back files, taken others. I've had no privacy. They've even installed bloody CCTV cameras.' 'What's that got to do with…?'

'I didn't tell the press anything. Some damn reporter came snooping around and told me the results of our research. Said he would like me to talk on air. When I said I didn't want to, he made it clear they would just broadcast an item about it anyway. On balance, I thought…'

'You thought you'd go on national television and announce an unproven hypothesis, one that wasn't even yours.' 'Yes.'

'OK, Jack. What's happened has happened. I have some business to finish off here, but I'll be back no later than the day after tomorrow. And Jack, please don't say another word on TV, or anywhere else.' After dropping Rose off at the apartment, Jeff and Edie arrived at La Pieta around 5.15 p.m., with the western sky a magical patchwork of orange, red and purple. Sunset was a little over a quarter of an hour away.

The church stood on Riva degli Schiavoni and looked out across the lagoon to San Giorgio Maggiore. Little remained of the fifteenth-century building Vivaldi had worked in; most of it had been rebuilt during the mid-eighteenth century, a structure designed by the architect Giorgio Massari.

'It's funny,' Jeff said gazing at the late-Baroque interior. 'In all the time I've lived in this city I haven't set foot in this building.' 'It's pretty incredible, if a little OTT.'

They walked along the aisle, admiring the elaborate cream and gold pillars and the spectacular ceiling fresco by Tiepolo. Windows ran along each wall to left and right, and between these were small frescos by a variety of artists.

The fresco they were seeking was the first on the right-hand wall. It was of a Madonna and child. Angels hovered above them, the colours still vibrant. The Madonna, taking up much of the left side of the fresco, was holding the Christ child in one arm. With the other she was pointing towards three men on mules. The mules were laden down with caskets. At the very top of the fresco, in the centre, was a large star, its rays a semi-circle of golden daggers. The lower half of the picture lay in shadow, and although the movement was barely perceptible, the shadow was slowly creeping up the fresco as light from the sinking sun was refracted by the rear windows of the church. The seconds ticked by.

'It's five thirty-one,' Edie said. 'Sunset. So what now?' 'I don't know. What are we…?'

'There,' Edie said so loudly an elderly couple turned and glared at her. 'There, look. The Madonna's hand.'

The sharp division between the umbra and the sunlight now ran directly along the Madonna's arm and through her pointing finger. It traversed the picture and crossed the wall to another fresco immediately to the right. They ran over to the neighbouring image on the wall. The picture was cut in two about one third lit-up, two-thirds in shadow. The dividing line sliced through blue sky, cut the tops off a mountain range, decapitated an angel and scythed through a building. 'Christ!' Edie exclaimed. Jeff peered at the fresco. 'Is that what I…?'

The line dissected a tiny image of a building that could only be the Medici Chapel in Florence. Beneath it was a line of writing: SOTTO 400, 1000. The sky was darkening as they emerged from La Pieta and headed west towards San Marco. Lights had come on along Riva degli Schiavoni. The evening crowds had begun to swell, and as the vaporetti arrived from the Lido, tourists bustled their way on to the thoroughfare. A brisk wind churned the lagoon, making the moored gondolas dance and clatter.

Crossing San Marco, they entered the hallway to the apartment. The whole place was deserted, but, as they walked towards the stairs, they heard a faint gurgling sound. The concierge behind the desk was spasming violently, a bullet wound an inch wide in his throat. His face and the entire inside of his desk was drenched in blood.

Jeff tried to suppress his rising panic. 'Edie.' He shook her shoulders and she snapped to attention. 'Call the police.'

Jeff took the stairs to his apartment two at a time. Emerging on to the landing, he could see his door was ajar. A tall, pale man dressed in a dark suit was standing by one of the sofas. He had Maria pulled close to him. The silencer of a gun was pressed hard up against her right temple. She was whimpering, her eyes wild with terror. Jeff retreated quickly into the hall.

'I'll blow her brains out, Jeff.' The voice was raspy, strongly accented. 'You know that, don't you? Then I'll kill the girl. I know Rose is here, somewhere. And I'll find her.'

Jeff walked slowly into the room, heart thumping. 'What do you want?' 'What a silly question. The clue, of course.' 'What clue?'

Jeff glanced down as liquid suddenly splashed to the floor between Maria's legs. The gunman saw it too. He pulled the trigger and half of Maria's head flew across the room.

Jeff threw himself back into the hall and collided with Edie, nearly knocking her over. Edie grabbed his arm. 'What the hell's going on?' 'Rose,' he croaked, rushing back into the room.

It looked like an abattoir. Blood splattered the walls and ceiling. The gunman was nowhere to be seen.

'Oh my God!' Edie raised both hands to her face in horror. 'We've got to find her,' Jeff muttered. They ran down the corridor.

The first room was empty. Two more rooms lay ahead, one to the left, one to the right. They were about to enter the second bedroom when the gunman reappeared, his pistol raised.

'Good evening, Signorina Granger. What do you think of the new colour scheme? Tres chic, no?' Two paces brought him nose to nose with Jeff. 'Give me the clue,' he whispered. 'Whether I kill you or the lovely signorina, I will find your little daughter and finish giving the apartment a makeover. So, last chance guys…' He put the pistol to Edie's forehead.

A voice came from the end of the corridor. 'Drop your weapon.'

For a second, the gunman hesitated. But then he lowered his gun. 'Drop it:!'

The place was suddenly full of uniformed men in Kevlar vests. One grabbed the gunman and cuffed him. Another ran forward to pick up the gun and bag it.

'Thanks' Jeff said and strode past Aldo Candotti, who made no effort to stop him.

At the far end of the corridor was a small bedroom. Just inside could be seen the faint outline of a door and a tiny handle sunk into the wall. Rose's secret hidey-hole. Jeff gripped the handle and pulled, praying his daughter was safe. He flicked on the light switch. The bulb had broken. But there was just enough light for him to see inside. It was a long, narrow room kitted out with a miniature sofa, a low table and a squat cupboard containing a few books. 'Rose?' No reply.

'Rose? It's Dad. Everything's OK. You can come out' Edie and two police officers approached. 'Jeff, what…?'

'I thought she'd…' Edie hugged him and he buried his face in her hair.

There was a scream from the living room. Dashing back along the corridor, they saw Rose, her face alabaster white.