1954 - Mission to Venice

by James Hadley Chase

  “Yes. His wife brought it to me.”

  “This took time. There was now no hope of moving il signor Tregarth; he was too ill. All we could do was to wait for you to come. One night, Curizo came to our house when Louisa was out. He searched it from top to bottom. There was nothing I could do, you understand? I was alone. When he couldn’t find il signor Tregarth, he left. He never said one word to me all the time he was in the house. I knew then the situation was now very dangerous for Louisa. I begged her not to go near il signor Tregarth, but she said she couldn’t desert him. She went to work the next morning, and that was the last time I saw her. Late last night, the police came to tell me she was dead.”

  “Do you think Tregarth has escaped?” Don asked.

  “I don’t know. I think it is very unlikely.”

  “And you have no idea why these people are so anxious to find him?”

  “No, signore, I have no idea.”

  “I must continue to look for him,” Don said. “I will keep in touch with you. You have no one now to care for you?”

  The old man shook his head.

  “No one, signore.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll fix something for you immediately. Your daughter helped my friend; you won’t refuse my help, will you?”

  The old man shrugged.

  “No, I must accept it, signore. I don’t wish it, but I have no choice.”

  “I’ll get someone to come here and look after you,” Don said. “You must allow me to see you want for nothing.”

  “It will not be for long,” Peccati returned. “I am old and very tired. Life meant something to me when Louisa was here. It means nothing to me now.” He offered his hand. “Thank you for coming, signore. If you wish to make me happy, find and punish those two men.”

  “I promise you I’ll do that,” Don said, his face hardening. “I will see you again soon.”

  It was growing dark as he left the house. Cautiously he paused to look to right and left, before he moved out of the shelter of the dark doorway. Then satisfied there was no one in sight, he slipped down the dark Calle that ran by the side of the house.

  Seven: Rough House

  An hour later, Don was pacing impatiently up and down Giuseppe’s room. From time to time he looked at his watch, lit another cigarette and then continued his pacing. He was getting worried. Giuseppe should have been back half an hour ago. Had he run into trouble? Don again glanced at his watch. He would give him another five minutes, then he would go and look for him.

  Three minutes crawled by, then Don heard the street door open, and a moment later, Giuseppe entered. He was breathing heavily as if he had been running. He spread out his huge hands apologetically as he kicked the door shut.

  “I am sorry to have kept you waiting, signore,” he said, “but Anita had much to tell me and it is impossible to hurry her.”

  “I was beginning to worry about you,” Don said. “Well, what’s the news?”

  “I have made some notes so I would remember,” Giuseppe said, taking a piece of paper from his hip pocket. “You understand, signore, I am not used to . . .”

  “I understand,” Don broke in impatiently. “What did she tell you?”

  Giuseppe examined the paper with irritating slowness, cleared his throat and spat into the empty fireplace.

  “Well, signore, first she saw Manrico Rossi go to the house. He rapped on the door; someone opened it and he entered. Anita knows many people in Venice. She has lived here all her life, and she takes an interest in people. She knew it was Rossi because she has been many times to his shop.”

  “Okay; so Rossi was the first visitor. Who else?” Don asked, trying to hurry Giuseppe on.

  “Then two men she had never seen before came and stood outside the house. They didn’t seem too certain that it was the Campo del Salizo. Both these men, she is sure, were German. They were big and strong and not good men. They knocked on the door of the house and went in.”

  “She was quite sure she hadn’t seen them before?”

  “Yes, signore. One of them carried a suitcase. She thinks they had only just arrived from the railway station. She doesn’t know for certain, you understand, but that is what she thinks.”

  “Then what happened?”

  “An hour passed without anything happening,” Giuseppe said, frowning down at his notes. “Then Rossi came out. This will interest you, signore. When he went in, he was swaggering and proud: you understand? When he came out, he was a different man. He looked ill: he was very white, and he walked like an old man. He looked as if he had had a very bad shock: a fright.”

  “It was dark by then,” Don said sharply. “How could she tell?”

  “He came to the cafe and drank three brandies as fast as she could pour them. She asked him if he was ill, but he didn’t seem to hear her. He just drank the brandies, paid for them and went out. When he pulled out his money, his hand was shaking so badly, he dropped most of it on the floor.”

  Don rubbed the back of his neck and stared at Giuseppe.

  “He didn’t say anything?”

  “Nothing at all, signore. He went away, walking slowly like an old man. Then two other men arrived at the house. They paused near the cafe and Anita had a good view of them. One of them was a tall, thin young man, very blond and handsome. He was well dressed and rich looking.” Giuseppe scowled. “He made a big impression on Anita who you will understand is only a working girl and whose head is easily turned by riches.”

  Carl Natzka! Don thought. It must have been he.

  “And the other man?” he asked.

  “The other man Anita knows well. He was Dr. Avancini; a very fine doctor who has a big practice among the rich people.”

  “Did they go into the house?”

  “Yes, signore, and Anita noticed the doctor carried his bag as if he were going to see a patient.”

  Don nodded and his eyes brightened. This must mean that Tregarth was in the house! Why else should a doctor be taken there?

  “Then what happened?”

  “Then I came, signore, and Anita told me, and when I could stop her talking, I ran back here.”

  “The doctor is still in the house?”

  “He was when I left, signore. He may have gone by now.”

  A sudden sharp rapping on the street door made both men look at each other.

  “See who it is,” Don said, lowering his voice, “but watch out as you open the door.”

  Giuseppe went softly into the passage while Don took up his position behind the door where he could see into the passage through the crack between the door and the wall.

  “Who is it?” Giuseppe demanded roughly as he half opened the door.

  “Blimey! Another Eye-tie,” a cheerful cockney voice said. “Can’t you speak English, chum?”

  Don came out from behind the door and stepped into the passage.

  “It’s all right, Joe. Let him in.”

  Suspiciously, Giuseppe stood aside and opened the door.

  “Come on in, Harry,” Don said. “You’ve arrived just at the right time.”

  Harry Mason, Don’s chauffeur, walked into the passage. He stopped abruptly, stared at Don, then at Giuseppe, and his suntanned face suddenly hardened.

  “What’s the game?” he demanded. “I thought I heard Mr. Micklem’s voice. . .”

  “So you did,” Don said, smiling. “Don’t you recognize me, you dope?”

  Harry gaped at him, gulped, took a step forward and peered at him.

  “Blimey! Is that you, boss? Don’t tell me you raised all that fungus since you’ve been here?”

  “Come in and don’t talk so much,” Don said. “I’m damned glad to see you, Harry. We have a job on, and there’s no time for explanations.”

  He led the way back to Giuseppe’s room.

  Slightly bewildered, Harry followed him, dumped his suitcase in a corner and looked at Don inquiringly, “What’s up, boss?”

  Stocky, broad-shouldered and pugnacious, Harry res
embled an aggressive bull mastiff. He was an excellent man to have in any emergency, as Don well knew. During the war he had been a commando, and the hard, tough training had left him with a highly-developed talent for roughhousing and a cold, unshakable nerve.

  “A friend of mine is in serious trouble, Harry,” Don said. “At the moment he is in the hands of a bunch of thugs, and I have just found out where they are hiding him. We’re going to get him out. These fellows stick at nothing. They have already murdered a girl who was helping him. That’s how tough they are. I haven’t time now to give you details: I’ll tell you later. Right now, we’ve got to get a move on, if we are to get him out.”

  Harry’s face brightened. When he had received Don’s telegram to be at the airport, he had guessed Don had stirred up something, but this sounded even better than he had hoped.

  “I’m ready when you are, boss,” he said.

  Don turned to Giuseppe.

  “Can we get to the back of the house?”

  “It is backed by a rio, signore. We could go in my gondola.”

  “We can’t hope to surprise them if we go in the front way. We’d better take a look at the back of the house. But, first, find out if anything has happened at the house since you were there.

  Meet us at the gondola station, and be as quick as you can.”

  “Yes, signore,” Giuseppe said and went quickly from the room.

  “Come on,” Don said to Harry. “We’ll get down to the gondola.”

  As they hurried through the dark Calle Don gave Harry a very brief sketch of what had been happening since he had arrived in Venice.

  “From what Peccati tells me,” Don said as they reached the gondola station, “Tregarth is pretty ill. We have a job on our hands, but the three of us should be able to handle it. When we get him out, we’ll take him to my place. Then we must decide what to do with him.”

  “These blokes won’t like parting with him, will they, boss?” Harry said with a grin.

  “They won’t, but I daresay we’ll persuade them to change their minds.”

  At this moment Giuseppe came running along the molo.

  “No one has left the house yet, signore,” he panted as he came up.

  “The doctor’s still there?”

  “Yes, signore. No one has left.”

  “Okay. Let’s take a look at the back of the house. There are too many in there for us at the moment, but at least we can look. Come on; let’s go.”

  The long, black gondola slid through the darkness of the narrow rio, its lantern shedding a faint yellow light on the still waters. The big moon lit up the rooftops of the buildings on either side of the rio, but failed to penetrate below the top floor windows.

  It was so dark Don wondered how Giuseppe knew where he was going, and Harry, who had never been in a gondola, stared uneasily out of the cabin window, expecting the boat to crash at any moment into some unseen obstacle.

  Giuseppe said suddenly, “We’re close now, signore. Shall I put out the light?”

  “I’ll do it,” Don said, and leaving the cabin, he moved forward and doused the flickering flame.

  A few more strokes of the oar brought them close to the black outline of a house.

  Harry crawled out of the cabin and joined Don. They both stared up at the dark house towering above them. No lights showed. Ten feet above their heads they could see the outline of a balcony. Another ten feet higher up the moonlight lit up a small, iron-barred window.

  As far as they could see the wall of the house was as smooth as glass with no foot or hand holds to assist a climb.

  “If we had a rope and a hook, boss,” Harry muttered, “I could get up there as easy as kiss your hand.”

  Don nodded.

  “That’s what we want. I can’t see if the window’s barred like the one above, can you?”

  Harry shook his head.

  “It could be, boss. If this bloke’s ill, we’ll have a job getting him down, bars or no bars. We want a stretcher to make a job of it.”

  Don thought so too.

  “Our best way is to go in at the back and come out by the front.” He turned to Giuseppe. “We want a rope and a strong hook, Joe.”

  “They’ll have rope at the cafe, signore. We had better go back,” Giuseppe said.

  He turned the gondola, and after a few minutes of swift rowing, he brought the gondola to the side of the molo.

  “If you wait here, signore, I’ll get what you want.”

  “We’ll come with you.” Don touched Harry’s arm. “I want you to take a look at the front of the house.”

  The three of them cut down a Calle that brought them into the Campo del Salizo. While Giuseppe crossed the campo and went into the cafe, Don and Harry remained out of sight in the dark mouth of the Calle.

  “That’s the house,” Don said, pointing.

  As he spoke the front door opened and Carl Natzka came out. He paused at the top of the steps to light a cigarette. He was followed by a fat, elderly man who Don guessed was Dr. Avancini. Together they walked down the steps, crossed the campo and disappeared into the darkness.

  “If that girl knows how to count,” Don went on, “that leaves four men in there. I guess we can tackle four if we surprise them.”

  Harry nodded.

  Giuseppe came from the cafe, carrying a coil of thin rope and a heavy hook. He joined Don and Harry in the mouth of the Calle “Fine,” Don said, examining the rope. “That’s the very thing.” He went on to Harry, “You go with Joe and get in at the back. I’ll give you ten minutes, then I’ll go in the front. Don’t start anything until I arrive, unless you have to.”

  “Suppose the window’s barred, boss?” Harry said. “I don’t want you to walk in there alone.”

  “If it’s barred, come around to the front as fast as you can. Okay?”

  Harry nodded. He never wasted words when action was pending.

  “Take him to the back of the house,” Don said to Giuseppe. “As soon as he’s up on the balcony and if he can get in, tie up your boat and come around to the front of the house. You’ll find me in there.”

  “Yes, signore,” Giuseppe said, and he flexed his great muscles as if he were already anticipating a battle. He and Harry went back to the gondola while Don leaned against the wall and waited.

  The minutes crawled by. Don kept peering at his watch while he wondered if Harry would be able to get into the house. He wondered, too, if Tregarth were really there, and he realized, if he had any luck, this could be the final move in the hunt. It seemed to him an hour had crawled by before the hands of his watch told him it was time to take action. Moving out of the dark Calle, he crossed the campo, walked briskly up the steps of the house and rapped sharply on the black-painted front door.

  There was a long pause, then as he lifted his hand to rap again, he heard someone coming. The front door jerked open and Busso, short, thickset and menacing, stood in the doorway and glared up at him.

  “What do you want?” he asked roughly.

  “I have an urgent call for Doctor Avancini,” Don said, edging forward. “I was told he is here.”

  “Well, he isn’t . . .” Busso began, then the rest of his sentence was choked off by a grunt of anguish as Don’s fist slammed into his stomach.

  Busso doubled up, gasping, and Don’s fist flashed up and smashed against the side of his jaw.

  “Just a little of your own medicine, fatso,” Don said softly, grabbing hold of Busso as his knees buckled. He lowered him gently to the floor, stepped over him into a dimly-lit passage and closed the front door.

  Well, at least he was inside the house, Don thought as he blew on his smarting knuckles while his eyes took in the layout of the ground floor.

  A steep flight of stairs faced him. There was a door to his right and another door at the far end of the passage. He stood listening for a moment. A murmur of men’s voices came from the door at the far end of the passage, but he could hear no other sounds.

  He decided to go u
p the stairs in the hope of joining forces with Harry. But as he moved forward, he heard the sound of a door opening on the upper landing, and he quickly ducked back into the shadow of the staircase.

  Footfalls thudded across the landing.

  “Busso? Who was it?”

  Peering through the banister rail, Don caught a glimpse of Curizo as he stood at the head of the stairs.

  Don waited, his muscles tense.

  Curizo began to descend the stairs. Halfway down he caught sight of Busso lying in the shadows. He stopped abruptly, leaned forward and peered at Busso.

  Don heard him curse softly, then Curizo came down the rest of the stairs with a rush. He bent over Busso, but not long enough for Don to reach him. He turned with the quickness of a striking snake as Don slid out of his hiding place.

  For a split second the two men looked at each other, then Curizo’s hand flashed behind him and Don jumped forward. He anticipated Curizo’s body swerve to the left, and his questing hand grabbed Curizo by the throat while his left hand slammed a punch to Curizo’s jaw. But Curizo wasn’t so easily caught. He threw up his arm and just managed to block the punch, and countered with a raking left that drove Don back a step.

  As Don’s fingers slid off Curizo’s throat, he grabbed him by his coat front, leaned back and jerked hard.

  Curizo lost his balance. Stepping to one side, Don kicked Curizo’s ankle and brought him heavily to the floor.

  “Hans!” Curizo yelled as he drove his foot into Don’s chest, sending him staggering back. “Hans!”

  The door at the end of the passage jerked open and a big, swarthy man who Don guessed would be Hans sprang into the passage. He was followed by a big, blond man who tried to shove Hans out of his way to get at Don. The two men hampered each other in the narrow passage, giving Don a chance to gain the stairs. He had one foot on the third stair when Curizo, still on the floor, heaved himself forward and grabbed at Don’s ankle, bringing him face down on the stairs.