The Reincarnationist

by M. J. Rose

  This was not his first visit to the crypt, yet he still was amazed that the thousands of skulls, ribs, teeth, leg and arm bones, pelvises and vertebrae had lost their semblance to human remains and became the medium the artists had employed to create their spectacle.

  When the tour ended, he obediently followed the other tourists up and out of the church and into the street, careful to watch the crowd scatter. No one lingered on the steps; everyone dispersed. After being certain they had all walked away, he strolled to the corner and passed the same group of street vendors he had walked by before going into the church. This time he slowed and took more notice of them.

  The first sat behind a table covered with cheap Italian souvenirs: Leaning Towers of Pisa, bronze St. Peters, refrigerator magnets of the glorious Sistine Chapel ceiling.

  * * *

  The next table had been transformed into a handbag and briefcase store. Leather goods of every imaginable shape and color were lined up invitingly, and the proprietor was doing a brisk business. The third vendor was selling cheap costume copies of very costly jewelry. Prevalent were thick gold chokers featuring facsimiles of Roman coins. There were also silver and gold ropes studded with pearls, and hanging earrings encrusted with faux diamonds. Surprising quality for street goods.

  He fingered a silver necklace. Six glass gemstonelike pendants hung from the heavy links. Rubies, emeralds and sapphires.

  “Gucci,” the vendor said.

  The priest nodded. A smile passed his lips. “Gucci? Really?”

  “Good copy.” The vendor spoke in heavily accented Italian. “Not expensive.”

  “Do you have three of these? Identical ones?”

  The vendor nodded and reached under his table to pull out first one, then another and a third, each in a box with the word Gucci stamped on it in a similar typeface to the one the high-end retailer used. Almost but not quite exact. Close enough so that most people wouldn’t notice it unless they had the real thing to compare it to.

  The price was negotiated and paid. The vendor slipped the bills into his apron and watched as the priest put the necklaces into his briefcase and walked off.

  Continuing down the block, he turned the corner and then entered the next café he came to, where he ordered a cappuccino in honor of the dead friars.

  He put the briefcase on the bar and rested his elbows on it.

  He was almost positive that no one had followed him to the church. He’d made sure of that. Certainly, no one had followed him into the crypt. And it didn’t appear that anyone had been loitering nearby, watching him buy the bargain tourist fare.

  The coffee was strong and hot, but he finished it quickly and went to the men’s room, where he pocketed all the jewelry and put the faux Gucci boxes back into his briefcase.

  Back out on the street, he strolled, stopping often to look in store windows, checking on the reflections to make sure he wasn’t being followed.

  If they tried to take the briefcase from him, he would put up a struggle. But he would let them have it. What he wouldn’t let them have was what was in his pocket.

  Chapter 24

  They had walked the general area dozens of times, but Inspector Tatti had asked them to fan out this time and cover a two-mile radius in every direction. The guard who had been on duty yesterday when Professor Rudolfo was shot was still missing. The man’s wife said he’d left for work as usual at 3:00 a.m. His shift was from 4:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. She’d packed his favorite meal—a mortadella hero and a big thermos of coffee—and gone back to bed.

  He never came home.

  The afternoon sun played games with the clouds, making the search much more complicated. It would be bright for ten minutes, and then shadows would fall over the whole landscape, turning an innocent rock into a man’s head, a clump of tree roots into a hand.

  Within the grove it was even more difficult to figure out what one was looking at. The ancient trees were so large and leafy that almost no light penetrated, so although it was only midafternoon it appeared to be late night.

  The inspector in charge, Marcello Angelini, told his officers to use their flashlights if they couldn’t see. They walked in formation, swinging the lights back and forth over the terrain, stopping every three or four minutes to check out a suspicious shape.

  But so far they still hadn’t found anything. This place was overgrown with bushes and vines. The ground was littered with nuts and seeds and pits and leaf rot from last year. Except somehow, Angelini thought, it was beautiful. It felt similar to how it was in church when there was no service going on and you could sit down by yourself to collect your thoughts and think things through.

  He walked on the outer edge of the line, the last policeman in formation, showing his men that he, too, could do the hard work. When his light picked out something shiny in the shrubbery, he broke away and walked over to the spot. When he got there, he couldn’t see anything but dark, glossy leaves. Maybe his flashlight had just caught one a certain way. He stepped back. Once he had some distance, he saw it. Then he advanced, keeping the light trained on that one specific spot. Yes, it was there. Silvery and shimmering.

  Bending down, he reached between the leaves of the shrub and felt something cold and metallic, then something colder.

  Angelini let go. Stepped back. Stared at the shrub. Let his eyes lose focus. Then he saw the abnormality in the leaf cover. Someone had sawed down the middle of the huge bush and made a hiding place deep inside, where, in the beam of the flashlight, Angelini could see the man’s bloated body. Moving closer, he leaned down and shuddered. The man’s throat had been slashed and his naked torso was painted with his now black, dried blood.

  Finally, he thought, this was a bona fide homicide investigation. Angelini knew his boss, Detective Tatti, well enough to know what that meant: none of them would have much time off in the next few days. He was almost sorry he’d seen that damn silver watchband.

  Poor man, though, he thought, and made the sign of the cross.

  What had he been guarding? What was so precious this time that a man was killed for it? He’d ask Marianna when he got home. She read the newspapers; she’d know what they were digging up at this site and if it had been worth dying for.

  Chapter 25

  When Gabriella came downstairs from having been with the professor, it was clear she’d been crying. “He’s so sick,” she said as she sat down next to Josh. He bought her a cup of espresso and sat with her while she drank it. She didn’t talk and he didn’t pressure her to, but he had a hard time taking his eyes off of her.

  Her face wasn’t extraordinary, but he didn’t think he’d ever get tired of looking at her. Her eyes were wide and expressive, her lips were full and she radiated a gentleness that softened her other strong features.

  Finishing the coffee, she thanked him and told him he could leave if he wanted to go, but she was going to stay a while longer.

  “Is he conscious?” Josh asked.

  She nodded. “But he has a raging fever and the antibiotics aren’t working. The doctor doesn’t think he’ll make it through the night. Maybe I should have lied and told him the police had found the man who shot him. That we’d recovered the stones. That might make a difference. It’s such a huge find…” Her voice tapered off.

  “Gabriella, I know you wouldn’t talk to Beryl about it over the phone, and I know you think what you found are the Memory Stones, but did you use them? Do you know how they work?”

  “I saw them, yes. But that’s all…I only saw them. We thought we had time.”

  * * *

  For the rest of the day and into that evening, Josh sat with Gabriella at the hospital. Every hour she’d go back upstairs to check on the professor’s status and he’d call Malachai again, worried about where he was and why he wasn’t answering.

  At six-thirty, Charlie Billings managed to find Josh in the cafeteria. The policeman who had been assigned to stay with Gabriella tried to keep him away, but Josh said it was okay. He was, in fact,
glad to see a friendly face, someone he knew from another time and place.

  “So are you going to give me anything?” Charlie asked.

  “Not yet.”

  “Not the answer I was hoping to hear.”

  “No, I guess not.”

  “Can you identify the guy?”

  “I don’t think I should answer.”

  “Josh, it’s me.”

  “And you’re on a fishing expedition.”

  “It’s my job.”

  “It’s my back.”

  Josh expected another round of questions and was surprised when Charlie put down the notebook and pencil. “Forget about what happened today. I ran into Emma at the bureau the last time I was in London and said something about us all getting together. She got all quiet, then told me you guys split up and that you’d taken a leave of absence. What the fuck, Josh?”

  He hadn’t anticipated that the personal questions would be harder to answer than the ones about the shooting at the tomb, but they were.

  “I needed to go back to New York. Take care of a few things.”

  Charlie’s eyebrows went up.

  Josh ignored the unspoken question.

  That wasn’t good enough for the reporter. “What happened? Why New York? And what are you doing here?”

  “If I tell you you’re going to think I’m crazy and you’re just going to have a hundred other questions.”

  “Questions are my stock in trade.”

  “I don’t have answers that are going to make any sense.”

  “I’ll take them, anyway.”

  Josh laughed.

  Charlie knew he’d hit another wall. “Okay, forget that. You need anything, man?”

  “A cessation of questions would be a good idea.”

  They both laughed this time, and Charlie stayed a while—being a friend this time, which Josh appreciated—and then he left to file what he had on the professor’s condition and find out what he could about the police’s search for his assailant.

  * * *

  At 6:50 p.m., Malachai finally answered his cell phone and explained that he’d been at the embassy all day, trying to work the system to get Josh released, until Gabriella had accomplished that—which he said was a miracle—and since then he’d been trying to get permission for him to leave the country.

  “But I haven’t had a lot of luck. The Italian authorities don’t want you to leave. You were a witness to the shooting and robbery.”

  “As long as I’m not a suspect.”

  “Well, that’s another problem. They’re hinting that you are.”

  “But I gave them a description and told them everything they wanted to know.”

  “Everything?”

  “Damn it, Malachai.”

  “I doubt they really suspect you—but they do want you to stay in case they find this guy. You’re the only witness.”

  The idea of being stuck in Rome disturbed him. The haunting lurches he was having were too real, too disturbing and too confusing. Josh wasn’t sure anymore if he was living in the present or the past.

  “The professor is a witness.”

  “How’s he doing?”

  “Not that good.”

  Malachai sighed. “Why don’t you get Gabriella to leave the hospital for a while and come back to the hotel and have dinner with us? She can’t just sit there all day.”

  “I’ll try. But I don’t think she’s going to agree to leave. And she’s not in any shape to go through this alone. I’m going to stay with her.”

  It was more complicated than that. Josh had a sense that this was his duty, his penance to stay with her and live this vigil through by her side—and yet he knew, although he couldn’t explain how, that even if he did all that, it would not be enough.

  * * *

  When Gabriella came downstairs at just before ten o’clock, she reported that Rudolfo had improved slightly and that the doctors had thrown her out and told her to go home.

  The street was dark, and Josh looked around carefully when they stepped outside. “I wouldn’t put it past the press to be out here holding a vigil and waiting for us,” he said, “but it looks like we’re okay.” He had expected to see Charlie Billings, but he was also being vigilant. The idea that he might be in danger made him more cautious than usual, especially since Gabriella was with him. They walked to Gabriella’s car, and he took her keys from her. She was drained, dazed, and in no condition to drive.

  She gave him directions to her apartment in a voice that broke every few words.

  The gray sedan followed them to a row of five-story apartment houses that were at least a hundred years old, all crammed onto a narrow street in the shadow of the Vatican. Josh, fairly certain by now—and relieved—that it was the police, didn’t even bother to turn around and check on the sedan, he just parked.

  Then, without asking Gabriella if she wanted him to or not, he escorted her upstairs. He’d told Malachai she wasn’t in any shape to be alone. The truth was, neither was he.

  He’d hoped she’d have a bottle of Scotch in her kitchen, but he’d settle for brandy. Glasses were where he guessed—in the cabinet closest to the sink—and he didn’t measure, just poured. When Josh put the drink in her hand, she lifted it to her lips as if she were on automatic. Neither of them spoke for a while.

  There weren’t many personal items in the living room except for several piles of books and a large, leather-framed photograph of a little girl, maybe three years old, smiling at the camera. Even at that age, the resemblance to her mother was apparent. It was in her eyes—the same golden-brown color. But where Gabriella’s gaze was a combination of curiosity and tempered strength, the little girl’s was soft and dreamy.

  When she saw him looking at the picture, Gabriella came to life for the first time. “That’s Quinn,” she said. And now her eyes took on the same softness as her daughter’s. It moved Josh in a way he wouldn’t have expected.

  “How old is she?”

  “Almost three. I miss her like crazy.”

  “I bet her father is taking great care of her.”

  “Her grandfather and her nanny. My dad is wonderful with her.”

  Josh instantly regretted he’d said anything. He could tell the end of the story from the way Gabriella’s face froze, as if she was stopping herself from showing any of what she was feeling. “My husband was an archeologist, too. Specialized in underwater excavations. There was a problem with his oxygen on a dive. He died three months before Quinn was born.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  She shrugged. “He was doing what he loved to do.”

  Suddenly her voice lacked all emotion, which didn’t surprise him. Josh knew what it was like to shut down over loss, over pain, over love. He wanted to go to her but sensed it wouldn’t be appropriate.

  “There’s some grace to the way he died, but it’s not fair to our daughter,” Gabriella continued. “She got shortchanged.”

  “I know about that.”

  “How old were you?” she asked.

  “Twenty. I always thought that it was too soon. But compared to your daughter…I had a lifetime with my father.” He suddenly missed him with a force that surprised him.

  “Quinn talks about her father all the time, even though she’s never met him. She tells me she knows her daddy is supposed to be gone, but he isn’t, really, and one day she’ll find him.”

  “What do you tell her?”

  She shrugged. “Maybe she understands something that I can only guess at. Children can be connected to the dead in a way adults can’t. They seem to know things that adults have grown out of knowing.”

  She took a long drink. “But you’re more familiar with that than I am, aren’t you? You and Malachai and Beryl?”

  It was Josh’s turn to shrug. He didn’t feel like talking about the foundation and their work, afraid it would sound clinical in the middle of such an intimate conversation.

  “Do you have children?” she asked, almost as if she’d read
his mind. He didn’t think he reacted, but he must have, because she immediately became apologetic. “Sensitive subject? I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. I wanted kids, but my wife, now my ex-wife, didn’t. It became an elephant in the room.”

  “Is that why you split?”

  “Not really. Yes. Maybe.” He laughed at himself. “I think it started the process. Emma is a reporter. We lived in England, but between both of our careers, we probably didn’t spend a total of sixty days a year with each other. The glue that might have kept another couple together through a crisis had already started to dry out when we had that first one.”

  “First one?”

  He didn’t answer right away. He wasn’t used to discussing his personal life. It wasn’t that he was discomfited talking to Gabriella—rather, it was too easy. And that unnerved him.

  “Am I making you uncomfortable asking all these questions? I’m sorry.”

  “No, I was thinking just the opposite,” he said, and then told her a truncated version of the accident and the hallucinations that followed.

  She listened intensely, fascinated, and she also looked at him in a way that was familiar. It was how the doctors and therapists had looked at him. Bristling, he stopped talking halfway through explaining how the hallucinations had affected him and, subsequently, his marriage.

  Gabriella didn’t realize he had stopped on purpose, and she asked him the next logical question. “But I don’t understand. Why would your needing to find out what was happening to you upset your wife?”

  Josh had expected her voice to be clinical and cold, the way the doctors’ voices had been. Instead, she sounded tender. Compassionate. Maybe he’d been wrong about her. Could he take the chance that Gabriella would understand the rest of his history?

  “Once it was obvious there was nothing physically wrong with me, Emma started losing patience with what she called my obsession. Actually, so did I, but I couldn’t walk away from it. I needed to find out what was happening to me. I needed to—I still need to understand, not just whether or not I’ve been reincarnated, but…about my conviction that there’s a woman who has something to do with all this. Whom I knew before and need to find again.” He shook his head, frustrated that he couldn’t explain it more eloquently.