Алистер Маклин - Caravan to Vaccares

‘Please, please listen,’ Bowman said. ‘I’m dealing with murderers. I know I’m dealing with murderers. More important, I know how to deal with murderers. I’ve already broken one bone – I should think it’s your forearm. I’m prepared to go right on breaking as many bones as I have to – assuming you stay conscious – until I find out why those four women in that green-and-white painted caravan are terrified out of their lives. If you do become unconscious, I’ll just sit around and smoke and wait till you’re conscious again and break a few more bones.’

Cecile had left the Simca and was now only feet away. Her face was very pale. She stared at Bowman in horror.

‘Mr Bowman, do you mean–’

‘Shut up!’ He returned his attention to Lacabro. ‘Come now, tell me about those ladies.’

Lacabro mouthed what was almost certainly another obscenity, rolled over quickly and as he propped himself up on his right elbow Cecile screamed. Lacabro had a gun in his hand but shock or pain or both had slowed his reactions. He screamed again and his gun went flying in one direction while the wheel-brace went in another. He clutched the middle of his face with both hands: blood seeped through his fingers.

‘And now your nose is gone, isn’t it?’ Bowman said. ‘That dark girl, Tina, she’s been hurt, hasn’t she? How badly has she been hurt? Why was she hurt? Who hurt her?’

Lacabro took his hands away from his bleeding face. His nose wasn’t broken, but it still wasn’t a very pretty sight and wouldn’t be for some time to come. He spat blood and a broken tooth, snarled again in Romany and stared at Bowman like a wild animal.

‘You did it,’ Bowman said with certainty. ‘Yes, you did it. One of Czerda’s hatchet-men, aren’t you? Perhaps the hatchet-man. I wonder, my friend. I wonder. Was it you who killed Alexandre in the caverns?’

Lacabro, his face the face of a madman, pushed himself drunkenly to his feet and stood there, swaying just as drunkenly. He appeared to be on the verge of total collapse, his eyes turning up in his head. Bowman approached and, as he did so Lacabro, showing an incredible immunity to pain, an animal-like cunning and an equally animal-like power of recuperation, suddenly stepped forward and brought his right fist up in a tremendous blow which, probably due more to good fortune than calculation, struck Bowman on the side of the chin. Bowman staggered backwards, lost his balance and fell heavily on the short turf only a few feet away from the vertical drop into the Rhône. Lacabro had his priorities right. He turned and ran for the gun which had landed only a foot or two from where Cecile was standing, the shock in her face reflected in the immobility of her body.

Bowman pushed himself rather dizzily up on one arm. He could see it all happening in slow motion, the girl with the gun at her feet, Lacabro lurching towards it, the girl still stock-still. Maybe she couldn’t even see the damn thing, he thought despairingly, but her eyes couldn’t be all that bad, if she couldn’t see a gun two feet away she’d no right to be out without a white stick. But her eyes weren’t quite so bad as that. Suddenly she stooped, picked up the gun, threw it into the Rhône, then, with commendable foresight, dropped flat to the ground as Lacabro, his battered bleeding face masked in blood and hate, advanced to strike her down. But even in that moment of what must have been infuriating frustration and where his overriding instinct must have been savagely to maim the girl who had deprived him of his gun, Lacabro still had his priorities right. He ignored the girl, turned and headed for Bowman in a low crouching run.

But Cecile had bought Bowman all the time he needed. By the time Lacabro reached him he was on his feet again, still rather dazed and shaken but a going concern none the less. He avoided Lacabro’s first bull-rush and wickedly swinging boot and caught the gypsy as he passed: it so chanced that he caught him by the left arm. Lacabro shouted in agony, dragged his arm free at whatever unknown cost to himself and came again. This time Bowman made no attempt to avoid him but advanced himself at equal speed. His clubbing right hand had no difficulty in reaching Lacabro’s chin, for now Lacabro had no left guard left. He staggered backwards several involuntary paces, tottered briefly on the edge of the bluff, then toppled backwards into the Rhône. The splash caused by his impact on the muddied waters seemed quite extraordinarily loud.

Bowman looked gingerly over the crumbling edge of the bluff: there was no sign of Lacabro. If he’d been unconscious when he’d struck the water he’d have gone to the bottom and that was that: there could be no possibility of locating him in those dark waters. Not that Bowman relished the prospect of trying to rescue the gypsy: if he were not unconscious he would certainly express his gratitude by doing his best to drown his rescuer. Bowman did not feel sufficiently attached to Lacabro to take the risk.

He went to the Renault, searched it briefly, found what he expected to find – nothing – started up the engine, let in first gear, aimed it for the bank of the river and jumped out. The little car trundled to the edge of the bluff, cartwheeled over the edge and fell into the river with a resounding crash that sent water rising to a height of thirty feet.

Much of this water rained down on Lacabro. He was half-sitting, half-lying on a narrow ledge of pebble and sand under the overhang of the bluff. His clothes were soaked, his right hand clutched his left wrist. On his dazed and uncomprehending face was a mixture of pain and bewilderment and disbelief. It was, by any reckoning, the face of a man who has had enough for one day.

Cecile was still sitting on the ground when Bowman approached her. He said: ‘You’re ruining that lovely gypsy costume sitting there.’

‘Yes, I suppose I am.’ Her voice was matter-of-fact, remarkably calm. She accepted his hand, got to her feet and looked around her. ‘He’s gone?’

‘Let’s say I can’t find him.’

‘That wasn’t – that wasn’t fair fighting.’

‘That was the whole idea behind it, pet. Ideally, of course, he would have riddled me with bullets.’

‘But – but can he swim?’

‘How the hell should I know?’ He led her back to the Simca and after they’d gone a mile in silence he looked at her curiously. Her hands were trembling, her face had gone white and when she spoke her voice was a muted whisper with a shake in it: clearly some sort of delayed shock had set in.

She said: ‘Who are you?’

‘Never mind.’

‘I – I saved your life today.’

‘Well, yes, thanks. But you should have used that gun to shoot him or hold him up.’

There was a long pause, then she sniffed loudly and said almost in a wail: ‘I’ve never fired a gun in my life. I can’t see to fire a gun.’

‘I know. I’m sorry about that. I’m sorry about everything, Cecile. But I’m sorriest of all that I ever got you into this damnably ugly mess. God, I should have known better.’

‘Why blame yourself?’ Still the near-sob in her voice. ‘You had to run some place last night and my room–’ She broke off, peered at him some more, looked away and tried to light a cigarette but her hand shook so much he did it for her. Her hand was still shaking when they got back to the hotel.

Bowman drew up outside the hotel entrance. Not five yards away Lila sat alone by a table just inside the patio entrance. It was difficult to say whether she looked primarily angry or disconsolate: she certainly did not look happy.

‘Boy-friend’s ditched her,’ Bowman announced. ‘Meet me in fifteen minutes. Alleyway at the back entrance of the hotel. Stay out of sight till you see a blue Citroën. I’ll be inside. Stay off the patio. You’ll be safe in the foyer.’