by Bill Cariad
“Let us imagine,” broke in Zola, “that LUP buys a plot of land and builds, say, six luxury villas. All legally registered. Rosso sells all six, and again ticks all the legal boxes. So the appropriate authorities all sign off on the correct paperwork, because six rabbits have been pulled from the LUP hat and shown to them. So the land registry office is satisfied, the taxman gets what he should get, and the buyer gets what he paid for. But if one of the villas has been sold for undeclared cash, then Rosso pockets the surplus once he’s paid the tax and the LUP company accounts only see five rabbits.”
Maria silently absorbed Zola’s explanation, beginning to reconcile it with what she had seen and heard inside the LUP building, whilst factoring in the background presence of the Lucchese family That Rosso could be defrauding her uncle came as no surprise, the amounts of money changing hands at LUP invited such a crime. Given LUP’s villa prices, thought Maria, Rosso’s hidden rabbit could have made him millions by now.
“So somewhere along the line,” she mused aloud, “Rosso’s lifestyle habits came to the attention of the Lucchese family, and they have dealt themselves into the game.”
“And they would have upped the ante,” replied Zola without hesitation, obviously already thinking along the same lines as Maria. “They would have demanded more rabbits, which makes concealment more hazardous, and their front companies would be laundering dirty Mafia money by buying LUP property which could be legally resold at a profit.”
“Which means Rosso is on a tight leash,” said Maria.
“Which would mean involving the LUP accountant,” said Zola.
“Who could have threatened to blow the whistle,” murmured Maria, “Which would explain the presence of Busoni on the scene.”
“Does the accountant have children?” Zola asked quietly.
“My uncle’s files show the Catalani couple have a three year old daughter.”
“Which would explain the teddy bear,” said Zola.
“Which would explain the teddy bear,” repeated Maria softly, before voicing a sudden thought.
“Why do they call Busoni the python?” she asked.
“He is credited with having squeezed people to death,” replied Zola quietly.
The ensuing silence was brief. “So what do we do now?” asked Zola.
“I was wondering,” replied Maria, “how you might feel about escorting an old woman to a villa on the Via Molise?”
Chapter Thirty-Four
The Snake and the Mongoose
“Escorting the Signora,” responded Zola, the hastily mustered smile on his face completely at odds with his racing thoughts, “would of course be a pleasure. But just what, exactly,” he continued, the smile dying on his face and replaced by a frown, “does the Signora imagine happening when we get there?” He forced himself to remain calm as Maria Orsinni keyed the Fiat’s ignition, and the car was joining the traffic flow as she replied.
“The Signora imagines her escort leading her to the door of the villa in question. She imagines her dashing escort pressing a doorbell, or using some other means to bring someone to the door. She imagines her gallant escort explaining to that someone, that his old and embarrassed aunt is in urgent need of a ladies room.”
Alarmed by her expressed intention to put them both in harm’s way, needing a diversion whilst he gathered his thoughts, Zola glanced out of the car to the pavement scenes peopled by multi-national tourists and indigenous Italians. He saw ordinary people doing ordinary things, some enjoying the attentions of tavern waiters, some merely window shopping, some of them looking happy, some of them not so. His vision of normality darkened as the Fiat was driven past the Santa Maria della Concezione, which he knew was the church best known for the macabre memento mori in its crypt. Under the peaceful looking church, in not so peaceful times, ancient friars had decorated five vaulted chambers with the bones and skulls of over four thousand skeletons. Zola recalled now the inscription which adorned the exit from the crypt, ‘What you are, we used to be. What we are, you will be.’
Zola shuddered at the memory, and felt the chill of uncertainty creeping through his own bones as he finally responded to his determined looking driver. “Busoni would recognize us as soon as he opens the door,” he reminded her.
“The Busoni’s of this world use others to open doors,” she countered calmly.
The determination was still stamped on the face of an old woman driving them into danger, observed a worried Zola. Running between the Via Veneto and the Via Di San Basilio, the Via Molise was a short tree-lined street which was backed on to by some modern commercial buildings. A small number of old looking private villas continued to occupy the street, but were probably owned, thought Zola, by people waiting for the right price to be offered by the next developer. Which didn’t explain Rosso’s ownership, Zola reminded himself. His driver brought the Fiat to a halt at the Via Veneto end of the street, and was reaching behind herself to grasp a tote bag as she spoke.
“Can we be seen from here?”
Zola watched her extract calf-length leather boots from the tote bag as he replied, “No, the villa is set back from the street. It’s just beyond that tree beside the rear of what looks like an office building.” He heard her grunt with effort as he watched her quickly substitute the ugly looking flat shoes with the boots. Then she surprised him with a mischievous grin as she spoke. “Steel toecaps. Every woman of an advanced age should have them. And I can’t carry my knives under this outfit.”
Just reading Busoni’s file had been frightening, so Zola couldn’t believe that she was making jokes whilst he was sitting here feeling like he was about to throw up. He glanced at his watch, which told him his Sergio-allocated hour had already over-run. It was time to end this madness, he decided, and injected firmness into his voice as he addressed her.
“Since we both suspect,” he said, pleased with the official tone he was managing to produce, “that Busoni has the Catalani child in there, I cannot think of any reason why I shouldn’t just call my captain and stop Maria Orsinni going any further from this point.”
“My uncle,” replied Maria, “still hasn’t recovered from the last incident involving children who came to serious harm. I have no intention,” she continued with steel in her voice, “of allowing anything like that to happen again. Bear in mind,” she added, “my telling you what I witnessed inside the LUP building. It’s quite clear to me now that Anna Catalani was a mother reacting to something which had only just happened to her child. My guess is that the child was snatched as recently as last night. A child who has suddenly been separated from her teddy bear, which the mother was attempting to have returned to her by the people who have taken her daughter. A recently angered mother, whose rage was still fresh enough to trigger her attack on Rosso in front of witnesses. My uncle has been good to the Catalani family, so Alfredo’s decision to blow the whistle on Rosso was probably triggered by conscience as much as discovery. But I’m guessing that Alfredo probably, foolishly, revealed his intention to Rosso.”
“Who would have panicked,” murmured Zola.
“Who would have transmitted that panic to the Lucchese family,” said Maria.
“Sergio Sabbatini,” said Zola, “wouldn’t want Maria Orsinni going inside that villa.”
“Maria Orsinni isn’t going inside that villa,” said Maria, opening her car door, “Maria Orsinni won’t be recognized by anyone connected to the Lucchese family. Maria Orsinni isn’t even here.”
Maria slid out from the car and turned to address him as she held her door open.
“The only woman going inside that villa is this old creature badly in need of bladder relief. Now is she going with an escort, or without?”
Realizing she wasn’t going to be stopped, Zola capitulated and stepped out the car to join her on the pavement. She was once more presenting an entirely believable persona
. Bent over her walking stick, already she looked nothing like the person he knew her to be. He tried another tactic as they walked. “Signorina Orsinni, I’m not even armed.”
“Gianfranco, you can call me Maria. But not of course,” she chuckled, “once we’re inside. I’m sure the carabiniere have taught you how to punch men, so don’t worry about being unarmed.”
Zola gave up at that point and within moments it seemed, found himself in front of the target villa’s door with an old and distressed looking woman hanging on his arm. There was a doorbell, and he jabbed it with a finger and tried to ignore his trembling. He was dimly aware of traffic sounds coming from the main thoroughfares nearby, but acutely conscious of the fact that he was exceeding his brief by being here. He was imagining the fury of Sergio’s reaction, imagining his sergeant’s stripes being removed by Kovac, imagining... when the door in front of him opened and the old woman beside him exploded into action.
Zola only managed to catch a brief glimpse of the person who opened the door, enough to confirm it wasn’t Busoni, enough to register a slimmer body on a man who lost his threatening facial expression as the tip of Maria’s walking stick was driven into his right eye a split second before she struck his larynx with a gloved fist. The man was still falling backwards as Maria seemed to glide past him, followed by the slower moving Zola who had now just stepped inside the doorway. The carabiniere sergeant froze then as Feruccio Busoni appeared in the hallway as the sound of a thud told everyone the first man’s body had hit the floor.
Zola’s thoughts were all over the place. He had been trained to handle himself in violent confrontations, but nothing in his training had prepared him for what was happening here at a speed he could scarcely believe was possible. Busoni was already coming for him, lethal intent personified, coming on legs which looked as thick as tree trunks. ‘Even a tank wouldn’t stop him’ was Zola’s uncontrollable and horrified thought.
In the opening second after seeing the intruders, without any hesitation, displaying no signs of surprise or fear, Busoni was ignoring the old woman and stepping towards the one whom he had obviously perceived to be his main threat. Busoni was eerily silent as he moved, ‘as silent as the snake his mafia cohorts liken him to’, thought Zola wildly. The man was using the quick short hops of the wrestler he might once have been, and his face showed no sign of emotion at all, and his huge arms were opening as if offering to embrace. ‘Or squeeze me to death’, thought Zola, whose own arms felt like they were moving through treacle as he made for the gun on the floor beside the man who was no longer moving. The gun he hadn’t seen when the man had opened the door. The gun, with silencer attached, which Maria obviously had seen before she attacked, he realized. His hand was still reaching for the weapon, and his eyes were still locked on the looming figure of Busoni, when Maria seemed to materialise between them and kicked the enforcer’s right knee. Zola actually heard the sound of the kneecap breaking, as Maria seemed to float backwards away from the reach of Busoni who was still standing but now roaring with pain and rage as he turned his focus towards the unexpected attacker.
Zola clearly saw Busoni’s eyes narrow with the effort of remaining upright whilst supporting his weight on his remaining good leg, and even more clearly saw the huge arms which were still capable of crushing anyone who could be brought into range. But, as a dark-shaped blur of movement took place before his eyes, the anxious carabiniere sergeant only thought he saw Maria Orsinni inside the reach of the python! and Zola suddenly had the memory-flash of a film depicting a small mongoose darting in and out of range as it attacked and killed a large snake.
Snapping the memory-link in his mind, the sound of the second kneecap breaking came a split second before Busoni’s next and last scream. Zola thought that he had just seen a gloved hand seeming to caress the face of Busoni, before the dark-shaped blur of movement repeated itself to become an old woman in a black coat standing clear as the Lucchese family’s chief enforcer collapsed heavily to the floor.
“Looks like we got lucky,” said the calm sounding voice of Maria Orsinni, “If Busoni had more helpers here, they would have introduced themselves by now. Best to be sure though,” she added quietly, “so you stay here while I check.”
Holding the captured gun, trying to hold himself together, Zola watched as she moved away and went through the doorway which had produced Busoni only minutes ago. Unforgettable minutes in the company of Maria Orsinni. Zola looked at the men on the floor as those minutes reprised themselves in his mind, and suddenly felt ashamed. He had done nothing to help her. He had simply pressed a doorbell, the door had been opened, he had stepped over the threshold, and he had bent down to pick up the gun he now held. In that same passage of time she had put down two men and probably saved his life. She suddenly re-appeared in the hallway, grinning, and Zola stared at her, unable to reconcile what he now saw with what he had seen before.
“Good news and other news,” said Maria, delivering her words at speed, “The girl’s here. She has been sedated, but she’s alive. She had female company, who was hiding but I found her. She was calling herself a nurse before I knocked her out.”
Unable to find words, Zola switched his stare to the man at his feet.
“That one’s dead, I’m afraid,” said Maria, her words still coming at speed, “I didn’t have time to go easy on him. He recognized you as carabiniere and was about to use that gun you’re holding. But I’ve only broken Busoni’s jaw and his legs, so he’s just unconscious for the time being. Which makes it easier for you while you wait for reinforcements. There’s a phone in the lounge you can use to call Sergio. Gianfranco, are you okay?”
Zola was feeling very far from okay. His thoughts were still in complete disarray. Before today, up until maybe ten minutes ago in fact, he had considered himself to be a strong character. Not just physically strong, but mentally strong also. He had demonstrated his possession of these strengths, many times, on his training ground and classroom progress towards attaining his carabiniere sergeant’s stripes. He had taken command of difficult situations, many times, he had fought his corner with men, many times, and he had certainly never met a woman who had made him feel inadequate.
Today had revealed a weaker Zola. He had firstly failed to stop a woman taking them both into harm’s way, so he had lost control of the situation before they had even left the Fiat. Despite all his training, he had failed to spot that the man opening the door had been armed and dangerous. Had it not been for a woman, sergeant Gianfranco Zola could be dead now. He had tasted fear as the python had come for him, because sergeant Gianfranco Zola had known that he had nothing in his personal armoury to stop the arms of Feruccio Busoni squeezing him to death. He had been saved by a woman who had gone up against a heavyweight killer, to become the mongoose to the snake, to emerge triumphant without even having dislodged her wig or her spectacles. Zola looked at her now through newly opened eyes. He had never been in the company of a woman so beguiling one moment, and ruthlessly efficient the next. A woman capable of committing murder to save life. A woman who made him feel inadequate.
“If he had recognized,” began Zola, suddenly finding it difficult to articulate, “if he had thought I was... he wouldn’t have just... just shot a carabiniere officer on his doorstep, in broad daylight.”
“The silencer is on that gun for a reason,” responded Maria, crouching down to check Busoni’s pulse as she spoke, “The Lucchese family have been hiding more than a child here, and the man at your feet would have been following orders.”
Zola was about to question this, when she stood up and looked at her wristwatch and pre-empted him.
“There’s a room next to where they’ve been holding the child,” said Maria, “which is filled with suitcases. I opened two of them. One of them is stuffed full of Lira, the other is packed with American dollars. This must be where the Lucchese family have been keeping their dirty money for laundering. Bri
nging the child here was probably a knee-jerk reaction when Rosso gave them the bad news. They would probably have moved her on at some point. But these two,” she indicated the men on the floor, “wouldn’t be stuck here all the time, and we don’t know when the next shift will get here. So we have to move quickly. You must call Sergio now, Gianfranco. I’m taking the child out of here.”
Zola’s police training prompted his response to her declaration of intent. “You can’t just leave. You can’t just take the child and disappear, Maria.”
“Maria was never here, remember?” she responded. “You and your special squad don’t need an old woman and a three year old to deal with what you’ve got here. Sergio will pat you on the back for discovering this illegal money which can now be linked to the Lucchese family. Tell him Signora Pellegrino is taking the child back to her mother.”
“But what about all this?” said Zola, surveying the carnage on the floor, “When he comes to, Busoni will say....”
“Busoni,” interjected Maria, “isn’t going to say he was taken down by an old woman. He won’t argue when the official report says the carabiniere had to use several men to make him look like he does now. The villa doorman won’t be disputing anything you say, and the woman purporting to be a nurse won’t be believed if she mentions an old woman, and her condition will be put down to justifiable restraint on your part.”
“On my part?” spluttered Zola.
“You will be the only one standing when Sergio gets here,” she said, “So who else could be responsible for what he will find here?”
Zola was still speechless when she left him, but was pleased to discover his thought processes were coming back as she returned carrying the sleeping child.
“What about Rosso?” he asked, “If he sees you with her....”
“I’m taking her back,” interrupted Maria, “to my uncle’s villa, and phoning the mother from there. I would expect Rosso to be under arrest before the day is out.”