Eric Lustbader - The Testament

Bravo nodded. "I won't be long."

The banker led him across the marble floor, up a staircase into a small hushed anteroom. Beyond was the massive open door to the safety deposit boxes. Of course, the vaults of Venetian banks would be upstairs, rather than downstairs, to protect against the periodic floods.

The banker left him in a small chamber-one of six that lined the left-hand side of the anteroom-and some moments later returned with a long gray metal box, which he put on the table in front of Bravo.

"I will be just outside, signore," he said. "You need only to call me when you are finished." He left without a backward glance.

Bravo sat staring at the box for a moment. In his mind's eye he saw his father seated where he himself now sat, the open box before him, filling it in his mathematically precise fashion. Bravo reached out, put his arms around the box, as if he could feel the last traces of his father. Then, with a convulsive gesture, he threw open the lid.

Jenny stood in the shadows beneath the bank's arcade, peering out at the glare. She leaned nonchalantly against one of the arches and made a good show of looking bored as she sipped a small cup of blood-orange juice she had purchased from a cart just opposite. She savored the sweet-tart taste but nothing else. As her eyes worked the people criss-crossing the campo, she felt a kind of depression weighing on her, as well as a dull headache, as if Dex's ghost were sitting on her head.

The deeper she got into this assignment, the worse she felt. She asked herself again why she had taken it, but the answer was as obvious as it was deflating: Dex had asked her to take it, and she never refused him anything. Hadn't he proved that he knew what was best for her? That had included, she'd assumed, this assignment guarding his son, but assumptions never took into consideration the curve balls reality threw at you. And Braverman Shaw had turned out to be one helluva curve ball. I can't let it go on like this. When am I going to tell him the truth? she asked herself. You have to let it go on like this, she answered herself. The moment you tell him, everything will blow up in your face and you'll have lost him.

"Have you spotted Berio?"

Jenny whirled, startled. "Um, no, but that doesn't mean he isn't here somewhere, spying on us."

"He only wants to protect us."

They began to walk toward the Dorsoduro, leaving the knots of people behind. Their footsteps echoed off the walls and narrow cobblestone streets, whose colors were made illusory by the reflections from the canals.

"What was in the account?" Jenny asked.

"One hundred thousand dollars," Bravo said.

She gave a low whistle. "Wow."

"And this." After a quick check of the immediate environment, he pulled out the SIG Sauer P220. "It's fully loaded with .38s ammo."

Her eyes opened wide. "Damn, that semiautomatic could win a war."

"I guess that's what my father had in mind," he said, pocketing the weapon.

"Do you know how to use that? Maybe you ought to give the gun to me."

"I can shoot an apple off your head at a hundred paces." He laughed. "Don't worry, my father made sure I had plenty of practice with handguns."

For a city that prided itself in architectural marvels, the Church of l'Angelo Nicolo` was remarkably plain. Founded in the sixth century by a group of displaced Genoese, it reflected to this day their essential poverty. Apart from a much needed renovation in the fourteenth century, including what became its signature triple-bay gemel window and the installation of a beautiful portico in the fifteenth century, it remained essentially as it had at its founding.

"Stuck away in this backwater sestiere, it was so far out of the mainstream of Venice's religious life that it had been systematically denied donations from wealthy parishioners and patrons," Bravo said. "Instead, L'Angelo Nicolo` became the de facto sanctuary for the pinzocchere-religious zealots-who sought to do penance within its walls."

"How did it survive?" Jenny asked.

"Good question. One answer is Santa Marina Maggiore, the nunnery built just behind. Apparently, it was money from the nuns that paid for the renovation."

"That must have cost a fortune," Jenny said. "I'd love to ask the nuns how they managed such an amazing feat."

The interior was cool and gray and beautiful, the Tiepolo painting of San Nicolo` awe-inspiring. They stood beneath the central apse surmounted by a Byzantine cornice from the seventh century. At this hour, they were virtually the only people in the church, but now and again they could hear small echoes of hushed voices like the lapping of canal water, a door opening or closing, shoe soles padding along the stone flagging.

Bravo saw a small figure coming through the apse, a priest, who he stopped.

"Excuse me, father, does this coin have any significance for you?"

The priest was an ancient man with a deeply creased face, his skin burnished by the elements to the texture of fine leather. His long white hair and beard were in need of barbering-in fact, he looked more like a mendicant for whom the area was named than a member of the Church. Despite his extreme age, his blue eyes-as electric as Bravo's own-were so clear and penetrating that they seemed to pierce straight through to Bravo's core. After a long, contemplative look, the priest smiled and took the coin. His fingers, too, belied his years, for they were as straight as those of any man one third his age-in fact, save for the skin of his face, he exhibited none of the telltale signs of time's ravages.

The unknown priest gave the front of the coin only a cursory glance, then his fingers, still as deft as a conjuror's, flipped it onto its reverse. He nodded to himself, then looked up, his eyes, bright with secret knowledge, might have contained a touch of humor or satisfaction.

"Wait here, please, signore," he said, bobbing his head.

He went off with the coin and soon disappeared behind a column. Silence, and the dust floating down from on high. Light splayed across the floor, colored by the marble, conjuring up the bouquets of flowers in the Erberia. Three nuns, hands lost within their black robes, passed slowly in procession, walking in perfect unison, as if to a tempo God had provided for them.

"Do you think that was wise?" Jenny said. "Giving him the coin."

"To be honest, I don't know," Bravo told her. "But it's done now."

Two priests, one taller and slender, the other shorter and stout as a wine cask, appeared, walking down the north transept toward them, their faces bent, shrouded in shadow, deep in discussion.

"I'm going after him." Jenny made a sudden move, which startled the priests, for they paused, whispering to each other. By this time, Bravo had stopped her. The priests resumed their stroll, but in a different direction now, away from them.

"Listen, Bravo-"

He made a curt gesture, silencing her. "When it comes to protecting me, you call the shots, otherwise this is my show, got it?"

She bridled, her faced flushed with anger. He could see that she was uncomfortable ceding control to him, and he realized that she still harbored questions about his instincts, his motivations and, even worse, his mental fortitude. No matter that they were intimate in bed, there was still a chasm of distrust between them, which caused him to wonder whether their physical relationship was anything more than a passing illusion. He had been so happy when he'd arrived in Venice last night-he'd been sure that he'd been nearing something he'd been longing for all his life, something so important and vital that at last he might be absolved of the guilt he had felt over Junior's death. And now he was possessed by the sudden sensation of looking down at himself from outside his body, as if he had entered a dream without knowing when or how. Nothing seemed certain anymore; thin ice was beneath his feet, and he felt on the verge of losing his balance and tearing through into the chill water beneath.