Where Dead Men Meet

by Mark Mills

  “Why are you smiling?” Pippi asked.

  Bianca’s brother Araldo was at the wheel of the boat, and they were standing beside him, the wind in their faces, squinting at the low shoreline on the far side of the lagoon.

  “I was thinking … we didn’t just fail; we’re now fugitives from justice in four European countries.”

  “But not in Tahiti.”

  It had started as a fantasy, a solace, something to cling to. No longer. In a few minutes, they would come ashore in a remote spot and find a car waiting for them, and also a man—a friend of Araldo—ready to drive them wherever they wished to go. They had yet to decide. Far from Venice as quickly as possible, that much was certain. Maybe south to Bologna, then a train to Livorno, followed by a boat to Spain, where the chaos of the civil war, the flood of foreigners coming and going, lent itself to losing oneself. From there it was a short hop to Portugal, to Lisbon, to the Atlantic and everything beyond it.

  Luke turned and took one last look at Venice, the floating city of his birth, receding behind them … and something not receding. A boat was flying across the lagoon, set on the same course as theirs.

  “Pippi, look.” She turned and took in the view. “It’s probably nothing.”

  Pippi wasn’t so sure. “Araldo, più rapido,” she said. Araldo threw a quick glance over his shoulder and pushed the throttle lever forward as far as it would go.

  It made little difference. The boat continued to gain on them. Luke spun around, taking in the approaching shoreline. “We’re not going to make it.”

  “No,” Pippi concurred.

  She threw open the suitcase and fished out her gun. As soon as Araldo saw the weapon, he started to panic. Pippi snapped at him in Italian, but the poor man was almost in tears. Pippi grabbed the field glasses from the suitcase and trained them on the boat. “I can’t see,” she said, trying to focus. “Oh, God, it’s Monsignor Ruspoli.”

  Luke took Petrovic’s silenced pistol from his pocket. Three cartridges. He had counted them in and out of the magazine last night at Bianca’s apartment.

  “There’s someone with him.”

  Pippi’s pistol held six. Nine total. Enough to give them a fighting chance.

  “It’s Vittorio.”

  “My grandfather? Are you sure?”

  “Yes, it’s him.”

  It took a bit of persuading to get Araldo to ease off the throttle and bring them to a halt. The monsignor’s launch overshot them, carving a long turn before drawing up alongside. Nothing was said until Luke had helped his grandfather clamber aboard.

  “Fredo has told me everything. Is it really you?”

  “I don’t know,” Luke replied.

  Vittorio smiled. “I do.” He reached for Luke and they clung to each other. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, forgive me.” He choked back a sob. “Come home.”

  “I can’t. They’ll find us again. How did they find us?”

  “I don’t know. Ma ci si può giocare in due.” Vittorio turned. “How do you say in English, Fredo?”

  “Two can play at that game.”

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Benedetto, Giovanna, and the children were leaving for the villa at Asolo that evening for a couple of weeks, and when Vittorio returned to the palazzo he found it a hive of activity. Giovanna was at the heart of the commotion, snapping orders—the general marshaling her small troop of staff. There were beds to be stripped, rooms to be cleaned, clothes to be ironed and packed. Benedetto was off at the Lido, getting one final dose of the film festival before the break, but even if his son had been present, Vittorio would have said nothing to him of Vincenzo.

  Vincenzo? Luke? Did it matter? No, the only thing that mattered for now was his safety, and there was still a way to go before that could be ensured. It meant acting with speed and ruthlessness, well outside the law, and he didn’t wish Benedetto to be guilty, even by association, of the dark deeds that needed to be done.

  Alone in his apartment on the top floor of the palazzo, he sat with this thought for a good while, following it through. By the time he finally rose from the chair on the terrace, he had accepted, with regret, that Vincenzo would never be able to take his rightful place in the family—not publicly, at least. How could his miraculous reappearance after twenty-five years be explained? With the truth? The truth would condemn him in Germany, where he had shot and killed an official; he was party to two more killings in Zurich; and here in Venice, a murdered man had been discovered in his hotel room. Through no fault of his own, simply to stay alive, he had left a trail of bodies across Europe. Could he really just show up in Italy and hope to be forgiven?

  There was another vital consideration, and it was this that ultimately sealed the matter in Vittorio’s mind. For it to be truly over, it wasn’t enough that the Karamans die; they had to die in a manner that left no connection between Vincenzo and their deaths, or someone might come looking to avenge them. Yes, his big, beautiful grandson was back, and although he wanted to scream the joyous news through the streets of the city, only immediate family and a handful of friends could ever be allowed to know it.

  His first priority was personnel. He needed men who could be trusted to act without hesitation and keep their silence afterward. There was never any doubt who he would contact first.

  “Giorgio, it’s Vittorio Albrizzi.”

  “Dottore, what a pleasure it is to hear from you.”

  “How’s the haulage business?”

  “Better than ever, but don’t tell anyone, or the drivers will ask for a raise.”

  Almost thirty years had passed since the two of them left the courthouse in Spalato and boarded the plane back to Italy. Giorgio had fully expected to spend a good deal of his life in jail for murder after firing on the mob that had threatened to overrun the Albrizzis’ residence. “I’ll never forget that you stayed and fought for me,” Giorgio had said at the time, and many times since. Vittorio had given him the money to buy his first truck, and he had been honored when asked to be godfather to Giorgio and Laura’s first child, Grazia.

  Giorgio was the one to cut the pleasantries short. “Come on, Dottore, out with it. What’s on your mind?”

  “It’s … delicate.”

  “I may look like a brute, but I can do delicate.”

  “Do you remember our last day together in Dalmatia?”

  “Only every morning when I wake and give thanks for another day of freedom put between me and it.”

  “It’s not over, Giorgio. It never went away.”

  There was a heavy silence at the other end of the line. Then: “Sounds like we should meet.”

  “Yes, that would be good.”

  “Just name the time and the place, Dottore.”

  Vittorio thought about telephoning Croatia but decided it could wait. Another ten minutes was neither here nor there in the grand scheme of things. Best to call in another favor first. He asked the operator to put him through to the Questura.

  By law, all foreigners had to submit their passport to the hotel or pensione where they were staying. The details were then recorded and passed on to the Questura, the local police headquarters. There was every chance that the Karamans’ henchman, Petrovic, was in the system, an arcane and bureaucratic world shut off to the masses—unless you happened to have someone on the inside. Some years ago, Vittorio had used his influence to secure a promotion for the son of a friend. Carlo Gasperi’s steely ambition had done the rest, and he now held a senior position in the Questore’s office, where reaching him meant getting past his private secretary.

  “I’m afraid Signore Gasperi is in a meeting, sir.”

  A lie. She would have known that already without having to check.

  “Please tell him it’s a matter of the utmost urgency. I’ll hold.”

  Carlo finally came on the line. “Signore Albrizzi,” he said, hi
s tone guarded, even cold.

  “I’ll come straight to the point, Carlo. I need a favor.”

  “I assume you’re joking.”

  “Why would I be joking?”

  Carlo lowered his voice. “You haven’t heard what happened at San Barnaba?”

  A lifetime in business had taught Vittorio that there were times to feign ignorance, and times to feign knowledge.

  “That was unfortunate, I grant you.”

  “Unfortunate?” snorted Carlo. “I can think of other words.”

  “I don’t doubt it.” Vittorio felt his mouth moving, heard the words issuing from it, and felt a cold dread in his heart.

  “I owe you a lot, Signore Albrizzi; I’m the first to admit it. But please don’t contact me again. And you can tell Benedetto the same.”

  Vittorio closed his eyes, exhaled, then said, “Don’t hang up, Carlo.”

  “This conversation is over.”

  “Listen to me very carefully. You are complicit in a murder.”

  “All I did was—”

  “Be quiet and listen. There is a café in front of the church of San Niccolò da Tolentino. Be there in half an hour. Do not speak to anyone else in the meantime—no one at all. If you don’t show up, I will destroy you. Have no illusions about that. However, I can also protect you. Your life will go on just as before, and this will become no more than a bad memory. Do you understand me?”

  “Yes,” came the feeble reply.

  “Half an hour. Don’t be late.”

  With a trembling hand, Vittorio replaced the receiver on the cradle. He could have told Carlo twenty minutes, but he needed a bit more time to gather himself.

  Benedetto? Surely not. It wasn’t possible. But he saw the why of it, saw how it fit with everything else, and felt the euphoria of the past few hours seeping away.

  The last time Luke drowsed with the sun on his face had been while lying beside a lake in Switzerland. It felt like a lifetime ago, but as he traced the road back in his mind—to Lake Como by way of Bergamo, then over the Alps to Zurich and Luzern—he calculated that only four days had elapsed, almost to the hour, since Pippi insisted they stop for a swim at Interlaken.

  They had been ignorant then, and now they had the answers. They had killed and they had watched men die. They had fought each other, consoled each other, and slept together as lovers. Jubilation, terror, hope, despair, laughter, revulsion … Was there any emotion they hadn’t experienced together in that time?

  And now this: an uneasy calm. The eye of the storm, or the end of it, as his grandfather had promised them? Before leaving them in the care of Monsignor Ruspoli, Vittorio had given them his solemn promise that he would see them safe for all of time. A tour of the abandoned and sadly dilapidated monastery where the monsignor lived had been followed by a light lunch of cold roast duck, salad, and chilled red wine, and from the table on the terrace it had been a short stroll to the bench at the end of the garden, where Luke now hovered on the fringes of sleep, not quite able to give himself over to it.

  Male voices. His hand groped for the gun in his jacket pocket as his eyes struggled to focus. His grandfather had returned, and there was someone with him.

  “This is Giorgio.”

  Giorgio was a powerfully built man with a heavy brow and hair growing up his throat. He gripped Luke’s hand and said something in Italian that earned him a laugh all around.

  “He’s happy,” Pippi explained. “The last time you met, you cried when you saw him.”

  They had bad news: Petrovic was alive. He had checked out of his hotel room this morning. His whereabouts were currently unknown, but there was every chance they would have another fix on him by tomorrow at the latest, assuming he was still in Venice.

  “How did you find him?” asked Luke.

  “The same way they found you: the Questura.”

  Before Luke could ask what he meant, Monsignor Ruspoli said with surprise, “They have someone in the Questura?”

  “No, but they have someone who does.” Vittorio faltered before adding, “Benedetto.”

  Luke had received a family history lesson yesterday from Bianca, and there had been more talk of his relatives over lunch with the monsignor. “My uncle?”

  “Yes.”

  The monsignor was clearly pained by the news. “Why?” he demanded.

  “I will tell you when I have talked to him.”

  For now, the most likely explanation seemed to be that the Karamans, on discovering that Luke was still alive, had sought to capitalize on the information, peddling it to the man who stood to lose the most from it—along with a promise to nip the problem in the bud. As theories went, it fit with Borodin’s final words of caution to Luke and Pippi: that the Karamans always sought a way to make a situation pay.

  “What are you going to do?” asked Monsignor Ruspoli.

  “With Benedetto? Why, use him, of course.”

  “And then?”

  “And then we’ll see.”

  Luke saw the vacant look of sorrow in his grandfather’s eyes. “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “After everything you have been through, you think of me?”

  “His father’s son,” said the monsignor.

  “Yes, just like Alessandro.”

  As he was leaving with Giorgio, Vittorio took Luke aside.

  “I know you want to help, but you and Pippi must stay here with Fredo and let me finish it. There are some bad things to be done. I am an old man; I don’t have to live with my conscience for long. You have your whole life.”

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Vittorio waited until the family were about to board the launch before making his move.

  “Stay with me tonight,” he said to Benedetto. “You can join them in Asolo tomorrow.”

  “You know I can’t, Papa. Giovanna—”

  “Giovanna won’t mind when she hears why. I’ve made a decision. I’m stepping down.”

  “Stepping down?”

  “Retiring. From the company. That’s right. Albrizzi Marittima is yours.”

  Benedetto appeared genuinely stunned. “Mine?”

  “To do with as you see fit, without your old father throwing his weight around.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Vittorio contrived an ironic smile. “Well, I might change my mind if you can’t spare me one little evening to talk it through.”

  He watched from a distance as Benedetto broke the news to Giovanna, and he thought for a moment that she might actually let out a yelp of joy. Collecting herself, she hurried over and gave Vittorio the first hug he had received from her in years.

  “You’ll still be living with us, I hope.”

  It was the last thing she hoped for, and it cost Vittorio nothing to boost her pleasure still further. “Please don’t be offended, but I thought I might take a small place of my own. I’m not getting any younger, and all those stairs up to the top floor …”

  “I’m not offended, Papa.”

  So, not just a hug; he was “Papa” again.

  With the staff all gone, it fell to Vittorio to open the bottle of vintage champagne he had placed on ice earlier.

  “I’ve booked us a table at Harry’s Bar,” he said, filling two flutes. “Your favorite table.”

  Benedetto beat him to the toast: “To the best father any man could ever hope to have.”

  They clinked glasses.

  “How does it feel?” asked Vittorio. “You now have everything you always wanted.”

  “I only want what you want, Papa.”

  “Benedetto, please, you’re allowed to be happy for yourself. It’s only human.”

  “Okay, yes, I’m happy,” he beamed.

  “That’s good, because I want you to hold the prize, to feel it in your hands, feel the weight of it, before I ask the q
uestion.”

  “What question?”

  Vittorio took a sip of champagne and bestowed a kindly smile on his son. “Do you have a telephone number for the Karaman brothers?”

  “Who?”

  Impressive. Barely a tremor in his eyes.

  “You heard me. Do you have a number for the Karamans, or do they call you?”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Vittorio laid his glass aside and lit a cigarette, letting Benedetto stew. “I’m going to allow you two more denials. After the third, I can’t help you.”

  “Help me with what?”

  “That counts as one. I’m talking about Vincenzo. I’m talking about Petrovic.”

  “Petrovic? I’ve never heard that name before.”

  “You can have that one on me. It’s possible you don’t know his name. Petrovic works for the Karamans. He is the man you told about the Hotel San Barnaba.”

  “Papa, I really don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “And you’ve just used up your second denial.” Seeing that Benedetto was about to reply, Vittorio raised his hand. “No, think very carefully before you speak again. You’re wondering if I am bluffing. I am not. I know about Gasperi at the Questura. I know you gave him a name: Luke Hamilton. Where did you get that name, Benedetto? Who told you about him?”

  Benedetto made to pour himself some more champagne, then changed his mind. Abandoning his glass, he sat down on the divan, head in his hands.

  “Look at me, Benedetto. I said look at me.” Benedetto finally looked up, his face creased with shame and anguish. “How much did you pay the Karamans?”

  “What they asked for.”

  “Tell me. I want to know how much your nephew’s life was worth to you.”

  “Four hundred thousand lire.”

  “Company money?”

  “Not all of it.”

  “What were the terms of payment?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “It does to me,” replied Vittorio.

  “Half up front, the rest on completion.”

  “Completion … It sounds so innocuous. Do you have any idea how many other people have been ‘completed’ because of you?”