He did not hear the shot.
Instead of ducking back into the cabin, where he would be trapped, he threw himself forward and flung himself behind the shelter of the cabin wall on the seaward side.
A second bullet scarred the blue paint on the cabin roc and screeched out to sea. Again he did not hear the shot which meant a silencer; and most likely a rifle held by someone up on the black and ocher headland nearby.
The tide lapped peacefully against the hull as he crouched there. At his back was the long mole and across the harbor, th white and immaculate shape of Apollio’s yacht. The shots had come from the landward side, however. The sun beat like a hammer on the nape of his neck. He moved to the end of the cabin and risked a glimpse of the shore.
The headland soared up from the stone pier with a few zigzag goat paths scarring its scrubby cover. At the end of the headland was the dilapidated Bellaria place, like a dark cube against the brilliant sky. To the left was the village. A new fishing boat, of somewhat different design from the Filibanos’, had come in and docked at the community pier while he’d been searching the cabin. The different design meant it had come from the mainland. He wondered who had arrived in it.
The third shot, when it finally came, nicked the mainmast, going far wide. The aim was getting worse.
Maybe the last shot was designed to entice him into the open. He decided to accommodate the hidden sniper.
He got up suddenly and ran, hurdled the boat’s rail, hit the stone pier and kept going. Nothing happened. There were no more shots. The sun shone peacefully, the wind blew laundry hanging from the village’s stone houses, and the tide made small purling sounds on the black sand.
He walked fast until he reached the shelter of the first village street, and then saw Deirdre crossing the square. She was still some distance away. He walked toward her with a crawling sensation between his shoulder blades. A few old men sat in front of the church and drowsed in the sun. As he came around the bulk of the church he heard some one call, “Miss Padgett!” Deirdre paused and then walked toward the scattering of tables outside the cafe across the cobblestoned square.
A newcomer had made himself at home there.
It was Anton Pacek.
It was unfortunate, Durell thought later, that Deirdre saw him at that moment and changed direction to join him instead of answering Pacek’s quiet call. She hesitated, then walked with her long, graceful stride, her dark hair loose in the sunlight, her tan linen sun-dress clinging to her curves.
“Sam? I’ve been looking all over for you.”
Durell thought of the sniper. “I almost wish you hadn’t found me, hon.”
“Isn’t that man in the cafe the same one we noticed in Naples? How does he know my name, Sam?”
“He knows everything. Too much.”
She regarded him gravely. “You look strange. Has something happened?”
“Fortunately, no.” Three shots. “Nothing.” He took her arm, aware of Pacek smiling at them. “Pacek has seen you with me twice, now. That gives him a fat lever. He knows who you are, and he’s got a memory like a computer. Right now he’s leafing mentally through my dossier, and since he’s found your name on it, he’ll try to throw me out of the game. He’ll try to get at me now—through you.”
She paled. “I’m sorry, Sam. But I can take care of myself.” “I’d rather do that job. You’d better stick with me for the next few hours, Dee.”
“I’d like nothing better, darling.”
Pacek lifted his wine glass in a mock salute from his seat in front of the cafe. His squat body and thick neck looked as if he’d been hewn out of the dark stone of the island.
His smile was the grimace of death.
The Bellaria place had once been painted a dark yellow over the stucco, but most of the paint had peeled off or been scoured away by winter winds, and the building had a faded, scabrous look of near decay. It was built in seventeenth-century style, with some rococo additions, around a central courtyard. Parts of the main gate of scroll-work iron was missing, probably sold off as scrap or taken by the Fascisti twenty years ago to melt down for guns. Durell walked with Deirdre into the courtyard, saw that three of the four wings held only empty, yawning windows, and turned to the small servants’ area to the right. It was the only habitable area left in what had once been a proud and rich residence.
“What are we doing here?” Deirdre asked. She wore shoes with moderately high heels, and leaned on Durell’s arm to pick her way across the irregular cobblestones. “How do you know about this place?”
“Somebody took a pot shot at me,” he said, “from one of these windows, less than half an hour ago.”
“And we’re walking into it, just like this?”
“I’m ready for the pot-shotter, now.”
They were almost to the front door when the old man appeared. He called out to them in a quavering voice, wishing them good evening, and then told them to go away, that this was private property and no tourists were welcome. Durell explained in his best Italian that he was not a tourist and that he was looking for Cesare Bellaria.
“My brother is not here,” the old man said. “I am Rafael Bellaria. Why do you seek Cesare?”
“His boat is in the harbor now. Where is he?”
“I do not know, and do not want to know.”
As they approached, Durell saw that the old man had recently—very recently—been slashed across the forehead with something like a gun butt. There was a welt and a split in the flesh over his left temple, and dried blood. Rafael had thick white hair that hung heavily over his ears, a weathered and seamed face, and the same calloused fisherman’s hands as his brother Bruno in Geneva. He wore a dark brown vest over a striped shirt that was old-fashioned enough to need a gold collar stud. His trousers were blue denim, his cracked shoes serviceable. Here was none of the sophisticated elegance of Cesare, the baby brother of the family. And there was less of Cesare’s tigerish qualities in Rafael’s weather-beaten eyes.
“Well, you are here, you are welcome to Bellaria’s hospitality,” Rafael said. “Come in, you and the young lady.” “Who put the cut over your eye, signor?” Durell asked.
“I am an old man; I fell.”
“You fell against Cesare’s gun?”
The shaggy, pale brows lifted. “It was not Cesare.”
“Who shot at me when I was on his boat, then?”
“I heard no shots.”
“I was on Cesare’s boat, and somebody up here used a rifle and silencer to try to pick me off.” Durell looked down the mountainside at the harbor. The motor sailer was like a toy etched on the bright water. “If it wasn’t Cesare, who was it?”
“Let me get you some wine,” the old man muttered.
Durell and Deirdre followed him inside. Apparently Rafael lived in only two rooms, a huge beamed sitting room and a kitchen, equipped with a kerosene stove. There was no electricity, to judge by the smoky oil lamps in the place. The furniture, old and worn, might once have been worth a fortune; it could still be worth a fortune, refurbished and set in a window in one of the Via del Babuino’s antique shops in Rome. Rafael shuffled about and poured red wine into three crystal cups and sat down and stared at them.
“You are from the mainland police?” he asked Durell. “No.”
“We need police here on Isola Filibano. There is no law, you see. Only what Count Apollio declares to be the law. Why do you look for my young brother?”
“Cesare is in trouble. He knifed a man in Montecapolli and he helped to steal some valuable art treasures in Geneva. He may get killed if he tries to pull a deal with Count Apollio.”
“Yes. To everything you say—yes.”
“Haven’t you been helping him?” Durell asked.
“I am an old man, and he is young, hot-headed and bitter. He plays with fire, eh? He plays with the contessa. This is a thing everyone knows. He wants to repair this house, to make much money and bring back old glories. I tell him and Bruno the old days are gone f
orever—like my youth, like the aristocracy. The old hatreds were almost dead; they were cold, like ashes. And then Bruno blew upon them with his hatred during the war and the flames shot up again. It is difficult to understand. Cesare is young and I am old and I live in yesterday’s dreams, but it is Cesare who wishes to restore what is a dream, and it is I who accept and wish to live in today.”
“Have you told Cesare how you feel?”
“Many times. He only laughs. He and Bruno laugh at the old brother. I am senile, they say—an old fool. And today? I hear that Bruno is dead.”
“Yes,” Durell said.
Rafael looked at him. “Did you kill him?”
“Not exactly. But he is just as dead.”
The old man sighed. “It was wrong, what Bruno did. A terrible thing. No man deserved such punishment as Bruno gave Apollio, whatever the hunger and terror and need for revenge at the end of the war. It would have been better if Bruno shot him.”
“What did Bruno do to Apollio when he got the upper hand, here on the island?”
“I cannot say.”
“You know what it was, though?”
“Yes. It was unspeakable. Bruno was my brother, but he was not a good man; and if young Cesare dies because of this thing, it will rest with Bruno’s ghost.” Rafael looked gently at Deirdre and his voice changed. “You are lovely, signorina. But you should not be here.”
“I want to know who shot at me,” Durell persisted.
“It was a stranger. An American, like you.”
“A big man, with yellow hair?”
“Yes. He looks for Cesare, to kill him. Cesare saw him coming and ran away. The stranger was like a madman. He came on a boat last night—maybe Giuseppi’s; he was in Naples these last two days. He went through the empty rooms of my house like an angry wind.”
“His name is Jack Talbott,” Durell said.
“I do not know his name. I did not ask.” Rafael touched the split, puffy flesh over his eye. “He had a rifle, a thing on the end to make it quiet. It went phut! and made not enough noise to frighten a bird. But I heard it and saw him shooting at you on Cesare’s boat. I thought he was shooting at Cesare, and the boy is still a baby, he is my little brother, and I wished to save him. So this man with the wild eyes turned and struck me and then ran away. I did not see him go. I was dreaming on the floor for a long time. And then you came. It is all I can tell you. No one is here now.”
“When Cesare saw Talbott coming and ran away, did he have the paintings with him? You know about the paintings and how they were stolen, don’t you?”
“I know.” The old man grimaced. “Cesare took them.”
“Just half an hour ago?”
“Yes. I do not know where he went. He can hide on the mountain. It is wild and lonely there, and he knows it well. He can hide until he finishes his business—or is killed.”
Durell believed the old man’s story. There was a gentility in Rafael that was at odds with the qualities in his brothers. In Rafael, poor and bedraggled, the traditions of aristocracy somehow survived. The man was honestly worried.
“Rafael, will you help me?” Durell asked bluntly. “If I can, in turn, I will help your brother Cesare, although he has done many bad things. But he hasn’t killed yet, and maybe I can stop him from that.”
“You are a good man, signor. Are you worried about the signorina, because this Talbott man shoots at you?”
“Yes. He may try to hurt her, too.”
“The signorina could be safe here.”
Durell said, “I was thinking of that.”
“This is a big house. He searched it once and found nothing. There are many empty rooms, many suites. No one goes there, not even Cesare. The signorina could stay for a short time and I would keep her company, if she wishes, in one of the empty rooms in the back. No one would find us there.” Durell stood up. “I won’t be gone for long.” He looked at Deirdre. “Do you understand, Dee? Pacek saw you with me; Talbott must know about you, too. You’ve got my hands tied, if they reach you.”
“But I want to stay with you, Sam.”
“It will be better here, just for an hour or two.”
She spoke in English. “I like this old man. I trust him. But I don’t like the thought of our separating. Somebody shot at you. Maybe it was Talbott, maybe not—Rafael isn’t too sure about things. So please be careful.”
“I’m always careful.” Durell said.
chapter sixteen
FRANCESCA picked her way daintily down the rocky goat-path in the cliffside. She knew the way well, having found the path last year in her determination to join Dom Angelo’s parties. After all, she told herself, this was not the feudal ages. She would not be kept behind walls, guarded by sullen men and fierce dogs, immured in the palazzo far from fun and gaiety. She was still young, and being a prisoner was not part of the deal with Count Apollio. The terms of their marriage hadn’t been fulfilled, anyway. There had never been a consummation. So why shouldn’t she have some fun when Dom Angelo showed up?
Lordie, she thought, how Bernardo hated them all! Sometimes when the wind blew right across the volcanic wastes of Isola Filibano, they could hear the music from the villas and see the lights of the yachts collected for a weekend party down there. At such times Bernardo watched her even more closely. But he was a fool. She wasn’t afraid of him. She was more afraid of missing a night with Cesare.
The thought of Cesare brought a chill of excitement, although the late afternoon sun held a barrel of molten heat pouring down on the rocks. From the path, the horizon seemed to reel in blue-white shimmerings. A couple of fishing boats were out there, suspended between sky and water. The surf crashed viciously on the rocks below, but she didn’t look down, because she was afraid of getting dizzy. She carried her high-heeled gold shoes in her hand and walked barefooted, her expensive frock blowing in the hot wind, lifting about her thighs and hips in playful abandon, as if the very elements themselves wanted to seduce her.
Cesare had warned her to stay in the palazzo until he came there tonight, but she couldn’t wait. She had never been a patient person, and nothing could happen to her on Isola Filibano. Bernardo ruled everything here with an iron fist, like he tried to rule her.
Rebellion made her thrust out her full, fleshy under-lip. Her skin was flushed under the tan, heated by the sun and exertion and her anticipation. Cesare would get angry, if he was with the movie people down there, but she could handle him. All men were easy to handle. It was silly to be afraid of any of them.
And that included Durell, she told herself firmly. She thought briefly of his tall figure, his dark hair, his sober blue eyes that seemed to look right through her. She shivered. There was something about him that was different from the others. But he wasn’t on the island. He couldn’t possibly get here.
She jumped nimbly from the last rock to the hot sand of the beach at the foot of the cliff. The sand was hot enough to make her yelp, so she ran down to the water’s edge where she could walk through the cool, foaming surf. The movie colony villas were just beyond the second point of a little cove where sometimes, when she was stuck here with just Bernardo for company—and he wasn’t much fun, poring constantly over his eternal catalogs, listing new items in his art collection—she came here to swim in the nude, to dream and feel the sun and water on her body. . . .
He must have been watching her all the way down the goat path, she thought later. Watching and waiting, like an animal ready to spring.
She did not see him until it was too late.
She was already in the second cove, and she crossed just below the huge, corroded boulder where he must have been sprawled like a lizard on a rock, disregarding the searing stone and broiling sun. The impact when he jumped down on her drove the breath explosively from her lungs, knocked her face into the hot dark sand. She did not know what had happened. There was no time to think. She tried to scream, but her mouth was in the sand and she choked and gasped and spit some of it out and tried to roll
free of his enormous weight pinning her down. She heard a roaring in her ears, like a tremendous tidal wave crashing on the rocky shore. Something struck her across the back and darkness surged through her mind. And again. She heard a gasp, a grunt. She thought illogically of the ruin of her dress and wondered where her slippers had gone. They had flown from her fingers with the impact.
Then she felt herself cruelly hauled up by one arm so that she swung like a rag doll, limp and yielding, in a dizzy semi-circle at the end of his long arm.
“Hello, Fran.” He grinned. “You’re a mess, hey?”
She could not focus on his face, and terror squeezed her throat. Then her vision suddenly cleared and she saw him, enormous against the blazing, brazen sky, his tight curly yellow hair like an unholy halo around his head.
“Jack. . . .” she whimpered.
“Yeah. Jack Talbott.”
It was like being struck by lightning to see him here, where she thought she was safe. She’d been worrying about Bernardo’s anger, about Cesare, about the danger from Durell. She had almost forgotten about Jack.
He let her go abruptly, and she fell, sitting on the sand, undignified, her legs sprawled, the silk frock roiled around her thighs. Her black hair tumbled and blew in the wind. He looked even bigger from down here, his feet spread in the sand like some colossus, his head tilted, his big shoulders hunched. He looked so different from the handsome, well-groomed man she had flirted with in Rome and Geneva. His face was hard, and there was no mercy in his eyes.
“You didn’t expect to see me, hey?” His voice was as brazen as the sky that reeled above her, booming louder than the surf. “You thought you had it made, Frannie?”
“How—how did you get here?”
“I stole a boat. It wasn’t easy.”
“Jack, you don’t understand. . . .”
“You bitch,” he said. “Whore. I’ll Mil you.”
Assignment - Sorrento Siren Page 14