Dick Francis - The Danger

'Pucinelli's a good policeman,' I said. 'Intelligent, bags of courage. He was helpful. More helpful, I found, than most, though never stepping out of the official line. He hasn't yet…' I paused. 'He hasn't the clout to get any higher, I don't think. He's second-in-command in his region, and I'd say that's as far as he'll go. But as far as his chances of catching the kidnappers are concerned, he'll be competent and thorough.'

'What was the latest, when you left?' someone asked. 'I haven't yet had time to finish your last two pages.'

'Pucinelli said that when he showed the drawings of the man I'd seen to the two kidnappers from the siege, they were both struck dumb. He showed them to them separately, of course, but in each case he said you could clearly see the shock. Neither of them would say anything at all and they both seemed scared. Pucinelli said he was going to circulate copies of the drawings and see if he could identify the man. He was very hopeful, when I left.'

'Sooner the better,' Tony said. 'That million quid will be laundered within a week.'

'They were a pretty cool lot,' I said, not arguing. 'They might hold it for a while.'

'And they might have whisked it over a border and changed it into francs or schillings before they released the girl.'

I nodded. 'They could have set up something like that for the first ransom, and been ready.'

Gerry Clayton's fingers as usual were busy with any sheet of paper within reach, this time the last page of my report. 'You say Alessia Cenci came to England with you. Any chance she'll remember any more?' he asked.

'You cannot rule it out, but Pucinelli and I both went through it with her pretty thoroughly in Italy. She knows so little. There were no church bells, no trains, no close aeroplanes, no dogs… she couldn't tell whether she was in city or country. She thought the faint smell she was conscious of during the last few days might have been someone baking bread. Apart from that… nothing.'

A pause.

'Did you show the drawings to the girl?' someone asked. 'Had she ever seen the man, before the kidnap?'

I turned to him. 'I took a photostat to the villa, but she hadn't ever seen him that she could remember. There was absolutely no reaction. I asked if he could have been one of the four who abducted her, but she said she couldn't tell. None of her family or anyone in the household knew him. I asked them all."

'His voice… when he spoke to you outside the motorway restaurant… was it the voice on the tapes?'

'I don't know,' I admitted. 'I'm not good enough at Italian. It wasn't totally different, that's all I could say.'

'You brought copies of the drawings and the tapes back with you?' the Chairman asked.

'Yes. If anyone would like…?'

A few heads nodded.

'Anything you didn't put in the report?' the Chairman asked. 'Insignificant details?'

'Well… I didn't include the lists of the music. Alessia wrote what she knew, and Pucinelli said he would try to find out if they were tapes one could buy in shops, ready recorded. Very long shot, even if they were.'

'Do you have the lists?'

'No, afraid not. I could ask Alessia to write them again, if you like.'

One of the ex-policemen said you never knew. The other ex-policemen nodded.

'All right,' I said. 'I'll ask her.'

'How is she?' Gerry asked.

'Just about coping.'

There were a good many nods of understanding. We'd all seen the devastation, the hurricane's path across the spirit. All of us, some oftener than others, had listened to the experiences of the recently returned: the de-briefing, as the firm called it, in its military way.

The Chairman looked around for more questions but none were ready. 'All finished? Well, Andrew, we can't exactly sack you for coming up with pictures of an active kidnapper, but driving a car to the drop is not on the cards. Whether or not it turns out well this time, don't do it again. Right?'

'Right,' I said neutrally; and that, to my surprise, was the full extent of the ticking-off.

A couple of days later the partner manning the switchboard called to me down the corridor, where I was wandering with a cup of coffee in search of anything new.

'Andrew? Call for you from Bologna. I'll put it through to your room.'

I dumped the coffee and picked up the receiver, and a voice said 'Andrew? This is Enrico Pucinelli.'

We exchanged hellos, and he began talking excitedly, the words running together in my ear.

'Enrico,' I shouted. 'Stop. Speak slowly. I can't understand you.'

'Hah.' He sighed audibly and began to speak clearly and distinctly, as to a child. 'The young one of the kidnappers has been talking. He is afraid of being sent to prison for life, so he is trying to make bargains. He has told us where Signorina Cenci was taken after the kidnap.'

'Terrific,' I said warmly. 'Well done.'

Pucinelli coughed modestly, but I guessed it had been a triumph of interrogation.

'We have been to the house. It is in a suburb of Bologna, middle-class, very quiet. We have found it was rented by a father with three grown sons.' He clicked his tongue disgustedly. 'All of the neighbours saw men going in and out, but so far no one would know them again.'

I smiled to myself. Putting the finger on a kidnapper was apt to be unhealthy anywhere.

The house has furniture belonging to the owner, but we have looked carefully, and in one room on the upper floor all the marks where the furniture has stood on the carpet for a long time are in slightly different places.' He stopped and said anxiously, 'Do you understand, Andrew?'

'Yes,' I said. 'All the furniture had been moved.'

'Correct.' He was relieved. 'The bed, a heavy chest, a wardrobe, a bookcase. All moved. The room is big, more than big enough for the tent, and there is nothing to see from the window except a garden and trees. No one could see into the room from outside.'

'And have you found anything useful… any clues in the rest of the house?'

'We are looking. We went to the house for the first time yesterday. I thought you would like to know.'

'You're quite right. Great news.'

'Signorina Cenci, he said, 'has she thought of anything else?'

'Not yet.'

'Give her my respects.

'Yes,' I said. 'I will indeed.'

'I will telephone again,' he said. 'I will reverse the charges again, shall I, like you said? As this is private, between you and me, and I am telephoning from my own house?'

'Every time,' I said.

He said goodbye with deserved satisfaction, and I added a note of what he'd said to my report.

By Thursday morning I was back in Lambourn, chiefly for the lists of music, and I found I had arrived just as a string of Popsy's horses were setting out for exercise. Over her jeans and shirt Popsy wore another padded waistcoat, bright pink this time, seeming not to notice that it was a warm day in July; and her fluffy grey-white hair haloed her big head like a private cumulus cloud.

She was on her feet in the stable-yard surrounded by scrunching skittering quadrupeds, and she beckoned when she saw me, with a huge sweep of her arm. Trying not to look nervous and obviously not succeeding, I dodged a few all-too-mobile half-tons of muscle and made it to her side.

The green eyes looked at me slantwise, smiling, 'Not used to them, are you?'

'Er…' I said. 'No.'

'Want to see them on the gallops?'

'Yes, please.' I looked round at the riders, hoping to see Alessia among them, but without result.

The apparently disorganised throng suddenly moved off towards the road in one orderly line, and Popsy jerked her head for me to follow her into the kitchen; and at the table in there, coffee cup in hand, sat Alessia.

She still looked pale, but perhaps now only in contrast to the outdoor health of Popsy, and she still looked thin, without strength. Her smile when she saw me started in the eyes and then curved to the pink lipstick; an uncomplicated welcome of friendship.