The Venetian Affair (48 page)

Fenner didn’t answer. He was staring up at the attic windows. “Thought I saw a light. Just a thin sliver—a crack in the shutters.”

Holland looked quickly. There was nothing to see.

Their gondola was slowing up to avoid the rush of water from a
vaporetto
on its quick way up the canal. Sharply, there sounded a warning hoot from its siren. Floating down toward the water-bus, in the middle of the canal, was an island of gay lights and music. The water-bus altered course slightly, with a last pay-attention blast on its siren, and passed the two decorated gondolas, roped together, crowded, their three-piece orchestra throbbing into
O sole mio
under a canopy of coloured lights and flowers. See Venice by night. Indeed, yes. Fenner watched the shimmering drift of the linked gondolas, listened to the music as it floated along, looked back at the attic window. I’m going in that way, he decided. How strong are the shutters?

“
Bellissimo!
” their gondolier shouted to encourage everyone’s enjoyment, and began his rhythmical sway once more on the flat-topped
stern, judging the backwash of the
vaporetto
skilfully, rowing his way in earnest now across the canal.

“
Bellissimo!
” Holland agreed, tactfully. He started as Fenner’s arm grasped his. Fenner was staring up at the roof of Ca’ Longhi.

Holland looked, too. He saw a thin edge of light from the second attic window. Then it vanished.

“Watch!” Fenner told him.

The light came on again. It went off. On again. Off. On.

Their gondola was drawing closer to the bank, up canal. They could no longer see the attic window.

That might not be Claire, Holland thought. It could be Sandra Fane. But all he said was, “That’s what I like about women. They never give up, do they?” He added, “You’ll have company on the roof. Two of Marco’s specialists.”

Fenner looked at him swiftly.

“Did you notice those nice big Renaissance chimneys, filled with soot? No, don’t ask how they’ll do it. Just guess. You’ll come near enough the truth.”

They both half-smiled, fell silent.

Had that been Claire, Holland wondered again, or Sandra? He was too old a hand at this kind of work to hope for anything: you did your best, made the most of every small advantage, and that was that.

It was Claire, thought Bill Fenner, it was Claire.

Claire drifted out of the black sleep of unconsciousness into blind suffocation. She couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, couldn’t breathe. Her hands went up to her face, pushing, pulling, and
she came free of the long dark cloak that had been twisted around her.

She was lying on a narrow bed in a square-shaped room with a light, one naked bulb dangling from the ceiling, setting her head throbbing as she looked up at its knife-sharp gleam. She looked away, to the other side of the room. It was filled with a mass of old furniture, trunks, crates. She pulled the cloak’s cocoon-like wrapping away from her thighs, freed her legs, and sat up slowly. The thin straw mattress crackled; the rickety bed creaked and trembled. From the cluttered side of this boxlike room came the scrabble and skitter of mice back into the wainscoting. If I frightened you, you frightened me, she told them silently; and rose unsteadily. Wooden floor, dusty. One door, very closed, in the centre of the wall that faced the window. A single window stoutly shuttered on the outside. And silence. Silence complete. Where was she? At Ca’ Longhi? It was only a guess: she had no way of knowing. She had seen nothing, heard nothing, since she had come down the bridge on to the quay to talk to Zorzi, waiting half-asleep in his gondola.

The gondola had certainly been Zorzi’s. From the bridge above, she had seen about two thirds of it clearly and recognised the brightly polished dolphins that held up its black side cords, the black leather cushions with their bobbed red fringes, the red rug at the feet on the two upright armchairs. She ran down the steps and saw Zorzi stretched along the stern under the shadow of the bridge, resting gondolier-style on his back, knees raised, one leg dangling over the other, hands behind his head, hat tilted over his brow. But it wasn’t Zorzi.

The man had a ready explanation as he rose and came forward to where she stood by the side of the gondola. Zorzi’s
little boy was ill: Zorzi had asked him to take his place tonight. As she quickly searched in her purse to give the man some lire and ease the broken appointment, she heard quiet footsteps behind her. And sensed danger. She had snapped her bag shut, turned to see who this was—two men, pleasant-faced, smiling. But across the quay, in a dark doorway, were standing two other men, one looking along the lighted street, raising his hand. As a signal? Before she could scream, the gondolier behind her had struck a sharp blow against the back of her neck. She had dropped her bag as she felt the pain, the paralysis that turned the scream into a moan. And then blackness complete. And nothing more.

Where was she?

She walked over to the casement window. It opened inward, showing a deep recess between it and the shutters. No problem there. But the broad shutters were another matter. They were sturdy, unpainted, weathered by age. They met together tightly, as if sealed by sun and rain. And they were most definitely secured: a combination of hasp over staple was clinched by a padlock. The hasp and staple were of black iron, antique in design, massive. The padlock was new, small, made of steel. She looked at it in dismay. Then she noticed the contrast between the large staple, made for some heavy ancient lock, and the padlock’s slender link. There was a lot of room to spare there, enough to give the hasp some free play.

She reached up, across the deep stone sill, and pulled the hasp toward her as far as the padlock would allow. This would permit the shutters—if she could force them apart—to open for at least one inch. One good inch of view. That was all she needed. She would know where this window faced—a courtyard, a canal, a
street. She could scream for help. Her throbbing head might split open, but she would like to scream right now. Useless, though; unless she knew there were other houses, other people near enough to hear her cries, she would only give warning to her captors that she had to be gagged and bound.

But she couldn’t force the shutters apart. She pulled and tugged. They should open inward, obviously, judging by the depth of the stone sill. But they didn’t move. She could get no grip, no fingerhold on their closely met edge. They were jammed. Warped? Too long unopened? She stepped back, letting her tired arms rest, easing the hard pressure of the sill against her waist. She stared at the shutters helplessly. And in that moment, she felt her complete loneliness.

Where was Bill? Was he safe? The two men in that dark doorway had made no move toward her—only signalled that the lighted street near them was clear, that no one was about to reach the bridge. Had they been sent to deal with Bill? Would they have taken him, too? Or left him there in some dark corner? Was he lying somewhere near that alley?

Rosie, Chris, Marco, the Frenchman they called Jules—where were they? Had her handbag been found? She didn’t even know if it had fallen on the quay or been kicked into the canal in the quick scuffle. If it had been discovered, and she
must
believe it would be or else she’d be paralysed by helplessness, the search was on. Her optimism was qualified, though: the first search must be for Sandra Fane. Her escape was vital if Kalganov was ever to be tracked down. When Ca’ Longhi was raided (and Marco had plans all made and ready, hadn’t he? That was when she had been asked to leave them in peace while they talked, to make coffee—tactful Chris...),
Lenoir would certainly be caught. But Kalganov, where was he to be found? So Rosie and Chris—they had to concentrate on Sandra, free her, protect her, get her tongue unlocked, find Kalganov before he could change his plans again, perhaps even pull a victory out of threatened defeat.

Strange that Sandra was the one who would escape. Where was justice now? Very much there, she realised sadly: Justice blindfolded, so that she would play no favourites, and Kalganov could be caught. You’ll have to settle for that, she told herself: what is unfair to you is fair to others. How else would people be able to go on spending pleasant Sundays in their free-walking, free-talking, free-thinking world? Kalganov, uncaught, would end all that: if not this time, some time. He had the will, and he had the cunning, and he was gathering the power. Strange, she thought, the Russians may yet be thankful to us—although they’ll never admit it—if we can stop Kalganov. Unless, of course, they want a return to Stalin the Awful... Ivan the Terrible... Kalganov the Frightful.

All right, she told herself, you’ve talked yourself into accepting Sandra’s importance. She comes first. You’re a poor second. As far as the Kalganov problem goes.

Strange, though, so many things are strange... For eight years, you’ve had no personal need to survive. Since Jim’s death, no real meaning in your own life. All you wanted was the cause of Jim’s death removed, the cause of those other murders exposed, the blackmail of terrorism and the threat of violence gutted out—the way cancer is destroyed before it runs through the whole body. And you had fine words to speak: you said you’d die happy if, in one small way, you could help. You told Rosie that. You meant it, too. You still mean it. Only now, today, you
would like to have helped and stayed alive, too. Strange... on the day you found life anew, you may lose it.

She closed her eyes. She allowed herself one long, unhappy sigh. The mice rustled. She came back to the room again. She stared at the shutters. How long shall I be kept here? How long have I been here?

She couldn’t even tell that. Her watch had been taken off her wrist. Regrets and sad thoughts vanished. She was suddenly angered by the very meanness, the calculation of that theft: she was to know neither place nor time. She stopped staring hopelessly at the shutters and looked around for something to use on them.

Spindle-leg chairs, a broken marble table, cracked or spotted mirrors in gilded frames, antiquated footstools, a carved chest, chipped golden cupids, a high old-fashioned trunk with carved lid, smaller trunks of battered tin, an elaborately carved candlestick with broken feet and a chunk of wax still in its holder, uncovered boxes exposing a clutter of yellow-paged books half-fallen from crumbling bindings, a music stand tra-la, a do-re-me recorder, two repellent busts of Roman matrons, inlaid trays, broken chessman...

Her eyes travelled again over the most likely objects. Quietly, she moved through the crush of junk. She was searching for something strong enough to act as a lever, force the shutters apart; something sharp enough to try to turn the padlock. Everything was made of wood, or marble, or plaster, or glass, or tin. Inside the large trunk, she found faded brocades and silks. She picked up the tall candlestick—wood, too, but a solid piece of carving—and studied the remains of its broad candle. The wax was so hardened by age that even a mountaineering
mouse had only fretted its edge with gnawings. Possible?

She hit the squat chunk of wax against the edge of the marble table. It split after three quick, hard blows, and the candle could be gouged away from its holder. She found what she had hoped for: a metal point almost two inches long on to which the original candle, tall and heavy, had been jammed for safe anchorage. She found, too, something she didn’t want: after the sound of the blows, someone outside the door had walked a few heavy paces, and stood listening. She waited. The footsteps receded again, and silence returned. The guard must have sat down on a chair; the guard, by the footsteps, must be a man. So she knew what was outside in that direction. She would have to work cautiously.

She carried the largest footstool over to the window to give her ten more inches of height. She examined the padlock more closely. Its keyhole was too small for the thick point of the candle holder. That was a bad disappointment. She would have to concentrate on the shutters. It should have been a simple job, but it wasn’t. The candlestick wasn’t too heavy, but it was cumbersome to handle. Its spike, once she had managed to insert it between the two shutters, refused to catch on either wooden edge to give her enough leverage. It slipped, held, slipped, almost caught again, slipped. If she could have risked noise, it would have been easier. She was almost weeping in frustration when she felt the point hold as if, this time, it meant to keep its grip. She pressed, pressed. One shutter trembled for an instant, sighed, and moved free.

She pulled it inward, as far as it would come. She had her full inch of view. Of black nothing. Idiot, she told herself, kicking off her shoes and running over to the light switch near the door. She remembered the guard outside, looked down at the gap of
door above the threshold. Not always an idiot, she thought, as she dropped her coat along the edge of the door, and switched off the light. She could see what lay outside.

It was a view of night sky, black suffused with red. So she was in Venice—that was a city’s glow—and not in some remote house far out on the shores of the lagoon. Stars, bright when the light clouds drifted away from them. A small piece of moon. Some distance away, directly opposite her, there were roofs, a row of them, broken in silhouette, possibly belonging to large and handsome buildings. But she could only see their unlighted upper floors—her downward view of them was blocked by some kind of balcony outside this window. Did they rest on water, or on some broad piazza near water? (She had been brought here by gondola, hadn’t she?) To see the ground floor of that row of houses, she would have to stand higher, be able to look down over the high balustrade that cut the view in half. She would have to drag apart some of the clutter behind her, pull that marble-topped table to the window.

The idea, when she had switched on the light again and could study the table, defeated her. She couldn’t move it six inches. She stood there, dispirited, looking down at the silks and satins in the opened trunk. It was made of light wood, covered with leather. The lid felt thin to her touch. Perhaps she could empty the trunk, drag it gently over to the window. But even as she pulled at a piece of heavy brocade, white turned yellow, she knew she was too tired, too weak. She sat down on a low chest beside the trunk, her hand fallen on the silks. She’d rest for a little. Opening those shutters had been harder work than she had thought at the time. Or else she had hope then; and now it was slipping away.