Day of Confession - Allan Folsom [55]
Trembling and horrified, and certain without doubt who had been responsible for the bombing of the bus, Marciano had simply hung up. Palestrina was everywhere. Twisting the screw, tightening his hold. Efficient, controlled, ruthless. Larger, more terrifying and detestable than Marsciano could ever have imagined.
TURNING IN HIS CHAIR, Marsciano looked out the window. Across the street he could see the gray Mercedes waiting to take him from his apartment to the Vatican. His driver was new and a favorite of Farel’s, the baby-faced plainclothes member of the Vatican police, Anton Pilger. His housekeeper, Sister Maria-Louisa, was new as well. As were his secretaries and office manager. Of his original staff only Father Bardoni remained, and only because he knew how to access computer files and understood the shared database with Weggen’s Geneva office. Once the new portfolio was accepted, Marsciano was certain Father Bardoni would be gone, too. He was the last of the truly loyal, and his going would leave Marsciano wholly alone in the nest of Palestrina’s vipers.
36
HARRY MOVED UNSTEADILY IN THE DARKness, his head still aching from the smack of the ricocheting bullet, his back against the rough of the tunnel wall, with his good hand stretched out along it trying to find Hercules’ great door. He had to get out before the dwarf came back. Who knew what he would bring with him when he did? Friends? The police? What must sixty thousand dollars mean to a creature like him?
Where was the door? It couldn’t be this far. What if he had gone past it in the dark?
He stopped. Listening. Hoping for the distant rumble of a Metro train that might give him some clue to where he was.
Silence.
It had taken most of his strength just to dress, collect Danny’s things, and get out of Hercules’ den. What he would do once he was out and away he didn’t know, but anything was better than staying there and waiting for whatever Hercules had planned.
Behind and in front was blackness. Then he saw it. A pinpoint of light in the distance. The end of the tunnel. He felt relief shudder through him. Back against the wall he started toward it. The light became brighter. He walked faster. Now his foot touched something hard. He stopped. Put his foot up to feel it. Steel. It was a rail. He looked back. The light was closer. He flashed on the machine of torture his captors had used. It couldn’t be the same. Where was he? Had he never left there at all?
Then he felt the ground rumble under him. The light was racing toward him. Then he knew! He was in a live tunnel. The light rocketing toward him was a Metro train. Turning, he ran back the way he had come. The light became brighter and brighter. His left foot slipped on the rail and he nearly fell. He heard the shriek of the train whistle. Then the scream of steel as the driver slammed on the brakes.
Suddenly rough hands grabbed him and threw him against the tunnel wall. He saw the lights inside the train as it slid past inches from him. The faces of startled passengers. Then it was past. Screeching to a stop fifty yards down the track.
“Are you crazy?”
Hercules was in his face, his hands on Harry’s jacket, holding him in an iron grip.
Yells of trainmen came from down the track. They were climbing out, coming toward them with flashlights.
“This way.”
Hercules spun him around and into a narrow side tunnel. A moment later he shoved him up a work ladder, then followed himself, crutches hanging on one arm, swinging up behind him like a circus performer.
Behind them they heard the shouts and calls of the trainmen. Hercules stared angrily at him, then moved him forward down another narrow tunnel full of wiring and ventilation equipment.
They went on that way, Harry in front, Hercules directly behind, for what seemed like a half mile or more. Finally they stopped under the light of a ventilation shaft.
For a long moment Hercules said nothing, just listened, then, satisfied