“Because he’s Giorgio Montefiore.”
They led themselves on an unhurried tour of the Piazzale degli Uffizi, pausing briefly to ponder the statue of Leonardo, and returned to Door 3 at eleven thirty. Montefiore was nowhere to be seen.
This time Veronica dialed his number. The call went straight to voicemail.
“Try his office,” suggested Gabriel.
She found a number online. A secretary informed her that Montefiore had not yet arrived at the museum.
“We had an appointment at eleven.”
“I wouldn’t worry, Dottoressa Marchese. He’s almost never on time.”
Veronica rang off and dialed his mobile a second time. Once again her call went directly to voicemail.
“Do you remember where he lives?” asked Gabriel.
Veronica pointed toward the opposite bank of the Arno.
“Inside thezonaor outside?”
“The latter.”
“Let’s take the car,” said Gabriel. “And never mind the brakes.”
***
The villa stood atop a low hill on the southern fringes of the city, behind a stone wall approximately three meters in height. The metal gate was tightly locked. Gabriel pressed the call button on the intercom and received no response. Veronica rang Montefiore’s mobile phone a final time, with the same result.
“What now?” she asked.
“I suppose one of us should climb over the gate.”
“I nominate you for the job.”
“My back is killing me.”
“You’ll manage somehow, I’m sure.”
Gabriel considered his options for a moment, then clambered onto the bonnet of Veronica’s Mercedes. Even with the added elevation, he was scarcely able to grasp the top of the gate. The bars were vertical, thus robbing him of a toehold to ease his ascent. Nevertheless, after several seconds of sustained effort, he managed to hoist a leg over the barrier. With a simple rotation of his shoulders, the rest of him soon followed. He dangled there a moment, calculating the distancebetween his feet and the gravel drive, and then released his grip. The landing was excruciating but for the most part dignified.
“Bravo,” declared Veronica through the bars of the gate. “You were magnificent.”
“Now you.”
“I’ll wait here, if you don’t mind.”
Gabriel brushed the dust from his gabardine trousers and headed up the drive to the entrance of the villa. He didn’t bother with the bell push, placing a hand on the latch instead. Like the gate, the door was locked. Breaching it, however, required nothing more arduous than a few seconds of gentle work with the slender tools in the breast pocket of his jacket.
He opened the door and stepped into the cool shadows of the entrance hall. Which was where he discovered Giorgio Montefiore lying in a crimson pool of recently shed blood, with three tightly spaced bullet holes in the center of his forehead. His life’s ambition had finally been realized, thought Gabriel. He had found his lost Leonardo. And now he was dead.
20
Hotel Hassler
It was Contessa Teressa Simonetti, a faded Florentine noblewoman with midnight-blue blood flowing through her veins, who sounded the alarm. She did so at 12:17 p.m., with a call to the Florence headquarters of the Carabinieri. The dispatcher was justifiably dubious, for the contessa was getting on in years and was a frequent if unreliable observer of crimes and misdeeds of every sort.
“An intruder, you say?”
