form of execution. In Roman times, Cicero was beheaded for challenging the Republic. His hands were also cut off. It beats crucifixion.”
A patrolman, looking peeved, approaches the lieutenant colonel with a salute.
“Comandante, there are three other bodies in the stalls. Two are young women in their early twenties. They appear to be visiting students. Both were carrying knapsacks. In addition, there is one man. He looks to be between thirty and thirty-five. He has a shoulder bag and a camera case.”
Giacomo thanks the officer who then retreats.
Moving on to his colleague, he charges Alfredo with specific tasks.
“Dump the two students and traveler elsewhere. Make it believable. Arrange matters with our newspaper friends. Moreover, transport the family back to their kin in Gioiosa Marina, Calabria. Seal the area. This is not a scene for public consumption.”
As Alfredo prepares to leave, he asks Giacomo, “I know this kind of brutality is like a dog pissing to mark his territory but, Jesus Christ, this is the Vatican. What’s the message? Why the Vatican?”“I don’t know exactly but I suspect the Stregheria is messaging the Mafia. These emissaries were coming to see Cardinal Pio, the professore’s brother-in-law. He might know. I don’t know the specifics. What I do know damn well is that we have
a declaration of war. God help us all.” Giacomo mutters to himself.
“For my part, God will abandon me.” Alfredo, confused and alarmed, wobbles
away.
Giacomo heads toward the Swiss Guard gate.
He must communicate these events to his uncle, Cardinal Pio. Then, he must escape the country.
Chapter 11
Rome, central Italy Vatican Square,
Filomena sings from within the rectangular, glass shower stall. She left the bathroom door open not so much to reduce the water vapor from bathing as much as to display sexual playfulness and her many charms. During each visit, ‘Peeping Tom’ Emilio role-plays spying on his ‘Lady Godiva’. She reciprocates, teasing Emilio with seductive poses before settling under the stream of water, scrubbing and rinsing as if suffering from a pathological disorder but anxiously anticipating his naked attack. However, not this time. It is a matter of priorities.
Partially dressed, Emilio rests on the edge of the bed, his back to the window overlooking the street and the piazza. Methodically, he is cleaning
and reloading his revolver and silencer. This visit’s voyeurism, prolonged ogling and then dramatically sweeping in to ride his watering steed is forsaken. He has unfinished business within the Vatican fortress.
Emilio finishes dressing. He takes a few large bills out of his wallet and places the money on the dresser. Seeing colored stationary on the dresser, he scribbles a parting note: bye tesoro (bye sweetie), alla prossima (until next time).
Taking a final glance in the mirror, Emilio puts on his game face and casually leaves the apartment. At street level, an ecological triad hits him: the sun’s blinding brightness, the air’s stifling heat and humidity’s heavy-handedness. He lowers the brim of his cap, swings his jacket over one shoulder and beelines toward the Vatican’s Swiss Guard gate. Within ten paces, he is perspiring profusely evidenced on his shirt by sweat stains on his back and underarms.
The touristy hustle-and-bustle, in the smallest state in the world, resembles a packed shopping mall during a holiday sale. The number of people who have braved the heat appears to be growing, like overcooked, steaming spaghetti. Visitors queue and wait. Civil servants with portfolios rush across St. Peter’s Square for yet another espresso and, surely, not for work-related affairs. Unguided visitors ramble aimlessly in an exhilarated stupor snapping pictures every minute. The remaining ground of the grandiose terrain is peppered with priests, nuns and guards.
Emilio sees the carabinieri at the crime
scene but pays scant attention. He proceeds on his way toward the Pontifical Swiss Guard gate. The police will be tending to their housekeeping while he completes his mission.
Emilio advances leisurely toward the ornate, wrought iron gate with two Swiss Guardsmen barring entry to the Vatican’s inner circle of office buildings. He raises his right hand skyward, his thumb, index, and middle finger extended on three axes. The gesture, normally, symbolizes the Holy Trinity. For Emilio, it represents the killing of the Corrado clan, the screwing of Filomena and, his final hit: the murder of the Corrado collaborator within the Vatican. He laughs at his own inside joke and today’s triumphs.
True to task, Emilio quickens his pace, understanding that the opportune moment is imminent and, as Macbeth grasped, the assassination must proceed quickly.
Chapter 12
Rome, central Italy Piazza del Colosseo,
If looks could kill, Emily would make a first- class gladiator. After all, female gladiators, until banned, fought alongside their male counterparts for hundreds of years.
It befuddles me how such beauty can co- exist with pristine physic brutality and revulsion.
My thoughts stray as we sit on a patio, across from the Coliseum, waiting for our lunch orders.
When I first met Emily, I associated her name with Emily Bronte, author of ‘Wuthering Heights’, one of my favorite childhood paperbacks alongside the collected works of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle. Regularly, Emily makes me think of fictional characters like ‘Heathcliff’ and ‘Professor
Moriarty’.
I recollect a portentous day at her family’s club picnic. We were only days into our engagement when, in a moment of personal frustration while playing cards with her friends, she turned to me, a spectator, and told me, with combined evilness of Heathcliff and Moriarty, to “fuck off”.
My wife is the second child of Valeria and Augusto. She was born in Toronto, Canada. She is a university graduate with an honors degree in psychology. She has excelled in extracurricular activities: figure skating, gymnastics and hot yoga. For a time, she yearned to be a model and an actress. Her mom always expected her to go into the nunnery. They compromised. She settled as a suburban boutique owner, acting happy, selling young ladies’ dress fashions while promising to teach Sunday catechism classes at the local church.
Emily is a classic beauty with natural blonde hair. She is tirelessly teasing with others and ‘ballsy’ toward me at the slightestirritation. She hasaradiant smile and entrancing green eyes. Women spy her with jealous looks. Men ogle. I really do not mind as long as such gestures are unreciprocated. Perhaps I am shallow. In my core, when such overtures are invited or shared, thoughts of betrayal begin. Doubt festers and the fury in me becomes agonizing.
Emily is talking and I listen but my mind wanders as it does so often when listening to the same refrain. The geography is different; perhaps even some of the words, but the condemnations and the callousness are painfully familiar.
“You are a selfish, hard-headed Calabrese.”
Emily points her finger at me like a scolding schoolteacher.
“You do what you want, when you want. You never think of me or the kids.”
