The Angry Mountain (15 page)

“She was staying the night in Florence.” I answered his question almost automatically. I was thinking what a strange
coincidence it was that I should meet her chauffeur like this and find I knew him from the war days. It was almost as though I had conjured him here. He had finished his wine and was getting to his feet. “
Scusi, signore.
Now I must have my swim.”

I nodded. “Will you give the Contessa a message? My name is Farrell. Tell her I propose to call on her at the Villa Carlotta this evening at six-thirty and that I would like her to have dinner with me.”

Again I was conscious of that slight narrowing of the eyes and the beginnings of a scowl. “I will tell her, signore,” he said. “
Molte grade.
” He gave me a little bow which seemed strange, dressed as he was in nothing but his bathing trunks. “
A rivederla, signore.
”

“
A rivederci.
” I watched him as he disappeared down the steps. I felt as though somewhere a string had been pulled, tightening my contact with Zina Valle. A moment later I saw his brown body cleave the brazen surface of the water below me with hardly a splash. He swam with strong, powerful strokes straight out to sea. The soles of his two feet beat the surface like a propeller. I got up quickly and went into the restaurant.

That evening, just after six-thirty, a taxi deposited me at the entrance of the Villa Carlotta. It was a big, white house approached from the Via Posillipo by a long curving drive overhung with the trailing fronds of palm trees. Through a little group of firs I caught a glimpse of the frowning rock arches of the Palazzo Don Anna, golden brown against the blue backcloth of the sea. A manservant showed me into a room on the first floor. My only impression of it is one of soft, powder blue with glass doors open to a balcony that had for background the picture postcard blue of Naples Bay with Vesuvius in one corner and Capri, looking remote and mysterious, in the other. Zina Valle came in from the balcony. “It is very kind of you to visit me so soon,” she said in that soft, husky voice. She was dressed in a black evening gown. Her bare shoulders were covered by a white ermine wrap, which hung loose so that I could see that the top of the gown barely covered her breasts. A shiver ran down my spine as I took her hand and kissed it.

A servant brought in drinks and she handed me one. “Is it business or pleasure that bring you to Napoli?” she asked, raising her glass to her lips.

“A holiday,” I replied.

“So you take my advice, eh?”

“How do you mean?”

“That day I come to see you at the Excelsior—I advise you to take a holiday. Remember?”

“Yes, I remember,” I answered. She'd said something else, too. “You told me Milan was bad for me. Why?”

She shrugged her shoulders. “In Milano it is business, always business,” she answered evasively. “You work too hard.”

But I knew she hadn't meant it like that.
Milan is not good for you.
She had meant it as a warning. “You were right, you know.”

Her brows lifted. “How so?”

“That night at the Albergo Nazionale when you took my glass—you didn't drink it, did you?”

She shook her head.

“Why?”

She shrugged her shoulders again. “I think perhaps the flowers want a drink, too.”

“It was drugged, wasn't it?”

“Drugged?” She laughed. “Now you are being melodramatic. And they say the English—”

“I'm not being melodramatic,” I cut in. “About three-thirty in the morning someone came to my room. If I'd had that drink—I don't think I should be standing here now. You saved my life.”

“Oh, come now, you are being ridiculous. It was all a joke.” She lowered her eyes. “I will be honest. I thought
you very attractive. I wanted to make you think me mysterious. That is all.”

“Someone tried to murder me.” My voice sounded obstinate.

“Why should any one wish to do that?” She turned and put her glass down on the tray. “I think I was right when I say you must have a holiday. Either you pull my leg, or if you really think such nonsense, then the fact that you have been overworking has made you imagine things.” She pulled the wrap closer round her shoulders. “Come now. You invited me to dinner. But please, no more silly jokes about people trying to murder you.”

We went out to the car and then drove to a restaurant high up on the Vomero where we had dinner looking through tall glass windows out across the Bay. I don't remember what we talked about. I only know that I didn't refer again to what had happened in Milan and soon I had forgotten all about it in the pleasure of her company. The moonlight and the warmth seemed to fill all the dark corners of my mind, so that Milan and Pilsen were forgotten and I was free of the past, alone with her on a cloud where yesterday and to-morrow were nothing and only to-day mattered. We danced a little, talked a lot, and in a moment, it seemed, the evening was over. “I must go now,” she said. “At midnight my husband will telephone me from Rome.”

That mention of her husband broke the spell. “He always telephones me at midnight.” She smiled as she said this as though it was amusing that her husband didn't trust her. I helped her on with her wrap and then she said, “Will you have them call Roberto please.”

When Roberto had driven us up to the Vomero his face had been wooden and impassive. But now, as he held the door open for us to get in, it was dark and alive with something that made him look more of the peasant and less of the grown-up urchin I had known. His eyes didn't once glance at me and as he closed the door I saw he was watching Zina.

The car moved off and she slipped her hand under my arm. “It has been a lovely evening,” she murmured. Her eyes were deep like velvet, her lips slightly parted. Her skin looked very white against the black of her dress. I wanted to touch it, feel her lips against mine. And then something made me look up and I saw Roberto's eyes watching us through the driving mirror. I stiffened and she said something violent in Italian. Then she removed her hand from my arm.

As I was getting out at my hotel, she said, “Would you like to have a bath with me to-morrow? “She was smiling as though she had purposely phrased it to sound naughty. When I hesitated, at a loss quite what to reply, she added, “I always go to the baths at the Isola d'Ischia when I come back. It is very good for the skin after the chemical atmosphere of Milan. If you would like to come I shall be leaving in the launch at eleven. We could have lunch there.” She smiled. “You do not have to have the bath, you know.”

“It's very kind of you,” I said awkwardly. “I'd love to.”

“
Benone.
At the Villa Carlotta at eleven then.
Buona notte,
Dick.”

Roberto was watching me from the driving seat. “Good night,” I said.

Next day was as warm and blue as the previous one. I breakfasted on the balcony, dressed leisurely and then drove out to the Villa Carlotta. Zina was waiting for me in the garden. She wore white slacks, white sandals and a white silk shirt. The white emphasised the warm olive tan of her skin and the raven-gleam of her hair. A blue wave of wisteria cascaded over the summer-house in which she was sitting. She took me down a rock path, heavy with blossom, to a wooden jetty where Roberto waited for us with a smart little motor launch, white-painted with chromium fittings sparkling against the glossy brown of the teak hull.

“
Buon giorno, Roberto.
” It was said softly, silkily and like that it seemed to have significance. Roberto looked at her
as though he hated her. Then he turned quickly and started the engine.

Lounging on the cushions as the powerful engine thrust us out into the glare of the Bay I felt lazy and content as though I were a child again and had never known what it was like to be scared. The sound of the water creaming back from the bows and the touch of Zina's hand on mine merged to form something beautiful that I wanted to grasp and keep. It was the lull before the storm and if I'd had my wits about me I'd have known it, for it was all there could I but have seen it—in the baffled hatred of Roberto's glance, in the puff of vapour at the top of Vesuvius and in what happened at Casamicciola.

The sea was smooth as glass and as we roared westward at nearly twenty knots a liner was steaming into the Bay between Capri and the Sorrento peninsula, looking very big by comparison with the yachts whose white sails scudded round it. We passed Procida with its castle prison and the crater harbour of Porto d'Ischia. At Casamicciola, where we landed, the villas and hotels shone in the sunlight and the air was laden with the scent of blossom.

Zina took me to a small hotel where she was apparently known. We had a drink whilst our baths were prepared and I asked her what they were like. She shrugged her shoulders. “They are natural hot springs. They say that they are radioactive. I do not know anything about that. All I know is that you feel good afterwards.” She glanced down at my leg. “Is that made of metal?” she asked.

“Yes,” I said. “Some aluminium alloy.”

She nodded. “Then I should not take it inside the cubicle. The steam will not be good for it.”

“The steam won't hurt it,” I answered. My voice sounded angry and I could feel the blood coming up into my face. I hate being reminded that the damned thing isn't a part of me.

“Do you never take advice?” she asked, smiling.

“Sometimes,” I answered.

“Very well then. Do not be stupid about your leg. The steam will do it no good. When you are inside, pass it out to the attendant.”

I laughed. “I'll do no such thing. As for the steam being bad for it, there's one advantage about an artificial limb, you can always go to a shop and get another if it gets rusty.”

Her eyes were suddenly violently angry. “You have not had one of these radio baths before, no?”

“No.”

“Then you do not know what damage it does to metal. Anything metal—watch, cuff-links, anything—should be given to the attendant. You cannot buy a new leg here in Napoli.”

“I'll give it an extra polish to-night,” I said in an endeavour to allay her fears. “You've no idea the amount of care and attention I lavish on this leg of mine.”

She didn't smile. She sat and stared at me as though I were a child and she would like to whip me. Then she relaxed and gave a little pout to her lips. “You are a stubborn man.” She smiled. “I should not have tried to reason, eh? A woman should know nothing about radioactivity, she should be all emotion and no brain. Very well then.” Her voice softened. “Will you let me look after your leg for you while you are in your bath?”

The idea of her even seeing it seemed quite horrible. It made me into a piece of machinery that unscrewed and took to pieces so that it could be passed part by part through bathroom doors. “No,” I said sharply.

She gave an angry sigh. “You are an obstinate fool,” she said and got to her feet. “I ask you to do something and all you say is No. I shall not speak to you again unless you do as I ask you.” She left me then, cold as ice, quite remote. I couldn't see what all the fuss was about. The obvious thing was to do as she said, but somehow I couldn't. The queer contraption that was my leg was my own affair, whether it got rusty or not.

A few minutes later the attendant came in to say that my bath was ready. “Is the Contessa having her bath?” I asked him.

“
Si, si, signore.
” He leered up at me as we crossed the lounge. “She is in the next cubicle to yourself,
signore
, so that you will be able to talk. I arrange it myself.” Apparently his clients enjoyed bathing with only a partition between them. I gave him some lire.

He took me through to the back of the hotel and down some stone steps. The atmosphere became hot and humid as we descended. By the time we had reached the electrically-lit cellars of the hotel I could see the steam and feel the moisture settling on the inside of my lungs and throat. He took me through to a room lined with doors. He opened one and as I entered the steam-filled interior he said, “Please pass your clothes out very quickly, otherwise they will become damp. Also anything of metal, even rings, signore. The steam is very bad for metal, you understand.”

I passed out everyting, but I was damned if I was going to hand him my tin leg. I unstrapped it and wrapped it up in my towel. Then I got into the bath. It seemed to me much the same as any other bath. I could hear Zina splashing in the next cubicle. Then the splashing ceased, there was the sound of a door opening and a whispered conversation. I heard the bath attendant say, “
No, no, Contessa.
” Then the door was closed and the splashing began again. I called out to her, but she didn't answer.

I lay and wallowed, wondering why she had been so insistent about my leg. I even began to think I'd been a fool not to do as she suggested. After all, she knew what effect the steam would have on it. And then I tried to remember whether radio-activity could be transmitted through steam. Surely the steam would be just plain water? Anyway it didn't seem to matter.

After half an hour I got out, dressed and left the bath-house. My body seemed overcome with lassitude so that it was a
great effort to climb the steps to the hotel. I went through to the balcony and then stopped. Seated at a table with a tall glass in front of him was Hacket. He had seen me before I had time to turn back into the lounge. “Well, well—Mr. Farrell. This is a surprise. I see you've been having one of their damned energy-sapping baths. Guess you could do with a drink, eh? What will it be?”

“Cognac and seltz,” I said as I sat down.

He gave the order. “Just had a bath myself. It left me weak as a kitten. Feeling better for your holiday?”

“Much better, thanks.”

“That's fine. You look better already.”

“What brings you to Casamicciola?” I asked him.