Part One Divination Fere libenter homines id quod volunt credunt. Men willingly believe what they wish.--Julius Caesar, De Bello Gallico, Book III, Chapter 18 Chapter One The garden of the Quirinale felt like a sun trap as the man in the silver armor strode down the shingle path. He was sweating profusely inside the ceremonial breastplate and woolen uniform. Tight in his right hand he held the long, bloodied sword that had just taken the life of a man. In a few moments he would kill the president of Italy. And then? Be murdered himself. It was the fate of assassins throughout the ages, from Pausanius of Orestis, who had slaughtered Philip, the father of Alexander the Great, to Marat's murderess, Charlotte Corday, and Kennedy's nemesis, Lee Harvey Oswald. The stabbing dagger, the sniper's rifle . . . all these were mirrored weapons, reflecting on the man or woman who bore them, joining perpetrator and victim as twin sacri?ces to destiny. It had always been this way, since men sought to rule over others, circumscribing their desires, hemming in the spans of their lives with the dull, rote strictures of convention. Petrakis had read much over the years, thinking, preparing, comparing himself to his peers. Actor John Wilkes Booth's ?nal performance before he put a bullet through the skull of Abraham Lincoln had been in Julius Caesar, although through some strange irony he had taken the part of Caesar's friend and apologist, Mark Antony, not Brutus as history demanded. As he approached the ?gure in the bower, seeing the old man's gray, lined form bent deep over a book, Petrakis found himself murmuring a line Booth must have uttered a century and a half before. "'O mighty Caesar . . . dost thou lie so low? Are all thy conquests, glories, triumphs, spoils, shrunk to this little measure?'" A pale, long face, with sad, tired eyes, looked up from the page. Petrakis, realizing he had spoken out loud, wondered why this death, among so many, would be the most dif?cult. "I didn't quite catch that," Dario Sordi said in a calm, unwavering voice, his eyes, nevertheless, on the long, bloodied blade. The uniformed of?cer came close, stopped, repeated the line, and held the sword over the elderly ?gure seated in the shadow of a statue of Hermes. The president glanced around him and asked, "What conquests in particular, Andrea? What glories? What spoils? Temporary residence in a garden ?t for a pope? I'm a pensioner in a very luxurious retirement home. Do you really not understand that?" The weapon trembled in Petrakis's hand. His palm felt sweaty. He couldn't speak. Voices rose behind him. A shout. A clamor. There was a cigarette in Dario Sordi's hand. It didn't even shake. "You should be afraid, old man." More dry laughter. "I've been hunted by Nazis." The gray, drawn face glowered at him. Sordi drew on the cigarette and exhaled a cloud of smoke. "Played hide-and-seek with tobacco and the grape for more than half a century. Offended people--important people--who feel I am owed a lesson. Which is probably true." A long, pale ?nger jabbed the evening air. "And now you wish me to cower before someone else's puppet? A tool?" That, at least, made it easier. Petrakis found his mind ranging across so many things: memories, lost decades, languid days dodging NATO patrols beneath the Afghan sun, distant half-recalled moments in the damp darkness of an Etruscan tomb, talking to his father about life and the world, and how a man had to make his own way, not let another create a future for him. Everything came from that place in the Maremma, from the whispered discovery of a paradise of the will sacri?ced to the commo Excerpted from The Blue Demon by David Hewson All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
