第 11 页

Only the language was different.

Well, that and another distinction: There were no paper coffee cups, as you’d find littering the desks of American cops. No fast-food bags either. Apparently the Italians avoided this sloppy practice. All to the good. When he’d been head of NYPD forensics, Rhyme had once fired a technician who was examining slides of evidence while he chomped on a Big Mac. ‘Contamination!’ he’d shouted. ‘Get out.’

Rossi led them into a conference room of about ten by twenty feet. It contained a battered table, four chairs, a filing cabinet and a laptop. Against the wall easels held pads of newsprint, covered with handwritten notes and photos. These were just like his own evidence charts, though paper, rather than whiteboards. While there were words he couldn’t make out, many items on the list of physical evidence were understandable.

‘Mr Rhyme,’ Rossi began.

‘Captain,’ Ercole said quickly. ‘He retired as captain from the NYPD.’ Then seemed to decide he should not be correcting his superior. A blush.

Rhyme gave a dismissing gesture with his working arm. ‘No matter.’

‘Forgive me,’ Rossi continued, apparently genuinely troubled by this lapse. ‘Captain Rhyme.’

‘He is now a consultant,’ Ercole added, ‘I have read about him. He often works with Detective Sachs here. That is correct too?’

‘Yes,’ she said.

A cheerleader, like this Ercole, was not a bad idea, Rhyme thought. He was curious about the man. He had both a confidence and a rookie’s air about him. And Rhyme had seen throughout the building no gray uniforms like his. There’s a story here.

Sachs tapped her shoulder bag. ‘We have the results of the evidence analysis at the two crime scenes involving the Composer in New York. Crime scene photos, footprints and so on.’

Rossi said, ‘Yes. We were looking forward to receiving it. Have you gathered any more information since you spoke to Officer Benelli?’

‘Nothing definitive,’ Sachs said. ‘We could find nothing about the source of the musical strings he used for the nooses. His keyboard was purchased with cash from a large retailer. There are no fingerprints anywhere. Or, at best, small fragments that aren’t helpful.’

Rhyme added, ‘Our FBI is looking at manifests for flights here.’

‘We have done so too, with no success. But flight manifests would be, what do you say, a long shot. With no picture, no passport number? And your Composer could have flown into a dozen airports in the EU and moved over borders without any record. Rented or stolen a car in Amsterdam or Geneva and driven. I assume you considered he might not have left from a New York-area airport. Perhaps Washington, Philadelphia … even Atlanta on Delta. Hartsfield is the busiest airport in the world, I have learned.’

Well, Rossi was at the top of his game.

‘Yes, we considered that,’ Rhyme said.

Rossi asked, ‘He’s American, you think?’

‘It’s our assumption but we aren’t sure.’

Ercole asked, ‘Why would a serial killer leave the country and come here to kill?’

Sachs said, ‘The Composer isn’t a serial killer.’

Ercole nodded. ‘No, he hasn’t killed, that’s true. You saved the victim. And we have not found the abducted man’s body here.’

Rossi: ‘Detective Sachs doesn’t mean that, Ercole.’

‘No, Inspector, you’re right. A serial killer is a rare and specific criminal profile. In males the motives’re sexual in nature usually, or nonsexual sadism. And while there’s ritualistic behavior, that’s limited in most cases to binding or arranging the victims in certain ways or leaving fetishes at the scene or taking trophies, postmortem. The behavior doesn’t rise to the Composer’s level of elaborate staging – the videos, the noose, the music. He’s a multiple perpetrator.’

Silence flowed into the room. Then Rossi spoke. ‘We thank you for your insights and assistance.’

‘In whatever humble way we can,’ Rhyme said. Not very humbly.

‘And in coming all this way to deliver to us that file.’ Not very subtly.

Then Rossi looked him over. ‘You, Captain Rhyme, I think, are not used to perpetrators, come si dice? Absconsioning?’

‘Absconding,’ Ercole corrected his boss. Then froze, blushing once more.

‘No, I am not,’ Rhyme said. Dramatically, perhaps overly so. Though he believed the delivery was appropriate since his impression was that Rossi, too, was a cop who would not do well with absconsioning perpetrators.

‘You are hoping for extradition,’ Rossi said. ‘After we catch him.’

‘I hadn’t thought that far,’ Rhyme lied.

‘No?’ Rossi brushed at his mustache. ‘Whether the trial is here or in America, that is a decision for the court, not for me or for you. Allora, I appreciate what you’ve done, Captain Rhyme. The effort. It must be taxing.’ He avoided a glance at the wheelchair. ‘But now you have delivered your report I cannot see how you can be of further help. You are a crime scene expert but we have crime scene experts here.’

‘Your Scientific Police.’

‘Ah, you know of them?’

‘I lectured at the main facility in Rome years ago.’

‘I do hate to disappoint you, and you, as well, Signorina Sachs. But, once again, I see little you can offer other than that.’ He nodded to her bag. ‘And there are practical issues. Officer Benelli and I speak serviceable English but most others involved in the case do not. I must add too that Naples is not a very …’ He sought a word. ‘… accessible city. For someone like you.’

‘I’ve noticed.’ Rhyme shrugged, a gesture he was fully capable of.

Silence, again.

Broken at last by Rhyme: ‘Translation is easy, thanks to Google. And regarding mobility: In New York, I don’t get out to crime scenes much. No need. I leave that to my Sachs and other officers. They return like bees with nectar. And we concoct the honey together. Forgive the metaphor. But what can it possibly hurt, Inspector, for us to hang around? We’ll be sounding boards for ideas.’

‘Sounding board’ seemed to confuse him.

Ercole translated.

Rossi paused then said, ‘This that you are proposing, it is irregular and we are not people who are well with irregularness.’

At that moment Rhyme was aware of a person striding into the room. He swiveled the chair around to see a lean man of slight build in a stylish jacket and slacks, pointy boots, thinning hair and salt-and-pepper goatee. His eyes were narrow and tiny. The word ‘demonic’ came to mind. He looked over Sachs and Rhyme and said, ‘No. No sounding boards. There will be no consulting, no assistance at all. That is out of the question.’ His accent was thicker than Rossi’s and Ercole’s but his grammar and syntax were perfect. This told Rhyme he read English frequently but probably had not been to America or the UK often and watched little English-language media.

The man turned to Ercole and fired off a question in Italian.

Flustered, blushing, the young officer muttered defensively, obviously a denial. Rhyme guessed the question was: ‘Did you ask them to come?’

Rossi said, ‘Captain Rhyme, Detective Sachs, and Signor Reston, this is Prosecutor Spiro. He is investigating the case with us.’

‘Investigating?’

Rossi was silent for a moment, considering Rhyme’s question, it seemed. ‘Ah, yes. From what I know, it is different in America. Here, in Italy, prosecutors function as policemen, in some ways. Procuratore Spiro and I are the lead investigators in the Composer case. Working together.’

Spiro’s dark eyes lasered into Rhyme’s. ‘Our tasks are to identify this man, to ascertain where he is hiding in Italy and where he is keeping the victim, and to marshal evidence to be used at the trial when we capture him. As to the first, you clearly cannot help because you have failed to identify him in your country. The second? You know nothing of Italy so even your expertise in evidence would offer little help. And as to the third, it is not in your interest to assist in a trial here, as you wish to extradite the suspect back to America for trial there. So, you see, your involvement would at best be unhelpful and at worst a conflict of interest. I thank you for the courtesy of providing us with your files. But now you must leave, Mr Rhyme.’

Ercole started to blurt, ‘It is Capitano—’

Spiro shut him off with a glare. ‘Che cosa?’

‘Nothing, Procuratore. Forgive me.’

‘So, you must leave.’

Apparently prosecutors – or this prosecutor, at least – carried more authority than police inspectors when it came to investigations. Rhyme sensed no disagreement on the part of Rossi. He nodded to Sachs. She dug into the shoulder bag and handed the inspector a thick file. Rossi flipped through it. On the top were photos of the evidence and profile charts.

He nodded and handed them to Ercole. ‘Put this information on the board, Officer.’

Spiro said, ‘Do you need assistance getting to the airport?’

Rhyme said, ‘We’ll handle our departure arrangements, thank you.’

‘He has a private jet,’ Ercole said, still awestruck.

Spiro’s mouth tightened, approaching a sneer.

The three Americans turned and headed to the door, Ercole escorting them – as Rossi’s nod had instructed.

Just before they left, though, Rhyme stopped and pivoted back. ‘If I can offer an observation or two?’

Spiro was stone-faced but Rossi nodded. ‘Please.’

‘Does fette di metallo mean “bits of metal”?’ Rhyme’s eyes were on the chart.

Spiro’s and Rossi’s eyes swiveled to one another’s. ‘“Slices,” yes.’

‘Fibre di carta is “paper fibers”?’

‘That is correct.’

‘Hm. All right. The Composer has changed his appearance. He’s shaved his beard and I am fairly certain his head as well. He has the victim hidden in a very old location, and it’s deep underground. It’s most likely urban, rather than rural. The building is not now accessible to the public and hasn’t been for some time but it once was. It’s in a neighborhood where prostitutes used to work. They still might. That I couldn’t tell you.’

Ercole, he noted, was staring at him as if mesmerized.

Rhyme continued, ‘And one more thing: He won’t use YouVid again. He uses proxies to hide his IP address but he’s not good at it and I’m sure he’s smart enough to know that. So he’ll expect your computer people, and YouVid security, to be onto him. You should start monitoring other upload sites. And tell your tactical people to be ready to move quickly. The victim doesn’t have much time at all.’ As he turned his chair toward the door he said, ‘Goodbye now. I mean, arrivederci.’

CHAPTER 15

Am I dead?

And in Jannah?

Ali Maziq could honestly not say. He believed he had been a good man and a good Muslim all his life, and he thought that he had earned a place in Paradise. Perhaps not the highest place, Firdaws, reserved for prophets and martyrs and the most devout, but certainly in a respectable locale.

Yet … yet …

How could Heaven be so cold, so damp, so shadowy?

Alarm coursed through his body and he shivered, only partly from the chill. Was he in al-Nar?

Perhaps he had gotten everything wrong, and had been dispatched straight to Hell. He tried to think back to his most recent memory. Someone appearing fast, someone strong and large. Then something was pulled over his head, muffling the screams.

After that? Flashes of light. Some strange words. Some music.

And now this … Cold, damp, dark, only faint illumination from above.

Yes, yes, it could be. Not Jannah but al-Nar.

He had a vague sense that perhaps this was Hell, yes. Because perhaps he had not lived such a fine life, after all. He had not been so good. He’d done evil. He couldn’t recall what specifically but something.

Perhaps that was what Hell was: an eternity of discomfort spent in a state of believing you had sinned but not knowing exactly how.

Then his mind kicked in, his rational, educated mind. No, he couldn’t be dead. He was in pain. And he knew that if Allah, praise be to Him, had sent him to al-Nar, he would be feeling pain far worse than this. If he were in Jannah, he would be feeling no pain at all but merely the glory of God, praise be to Him.

So, the answer was that he wasn’t dead.

Which led to: So, then, where?

Vague memories tumbled through his thoughts. Memories, or maybe constructions of his own imagination. Why can’t I think more clearly? Why can I remember so little?

Images. Lying on the ground, smelling grass. The taste of food. The satisfaction of water in his mouth. Good cold water and bad tea. Olives. A man’s hands on his shoulders.

Strong. The big man. Everything going dark.

Music. Western music.

He coughed and his throat hurt. It stung badly. He’d been choked perhaps. The lack of air had hurt his memory. His head ached too. Maybe a fall had jumbled his thoughts.

Ali Maziq gave up trying to figure out what had happened.

He focused on where he was and how to escape.

Squinting, he could discern that he was sitting in a chair – bound into a chair – in a cylindrical room that measured about six or seven meters across, stone walls, no ceiling. Above was merely a dim emptiness, from which the very faint illumination came. The floor, also stone, was pitted and scarred.

And what exactly did this room remind him of?

What? What?

Ah, a memory trickled from a dim recess in his mind, and he was picturing a class trip to a museum in Tripoli: the burial chamber for a Carthaginian holy man.

A brief recent memory flickered again: sipping cold water, eating olives, drinking tea that was sour, made from water shot out of a cappuccino machine steamer, residue of milk in the brew.

With somebody?

Then the bus stop. Something had happened at a bus stop.

What country am I in? Libya?

No, he didn’t think so.

But I am certainly in a burial chamber …

The room was silent except for the drip of water somewhere in the chamber.

He was gagged, a piece of cloth in his mouth, which was covered with tape. Still, he tried calling for help – in Arabic. Even if he were elsewhere and a different language was spoken, he hoped the tone of his voice would draw rescuers.

But the gag was efficient and he made hardly any sound whatsoever.

Ali now gasped in shock as there was sudden pressure against his windpipe. What could this be? He couldn’t see clearly and he had no use of his hands but by twisting his head from side to side and analyzing the sensation, he realized that his head was in a hoop of what seemed to be thin twine. It had just grown slightly tauter.

He looked up and to the right.

And then he saw it – the device meant to kill him!

The cord around his neck traveled upward, to a rod stuck into the wall, then over another rod and down to a bucket. The pail was under an old rusted pipe, from which water dripped.

Oh, no, no! God protect me, praise be to Him!

He now understood the source of the sounds. Slowly the drops of water were filling the bucket. As it grew heavier, it tugged the noose tighter.

The size of the bucket suggested that it would hold easily a half-dozen liters. Ali didn’t know how many kilos that represented. But he suspected that the person who had created this horrible machine did. And that his calculation was accurate enough to make certain that – for reasons only God knew, praise be to Him – the bucket would soon be more than heavy enough to choke him to death.