The Bible of Clay Read Free

by never laughing and rarely smiling. But she'd never left them in the lurch: She paid judiciously, made certain they all had health insurance, and respected their personal lives. No one could accuse her of being authoritarian or of having even once raised her voice. She inspired respect, and just a touch of fear.
    Dressed in a tailored beige suit and a string of pearls, Mercedes was striding swiftly through the corridors of the Fiumicino Airport in Rome. A voice came over the loudspeaker system announcing the arrival of the flight from Vienna that Bruno was coming in on. They would take a taxi to Carlo's house together. Hans should have already arrived, an hour earlier.
    Mercedes and Bruno embraced. It had been more than a year since they'd seen each other, although they spoke often on the phone and e-mailed regularly.
    "How are your children?" Mercedes asked.
    "Sara just became a grandmother, imagine! My granddaughter had a little boy"
    "Which means you're a great-grandfather. Not bad for an old relic like you. What about your son, David?"
    "A confirmed bachelor—unmarried, like you." "And your wife?"
    "Unmanageable. She didn't want me to come to Rome. She'd rather I'd forget my past. You know, she's afraid, I think, terribly afraid, though she can't admit it, even to herself."
    Mercedes nodded. She couldn't blame Deborah for her fears or for wanting to hold on to her husband. She had great affection for Bruno's wife: She was a good woman, easy to get along with, quiet, always ready to help others. But Deborah didn't feel the same way about Mercedes. She couldn't hide the fear "the Catalonian," as she called Mercedes, inspired in her.
    Mercedes, actually, was not Catalonian, but French. Her father was a Spanish anarchist who had fled Barcelona just as the Spanish Civil War broke out. In France, he, like so many other Spaniards, joined the Resistance when the Nazis entered Paris. There in the underground, he met Mercedes' mother, a young Frenchwoman who acted as a courier. They fell in love; their daughter was born at the worst time, in the worst place.
    Bruno Miiller had just turned seventy. His hair was as white as snow, and his eyes as blue as the sky. He limped, aided by a silver-headed cane. He'd been born in Vienna. He was a musician, an extraordinary pianist, as his father had also been. His was a family that lived for music and earned their livings by it. When he closed his eyes, he could see his mother smiling as he performed four-handed pieces with his older sister. His son, David, too, had dedicated his body and soul to music; his world was the violin, that delicate Guarini that was always almost literally within his reach. Bruno had retired from concert touring three years ago; until then, he had been considered one of the greatest pianists in the world.
    Hans Hausser had arrived at Carlo Cipriani's house half an hour earlier. At seventy-two, Professor Hausser was still impressively tall, over six foot three, and his extreme thinness made him look fragile, though he was anything but. Over the last forty years he had been teaching physics at the University of Bonn, theorizing on the mysteries of matter, peering into the secrets of the universe. Like Carlo, he was a widower, and he allowed himself to be cared for by his only daughter, Berta.
    The two friends were enjoying a cup of coffee when the housekeeper showed Mercedes and Bruno into the doctor's study. They wasted no time on formalities. They had met to kill a man.
    "Well, I'll explain where we are," Carlo began. "This morning I came across the name Tannenberg in the newspaper. After speaking with you all, I called Security Investigations. As you all know, I've hired them in the past to try to track down Tannenberg—to no avail, of course, beyond strong indications that he was involved in high-level archaeological transactions from time to time, but at a shadowy remove. At any rate, the president, a patient of mine named Luca Marini, called me a few hours