“Ercole, maps of Roman water supplies?”
This document was readily available in the historical archives.
Ercole handed the printout to Daniela. He pointed to the document and said, “Here I have ten Roman water-holding chambers in the areas we have marked. They are like large wells or silos, round. These were connected to aqueducts coming into the city from the north and west. Some of them are large municipal reservoirs, twenty by twenty meters, and some are those serving smaller areas or individual homes, much smaller. When the supply of water became more modern, and pumping stations were created, many of these reservoirs were converted to warehouses and storerooms. Doors and windows were carved into the walls.”
Daniela marked them.
Rhyme: “I want to see the video again.”
The image came onto the screen once more. “Look at the wall, the stone. Is it a water reservoir?”
“It might be.” Ercole shrugged. “Carved stone. Stained with what might be water marks. And if converted, it could have had a doorway cut for access. There, that shadow suggests there is a doorway.”
Sachs said, “We’ve narrowed it to nine or ten locations. Can we do a search of them all? Get a hundred officers?”
Rossi seemed uncomfortable. “We do not have the resources I would like.” He explained that there’d just been reports of potential terror attacks in Italy and other parts of Europe recently and many officers had been pulled off non-terror crimes.
Rhyme had the video played once more: the stone, the noose, the unconscious victim, his chest rising slowly, the trickle of dust, the— “Ah. Look at that.” His voice was a whisper. But everyone in the room turned to him immediately. He grimaced. “I saw it before but didn’t think a damn thing of it.”
“What, Rhyme?”
“The dust and pebbles, falling from the wall.”
Sachs and Ercole spoke simultaneously. She: “Subway!” He: “Rete Metropolitana!”
“A train’s shaking the walls. Ercole, quick, what lines run through the areas we’ve marked?”
He called up a subway system schematic on the laptop. Looking it over, Daniela drew the transit lines on their working map.
“There!” Rossi called. “That water reservoir, the small one.”
It was a room about twenty by twenty feet, at the end of an aqueduct. It was accessed by a passageway that ran to a street by a square on Viale Margherita.
Giacomo added, “I know that area. That reservoir would be in the basement of an old building, now abandoned. Prostitutes could have used the passages years ago, yes.”
“Abandoned,” Rhyme said. “So the doors might be sealed with the lock and chain the Composer cut through; that’s the rust and the slices of metal.”
“I’ll call the SCO,” Rossi said.
Daniela offered: “Servizio Centrale Operativo. Our SWAT force.”
Rossi spoke for several minutes, giving firm orders then hung up. “The central office is assembling a team.”
Sachs met Rhyme’s eyes. He nodded.
She asked, “How far away is that?” She stabbed the map, the entrance around which Daniela had drawn a red circle.
“No more than a few kilometers from us.”
“I’m going,” Sachs announced.
After a brief hesitation Rossi said, “Yes, certainly.” He looked to Giacomo and Daniela, and the three had a brief conversation in Italian.
Rossi translated, “Their vehicle is with other officers. Ercole, you drive Detective Sachs.”
“Me?”
“You.”
As they started for the door, Rhyme said, “Give her a weapon.”
“What?” Rossi asked.
“I don’t want her in the field without a weapon.”
“That’s irregular.”
We are not people who are well with irregularness…
“She’s an NYPD detective and a competitive shooter.”
Rossi considered the request. Then he said, “I am not aware of the agreement we have with the United States but I authorized gendarmes in pursuit of a criminal from France to enter Campania armed. I will do the same now.” He vanished and returned a few minutes later with a plastic pistol container. He jotted the number from the case onto a form and opened it. “This is a—”
“Beretta ninety-six,” she said. “The A-one. Forty caliber.” She took it and pointed it downward, moving the slide slightly to verify it was empty. She took two black magazines and the box of ammunition that Rossi had also brought.
“Sign here. And where it says ‘Rank,’ and ‘Affiliation’—those words there—write something illegible. But please, Detective Sachs, do not shoot anyone if you can avoid it.”
“I’ll do my best.”
She scrawled where he’d indicated, slipped in a mag and worked the slide to chamber a round. Then, making sure it was on safe, she tucked the weapon into her back waistband. She hurried to the door.
Ercole looked from Daniela to Rossi. “Should I—?”
Rhyme said, “Go! You should go.”
Chapter 18
That’s it?” Amelia Sachs asked as they ran from the Questura. “That’s your car?”
“Yes, yes.” Ercole was beside a small, boxy vehicle called a Mégane, soft blue, dusty and dinged. He began to walk to her side and open the door for her.
“I’m fine.” She waved him off. “Let’s go.”
The young officer climbed into the driver’s seat and she dropped into the passenger’s.
“It’s not much, I’m sorry to say.” He gave a rueful smile. “The Flying Squad actually had two Lamborghinis. One was in an accident a few years ago so I’m not sure if they still have both of them. It’s a marked police car. What a—”
“We should move.”
“Of course.”
He started the engine. He put the shifter in first, signaled to the left and looked over his shoulder, waiting for a gap in traffic.
Sachs said, “I’ll drive.”
“What?”
She slipped the shifter into neutral and yanked up on the brake, then leapt out.
Ercole said, “I should ask, do you have a license? There are probably forms to be filled out. I suppose—”
Then she was at the left-hand door, pulling it open. He climbed out. She said, “You can navigate.” Ercole scurried around the car and dropped into the other seat and she settled into the right, not needing to adjust the seat’s position; he was taller and it was as far back as it might go.
She glanced at him. “Seat belt.”
“Oh. Here, no one cares.” A chuckle. “And they never give you a ticket.”
“Put it on.”
“All right. I will—”
Just as it clicked, she slammed the gears into first, fed the engine a slug of gas and popped the clutch, darting into a minuscule gap in traffic. One car swerved and another braked. Both honked. She didn’t bother to look back.
“Mamma mia,” Ercole whispered.
“Where do I go?”
“Straight on this road for a kilometer.”
“Where’re your lights?”
“There.” He pointed to a switch. The headlights.