Gerald Seymour - Red Fox

Carboni loosened. The man opposite him talked like a human being, playing down the superiority of his rank. The man from the Questura felt a freedom to express himself. 'Last night I was able to ask the carabinieri of Palmi near Reggio to keep a watch on this speculator. His name is Mazzotti, from the village of Cosoleto, he has connections in local politics. I acted without a warrant from the magistrate but the time would not allow. If I might digress, a man was found yesterday in a Roman pensione battered to death… he had a record for kidnapping, his family is from Cosoleto. I return to the point. The carabinieri behaved faultlessly.' Carboni permitted himself a slow smile, one policeman to another, histories of rivalry with the para-military force, mutual understanding on the scale of the compliment. 'The carabinieri followed Mazzotti to a barn, he was taken there by a woman who had heard sounds in the night. The woman's husband was dead there, shot at close range, another man also had been killed. There were signs of a temporary holding place, flattened down hay bales, and there was a chain with a manacle.

A pistol, Vellosi, had been used to break the lock of the handcuff.

It had been broken by gunshot. We did not find Harrison, nor any trace of him.'

Vellosi nodded his head, the picture unveiled, the drape drawn back. 'What conclusion, Carboni, did you draw from this information?'

'Someone came to the barn and killed the two men that he might have Harrison for himself. It was not a rescue, since there have been no messages from the south of Harrison's arrival at a police station or a carabinieri barracks. I checked before I left my home. I cannot draw an ultimate conclusion.'

The head of the anti-terrorist squad hunched forward, voice lowered and conspiratorial, as if in a room such as his there were listening places. 'Last night I was attacked. Ambushed as I left my home, and my driver killed.' Vellosi understood from the stunned frowns building and edging across Carboni's forehead that he knew nothing of the evening's horror. ' I survived unhurt. We have identified the swine who killed my driver. They are Nappisti, Carboni. They were young, they were inefficient, and they died for it.'

' I congratulate you on your escape,' Carboni whispered.

' I mourn my driver, he was a friend of many years. I believe I was attacked as a reprisal for the capture of the woman Franca Tantardini, taken by my squad in the Corso Francia. She is an evil bitch, Carboni, a poisoned, evil woman.'

Carboni recovered composure. ' It was a fine effort by your people.'

' I have told you nothing yet. Hear me out before you praise me.

There is a town, Seminara, in Calabria. I have no map but we will find, I am sure, that it is close to your Cosoleto. Under the mayor's door an hour ago was found a scribbled statement, not typed, not neat, from the NAP. A credit card of Harrison was with the paper. They will kill him tomorrow morning at nine o'clock if Tantardini has not been freed.'

Carboni whistled, an expiry of wind from his lungs. His pen fumbled between the fingers of his two hands, his notebook was virgin clean.

' I make an assumption, Carboni. The Nappisti reached your man Claudio. They extracted information. They have taken Harrison from the custody of Mazzotti. The danger now confronting the Englishman is infinitely greater.'

With his head bowed, Carboni sat very still in his chair as if a heavy blow had struck him. 'What has been done this morning to prevent an escape… '

'Nothing has been done.' A snarl from Vellosi's mouth, and above it the cauterized cheeks, the whitened skin at the temples.

'Nothing has been done because until we sat together there was no dialogue on this issue. I have no army, I have no authority over the polizia and the carabinieri. I do not have the numbers to stifle an escape. I have given you the Nappisti, and you have given me a location, and now we can begin.'

Carboni spoke sadly, unwilling to stamp on the energy of his superior. 'They have five hours' start on us, and they were close to the autostrada and at night the road is free.' His head shook as he multiplied kilometres and minutes in his mind. "They could travel hundreds of kilometres in a fast car. The whole of the Mezzo Giorno is open to t h e m… ' He tailed away, awed by the hopelessness of what he said.

'Bluster the local carabinieri, the polizia, breathe some fire under their backsides. Get back to your office now and hunt the facts.' Shouting now, consumed by his mission, Vellosi banged on his desk to emphasize each point.

'It is outside my jurisdiction… '

'What do you want? A rule book and Harrison dead in a ditch at five minutes past nine tomorrow? Get yourself on to the fifth floor at the Questura. All the computers, all the Honeywell machines there, get them moving, let them earn their keep.'

Resistance failing, Carboni subsided. 'May I make a telephone call, Dottore?'

'Make it and be on your way. You're not the only one to be busy this morning. The Minister will be here in forty minutes…'

Carboni was on his feet, galvanized into activity. With quick, sweaty fingers he flicked in his diary of telephone numbers for that of Michael Charlesworth of the British Embassy.

The early sun was denied entry to the reception lounge of the Villa Wolkonsky by the drawn drapes. The more fancied of the room's collection of rare porcelain had been put away the night before because there had been a small reception and the Ambassador's wife was ever wary of light fingers among her guests. There remained enough to satisfy the curiosity of Charlesworth and Carpenter as they stood close to each other in the gloom. They had come unannounced to the Ambassador's residence, spurred by Giuseppe Carboni's call to Charlesworth sketching the night's developments. The diplomat had collected Carpenter from his hotel. A servant in a white coat, not hiding his disapproval of the hour, had admitted them. If we broadcast we're on our way, Charlesworth had said in the car, then the barricades go up, he'll stall till office hours.

The irritation of the Ambassador was undisguised as he entered the room. A puckered forehead and a jutting chin sand wiched the hawk eyes of annoyance. He wore his familiar dark striped trousers, but no jacket to drape over the braces that held them firm. His collar was unfastened. The opening was abrupt.

'Good morning, Charlesworth. I understand from the message sent upstairs that you wished to see me on a matter of direct and pressing importance. Let's not waste each other's time.'

In the face of this salvo Charlesworth did not falter. 'I've brought with me Archie Carpenter. He's the Security Officer of International Chemical Holdings in London… '

His Excellency's eyes glinted, a bare greeting. .. I have just been telephoned by Dottore Carboni of the Questura. There have been disturbing and unpleasant developments in the Harrison c a s e… '

Carpenter said quietly, 'We judged that you should know of these – whatever the inconvenience of the hour.'

The Ambassador threw him a glance, then turned back to Charlesworth. 'Let's have it, then.'

'The police have always believed Harrison was kidnapped by a criminal organization. During the night it seems this organization was relieved of Harrison, who is now in the hands of the Nuclei Armati Proletaria.'

'What do you mean – "relieved"?'

'It seems that the NAP have forcibly taken Harrison from his original kidnappers,' said Charlesworth with patience.

'The police are offering this as a theory? We are to believe this ?'

Spoken with the killer chop of sarcasm.

'Yes, sir,' Carpenter again interjected, 'we believe it because there are three men on their backs in the morgue to convince us.

Two have died of gunshot wounds, the third of a dented skull.'