Professor k the final q.., p.8
Professor K- The Final Quest, page 8
part #4 of Jack Rogan Mystery Series
Villa Laurentius was a TV producer’s dream. No expense had been spared by the TV channel to secure one of the most stunning Renaissance properties in the hills just outside Florence for the show. Famous for its spectacular gardens, sumptuous interior, library and art collection, it was the perfect setting for Europe’s most popular cooking show. After football and Eurovision, Top Chef Europe was the TV program boasting most viewers.
Capable of accommodating a hundred guests in luxury and elegant comfort, the stables had been converted into five-star accommodation complete with restaurant facilities, swimming pool and tennis courts. Booked out for months in advance, Villa Laurentius was a sought after venue for hosting corporate events, conferences, and bonding retreats for high-flying corporate types, or mega-rich business tycoons to plan the next takeover or international pipeline deal. On this occasion, however, the coach house had been converted into a state-of-the-art kitchen with six separate workstations and a huge pantry. The large ballroom on the ground floor of the villa had become an elegant dining room seating fifty guests and was used to showcase the dishes prepared by the contestants. Sometimes, the guests also acted as judges and would vote on each of the dishes.
Each year, Top Chef Europe was hosted by a different country, which added to the show’s huge popularity and appeal. This year, it was Italy’s turn to showcase its culture and cuisine. Celebrity chef Matteo Monti, owner of the acclaimed Michelin-starred restaurant MM in Siena, had been chosen as the compere of the competition, which lasted three months and moved to several locations within the country. This year’s highlights had included a spectacular cook-off in the Colosseum, an al-fresco lunch for one hundred on the beach in Positano, and a formal candlelit dinner party in an ancient villa in Pompeii. All cooked for and presented by the contestants.
Hundreds of hopefuls from all over Europe had auditioned for months to become part of the competition. After a rigorous selection process, thirty lucky contestants had been chosen to do culinary battle for the coveted prize: to be crowned Top Chef of the year, which would most certainly lead to an illustrious career for life. But there were also other prizes. This year, a staggering one million euros, a new Audi, a book deal and a TV show were the rewards waiting for the lucky winner.
Louis Fontaine was in his element. The big day, the grand finale, had finally arrived. As the producer in charge, he was the artistic director of the show responsible for just about everything. Flamboyantly gay, in his middle thirties with a perfectly trimmed designer beard and wearing a pince-nez instead of glasses, which he balanced precariously on the tip of his large nose, Louis was the go-between, the peacemaker, the shoulder to cry on. He was the man the contestants could turn to with problems involving the judges, the media, or the complex corporation that owned and ran the show as a mega-business.
Living together for three months in virtual isolation, cut off from family, friends and the outside world, the contestants were under a lot of stress. Louis would stroke bruised egos, cover-up hissy fits and do his best to avoid other major disasters that were inevitable in a pressure cooker environment like Top Chef Europe, where naked ambition rubbed shoulders with jealously defended reputations and egos as big and volatile as Vesuvius.
Louis had decided to use the fabulous library overlooking the gardens as the venue for the interviews with the two finalists who would do battle in the evening. The light was perfect, and so was the setting.
‘You look absolutely gorgeous, darling,’ said Louis, taking Lorenza by the hand. ‘You wore the blue dress; excellent. It sets off your hair. Your hair! Movie stars would kill for hair like that, you know. Come, sit here by the window; perfect,’ fussed Louis. ‘How do you feel?’
‘A little nervous, of course,’ replied Lorenza, smiling. She liked Louis and got on very well with him.
‘To be expected. But your performance the other night. Well that was really something. To win against Kemal Bahadir ... unheard of!’
‘How did he take it?’
‘Quite badly, actually,’ said Louis, lowering his voice. ‘He shouted at the judges after the show and stormed out in a huff. Celebrity egos! What do you expect – right? Quite a performance.’
‘Am I on first?’ asked Lorenza.
‘Yes. As I told you, Matteo will conduct the interview. It will be quite short. We have done this before. Just relax and answer the questions with your usual charm, darling. Nothing to worry about.’
Lorenza wasn’t so sure, but interviews were an important part of the show. They were usually screened at the beginning of the show to profile the contestants, build tension and prepare the audience for the contest to come. An interview just before the grand finale was therefore particularly important, and Lorenza knew that difficult, sensitive questions would be asked, most likely about her spectacular win against Kemal Bahadir the previous day. She was right.
Kemal Bahadir paced nervously up and down in his hotel suite in Florence overlooking the Piazza della Signoria and glanced at his watch. It was almost time. He poured himself another glass of wine and turned on the television.
‘In a few hours, the two finalists, Lorenza da Baggio from Venice and Carlos Castellano from Barcelona,’ said the announcer, ‘will go head-to-head in the greatest culinary contest of the year. The winner will be crowned Top Chef of Europe. We now take you live to Villa Laurentius just outside Florence for an interview with the contestants …’
‘Good afternoon, I am Matteo Monti. It is my pleasure to introduce to you the lovely Lorenza da Baggio, one of the two finalists in Top Chef Europe,’ said Monti, smiling into the camera.
The camera zoomed in on Lorenza sitting in the library next to a spectacular flower arrangement, perfectly positioned by Louis on a small marble table for maximum effect. Lorenza’s face was a cameraman’s dream. Her large, cornflower blue eyes, pale skin and stunning auburn hair that framed her beautiful face with luxurious curls bouncing off her shoulders made her look more like a movie star than a budding masterchef about to do battle in the kitchen to fulfil a dream.
‘Your victory the other day against Kemal Bahadir, one of the great chefs of our time, put you straight into today’s finale,’ began Monti, coming straight to the subject everyone wanted to hear about. ‘Were you surprised?’
‘I certainly didn’t expect to win,’ replied Lorenza. ‘It was a very difficult contest.’
‘Because the dish you had to recreate was classic Ottoman cuisine, Bahadir’s speciality?’
‘No. That didn’t concern me at all. In fact, I was pleasantly surprised. I thought it was destiny.’
‘Destiny? How intriguing. Care to explain?’
‘It’s a long story.’
‘Tell us; please,’ urged Monti, enjoying himself.
Unable to take his eyes off the TV, Bahadir listened in amazement to Lorenza’s astonishing story. At the end of the interview, he turned off the television and for a long moment kept staring at the empty screen. This is a disaster, he thought, anger churning in the empty pit of his stomach. Then he reached for his mobile and dialled a number only known to a privileged few. It was a direct line to Salvatore Gambio.
4
Near the Turkish border: 19 May
The counterattack by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant – ISIL (commonly referred to as IS) – against the advancing Free Syrian Army near the Turkish border came to a sudden standstill just before sunset. The rockets stopped coming and the guns fell silent. Death was taking a break.
Amena Algafari decided to make a run for it before it got dark. Having survived the deadly hospital attack with only minor injuries, she was one of the lucky ones. The border was very close. For most of the day, she had been hiding in a ditch next to the road and had watched a different army, an army of the homeless and the desperate, trying to escape from the merciless carnage and destruction that was Aleppo.
Women carrying children – many of them injured – boys carrying heavy suitcases, toddlers dragging bundles of bedding, old men barely able to walk, were all heading north towards the border. Thirsty, and feeling weak from lack of food, Amena joined the throng and an hour later crossed the border into Turkey near the once sleepy town of Kilis. This was the first point of safety for hundreds of thousands of refugees who had been made homeless by four years of brutal war.
Kilis had been overwhelmed by the relentless tide of human misery flooding across the border. The generosity of its Turkish inhabitants had won worldwide admiration and even a Nobel Peace Prize nomination, but the town could no longer cope. The main Oncupinar refugee camp was overflowing and resources, even water, were stretched to breaking point.
Set up in 2012 to house refugees escaping from the Syrian civil war disaster, the Kilis Oncupinar Accommodation Facility was one of six ‘container camps’ established by Turkey. They were called container camps because the refugees were accommodated in identical containers, several thousand of them, linked by brick paths. Ingenious, cheap and practical. In addition, the camps had schools, playgrounds and medical facilities.
Just before fleeing Aleppo, one of Amena’s former colleagues told her to find a Dr Rosen. Apparently, Dr Rosen, founder and principal of the famous Rosen Foundation, had recently established a clinic near the camp, and was in desperate need of trained medical staff.
Dr Rosen looked at the three modified army containers that were her new clinic, and smiled. She had seen worse. The facilities were basic, but somehow it all worked. Her tent clinic in Dadaab, the world’s largest refugee camp in Kenya near the Somali border, had been the same. Benjamin would be pleased, she thought, that his generosity has been put to good use.
Only a few months before, Benjamin Krakowski, celebrated composer and violin virtuoso, had donated a staggering thirty-five million pounds to the Rosen Foundation. The money represented the entire auction sale proceeds of a recently rediscovered Monet. The painting, Little Sparrow in the Garden, had belonged to Krakowski’s father. Stolen by the Nazis, it had been lost for over seventy years before surfacing again in extraordinary circumstances. The record sale of the painting and its astonishing history had attracted a lot of media attention at the time, and created quite a storm in art circles.
Dr Rosen turned to Nazir Al-Kafri, her young assistant standing next to her. ‘I couldn’t have done this without you,’ she said, putting her arm affectionately around the young man. Nazir beamed. After losing his entire family during an air strike in Damascus six months before, he had ended up in Oncupinar. He firmly believed that meeting Dr Rosen had not only given him hope and purpose, but most likely saved his life.
‘All we need now is a couple of doctors and nurses and we are in business,’ said Nazir cheerfully.
Dr Rosen nodded. ‘I wish,’ she replied wistfully. She remembered the day she had met the frightfully thin young man from Damascus very well. She had been searching for someone in the camp who spoke good English and could help her with languages. Fluent in Arabic, English and Turkish, Nazir became her right-hand man. Enthusiastic and intelligent, with an inquisitive mind and a good sense of humour, Nazir had all the qualities Dr Rosen needed to help her navigate the complex and often-confusing and exasperatingly disorganised refugee camp environment bursting at the seams with desperate people.
Exhausted but elated, Dr Rosen reached for her water bottle. As she was about to lift it to her mouth she noticed a dark shape standing in the shadows. Someone was watching her. ‘Can I help you?’ she asked, and waved towards the shape. ‘Come; don’t be afraid.’
Amena watched the tall, elderly woman with short grey hair turn slowly towards her. She instantly recognised something familiar in the woman’s voice that reminded her of her late husband: empathy and kindness. It was the voice of a true healer. Feeling calm for the first time since leaving Aleppo, Amena stepped out of the shadows and said, ‘Dr Rosen?’
‘Yes,’ replied Dr Rosen, surprised.
‘I am Dr Algafari from Aleppo. I would like to work for you.’
5
Florence: 20 May, 1:50 pm
Luigi Belmonte made sure he looked like all the other tourists enjoying the sunshine. Casually dressed in a pair of jeans, polo shirt and a linen jacket and wearing a straw hat and dark glasses, he certainly blended in well. But his appearance was deceptive. In his forties, shortish with a barrel chest and broad shoulders, he radiated strength and moved with surprising agility for a man with such a powerful physique. Belmonte looked at his watch, reached for his Campari and smiled. The location, a busy restaurant opposite the Palazzo Vecchio in the heart of Florence, was perfect – and so was the time.
His instructions were clear: it had to happen in a public place, today, between one pm and two pm precisely. Belmonte was a perfectionist who took his assignments very seriously and left nothing to chance. He had been following Mario Giordano, the eldest son of Riccardo Giordano, the head of one of the powerful Mafia families operating in Florence, for several days now.
Good-looking, in his late twenties, Mario was in charge of supplying drugs to a number of nightclubs popular with tourists. He had several girlfriends and liked to have long lunches before taking them back to his apartment above one of the nightclubs owned by the family. To the exasperation of his Sicilian bodyguard, who followed him everywhere like a shadow, he preferred to sit outdoors, usually in one of his favourite restaurants also owned by the family. This wasn’t just careless, but showed a certain arrogance and disregard for his own safety and his father’s specific instructions. Habits were dangerous and made you vulnerable.
As an experienced hitman, Belmonte knew that meticulous preparation was the key to staying ahead of the game; and alive. He always studied the habits of his subjects carefully, and planned his approach accordingly. He was the master of the unexpected and the audacious. He dared to do what others wouldn’t contemplate. This was reflected in his success rate, reputation and astronomical fee.
Mario was flirting animatedly with an attractive young woman, an English tourist he had met in one of the nightclubs the day before. Sitting at the table next to him, his bodyguard was sipping his mineral water and frowned when Mario ordered another bottle of Chianti. Another long lunch, he thought, looking bored as he watched the tourists stroll past in the Piazza della Signoria to take selfies with Michelangelo’s celebrated David in front of the palazzo.
When Mario got up to go to the bathroom, Belmonte made his move. He knew the bodyguard would follow Mario to the toilet and wait outside. He had observed this several times before, and knew the exact layout of the restaurant.
Belmonte followed Mario and the bodyguard past the busy kitchen at the back of the restaurant and watched Mario go into the toilet. When the bodyguard pulled a packet of cigarettes out of his pocket and was about to light up, Belmonte knew it was the right time.
For a moment, there was no-one else around. He quickly walked up to the bodyguard from behind and shot him twice in the back, the dull thud of the gunshots masked by the silencer the only sound in the deserted corridor. Shot in the heart, the bodyguard was dead before he hit the floor. Without breaking his stride, Belmonte quickly walked past him into the toilet.
Mario was facing a urinal with his back towards the door. Another man stood at the washbasin drying his hands with a paper towel. Otherwise, the toilet was empty. Belmonte walked up to Mario and shot him twice in the back of the head, blood splatters turning the white tiles crimson like an exploding sun. The man at the washbasin turned around, his eyes wide with terror and surprise. Smiling, Belmonte lifted his gun and shot the man between the eyes. Slipping the gun back into his shoulder holster, he pulled a white feather out of his pocket and inserted it into Mario’s open mouth. Then he walked casually outside and looked around. The dead bodyguard was lying face down in a pool of blood; a young waitress was kneeling next to him on the floor, screaming.
People came running out of the kitchen towards her to see what the commotion was all about. Confusion; perfect, thought Belmonte. No-one will remember a thing. Having carefully studied the configuration of the restaurant before, Belmonte knew there was a back door next to the kitchen that opened into a laneway behind the restaurant where the deliveries were made. He also knew that confusion and fear were the best cover. When you added a dead body and lots of blood to this, you had shock and panic as well. A perfect recipe for conflicting accounts, he thought, as he walked quickly past the distraught waitress, opened the back door and stepped outside into the brilliant sunshine.
Salvatore Gambio looked at his watch and poured another glass of wine for his guest. As the head of one of the three most powerful Mafia families in Florence, he left nothing to chance. It’s probably all over by now, he thought and turned to face his notorious visitor. It had taken months of careful planning and manoeuvring to bring this meeting about. It wasn’t often that the heads of rival families fighting a bloody turf war agreed to meet to discuss peace. ‘Salute,’ he said and lifted his glass. ‘Are we agreed?’
‘We are,’ said Riccardo Giordano.
They touched glasses.
‘To our alliance,’ said Gambio, and kissed Giordano on both cheeks.
‘Alleanza,’ repeated Giordano. For reasons he couldn’t quite explain, he felt uneasy in Gambio’s company, or perhaps it was the opulent setting with all the impressive paintings and trappings of wealth that made him feel uncomfortable. A man of simple tastes with a long Mafia family tradition, Giordano was a cautious man. He had reluctantly agreed to the meeting proposed by Gambio, but only after elaborate arrangements had been made and hostages exchanged. This wasn’t unusual in Mafia circles. The reason the meeting took place at Gambio’s fortress-home was purely strategic. It would send a powerful message to the Lombardo family, their main rival.
The turf war that had cost the life of Gambio’s father three years before had been costly for all concerned, and a resolution seemed as far away and elusive as ever. The powerful families were evenly matched. But if two were to unite, the third may be forced to make peace on their terms and lose territory and influence. That was the strategy behind the plan. Simple, but compelling. Self-interest above all else; classic Mafia.
