”Julian. Call the airport. Request passenger lists. Ask them to keel-haul Feigl´s name through the lists on the previous day and the next day.”
”Tobias. Contact all car rental companies you can find. Check the registration office if he has a car regged.”
”And let's go!”
Somewhat friendlier he asked Max about running another track of his electronic footprints. Credit Cards. Phone. IP numbers if he had access.
He also asked him to call the House to see if any of the descriptions on the fake guards of the City Hall Offices matched Karl Feigl, or on the length of the two persons who were on the video feed from the theft.
He himself called Nora Smith to hear how it went with the wanted warrant. If she had heard from any police department from any other European country.
The warrant was issued and she had not. He didn´t think so.
After Nora, he called a uniform on Krugerstrasse. Asked if they had found some maps, itineraries, small notes, anything that could give a clue as to where he was going.
*
Ludwig leaned his head against the window. It was cold. The train jumped up and down. The head banged against the glass. The tension released and he felt tired.
Stockholm´s cold yoke rested on his shoulders. The theft of the Sapphire Box laid stone to burden but despite that, he tried to breathe, to convince himself that he couldn´t do anything about it. He was able to relax finally. He reminded himself that the police were after Karl Feigl and that Sweden was even further away.
In the borderland between waking and sleep, he heard Bo Kasper´s One & Zero. A humming Bo Kasper. A twenty-second clip that was played over and over again. He thought it sounded like a broken vinyl record in a 50´s-lounge with string shelves and teak furniture, he recognized the whole scene. And in a way I'm glad for that.
Behind his eyelids photographs flashed of the park the White Mountains in Stockholm, Antigone at the Oberon Theatre, the Sofia Church, the Culture houses and Hasse and Tage2.
All images were of Ella. She smiled. They held hands as they walked down a street on Södermalm.
Her blond hair was in crooked bangs.
The clear blue eyes looked up.
The images fluttered between consciousness and dream, like a camera lens that was set at the surface in a rippling pool. The pictures took hold, settled, joined together in a movie.
Almost every Saturday, in the winter anyway, they went for a walk on Södermalm. This Saturday was no different. The cold day in late January.
They put on their respective fur hat. Ludwig had his old grand-father´s. It was a brown, big thing from Siberia. Ella had a white, newly purchased from Lindex. They walked out of the apartment on Östgötagatan 32 and entered Åsögatan.
There was snow on the street corners, shuffled up by tractors. They went up to the White Mountains. They walked around the park and back, and then check out the shanties at Ersta and Ploggatan.
When they came home they always cooked tomato sauce. Also this Saturday. It got dark early. They lit candles. The fur caps were in a red chair from IKEA. The laptop's fan hummed in the kitchen. Ella turned on the radio. They wanted the radio. No moving pictures. Nothing distracting. Just candles and speech. Silence and tomato sauce.
They spread a blanket on the floor. They had a picnic on Södermalm, in the middle of winter. The radio show The Philosophical room on P1 started. Bo Kasper´s Orchestra flowed into the room. They listened with half an ear, sat with their hands to their chins and mimicked the philosophers. Ludwig said with a mimicked grandfatherly voice.
”Yes, I would agree with Alfred North Whitehead, as he summarily said, that all philosophy is merely a series of footnotes to Plato's works ...”
Just for the evening Ludwig wanted to go out. He was tired, unwilling to socialize with any other than Ella. Actually, he was tired of some of Ella's friends, who he thought was annoying. Petter, Ida and Moa who read some obscure humanist course at the university. They were all too often in long cardigans, slurped their tea in a second or third hand rented apartment on Södermalm. Discussed, rather agreed with each other, about the Iraq war and George W. Bush. Quoted, Noam Chomsky, John Pilger, Robert Fisk. Once they left home they were at screenings of the Palestine group or saw bands play at Debaser at Slussen. All were vegans. Stud skinny and queer.
Ella was like them in their opinions, but she was different, thought at least Ludwig. He didn´t think it was only that it was her he loved. There was something else behind it. A sense of tolerance.
The ability to understand that behind that facade of politics was always a human being. Love, hate, dishwasher, singstar, art and drinking songs. She had never endorsed the left´s struggle device of the exclusion of the upper class. That aggressive, that hateful run against other people that seemed to say ”Fire up those bastards, put them in the pillory, spit on them.” It was not Ella, that she was also picked on a bit for but she didn´t take much of it to heart.
Ella agreed to not go to the pub, and suggested that they go to the Cinematheque. It was Kubrick theme. Dr. Strangelove shoed at nine o´clock.
They laid intertwined on the couch for a few hours and listened to the radio. Ella jumped into the shower. When she was finished, they pulled off to the subway.
Ella poked Ludwig in his hair and smiled at a fellow passenger. It was a blind guy with a dog. She said.
”What a beautiful dog. What's his name?”
They talked for a little while. The blind man smiled at Ella when he got off at the Old Town station.
After a while they discovered something you rarely saw in the subway. In the corner near the door a woman sat crying. She tried to hide it by holding a napkin in front of her face but it was easy to hear her sobbing.
Sometimes it was someone who smiled on the subway, for the most part all sat and looked straight ahead and seemed to wonder if it would be like this the rest of their lives. On weekends, everyone was mostly drunk around midnight onwards. Now and then you could bump into someone who laughed. But you almost never saw anyone crying.
Ella took up a promotional poster that littered the floor. She pointed low on the crying woman who tried to hide her sobs in her hand. A tear ran down her knuckles.
”Ludde3, I have a theory. Do you want to hear?” She said cheerfully.
Ludwig nodded. Ella often had theories. They were more or less elaborate but always charming.
She showed off a poster from a company that sold microloans with sky-high interest rates. She whispered.
”Ok, this is how it goes. That girl crying in the corner over there. If we say that she has lost someone, like her husband in a plane crash, so now she will repay the love for him in the form of grief. As with interest on that borrowed money. You really have fun with them, they last until the end ... and the more money you have borrowed, the more you loved, you have to pay back.”
”Huh, Ella, what are you talking about?”
”Yes, but listen.”
She turned to Ludwig. Staring into his eyes and smiled. She said nothing for a few seconds. Ludwig saw how her eyes teared up.
”What is it, Ella?”
He stroked her cheek and laughed affectionately at her.
”I love you so fucking much, Ludde, that sometimes I get so stressed out that there is so much love laying around in our home because it doesn´t get to be used. And if you would die, Ludde, and that you will not do, my love, my joy love, will turn into mourning and because I loved you so much, invested so much, I would probably have to repay with my life. Others who love less mourn a few months, but the rest of us who loved much more get broken heart and die, you know?”
”Wait a minute, you mean that love is something you borrow?”
Ella did one of her mind grimaces. Said.
”In a way, It´s a loan in the sense that if you genuinely love what you borrow and lose it you have to pay but if you love but then get tired of it, you do not pay anything.”
”Sounds like a bad busin
ess idea ...”
”But you´re not”, said Ella and kissed Ludwig tenderly.
Then she laughed.
”Shit, what sleazy come back.”
She aaauuumed and spoke with a deep, sensual voice.
”But you´re not ... come here ...!”
They walked out of the subway at Karlaplan and walked down the snowy roads to Filmhuset where it lay desolate in the January evening. The lone cashier looked uninspired behind the counter at the Film House. They solved the ticket to Dr. Strangelove and sat down in the orange seats.
They looked at the people. It was always the same audience. A little further away, there was she who always had a Salomon bag, and the fifties girl, born in 1988, and the old man who always laughed in the wrong place.
They went inside. Said thank you to the ticket tearer. Sat on top of the saloon Victor under the projector where they used to sit. The classic dim gong sounded as usual before the film started. Ella leaned over to Ludwig and smiled. She kissed him on the cheek and whispered in his ear, the one thing she always said before a movie:
”Magic is about to happen.”
Ludwig woke up with a jerk. He tried to forget what he had dreamed. The computer was in standby mode, he started it but it was bad batteries. It died after a few minutes.
He drummed his fingers on the table, did not dare to take up the Four-Leaf Clover. He didn´t have the energy to read anything. The White Mountains, Dr. Strangelove and the tomato sauce pressed on.
To break with the past, he focused all his energy on thinking about that original truth August talked about.
”August, wake up.”
Ludwig struck him across his legs to get his attention.
”What is it?” wondered one drowsy August.
”How is it that it has been so difficult to find out what the original truth is from the old country and Thoth?”
The salon Victor on Filmhuset faded. The black leather armchairs grizzled.
”Ludwig”, August sat up, not without trouble. ”There's no manual on this handicraft. We're talking about one original truth, one over all others.”
”What do you mean, an original truth. About what, exactly?”
”The secret of the Creation”, said August and yawned. He shook his head to wake up, looked out the window and tried to understand where they were. He continued.
”But of course it is hard to explain because no one knows it. However, I can say a lot about the things surrounding the original truth that proofs that Thoth´s book and the Theatre exists and why the book contains the original truth. As you have seen in Victoria's chambers.”
*
Luca called Matteo who was still in Vienna, together with Marco and Juan.
”How's it going?” asked Matteo.
It crackled in the handset. Luca dropped his coverage. Seconds later he was back. Matteo could hear that he was on a train. The wheels hit the tracks. It creaked occasionally.
”It´s going well. I have them here.”
”Do you know if they have the Four-Leaf Clover?”
”No, I have not had the opportunity to verify that just yet.”
Matteo was silent. Luca was waiting for a response.
”Luca. Be very, very careful. First, Juan could be wrong. Secondly. It is not at all certain that they have the Four-Leaf Clover with them. They might as well have given it to someone if they have control over it at all. We do not want to scare them so they do something stupid or become aware that we are watching them. It may be more people involved than the old and the young. Got it?”
”Yes, Matteo.”
”Good. See if there is any way to access their bags or anything else that they may be carrying the Sapphire Box in. I will prepare for departure from here.”
Luca hung up. Put down the phone. Took up a newspaper. Straighted his clothes. He turned and went towards the first-class train compartments.
[ Chapter 34 is missing ]
35
Rome
Year 1599
Michele did eventually give up the day he searched for Pasquino. But his search was far from over. He was, however, becoming more and more afraid of bumping into Sciarra and what would happen if he did.
Dusk was falling and the streets were in the dark, Michele stayed away. He crouched at the entrance to the poor man’s house at the Palatine. He glanced at the few people who were in movement.
A man drove a cart with fish remains from the Coliseum down towards the Tiber, lanterns inside the houses shone through the slats of the shutters that threw small streaks of light down on the piazza in front of the poorhouse.
None of Sciarras men were nearby. Michele went inside.
On his gurney was a dispatch from his father. The family that he shared the room with sat and shared a piece of bread and a small bowl of flax seed. His mother sat with a mortar and crushed flaxseed and poured crumbs in the hands of children. The ribs sticking out of their stomachs. The youngest boy threw his hand with flaxseed in the eyes of his older brother who pinched him when the parents weren´t looking. He received a resounding slap in the face of the mother, the father threw the other one in the corner next to the bed.
Michele lit a candle and held the letter up to the light.
His father asserted that he felt fine. The neighborhood boy cooked a rich cabbage soup and the porridge was thick and delicious for breakfast. He felt stronger every day. He shouldn´t be worried about his old father. Michele had written a few lines about the Theatre to Fermo which the father responded to. His tone changed when he asked Michele to abandon such nonsense.
My boy, do not listen to such nonsense. It's only consolation for the bad times, a story and nothing else, remember that. You are going to support yourself with your skills.
In the margin the neighbor boy had, as usual, posted what state his father were in. The neighbor boy had seen Lucia die of the plague. He announced now that the black wires had wrapped itself around all of Fermo´s fingers. He wrote that it looked like he had dipped the fingertips in tar. He was nearly as far along as Lucia was next to her last days.
Michele did not listen to his father's words about the Theatre, although he somewhere felt that perhaps he should. But Michele persuaded himself that his father was ill, with one foot in the grave and therefore did not know what he was talking about. He did not know what would be his salvation. He knew also knew nothing about Sciarra.
The youngest son took the last flaxseed and pressed into the face of his brother. His brother pushed him so that he almost flew through the room, light as he was, and fell against Michele's arm. Michele sent him back with a friendly pat on the back. He felt for his arm. He looked under the dressing. He was still bleeding after he was stung by Sciarra´s men.
He went out on the piazza and into the dark alleys. He went on the back roads up to Constantine's terms. In the darkness he slipped on horse manure and vegetables that lay on the streets in piles against the walls. He went to his barber Antonio who first placed the band over the wound.
It felt like he broke his back. The barber Antonio had put his thick arm across the chest of Michele. He was a heavy Calabrian with a peculiar accent. It was not always Michele understood him.
Michele sat in a chair. Antonio pulled him back and held back. A small pool of blood had collected on the floor.
The barbers were cheaper up at Constantine's terms, despite all the cardinals who visited the Lateran Palace and the newly built Quirinale Palace.
In the district numerous dogs ran around, despite the cardinals attempts to get rid of them. Antonio laughed at them. He left Michele and went to the fountain with a bucket. Scooped up water and put down to the dogs. Scratched them under the chin.
Antonio put a bandage over the wound which he said was not healing particularly well. Antonio rolled up Michele´s pants. In his hand he held a cup. He made an incision. Let the blood pump out to a measuring cup at his feet. Antonio squeezed gently on Michele. When they were finished, he asked Michele, who co
uld barely stand, dizzy from having lost a lot of blood.
”You, my friend, have you also seen him?”
”Who”, asked Michele tired. He sat down again.
”He. Who else. The Nolan.”
”How will I be able to see him. He sits in the citadel.”
Antonio gave up his grin and leaned forward.
”He walks here during the nights. The dogs, you know, outside. That's why they want them. Carpedinares. The dogs bark at the Nolan.”
”The dogs bark at the Nolan?”
”You understand. He has the power, he has taken in that Theatre. If you ask me. You should know. He, Bellafino, stupid man. Cannot compete with him.”
”What do you know about Thoth´s Brotherhood?” asked Michele gently.
The dogs barked outside, the water was over. Some cardinals walked past. They wrapped his cloak over his mouth. Antonio whispered.
”My friend, I do not know much. You should not talk about it. Bellafino kill you.”
”I'm not afraid of him.”
Antonio raised a finger.
”But he is not afraid of you either, my friend.”
Antonio crouched down in front of Michele's chair. Kept him on the kneecaps.
”Look at the obelisks. The rumor here, cardinals talking. You know, the ones that are here with me. They say. Pope Sixtus raised the obelisks because he thought they showed the path to the Theatre. They thought they knew, the obelisks were from the old country. That's what it says here.”
”Antonio”, Michele leaned forward as if to tell you a big secret. ”Are you familiar with something called Pasquino?”
Antonio chuckled.
”Oh no, my lord. Not then.”
Michele saw that he knew something.
”Antonio, please. It is life or death.”
”It always is, my friend.”
Michele used his last strength to pull him hard in the arm.
”Antonio, I beg you.”
The great Calabrian had a heart as big as his body. He could not resist Michele's wishes.