Death Run

Like Rich, she knew the man – knew him as Ralph, though she also knew that was not his real name. They had met in the former Soviet state of Krejikistan when he had helped Jade and Rich rescue their Dad from a madman. What was a powerful Eastern European gangster doing in Venice?

“After our mutual friend Mr Vishinsky was no longer ‘available’,” Ralph was saying, “most of his assets fell into my hands. I have a lot for thank you for.”

“Is that why you brought me here?” Rich asked defiantly. “Well, thanks accepted. No problem. So you’ve become public enemy number one in Krejikistan or whatever. And grown a neat moustache to prove it. Can I go now?”

Ralph laughed and wagged his finger like a teacher warning a small child. “I am afraid there is a little more to it than that.”

“I was afraid there might be.” Rich looked up at Ralph, his face set. “Are you going to kill me?”

Ralph looked offended. “Oh, please. We are all friends here. You, me, your family. And talking of family…” He spread his hands to include the men in suits. “My Italian colleagues too. We just want to talk to your father about some work he did in Mont Passat.”

Rich shook his head. “He didn’t do any work in Mont Passat. We were only there for a day. Not even that.”

“Oh, Rich, Rich, Rich.” Ralph shook his head in amusement. “Now we both know that just isn’t true.”

Jade didn’t hear Rich’s answer. She needed to get closer so she could rescue him if she got the opportunity. Though Ralph had helped them before, she knew only too well that the man was a criminal – he’d told them himself that whatever he did was for his own good, in his own interests. For his own survival.

She edged her way carefully back towards the stairs. As she went, she dialled Dad on her mobile. He answered at once and she whispered urgently into the phone – telling him as best she could where she was.

“I’m on it,” Dad told her. “I’ll find you. Just sit tight and wait till I get there, right?”

“What’s going on?” Jade asked quietly. “You spoke to Ralph – what’s he after?”

“He said he wanted to talk. I told him I was on holiday. End of story.”

“Except they got Rich,” Jade pointed out. “I’ll try and get closer. I’ll leave the phone on so you can hear. But, Dad…” Her voice tailed off as she headed down a corridor that ran along the back of the circle, leading – she hoped – closer to the stage.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ll hurry.”

The first door that Jade tried opened into a box almost alongside the stage. It was so close that the curtain that hung down at the side of the stage almost touched the side of the box. It was faded, torn and filthy.

Jade crept forward, keeping low, hidden by the front wall of the box and shadowed by the way the curtain hung. The seats were worn and the fabric ripped. Jade perched on the front of the cleanest-looking and stared down at the stage. She could see Rich’s profile and Ralph standing talking to him.

The men had all taken their masks off now. Ralph was the shortest of them, but standing with his hands clasped in front of him as he spoke to Rich, he was easily the most impressive and powerful figure on the stage. Obviously in charge.

“So what’s with the masks and the Doctor Plague stuff?” Rich was asking.

“They are costumes for Carnival,” Ralph explained. “Some are just for decoration, to look pretty.” He gestured to the Harlequin man at the edge of the stage. “Others, like Harlequin, are from the Commedia Dell’Arte. Characters from the plays.”

“And what about you?” Rich asked. “Doctor Plague, who’s that?”

“When the plague came to Venice, in medieval times, the doctors wore a black gown and a mask like this to protect them from the disease.”

Forget dying of the plague, Jade thought as she crouched in the box above the stage. Heprobably scared his patients to death. She was focused on Ralph as he nodded to one of the Italians. “Family” he had said – Mafia. Jade leaned forward, keeping in the shadows cast by the dusty ragged curtain.

“The business of crime is a business of money,” Ralph said. “Large amounts of money, one hopes. And like any business, it has to be accounted for.”

“So?” Rich asked.

“So the actual accountancy is quite involved. There are so many expenses, so many people on the payroll. Pension schemes, of a sort. Profit and, sadly, loss.”

“So get an accountant.”

“Oh I have an accountant. The very best accountant. A man who is both accountant and banker. He is Swiss, of course. The very best in his business. He borrows my money and lends it to others at a good rate of interest. He is a very clever man. Banker to so very many people in my line of work as well as dozens of more legitimate businesses. I really cannot afford to do without him…”

“And why are you telling me this?”

Ralph walked quickly across to Rich. He put his hand on Rich’s shoulder and leaned down to look at him closely. “Because several days ago, I heard rumours that my banker was planning to defect. To give himself up to the authorities and hand over access to a large number of accounts he controls. In return for immunity, anonymity, a new secret life.

“Now, I wasn’t the only person who heard these rumours. There is another man – a very unpleasant man who deals in matters that even I would think twice about – who also heard. And he decided he would have a word with the Banker and see if there was any truth in the rumours. This man, who is known only as the Tiger funds all sorts of unpleasantness – crime and murder and terrorism. He invests and he clears a profit. And the Banker controls almost all his money. So you see, he had a lot to lose. Now then-I think it’s time for a little show. This is, after all, a theatre.”

A bright light snapped on, shining above Rich on to the faded backdrop like a spotlight. Ralph’s elongated shadow seemed to be standing at the gates of the painted castle. He walked quickly to the side of the stage so as not to be in the way. Then he straightened up and clicked his fingers. On cue, a picture appeared on the backdrop, and Jade realised the light was from a projector somewhere up in the main part of the theatre. The picture showed the hotel and casino where they had stayed just a few nights ago.

“The Tiger had the Banker taken to Mont Passat. But before he could get there himself to question the man…the Banker disappeared.”

“And what’s that got to do with us?”

Jade could hear a hesitancy in her brother’s voice. She could guess what he was thinking.

The picture on the backdrop changed to grainy moving images – pictures from a security camera complete with time and date stamp on the bottom. The footage showed the inside of a casino. It panned back and forth, taking in most of the gaming floor.

“This is from the CCTV in the casino on the night the Banker vanished,” Ralph was saying.

At the edge of its journey, the camera swung past a bar. And standing at the bar, drink in hand, was Jade’s dad.

“And look who is also there. What a coincidence.”

“It must be,” Rich said. But he didn’t sound very sure.

“And if we wind on a bit…” Ralph waved to the man working the projector and the images speeded up – people hurrying and scurrying round the casino floor. “Oh – look,” Ralph went on as the footage slowed back to normal speed.

It showed Dad at the roulette table. Placing a bet.

“You getting this, are you?” Jade whispered into the phone, ducking behind the front of the box. “Because when you get here, you are so in trouble.”

“It doesn’t mean anything,” Rich was saying. He sounded less certain than ever now. “It could be a coincidence. Just a coincidence.”

“Really?” Ralph sighed. He clicked his fingers again and the projector cut off. “I suppose it could. But neither of us really believes that, do we?”

Jade was angry as well as frightened now. But never mind what the hell Dad had been up to. It was time to get Rich away from here.

At that moment, the insistent sound of a car alarm came from close outside. On the stage below, Ralph was talking rapidly to the man with the skull-face. He gestured urgently and the five Italians hurried towards the front of the theatre.

“Probably nothing,” Ralph said to Rich. “But it is as well to be sure. And we would, after all, like your father to come looking for you. You see, I have a warning to deliver to him.”

She wasn’t going to get a better opportunity than this – only Ralph was left with Rich on the stage below. Jade heard the main theatre doors bang shut as the others left. She grabbed hold of the ragged curtain hanging down the side of the stage, swung her legs up and over the side of the box and began to climb down.

Jade could feel the material breaking apart under her hands, could hear an ominous creaking sound from above. She climbed as fast as she could, half sliding down and sending out clouds of dust – desperate not to cough as she breathed in. desperate for Ralph not to look up and see her.