The Cross of Lazzaro

by John Harris

  ‘We’d better get out of here,’ Caporelli said.

  The crowd seemed still to be stupefied at the effrontery of the students, and watched them, motionless, with shocked, horrified eyes, as though something vile had come from the narrow streets that never normally saw daylight. For a second longer, in an atmosphere charged with hatred, the students continued to push towards the Hoferdenkmal, their leaders rigid in their reckless lunacy, then the watching crowd seemed to step forward in one mass.

  Henry tugged at Maggie’s arm.

  ‘Come on, Maggie,’ he begged. ‘There’s going to he trouble.’

  There was another sound from the crowd now, a low murmuring that was sullen and angry. Then Henry saw a woman’s face contort into fury and she shouted at the procession.

  ‘Traitors! Murderers! Assassins!’

  The police were moving forward quickly now, but stones were already being thrown, and the procession was crumbling into frightened fragments.

  As Henry pushed Maggie away, he saw one of the students go down, and the wreath dipped, then he saw a student hitting back and a policeman’s cap go rolling in the mud. Then the procession broke up into fist fights all over the square, with the crowd joining in willingly, the women beating the youngsters over the head with umbrellas. One boy, more hot-headed than the rest, fired an illicit pistol into the air and the crack of the shot seemed to stop everybody dead in their tracks. Someone stumbled against Henry and he almost fell as the crowd surged back. Then, as he recovered his balance, he saw the policemen, who had been mostly set on arrests before, now begin to lay about them savagely with their rifles and fists and capes, and students began to go down like ninepins. Maggie and Henry and Caporelli watched from the steps of the Municipio, in the middle of a crowd of shrieking women, Maggie half behind Henry and crouching in fear.

  By the time it was over most of the students were in the old dungeons of the former Von Benedikt palace and seven more, who were unconscious, had been bundled not very gently into ambulances and carted off to the hospital at Trepizano. And the wreath was lying in the gutter, where the rain had washed it against the bottom of the Hoferdenkmal, and there were only a few trampled red and white flowers and muddied leaves and a scrap of coloured ribbon to mark the path of the procession.

  It was afternoon before the police had restored order to the town and taken up their accustomed posts by the road blocks, no longer polite as they asked for passports and identity cards, but brusque and rude, their eyes full of hate.

  The Stettnerhof was gloomy in the rain which fell in an impenetrable curtain, tumbling out of the sky and sending the water draining off the mountains and racing in a thin sheet from the meadows across the road towards the lake. It was pouring out of the mountain lanes in thick torrents and washing mud and gravel into the road. Two streams met at the entrance to the forecourt of the Stettnerhof and leapt high into the air like a burst fire hydrant.

  Pushing through the rain, huddled under an umbrella, the black figure of Sister Agata picked its way through the puddles that the explosion of water had caused, her glasses misted, her skirt spattered with mud.

  She sat down in the hall to get her breath back while they all stood round her waiting for her to speak.

  ‘It’s Giovanni,’ she said at last. ‘He’s disappeared. He told Ercole Battista that as Sister Ursula was dead, the promise he made to her not to run away again was no longer any good. He disappeared after the funeral. I think it must have been during that awful fight in the square. It was only when we came out of the church that I noticed he was missing.’

  ‘Sister Agata,’ Caporelli said. ‘I owe that boy something. We must find him. Where can he have gone?’

  ‘Last time it was Trepizano.’ She flapped her hands hopelessly. ‘I don’t know why I came here. I’ve been to the police but they’re too busy. I suppose it’s understandable. I could only think of you. He just disappeared.’

  ‘He couldn’t get to Trepizano,’ Caporelli said. ‘They’d see him as he went through one of the blocks or on to a boat. Has he any money?’

  ‘None. We can only think he might try to get to Bolzano. His mother came from the north. His father – I think his father was an American or a British soldier in Austria. I don’t know. Only Sister Ursula really knew his background and she’s – she’s–’ She stopped and looked up at them, her myopic eyes puzzled and frightened, a plump ugly young woman who hadn’t yet quite grasped that Sister Ursula was dead.

  Caporelli took her back to the orphanage in his car while Henry and Maggie sat in the bar, waiting, waiting, waiting – that was all they seemed to do, Henry thought, wait for the next disaster. They were still there when the police arrived, their car turning into the forecourt with a rush of flung gravel.

  There was a group of Dei Monti’s archaeologists in the bar. They had continued to work in the rain at first, but without much visible enthusiasm, until the police had advised them to leave everything and go back to their hotels. The sight of them packing up Lazzaro’s treasures to be carted off to Rome might well have stirred up further trouble.

  They watched curiously as Caporelli led Inspector Castelrossi and a uniformed man into his office. Henry went to the door and watched them talking together, then Caporelli appeared, looking grave.

  ‘They’re here,’ he said. ‘They wish to see the Signorina Daniells.’

  ‘She’s in the bar,’ Henry said.

  Caporelli sighed. ‘Aynree, I wonder if you would tell her. Perhaps it would be easier for her, that way.’ He looked apologetic.

  ‘Forget it,’ Henry said shortly. ‘What’s it about? What she brought here last night?’

  Caporelli shook his head. ‘They don’t know anything about that yet. If they ask, I shall have to produce it, of course. But if they don’t, I shall say nothing. It’ll be better to let things calm down. They’ve discovered Alois is missing.’

  Henry nodded. ‘I’ll tell her,’ he said.

  Maggie was still sitting in the corner of the bar where he’d left her, under the carved eagle of Colleno, her hands folded, staring in front of her. She had the look of someone who’d been beaten. She had been sitting like that since he’d left her.

  ‘Maggie,’ he said gently. ‘It’s the police.’

  ‘What do they want?’

  ‘They want to speak to you.’

  She looked up. ‘Me?’

  ‘I’m afraid so, Maggie.’

  ‘Why? Is it about the plastic?’

  Henry shook his head. ‘Caporelli says they know nothing about that.’

  ‘Ought I to tell them?’

  ‘Leave that to Caporelli. He knows what to do. He says they’ve come about Alois. He’s disappeared. They think he was “Hofer” and they know you saw a lot of him.’

  She stood up and he took her hand. ‘What shall I say?’ she asked.

  ‘Tell them everything. You’re not involved. It’s possible you might be able to help.’

  ‘Henry, I’m frightened. Will you come with me?’

  ‘Yes, of course. If you wish.’

  In the office Castelrossi was sitting in Caporelli’s chair and the uniformed man was standing behind him with an open notebook. There were people in the hall, staring curiously through the window, and Henry saw Maggie go red as they had to push between them.

  Castelrossi made no objection to Henry’s presence. Caporelli was standing nervously opposite them, his mind full, Henry knew, of the knowledge that the responsibility for the explosion was always, even if indirectly, his own.

  ‘I knew nothing about him,’ Maggie kept insisting, her face pale and strained as Castelrossi leaned forward and pushed his questions at her.

  She seemed to have recovered a little, but she’d brought the dark glasses out again and Henry knew she found them something to retreat behind.

  ‘Surely he must have given some hint of what he was doing?’ Castelrossi said.

  ‘No. Never. Not to me.’

  ‘What was your relations
hip with him?’

  Maggie glanced at Henry and blushed. ‘I went about with him,’ she said. ‘He worked on the boats with us, skin-diving for the group. Professor Dei Monti employed him because he knew the lake so well.’

  ‘I don’t mean that relationship. We’ve got that information from Professor Dei Monti. I mean your personal relationship.’

  Maggie hesitated. ‘He got to know me very early when I first came here,’ she said. ‘I think he liked me.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  ‘Yes.’ She spoke quietly. ‘That’s all.’

  ‘What about you?’

  ‘He made me laugh. We danced together. We used to meet at night.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘That’s all.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  She glanced at Henry again and became silent for a while and he could hear the clock ticking on the wall.

  ‘He took me up the mountain occasionally when I first arrived. To the refuge at the bottom of La Fortezza. To show me the view, he said.’

  ‘Go on.’

  She looked agonized. ‘Do I have to tell you any more?’ she asked.

  Castelrossi stared at her and shook his head.

  ‘Did he ever come to your room?’ he said.

  ‘Once. No…’ She paused. ‘…Twice. The second time I made him go away.’

  ‘Did you ever go to his room?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Did you stay?’

  Her head dipped slowly and she kept her eyes on the floor.

  ‘Did you see anything?’

  She flared up suddenly. ‘When you go to a man’s room at night you don’t go to look for things,’ she snapped.

  Castelrossi nodded. ‘You might have seen something,’ he pointed out quietly. ‘Something that might have linked him with what has been happening.’

  She shook her head. ‘No. There were a few pictures, that’s all. Of himself taking part in parades in Bolzano. He liked pictures of himself. Once or twice I saw Volkspartei posters, but everybody knew he was a member.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  ‘I didn’t know he was one of the Montanari, though once or twice I met people there who said they were members of the party.’

  ‘Who? Who was there?’

  ‘Dittli. He was a waiter here. And another man with a beard.’

  ‘Did he say what his name was?’

  ‘Yes, but I don’t remember.’

  ‘Could it have been Carlo Wasescha?’

  ‘It could have been. I don’t know.’

  ‘Anybody else?’

  ‘Nobody I knew.’

  ‘What else can you tell us?’

  ‘I’ve told you,’ she said angrily, and she seemed to be crucifying herself in her own self-disgust. ‘When you go to a man’s room at night he doesn’t usually fill it with his friends.’

  Castelrossi shrugged. ‘Is that all you can tell us?’ he asked.

  She nodded miserably and the Inspector put on his hat. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘We would like to have your passport, of course, Signorina. Just for a while. As a formality. It will be returned to you as soon as possible.’

  She looked up slowly. ‘Does that mean I can’t go home?’ she asked.

  Castelrossi turned and nodded. ‘Yes, Signorina,’ he said. ‘It means exactly that.’

  Maggie sat with Henry alongside the big fire in the bar when they’d gone. Caporelli left them alone, but he quietly brought in two brandies and placed them in front of them.

  ‘What will happen?’ Maggie asked. ‘What will happen now? Everything seems in such a mess. Giovanni. Sister Ursula. Now this. I feel so responsible for it all.’

  ‘It’s nothing to do with you, Maggie. You weren’t involved.’

  ‘It was my fault Giovanni disappeared. If I hadn’t got them involved with what we were finding he’d never have stolen the altar cross and then Sister Ursula would still be alive.’

  ‘Maggie,’ Henry said. ‘You can’t dig too far back, or else everybody was responsible for everything that ever happened. Our ancestors were responsible for no other reason than that they gave birth to us.’

  She nodded. ‘What about me?’ she asked. ‘Does it mean they’ll put me in prison?’

  ‘I shouldn’t think so,’ Henry said, though he had to admit to himself that he wasn’t any too certain. ‘At the moment I imagine it’ll just mean they’ll ask you to leave the country.’

  ‘I see. I think I’d like to go home.’

  ‘I’ll be going myself now,’ Henry said. ‘If you like I’ll hang on until they say it’s all right for you to go, then we’ll go together. You’ll probably be glad of a little help.’

  ‘Yes. I’ve got a lot of luggage. You seem to collect it when you stay anywhere for a long time.’

  She spoke flatly, as though she were trying to make conversation to take her mind off the silence in the bar. After a while she touched his hand nervously, then he felt her fingers close and grip it tight.

  ‘I’m very grateful,’ she said in a low voice. ‘I don’t suppose I was always very kind to you, Henry, but I’m sorry if I said anything unpleasant. I’m sure I did.’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘Nothing to worry about.’

  She looked up at him. ‘I’m glad you’re going home, too,’ she pointed out.

  The rain came down harder than ever during the afternoon, turning the forecourt into a quagmire littered with leaves and twigs and even small branches. Even the radio had started to draw attention to the weather, something Henry had never noticed before outside England. But there’d been flooding in the valley of the Piave and a bridge had been washed out at Valli dei Signori to the south.

  The low-scudding clouds drifted like smoke across the sky and the air was chilled and sodden with water after the steady drumming rainfall of the morning. The thunder had started again, too, and was crashing down into the mountains and echoing among the dripping crags. Caporelli was standing by the door staring out at it, his face grim, his eyes burning, dark and agonized in his pale face.

  Maggie still sat by the fire in the bar, her hand in Henry’s, as though she were deep in thought.

  After a while she lifted her head and looked at him, almost defiantly. ‘It’s all true,’ she said. ‘All I told that policeman. All of it.’

  Henry said nothing and squeezed her fingers.

  ‘I did go to Alois’ room.’

  Henry still didn’t make any comment, feeling it was best to let her say what she wished. She’d probably regret it all later, but it didn’t matter much just then. She’d gone through the process of becoming an adult painfully, and something, some small subtle expression, had changed in her face, and for the first time Henry felt the gap between their ages had closed.

  Later he went out into the hall, leaving her by the fire, and stood with Caporelli staring at the rain.

  ‘I ought to tell them,’ Caporelli said slowly. ‘I ought to tell them about the box that came from my car. It was my fault. I was to blame.’

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ Henry said. ‘You brought that stuff here for a peaceful purpose, not to kill people.’

  ‘You think it is peaceful to blow the gates off a dam?’

  ‘The way you thought of it, it was.’

  ‘It wouldn’t have been peaceful if the Montanari had done it. It’s only a point of view.’ Caporelli smiled slowly, a small withdrawn smile as though he were mocking himself. ‘I wanted to make a bang,’ he said. ‘I was like a little boy with a firework. Others were making bangs and I wanted to make a bang, too. I forgot I was over fifty. I thought I was still young and stupid. It’s like a man suddenly leaving his wife and running off after a young girl. We forget we are old and go on trying to think of ourselves as boys, long after our bones have grown brittle and our muscles stiff. Tomorrow I shall go and confess. It is my duty.’

  Henry wasn’t sure how he fitted into it all. It was no responsibility of his, but he felt he had put the idea into Caporelli’s head.


  ‘I’ll come with you,’ he said.

  They were still standing there, watching the rain in silence, when they saw an old car turn into the forecourt. It was a battered Fiat with a torn canvas hood over the rear half.

  ‘That’s Oswino’s van,’ Caporelli said. ‘What’s he want?’

  A heavy muffled figure was climbing out of the van and they heard a door slam. Then they saw the figure pass in front of the car and appear in the hotel entrance.

  It was Dieter Oswino’s wife and she looked like a plump drowned chicken. Her hair was hanging over her face underneath the hood of a grey rubber cape she wore, and her big eyes looked frightened. Henry had only seen them looking arrogant and challenging before and the change made her seem somewhat smaller.

  ‘Signor Caporelli,’ she said. ‘Where is Alois?’

  Caporelli’s eyes narrowed. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I wish to God I did.’

  ‘I must find him. I’ve been expecting him to telephone but nothing’s happened. The telephone’s stopped working.’

  ‘Which one? Your own or Mornaghini’s?’

  ‘Both of them. The water’s washed out the telegraph poles. I saw them at the bridge on the way down, hanging over into the water.’ Her eyes flickered about her nervously. ‘Signor Caporelli, I must find Alois. He has some things at the farm and he ought to come and get them. We’ll have to leave. The water’s coming down the mountain and cutting great channels in the soil. The pond’s overflowed and it’s making the barn start to collapse. It’s washing away the foundations. Dieter tried to telephone. He’s been trying to telephone for hours.’

  Henry’s eyes flew to Caporelli’s. He could just imagine the wedge-faced, narrow-eyed farmer whom Stettner had apparently deluded for years, standing by the telephone, patiently trying to make contact with Mornaghini or the police, again and again and again, still dumbly trying when it would have been obvious to anybody else that there was no hope.

  ‘Why?’ Caporelli was asking. ‘Why did he telephone?’