The abduction had been easy enough: sneaking a sedative into a cup of coffee, helping a staggering Orsina into his car, and handing her over to Bhaskar and Soma at a quiet dock in Fusina, near Venice. Making the ransom demands on the phone in a Roman accent had been almost a joke, though that too had taken nerve. But now the real test was beginning.
Giorgio resurfaced from his recollections. Gallorini was still watching him; he was still sitting, handcuffed, in his own living room. Ghedina would be back soon, and then they would take him to the police headquarters. But would the Inspector succeed in persuading a PM, and the latter, in turn, a GIP, to hold him provisionally so as to put him on trial? On what evidence? There wasn’t any, not even circumstantial. After the embarrassment caused by MacPherson’s detention, no judge would realistically hold him, especially not on a related case. The Court of Bolzano had been humiliated by the media and become a laughing stock in the juridical world; no other court of law in Italy would wish to go through a similar ordeal.
The crucial question was whether Ghedina had some evidence up his sleeve, and that hinged on what the Baronessa might have told him after her release. But she would almost certainly not have mentioned her uncle. She knew what she was up against, and would have no confidence in the police. She might have to be dealt with later, unfortunately, but that was the Baron’s business.
Giorgio was a consummate poker player. He knew when and how to bluff, and won more often than he lost. Ghedina, he surmised, must have been bluffing all along. Like all amateurs he had overdone it. Smashing down the door; handcuffing him; all those accusations—it was exaggerated and unnecessary. No, Giorgio concluded, it looked like a desperate bluff.
Ghedina was back. They had collected many things to confiscate, and it was time to leave. But Giorgio kept his seat.
“Why don’t you spare yourself more unpleasantness?” asked Ghedina. “You don’t mean us to carry you out, do you?”
Giorgio looked Ghedina in the eye and asked, calmly: “Inspector, may I see your arrest warrant?”
“What’s the hurry? You’ll see it later if you must.”
“I’m afraid that won’t do, Inspector. I’ve done nothing wrong. You’re the one who’s broken the law. You’ve burst into my apartment without a search warrant or an arrest warrant. Isn’t that so?”
Gallorini looked at his boss with a questioning glance; Ghedina looked away. Giorgio noticed, and elaborated. “You have no right to be here harassing me with slanderous accusations, and least of all do you have any right to arrest me. Too bad for you, but Italy’s not a fascist police state, and hasn’t been for the last sixty years or so. Now,” Giorgio continued, very collectedly, “take these handcuffs off and allow me to call my lawyer.”
A long, silent pause ensued. All policemen were looking at their boss, awaiting instructions. Ghedina was looking at the floor, fuming. “Remove his handcuffs,” he said.
Giorgio massaged his wrists, and added: “Of course, you have no search warrant either, and the least you can do is put everything you were going to confiscate back where you found it. Isn’t that so, Inspector?”
Ghedina was obliged to nod.
“And, you’ll have to pay for the broken door, hinges and jambs and God knows what else. My lawyer will take you to the cleaners.” The counterbluff must be thorough, he felt, if it was to work. He dialed his lawyer’s number and made sure that Ghedina’s men could hear every word.
As the policemen left the apartment, Giorgio relaxed; his icy calm turned to triumph and his voice followed them: “I’m suing you, Ghedina. You’re in deep shit. Start looking for another job, you fascist bastard!”
****
At Villa Riviera, the Baron rang for Dumitru. “I’m going to spend some time in my studio,” he told the butler. “On no account should I be disturbed.” He went up to his dressing room and put on full court dress: white bow tie and waistcoat, black tail coat, knee breeches, silk stockings, and shoes with rhinestone-spangled buckles. From a leather box he took his military and civil decorations, which he pinned onto the lapel, and the heraldic insignia of the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus. Over all, he threw the cloak of the Order of Malta, then he took his dress sword with its belt and scabbard, and descended the stairs.
To climb into a car seemed so inappropriate that Emanuele decided to walk the two kilometers to the hunting lodge, as his ancestors, in absence of a horse, would undoubtedly have done. He walked slowly, emulating the famous “royal gait” of the Sun King, Louis XIV. Not the slightest sign of the modern world was visible as he trod the avenue between the great horse chestnuts, his imagination gradually sinking into the mood of the past.
Emanuele locked the door, covered the windows, and lit candles in the tall silver candelabra. He took his sword from its sheath, and set it between his knees as he sat in an upright chair, resting his gloved hands on the pommel, breathing deeply. In a state of feverish exaltation, he felt that at last he had come of age: he was no longer to be counted as one of those weaker brethren who required the assistance of a female companion. No, with Angela he had at last achieved full-blown magical ecstasy. From an initiatic perspective, her demise had been no accident, but a successful rite of passage, and a glorious milestone too: it symbolized his being empowered as a magus.
He had had Orsina at his disposal in the palazzo, and could have pursued his sexual alchemy with her as he had intended to do. But he had never had any control over her, least of all now; his attempts had been a fiasco, and he had been forced to keep her under heavy sedation. And now she had been abducted: good riddance!
Finally the proud heir of a long line of magical heroes, as a full-fledged magus he could take the straighter path to transcendence, and achieve the magical working alone. And if on the way he should meet Mithras, he would not repeat his error: this time he would not become the bull, but the God. Then there was no limit to what he could achieve. He would be the first of his line to storm the gates of immortality: to regenerate the physical body, as described in The Magical World, and transform it into “another incorruptible and celestial body, that is none other than the celestial Mercury.”
TWENTY-SEVEN
Often, since the investigation had begun, Inspector Ghedina had felt very close to unraveling either the murder of Angela or Orsina’s kidnapping. Like a hound, he had gotten a whiff of a trail leading straight to the fox. But then it would grow cold; the fox would once more outsmart him. He would arrive late at the scene of a crime; or at the wrong scene; or, worse yet, not arrive at all when he was most desperately needed. He felt sure that Orsina had left much out of her testimony. That was why he had paid that surprise visit to Giorgio, hoping that the secretary, under pressure, might confess something. Instead of a confession, he had gotten a lawsuit.
There was little Ghedina could think of at this point. But he felt that it was his duty to return to the Baron, pay him a visit to comment on Orsina’s release and congratulate him on it. He told Gallorini to get ready to drive him down to Verona. The pensive agent, a book always in his pocket, would go down better in the Baron’s salone than the crass Colucci.
They reached Villa Riviera a couple of hours later. The security guards told him that they had orders to let him through at all times.
“The Baron’s not such a disagreeable type, Gallorini, do you think?” said the Inspector as they swept down the drive.
“He’s been through a lot,” said the sergeant non-committally.
“He humiliated himself by breaking the law to pay his niece’s ransom. I have to say, I respect him for that.”
“True. But I think he knows a lot that no one’s told us.”
“I’ve got no hard feelings toward him. He should be in a better mood now. Let’s get him talking, and he may let something slip.”
Dumitru opened the door. No, he said, the Baron was not at home. Ghedina pressed him. Dumitru would only give vague answers. The old instinct of the hound resurfaced; Ghedina stiffened.
“
That’s his Lancia, isn’t it? If he’s not at home, where’s he gone to?”
“He went to his studio,” the butler conceded at last, “but he told me that on no account was he to be disturbed.”
“How long ago was this?”
“The day before yesterday. That was the last time I saw him.”
“Does he usually stay there so long?”
“Not usually, but I always obey his orders.”
“Of course you do. Does he have a phone there?”
“No. If he takes his cell phone, he always turns it off.”
“Then we must go and rouse him,” said Ghedina.
The blinds were drawn at the hunting lodge, and there was no answer to the Inspector’s knock. He tried the door. “This is no time for pussyfooting around,” he said to Gallorini. “Open the door.”
The sergeant hesitated.
“No, don’t smash it. It’s not right to spoil antique woodwork.”
Ghedina returned to the police car and fetched his briefcase. The simple old lock yielded easily to a skeleton key. As Ghedina’s eyes became accustomed to the dim light, he saw a hunched figure on the floor of the bathroom.
“Turn the lights on, Gallorini.”
The figure stirred as Ghedina stooped over it. The Baron’s tongue protruded from its mouth, and he panted in what the Inspector recognized as the symptoms of thirst. “Quick, get him some water.” He helped Emanuele to drink, but it was not easy. The Baron’s right side seemed to be inert. “Barone, Barone: do you hear me?” There was no flicker of recognition in the Baron’s eye. “I think he’s paralyzed. He must have had a stroke. Call an ambulance, presto!”
Ghedina was not surprised at an elderly man, already under much stress, suffering a stroke. What did surprise him was the Baron’s garb, in full evening dress with decorations, and silk stockings, for goodness’ sake. Had he come home from a reception, a lodge meeting, or what? The Inspector discreetly removed the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus on its ribbon and unpinned the decorations, putting them into a desk drawer. “Gallorini: get up to the villa and tell that butler what’s happened. Then come back here.”
Half an hour later, Ghedina watched as the medical orderlies gently loaded the Baron into an ambulance. The two policemen were left alone with Dumitru. Ghedina told him to hurry back to the villa and get in touch with the Baron’s lawyer.
“Gallorini: open up those blinds now. And you can open some windows, too. This place stinks of sickness. We’re going to search every cranny.”
The lodge seemed to have few secrets. In one corner, covered by a jacquard throw, was a large easel and a painter’s equipment: canvases, expensive brushes, turpentine and linseed oil, tubes of oil paint. The brushes were uncleaned, and the paint was crusted on the palettes. “It looks as though he gave up painting all of a sudden. But where are the results?” The only decorations in the room were the grotesque paintings on the walls.
“Do you think he did these? They’re really weird.”
“No,” said Gallorini. “They’re old; as old as the lodge, I’d guess.”
Ghedina was going through the drawers of the tiny kitchen. “Go look around the back, and see if there’s a shed or cellar entrance.”
Gallorini returned.
“There’s nothing but a big garden incinerator.”
“There’s nothing more suspicious, you mean! Let’s take a look.”
The two men sifted through the few inches of ashes. “See here, Inspector: staples and nails. They’re like the ones on the backs of those canvases.”
“That’s right. So he paints, but then he burns his work. Very aristocratic, I guess,” said Ghedina, doubtfully.
The search of the lodge continued. They came to the bedroom. “Help me turn this mattress over, Gallorini,” he said. The double bed all but filled the room, and it was awkward to manipulate it in the narrow space. “Here’s a spot that doesn’t get cleaned,” Gallorini remarked, peering at the dust balls beneath the bed. “And here’s something else.”
The sergeant was reaching down into the crack between the headboard and the wall. He extracted a sketchbook and handed it to Ghedina, who blew the dust off and opened it. It was a standard artist’s book, filled with sketches in ink and pencil. They were amateurish in their lack of proportion and their inexpert shading, but highly detailed, like medieval work. Every one of them showed a nude girl, seemingly eleven or twelve years old, and then increasingly more grown up into her teens, in a variety of poses.
“Kiddie porn,” remarked the Inspector. “No wonder he burned his paintings.”
****
Leo sat on a bollard, looking over the harbor. “Be at the yacht dock at 15:30 hours on Thursday. There are two harbors; the one you must be at is called Porto Sole. Look for a boat called Lusimus.” That had been the message conveyed by Nigel’s custodian. The smell of iodine, the salt seawater, the blinding sun flickering and dancing on the calm waves, the screeching of seagulls—all this Leo was taking in as he watched the yachts come and go.
An hour later, Leo was wondering if there might have been a mix-up. Had he misunderstood the custodian’s broken English? Was he too tired to think properly? It certainly had been a couple of rough weeks since he had left Orsina at Milan’s central railway station, and then two more uncomfortable days to reach San Remo, a touristy village on the Italian Riviera, close to the border with France. He wondered if he shouldn’t try to ring the custodian again. There was little sense in sitting on a bollard indefinitely. He took out his wallet, and counted the coins: 3 Euros and 28 cents, all the money he had. He got up, and started to walk back to the village to look for a public phone booth.
“Dr. Kavenaugh, I presume,” came a braying English voice. He turned and saw a shortish man of his own age, dressed in a suit of salmon-colored linen that flapped open on a naked, hairy torso. It wasn’t exactly warm, but certainly less cold than in continental Italy, on the other side of the Apennines, where Leo had been until the morning.
“Yes, I’m Leonard Kavenaugh.”
“Nigel was quite right! He said to look for an American hippie don, and here you are. We’re docked over there.”
Leo followed the man, who called himself Teddy, to an old-fashioned motor yacht, all teak and understatement. They crossed the plank bridge, which Teddy immediately drew up, shouting, “I’ve got him!” Within minutes he was steering the yacht out of the harbor, and Leo was sitting at a table below, the object of curiosity for three other men and two beautiful women.
A tall young man made the introductions. “I’m Nicky; this is Nico, don’t confuse us; his wife Sophie; Marcus; and his wife Pauline. The wives prefer to speak French, but I’m sure that won’t bother you.”
The beautiful and elegant Frenchwomen, some fifteen years younger than their husbands, smiled uncertainly at Leo. Having been told next to nothing about him, they perceived him not as a “hippie don,” but rather as an out-and-out tramp.
“We’re playing ‘Fuck the Frontiers,’” explained Nicky. “We and three other boats. The idea is to dock in as many places as possible without being stopped by the customs or registering with the police.”
Leo grasped the idea, which did not make him feel confident. Was this Nigel’s brilliant plan for his escape from Italy? Then a suspicion crept up on him. He remembered how incompetently Nigel had behaved at the railway station in Milan, always one step behind every development, constantly asking for explanations. Was this the world class financier and shrewd speculator? How could he have been so clueless? Or had it been all an act? But what for? The answer, now, was apparent: to make him walk willingly into a trap! Were these dandies also acting? Had Nigel hired them to deliver him straight to the police? What a perfect way to get rid of a rival! “What do you do if you’re caught?” Leo asked gruffily.
“Plead ignorance, refuse to speak anything but English and, if need be, pay up. But then you lose points. Currently we’re winning by two ports. Do you care to know what’s the prize
?”
“No.”
“Of course you do: the losing crews have to walk the plank,” said the bluff, bearded Nico, and the company dissolved in helpless laughter. “Have a drink?” he added. “Or a pee, or perhaps a shower?”
“All three,” said Leo. He would play along, keep his wits about him, and improvise if needed. He must not allow suspicion to cloud his reasoning.
He returned from the well-appointed bathroom wearing a robe he had found in it. He had no extra clothes, and the ones he had been wearing for over two weeks stank.
“Well, how about a Dolce & Gabbana outfit?” asked Marcus, an aquiline fiftyish type.
Leo looked away, annoyed.
“Yes, yes, you have to blend in when we arrive at Antibes. All the more so if the coastguard nabs us before that. We’ve come prepared.” Pauline handed over the clothes.
Leo resurfaced from the bathroom dressed in rust-colored four-wale corduroys and a pink shirt, a fawn cashmere pullover hanging around his neck, his feet in handmade suede moccasins. The men looked him over matter-of-factly: his makeover was just part of the game. Their wives, on the other hand, looked at him appraisingly, and smiled.
“Now you’re fit for the Captain’s table; let’s have a drink,” said Nico.
The blend of Pimms, vodka, Cointreau and God knows what else went down everybody’s throat. Leo drank the entire highball out of thirst, indifferent to the punch it packed, and then asked for a glass of water. He had survived on a sandwich a day for the last two weeks, and skipped even that lately. He had slept very little, and had been cold all along. But it had been worth it.
The yacht was following the coast, heading toward the border between Italy and France. It was not the only one. The sea was not as crowded as in summer, but the sunny day had brought out many fellow boatmen.
Pauline spoke to Leo for the first time. “Your beard,” she mentioned with a disapproving glance. His beard was a mess, and his moustache, overgrown, covering his lips. “Would you mind?” she said.
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