Cold Tuscan Stone David Wagner (acx book reading .txt) 📖

Santo again, but Rick guessed that his present companion did not want to get into such specifics as names, just as Santo had pointedly avoided them. He was about to return to the urns when he noticed, for the first time, a wide plank the size of a door, leaning against the opposite side of the room. Wires from the batteries ran under it.

“Is there another room? Do you have more pieces in there?”

The man had been slouching against the table, but now he pulled himself to full height and raised his right hand, the burning cigarette between two of the fingers. “We have not yet completely excavated the area.”

So I guess I won’t see that room, Rick thought. While the man stared at him, sending the message that it was time to leave, Rick tried to think what else he should be asking. What would the Commissario ask? What would Beppo need to know? He admitted that he was more intimidated by Conti than his high school buddy. He was still trying to get his head around the concept of Beppo Rinaldi as an art cop.

The man stubbed out his cigarette on the floor and pulled the flashlight from his pocket. “I think you have seen enough, Signor Montoya, to make a decision. Go out first, and I will turn off the lights and follow.” Rick did as he was told.

By the time they climbed the path up to the car the darkness had arrived in earnest, and along with it a drop in temperatures. Rick put his hands in his coat pockets, looking across the hood of the Opel at the man who had put away the flashlight and was pulling out the keys.

“I need to make a visit to the bushes,” said Rick. “Too much wine with lunch and much too cold in that ravine.”

The man’s throaty laugh turned into a cigarette cough as Rick walked behind a clump of trees. When he emerged again the man was sitting in the Opel with the engine running. The car went into reverse and made a wide turn to put it back on the narrow trail, emerging from the trees a few seconds later at the edge of the pavement. The return drive was just as twisting, and perhaps even more confusing to Rick thanks to the darkness. It was also filled with smoke, until Rick finally opened his window and leaned his head toward the fresh air. After twenty minutes of silence, the man pulled to a stop and Rick realized he was at the entrance to a large parking lot, behind which loomed the walls of the city.

“You can get out here.” He pointed to the right with his chin. “Take that stairway.”

Rick climbed out and closed the door, leaning over to say something through the open window, but before he could speak the man put the car into gear and sped off. Rick watched it drive away and realized that he had forgotten to get his dictionary from the back seat. He also had not checked the license plate. Wondering which was more bone-headed, he walked toward the stairway and realized he was in the parking lot where the American couple had watched the deadly fall of Canopo.

Had it really been just three days since his arrival in Volterra?

***

When Commissario Conti stopped pacing, LoGuercio knew what was coming.

“How long’s it been now.”

The detective once more looked at his watch. “An hour and ten minutes, sir.”

“Tell me again what happened and what you did after he disappeared.”

Feeling like a suspect, LoGuercio slowly recounted his conversations with DeMarzo, how the man took a break to have a bite to eat, how the woman at the front desk told DeMarzo that Montoya had left the hotel through the front door a few minutes earlier, and how he, LoGuercio, had sent out various men to search for the American. Conti was looking out the window when he spoke again.

“So if he turned right after he got to the street, he could have gone out through the gate and left the city. How unfortunate that we don’t still have guards with swords and spears at all the gates of the city, like the Etruscans and Romans did, checking everyone who comes in and out. There’s a church there, San Francesco, just before the gate, did you check it?”

“Yes, sir.”

Conti continued to stare out the window. “And if he turned left up the hill, once he got to the fork in the street he could have come up here to the piazza or bent to the right, toward the cathedral and the baptistery. You sent men there too, I suppose. He might have decided to do some sightseeing or was having another meeting with the mystery man.”

“I did, there was no sign of him.”

“Most likely he got into a car, and—”

“But not his own, sir.”

“Yes, yes, LoGuercio, I got that, his car is still in the garage. He got into someone’s car and now could be half way to Pisa. Perhaps my capo at the Questura in Pisa could start looking for him there. Should I call him?”

LoGuercio prudently decided not to answer.

“Why don’t you get back to your office to continue coordinating the search, such as it is.”

“Yes, sir, I will let you know the moment he appears.”

“You do that.”

LoGuercio made his escape while Conti stood at the window watching a tall man crossing the piazza, his shadow handed off from one street light to the other as he walked. Going home after a day at the office, no doubt, something Conti wished he could do. He heard a rap on the door behind him. Perhaps LoGuercio had some news. He turned to see Rick standing in the doorway, and felt a strong sense of relief. Was it because the man was the nephew of a fellow policeman, or was he starting to like this American? He pushed the question out of his mind, and decided he would wait a bit