Goddess of Death (13 page)

Carmela glanced at Arnold. ‘I think in English, such ceramics are called
coarseware
. We have heard of illegal digs near the Liri River, particularly at Teana where a sanctuary suffered from clandestine activity. Some such ceramics have been recovered.’

Gabriel Nunza fingered his grey moustache nervously. ‘By the time the brochure came to me the sale had been concluded, and it was too late to protest, but my concerns were growing, as you must appreciate. The ceramic in question had been sent to me by a Spanish collector with whom I had been in contact: I had been asked to advise on it, confirm its authenticity, which I was happy to do, and I was allowed to retain it for six months for display purposes.’

‘And now your confirmation, and holding of the item, was being used—’

‘To provide provenance,’ Nunza muttered.

There was a short silence. Carmela Cacciatore glanced at Arnold and nodded. ‘An old trick. There are many ways in which provenance can be assumed and I fear the world of collectors is sufficiently unscrupulous to turn a blind eye to such practices. To say an item comes from a private collection is to shield the truth: it is a meaningless phrase, tells the purchaser nothing of the actual provenance, which may well be a looted tomb, an illegal importation, a naked theft. But since governments have started to clamp down on such practices – even Switzerland has changed its laws recently, although the country is still to be treated as a place from which antiquities should be treated with suspicion – it is not unusual for other methods to be used, such as the suggestion that the artefact in question comes from a museum collection. In other words, your contacts were using you, Nunza; to cover the lack of provenance they have been implying that the Abrogazzi had acquired the item legitimately. It was a stamp of approval. It would convince buyers, or at least allow them to fool
themselves
. So when you realized what was happening, what did you do about it?’

Nunza hesitated. He licked his lips. ‘I went to the owners of the museum. I explained my position. I told them I was unhappy about what seemed to be happening. They were …
unsympathetic
. I told them I wanted nothing more to do with such practices. The discussion became a little heated, I’m afraid. And then it became clear to me that while I could not say that the owners had been involved, I realized that certain significant bequests that had been made to the museum, helping it to keep afloat over the years, had probably come about as a result of actions by my predecessors and now by these … latest
confirmations
. And it was made clear to me that these bequests helped
pay my salary. I was angry. I announced I would not undertake any further confirmations.’

‘But you didn’t resign from your position,’ Carmela said coldly.

There was no response from Nunza. He stared at Carmela in owlish despair.

‘And you made no report to the authorities,’ she added in a disgusted tone.

Karl Spedding cleared his throat. ‘That’s a little unfair. Gabriel rang me. Told me what was happening. Asked my advice.’

Carmela looked at him, dark eyebrows raised. ‘And you reacted?’

‘We had been through much together in our former posts.’ He shrugged. ‘I said I would do what I could to help.’

‘Which was?’ Arnold asked.

‘I spoke to various people I knew at other museums. And I also made contact with someone in the
Guardia di Finanza
, who promised to look into it. He had been helpful in the past, supportive in some enquiries I made when I was at the Pradak Museum. Meanwhile, I told Gabriel to hang on, stay in the job for the time being, but keep his head down.’

‘And that’s what happened?’ Carmela asked sternly.

Nunza shuffled uncertainly in his seat. ‘All went quiet. And then, out of the blue, I received a telephone call from Peter Steiner.’

Arnold saw Carmela’s shoulders stiffen. ‘What was that all about?’

‘I was taken aback. I had had no dealings with the man; I had met him of course, before he was exposed and sent to prison, but I was taken completely by surprise that he should contact me after his release from incarceration.’ Nunza mopped again at his hands, twisted the handkerchief into a ball. ‘He had read some articles, he told me, and was interested in some of the items I had authenticated, along with other experts. But I didn’t want to talk
to him. I made that clear. He was persistent. And finally he asked me about some specific items, asked if they’d been submitted to me at any time. And we talked in general about the problems of provenance.’

Carmela’s tone had become careful; there was a new tension in her voice. ‘What specific items did he mention?’

Nunza hesitated. ‘It was a general discussion. Specific items … well, as I recall there was the matter of five
kantharoi
with cusped handles; a biconic vase painted in the white and red
technique
; some
fibulae
decorated with a motif previously found only in Villanova necropolises in Bologna, a bronze head … I told him a request had been made to me to consider some of these items, but I had refused to deal with them after my meeting with the Abrogazzi owners.’

‘Anything else?’

Nunza hesitated, glanced at Spedding and then raised one reluctant shoulder in a shrug. ‘There was also a bronze statuette.’ He licked his lips uncertainly. ‘This one … it worried me. It has a history.’

‘The statuette of Artemis?’ Arnold asked.

Nunza glanced at him sharply, with nervous eyebrows, then nodded silently.

‘What else?’ Carmela pressed. ‘Pottery, for instance?’

‘There were some further items of pottery: I can’t recall details because I was determined to have nothing more to do with this business. I felt I had been tricked. And I didn’t want to talk such matters with Steiner. So I cut off the conversation. After all, Steiner’s reputation was bad; he had probably been involved in such activity himself. I did not know what he wanted from me so I did not allow him to dwell on such matters.’ Nunza hesitated, glanced at Karl Spedding. ‘But I was getting worried. I felt I was in over my head. I needed advice. So I spoke to my friend Karl again, and he agreed to come over, meet me, stay a few days, go over the learned articles I had
written, check references, discuss what was to be done … and then I saw in the newspaper, heard Peter Steiner had been murdered.’

The room suddenly seemed stuffy. Arnold was aware that each of them seemed to be waiting for something to happen, something to change, a key to be turned, a ray of light shone on the murky world that had been spread out before them. At last, Carmela murmured, ‘The pottery items Steiner was talking about, so he didn’t describe them?’

Nunza shook his head regretfully. ‘I told you. I didn’t really want to be involved. I cut him short.’

Carmela grunted in dissatisfaction. She glanced at Arnold, then rose abruptly. ‘This all requires further investigation. I think, for the moment, I need to discuss matters with my colleagues and you, Signor Nunza, you should prepare a written report on what you have told us. No doubt we will be in touch with you again.’ She turned, frowned at Karl Spedding, seated quietly behind her. ‘I imagine your work here is now done. You will now be returning to England?’

Spedding nodded. ‘Tomorrow.’

‘You say that to help your friend you made use of contacts, to discuss matters. And you mentioned the
Guardia di Finanza
. Why did you make an approach to that office? They have nothing
official
to do with the recovery of stolen antiques.’

Spedding smiled thinly. ‘One way to trace illegal transactions and doubtful sales is to investigate financial matters, bank accounts, investments, taxes incurred … that sort of thing. You will recall that Al Capone, the mobster in America, he was brought down for tax evasion not murder.’

‘Somewhat before my time,’ Carmela muttered. She turned away. Arnold rose, nodded to Spedding and followed her towards the door. There she suddenly paused. ‘Nunza … you say you did not know why Steiner called you?’

‘That is correct.’

‘And he wanted to talk to you about certain artefacts? Or their provenance?’

‘It would seem so.’

‘Were no names mentioned?’

Nunza’s brow was furrowed. ‘I do not recall … although now I think of it, some of the items he wanted me to talk about, they had been presented to me by the same man. A collector, a
small-time
dealer in various ancient artefacts.’

‘What was his name?’

Nunza shrugged. ‘I do not know him well. I met him a few times, and he certainly sent some items to the Abrogazzi Museum for authentication. A Spaniard. His name … Zamora.’ He nodded.’That was it. Antonio Zamora. From Madrid.’

T
HE
I
NTERNATIONAL
S
POLIATION
Advisory Committee was scheduled to meet at Carmela’s office in Pisa. The room was hot and stuffy, even though Carmela had opened the window to the morning sun. Arnold had arrived early after a frugal
breakfast
in his hotel but it was clear Carmela had already been working at her desk, which was scattered with papers, for some hours. She gestured him towards the coffee machine and continued to concentrate on the sheets in front of her while he made himself a cup of coffee, and brought a fresh cup to her. He took off his tie, unbuttoned his shirt at the throat and sat down opposite her.

‘I’m going through what we know about the items that were lost in transit from Berlin to Moscow,’ she murmured.

‘Removed by Major Kopas.’

She nodded. ‘Several items have surfaced over the years. Some have been reclaimed through us, for their original owners. There are about four, I think, where disputed ownership has still to be settled by the courts. But this list of recovered items does not include the Artemis statuette, as we already know. The photograph Steiner showed us is its first sighting since it
disappearance
into Russia. But the photograph implies that it has been traded, or is up for sale.’

‘Have you heard anything from McMurtaghy?’ Arnold asked.

‘He rang last night.’ She checked her watch. ‘He expects to be here this morning, but might be delayed since he hopes to make
contact with Interpol again. He thinks that after his trip to the States he might have a lead but he was not explicit.’ She grimaced. ‘He likes to keep his information closely under control. Uses the need-to-know principle.’

‘Hardly helpful to the group.’

‘It is a result of his FBI background, I suppose.’

Which quite possibly had been a violent one, Arnold suspected. He sat back and sipped his coffee as Carmela continued to shuffle the papers in front of her. Over the next twenty minutes the other members of the group arrived: Alienor Donati, Joachim Schmidt. Alienora Donati smiled warmly when she saw him, brought her coffee to sit beside Arnold and questioned him about his experiences in Northumberland. She had heard of some of his exploits: the discovery of
Kvernbiter
, the Viking sword, and the
sudarium
, the cloth reputedly used to mop the brow of the dying Christ. She was clearly inclined to doubt the reality of the cloth but was enthusiastic in her desire to hear about
Kvernbiter
. Schmidt paid little attention after he arrived: he took some papers from his briefcase, extracts from learned journals, it seemed, and immersed himself in a close reading of them.

After a while, Carmela sighed, shuffled the papers together, finished her now cool coffee, looked around and said, ‘Forgive the delay. I think perhaps we should make a beginning. I’m not sure what time McMurtaghy will be arriving, so perhaps, Alienor, we should begin with an update from you?’

They spent the next twenty minutes discussing the steps the French group member had taken to recover a clutch of paintings that had been acquired by the French government and of which the ownership was disputed. The situation was proving to be more complicated than they had hoped: two had been the subject of presidential gifts, and there were signs that
acknowledgement
would be made of the true ownership of the looted art; others were still the subject of ongoing legal proceedings
which were hampering further activity on Alienor Donati’s part. The group agreed that she should continue with her efforts.

‘Well, perhaps we should move on to the matter which has been preoccupying us since the death of Peter Steiner,’ Carmela said. ‘Joachim…?’

The German art expert raised his head, picked up the papers he had been studying before the meeting began. He looked through them again now, while the others waited. He was not a man to be hurried. Finally, he nodded. ‘The meeting you had, Carmela, with the director of the Abrogazzi Museum, would seem to have produced some positive results. I have now had opportunity to study the learned articles that Gabriel Nunza directed us towards. He is quite a good writer … and his research methods are normally meticulous. But, as one might suspect, he must have been somewhat flattered by the attention being paid to him, and on some occasions I am of the opinion that he was displaying a degree of laxity in reaching some of his conclusions. But that is not the important point….’

He broke off as the door swung open and the American member of the group entered the room. McMurtaghy nodded apologetically to Carmela before taking the vacant seat at the table. ‘Sorry for being late,’ he growled.

Carmela raised a hand in greeting. ‘You arrive at an
opportune
moment. We have just started a discussion on matters that I mentioned to you, as a result of our interview with Nunza. We can then hear about what has been preoccupying you in the States.’

McMurtaghy hunched his shoulders and leaned forward. ‘Go ahead.’

Joachim Schmidt appeared slightly nettled at the commanding, somewhat patronizing tone in the American’s voice. He cleared his throat. ‘I was saying that Gabriel Nunza had been a little careless in some of his conclusions regarding items discussed in the articles he had written. But putting that
on one side, from what Carmela has already told us from her discussion with the director of the Abrogazzi Museum, I am able to conclude that her suspicions may be confirmed. Nunza was certainly being used.’

‘In what way?’ asked Alienor Donati.

‘I think it was quite methodical. Deliberate. An opinion would be asked for regarding an artefact, which would be permitted to be presented for display at the Abrogazzi, on a limited time frame. Nunza would be encouraged to study the artefact at his leisure during the agreed period. He was then given
commissions
by learned journals in which he would have encouragement to discuss the artefact in question. His conclusions were then printed, and made available to the academic world. Alongside, but ostensibly not linked to this process a
sizeable
donation would be made to the Abrogazzi: not to Nunza personally, there is no evidence that he gained financially from such transactions. The funds were made available to the owners: one presumes they were used for the support of the museum itself but we have no information with regard to this. But I have no doubt in my suspicious mind that these
benefactions
were made by way of what you Anglo Saxons would describe as ‘sweeteners’ … is that the right word?’

McMurtaghy grunted. ‘Encouragement for Nunza to include references to the artefacts in his learned articles.’

‘That is correct.’

‘But you feel that Nunza himself was acting honestly?’ Carmela enquired.

‘If carelessly. Blindly, even, on some occasions.’ Schmidt took off his glasses and began to polish them with his handkerchief. He sighed. ‘There is a certain academic innocence in Nunza’s actions. Only late in the day did he begin to have doubts….’

‘Possibly only after he received a call from Peter Steiner,’ Arnold intervened. ‘At that point he began to get nervous and he went back over his work, began to check references, and realized
that his work was being referred to in brochures where artefacts he had authenticated appeared.’

‘There was nothing wrong with his authentications?’ McMurtaghy queried.

‘No. They were sound enough,’ Carmela confirmed.

‘So the problem is…?’

Arnold leaned forward. ‘Authenticating the artefacts was one thing. But the brochures were saying other things, such as providing provenance.’ He shook his head. ‘There are several examples we’ve been able to identify. When put up for sale, these artefacts were stated to have been obtained from the
collection
of the Abrogazzi Museum. For most purchasers, that
implied
provenance would have been sufficient. And the fact that the Abrogazzi is well known to have financial problems, as a privately owned operation, would be enough to silence doubts as to why the museum had at some point sold the artefact in question. Which, of course, it had not done. It had merely held the artefacts for a period of time before returning them to the current owner.’

‘But now with a rubber stamp from Gabriel Nunza. Which would enable the person holding the artefact to sell the item more easily.’

The group was silent for a little while, as each member sat thinking about the implications. At last, Carmela turned to McMurtaghy. ‘That is as far as we reached. Other than the fact that Nunza reported that among the items Steiner had discussed with him, was a statuette of Artemis, which would seem to have been recently put on the market. As for the statuette, which Arnold and I have concluded was probably part of a haul looted by Major Kopas on his flight from Berlin to Moscow, we have no further information. But I understand your visit home was not without some degree of success.’

McMurtaghy straightened in his chair, folded his arms across his broad chest and nodded. ‘Yep. I paid a visit to an old acquaintance
… a former adversary, you might say. And he finally opened up, even though he’s stayed silent all these years. I think we can now work out what happened.’ Briefly, he brought the committee members up to date with what he had learned from the dying man in the Greenlawns Rest Home. ‘So we’re now able to
determine
, by putting the various information together, just what’s been going on. As the war came to a close, Major Kopas was betrayed, his family killed – except for one son – and some of the loot he had grabbed, it was in turn acquired by this mysterious Englishman, Stoneleigh, who had brought about the deaths of the major and his family. The son had managed to flee to America, got involved, under his new identity as George Cooper, in criminal activity, but had remained hell bent on revenge. It took him years but he finally managed to trace the betrayer’s movements,
discovered
he had fled to Spain and assumed a new identity: Zamora.’

‘The same name given to us by Gabriel Nunza,’ Arnold murmured. ‘The man who’s been obtaining false provenance by this scam with the Abrogazzi Museum.’

McMurtaghy nodded. ‘That’s the way the cards seem to be falling.’

‘Zamora,’ Carmela murmured, almost to herself. ‘But in your interview in America you were not discussing the man who has been dealing with Nunza.’

‘No. The Zamora who has been dealing with Nunza is the son of the Englishman, of course: Stoneleigh, the man who fled from Moscow to Spain and took a new name under Franco’s regime will be long dead by now.’

Arnold nodded. ‘So now we have a name to look up; a lead to follow if we are to find the Artemis statuette. And in addition, perhaps find out who ordered the killing of Peter Steiner.’

McMurtaghy cleared his throat. He stared at Carmela. ‘I need to say … something else has come up.’

‘What is that?’

‘I had a call this morning. Regarding the hitman who shot
Peter Steiner. His identity has now been positively confirmed by Interpol. And he’s left a trail, back from the location of the hit, into France and Italy. The
Surété
is involved, as well as the Italian
Carabinieri
so it looks as though with this united effort the net is closing in. The man we’re looking for, he’s been out of the game for a few years; he’s got careless. I’ve been using my own contacts with Interpol and it seems they’ve also had some useful information from the
Guardia di Finanza
in Italy.’

Carmela raised her head and stared at him in some surprise. ‘Where do
they
come into this?’

McMurtaghy shrugged. ‘They’ve been quite helpful. It seems they’ve been able to draw attention to certain financial
transactions
… deposit of large sums of money into an account which Interpol believes may be held by Steiner’s killer. Sam Byrne.’ He held Carmela’s glance. ‘I’d like to follow that up. I’d like to be there when …’

His words tailed off in a growing silence. Arnold guessed there was something personal in this, arising out of McMurtaghy’s background as an FBI agent. He would perhaps have crossed swords with this man Byrne, years ago, and resented his earlier failure to deal with the killer successfully. Now he was sensing an opportunity to soothe old sores. Or maybe it was merely a blood lust, a hunger for the hunt that had been reawakened in him.

‘You would like to concentrate on finding the killer of Peter Steiner,’ Carmela said thoughtfully. ‘It’s a little out of line, as far as the work of ISAC is concerned.’

‘There are people I can work with.’ McMurtaghy hesitated. ‘And if we find who employed Byrne to kill Steiner, maybe we’ll get right into the heart of the
cordata
, or whatever other
organization
is dealing in these looted artefacts.’

‘You think Byrne will talk?’ Arnold asked.

‘If we get our hands on him, we might give him incentives to sing,’ McMurtaghy growled.

Arnold had the feeling that whether McMurtaghy gained the support of the committee in this activity he would be going for it anyway. He guessed Carmela was of the same view.

She glanced at Arnold, her brows knitted. ‘Yes. Well, in the circumstances … I think that perhaps we should consider afresh our efforts, perhaps work in different directions. Alienor, you already have enough on your plate. Joachim, I think you should continue checking these references in learned articles: there may be other items you can link in. Our American friend can try to work with his contacts and follow the trail leading to this hired killer, Byrne. Arnold … if you agree, I think it would be appropriate if you were to
concentrate
on finding out what you can about this man Zamora, who has been fooling Nunza. And, it would seem, is trying to sell the Artemis statuette.’

A short silence fell. Carmela seemed preoccupied, thinking about something, her mind wandering. ‘What about you?’ Arnold asked at last.

She blinked, frowned. ‘If McMurtaghy pursues the hired assassin, while you visit this man Antonio Zamora, I … I have some other lines I would like to follow. Things that slightly puzzle me….’