North From Rome

by Helen Macinnes

  Behind Eleanor, the room door opened. It was Rosana at last. She brought the key inside with her and turned it in the lock.

  “Why didn’t you come back and let me out?” Eleanor asked. “The gate was open for a few moments; we could have—”

  “We could have done nothing,” Rosana said, coming slowly away from the door. “Not with Sabatini here.” She sat down on the edge of a chair as if her strength had suddenly been drained away. “We’ve lost,” she said dully. Her hands were trembling. She stared down at them and burst into tears. “Everything has gone wrong, everything. And everything will go more wrong.” She brushed at her tears savagely with her knuckles. “And I couldn’t wait to open your door. I had to get to the little gallery above the chapel before they entered. I had to find out why Sabatini came here. The man’s a murderer. Don’t you know that? And he is the man who is deciding about you—and me. He—” She caught hold of herself. The tears had gone but her hands still trembled.

  Eleanor searched for a cigarette, lit it for her. She poured out the last of the water from the San Pellegrino bottle and handed the glass to Rosana. She said, not without respect, “You ran a terrible risk!”

  “I got back, didn’t I?” Rosana asked, almost fiercely. She took a deep shuddering breath. “Sabatini—he makes me feel sick, that man. Even to be in the same place as he is makes me feel—” Her whole body shuddered this time. “And Luigi—” she said contemptuously, “Luigi looking so noble, listening, never objecting. I kept thinking, he can’t, he won’t, ever agree to that. But he did, he did!”

  She’s near breaking point, Eleanor thought. More calmly than she felt, she said, “All right, all right... What’s the bad news? Just how lost are we?” She even managed a smile.

  “The meeting is today. I told Joe it was tomorrow. But it is today. This afternoon. At three o’clock. Three! And it’s almost two now. An hour, that’s all we have...an hour!”

  We’d better keep the exclamation marks out of our voices, Eleanor thought. She said, “So we’ll find Joe and tell him.”

  “But where is he? I don’t know. He was coming here this evening to check up. This evening!” Rosana made a gesture of despair. “And that’s not all my bad news,” she said quickly. “Luigi’s orders have been changed. He isn’t to attend the meeting. Oh, he is going to Perugia, all right. But he isn’t to attend the meeting. Sabatini says there has been too much trouble—Luigi may be followed.”

  “Why send him to Perugia at all?”

  “Because Sabatini is clever—didn’t I tell you?”

  “Yes, yes. I’m sorry. Go on. About Luigi.”

  “Luigi will drive to Perugia without any luggage, in his own car. He is to leave it at the Piazza Italia, but on no account must he go near the Corso Vanucci. That’s the main street, where people walk and sit at the cafés.”

  “Yes, yes,” Eleanor said again, her impatience growing.

  “Don’t you see—the Corso Vanucci is the last place you’d expect a group of conspirators to gather? It’s so open, so innocent. But that’s where the meeting is going to be held. Luigi is to avoid it, to lead anyone following him away from it. Don’t you see? He’s a—a—”

  “Decoy?”

  Rosana nodded. “He is to walk down by the market, choose a little café there—any café, it doesn’t matter—go inside, sit at the back, look as though he were waiting. After an hour, he can leave. Go back to his car, drive over one of the hill roads to Gubbio. There are so many small roads. He will lose anyone following him.”

  “What about the other car, the Lancia—and the suitcases?”

  “These arrangements have not been changed,” Rosana said, avoiding Eleanor’s eyes. “The mechanic will take you in the Lancia, by the main route to Gubbio. And then Luigi will drive you across the Apennines, to—” She paused. “To Venice.” She stared down at her hands.

  Arrangements had not been changed. Eleanor stared in amazement.

  “You mean, Luigi knew all along that—” Eleanor’s lips closed in anger, and she turned to the window. “And what are the ‘arrangements’ for you?” she asked.

  “The carabinieri will be notified that I am here. The police in Rome want to question me.” She added, almost hopelessly, “About Tony Brewster’s death.”

  “But the police must know you were his friend.”

  “Murder is murder.”

  Eleanor took a deep breath. “We have to find Joe.”

  Rosana said nothing.

  “He is known in Montesecco, isn’t he? He’s the princess’s chauffeur. Surely he has friends you could telephone, send them looking—”

  “I can’t get near the telephone. The mechanic is guarding it now.” She rested her brow on her hands. “I’ll have to get out, that’s all. Without being seen. If Luigi discovers I’m missing—” She paused. She was thinking aloud now. “Yes, I’ll have to get out. But will Joe be at the farmhouse? And there is no telephone there. I may only waste time searching for him.” And then a new fear spread over her face. “How do we even know he is still alive? Sabatini could have seen him, Sabatini—”

  “Stop that, Rosana! Stop it. You outwitted Sabatini in the chapel. You’ll do it again.”

  Rosana said slowly, “All day, you’ve been afraid. Now—” She shook her head in wonder.

  “We can’t afford to be afraid both at the same time,” Eleanor said sharply.

  “If you knew what I knew—” Rosana flashed back at her. Then she controlled her voice. “I’m sorry. I—I—” If only, she thought miserably, I didn’t have to be responsible for both of us. The American is so helpless, so unaccustomed to danger.

  “Rosana,” said Eleanor, with a confidence that sounded real enough even to her own ears, “you must get to a telephone somewhere. Call Rome. Have your people there relay, your message to Perugia. Isn’t that possible?”

  Rosana nodded. It was an idea to be considered. Only, she thought wearily, I wish I weren’t alone. The American may give ideas, but no practical help. She means well, but— Rosana said, “I’ll risk, going out by the main gate. That will save fifteen minutes. I can telephone from the restaurant.” She rose, frowning. “The post office is even nearer.”

  Eleanor looked down at the cars in the courtyard, and then back at the untouched luncheon tray on the little central table. “Telephone from here,” she said, “that’s quicker still.” She walked over to the table. “I’ll slash the tyres. You give the mechanic the alarm. He’ll leave that phone in a hurry.” She picked up the knife and tested it. “Probably can’t cut anything except spaghetti. Cooked spaghetti, at that. Still, woman with knife—always an alarming sight.”

  “You are mad,” said Rosana, “quite mad.” But there was interest in her eyes, and almost a smile on her lips.

  Eleanor reached the door. She paused, her hand on the key. “Help me with my geography, in case I have to play hide-and-seek.”

  “Let me draw you a map.”

  “No time. The house is a square—four wings built around the courtyard. Where is the main staircase?”

  “In the centre of this wing.”

  “That’s to my left as I go out of this door?”

  “Yes. It leads down to the big hall, then into the courtyard. Then there are four other staircases, smaller ones—”

  “Four?” I’ll never remember them, Eleanor thought in alarm.

  “It’s quite, simple—they lead out to the four corners of the courtyard.”

  “And where is the telephone?” Only one, of course. The princess no doubt thought telephones ruined her décor, all six centuries of it. But some might say that cupids playing around Venus were just as much of an anomaly to Signorelli’s fresco.

  “That’s across the courtyard, in Alberto’s office, beside the main gate. Alberto’s quarters are over there, too.”

  I was safe, he told me again. He would place a guard outside my door and it would be locked. No one could harm me here. And he would send Rosana to keep me company. In a few days,
we’d forget all this. Together, we’d forget. Meanwhile, I was safe. That was all that mattered. “That’s the east side,” Eleanor said quickly, remembering the sun’s rays that morning. “So we’re in the west wing.

  Rosana looked at her. She has more brains than I guessed. Rosana thought: she has more courage, too. Her own confidence began to grow again. She said, “Kitchens, storerooms, stables, and garages.”

  “And Pirotta?”

  She no longer called him Luigi, Rosana noticed again. “His rooms are in the south side of the house over the gun room and the chapel.”

  “Then, when the mechanic comes yelling into the courtyard, I run to the north,” Eleanor said with a little smile. She unlocked the door and stepped into a shadowed corridor, with doors along one side, shuttered windows along the other. This was a good feeling, she thought, a good feeling to unlock a door and step out, of your own free will. Whatever happens now, I’m not going back into that room. Never, never.

  “What’s out there?” she whispered, pointing to the shuttered windows.

  “The garden. The gamekeeper has his lodge down near the big wall. Jacopone. He’s a friend.”

  Eleanor took a step to her left. “I’ll go down the main staircase. And you?”

  Rosana moved to her right. “North through the kitchen wing into the east one. Each wing is connected by corridors, upstairs and downstairs.”

  For a moment they stood looking at each other. Then they smiled.

  “Remember,” Eleanor said, “I escaped.”

  Rosana nodded. “You threatened me with that knife.” Her smile deepened; she had to smother a laugh. Eleanor thought, at least she’s out of the slump; she’s all right. She’s very much all right. Eleanor began walking towards the staircase.

  The doors to the other rooms up here were all closed. Certainly it was comforting to know that Pirotta lived in another part of the house. But she was nervous, she might as well admit it. She could drop the pretence now that she wasn’t afraid. Afraid? She was scared sick. She couldn’t even laugh at the picture she must make, carrying this ridiculous knife in her hand. She could laugh later, if she were still free to laugh, at the comic relief. And then— Even thinking of comic relief made her feel a little better. She looked over her shoulder as she reached the staircase. The corridor behind her was empty. Rosana had been quick. There was no turning back now.

  She started to descend the long flight of stairs. “Dear God,” she was praying, “help us, help us.” And then she added, playing fair. “If we are in the right. Dear God, just help those who are in the right.”

  The staircase running down the wall on her left had wide and shallow steps that stretched almost the full length of the hall. They were of stone, like the heavy balustrade, like the towering walls. This must be the oldest part of the house, perhaps the original building. No pink clouds and golden decorations here, no baroque twists and curves. The hall beneath seemed vast in its bareness. It was filled with shadows, dark and cold. At its large doorway, standing open, there was a stream of light slanting towards the foot of the staircase, at first strong, then weakening, then fading into the shadows. Outside, the heat blazed and shimmered.

  She kept close to the wall of the staircase, sliding her left hand down its cool stone surface to steady her and keep her footsteps sure. A twisted ankle would be a foolish thing. I ought to take off my shoes, she thought, and paused for a moment to slip her feet out of them. She didn’t stop to pick them up. She started to run lightly, noiselessly, down the broad steps. As she almost reached the pool of warm light, seeping up over the bottom steps, the oblique view through the doorway lengthened to show more of the courtyard. She could see part of the black shadow now cast by the south wing of the house, and the cars parked against the wall, carefully within the shade. And there also were two suitcases lying close to the Lancia’s near wheel.

  She stopped abruptly. From the opposite side of the hall came a little cry, quickly silenced. She looked over the balustrade. Anna-Maria and Alberto were down there, huddled together, standing quite still, undecided, waiting. It had been Anna-Maria who had almost cried out: her hand was still over her lips. Now they both stared up at her in amazement and wonder.

  “It’s all right,” she said, and smiled. But they didn’t smile back. Alberto pointed to the courtyard warningly. She heard a movement out there, and then a man’s confident stride, crisp, unhurried. It could only be Pirotta.

  She retreated back against the wall. Were its shadows deep enough to hide her? She could see him now, as he dropped a third suitcase beside the others. Then he turned towards the hall.

  Swiftly, Eleanor moved away from the wall back to the balustrade again, and sank down on the step behind its waist-high pillars. Was this safer? At least, it felt less vulnerable than standing up. Thank God, she didn’t feel sick any longer; but her legs were trembling, and so were her hands.

  “Well,” he said at the doorway, “is the rebellion over?”

  For a moment of shock, she stared down at him from between the banisters. Then she saw he wasn’t looking at her. His eyes, frowning as they accustomed themselves from the blaze of sunlight to the dark shadows, were searching the hall. “There you are,” he told Alberto and Anna-Maria, “just as I thought.”

  Alberto took a few steps forward, trying to pull his arm free from his wife’s sudden grip. She cried out, “Alberto! No! No! You’ve done enough. He will strike you again, he will kill you this time! No! No!—”

  “You’re a very foolish old woman,” Pirotta said coldly. “I don’t kill people. And I did not strike Alberto.”

  “I saw you—” she began hysterically.

  “You did not. You saw him try to stop me from taking the suitcases to the cars—a job he should have been doing. I pushed him aside: that was all. What did you expect, Anna-Maria? In my place, what would you have done? You would have struck him, and hard, wouldn’t you.” The voice of quiet reason subdued the old woman. Now it changed to sharp authority. “Go back to your kitchen before I do lose my temper. Do you want me to report him to the princess? You’d both be out on the street, soon enough!”

  “He—he was only doing what the princess told him to do.”

  Anna-Maria made her last protest. She looked at her husband and began to cry.

  Alberto said, “That is the truth. The princess gave her orders—”

  “You’ve told me all that!”

  “But you have not listened. You must wait here, until she comes,” Alberto insisted, his words gathering strength. “The princess must talk to you—she has much to say—I have never heard her so angry—”

  Pirotta said impatiently, “I shall talk to her when I get back here. Alberto, can’t you understand that the American is ill? We must drive her to the hospital in Assisi—”

  The old man shook his head. “You must not take the princess’s car! That will make her angrier. She did not give permission—”

  Running footsteps came across the courtyard, slipping and clattering on the cobbled stones.

  Pirotta spun round on his heel. “Giovanni! What the devil are you doing out here?”

  Giovanni reached the Lancia and walked around it anxiously, looking at the wheels. “No, the tyres are all right. Perhaps she damaged the engine.” He opened the car’s hood.

  “Who?”

  “The American girl. She’s escaped.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “Signorina Di Feo. The American girl escaped and—”

  “You locked the office? You didn’t leave it unlocked?”

  Giovanni stared at him. “But there was no one there! And the car was being—”

  “Signorina Di Feo? Where is she?”

  “She went away to try to find the American.”

  “You fool, you idiot, you blundering— Don’t you see it’s a lie? The cars are all right. No one has escaped. Get back to that telephone. No—I’ll go myself.”

  “It isn’t a lie,” Eleanor said, and rose to her feet. He
turned and looked up at her. It was the first time she ever remembered seeing him completely and absolutely amazed. Keep talking, she told herself: anything, anything to silence questions about Rosana. “I did escape. I did mean to damage the car.” She held out the knife, gripped firmly in her right hand and Anna-Maria let out a piercing scream.

  “You see,” Pirotta told Alberto, “the signorina Americana is ill.” Swiftly he crossed over to the foot of the staircase.

  In Italian she said, “I am not ill—I am not ill. I want to stay here. I do not want to go. I—”

  “Eleanor—” he said worriedly. He shook his head. “You are ill, you know.” He turned to Alberto and Anna-Maria. “See— she has forgotten her shoes. Her feet are bare. Help me, will you? She must leave at once. Anna-Maria: find the signorina’s shoes, her coat—” He began to mount the stairs, slowly.

  “I am not leaving,” Eleanor told him. “You are the one who’s crazy. Alberto—”

  “What nonsense you talk! What nonsense you’ve let yourself believe!” Suddenly his arm reached out to catch her wrists, and then pulled back as she slashed at it with the knife, “God in heaven!” He stared at her unbelievingly. He gave an incredulous laugh. “You little idiot.” he said gently. “Do you still not realise that if it hadn’t been for me you would be dead?” His voice hardened. “I risked everything for you. I gave my word that you’d go with me, leave Italy until everything was forgotten, all interest ended.”

  “Ended? Forgotten?”

  “People forget,” he reminded her. “They like to forget. And sometimes, they find new—new interpretations, which help them to forget. Eleanor—you’ve been told so much nonsense, so many lies! Come with me. My plan will work. You’ll see. We aren’t monsters. We are reasonable men.”