The Rome Prophecy

139

The outside of the unassuming farm has been turned into a military compound.

In the centre is a four-wheel-drive Mercedes Unimog, the size of a small barn. It’s stacked with equipment and stands ready to tow vehicles away, bulldoze down walls and perform all manner of muscular tasks.

Several Iveco armoured vans have already been loaded with prisoners. A soldier slaps the side of one and it heads off down the dirt road, flanked by BMW R85 motorcyclists, blue lights flashing.

Up above, an Augusta-Bell helicopter keeps constant watch as the prisoners are taken down the Appian Way and back towards Rome.

Tom sits on a stone trough and draws breath.

He watches Valentina’s heart breaking as she says goodbye to Sweetheart. The child is being taken away by social workers, and the parting seems to be hurting her every bit as much as it’s hurting the kid.

She joins him at the trough, puts her left hand on his thigh and her head on his shoulder.

He takes her hand. ‘Is she all right?’

‘I don’t think so. I don’t think she’s even in the same postal code as all right.’

He squeezes her fingers. ‘There’s no more you can do. You have to leave her to the experts now.’

She looks up at him. There are no tears in her eyes; just disbelief and disgust. ‘Silvestri says they freed almost a dozen kids. Some are even younger than that little girl.’

‘How many of the cult have they arrested?’

‘A dozen men. All guards, by the look of it.’ She glances towards the front of the farm. Mater is being lifted on a gurney into an ambulance. ‘Along with the old witch, they’ve taken four women of about her age and another two or three who seem to be in their forties.’

Tom wipes rain from his forehead. ‘The tip of the iceberg.’

Valentina knows what he means. ‘Under interview, some of the old birds will start singing. They won’t want to spend the rest of their lives in prison and should give up a good number of the other members.’

Tom turns further towards her. ‘Down in the place where the lion killed Anna’s friend, we discovered a secret chamber, a columbarium.’

‘One of those old Roman resting places for the poor?’

He nods. ‘We found a stack of books in there, all marked with the number X. They’re being lifted out by your forensics people.’

She’s intrigued. ‘Do you know what they are?’

He thinks he does. ‘The one on top was the most recent one. It was like a cross between an address book and a diary. On the left were telephone numbers and email addresses. No names. On the right were descriptions of the rituals they’d performed with children and names and descriptions of the children. I saw several pages talking about new arrivals and the initiation ceremonies they had to endure.’

Valentina drops her head and feels sick.

Tom puts his hand on her shoulder and rubs it. ‘The books go back years, maybe even centuries. The Tenth Book has nothing to do with wisdom or prophecies; it’s a never-ending paedophile directory and diary, that’s all.’

Valentina looks up and her face is hardened by anger. ‘You’re wrong, Tom. Wrong because it contains the greatest knowledge of all: information on how to find these sick animals, and probably enough evidence to get convictions and send them to their own damned cells.’