Midnight Angels (3 page)

“Professor, please,” Stephen pleaded. “I don’t think I’ll be able to remember everything I wrote.”

“You won’t need to,” Professor Edwards said. “Just remember enough of it to convince me you were telling the truth, that somewhere on this campus or in this state there is a finished essay on Michelangelo with your name on it. I will accept the fact that papers can be lost or stolen. I will never accept being made to look like a fool. Have I made myself clear?”

“Very clear, sir,” Stephen said.

The boy turned slowly away, stopping in the middle row of the auditorium, and sat down, dejected.

Edwards walked over to a large bay window that looked toward the north, the upper part of his right shoulder braced against a wall, the warm sun reflecting off the dirt-speckled glass. He stared out at the tree-lined walkways, students lounging on the lawn or sitting on benches, iPods latched to their ears, textbooks open and spread across bended knees. Professor Edwards loved the serenity of campus life, a safe bubble from the risks of the world that lay beyond the brick-lined campus entrance. Here, life could be dissected and discussed without fear of reprisals, and answers to even the most complex questions could be found—at least within the context of a spirited discussion. An environment dedicated to breaking down the lessons of the past and applying them to the problems of the present. As an academic, he found solace in this tranquil setting. And if that were the whole of his life, then Richard Dylan Edwards would indeed be a man who had found peace on this earth.

BUT THE ACADEMIC WORLD
did not command the youthful professor’s full attention. Edwards’s true calling, which more often than not put him in danger’s scope, was chasing down lost and stolen works of art and returning them to their rightful owners. His academic work offered cover for those clandestine endeavors, affording him the luxury of traveling for
months at a time and allowing him to seek what many considered forever lost.

He came to his calling well-equipped to handle its challenges. Naturally athletic, he worked his body hard to stay in shape. He was skilled in the use of a variety of weapons, from modern to medieval, and had spent decades studying martial arts. Even so, he didn’t embark on his adventures alone, but was instead one of a number of scholars, academics, art restorers, historians, and treasure hunters belonging to a dedicated and secretive group. The Vittoria Society had been named in honor of Signora Vittoria Colonna, daughter of the grand constable of the Kingdom of Naples and the only woman known to have captured Michelangelo’s heart. The artist had been sixty-one in 1536, when he met the beautiful Vittoria, by then the widow of a marquis who had fallen in battle, and Michelangelo would spend the remainder of his days in her grip. He wrote her numerous sonnets, drew dozens of pictures capturing her in various stages of repose, and spent as much time in her company as his work would allow. And when Vittoria died, on February 25, 1547, at the Convent of San Silvestro in Rome, Michelangelo mourned her loss more than that of any other who crossed his path.

They were art hunters.

In the past five years alone, half a dozen members of the Vittoria Society, spread across the globe, had discovered three paintings by Caravaggio in the basement of a soon-to-be demolished Paris hotel; found a soiled folio believed to have been written by William Shakespeare in a rusty freezer in the foyer of an abandoned farmhouse in the Scottish highlands; bought a complete manuscript thought to be written by Sir Walter Scott at an illegal auction held long after closing hours in a fashionable London row house; and were scouring Hong Kong seeking a sword used in battle by Genghis Khan. Each of their discoveries had been delivered with discretion to its rightful owner as determined by the leaders of the Society.

Edwards had been brought into this secret world by Frank and Andrea Westcott.

They were academic legends, a studious and brilliant couple long considered the most renowned Michelangelo scholars in the world. They were also among the six founding members of the Vittoria Society and by far the most active and adventurous of the group.

Edwards had been a shy twelve-year-old, living in an Indianapolis orphanage, when he first met them, standing in the hallway of that prison-gray dormitory he had learned to call home. He did not question why they wanted to see him, and had not the slightest clue as to their identities. Still, he knew from that moment that he belonged in their company.

The Westcotts taught him their methods and were as demanding in their work and study as they were effusive in their affections. “We’re not out to change the world,” Frank once told him, outside the Sir John Soane’s Museum in London a week before Edwards would begin his college studies. “We’re just looking to bring balance to it. No one should ever gaze at a work of art for what it’s worth financially. You seek it out and allow it to tell you all it can about who you are as a person. Watch a man’s eyes the first time he looks up at the statue of David and you’ll know all there is to know about him in a matter of seconds. If you can’t be moved by a great work, if all you can do is break it down to its financial value, then what more is there to say about you?”

THE PROFESSOR WATCHED
a young woman walk across the well-kept lawn of the quad outside his second-floor classroom and his mind immediately conjured the image of Kate. She had been barely four years old when her parents died. He was in his mid-twenties then, unprepared for a family. But he owed his life and calling to Kate’s parents. In turn he had devoted years to the raising of their daughter.

He taught her as he himself had been taught.

Her parents had left him financially well-positioned to place Kate in the best educational environment he could find. But he realized early on that he would have to do more than simply enroll the quiet and studious child in a variety of classes to consider his job complete. He needed to provide her with a stable home and someone she could turn to and confide in during troubled days. And it had been important to him that her life not evolve into a series of mental and physical chores. He wanted her to cherish the moments they spent together and to pursue her studies and her physical regimen with a passion that matched that of her parents.

Edwards stepped back from the glare of the outside sun, turned and looked down the row of desks at Stephen. “Five more minutes,” he said, “and then we’ll get started.”

He walked back toward his lectern. He reached down for his brown leather briefcase and skimmed through its contents until he found the folded piece of paper he sought. He pulled it out, leaned against a corner wall and held the paper against his right leg. It was a letter he had written Kate earlier that morning, one that was still missing the ending he required and she had grown to expect—the clues to a riddle.

It was a game they had been playing now for nearly two decades. It grew out of Kate’s fondness for the TV show that featured her favorite childhood comic book hero, Batman. She was particularly taken by one of the villains he faced on a regular basis, the Riddler, and would devour any story where the two did battle. More often than not, the Riddler would attempt to snare his opponent through a series of “Riddle Me This” hints, many of which stumped Batman long enough for his nemesis to get away. Edwards noted how much Kate enjoyed that part of the story line, and soon enough a game of hints and clues built around most any subject they discussed became a signature part of their routine.

He recalled the last time the two had played the game, four months earlier as they walked through the airport terminal, two hours before her flight to Rome was to depart. “Remember,” she said, “you promised you would visit as often as you could.”

“And I will,” he said. “But remember this trip is your time now. You’ve read all the books, you’ve taken all the classes, you’re even teaching a few yourself. And you’ve excelled at all of it. But there’s still one piece missing. One very important and crucial piece.”

“What?” she asked.

Edwards looked over at her, realizing that behind the confident façade of the well-trained young woman still resided the frightened little girl whose parents had died years before she could get to know them, that he, and their shared devotion to the study of Michelangelo, was her only link to them. “Riddle me this,” he said to her.

“Oh, no,” Kate said, not bothering to hide the pleasure the game gave her, “not now. Not with something like this. I’ll
never
guess the answer. You know how terrible I am at this game.”

“I see some progress,” he said.

“Richard, we’ve been playing this since I was in preschool, am I right?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“And how many times have I guessed the correct answer?”

“That doesn’t mean you’re not good at it,” he said.

He loved her as much as a father would a daughter, but because of their closeness in age, their relationship was much like that of an older brother and younger sister.

“How many times?” she repeated.

“Not once,” he said with a shrug. “But I have a lot of faith in your abilities. I always have and I always will.”

Kate stared at him for a quiet moment and gently placed her hand on top of his. “I never thanked you for everything you’ve done for me,” she said. “You’re the only family I’ve ever known.”

“And you’re the only family I’ve ever needed,” he said, squeezing her hand. “Now, are you ready? And you don’t have to give me an answer now. Think about it on the flight over and during your first few weeks in Florence. I’ll include a new clue in each letter I write, and I don’t want you to get frustrated. This will be your most difficult one yet, but I think you’ll get it eventually.”

“Is there a prize at the end?” Kate asked with a wide smile.

“A grand prize,” Edwards said. “A prize for the ages.”

STEPHEN WALKED UP
the narrow aisle toward the professor. Edwards slid the folded paper into the side pocket of his jacket and gestured toward the lectern. “Has it all come flowing back to you?” he asked his student, watching him step in front of the lectern, his fingers gripping the side panels.

“Not exactly, sir,” Stephen said.

“You might surprise yourself,” Edwards said. He stood in the center of the classroom, hands in his pockets, and faced the student. “We always retain more than we think. The key is not to panic, but to allow the answer to come to the surface. Are you ready to begin, then?”

“I never seem to be quite ready, sir,” Stephen said.

“Few of us are,” Edwards said. “Despite that, we still find it in ourselves to move forward. Sometimes, that’s even more important.”

“Yes, sir,” Stephen said.

“Then let’s both move forward together,” Edwards said, taking two steps closer to the student. “Now riddle me this.”

CHAPTER
3

K
ATE AND MARCO WALKED ON THE STONE STEPS OF THE NARROW
sidewalk, the Arno running hard to their right, leather shops and dress boutiques lining the street to their left, racing traffic the only buffer. The day was leaning toward dusk and a gentle mist hung on the air. Lights from the Ponte Vecchio and the apartment buildings and businesses lining both sides of the river cast the city in a soft glow.

“You have been so lucky, Marco,” Kate said.

“In what way?”

“You’ve spent your life in this city,” she said. “I can’t imagine a more beautiful place in the world.”

“It’s even more beautiful when there aren’t men with guns chasing you down every street,” he said.

Kate glanced over at him, observing his dark hair flopping against the collar of his denim shirt, his round, handsome face doing little to hide the concern visible in his almond eyes. “I’m sorry I got you mixed up in this,” she said. “It wasn’t intentional, believe me.”

Marco shrugged his thin shoulders and shook his head slightly. “It’s not as if you forced me to go with you,” he said.

“Yes I did,” she said.

“What I meant is that you didn’t drag me with you at the point of a gun,” he said. “I went because I wanted to go. Not that you have a gun. I mean you don’t, right?”

Kate stopped, leaned against the gray stone wall and stared down at the Arno below. “The river is so much like this city,” she said, “don’t you
think? So dark and majestic, beautiful and powerful, and yet filled with so many secrets.”

“And don’t forget to add dangerous,” he said. “Not too long ago, the Arno almost brought Florence to ruin.”

“The flood?”

Marco nodded. “You can still see the watermarks in some of the buildings and the museums,” he said. “In some parts it reached the street-lamps. Can you imagine? The water came in strong. My father was my age when it happened, and a day never passed that he didn’t think about the damage that had been done. My mother never spoke about it—the memories were too disturbing to her—but Papa told me a few stories before he died, and all of them had sad endings. There was a point during that flood, maybe just a few hours, when many people here, including my family, felt the entire city would be washed away. Disappear as if it had never existed.”

“A lot like what Hurricane Katrina did to New Orleans,” Kate said.

“Yes,” Marco said, “except in one respect. No one here would dare to turn his back on Florence. No one would allow it to float away, not the government and most especially not the people of this city. Those might have been our darkest days and nights, but the lights stayed on.”

“Do you think you’ll ever want to live anywhere else?” she asked.

“America is the only place that interests me,” Marco said. “If what I have heard and read is true, then so much is possible there. I never believed, as many did here, that the streets of American cities were filled with gold, but I do believe you have more opportunities to achieve your goals as an American than I do as an Italian. Here, ambition is not enough.”

“America is bigger,” Kate said. “With a larger appetite. And yet I feel more at home here than I ever did there. I feel like America is where I live and where I study and where I work. Here is where I belong. It’s as if my history is here on these streets, down these alleys, in the museums and in the churches. And I’ve only been here a few weeks.”