Cold Tuscan Stone (22 page)

Chapter Nine

Rick was back to his normal morning routine. Well, almost normal. He had just returned to the breakfast table after taking a call at the front desk. He poured Erica another cup of coffee, adding a touch of hot milk, just the way she liked it.

“That was Zerbino, the curator of the museum. He invited me to come by this morning when the museum's closed. Said he felt badly about giving me short shrift the other day. I accepted, but didn't mention your presence. Why don't you come with me? He certainly wouldn't mind.”

Erica brushed away some of the crumbs from her half-eaten
cornetto
and stirred her cup with a small spoon. “I've been to that museum, Ricky, and to be honest, I'm not very keen on the Etruscans. My Etruscan course was taught by a professor who was constantly looking at me in a way that I didn't appreciate.”

“I do, but I certainly wouldn't blame—”

“Ricky.” He'd forgotten. No joking until after the coffee does its work.

“Sorry. But Zerbino seems like a nice guy, and I assume all Etruscan scholars are not dirty old men. He'll be giving a private tour of the museum.” He rooted through the basket in the middle of the table to find another piece of the soft white bread. Still hungry, he was tempted to order the eggs and bacon that he had seen on the table of some English tourists. He resisted, taking a slice of bread and pulling the top off a small plastic cup of Nutella. He carefully spread the chocolate on the bread. Nutella, the great rejuvenator.

“Thank you, Ricky, but I'll pass on the Etruscans. I have some work to do anyway, a thesis I have to review before next week, and I'd rather get it over with. And by the time I'm finished reading it you'll be back, and I can take you to the Civic Museum to see Rosso's Deposition. The best painting in the city, bar none. It will win you over to Mannerism.”

He gently took her hand. “You have already won me over, Erica. I cannot conceive of any student who would not be completely captivated by the field, with you teaching it to them.”

She pulled her hand back and used it to lift her coffee cup to her lips. “Sure,
caro
. Have some more Nutella.”

***

Inspector Conti sat in the front passenger seat of the unmarked police car as it curved through in the wooded area north of the city. His men had arrived before dawn and hidden themselves and their vehicles, but so far nobody had shown up for work at the cave. Perhaps this was a day off for everyone, or the grave looters union had negotiated a very favorable work schedule. It would be good, Conti supposed, to get this business cleared up so he could devote all his resources to the Canopo murder investigation. He might even assign LoGuercio to the case, despite his losing track of the American last night.

“Take off your hat, sergeant, in case we come across someone going to the same place we are. We don't want to scare them off.”

The driver removed his blue service cap and tossed it in the seat behind him.

“It should be just around this bend, Commissario, according to the directions they gave me this morning. There will be a small road leading off—there it is.”

The car slowed and left the pavement, turning into a break among the trees, a path barely wide enough for the vehicle. After a hundred meters of ruts and bumps they entered the clearing.

“Are you sure this is the right place, Sergeant?” As he spoke Conti saw various policemen emerging from the trees, weapons in hand, and answered his own question. “Never mind, it is.”

Conti stepped onto the dirt of the clearing, noticing that in addition to the men coming out of the woods, two had appeared behind him on the path into the clearing. One of the men strode quickly over to the car.

“Commissario, good morning. We have our vehicles down the highway a few hundred meters, but there is room over there to hide yours. If anyone appears, once they are into this clearing we can block their exit. But I'm beginning to think that we have come on their rest day.”

As his car was driven behind the bushes, Conti looked around and saw that the area was just as the American had described. He walked over to the ravine and peered down, his eyes searching for the cave entrance.

“It's over there, sir,” said the policeman, pointing his hand. “You can see that the bushes have a slightly different color, the leaves are a bit lighter.” Conti nodded. “I can lead you down there when you are ready, sir. We've already taken pictures of the footprints inside, so you can step anywhere without a problem.”

Conti had to admit to himself that he was curious to see this cave. The only part of the case that irked him was that it was Montoya who had broken it open, just as the culture cops in Rome had planned. He didn't mind being wrong, except when it was another public safety arm that turned out to be right. Well, these rivalries would soon be a thing of the past for him, replaced by more wholesome ones on the card tables and bocce courts at San Giorgio. He was about to ask the sergeant to lead him to the cave when he realized that he had forgotten to call off the tail on Montoya. Cursing softly to himself, he opened his cell phone and dialed.

“LoGuercio?…Where?…That's fine, but you can pull back, the case has been resolved. I'll explain later, go back to the station.”

So Montoya was at the museum. That was certainly as good a place as any for the man to spend the morning. Conti didn't think there would be any immediate repercussions from the raid of the cave, but it was just as well that Montoya was in a public building where nothing could happen to him. He pocketed his phone and signaled to the sergeant that he was ready to descend into the ravine.

As they traversed down the narrow path, Conti wondered if it had been used by wild boar hunters, or even by the boars themselves. Fortunately poaching was not something under his purview, there was another corps of law enforcement which dealt with hunting and fishing. Which was just as well since he enjoyed a bit of fresh
cinghiale
out of season as much as the next person. Indeed, the Tuscan specialty would be a dish he would miss when he moved back home to San Giorgio. Close to the cave opening the sergeant cleared away the loose brush and moved the boards aside. He pulled a flashlight from his pocket and turned to Conti.

“I'll go in first, sir, and turn on the lamps. They have them on batteries.”

Conti waited until he saw the glow of light through the opening, then bent over with some difficulty to enter the cave. He was definitely getting too old for this kind of activity. When he straightened up, not without more difficulty, he was inside the room that Rick had described, its walls and ceiling spread with a yellow glow from the lamps. He immediately walked over to the niches in the wall and studied the urns. Like all Italians, Conti had been taught about the Etruscans in grade school, but despite living in the heart of their ancient territory now for several years, he'd never gotten around to learning much more. Police work was like that. So it was no use examining the urns, verification of their authenticity would be something for the damn art cops. He turned to the sergeant.

“What's in the next room? The American didn't get into it.”

“I think you'll find it interesting, Commissario,” said the policeman as he lead the way. The wooden plank that Montoya had described had been pushed to one side, revealing another doorway, about as low as the entrance to the cave itself. Being careful not to trip on the wires, Conti bent again and found himself in another room, this one slightly larger than the first, and well lit. When he looked around, his mouth dipped to a frown.

What the devil is this?

***

Rick was about to ring the bell at the side of the museum door, as Zerbino had instructed, when he remembered the cell phone issue with the building's security system. He pulled his out, did the needful, and returned it to his pocket before pressing the bell with his thumb. If it was working, it must ring well inside the building, since Rick heard nothing. When he was starting to wonder how long he should wait he saw the large figure of Zerbino through the glass, a key chain swinging from his hand like a prison guard. Even on his morning off the man was dressed like he was about to give a lecture to a group of university scholars. After some fumbling with the lock the door was opened, and the two men shook hands.

“Riccardo, so good to see you again. Come in, come in.”

“This is really very kind of you, Arnolfo.” Their heels clicked on the empty marble floor. Unlike their last visit, when Rick had squeezed through various groups of giggling school kids, the building was pleasantly quiet. The collection appeared even more ancient in the silence, causing Rick to lower his voice, as if they were in a church. Zerbino, however, was lively, if not bubbling, as he talked about the museum.

“I can't tell you how exciting it was for me when I won this position. Becoming the curator of such a collection is the dream of any Etruscanologist.” They were in a room displaying metal Etruscan artifacts of daily life: utensils and goblets, pins and other jewelry. Zerbino was in his element, pointing out how certain objects changed their design with fashion, how ideas were borrowed from the Greeks, and the extent to which the Romans were influenced by Etruscan design. Rick was fascinated by the running commentary and could not help contrasting this tour with the first one when Zerbino seemed merely to be going through the motions. They moved through various other rooms and found themselves in the first of those displaying the museum's famous collection of funerary urns. Zerbino looked around the shelves and his voice became more serious.

“These wonderful pieces, Riccardo, remind me of one of the scourges of our profession; the trafficking in ancient art. It has been going on for centuries.” He paused and turned to face Rick. “And it continues today.” Rick remembered Commissario Conti's comment about consulting Zerbino in the early days of the case. Perhaps he was going to boast about supporting the valiant efforts of the police. The curator walked slowly around the room, looking at the urns in silence. Suddenly he stopped and turned, looking at his guest. His face had changed.

“You can imagine that for me, as someone who is so involved in preserving these beautiful objects, it was a great shock to find someone in my very midst who is involved in that insidious trade.”

Rick stood in silence, digesting the man's words and attempting to make sense of them. Was it possible that Zerbino knew about Rick's undercover job? Conti had been so careful in telling Rick to keep anything from Zerbino, it was unlikely that the man could have found out, unless it was from someone else in the
commissariato
. Rick suddenly thought of another possibility. With all the hints I've been dropping around the city about wanting to buy special Etruscan objects, Zerbino could have gotten wind of them from someone and actually thinks I'm a trafficker. And now the outraged Etruscanologist is confronting the unscrupulous criminal, ready to make a citizen's arrest. He's certainly large enough to do it.

“I don't understand, Arnolfo, what are you getting at?”

Zerbino's mouth turned to a leering smile as he looked directly at Rick. “Your activities here in Volterra have not gone unnoticed. Need I say more?”

***

The second room of the cave held two crude tables made of long planks, each supported by wooden sawhorses, and each holding a set of Etruscan urns. Industrial pole lamps, like the ones in the other room, directed their light to the surfaces of the two tables. Spread on them were chisels, hammers, rulers, and other tools. Conti walked to one of the tables and examined its two urns, realizing immediately that they were similar. No, not similar, virtually the same, or at the very least close to being the same. The design was identical, a winged god surrounded by warriors who were led by a man with a long sword. Certain details of the one, in front of which most of the tools lay, were still a bit rough, but someone looking quickly at them would have had trouble telling them apart. The copy would probably be a perfect one, detectible by only the most learned of Etruscan scholars. Conti was trying to put it all together in his mind when he noticed a dirty folder on the far side of the table. Inside was a photograph of the urn he had just examined. The photograph was enclosed in a protective plastic sheet on which a label had been attached to the bottom. The label had the logo of the Etruscan museum and what Conti guessed to be a catalog number. He held up the photograph and compared the urn pictured with the one on the table. The only difference was that the urn in the photo was sitting on a shelf in the
Museo Etrusco Guarnacci
.

Conti turned and walked quickly out of the room, almost colliding with the top of the doorway. Cursing, he bent down and nearly ran through the other room toward the cave entrance where he did collide, but this time with a policeman whose head was down to enter the cave.

“
Mi scusi, Commissario
,” said the man as he picked himself off the floor, brushing his hands of the mud that had stuck to them when he fell. “I was bringing you an urgent message,” he added, hoping it could deflect some of his boss' anger.

“Make it quick, I'm in a hurry.”

The man read from a piece of paper he took from his jacket pocket. “A call from the station. They found the red Opel. A meter maid spotted it after she had seen our notice on the bulletin board this morning.”

“She is to be complimented. Are they sure it's the right one?”

“There was an English-Italian dictionary in the back seat.”

“Excellent. Where is it?”

Again the policeman glanced at the paper. “Via della Porta Marconi, a side street that doesn't get much traffic. Near the Etruscan museum. In fact it was just off the street itself, parked in one of the spaces reserved for the museum.” He looked up from the paper and saw Conti staring down at his hands.