Roselli's Gold

CHAPTER ONE

THE VATICAN – 1941

THERE WAS VERY little sound in the chamber as Cardinal designate, Enrico Donatello walked slowly past the finely crafted cabinets, their beauty lost now in the darkness of the Secret Archives of the Vatican. It was well past midnight and Donatello had removed his shoes to conceal the sound of his footsteps. All he had to guide him was the yellowing ring of light thrown by the small torch he carried, pointing down towards the floor. He held one hand out, feeling for any object that might impede his progress, groping his way along the cata­comb–like rows of cabinets that held the Vatican secrets, many of them centuries old.

As he approached the second hall with its ornately carved and painted ceiling, embracing the coat of arms of Cardinal Scipione Cafarelli, librarian of the Secret Archives four hundred years earlier, his heart began to beat faster, pulsing down to the soles of his stocking feet. He paused and listened for other sounds, but none came. Slowly, his hand shaking as he reached into the sleeve of his vestment, he retrieved a large key. It rattled against the keyhole as he pushed it into the lock. He turned the key gently and opened the door into the second chamber. He withdrew the key and stepped through, closing the door and locking it behind him.

Cardinal designate Donatello, Archbishop of the Roman Catholic Church, had already committed an unforgivable sin by venturing into the Secret Archives without permission and in the dead of night, but his reasons were, he believed, for the good of the Holy See and to prevent a calamity that could endanger the whole credibility of the Catholic Church.

Ignoring the demons that began to assail his conscience, and refusing now to listen to his own, good advice, Donatello moved forward carefully, following the yellow ring of torchlight until he came to a door which he knew would be securely locked. He stopped and reached into a pocket for a second key that was concealed beneath his vestment. Even as he looked at the door, he knew he should stop this madness, but without hesitating, he pulled out the key.

With a trembling hand, he inserted the key into the lock and turned it carefully, fearful that the lock might tumble noisily and announce his presence, although there was nobody in the vast chambers to hear Donatello’s fumbling access into the most secret room in the Vatican.

He closed the door behind him, locked it and raised the torch so that its beam fell on to a cabinet door that he knew concealed a wall safe. He walked over to the door and opened it. He composed himself by taking deep breaths to steady his shaking hands. He then reached for the dial on the safe door and began turning it, dialling in the combination, sensing rather than hearing the tumblers falling into place. He heard the sound as the final tumbler dropped and pulled open the heavy, metal door. It opened noiselessly on its well–oiled hinges. He shone the torch into the safe, sweeping the beam over the array of boxes and documents inside.

The box he wanted had been placed on the lowest shelf. He knelt down and pulled it towards him. He paused and looked up, and offered a prayer up to God that his sins would be forgiven. He took a smaller key from his vestment pocket and opened the box. Inside was the document he sought. It was enclosed in an envelope with the Papal seal emblazoned across the flap. The writing on the face of the envelope was in a clear, bold hand. Donatello nodded his satisfaction and removed the envelope, which he carefully concealed beneath his robe. Then he withdrew an identical envelope from his pocket. The Papal seal and handwriting were perfectly forged. He looked at it for the last time and put it in the box. He closed the lid, locked the small casket and closed the safe, spinning the dial once it was closed.

Archbishop Enrico Donatello, Cardinal designate to the highest offices of the Roman Catholic Church, had entered the most secret place in the Vatican, like a thief in the night and removed the most important document ever to reside in the Secret Archives and replaced it with another.

CHAPTER TWO

TWO WEEKS LATER

LIBYA, NORTH AFRICA –- 1941

THE SILENCE IN the desert was so incredible it was as if you could reach out and touch it, almost as if you could feel its presence. A patrol of the British Army had pulled in to a dry river bed to avoid the heat of the day. It was mid–afternoon and the heat was coming off the sand in shimmering waves while the sun seemed to bounce off it in every direction. It was dazzling and the need for eye protection was paramount.

The patrol was about one hundred miles south–west of Jalu, deep behind the Italian lines, waiting for something to happen. The patrol leader, Captain Miles Roselli had called a halt, knowing the brief respite would be most welcome to his men. The patrol had been warned by Allied HQ in Egypt of an Italian convoy that would prob­ably pass within a few miles of their position.

Miles Roselli was a big man, well respected by those under his command. He was of Italian descent which often meant a great deal of 'mickey taking' by his soldiers, but his Italian antecedents were several generations back so it meant little to him other than a liking for things Italian. Despite being English, he still carried something of the Mediterranean look in his appearance. He was a little over six feet tall and weighed over two hundred pounds; an ideal weight and size to lead a bunch of independent–thinking, tough, battle–hardened troops.

There were eight men in Roselli's group and they were all utterly reliable, extremely competent and experienced men. They had fought many battles with him, or skirmishes as Roselli often called them, in the unforgiving desert of the Sahara.

The patrol had two Chevrolet trucks, each armed with a Vickers 303 machine gun. There was also a Bren gun on one Chevvy truck and a Lewis machine gun on the other. The other addition to their armoury was a bazooka; a phenomenal weapon that had recently been invented by the Americans. It was not officially available to the British Army but some of the weapons had found their way to the Desert patrol groups. The bazookas were ideal for taking out tanks.

The patrol's daily routine was always left to the leader unless specific orders were received from HQ in Egypt, and the patrol employed itself with hit–and–run tactics, engaging with the enemy whenever and wherever the enemy appeared. Generally, the officers commanding the patrol groups preferred to operate under the cover of darkness, but they were never averse to doing the job during the heat of the day. Miles Roselli was no excep­tion and, in fact, he believed that this tactic had much to favour it. This was because the enemy were nearly always conscripted soldiers who were not trained for such ordeals and had little stomach for them against the battle–hardened soldiers of the desert groups.

Roselli's patrol was bivouacked along the slope of the river bed that offered a little shade. Corporal 'Ginger' Edwards was on watch. He had positioned himself high enough to have a clear view across the wadi. He didn't expect to see much movement, if any, but it was from this vantage point that he spotted a small dust column on the horizon.

He called Captain Roselli up to the high point above the wadi from where he had a commanding view. Whatever was causing the dust column was about thirty minutes away from their current position, where the patrol was resting up. There was another reason Roselli had chosen this particular spot; it was a good point from which to launch an ambush if the convoy they had been warned about should pass this way. The ground from the riverbed rose up to about sixty feet and, with the sun in its present position, the shadows were lengthening into the wadi itself.

Roselli joined Edwards on the high point and lifted his binoculars to his eyes. He focused carefully until he could make out a line of trucks forming the convoy. He lowered the binoculars and rubbed the tip of his nose with the back of his hand; it was an unconscious habit he had when he was thinking.

He got to his feet and ordered Edwards to follow him back down into the wadi. The other men in the patrol were lying in the shade cast by the trucks, some catching a precious nap when Roselli and Edwards scrambled down the sloping side of the river bed. Roselli gathered the men around him and told them what they had seen.

They began preparing themselves with a sense of disciplined urgency and moved their vehicles into a position that would give them the benefit of surprise when the convoy drew closer. The shadows were lengthening by the minute, and as they lengthened, so they darkened, which gave excellent cover for an attack.

The convoy was following the riverbed, and as it drew closer, Roselli could see it consisted of a leading, Autoblinda armoured car, two L3, anti–tank 'tankettes', a Mercedes half–track and a Magirus Deutz three­ ton truck. The truck had an unusual rigid, metal box construction that had obviously been manufactured to replace the usual canvas 'tilt' that was common among these types of general–purpose vehicles.

Although the convoy carried a lot of armour, Roselli could see no reason why his men shouldn't succeed in the attack. His strategy was usually the same, depending on circumstances. But basically, he always tried to engage the enemy with a direct, frontal assault. In this attack, he could see the benefit of using the patrol's massive firepower and the American bazooka to disable the 'tankettes'. He knew they would be facing a lot of cannon fire from the L3s and the halftrack that appeared to be riding 'shotgun' on the convoy, but he was still supremely confident.

It didn't take long. The suddenness and swiftness of the ambush completely overwhelmed the Italians as Roselli's group hurtled at them out of the shadows. The Italians responded with guts and resoluteness which probably meant they were not conscripts. The fire fight lasted no more than five minutes. Two of Roselli's men were wounded in the conflict, one seriously. Roselli never liked losing men in an attack, naturally. The downside, apart from the injury to a soldier was that it meant that he would have to make some arrange­ment for the wounded men to be evacuated for medical treatment. This would mean a weakening of the group and inevitable delays until suitable replacements could be found.

Roselli ordered his men to search the damaged trucks for survivors and any documents that might be of value to the Allied Headquarters back in Cairo. He had sent Edwards back up to the top of the wadi as a lookout, and it was while he was planning ahead that one of the men made a startling discovery in the Magirus Deutz truck.

It had been quickly established that there were no survivors, so the men were carrying out their searches in relative quiet. Suddenly the voice of Lance Corporal Joe Reams cut through the peace and quiet like a blast going off. Roselli turned and looked across to the Magirus and could see Reams waving frantically at him from the truck.

He jogged across to the truck, not knowing what to expect. Reams had disappeared back inside the Magirus. Roselli heaved himself up into the back of the truck and it was immediately obvious what it was that had got Reams so worked up.

Inside the truck were several boxes stacked one on top of the other. A couple of the boxes had toppled and one of them had taken a hit from a shell during the fire–fight. And there on the floor, spilled out like hundreds of playing cards were glittering ingots of brilliant gold.

Roselli could only stand and gape. He had never seen so much gold. For a while everything else was forgotten as he stood at the back of the Magirus truck while Joe Reams stood in front of him with a bar of gold in each hand. Reams watched his captain stare in awe at the gold.

Suddenly Roselli shook his head as if he was trying to clear his mind. 'Put the gold back, Joe,' he said softly.

'Beg your pardon, sir?' Reams answered.

Roselli's eyes went back to the gold. He said nothing for a few seconds. Reams continued staring at him. Then Roselli snapped out of his trance–like state.

'Put all the gold back into the box, including the bars you've picked up,' he ordered Reams again. 'Then tidy it all up.'

Joe Reams looked extremely disappointed. He dropped the bars on top of the others.

'Sir,' he began to say.

'I know what you're thinking,' Roselli interrupted sharply. 'But we've got to be careful and think clearly.' He looked at Reams. 'I don't want you to say anything to any of the others. Do you under­stand?'

Reams nodded. 'Yes sir,' he answered, although a little hesitantly.

'Not a word, Corporal. I mean it!'

Reams turned away and began to put the gold ingots back in their boxes as tidily as he could. He didn't understand why Roselli had told him to keep quiet about the gold. He had a feeling that his captain was already thinking ahead but probably had no clear idea what he was going to do; he was probably just being cautious, Reams decided but he found it, well, disturbing.

Roselli jumped down from the truck and went to find the other members of his patrol, his mind working furiously. None of them had noticed Joe Reams's display of excitement, and for now it suited Roselli to keep it that way until he could figure out exactly what he was going to do.

Within thirty minutes of the attack, what was left of the patrol was mounted up and ready to leave. It was clear from an examination of the two wounded men that one had only superficial wounds, which could be dealt with. The other soldier needed medical treatment in a field hospital as quick as possible. Roselli took the decision to order two of his men to remain with the wounded soldiers, which meant leaving behind one of the Chevvy trucks, while he took the Magirus truck and the other half of the patrol to a safer location. They agreed to meet up at a rendezvous point near the small desert town of Bardai in the extreme north–west corner of the country of Chad, over two hundred miles away. The oasis town nestled near the foot of the Tibesti Mountains. Different varieties of palm trees grew there in no particular pattern or order but lent a picturesque element to what was really a harsh envi­ronment. The backdrop of cliffs behind Bardai sheltered it from much of the fierce Sahara winds and it was from these and the mountains behind that moisture and occasional rainfall filtered down to fill the wells of the oasis. It was a popular rendezvous area for members of the desert patrol groups.

Roselli ordered his patrol to stop about two miles north of Bardai. He was not interested in the charms of the desert oasis; but was more concerned with what he should do about the gold.

Since leaving the wadi where the patrol had ambushed the Italian convoy, Roselli had been troubled about the gold. He had thought of little else. It was obviously a large shipment and quite probably the patrol could claim it as theirs as the spoils of war. But Roselli knew that was out of the question; they certainly couldn't carry the gold around with them for the duration of the war, and his senior officers would certainly contest any claim, likely or unlikely, that his patrol group might make.

Roselli was also convinced that his own men would have some­thing to say about the gold. He had seen the look in Joe Reams' eyes as he stood in the back of that truck, a bar of gold in each hand. Roselli knew that gold did strange things to men, of that he was sure. What he needed to do now was to find an acceptable answer to the prize that had landed in their hands and ensure that his men all agreed once he had told them.

There were only two others in the patrol now who didn't know about the gold; Corporal Harry Edwards and Private Simon Richie. The men he had left behind knew nothing of it, but Roselli's belief in honesty and fair play meant that he would include those men in any decision that was reached. Although he had ordered Reams not to mention the gold, he knew it was inevitable that the men would talk, and Reams would not be able to keep secret what he had seen in the back of the Magirus, so he had to assume they would probably all be aware of the prize they had netted.

And a prize it was indeed. Roselli knew that they could all simply disappear into the huge continent of Africa, be posted 'missing presumed dead' and no–one would be any the wiser. If it ever became known that the gold convoy had been overwhelmed and the gold taken, too many years would have passed for the trail to be picked up and followed; it would have gone cold.

Roselli's problem was how to convince the others to agree with him and not become deserters and criminals, which would be against their natural inclination. If he could achieve that then they would have to conceive a plan that would ensure they all received a fair share of the gold. But each of them would know that there were three other men who would have knowledge of the gold's whereabouts and the question of honour among thieves would be paramount in their minds. Would any of them come back, single handed, to plunder what they had agreed to keep safe?

They made themselves as comfortable as they could where they had stopped. Roselli decided to take the first watch as they bedded down for the night. He wanted to be on his own and to collect his thoughts, to come up with an agreeable plan.

It was while Roselli was on watch that Reams told the others of what he had seen despite being told by his captain not to.

'Look, I put the gold bars back in the box that had been smashed. I tell you, there must have been a hundred or more in the box.'

Ginger Edwards drew heavily on a cigarette. He asked how big the bars were.

'About six inches long, maybe; couple of inches wide.' He held the thumb and finger of one hand about half an inch apart. 'About this thick,' he suggested.

'How much do you reckon they're worth?' Simon Richie asked.

Reams gave him a blank look. 'Don't be bloody daft; how am I supposed to know that?'

'How many boxes were there?' Edwards asked.

Reams shrugged. 'I don't know; one hundred perhaps.'

Simon Richie lit a cigarette and drew the smoke deep into his lungs. He expelled it forcefully and coughed. 'So why did the captain tell you to say nothing?'

The three of them looked at each other.

'I'll tell you why,' Richie went on. 'It's because he's up to some­thing. Why else would he tell Joe to keep quiet?'

Richie took another drag on his cigarette. 'He means to do a runner,' he said in a wave of smoke.

'What, with all that gold?' Edwards laughed scornfully. 'Don't be bloody daft. There are three of us and only one of him.'

'Well, if he is up to something,' Richie suggested, 'we had better be on our guard. Make sure we're not caught in a group of three.'

Edwards studied his friend for a while. Then suddenly shook his head. 'No, bollocks, he ain't going to do that. What's he going to do with the gold if he does get the drop on all of us, drive the fucking stuff back to Blighty?'

The three of them talked around the problem until it was time for Richie to take over watch from the captain. When Roselli returned to the bivouac, the other two had turned in. He made himself a brew and sat outside of the tent, looking up at the dark sky covered in a million jewelled stars and thought again of his future.  

*

The following morning the patrol were up early and looking down towards the town of Bardai from an elevated position. The men had all had different plans and schemes running through their minds during the night, but all of them knew they would have to wait until the captain broached the subject. The only one of the group who had a positive idea of what he wanted to do was Joe Reams, but he intended playing his cards very close to his chest and to wait for the right moment.

The town of Bardai was about two miles from their position. Roselli's thoughts were fixed not on refuge in the town, but on a drive into the foothills of the Tibesti Mountains to a cave he had known about from earlier forays in the southern Sahara. He wasn't absolutely sure where it was, but he intended to find it.

The mountains were well known for their prehistoric caves and cave paintings, and many anthropologists and archaeologists had scoured the hills and studied the ancient art forms found deep within the walls of the mountains. Roselli was not a scientist, but as a Long-Range Desert Patrol leader, he had always believed that a good commander should have an almost encyclopaedic knowledge of the areas that could afford refuge if it should ever be needed.

This far south was really the extremity of his knowledge, but he was sure he would find the cave he recalled from earlier visits; it was big enough in which to conceal the Magirus truck and its precious cargo. It was now simply a case of searching carefully while avoiding others who might see them.

It took Roselli several hours before he came across the cave he remembered. It was situated about five hundred feet above the desert on a steep incline. The cave entrance was in shadow, largely because of an overhanging rock which jutted out across the opening to the cave.

They drove the trucks up the slope and into the cave, which ran about sixty or seventy feet into the mountainside. They switched off their engines and as the noise of the engines subsided, the silence in the cave swamped them. Roselli jumped down from the cab of the Magirus and slammed the driver's door shut behind him. The clunk of the door resonated around the cave walls. The others quickly followed suit and were soon standing in a small group looking up at the high roof of the cave and around its walls. Deeper into the interior of the cave they could see the familiar sight of stalactites and stalagmites, none of which now bore signs of moisture that would have trickled through the seams of the mountain rock to form the prehistoric shapes that fasci­nated so many explorers and visitors alike.

Roselli gave the men a few minutes before ordering them to prepare the cave entrance for the next part of the plan.

'Right lads,' he said, rubbing the tip of his nose with the back of his hand. 'I want you to put charges beneath that