Antonio blows out cigarette smoke and waves him gently away. 'Another time. Thank you for asking me, but today I promised my new girlfriend-'
Marco, the unit's weasel-faced number two, wags a long finger and leers. 'Haah! We know exactly what you promised your girlfriend!' He slaps a tattooed hand on his bicep and snaps his arm upwards. 'Why should you be eating pasta with old dogs like us, when you can be at home eating young pussy, hey?'
'Enough, Marco! You're a fucking pig.' Luca glares at him, a supervisor's stare of death. He turns towards Pavarotti and adopts a more fatherly look. 'Another time, 'Tonio. Remember, you're working mornings – twelve on, twelve off for the rest of the week, okay?'
'Si. Va bene. I'll remember.' Antonio gives his boss the thumbs-up and focuses his attention on his cigarette until they all head off for the waiting water taxi.
The commune is set in the middle of the island with four major landing stages for boats, the main one being close to the guard house. Water from the lagoon has been channelled in various tributaries around and through the island. Numerous bridges arch decorously over waterways that lead to footpaths and forests planted centuries ago.
The undercover cop watches the water taxi head across the lagoon, flicks the dog-end of his cigarette into a metal bin and begins to amble around the mansion's northern perimeter walls. If he's right, Fernando, the exterior night guard is now exactly at the opposite end of the island. He's got a good half-hour to do his snooping before they're likely to bump into each other.
Antonio's already noted that the walls are covered with anti-vandal night cameras and anti-glare high-def day cameras. An introductory shift designed to teach him how to monitor the feeds and archive video from the hard drives was enough for him to spot several weak areas. Nothing wrong with the system, nothing at all. The German-made Mobotix IP high-res set-up is one of the best in the world. But the flaw Antonio has found is a human one. It hadn't been fitted by Mobotix, it'd been installed by Mario's own team and they hadn't quite got all their angles right. Forty overlapping camera views cover four long walls and any nearby internal and external activity. But the video sweep on the south wall, the one opposite the guard's complex, seems to his expert eye to have been poorly rigged. It lazily misses a whole section of the mansion's grounds. Well, to be precise, it's not so much the grounds it misses as the waterway access and the building that lies behind it – the area they've been told is strictly out of bounds – the boathouse.
Antonio sticks close to the wall. As close as the climbing ivy that's bound its pink tendrils into the whitewashed mortar. The boathouse is top of his list of places to check out. If drugs are being run in and out of the island, then this place is going to be the centre of activity.
By the time he reaches the slipway he realises prowling around isn't going to be as easy as he thought. He glances up at the walls. The night cameras are out of view. Good. If he can't see them, they can't see him.
But that's not the problem. Running out from the wall – outwards and upwards – is a vast wire-mesh fence, topped and edged with razor wire.
He weighs it up. Even if he could climb it and swing his family jewels over those slice-happy jaws of sharpened steel, then he still has to drop at least twelve feet on the other side into the water. Dangerous. At least break-your-ankle dangerous. Maybe worse.
Going round doesn't look an easier option. To do that, he'd have to walk maybe a mile to the edge of the island, then dive into the lagoon and swim underwater and unseen up the slipway. In a wetsuit and properly prepared he'd happily give it a go. But not fully dressed, not unprepared, and not right now with one of his security-guard colleagues about to arrive on his tail.
Antonio moves his attention to the large wooden doors of the boathouse.
They're going to be locked as well.
Even if he manages to get to them, those big old wooden slabs are going to give him problems. They're padlocked from the outside and possibly even bolted on the inside. Hopeless. Absolutely hopeless.
He turns and starts the walk back in the gathering dusk. He can just make out Fernando in the distance, a distinctive bow-legged walk, his pace slow and casual. In another hour the last dregs of daylight will have drained away and he'll be making the last of his rounds with a flashlight.
Way beyond the vicious razor wire and high above the weathered old doors a rusty weathervane gently spins, kicked into life by a gathering westerly wind. A closer look – perhaps through binoculars – would have revealed that the iron head of the cockerel was a twenty-four-hour camera with night-vision lens, routed not to the Mobotix control room but to a smaller and more private panel of monitors and recorders at the back of the boathouse. A panel now controlled by the man who killed Monica Vidic.
CAPITOLO XVII
666 BC
The Plains of Atmanta Kavie and Pesna are in a foul mood as they leave Teucer's bedside and board their waiting chariot. Larth notices their sullen demeanour as he climbs up front with the driver and whips four of Etruria's finest stallions across the hardened turf.
The chariot is new but the magistrate hasn't even passed comment on it. Larth personally designed and supervised its construction. Twin axles, four nine-spoke reinforced wheels and bronzed shielding to all sides. It is the finest in Etruria. Better than anything his father ever made. Better than anything his father's father even dreamed of making.
He glances over his shoulder and sees them deep in one of their many confidential conversations. The kind that excludes him. Belittles him.
They take him for granted. Treat him merely as a purveyor of pain. Well, he's worth more than that. More than they credit him for. More than either of them will ever be.
Fields of barley and wheat fly by on either side of the chariot as Larth languishes in his loathing and resentment.
Everything the naked eye can see now belongs to Pesna.
Beneath the soil lie the rich reserves of silver that Pesna is mining and turning into precious jewellery.
The chariot halts and the driver, grumbling, dismounts and walks ahead to unbuckle a field gate.
Larth strains to listen to the conversation of the men behind him.
Kavie sounds upbeat: 'It is a blessing in disguise.'
Pesna is scepticaclass="underline" 'How so?'
'Our invitation to the noblemen, magistrates and elders can now include an invitation to the blessing of our new temple. How could they refuse to come and be part of something sacred?'
Pesna doesn't sound convinced. 'A blessing by a blinded netsvis? How will that look?'
'He may not be blind.'
'But what if he is?'
There is a pause. Larth can almost hear the wheels of Kavie's devious mind turning before finally – as always – he finds the right reply: 'Then he is a novelty. We invent a legend that Teucer selflessly sacrificed his sight so he would not be distracted by earthly things and could better listen to the words of the gods. Having such a devoted netsvis will make you the envy of all Etruria.'
Pesna laughs. 'Sometimes, my friend, I doubt whether even the gods themselves are as blessed with words as you are.'
Kavie the sycophant laughs as well. 'You are too gracious.'
'Have you not already sent the invitations?'
'Drafted, yes. Sent, no. I can make amendments later this evening and despatch them by messengers on the morrow.'
'Good. So when? When do we invite these powerful and influential men to our modest meeting and divine temple blessing?'
Kavie holds up both hands and stretches out his fingers. 'Six days' time.'
The conversation falls off as the chariot driver returns. He mumbles something, climbs back on his seat and shakes the stallions' reins. Larth ignores him and sits up straight.
Six days. Excellent. Six is his favourite number.