Chapter 39
MARCO HAD AN extraordinary feeling of being surrounded by ... death. His soul was arriving in heaven. He had not imagined there would be so much pain in heaven.
Opening his eyes he could see Mary standing in a haze, beckoning for him to come forward to the foot of the cross. This was no vision: this was reality. Reality in a spiritual world. So this was what it was like to pass through death to eternal life.
Mary moved her hand slowly. In the morning light of heaven this experience made the troubles of life seem as nothing. Except for the pain.
"Marco," she called.
The vision ended as Laura raised her arm and slid heavily to the ground. "For God's sake, Marco, help me!"
As Marco became fully conscious, the pain in his neck seemed too intense to bear. By crawling he might be able to reach Laura. "Keep still. I'm coming over."
"There's something in my back, Marco. I think it's a knife."
He put a hand on Laura's jacket and withdrew it instantly as he touched the cold, broken metal. "Stay where you are."
"I've hit my head ... I can't get up."
"I'll get help."
"No, don't leave me. I'm scared of dying."
"Laura, you're not going to die." He reached out to touch the end of the knife again. The metal felt jagged. "I have to get help."
"It feels more comfortable now."
He knew that deep knife wounds often felt like minor injuries. He'd say nothing. Laura's life could be slipping away.
Reaching round to her back. Laura began to pull at her jacket. The blade came away in her hands.
"No, Laura, don't!"
"It wasn't in me. It was stuck in my coat."
The pain pounded through Marco's head. He had to act fast to save them both from another attack. The prospect of a deep wound was difficult to face. "Let me ... let me see."
The blade had broken just below the handle as it entered Laura's jacket. Her skin was bleeding but the wound looked shallow. The large swelling on her forehead was serious. "We've failed, Laura."
"Was it the skinhead?"
He tried to look around but the severe pain paralyzed his neck. This graveyard was certainly not heaven. "We know the zoticone is in Paris. He killed Riccardo."
Laura shouted in surprise. "Look, the relic is still there!"
He felt sick with pain as he tried to focus his eyes. "Father Josef said I had to destroy it rather than let the Nazis get it."
"If we could get in there to destroy it, we could just as easily take it with us." Laura let out a long groan. "My head is hurting badly."
"I'm calling an ambulance."
"We don't go near the authorities. They'll connect us with Riccardo. Get us back to Rome and then we can think what to do next."
Marco looked at the low iron railings surrounding a nearby grave and noticed that one of the short uprights appeared to be loose. "If we want the relic, you'll have to help me."
Laura stood up unsteadily, supporting herself on the high wall of the grave. Together they pulled the bar free and placed it between the grill and the wall. Marco put his weight against the end, using it as a lever. The grill came away after a few attempts. He smiled in spite of the pain. Laura was alive -- that was all that mattered. Laura was more important than the relic.
"I'm taking this. It might come in useful." He pushed the iron bar into his belt. It would provide some protection against the large neo-Nazi. He crawled forward to reach into the tomb, his fingers closing on the ancient object.
The exhilaration gave him the strength he needed. He gripped the cold metal and pulled the relic from its resting place. The head of Jesus Christ was back in the hands of the Church.
"I love you, Laura." He pulled the bronze head into the open. "I really do love you. I thought you were dead."
KARL SHOOK WITH anger as one of the gendarmes demanded some identity and then had the insolence to search him. The other gendarme held his handgun in a threatening manner, and the wire lanyard made it impossible to snatch.
The ivory handle of the Göring dagger caused a predictable reaction, but it was blood-free, and without the blade it was hardly evidence of being armed. Fortunately his Makarov automatic was deep in the Seine, dumped on his way to see the loathsome Zeta last night. His only hope of being allowed to go free was to act the innocent tourist and co-operate with these two clowns in uniform.
As he listened to the endless babbling in French, shrugging his shoulders to make them see he was unable to understand a word, he saw a movement amongst the graves. The two Italians had survived and were making their way cautiously to the entrance gates -- carrying his passport to recognition and fame.
He wanted to shout. He wanted the gendarmes to turn and make an arrest. Theft from a grave should be enough reason to detain them. The woman must have missed death by some miracle. There was no way she could walk far with a blade in her back. The man and the woman looked his way but stayed silent. For some reason they were afraid to call out for help. He watched them walk out of the cemetery with the relic.
Total Training told him to wait until the right opportunity came. These two bored gendarmes, looking for some excitement to brighten an early morning patrol, were not likely to give him the right opportunity.
JACQUES HAD TO admit that random questioning rarely produced results. Incidents like this did little to make the life of a gendarme interesting -- especially on a damp, drizzly morning. It was all very well for Alain; he would be out soon on a good pension.
Jacques felt he had received a rough deal from life. Always unlucky and never in the right place at the right time. Colleagues got special mention for their achievements. All he got was the early patrol -- and unshaven skinheads to question.
More than likely the German peasant had been sleeping rough amongst the graves. He certainly looked scruffy. Mercifully there wasn't a group of them to deal with. It was easy to show contempt for one kid on his own. In a gang, even with Alain to help, these skinhead troublemakers could be very difficult to handle.
They had no option but to let the youth go. He was alone and he'd not been making any sort of trouble in the cemetery.
"Allez vous en!"
AT THE GREEN gates, Karl saw the silver Alfa pulling away. If Sartini and the woman planned to drive straight back to Rome he could make a phone call and get the vehicle stopped on the autostrada by sympathizers in Italy. Phönix and his team would know how to call up the necessary help -- if he was brave enough to phone him.
Unarmed, and with nothing better than the old Frenchman's moped for transport, he could do no more than try to follow the Italians. It was already after nine, and Erich and the gang from Düsseldorf would soon be here in Paris at the Gare du Nord. They would just have to wait. He accelerated into the boulevard Clichy with the silver Alfa still in sight.
MARCO SAID IT was out of the question to drive the Alfa back to Rome with their injuries, and Laura readily agreed to the train. If they had any sense they'd be going straight for a medical check-up, but some chief of gendarmes, sympathetic to neo-Nazi aims, could already be tipped off that they had come to Paris with Riccardo. His men could be waiting for them to turn up at a Paris hospital. The zoticone had been talking to the gendarmes in the cemetery, and they had no idea what he had been saying. He could have been telling them about his plans, and if the neo-Nazi network was as extensive as Father Josef reckoned, anything was possible.
Marco still found it difficult to turn his head. "I think there's a large supermarket bag behind my seat. Put the relic in there."
"In a carrier bag?" Laura sounded incredulous.
He tried to smile. "We have to keep it out of sight on the train."
The agony in his neck persisted, making driving extremely painful. The courtesy of the Parisian drivers surprised him -- compared to the drivers in Rome at any rate. It was pleasant to drive with occasional rather than constant sounding of impatient horns.
He recalled that the Gare de Lyon was
the main station for the south. The Paris one-way traffic system seemed dreadful. Even with the street map in the back of Laura's European road atlas, finding the Gare de Lyon wasn't easy.
They left the Alfa in the open car park by the side of the station. Laura said it would need to be recovered within a few days, before the overstay fine became greater than the value of the car. He told her not to worry; it was TV Roma's problem. The huge clock on the tower outside the entrance said nine-forty.
Laura climbed slowly from the passenger seat. "I'm frightened, Marco. What do we do if the zoticone is already here?"
"Get me the iron bar from the back seat. It should be strong enough to break his skull."
Laura put her hand to her mouth. "You wouldn't?"
"I would -- if I had to." Laura's aversion to a bit of self defense was unexpected, considering the violence that had surrounded her in the past few days. "Just trust me. Anyway, the skinhead wouldn't dare do anything in front of hundreds of travelers."
At the ticket office a railway official said a train to Rome was leaving in just under an hour-and-a-half. There was no need to hurry.
Marco shook his head. They wanted to leave at once, he explained.
The official said a train was leaving shortly to the city of Lyon, and they could catch the Paris-Rome train from there later. Marco agreed. He sighed with relief as Laura's credit card was accepted, opening the way to Rome and safety. Men were renovating part of the entrance hall, and the way ahead was blocked off with red and white tape. For a moment he wondered if this was a trap, then realized that all the passengers were making a simple detour.
KARL BRAKED THE moped to a halt at the station entrance just in time to see the two Italians going inside. It was obvious the Priester and his girlfriend were hurrying back to Rome, with the relic in a supermarket carrier bag.
He would be able to carry out the killings on the train, but he would plan it with more care this time. It should be simple with all his experience. All he had to do was eliminate the opposition and recover the Nazi property. Destiny still held his hand.
While in the line for his railway ticket his thoughts were on his friends in the ADR who would be arriving at the Gare du Nord in less than an hour, expecting him to be there to meet them. He could forget meeting up with them and stay with the crazy couple. Phönix would surely appreciate this initiative.
"Cette carte, M'sieur!"
"Was ist los?"
The booking clerk held the card behind the glass partition, shaking his head with an exaggerated movement.
There was some sort of problem with the card. To his surprise the man slipped it back through the security glass. As Karl moved out of the line, the clerk was busy with the next customer. He laughed to himself. The card was still his, although from now on he could only use it for minor purchases where checks would not be made. Even so, getting the card back had to be providence, had to be a sign.
As he pushed through the crowd of travelers he could see the priest and the woman already on the platform, standing by a group of luggage trolleys and looking indecisive. Karl grinned. No need to get on the train at all. He moved in, regretting that he no longer had the knife or the gun.
The Italian woman saw him and screamed. He hesitated as the two ducked behind the high trolleys. Several people turned to watch, but no one followed.
Behind the trolleys he would be screened from prying eyes. He could deal with the pair quickly, with no witnesses. As he pushed his way through, the woman appeared from behind a pile of cases and stuck her foot out. He was too close to avoid her and they both fell heavily. The stupid bitch should have died in that cemetery.
Sartini threw the bag to the woman and began to lash out with a metal bar. As Karl rolled sideways to get to his feet, a hard blow crashed across his shoulders. He twisted away in pain. Then another strike as he tried to get up. Escape would soon be impossible. The Priester was so strong, a hit on the head could be fatal. The woman's shoulder bag was on the ground. He rolled over and grabbed it as he scrambled to his feet.
Two officials spotted him as he ran across the lines, and they blew their whistles.
FABIEN TURNED wearily to his colleague in the railway police. Something had happened amongst the luggage trolleys. It looked like a bag snatch. A Code Twelve. They would not pursue the hoodlum, le voyou, across the track. They had radios to communicate with Security Control. This way was effortless as well as safer.
Railway security was all a matter of following procedures. There were no prizes awarded for over-exertion. Fabien made his Code Twelve report and returned to the entrance hall to await instructions. Whatever had happened amongst the trolleys, the passengers seemed calm again now. The voyou with the bag was already out of sight. Control should be monitoring his whereabouts on closed circuit television.
Fabien lit a cigarette. It was someone else's problem now, and he was overdue for a smoke.
MARCO AND LAURA came out from behind the trolleys to find everyone staring across the track at the fleeing skinhead. No one seemed to notice them as they boarded the train to Lyon and found seats in an empty compartment. Marco looked at his watch. Unless the railway police delayed the train, they would be on their way in about ten minutes.
"You were fantastic, Marco. I didn't realize you had it in you."
The admiration in Laura's voice made him feel embarrassed. "I thought I was fighting a devil."
"You were, and it's not over yet." She looked anxiously out of the carriage window and began to tremble. "That devil can still get on the train. He'll kill me. I know he will."
"He won't dare come back. The railway police are watching out."
"He's got my purse."
Marco sank back in the seat, his neck too stiff to turn. "But we have the bronze head, and that's all that matters."
"My credit card was in my purse."
"We don't need it. We already got our tickets, and I've enough money for food."
Laura felt cautiously at her forehead. "The zoticone could use the card to get a train ticket."
"Here, don't touch that with your fingers. Use a tissue. Don't worry, it's got your photo on it. I can't believe he'd try to use a woman's credit card!"
KARL REACHED the main road and ran into a side street. Quickly he tipped the contents of the bag into a doorway. A small amount of money, a TV Roma pass, and a credit card with the woman's picture on the back. The money and the pass went into his pocket; the credit card and the rest of the junk went into the bin. It wouldn't do to be searched with all this rubbish on him.
He hurried back to the station. With Herr Kessel's card invalid, and with insufficient cash to buy a ticket, he would have to find another way to get on the train. At the station entrance he could see signs of increased security. Bag snatching should surely an everyday occurrence, but the railway police seemed to be taking this one seriously. Sartini had turned out to be a nasty surprise with the metal bar. He wasn't exactly the frightened pushover Herr Kessel said he'd be. The man had totally the wrong attitude for a priest.
After waiting for a few minutes he made his way round to the station entrance where he checked the timetable and his watch. The platform was empty. The train had already left. He cursed himself for acting like a frightened rabbit. Reluctantly he mounted the moped and rode down the station approach to the main road. Erich and his gang would need him soon at the Gare du Nord. Everything was going wrong. He had only slept for a short time in the doorway last night. He was not the Held of Achtzehn Deutschland Reinigung he had imagined himself to be. Perhaps Oberpriester? Even an ordinary Priester had somehow got the better of him.
If the stupid knife hadn't broken it would all be different.
"I'M GOING to get the head out of the bag and have a good look at it," said Marco, as the train pulled out of the Gare de Lyon.
He already had the bag open on his lap. The head was upside down, showing the hollow inside, black with age. A piece of paper had been pushed into the space. The metal felt
rough, almost jagged as he reached in and withdrew what seemed to be a piece of parchment.
"It's some sort of deed," he announced. "I think it's in Latin."
"I thought priests learned Latin," said Laura.
"I can't say I was exactly brilliant at it. Besides, the old fashioned script is a bit of a pain to read. I can see the name Donato Bramante. Good old Bramante, the vandal architect of Saint Peter's. It says he's..." The lettering was too elaborate to decipher with any certainty.
"Yes?"
"He's giving away a bronze sculpture to ... to an unnamed monastery. It's to be a gift." He looked at Laura in surprise. "I'm amazed Donato Bramante gave anything away. The man tried to sell most of the statues and relics from the old Basilica of Saint Peter's, and the rest ended up as hardcore for the new building. At least, that's what I've always heard. Il Ruinante they called him. No wonder. That man squandered so much of our Christian heritage. It was a case of out with the old and in with the new. This document will need an expert to look at it, but it seems to give provenance to our relic."
Laura was pulling impatiently at the bag. "Get the thing out so we can see it."
A woman sat down heavily in the seat opposite, followed by a breathless man carrying a large suitcase. Marco carefully pulled the top of the bag closed. The head was covered in too much white plaster for him to see any detail on the face. A hasty attempt to remove it could wreck the surface underneath. He closed his eyes and the pain felt worse than ever. He hoped they'd still be awake when they had to change trains at Lyon. Once they got to Rome he could take the relic to Father Josef for expert attention. It would be interesting to hear what Amendola had to say when he read the document.
THE NOISY GROUP arriving at the Gare du Nord made Karl feel excited, even optimistic, in spite of severe bruising on his shoulders from the attack by Sartini with the iron bar. When Erich and the gang heard what had happened, they clearly saw him in a new light and were ready to take orders. There was no reason why he should feel shame for his past failures. He smiled. Destiny again. He certainly was not about to tell how he had let the prize be carried away. He could manipulate the truth. Manipulation of the truth was part of propaganda. His instructor was strong on the value of propaganda.
"We're taking the next train to Rome," he shouted, receiving a great thrill from giving orders in German -- and knowing that for once he would be understood. And obeyed. "Has anyone got enough money to buy me a ticket?"
JUST AFTER MIDNIGHT, Marco and Laura alighted sleepily from the train at the Termini in Rome, to find Monsignor Giorgio and three armed carabinieri waiting for them on the platform. Marco guessed they had traced the use of Laura's card to buy train tickets to Rome.