Luciano’s Luck

2

It started to rain as Carter went over the ridge, a heavy, drenching downpour, sheet lightning flickering beyond the mountain peaks. He leaned the cumbersome bicycle against a tree and took the field-glasses from his pocket. When he focused them the houses of Bellona three miles away jumped into view. He followed the valley road to where it disappeared into pine trees, but there was no sign of life. Not even a shepherd.

He replaced the field-glasses in his pack, moved back through the trees to the other side of the ridge and looked down at the villa in the hollow below, quiet in the evening light, waiting for him.

He was tired and yet filled with a sudden fierce exhilaration, faced at last with the final end of things. He started down the slope through pine trees, pushing the bicycle before him.

He entered the grounds by a gate in the rear wall and followed a path round to the front of the house. The garden was Moorish, lush, semi-tropical vegetation pressing in everywhere. Palms swayed gently above his head and in the heavy downpour water gurgled in the old conduits, splashing from numerous fountains.

He emerged into the courtyard at the front of the house, leaned the bicycle against the baroque fountain, and went up the steps to the front door. There was already a light in the hall and he pulled on the bell chain and waited. There was the sound of footsteps approaching and the door opened.

The man who stood there was perhaps forty, his heavy moustache and hair already grey. He wore a black bow tie and alpaca jacket and looked Carter over with total disapproval.

‘What do you want?’

Carter removed his cloth cap and when he spoke, his voice was rough and hoarse, pure Sicilian. ‘I have a message for the Contessa.’

The manservant held out his hand. ‘Give it to me.’

Carter shook his head, assuming an expression of peasant cunning. ‘My orders were to deliver it personally. She’s expecting me. Tell her Ciccio is here.’

The manservant shrugged. ‘All right, come in. I’ll see what she has to say.’

Carter stepped inside and stood there, dripping rain on to the black and white ceramic tiles. The manservant frowned his displeasure, walked across the hall and went through a green baize door into a large kitchen. He paused just inside the door, took a Walther automatic from his pocket, checked it quickly then opened a cupboard beside the old-fashioned iron stove and took out a military field telephone. He wound the handle and waited, whistling softly to himself, tapping the Walther against his thigh.

There was the murmur of a voice at the other end and he said in German, ‘Schäfer – at the villa. Carter’s turned up at last. No problem. I’ll hold him till you get here.’

He replaced the telephone in the cupboard, turned and still whistling softly, moved back to the door.

Carter shivered, suddenly cold, aware for the first time that the rain had soaked through to his skin. Almost over now. God, but he was tired. In the gilt mirror on the other side of the hall he could see his reflection. A middle-aged Sicilian peasant, badly in need of a shave, hair too long, with sullen, brutalized features, patched tweed suit and leather leggings, a shotgun, the traditional lupara with sawn-off barrels, hanging from his left shoulder.

But not for much longer. Soon there would be Cairo, Shepherd’s Hotel, hot baths, clean sheets, seven-course meals and ice-cold champagne. Dom Perignon 35. He still had, after all, an infallible source of supply.

The green baize door opened in the mirror behind him and the manservant came through. Carter turned. ‘The Contessa will see me?’

‘She would if she could, only she isn’t here. We took her away three days ago.’ His right hand came up holding the Walther and now he was speaking in English. ‘The shotgun, Major Carter. On the floor, very gently, then turn, hands against the wall.’

Strange, but now that it had happened, this moment that he had always known would come one day, Carter was aware of a curious sensation of relief. He didn’t even attempt to play Ciccio any more, but put down the lupara as instructed and turned to face the wall.

‘German?’ he asked.

‘I’m afraid so.’ A hand searched him expertly. ‘Schäfer. Geheimefeldpolizei. I was beginning to think you weren’t coming.’ He stepped back and Carter turned to face him.

‘The Contessa?’

‘The Gestapo have her. They’ve been waiting for you in Bellona for three days now. I’ve just telephoned through from the kitchen. They’ll be here in twenty minutes.’

‘I see,’ Carter said. ‘So what do we do now?’

‘We wait.’ Schäfer motioned him through into the dining room.

Carter paused, looking down at the open fire, steam rising from his damp clothes, and behind him Schäfer sat at the end of the long dining table, took out a pack of cigarettes, lit one, then pushed the pack along the table. Carter took one gratefully and when he struck the match, his fingers trembled slightly.

Schäfer said, ‘There’s brandy on the sideboard. You look as if you could do with it.’

Carter went round the table and helped himself. The brandy was the local variety, raw and pungent, it burned as it went down and he coughed, struggling for breath. He poured himself another and turned to Schäfer.

‘What about you?’

‘Why not?’

Carter found another glass and moved to the table. ‘Say when,’ he said and started to pour.

Schäfer still covered him with the Walther. Raising the glass to his lips he said, ‘I’m sorry about this, Major. I don’t like those Gestapo bastards any more than you do, but I’ve got a job to do.’

‘Haven’t we all,’ Carter said.

He swung the decanter in an arc against the German’s skull, at the same time grabbing for the wrist of the hand that held the Walther, desperately trying to deflect it.

He swung the decanter again so that it splintered into dozens of pieces, brandy spurting across Schäfer’s head and face, mingling with the blood. Incredibly, Schäfer’s left fist managed a punch of considerable force high on Carter’s right cheek, splitting the flesh to the bone, before clutching him by the throat.

They fell across the table and rolled over the edge to the floor and Carter was aware of one blow after another to the body and the pistol exploding between them. Somehow, he found himself up on one knee, twisting the other’s wrist up and around until the bone cracked and the Walther jumped into the air, landing in the hearth.

The German screamed, his head going back, and Carter punched him in the open throat with knuckles extended. Schäfer rolled over on to his face and lay still and Carter turned and ran into the hall. He grabbed for the shotgun, slinging it over his shoulder as he made for the front door.

There was a dreamlike quality to everything. It was as if he was moving in slow motion, no strength to him, so that even opening the front door was an effort. He leaned against the balustrade of the porch, aware now that the front of his jacket was soaked with blood, not Schäfer’s but his own. When he slipped a hand inside his shirt he could feel the lips of the wound like raw meat where a bullet had ripped through his left side.

No time for that, not now for he was aware of the sound of vehicles approaching on the road, very fast. He went lurching down the steps, picked up the bicycle and hurriedly retraced his steps through the garden to the rear gate.

He reached the shelter of the pine trees below the villa, turned in time to see a truck and two kubelwagens appear on the main road above him. Carter didn’t wait to see what would happen, simply pushed on through the trees until he came to the woodcutter’s track that ran all the way down through the forest to Bellona. Just enough light to see by if he was lucky. He flung a leg over the broken leather saddle of the old bicycle and rode away.

There wasn’t a great deal to remember of that ride. The trees crowding in on either side, deepening the evening gloom, the rush of the heavy rain. It was rather like being on the kind of monumental drunk where, afterwards, only occasional images surface.

He opened his eyes to find himself lying on his back, the rain falling on his upturned face, in a ditch on the edge of the village, the bicycle beside him.

The pain of the gunshot wound was intense now, worse than he would have believed possible. There was no sign of the shotgun and he forced himself to his feet and stumbled along the track through the swiftly falling darkness.

The smell of wood smoke hung on the damp air and a dog barked hollowly in the distance, but otherwise there was no sign of life except for the occasional light in a window. And yet there were people up there, watching from behind the shutters, waiting.

He made it across the main square, pausing at the fountain in the centre to put his head under the jet of cold water that gushed from the mouth and nostrils of a bronze dryad, continued past the church and turned into a narrow side street. There was an entrance to a courtyard a few houses along, barred by an oaken gate, a blue lamp above it. The sign painted on the wall in ornate black letters read Vito Barbera – Mortician.

A small judas gate stood next to the main door. Carter leaned against it and pulled the bell chain. There was silence for a while and he held on to the grille with one hand, staring up at the rain falling in a silver spray through the lamplight. A footstep sounded inside and the grille opened.

Barbera said, ‘What is it?’

‘Me, Vito.’

‘Harry, is that you?’ Barbera said, this time in the kind of English that came straight from the Bronx. ‘Thank God. I thought they must have lifted you.’