All He Saw Was the Girl

by Peter Leonard

  Ray moved down the dock, turned when he was halfway across the lawn and saw them drenched, coming out of the lake.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Angela put her purse on the kitchen counter and opened a bottle of Chianti Classico, her last '97 Antinori, and poured herself a glass. She was tense, nerves frazzled after a two- hour dinner with her father and his surprise guest, cousin Joey from America, visiting for a few months, staying at her father's villa outside Rome.

  Joey had talked about himself through three courses: tagliatelle and fresh white truffles that the owner, Signor Moro, sliced on their pasta at the table. The secondo piatto was veal chops that were as thick as a Russian novel. That was followed by insalata verde and formaggio, tiramisu and espresso.

  Joey had talked about his house on Lake St Clair in an area called Harrison Township. You should see the sunsets, Joey said. He talked about his boat and about his cars, talking with his mouth full. Her father did not seem to listen or pay attention. Sat hunched over his plate, shoveling food in his mouth, eyes moving around the room.

  At one point, Joey said, "What's with him?" Pointing to Mauro, her father's bodyguard sitting at the bar. "What's the story, Unk, you don't eat with the hired help?"

  He grinned and gulped more Amarone, drinking it too fast.

  Her father said, "Do not ask about matters that are not your concern."

  Angela liked that, her father telling him to mind his own business. She could see that Joey annoyed him too.

  Joey grinned, "Take it easy, Unk, I'm just having some fun with you, yanking your chain."

  He rubbed his eyes and wiped his fingers on his pants.

  Angela said, "What brings you to Rome?"

  "You know, get away for a while," Joey said. "I been here four days, I've got to ask you where the hot spots are at? Deadest town I ever been to in my life. Lights out at like nine o'clock."

  Angela said, "What are you looking for?"

  "Action," Joey said. "What do you think?"

  It had been a couple of years since she had seen him. He looked older, heavier, most of the weight around his middle like a tire that had been inflated, and his hair was thinning on top, but these imperfections did not seem to affect his confidence. He reminded her of an actor playing the role of a TV Mafia character.

  When Joey got up to use the toilet, Angela said to her father, "What is the matter? You have not said a word."

  "How can I?" her father said. "He never closes his mouth — even when he is eating."

  He picked up his glass, sipped his wine. She could tell he liked it, his expression changing when he took a sip. His eyes looked across the room and then back to her.

  He said, "Are you still seeing that street punk?"

  "Are you going to bring that up again?" He did business with Roberto, but did not approve of him. She had been so careful, trying to keep it a secret, and he had somehow found out. She was going to say: I see who I want, but said, "Do we have to talk about this now, ruin the dinner, our evening?" Because of Roberto, he had stopped supporting her, so as far as Angela was concerned, she was on her own. She could see who she wanted.

  Her father took another sip of wine and fixed his attention on her. "Are you doing okay? You have money to live?"

  "I'm fine," Angela said. Which was not completely truthful. She was almost out of money, but with her share of the ransom she could keep going for a while. She just had to get it from Roberto.

  "I want you to help me with Joey. You need money, I pay you to come over and take him out, get him away from me. He's driving me out of my mind."

  "Why is he here?" Angela said.

  "He is in trouble."

  "What kind of trouble?" She looked up and saw Joey coming back to the table.

  "I will tell you," her father said.

  Angela said, "Why is he your problem?"

  "What can I do? It's for my sister."

  After dinner her father ordered a glass of grappa. Angela and Joey walked down the street to see the Trevi fountain. Angela took his arm and they moved through the crowd, around the side of the fountain to the front to get a better view.

  Joey said, "What's this?"

  "One of the hot spots, the big attractions of Rome," Angela said.

  "All I see is a fountain. When I say action I'm talking about nightclubs."

  Angela said, "No visitor can leave Rome without seeing the Trevi fountain. It's called Trevi because three streets meet here: tre vie. Do you understand?" "I know," Joey said. "I seen it before." He was staring at the fountain. He pointed at a statue and said, "Who's that again?"

  "Neptune," Angela said. "God of the sea."

  "That's right," Joey said.

  They walked up to the edge of the pool.

  Joey said, "Look at all the coins in there."

  "People throw in three thousand euros a day," Angela said. "For good luck."

  He grinned. "Tell me you don't believe that bullshit."

  A vendor, an aggressive little dark-skinned Asian, approached them with an armful of roses. "Want to buy?" he said to Joey, big smile.

  "No want to buy," Joey said. "Get the fuck out of here. "

  The vendor kept smiling and said, "Want to buy?"

  Joey said, "Say that one more time I'm going to pick you up and throw you in the fucking water."

  "Take it easy," Angela said. "He doesn't understand you."

  "Let's have some fun," Joey said. "Put Unk to bed, hit some clubs. What do you say?"

  She told him she was too tired, but would pick him up the next morning, and show him the sights of Rome.

  "Oh, boy," Joey said. "I can hardly wait."

  Angela carried her wine into the bathroom, placed the stemmed glass on the sink and filled the tub with hot water. She was going to soak and relax, drink her wine. She could see the Colosseum lit up in the distance. This view was the reason she had fallen in love with the apartment. It was expensive, but her father was helping her in those days.

  She took her clothes off and dropped them in a pile on the bathroom floor and stepped in the tub, taking her time, getting used to the hot water. When she was all the way under, water covering her shoulders, she heard a sound — like a door closing. She thought it was Roberto and was disappointed, she wanted to be alone tonight. More than that, she could see their relationship coming to an end. She had lost interest in him, but didn't have the energy to tell him tonight, so she would have to think of an excuse to get rid of him.

  She said, "Roberto, is that you?" And then thought, who else would it be? "I'm in here." They were supposed to split up the money. With her share she was going to get away for a while — from her father who was trying to run her life, and from Roberto who needed someone to run his, but not her. She was thinking about Greece. Cruise the islands, lay in the sun for a week. Then she was thinking about going to Paris. Stay at a nice hotel, shop and eat and drink wine.

  She finished her Chianti and reached her arm out of the tub and put the glass on the tile floor. Now she stood up and grabbed a folded white towel off a warming rack attached to the wall and wrapped it around her and stepped out of the tub onto the Persian rug, a gift from her father. She dried herself and slipped on a white terrycloth robe and went into the living room and put on a Magic Numbers CD, a British group she liked, and played Love Is Just a Game, singing along to it, thinking about Roberto again. As soon as she received her share of the money she would tell him the relationship was over.

  Oh maybe I think, maybe I don't Maybe I will, maybe I won't…

  She danced into her bedroom and turned on the light. He was sitting on the bed, looking at her.

  McCabe watched her park the Lancia on the street, and walk in the building, but it wasn't the one he thought, the entrance was on the next block on Via del Monte Oppio. Her apartment building was the last one, bordering two streets, with an unobstructed view of the Colosseum lit up right there less than a hundred yards away. He parked on Via della Polveriera and waited. He saw lights go
on in an apartment and saw her in the window that was open. He got out of the car. There was a downspout that ran up the apartment wall a foot from her window. He climbed it with his backpack on. Reached out and touched the window, pushing one side all the way open. Now he reached over and grabbed the sill and jumped, arms through the window, body half inside the room, legs hanging over the edge, and shimmied his way in.

  He got up and bumped the window and it closed with a bang. She must have heard it. He was in her bedroom. He crouched next to the bed, listening. Heard her call Roberto, but Roberto didn't answer. McCabe heard her turn the water on and off a couple times. Heard her walk into the other room and put music on. Heard her singing and was surprised how bad her voice was, worse than his and that was saying something.

  She had a robe on and was drying her hair with a towel when she walked in the room, and turned on the light. She glanced at him sitting there and he sprang off the bed and tackled her, trying to pin her down, surprised how strong she was. She yelled and he put his hand over her mouth and she tried to bite him. He flipped her on her stomach, sat on her, pulling her arms back, and wrapped duct tape around her wrists. She yelled again and he put a piece over her mouth, and taped her feet together. He flipped her on her back. Her robe had come apart and he pulled it closed.

  He could see her arms flexing, trying to rip the tape and pull her hands free.

  McCabe said, "What's the matter? You're not glad to see me?

  She glared at him.

  He said, "Where's the money?" He pulled the tape off her mouth.

  "I don't know."

  "Then you've got a problem."

  He went in her closet and looked at her clothes and took out some things and threw them on the bed. He could see her eyes follow him. He went back in the closet, opened the top drawer of her dresser, looking at panties and thongs, and saw a small black pistol with a short barrel. He picked it up and went back in the room and said, "This what you're looking for?"

  "You better go some place and hide," she said. "Hope they don't find you."

  He put the tarp on the floor and unfolded it. He saw her watching him.

  "You're making a big mistake," she said. "You have no idea."

  He put the tape over her mouth again. "You're the one made the mistake."

  Now he had to get her out of the apartment without anyone seeing them. He walked across the apartment and looked out an east-side window down at Via del Monte Oppio. It was 1:15 a.m. He looked in both directions. The street was deserted.

  He found her keys and cell phone on a table near the front door. He put the phone in his shirt pocket and took the keys. There were two of them. He opened the door and tried the keys and found the one that worked. The second key had to open the door to the building.

  The stairs were made of white marble and very narrow and there was a small elevator that ran through the center of the apartment building. He went down and got the car and parked in front with the hatchback open. Now he went back upstairs and wrapped her in the tarp, and carried her over his shoulder, down a flight of stairs to the car. She fought him the whole way, squirming, moving, trying to make noise. He opened the hatchback and slid her in and closed it. He hadn't seen anyone and hoped no one had seen him.

  He went back to her apartment and got his backpack and her clothes. He filled two bags with food from her kitchen and took the stairs again, down to the car. He drove through the city and got on the autostrada, heading north to Viterbo, a fifty-minute drive at 1:30 in the morning with no traffic, following Pietro's directions to the house called Casale Vecchio, his summer home, McCabe replaying their conversation at the restaurant.

  "I met a girl," he'd said.

  Pietro had given him a sly grin. "A girl, eh? This is sounding good. An Italian girl?"

  "A good-looking Italian girl."

  "It is sounding better. And what, you want to bring her here for dinner?"

  "You told me I should visit your house in Lazio. Now I have a reason."

  He gave McCabe the keys and drew him a map.

  It was originally a hunting lodge — the walls were made out of perperino, volcanic stones. It had a tile roof and was built in 1782 on a hill overlooking the lush green countryside of Lazio. He could see Viterbo to the north, the clock tower, Palazzo del Podesta sticking up over the rooftops of the city.

  He pulled up the steep drive and parked and carried Angela inside and unwrapped the tarp on a rug in the main room. She was soaked with sweat and he could see fear or anger in her eyes, or both. He couldn't blame her, wrapped in a tarp for an hour. He felt bad about it. But he couldn't think of another way to get her out of the apartment without being seen.

  He pulled the strip of tape from her mouth. She didn't say anything, just looked up at him. Her robe had come apart down the middle where the sash had loosened, exposing the soft curve of her breasts, her flat stomach and the thin dark strip of hair between her legs. He knelt next to her and pulled it closed.

  "Don't touch me," she said.

  McCabe was thinking, okay, you don't care if your robe's open, I don't either.

  She said, "Where are we?"

  "In the country," McCabe said.

  "I have to use the toilet."

  McCabe took the Swiss Army knife out of his pocket and pulled a blade open and cut the duct tape binding her hands and feet. Now he helped her up and gave her the paper bag with her clothes, and took her to the bathroom. It had a ten- by-ten-inch window that looked down a steep hill to a valley, and beyond it rolling hills extending to a dark ridge of mountains in the distance. The room had a toilet and a sink, a mirror and stone walls and no way out except the door. He closed it and waited.

  Ten minutes later she came out wearing a pair of jeans and a white blouse, barefoot, red t-nails on the gray tile floor. The clothes seemed to change her attitude.

  She said, "Listen, take me back to the city. I will talk to them. I will see what I can do about getting your money."

  "Is that right?"

  "I will talk to Mazara," she said. "I will make sure you get some of it back."

  Like that was it. It was over. She was ready to go home now. McCabe said, "I don't want some of it. I want it all." He'd put the bags of groceries on a coffee table in the center of a furniture grouping. He was hungry and reached in a bag, grabbed a loaf of ciabatta and a wedge of pecorino romano. He said, "You want something to eat?" Looked up, and she was gone. He moved toward the front of the house, down a hallway into the salon. Checked the front door. It was locked. Behind him stairs led to the second level. The stairs, like everything else, were made of stone. He ran up and stood at the top. There was a bathroom straight ahead and bedrooms on both sides, moonlight coming through the upstairs windows casting light across the floor.

  He went right into a dark bedroom. The side window was open and he could see her on the roof, moving to the top of the pitch and then climbing over onto the other side, bare feet sliding on the curved tiles. He ran down the stairs into the main room, picked up the roll of duct tape, went into the kitchen and out the back door. A tile slid down the roof, hit gravel and broke in half.

  He waited under the overhang. Heard the low hum of the wind and felt a cold breeze come up the hill past the house. Heard her on the flat roof above him. He stepped out in the yard now and said, "How're you going to get down?"

  She had a roof tile in her hand and flung it at him. He stepped aside and it hit the ground. She said, "You're never going to get the money."

  Now a bat flew over the roof and dove at her.

  McCabe said, "Know what that is?"

  She tried to swat it and missed.

  "It's a bat," McCabe said. "Don't let it get tangled in your hair. It'll bite you and bats have rabies."

  The bat came at her again and she screamed, and moved to the edge of the roof and got down on her hands and knees. She lowered her body over the edge and hung there still five feet from the ground. McCabe reached up, grabbed her and brought her down, and ca
rried her inside. He took her to the bathroom and locked her in with a key that was sticking out of the lock. He went upstairs, got a blanket and pillow off one of the beds and brought them down and unlocked the bathroom door and threw them in.

  "I won't sleep in here."

  "You don't have a choice." He closed the door and locked it.

  She pounded on it for a while, and yelled some things in Italian he'd never heard before. She wasn't making it easy, but why did that surprise him? He took the bags of groceries in the kitchen and opened a bottle of wine and poured some in a glass. He cut a couple slices of cheese and ripped off a chunk of bread and went outside. Light was breaking over the hills. He'd get some sleep and see what Mazara had to say. See if he wanted his girlfriend back.

  Chapter Eighteen

  McCabe opened his eyes, looking up at the beamed ceiling and stone walls of Casale Vecchia, and for a split second forgot where he was. He got up and went outside and took a leak in the bushes next to the house. It was a bright clear day, a cool breeze blowing up the hill. He looked out across the lush green countryside and saw the dark shapes and angles of Viterbo about five kilometers away.

  He went back inside, splashed water on his face and brushed his teeth at the kitchen sink. He was tired, groggy. There was a clock on the wall. It was 9:30. He'd slept maybe three hours. He rubbed his eyes, yawned and stretched, trying to wake up.

  He'd brought eggs, pancetta and bread from Angela's apartment. He found coffee in the freezer, and put it in the coffee maker on the counter and made a pot. He fried the pancetta in a skillet on the stovetop. Cracked six eggs in a bowl and found a whisk in a drawer and beat them. The ciabatta was hard so he put it in the oven to soften it. He scrambled the eggs and sprinkled in grated cheese. Drained the pancetta on a paper towel to get rid of the grease. Took the bread out of the oven and buttered it. He put the eggs, pancetta and bread on heavy white plates and poured coffee in two mugs, put everything on a tray and took it to the dining table in the main room.