T. Bunn - Drummer in the Dark

Her knock was answered by a musical protest in Italian. Jackie opened the door and inquired, “Was that a hello or get lost?”

“Jackie, hello, please forgive me.” When Anna rose from the chair behind the desk, she grew shorter. “I thought it was the children. Some days. . Come in, please. No, no, va via! ” This to the children crowding in behind her. “Shut the door, quickly now. Good. Sit, sit. Will you have coffee?”

“No thanks.”

“Please take something. It will delight the children no end to have me assign them something to do.”

“All right.”

“A spremuta , perhaps? Orange juice?”

“Anything.”

“Excellent.” The children greeted her reappearance by jostling for position. There was an argument over who was to go, settled only by Anna handing lire to the middle one and shutting the door once more. “Forgive them. They are starved for more than food and a bath.” She returned to her desk. “Mr. Bryant has departed safely?”

“As far as I know.” Jackie waited until the small woman was seated to say, “We need to hire a detective.”

Anna inspected her for a somber moment. “This request. It has to do with your visit here in Rome?”

“Yes.”

“Then the enemy has tracked you here?”

“Wynn thinks so.”

Anna cocked her head to one side. “Do I wish to know more, Ms. Havilland?”

“Probably not.”

“ Bene .” Anna rose from the chair and gave what was perhaps her first false smile. “Please wait here.”

The children returned soon after Anna’s departure, proudly bearing a tray with a frothy glass. Jackie sipped the juice and enjoyed their company. The room suited them perfectly, unadorned save for the cross behind the desk and the furniture worn to bare bones. Once the children accepted that she neither understood them nor would give them money, they made a game of one-way conversation. Jackie responded with smiles, delighting in their dark-eyed frivolity.

When Anna returned, she let the children remain clustered about Jackie, as though seeking a witness, however flimsy. “Sadly I cannot help.”

The flat turndown was unexpected. “Do you have any idea where I could go?”

“Perhaps one thought. Do you travel with a computer?”

“Yes.”

“You know our website?”

Jackie thought of the blank screen and the unanswered message. “I’m not sure.”

“Not the official Sant’Egidio address. I mean the other.” Anna waited, examining her closely.

“Trastevere?”

“Ah. Excellent.” This time the smile was very real. “That was the gift of one of our young members. An American like yourself. The work was done by a friend of hers. But that is unimportant now.”

“I’m not sure I understand.”

“Oh yes, of course, the single word can be most confusing. The one choice, to go or not.” Anna raised Jackie with a gesture, and led her toward the door. “Make your request again there. Our friends can hear and remain hidden. Most important.”

“Why is that?”

The long stone hallway turned Anna’s words into a litany, the children into a cluster of filthy acolytes at her heels. “This other young woman worked in your Library of Congress. She was a dear friend. She loved life, Ms. Havilland. She loved God. And now she is gone.”

The final word drifted up and away as they reentered the church. Jackie recalled an earlier conversation and wondered where Nabil was at that moment. “She was killed!”

“The police claim she died by her own choice. Leaping from a building. During a protest she helped organize. Please, you will return tonight and tell me what you have discovered?”

“Yes, all right.”

“Where are you staying, may I ask?”

“The Hassler.”

“A lovely hotel.” Anna offered a parting smile. “Go with God, Ms. Havilland. And take great care.”

By the time Jackie returned to her hotel and e-mailed her request, she was ready for lunch. She returned to the tiny coffee shop crammed between the intersection of two streets, across the cobblestone piazza from the Spanish Steps. The two old gentlemen seated by the doorway greeted her with the solemn nods of men who had learned the Italian etiquette of charm early and well. She felt the eyes of the young men tending bar even before she passed through the doorway, but in this time and place she did not mind. She ordered another spremuta and looked over the sandwiches arrayed in disciplined ranks beneath the glass. The older bar owner left his place by the cash register and shooed off the young man making famished eyes at her. He scooped up a spoonful of cream cheese and fresh herbs, spoke with the fluid arrogance of the native Roman, and gestured for her to smell. She did so, inhaling all the fragrances of a fresh-cut field. He grinned at her response, and pointed her to an outside table. Again the old men nodded and welcomed her with murmured flirtations. She sat and sipped her orange juice until the café owner appeared and set down the plate with an impossible flourish. The entire café watched as she tasted. Toasted black-olive ciabatta with fresh tomatoes, cream cheese, and prosciutto. Roman sun, a host of men watching her eat. All the world eager to see her smile. It was very hard not to be blinded by the day.

After lunch she returned to her room to check the electronic message board. She logged onto the Trastevere site, stared at the enigmatic command, then hit the key for Go . The screen instantly revealed the query, Incoming direct coded signal. Will you accept? Go/NoGo .

She studied the message as she would an alien life-form. There was no reference to anything she understood. But she hit the key for Go .

The message board dissolved, then filtered back again. This time there was the query, Payment?

She typed out, Who are you? Hit ’send’. The message slip folded itself into smoke and evanesced. The reply was swift in coming: You made a request for assistance in tracking an individual from Rome. I am a detective and a friend of a small lady known for strong prayers .

Jackie stared at the screen long enough to realize this was all the response she would ever receive. So when the incoming slip returned with the payment query repeated, she typed in Wynn’s credit card number and a query of her own, How can I know this is confidential?

All Trastevere messages are automatically anonymized.

“What choice do I have,” she asked the empty room. When will you have the requested info?

Soon.

This is urgent. How can I contact you?

But the screen remained blank.

Jackie decided it was necessary to call Esther, despite the hour in Washington. “I know it’s too early.”

“It’s fine. Really. I was just leaving for the hospital. Graham is coming home.”

“That’s wonderful news.”

“He spoke my name yesterday.” She sounded close to singing. “What do you need?”

“I just wanted to pass on what’s happened.” She related the events, or at least some of them. She spoke only of the church and Wynn’s departure and Valerie’s arrival and Anna’s warning. Leaving out the images that floated about as she spoke. Saying nothing of their dinner, their talk, their leave-taking in the lobby. Or the way she had felt as Wynn left her room the night before, the sudden desire to walk down the hall, speak his name again, holding him as she did. The first time in over two years she had felt anything more than warning.

Esther must have heard the slight tremor that escaped, and understood. For her voice flattened when she said, “Wynn Bryant is a handsome, dangerous man.”

Jackie swallowed. It was so hard to speak up on behalf of any male. “I don’t think he’s the enemy, Esther.”