1952 - The Wary Transgressor

by James Hadley Chase

  I drove all my weight against him and slammed him against the wall, pinning him inside the legs of the chair.

  He cursed me trying to pull the chair away, but I leaned my weight against it and held him.

  "Drop that knife, Torrchi!"

  He snarled at me.

  I jerked the chair out of his hands, and before he could move, shifted it, and slammed it back so two of the legs drove into his chest.

  The breath came out of his body like the hiss of a punctured tyre. The knife dropped from his hand. I flung the chair from me, jumped in close, grabbed his arm and wrist. I spun him round, bending his arm and twisting it up his back. I forced him on to his knees.

  He started to struggle, but I twisted his arm harder, wrenching it further back. He caught his breath in a quick gasp and stopped moving.

  "Spill it, Torrchi," I said. "Why did she give you the clip?"

  "She didn't."

  I put a little more pressure on his arm, and he howled softly, tried to resist the pressure, so I put on some more.

  I saw sweat begin to run down his neck.

  "I'll keep this up until you tell me," I said, panting a little myself. "I've got to know."

  He started to curse me, so I leaned my weight on his arm, and his cursing cut off into a shuddering groan.

  "You're breaking my arm!"

  "I don't give a damn about your arm. If I have to break it, I'll break it. You won't pick any more pockets with a busted arm, Torrchi."

  I began to increase the pressure. I heard his bones creak. He dropped flat on his face, pulling me with him. For a moment he almost broke my hold, then I shoved my foot on the back of his neck and grounded his face into the carpet. I gave his arm another wrench that made him yell out.

  "I'll tell you!" he gasped. "Only let go of my arm."

  I eased the pressure a little, but I didn't release my hold.

  "Why did she give you the clip?"

  "She wanted to know if you were still trying to leave the country. I said you were."

  "Did you tell her why?"

  "I didn't have to," he gasped. "She knew."

  I let go of him, kicked the knife across the room and went over to the window. I was badly shaken. If what he had just said was true the situation was dangerous.

  Torrchi sat up, groaning, holding his arm. Sweat streamed down his face. He didn't look at me.

  "Tell it from the beginning," I said. "Everything."

  "She came here in the afternoon," Torrchi said. "I recognized her. She didn't tell me her name, but I knew she was the one you are in love with." He peered cautiously at me. "It is right, isn't it: you are in love with her?"

  "Tell me what happened! Tell me quickly or I'll break your dirty neck!"

  "Yes, signor David. I will tell you exactly what happened," Torrchi said hurriedly. "She said she wanted to help you, but you were too proud to accept her help. She asked if you were still wanting to leave the country as if she knew all about it, but just wanted to make sure. I told her I didn't talk about my friends. Then she brought out the clip. She said I could have it if I told her what she wanted to know."

  "And you told her?" I said, so angry I could have killed him.

  "It was a great temptation, signor David," Torrchi said miserably, "but I knew you loved her and she loved you, and it seemed I was helping you by telling her. Of course, the clip made a difference, but it did seem I was helping you as well as myself."

  "Go on, you damned little rat! What did you tell her?"

  "I said you wanted to get out of the country, and I was trying to get a passport for you."

  "You told her how much Jacopo wanted?"

  "Yes, I told her that."

  "Well, go on, what else did she want to know?"

  "She asked if the police were looking for you."

  "Well, go on!"

  Torrchi hesitated.

  "It's nothing to be ashamed of," he said cautiously. "I told her you had run away from the Army, and that I had too. I explained you had no papers, and if she wanted to help you she could give you the money. I was being a good friend to you, signor David. I told her if she really loved you she would find the money and make you take it."

  "Was that all she wanted to know?"

  Torrchi frowned.

  "She did ask if your name really was Chisholm."

  I felt a cold chill run up my spine.

  "I told her as far as I knew it was.” Torrchi went on, rubbing his arm tenderly. "Then she asked if I had ever heard anyone call you Chesham; I think that was the name, and I said I hadn't."

  I felt as if someone had socked me in the belly. She knew!

  She must have known all the time! That's why she had picked on me!

  "You're a fine pal, Torrchi," I said, my voice husky. "I always thought you were to be trusted."

  Torrchi was looking ashamed of himself. He didn't look up.

  "But she loves you, signor David. It's not as if she would want to harm you."

  "Oh, go to hell!" I said, and crossed over to the door.

  "Have a drink, signor David," Torrchi pleaded, scrambling to his feet. "Just to prove we are no longer enemies."

  "No! We're not enemies. We're not friends. We're nothing to each other."

  I slid back the bolt, opened the door and went out.

  Now, any time she wanted to get rid of me, any time I didn't do what she wanted, she had only to pick up the telephone and tell the police where to find me to get me hanged.

  I was in a jam, and I knew it.

  chapter six

  As I drove along the monotonous autostrada that connects Milan with Sesto Calendo, I remembered very vividly how that trouble had begun.

  I remembered the exact date: April 23rd, 1945: two days after Bologna had been liberated, and when American and British troops, by establishing a bridgehead across the Po, had knocked the guts out of the campaign.

  What was left of my unit, about a hundred and fifty men, had been in the thick of the fighting, and in the lull that followed we had been pulled out of the line to regroup. We had been sent down to a tiny village on the banks of the Reno, about twenty kilometres from Praduro e Sasso.

  By now, most of us had an idea the fighting would be over in a few days. It had been a slogging campaign, and we weren't sorry to have the opportunity to take it easy.

  On this particular day, I and two other sergeants were bathing in the river when Lieutenant Rawlins came down the bank and waved to me.

  We liked Rawlins. He was big and tough and humorous. He had slogged along with us now for the past six months, fighting with us up the backbone of Italy, looking after us, and leading us into the tough spots, always three jumps ahead of us, never looking back to see if we were coming, but just keeping on, sure we were right behind him, as we invariably were. He was a good officer and a fine man.

  I swam over to him and straightened up, the water coming to my waist.

  "Sorry to break it up, sergeant," he said, grinning at me, "but I want you. Looks pretty good in there."

  "It is pretty good, Lieutenant," I said, and began to haul myself up on to the bank.

  He reached out and gave me his hand: nothing snooty about Rawlins. He had that rare talent of being able to treat his men like equals without losing his firm hold on the reins.

  "Get dressed, sergeant," he said, dropping down on the grass. "We're going down to H.Q."

  While I rubbed myself down, he lit a cigarette and tilted his cap over his eyes.

  "You speak Italian, don't you?" he asked.

  "Yes, sir."

  "Pretty well?"

  "I'm bilingual, Lieutenant. I lived ten years in Florence when I was a kid."

  "How was that?" he asked, looking up at me.

  "I was born in Florence. My father was a painter; not much of one, but he was pretty enthusiastic. When I was ten years old, his brother died, and left him some money and a house in Carmel, California. We left Florence and settled in Carmel, but I've never forgotten the languag
e."

  He nodded.

  "Know Florence pretty well?"

  "I was there for two years in 1934. I was studying architecture, specializing in the Renaissance period. Yes, I know it pretty well."

  "How about Rome and Venice?"

  "I can find my way around them. What's cooking, Lieutenant?"

  He flicked his cigarette into the river.

  "Can you drive a car?"

  "Yes; I've driven for years."

  "Think you could act as a guide? You'd have to be ready to answer any question shot at you, and give the right answer: the historical as well as the art angle."

  "I guess I could manage it," I said, wondering what he was getting at. "I've got a copy of the Guide Bleu somewhere. I guess I could get along all right."

  "Well, there isn't anyone else," Rawlins said, getting to his feet, "so it'll have to be you."

  "What do I do, Lieutenant?"

  "You're detailed to take General Costain on a sightseeing trip. Florence, Rome and Venice; starting tomorrow."

  I stared at him.

  "Isn't he interested in fighting this war, Lieutenant?"

  Rawlins hid a smile.

  "He's on sick leave, sergeant. Better not let him hear you talk like that: he's the original firebrand. Of the record, Chisholm, this isn't going to be an easy assignment. If I could do anything about it, I wouldn't be sending you or any of my other men, but H.Q. has your record, and the General's asked for you."

  "What kind of a guy is he, then?"

  "Like I said: the original firebrand. You'll have to watch your step. He has very set ideas how a soldier should look and behave. I'll kit you out for the job, but you've got to be immaculate; and when I say immaculate, I mean immaculate. He'll even check to see if the insteps of your boots are polished, and if they're not— God help you!"

  I scratched the back of my neck and grimaced.

  "You couldn't say I was sick, Lieutenant? This doesn't sound my cup of coffee."

  Rawlins grinned.

  "It isn't. It isn't anyone's cup of coffee, but maybe it'll do you good. It's time some of you sergeants braced up your ideas. Better get hold of that guidebook of yours. If you give him a bum steer on anything, you'll imagine an atomic bomb has hit you."

  "You make it sound like a vacation."

  "I'll get you some leave when you're through—you'll need it. Come on, let's get down to H.Q. and get your papers fixed. You're to report to him at Bologna at ten hundred hours, tomorrow morning, so you haven't much time."

  The Headquarters of General Costain at Bologna was in Via Roma, near the railway station.

  I reported to a grey-faced major at three minutes to ten hundred hours the following morning.

  I had been to a number of H.Q.s during my service in the Army, but I had never seen one as clean and as smart as this one.

  The floors were so polished you could look down and see your face in them. The brass door handles shone like diamonds. I saw a big, burly sergeant open a door by putting a sheet of paper over the handle so as not to spoil the shine. The men at the desks looked as if they had just stepped out of an envelope of cellophane; none of them lounged. They all sat their chairs like a good horseman sits his horse.

  The grey-faced Major went through my papers as if his life depended on finding some mistake in them, then he turned jaded, tired eyes on me and went over me inch by inch with the microscopic thoroughness of a scientist in search of an invisible germ.

  "Turn round," he said.

  I turned round and felt his eyes creeping up and down my back.

  "Right. At ease, sergeant."

  I turned and shuffled my feet a little and waited, looking over the top of his head in the approved manner.

  "You know what you have to do?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "What?"

  "At eleven hundred hours I drive the General from here to the Grand Hotel, Florence, arriving in time for lunch. We remain in Florence for four days, then leave for Rome, stopping at the Continental Hotel, Siena, for two nights, and then on to Hotel Flora, Rome for three nights. From Rome I'm to drive the General to Venice by way of Terni, Fano, Ravenna, Ferrara and Padua. We stay at the Hotel Londra, Venice, for four nights and return to Bologna, arriving May 8th."

  The Major stroked his lean nose and nodded his head.

  "That's right, sergeant. The General will tell you what he wants to see in Florence. You know the place?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "At the back of this building you will find the General's car. Hennessey, the General's servant, is out there now. You better go and look at the car and talk to Hennessey. He'll tell you what you'll need to know. Report back here at five until eleven sharp."

  "Yes, sir."

  I saluted, about-faced and marched out.

  On my way I saw some of the desk sergeants looking at me the way you look at someone who is dying of smallpox.

  I found Hennessey in the yard at the back of the building, putting some hand baggage into the boot of an enormous Cadillac.

  Hennessey was a tall, thin man with a deadpan face and eyes like flint stones.

  "You the driver?" he asked, eyeing me up and down.

  "Yeah," I said. "Some car."

  "You'll grow to love it," he said. "Take a look at this." He held up the handbag. It was made of leather, and I could see my face in its polished side as clearly as if I were looking in a mirror. "Hand polished," Hennessey went on, with a bitterness that made my flesh creep. "There are five of the bastards. Takes you two solid hours a day to keep them like this. I know; I have to do them. Well, that's the way he wants them, and that's the way you'll keep them."

  "You mean I have to polish his baggage?" I said, gaping.

  "You do if you want to remain in one piece," Hennessey returned, and laid the handbag in the boot as if it were made of eggshells. "Take a look at the car. That's another little job you've got to do. Spotless, no grease, polished, and that goes for the inside as well. Every time you stop to let the General eat or relieve himself, you clean the car, see? He doesn't like to get into a dirty car. He has a thing about it. Many a time I've eaten my dinner with one hand and cleaned this sonofabitch with the other. Don't forget the ashtrays. It he finds even the smell of ash in those trays when he gets into the car, he'll put it down in his little book."

  "What book?"

  Hennessey spat carefully on the concrete, then erased the mark with his boot.

  "You'll get to know his little book. Everything he doesn't like goes into that book. Everything you forget to do, every dirt mark, every mistake you make goes into that little book. Then he hands it over to Major Kay with instructions, and you get it in the neck. I got three days' field punishment for forgetting to empty an ashtray."

  I surveyed the enormous expanse of glittering coachwork, and my heart sank.

  "Aren't you coming on this run?" I asked.

  "Me?" Hennessey let his cold, granite face dissolve in a split-second grin. "This is my first vacation from the General in four months. No, I'm going to enjoy myself. It's all yours, sergeant, and I hope you enjoy yourself as much as I'm going to enjoy myself. I don't think it's likely, but I hope so just the same."

  I opened the car door and glanced at the controls. It was the finest car I'd ever seen, let alone handled. It had everything from a cocktail bar to electrically driven windows.

  "Is he as tough as I hear he is?" I asked without hope.

  "No; he's tougher than that," Hennessey said. "Know what puzzles me?"

  "You tell me."

  He looked furtively from right to left before saying, "How he's managed to live so long. I can't understand why some guy hasn't knifed him before this." He looked hopefully at me. "You've got fifteen days with him. Just you and him, and no one else for him to pick on. Maybe you're the guy to do it. Maybe by the fourteenth day you'll blow your top and stick a knife into the bastard. Do that, sergeant, and everyone here from the Colonel down to me will ask the Pope to make you a saint."

/>   "I don't scare that easy," I said, and grinned at him. "I once worked in a unit that came under Patton. They don't come tougher than Patton."

  Hennessey stared at me.

  "Patton? You don't call him tough, do you?"

  "He's a tough general: no one tougher."

  "Then you've got a wonderful experience ahead of you," Hennessey said dreamily. "You haven't begun to live yet. Patton, huh? That's the funniest thing I've heard. Excuse me, sergeant, while I laugh."

  "The Major said you would tell me what I want to know," I said coldly. "Is this it or is there some more of it?"

  Hennessey produced a sheet of folded paper from his pocket.

  "I've put it down for you. Slip up on one of these items, sergeant, and you'll lose your stripes. Now listen: he likes to be called at seven. Not a second before or after, and he'll check you with his watch. All his things must be ready. Watch his shoes. He likes the insteps polished and you've got to take the laces out every time you clean them. If he finds polish on his laces, he'll walk up the wall. He likes his bath exactly sixty-five degrees, and if you've never tried to get water at an exact temperature in a hurry, you've a sweet experience ahead of you."

  Hennessey glanced at his notes and then gave me a sly little smile.

  "He puts his teeth in a box by his bed. You have to polish them. That's another of his little fads. Not a spot or a speck or out comes his little book. Coffee, two fingers of Vat 69, and one piece of toast must be ready for him when he comes out of his bath. The coffee must be at 80 degrees or there'll be hell spread over the room. You get out while he dresses, but wait outside the door. When he's ready for you he'll call you, and he only calls once, so stick outside the door and keep your ears open. He doesn't call loud. He'll tell you what he wants to do for the day, and he'll only tell you once. You don't write anything down; you listen and you remember, or the book comes out. When you're not moving about the room, stand to attention. He likes guys to stand to attention: thumbs along the seams of your trousers, head up, eyes front and up, no movement. He loves a guy who stands like that, so don't forget it, sergeant. Speak only when he speaks to you; even if the goddamn car catches fire, go on driving until he tells you to stop." Hennessey paused to look at me. "Getting all this, sergeant?"