The testament, p.31
The Testament, page 31
"Anzolo-you don't hear that name much."
"Oh, but you do in Venice, signore, it's our dialect."
"Really? What is the Italian equivalent?"
Anzolo's brow wrinkled in thought, then his face brightened. "Ah, yes, Angelo."
Bravo threw the chair sideways so quickly and so hard that Anzolo was taken completely by surprise. It struck him in the face, and he fell in a kind of swoon. Blood was spattered in a fanlike arc across the slats of the chair back.
Bravo was up and on him in an instant, but Anzolo was only lying there, regaining his equilibrium, and when he felt Bravo grip him, he jackknifed his torso. His knee went straight into Bravo's solar plexus, and Bravo doubled over as all the air was driven out of him.
Anzolo drove a fist into Bravo's side. "Don't fight me," he said.
Ignoring him, Bravo lashed out, connecting with Anzolo's rib cage, but he had no leverage, and Anzolo brought his weight to bear.
"I warned you."
He jammed his forearm against Bravo's throat.
IN a defensive half crouch, Anthony Rule crept through the monastery corridors. He had encountered no one and nothing, which was both puzzling and somewhat alarming. He had expected to come across at least a couple of Guardians.
Up ahead he saw a door on his left that was partially open. Approaching it with caution, he contrived to peer inside. A man was hunched over a table on which several thick books were open. He was paging through one. Then he turned to search through another stack of volumes, and Rule caught a glimpse of the side of his face. It was Paolo Zorzi. The muscles of Zorzi's broad back and shoulders bunched and rippled as he stretched and torqued his torso, as if he were a lion or panther. Rule thought about Zorzi's deep and abiding hostility toward him and knew it stemmed from his friendship with Dexter. The nature of jealousy, he considered, momentarily caught by the thought, was to be like a serpent, slithering this way and that through the thicket of other, more obvious emotions. But it colored everything, even the intentions of the most clear-eyed people.
Rule smiled, his lips a thin, cruel line. This was all too easy-no Guardians and now Zorzi presenting himself through a partially open door, his back turned, a perfect target. Rule could smell a trap even from this distance, and so he moved on, past the bait meant to tempt him. He wanted Zorzi, of course, but he had come for Bravo, and he wasn't going to leave without him. He held no illusions as to how dangerous it was for Bravo to be with Zorzi. It was Zorzi, he suspected, who had tried to undermine his relationship with Dexter Shaw, and now that Zorzi had Bravo he imagined the same thing happening all over again-Zorzi would try to poison Bravo against him.
The room Zorzi was in was windowless, a place where logic said they would be holding Bravo. Also, he could see that the texts were on ciphers and decoding-Bravo would be working on the cipher Dexter had left for him here in Venice. Chances were, then, that Bravo was inside the room, somewhere where Rule couldn't see him. In any case, Rule knew that he couldn't afford to ignore the possibility. That meant he needed to gain entrance to the room by means other than the invitingly open door.
He stole past and soon came to a left-hand branch that, he calculated, would bring him along the right-facing wall of the loom. Risking a peek around the corner, he saw a Guardian standing beside a closed door that could only lead into the room.
Pulling the hood of his appropriated robe up over his head, he walked with the sword-cane hidden behind him and his head down directly toward the Guardian. The man, a young, slender Venetian with a face still in the process of maturing, said, "You're ten minutes early, but I could use the relief."
Rule threw a punch to his solar plexus and then, as the Guardian doubled over, chopped down on the exposed back of his neck with the edge of his hand. Rule caught the Guardian as he slumped into unconsciousness and dragged him further down the hallway into a corner, where he piled him into the shadows.
Returning to the closed door, he put his ear to it. He could hear a voice he recognized as Zorzi's and someone else replying, but the second voice was too far away for him to be certain it was Bravo's.
He breathed deeply and slowly, his fingers tightened on the hilt of the sword-cane. His other hand gripped the doorknob, turning it slowly to the left. He was opening the door slowly and silently when he felt a tiny flicker of pain in the side of his neck. He started, turning instinctively, his senses already swimming as if he were drunk, and saw a face leering at him like a Carnevale mask.
Struggling through the chemical fog of the drug, he understood what had happened, and he pulled out the tiny dart that had embedded itself in his neck.
"Too late." The leering face laughed.
A moment later, the world disappeared from view, and Rule toppled over.
Bravo's eyes were bulging and there was a burning in his lungs. He knew if he didn't get oxygen soon he'd lose what was left of the strength in his limbs. Once that happened, he would be helpless. He couldn't let that happen.
In his mind's eye, he saw his father, and he a boy of eleven, learning how to use his body, to stretch it past its assumed natural limits.
"Relax, Bravo," his father said. "When you try too hard, your body will resist you. Mind and body need to work together, like a team."
Instead of continuing to fight Anzolo, Bravo let his limbs go limp. He allowed his eyelids to flicker, his breathing became erratic. His reward was the grin on Anzolo's face as he bent forward to apply more pressure. That was when Bravo slammed his forehead into the bridge of Anzolo's nose. A fountain of blood gushed out, and Anzolo reared back.
Bravo twisted from his hips and Anzolo lost his balance. Bravo rose up and brought the full force of his fists against the other's ear. Anzolo went down and Bravo was on him.
"Where is Zorzi?" He slammed the back of Anzolo's head against the stone floor. "Tell me where he went!"
Anzolo told him.
Bravo released him and began to turn away. Anzolo grabbed at him in desperation, trying to gouge out his eye, but Bravo used the Guardian's own momentum against him, swinging his body around in a shallow arc, using the entire force of it behind his cocked elbow. He felt the clavicle shatter, and then the Guardian collapsed onto the refectory floor.
In an instant, Bravo was up and sprinting out the door.
"The neurotoxin will only last two or three minutes," Alvise said.
"That will be sufficient," Paolo Zorzi said as he stared into Anthony Rule's slack face. Rule regarded him with the peculiar wide-eyed stare of the newly paralyzed.
He and Alvise had carried Rule into the room, setting him down on a chair to whose legs they had lashed his ankles. His hands were tied behind his back.
Alvise already had a knife out, its gleaming point pressed against the hollow at Rule's throat.
"How d'you like the feel of this, Rule?" he said. "How d'you think it's going to feel when I push the blade in inch by agonizing inch."
"Careful," Zorzi said mildly, as if he did not mean what he said.
"I want him to pay for each and every sin he has committed."
"I'm afraid that would take several lifetimes." Zorzi took a handful of Rule's hair. "Wouldn't it, Anthony?"
"You were asked a question." Alvise dug the point of the blade in, turning it so that a drop of deep-red blood was held on the forged stainless steel. "Rude of you not to answer."
"Your time has run out." Zorzi bent over him, staring into his ferocious half-glazed eyes. "You no longer have Dexter Shaw to protect you. You're alone and naked in front of your judge." He jerked on Rule's hair. "I will now pronounce sentence and Alvise will act as executioner, a mantle he is all too eager to don in your honor."
Zorzi's lips pulled back from his teeth. "You are guilty, Rule, guilty on all counts. And now I have the satisfaction of informing you that the sentence of death will be carried out."
Zorzi was aware of a blur of motion, and then Alvise was falling and there was blood spattering on him like rain. He jerked erect and looked at Bravo, who was pointing the SIG Sauer at him.
"What do you think you're doing?"
"Untie him," Bravo said, gesturing at Rule.
"That would be most unwise. You have no idea what you're doing, what a grave mistake you're-"
"Shut up and do it!" Bravo said. He stood far enough away from Zorzi that the other had no chance to reach him.
"I won't." Zorzi shrugged. "Go ahead and shoot me while you have the chance. No? I see, you haven't the nerve or the fortitude. Coward! Of what use are you to the Order?"
He rushed Bravo, who pulled the trigger of the SIG Sauer. Nothing happened: the trigger was frozen in place. Zorzi was upon him, slamming him backward against the wall. He was grinning grotesquely, like some evil ogre out of a Grimm's fairy tale. "The gun is useless, it won't fire, and now where are you, do you suppose?"
Bravo slammed the butt of the gun into the spot behind Zorzi's ear. Zorzi went down, just as Alvise had, and stayed down.
Quickly, Bravo untied Rule. "Uncle Tony, can you hear me?"
Rule's lips moved slightly but no sound emerged. His eyes were clearer and more focused.
"What did they do to you?"
"Neurotoxin." Rule's voice was thin and reedy, as if he hadn't used it for some time. "Delivered with a blow-dart."
"Can you stand up? Here, let me help you." Bravo put his arm around Rule and lifted. He grunted with the drag of the dead weight, all the bruises and contusions he'd sustained in his hand-to-hand combat with Anzolo burning into him like tattoos.
Then Rule began to regain some motor control, and he took more and more of his own weight into his legs and hips.
"How did you find me?" he said.
"I came looking for Zorzi."
Rule nodded, still groggy. He turned back toward Zorzi. "Kill him, Bravo. It's the perfect time."
"Uncle Tony, we have to get out of here now."
Still Rule resisted. "Do it, Bravo."
"No, Uncle Tony, not in cold blood."
"You'll regret it. The sonuvabitch will come after you."
"I'm not a murderer."
"This isn't murder, it's an execution." Rule held out his hand. "Give me the gun."
"Uncle Tony, no."
But Rule had grabbed the SIG Sauer and, aiming it at Zorzi, pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. Taking advantage of Rule's surprise, Bravo wrested the gun away from him. For a frozen moment they stood staring at one another.
The next instant, they heard a noise in the corridor just outside the door, and the two of them froze. Rule put his forefinger across his lips, crossed silently to the door, and without a moment's hesitation, swung it quickly open.
A Guardian with his hand still on the doorknob stumbled in, and Rule drove a knee into his midsection with such ferocity that he broke several ribs.
"Come on!" Bravo whispered, taking the opportunity to get Rule out of the room and away from Paolo Zorzi. As much as he hated the traitor, he could not be a party to his cold-blooded murder. Did that make him weak, a coward? Would his father have made a different choice? This was the Voire Dei, after all-he was far away from the civil and criminal laws that governed other people. But what about the laws of morality? Did being a part of the Voire Dei give him the right to abrogate those? Even if it did, he still had a choice in the matter and, for better or worse, he had made his.
The corridor loomed, silent and deserted. Rule showed him the way and they retraced his steps back to the side door. By the time they passed through it, he had regained much of his strength and all his animal cunning.
"However many Guardians are remaining will be combing the island for us," he said. And he was right, for as they approached the shingle where he had beached the topo they saw two Guardians keeping watch on it.
"How are we going to get off the island?" Bravo whispered.
"I have a plan," Rule said.
Uncle Tony always had a plan. As far back as Bravo could remember, Uncle Tony had a plan for every contingency. If you needed to get from point A to point B, he knew the fastest route, the most circuitous, the most devious, as well as the most sensible.
They moved off, Rule leading the way. The long summer twilight had ended and it had grown dark, but out on the lagoon strings of pale yellow lights marked the perimeters of the deep water channel. A gull passed by overhead, calling in its plaintive voice, and then it swooped down, skimming the water, which picked up tiny phosphorescent lights like glimmering bangles on the double bracelet of the channel.
As they passed the pitch-black outlines of pine trees, Bravo could see more lights, pouring from a section of the Franciscan monastery. The air smelled resiny, and then a whiff of the lagoon reached them-bleached stone and clams, salty weeds that twined in the depths.
As they approached, they could make out the cluttered sound of many voices.
"The Franciscans have turned the island into a tourist destination," Rule said. "Once a week, they have an evening tour. We can mingle with the crowd and hitch a ride on the ferry."
But when they arrived in the shadows cloaking the outskirts of the dock, they saw that passage on the ferry would be impossible. Three Guardians were patrolling the area, no doubt having given the Franciscans a plausible cover story as to why they needed to be there.
They crept around to their left in a rough semicircle and saw a motoscafo tied up on the other side of the large ferry. Moving from shadow to shadow, they circled toward it. A Franciscan monk was unloading the last of a pile of small barrels from the rear deck of the motoscafo. People continued to stream onto the ferry, which sounded its horn twice, as warning of its imminent departure.
As they watched, another monk appeared to help the other carry the barrels into the monastery. When they were both out of sight, Bravo and Rule ran to the motoscafo and jumped aboard. The two monks reappeared and picked up two more barrels. The last of the tourists had boarded the ferry, and now it gave another long hoot of its horn as its engines began to churn.
Rule climbed behind the wheel and fired the ignition. Bravo let go the lines holding the motoscafo at the dock. The monks had just disappeared into the monastery, and Rule took advantage of the moment to ease the boat forward. Their window of opportunity was short, the monks would reappear at any moment, but he resisted the urge to surge forward and instead matched his speed with that of the ferry. They moved out in tandem, the motoscafo hidden from the Guardians by the bulk of the ferry. A night heron crossed their path, silent as death, and as the land slipped away through the black, purling water they got one last bracing whiff of the pines on San Francesco del Deserto.
Then the yellow lights were upon them and they were in the channel, free.
After many hours the celebration of the new Knights-the Knights of Muhlmann, as Jordan privately thought of them-was still in full swing. A twelve-course dinner catered by Ostaria dell'Orso, one of Rome's finest restaurants, along with five cases of vintage Brunello di Montalcino had been consumed. The assembled had settled in for Cuban Montecristo Coronas, snifters of cognac and dark chocolate truffles, each one imprinted with a miniature of the Muhlmann shield, flown in that day from Belgium.
Jordan, his belly full, his head alight with his victory, was just finishing his second glass of the luscious Hine 1960 when Osman Spagna tapped him discreetly on the shoulder. One look at his expression caused Jordan to rise and follow the short man into the room where he had signed the contract on the villa. Behind him Spagna closed the double doors. Jordan saw before him four of the most influential and wealthy Knights: a Netherlands diamond cartel merchant, an English MP, an American money manager and the president of a South African-Australian metals conglomerate.
"Gentlemen," Jordan said, approaching them. "What have we here?" He laughed. "A meeting of the minds?"
"We fervently hope so, Grand Master."
They left it to the English MP, which was a bit of a surprise. Jordan had expected the American to be the mouthpiece. But they had opted to take the smooth path, the gentlemanly action.
"We'd like a bit of a word," the English MP said in his mildest and plummiest tone. "In theory, we have no problem with the action you've taken-"
"The coup," the American said, arching forward on the balls of his feet.
"Something stinks in here." Jordan stared hard at the American. "Is it a mutiny I smell?"
The MP moved at once to smooth the feathers ruffled by the American's injudicious remark. "Nothing of the sort, I assure you. We all recognize you as Grand Master, we all believe you're the man for the job."
Jordan, waiting for the shoe to drop, said nothing. He was good at waiting, better than the four of them put together, he'd wager.
The MP, rail-thin and pasty faced, cleared his throat. "We do, however, envision a potential problem."
"A large one," the American interjected. He was a big, beefy man with a Midwestern accent and the overly aggressive stance of a football thug.
No one was willing to restrain the American, Jordan noticed, which meant he was the designated attack dog. Smart move on their part.
"And that would be?" Jordan said.
"Your mother," the MP said silkily. "It's no secret that she's wanted to take control of the Knights. We've tolerated her machinations out of respect for you, Grand Master, but now… now she's inserted herself into the field with Damon Cornadoro, and we wonder… well, we wonder whether she would be playing so active a role in this most crucial venture if she wasn't your mother."
A stifling silence now descended on the six men. The MP cleared his throat again, someone-the Netherlander perhaps-coughed nervously.
"It was my plan," Jordan said evenly. "You're questioning it now?"
"Not at all," the MP said at once. "However, reports have come to us of her activities and we think something needs to be done to rein her in."
"You don't know my mother," Jordan said.
