Amy and Dan shared an instant of perfect understanding. This book and its epilogue were what Vesper One had been after all along — his real reason for compelling them to steal the Caravaggio! The “Medusa” was the map, the back of the shield was the location, and the manuscript was the treasure! Something in that lost epilogue was so valuable to the Vespers that it justified kidnapping and who knew what else.
At that moment, Jake’s distant call echoed through the tunnels. “Att — where are you?”
“I’m with Amy and Dan!” the boy genius shouted back. “And you’ll never believe what we found!”
“You will return to the legal part of the tunnel!” ordered an authoritative voice, deeper, and with an Italian accent. “At once!”
Atticus stood up, still cradling the Marco Polo manuscript. “I almost hate to give it up. I know it belongs in a museum, but —”
To his utter astonishment, Dan snatched the leatherbound volume right out of his arms.
The boy’s smile disappeared as he took in the seriousness and intensity of Dan’s expression. “You can’t keep it.”
“You were going to.”
“I was only kidding,” Atticus told him. “It’s a cultural treasure. It belongs to the world.”
Protecting the manuscript with crossed arms, Dan made no reply.
Amy set the Da Vinci shield back in its space in the floor and did her best to kick the stone slab into place over it. “We should go,” she urged gently.
Dan nodded, but his eyes were filled with regret over the distress he was causing his buddy.
Atticus gawked in escalating dismay. His IQ may have been off the charts, but he could not quite wrap his mind around the fact that Dan was really going to take the manuscript.
“I thought we were friends,” he whispered finally.
“We are friends.”
The young prodigy shook his head sadly. “I’d never be friends with someone who would steal something like this.”
Amy could almost feel the hot shame radiating from her brother. He’s made so few friends since the clue hunt. The admiration of this half-pint Mr. Know-It-All means a lot to him. And now it’s gone.
She sympathized — honestly she did. But nothing took priority over doing what needed to be done.
“Dan —” she prompted.
They heard the slap-slap-slap of rushing feet in the tunnel — Jake and the guard, growing closer.
“I’m sorry, Atticus —” Dan managed.
He turned and ran, the Marco Polo manuscript tucked in the crook of his arm. Behind him, Atticus’s high-pitched voice echoed through the tunnels. “Jake! Jake!” He seemed to be screaming and sobbing at the same time.
Amy was at Dan’s side, holding the flashlight key chain in front of her like a headlamp. “You don’t think he’s upset enough to get himself lost down here?”
“Don’t worry, the guard will find him,” Dan panted. “Come on, we’ve got to beat them back to the Colosseum!”
They could see electric light in the distance — the “legal” part of the tunnel system.
And then a large uniformed man stepped out into their path.
Dan put on the brakes so suddenly that Amy very nearly plowed into him from behind.
“Halt!” ordered the guard.
The Cahills wheeled on a dime and started in the opposite direction. The Clue hunt had honed their escape instinct into a fine art, and the talent served them well here. They sprinted through the passages, turning left and right, weaving an intricate trail through the maze of tunnels.
At last, Dan slowed. It was a mistake. Strong hands reached from a side passage, grasping him firmly under the arms. Dan struggled to get free, but the hold was too powerful.
“Guardia! Vieni aiuto!” shouted Jake Rosenbloom.
Atticus was reunited with his brother. His face was streaked with tears. The young genius was barely coherent. “Il Milione, Dan … Il Milione …”
Amy’s eyes were on Jake. “Let him go,” she said quietly.
“Why?” he demanded. “So you can plunder a World Heritage Site?”
“You have no idea what’s at stake.”
“Do you?” Jake retorted. “This is Marco Polo’s original manuscript. There’s an epilogue that’s never been seen before! By anybody! Who do you think you are?”
In a lightning motion, Amy’s foot came up, striking Jake in the side of the abdomen, just below the rib cage. He emitted a short gasp as all the air came out of him. His hold on Dan evaporated, and he hit the ground, dazed and winded.
The Cahills fled.
CHAPTER 22
Dan knew the instant they left the “Medusa map,” but he didn’t stop moving, navigating by the dim glow cast by Amy’s key chain light. Loose rubble hampered their progress, and they had to slow down. Here, a twisted or broken ankle would be more than a painful inconvenience. At best, they would be caught by the Italian police. At worst, they would be lost forever in this underground capillary of a dead empire.
Amy grabbed his wrist and the two came to a stop. “Listen,” she hissed.
Silence. No shouted threats, no pounding footsteps of pursuit, just their own anxious breathing.
“You think we gave them the slip?” Dan whispered.
“Maybe. Either that or they won’t enter the unexcavated part of the tunnels. Why should they? They’re assuming we have to come back to the Colosseum sooner or later. All they need to do is wait around and scoop us up.”
Dan was alarmed. “We do have to go back to the Colosseum sooner or later—don’t we?”
“The whole point of digging a tunnel,” she reasoned, “is to have a secret passage between point A and point B. There has to be another exit somewhere.”
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Dan’s voice rose sharply. “This is the Roman Empire — most of the point Bs crumbled to dust centuries ago! Who knows what’s there now? This tunnel could lead into the concrete foundation of an eleven-story parking garage!”
“It’s a chance we’ll have to take.” She pointed to the Marco Polo manuscript in his arms. “We need to figure out what the epilogue means. If we get arrested, the police will confiscate the book.”
“That’s the least of our problems,” Dan told her. “How’d you like to miss the ‘Medusa’ drop-off in Florence because we’re sitting in a jail cell in Rome?”
Amy gulped. In the end, it was all about the hostages. No effort could be spared, no corner cut, while there was still an opportunity to bring them home safe and sound. Well, more or less sound.
“What could be in a Marco Polo manuscript that has anything to do with the Vespers?” Dan wondered. “Marco Polo lived in the twelve and early thirteen hundreds — before there were Vespers and Cahills.”
“I’m not sure,” Amy admitted. “We’re assuming that Damien Vesper was interested in something new, like Gideon’s serum. But what if Vesper was mixed up in something old — dating back to Marco Polo’s time? Maybe even to the days of Pliny the Younger.”
At that moment, Amy’s flashlight key chain flickered, and the circle of illumination it cast grew dimmer.
Dan’s heart dropped. “Have you got spare batteries for that thing?”
She shook her head sadly. “It’s just a freebie they were giving out at the dry cleaners in Attleboro. I never thought I’d actually use it.”
The walls were growing closer together, until Dan’s narrow shoulders were passing just inches from the rock on both sides, and he had to duck his head in a few places. This was no gladiator’s tunnel; it would barely serve as a kindergartner’s tunnel. Where could it possibly be leading them?
The beam flickered again, fading to a rusty brown. They forged on, knowing that even if the light died altogether, they’d have no choice but to continue blind, crawling over pebbly debris, feeling for a way out with flailing hands.
It’s my fault! Dan berated himself. I had two years to re-create the serum. Then we could have destroyed the Vespers the minute
we heard about the kidnappings. The hostages would be safe, and Amy and I wouldn’t be lost in the dark in an ancient Roman tunnel!
At that instant, the light died utterly. There was no beam, not even a dim glow.
Wild, uncontrollable panic. We’ll die down here! No one will ever find us —
“Wait a minute —” Amy began.
“What?”
“Our light’s out. So —”
He finished her sentence. “— how come I can see you and you can see me?”
Dan blinked. She was right! Sure, it was dark, but without the key chain light, they should have been smothered in blackness. There was light coming from somewhere. And light meant maybe this awful journey was actually going to end.
He got to his feet and stumbled on forward. “This way!”
They picked up the pace, buoyed by the perception that it might be getting just a little bit brighter—or was that just wishful thinking?
All at once, the narrow tunnel opened into a large underground grotto. The sudden absence of walls closing in on him gave Dan a sensation of freedom he hadn’t even known he was missing. He looked up. An elaborate domed ceiling hung above them. This was no random underground chamber! It was finished and decorated — at least it had been a zillion years ago.
Amy spun around, taking in her surroundings with a growing sense of amazement and discovery.
“Dan —” Her voice was reverent. “Do you know where we are?”
Dan was impatient. “Wherever it is, how do you get out?”
“I’ve seen pictures of this place! It’s the Lupercal!”
“What’s that — some diet pill?”
“In mythology, Rome was founded by two brothers, Romulus and Remus, who were raised by a she-wolf in a cave. This was that cave.”
Dan looked skeptical. “Who tiled the ceiling? The wolf?”
“I didn’t say it was true; I said the ancients believed it. So they turned this place into some sort of shrine. It’s under the ruins of Emperor Augustus’s house on the Palatine — that’s one of the Seven Hills of Rome.”
“Who cares about that?” Dan returned. “Where’s the door?”
Amy shook her head. “I don’t think there is one.”
“You said there were pictures.”
“The archaeologists dropped a remote camera down a hole in the roof,” Amy explained. “The Lupercal grotto hasn’t been explored yet. We’re the first people to stand in this spot for two thousand years. How incredible is that?”
Dan was unimpressed. “You know what would be even more incredible? An exit sign.”
If there was a way out, it was surely inaccessible. The entire far side of the chamber was blocked by a cave-in. Earth and rocks formed a steep slope that soared nearly to the ceiling. Peering up the incline, they could see the light source — a sliver of blue sky where the cave wall met the dome.
Amy pointed. “They must have lowered the camera from there.”
There was a distant clinking sound. A tiny pebble dropped from the opening and rolled down the debris pile to land at their feet.
“Somebody’s up there!” Dan hissed.
He zipped the Marco Polo manuscript inside his jacket and began to climb the slope. Amy followed, eating loose dirt from her brother’s messy progress. Dan got about ten feet off the floor before hitting a soft spot and beginning a slow slide down again. Amy caught his arm, stopping his descent, and the two scrambled together, inching toward the top. The earth mound was so unstable that every few feet would send one of them slithering back. They stayed close, so each could support the other. It was half climbing, half swimming. Their sweat mingled with the earth, covering them with slimy mud.
Dan got in range of the ceiling first. The dome was close enough to touch, and he could see that the mosaic pattern had actually been created with seashells. It was pretty cool, but his one priority was departure. He tried to snake through the opening, but it was just a little too narrow for his shoulders.
I can’t fit!
“Hello?” he called.
It got a huge response from the two scientists who were tapping and chiseling into the Lupercal. The pair leaped to their feet and began to back away, mouths agape. Their legs locked, and they went down in a heap. Dan could well understand their shock. When you’re painstakingly trying to open an ancient grotto that hasn’t seen the light of day for two thousand years, the last thing you expect is some mud-encrusted kid trying to squeeze his way out.
They began to jabber in excited Italian, of which Dan did not understand a single word. He extended his arm, snatched a hammer from the spot where one man had dropped it, and began to hack at the edge of the hole that was blocking his exit. Then he hoisted himself up to the grass of the Palatine Hill.
“How you are in this place that has been sealed since the time of Caesar Augustus?” one of the archaeologists demanded in amazement.
“I was looking for my sister,” Dan quipped.
“Your sister?”
“Oh — here she is.” He reached through the opening and hauled out an equally grubby Amy.
“You will explain your presence here immediately!”
“Sorry. Gotta bounce,” Amy said breezily.
The bewildered scientists watched in wonder as the filthy American teens scampered down the Palatine Hill, slaloming around ancient homes and ruins. They were still running when they hit the Via di San Gregorio and disappeared aboard a city bus.
The taxi driver already had a sour look on his face as he loaded their luggage into the trunk. Amy could read his mind. He was anticipating an endless ride to the airport through the brutal Rome traffic.
If he only knew, she thought.
Dan held out his cell phone, his expression solemn. “You’d better hear this.”
Amy raised the handset to her ear just as the voice mail began. “Hi, Dan, it’s Atticus. How’s it going? Uh — I guess that’s kind of a dumb question because, in actuality, it probably isn’t going so good. Jake ratted you out to the police, so by the time you hear this—”
“Not that one!” she exclaimed suddenly, snatching her overfilled backpack from the driver’s hands. It contained one “Medusa” by Caravaggio and one original Marco Polo manuscript — the most sought-after item in the world and a treasure the world did not yet even know existed. Not a bag to let out of your sight. “I’ll keep this with me.”
“As you wish.” The man slammed the trunk shut and opened the rear door.
As they got in, Amy tried to return the phone to her brother, but he handed it back to her. “There’s more. He left eleven messages while we were in the tunnels.”
“It’s me again — Atticus. I feel bad about this. Well, not in actuality, because you did steal Il Milione. We’re still in the police station. There are two Interpol agents coming over to interview us. Interpol, Dan — that’s the international police force.… ”
The driver got behind the wheel of the taxi. “Destination?”
“Florence,” Amy replied.
“Firenze?” the man repeated in amazement. “You do not travel to Firenze by taxi. It is three hundred kilometers away!”
In answer, Amy pulled a handful of hundred-euro notes from her backpack and dropped them over the bench seat.
The driver started the engine and pulled away from the hotel.
“The Interpol guys didn’t believe us about Il Milione, but wait till you hear this: They suspect you and Amy might have been behind that big Caravaggio heist at the Uffizi! They say you were in Florence! Crazy, right? But if you don’t turn yourselves in, it’s going to look like you’ve got something to hide, when you’re innocent.… ”
Amy handed back the phone. “Innocent,” she said aloud. “I don’t even know what that word means anymore.”
He accepted it glumly. “That kid hates me now. I guess I can’t really blame him.”
“If he hated you, he wouldn’t be trying to convince you to clear your name,” Amy reasoned. “He’d just throw
you to the sharks. When this is over, and we’re all back in the States, you can explain it to him. He’s smart. He’ll understand.”
“You’re dreaming,” her brother told her. “There’s no such thing as ‘when this is over’ for our family. We got past the clue hunt, and along came the Vespers. When we get the hostages back, it’ll be something else. Trust me, five hundred years of backstabbing was just a warm-up. I’ll be able to explain this to Atticus when I can forget …” He fell silent, his mind on the seven ingredients to the master serum in his luggage in the trunk.
Amy regarded him with sadness. The chasm between them seemed to grow with each passing day. It wasn’t merely that they disagreed; it was that they saw the world with completely different eyes.
Yet in spite of everything that had happened, Amy believed with all her heart that the future could be different. “We’re the Cahills now — us, Sinead, Ian, Hamilton, Jonah. We’re not perfect, but at least we’re not trapped in that old thinking. That’s what made Grace unique — she was the only one back then who could see beyond the clue hunt. She died before she could bring the family to this point, so we have to try to live up to her vision.”
A sudden news bulletin interrupted the Euro-pop on the radio in the taxi. Amy and Dan didn’t understand the message itself, but there was no mistaking the newscaster’s urgency. Amy’s heart sank as she recognized the words Colosseo, Caravaggio, Uffizi, Americano, and Cahill. She watched as the driver’s shoulders stiffened, and his eyes darted to the rearview mirror.
She plucked another few hundred-euro notes from the backpack and tossed them to the front seat. “A bonus,” she said, “for speed.”
The man gave an elaborate European shrug and stepped on the gas.
CHAPTER 23
The test was conducted in the main room of the Vesper holding cell. Fiske, Alistair, Reagan, Natalie, and Phoenix each brandished a piece of plastic cutlery to determine which of them had the steadiest hand.
“It would appear,” Fiske decided, “that young Phoenix is our ‘winner.’”