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The provost studied the man curiously. The Consortium often mass-distributed information for clients, and yet something about this man’s request felt disconcerting. “On the same date?” the provost asked, motioning at the scrawled circle on his calendar.
“Same exact date,” the client replied. “Not one moment before.”
“Understood.” The provost tagged the red memory stick with the proper information. “So that’s it, then?” He stood up, attempting to end the meeting.
His client remained seated. “No. There is one final thing.”
The provost sat back down.
The client’s green eyes were looking almost feral now. “Shortly after you deliver this video, I will become a very famous man.”
You are already a famous man, the provost had thought, considering his client’s impressive accomplishments.
“And you will deserve some of the credit,” the man said. “The service you have provided has enabled me to create my masterpiece … an opus that is going to change the world. You should be proud of your role.”
“Whatever your masterpiece is,” the provost said with growing impatience, “I’m pleased you have had the privacy required to create it.”
“As a show of thanks, I’ve brought you a parting gift.” The unkempt man reached into his bag. “A book.”
The provost wondered if perhaps this book was the secret opus the client had been working on for all this time. “And did you write this book?”
“No.” The man heaved a massive tome up onto the table. “Quite to the contrary … this book was written for me.”
Puzzled, the provost eyed the edition his client had produced. He thinks this was written for him? The volume was a literary classic … written in the fourteenth century.
“Read it,” the client urged with an eerie smile. “It will help you understand all I have done.”
With that, the unkempt visitor had stood up, said good-bye, and abruptly departed. The provost watched through his office window as the man’s helicopter lifted off the deck and headed back toward the coast of Italy.
Then the provost returned his attention to the large book before him. With uncertain fingers, he lifted the leather cover and thumbed to the beginning. The opening stanza of the work was written in large calligraphy, taking up the entire first page.
INFERNO
Midway upon the journey of our life
I found myself within a forest dark,
for the straightforward pathway had been lost.
On the opposing page, his client had signed the book with a handwritten message:
My dear friend, thank you for helping me find the path.
The world thanks you, too.
The provost had no idea what this meant, but he’d read enough. He closed the book and placed it on his bookshelf. Thankfully, his professional relationship with this strange individual would be over soon. Fourteen more days, the provost thought, turning his gaze to the wildly scrawled red circle on his personal calendar.
In the days that followed, the provost felt uncharacteristically on edge about this client. The man seemed to have come unhinged. Nonetheless, despite the provost’s intuition, the time passed without incident.
Then, just before the circled date, there occurred a rapid series of calamitous events in Florence. The provost tried to handle the crisis, but it quickly accelerated out of control. The crisis climaxed with his client’s breathless ascent up the Badia tower.
He jumped off … to his death.
Despite his horror at losing a client, especially in this manner, the provost remained a man of his word. He quickly began preparing to make good on his final promise to the deceased—the delivery to the silver-haired woman of the contents of a safe-deposit box in Florence—the timing of which, he had been admonished, was critical.
Not before the date circled in your calendar.
The provost gave the envelope containing the safe-deposit-box codes to Vayentha, who had traveled to Florence to recover the object inside—this “clever little barb.” When Vayentha called in, however, her news was both startling and deeply alarming. The contents of the safe-deposit box had already been removed, and Vayentha had barely escaped being detained. Somehow, the silver-haired woman had learned of the account and had used her influence to gain access to the safe-deposit box and also to place an arrest warrant on anyone else who showed up looking to open it.
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