Margot looked up from the newspaper as if she’d heard the word teleological.
“The fall of Troy,” Woody said. “It’s all in a day’s work. It’s not the big stories that matter; it’s the small ones: Hektor’s love for his wife, Odysseus’s wanting to hold his mother in his arms. Homer’s so clear-headed,” Woody said, “compared to Dante. Look at Odysseus in the underworld. Odysseus’s old comrades—Agamemnon, Achilles, Aias—have learned nothing. Their deaths have canceled out the meaning of their lives. They’re like the sinners in the Inferno. But Odysseus sees clearly.”
“What does he see? What keeps death from canceling out the meaning of his life?”
Woody folded the book around his thumb. “I’m not sure,” he said. “Whatever it is, I can almost see it myself, out of the corner of my eye, but I can’t focus on it directly.”
At the office of the association, on Via Polese, Margot chatted with the secretary while Woody met with the president and vice president.
“You don’t have to tiptoe,” the secretary said. “This isn’t a funeral home.”
Margot laughed.
“You should have seen Woody when he first came here,” she went on. “So shy and timid. But only for a little while. We’re going to miss him.”
“I’m going to miss him too,” Margot said.
Margot had always found Bologna dark and gloomy. She was a Fiorentina and thought that ragù Bolognese was overrated. But walking under the porticoes with Woody, and seeing through Woody’s eyes, Bologna appeared to her as a real city, not a tourist destination. A university town. That’s the way Woody thought of it. But the tour Woody gave her was personal rather than educational: the office of the association; Piazza Maggiore, where the families of the victims assembled every year on the anniversary of the bombing for their march to the station; Santa Maria della Vita, where his wife had had a nervous breakdown or had seen an angel, depending on your point of view; and the Osteria del Sole, where they stopped for a glass of wine, and Woody laid out, for the first time, his plan for kidnapping the dog.
Rinaldo’s family lived on Via della Capponcina, which started in the little piazza in Settignano and ended at Via di Rocca Tedalda at the bottom of the hill. Woody sketched a rough map on a paper napkin. His plan was to come up to the villa from the back, through an olive grove and then a maze of narrow alleys that serviced the villas that lined the main road, and use a bolt cutter to cut through the bars of the fence. He’d arrange for a driver to wait for them—for him and Biscotti—at the gas station across from the bus stop on Via di Rocca Tedalda.
The whole thing made Margot nervous, and she drank more than her share of the bottle of Prosecco that Woody had ordered. She wanted something to eat, but there was no food in the osteria, one of the oldest in Italy. Only wine. When the osteria got too busy, Woody told her, the old men who ran the place threw everyone out and played cards.
Margot felt a little dizzy when they got back out into the sunlight. They walked to the morgue on Via Irnerio and went inside. Margot held back, but Woody pushed through a door that said ABSOLUTELY NO ADMITTANCE and was greeted warmly by a man in green scrubs. There was a body of a woman on an autopsy table. This was where Woody had said good-bye to his daughter. Margot braced herself, expecting him to burst into tears, but he accepted a cup of coffee, an espresso brewed on an alcohol burner, and chatted with the doctor. From the morgue they walked to Gabriella’s osteria, just inside Porta San Mammolo, where they were going to eat lunch.
Margot had always thought of Woody as the opposite of Bruno Bruni, and yet like Bruni, Woody had left a trail of lovely women behind him. Margot expected to dislike these women, but instead had found in them potential friends: Allison Mirsadiqi, whom she’d met in Rome, who had invited her to come back to Rome for a special viewing of the restoration work on the Sistine ceiling, which was nearing completion; and Allison’s daughter, Turi, who as a student had gotten Woody kicked out of St. Clair; and now Gabriella. She was a stunning woman. Margot didn’t expect her to be friendly, didn’t expect such warmth. She sat down next to Margot while Woody was in the men’s room and wanted to know how Woody was doing. It was too bad he was going back to the States. But Gabriella told Margot that he was always homesick, even when he was happy. Like Odysseus. And Margot understood that Gabriella could be a real friend, like Francesca, and put her hand on Gabriella’s. Gabriella served them a wonderful lunch—her own ragù Bolognese, and filets in a sauce made of garlic and balsamico. Afterward Margot asked Woody, “How could you let go of such a splendid woman?”
“Gabriella?”
“Of course, Gabriella.”
“I was thinking of you,” he said.
On their way back to the station, they went out of their way so that Woody could point out the apartment that Cookie had rented on the day before she was killed, in Via Zamboni, the main artery of the university. But it wasn’t until they got back to the station and entered the second-class waiting room and saw Cookie’s name on the lapide above the crater where the bomb had been placed—Carolyn Clifford Woodhull—that Woody let himself go. He sat in front of the stone with his head in his hands, and Margot sat next to him. She had her own loss to deal with, but there was no time for that now. The loudspeaker was announcing that the Adria Express from Basel was arriving on binario uno on its way to Florence and Rome. This was the train Cookie had been waiting for when the bomb went off.
On the day before the dognapping, Woody stayed in Margot’s studio while she examined the Galileo codex that she’d bid on earlier. He was restless and kept checking his tickets. He had two: one from Leonardo da Vinci Airport to Chicago’s O’Hare, to throw off would-be pursuers, and the one he was actually going to use: from Ciampino to New York. He was worried about the bolt cutters he’d bought: would they be strong enough to cut through the wrought-iron fence? What if the dog didn’t want to come with him? But Margot was glad he was there to occupy Sterling Pears, a historian from Harvard who had become the world’s foremost authority on the Galileo manuscripts.
What had happened was that the inexperienced independent conservator who’d submitted the lowest bid to the Biblioteca Nazionale, and had been awarded the contract for the Galileo codex, had severely damaged some of the badly cockled pages by trying to flatten the codex in a nipping press before disassembling it. It was Pears—the conduit for funds from the Smithsonian and National Science Foundation in the U.S.— who intervened and arranged for the codex to be transferred to Margot’s studio. He’d brought it himself, actually, in a taxi, accompanied by an armed guard from the Biblioteca Nazionale.
All the paperwork had been done, all the photo documentation, and Pears was understandably impatient for Margot to get started. But he’d arrived at the studio at an inconvenient time, and Margot, who had known Pears for years, refused to be hurried. She didn’t want Pears handling the damaged manuscript, so she sent him out with Woody to have a caffè.
Woody and Pears were both academics, but their specialties didn’t overlap, so there was no rivalry between them, and Woody was happy to share Pears’s enthusiasm for the codex as they crossed the Ponte Santa Trinità.
“It would have belonged to Giovanni Battista Clemente de’ Nelli at that time,” Pears explained. “He bought as many holographs as he could for his biography, and it’s a good thing he did. That’s the core of the present Collezione Galileiana. The collection could have been lost then, or again after his death, when his sons tried to sell the manuscripts, and then again in the flood. Another five inches and it would all have been lost. You can’t imagine what a disaster that would have been. Without it we’d never understand the transition from Aristotelian to classical physics. It’s never been translated, never even been adequately published.
“I’m talking about the notes that begin in 1589 when Galileo was at the University of Pisa and go right up to the time he was arrested by the Inquisition at Arcetri. He’d given the manuscript to Aggiunti because he was afraid of the Inquisition, a
nd when it disappeared he felt ‘un dolore e afflizione intolerabile.’ Think of it: ‘an unbearable sorrow and affliction.’
“There are some letters, too, bound in at the end of the notes. From his daughter. He put her in a convent, you know. He could see the convent from Arcetri.”
Through the window of the bar where they were sitting they could see Margot’s window in the palazzo on the other side of the river. Woody could picture her standing at her big workbench, but in the window all he could see was the reflection of a few thin clouds in the pale gray sky.
“You know,” Pears said, “her bid for the codex job was over seven million lire, and now she wants another two million to repair the damage done by the idiot on Via Faentina. His bid was only four million, but if I hadn’t kept my eye on him he could have ruined the whole thing, all the corners would have been lost.”
“But it’s worth it, right? The extra money?”
“Oh yes,” Pears said. “Absolutely. But tell me something— you’re leaving us. Margot says you’re interested in buying a place in the country.”
Woody nodded. “It’s not far from my old home. Not far from the cemetery where my daughter’s buried.”
“The one who was killed in the strage? I’m terribly sorry. What a blow. Animae dimidium meae.”
Woody nodded.
“Like one of these Medici villas,” Pears said. “Have you been out to Poggio a Caiano?”
“More like Horace’s villa rustica,” Woody said.
“Of course,” Pears said, rattling off the Latin: “on me undeceitful fate has bestowed a small country estate, and the slight inspiration of the Grecian muse, and a contempt for the malignity of the vulgar.”
“I haven’t closed yet,” Woody said, “but they’ve accepted my offer.”
“Tristis eris si solus eris,” Pears said. “You will be sad if you are alone. I couldn’t take it, living out in the country.”
“Minus solum, cum quam solus esset. I am never less alone than when alone.”
The two men traded more quotations and drank more espresso. Pears left to go back to the Biblioteca Nazionale, where he was preparing a new edition of his biography of Galileo. Woody went back to Margot’s studio.
Margot had finished her final assessment and wanted to show off the codex.
“I thought you didn’t want us pawing through it,” Woody said.
“I don’t want Pears pawing through it. He’s a great scholar, and he’s single-handedly saved a lot of the manuscript from being completely ruined. That’s why he had the clout to get the codex away from Balentari. Balentari’s a nice man, but he was out of his depth here. He had no business bidding on this job.”
“But Pears?”
“He dog-ears everything he touches.”
“I want to see the letters from Galileo’s daughter,” Woody said. “Are they in Latin or Italian?”
“I’m not sure,” Margot said. She opened the codex to one of the later gatherings. The pages were smaller. They looked at the first letter, which was in Italian:
As I have no cell of my own to sleep in, Sister Diamanta kindly allows me to share hers, depriving herself of the company of her own sister for my sake. But the room is so bitterly cold that with my head so infected, I do not know how I shall remain well, unless you can help me by lending me a set of those white bed-hangings which you will not want now. I would be glad to know if you can do me this service. Moreover, I beg you to be so kind as to send me that book of yours which has just been published, so that I may read it, for I have a great desire to see it.
Woody was as upset by the letter as if it had come from Cookie, come from beyond the grave.
Woody had shipped most of his stuff airfreight. His papers were in order. The false papers that matched Biscotti’s tattoo were in order, and Woody had various certificates from the vet who’d treated her after she’d been dragged behind Rinaldo’s car. The arrangements at Fiumicino airport were in order. The driver had picked up Woody’s big suitcase at the taxi stand in Santa Croce. Woody had a sack of food and a bottle of water for the dog. He was too keyed up to understand what Margot was saying. He kept fiddling with the bolt cutter, which was wrapped in a blanket. What she was saying was, “I’m going with you. To Settignano.”
“It’s too dangerous,” he said, when she finally made him understand. “You could get in trouble. What would happen to your career if you got arrested for kidnapping a dog?” Margot agreed. It was impossible to imagine such a thing. But she remembered her moment of cowardice on the night Woody rescued the dog from Rinaldo, and she was determined to expunge that moment.
“What about you?” she asked.
“I’m an American, they’d just throw me out of the country. It’d be worse for you. You’ve got dual citizenship. You’d have to come home.”
Woody engaged a taxi. Margot got in too. They drove to an Agip station on Via di Rocca Tedalda, at the bottom of Via della Capponcina. They were early. The driver wouldn’t be there till it was dark. They wanted coffee, and there was a bar just down the street, but they didn’t want to be seen.
“They’re sure to figure out who did it,” Margot said.
Woody put his arm around her. “But I’ll be long gone.”
At eight o’clock the car arrived, a dark Alfa Romeo sedan. Margot sat in the back of the car while Woody went over things with the driver. At nine o’clock he and Margot crossed the railroad tracks and then left the road. There wasn’t much of a moon but it wasn’t totally dark.
“Did you bring a flashlight?” Margot asked.
“I don’t need one.”
Margot had to resist the impulse to run away. “What if the police . . . ? What if . . . ? What are you going to do with a dog when you get home?”
“You don’t have to do anything with a dog. It’s just a dog.”
Their footsteps made no sound on the soft ground. The stone walls along the road were topped with broken glass. They walked up the slope through an open field, past a hunter’s blind, and then through an olive grove. At the upper end of the grove they came to a narrow alley, just wide enough for a car, that led to the back gate. There was a surveillance camera here, just as there was at the front gate.
They waited. The dog didn’t come. Woody unwrapped his bolt cutters.
“My God, Woody, what are you going to do? You said the dog came here every night.”
“I’m going to cut through this bar next to the gate.” The bar was thick, but the bolt cutter was at least four feet long. The bar rang like a church bell when Woody cut through it.
“Can you bend it out now?”
Woody shook his head. “I have to cut through at the bottom too. It’s too heavy to bend. I want to wait a little while. I didn’t think it would make so much noise.”
“Where’s the dog?”
“Margot, I don’t know. The dog has been here every night.”
Ten minutes later he made another cut. Another ringing sound. But no dog.
“She may be chained up.”
“Why would she be chained up? They’ve got this fence.”
“I don’t know.”
“What are you going to do?” she said again.
“Don’t panic, Margot. I’m going to look for her.”
“Woody, you can’t. It’s too dangerous. Please.”
But Woody was already squeezing through the gap he’d made in the fence.
It was darker now. A cloud had covered the little bit of moon. Margot couldn’t see the house from here. Just the surveillance camera. A little glass window. She had an impulse to ring the bell and look in the little window, but she stayed hunched down.
What to do? How long could she wait in the dark? She was afraid Woody would break into the house. She listened. A car went by on Via della Capponcina. Then another car. And then she heard someone walking, someone with a stick. Someone coming down the alley from the town. She hid herself behind the laurel hedge. It was an old man. He opened the gate with a key and went
inside. He was too old to be Rinaldo’s father. He must be the grandfather.
Margot imagined God watching her. What circle of hell would He put her in? There was no circle for kidnappers or dognappers. Maybe stupidity. Was stupidity a sin? No circle for the stupid. But maybe there should be.
And then she heard the dog, heard someone talking to the dog. Not Woody, but the old man: “Fai pipì, Cicci, fai pipì.”
Woody, crouched down behind some bushes, heard the old man too: “Cicci, Cicci. Fai pipì.” He heard the dog too. “Buona ragazza,” the old man said. Woody thought the dog was going to go back in the house, but she’d caught his scent on her way and came to him. The old man kept calling her. “Cicci, Cicci.” Woody talked to her while the old man called. He could have grabbed her collar, but he didn’t. He just talked to her: “Biscotti,” he whispered, “you can stay here, or you can come with me, it’s up to you.” The dog stayed with him, and he heard a voice from inside telling the old man to leave the dog out. Then the shutting of the door.
Woody came back with Biscotti. “I think they forgot to let the dog out,” he said. “The old man let the dog out, but then he wanted her to come back in.”
“He sounded nice.”
Woody nodded. “He did, didn’t he?”
Down the alley they went, through the olive grove, past the hunter’s blind in the field, back onto the road. Crossing the tracks to the Alfa Romeo in the Agip station.
Woody opened the door and the dog jumped into the back.
“You could come with me,” Woody said.
“To Rome?”
“Home. To America. I’ve got a credit card for the plane.”
“This isn’t a romantic comedy, Woody. This is real life. I have a job, responsibilities, an apartment, a grown-up life. Besides, I don’t have my passport.”
“Right right right. I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”