The Shroud Key Read online

  He slaps me again. Harder.

  “You made it look like the box hasn’t been opened in that time. You took the bones and made sure the box looked as if it hadn’t been tampered with. That’s what you did, but now you are going to tell me where you hid the bones of Jesus. Only I’m not going to be one to get it out of you. My associates will do the job effectively.”

  Ear Flicker comes around front. Second Goon takes his place beside him. Both men reach into their leather coat pockets at the same time, pull out a pair of thin leather gloves apiece. Second goon holds up an index finger, as if to say, Wait just a second! He heads into the kitchen where I hear him going through some of the silver wear drawers. When he comes back out, he’s holding a paring knife and a wine opener.

  “You gonna pop my cork with that?” I say.

  Ear Flicker punches me in the mouth.

  “We’re going to remove your eye with it,” Second Goon says in stilted, Italian-accented English.

  “You only have two eyes,” Cirpriani says. “That means you only have two chances to tell us where you’ve placed the bones. I think that’s fair.”

  “Oh goody,” I say. “You boys from Sicily?”

  Ear Flicker picks up the paring knife, presses the sharp business end against my throat, directly below the Adams apple. He wraps a huge, leather-gloved left hand around my forehead, presses the back of my skull tight against his hard gut. Using his index finger and thumb, he forces my right eyelid open. Second Goon picks up the wine opener, aims the sharp, pointed screw at my right eyeball.

  “So what will it be, Chase?” Cip says, not without a smile. “Will you tell us where the bones are hidden? Or will you lose an eye for Jesus Christ?”

  He belly laughs.

  Ear Flicker tightens his grip.

  Second Goon comes within a half inch of my eye with the screw tip.

  Anya shrieks, covers her eyes with her hands.

  “Hold him very still,” Second Goon says. “I want to feel the pop of his eyeball when I pierce it.”

  The screw comes closer … Closer still …

  Forgive them God, for they know not what they do.

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  It’s all going in slow motion. The screw approaching my eye. The deep, guttural laughs emerging from two hundred pounds of back-stabbing Detective Cipriani. It’s like a video played at slower than slow speed. I pray to the good Lord, if it’s possible for the good Lord to hear me, Please make me pass out. Pass. Out. Now!

  But it doesn’t happen.

  I maintain total consciousness.

  At the same time, I’m trying to lift my right foot up and down in order to take advantage of an exposed nail that’s embedded into the old chair’s lower right leg. Trying to do it unnoticeably. If I lift and lower my foot, the duct tape wrapped around my ankle scrapes against the nail. I can feel it tearing just a tiny bit with each up-and-down movement.

  I see the needle-like corkscrew about to enter into my eyeball. Funny what you recall during moments like these. Like when I was in high school and a friend of mine fell face forward on his ski pole during the Friday night ski club outing. It went directly into his right eye. He didn’t lose the eye but he sported quite the shiner for the next month. All the while he kept insisting that as bad as the injury looked, he felt no real pain, other than what came from the socket and the eyelids. I asked him how it was that he couldn’t feel any pain from a ski pole being rammed into his eye. He shook his head and said, “The eyeball feels no pain. Simple as that.”

  As the corkscrew approaches I look forward to feeling no pain even if I am about to be half blinded.

  Then, on the window sill, something appears.

  Something soft, cuddly and wonderful.

  I try and raise up my right arm as if to shout, Stop the corkscrew!

  “Hold it,” Cipriani barks. “Looks like our raggazzo wants to talk after all.”

  Second Goon sports an almost disappointed look on his clean shaven mug as he steps away with the corkscrew. Ear Flicker removes his hand from my face allowing me to close my eyelids around the now dry eyeball. I try and focus the other swelled eye on the window sill, on another set of eyes looking back at me. Eyes that are black and angry. Eyes that belong to a face sporting exposed white fangs.

  “So then, Chase,” Cipriani says, “what do you have to say for yourself?”

  “This is what I have to say, Cippi: Sick ‘em, Lu!”

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  It’s a beautiful scene really. Nature’s grace incarnate. The two year old female pit bull leaping from off the window sill directly onto the face of Detective Cipriani, her front fangs impaling themselves into his bulbous nose, her claws tearing at his eyes, the two goons desperately trying to remove the dog but Lulu biting them in the hands shredding their leather gloves.

  I give my right leg one final hard thrust upwards against the nail, and the duct tape tears away. Immediately, I swing the now freed booted foot up into the crotch of Second Goon, dropping him on the spot. Then, lifting myself up, I manage to stand on the same free leg but, at the same time, bent forward as if bowing for an audience, the chair legs pointing out and away from my back-side like the horns on a bull. In that manner I back-step quickly, rushing Ear Flicker with my bull horns. I slam into him, pinning him against the wall, the hard wood chair legs gouging his stomach and ribs. He screams and falls to the floor like a sack of rags and bones.

  Then comes a shot, followed by two more shots.

  Lifting my head I make out a tiny spatter of blood that stains Anya’s right cheek. She drops to the floor beside the now lifeless Second Goon. Meanwhile, the brick walls rattle with Cipriani’s tortured screams as Lu continues to bury her powerful jaws into his bearded face.

  Until I shout, “Lu! Basso!”

  The dog immediately obeys and releases the crooked cop. Coming to me, she jumps up on my legs, tries to lick my face with her blood-stained teeth, lips, and tongue.

  Now coming through the open window is a man with a smoking gun in his hand.

  Checco.

  “Took you so long?” I say.

  “I took Lu to the pet spa to have a wash and a nail clipping.” Now looking around the room. “Mamma mia, what kind of mess did you step into here?” Then, his eyes back on me and where I’m once more seated, still duct-taped to the chair. “Wait, Chase, don’t answer that. Not yet anyway.”

  “Can you un-tape me, please?”

  “Of course,” he says. Then, “You’ll be needing some emergency house cleaning, I can see. Shall I add it to my bill?”

  “I still owe you for cleaning up after that Vatican soldier I left bleeding on my floor a few days ago.”

  He shakes his head.

  “Ah yes, I meant to speak with you about that. When my people arrived, they expected to find a dead man along with lots of blood. They were prepared naturally, for the worst. But instead, the man you shot in the leg was gone. Disappeared. And your apartment was clean. No blood. No sign of violence.”

  He must have survived, I think. The Vatican soldier must have survived the shooting. Or, at the very least, his own people came and got him. Then they cleaned up all the evidence. Why they would bother at that point, I have no idea. Better not to think about that for now.

  “Search the girl,” I say, as he cuts away the tape from my wrists. “Let’s hope she’s got cash, or at least an American Express that’s not maxed out.”

  “Yes,” he says. “Lucky for you I am proud to take American Express for my services.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  As promised Checco has the entire placed cleaned of bodies and blood. Checco, an expert shot, knew precisely where to shoot Anya so that she wouldn’t die or, for that matter, receive an injury that would require years of healing. He did however, put a .22 caliber round in her right shoulder, which necessitated the services of an EMT van. He wasn’t so kind with the goons, having put them permanently out of the bullying and torture business. The damage Lu did
to Cipriani’s face required a second EMT van. The wounds are more emotional than physical (the face bleeds a lot, after all). But no doubt they will also require the services of a very decent plastic surgeon. I hope someone can recommend a good one for Cip while he resides in prison for the rest of his days.

  But then, it’s more likely that Detective Cipriani won’t go to prison. In fact, it’s more probable the crooked cop will find someplace quiet to retire while his wounds heal. Not the wounds from his face, but the wounds to his financial hopes and dreams now that he knows the bones of Jesus will not be his for auctioning to the highest bidder on the illegal antiquities black market.

  When the bodies are gone, Checco sends a couple of associates to the Hotel Rex on the Via Faenza in order to dig through Anya’s things. It’s not long before he comes up with a bundle of cash and even the promised Amex. The money covers all his expenses and mine. I take only what I require for having found Dr. Manion, but no more. After all, he died on my watch. I take nothing for having gone after the bones. The bones were never mine in the first place. They are no one’s. No one belonging to this earthly world anyway. In the end, it wasn’t the bones I wanted, so much as the experience of going after the bones. I’m a writer now, not a sandhog. Writers require experience. And what an experience it’s been searching for my maker.

  “You have the money you need to go home now, Chase,” Checco says, running his hand through his wavy black hair. He smiles at me like an innocent boy, the kind of international fixer who can arm a small revolutionary army within twenty-four hours, if the price is right. “I will take care of your child support problem and make sure you are up to date and no longer face the possibility of arrest upon your arrival in the US.” He smiles. “Which, of course, begs the question, would you like me to book you a first class ticket to New York City?”

  Checco talks. I hear him talking, and I understand what he’s saying, but I can’t take my eyes off the strongbox. In my head, I’m seeing the bones it was supposed to possess. I wonder if one of the scientists who was entrusted to bury the bones inside the pyramid came back for them at a later date. Maybe the bones occupy a place of honor in some private antiquity collector’s personal museum. Or perhaps the Vatican secretly possesses them. But then, why send one of their soldier’s after me with threats of retribution? Threats of death? Why not just let me go about my business knowing I would never find the bones anyway?

  I feel that familiar tingling in my gut. It tells me my search for the bones of my maker is not yet finished. Just as well. All novels, good or bad, need a proper ending.

  A hand waved in my face.

  “Earth to Chase,” Checco sings. “Shall I purchase you a ticket?”

  He breaks me out of my spell.

  “Yes, Checco,” I say. “Yes, that would be great.”

  He slips into his windbreaker.

  “Will that be round-trip or one-way?” he adds, while making his way across the dining room and the living room to the front door.

  I turn and look at him. Into his face.

  “What do you suggest?” I say.

  He shrugs his shoulders.

  “I think we both know that eventually, Cirpriani is going to come after you again. He and his Sicilian ragazzi.”

  I nod. Checco is right. I’m not the type to run from trouble. But then, who wants to be constantly looking over his shoulder?

  “Make it one-way,” I say.

  “Good choice. I’ll text you when the reservation is made. It will of course be an electronic ticket.”

  He opens the door.

  “Checco?” I call out.

  “Yes?”

  “Will I ever see you again?”

  “In a few months,” he says. “I come to New York. You can take me to the Empire State Building.”

  “Deal.”

  “Enjoy your daughter, Chase.”

  “Thank you.”

  He steps out, closing the door behind him.

  Which leaves me all alone with an empty strongbox that was recovered from a secret chamber inside the Third Pyramid. While Lu lies on the couch, trying to catch some much needed Zs, I feel a sudden wave of sleepiness wash over me. Maybe that’s because, other than catching a quick nap or two on the fishing boat from Alexandria to Italy, I haven’t slept in forty-eight hours.

  In the bathroom I wash my face, remove the dried blood from around my mouth, apply some antibiotic ointment to my fat lower lip. I feel around the inside of my mouth with my index finger, pushing and pulling on my teeth, especially on what I thought was a loose molar. Every tooth is both present and accounted for and solidly in place. Chase the lucky dog.

  From the bathroom I make my way into the kitchen, find an already opened bottle of whiskey, pour myself a tall shot. Taking it back out into the dining room with me, I set it out onto the table beside the empty strongbox. I dig into my left trouser pocket, empty it out. There’s a little cash which consists of Euros and useless Egyptian pounds. Some coins, some small rocks and sand that found its way into my pockets along the way. I empty my back pockets of my wallet and passport, then I remove whatever is still stuffed into my right trouser pocket.

  That’s when I see it again.

  The cross I pulled off the Vatican soldier.

  The Maltese cross which contains the statuette of a robed woman at its base. I feel a cold shiver run up and down my spine. I dreamt about this cross when I was passed out from the beating the goon was giving me. I dreamt I was flying over a cemetery I knew from my youth. Why would I dream of this cross if it weren’t speaking to me? Calling me?

  The job of finding your maker is not finished…

  I lift the glass off the table, take a deep drink, set it back down. Then I pick it up the cross by its leather strap, stare at it. Stare at the woman. For a brief second I almost feel like the miniature statue is staring back at me. Communicating with me.

  I turn the cross over. That’s when I see the small inscription.

  Double-timing it to my bedroom, I find my reading glasses, take them back out to the dining room with me. In the light from the still open window, I read the inscription.

  Erastus

  Section 24, Lot 8

  GPS coordinates: 42.7076416, -73.7338181

  There’s that name again … Erastus. The same name uttered by the Vatican soldier before he fainted on my apartment floor from blood loss.

  Who or what the hell is Erastus?

  What is section 24? Lot 8? Sounds almost like a parcel of land. But then, with the GPS coordinates that are also provided, it must be a plot of land. But where?

  About-facing, I open my laptop, boot it up.

  When it’s ready I type in Google Maps. With hands that are almost to the point of trembling, I type in the GPS coordinates into the designated boxes, then come down on the Enter key with my index finger.

  The location that comes up takes my breath away.

  It’s as if this entire journey were leading me to this very place on earth. After all the running I’ve been doing, the chasing, the digging, the disappearing, I am finally going back to the one place on earth I can never truly escape.

  I am going home again.

  Going home to meet my maker.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  The flight arrives in New York’s JFK at 7:07 in the morning.

  Fifteen minutes early thanks to a lighter than usual head wind, or so the captain politely informs us.

  I have a choice here. I can immediately head into the city and surprise my ex-wife and daughter now, or I can head upstate to finish the job I started days ago. Truth is, there never was a choice. I want to see my daughter more than anything in the world. But I know that I cannot be hers entirely. Not until I nail the lid shut on this mystery … This chase.

  That in mind, I take a cab in into the city and hop a train for Albany at Penn Station.

  All during the train ride north, my eyes staring outside onto the Hudson River as the train winds its way along the banks,
I can only wonder if my instincts are going to serve me right. If the bones of Christ are to be found not in Jerusalem or Egypt, but in New York of all places, the irony would not be profound, but almost comical. If they are to be found only within a mile of my birthplace and inside a cemetery where I used to play my Indiana Jones games as a scrappy-haired kid, I will know for certain that my life will have taken a humbling turn for the surreal. Or, what the hell, maybe it will all simply be a bizarre coincidence.

  I ride, careful to keep a watchful eye on my surroundings, knowing that I am not yet out of danger. That at any moment, anyone of a number of enemies can jump me when I least expect it, those enemies now including certain corrupt members of the Florence police force.

  By the time the train pulls into the station in Albany, it is going on noon. Outside the station I hail a cab and immediately tell the driver to take me to the Albany Rural Cemetery.

  “Who died?” the old, overweight white man says from behind the steering column.

  “A very important man,” I say. “Lived a long time ago.”

  He looks at me in the rearview with tired eyes.

  “You’re a little late for the funeral,” he says, with a lung cracking smoker’s laugh.

  “Two thousand years too late,” I say.

  I see his eyes do a roll in their sockets, and he falls quiet. I couldn’t be happier.

  Driving over highway that borders the city of my youth, I open the window and take in the sweet smell of spring in upstate New York.

  Albany.

  The capital of the Empire State. Considered a backwater by some. A home for state workers and not much else. A place lost in time, always in the shadow of its far more popular bigger sister to the south. New York City.

  How long has it been for me?

  Maybe twenty years since I last laid my eyes on her tall buildings and the Hudson River that flows calm and heavy from the winter run-off in the spring. It dawns on me suddenly that I have nothing to dig with. Leaning forward, I instruct the cabbie to make a quick detour to the nearest hardware store, where I will purchase a shovel and a pick axe. He does it. When I get back inside the cab, I lay the tools onto the floor as the cabbie questions me over what I’m about to do with the digging equipment.