The Big Story

by Morris West

  As he broke out from the olive-groves on to the grass of the cliff-top, he saw a man standing near the rock where the old shepherd had sat the day before. He wore rough, peasant clothes and carried a double-barreleld shot-gun.

  Ashley saluted him and called a greeting :

  “Buongiorno! Cosa fai? What are you doing?”

  “Quaglie!” came the shouted answer. “Quail!”

  Ashley stopped in his tracks and looked at him. The quail came in the spring and were soon shot out. This was high summer. He called:

  “Isn’t it late for quail?”

  The fellow shrugged and gestured and turned away. So far as he was concerned the conversation was over. Ashley turned down on to the shaly path that led to the beach.

  The first plunge shocked the sleep out of him and he swam steadily out into the deep, where the water was blue as sapphire over the ribs of Roman galleys and the coral bones of Phœnician sailormen. The salt stung his damaged eyes and, after a while, he turned on his back and floated, shutting his lids against the glare, and feeling the sun dry his chest and his belly, while the cool water still lapped about the rest of him.

  It was a good time, a pleasant time. He began to feel clean again, as if the waters were washing away the grime from his spirit as they cleansed his skin of night-sweat and fatigue. An illusion, of course, like so many other things, but it pleased him to cherish it for these brief suspended moments between the empty sky and the sea-floor full of the detritus of the centuries.

  Then the tide began to shift, running swiftly out between Capri and the point of the Sorrentine peninsula. He rolled himself over in the water and headed back to shore.

  As he was towelling himself, he glanced up at the cliff-top. The hunter of quail was there, standing black and motionless against the blue sky, the gun cradled in the crook of his arm.

  Ashley put on his dressing-gown and walked thoughtfully to the house.

  When he had dressed, he went down on to the terrace and a servant brought him coffee and fresh rolls and a bowl of fruit. The others, she told him, were taking breakfast in their rooms. He thought he detected a faint disapproval of crazy forestieri who stirred too early before the household had time to rub the sleep out of its eyes and set itself in order for the day.

  He finished his coffee, smoked a leisurely cigarette and decided to treat himself to a walk around the property. It seemed quite likely to be his last opportunity. He stepped off the terrace, crossed the lawn and began following a path that led up the hillside, away from the sea-reaches.

  The lower slope was planted with oranges and olives, but beyond them, where the slope was steeper and the ground rougher, the land was terraced and planted with vines. Beyond the vines were the silos and the storehouses huddled against the high stone wall, which was the boundary of the property. His eyes followed the line of the wall and he saw with mild surprise that it stopped short on the edge of a humped escarpment. Then he realised that the escarpment was the cutting of the road—the same road on which Cosima and he had driven up to Il Deserto, on which Enzo Garofano had been killed.

  He quickened his steps. This was important. If he could show that the spot from which Garofano had been flung was part of the Orgagna property… He gasped with surprise and stumbled backward as a man rose up from the vines in front of him.

  He, too, was a peasant. Like the other he carried a shot-gun. Ashley twisted his features into the semblance of a smile and greeted him as he had greeted the other.

  “Good-morning. You startled me. What are you doing?”

  “Quaglie, signore,” said the fellow succinctly.

  Ashley grinned at him and shook his head.

  “You’re wasting your time. There are no quail now. Spring is a long time gone and the other hunters have shot them out.”

  The peasant stared at him with stubborn, hostile eyes.

  “There are still some birds.”

  “Come vuoi,” said Ashley indifferently. “Have it your own way.”

  He stuck his hands in his pockets and began to walk up the path towards the wall. The peasant stepped out in front of him.

  “Not that way, signore.”

  “Why not?”

  “You will frighten the birds.”

  “To hell with the…”

  But he didn’t finish it. The gun was pointed at his chest. The peasant grinned shiftily and licked his lips. His stubby finger curled around the trigger. Ashley turned and walked slowly back the way he had come.

  Let Granforte look for his own evidence. The big story was still a long way from the teleprinters and he couldn’t get it there with a charge of birdshot in his chest.

  When he reached the shelter of the trees, he looked back. The peasant had left the path and was beginning to patrol the stone wall from the far end, down towards the cutting. On the lip of the cutting there was another man; two hundred yards below him, another. Each carried a gun, and if there were birds to be shot, they didn’t seem to care. They were all looking down towards the olive trees, where a tall American in a bright sun-shirt stood leaning against a gnarled grey trunk.

  ‘Like a sitting duck,’ thought Ashley. A squawking silly duck who didn’t know what time of day it was.

  He looked at his watch. Nine-fifteen. Captain Granforte should be in his office by now. Best to telephone him and have done with this sinister little comedy before somebody got hurt.

  He trod out his cigarette and headed down towards the house. The hunters on the hill whistled to each other and made derisive gestures as they watched the flicker of his coloured shirt in and out among the tree-trunks.

  The terrace was still deserted. He crossed it swiftly and walked into the salon where the telephone was. A thick-bodied peasant with broken shoes and a patched dress was washing down the tiled floor. She looked up at him a moment, then resumed her patient, back-breaking task.

  Ashley picked up the telephone. There was no dial tone but he knew that Italian phones were apt to be temperamental. He jiggled the cradle a few times, then tried to dial the exchange. The line was still dead. He thought it would probably be dead for some time.

  He thought also that the moment had come to do business with Tullio Riccioli.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  IT WAS WELL AFTER TEN before Tullio showed up. He came out on to the terrace, wearing only black trunks and a pair of espadrilles and carrying his artist’s gear under his arm. His smooth brown body shone with health and he walked with the swaying, conscious grace of a preening peacock.

  Ashley greeted him casually and waited until he had set up his easel and begun work on the unfinished canvas. Then, without haste, he got up and walked across to him. He said quietly:

  “Keep working, Tullio. If anyone comes, I’m talking to you about the picture.”

  “D’accordo!” Riccioli gave him a swift, sidelong look and went on with his work. “What do you want to talk about?”

  “I want you to do a job for me—today.”

  “Do I get paid?”

  “Surely.”

  “How much?”

  “Five hundred dollars in advance and another five hundred at the end of it.”

  “It sounds important.”

  It is—to me.

  “What’s the job?”

  “I want you to go down to Sorrento and deliver a message to the Englishman, George Harlequin.”

  “What’s the message?”

  “Just tell him I have what he wants and I’d like to see him here as soon as possible.”

  Tullio stepped back from the easel and surveyed his work with theatrical care.

  “Is there anything else?”

  “No. Just deliver the message. Can you get away?”

  “No reason why not. I’d like a change anyway. This place is like a museum.”

  “How soon can you leave?”

  “Before lunch. I’ll have to ask Orgagna for the car. I’m not going to tramp around in this heat. Er—when do I collect the advance?”

 
; “Come to my room when you go in. I’ll give it to you then.”

  “Very well.”

  And that was the end of it. Tullio went back to work and Ashley strolled back to his chair under the big coloured umbrella. He would have preferred to go back to the beach and spend the morning bathing and baking in the sun, but he thought better of it. The folk of the peninsula were chancy and temperamental. There were too many chances of accident, when they went shooting quail out of season.

  Tullio Riccioli was chancy, too, of course. Capricious, self-absorbed, venal, void of love and incapable of loyalty, he made a dangerous ally. He and his kind haunted the international resorts, picking up a modest living from foolish dowagers and wealthy inverts. They were up to all the tricks of their ancient trade—blackmail, minor cruelty and theft from those who lacked the courage to speak out against them. Their talents ran to early seed and, once their youth was over, their vices impoverished them quickly. But they were all susceptible to one lure—easy money, the crackle of hard currency in their slim pampered hands. Ashley hoped fervently that with five hundred dollars still to collect Tullio’s loyalty would last the short distance to Sorrento and back. But he knew that he could not be sure of it.

  The next member of the household to come on to the terrace was Elena Carrese. In spite of the heat, she was dressed in a bright peasant skirt, an embroidered vest and a blouse buttoned to the wrists. Tullio gave her a curt nod and went on with his painting. Ashley called to her cheerfully, and, after a moment’s hesitation, she came over and sat beside him.

  She was calmer this morning, he noticed. Her hands were steady and her face was composed. But resentment still smouldered in her dark eyes and the skin of her face was tight and strained under the make-up. Ashley offered her a cigarette and lit it for her. She smoked a few moments in silence, then, in a low voice, she said :

  “Did you get what I sent you?”

  “Yes, thank you. Do you want to talk about it now?”

  “No. Just keep them safe. For your sake and mine.”

  He looked at her sharply, but her face was turned away from him and she was staring out across the garden.

  “Why do you say that? Are you afraid of something?”

  “Afraid?” She gave a bitter laugh. “Not now! Not ever again.”

  “What—what happened yesterday… after you left me?”

  In a flat, expressionless voice, she told him.

  “My father beat me. He beat me like a barefoot farm-girl from the mountains. That’s why I’m dressed like this, to hide the bruises. He called me a putana and worse, because he found me in your arms under the orange trees. He threatened to kill me if I ever came near you again. But I laughed in his face and he beat me again as he used to beat my mother—until he was tired and had to let me go. I wonder…” She puffed nervously at the cigarette. “… I wonder what he would say if he knew about Vittorio and me.”

  Ashley gaped at her in amazement.

  “Doesn’t he know already?”

  She laughed again, a dry, unhappy little sound, incongruous from her young lips.

  “How could he? We have never been together in this house. To him, Vittorio is the gran’ signore who has taken a little peasant girl and made her a signora out of the goodness of his heart; and who now completes the charity by marrying her to a suitable husband.”

  “God Almighty!” Ashley swore in English.

  Elena went on bitterly :

  “My father is a simple man, as you see. He believes in God and the house of Orgagna. He believes that there are three sorts of women—virgins, wives and the others. He beats me to see that I stay in the class to which God and His Excellency have called me.”

  “What would happen if he found out the truth?”

  “I don’t know,” said Elena Carrese sombrely. “I think it would be the end of the world for him.”

  “Do you love him?”

  “No. I—I am fond of him in a certain way. But I have never loved him as I loved my mother. He never belonged to us, you see. He belonged to the house of Orgagna.”

  “Do you know he tried to kill me in the garden yesterday?”

  She nodded slowly.

  “Yes. He told me that while he was beating me. He told me he had failed once and that he would not fail again. When he is angry, he is a little mad, I think.”

  Then he put it to her, softly, soberly, the last damning question:

  “Do you know he killed your brother?”

  She swung round to face him. Her mouth drooped slackly. Her eyes were wide with shock. She got the words out with difficulty.

  “Do—do you mean that?”

  Ashley laid a firm hand on her wrist to steady her. He dared not risk a scene on the open terrace, in full view of the windows, with Tullio Riccioli only a dozen yards away. He spoke, swiftly and urgently.

  “Try to control yourself. Don’t let anybody see that you are disturbed.”

  Her whole body stiffened and she held herself rigid and tense, trying to steady herself. She said quickly:

  “I—I won’t do anything stupid. Just tell me.”

  Ashley hurried into his explanation. At any moment now, Orgagna or Cosima might come out on to the terrace and the opportunity would be lost to him.

  “I can’t prove it, you understand, but I believe it’s true. I believe that Orgagna warned your father that Garofano had the photostats in his possession. Somebody from this house paid Roberto at the hotel to telephone my movements with Cosima. I believe that when your brother walked out, after our quarrel, he was met by someone who bundled him into a car and drove him up here to the villa. They probably searched him for the photostats. Then, when they didn’t find them, I think they took him to the edge of the cutting and waited until Cosima and I came back down the road. They could watch us a long way from there. They would know that everybody drives fast on that stretch. They had only to wait. Now, could anybody from this house have done a thing like that without your father knowing? Without his help?”

  “No one,” said Elena tonelessly.

  “That’s what I thought.”

  The girl looked at him for a long time without speaking. He was wrenched with pity for her, young and defenceless in the tangle of passion and intrigue. Her brother was dead. Her lover and her father had conspired to kill him. The lover had cast her off and she was left rootless and alone to be sold to a man like Tullio Riccioli.

  “Now,” he told her bluntly, “I think they may try to kill me.”

  “I know.” She nodded wearily. “I heard my father talking to the men with the guns. If you try to leave the grounds they are to shoot you and say it was an accident. You should stay near the house. Do not go into the gardens or the olive groves.”

  “I’d like you to stay near me.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I think I may need you. I think we may need each other.”

  Then he gave her another cigarette and made her stretch out on the sun-lounge beside him, and they lay back, watching Tullio Riccioli paint the blue sky and the grey trees and the flaring flower-pots in the bold and dashing style that had charmed the eccentrics of Rome.

  Half an hour later, Orgagna appeared, dressed for the beach, a big coloured towel slung over his arm. He nodded a brief greeting to Ashley and Elena, then stopped a moment to admire Tullio’s picture. They talked animatedly for a few moments. Then Tullio appeared to ask him a question. Orgagna cast a quick glance at Ashley and the girl, then turned back to Riccioli. After a moment, he patted him on the shoulder and walked quickly down through the olive trees in the direction of the cliffs. A moment later, Tullio turned round and made a quick gesture of triumph.

  Ashley grinned and waved an acknowledgment. He was over the first hurdle. Tullio would take his message to George Harlequin in Sorrento.

  Just before midday, Tullio packed up his gear and walked into the house. A few moments later, Ashley followed him, leaving Elena dozing wearily on the sun-lounge under the big umbrella.

>   When he reached his room, Tullio was waiting for him.

  “Everything is fixed, my friend. I told him I wanted to go down to Sorrento and I asked him to let me have the car. Yes to both. He seemed happy to get rid of me. Told me I could stay the night if I wished.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  Tullio smiled and shrugged in deprecation.

  “What could I tell him but the truth? I am bored with these glum people. I would like to get out for a while.”

  “Fine.”

  Ashley walked to the wardrobe and fished for his wallet in the breast-pocket of his coat. He counted out five hundred dollar notes and handed them to Riccioli, who kissed them lovingly and waved them in the air before thrusting them deep into his trouser pocket.

  “And the other five hundred when I get back? Right?”

  “Right. Now repeat the message for George Harlequin.”

  “You have what he wants and you would like to see him as soon as possible. Anything else?”

  “No. That’s all.”

  Tullio giggled girlishly.

  “Would you like to send a message to Captain Granforte as well?”

  “No, no. George Harlequin will fix…” The words were half out before he had weighed their import. He saw Tullio’s eyes narrow shrewdly, and caught the small frown that was hidden by the swift, practised smile. He had made a mistake. He could only hope that for the five hundred dollars still to come, Tullio might be prepared to overlook it.

  “Arrivederti, amico!” said Tullio blandly.

  “See you later,” said Ashley tersely, and ushered him from the room.

  Now he was really afraid. In the wooded confines of the Orgagna estate, between the tufa hills and the ancient sea, he was as surely imprisoned as in a dungeon or a police cell. The telephone was out of action. The high iron gates were locked. If he took to the orchards and the vineyards, the quail-hunters would flush him out and kill him, and swear that his death was an accident. If Riccioli failed him, then he was alone indeed.

  He walked to the window and looked out. Elena was still there under the big umbrella. Cosima was standing talking to her. She was wearing a cotton sun-frock and a big straw hat and she carried a basket of flowers, fresh-cut from the garden. Far down the path between the orchard trees he could see Orgagna striding up, briskly, from his swim. Soon it would be lunch-time and, with Tullio gone, there would be only the four of them, a tense constrained little group, fearing and mistrusting each other, watched by the dour old steward who believed only in God and the house of Orgagna.