The Last Cato Read Online Free PDF Page A

the uniform. On the two occasions I’d met him, he was dressed in civilian clothes that were clearly very expensive, almost too expensive for the meager salary of a poor member of the Swiss Guard.
    We crossed the vestibule of the Classified Archives in silence, passing in front of Reverend Father Ramondino’s closed office, and entered the elevator simultaneously. Glauser-Röist stuck his brand new key into the control panel.
    “Do you have the photographs on you, Captain?” I asked as we descended toward the Hypogeum.
    “I do, Doctor.” More and more he resembled a sharp rock on a steep mountainside. Where did they find this guy?
    “Then I suppose we can start work right away, yes?”
    “Right away.”
    My staff’s jaws dropped when they saw Glauser-Röist come down the aisle toward the lab. Guido Buzzonetti’s desk was painfully empty that morning.
    “Good morning,” I said in a loud voice.
    “Good morning, Doctor,” someone murmured so I didn’t go unanswered.
    If a thick silence followed us to my office, the shout that escaped me as I opened the lab door could be heard all the way to the Roman Forum.
    “Jesus! What happened here?”
    My old desk had been shoved heartlessly into a corner, and in the middle of the room was a metal desk and a huge computer. Other hulking devices had been set on small plastic tables that came from some empty office. Dozens of cables and plugs crisscrossed the floor and hung from my old bookcases.
    Horrified, I clapped my hands over my mouth and cautiously stepped inside as if I were walking into a nest of snakes.
    “We need this equipment for our work,” answered the Rock, behind me.
    “I hope you’re right, Captain! Who gave you permission to enter my lab and assemble this mess?”
    “Prefect Ramondino.”
    “Well, he should have consulted me!”
    “We set up the equipment last night after you left,” in his voice there was not even the slightest note of remorse. He was limited to informing me of the facts and that was that, as if everything he did was beyond discussion.
    “Splendid! That’s splendid!” I repeated, utterly furious.
    “Do you wish to start work or not?”
    I spun around as if he had slapped me and I looked at him with all the disdain I could muster.
    “Let’s get this over with as soon as possible.”
    “At your orders,” he murmured, again dragging out his r ’s. He unbuttoned his jacket and from some unfathomable place took out the same bulky dossier in a black file I’d seen the day before. “It’s all yours,” he said holding it out to me.
    “What are you going to do while I work?”
    “Use the computer.”
    “To do what?” I asked, astonished. My computer illiteracy was an unresolved issue I knew I’d have to confront someday. Up until then, like any good scholar, I found it very comforting to scorn those diabolical pieces of electronic junk.
    “Solve any problem you may have and access all the information on any topic you wish.”
    And that’s how we left it.
    I started by examining the photographs. There were a lot of them— thirty, to be exact. They were in the chronological order of the autopsy, from start to finish. After a quick once-over, I chose the ones where I could see the entire body spread out on the metal table in the positions of dorsal and prone decubitus (face up and facedown). At first glance, what stood out was the fracture of the pelvic bones, the very unnatural arch of the legs, and a huge lesion in the right parietal area of the cranium that had left the gray gelatin of the brain exposed amid slivers of bone. I found the rest of the images useless. The body probably had a number of internal lesions that I had no way to evaluate; nor did I think they were relevant to my work. But I did notice that—most likely due to the accident—the man had bitten through his own tongue.
    That man could never have passed for anything but what he was: Ethiopian. Like most Ethiopians, he was very thin and reedy, with