by Ann Turner
‘What is it?’ Giotto was staring hard.
‘I really think it’s unlikely. There’d be no reason. He wouldn’t have left me alone for dinner. He’d be back by now.’ My voice cracked. It was after midnight. Then a thought struck. ‘Stephen’s due to speak at a conference on Capri next week. Maybe he was called across?’
I scrolled through my phone and found the hotel where the conference was being held and where we were due to stay. I dialled, hands shaking, and reception picked up immediately. Rapidly I outlined my problem – was Stephen there? After a long minute the helpful man came back: no, he certainly hadn’t checked in, our booking wasn’t until next Wednesday. I asked if he could check if Stephen was in the building, perhaps meeting with someone in the bar. I waited for what seemed an eternity before the reply came: no, Professor Wilding was not there. I left my number, and he assured me he would contact me if Stephen turned up.
‘Perhaps he went to shop in Amalfi or Positano for a surprise for you and got lost?’ Adriana was trying to be helpful, but it didn’t make any of us feel better.
‘Could someone check there?’ I asked, in spite of thinking it was stupid. Where would they even start to look?
Giotto shrugged. ‘All of us are here. I’ll see if the Commissario wants to send someone.’
A commotion rang out along the rocky ledge.
‘Over here! Over here!’
Marco stood at the front of the crowd. In a tiny crevice, a white hotel towel was rolled up. Marco pulled it out and the Commissario, a tall, lean man in his forties with the look of a sleek wolf, took it and unfurled it.
Stephen’s shirt and shorts fell to the ground.
The world went black.
19
I woke in the small lounge off reception. A shell-pink dawn was creeping across the sea.
My limbs were as heavy as anchors as the night’s events slowly came back.
‘Have you found him?’ I slurred and Marco rushed to my side.
‘Not yet.’ He handed me a glass of water. I touched my lips but couldn’t feel anything.
‘The doctor’s given you a tranquilliser,’ said Marco, gently rubbing my shoulders.
Adriana came in with the Commissario, who in the daylight looked even less friendly. ‘You remember Commissario Napolitano from last night?’ I nodded like a rabbit frozen in headlights.
‘Do you have his passport please, Signora Wilding?’ Napolitano’s voice was cold with suspicion.
‘It’ll be in our room, in the safe.’
‘We’ve looked,’ said Adriana apologetically. ‘Yours is there, but not Stephen’s.’
I blinked mutely.
‘Did you always keep them together?’ asked Marco.
‘I can’t even remember getting them back after we left them at reception.’
‘Of course I gave them back,’ said Adriana, offended.
I thought hard but had no recollection. ‘When?’ I asked.
‘That day or the next.’
‘Who did you give them to?’
‘You or Stephen, I’m not sure.’
‘I’m sorry, I don’t remember getting them,’ I repeated. All I could think was how passports were left lying around unattended at reception.
‘Well, clearly I did because yours is in your room safe,’ said Adriana. Marco frowned and went to reception, where he shuffled about behind the counter.
The Commissario called Giotto over to take notes. ‘I’d like to go through the last twenty-four hours you spent with your husband, please? Every detail.’ He sat down in a deep sofa that sighed with his weight. ‘Firstly, please, you need to tell me if you had a fight?’
‘No, we had a lovely day. Stephen was unwell in the morning but then he was much better by lunchtime.’ I flashed to how generous he’d been about my keynote address; my leg jittered uncontrollably. ‘I’m so worried his illness came back. Please, can we go down to the water?’
‘We have our boats. There’s nothing you can do,’ said Napolitano.
The drugs were numbing my brain; it was difficult keeping a train of thought. If Stephen’s passport had disappeared, was that good or bad? I struggled to make sense of anything. The sea had taken another man from me. I’d asked Stephen never to swim there. Adriana, the Commissario and Giotto were staring at me. I’d just spoken my thoughts aloud.
‘He’s a strong swimmer and the sea was calm,’ I continued. ‘Are there rips?’ No one understood. I made a movement with my hands and twisted my body, trying to imitate getting caught in turbulence. I felt like I was swimming through molasses. ‘Dangerous water? Strong currents?’
Finally they nodded.
‘Perhaps,’ said Napolitano.
‘There can be,’ muttered Adriana sadly.
‘We grew up here. We know how to read the sea,’ said Giotto, looking up from his note-taking. ‘Last night was calm. It would be unusual. But then, you can never take the sea for granted.’
‘I know that,’ I said grimly. ‘Are there coves? Could he have swum somewhere and not be able to get back?’
‘We’re checking everywhere,’ replied Giotto, ‘and we have divers.’
Tears rose uncontrollably, forming into a tight sob that I tried to suppress. When my father drowned, divers had gone in, but his body had washed up further down the coast the next day. My mind grasped slowly the concept that Stephen’s passport had gone.
‘Anything?’ I called to Marco.
‘It’s not here,’ he called back. ‘Stephen’s passport is not here with us.’ He looked at me sympathetically.
The image of Stephen’s clothes hidden in the crevice flashed back. ‘Do you think he’s met with foul play?’ My voice cracked.
‘How?’ said Marco, ‘It’s a private beach.’
‘One of the guests?’
‘That’s highly unlikely,’ said Adriana loudly.
Napolitano watched us.
‘Sir, is it possible?’ I asked.
‘It is completely improbable,’ he snapped, ‘that a guest or a stranger would be down there. Your husband was the only one who asked for the key to the gate that day.’ He stared at me. ‘I am wondering, did he leave his wallet and phone?’
Napolitano led the way to our room. Marco picked up my phone from the bedside table, and I listened to the messages. Burton had left five, growing increasingly urgent. There was nothing from Stephen. Napolitano’s eyes remained fixed on me.
I couldn’t see Stephen’s wallet anywhere; it wasn’t in his bedside drawer or the safe, so I rushed to the wardrobe and found the trousers he’d worn to the Grotta Verdi yesterday, feeling in the back pocket. Pain as sharp as a knife cut through me as I pulled the wallet out. With trembling hands I opened it: there were gaps where some plastic banking cards had been but I had no idea whether he might have just left them in Australia. I’d left a lot of mine at home. Stephen’s main credit card was there but I knew he had others that weren’t. My head spun as I stared at the black leather wallet that Stephen would normally always have on him in the outside world.
In his jacket pocket was his phone. I turned it on and it immediately died. I went to the charger still plugged into the wall and slotted it in. I tried to turn it on again but knew it would take a few seconds to kick to life.
Napolitano observed like a hawk as I propped on the edge of the bed and waited impatiently for Stephen’s phone to fire up.
There was a message from his stockbroker Phillip Bradley in Melbourne, asking to call him urgently. I flicked through Stephen’s emails – a few from work needing his advice even though they knew he was on holiday and hundreds of other emails he’d deal with upon his return. They looked typical and uninteresting as I scrolled frantically.
There was nothing from Priscilla in any medium.
The Commissario coughed. ‘May I?’
I handed him the wallet and phone, which he quickly inspected, flicking through the small amount of cash Stephen had.
‘I can’t tell if anything’s missing
,’ I said. ‘He has more banking cards but he might not have brought them on holiday.’ I was desperately frustrated I didn’t know.
Napolitano eyed me as if I were an insect, then turned his attention to the phone and rang through to the messages, listening to Phillip Bradley.
‘Who is he?’ Napolitano asked as he hung up.
‘Stephen’s stockbroker.’
‘Ah.’ The Commissario’s eyes lit up. ‘May I keep these, please?’
I didn’t want to relinquish the wallet or the phone in case they held clues I could decipher and they were Stephen’s – they were part of him.
‘We will return them. When we can.’ Napolitano strode out, giving me no say in the matter.
• • •
The sun’s rays cut strong white lines across the tiled floor. Rolling over, I saw the empty bed. I sat up and looked around, eyes heavy, mouth desert-dry with a sandpaper tongue.
‘Stephen?’ There was birdsong and the soft lull of the sea. A ferry echoed through the stillness and I could hear a low throbbing of slow-moving boats. Reality hit.
Stephen was gone.
Vaguely I recalled Adriana giving me a strong sleeping potion this morning. I hadn’t wanted to take it but in my disorientation I must have acquiesced. Or did Adriana only tell me after I’d drunk it? My memory was blurred.
I rushed to the balcony. Two police cruisers crawled through the water. Further out, the helicopter was a small dot in the sky, swooping along the horizon. I checked my phone, hoping against hope there’d be a message from Stephen. There wasn’t.
I threw on my clothes and ran to reception, taking the stairs as the lift now bore an OUT OF ORDER sign.
Marco met me. He had clearly not slept.
‘Any news?’ I asked. He shook his head and led me into another tiny sitting room that didn’t look out to sea.
Police and other guests mingled in the reception area and I was glad to be away from their sight.
‘There’s no sign of him. My friends the police are checking other towns, the railway stations and airports. I will bring you something to eat.’
‘Just water,’ I said, my head aching. As soon as Marco left I phoned Burton, who picked up immediately. ‘Where have you been, Bec? We’ve been worried. And we have the most explosive news.’
‘Burton . . .’ I said shakily.
‘What’s happened? You sound dreadful.’
‘Stephen’s disappeared. He may have drowned.’
Burton was silent. Far below, the police boats thrummed as they swept the coves.
‘Bec, are you there?
‘Yeah,’ I croaked.
‘Stephen’s a strong swimmer. He knows the sea. Why’d he go in if it was rough?’
‘It was calm.’
‘Were you there?’
‘No. And he hadn’t been well in the morning.’ Tears spat from my eyes. ‘Burton, if only I had been with him. I was sleeping. If I’d gone down this would never have happened.’
‘We’ll come immediately. Where are you?’
‘Between Positano and Amalfi. Hotel Della Mare.’
‘How are the kids taking it?’
‘I’m hoping Stephen will turn up. Walk back in the room like nothing’s happened and tell me off for overreacting.’ My lips split into an involuntary smile. ‘Like in Athens. He was safe all the time.’ I wept silently.
‘So, the kids don’t know?’
‘That’s right, Burton,’ I snapped.
‘Hang in there, I’m booking tickets as we speak. We’ll see you in a few hours. Damn, I hope Maria brought her passport. I always travel with mine. Maybe it’ll just be me.’
I took a breath. ‘Burton, Stephen’s passport’s missing.’
‘Well, that’s strange . . .’ Burton paused. ‘Bec, I’m on my way.’
I went back to my room to put on shoes. I needed to get down to the beach. The image of Stephen’s clothes falling onto the stone was nightmare-vivid.
Before I could leave, there was a loud rapping on the door. Commissario Napolitano, Giotto and two other policemen stood in the corridor. Marco was a distance behind, his brow deeply furrowed.
‘Please, Signora Wilding. We need to take you to Positano for questioning,’ Napolitano said gruffly.
‘Can’t we do it here? I don’t want to leave in case Stephen comes back. Or if he’s found,’ I added, my voice barely audible by the end.
‘We go now.’ Napolitano took my arm in a pincer grip and started to lead me out, but I planted my feet firmly on the ground and forced more strength into my voice than I felt.
‘I’ll answer anything but I’m staying here.’
The Commissario’s cheeks blazed. ‘But you will please come?’
Marco sidled up. ‘Rebecca,’ he said firmly, ‘do what the Commissario asks. I’ll come with you. Adriana will let us know immediately if there’s any news.’ He cast a quick glance at Napolitano, who stepped aside to let Marco take my arm. ‘You’ll make things worse if you don’t oblige him,’ Marco whispered hotly into my ear.
I grabbed my phone and handbag and accompanied the tall gaggle of men up to street level and into a small blue car with a white stripe, POLIZIA emblazoned on its side. Giotto and I squashed in the back while the Commissario positioned himself in the front beside a young driver. The other police led the way and Marco followed in his car.
At the hairpin bends the sirens whooped and lights flashed. The cars sped along, stopping for no one.
‘What’s the rush?’ I whispered to Giotto.
He shook his head. Napolitano turned around, glowering. All I wanted was to be down at the private beach waiting, searching for Stephen, looking for—
Suddenly I silently cursed; Burton had mentioned at the start of his call that he had explosive news. Were Stephen’s disappearance and the fraud somehow connected? And if so, how? Whichever way I juggled them, the two pieces of the story didn’t fit. Nothing was making sense.
The purple bougainvillea blazed in the sunlight at the turn-off. How much had changed since the day I’d first seen it. Stephen had been moody then. I needed to sit and retrieve the past, sift through it layer by layer and build a picture. My time at the police station must be brief. I vowed to myself to answer everything quickly and efficiently.
Inside the pale building Giotto seated me in a stiff, upright chair in a cavernous room that had a view down to the sweeping bay where ferries plied the water and colourful tourists queued wharf-side, filing on and off the boats. A happy scene, carefree and playful. Had Napolitano chosen this space on purpose? Pleasure craft dotted the horizon. I watched a handful of boats, rainbow sails full of wind as they skimmed the white-capped surface. My mind flashed back to my own beach at home. Like two paintings, one on each side of the world. What was wrong with this picture in front of me?
‘You have financial problems, Signora Wilding?’ Napolitano moved swiftly between me and the water, his bulk casting a shadow as the sun poured in behind.
‘No.’ I frowned, panic churning my stomach as I willed myself to keep calm.
‘But I think you do.’
How could he possibly know about the university investigation? It was internal, there was no way he could find out, surely?
‘I phoned your husband’s stockbroker, who was most obliging. He was not surprised that Stephen Wilding has disappeared.’
Now he had my full attention. I sat forward on the edge of the hard vinyl chair, barely breathing.
‘His stock market bets have gone sour,’ Napolitano announced imperiously. ‘In the past weeks, the market has been volatile. Every time it plunged or rose, your husband went the wrong way. He had, is it called, a loan of the margin? And options. He lost everything. Signor Wilding now owes a great deal of money. But you know this, no?’
I shook my head as it drained of blood. I tried to stop the floor spinning.
‘You will lose your house,’ Napolitano continued matter-of-factly as he scrutinised me. ‘It was mortgaged against hi
s loans.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ I snapped. ‘Our house is in joint names. And I certainly never approved anything like that.’
The Commissario shrugged. ‘I talked to his broker and then to his banker, who is in the same firm. They were both very eager to hear from me. They’d like to talk to you, too.’
My heart was beating so fast it was like I’d just sprinted uphill. ‘If any of this is true, I’ll be more than talking to them. They have no right to be having these conversations with you. Anything between them and my husband is confidential.’ Stress rose tight through me as I thought of the bank revealing these awful things to Napolitano, and I started to wonder if they could possibly be true.
The Commissario raised his shoulders and dropped them. He reached to a table and poured a glass of water. My throat was parched.
‘Could I have a drink please?’
He ignored my request.
‘You were perhaps very angry? Wives have killed for less.’ His manner turned from frosty to glacial. ‘How handy it would be for you if he disappeared.’
My mind was grasping for facts. Could Stephen have bankrupted us? He had my power of attorney, something our solicitor had advised when making our wills years ago. It was just conceivable that Stephen could have put the house up without my knowledge. It would make sense of his strange moods of recent times. With horror it struck me that perhaps he hadn’t drowned accidentally. If he had lost everything . . .
‘There is life insurance with him gone, no? You could save the house. Your family home.’
‘No. No. You’re wrong,’ I blurted. ‘But what if Stephen killed himself?’ My hands and feet jittered, unable to keep still.
‘Was he the type?’ asked the Commissario softly, looking like a lion about to pounce.
I shook my head. Stephen would be devastated and ashamed and certainly wouldn’t want to face me. If it was as bad as Napolitano said, he might have panicked. I sat back as I saw a whole world opening.
Stephen might have run away. Not been taken by the sea like my father. He could just need space.
The Commissario was watching me and I didn’t care. Let him accuse me of whatever he wanted. Let Stephen lose everything – but if he was alive I would hunt him down. And I would take him in my arms and tell him it would be all right. All of it. As long as we were together, we would find a way to fix everything.