anyone looking for a nightcap other than grappa or brandy would be deeply disappointed.

Seated, Manicci put a small tape recorder on the table. "Where was the car when stolen?"

Lang pointed as though the walls were not there. "Right along this edge of the piazza."

The Italian frowned. "Parking is forbidden there."

"No doubt the thief was merely enforcing the law."

"How did you know the car had been stolen and not, dragged…"

"Towed?"

"Towed. How do you know the car was not towed rather than stolen?"

Lang looked at him blankly. "When is the last time you saw a car towed in this city for parking in a no-parking space?"

The inspector made a noise that had equal chances of being a laugh, cough or clearing his throat. He leaned forward, studying Lang's face. "It was found on the Aventine shot full of holes. Do you have an idea who would do this?"

Lang hoped he was successful in demonstrating surprise. "Perhaps someone frustrated when he couldn't get the car started?"

"You make the joke, Mr. Reilly. My investigation is serious."

Lang leaned back, hoping the shadows helped obscure his face. "I apologize. I have no idea who would shoot that car."

Uncertain of the sincerity of the admission of fault, the inspector continued. "You are in Rome on business?"

"I come almost every year to enjoy the museums, the churches, the architecture. One cannot live long enough to see it all."

"And how much longer will you remain?"

"Several more days at least. But I doubt I'll rent a car."

"And you have no guess as to who would shoot the car?"

"None. Perhaps the thief had enemies." "Why did you rent the car, Mr. Reilly? Is not Rome's bus and metro good enough?"

"I had hoped to drive out to Hadrian's villa. I understand it is both interesting and beautiful."

Lang was certain the man was more interested in studying his face than asking fruitless questions.

He stood. "Inspector, I know nothing of what happened on the Aventine. I do know I have a lunch date with a business associate. I'd prefer not to keep him waiting."

Manicci stood also, stuffing the recorder in his pocket, an admission the interview was unproductive. "Very well then. I may wish to contact you again."

"I'll be right here."

Jacob and Lang watched the policeman's departure through the hotel's glass door.

"From what I heard from the lobby, the copper didn't learn a thing," Jacob observed.

Lang was still looking out into the piazza. "After the first few minutes, it wasn't information he was after."

"Oh?"

"Remember, I told you about the gunfire in the priest's apartment building, the one where I gave last rites in the priest's cassock before disappearing?"

"So?"

"That cop, Manicci, was one of the investigating officers."

"You're sure he saw you there?"

"Your people took the same course in face recognition we did, hours of looking at different photos, different views of the same person. Yep, that's him. He kept trying to get a better look at my face. Sooner or later, he'll place me."

Jacob stuck his pipe in his mouth. "Bloody hell! I'd say it's jolly well time to bid farewell to this place before he comes back. As our Froggie friends would say, tout de suite."

VIII.

Piazza Venezia

Minutes Later

Inspector Antonio Manicci was oblivious to the huge Monument Victor Emmanuel that filled the unmarked Fiat's windshield. Referred to by irreverent Romans as the Typewriter or the Wedding Cake because of its tiered structure and mass of white Brescian marble, it was completed in 1911 in honor of Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy, the first king of a unified Italy. Also commemorated were architectural bad taste, self-importance and insensitivity to the ocher tones of surrounding buildings.

Instead of the universal loathing of the thing, Manicci's mind was occupied with the man he had just interrogated. He had seen Reilly before. He was sure. Remembering faces went with his job.

But where?

He swung left, south, onto the Via del Teatro di Marcello. Michelangelo's steep staircase, the Cordonata, stretched up to his Piazza del Campidogli at the top of the Capitoline Hill. Tour buses blocked the first of the northbound lanes and Roman motorists, ever impatient, were honking their disapproval.

Where would he have met the American?

The wooded flanks of the hill were on his left now but he didn't notice. Instead, his eyes fixed on three priests walking along the sidewalk.

Priests!

That Greek priest whose apartment had been the scene of some sort of gun battle, a Wild West shoot-out like something in the American Western films.

Another priest, one who had murmured last rites over the dead man on the stairs and then disappeared.

The realization was as violent as an electrical shock, so disconcerting he had to jam on the Fiat's brakes at the last moment to avoid running over a young woman on a Vespa. A young woman whose small dog had been riding at her feet. The animal turned to snarl his anger at the inspector, an expression that closely matched that on his mistress's face.

That priest had been the American, Langford Reilly. He was certain of it.

He fought the temptation to attempt a U-turn, aware such a move would likely be fatal even with his siren and lights hidden in the grille turned on. Instead, he pulled his cell phone from its holder on his belt and scrolled down before punching in a number. He ignored the chorus of horns behind him.

He identified himself, then, "I want you to check the immigration records for the last three months for Langford Reilly, an American. He should have entered the country recently, but more important, I want the date he entered before. Entry and exit."

He listened for a moment of protest.

"I don't care if the office is closed until 1600; the computer records aren't!"

He pushed the disconnect button among a cavalcade of more excuses.

If he were right, if Lang Reilly had been in the country when the shooting took place-and the Greek priest subsequently found dead-the American would have a lot more questions to answer.

IX.

Via Campania

An Hour Later

The safe house Jacob had managed to scrounge from his former colleagues on short notice was no more than a third-floor suite of three rooms, a bath and a tiny kitchen. Were it not for the tedious sameness shared by safe houses, Lang could have sworn this was the apartment he had shared with Jacob and Gurt for a few days during the Pegasus affair. Through a pair of grime-streaked windows, he could see just over the top of the ancient city wall, where a strip of green denoted the park of the Villa Borghese, the only thing remotely cheerful in sight.

Two chairs and a sofa that Goodwill would have rejected were placed against walls bare of any decoration other than cracks in the plaster. A wooden table, its surface scarred by cigarette burns, stood forlornly between the main room and a two-burner stove, sink and small refrigerator that seemed to be gasping its last breaths.

Lang was thankful they would be there only a few hours. Jacob seemed to be taking contentment from his pipe, which he had smoked continually since their arrival.

The place was not only dismal, now it stunk.

Jacob looked at his watch. "Suppose the inspector has made the connection by now?"

Lang tossed down a two-month-old copy of Der Spiegel." I wouldn't have wanted to hang around the hotel and find out."

Jacob gently puffed a smoke ring. It shimmered across the floor before dissolving against a table leg. "Too bad we can't be at the airport. If he's noodled out who you are, the place will be rife with coppers. Bright idea, that: making reservations on the next flight back to Atlanta."