In The Lion's Sign. Stefano Vignaroli

       CHAPTER 6

      Beauty will save the world

      (Fedor Dostoevsky)

      Muddy up to his neck, Andrea had his forehead beaded with sweat, despite the stinging cold of the beginning of a winter that, in fast steps, would open the doors to the year 2019. The municipal administration had been clear. By the following spring, Piazza Colocci had to be restored and the archaeological excavations, which had brought to light the remains of the lower floors of the old Government Palace, would be buried. Everything had already been photographed, the main finds transferred to the new archaeological museum, on the ground floor of the Pianetti-Tesei Palace, and by then it had been given too much time to citizens, tourists and curious people to take a peek, completely free, at the uncovered square. But Andrea was not satisfied, he did not give up. Down there, at a lower level, there must have been the remains of the ancient Roman amphitheatre. Evidence of this were the ancient balls of the “ball game”, an ancient discipline dating back to Roman times. This game, also known as Harpastum, or spherical ball game, was an integral part of the training of gladiators and was played mainly by legions to guard the borders. According to Andrea, the balls found about twenty years earlier at the bottom of the well in the inner courtyard of the Palazzo della Signoria were not referable to the eighteenth-century game of tennis court, as had been asserted so far. They were instead the testimony that in that area took place, between the first century B.C. and the third century A.D., games in which gladiators and slaves were involved, in the same way as those that could be seen in Rome inside the Coliseum. Of course, he could not go down to the bottom of the well to break through its walls, but according to him a passage from the rooms of the ancient Government Palace to the levels below had to be there. Everything was there to find him. The very expensive radar surveys that he had carried out completely at his own expense proved him right, but every time he thought he was close to the sensational discovery of the possible passage there was something that went wrong. There were sewer manifolds that could not be touched except at the risk of flooding everything, there were metal bulkheads to protect and consolidate the foundations of the Palazzo della Signoria. Here remains of fireplaces, which could not be touched except by unleashing the wrath of the delegate for Cultural and Artistic Heritage. And now there was also snow. Since December 8, an early but heavy snowfall had prevented him from working for a few days. Then, when the snow had melted, it had left so much mud that it was almost impossible to stand upright in the excavations without sliding continuously. Irritated, cold, with nerves on edge, he lifted the pickaxe. He would have given a dry picket to the back wall, the one that separated the old government building from the foundations of the present one, finished building around the year 1500, but he stopped with his arm in the air. Something had attracted the attention of his eyes. The mud, draining downwards, had left uncovered a detail he had never noticed before. A vaulted arch limited by the ancient bricks, almost at the top of the ground he was trampling on and representing the floor of the ground floor of that ancient building, undoubtedly delimited an opening, even if it was occluded by debris and semi-basement.

      Certainly the bricks that delimit this arch are older than the rest, have a more irregular appearance, are darker. Perhaps they are from Roman times...

      Andrea rubbed his hands satisfied, breathed on them to warm them a bit and looked around for the right tools, leaving the pickaxe. He tried to clean the hypothetical opening, as much as possible with his bare hands, helping himself with a small folding hoe shovel to remove the debris, then finishing the work with a brush to remove dust and soil. Little by little, came to light a wooden door, quite well preserved, closed with a latch. It would not have been difficult to open it or break it down but, not knowing what he would find beyond and it was by now dusk, he decided for that day he could be satisfied and he could suspend the work to resume the next day.

      Better go home and recheck the radar readings. I would not want to have any surprises. And then better to get help from someone. One can never be too careful in these cases. Never open that door to cause collapses. At which point all the work of months and months would be blessed.

      He gathered his tools, put his work bag over his shoulder, came out of the excavations and headed down to Costa Baldassini to reach his home. The cozy warmth of his home and the smell of smoke from the cigarettes consumed by his companion put him in a good mood. He threw the bag on the ground near the entrance, tried as much as possible to free his shoes from the mud and ran up the stairs. He found Lucia asleep, with one arm and the head resting on the living room table, the notebook lit in front of her and the cigarette butt still smoking in the ashtray. He caressed her hair gently, evoking her awakening.

      «My God, Andrea! I collapsed. I must have been really tired. I worked all day trying to interpret a new document, which I found here among the paperwork in your library and which refers to the period when your ancestor Andrea Franciolini went to fight in the Netherlands in support of the King of France against Emperor Charles V of Habsburg. Aside from the politically entangled period, for which the pope was now a partisan for France, now a partisan for the empire, the chronology of dates in this document seems strange. And then there is this representation, which seems much older than the times we are discussing. It is a lion who is lying, lying down, engraved on stone, it seems to me. I don’t understand what it means: it is neither the rampant lion symbol of Jesi, nor the lion of San Marco, symbol of the Venetian Republic. It looks more like an icon, a high-relief on stone, coming from some dwelling or from some construction of Roman times, almost similar to those decorative tiles that adorn the outline of the portal of this palace.»

      «As you know by now, those tiles were decorations of an ancient Roman temple that stood in this place in antiquity, and that were found during the excavations of the foundations.»

      «Exactly. And so my idea is that whoever designed this illustration was inspired by a decoration of the ancient Roman amphitheatre, which stood more or less between Piazza Colocci and Via Roccabella. After all the lions were used by the Romans, inside the arenas, in the fights with the gladiators.»

      «And they often made a mess of it. What horrible shows! And yet at the time they were appreciated by the population. In any case, since we are on the subject, I must tell you that just a little while ago perhaps I identified a passage that could lead to the remains of this ancient amphitheatre. I managed to isolate a wooden door, at a lower level than the rest of the excavations, which in my opinion should have given access to the cellars of the ancient Palazzo del Governo. And if the accounts are correct, those cellars should correspond with ancient environments referable to some areas of the amphitheatre.»

      «Have you tried to open the door?»

      «No, I need the proper tools and someone to assist me. I don’t want to cause a collapse.»

      «And who do you want to find as assistants? We are close to the Christmas holidays, all your archaeologist friends have disappeared for a while now and the city administration has already decided to close the excavations soon!»

      «I think one person is enough. And I believe that whoever is right for me is now here in front of me.»

      «Oh, forget about getting me involved in another one of your whimsical adventures just because you’re leveraging the fact I’m in love with you», Lucia replied, indignant. «I have no desire to be buried alive among the ruins of a Roman amphitheatre. Besides, you know very well that I suffer from claustrophobia.»

      «I know», Andrea said. «But I also know that your curiosity as a scholar manages to prevail over all fears. You have demonstrated this in the past. And if you think that down there you could find the original icon representing that laying lion...»

      «Hey, you think you can always get me to do whatever you want!»

      Lucia stretched out a nervous hand towards the cigarette packet and took one out to light it. She remained with the cigarette in her mouth and the lighter lit in her hand, interrupted by the ringing of her cell phone. On the display appeared a cell phone number, not saved in the phonebook and preceded by the international prefix +49.

      Lucia and Andrea exchanged a questioning glance, then he beckoned her to answer. Lucia activated the speakerphone, so that Andrea could also listen to the conversation. On the other end