Day of Confession (15 page)

36

HARRY MOVED UNSTEADILY IN THE DARKness, his head still aching from the smack of the ricocheting bullet, his back against the rough of the tunnel wall, with his good hand stretched out along it trying to find Hercules’ great door. He had to get out before the dwarf came back. Who knew what he would bring with him when he did? Friends? The police? What must sixty thousand dollars mean to a creature like him?

Where was the door? It couldn’t be this far
. What if he had gone past it in the dark?

He stopped. Listening. Hoping for the distant rumble of a Metro train that might give him some clue to where he was.

Silence.

It had taken most of his strength just to dress, collect Danny’s things, and get out of Hercules’ den. What he would do once he was out and away he didn’t know, but anything was better than staying there and waiting for whatever Hercules had planned.

Behind and in front was blackness. Then he saw it. A pinpoint of light in the distance. The end of the tunnel. He felt relief shudder through him. Back against the wall he started toward it. The light became brighter. He walked faster. Now his foot touched something hard. He stopped. Put his foot up to feel it. Steel. It was a rail. He looked back. The light was closer. He flashed on the machine of torture his captors had used. It couldn’t be the same. Where was he? Had he never left there at all?

Then he felt the ground rumble under him. The light was racing toward him. Then he knew! He was in a live tunnel. The light rocketing toward him was a Metro train. Turning, he ran back the way he had come. The light became brighter and brighter. His left foot slipped on the rail and he nearly fell. He heard the shriek of the train whistle. Then the scream of steel as the driver slammed on the brakes.

Suddenly rough hands grabbed him and threw him against the tunnel wall. He saw the lights inside the train as it slid past inches from him. The faces of startled passengers. Then it was past. Screeching to a stop fifty yards down the track.

“Are you crazy?”

Hercules was in his face, his hands on Harry’s jacket, holding him in an iron grip.

Yells of trainmen came from down the track. They were climbing out, coming toward them with flashlights.

“This way.”

Hercules spun him around and into a narrow side tunnel. A moment later he shoved him up a work ladder, then followed himself, crutches hanging on one arm, swinging up behind him like a circus performer.

Behind them they heard the shouts and calls of the trainmen. Hercules stared angrily at him, then moved him forward down another narrow tunnel full of wiring and ventilation equipment.

They went on that way, Harry in front, Hercules directly behind, for what seemed like a half mile or more. Finally they stopped under the light of a ventilation shaft.

For a long moment Hercules said nothing, just listened, then, satisfied they hadn’t been followed, looked to Harry.

“They will report that to the police. They will come and search the tunnels. If they find my place, they will know you were there. And I will have nowhere to live.”

“I’m sorry…”

“At least we know two things. You are well enough to walk, even run. And you are no longer blind.”

Harry
could
see. He hadn’t had time to even think about it. He’d been in darkness. Then had come the light of the train and seeing the passengers inside. Not with one eye but two.

“So,” Hercules said. “You are free.” With that he slung a small bound package from his shoulder and pushed it at Harry.

“Open it.”

Harry stared, then did as the dwarf said. Undoing the package, he unrolled its contents. Black trousers, black shirt, black jacket, and the white clerical collar of a priest, all worn but serviceable.

“You will become your brother, eh?”

Harry stared, incredulous.

“All right, maybe not your brother, but a priest. Why not? Already you are growing a beard, changing your appearance…. In a city filled with priests, how better to hide than in the open…? In the pants’ pocket are a few hundred thousand lire. Not much, but enough for you to gather your wits and see what you would do next.”

“Why?” Harry said. “You could have turned me over to the police and collected the reward.”

“Is your brother alive?”

“I don’t know.”

“Did he kill the cardinal vicar?”

“I don’t know.”

“There, you see. If I had given you to the authorities, you could never have answered the questions: If your brother lives. If he is a murderer. How do you know unless you find out?—Not forgetting that you yourself are wanted for the murder of a policeman. It makes it twice as interesting, eh?”

“You could have had enough money to last you a long time.”

“But the police would have to give it to me. And I cannot go to the police, Mr. Harry. Because I myself am a murderer…. And if I had someone else do it and offered some sort of arrangement, they might take the money and never come back…. You would be in prison, and I would be no better off than I am now…. What good is that?”

“Then why?”

“Do I help you?”

“Yes.”

“To let you out, Mr. Harry, and see what you can do. How far your wits and courage will take you. If you are good enough to survive. To find answers to your questions. To prove your innocence.”

Harry studied him carefully. “That’s not the only reason, is it?”

Hercules moved back on his crutches and for the first time Harry saw sadness in him. “The man I killed was wealthy and drunk. He tried to smash my head with a brick because of what I look like. I had to do something and did.

“You are a handsome, intelligent man. If you use what you have, you have a chance…. I have none. I am an ugly dwarf and murderer, condemned to a life beneath the streets…. If you win your game, Mr. Harry, maybe you will remember me and come back. Use your money and what you know to help me…. If I am still alive, any Gypsy will know how to find me.”

A feeling of warmth and true affection crept over Harry, making him feel as if he stood in the presence of an extraordinary human being. And he cocked his head, smiling at the sheer curiosity of it. A week ago he’d been in New York on business, one of the youngest, most successful entertainment lawyers in Hollywood. His life had seemed charmed. He was on top of the world, with only higher to go. Seven days later, in a turn of circumstance beyond imagination, he stood bandaged and dirty in a cramped air shaft above the Rome Metro—wanted for the murder of an Italian policeman.

It was a nightmare that defied belief but all too real just the same. And in the middle of it, a man brutalized by life, who had little or no hope of ever being free again—a crippled dwarf who had rescued him and helped nurse him back to health—hung on his crutches inches away in a deep chiaroscuro of light, asking for his help. One day in the future, if he could remember.

By his simple request, Hercules had effected a grace Harry barely knew existed. Saying gently that he truly believed one person, if he wished, could use what he had learned in life to do something of value for another. It was pure and honest and had been asked with no expectation that it would ever be carried out.

“I will do the best I can,” Harry said. “I promise you.”

37

A cafeteria in Stazione Termini,

Rome’s main railroad terminal. 9:30
A.M
.

ROSCANI WATCHED HIM WALK OUT TOWARD the trains and disappear into the crowd. He would finish his coffee and take his time leaving, making certain no one had the impression they knew each other or had left together.

Enrico Cirelli had been just another face ordering coffee. He’d taken it from the counter and come to the table where Roscani was having his own coffee and reading the morning paper. No more than a dozen words had been exchanged between them, but they were all Roscani needed.

An electrician, Cirelli had been north on a job and had come back only yesterday. But for Roscani it was worth the wait. As a ranking member of the Democratic Party of the Left, the new name for the Italian Communist Party, Cirelli knew as well as he knew his children whatever was happening inside Rome’s far left. And the far left, he told Roscani straight out, had had nothing to do with the murder of Cardinal Parma, the bombing of the Assisi bus, or the killing of Ispettore Capo Gianni Pio. If there were outside factions at work, a splinter group, he didn’t know. But if they existed, he would find out.

“
Grazie
,” Roscani had said, and Cirelli had simply stood and walked out. There was no need for the party leader to acknowledge the appreciation. Roscani would reciprocate later. When it was needed.

Finally Roscani stood and walked out himself. By now the Harry Addison video would have played on every channel of Italian television. His picture and that of his brother would have been seen in ninety percent of the country.

Roscani had purposely stayed away from the Questura and out of the limelight. It was a decision that had been made when he’d called Taglia at home at three in the morning to inform him Italian television had gotten hold of the video, and also a photo of Father Daniel, complete with pertinent details of the Gruppo Cardinale investigation of him. In response, Taglia had assigned Roscani to discover who had leaked the material. It was an inquiry to be rigorously pursued. One necessary to preserving the integrity of Gruppo Cardinale, not to mention Italian jurisprudence. Yet it was a pursuit both agreed would be difficult at best and might lead nowhere. Since both knew the material had been leaked by Roscani.

Now, as he crossed the terminal and out toward the street, pushing quickly through the tremendous flow of humanity that moved through it, Roscani saw uniformed police watching all of it. And knew there were more watching in other public places—airports, train stations, bus and ship terminals—from Rome to Sicily, and north to the borders at France, Switzerland, and Austria. Knew, too, that because of the media, the general populace would be on the lookout for them as well.

As he pushed through the glass doors and out into the bright sunshine, walking across toward his car, the immense scope of the Gruppo Cardinale manhunt began to sink in. He felt his eyes begin to narrow and realized he was watching faces, too. That was when he knew the feelings and emotions he thought he had put aside and buried under the guise of distance and professionalism hadn’t been left behind at all. He could feel their heat coming up through him.

Whether Father Daniel was alive or dead was a guess—conjecture one way or the other. But Harry Addison was somewhere out there. It was only a matter of time before he would be recognized. When that happened he would be pinpointed and watched. People in harm’s way would be quietly evacuated. And then, when the time was right, probably after dark, one man would go in after him alone. He would wear a flak jacket and be armed, both with a gun and memories of a fallen comrade.

That man would be Roscani himself.

38

Friday, July 10, 9:50
A.M
.

HARRY ADDISON STEPPED OUT OF THE METRO and into bright July sunshine at Manzoni Station. He wore Hercules’ costume and looked, he assumed, like a priest who’d had a bad night. A stubble beard, one bandage on the hairline at his left temple, another on his left hand, which kept together his thumb, index, and middle fingers.

The thing that jolted him to hard reality was his picture, side by side with Danny’s, on the covers of
Il Messagero
and
La Repubblica
, Italian-language newspapers that lined either side of a news and magazine kiosk near the station. Turning, he walked off in the other direction.

The first thing was to clean up to keep from drawing attention to himself. Ahead of him two streets came together with a small café on the corner. He went in, hoping to find a rest room where he could wash his face and hands and wet back his hair so that he was at least presentable.

A dozen people were inside, and not one looked up as he entered. The lone barman was at the coffee machine and had his back to the room. Harry walked past, assuming the rest room, if there was one, was at the rear. He was right, but someone was inside and he had to wait. Stepping back, he leaned against the wall near a window, trying to determine what to do next. As he did, he saw two priests pass by outside. One was bare headed, but the other wore a black beret that was pulled jauntily forward and to the side like some twenties Parisian artist. Maybe it was the style, maybe not, but if one priest could do it, why not two?

Abruptly the lavatory door opened and a man came out. He stared briefly at Harry as if in recognition, then passed by and went back into the café.

“
Buon giorno, padre
, “he said as he did.

“
Buon giorno
, “Harry said after him, then stepped into the lavatory and closed the door. Locking it with a flimsy slide-bolt, he turned to the mirror.

What he saw startled him. His face was gaunt, his skin pallid, his beard filled in more than he’d realized. When he’d left L.A., he’d been in good shape. A hundred and ninety pounds, over six feet two inches. He was certain he’d lost considerable weight. How much, he didn’t know, but under the black of the priest’s clothing he looked exceptionally slim. The weight loss, with the beard, had changed his appearance considerably.

Washing his face and hands as best he could, considering the bandages, he wet his hair and slicked it back with his palms. Behind him he heard a sound and saw the doorknob rattle.

“
Momento
,” he said instinctively, suddenly wondering if that was the correct word or not.

From outside, an impatient knock on the door was followed by an angry rattle of the doorknob. Unlocking the door, he opened it. An irate woman stared at him. That he was a priest had no effect at all. Obviously, her business was urgent. Nodding politely, he pushed past her, walked the length of the café and out into the street.

Two people had seen him face-to-face; neither had said a word. Yet he had been seen at a place with a name, and later—hours or moments—they might see his photo and remember. And remembering, call the police. What he needed to do was distance himself from the café as quickly as possible.