The Abduction: A Novel

by Jonathan Holt

“Guess what, Boland,” he said softly. “It’s date night.”

  EIGHTY-ONE

  THEY MARCHED IN military formation to the gates of Site Pluto. The officers had their sidearms drawn, and the regular carabinieri had their rifles at the ready. But it was the warrant, duly issued by Li Fonti, which Aldo Piola brandished at the hapless soldier in the guardhouse.

  “Sir, you’ll have to wait while I consult—” the American began.

  “No, I won’t,” Piola said in English. “This is Italian soil, and we are duly authorised officers of the Arma dei Carabinieri. I am showing you this warrant as a courtesy, but if you impede my men or me in any way, you will be arrested and disarmed.” Before the man could protest further, they’d passed him, the carabinieri fanning out as they approached a massive semi-circular door of reinforced steel built into the hillside.

  To one side was a smaller door, open.

  Inside, under utility lighting, a tunnel fifty feet high led downhill. Smaller tunnels branched in four directions. Along every one, as far as the eye could see, cages lined the walls.

  It’s like a zoo, Piola thought as they marched deeper. From cell after cell exhausted, dark-skinned faces stared dully out at them. Most of the detainees were wearing orange jumpsuits. A few clasped battered copies of the Koran. Some were shackled in goggles, so that they resembled bug-eyed orange flies. It was eerily quiet.

  From one of the tunnels, faintly, came the sound of Beyoncé singing “End of Time”.

  “She’s down here,” Kat said, breaking into a run. Without waiting for a command, the carabinieri at her side did the same.

  She was the first through the doorway of the little cell. The music had masked their approach, so neither of the people inside heard her at first.

  Holly was tied up by her arms to a hook in the ceiling. Her legs had been lashed up too, so that she was hanging in a foetal position. Her fair skin was covered in bruises and her eyes were closed.

  Like her, Carver was naked. He was holding a wooden paddle.

  He made no effort to cover himself up as he turned to Kat. “What the fuck do you want?” he demanded.

  Kat indicated Holly. “Her. I’ve come for her. And you can get the fuck away from her, you creep.”

  Holly moaned softly and her eyes opened. Kat stepped forward and took her in her arms. “It’s all right,” she said. “Holly, it’s all right. It’s me.”

  “Kat… Kat…” Holly whispered. “Warn Daniele.”

  “I’ll get some men over to Ca’ Barbo. Don’t worry, he’ll be safe.”

  “Colonel Carver,” Piola said, following her in, “I have here a warrant for your arrest on charges of abduction.”

  “Abduction of who?” Carver said, amused. He indicated Holly. “She’s a US soldier under my command. I have the right to discipline her in any way I choose, including depriving her of her liberty.”

  “This is military discipline?” Piola said, lifting his eyebrows at the man’s lack of clothing.

  “What this is, is none of your business, Colonel.”

  “Actually, that’s not quite correct,” Piola said. “For one thing, Second Lieutenant Boland has dual nationality and is entitled to the protection of Italian law. For another, the charge of abduction doesn’t only refer to her, or even to Mia Elston. It applies to every single person in this facility.”

  He had the satisfaction of seeing, first doubt, then fear, fill Carver’s eyes. “Handcuff him,” he ordered the nearest carabiniere. “And get a stretcher for Second Lieutenant Boland.”

  EIGHTY-TWO

  ALDO PIOLA WAITED patiently as Ian Gilroy turned the pages of his report. It was a room in which it was easy to be patient: the frescoes alone could have absorbed his attention for many hours.

  “So,” Gilroy said at last, putting the document to one side. “What is it you want to ask me, Colonel?”

  It had been Gilroy who’d initiated this meeting, calling Piola to say that the US owed him a debt of gratitude, and that if there was anything Piola wanted, he only had to ask. He’d been referring, in part, to the way the drugs-for-detainees scandal had been swiftly hushed up. The whole business, after conversations at the very highest level, had been handed over to the Americans to deal with as they saw fit: the tunnels at Longare quietly evacuated; Colonel Carver transferred to American custody and whisked off to one of the secret tribunals that were yet another unintended consequence of the war on terror. It was better that way, Saito had told Piola: were Carver to be charged in an open court, it would endanger the lives of American soldiers around the world.

  Piola heard the echo of some shadowy diplomat in that sentiment. He hadn’t pointed out to Saito that not putting Carver in the dock would mean leaving the public in the dark, or that it would send no signal to others like him that they were all subject to the rule of law. Nor had he wondered aloud where the detainees from Site Pluto had been evacuated to. Such were the complexities of leadership, and on this occasion he was only too glad not to have to exercise them himself.

  But if that had been Gilroy’s primary meaning when he’d talked about gratitude, Piola knew he had been invoking a more personal debt as well. Seeing the way the old man had appeared and embraced Holly’s stretcher as the medical team carried her from the caves, there could be no doubt about the closeness between them – almost, he’d thought, like a father and daughter, rather than an ex-spy and his protégée.

  And so Piola, after some thought, had replied to Gilroy’s offer by saying that he would like to show him a draft of his report into the death of Max Ghimenti, and receive Gilroy’s comments on it.

  There had been a long silence down the phone before Gilroy had said, “How interesting. I’d imagined you were going to ask for something quite different, Colonel. But yes, I’d be happy to do that for you.”

  Now Piola looked across the antique rosewood table at the American and said, “I simply want to know how much of it is true. What really happened.” He gestured at the report. “Whether I got it right.”

  Gilroy’s expression gave nothing away. “And why do you think I might be able to tell you that?”

  “You worked with Bob Garland. If I’m right, he seems to have run the Italy Section as his own private fiefdom. When you took over, you must have inherited many of those secrets.”

  Gilroy nodded slowly. “It’s certainly true that some of Bob’s methods were unorthodox.” He tapped the report. “Though if you’re asking me for a critique, I’d say this document is far too speculative. If one of my analysts had sent me this, back in the day, I’d have sent it straight back with a rude comment in the margin.”

  Piola waited.

  “But,” Gilroy said with a sigh, “it is also mostly correct. There was a massive effort after the war to steer Italy away from democratic communism. And that did include funding and organising the Christian Democrats. And there were various other organisations and networks through which America did distribute project funds and other forms of influence. Some masqueraded as Masonic lodges, some as the Honoured Society, others were effectively joint ventures with the Church. The Order of Melchizedek was one of the latter.”

  “I imagine it would shatter Marco Conterno to discover it’s a fake.”

  Gilroy shook his head. “It may have been a fabrication, Colonel. But that’s not quite the same thing as a fake. Bob’s genius was to see how such networks, once they achieve a certain momentum, become self-perpetuating; their initial success lends them an aura of power, which in turn creates more power, the kind that doesn’t have to be bought. Besides, I would hope you wouldn’t be so cruel as to enlighten Marco Conterno about the Order’s true origins. That young man already has a hard enough burden to bear, knowing what he does about his father and his grandfather.”

  “That Conterno Costruttori was also a CIA fellow-traveller, you mean?”

  Gilroy nodded. “Bob came across Ambrogino during the war. I think the simple truth was, they liked each other. But Bob had been on the lookout for i
ndustrialists he could bring into America’s sphere of influence, and Ambrogino was shrewd enough to see the advantages of that as well. It started with a request to sabotage the parts the Conterno factory was supplying to the Germans – ironically, the Nazis did Conterno a huge favour when they switched him from making tractors to aircraft and construction. Ambrogino agreed, and the association took off from there.”

  “And continues to this day, I understand.”

  The old man’s eyes narrowed. “We’re here to talk about the past, Colonel. You’d have to ask some youngster what happens now. I’m sure it’s all very different.”

  Piola doubted both parts of that statement – that things were very different now, and that Ian Gilroy knew nothing about them – but he kept the thought to himself.

  “But I should also tell you,” Gilroy continued, “that your report does contain one rather fundamental misconception. It wasn’t Bob Garland who killed Max Ghimenti.”

  “Who was it?”

  “A man you’ve never heard of. Alvaro Lucci.”

  “And who was this Signor Lucci?”

  “Not ‘Signor’,” Gilroy corrected. “Monsignor. A parish priest from near Marostica, where the partisans were based.”

  Piola digested this. “Why?”

  “Ghimenti and his fellow partisans used Lucci’s church as an occasional hideout and meeting place. One day La Sala came to the priest in a state of agitation and told him about a meeting they’d just had with some Yugoslav partisans. The Yugoslavs had brought an order, signed by the Party leadership, to rise up in the wake of the German retreat and take the Veneto for the communists.”

  “So Lucci—”

  “Alerted the only authority he was in touch with – the Vatican. Where the information passed to one Giovanni Battista Montini, Protonotary Apostolic. Officially, of course, the Holy See was neutral. But this was a threat to its very existence. It was a difficult decision for Montini: he told Bob later that he prayed all night, seeking guidance. Then he sent a note back to Lucci, saying he should stop the plot by any means possible, and that God would forgive him for whatever extreme acts were required. It was a clear instruction to assassinate the plotters.”

  “A priest committed murder? In cold blood?”

  “Yes. The next time the partisans came to the church – on their way to a meeting with OSS this time, trying to trick more weapons out of them to stockpile for their coup – Lucci killed Ghimenti and all the others except La Sala. As a gesture of compassion, I understand, he allowed Ghimenti to pray before he shot him – strange how even a communist can rediscover God in his last moments. Lucci was left-handed, by the way – I imagine that tallies with the archaeological evidence?”

  Piola inclined his head, although he suspected that Gilroy already knew perfectly well what the evidence showed.

  “So now they had three bodies, the Germans were bound to find them, and the priest was panicking. La Sala convinced him to go to the meeting with Garland in Ghimenti’s stead and ask for his help. Conterno took care of the bodies, La Sala went back to the partisans with a hastily concocted story about a German ambush, and Bob Garland had in his hands a note that would change the course of post-war intelligence in Italy.”

  “I don’t understand,” Piola said. “Why would it do that?”

  “Blackmail,” Gilroy said succinctly. “Or, if you prefer a less ugly word, leverage. As soon as he could, Bob made his way to Rome and told Montini he had the letter he’d written to Lucci. He dressed it up nicely, of course – told Montini he was clearly a man of great practicality as well as a man of God; that such a combination of talents was so rare, OSS should be singling out Montini for support; that their aims were, after all, the same: to prevent Europe from falling to the communists. Within a week, Montini had passed OSS valuable information from Vatican officials in Tokyo. And of course, once you have one report from a highly placed agent, you’re on your way. They always try to back out after a while, say they’ve given more than enough. That’s when you gently make it clear they’re yours for life. But there was no doubting Montini’s worth. His recruitment made possible the whole post-war strategy of aligning the Church and the centre-left in Italy.”

  “And he went on to become Pope Paul VI,” Piola said. “During one of the most intense periods of the Cold War, too. I suppose America helped?”

  “Let’s just say, we did what little we could. But what Bob had told Montini was true: he was an unusually clever and pragmatic cleric. I truly believe he was the right man for the job.”

  “And La Sala was richly rewarded for his betrayal too. What happened to the priest?”

  “He chose to serve out his life in the same parish church, in the area where he had probably saved every church and every priest from destruction. He received the Star of Bethlehem, but so far as I know he never wore it, or even revealed that he’d been given it. And when you accuse La Sala of betrayal… it’s more complicated than that, Colonel, isn’t it? He betrayed his comrades, certainly, but he was loyal to his country. Ghimenti was loyal to his cause, but he was also a traitor who would have torn Italy apart.” He indicated Piola’s report. “And where you accuse the Americans of plotting, murdering and betraying their allies, in fact the reverse was true. America helped to save Italy from a group of renegade Italians who were bent on destroying it.”

  Piola was silent for a while, thinking over the implications. “I jumped to a conclusion,” he admitted. “I so wanted to believe that America was responsible for Ghimenti’s death, it didn’t occur to me that the reality might be more nuanced.”

  Gilroy nodded.

  “But then again,” Piola added, “everything else you’ve told me – the plots, the manipulation of elections, agents inside the Vatican… When the things your country are guilty of are so extraordinary, it’s hardly surprising that every extraordinary allegation is laid first at your door.”

  “True,” Gilroy said. “When I took over from Bob, my first years as Section Chief were largely spent undoing the excesses of the past. But I don’t judge him. Italy was the battleground where the Cold War was fought, just as it would have been the theatre of conflict should the war have turned into a real one. I can’t tell you how many crises and near-misses there were during those years. And yet it survived. Sometimes it feels like a miracle.”

  “Sempre crolla ma non cade,” Piola said, quoting the old Venetian proverb.

  “‘It’s always collapsing but it never falls down.’ Indeed.”

  “And Dr Iadanza and Professor Trevisano? Why were they killed?”

  Gilroy shrugged. “Not because of some plot seventy years ago, certainly. My guess is, Dr Iadanza had realised that the rubble beside the old runway had been quarried from the caves at Longare. As the archaeologist attached to the construction project, she was uniquely well placed to make that connection. The last thing Carver would have wanted was someone snooping round Site Pluto.”

  “When I asked you to read my report,” Piola said, curious, “you said you’d thought I was going to ask for something else. What was that?”

  “Oh… I thought perhaps you were going to ask me if I could have a word with your generale di divisione about a transfer to Genoa.”

  Piola’s surprise must have been written all over his face. He had told no one about his plans. But then, he thought, Kat knew his wife’s family came from there. If she’d mentioned it to Holly, and Holly to Gilroy…

  Gilroy smiled, enjoying his astonishment. “Do I take it you’ve made no decision yet?”

  “No,” Piola said. “Not yet.”

  “Well, let me know what you decide.” Gilroy stood up, and came around the desk to offer Piola his hand. “I’d be very happy to use what little influence is still left to me. Or, indeed, to help you remain in Venice, if that’s what you’d prefer.”

  EIGHTY-THREE

  THEY SAT IN the old music room at Ca’ Barbo, the lights from Carnivia’s newly upgraded servers pulsing softly behind them. Holly was w
earing similar clothes to Daniele today: a hoodie, sneakers, jeans. She didn’t feel quite ready yet to put on the uniform of the US Army again, the uniform Carver had been wearing when he’d cut hers off.

  Truth to tell, she wasn’t sure she ever would.

  “I’m taking each day as it comes,” she told him. “No schedule, no plans. And I’m seeing Father Uriel. He’s helping a lot.”

  “I’m glad,” Daniele said. He added, “I’ve stopped seeing him myself.”

  “Why?”

  His eyes had a curious, distant quality. “Now I’ve had a chance to think it through, I’m not sure I actually want to develop empathy. I think perhaps, during Mia’s kidnap, I did the wrong thing, compromising my principles for sentimental reasons. Once you start doing that, where does it end? Don’t you just end up like Caliari or Carver, believing that whatever you’re doing, it’s for the greater good? How do you ever decide who’s important enough to make an exception for, and who isn’t? How do you live in a world where everyone wants different things of you?”

  The world he was talking about, she knew, wasn’t just the one in which they were sitting, but that other, newer creation inside his servers, for which he alone bore ultimate responsibility.

  She said gently, “When people pray, they hope someone will answer. It doesn’t trouble them that if he does, God’s being inconsistent.”

  “Perhaps.” Daniele was silent a moment. “Anyway, I’ve made another inconsistent decision. I’ve barred Ethereal from Carnivia.”

  “Can you do that?”

  “It required a major rewrite to the code. But even if the effect is largely symbolic, it will let people know that there are limits to what they’re allowed to do. And I’ve plugged the holes that allowed Mulciber to look as if he was hacking it. It turns out he’d built some administrator privileges into the coding when we collaborated on it. They won’t either of them be able to do anything similar again.”

  “I’m pleased. But you know it won’t stop people wanting to control or destroy it, don’t you?”