Battiglia to Follow the American

My counterpart, I'll refer to him only as Battiglia, will be keeping an eye on Evan, mostly for his protection, but also to see who from al-Qaeda will come calling. We've begun looking into Molotov's reference to an ivory cross in Crete. We've been scouring information regarding anything to do with crucifixes or crosses made of ivory and, not surprisingly, there isn't much there. We're looking into certain rumors about there being an immense crucifix carved out of Indian ivory brought to Italy by a fourteenth-century traveler and author by the name of Pirandello. It seems that the cross was given to Pirandello to present to Charles IV as proof that a certain Islamic leader of that time was tolerant of Christianity and its practices in his land. The cross served as a symbolic treaty of sorts between this Islamic leader and Charles IV. It remained in the Holy Roman Empire's possession until the late 1500's when it disappeared. It was believed to have been stolen from Luxembourg, and secreted away to a monastery in Crete, somewhere along the coast of the Gulf of Merabellou. In the mid 1600's the monks possessing the ivory cross were forced to rebuild their monastery deep inside a cave due to the military operations in Crete wagered against the Venetians by the Ottoman Empire. As far as the myths indicate, the cross is still in this monastery. The monastery as well as the cross may not even exist. Whether these diamonds are somewhere here, in Italy, or in some cave in Crete, we don't know. But we are positive of one thing; since Molotov passed this information on to Evan, we're ahead of al-Qaeda in this race for their diamonds. If they don't get them, that would be the end of their Pandora Plan, or at least it would be a major setback. They'd have to secure other funding. Luckily, it was in Evan's arms that Molotov died and not somebody working for al-Qaeda. Also, we learned this morning that Evan's girlfriend's brother was killed in a drunken driving accident last night. The funeral's Saturday. I plan on attending from afar. One more thing is my amazement at the fact that the information I've been posting on my web log since I've been in Rome is for the most part going unnoticed. Strange that while I was in the States I was being tracked down with nearly every word I typed. I'm being sarcastic, but truly it's as if my activity over here is going completely unnoticed Stateside. Which, I suppose, is both a blessing and a curse. More later.