The Malta Exchange (Cotton Malone 14)

He pointed at the man’s ring. “Like you, I take my strength from Constantine the Great. Only he and I succeeded where all others failed.”

The car outside arrived, and he heard doors slam shut as people emerged.

“Tell your grand master that he will regret not saving me,” he said.

“You’re a fool.”

He stiffened his back. “I am Il Duce.”

The man in the German uniform seemed unfazed, only shaking his head and saying, “Goodbye, great leader.”

And the emissary left.

He continued to stand tall and straight, facing the open doorway. How many times had he sent men to their deaths? Thousands? More like tens of thousands. Now he understood how helpless they felt at the moment of their demise.

Footsteps pounded up the stairs.

A new man entered the room—wiry, black-eyed, black-tempered—holding a machine gun. “I have come to set you free.”

He did not believe a word, but played along, “How fortunate.”

“We must go. Now.”

Clara appeared, entering the room and stepping toward the bed, searching the covers.

“What are you looking for?” the man asked.

“My knickers.”

“Never mind them. There’s no time. We must go.”

Mussolini gently grasped her arm and motioned for them to leave. Was she aware of what was about to happen? He doubted it since, as always, she seemed more concerned with him than herself.

They descended to ground level, left the house, and climbed into the rear seat of a tattered Fiat. A driver was already behind the wheel, and the man with the machine gun did not get in. Instead he stood outside, on the right-hand running board, pointing his weapon inside.

The car ground slowly down the steep road toward the village. Behind, on foot, came the two guards from last night. They all rounded a hairpin turn at a walking pace, but the Fiat picked up speed as it straightened out, the tires hissing on the damp road. The man perched outside ordered the vehicle to stop directly opposite an iron gateway, which formed a recess in the narrow inclined road about five meters wide and two meters deep. The gates blocked a driveway and hung between two large concrete posts, the extending walls about waist-high, curved inward, and topped with bushes.

The man with the machine gun sprang off the running board and opened the car doors. The driver emerged. More orders were yelled and the two other armed men took up positions, one above, the other below on the road. Trees and a sharp bend kept everything out of sight from the houses down in Azzano.

“Get out” came the command.

An agonized look formed on Clara’s face, her eyes darting about like a frightened bird’s.

Mussolini exited.

She followed.

“Over there,” the man said as he waved the muzzle of his gun toward the iron gateway.

Mussolini marched straight to the wall and stood against it. Clara came and stood at his side. He would not make the same mistake as yesterday. He would not be afraid. When they recounted what was about to happen, they would have to lie to make him a coward.

“Benito Mussolini, you are a war criminal. A sentence of death has been proclaimed as justice for the Italian people.”

“No. You can’t,” Clara screamed. “You can’t do that.”

She hugged his arm.

“Move away from him,” the man shouted. “Get away or you will die, too.”

She did not flee and the man pressed the trigger.

But nothing happened.

The assailant rattled the bolt and tried to free the jam. Clara screamed and leaped forward grabbing the barrel of the machine gun with both hands.

“You can’t kill us like this,” she shrieked.

“Bring me your gun,” the man hollered.

One of the other two guards ran over and tossed a weapon. Their assassin released his grip on the gun Clara held and caught the offering.

Mussolini realized this was his moment.

Energy filled him.

He made no move to run or defy.

Instead he swept back his jacket with both hands, thrusting his chest forward like the jutting bow of a ship. Past the three men who’d come to murder him he saw the knight in the German uniform walking down the road. Casual. No hurry. Unmolested by the other three. The uniform stopped and stared at the scene. Good. Let him watch.

“Magnus ab integro saeclorum nascitur ordo,” Mussolini called out.

He doubted any of these fools spoke Latin.

Only the knight would understand.

The great order of the ages is born afresh.

The machine gun erupted.

Clara was hit first and dropped to the ground. His heart broke to see her die. More rounds came his way. Three thudded into his midsection. Four more found his legs. His knees buckled and he dropped to a sitting position.

His eyes stared across at the knight, and he summoned what little strength was left inside him to say, “This … is not … over.”

Blood spewed out his mouth.

His left shoulder dipped and he slumped to the wet cobbles. He stared up at the cloudy sky, still alive. The smell of cordite hung heavy in the moist air. One of the guards stood over him, the barrel of the weapon aimed down.

He focused on the black dot.

Like a period at the end of a sentence.

The gun fired.

PRESENT DAY

CHAPTER ONE

TUESDAY, MAY 9

LAKE COMO, ITALY

8:40 A.M.

Cotton Malone studied the execution site.

A little after 4:00 P.M., on the afternoon of April 28, 1945, Benito Mussolini and his mistress Claretta Petacci were gunned down just a few feet away from where he stood. In the decades since, the entrance to the Villa Belmonte, beside a narrow road that rose steeply from Azzano about half a mile below, had evolved into a shrine. The iron gate, the low wall, even the clipped hedges were still there, the only change from then being a wooden cross tacked to the stone on one side of the gate that denoted Mussolini’s name and date of death. On the other side he saw another addition—a small, glass-fronted wooden box that displayed pictures of Mussolini and Claretta. A huge wreath of fresh flowers hung from the iron fence above the cross. Its banner read EGLI VIVRÀ PER SEMPRE NEL CUORE DEL SUO POPOLO.

He will always live in the hearts of people.

Down in the village he’d been told where to find the spot and that loyalists continued to venerate the site. Which was amazing, considering Mussolini’s brutal reputation and the fact that so many decades had passed since his death.

What a quandary Mussolini had faced.

Italy languishing in a state of flux. The Germans fast retreating. Partisans flooding down from the hills. The Allies driving hard from the south, liberating town after town. Only the north, and Switzerland, had offered the possibility of a refuge.

Which never happened.

He stood in the cool of a lovely spring morning.

Yesterday, he’d taken an afternoon flight from Copenhagen to the Milan–Malpensa Airport, then driven a rented Alfa Romeo north to Lake Como. He’d splurged on the sports car, since who didn’t like driving a 237-horsepowered engine that could go from zero to sixty in four seconds. He’d visited Como before, staying at the stunning Villa d’Este during an undercover mission years ago for the Magellan Billet. One of the finest hotels in the world. This time the accommodations would not be anywhere near as opulent.

He was on special assignment for British intelligence, working freelance, his target an Italian, a local antiques dealer who’d recently crept onto MI6’s radar. Originally his job had been a simple buy and sell. Being in the rare-book business provided him with a certain expertise in negotiating for old and endangered writings. But new information obtained last night had zeroed in on a possible hiding place, so the task had been modified. If the information proved correct, his orders were now to steal the items.

He kn