The Lizard's Bite nc-4

by David Hewson

  The waiter had gone back to the counter, back to flicking at bread-crumbs and dust with his cloth. Randazzo got to his feet, a little unsteadily, and lifted the bottle of wine. It came up too easily from the table. He glowered at the Barolo, with its fancy yellow label and dark, dark glass. It was empty.

  “Coffee,” he mumbled.

  The waiter turned and grimaced at him. “What?”

  “Coffee,” Randazzo barked angrily. “And grappa. Good grappa. Not the shit you’d normally give out. Big one. I’ll take it outside.”

  On another occasion he’d have sat there anyway, looking at the Arsenale gates, thinking about those stolen lions. He liked his history, the good parts anyway. There was a time when entire naval fleets sailed out from the vast military boatyard hidden behind that castellated frontage. Big enough, powerful enough to browbeat the entire eastern Mediterranean into submission, to send emperors fleeing for safety, nations flocking to their treasuries to find some gold that could keep the Venetian pirates at bay.

  Piracy and thieving. These were in the native blood. It was fruitless trying to pretend otherwise. He stumbled to the nearest table outside, fell into a chair, waited for the coffee and the drink to arrive, took one gulp of the latter, then poured some cane sugar into his cup and sipped at that.

  He was next to the four businessmen, who were staring at him. They could go to hell, Randazzo decided. He’d heard them speaking. Small talk. In a language he half recognised because it was close to native Veneto.

  The Croatians were everywhere these days. In the holiday business. In the smuggling rings. It was hard to draw the line between the legitimate ones and the crooks.

  Randazzo gave them a sarcastic grin and mumbled, “Salute.”

  The biggest raised his glass of beer and said the same back.

  Randazzo considered mumbling some low insult under his breath, then thought the better of it.

  “What do we call you?” one of the men asked. “Father? Brother? What?”

  Randazzo peered at them. In his view the Croatians were scum, mainly. Opportunists who’d just crawled their way to the other side of the Adriatic in the hope of screwing some money out of the first mug they encountered. He gave them one sour glance, then returned to his grappa.

  “Maybe he’s supposed to be one of the silent ones,” the nearest suggested. “You know. The kind of monk who never says a thing because he’s too busy contemplating God or something?”

  The weasel-like dark-eyed creature by his side laughed. “Too busy contemplating his glass, more like. And what’s on his plate. You pay for that, Father, Brother, Sister, Uncle? Or whatever they call you?”

  And they never had any respect. That was another thing that bugged him about the Croatians.

  “I pay for everything,” Randazzo replied, trying not to sound drunk. “Including scum like you.”

  They were coming into focus now. There were three of them. One older, bigger than the rest. Randazzo took a good look around the empty square.

  “Lavazzi! Malipiero!” he yelled. “Where the hell are you when you’re wanted?”

  “Language, language,” the big one tut-tutted under his breath.

  “Where the fu . . .”

  Randazzo cut what he was about to say and looked inside the restaurant. There was no one there now. Not even the insolent little waiter. The piazza was silent and empty, not a face at any of the windows, not a hand pushing out ribbons of washing onto the ropes that were strung across the adjoining alleyways, one wall to the other. Nothing but him, the men and some old stone lions.

  He sniffed the air. There was a stink here, rising up from the water lapping in the canal by the Arsenale gates, reaching him on the slightest of August breezes.

  The big one got up, brushed crumbs off his trousers, then took a final gulp of his beer. “You know,” he said, “I don’t think there’s anything worse than that. A man of the Church using profanities. Feeding his face with good, rich food when half the world’s starving.” He glared at Randazzo, then nodded back at the restaurant. “Back where we come from, people dream about eating somewhere like this. Even the priests.”

  But I’m not a priest, Randazzo wanted to object. Something, some note of alarm sounding in the Barolo fuzz that filled his brain, stopped him.

  The other two were up on their feet now, one of them with something to say.

  “You know what’s worse than a greedy priest?” he asked.

  Randazzo yelled for Lavazzi and Malipiero again, swore he’d kick their asses when they finally dragged themselves out of whatever fleapit they’d found.

  “What’s worse,” the Croatian continued, coming close to him with a look on his face that was more disappointment than threat, “is a crooked cop. One who takes what’s on offer and still doesn’t know his place.”

  “A lack of gratitude,” said the big one, taking something out of his pocket, something black and dull and familiar, screwing an object onto its nose with a casual disdain that made Gianfranco Randazzo start to shiver inside the hot, itchy Franciscan habit, “is tantamount to a lack of respect.”

  The Croatian stood in front of Randazzo now, the gun with its silencer firm in his right hand. “And that, Commissario,” he added, “is why I’ve decided this doesn’t happen easy.”

  Randazzo’s head cleared in an instant; every last confusing speck of the heavy bloodred booze fled somewhere deep inside his bloodstream.

  “I di-didn’t talk to anyone,” he stuttered. “I wouldn’t talk to anyone. Tell him. Tell them all. I . . .”

  They weren’t even listening. They were just scanning the piazza, making certain they were alone.

  “I’ll be sure to pass that on,” the big one said, then pressed the pistol hard on Randazzo’s right knee, just as the policeman was coming off the seat, trying to summon the strength and the courage to run. There was a compressed, powerful retort, like the popping of a balloon inside a pillowcase.

  Gianfranco Randazzo lifted his shattered leg and, still convinced he was able to run, screamed when his foot hit the ground, felt himself falling, felt something stab through his chest and his gut, small hot metal devils whirling through him, cutting and slicing, fiery chunks of metal scorching through his flesh.

  The paved piazza rose up to meet him. His head banged hard on the cobbles, his teeth smashed on the hard, hard stone.

  He looked up, trying to see them. Above him stood the stone lion, leering, a stolen object happy to watch something else being robbed from a man.

  Then its worn features disappeared, were replaced by the face of the big Croatian. An unseen object, hard, cold, metallic, came from nowhere and placed itself on a pulsing vein in Randazzo’s right temple.

  “Ciao,” the man murmured.

  SCACCHI’S BOAT WAS STILL ABSENT WHEN THEY’D CIRCLED the island. Apart from the woman, anxiously scanning the sky, looking for the source of the noise, Costa knew he had nothing to go on. Nothing except an illicit little shack, erected somewhere at the back of Piero Scacchi’s property, and recently, from what he’d seen from the passenger seat of Andrea Correr’s plane. It was a shot in the dark. Just the kind of trick Leo Falcone would have pulled when things were getting difficult. Costa hoped a little of the old bastard’s luck had rubbed off.

  He walked up from the beach, climbed over a low rickety fence and found himself in a field. Immaculate rows of pepper plants, dotted with red fruit, stretched in front of him, verdant on raised beds. Beyond a fence to the left lay similar ranks of purple artichokes, and to the right a field of equally proper spinach beet, a vivid sheet of green. Scacchi, or whoever tended these crops, was careful. Not a plant was out of place, not a leaf showed a sign of disease or insect damage. Nic recalled the way his own father had worked the vegetable garden outside the family house back in Rome, on the outskirts of the city, close to the old Appian Way. There had been the same peasant skill, the same monotonous, backbreaking care there, and it showed in the crops, in every shining leaf.

 
He looked ahead, towards the shack, now no more than a hundred metres away. The woman was gone. Back inside perhaps. Or fleeing to find help, suspecting what was on the way. Costa thought about what he knew of the background of the case, took out his service pistol, looked at it, checked the magazine, then put it back in the holster hidden beneath his dark jacket.

  Guns depressed him. They always had, and, he suspected, always would.

  Then he took out his mobile phone and checked for messages. There were none. Not a word from Teresa or Peroni. Or Emily either, and he wondered why he’d thought of her last.

  Casting these misgivings to one side, or trying to, he walked on to the little house, found the door open, went in, and said, quietly, calmly, with not a hint of threat in his voice, “Signora Conti?”

  The place wasn’t what he expected. From the outside it seemed a run-down rural hovel, plain white walls, poorly built, with a single small window giving out onto the tiny patch of garden, nasturtiums and roses, that sat in front of the cheap green single door. But from within, it looked like a home, and not that of a peasant farmer either. There were paintings on the walls, only dimly visible in the poor light, a hi-fi system playing classical music at low volume, and shelves of books. The smell of food drifted in from an adjoining open door. The place was spotless, tidy and organised in a way which seemed, to him, more urban than rural.

  “Signora Conti?” he called again. “I wish to talk with you. There’s nothing to fear.”

  The woman came out of the kitchen, wiping her hands with a cloth, glowering at him. She had short light brown hair, an attractive, intelligent face, and eyes that kept darting around the room, in any direction but his.

  “Who are you?” she demanded. “What right do you have to walk in here? Flying your plane over my house . . . ?”

  “Signora Conti—”

  “Stop saying this name!” she insisted, voice rising. “There’s no such person here. Go, please. Before I call the police.”

  He took out the photo from his pocket. They had just one in the files in the Questura. It was old. She’d changed her appearance. Dyed her hair, cut it short.

  He held it up in front of her. “You’re Laura Conti. I know why you’re here. I know why you’re hiding. Piero’s done a good job keeping you safe. The postcards. Putting you so close to him, so close to the city. It’s clever. He’s a smart man.”

  “Piero?” she asked. “Where is he? What have you done with him?”

  “I haven’t done anything with him. He’s not here. I thought perhaps you knew . . .”

  “He’s the landlord. Nothing else. I don’t understand what you’re saying. It’s nonsense.”

  “Laura . . .”

  “Not that name!”

  He took one step towards her. She shivered at his closeness.

  “I need your help,” he said. “I need it desperately. And I can’t allow this to go on. It’s wrong. There’s a time to run away, and a time to face up to your past. This is that time. You and Daniel—”

  “Daniel, Daniel, Daniel . . .” she whispered, holding her head in her hands. “What are you talking about? My name is Paola Soranzo. I live here with my husband, Carlo. We are simple farmers. Now leave us alone.”

  Costa tossed the photo on the table. She didn’t even look at it. “I can’t do that,” he said. “Not for your sake. Not for mine. I have to . . .”

  He was reaching into his jacket, looking for the badge, when the man crept up behind him, quiet as a church mouse, unseen until the moment the long, ugly double barrel of a shotgun emerged round Nic Costa’s right shoulder and angled up towards his face.

  A hand came round the left side of his chest, found the gun in its holster, removed it, threw the weapon to the floor. Then he came slowly into view. Daniel Forster could pass easily as a Sant’ Erasmo farmer now. His hair was dyed almost black, long beneath a grubby beret. He wore a heavy moustache and stubble. And he had the farmer’s hunch too, the turned shoulders that came from working the fields. Costa was impressed. He raised his hands and kept them high all the same.

  “Signor Forster . . .” he began to say.

  “Shut up!” the man yelled, then cracked the side of Nic’s head painfully with the barrel of the shotgun.

  The woman was screaming, in fright or anger. Costa didn’t know which. Then the hard wooden stock of the gun fell again, and he tumbled to the floor, not caring.

  THE LAWYERS’ OFFICES WERE ON THE THIRD FLOOR OF a block on the Zattere waterfront in Dorsoduro, with a view out to Guidecca, the low residential island opposite. Emily Deacon forced her mind off the conversation briefly and stared at the Molino Stucky, the old mill almost opposite. This was, like the Isola degli Arcangeli, a piece of Venetian obsolescence seeking a purpose in a new, changing world. Unused for decades since the company behind the towering, red-brick factorylike structure collapsed, it had been through any number of redevelopment schemes trying to revive the place for industrial or manufacturing purposes. Now it was turning into a mix of hotels and apartments, a sign of the way Venice was headed. Massiter was right. There was only one form of commerce allowed in this city these days—the milking of ever-increasing numbers of visitors. Compared to the Molino Stucky, the Arcangeli’s island was paradise, a unique mix of extraordinary architecture and location, not some ungainly refurbished mill block perched at the end of an island few would ever wish to visit. She could appreciate why Massiter didn’t intend to be encumbered by the Arcangeli’s futile aspirations to continue their glassmaking trade. He’d seen the main chance and was now intent on seizing it.

  She listened to the argument continuing to rattle from side to side, between Massiter’s two surly attorneys, one English, one Milanese, and the single local lawyer representing the Arcangeli, a man who was both out of his depth and, it seemed to her, a little afraid of the Englishman. Michele Arcangelo sat by the man’s side, intent on stiffening his resolve every time some new demand from Massiter fell on the table, his one good eye staring at the sheaves of papers and plans that marked, as he surely knew, the end of the Arcangeli’s tenure on their sad little island. His brother Gabriele remained mute on the other side, looking as if he wished he were anywhere else in the world. This was all, Emily decided, Michele’s game. He was driven by his ego, his desire to be seen as an equal with his father. Massiter’s solution left him with nothing but money. Plenty of money. Several million euros to spare, even after the family’s debts were cleared. All the same, it was apparent to her this was meaningless. Without some stake in the island’s future, Michele Arcangelo would deem this deal worthless. Unless the alternative was even more difficult to swallow.

  The Arcangeli had conceded every point but one. That last concerned the fornace. Michele was insistent that Massiter hold to his original offer, allowing them to work the place unhindered and set up a small shop to market their goods. It was a final sticking point, one Massiter was reluctant to let pass. On the yacht, Emily had seen enough of the plans for the scheme to understand what the Englishman wanted for the building. It would be a restaurant and conference facility, sitting alongside the gallery of the palazzo, the premium hotel rooms of the mansion, and in front of a new hotel facility of cheaper rooms intended to be squeezed in at the rear of the property. The idea that he’d allow a working furnace, with its gas and smoke and industrial stink, to live alongside the rest of the island was unthinkable. Tourists demanded perfection, solitude, a promise of escape. Not the Arcangeli clan’s hot, noisy nights of glassmaking on their doorstep. This doubtless explained why Massiter had concealed from the Arcangeli from the beginning his greater plan for the island, allowing them to believe his interest was merely personal, focused on the establishment of the exhibition facility.

  There was a reason for Emily’s presence in the room. She wanted to keep Hugo Massiter’s trust, as much as possible, until it no longer mattered. Trust and usefulness were indivisible to him. So she looked at her watch and, quite deliberately, interrupted Michele in full flow
as he embarked upon a bitter tirade about the major changes being introduced into the contract at such a late stage.

  “We’ve two hours to conclude this, gentlemen,” she said. “Is it really worth pursuing these points? Or should we just call it a day? Everyone from the mayor down is scheduled to see you people sign on the dotted line at six. If that’s going to be cancelled, let’s do it now.”

  Michele’s glassy eye glinted at her. “The mistress speaks,” he snarled. “Is this one more insult you hurl at me, Massiter? If so—”

  “I’m his architect,” she interrupted. “I’m here to try to ensure that, whatever contract Signor Massiter signs, it makes some kind of economic sense. He’s too shrewd a man to wind up in the financial mess you did. I intend to keep it that way.”

  The man’s wrinkled hands stabbed at the papers on the table. “So you knew? All along? That this was what was on his mind?”

  Massiter was watching her, smiling. Impressed, she judged.

  “Many people work on contracts of this scale,” she replied. She felt emboldened by her position, able to play this charade. “None of this is one person’s work alone. I apologise to both of you if this sounds rude, Signor Arcangelo. But an enterprise which is to survive must be based upon sound financial planning. Not daydreams.”

  “Like ours?” Michele roared.

  “Like yours,” she rejoined calmly.

  “We’re artists! We’re the kind of people who made Venice what it is!”

  Massiter laughed, not unkindly. “Oh, Michele. Please. Don’t be so precious. You’re a bunch of Chioggia boatbuilders, one of whom happened to have an idea that worked for a little while. No one’s interested in your art anymore. It’s passé. That’s the problem with fashion. One day it’s in. The next . . .” He held up his hands.