… covered with faces …
I moved out of the Caracalla auditorium on a tide of spectators too deep to be trawled. In any case there was little sign of special police activity at the exits and I guessed this meant that my Trinity scholar had made his escape. Passengerless, once back on the road he’d just be another scooter-rider. I climbed into one of the innumerable coaches waiting to pick up tour parties and drop them at their hotels. A courier counted heads, looked a little puzzled, decided one too many was better than one too few, and we were off.
The first hotel we stopped at was in the Via Cavour. I got out and drifted through the plate glass doors with the crowd. There was a large, comfortably appointed lounge on the ground floor and I settled down in the corner furthest from the door. I wasn’t altogether certain what to expect back at my own hotel. It didn’t seem likely that the police could have got a line on me unless they’d talked to Teresa and she’d put them on to me. I doubted if she would. But at the very least, my Trinity scholar would have reported back to the Brigadier and there’d be a little reception committee anxiously awaiting my return.
I wanted a moment to relax and also to check through the contents of Kate’s handbag to see if there were any clues to her reasons for being in Rome.
It was in my inside pocket. I opened it surreptitiously beneath my jacket and started emptying it out bit by bit.
It didn’t take long.
Lipstick, compact; billfold; keyring. There were three keys, one for a car, two Yale type. They could tell a great deal if there were any way to make them speak.
Then there was a cigarette packet, an Italian brand. Ten years ago Kate hadn’t smoked. Had she started? There didn’t seem to be any lighter. I opened the packet. It was empty. But there was something scribbled on the inside.
It was Teresa’s address and telephone number.
There was only one thing more in the bag, a sheet of writing paper folded once.
I opened it and knew at once even before I read the words that this round uncluttered hand was my daughter’s.
Dear Mummy, he’s in Rome and looking for me so I’m going off somewhere safe. I’ll be with friends, so don’t worry, and I’ll be in touch as soon as I can. Love, Angie.
There were no prizes for guessing who he was, and not many for guessing who had got to Angelica with such a picture of a deranged father in mad pursuit of his daughter that she had climbed into that fiery red two-seater and roared off—to where?
The bastard. If I’d had my nephew Vasco within reach at that moment, he’d have found out just how deranged I could be.
What Teresa’s part was in all this I couldn’t yet fathom and there was no way I was going to be able to ask her till the police activity around her block of flats had abated. My guess was that the cigarette packet address had been scribbled by Vasco and given to Angelica for use in emergencies, that Kate knew nothing about the Carducci connection and, far from reassured by Angelica’s brief note, she had headed straight round to the flat when she came across the packet in her daughter’s room.
And at the apartment block, she had run into—what?
Speculation had gone as far as it could. One thing was clear to me. Kate and Angelica hadn’t picked on Rome as their refuge by accident. The Brigadier had some explaining to do.
I returned Kate’s things to my pocket and stood up. It was nearly midnight and I felt weary. It had been a long, demanding day and I had the feeling there was a lot of mileage in it yet.
I went out into the Via Cavour and set off at a brisk pace towards the Piazza Barberini.
There was no sign of any police activity at my hotel, no reason why there should have been. I was Alexander Evans, computer salesman. What link could the Italian police make between me and Kate, Lady Bessacarr? None, without help.
But there was a light on in my bedroom and the sound of voices.
I opened the door with the utmost caution.
Seated on my dressing-table stool was Reilly watching television.
‘There you are,’ she said, without moving her eyes from the screen. ‘Enjoyed your evening, have you?’
‘So-so,’ I said, heading for the whisky bottle.
‘I hear you corpsed your old lady,’ she went on as I poured myself a generous measure.
‘You hear wrong,’ I said.
‘Is that right? You just happened to be kneeling over her with a knife in your hand when the police arrived?’
‘How do you know that?’ I demanded.
‘I have it from the highest authority in the land,’ she said.
‘Not the Pope, surely?’
For answer, she nodded at the TV screen.
‘It’s made big news,’ she said. ‘Not the murder, that’s pretty run-of-the-mill. But interrupting Aida, that really hit them where it hurts. That was you, wasn’t it?’
‘It wasn’t my idea,’ I said. ‘You can blame your mad scooterist for that. Not that I wasn’t grateful to see him again.’
‘I bet,’ she said, giving me her full attention now. ‘Swifty, are you really saying you didn’t do it?’
‘Really, Reilly,’ I said. ‘But I’m not begging to be believed. Where’s the Brigadier? There’s a couple of questions I need to ask.’
‘Oh, he’s around,’ she said vaguely. ‘He’ll be keen to talk to you, I’ve no doubt.’
‘Well, you’ll do for starters,’ I said. ‘Tell me, Reilly, why did you decide to bring Kate and Angelica to Rome?’
To my surprise she didn’t hesitate about replying.
‘Not Rome,’ she said. ‘Ostia. They were nice and handy there. We put them in a safe house, a little villa near the beach. You weren’t likely to run into them unless you decided to spend a day sunbathing.’
‘Didn’t you have someone watching them?’ I demanded.
‘Certainly,’ she said. ‘Your daughter seemed to be happy enough improving her tan on the beach and being chatted up by the local Romeos. Your ex-wife didn’t care for that too much, though, the sun-worship, I mean.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘She never did.’
‘She got restless, but she rapidly made friends. She spent today cruising around with some of them in a motor yacht.’
‘That sounds like Kate. And Angelica?’
‘Same routine as always. Sunbathing, swimming, teasing the lads. She went back to the villa in the middle of the afternoon, presumably for a siesta. Our man had his at the same time, it seems. He had no idea she’d gone till your wife came back and started yelling. Then later she went missing too. Well, we know where she went. What we don’t know is why. Any ideas, Swifty?’
My instinct was to trust her and pool all my ideas with hers. But to trust someone whose profession was deviousness would be a great foolishness. And besides, whereas previously we had perforce shared the common aim of wanting to get a line on my father, now our paths had parted. Angelica was my only concern, finding her my only object. And I thought I knew how I could do it.
But not with the Brigadier and Reilly in tow.
I passed my hand over my eyes and swayed slightly.
‘You OK, Swifty?’ she asked, swinging round on the stool to face me.
‘Fine, thanks. A bit worn out,’ I said. ‘God, Reilly, it’s a mess, isn’t it? Where do we go from here?’
I looked down at her helplessly and reached out my hands.
‘It’ll be OK, I promise you,’ she said sympathetically, taking my hands. ‘Don’t worry.’
‘I’ll try not to,’ I said and drew her up towards me. She raised her mouth to be kissed and I butted her between the eyes with my forehead.
Even half-numbed with pain, her reflexes nearly caught me. She fell backwards using my own wrist-grips to draw me after her, the whiles swinging her knees upwards to drive into my belly.
I let go, not so easy as it sounds. The natural instinct is to hang on to a falling body. Normally she would have done a simple backward roll, or even a back-flip if she’d felt in the mood, ending o
n her feet. But this time my head-blow had slowed her down and she exacerbated the damage by allowing her own head to crack sickeningly against the tiled floor.
She lay twisted and still beside the fallen chair. I approached cautiously and then with growing anxiety as I realized this was no ruse to lower my defences. She was out cold. I checked her pulse and raised her lids to peer into her eyes. Then I ran my fingers gently over the back of her skull. I could detect no sign of a fracture and her breathing was deep and regular. I laid her on the bed on her side to lessen the chance of vagal inhibition if she happened to vomit. Why I should feel quite so guilty I didn’t know. I shook off the feeling as best I could and swiftly changed my clothes and collected what I wanted—money, passport, my little wallet of keys and instruments, and my pistol. I also wanted to take some spare clothing with me—socks, pants, plus my shaving kit, but I needed something to carry it in. Reilly had a kind of mini duffel-bag with her. I tipped out the contents on the bed. They included a tiny double-shot automatic which looked far too ladylike for Reilly and a set of brass knuckledusters which were far more in keeping. Also a pencil torch which I appropriated. Quickly I stowed my gear in the bag. It was surprisingly capacious and I even managed to get a spare pair of slacks and a T-shirt in.
Reilly stirred as I finished. I checked her eyes again. She looked OK.
Then I was on my way, the parfit gentil knight, accoutred to do doughty deeds to rescue and protect his lady.
At the door I wondered how many knights had looked back longingly at their comfortable bed and wished they were getting into it rather than setting out on the road.
Most of them, I guessed. And left.
An hour later I was back at Teresa’s apartment. It had only taken me twenty minutes to get there, but I approached with utmost caution. A black Mercedes moved away from in front of the apartment block as I approached. Probably nothing to do with Teresa, but it had sent me diving into a shadowy doorway like a rabbit down a burrow. There were two people in the car but I couldn’t identify their gender let alone their persons. Friend or foe, they’d done me a favour by leaving the main door to the block slightly ajar. Or perhaps it just meant there was a cop on duty at the scene of the crime so it could be examined inviolate by daylight. Well, I was ready to deal with him if necessary.
It wasn’t. The hallway was empty. Reilly’s torch ran round the angles. The floor where Kate had lain looked as if it had been scrubbed. That would be typically Italian, some house-proud mamma coming out with a bucket as soon as the pozzi had gone to scrub out the evidence! But who needs evidence when you’ve caught your killer in the act?
I shuddered and went up the stairs.
On the dark landing I knelt and began to work on the lock. I’d noted the make when I was there earlier and now tried a selection of possible keys. None of them fitted—that would have been too lucky a strike—but I was getting close with one of them, inserting it, turning till I felt a slight pressure, removing it and modifying the teeth with an instrument like a nail cutter which sliced through the soft metal if not like butter, at least like steak.
One final adjustment and I had it. They key turned. What I feared now was either a chair or bolts. But the door swung open easily and soundlessly.
I stepped inside.
The first thing I did was to check the door with my pencil torch. Yes, there were bolts, two of them, formidably massive. A woman alone in an apartment like this would automatically slip them home before she went to bed. At least, so it seemed to me.
Either—she wasn’t in.
Or—she had gone to bed but was expecting someone with a key to appear later. (Vasco?)
Or there was someone else here and they didn’t want to place any obstacles in the way of illegal entry.
I had drawn my gun.
There was someone here, I could sense it. Emptiness feels empty. Building are like bodies, you know before you look if there’s any life left in them. Now when I listened I could hear it.
Breathing.
Someone was attempting to control it but couldn’t. This gave me comfort. Your professional would at least know the art of perfect stillness. I crouched low and made my way towards the one door my little pinpoint of light had shown me to be ajar. When I reached it, I lay down completely flat. An amateur’s eyes would be focused at head level.
I counted three to steady myself, then thrust the door open with my shoulder as I rolled into the room. The door went right and I went left, finishing up against the foot of a bed. Here I lay, pressing myself tight against the wooden bed leg. Silence flooded back into the room. Then the breathing started again.
I spoke with my mouth close to the floor to make source-location difficult.
‘Say something or I come up shooting. I’ve got two more men outside. I don’t want trouble, just a chance to talk. But I’ll shoot if I have to.’
Silence again. Real silence this time. The breath was being held. I decided to risk the torch, cautiously stretching my arm out to full length above my head to distance the target if it brought a hail of bullets.
I flicked it on. Nothing. I could see the edge of the high old-fashioned bed by which I lay. I had a sense that someone was lying on it and I decided to be clever, roll underneath it and come up the other side. One, two, three, go! Only I didn’t go far. I was fetched up short by a bulky obstacle.
I turned the torch on it and illuminated a pair of wide eyes staring back at me from a distance of about eighteen inches.
I yelled and rolled back.
When I brought the light to bear again, the eyes were still there, still open, still staring. But they weren’t seeing me, any more than the gaping mouth was drawing in the life-giving air.
I recognized that jaw now. This was Piltdown, the man who’d fired at me in the Forum. The torchlight picked out a dark stain low in his ribcage. The same blow that had killed Kate. I’d half nominated Piltdown for that crime. It seemed I’d been wrong again.
The breathing had started again, I realized. At least I knew whose it wasn’t. I said, ‘Teresa?’
‘Tonto, is that you?’
The voice was faint and distant but not in terms of space.
I rose slowly and let the little O of torch-light fall like an exclamation on the bed. It was covered with faces; solemn, smiling; in groups, alone; young, old. Someone had strewn the counterpane with snapshots for a family album. But among them was one face as still as those photo-printed ones, but touched with an agony it would have taken an artist’s brush to convey.
Only an hour ago I’d left one woman lying unconscious on a bed.
Now here was another outstretched before me. ‘Teresa!’ I cried.
There was a lamp by the bedside. I snapped it on. This one was conscious all right. Her wide brown eyes regarded me unblinkingly but with the sparkle of life.
But unconscious or not I could tell at a glance that Reilly had been better off.
15
… a romantic violinist …
Teresa’s head was resting on a pillow sodden with blood from a huge gash across her left temple. Someone had hit her very hard with a metal club, probably a gun barrel. There was blood trickling from her mouth too and her lips were bruised and puffy. But these were not the injuries which caught my gaze.
Someone had been working on her fingernails. Several were completely detached and the ends of all her fingers were bloody and swollen.
Her legs were tightly bound at the ankles. I swept aside the photographs littering her body and cut the binding. She cried out in new agony as the blood began to circulate into her feet once more. I took that as a good sign—at least she had not progressed beyond that point of no return where pain no longer matters.
I went back into the living-room and dialled the emergency service. I returned to the bedroom with a bowl of warm water and some disinfectant from the bathroom. I washed the head wound but didn’t dare touch the fingernails. I felt angry and helpless.
I’d noticed a bottle of
grappa in the living room and I fetched it. I managed to get a little between Teresa’s lips but she quickly gagged and shook her head to show she’d had enough.
I finished the glass myself. It was violent stuff but I was beginning to feel violent.
Teresa was trying to speak.
I said, ‘Lie still. There’s an ambulance coming.’
She said, ‘No time,’ very slowly and deliberately.
I thought for a moment she was making a medical prognosis and my alarm must have shown. She shook her head and glanced towards the grappa. I gave her another sip and this time it seemed to give her a little strength.
‘Tonto,’ she said with difficulty. ‘You must go.’
I was reassured by the sight of a healthier colour returning to her cheeks.
‘Who did this, Teresa?’ I asked urgently.
A man. Russian, I think. Krylov, Vasari called him.’
‘Who’s Vasari?’
‘In the Party. A colleague of my dead husband’s. I never liked or trusted him.’ Her voice increased in strength as though charged with the energy of hatred. A Moscow arse-licker. But I let him in because I knew him. The other followed. Like a violin-player he looked, all Slavic and soulful. But he did this …’
She raised her ruined hands momentarily.
And the man under the bed, who is he?’
My mind was so full of questions that the lightest and most unnecessary were forcing their way to the top.
‘Giuseppe … a friend. I would not have let Vasari in if Giuseppe had not been here …’
Incredibly, even in her own pain, tears for her dead friend were rolling down her cheeks.
‘Why did he want to kill me? In the Forum?’
‘He was there to protect me … he thought you were attacking me … if he’d wanted to kill … he was a crack shot …’
And a lot of good it had done him, I thought brutally. I could hear the sound of a distant siren. Perhaps I should have been more ruthless and not telephoned for help till I’d tried talking to Teresa. I was sure that Reilly wouldn’t have risked being interrupted till she’d squeezed every last drop of information out of the suffering woman. On the other hand, perhaps I should be glad to realize I was staggering back towards the human race.
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