‘Good Lord, no. Jake is as straight as a die. But he started getting suspicious that someone was leaking information about where we would be raiding next, so I had to cast doubt on Colonel Quincy, though in reality Quincy is totally innocent.’ He paused, uneasy. ‘I then had to make Quincy suspicious of Jake to cover paintings and other things that were missing from our stores of artefacts. Damn bad, I admit.’
‘Damn bad,’ she echoed.
‘You’ve really messed things up now, killing Drago Vincelli like that. Who is going to run the Caesar Club now?’
Vincelli’s body lay half in shadow, already departed from this world. The stink of blood was strong.
‘Listen, Harry, it’s not too late to . . .’
The gun jabbed harder into the back of her head.
‘Sorry, Caterina. Really sorry.’
Face to face with death, Caterina felt it strip her of everything except who she was. She slowed the wild panic of her heart, and held on only to what mattered to her. Her love for her family. For Luca. For Nonno. And yes, even for her dissolute mother. But it was the depth of her love for Jake Parr that took her by surprise. It was a fierce consuming thing that burned through her veins and devoured the best of her. It made her stronger in ways she did not know she could be strong and she knew she could not bear to let it go.
With a rapid step to one side, she jerked her head around to face Harry.
‘At least look me in the eyes when you kill me, Captain Fielding.’
His handsome face looked sad. But nothing more.
‘Goodbye, Caterina.’ The black eye of the gun stared straight at her forehead. ‘I’ll miss you.’
The explosion of the gunshot crashed against the rock walls, but Caterina felt no pain, no splitting of bones and brain. Instead of crumpling to the ground, she watched in confusion as Harry Fielding twitched, as though a wasp had stung his neck, then folded his limbs neatly to lie flat on the stone floor. Blood, as black as ink in this unlit patch, spilled in a torrent from a raw hole in his throat.
Jake saw his friend fall. Instantly he was overwhelmed with grief. He had fired the bullet himself from his Colt .45, but he stared at his own hand in horror, appalled by its betrayal, sickened by what it had done.
But Caterina was still alive. Still breathing, still standing, and the relief of it outweighed his grief. He darted forward to Harry’s side and saw Caterina scoop up her old revolver from the floor and point it squarely at Aldo.
‘Don’t move,’ she warned.
Jake threw down his torch and tore off his jacket. He knelt beside his comrade and used the jacket to press down hard on the wound. If he could stem the flow of blood, there was a chance, but it kept coming and coming.
‘Harry,’ he said urgently, ‘stay with me, my friend. Hold onto me.’ He wrapped one of Harry’s hands around his arm and saw the faintest flicker of his pale eyelids. His slack mouth opened but no sound emerged.
‘Jake! Watch out!’
It was Caterina’s voice. He wrenched his attention away from Harry and saw Aldo charging down on him, a knife in his hand, coming for his undefended back.
In that instant, Caterina stepped towards Aldo and pulled the trigger of her gun, but Jake heard the heart-stopping click of a gun jamming. The old Bodeo had failed. He snatched at his own gun which lay discarded on the ground beside him, but his hands were slippery with blood and he fumbled it.
When the massive shadow was about to crash down on him with the knife, he saw something leap through the air. A flash of white. A dog sank its fangs into the arm with the knife. Aldo roared and smashed the animal against the rock wall where it slithered to the floor, motionless.
Though it had gained Jake precious seconds in which to seize his gun, he knew it was too late. But out of nowhere the long thin blade of a sword arced up from the ground and bit deep into Aldo’s armpit. He heard Aldo’s scream, a sound that scraped the surface off the rock.
Jake leapt to his feet, but Aldo was already vanishing through the rear entrance to the cavern. He put out a hand to Caterina who was standing with a bloodied sword still in her grip.
‘Give me your gun, Jake. I’ll go after him . . .’
For half a second he pulled her close to him, touched his cheek to hers. ‘No. Stay here,’ he said. ‘Try to slow the bleeding on Harry. Quickly now, while I . . .’
For the first time in the dim light he saw the body of Vincelli and his words dried.
What kind of hellhole was he leaving her in?
Without another word, he seized his torch and took off after Aldo.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Caterina crooned to Harry. He was dead. He would not hear her song of sorrow, but she stroked his fair hair off his face in the subterranean gloom and quietly sang a psalm for him to ease his path from life. She crouched beside his body, head bowed, and held his chill hand tight between hers as if her warmth could delay his journey.
How long she crouched there, she didn’t know. The psalm had ceased. Her fear for Jake prowled through the darkness around her and she did not count the number of times she ceased breathing to listen for his footstep.
He should be back by now. Had he found Aldo?
Was he safe?
Should she abandon her vigil and race through the tunnel?
She closed her eyes to shut out death and darkness, and summoned up instead an image of Jake alive and laughing, his skin naked and gleaming gold in the lamplight. As it had in her house last night when she had lain on top of him, skin on skin, life on life. Her American soldier, whom she would not allow death to lay a finger on, was now in danger of . . .
A murmur came out of the gloom. The unmistakable rustle of long skirts made her eyes fly open and she saw three women dressed in black, two tall and one short. Her mind must be playing tricks. The figures loomed over her like three witches and she was ready to strike out in panic, but a hand gently touched her head.
‘Caterina, bella, hush that sound.’
It was Signora Bartoli, the jeweller’s wife. Caterina was keening over Harry and hadn’t even heard the mournful sound drifting out of her mouth. She jumped to her feet and by the light of the three extra torches that had entered the cavern, she recognised the stern faces of Augusta Cavaleri and Octavia di Marco. She stared at them open-mouthed, baffled by their presence.
‘You didn’t think I would leave you all alone, did you, Caterina?’ Signora Bartoli spoke kindly.
‘What are you all doing here?’
‘We are here,’ Octavia di Marco said with an urgency that Caterina had never heard from her before, ‘because we three are friends, bound together by our oath to help liberate Italy.’
Nothing made any sense.
‘Caterina,’ Signora Bartoli explained, ‘before you left my house with the key to these tunnels, I telephoned Augusta and Octavia. I knew they needed to be here.’
With a sudden intake of breath, Augusta Cavaleri broke the circle as she caught sight of the dead body of Drago Vincelli. She strode over and stood beside it, gazing down without a word, just her robes rustling as she fingered the rosary beads that hung from her neck.
‘Signora Bartoli,’ Caterina demanded, ‘what is going on?’
‘It is time you knew the truth. You have come so close, far closer than we ever expected.’
Truth? Caterina’s mouth went dry at the thought. Truth had a cold finely honed edge that could cut you in pieces.
‘Yes, I want the truth,’ she said.
It was Octavia di Marco who started to speak, calm and unhurried, her eyes fixed on Caterina’s. Only the soft click of the rosary beads intruded into the cavern’s silence. She talked of the agonies that Italy had suffered for more than twenty years under the Fascist dictatorship of Benito Mussolini. The killings. The beatings. The fear. And the destruction of the country’s spirit till it was face down in the dirt.
But throughout the country brave men and women had fought back – the partisans. These rebels had sabotaged the r
egime in every corner with bombs, assassinations and secret spies. Many gave their lives, were caught and executed. And when the Germans came, the partisans fought again just as fiercely to rid Italy of the Nazi jackboot.
‘In Naples,’ she continued, ‘there was a group of these men who met in secret under the guise of the Caesar Club, a drinking fraternity. Your father was one of them.’
‘And my Orlando was another,’ pointed out the jeweller’s wife, ‘as well as Augusta’s son, Roberto, before he ran off to Rome with your mother.’
Augusta Cavaleri’s voice cut in sharply. ‘This man fought courageously at their side.’ She pointed down at Drago Vincelli’s bloodied body. ‘He was an explosives expert, destroyed railtracks and bridges. But he grew greedy when one day he derailed a freight train and found it was transporting treasures stolen from Naples museum. That was the end of his loyalty to Italy.’ She spat on the man at her feet and it slithered down his cheek.
Caterina could sense the hatred in the air as she turned back to Octavia di Marco. ‘My father was a master craftsman. He knew nothing about bombs.’
‘Yes, they were all getting older, so they switched to raising money to finance the guns and missions of the younger partisans.’
Realisation hit Caterina and a mix of anger and relief swept through her. ‘By repairing stolen works of art and selling them to wealthy buyers all over the world. Using Italy’s own wealth to build a new stronger Italy.’
‘Exactly. But Drago got too greedy. He always wanted more and more for himself. And as chairman of the Caesar Club he persuaded other members to do the same, selling the artefacts to line their own pockets instead of to finance the resurgence of Italy.’ Octavia stared at the inert body of Vincelli. ‘He always feared you, Caterina.’
‘Me?’
‘He was afraid you knew too much because you worked so closely with your father. He was frightened you would betray the club.’
Papà, you should have told me. Warned me. So I would have been ready.
Vincelli’s dying words came back to her. No military bombs . . . not from the planes.
‘He claimed that the bomb that killed my father was planted by someone. The police were bribed to lie that it fell from a plane.’ Caterina felt, rather than heard, the air escape from the women’s lungs. ‘Who?’ she asked, her voice louder. ‘Who did it? Tell me.’
There was silence. For a full minute no one spoke.
‘I did it.’
Three small words of confession.
From beside the body, Augusta Cavaleri looked steadily into Caterina’s face and said again, ‘I did it.’
But this time there was fury in every syllable.
‘If your father had kept his wife happy in bed, she would not have needed to steal my son. The day I heard of my Roberto’s death in Rome, I knew his soul would demand vengeance. I begged a bomb from Drago and set it off in your father’s workshop when he was busy in the back room.’ She struck her fist against her own breast with sudden passion. ‘I am Italian. We believe in revenge. An eye for an eye, a life for a life. It is the Italian way.’
‘I believe in family,’ Caterina declared fiercely. ‘I have protected mine.’
Signora Bartoli nodded. ‘You protected them well.’
Caterina advanced on the tall figure of Augusta Cavaleri. ‘And the Rocco brothers too? Did they see you enter my father’s workshop the day of the bomb?’
The scar on the proud woman’s face gleamed silver like the mark of Cain. ‘If your soldier friends had stayed out of it, and not come asking questions in the street, it would not have been necessary.’
No remorse. No shame. No guilt at taking a knife to the throats of four men who would let her come close because she was a woman. They trusted her. All Caterina could see was Augusta Cavaleri’s pride that she had defended her family’s honour.
‘Who bribed the police?’ Caterina asked.
‘It doesn’t matter. Not now,’ Octavia di Marco murmured.
‘It matters to me. Was it the Count?’
Octavia laughed scornfully. ‘No. Count di Marco cares for nothing but his own ivory palace.’
‘It was Drago,’ Augusta Cavaleri replied. ‘Drago bribed Commissari Balzano to report that it was a bomb dropped from an Allied aeroplane.’
‘Why would Drago Vincelli do that?’
‘Dear Mother of God, will you never understand, Caterina Lombardi? Drago Vincelli was my sister’s son. My nephew. Even though he turned bad and stole Italy’s treasures for his own selfish greed. Still, he was family.’
It was half an hour before Jake emerged from the maze of black tunnels back into the cavern with its treasures. His shirt was stiff with blood, but it was Harry’s blood.
He could not bear the touch of it on his skin. He knew that the memory of that split second in his life when he was forced to pull the trigger and kill his friend would never leave him. It would stalk his nights, dragging its claws through his dreams. Caterina had been blocking his shot, her back to him, standing unknowingly between him and Harry. He’d had no choice, no time. It had to be a head shot or the neck. He chose the neck in the hope the wound would not prove fatal, but he knew the moment he saw the damage that it was a vain hope.
When he reached the cavern it was a blur of people in uniform. Someone must have alerted the authorities because they were here in force, police and army, dark suits and white medical coats, with voices raised and language barriers that made the confined space feel as if it would burst. But Jake’s eyes saw only Caterina.
She stood tight against a wall, refusing with a shake of the head to leave each time she was ordered to do so. She looked small and resolute, her face drained of colour, her hands twisting together and covered in dried blood, but when her eyes found his, they came back from the dead.
She stood quietly while he cut a path through the crowd to her, and he wanted to take her into his arms. Instead he placed his hands on her shoulders and looked carefully into her face.
‘I didn’t find Aldo,’ he said quietly. ‘I’m sorry. He escaped. Even though he was wounded, I lost him. He turned a corner and vanished among the tunnels. I’m sorry.’
‘He must know these secret passageways very well and have escape routes already laid out in his mind.’
‘Were you frightened I was lying dead too?’
‘You were a long time,’ she said simply.
‘You must trust me.’
‘I do.’
She wrapped a fist into his bloody shirt front and held on to it. He kissed her forehead and they stood like that together, his lips on her skin, their hearts beating in rhythm.
‘Outside, please, sir,’ said a British corporal in an officious tone.
Caterina took Jake’s hand and led him away from the darkness.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
The glass was cool in Caterina’s hand, the prosecco dry and delicious. Her grandfather’s hand caressed her cheek, reluctant to leave it, and his lips found her forehead and lingered there.
‘You are your father’s daughter,’ he declared with pride. ‘You possess his heart and his courage. He fought for Italy like a lion and now you, my Caterina, fight for the Lombardi family.’
‘And you say that Signora Bartoli, Augusta Cavaleri and Octavia di Marco fought too? Alongside Papà?’
‘Ah yes. You should have seen those three women in their youth. They were warriors.’ Her grandfather laughed and Caterina realised it was a sound she had not heard since her father died. ‘They handled a rifle as well as any man. Italy needs women like them. It is tragic that Augusta Cavaleri lost her reason after her son was shot and cared for nothing but vengeance.’
He was prowling up and down the room, swinging his long limbs, unable to keep them still, suddenly a man ten years younger. The smell of burning filled the room as Luca fed Harry Fielding’s map to the flames in the firebasket.
‘Nonno, why didn’t you tell me the truth long ago?’
‘Oh, Caterina, becaus
e I was frightened Drago Vincelli would come to kill you or your brother if you angered him, and I knew I would be unable to defend you. But now,’ the smile would not stay off his face, resurfacing each time he tried to banish it, ‘now you have done what I would have done years ago if I’d had my eyes. Put a bullet in Drago Vincelli’s heart.’
Put a bullet in Drago Vincelli’s heart.
The words lay heavy on her own heart. She would carry them with her for the rest of her life, just as she knew Jake would carry the guilt of killing his friend. But now she knew she had a life, and so did Luca. Her brother turned and grinned at her.
‘Don’t look sad, Caterina,’ he said, ‘I heard that a new troopship from Cairo docked in Naples today on its way home to England. Lots more customers for our music boxes.’
She heard the word – our. Our music boxes. And she smiled because she knew she would need a bigger workshop.
Nonno swung out his arm and pointed directly at where he knew his own carved chair to be.
‘And you,’ he said as he strode over to it, ‘Major Parr, you have the respect of Giuseppe Lombardi.’
In the chair Jake was taken by surprise at the sudden approach and Caterina laughed when her grandfather swooped down on him, took his face between his two strong hands and kissed him soundly on each cheek.
‘To you, Major Parr,’ her grandfather announced solemnly, ‘I give my thanks and my heart for saving my Caterina’s life. You will always be welcome in this house.’
‘Thank you, Signor Lombardi.’ Jake smiled as he looked straight across at Caterina and said, ‘I hope I will be.’
She didn’t smile. Or laugh. Or make it easy. She nodded. And that was it. Caterina’s promise to him.
Nothing had changed.
The mountain-top terrace of the di Marco villa on Capri still dazzled with its whiteness. Even Octavia di Marco in her black mannish suit hovered with a tray of freshly squeezed lemonade, silent and watchful as though the underground cavern had never existed.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Caterina said sincerely. ‘I feel responsible. Is Bianchezza any better?’
The Liberation Page 41
