Kent Conwell - Tony Boudreaux 15 - The Mona Lisa Murders Read Online Free PDF Page A

remains of the model for the Mona Lisa.’
     

Chapter Six
    I stared at him. ‘What?’
    ‘That’s the truth. You see, Lisa Gherardini was married to Francesco del Giocondo, a wealthy silk merchant. She posed for da Vinci. Her remains were discovered at the St. Ursula Convent in Florence. They were dug up and plans were to reconstruct the facial features of Gherardini and compare them to the Mona Lisa. Somehow, Bianchi—’
    A dark object dropped on the deck at his feet and instantly unwound.
    Antone jabbed a finger at the snake and gagged. ‘Snake, snake, snake,’ he managed to scream from where he had leaped in a single bound to the console seat.
    ‘Shut up,’ I snapped, slamming the blade of the oar on the three-foot long water snake. It curled around the blade in a reflexive strike. Before it could unwind, I lobbed the oar and snake overboard.
    ‘Get down,’ I said. ‘You made enough noise to wake the dead. We’ve got to get out of here.’
    We eased from the cane and headed back to our left. ‘Keep an eye behind us for lights.’
    ‘All right.’
    At the end of the canebrake, a broad channel cut back north. A light clicked on in my head. Now I knew where we were. The channel twisted for a couple miles before splitting, one fork going to the lodge, the other – well, who knew?
    We ran without lights, using starlight to keep a safe distance from the dark underbrush lining the channel.
    ‘Look,’ Antone whispered urgently, pointing at the beam of a spotlight coming from a bend in the river ahead of us. The light struck the far shore. Someone was coming downriver. The way my luck had been running it was probably the goon named Bumper.
    ‘Quiet,’ I muttered, cutting the power and easing into the shadows enveloping the east shoreline. ‘Now listen to me. We’ve got to hide under some bushes. If a snake falls in the boat, stomp it, strangle it, do anything, but don’t shout, or I’ll throw you overboard. You understand?’
    I barely heard his whispered reply, ‘Yes.’
    The spotlight beam swung to the left, slashing a bright light across the lush vegetation on the distant shore. The powerboat swept around the bend, heading south on the far side of the channel from us. In the lights from the boat’s console, we made out three men, one standing, two sitting.
    One of the sitting operated the spotlight, sweeping it along the shore then across the river. I caught my breath and muttered a hasty prayer.
    When the powerboat was about a hundred yards behind us, the beam swept across the river and back up the shore. ‘Duck,’ I said, pulling Antone to the deck. The beam swept past.
    I jumped to my feet. ‘Let’s get out of here.’ Even as I slammed the engine into gear, the beam swept back, pinpointing us.
    Caution jumped out the proverbial window. I flipped on the spotlight and jammed the throttle all the way forward. The wind whipped our hair as I shot around the bend. I glanced over my shoulder.
    Behind us, the powerboat slid around the bend. Tiny pops cut through the roar of the hundred and fifty horsepower Mercury. ‘Keep your head down,’ I shouted. ‘They’re shooting at us.’
    To the east, the first traces of false dawn grayed the sky. Antone shouted. ‘Where are we going, back to the lodge?’
    I spun the wheel, taking us around another sharp bend in the sluggish river. Just before we disappeared behind the thick understory vegetation, a slug slammed into the engine. It began sputtering.
    In the midst of a line of curses a sailor would admire, I cut back to the right and shot through a tangle of underbrush into a shallow slough. Within thirty yards, we ran aground.
    Antone looked around at me in alarm. I held my finger to my lips, indicating the pursuing powerboat. We remained silent as it swept past, heading upriver.
    I opened a trapdoor in the deck and retrieved a backpack emergency kit, then grabbed an oar and climbed over the side. ‘Let’s go.’
    The small man’s eyes grew wide.