Arcadia Awakens (45 page)

At the moment Rosa couldn’t do anything else for her. The northern route seemed to be reasonably safe. The Carnevares, and others who had come to Gibellina for the election and the hunt that would follow it, had left their cars in the valley south of the ruined village. In the dim light of early morning, Rosa had seen them some way farther down the slope. She thought, and hoped, that Iole could get away unnoticed on the inhospitable and winding road to the north.

Several men were preparing for the hunt in the concrete alleys of the monument, setting up floodlights and generators. Rosa crouched in the tall bushes, assessing the best way to avoid Cesare’s henchmen.

Time was short. The sun was coming up over the hills in the east, turning the sky a fiery red. Morning mists rose from the surrounding valleys, dispersing among the untended vineyards. Rosa set out on a wide detour around the concrete labyrinth on its western side. Ducking low, she ran up the slope, taking what shelter she could find in the bushes and the rubble. No one had yet realized that Iole had disappeared. It was possible that Remeo was covering up for her down there.

Above her was the lonely rough-hewn stone farmhouse that she had seen when she’d first arrived. It stood on the slope above the monument, apparently unoccupied.

So far she had seen only a single patrol, and avoided it easily enough. All the other men were busy putting up floodlights, laying cables, and preparing a large festive table in the shelter of the mighty rocks at the edge of the monument, out of the wind. Crates of wine were carried, clinking, up a path that ordinary cars couldn’t manage; wooden benches and folding chairs were set up. A huge barbecue with a spit big enough to hold a whole calf was being hauled up the hill by four men. Rosa had a horrible idea of
what
the long spit was intended for.

Was this the way the Arcadian dynasties had helped the savage lusts of antiquity to survive into the present day? What barbarity would there be if the Hungry Man regained control of the dynasties again, reviving King Lycaon’s cult of cannibalism?

As she climbed the last part of the way to the house, she wondered again about Cesare’s motives. It seemed strange that he wasn’t mounting a search for her. Unless, it suddenly occurred to her, he had indeed given orders for one, but they had never arrived at the Gibellina monument. If so, Pantaleone’s second informer must hold high rank within the Carnevare clan—high enough to countermand Cesare’s message.

Up above the monument, Rosa crossed a narrow path—asphalted, but the surface was breaking up—and then she reached the outer wall of the old farmhouse. Keeping low, she was moving into its shadow when she heard a noise far away. It was the rhythmic hum of an engine, rapidly getting louder.

Cautiously, she peered around the corner of the wall. The dismal concrete expanse of the monument stretched out below her.

In the sky to the east, gold in the rising sun, a helicopter was arriving.

T
HE HELICOPTER LANDED ON
the open space at the edge of the concrete labyrinth. The men busy with preparations for the celebration stopped work when the wind of the rotor blades and swirling dust whipped across the slope.

Rosa was about two hundred yards uphill. No one could see her from below. Her heart was hammering so hard that she could sense the pulsing at her throat.

The side door of the helicopter opened and Cesare Carnevare climbed out, accompanied by three bodyguards, all of them in black suits. One of the men who had been working on the monument hurried toward Cesare.

Rosa withdrew her head and leaned against the wall for a moment. Even if Cesare’s orders to his men in Gibellina to look for her had never reached them, it wouldn’t be long before someone went in search of Iole and Alessandro.

She hid behind an abandoned stable a little way up the slope and found that she could peer cautiously around its corner and see the front of the dilapidated farmhouse. New windows had been set into the facade.

Two Land Rovers were parked outside the entrance. There were no guards in sight, but she couldn’t be quite sure. So she ran first into the cover of one vehicle, then over to the other. There were ten yards now between her and the farmhouse door.

She was betting everything on a single card. She ducked low and ran across the open space of the farmyard. A light shone behind one of the dirty windows. Crouching down, she heard men’s voices inside the house, talking in low voices. Two at least.

There were still four bullets in her revolver. She wasn’t sure what her best course of action would be. All she knew was that Alessandro was being held in this building, and she had to do something.

A cell phone rang inside the house. The men stopped talking. A brief silence, and then one of them said, on the other side of the glass, “No, all in order here. No problems. But Gino will take a look around outside.”

“Why me?” protested his companion, but the next moment came the scraping sound of chair legs being pushed back.

Rosa raced away, retreating behind one of the Land Rovers. In a panic, she looked around for a better place to hide, and at the last second rolled under the vehicle. She lay on her stomach in the dust, the gun in both hands, looking toward the house.

The front door opened; faint light fell out into the farmyard. A man came out with a submachine gun in one hand and a flashlight in the other.

Rosa didn’t move. She held her breath.

Slowly, the man crossed the yard. His shoes disappeared behind one of the high tires. She couldn’t see him now, although he was less than four feet away.

“Anything unusual?” asked a voice as the second man appeared in the doorway.

“Not a soul in sight.”

“Go and look all around the house.”

“What are they so scared of all of a sudden? Cops?”

The man in the doorway shrugged his shoulders. “We’re to keep our eyes peeled, that’s what they said. Signore Carnevare is coming up. He wants to speak to the boy.”

Gino, the man standing between the Land Rovers, groaned. “Okay, I’ll look around. Leave some of those cannoli for me.”

No sooner had he disappeared around the corner of the house than a third voice called, from the trail leading up to the house, “All clear with you?”

Rosa couldn’t believe her ears.

The man in the entrance shone the light of a lamp on the new arrival. “Does anyone say anything different? Why do they all seem to think we’re not up to the job?” Morosely, he stepped out of the door. “So what do you want?”

“Signore Carnevare sent me. I’m to take Alessandro to him down by the chopper.”

“Just now they said he was coming up here to us.”

“Then he’s changed his mind.” Footsteps crunched on dust and gravel. Turning her head, Rosa saw sneakers and jeans moving over the yard outside the house from the path below.

She knew that voice.

“Are you alone?” asked Fundling.

“Gino’s just checking the back of the building. Wait there while I call them down below so that they can—”

“No need.”

Two shots hissed through a silencer. The man in the doorway collapsed without a sound.

Rosa still didn’t move.

Fundling was faster. She could see him now, bending over the lifeless man and hauling him into the house. After a last glance into the dawn twilight, checking the surroundings, he closed the door from the inside.

Maybe he had hot-wired the Maserati. Or someone had picked him up and brought him here. The judge’s people? But wouldn’t they have intervened long before?

Rosa glanced at the corner of the house. Gino wasn’t in sight yet. She quickly rolled out from under the Land Rover, ran on tiptoe to the window, and peered in. No one there.

She switched the gun to her left hand so that she could wipe her sweating palm on her jeans. Then she took the butt in her right again, stole over to the door, breathing deeply—and opened it.

She aimed the revolver into the house.

Fundling was standing in front of her, with the muzzle of his own firearm pointing her way.

“Rosa!” Relieved, he lowered the pistol.

She kept her gun at the ready and stepped inside the door, kicking it closed behind her with her foot.

“Where’s Alessandro?”

Legs apart, Fundling was standing over the dead man’s feet. “You don’t have to wave a gun at me.”

“What are you doing here?”

He shrugged. “You left me the Maserati.”

“Did Quattrini send you?”

“She’s looking for you.”

Rosa pointed at the body of the dead man. “What was that for?”

“We have to hurry. Before Gino comes back.” He put the pistol in his waistband and started dragging the body away from the door. They were in a narrow hallway. To the left was the lighted room where the guards had been sitting. The door on the right was closed. Fundling maneuvered the corpse through the third door, at the end of the tiny hall.

Rosa never took her eyes off him. The gun in her hands wasn’t shaking nearly as badly now. She was still confused, but she was regaining control over herself. She waited.

Fundling came back into the hall, closing the door behind him. He had the pistol in his hand again now. Rosa kept aiming at his chest.

“Now to look for Alessandro,” he said.

“You just shot that man.”

“Well, what exactly were
you
planning to do?” He nodded at her gun.

She heard footsteps outside in the front courtyard.

Rosa swore. She was still standing with her back to the front door. Time to get out of there, fast. She quickly made her way into the room on the left, just in time to see Fundling aiming his pistol at the entrance to the house.

Gino opened the door. “Nothing there. No idea what they—”

Fundling fired twice. Through the narrow gap, Rosa couldn’t see either of them. But she heard the heavy thud of a body falling. Fundling hurried to the door. A moment later he was dragging the second dead man to the end of the corridor.

The room where Rosa was standing smelled of sweet pastries and coffee. Two cardboard cups stood on a table, with a thermos jug and a plastic plate of cannoli.

Outside the room, the door at the end of the corridor closed, and then Fundling shut the front door as well. Seeing a trace of blood on the floor, he cursed under his breath.

“Once again,” said Rosa, “what are you doing here?”

“Keeping an eye on you.”

“‘Keeping an eye on—’” She was lost for words. “Quattrini knows I’m here, and she sends
you?
What exactly
are
you, her fucking intern?”

“She has no idea what’s going on here.”

Rosa stared at him. Suddenly she remembered what she had been thinking earlier. “It’s
you?
Pantaleone’s second man in Cesare’s camp?”

His nod was surprisingly frank, although he avoided her eyes with a touch of shame next moment. “It’s complicated.”

She’d been wrong. The second informer did not hold high rank in the Carnevare outfit; his was about as low as you could go—he only ran errands for them. That was how he had been able to intercept Cesare’s message to the others.

She lowered her weapon a little way. “You’re informing on the Carnevares to the police
and
to Pantaleone?”

“I’d help any enemy of Cesare’s, never mind who else they are and what they want.”

“Because he—”

“For the same reason as Alessandro,” he interrupted her, “only by other means. He wants to kill Cesare but protect the clan. I couldn’t care less about the clan. Cesare murdered Gaia and the baron. I owe more than my life to them. I won’t allow Cesare to become one of the most powerful
capi
in Sicily through murdering them.”

“Pantaleone told you to help me?”

He nodded. “But I was already well on my way here by then. This has nothing to do with either Pantaleone or the judge. I’ll explain it all to you later, if you like, but right now we don’t have time.”

“Cesare’s coming up here,” she managed to say.

“Yes. We have two or three minutes at the most.”