The Absolution (14 page)

“What's it used for now?”

“Not a lot. The base was turned into a fancy hotel. The rest of the island's just a bird sanctuary. Though I did hear they use it for military exercises from time to time.”

“What kind of exercises?”

“Who knows. It's pretty remote. Whatever they do up there, there wouldn't be anyone else around to see it.”

She thought. “Any climbing?”

“Some. Bouldering on sea cliffs, mostly. But what with the contamination and everything, why would you want to go there?”

She flashed him a smile. “I like birds, I guess.”

ONCE AGAIN VENICE
had dawned hot and humid. Kat had to share the
vaporetto
from the train station at Santa Lucia with a mass of tourists, who shuffled slowly around the deck at each stop like penguins instead of going down inside the boat to make room. Nor was her mood improved by the article she found on page four of
Il Gazzettino
, headed: “Night Swimmer Found Dead on Beach”. According to the unnamed reporter, a body “wearing goggles and partially undressed” had been found on the beach at the Lido. It was thought, the article went on to say, that the dead man might have decided to sleep outside in the hot weather, and fallen victim to muggers. Even before she saw the quote from Avvocato Marcello, reassuring tourists that Venice was generally a very safe place to visit “so long as sensible precautions are taken to avoid areas with a large itinerant population”, Kat had discerned the prosecutor's fluttering hand, airily rewriting history.

On the next page, another article caught her eye.

NAPOLEON'S IMPERIAL SUITE REOPENS
AFTER €3M REFURBISHMENT

After a century of neglect, the Imperial Apartments of the Royal Palace, commissioned by the Emperor Bonaparte after
the fall of the Venetian Republic, reopen this week following a €3m refurbishment.

The refurbishment of the rooms overlooking Piazza San Marco marks the completion of an ambitious programme of restoration for the Royal Palace. The project's sponsors, who include the Tignelli fashion brand, will mark the occasion with a spectacular gala in the Imperial Ballroom on Monday night.

At Campo San Zaccaria, the operations room so efficiently set up by Bagnasco had just as efficiently been dismantled, the manpower already allocated to other investigations. Kat went and found Colonel Piola, still dealing with the paperwork from their previous case.

“How's it going?” she asked.

He grimaced and stretched, glad to have the chance to lay down his files for a few minutes. “The usual. The lawyer representing the glassblowing family has come up with the ingenious explanation that they made the glass themselves and shipped it to China, before realising they couldn't sell it there and returning it to Murano. A failed business venture, in other words, not an attempt to fleece Venice's tourists. Oh, and the prosecution's own expert says the Chinese fakes are probably better quality than the stuff the family was knocking out in any case. I wouldn't be surprised if they drop the whole thing. You?”

She hesitated. The room was filled with Carabinieri officers tapping at their computers. “Can we do this somewhere else?”

They went to a small bar on Fondamenta de l'Osmarin. As well as coffee, Aldo ordered a
cornetto
, a croissant dusted with icing sugar. He was putting on a little weight, she noticed. She wondered if he was looking after himself now he and his wife had separated. She didn't ask. Their personal lives were off limits to each other now.

“This is about your Freemasonry case, I take it,” he said, when they'd found a quiet corner.

“That's the problem – it's not my case any more, at least not officially.” She told him about Grimaldo's intervention, the list Malli found on Cassandre's computer, and the Masonic cards in his desk.

“May I see?”

She took out one of the cards and passed it to him. “I've seen this symbol before,” he said immediately.

“Where?”

“You recall that Romani case I dealt with a few years ago?” She nodded. It had been not long after she'd joined the Carabinieri. There had been a national panic about the number of gypsies coming into Italy, with the press full of scare stories about pickpockets and white babies being stolen to order. “The city council in their wisdom decided to put all the Romani in one place, the
campo nomadi
on Via Vallenari. Some wild rumour started doing the rounds, something about an Italian schoolgirl being dragged there against her will . . . We never found out who started it. But the upshot was that a mob of vigilantes went down to the camp, cut off the power, then set fire to the Romani caravans.” He shook his head. “Three gypsies died, including a bedridden old lady whose son was on a night shift at a local factory. No one was ever arrested. But I remember seeing that symbol sprayed on one of the burnt-out caravans.”

“That's horrible.”

“And that's not all. It cropped up again when some gay tourists were beaten up in Mestre a couple of years ago. Someone had sprayed it on a wall, along with the words ‘
Morte ai culatoni
'. Death to queers.”

“Father Calergi told me it was banned because it was being
used by right-wing extremists. But he said it was also the sign of an ancient Venetian confraternity.”

“Then perhaps that's why they chose it,” he suggested. “Because of the overlap. Has it occurred to you that your Masons may not be Freemasons at all, at least not primarily – that their lodge may have been formed for some specific criminal purpose, and they're simply using the rituals and structure of Freemasonry to disguise it? After all, what better cover for an illegal conspiracy than an organisation which already exists in the shadows, one where absolute loyalty to your fellow members is a given?”

It made sense, she realised. Like a partygoer at Carnevale, Cassandre had stepped onto the stage wearing a mask, and they had all obligingly looked at the mask, not the person. Even those like General Saito, who wanted this whole business hushed up because it might bring Freemasonry into disrepute, were thinking about the trappings rather than the crime.

“Father Calergi hinted at much the same thing,” she said, remembering. “He said that even today, no one really knew what P2's political agenda had been.”

“What are Count Tignelli's political leanings?”

“Also to the right, I think. He hero-worships Napoleon, of all people. Called him the ‘liberator of Venice'. He's even sponsored the refurbishment of Napoleon's Imperial Apartments.”

“Perhaps he sees himself as Napoleon's political heir.”

She nodded thoughtfully. “He almost said as much, actually – that Venice today is mired in corruption and vice, just as it was in the last days of the Republic. He suggested that I, as a Carabinieri officer, would surely agree with that.”

“I'm sure many of our colleagues would.” Piola dusted his lips with a paper napkin and gestured to Viliberto, the owner,
for the bill. As usual, Viliberto waved the suggestion away, indicating that it was on the house; and as usual Piola pulled out a five-euro note and dropped it on the counter – probably more, Kat reflected, than the bill would have been in the first place. Piola's refusal to accept kickbacks, however small, was one of the things that had made her fall for him, back when they did their first investigation together.

“I'll ask around,” she said. “Someone will know something.” Venice might be one of the world's most popular holiday destinations, but it was also a village. Take away the tourists and you were left with just sixty thousand residents, many of whose families had been there for generations. She might not have come across Tignelli before, but he would almost certainly be known to some of her contacts.

“I take it you won't be involving General Saito's niece in these unofficial investigations?”

She stared at him. “Who?”

“Lieutenant Bagnasco. Saito's niece.” He laughed at her horrified expression. “Didn't you know? You should feel honoured – he could have assigned her to any investigation, but he chose yours.”

“He wanted to keep an eye on me,” Kat said slowly. “Even if he's not involved in the black lodge himself, he doesn't want any scandal that might discredit the Carabinieri.”

“Or perhaps he wanted to keep an eye on you because it looked like being a big case, and you're still relatively inexperienced,” Piola said mildly. “Besides, Bagnasco has the makings of a very good officer.”

“You know her?” Kat said. It was her turn to be surprised: Bagnasco had said she'd only been in Venice a few weeks.

Piola nodded. “She's asked me if I'll mentor her. We've had a few chats, that's all.”

“Chats? Over dinner, I suppose?”

“Over dinner, yes. Why not?”

Because she's using you
, Kat thought sadly.
Because she knows you're lonely, and she's seen an opportunity to advance herself.
Bagnasco would never make the mistake she had, of sleeping with a more senior officer, but she might well let that officer think she wanted to.

She saw from the look Piola gave her that he thought she was jealous; saw, too, that he found the idea rather pleasing. “I'm not jealous,” she said angrily. “I just think she's trying to run before she can walk.”

“Well,” he said, still amused, “you'd know all about that.”

As they left the bar she saw how he glanced automatically at his reflection in the mirror behind the counter. His hair was greying at the sides, and his face had a lived-in, crumpled quality that was part of its charm. There was no doubt: he was still a very good-looking man. And not just physically, either. It occurred to her, not for the first time, that he wore his principles proudly, like one of his Brioni suits; as if he knew how attractive they made him.

Back at Campo San Zaccaria, she went up to Malli's attic. The usually ebullient technician gave her a sombre look and scooted his chair over to a table piled high with evidence bags. “Here,” he said, handing one to her. “I have a feeling I should never have looked at that.”

“I was hoping I could persuade you to look some more.”

He shook his head. “No, you can't, and besides, there's nothing much there.”

“Nothing much?” she echoed. “So you did find something else besides that list?”

He hesitated, then rummaged around on another desk until
he found a printout. “He'd deleted his search history as well. But what people don't realise is that a deleted browsing history isn't erased – it's stored in a system file called
index.dat
. Getting it back can be as simple as doing a System Restore.”

“Have you taken a copy of this?” she asked, skimming the list quickly.

He shook his head. “And if you've got any sense, you'll put it straight in the shredder.”

“You're right,” she said. “That's exactly what I should do.”

He nodded, relieved, and she left him.

But that doesn't mean I will.

HOLLY SMILED AT
the young woman behind Reception. “Hi, I have a reservation. Name of Boland?”

“Of course,” the woman said, with the mechanical friendliness of her profession. She checked her computer. “One night, yes?”

To anyone familiar with post-war US colonial architecture, the hotel on the tiny island of La Maddalena could only have been a former military base. The building was long, low and sleek, made mostly of glass and girders, and the floors were polished parquet. Whoever had supervised the conversion into a hotel had spared no expense, trying to soften the vast interior with dramatic chandeliers and murals, but to Holly the result felt like a cross between an airport terminal and a very tasteless nightclub.

Not that the hotel's current clientele would mind much, she suspected. Her journey from Sardinia had been an arduous one, involving a long drive, two ferries and a taxi. But the island's marina was full of sleek superyachts, many with Russian names painted on their bows. And if the lack of conventional access wasn't enough of a deterrent for ordinary mortals, the hotel's astronomic prices would have been. She'd been startled to discover that the cheapest room cost more than three hundred euros a night.

While the clerk checked her in, she turned and watched the lobby. A group of half a dozen men were strolling out of the main doors, dressed in the ubiquitous local uniform of Ralph Lauren polo shirts with sunglasses tucked into the neck, Bermuda shorts and sandals. All were muscular, with military crew-cuts. She recognised them: the soldiers from the airport. They must be remarkably well paid, if they could afford to vacation here.

Turning back to the receptionist, she said idly, “Is there a golf course here?”

The young woman looked apologetic. “I'm afraid the ground's too rocky. But we can offer you some beautiful snorkelling.”

At Alghero the men had been wheeling golf bags. Not very smart, to use a golf trip as cover when your destination didn't even have a course.

Abruptly leaving the desk, she followed the men outside. They were boarding one of the yachts, a shiny forty-footer bristling with antennae; expensive-looking even in that company. As soon as they were on board, it began moving towards the marina exit. Beyond the sea wall, the helmsman opened the throttle, and the yacht surged in a graceful arc to the south, its wash bubbling and sparkling in the sunlight.

She went back to the desk. “Look after my case, will you?” she said to the startled receptionist as she grabbed her backpack. “I'll go up to the room later.”

Slinging the pack over her shoulders as she ran, she cut across the headland at a fast jog. It was almost twenty minutes before she came to a chain-link fence similar to the one at Capo Marrargiu. But where that one had been rusted through, this was clean and well maintained. It bore the same dire warnings against trespassing in a military zone.

She tracked parallel to it and found a place where animals had burrowed beneath the wire. As she wriggled underneath she caught the sound of gunfire. A burst of around thirty shots, then silence, followed by more firing. Range practice, it sounded like. But as to who would need to come to a place as remote as this for range practice, she had no idea.

She could see the yacht now, moored a little way out to sea, but the firing was coming from the beach, forty feet below her. Crouching down, she took her equipment out of her backpack: a chalk bag, which she fastened round her waist, and her bouldering shoes, tightly fitting slippers of thin rubber with a flat, flexible sole and no tread. The toe of each shoe had a stubby rubber point, for wedging into crevices. They hurt like hell to walk in, but on rocks they made her feel like Spiderwoman.

She crawled towards the edge of the cliff and looked over. There were, she now saw, a total of three yachts moored offshore, and half a dozen rigid inflatables pulled up on the beach. Around forty men were being drilled in groups – some target-shooting, some engaged in unarmed combat, some crouched round an instructor who was demonstrating how to use a rocket launcher. No one was in uniform, but she noted that the soldiers she'd seen at the airport seemed to be the ones doing the instructing.

She edged back, then re-approached the cliff fifty yards to the left, where a bend would mask her from view. Turning onto her stomach, she wriggled her feet down the rock face until she found her first foothold.

In bouldering – climbing without ropes – going down required greater concentration than going up. Climbing up, her eyes and the handhold she was searching for would be in reasonably close proximity. Descending meant she was
climbing blind, with gravity trying to make her go faster and further than she could safely control. She took it slowly, reaching into her bag frequently for chalk.

She was about twenty feet into her descent when she heard, above her, the unmistakable squawk of a walkie-talkie. The end of a mountaineering rope skittered down the cliff face to her left, swiftly followed by another to her right.

Shit
.

Whoever had been watching her before, at the derelict Gladio base, must have followed her here. She thought she'd been careful, but evidently not careful enough.

Quickly she thought over her cover story. There was nothing incriminating on her, and back at the hotel she had receipts and maps to prove that she was only what she said she was – a US Army officer who preferred her own company when climbing.

She clung to the rock face, conserving her strength, as two men dropped down towards her, one on either side. “Good spot, right?” she asked in Italian, trying to adopt the cheery tone of someone who didn't know she was trespassing.

“Sure,” the man on her right said, equally cheerily, swinging something at her.

Just in time she saw that it was a small iron crowbar, the curve ending in a sharp claw. “Hey!” she shouted, pulling back.

The man grunted and swung again, all pretence at friendliness abandoned.

The climber on her left, meanwhile, was fiddling with his line, trying to swing close enough to grab her. It looked like they were simply going to throw her off the cliff. She glanced down. Below her were rocks. If they succeeded, she'd be messed up at best. At worst, she'd be dead.

Instinctively, she went upwards. Men on ropes would always have the advantage going down, but up was a straight race, and she was unencumbered by the gear they carried. The man on her left lunged and succeeded in grabbing her foot as she passed. She went the only way she now could, towards him, jumping into his rope and kicking down at his head. But he was stronger than she was. He tugged and grabbed again, getting a better grip on her ankle.

Looking up, she saw the crampon he was clipped to, just above her head.

It was him or her, and she chose him. Grabbing the crampon's release mechanism, she yanked it from the cliff, then gave one last kick. He fell with a surprised grunt, hitting the rocks below with a sickening thud.

The other man, meanwhile, was using the curved end of the crowbar as a hook, trying to pull himself over to her. She grabbed the claw and twisted. He cursed, surprised, as it slipped from his grasp.

Scurrying up to his belaying point, she levered the flat end of the crowbar into the crampon. It came out easily, and he fell after his colleague, his body thumping off two ledges on the way down. She paused just long enough to see that he was moving, then resumed climbing until she reached the top.

Cautiously, she raised her head over the edge. But there was no one there, just a white Land Rover parked twenty yards off. She ran to it and jumped in, her heart pounding with adrenalin. The keys were still in the ignition. Without pausing to look back, she gunned it back to the hotel to pick up her bags. The most important thing right now was to get off the island before anyone else tried to kill her. Working out who it had been, and why, would have to wait until later.