Dante he was a long way from being destitute. Don’t forget, he’d been involved
in diplomacy between Florence and the Vatican and had been asked by the Pope to
stay in Rome while all the other legates were dismissed, which suggests he was one
of the most senior and important people involved. And even after he was driven into
exile, he was still communicating with kings and emperors throughout Europe. In
fact, the whole reason he ended his days in Ravenna was because a prince had invited
him to stay there and, presumably, had provided him with accommodation and perhaps
even funded him as well. So it is at least possible that whatever we’re looking
for could be some kind of legacy from Dante, some valuable he owned, rather than
a relic in the normal sense of the word. But there is another question we need to
think about as well.’
Lombardi just looked at him, then shook
his head.
‘Normally, Silvio, I know where you’re going with this kind of
argument, but right now I don’t. What other question are you talking about?’
‘Both you and Guitoni seem quite convinced that these mysterious
extra – or replacement, I suppose – verses were not written by Dante, and the implication
is that they might even have been written after his death. In which case, it’s not
one question, in fact, but three. First, who wrote the verses and, second, why did
they write them? And, most importantly, what were they trying to say?’
Chapter 11
Ever since the two Italians, hired at considerable expense through
a contact in the Moscow Mafia who had been expanding his operations inside and outside
Russia virtually since the day Gorbachev came to power, had failed to extract the
information that he was sure the elderly professor of Italian literature had possessed,
Stefan had been trying to retrieve the situation. But it wasn’t easy, and it had
been difficult for him to decide exactly what he should do next.
The man Marco had been quite adamant on the telephone after the
event. He had been positive that if Bertorelli had possessed the information Stefan
sought he would certainly have divulged it. And when Stefan had read the reports
in the newspaper about the death of the academic – the murder had, entirely predictably,
been front-page news ever since the body had been discovered – he had absolutely
agreed with the Italian. Details of at least some of the appalling injuries inflicted
by the two men on Bertorelli had been released by the police to the media, and the
reporter had then described them with a kind of meticulous devotion that suggested
he had been relishing writing every single word of the story. Anyone, Stefan knew,
would have broken under that kind of pressure.
And that was a worry. Because if the man responsible for discovering
the modified verses genuinely had no idea where the relic might be found, then Stefan
wondered whether it wasn’t all just a stupid mistake, if he had read more into the
article than was merited by the facts.
He had gone back again to the article, and to the professor’s
analysis of the two verses, and studied it once more. And, again, he had come to
precisely the same conclusion. Bertorelli had apparently been too obtuse to see
it, probably because he was so tied up in an analysis of the verse structure, form and vocabulary that he had simply failed to recognize
the actual meaning of words. But as far as Stefan was concerned, they were clear
enough. Kidnapping the professor, he realized with hindsight, had been a bad mistake,
though it had seemed justified at the time, but fortunately he believed he was well
insulated from the consequences.
So what he now needed to do was move on, and identify through his own resources what he had expected Bertorelli
to have told him: the actual location of the object that he had set his heart on
acquiring, at almost any cost.
Stefan glanced at the analysis of the verses in Bertorelli’s
article one more time, and then replaced the
in diplomacy between Florence and the Vatican and had been asked by the Pope to
stay in Rome while all the other legates were dismissed, which suggests he was one
of the most senior and important people involved. And even after he was driven into
exile, he was still communicating with kings and emperors throughout Europe. In
fact, the whole reason he ended his days in Ravenna was because a prince had invited
him to stay there and, presumably, had provided him with accommodation and perhaps
even funded him as well. So it is at least possible that whatever we’re looking
for could be some kind of legacy from Dante, some valuable he owned, rather than
a relic in the normal sense of the word. But there is another question we need to
think about as well.’
Lombardi just looked at him, then shook
his head.
‘Normally, Silvio, I know where you’re going with this kind of
argument, but right now I don’t. What other question are you talking about?’
‘Both you and Guitoni seem quite convinced that these mysterious
extra – or replacement, I suppose – verses were not written by Dante, and the implication
is that they might even have been written after his death. In which case, it’s not
one question, in fact, but three. First, who wrote the verses and, second, why did
they write them? And, most importantly, what were they trying to say?’
Chapter 11
Ever since the two Italians, hired at considerable expense through
a contact in the Moscow Mafia who had been expanding his operations inside and outside
Russia virtually since the day Gorbachev came to power, had failed to extract the
information that he was sure the elderly professor of Italian literature had possessed,
Stefan had been trying to retrieve the situation. But it wasn’t easy, and it had
been difficult for him to decide exactly what he should do next.
The man Marco had been quite adamant on the telephone after the
event. He had been positive that if Bertorelli had possessed the information Stefan
sought he would certainly have divulged it. And when Stefan had read the reports
in the newspaper about the death of the academic – the murder had, entirely predictably,
been front-page news ever since the body had been discovered – he had absolutely
agreed with the Italian. Details of at least some of the appalling injuries inflicted
by the two men on Bertorelli had been released by the police to the media, and the
reporter had then described them with a kind of meticulous devotion that suggested
he had been relishing writing every single word of the story. Anyone, Stefan knew,
would have broken under that kind of pressure.
And that was a worry. Because if the man responsible for discovering
the modified verses genuinely had no idea where the relic might be found, then Stefan
wondered whether it wasn’t all just a stupid mistake, if he had read more into the
article than was merited by the facts.
He had gone back again to the article, and to the professor’s
analysis of the two verses, and studied it once more. And, again, he had come to
precisely the same conclusion. Bertorelli had apparently been too obtuse to see
it, probably because he was so tied up in an analysis of the verse structure, form and vocabulary that he had simply failed to recognize
the actual meaning of words. But as far as Stefan was concerned, they were clear
enough. Kidnapping the professor, he realized with hindsight, had been a bad mistake,
though it had seemed justified at the time, but fortunately he believed he was well
insulated from the consequences.
So what he now needed to do was move on, and identify through his own resources what he had expected Bertorelli
to have told him: the actual location of the object that he had set his heart on
acquiring, at almost any cost.
Stefan glanced at the analysis of the verses in Bertorelli’s
article one more time, and then replaced the
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