Costa 08 - City of Fear by David Hewson Page B

pieces. “That makes seven in all, with an eighth, who’ll join us tomorrow.”
    “The Via di San Giovanni in Laterano,” Peroni murmured, reading Falcone’s scribble. “I know this place. It’s that apartment in the old monastery, isn’t it? The safe house?”
    “It’s police property that is currently going unused. Seems a shame to waste it. We will have facilities. Whatever we require.”
    Peroni picked at his pizza in silence.
    Teresa looked mildly excited. “And I’m allowed into this monastery?”
    “Very much so.”
    “In order to do what, exactly?” Costa asked.
    “Whatever we like. Let’s sleep on it. Things will be clearer in the morning. Without files, or evidence, or—”
    “We’re in the middle of a turf war between Dario Sordi and that devil Campagnolo,” Peroni said, interrupting. “I’d stake money on the angels losing this one, Leo. Don’t put anyone else’s neck on the line.”
    The lean inspector stroked his beard and stayed silent.
    “There were numbers on the wall,” Costa said. “Roman numerals. Beneath the poster of the Blue Demon.”
    “Oh, yes,” Teresa remembered. “It seems to me that Petrakis is crazy in the highly intelligent and complicated way only an educated man can be. He adores games and codes and riddles, and the opportunity to show off his erudition. This is the same key as with the dead Frasca couple. Different numbers, though. III. I. CCLXIII. Three. One. Two hundred and sixty-three.”
    Peroni looked at the two of them and shrugged.
    “Shakespeare?” Costa suggested.
    “Congratulations,” Teresa said, beaming. “It’s the same schema. Act, scene, line. From
Julius Caesar.”
They waited. She watched them as she spoke:
    “Domestic fury and fierce civil strife
Shall cumber all the parts of Italy.”
    Falcone pushed back his glass and said, “San Giovanni in Laterano. Tomorrow. Eight o’clock.”

12
    THEY WERE ALREADY IN THE DRIVE OF THE FARMHOUSE off the Via Appia Antica. The president, two bodyguards, and Capitano Fabio Ranieri of the Corazzieri. Costa had checked out the regiment with Peroni. As Sordi said, they were formally under the control of the Carabinieri, though with effective autonomy. No one in the Questura had much experience in dealing with the Quirinale’s equivalent of the Swiss Guards. They were regarded as dedicated soldiers committed to a single duty, the protection of the head of state. For this reason their presence beyond the palace was limited, without the contacts—official and informal—that took place in the occasionally uneasy relationship between the Polizia di Stato and the Carabinieri.
    Ranieri was out of the car first as Costa arrived. The officer was a massive man around Peroni’s age, taller than Dario Sordi himself, broad-shouldered in a black suit, with close-cropped dark hair and alert, searching eyes.
    “Capitano …” Costa began.
    “This isn’t a formal visit,” the Corazzieri captain interjected. “Call me Ranieri. The president does not wish news of your meeting to become public knowledge. I expect—”
    “Yes, yes, yes,” Sordi said, patting the man on the back. “Nic—Ranieri. Ranieri—Nic. Or Costa, if you prefer. For myself, I cannot think of him as a surname, but then …” He stopped beneath the porch light andgazed at the low stone villa that had been the Costa family home for almost forty years. “… I have memories.”
    He pointed to the long field leading back to the road. “I helped your father plant those grapes. Before you were born, Nic. It was backbreaking work, for which I was repaid with terrible wine. Did it get any better over the years?”
    “Not much.”
    “I thought that might be so.” He held up a bottle. “From the Quirinale cellars. Brunello. A glass now? Or would you prefer to keep it as a gift?”
    “Neither,” Costa said, and opened the door.
    Sordi sighed. “Then I shall take a drop alone. Let’s go out to the patio,” the president suggested. “These