Authors: Patricia Highsmith
Steps crunched firmly, at a polite-sounding pace, on the road, then the gravel. This wasn’t a bomb-thrower, Tom thought. The doorbell rang. Tom waited a few seconds, then said in French, ‘Who is it?’
‘I would like to ask a direction, please,’ the man’s voice said with a perfect French accent.
Jonathan had been crouching with the rifle since the approach of footsteps, and now he leapt out of the bushes just as he heard Tom slide the bolt of the door. The man was two steps up from Jonathan, but Jonathan was almost as tall nevertheless, and he swung his rifle butt with all his power at the man’s head –
’
which had turned just slightly towards Jonathan, because the man must have heard him. Jonathan’s blow caught him behind the left ear, just under the hat-brim. The man swayed, bumped the left side of the doorway, and dropped.
Tom opened the door and dragged him by the feet into the house, Jonathan helping, lifting the man’s shoulders. Then Jonathan recovered the rifle and came in the door, which Tom closed softly. Tom picked up the piece of firewood and walloped the man’s blondish head with it. The man’s hat had fallen off and lay upside down on the marble floor. Tom extended his hand for the rifle, and Jonathan handed it to him. Tom came down with the steel butt of it on the man’s temple.
Jonathan couldn’t believe his eyes. Blood flowed on
to the white marble. This was the husky bodyguard with crinkly blond hair who had been so upset on the train.
‘Got that bastard !’ Tom whispered with satisfaction. This is that bodyguard. Look at the gun!’
A gun had fallen half out of the man’s right side jacket pocket.
‘Farther into the living-room.’ Tom said, and they hauled and pushed the man across the floor. ‘Mind the rug with that blood!’ Tom kicked the rug out of the way. ‘Next guy’s due in a minute, no doubt. Bound to be two, maybe three.’
Tom took a handkerchief – lavender, monogrammed – from the man’s breast pocket and tidied a splotch of blood on the floor near the door. He kicked the man’s hat and sent it flying 6ver the body, and it fell near the hall door to the kitchen. Then Tom bolted the front door, holding his left hand over the bolt so it would not make a noise. ‘Next one might not be so easy,’ he whispered.
There were footsteps on gravel. The bell rang – nervously twice.
Tom laughed without making a sound, and pulled his Luger. He motioned for Jonathan to take his gun also. Tom was suddenly convulsed, and doubled over to repress his mirth, then straightened and grinned at Jonathan, and wiped the tears from his eyes.
Jonathan didn’t smile.
The bell rang again, a long steady peal.
Jonathan saw Tom’s face change in a split-second. Tom frowned, grimaced, as if he didn’t know what he should do.
‘Don’t use the gun,’ Tom whispered, ‘unless you have to.’ His left hand was extended towards the door.
Tom was going to open the door and fire, Jonathan supposed, or cover the man.
Then steps crunched again. The man outside was walking towards the window behind Jonathan, a window now
quite covered by the curtains. Jonathan edged away from die window.
‘Angy? –
Angy!’
the man’s voice whispered.
‘Ask him at the door what he wants.’ Tom whispered. ‘Talk in English – as if you were the butler. Let him in. I’ll have him covered. – Can you do it?’
Jonathan didn’t care to think whether he could or not. Now there was a knocking, then another ring of the bell. ‘Who is it, please?’ Jonathan called to the door.
‘Je – je voudrais demander mon chemin, s’il vous plaît.’
The accent was not so good.
Tom smirked.
‘Whom did you wish to speak to, sir?’ Jonathan asked.
‘Une direction! – S’il vous plaît!’
the voice yelled. Desperation had entered in.
Tom and Jonathan exchanged a glance, and Tom gestured for Jonathan to open the door. Tom was immediately to the left of the door to anyone standing outside, but out of sight if the door were opened.
Jonathan slid the bolt, turned the knob of the automatic lock, and opened the door partway, fully expecting a bullet in his abdomen, but he stood tall and stiffly with his right hand in his jacket pocket on the gun.
The somewhat shorter Italian, wearing a hat like the other man, also had his hand in bis pocket and was plainly surprised to see a tall man in ordinary clothes in front of him.
‘Sir?’ Jonathan noticed that the man’s left jacket sleeve was empty.
As the man took a step inside the house, Tom poked him in the side with his Luger.
‘Give me your gun!’ Tom said in Italian.
Jonathan’s gun was also pointed at him now. The man heaved his jacket pocket up as if to fire, and Tom pushed him in the face with his left hand. The man didn’t fire. The Italian looked paralysed at finding himself suddenly so close to Tom Ripley.
‘Reeply!’ the Italian said, in a tone of mingled terror, surprise, and maybe triumph.
‘Oh, never mind that and give us the gun!’ Tom said in English, poking the man again in the ribs and knocking the door shut with his foot.
The Italian got the idea, at least. He dropped the gun on the floor, when Tom indicated that that was what he wanted. Then the Italian saw his chum on the floor yards away, and started, wide-eyed.
‘Bolt the door.’ Tom said to Jonathan. Then Tom said in Italian, ‘Any more of you?9
The Italian shook his head vigorously, which meant nothing, Tom thought. Tom saw that his arm was in a sling under his jacket. So much for the newspaper reports.
‘Cover him while I do this.’ Tom said, beginning to frisk the Italian. ‘Off with your jacket !’ Tom took the man’s hat off and threw it in Angy’s direction.
The Italian let his jacket slide off and drop. His shoulder-holster was empty. There were no weapons in his pockets.
‘Angy —’ said the Italian.
‘Angy
è morto,’
Tom said. ‘So will you be, if you don’t do what we say. You want to die? What’s your name? — What’s your
name?’
‘Lippo. Filippo.’
‘Lippo. Keep your hands up and don’t move. Your hand. Go stand over there.’ He motioned for Lippo to go stand by the dead man. Lippo lifted his good right arm. ‘Cover him, Jon, I want to have a look at their car.’
With his Luger ready, Tom went out and turned right on the road, approaching the car cautiously. He could hear the motor. The car was at the side of the road with parking lights on. Tom stopped and closed his eyes for a few seconds, then opened them wide, trying to see if there was any movement at the sides of the car or behind the back window. He advanced slowly and steadily, expecting possibly a shot from the car. Silence. Could they have sent only two men? Tom hadn’t brought a torch in his nervousness. With his
gun pointed at someone who might be crouched in the front seat, Tom opened the left-side door. The interior light came on. The car was empty. Tom closed the door enough to shut the light off, stooped, and listened. He didn’t hear anything. Tom trotted back and opened the gates of Belle Ombre, then went back to the car and backed it in on to the gravel. A car passed just then on the road, coming from the village direction. Tom turned off the ignition and the parking lights. He knocked and announced himself to Jonathan.
‘It seems this is all of them.’ Tom said.
Jonathan was standing where Tom had seen him last, pointing his gun at Lippo, who now had his good arm down and hanging a little out from his side.
Tom smiled at Jonathan, then at Lippo. ‘All alone now, Lippo? Because if you’re lying, it’s
finito
for you, you get me?’
Mafia pride seemed to be returning to Lippo, and he merely narrowed his eyes at Tom.
‘Risponde,
you … !’
‘Si’
said Lippo, angry and scared.
‘Getting tired, Jonathan? Sit down.’ Tom pulled up a yellow upholstered chair for him. ‘You can sit down, too, if you want to,’ Tom said to Lippo. ‘Sit next to your pal.’ Tom spoke in Italian. His slang was returning.
But Lippo remained standing. He was a bit over thirty, Tom supposed, about five feet ten, with round but strong shoulders and a paunch already starting, hopelessly dumb, not capo material. He had straight black hair, a pale olive face that was now faintly green.
‘Remember me from the train? A little bit?’ Tom asked, smiling. He glanced at the blond hulk on the floor. ‘If you behave well, Lippo, you won’t end up like Angy. All right?’ Tom put his hands on his hips, and smiled at Jonathan. ‘Suppose we have a gin and tonic for fortification? You’re all right, Jonathan?’ Jonathan’s colour had returned, Tom saw.
Jonathan nodded with a tense smile. ‘Yep.’
Tom went into the kitchen. While he was pulling out the ice tray, the telephone rang. ‘Never mind the phone, Jonathan!’
‘Right!’ Jonathan had a feeling it was Simone again. It was now 9.45 p.m.
Tom was wondering how to force Lippo to get his chums off his trail. The telephone rang eight times and stopped. Tom had unconsciously counted the rings. He went into the living-room with a tray of two glasses, ice, and an open tonic bottle. The gin was on the bar cart near the dining-table.
Tom handed Jonathan his drink and said, ‘Cheers!’ He turned to Lippo. ‘Where’s your headquarters, Lippo? Milano?’
Lippo chose to maintain an insolent silence. What a bore. Lippo would have to be beaten up a little. Tom glanced with distaste at the splotch of drying blood under Angy’s head, set his glass down on the wooden chest by the door, and went back to the kitchen. He wet a sturdy floor-cloth – called a
torchon
by Mme Annette – and mopped up the blood from Mme Annette’s waxed parquet. Tom pushed aside Angy’s head with his foot, and stuck the cloth under it. No more blood was coming, Tom thought. With sudden inspiration, Tom searched Angy’s pockets more thoroughly, trousers, jacket. He found cigarettes, a lighter, small change. A wallet in the breast pocket, which he left. There was a wadded handkerchief in a hip pocket, and when Tom pulled it out, a garrotte came with it. ‘Look!’ Tom said to Jonathan. Just what I was wanting! Ah, these Mafia rosaries!’ Tom held it up and laughed with pleasure. ‘For you, Lippo, if you’re not a good boy,’ Tom said in Italian. ‘After all, we don’t want to make any noise with guns, do we?’
Jonathan looked at the floor for a few seconds as Tom strolled toward Lippo. Tom was whirling the garrotte around one finger.
‘You are of die distinguished Genotti family,
non è vero,
Lippo?’
Lippo hesitated, but very briefly, as if it only flitted across his mind to deny it. ‘
Si
,’ he said firmly, with a trace of
vergogna.
Tom was amused. Strength in number, in togetherness, the families had. Alone like this one, they turned yellow, or green. Tom was sorry about Lippo’s arm, but he wasn’t torturing him yet, and Tom knew the tortures the Mafia put its victims to if they didn’t come across with money or services – yanked toenails and teeth, cigarette burns. ‘How many men have you killed, Lippo?’
‘Nessuno!’
cried Lippo.
‘No one,’ Tom said to Jonathan. ‘Ha, ha.’ Tom went to rinse his hands in the little loo opposite the front door. Then he finished his drink, picked up the piece of log beside the front door, and approached Lippo with it. ‘Lippo, you’re going to telephone your boss tonight. Maybe your new, capo eh? Where is he tonight? Milano? Monaco di Bavaria?’ Tom gave Lippo a swat over the head with the wood, just to show he meant business, but the blow was fairly hard, because Tom was nervous.
‘Stop it!’ yelled Lippo, staggering up from a near collapse, one hand pitifully on top of his head. ‘Me a guy with one arm?’ he shrieked, talking like himself now, the gutter Italian of Naples, Tom thought, though it could have been of Milan, because Tom was not an expert.
‘Sissi!
And two against one even!’ Tom replied. ‘We don’t play fair, eh? Is that your complaint?’ Tom called him something unspeakable, and turned on his heel to get a cigarette. ‘Why don’t you pray to the Virgin Mary?’ Tom said over his shoulder. ‘Another thing,’ he said to Lippo in English, ‘no more shouting or you’ll get this over your head in no time flat!’ He came down with the piece of firewood in the air –
whish! –
to show what he meant. ‘This is what killed Angy.’
Lippo blinked, his mouth slightly open. He was breathing shallowly and audibly.
Jonathan had finished his drink. He was holding the gun
pointed at Lippo, holding it in two hands, because the gun had become heavy. He was not at all sure he could hit Lippo if he had to fire it, and anyway Tom was frequently between him and Lippo. Now Tom was shaking the Italian by his belt. Jonathan couldn’t understand all of what Tom was saying, some of it being in clipped Italian, the rest in French and in English. Tom was mostly muttering, but his voice finally rose in anger, and he shoved the Italian back and turned round. The Italian had hardly said anything.
Tom went to the radio, pressed a couple of buttons, and a ‘cello concerto came on. Tom made the volume medium. Then he made sure the front curtains were completely closed. ‘Isn’t this dreary.’ Tom said apologetically to Jonathan. ‘Sordid. He won’t tell me where his boss is, so I’ve got to hit him a bit. Naturally he’s as afraid of his boss as he is of me.’ Tom gave Jonathan a quick smile, and went and changed the music. He found some pop. Then he picked up the wood with determination.