Day of Confession Part 25

"I've come to take you to your brother..."

Harry stared. "I don't understand..."

"It's all right...." She could feel his caution, see his uncertainty. "I'm not with the police..."

"I'm sorry, I don't know what you're talking about."

"If you are not sure... follow me out. I will be waiting on the steps leading up to the village. Your brother is ill.... Please... Mr. Addison."

76.

HARRY TOOK HER DOWN A BACK STAIRWAY. At the ground floor, he opened the door to a rear hallway.

USCITA. Exit, the sign read. An arrow pointed off. Harry hesitated-he wanted to go out a rear or side door, anything but through the front and out onto the street where Roscani was. But there was only one sign, and he followed it, moving them off in the direction the arrow pointed. A minute later they pushed through a door and into the hotel lobby with the front door directly in front of them.

"d.a.m.n it," Harry breathed. People were at the front desk, checking in or out. Past them, a rotund man was in animated conversation with the concierge. Harry looked back. If there was another exit he had no idea how to find it. Just then the elevator doors opened, and two couples and a porter pus.h.i.+ng a luggage cart came toward them. If they were going out, this was the time.

Taking Elena's arm, Harry timed his move to keep in step with the porter. As they reached the door he motioned for the man to go ahead. The porter nodded and pushed the luggage cart through. Harry and Elena came out just behind. The sunlight hit, and Harry turned them abruptly left along the sidewalk, walking with other pedestrians.

"Buon giorno." A man tipped his hat. A young couple smiled at them. They kept on.

"Go up the steps to the left," Elena said calmly.

Then Harry saw Roscani coming up the walk from the water, the same way Harry had come last night. He was walking quickly, the other two plainclothes policemen at his heels. Harry moved closer to Elena, keeping her between himself and the police.

They were almost to the corner now, and Harry could see the steps Elena was talking about. Suddenly Roscani looked up. Directly at him. In the same instant, Elena began talking in Italian. He had no idea what she was saying. But she gestured ahead, using her hands, talking as if what they were doing and where they were going was hugely important. At the steps, she turned him abruptly left and up, still talking, sounding now as if she were scolding him, then, as quickly, smiling at an elderly man coming down the steps toward them.

Then they were in a mix of people on the stairs. Winding their way through them, pa.s.sing shops and restaurants. It was only when they had reached the top that Harry looked back. Nothing. No police. No Roscani. Just shoppers. Civilians.

"Those men coming up from the landing were police," Elena said.

"I know." Harry looked at her as they moved on, wondering who she was, and why she was doing this.

77.

9:10 A.M A.M.

GRINDING GEARS, HARRY TURNED A CORNER, then, gritting his teeth, s.h.i.+fted again and accelerated down a narrow street. The farm truck was old and cranky, its clutch and manual s.h.i.+ft worn and difficult. Crunching the gear box once more, he turned past a park, and then they were out of the city.

"Tell me about my brother." He took his eyes from the road and looked at Elena, calculating, to see if she really knew.

"His legs are broken, and he has been burned over parts of his head and upper body. He suffered a very serious concussion. But he is better now, and is beginning to take solid food and can talk a little. His memory comes and goes, which is normal. He's weak but is healing. I think he will be all right."

Danny was alive! alive! Harry felt the breath go out of him. A rush of emotion followed, as the reality of it hit home. Suddenly he looked at the road in front of them. Cars were slowing, coming to a stop. Harry felt the breath go out of him. A rush of emotion followed, as the reality of it hit home. Suddenly he looked at the road in front of them. Cars were slowing, coming to a stop.

"Carabinieri, "Elena said.

Harry's hand went to the s.h.i.+ft lever. Immediately there was a loud wrench of grinding gears as he downs.h.i.+fted, coming to a halt inches behind a white Lancia stopped in a clog of vehicles pulled up at the police checkpoint.

Two uniformed carabinieri carabinieri armed with Uzis checked each car as it came abreast and stopped. Two others stood to the side watching. armed with Uzis checked each car as it came abreast and stopped. Two others stood to the side watching.

Now the car ahead of them was waved through, and Harry ground the truck into gear. It bucked raggedly forward, bouncing to a stop only after one of the carabinieri carabinieri had jumped out of the way, yelling for Harry to halt. had jumped out of the way, yelling for Harry to halt.

"Jesus Christ."

The carabinieri carabinieri came up, one on either side. came up, one on either side.

Harry glanced at Elena. "Talk to them. Say anything."

"Buon giorno. "The carabinieri carabinieri glared at Harry. glared at Harry.

"Buon giorno." Harry smiled and Elena began. Speaking rapid-fire Italian. Gesturing between herself and Harry and the truck, talking to both policemen at once. In a matter of seconds it was over. The carabinieri carabinieri stood smartly back, saluted, and waved them through. And with a grinding of gears and a sharp backfire, Harry steered past them, leaving all four police turning away in a cloud of blue smoke. stood smartly back, saluted, and waved them through. And with a grinding of gears and a sharp backfire, Harry steered past them, leaving all four police turning away in a cloud of blue smoke.

Harry watched the mirror, then looked to Elena.

"What did you tell them?"

"That the truck was borrowed and that we were on our way to a funeral and were late.... I hope it's not so..."

"So do I."

Harry looked back to the highway as it began to rise toward the distant cliffs, then instinctively glanced in the mirror. There was nothing but the checkpoint and vehicles being waved through one by one.

Slowly Harry took his eyes from the mirror and looked to Elena. She was staring at the road ahead, quiet, even introspective. Suddenly she turned and looked at him, as if she knew what he was thinking and was about to ask.

"Your brother's care was a.s.signed to me by my convent."

"You mean you knew who he was?..."

"No."

"Did the people at your convent?"

"I-don't know..."

"You don't?"

"No."

Harry looked back to the road. She certainly knew who Danny was now. And she knew who Harry was, and still she had put herself in all kinds of potential trouble tap-dancing them through the police.

"You mind if I ask what seems like a silly question?... Why are you doing this?"

"That is something I have been asking myself, Mr. Addison...." She glanced down the road and then back to Harry, her brown eyes suddenly intense and penetrating.

"You should know that when I came to Bellagio I was going to go to the police. To tell them about you and about your brother. And I almost did-except... the body they pulled from the lake in front of your hotel was that of a man who helped bring your brother to where he is.... Only hours ago he learned his wife had been murdered, and he left immediately to go back to his home...." Elena paused, as if the memory of what she had seen was too heinous to talk about. Then Harry saw her gather strength, and she went on.

"They said he drowned. I don't know if that's true.... There were two other men with him.... I don't know where they are or what happened to them.... In result, I-made up my mind..."

"About what?..."

Elena hesitated. "... About my own future, Mr. Addison.... G.o.d gave me a job to do caring for your brother.... No matter what else has happened, it is something He has yet to dismiss me from.... The decision was really quite simple...." Elena's eyes held on Harry, then she looked back down the road. "Those trees ahead-just past them is a dirt road to the right. Please take it."

78.

10:15 A.M A.M.

EDWARD MOOI STOOD NAKED, TOWEL IN HAND. Dripping from the bath.

"Who are you? What do you want?"

He had not heard the door open or had any idea how the blond man in jeans and light jacket had found his way to the second-floor apartment. Or how he had gotten past the Gruppo Cardinale police still outside and into the building. Or even onto the grounds of Villa Lorenzi, for that matter.

"I want you to take me to the priest," the blond man said quietly.

"Get out of here, now! Or I will call security!" Edward Mooi pulled the towel around him angrily.

"I don't think so." The blond man took something from his jacket pocket and set it on the white porcelain sink next to the poet.

"What am I supposed to do with that?" Mooi looked at what had been set on the sink. Whatever it was was wrapped in what looked like a dark green restaurant napkin.

"Open it."

Edward Mooi stared at him, then slowly picked up the napkin and unwrapped it.

"Oh, Lord!"

Heinously blue. Bloodied. Grossly swollen with bits of the green napkin fiber clinging to it-a neatly severed human tongue. Half gagging, Mooi threw it into the sink and backed away, terrified.

"Who are you?"

"The ambulance driver didn't want to talk about the priest. Instead he wanted to fight." The blond man's eyes were on his. "You are not a fighter. The television says you are a poet. That makes you an intelligent man. Which is why I know you will do as I ask and take me to the priest."

Edward Mooi stared. This This was who they had been hiding Father Daniel from. was who they had been hiding Father Daniel from.

"There are too many police. We will never get past them-"

"We will see what we can do, Edward Mooi."

ROSCANI LOOKED AT THE OBJECT-or objects-intertwined in a single water-sodden ma.s.s of blood, flesh, and clothing pulled from the lake, discovered by the elderly owner of the villa on whose manicured grounds they now stood, while the tech-team people took photographs, made notes, interviewed the man who had come upon it.

Who could tell who they were, or had been? Except Roscani knew; so did Scala and Castelletti. They were the others-two, it looked like-who had been onboard the hydrofoil that brought Father Addison to Villa Lorenzi.

d.a.m.n, Roscani wanted a cigarette. Thought about b.u.mming one from one of his detectives. Instead he pulled out a foil-wrapped chocolate biscuit from his jacket, unwrapped it and bit off a piece, then walked away. He had no idea how the men here were butchered, except that they were-butchered. And he would bet a year's cache of chocolate biscuits that it was the work of the man with the ice pick.

Moving to the water's edge, he stared out at the lake. He was missing something. Something of what had happened should be telling him something.

"Mother of G.o.d!" Roscani turned quickly and started back across the lawn toward the car. "Let's go! Now!"

Immediately Scala and Castelletti left the tech crew to follow him.

Roscani was walking, half running as he reached the car. Getting in, he s.n.a.t.c.hed the radio from the car's dashboard. "This is Roscani. I want Edward Mooi taken into protective custody right now! We're on our way."

An instant later Scala swung the car in a wide arc, spewing gravel over the freshly cut lawn. Roscani was beside him. Castelletti in back. No one said a word.

79.

10:50 A.M A.M.

HARRY WATCHED AND LISTENED AS THE sunlight faded to shadow and then darkness, and the wood-and-steel cage lowered, creaking, between the rock walls. Down there, somewhere, was Danny. Above was the dirt road through the trees and the farm truck they had left hidden in the brush near the edge of the wooded circle at the end of it.

One minute pa.s.sed. Then two. Then three. The only sounds were the creak of the cage and the distant hum of the electric motor as the lift descended and they pa.s.sed the occasional safety lamp mounted in the rock. With the coming and going of the light, Harry could see the quiet nuance of Elena's body under her habit, the strength of her neck held high above her shoulders, the soft sweep of her cheek punctuated by the angular bridge of her nose, a before unseen sparkle in her eyes. Then suddenly something s.h.i.+fted his attention away from Elena. It was an odor of mossy dampness. Pungent and vividly familiar. One he hadn't smelled in years.

Instantly he was transported to the afternoon of his thirteenth birthday. He was wandering alone in the woods after school-woods with the exact same mossy-wet smell that surrounded him now. Life had taken them all in a rush. In less than two years he and Danny had lost their sister and father to tragic accidents and seen their mother remarry and move them into a house of chaos with a distant husband and five other children. Birthdays, like other things personal, became lost in a tide of confusion, uncertainty, and readjustment.

And though he tried not to show it, Harry was as lost and dangling. Eldest son, older brother, he was expected to be the leader of the household. But of which household, when there were already two older boys in his adopted family who seemed to run everything?

The whole thing made him reticent, afraid to step in any direction for fear something else would happen and things would become even worse than they were. The result was that he quietly withdrew. With few friends in the school they had been transferred to, he kept more and more to his own company, reading mostly, or watching TV when someone else wasn't, or, more often, just wandering as he was now.

This day was especially difficult-his thirteenth birthday, the day he was officially a teenager and no longer a child. He knew there would be no celebration at home-he doubted the others even knew it was his birthday; the best he might get in recognition would be a present or two from his mother given to him with Danny there in her room, away from the others and just before bedtime. It was, he understood, that she was as lost herself, and simply afraid to single out her own children in a much larger household and in front of a husband she felt beholden to. Still, it made the celebration of his birth seem secretive and forbidden. As if he were hardly worth it, or, worse, as if he existed in name only. So the best he could do was wander in the woods and let the day pa.s.s, trying not to think about it.

That was-until he saw the rock.

Away from the trail and half hidden by brush, it caught his attention because something was written on it. Curious, he climbed over a log and approached it, pus.h.i.+ng foliage aside as he went. When he reached it, he saw what was written-large, clear words freshly scratched in chalk.