The Grey Beginning, page 26
“The same goes for you,” I said.
“Right. ‘Neck by neck, stride by stride, never changing our pace…. Not a word to each other….’” He switched off the lamp.
We stood in darkness till our eyes adjusted. Gradually the shapes of the windows became visible, half hidden by piled-up boxes, and lighter than I would have liked. It was pitch-dark where we stood and I heard, rather than saw, David open the door.
“Stairs,” I whispered.
“How many?”
“Damned if I know.”
He let out a soft breath of laughter.
I sympathized with his decision not to use the lamp, but as we blundered through the warren of rooms and passageways I wondered if any prisoners in fact or fiction had ever carried out such a farcical escape. We barked our shins on sharp edges of furniture and tripped over chairs; ran into door frames and groped for openings. Even in daylight I had been bewildered by the absence of any coherent plan in this part of the house.
After David had fallen headlong across a low iron bed in one of the maids’ rooms, producing a hideous howl of rusted springs, he switched on the lamp. He was grinning like an idiot, and if he was crazy, so was I; I wanted to laugh too. This wasn’t James Bond or Jane Eyre, it was the Marx Brothers.
I knew why I felt so ridiculously lighthearted. It was David. Maybe Browning had a word for him. The only ones that came to my mind were totally inadequate.
“I’m afraid to get up,” he said in a low voice. “Do you think there’s something alive under here? Where the hell are we?”
I looked around the room. It was exactly like a dozen others on that corridor, but at least I knew which corridor it was. “I picked the wrong door. The one we want must be farther along. It leads to another storeroom, and that opens into a big room with windows overlooking the front, and from there you go into the corridor where Pete’s room is. And from that—”
“I’ve got it.” He heaved himself off the bed, amid another screech of rusted metal. “We’ll have to use the lamp. I don’t mind telling people I’ve been beaten and tortured, but I’ll be damned if I want to admit I broke a leg tripping over a chamber pot.”
It was easier with the light. David switched it off again when we reached the passageway stretching along the front of the house. From there the route was known to both of us.
As we passed the door of Pete’s room David reached for my hand and squeezed it, and I knew he was thinking the same thing I was. Whatever became of us, the boy would never be locked in that room again. I had accomplished that much, at any rate. If I didn’t return to the Grande Albergo, my letter would go to the police, and my disappearance would confirm the accusations I had made. From what David had told me, I felt certain Pete’s aunt and uncle would hurry to be with him. He would be all right now. I only hoped the same could be said of us.
Down the stairs to the second floor, to lighted corridors at last. Not a sound broke the stillness. Francesca must have gone to bed. David gave me the lamp. His right hand went to the pocket of his jeans, where his “defensive weapons” made unseemly lumps. Down, farther down, to the wide landing. David stopped and looked over the balustrade. The bulbs in the chandelier shone on the polished marble of the floor of the hall, and reflected in the polished brass of door handle, bolt and chain.
“The door is unlocked, David! We can—”
“Sssh.” His finger touched my lips.
Then I heard it too—a far-off rumble that rose to a roar and ended in a crash and a crunch of stone. David abandoned his favorite poets for a more emphatic comment. “Son of a bitch! He’s back. I’d know the sound of that motor anywhere. I wonder what—”
Of course Bart would use the front door. Only tradesmen and servants went to the back. I heard the furious thud of his feet crossing the terrace; then the heavy oak panel exploded open. We had barely time to retreat a few steps, out of the light, but if he had looked up he would have seen us. David had taken the brass doorknob from his pocket. His fingers curled around it and I thought insanely, “Fast ball.”
Bart didn’t look up or pause. He was in a towering rage. Without stopping to close the door, he ran across the hall and disappeared from sight under the stairs. Another door crashed open.
“Run for it,” David said, taking my hand.
We didn’t have much time. Bart would be up the back stairs like a bullet, and when he found the door was blocked he would really blow up. He wouldn’t waste time forcing it, he was smart enough to know what we had done. He must know every inch of the house, every door, every room.
Illogical though it was, I almost hated to leave the house. The front terrace and stairs were so open, so well lighted; and it was such a long way to the car. Then I saw the motorcycle lying on its side at the bottom of the stairs.
We made a bad mistake then. But the temptation was almost irresistible—fast transportation, practically at our feet. If I knew Bart, he had left the gates open. And there was no other functioning vehicle in the place.
David righted the bike and mounted. I jumped on behind, wrapping my arms around his waist. His foot hit the pedal; the still-warm engine caught instantly. The roar was loud enough to alert everyone for miles around.
We hadn’t gone ten feet when I felt the machine lurch and slide. There was something wrong with the steering. Either it had been damaged when Bart threw it down or the furious pace he had set along the rutted road had done the job. We took the turn too wide, branches battering our heads, and narrowly missed the trunk of a tree. I missed it; David’s knee didn’t and the jar threw him even farther off balance. We slid off the drive at an angle, straight at the trees. At the last second David did the only thing possible—he let himself fall sideways, pulling me with him. We hit the ground, the bike hit a tree trunk and landed on top of us. By the time we had untangled ourselves I knew it was too late. A flashlight beam cut through the branches over our heads, and when David tried to stand, his knee gave way. He dropped down onto his side. “Run,” he gasped.
I suppose I might have tried. The shrubs were thick and the shadows were dark. But they could have tracked me by the sounds I made, and it was a long way to the gate. The crack of a rifle and the whistle of a bullet through the boughs made up my mind for me. Twigs and pine needles showered down onto my head.
“All right, you’ve had your little run,” Bart said. “I hope you enjoyed the exercise.” He clamped a hand over my arm and yanked me to my feet.
The rifle was in his other hand. Alberto held the flashlight. In the same cool, pleased voice Bart went on, “You little bitch. I know you have the tastes of a peasant, but I didn’t think you were that low. You must have been desperate to shack up with him.”
I looked at David, blinking foolishly at the light shining in his eyes. It would have been hard to find a more disreputable specimen of manhood. “You’re right,” I said. “You are absolutely right, Bart. I was desperate.”
He wasn’t quite sure how to take that. The irony eluded him, but he must have sensed some undercurrent. His fingers tightened till I had to bite my lip to keep from crying out.
We started back to the villa. Bart kept jerking and shaking me, like a child venting his anger on a stuffed toy. It was stupid, and it hurt. But I was more concerned about David, stumbling behind us. Once I heard a slither and a gasp, and knew he had fallen. Alberto laughed.
When we reached the open space in front of the fountain Bart stopped. I had expected he would take us inside, but as he began arranging his tableau, pushing me down to kneel at his feet, ordering David and Alberto to take up a position nearby, I understood. Setting: a villa near Florence. I wondered how Bart had cast himself, as hero or villain. He wouldn’t care, so long as he had the leading role.
I tried to get up. He pushed me down. “Where’s the boy?”
“I told you. With the carnival.”
“You rotten little liar, I looked for him there.”
“Then you didn’t look hard enough or ask the right people. I didn’t exactly advertise his presence.”
The faintest shadow of uncertainty crossed his face. That was why he had returned earlier than we had expected. He hadn’t looked hard enough. Patience was never one of his virtues, and his arrogant manners wouldn’t go over too well with the independent carnival people. No doubt he had started giving orders and they had told him what he could do with them.
“That won’t wash, Kathy,” he said. “How can I trust you when you were ready to betray me? How long have you known this—this scarecrow?”
“I never met him until I came here. That’s the truth, Bart.”
“But you preferred him to your husband. What lies have you told him about me? What were you doing, if you weren’t running off with your lover?”
Unfortunately, that was the difficulty. Either I was running off with a lover or trying to escape a killer. I couldn’t deny one accusation without admitting the other. I tried to think of a third possibility, but there wasn’t an idea left in my head.
David cleared his throat. “I’d like to say something.”
“The only information I want is the location of the boy.”
“I don’t know where he is. If I did know, I wouldn’t tell you.”
This time I made it to my feet, shaking my head frantically at David. Neither he nor Bart paid the slightest attention to me.
“Why not?” Bart asked softly.
“Let’s not fool around, okay? You’re a sensible man; you know when it’s time to retreat and regroup. The police have been informed that you’re here. They know all about your background and they know what you were trying to do to the child. They could arrive at any minute. If you make tracks right now, you stand a good chance of getting away.”
It was a sensible, reasonable speech. If he had been dealing with a sensible, reasonable man, it might have had the desired effect. Bart’s reaction was to swing the rifle to his shoulder.
David’s eyes widened, more in surprise than in fear; it had never occurred to him that Bart would do anything so stupid as commit deliberate murder in front of two witnesses. I wasn’t surprised. David’s speech had threatened Bart’s most cherished images of himself: the great lover, the brilliant schemer. As Bart’s finger tightened on the trigger I grabbed the barrel of the rifle. The bullet hit the ground. The recoil sent me sprawling, my ears ringing with the blast of the explosion.
When I got my eyes back in focus I saw that Bart was standing quite still, the rifle in one hand. Alberto had David in a wrestler’s grip. All three were looking up, toward the top of the staircase.
The light behind her left her face in shadow and outlined her slender, erect form. The sweeping folds of her robe and the fur-trimmed neckline and the flowing sleeves gave her the look of a character in some dark Renaissance melodrama—the duchess pronouncing sentence on the traitors, the princess awaiting the return of her lover from the war. Emilia, all in black, hovering, might have played the malevolent duenna or housekeeper, or a witch crying doom on the ancient manor.
“Go back inside, Francesca,” Bart said. He spoke English. I suppose his adopted language came easier and more naturally by now. Or perhaps he wanted me to know he was still in command.
“You have lost your senses,” she said in the same language. “No matter what she has done, you must not risk your child.”
“How do I know it’s mine?” demanded my devoted husband. “She’s had the scarecrow and the shrink since she arrived; the latest of a long list, I’m sure.”
“You are obscene,” Francesca said frostily.
Before she could continue, Emilia sidled forward and tugged at her sleeve. I didn’t understand the hissing, hostile speech, but Bart did; a slow, unpleasant smile lifted the corners of his mouth. “Well, well. Who would have thought it? Guess what, my honorable little wife. Emilia says you aren’t pregnant after all. What do you say?”
“Oh, what difference does it make?” I said impatiently.
Francesca started. “Is it a lie?” Her voice was not as steady as usual.
“You see, it does make a difference,” Bart said, showing his teeth. “You don’t suppose Francesca tolerated you for your own sweet sake, do you? She—”
“She’ll stand by and watch you commit two murders?” I cut in. “What lie did you tell her to explain why I took Pete away tonight? She doesn’t know you want him dead, that you tried—”
He reached for me. I had expected a blow, and tried to duck; instead of striking he caught me and pulled me against him, his hand spreading over my mouth and throat in a grip so agonizingly painful I couldn’t move. David, who had stood meek and limp in Alberto’s grip, brought his head sharply back. The chauffeur let out a yell and released his hold, clasping both hands over his nose. David started toward us.
“Stop right there,” Bart said. “I’ll snap her neck if you take one more step.”
Francesca stood unmoving, aloof as a spectator at a play she found faintly disgusting. “Go back inside,” Bart said. “I’ll deal with this. It’s my right—my honor that has been sullied.” Still she didn’t move. Bart’s voice took on a softer, wheedling note. “She lied to you, carissima. You wouldn’t take the word of a liar, a stranger, against mine?”
He knew he had won. His caressing voice poorly veiled the note of confident triumph. His hand tightened; fingers and thumb had settled into points of pressure against nerves and arteries. They contracted and relaxed, rhythmically, sensuously, and spots danced in front of my eyes.
Francesca straightened. She spoke slowly, articulating every word with such precision that even I understood.
“Alberto. The rifle. Take it from him. Bring it to me.”
The chauffeur’s heavy body swayed, forward and back, as if invisible hands were tugging at him from two different directions. Emilia let out a long, keening cry. That was the only sign of emotion—I almost said of humanity—either gave. Emilia was suddenly silent. Alberto started walking toward Bart.
Bart was even slower to react. He cried out to Alberto in Italian, stumbling over the words. His voice was high with disbelief. Alberto kept walking. Bart backed away. I was an impediment now; he tossed me aside, carelessly, without malice for once, as he might have brushed an object out of his way. Again I measured my full length on the gravel. I didn’t even notice the pain, I was too stupefied. David raised me to my feet and we clung together, like children seeing monsters in the dark.
Bart’s voice had lost all its trained beauty. It was a hoarse, breathless monotone. He appealed to Francesca, who stood like a marble statue, to Alberto, who plodded steadily forward, to Emilia…astonishingly, horribly, to me. “Kathy, tell her you lied, goddamn you, tell her, you got me into this, it’s all your fault….”
It was fitting that those were the last words I heard him speak. He had reached the steps and was backing up them, stumbling, his eyes fixed on Alberto. The chauffeur started up after him. His hand went out.
Bart raised the weapon. The muzzle could not have been more than a foot from Alberto’s chest when he pulled the trigger.
Dark liquid spattered against the balustrade. The impact flung Alberto back, then forward, as his body rebounded from the stone railing. He fell, his arm still extended. Only the stiffened hand touched Bart, but it was enough to make him lose his footing. If he had dropped the gun and caught the balustrade he might have saved himself. Still clutching it, he toppled backward, and his sleek black head struck the sharp edge of one of the stone steps.
The dull, soggy sound seemed to go on echoing for hours. It was the only sound, the only movement; we were all characters in some unbelievable black farce, frozen in the final tableau as the curtain fell. The only figure of genuine tragedy was the woman who stood silent and motionless at the head of the stairs. She was a little more, and a little less, than human at that moment—the personification of some cold abstraction such as Justice or Retribution. For a moment she stood looking down. Then she turned and walked steadily into the house.
It was Emilia who crawled down the stairs, her face slobbered with tears, to raise, not her husband, but mine, into her arms, and cradle his head against her breast. His eyes were open. They were tarnished and muddy, like pools of stagnant water.
VIII
I’ve often wondered if Francesca knew what would happen when she gave her servant his final order. She must have realized Bart would never endure such a challenge to his authority, especially in the house where he had always been master. I wonder, too, what intangible evidence tipped the scales in my favor. I’d like to think it had something to do with her feelings for me. Not love or liking or fondness, but something more important, at least to me. What was it she said? “I respect those qualities, if I do not admire them.”
I will never know. I never saw her again. She never answered my letters. All I can do for her is respect her wish to be left alone.
David and I limped down the drive toward the gate. He was hobbling like a rheumatic old man and I was so exhausted every step was a supreme effort. Neither of us spoke. As David said later, it would have been impossible to invent dialogue that wouldn’t have sounded banal and anticlimactic.
The gates were open, as Bart had left them. I said, “Why don’t you wait here? I’ll get the car.”
“I accept,” David said promptly. “Old baseball injury,” he added, indicating the wounded knee.
I smiled feebly. But as I started forward he caught my hand. “Kathy,” he said. “Don’t be long.”
The mountaintops were black against the dawn. I said, “‘There’s the grey beginning…. I know my own way back. Don’t fear me!’”
I heard his laughter, so different from that other laughter, as I started up the hill toward the sunrise.
About the Author
ELIZABETH PETERS (writing as BARBARA MICHAELS) was born and brought up in Illinois and earned her Ph.D. in Egyptology from the University of Chicago’s famed Oriental Institute. Peters was named Grand Master at the inaugural Anthony Awards in 1986, Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America at the Edgar® Awards in 1998, and given the Lifetime Achievement Award at Malice Domestic in 2003. She lives in an historic farmhouse in western Maryland. You can visit her website at www.mpmbooks.com.
