The Malaspiga Exit (29 page)

‘Go on up,' Driver said. He had released Katharine's arm; it was aching right into the shoulder. Looking up at the narrow, torturous stair, she felt a sense of horror. It came over her with such force that she leaned against the grey stone wall, trembling. She had never been a prey to neurotic fears; confined spaces had never troubled her. But she couldn't bring herself to climb that curving cliff of stair into the turret. Something terrible was at the top of it, something so evil that it couldn't be imagined …

‘I can't,' she whispered. ‘I can't go up there.'

‘You don't have to be afraid,' he said. ‘I'm not going to hurt you. I'm just going to lock you up.' He squeezed in front of her, the space was so narrow that his body brushed against her. He took her right hand in his and gripped it tight. He might have been doing her a kindness. ‘I'll go first,' he said, ‘and help you up.' The next moment she was almost jerked off her feet as he started up the stairs. Pulling and dragging her, forcing her to climb, although she stumbled and began to cry, unnerved by a fear which was getting beyond her control. Driver led her higher and higher through the throat of the turret. The walls pressed in upon her, her arm felt as if it were being torn out of its socket. Each time she pulled backwards, he wrenched her up with all his strength. She had no idea how long they had been climbing. ‘Careful,' he said. ‘There's a defensive step here.' She didn't understand the reference to a step built specially higher than the rest in medieval times as a deterrent to attackers coming from below. She misjudged it, slipped and fell.

Taken by surprise, he was unprepared for her full weight and he let go. She hit her head against the wall and lay in a cramped, unconscious huddle. He stepped down to her, satisfied that she was knocked out, and swore long and angrily. It was a bump, no more; she had fainted as much from fear … He would have to carry her the rest of the way. He pulled her up and lifted her over his shoulder. She hung slack against him, her arms dangling. He began very slowly, and with great difficulty because of the constricted space, to climb the rest of the stairs to the top.

Alessandro leaped down the last of the steps and into the hall; it was empty and silent, dimly lit by the wall sconces. This was where his uncle had seen Katharine. ‘Your wife and John. Dragging her across the hall … They're going to take her up to the tower …'

He had known immediately that this was no figment of the old man's imagination. He had seen Katharine, just as he described. And there was only one reason why she should be taken by force to the East Tower. For a moment he felt physically sick with fear. God knew how long it had taken Uncle Alfredo to collect his wits and come to tell him; God knew how long he had been hesitating. He crossed the hall at a run, and opened the door behind the screen. The passage was in darkness, but well enough lit by the moon through its windows for him to see his way; he didn't pause to switch on lights, he ran the length of it, and through the door into the room at the end. Here the lights were on; he didn't even need that proof that his uncle was telling the truth; the open door at the other end confirmed it. At the foot of the staircase leading upwards, he paused. It was a short flight of stairs and it ended on a landing. He heard somebody cough. He began to run up the stone steps, lightly, making no noise. At the stair head he paused, and looked round the corner. He saw Francesca. She was standing with her back to him; she coughed again, and leaned against the wall. There was a gun in her right hand; it was held loosely by her side. She was alone and she looked as if she were waiting. Katharine. His lips formed the word. Katharine. There was only one door on the landing and he knew where that led. It was open.

Francesca di Malaspiga shivered. She wore a sweater, but it didn't protect her from the chill in the atmosphere. She hated stone; she hated the bleakness and the feel of it. Her earliest memory of the Castle was one of revulsion, even before she came there as Alessandro's wife. She associated it afterwards with the torment of her life with him, although they had spent their first six months in Florence. Since she had become John Driver's mistress, she avoided that memory, unless it was to bolster her hatred of her husband. She had spent the first part of her honeymoon frigid with fear and disgust at the desire of a virile man who insisted he was showing how he loved her. Elise Bohun. She only remembered her with gratitude. To the frightened, unhappy young girl she had been comforting and kind, interposing herself between her and Alessandro as if she understood the situation. Motherless, yearning for the sympathy of her own sex, Francesca had responded to the older woman's solicitude and affection. There was nothing wrong in being embraced, in having Elise smooth her hair and tell her how pretty she was. When the moment of seduction came she was subconsciously prepared. She had let herself be petted, soothed, felt the relationship assume a different role and found that it was satisfying something which recoiled from Alessandro.

And not just from him. She had always been afraid of men; as a small girl she was surrounded by women, by her mother and her sisters and the servants who took care of them. It was a female world; light voices, soft handling, pale colours. If there was anger it was shrill, without the deep tones of her father's voice when he abused her mother. She had never forgotten the first time she heard them arguing. His shouts had terrified her; she had cringed, whimpering with fright in a corner of the salon in their house at Lucca, while her mother cried and tried to make excuses. The child had no idea for what. And then he struck; the slap brought her mother stumbling to her knees, and Francesca's scream of horror had put an end to the scene. For nights afterwards she had nightmares and woke shrieking to run into her mother's bed. And her mother was alone. Without understanding what had happened, the child knew that the family was menaced by some danger.

Years later Francesca learned of the discovered love affair which had almost broken up her parents' marriage. But she had never told anyone of the night when, running to her mother's room for comfort, she had found her father had returned. The impression of something brutal, accompanied by ugly sounds, was never conveyed to anyone or admitted even to herself, until she married Alessandro. In the beginning of her relationship with Elise Bohun she had believed a large part of the older woman's sexuality to have maternal overtones. She allowed her own frustrated, pent-up needs to be released. Then Alessandro had taken her away; his consideration changed to harshness; he blamed her and abused her. Subconsciously the pattern of her childhood was repeated, with her filling her mother's role. And then the moment came when she had quite transposed herself. The eager bridegroom had become the harsh revengeful husband. The child who had watched her parents copulate had been disgusted. But deeper than disgust, hidden so far beneath the layers of consciousness that it could never, ever be admitted, there had been jealousy. And that was when she found herself ready to love Alessandro. Ready to accept what had revolted her before, freed of the smooth enticement of another woman's lovemaking. She had clung to him and offered herself, begging for a reconciliation. It shamed her after all the years to remember the passion, the upsurge of sensuality which had overtaken her with Alessandro. And he had stepped away from her, cold and disgusted.

If she had hated him before and cried for the comfort of Elise, the reappearance of the older woman had brought her running back, her self-respect in desperate need of restoration. Again she had found sympathy and understanding, followed by the experienced advances which she submitted to as much from spite against her husband as from genuine desire. But the days she spent with Elise in Rome were different from the sentimental interludes stolen during her honeymoon in California. There was an ugliness, a degeneracy about their relationship. It climaxed when Elise tried to persuade her to take heroin. In the Beverly Hills house, surrounded by the glamour of a different world, Francesca might have been tempted. But not in Rome. In Rome she knew herself and her lover for what they were, and there were times when Elise drowsed beside her, lost in the limbo of a fix, when Francesca shuddered in self-disgust. But coupled with it was her burning blame of Alessandro, who had first purged her of the liaison and then, by rejection, thrust her into it again.

When Elise made the proposition she was prepared to listen. It appealed to her need for revenge upon him, to see herself as the means by which he could be manipulated. It didn't need blackmail to persuade her to help John Driver. It hadn't needed Elise's attempt to get her hooked on the drag, a ruse which she recognized later. She needed to be revenged upon him, because she had to blame him for what she now recognized was her own degradation. When John Driver came to the villa, as had been arranged, she welcomed him. And with him she had found the antidote that eased the agony of loving and hating her husband at the same time. Eased but not cured.

She balanced the gun in her right hand. It belonged to John; it was as well he had asked her to follow him down to the store-room. Katharine Dexter had almost escaped. She looked at her watch. They must be at the top of the stairs. In a few minutes it would be over. Then they had to pack up her clothes, drive off in John's car and establish an alibi on the autostrada. When paying the road toll he would call attention to her, using Katharine's name. It could be done all along the route, making certain that some of the attendants on duty would remember their passage. Once in Florence, they would buy a single railway ticket to Pisa for the early-morning train, and slip back behind the barrier, driving along the old coast road on the Via Versilia to Malaspiga before dawn. Driver had worked out the story since receiving Svenson's warning. Katharine had come and asked him to drive her away from the Castle. She was distressed by her cousin's attentions and didn't want to stay till the morning. He had left her at the station en route for Pisa. There would be witnesses to prove that he had been with a woman. Late at night and wearing a deep-brimmed hat, who could identify her clearly afterwards? It was clever and with a different variation, it had been worked before. And before the full repercussions came from America, she and Driver would have vanished. They had amassed enough money to buy them privacy anywhere in the world. Enormous wealth deposited in Switzerland. His share in the proceeds. He had promised her that night, the time had come. He would take her away. The Duke of Malaspiga would find that his wife had run off with the Canadian artist he had befriended and there was nothing anyone could do about it.

She sighed and let the gun hang slackly in her hand. She knew how to aim and pull the trigger, but she had never used it. She had been ready to shoot Katharine Dexter at point-blank range. Helping to kill Firelli had been more difficult than leading Katharine to the turret stairs. Her husband loved Katharine. She thought of what would happen at the top of the stairs and allowed herself a thrill of satisfaction which was honestly sadistic. She wished she could have been there to hear the final scream … Driver wouldn't show mercy. There was no one in the world capable of arousing his emotions except her. They had come together in mutual need. He, because he was consumed with ambitions which couldn't be satisfied, incapable of giving anything of himself, and she with the guilt of her only physical relationship.

John had changed that for her. They had groped towards their love; he had shown her patience and tenderness, without reproach for the past. She had given him passionate gratitude. She insisted that she loved him, and soon they would be alone together for the rest of their lives. Out of the shadow of the Malaspigas for ever.

When Alessandro sprang on her she gave a shrill scream of fear; the gun was wrenched out of her hand, and she was back against the wall, her husband standing over her. She saw his face and cowered away from him.

‘Where is she?' Alessandro said. ‘What have you done with her?' Francesca didn't answer. He put the gun in his pocket and placed both hands around her neck. ‘I will kill you if you don't answer me,' he said. ‘Has she gone up to the East Turret with John? Has she?'

He actually squeezed and she choked, tears coming down her cheeks. Hate blazed in her and she looked at him and saw the loathing and the suspicion in his eyes. She knew what his anger meant. It meant the extent of his love for someone else.

‘Yes,' she whispered. ‘She wanted to go. She wanted to see it.' She tried to claw at his hands.

‘At the point of a gun …' Alessandro released her. ‘If anything has happened to Katharine I will kill both of you.' He turned and she sprang after him towards the door leading to the spiral stairs.

‘John! John! He's coming after you …'

Malaspiga threw her to one side; she sprawled on the ground, the breath knocked out of her. He started up the stairs.

Katharine regained consciousness before they reached the top. She moved and gave a slight groan; Driver shifted his grip on her, holding her tighter. He rounded the last curve and they were out on to a landing. He let her slide down to the ground, and leaned her against the wall. She pushed the hair back from her face and looked at him. He had switched on a light and it was harsh, coming from a bare bulb in the ceiling. Sweat glittered on his forehead; he looked very pale and he was breathing hard.

‘You're heavier than you look,' he said. For a moment she couldn't speak; her head was aching from the blow against the stone wall, her body was trembling and her legs threatened to give way. But the terror was returning. It came in waves, shocking her nervous system, fighting to take control of her completely. It was only physical weakness and confusion after her fall that kept it at bay. ‘Come on,' John Driver said. ‘I'm going to shut you in here for a while.' He stepped close and took her arm. There was a door set in the wall. It was blackened with age, hinged with massive wrought iron, and held shut by a bolt of wood that fitted into a socket in the wall. On the wall to the right, there hung an iron ring.