The Shroud Key

by Vincent Zandri

  “Chase,” Anya screams.

  “Find a light switch,” I shout.

  The man who tackled me led with his shoulder. The classic football tackle. He might have even bruised a rib. But he’s not quick in retreating. I grab him in a headlock with my left arm while with my right, pull my automatic from its shoulder holster. I press the business end of the pistol against his skull.

  “Don’t shoot,” comes a voice. The voice of an older man. He speaks English, but the accent is most definitely German.

  I release him.

  The overhead light comes on revealing my attacker. He’s a short, gray-haired and bearded man dressed sloppily in an old wool blazer and corduroy pants. Most definitely a professor. He’s even got a plastic pocket protector filled with pens and pencils plus a translucent six inch ruler.

  “I thought you were a burglar,” he says, panting. “Or perhaps, a rapist.”

  “You’ve got some spunk, Einstein, I’ll give you that. We’re the good guys. The bad guys are on the other side of this wall. Think you can call security for us?”

  His eyes light up. He glances at my gun.

  “I haven’t had this much fun since I earned my PhD in Physics forty years ago,” he smiles.

  “We’re going to leave now,” I say, crossing the office and joining Anya at the door.

  “Go, go,” the professor insists, picking up the phone on his desk, punching in a number. “I’m calling security. In the meantime, if they come through that vent, I’ll be waiting for them.” He raises up his free arm and makes a muscle under his jacket sleeve. Like I said, he’s got some spunk.

  “Sorry for the intrusion,” I say.

  “No worries. You made my day.”

  He begins speaking into the phone in Italian. I take hold of the door opener, slowly twist the knob, pull the door open, poke my head outside into the hall. I look both ways for a man dressed entirely in black.

  “All clear,” I say. “We’ll take the stairs.”

  “Roger that, Chase.”

  “Roger that?”

  Holding her hand, we step out into the hall, and take it double-time all the way to the stairwell.

  Down on the first floor, we head back out into the street.

  People surround us on all sides. Students mostly, carrying books, canvases, sketch pads, knapsacks. Always moving about in pairs or groups. They stare at us with curiosity and perhaps even a little fear as they pass.

  I grab Anya by the shoulders.

  “We need to get back to my apartment while our tail is still busy upstairs with security. After that we’ll have to find another place to hold up. The apartment isn’t safe anymore now that I know you’re being followed.”

  “I’m sorry. I just had no way of knowing.”

  “Don’t be sorry. Goes with the territory. Sad thing is, that man probably isn’t the only one watching you.” Removing my hands. “Let’s move.”

  “I’m right on your ass,” she smiles.

  “Now who’s the pig, Anya Manion?” I say.

  We run.

  CHAPTER NINE

  The door to my apartment is open.

  Correction, the door has been jimmied open.

  “Stay here,” I say, turning to Anya. “Whoever did this could still be inside.”

  “Not on your life, Ren Man,” she says, following me into the vestibule.

  Reaching into my bomber, I pull out my 9 mm, thumb off the safety. Taking a slow second step into the vestibule, I move on into the living room, scanning it with the gun barrel. I then head on across the dining room and into the kitchen. Both appear to be empty. Opening the door onto the terrace, I can see that no one is hiding out there either.

  “Lu,” I say, not loud, but loud enough for the pit bull to hear me.

  That’s when I hear the noise coming from the other side of the apartment.

  “Bedroom?” Anya says. It’s both a statement and a question.

  I run from the kitchen to the vestibule just as he’s coming out the bedroom door. A big man, dressed in dark clothes. He raises up an automatic, aims the business end for the center of my chest. Pointblank.

  I stop.

  The shot from his gun echoes throughout the apartment, the bullet nicking the wood beam over my head. Sucking in a breath, I lower my aim, depress the trigger, and shoot his left leg out from under him.

  The search for Andre and Jesus has just gone nuclear.

  Both Anya and I go to the big wounded man, where he lies on the stone, vestibule floor.

  “Grab his gun,” I say.

  She does it.

  I drop down onto one knee, press my still smoking barrel against his forehead.

  “Who do you work for?”

  He’s clutching at his bleeding leg.

  “Go to hell,” he says, his accent distinctly Italian.

  I cock back the hammer.

  “Una volta,” I shout. “One more time … Who sent you?”

  “One more time,” he says through grinding teeth. “Go. To. Hell.”

  I slide the barrel away from his forehead, press it against the thigh on his healthy leg.

  “No!” he screams through gritting, grinding teeth. “Please.”

  “Tell me … Now.”

  He swallows his pain, tries to suck down a breath.

  “I am a holy man,” he whispers. “If you want to know who sent me, look no further than divine providence. I am a messenger of God.”

  Slowly, I stand, turn to Anya.

  “The Vatican,” I say. “He’s a soldier of the Vatican.”

  “What do we do with him?” begs Anya.

  She’s standing over him, looking panicked and pale in the face. Chalk white against her black clothing.

  “We leave him.”

  “He could die. Bleed out.”

  I grab hold of her arm, look her in the eyes.

  “Since you came through my door an hour ago, lady, I’ve been chased, been made to crawl through an air diffuser, tackled by a little old man, shot at and cursed to hell by some man who claims to be on God’s side. Now my dog is missing. You want me to find your husband, you do as I say.”

  Her eyes well up. I can tell she wants to say something, but she just can’t work up the words.

  I release her arm.

  “My apologies,” I say. “But you’re turning out to be a boat load of trouble, and if we are somehow able to survive these next few hours, the sooner we get out of town the better.”

  “Why don’t you just stop?” she cries. “Don’t work for me if I’m so much trouble.”

  She wipes a tear from her eyes.

  “Because I’m already in too deep. I know what you know and they’ll come after me, regardless of what I do.” But on the inside, what I’m telling myself is this: I’m not leaving for US soil without those holy bones.

  She smiles against the tears. But as if reading my mind she says, “Okay, the job is still yours for the taking. But I have to ask you, is it really my husband you want to find, or is it a fortune in Biblical treasure?”

  Releasing a breath, I find myself nodding. Maybe she’s right. Maybe what I’m after besides some much needed money is fortune, glory, and immortality. But not even fame holds a brightly lit candle to the possibility of once more being close to my daughter.

  I turn away from her, head into the bedroom. After a fruitless search for Lu in all the obvious places, including under the bed, I go to the safe which is built into the far wall. Opening the safe, I pull out three extra ammo clips which I stuff into the left-hand pocket of my bomber. Reaching into the safe again, I grab a plastic sandwich baggy containing several SIM cards. I also grab my passport, plus three wads of Euros. Each rubber-banded wad is worth 5,000 Euros a piece. I step out into the hall, and hand her one of the cash wads.

  “What’s this?” she says, her tears now dried up.

  “That’s a loan,” I say. “I can only assume you don’t have much on you.”

  “We’re not going back to my
hotel room?”

  “We’re not going to Andre’s apartment either. It’s too late for that. They’ll be waiting for us there too. That’s what I would do anyway if I were them.”

  “Who’s they?”

  “The Vatican soldiers, and who the hell knows who else.”

  “Where will we go?”

  “Let’s hope you have your passport on you at all times like a responsible traveler should.”

  Reaching into the interior pocket on her leather jacket, she produces her passport and her wallet.

  “Plenty of credit cards,” she smiles, like this is her way of contributing to the cause.

  “Can’t use ‘em,” I say. “They’ll track us if we use credit cards.” Then, “Where’s your cell phone?”

  She digs into another pocket, pulls out an I-Phone.

  “Shit,” I say, taking the phone in hand. “Was hoping you had a Droid. You could use one of my SIM cards.”

  Dropping the phone I stamp on it, and crush it with my boot heel.

  “Hey!” she barks. “That phone cost me a grand back in the states.”

  “Sorry,” I say. “It might be a fancy phone but it’s also a tracking device. How do you think they been tailing you so easily?”

  Her eyes go wide.

  “What about your phone?” she says.

  I hold up the sandwich baggy.

  “SIM cards. Makes my phone like new again every time I change one out.”

  The Vatican soldier on the floor is moaning in pain, blood pooling around his leg.

  “I need to grab something else,” I say. “In the meantime, go through his pockets, see what you can find. Then we have to leave this place. It’s too damned hot.”

  “What about your dog?”

  “I’m guessing the man of God took a shot at her and missed. Otherwise her blood would be all over the place. Instead she took off running through the open window. She’s probably in Pisa by now.”

  I approach the bookcases while Anya searches the semi-conscious Vatican soldier. Scanning the books beginning with H, I pull out one of the many antique copies of the Holy Bible I possess. I open the book. There’s a square cut-out in the center of the pages. I made the cut-out myself. Inside it is stored a small piece of mirror I dug up while sandhogging for Andre in the Giza Plateau eight years ago.

  I pull out the mirror, feel the solid weight of it in my hands. Feel its ancient construction and revel in its mystery. I stare down at my reflection in the flat, gold-rimmed surface. I stare into my brown eyes, and I see my father. He was a digger, like me. But he possessed a special, spiritual gift.

  Once, when he was hired to excavate a foundation for a new office building, he suddenly killed the power on the machine, mid-scoop. He jumped down from the cockpit, screaming at everyone to move away from the site as quickly as their legs would take them.

  Those were the days before electronic finding devices. Before smartphone apps that tell you where buried cables and gas-lines are located. While the diggers who worked for him all ran for cover, my dad slowly made his way to where his big, sharp-toothed, dinosaur-like scoop barely touched the raw soil. He reached into his pocket, pulled out his pocket knife. Flipping up the long blade, he then gently stabbed at the raw earth. The blade didn’t enter the dirt and clay for more than an inch or two before he struck cast iron. That cast iron belonged to a far too shallow gas main that, had my dad pierced it with his backhoe, would have blown the entire site to Kingdom Come and my dad right along with it.

  Developing a sixth sense for what might come your way … for buried pipes, electrical lines and even buried bodies … It was a gift my dad developed or perhaps was born with. A gift from God, maybe. But it was something he tried with all his might to instill in me. Some might refer to this gift as simply “going with your gut.” But for me, it’s more than that. It’s like learning to believe in the invisible. I guess it isn’t all that different from faith. Believing in something you can’t see, touch, or feel, but somehow knowing it exists all the same. Knowing it exists as sure as the blue blood that flows through your veins.

  Returning the Bible to the book shelf, I clutch the small, three thousand year old mirror in my hand, well aware that the voice in my gut wants me to bring this along for the ride. That at some point, I am going to need it. For what exactly and when, I have no idea. But I know that when the time comes, it will be there for me.

  Pocketing the mirror in the right-hand pocket of my tan Levis, I go to Anya.

  She looks up at me from where she’s kneeling on the floor.

  “Nothing,” she says, shaking her head. “He’s got nothing on him. Not a scrap of paper.”

  “Most pros won’t carry anything, just in case something like this happens to them.”

  The man is down on his back now, mumbling something in his semi-conscious state.

  “What’s he trying to say?” Anya says.

  “You mind?” I say.

  She scoots back while I drop down onto my knees, position my ear near his mouth.

  He mumbles, “Erastus … Erastus … Erastus ...”

  I straighten up.

  “What’s he saying?” Anya asks.

  “Don’t know,” I say. “Sounds like the name, Erastus, to me. But who or what the hell is Erastus?”

  “Maybe he’s speaking another language.”

  “God only knows. But what I do know is that we need to get out of here and I don’t want him bleeding out on my floor any longer than he has too.”

  Anya stands.

  “Go now,” I say. “Out the front door.”

  I stand, listening to the man mumble, “Erastus” with his desperately wide eyes.

  She steps out the door and begins making her way down the stairs to the landing. I give the Vatican soldier one last look. It’s then I notice, resting on his chest, half hidden by his black button down shirt, a small wood and gold cross. Kneeling once more, I pull the cross out from under the shirt. Soldered to the vertical beam of the little Maltese cross is a woman. An angel. Or perhaps Mary, the mother of Christ. It’s a beautiful amulet that I have no intention of stealing. But there it is again: That feeling in my gut. The one my dad helped instill. Dad and who knows, maybe God Himself.

  Yanking the cross and its leather strap over the Holy thug’s head, I pocket it along with my mirror, and leave my Florence apartment. Perhaps for the final time.

  CHAPTER TEN

  At the bottom of the landing, my gun gripped in my left hand, I open the front door, stick my head out like a rabbit peeking out of its hole. Look both ways down and up the Via Guelfa. No one in either direction. No one who appears to be an immediate threat anyway.

  But this ancient street is bordered on both sides by four and five-story brick and plaster buildings with shuttered windows every few feet. The street fighting here during World War Two was ferocious since it was so easy to hide and find cover behind those five hundred year old walls. If you were caught by the enemy alone and unprotected in the street unawares, you were dead.

  I take Anya by the hand, lead her out onto the street. Just a couple of sitting ducks looking for a safe haven.

  “Where are we going?” she begs, as I re-holster my gun and as she pulls her hand from mine. “I’m not a child.”

  “Good, that means I don’t have to treat you like one.”

  “Go to hell, Chase.”

  “I’d have to die first. And I’m doing my best to prevent you from causing that to happen.”

  “Told you, you can quit any time you want.”

  “And I told you I’m already in too deep. Just ask that Vatican asshole bleeding all over my vestibule floor.”

  “I’m sure if there wasn’t a substantial amount of money in this for you, you’d be quit by now.”

  I turn to her, smile.

  “Money sings. And I love music.”

  We round the corner onto the Via Nazionale, then negotiate our way through the throngs of tourists, natives, cars, trucks, and scooters u
ntil we come to Via Faenza. We hook a right at the corner gelato joint and cover maybe fifty meters over a winding cobble road before I stop outside a guesthouse called Il Ghiro. I depress the intercom button that’s embedded into the stone wall beside the tall green door.

  “Ciao,” comes a tinny male voice. “Can I help you?”

  “Checco,” I say into the intercom. “It’s me, Chase.”

  “Chase!” barks the voice. “Come stai?!”

  “Friend of yours, Ren Man?” Anya says, not without sarcasm in her voice.

  I shoot her a glance.

  “A friend who will help us and just maybe save your life….My life…Your husband’s life inevitably. He might even locate my dog for me.” Looking her in the eye. “But he doesn’t come cheap.”

  “I get it,” she says. “But if you feel he’s necessary.”

  Back at the intercom.

  “I’m not so good right now, Checco,” I say. “Need your help.”

  “Come up,” he says. “Come, venire.”

  The old wood door opens with the loud mechanical release of its bolt.

  “After you, precious,” I say to Anya.

  “At least you got one thing right,” she says, stepping inside.

  I follow, the door slamming like a prison gate behind us.

  Set before us is a long corridor beset by cold plaster walls on both sides. There’s a staircase at the very end.

  “All the way up,” I say. “Five floors.”

  Without a word, Anya begins her climb. So do I.

  Checco is already waiting for us on the stone landing at the top of the stairs, illuminated in the late day sunlight that leaks in from the overhead skylight. He’s a man in his mid-forties, taller than average height, but possessing the thin, wiry build of a marathon runner, which he is. His black hair is thinning and when he skips a day shaving, noticeable signs of salt begin to pop up out of his smooth cheeks along with the pepper. But his mannerisms, unstoppable optimism, and constant smile give away the perpetual boy inside of him. He is also one of the most expeditious fixers I know working this side of the Atlantic inside a guesthouse called Il Ghiro, but which is really just a front created by whatever organization or organizations he works for. And like I said, he doesn’t come cheap.