The Malaspiga Exit (33 page)

When the door closed Frank Carpenter tried to take her in his arms. She drew back. ‘No … please. Let me talk to you—let me tell you what happened.'

‘All right,' he said. He didn't show disappointment or surprise at her reaction. He had seen people suffering from shock before. He took her by the hand and sat down with her, still holding it.

‘Raphael will be here sometime soon. Now you stay calm and tell me how it was. And don't worry. I'm not leaving here without you.'

‘Very ingenious,' Raphael looked round at his assistant. They were in John Driver's studio; the evidence collected in the store-room was already sealed up and documented. Alessandro had been unable to find a duplicate key for the studio and the police had broken the door open. Inside they had found John's unfinished work. Several small pieces, two more busts of children, similar in style to the two in the store-room; a classical torso, two feet high. This was unfinished and proved to be hollowed out in the middle. Raphael inspected it silently. Then he spoke to his assistant ‘Very ingenious,' he repeated. ‘I should think this space would hold about ten kilos of heroin. Which would make this piece of statuary very valuable indeed.' He glanced over his shoulder at the Duke.

‘Was this his idea or yours?'

‘I told you,' Alessandro said. ‘I knew nothing about it.'

‘I know what you've told me,' Raphael said. He lit a cigarette. ‘And I don't believe you. You say you are running a legitimate antiques business and the fact that your New York customer is a proven drug smuggler is pure coincidence. I find that difficult to accept. But I find your ignorance of how the heroin was brought here and smuggled out in sculptures worked by a man in your employ—I find that quite impossible!'

‘It happens to be the truth,' Malaspiga said. ‘I have hidden nothing from you. And you have Katharine Dexter's word for what happened.'

‘Yes,' Raphael agreed; he nodded several times. ‘You shot this man Driver, and you saved her life. You say he and your wife confessed to murdering Firelli. It is perhaps a little convenient for you that both these witnesses are dead?'

‘I don't regard my wife's death as convenient,' the Duke said coldly. He had spent the early morning down the side of the hill, watching the police remove the charred remains of a body from the twisted ruin of the car. The rear number plate had been found intact some distance away. He had identified it as belonging to the car in which his wife had driven away from the Castle. Frank Carpenter had stood beside him. He had felt nothing, except nausea; the place smelt of burnt flesh. He hadn't pretended to feel grief; he was surrounded by enemies and he preserved a frozen calm. He hadn't been allowed to talk to Katharine alone. Raphael and a squad of special police had arrived in the early hours, and he found himself under arrest in his own house.

Standing in the store-room, watching Raphael and his men examining the pieces, seeing the frame on the forged Giorgione split open in their search for heroin, Alessandro had said nothing. When they came to the poudreuse he had said quietly, ‘Before you damage that, I must warn you it is a rare and valuable work of art.'

Raphael had looked at him with contempt, and then turned to his men. ‘Take it to pieces,' he said. ‘I want everything in this room examined.'

They had found nothing, except in the bust of the little boy, which was full of heroin like its companion. Nobody mentioned the Giorgione painting. They weren't looking for art forgeries. Now, as he looked round at the work in Driver's studio, the enormity of the case against him couldn't be denied. The aggressive little Florentine policeman was triumphant; Alessandro recognized the type. A policeman with a political bias against people like himself. Raphael had enjoyed discovering the sculptures, just as he had enjoyed watching his men dismantling the exquisite little poudreuse. The fact that there was no trace of heroin in it didn't seem to bother him. He was confident that what he'd already found was enough. He hadn't seemed to be impressed by Katharine's insistence that the Duke was innocent. Alessandro denied him the satisfaction of protesting or demanding that his lawyer be called. There was nothing he could do to stop Raphael tearing down the Castle walls at that stage, and he sensed that the policeman would have enjoyed a trial of strength which he was sure to win. The Duke said nothing, but the contempt in his silence goaded Raphael.

When the search was over, and Driver's studio was locked and sealed, he demanded to see the old Duchess and Prince Alfredo. Alessandro recognized this as a piece of provocation. ‘My mother is over eighty years old and there is nothing she can tell you because she knows nothing. My uncle Prince Alfredo is senile; in the name of common sense if not humanity, I must ask you to leave them alone.'

Raphael felt in his pocket for another cigarette. ‘When it comes to murder and drug smuggling, Duke Alessandro,' he said, ‘nobody's sensibilities are sacred. I will ask your mother and your uncle to come down together. I am sending Katharine Dexter back to Florence. There is nothing more for her to do here.'

He was watching the Duke very closely, while pretending to adjust his lighter. He had the satisfaction of seeing his expression of indifference change.

‘I should like to see her before she goes,' Alessandro said.

Raphael shook his head; he had held the little flame to his cigarette end and inhaled the smoke. ‘That won't be possible,' he said. ‘She is the State's principal witness. I will see your mother and your uncle in the little room across the entrance hall. You will wait here. My men have orders not to let you leave the room, so don't make things unpleasant for yourself.' He went out, closing the door, and sent one of the worried servants upstairs to bring down the Duchess and Uncle Alfredo.

‘Kate,' Frank Carpenter had his hand on her arm, ‘Kate, there's nothing you can do. He isn't going to hurt them. He'll just ask them a few questions and then let them go.' Katharine didn't listen; she pulled away from him and went up to the Duchess. The old lady was walking across the hall towards the room where Raphael was waiting. Uncle Alfredo, guided by a policeman in civilian clothes, was following behind.

Isabella di Malaspiga paused; when Katharine took her hand it was cold and limp.

‘Where is my son? Who are these people?'

‘There's no need to be afraid,' Katharine said gently. ‘They're just making enquiries.'

The Duchess looked at her. ‘I'm not in the least afraid,' she said. ‘Something has happened; there are policemen here and that must mean there's been an accident. Where is Alessandro?' For a moment her mouth trembled.

‘He's here, he's perfectly all right,' Katharine said quickly. Carpenter had come beside her. She could feel his impatience; at any moment he would take her by the arm and try to hurry her away.

The Duchess turned and spoke to Uncle Alfredo. He was making slow progress, chafing against the policeman's guiding arm.

‘There's no need to worry,' she said. ‘Alessandro will be with us; he will look after you, Alfredo. So come along and we'll find him together.' She held out her hand and the old man suddenly hurried towards her. He was nodding his head up and down; a tiny streak of saliva had gathered by the corner of his mouth. He didn't seem to recognize Katharine.

‘It's the murder,' he said. ‘I told him they were going to kill her … that's why the police are here.'

‘Prince Alfredo,' Katharine said. He looked at her and then stopped suddenly. The Duchess had taken him by the hand.

‘They didn't kill you, then?'

‘No,' she answered. ‘Alessandro saved me.'

‘It was her fault,' the old man muttered. ‘She was the wicked one—trying to send me away.'

‘Come,' Isabella di Malaspiga urged him, and he pattered beside her, still mumbling to himself. She saw the door open and a brief glimpse of Raphael as he stood up and came towards them. They looked so frail and helpless, the old lady holding her brother-in-law's hand, that Katharine's eyes filled with tears.

Carpenter put his arm around her. ‘You've had enough,' he said. ‘I'm taking you out of here right now.'

‘I want to see my cousin,' she said. ‘They're my family—I want to know what's going to happen to them!'

‘Raphael's got a warrant for him,' Carpenter explained. ‘The old couple will be all right. Don't worry about them. Come on now—it's all over for you.'

He thought she slept during the drive back to Florence, until he saw her face as they stopped by a toll-booth on the way; the lights showed that she was crying. He didn't say anything, because he felt sure a few hours' sleep would bring her down from the nervous peak which was expressing itself in tears. He held her hand on the journey and whispered to her to try and rest. She didn't answer; she was safe and with her own kind. He had kept telling her so, while Raphael sat in Alessandro's sitting room, smoking and listening to her account of what happened. Carpenter had been soothing and protective, as if she were much more shocked than was the case. The Italian had said very little, except that her part was over and she should leave the Castle.

She had wanted to protest, to insist on staying, but they had taken the initiative away; they had separated her from Alessandro. Carpenter hadn't left her alone, or listened when she asked to say goodbye.

He drove to her hotel and came up to her room. It was lunchtime; the foyer had been empty; the clerk reading a newspaper behind the desk; she had seen the restaurant through the open door. It was full and there was a cheerful noise of people talking. She remembered the first day she arrived there, and her disquiet at being given a special table and the manager's personal attention because of the name of Malaspiga on her passport. She had felt alien, resentful of a deference which she felt was unbecoming for an American. She had come to Italy to destroy the Malaspigas, and it was the worst irony that because she was one of them, she had succeeded. Alessandro was under arrest; the impregnable walls of the Castle breached by the modern judicial process, using as its siege weapon a piece of paper giving total power. She opened her bedroom door and turned, blocking Frank Carpenter's way.

‘I'll rest,' she said. ‘I'm so tired, I can't think.'

‘I want to talk to you,' he said, ‘but I guess it can wait.' She saw how worn and tired he looked. He deserved something better than her frantic concern for someone else. But she couldn't give it. She couldn't have stepped aside and let him come into her room and try to resume what had been interrupted the night before she left New York. That belonged to the girl she had been; it would never be possible for the woman she had become.

‘I'm sorry, Frank,' she said. ‘I have to sleep. Whatever you said now wouldn't make any sense to me.'

‘I'll call this evening,' he said. ‘Raphael is bringing Malaspiga down. He'll want to see you but I'll head him off till the morning.'

‘No,' she said quickly. ‘No, don't do that—I'll be all right …'

‘You're out on your feet,' Carpenter said. ‘I can see that. He wants to go over your evidence with you, to help frame the charges. You've got to get everything clear.'

‘I'll see him today,' Katharine said. ‘Late this afternoon.' If you won't fix it, Frank, I'll do it myself.'

‘Okay,' he shrugged. ‘If that's how you want it. I was only thinking of you.'

‘I know,' she caught his arm for a moment, ‘I know you were, and I appreciate it. But I'm thinking of an innocent man being held in prison. I'll see Raphael as soon as he gets down here.'

‘I'll come and pick you up,' Carpenter said. His tone was abrupt; he turned away without looking at her.

She didn't intend to sleep; she lay on the bed, with an arm over her eyes, and woke with the telephone shrilling beside her. It was Carpenter; he was downstairs in the foyer, waiting to take her to Raphael's office.

‘You realize', Raphael said, ‘that you are my only witness? The contact in New York is dead, the Bureau man who was spying for him had a heart attack; the Duchess and the Canadian—there is no one who can testify against Malaspiga except you.' He paused and looked at Carpenter. They were sitting in his top-floor office on the Via Vecchio; below them the city was preparing for the evening, the shops were illuminated and the cafés filling with people.

‘You've had a rough time,' Carpenter said. He had been silent on the drive from her hotel; now he seemed intent on making an effort and establishing the contact with her which had been lost. ‘Naturally you believe his story about being innocent; he saved your life and you want to believe him. But look at the facts.'

‘He's guilty,' Raphael said. ‘He's the head of the drug-smuggling ring, and everything points to it. His connection with Taylor—coincidence? Maybe.' He shook his head. ‘I don't accept that and I told him so. He employs a man who hides heroin in sculptures and he knows nothing about it? A smuggling ring dealing in millions of dollars' worth of drugs is being run from his home by his wife and this Canadian, and in four years he never suspects anything? Why did he decide to play the patron to this particular artist—Florence is full of starving young students, but he picks a criminal in the pay of the Mafia? There isn't a jury in the world who would believe he wasn't head and tail of it all!'

Katharine didn't say anything. He had been cool and abrupt when she came in; he was walking up and down, gesticulating angrily as he argued. He stopped suddenly and came over to her. ‘You know he's guilty,' he said. ‘Whatever has happened between you—I appeal to your conscience not to try and protect him. You came here to break this ring and avenge your brother's murder—have you forgotten what they did to him? How they pumped him full of heroin and killed him to safeguard their pushers? This man, this cousin of yours that you say is innocent—he was responsible for that!'