"I've changed the rules," answered Holliday.
"Really," said the priest. He didn't sound impressed.
"Listen."
Holliday held the speaker of the digital recorder Vince Caruso had used the night before. He pressed the On switch.
"Yesterday's gold incisor is tomorrow's wedding band," said Father Thomas on the recorder. Holliday switched off the little machine.
"Remember that?" Holliday said.
There was a long silence. Finally the priest spoke. His voice was strained.
"I told you that you were resourceful, Colonel Holliday, but clearly I didn't know just how resourceful you really were. Someone else was obviously involved." He paused and thought for a moment. "The waiter?"
"You told me I had nothing to bargain with," answered Holliday, ignoring the priest's question. "Now I do."
"We could simply deny it," said Father Thomas. "A fake, a fabrication created by our enemies. No one would believe you."
"Not everyone, but a few would believe it. There'd be an investigation. It's like Watergate, Father Thomas. It's not the crime that gets you-it's the cover-up."
There was another long silence.
"What are you suggesting?" Father Thomas said finally.
"Just what I offered last night, except now you get a bonus. The gold and the tape. A twofer."
"How will I know you didn't make copies?" queried the priest.
"You don't," said Holliday. "But I'm not a fool. I'll keep my side of the bargain. We're well aware of your organization's long arm."
"You'd do well to remember it," warned Father Thomas.
"A trade and a truce," offered Holliday.
"That would require an exchange."
"I'll call you," said Holliday. He hung up the phone.
"Will he actually do it?" Rafi asked.
"Not in a million years," said Holliday.
Tidyman reappeared a few minutes later carrying a heavy-looking rectangular box wrapped in brown paper. He sat down on the couch, took a penknife from his pocket and opened the box with a few deft slices through the paper. Inside the plain covering was a medium-sized blue Tupperware container, and inside the plastic box, packed in foam peanuts, were three automatic pistols, three boxes of ammunition in plastic strip-clips, a GPS unit and five black Nokia cell phones.
"Will the lieutenant get in trouble if any of this surfaces?" Tidyman asked.
"We're supposed to toss the weapons and the phones when we're done-they're clean, untraceable. The GPS unit he wants back if possible," replied Holliday.
"The boat?" Tidyman asked.
"Leaves the dock at the Marconi Bridge at noon," said Holliday. "It gets to Ostia Antica at one thirty." He glanced at his watch. "We've got an hour and a half to set up." He looked across to Tidyman. "You know what to do?"
"There is a big potted plant by the doorway next to the pizzeria with the green awning at Santamaura Street and Via Candia," recited the Egyptian. "I plant the phone there, call you when I'm done and then get to the bridge in time to catch the boat."
"Rafi?"
"When you call me I get to the Castro Pretorio stop on the Metro and then I call the priest. I make sure he hears the announcer on the PA system give the name of the stop."
"Then what?" quizzed Holliday.
"I get on the subway and go in the opposite direction to the Marconi stop. Then I get myself to the bridge and the boat." The Israeli paused. "If any of us are being followed we'll know by then. We hope."
"Good," said Holliday. He could almost feel the blood rushing through his veins. "That's it. Are we ready?"
"Ready," said Tidyman.
"Ready," said Rafi.
Holliday smiled to himself, a little surprised at the depth of his emotions.
He hadn't felt this alive in years. This was who he was.
"Let's saddle up then," he said.
"Not 'lock and load'?" Rafi grinned.
"Different generation," said Holliday. "I'm from the John Wayne era, but yeah, that too."
For Holliday it was a simple exercise in applied tactics: when faced with a superior numerical force the primary objective was to distract the enemy and split his forces; divide and conquer. The Normandy invasion was a classic example: make Rommel's forces believe that the invasion was coming at Pas de Calais, the obvious choice, then attack somewhere else, in that case the beaches at Normandy.
For Rafi and Tidyman it was a bit too obvious, like a high school football play: fake left, go right. Distract the priest and his thugs and send them on a wild-goose chase to the north on the subway line, but attack them with a much smaller force to the south, into the heart of enemy territory.
Using a map of Rome and Vince Caruso's familiarity with the city, they concocted a Robert Ludlum-Jason Bourne, cat-and-mouse, hither-and-yon, hares-and-hounds game across the city that would supposedly lead the priest and his men to where the exchange of Peggy for the location of the bullion would take place. In fact, it would all be a figment of their collective imaginations, the moves and countermoves orchestrated with generic, throwaway cell phones and overseen by Lieutenant Caruso driving his Italian girlfriend's Dragon Red Vespa GTS-250 scooter. With the paper chase concentrating Father Thomas and his colleagues, Holliday, Rafi and Tidyman would meet at the Marconi Bridge on the downstream River Tiber, then board a river sightseeing cruiser down to the old ruins at Ostia Antica, Rome's original port, now two miles inland after the deposit of three thousand years' worth of accumulated river silt.
If things went according to plan they would discover a speedboat left for them by Vince Caruso at the marina where the sightseeing boat docked, which they would then use to reach the fishing shack where Peggy was being held hostage.
Like most rescue plans it looked perfect on paper, and like most rescue plans, as Holliday well knew, it would be anything but perfect in its execution. Still, it wasn't bad for something put together in a hurry. In every theater of war Holliday had fought in, he'd seen much worse plans generated by entire committees of so-called experts, and over the years he'd developed a basic rule of thumb: in war, just like cooking, too many cooks just screwed things up. In his own mind it was all pretty straightforward. Find Peggy, kill anybody who got in their way, grab her and get the hell out of town as quickly as possible.
The Ponte Guglielmo Marconi crossed the Tiber River south of Rome in a surprisingly rural area, especially on the southern side. The dock for the sightseeing boats was located a little downstream of the wide modern bridge on the bank of the river, squeezed in between a junior league rugby field and some fenced- off public tennis courts. The only way to get to it was down a dirt road that seemed to peter off the farther along you went. If it hadn't been for Lieutenant Caruso's detailed directions none of them would have ever found it. On the other hand, it was the perfect spot for a rendezvous; if anyone was following you they could be spotted a mile off. The boat was a small converted passenger ferry named, not surprisingly, the M.V. Horatio. She had three wedding-cake decks outfitted with restaurant-style booths set beside large tinted picture windows.
Holliday arrived first and waited on the dock, receiving updates from Caruso on his cell phone every few minutes. As far as the young lieutenant could see everything was going according to plan. Father Thomas had successfully retrieved the cell phone left for him in the potted shrub by Tidyman and had begun his wild-goose chase. According to Caruso there was no sign of the bald Father Damaso.
At eleven forty Emil Tidyman arrived, improbably dressed as a tourist in a Hawaiian shirt, a straw hat and big sunglasses with both binoculars and a camera hung around his neck. Ten minutes later Rafi appeared on the dock. As far as Holliday could tell neither man had been followed. He waited until they were about to pull in the gangplank before he boarded the broad-beamed, top-heavy ferry, and shortly afterward the M.V. Horatio eased out into the turbid green water and began making its ponderous way downstream.