by Robert Ryan
What I didn’t remember was anyone running up the hillside with the contents of several churches under his arm.
‘Of course, we only suspect those three items I showed you were from the haul. With medieval religious artefacts …’
‘It’s hard to prove provenance.’
‘Yes. We imagine anything more high profile than, say, a liturgical comb or a reliquary would have been fenced a long time ago, when things were more fluid.’
‘Through Switzerland.’ It wasn’t a question. It was the obvious route. ‘And Nino? You think he was the conduit?’
‘I suspected so. Now, unfortunately, he is going to be difficult to question.’
‘Why are you talking to me about this?’
‘Because, Mr Kirby, everywhere else is obfuscation and friends in high places. You know the term muro di gomma?
‘The rubber wall? Yes.’ It was a phrase used to describe police investigations that got nowhere, that were continually rebuffed.
‘It is what I keep hitting. I think if you discover the truth, you will tell me, without lies. You were, I believe, a good man in a bad place.’
I was a little taken aback. I guessed it was as close as I was going to get to a compliment, and I almost regretted I couldn’t help him.
On the way back in the Mercedes, we sat mostly in silence, feeling the night close in around us, lost in our thoughts. Eventually, I explained to Zopatti about the three men who beat me up, and being followed in Milan. He swore again it was nothing to do with him. I thought it best to leave the Colt out of the story. I may have softened towards him, but I wasn’t that stupid.
‘So you really didn’t follow me?’
‘I said I didn’t. I wish I had. Whoever is following you must be interested in the artefacts. Could you give me a description?’
I gave him a quick thumbnail sketch of the trio and he switched on a reading light and scribbled some notes. ‘It really has nothing to do with me. It seems there are others interested in you.’
‘Typical. You wait twenty years …’
His puzzled smile told me he didn’t know the old joke about London buses. ‘About the missing artefacts,’ I said with all the sincerity I could muster. ‘I never saw anything like those items, you know. Not in the safe house, not in the mountain huts we sometimes used. Or the trucks.’
‘Would you have noticed if they had taken them that night?’
‘Yes. Fausto, Rosario, all the others, we left the scene together. No candlesticks or what have you.’
‘Ah. Maybe it was what you call an inside job. Some other people took the trucks, some people who were already with the convoy, perhaps.’
‘Germans?’
‘Or Italians.’
‘Maybe,’ I said. I suppressed a yawn. ‘I am surprised you are still interested. Why?’
‘I hate loose ends,’ he replied.
‘If Nino was in charge of the loot, it was a good reason for him to kill Fausto. He’d get to keep the rest then.’
‘Perhaps.’
‘Or?’
‘Or maybe the articles have been in Italy all this time. Perhaps Nino came back to collect a new item every so often. Perhaps, while he was collecting one—and waiting to see me—curiosity got the better of him and he went to Domodossola. Someone saw him, and … bang. Vengeance is his.’
Or hers, I thought. ‘Who or where would he collect it from?’
‘You tell me, Mr Kirby.’ He spread his arms out. ‘It would be nice to know, wouldn’t it?’
Wouldn’t it just.
As we neared Maggiore, he said: ‘This plane you are looking for.’
‘The Liberator.’
‘You think you will find it?’
‘I don’t know. We’ve convinced ourselves we know where it is. It might be another convenient fable.’ He laughed. ‘If it got out of the area, it could well have flown south to Genoa and crashed in the sea. Then we’ll never find it. All I did was promise to look. Now, all this happens. Believe me, I didn’t want to get tangled up with SISDe.’
‘Few people do, Mr Kirby,’ he said. He stroked his chin for a moment. ‘It is not healthy for that young woman, this search. An attractive girl like that.’
‘I’ve told her. She’s missing out on pop music and pep pills, or whatever it is young people do today. And you are right, she is easy on the eye.’
‘Is that why you are doing this?’
I tried to act shocked. ‘Because she is attractive? I thought I was a good man back there?’
‘But still a man.’
‘No, Dottore, that’s not why I am doing it.’ I could feel anger invade my voice. ‘Too many flyers never got a decent burial. If I can help add eight more to the total who have, and earn some money into the bargain, I’m happy.’
He looked out of the window for a few moments. ‘I have had them turning the propeller. I believe you have to on radial engines, to prevent the lower cylinders oiling up.’
Only about once a week, but I was almost touched by his concern and impressed by his knowledge. ‘You are full of surprises,’ I said.
‘That’s my job, Mr Kirby. Come to the airfield tomorrow. You can have your plane back.’
‘Thanks. I appreciate it.’ We pulled up near my hotel, and I climbed out and slammed the door. I leaned back in through the open window and said, ‘And if I come across any lost Caravaggios, I’ll be sure to give you a call.’
Twenty-Seven
I DIDN’T NEED OR want to see anybody else. It had been a long day. My knee hurt and my head throbbed. I was tired. In fact, I was getting the kind of ache deep in the bones I recalled from twenty years previously, after too many missions and not enough sleep. Now the burden of history, the slagheap of the past, was piling on top of me until I felt I could barely breathe.
So I was not overjoyed to see Furio’s Fiat parked up. Too many people knew where to find me, friends and enemies alike, and for a moment I considered booking in down the road for a quiet night, but went through to the bar instead. I’d move hotels the next day, even though I’d be sorry to see the back of Maria and her first-aid skills.
Furio was sitting with Lindy. He was on Coca Cola, she was tugging on a Cinzano.
‘Hi,’ I said, without much enthusiasm.
‘Oh Jesus Christ, it’s not that bad, is it?’ said Lindy. ‘What happened to your knee?’
I didn’t bother answering. Furio motioned that she had been boozing with a quick flick of the wrist, winked at me and handed over a brown A3 envelope. ‘Sit down. You look like you need a drink.’
I did as instructed. ‘Long day,’ I explained. I ripped open the envelope and pulled out the clippings from inside. They were from Furio’s mother, copies of articles taken from the newspaper files. ‘Thanks. I’ll get her some flowers.’
‘You’ll get her fired if anyone sees those. Read and then eat them or whatever it is you old spies do.’
‘I was never a spy,’ I corrected him. ‘More like a spy’s oily rag.’
I raised my glass of Scotch at them and sipped while I read. It was dull stuff, mostly from the business pages. Every piece used the same head and shoulders picture of Conti, serious-looking, greying at the temples, in his early fifties, but still bloody handsome. He looked like an Italian film star, not yet over the hill, but with the summit in sight.
‘Look at the last one,’ suggested Furio. ‘The name of the company.’
I scanned the columns. The article was saying something about share trading and flotations and bearer bonds, the kind of thing I have trouble with in English. Four paras from the end, I hit it, and couldn’t help but laugh. It seemed that Riccardo Conti, Francesca’s husband, was a major investor in Gennaro, our former employer.
‘What do you make of that?’ asked Furio, when I had stopped chortling.
‘I think it answers all my questions. Francesca, through her hubby, has been giving us work all these months as an act of charity. Riccardo here,’ I flicked the picture, making a sati
sfying hollow noise, ‘goes along with it. But when I come up here to his little lake, and start seeing his missus more regularly, he has me worked over and then offers me a job down south. A double incentive to move along.’
‘And then puts a body in your plane?’ asked Lindy.
‘Well …’ I hesitated. Italian businessmen can be ruthless, husbands jealous, but it seemed a little extreme. I thought they just left dead fish on your doorstep as a warning, rather than real people. ‘I think that it is tied in with the war. Don’t ask me how, it’s too long a story.’
‘Another?’ asked Lindy, pointing at my glass. I hesitated but then acquiesced. One more, I promised myself, then bed.
Furio paid for the drinks. I promised I would dispose of the Conti files and he said he was going. ‘Get a good night’s sleep,’ I advised. ‘If Zopatti is as good as his word, we get the plane back tomorrow. We can make a start.’
Lindy let out a whoop and slapped my back with an enthusiasm that set the other patrons staring. ‘Well done, mate,’ she said, the Aussie accent thicker than ever.
Furio offered her a lift and she declined, so I walked him out to the car. ‘How long has she been hitting the bottle?’ I asked. I had the impression it would take a fair bit to dent Lindy, but dented she most certainly was.
‘Since we found the body, I think.’
Shit, I should have thought of that. A dead man in a plane. She’s going to be bracing herself for what is left of her father, making herself nice and numb. ‘OK. I’ll call last orders and pour her into a cab. See you at the strip.’
I went back in and sat down to do some gentle nursemaiding. Lindy shifted position to sit next to me and patted my arm. ‘How’d you get the plane back?’
‘Usual mix of charm, humour and threats,’ I lied. ‘And then I let an old fascist tell me fairy stories.’
‘Were they good ones?’
‘Not for me they weren’t.’ Truth was, I still hadn’t digested it all. I needed some time alone to go over everything Zopatti had told me, to see where and how it applied to me.
‘What are you doing, speaking to fascists?’
‘Good question. One I would have asked a few days ago. Now I am not so sure it is quite so cut and dried. This guy was on the other side. It doesn’t make him bad or even wrong about everything.’ I thought about what Francesca had said. ‘Damn, that’s me being reasonable again.’
‘I think you are a nice man.’
‘Thanks. But I’m not. Not particularly.’
She put a hand on my shoulder, leaned closer. Her voice was slurred; I realised the fact that she could still speak was a small miracle. ‘Do you want to fuck me?’
Now, there is a loaded question, I thought, as I felt myself blush. I guessed it was a generational thing but, even in the war, when morals were meant to be a lot laxer, I had never had quite such a direct approach. Well, not from an amateur. I stalled by hitting the whisky, but it burned my throat like battery acid.
‘There is no easy way to answer that.’
‘You can do it anywhere you like.’ I was about to say that, apart from the odd roll in the ferns, beds were usually my location of choice, when I realised I’d misunderstood. I was so red by now, Milan air-traffic control were probably diverting traffic away from me.
She stood up, grabbed my hand and started pulling me to my feet. Unless I wanted a tug of war with a formidable and very drunk woman, I’d have to come quietly. I scooped up the Conti material as she whisked me off.
I sobered up with each step on the stairs. At least, most of me did. There was that little voice saying: Why not? Go on, my son. You’re a man, she’s a woman. Barely, replied my sensible half. She’s a girl. Young enough to he your daughter.
You stupid English prig, came the retort. I ignored it.
I let her into my room and she crossed to the bed. There was a little stagger, and I knew that her view of the world was beginning to rotate. She started to unbutton her blouse, and I could see she had nothing on beneath it, and I knew I had to do something before the situation got out of hand. Before I got out of hand. I threw the newspaper clippings on the bottom of the bed, sat next to her, and held her wrists.
‘Whoa,’ I said gently.
‘Sorry. Do you like the “I’ll-just-slip-into-something-more-comfortable” routine? Shall I go to the bathroom?’
‘Lindy.
‘Uh-oh.’ Her mouth turned down. ‘You aren’t happy, are you?’
‘Look, you are a very attractive woman—’
A big sigh. ‘But you’re queer, is that it?’
‘No!’ I almost yelled, before I realised it was a ploy to make me disprove her. For a moment, I thought of agreeing with her, but something—the voice of my father perhaps—stopped me going down that route. ‘No. It’s just—’
‘You want to let go of my hands?’ she said with a sudden hardness in her voice.
I did so, but she didn’t do the buttons up. I made sure I kept eye-contact. ‘It’s more like a professional thing. Employer and employee. We pilots are like … lawyers, or doctors. We have codes of conduct.’
‘Really?’ She hiccuped, her self-esteem seeing a glimmer of light at the end of the dark, spinning tunnel. ‘I’ve never heard of that.’
‘I know it’s hard to believe, looking at me.’
Her eyes were cloudy and hooded. I was losing her, and myself. She was going to need another drink soon to keep her momentum going. Right on cue, she asked: ‘You got any booze up here?’
I shook my head.
‘What about room service?’
‘No, Lindy. We’ve got a big day tomorrow. That’s the other thing about survey pilots. Like footballers or boxers, no sex before a big game.’ I began to clutch at straws. ‘Did you know Japanese swordmakers had to abstain for three days before they started a new blade?’
‘You’re shittin’ me.’
The drink certainly seemed to have released a florid turn of phrase. ‘Ask Furio.’
‘I wish I had,’ she said in a quick rabbit-punch to my ego. It wasn’t Kirby she was after, not a father figure after all, just a compliant man. Maybe she figured I was the more desperate of the Kirby and Gabbiano partnership. She was probably right. ‘I need something to drink.’
‘I’ll get some water,’ I said as brightly as I could.
She sneered at me as I went to the bathroom and splashed water on my face and peered at myself in the mirror, while I wondered what the hell was wrong with me. When I eventually came out with a tumbler of water the girl was asleep, knees curled up to her chest. I was thinking how to throw blankets over her without waking her and whether there was a spare room in the hotel when there was a knock at the door.
Maria, I figured, either watching my back or protecting Lindy’s honour. I opened the door, and there was Francesca, her smile fading as she looked over my shoulder into the room. I wasn’t too sure which was causing her more surprise—the half-naked girl on my bed, or the pictures of her husband lying discarded at Lindy’s feet.
Part Four
Twenty-Eight
I PEELED THE POLICE tape off the door of the Beech and nobody shot me or clapped me in chains, so I guessed Zopatti had been as good as his word. A diamond-bright day had dawned only about forty minutes ago, but I knew I had a lot to do. When anyone has been in your aircraft without you present—anyone at all, but especially cops—you need to go through everything from the tyres up. You don’t want to find out that one of them has bent the caging mechanism for the gyro or trodden on a control surface while clambering over the wing when you are up at 20,000 feet.
I heaved myself into the fuselage and worked up to the pilot’s seat, slipping myself in and tapping the instrument panel. ‘You OK, girl?’ I asked my plane softly.
‘Fine, thanks for asking.’
I turned. It was Lindy, her head in the doorway.
‘Hi,’ she said.
‘Hi. There’s coffee on across the way.’ I pointed to the little café. ‘P
ut it on my tab. Well, your tab.’
‘I will.’
I had caught up with Francesca before she had time to drive off and had jumped into the passenger seat. It had taken me an hour to calm her enough to explain what had been going on. She was vehement in her defence of her husband, suspicious about the girl, disbelieving about what Zopatti claimed, but she finally accepted I had had a rough day.
She promised she would confront her husband when the opportunity arose, but she was sure I would have no more trouble from that direction—if it had come from that direction at all. I got the impression the first opportunity was going to arise over breakfast that very morning. And had she found out I was at Malpenso and put work my way? No, she said, but I wasn’t sure I believed her. She probably thought she was saving my pride. It was pretty much past saving, but I let it go.
When I got back to the room, Lindy had gone. After five minutes’ panic, Maria told me she had called her a cab, which came to the other side of the hotel, which was why I hadn’t seen it. I stopped worrying, except for a moment’s concern about the cabbie’s safety, but then I remembered it would be Giorgio at that time of night. Sixty with one tooth. Even less of a proposition than me.
Furio appeared at the airstrip five minutes after the girl, and we agreed I would do the interior checks while he went over the outside. Lindy sat in the rear seat, drinking coffee noisily.
‘Rudder movement?’ I yelled.
‘Full. Fine,’ came the reply from Furio.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Lindy quietly.
‘Flaps?’
‘Yeah, good.’
‘Jack.’
‘I know. Forget about it.’
‘I’m so embarrassed.’
‘Trim tabs?’
‘Free and easy.’
