Chapter Twelve

“Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.”
    Samuel Taylor Coleridge

 

An unsettling quiet stole across the room, the air growing heavy with charged apprehension. George’s neck straightened, like a wire pulled taut, his unblinking eyes narrowed on Stefano. I could see him thinking, deliberating, calculating. Stefano and I stood in the rigid silence. 

“Where is he?” George said, eventually.

Stefano wiped his wrist across his forehead. I leaned down and grasped my handbag.
“At home.” 

“How long ago?” asked George.

I sidled around the low coffee table, keeping my steps light and quiet.
“I don’t know,” shrugged Stefano. “Mario, he came to the café and he say Francesco was back. So I ran to my car and came here to tell everyone. Where is everyone?”

He looked at me and I shook my head, hoping he understood. My hand closed around the handle of the door out to the decking. 

“Never mind them, you’re sure Francesco is still at his mother’s?”

The handle wheezed a small groan then relaxed.

“Ah, it will be a long time until she lets go of him.”

I slipped through the narrow gap and pushed the door closed behind me. George didn’t turn. I trod carefully past the windows, holding my breath. Once I was clear of the window, the air whistled out of my chest and I ran around the building. 

Stefano’s red Alfa Romeo ticked over in the driveway, music pumping from the stereo. The driver’s door yawned wide open. Parked more uniformly was a black, sleek, pretentious Maserati. George’s car I guessed. I sprinted to Stefano’s car, the gravel spraying up from my sandals. I crawled in, precariously shifted over the gear stick and between the front seats. Fortunately, Stefano was a lazy and untidy young man. The back seat was a jumble of wet suits, diving apparatus, towels, blankets and empty cola bottles. I dove beneath the sea of junk, spreading it out until it concealed me completely. My nose protested at the pungent cocktail of stale sweat, old rubber, unwashed clothes and sour perfume. I stilled and prayed Stefano would return soon. 

I heard a door faintly scraped open and shut. Footsteps scampered across the gravel, drawing nearer. Leather creaked and the door slammed shut. A clunk from the gear shift and the engine purred into life. The radio abruptly snapped off. I clutched the seat as the car swung around, my slick hands sticking to the leather, and ploughed forward. The tires screeched, accelerating onto the main road. A silent sigh of relief blew through my lips. I closed my eyes. I didn’t know where Stefano was driving to but once there was some distance between us and the institute and George, I’d reveal myself and hope he’d help me.  

Successive bleeps of a dialling phone chimed through the muffled silence. 

“Hi, it’s me, I know where he is. Meet me at Via delle Comari.”
My eyes shot open. Surprise and dismay shuddered through me. That was not Stefano’s voice. It was George’s. 

Instinctively, I curled my limbs closer to my body. I wanted to cry in frustration. Whatever malicious plot or criminal web my imagination envisioned I was caught in I wanted to be free of. 

George’s phone trilled. 

“Yes?  . . . What do you mean, a crowd? . . . Hmmm. Do you see any police? . . . Well, stay there and watch, let me know as soon as anything changes. I’ll be at the boat.”

The car braked suddenly. I slid forward and almost fell into the footwell. I braced one hand against the back of the passenger seat and pushed myself back. George spun the car around, the engine coughing, and sped off in another direction. 

Panic rose up and receded in tremors along my body. I tried to stay calm, but the precariousness of my situation was not easily ignored. While the car was moving, there was little I could do. I didn’t know if George had killed the man in the freezer, or if he had a part in Vittorio’s death. But I now knew he was dangerous. The bruises on my arms were proof of that and the cold, dead look in his eyes as he tried to bully me into submission. His duplicity should have surprised me but I found that I accepted it easily. Had I harboured the tiniest suspicion of him? I couldn’t tell.

The car stopped several times and each time my heart would jump. Had we arrived at the boat? Then we would accelerate and the relief or fear was momentarily quieted.   

The squawks of disgruntled gulls and the splash of waves breaking over rocks floated through the open window. The hand brake clicked up, keys rattled and the engine’s hack ceased. Lifting the edge of a blanket, I risked a peek, blinking against the sudden light. George thrust himself out of the car, leaving the door to drift shut behind him. I scrambled to the window and peered over the edge of the window. 

A wash of grey greeted me. The sun had been swallowed by thick cloud and the sea below swirled like dirty dish water. Jagged outcrops of rock framed the water’s edge, the sea spray foaming between the seaweed clogged cracks. We were parked on a large flat rectangle of concrete, barren and deserted save for a boat moored at the end of a small jetty, jutting out into the water. George jogged along the wooden planks towards the boat, his phone to his ear. The keys still swung in the ignition, taunting me. I cursed myself. I had never learnt to drive. If I tried to start the car and drive away, George could be back in seconds as the car stuttered and jerked along, and my escape would be over as swiftly as it had begun. I slumped back. I listened for the splutter of the boat’s engine in the vain hope George would sail off. 

The jetty groaned and George’s voice returned. I shuffled down and buried myself again under the detritus. 

“Look, Gabriel, I said I’ll take care of it.”

I stilled. 

 “Tonight? . . . Fine. . .  Yes! I’ll call you when it’s done.”
Nausea and regret churned in my stomach. George stopped metres from the car. Seconds dragged by like minutes. I could hear nothing. And then, 

“So? What’s going on? . . . Damn it! OK, we’ll have to do it tonight, once they’ve all left. Call Tommaso and tell him to be there at midnight. . . no, not there, you imbecile. No, just stay there for now and, Sergio, try not to be noticed.”

He fell silent once more and I waited, my ears straining for the slightest sound that would indicate his movements. 

The low hum of a motor approached. Tires scuffed to halt close to Stefano’s car. A slither of hope coiled in my belly. George swore under his breath. A door opened, shoes treading on pavement.

“George.”

A male voice with a strong accent I couldn’t discern.
“Raoul. ”

The car door clicked shut.

“New car?”
“No, I just borrowed it.” George spoke calmly but there was an edge of impatience in his tone. “Didn’t expect to see you.”
“Just checking you’re prepared for tonight.”

The flick of a lighter then a whiff of tobacco trailed in the air.

“I have it under control,” George insisted.
“Good, this is an important one. Don’t let it collect any dust.”
“It won’t,” George replied bluntly.

“So what about this prospective British market you mentioned?” Raoul probed, loquaciously. “You have a reliable contact?”

“It’s complicated.”

Raoul blew out a stream of smoke, his lips whistling.

“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know if they’re a viable asset any more.”

“Well, find out either way. We have a surplus of product and it needs to go somewhere. You promised us you could solve our problem.”

“I can and I will, I just need time,” George asserted, seemingly fed up with the conversation.
“Hmmm. What about Carlos, have you heard from him?”
“No, no one has.”
“I don’t like it, him just disappearing.”
“You don’t think he’s done a runner? With the product?”
“He wouldn’t be that stupid,” Raoul scoffed. “He knows we wouldn’t let him get away. He may be an idiot but he’s not that stupid. And he has family he knows will get hurt if he steps out of line.”
“I’ll ask around. Maybe he’s sick.”

Or frostbitten, I thought. 

“No,” disagreed Raoul. “I’ll find him. You focus on the exchange.”

A soft thud as the cigarette butt landed on the ground. 

“You call me as soon as it’s done.”

“Yes,” said George, a hint of frustration in his voice.

“Bueno.”

Rubber grated on the concrete and Raoul drove off in a loud roar. 

I shifted, nudging the breathing tube of a snorkel digging into my back. With the engine off and no air conditioning pumping cool air into the car, the interior was slowly baking to an unbearable temperature. Insulated beneath the blankets and clothes, the heat besieged me. Sweat clung to me like a second skin, my own body odour adding to the unpleasant miasma. My mouth was dry and my hair glued to my neck, prickly and itchy. 

Market? Asset? Product? Exchange? I considered, desperate for a drink or a breath of fresh air. Were George and this Raoul smugglers? I thought back to George’s request that afternoon. Had he intended for me to unknowingly smuggle something into England in my suitcase? Was I the British contact Raoul had mentioned? No, that was silly. George barely knew me. How could he seriously think I would smuggle drugs or whatever it was for him? Threaten me? Blackmail me? Was Gabriel embroiled in this too? Was Vittorio’s death connected? Piercing barbs of pain lanced through my skull, echoed by a dull throbbing. 

I hadn’t heard a sound from George for some time. I chanced another look out the window. There was no sign of George. He must have gone back to the boat. I looked around. The concrete stretched out to the road, flat with no trees or shrubs. A steep hill ascending gradually from the road was half a mile away, littered with rocks and dry thorny bushes. If I ran across the concrete, George would easily see me from the boat and I imagined it wouldn’t take him long to chase me down. There was no shelter, nothing to screen me from view. But I had to do something soon. I could not stay in the car. 

Glancing back once more to see if George was still on the boat, I clambered into the driver’s seat and gently eased the door open. Keeping low, I scrambled out and softly pushed the door shut. Thick, muggy air engulfed me like an over affectionate grandmother. I crept forward, my knees and back bent, keeping the car between me and the boat, and inched towards the road. 

I broke into a run, my sandals slapping noisily on the road. My face flooded with colour, heat pouring off me. I drove my legs on faster, every second, every metre counting. Blood pounded in my ears. With every footfall, pain ricocheted through my head and I winced. My legs soon began to struggle, the soles of feet sore from grinding on the hard road. Every breath was a raw sting, my lungs puffing and wheezing. But on I ran. 

I passed no road signs, no clue of where on the island I might be. My only chance was to follow the road as it snaked along the coast. I would eventually come to a town or village. 

I had run around a gentle curve and the boat was no longer visible. Now just up ahead, about a quarter of a mile away, I saw the unmistakable outline of a petrol station. A ripple of hope bled through me. I quickened my pace but my legs faltered. 

And then the rapid, taunting thrum of a car cut through the ringing in my ears. I gasped out loud, a wail of despair. I didn’t turn and look. I knew who it was. I was running, half limping now, pain and fatigue riddling my entire body. I clutched my stomach, a needle like stitch impaling me. I gulped in air, begged the gods and hobbled on. 

My left foot, bathed in sweat, slipped on the oily leather of my sandal, shooting forward. I stumbled and crashed down. Grit and gravel cut into my knees and heels of my hands. Sobbing from exhaustion, discomfort and anguish, I hurriedly staggered upright. 

The red of Stefano’s Alfa Romeo flashed by, swung around and shrieked to a stop. I stood panting, waiting, my despair immediately simmering into anger. George stepped indolently out of the car, one arm resting on the door. His eyes ran up and down me, taking in my dishevelled hair, the sweat patches under my arms, my streaked face and bleeding knees. He shook his head.

“I told myself it couldn’t have been you,” he sneered. “I thought you were smart. Clearly I was wrong.”

I said nothing, looking past him, begging a car to drive up.

“Hiding in the back seat, were you?” he mocked. “Hoping Stefano would drive you away?”
He cocked his head, trying to gauge my reaction. 

“Well, he won’t be driving anywhere for a while.”

He had hurt Stefano, perhaps killed him. What would stop him from doing the same to me? He kicked at the gravel and scratched his cheek.

“You know I can’t let you go now, don’t you? I’m sure you overheard most of my conversations and there’s no doubt you did call the Inspector earlier, so you can’t be trusted can you?”

He slid a hand into his jacket pocket. 

“So just come along with me.”

I backed away. I had been so close and I wasn’t going to give up easily.  

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” I ground out, my hands fisted at my sides.

There was a click and he pulled his hand free of his pocket. He pointed the gun at my head.

“Yes, you will, Jenny.”