By the calendar it was late spring, but it rained that morning: hard, driving squalls which brought flurries of hail from the foothills above the town. The Old Port was deserted. The freighter-men from Italy had unloaded their wicker baskets and were waiting for the delayed deliveries of rose blooms and carnations from the hothouse growers. The fishermen had sorted and sold their catch, washed their nets and gone home. Their painted boats rocked gently in the tideless basin. In the dockyard, the shipwrights were working under cover. The trawler, hauled up on the slips for scraping and painting, looked like a hulk abandoned after a tempest.
As abruptly as it had begun, the rain stopped, the cloud lifted and the port was bathed in pale spring sunshine. Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh finished his coffee, paid the score and walked out of the Bar Felix, through the Porte Marine and along the Esplanade to the lighthouse at the entrance to the harbour. He was a big fellow in those days, red haired, tall, deep in the chest and broad across the shoulders, with ham fists and bright blue eyes and an easy grin. He was only twenty-five but he had the weathered, young-old look of a man with a certain amount of living behind him. Even Felix, the patron, who had small faith in mankind, less in women and none at all in God, treated this one with reluctant respect.
He had fetched up in Antibes a week ago, looking for a place to rest his feet. He let it be known that he had made his way on foot across the frontier. He had landed in Genoa from Australia and was fully resolved to spend the summer tramping around Europe – unless of course he could find a berth as a crewman on a pleasure yacht.
‘I wish you luck.’ Felix had dismissed the notion with a flick of his dish-cloth. ‘How many pleasure yachts do you think we get in here nowadays? The war’s been over since 1945 but we’re still up to our necks in shit! Indo-China, the Russians blockading Berlin, the Chinese pouring their troops into Korea. We’ve still got that great cesspool on the edge of the port where the Boche blew their mines! And they call this a peace?’
Nobody had bothered to answer. Felix was entitled to gripe in his own bar. His problems were well known. His first wife had divorced him. His second had run off with a cigarette salesman from Paris. His only son had stepped on a Viet Minh land mine.
But Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh had his own reasons to be hopeful. In Madame Audiberti’s pension he had met Marie-Claire, who came from Corsica and who worked with the Société Glémot: yacht brokers, ship chandlers and provedores. Marie-Claire had an angel face and a happy devil in her dark eyes, and a ready lust for Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh. She had told him of the imminent arrival of the motor yacht, Salamandra d’Oro, Boston registry, heading from Alicante to prepare for a Mediterranean cruise. Her master had wired ahead for fuel, fresh water and a list of provisions as long as your arm – all luxury stuff, liquor, pre-cut meats, deep frozen foods, fresh fruits and vegetables. They also wanted local labour for two days of scrubbing, painting and bright-work. The Port Captain had her listed for Berth No. 3.
So, experienced by now in the ways of dock-rats and five-dollar-a-day hitchhikers, Cavanagh perched himself on a bollard at Berth No. 3 ready to take Salamandra’s stern lines, run the hose from the water-hydrant, and then either pick up a tip or offer himself for hire. To which end he carried always on his person his passport, his Navy discharge papers and the final Captain’s report on his competence as a navigator and watch officer.
The only value of the latter document was that it was authentic and, given half a chance, he could demonstrate the skills it described. However, he had learned early that the whole Mediterranean littoral was crawling with ex-Navy types driving all sorts of craft from motor torpedo boats to clapped-out freighters, all running contraband, guns, cigarettes, whisky, and warm bodies from North Africa to Europe. That sort of job was easy enough to find and it paid good money; but Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh had survived one war and he had no desire to get his head shot off by a trigger-happy Customs man or to spend his precious sabbatical in a Mediterranean gaol. So perched on his bollard he fished out a battered copy of Mistral’s lyrics and waited for the Salamandra d’Oro to poke her nose past the grey bulk of the lighthouse.
At ten o’clock precisely she slid into the basin: a hundred feet of sleek white hull with a clipper bow and a square transom with a golden salamander displayed in relief under her name plate. She had a low profile and a broad beam, acres of afterdeck and a sheltered area for sunbathing abaft the wheelhouse. This was a real sea-boat built for cruising comfort with nothing stinted in the way of craftsman work. The crew moved and worked like trained sailors: a winch-man in the bows, ready to let go the anchors, one man aft with a heaving line, a deckhand laying out the fenders, although there was not another vessel within hailing distance. Whoever was running this craft did things by the book – starboard anchor dropped well up into the wind, a good spread for the port hook, then a slow steady reverse into the berth. Cavanagh held up a hand to signal that he was ready to take the stern lines. Two minutes later, the vessel was made fast, the gang-plank was lowered and the deckhands were coiling ropes on the afterdeck.
A few moments afterwards, a tall dark fellow in immaculate whites came to inspect the stern moorings. Cavanagh hailed him.
‘Excuse me, sir. Are you the master of this beauty?’
‘Owner and master.’ He had a flat Boston intonation with a touch of the Irish in it. ‘What can I do for you?’
‘The word’s about that you’ll be hiring day labour through Glémot. I’m your first applicant and the best you’ll get by a country mile.’
‘Are you now?’ A faint vinegary grin twitched at the dark one’s lips. ‘And who may you be?’
‘Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh, sir, Australian passport, ex Navy, clean discharge and a captain’s report which says I’m a good bridge officer with two years of combat duty.’
‘But now you’re on the beach?’
‘Not quite. I’ve just finished a law degree and I’m giving myself a working holiday in Europe.’
‘And you’re looking to bum a free ride round the Mediterranean for the summer?’
‘On the contrary,’ said Cavanagh agreeably. ‘I was offering for day labour, scrubbing, painting and varnishing. I doubt I’d want to serve under you at sea. I’m a good-humoured fellow and I’d have trouble with that sharp tongue of yours. I bid you good day sir.’
He was already five paces down the esplanade when a shout stopped him in his tracks.
‘Cavanagh.’
‘Sir!’
‘I’ll expect you aboard at seventeen hundred hours. You’ll get an apology and a drink.’
Cavanagh gave him a wide grin and a snappy salute.
‘It’s a gentleman’s offer. May I know the name of the man who made it?’
‘Molloy. Declan Aloysius Molloy.’
‘I’ll accept the drink, Mr Molloy, but I’ll make the apology. I’ve been on the road too long. I’m forgetting my manners.’
‘I look forward to our drink Mr Cavanagh.’
‘And a very good day to you Mr Molloy.’
It had been an edgy little exchange: two Irishmen playing ‘waltz-me-round-Willie’, each waiting for the other to tread on the tails of his coat. Even so, it had ended well – oh yes, by God! Better than well – though he still wasn’t sure whether Molloy was inviting him to discuss a job or setting him up for a fall to pay for his impudence. Either way he’d best come to the meeting well groomed and with all his wits about him.
His first call was on Marie-Claire at the Glémot establishment. For a modest fee she signed him on to their crew-register for service on foreign vessels. Then she helped him choose a pair of white trousers, a white shirt, white deck shoes. She gave him a discount of ten percent and a passionate embrace for good measure – which left him no choice but to invite her to lunch at the Relais de la Galette. After lunch he suggested an hour in bed, but she declined. Too long an absence would get her fired. Good jobs were scarce; eager lovers were much easier to find. So Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh took his siesta alone and dreamed of white sails on a wine-dark sea and brown girls leaping over the horns of bulls in the sunshine of ancient Crete.
At seventeen hundred hours he presented himself at the gangway of the Salamandra d’Oro. Molloy was seated on the afterdeck, reading a book, with a tray of drinks beside him. He snapped the book shut and stood to greet his guest.
‘Welcome aboard, Mr Cavanagh.’
Cavanagh walked up the gangway and paused to slip off his shoes before stepping on to the teak deck. Molloy noted the courtesy, but said nothing. He waved Cavanagh to a chair.
‘What would you like to drink?’
‘I’ll join you with the Scotch.’
‘Water? Ice?’
‘Please.’
Molloy made him a generous drink, then raised his glass in a toast.
‘Slàinte!’
‘And your health too!’
Molloy looked him up and down with a critical eye, then gave him that sour grin and a grudging approval.
‘I must say you scrub up well, Cavanagh. I’m impressed.’
‘You shouldn’t be.’ Cavanagh was relaxed and amiable. ‘I don’t know how far the Molloys go back in Boston, but in Australia the Cavanaghs have had lace curtains for three generations.’
To his surprise Molloy burst out laughing.
‘You’re an impertinent young bugger, Cavanagh, but I begin to like you! Lace-curtain Irish! I haven’t heard that in a long time, but yes, that’s what we were too, I guess. What did your people do?’
‘My grandfather struck it rich on the Ballarat goldfields; but he had ten children so the inheritance was somewhat dispersed. My father put his share into the liquor business – country pubs in the big towns. My mother taught me manners. I had three sisters to coach me in the ways of women. The Christian Brothers ground religion into me and the Jesuits introduced me to the liberal arts – and they all left it to the Navy to knock the rough edges off me. One way and another I’ve been a lucky fellow.’
‘Which makes me wonder why you’re doing this trip the hard way.’
‘Hard! This isn’t hard! What am I doing at this moment, but drinking good liquor in good company on a beautiful boat – with half an expectation that I might be offered a job at the end of it.’
‘That’s my point. With a background like the one you describe, how come you need a job?’
‘Or more precisely, how do you know I’m not some Mediterranean cowboy fresh from drug running or smuggling cigarettes from Casablanca?’
‘That’s about the size of it.’
‘According to the strict rules of evidence, I could be selling you a can full of smoke. But if you knew the Cavanaghs – and I’m told there are a few cousins and near cousins in Boston – then you’d understand that they’re godly folk who give handouts to the poor and needy, and are hard as iron to their own. My old man – God love him! – had it figured out for all of us. He’d paid for our education, the rest was up to us. I did my law course on a Service Grant and paid my room and board and the rest of my living, working as a barman, a fruit picker and pencilling bets for a bookie at the tracks. That filled up a lot of gaps in my liberal education. I didn’t mention, by the way, that I have French, Italian, German, Greek and Spanish – which may be a help to you.’
‘I’m sure it could be,’ said Molloy ‘but right now I want to know how good a seaman you are.’
Cavanagh fished in his pocket, brought out a battered wallet and laid out the documents on the table:
‘Passport, discharge, Service record. They’ll tell you as much as I can.’
‘More, maybe!’ Molloy gave a short, barking laugh. ‘I was Navy myself. I used to write these things.’
Cavanagh sipped his liquor and waited in silence until Molloy handed the documents back to him and announced:
‘I’ll walk you round the ship.’
‘I’d like that. She’s a beauty. Who designed her?’
‘A friend of mine. The best naval architect in Quincy.’ There was a ring of pride in the answer. ‘I had her built in Glasgow at half the price she would have cost me at home. She did her sea trials in the Baltic and her shakedown cruise from Plymouth to Gibraltar. After that we took her round the Balearics and into Alicante. Let’s take a look at the bridge first.’
The change in Cavanagh’s demeanour was abrupt. He studied every item in the console layout with a cool professional eye, counting off the items, touching each one as he did so.
‘. . . throttles, automatic pilot, electric log, depth sounder, forty-mile radar, D.F. loop, medium wave and VHF transceivers, chart index, a full Mediterranean list of pilot books, everything well positioned for a one-man helm-watch. A man would feel very comfortable up here Mr Molloy.’
‘And you could handle it all?’
‘Sure. But to do it properly I’d make myself familiar with your construction and wiring plans.’
‘Let’s go look at the engine room.’
When he stepped into the head-high chamber and saw the twin diesels and the big generators and the banks of knife batteries and switch-gear, Cavanagh gave a whistle of admiration.
‘You’ve done yourself proud. Who’s your engineer?’
‘An old shipmate of mine, Boston Greek, Giorgios Hadjidakis. Do you have any engine room experience?’
‘Very little and very basic. I can read a manual, use a wrench and an oil can and do exactly what the engineer orders in a damage control situation. That’s as far as I go. How many crew do you carry?’
‘On the voyage over we had five. Myself, Giorgios, Marcantonio the chef and two deckhands. When our guests come on board they’ll double as stewards, and I’ll be bringing in a cabin attendant for the ladies of the party.’
‘By my count,’ said Cavanagh, ‘you’re short one bridge officer. You’ll have very little time to spend with your guests, especially if you’re making long runs and overnight passages.’
‘You’re right of course. We do need a third officer. Interested?’
‘Eager would say it better.’
‘Eager enough to wear a sharp-tongued skipper?’
‘Well, now!’ Cavanagh gave him a big smile and a small shrug of deprecation. ‘Let’s say I could offer you enough skill to hone the edge off your tongue, and you’re enough like my old man to teach me the manners I lack.’
‘Prettily said,’ Molloy was a little amused. ‘But that doesn’t get you the job. It gets you the next drink and another set of questions. Let’s go topside.’
‘After you, Mr Molloy.’
This time all the questions had barbs in them.
‘Tell me about your sex life.’
‘With respect Mr Molloy, it’s none of your goddamn business.’
‘You’d better be goddamn sure it is my business!’ Molloy’s anger was swift and cold. ‘This is my ship, mister! There’s nowhere off limits to me! So, answer me, man! What’s your preference?’
‘Women.’
‘Have you ever had any sexually transmitted diseases?’
‘No. And I’m bloody careful to avoid ’em.’
‘If you were offered the job would you be willing to undergo a full medical – at the ship’s expense of course?’
‘Why not? But why should you care?’
There was a sudden dark anger in Molloy’s eyes and a savage rasp in his voice.
‘Because my principal guest is the young woman I’m going to marry. So every man jack about this vessel is going to have a clean body, clean hands and a civil mouth to welcome the lady and offer her the respect and services she deserves. Are you answered, Mr Cavanagh?’
‘I’m answered.’ His tone was mild and respectful. Inside an imp of laughter was plaguing him. This was too much altogether. It was archaic, incongruous, overblown, like a bad sermon from a ranting preacher. He waited in silence until Molloy demanded curtly:
‘So, do you want the job?’
‘I’d like to know what you’re offering.’
‘Four months’ contract. Discharge in Antibes. I’m booking a permanent berth here – buying a share in the new harbour. You get seventy-five dollars a week, paid in US currency, which means you do very nicely in drachmas and lire. Ship’s rations, all found. You get two free uniforms and a set of working overalls. You buy liquor and cigarettes from ship’s stores at duty-free prices. You’re insured against accident and sickness while on duty. You will not accept gratuities from guests. An end-of-voyage bonus may be paid for meritorious service. That’s it.’
‘When do I sign on?’
‘As soon as you present a clean bill of health. Glemot will make a doctor’s appointment for you tomorrow.’ He poured another generous shot of whisky and handed it to Cavanagh.
‘Let’s drink to a pleasant voyage.’
‘And a happy homecoming! Maybe I could polish up my Greek enough to write you an epithalamium.’
‘Which would be what? Instruct me, Cavanagh. I have no Greek and only Mass Latin.’
‘A marriage song, a nuptial hymn.’
For the first time Molloy laughed: an open, happy sound.
‘Cavanagh, you’re a clown!’
‘I am that!’ Cavanagh grinned, ruefully. ‘My old man stuck the label on me a long time ago. My mother – God rest her – made a virtue out of it. “A clown,” she said, “makes people laugh; so he has his proper place in God’s universe. It’s your drunken buffoons I can’t tolerate.”’
‘Wise woman.’
‘She was. I miss her.’
‘Do you have any steady woman in your life?’
‘I’ve a lot of women friends; but none I’d call a friend of the heart.’
‘I should warn you,’ Lou Molloy surveyed him with genial malice, ‘you’ll be seeing a lot of ports on this trip, but we won’t be lingering too long in any of them. In harbour, half the staff is always on duty to serve the guests, and those off duty stay within easy call in case we want to make a quick getaway. So your playtime will be strictly limited.’
‘I expected nothing different.’ Cavanagh was a model of good humour. ‘It’s a small price to pay for a berth on a beautiful ship – and on a lovers’ cruise no less!’
‘And just so you’ll never say I didn’t give you a true bill of goods, there’s some dirty work to be done before we put to sea: scouring bilges, checking all the toilet systems, bleeding water from the fuel tanks. Giorgios Hadjidakis is a hard man to please.’
‘And I’m the new boy; so he’ll have me swimming in grease and bilge-water.’
‘That’s about the size of it, Mr Cavanagh. But you’ll have the midnight watch, so you’ll breathe the clean night air and get the stink of diesel out of your nostrils.’
‘The Lord giveth,’ Cavanagh intoned with mock solemnity, ‘the Lord taketh away. For seventy-five bucks a week all found, the skipper doth what pleaseth him. Amen.’
Declan Aloysius Molloy let out a huge bellow of laughter.
‘We’re well met, Cavanagh! If you’re free of the pox and your lungs are clear, you’re hired! When you meet your shipmates ask them about me, they’ll tell you I’m a bad man to cross, but I look after my own!’
‘I’m happy to hear it,’ said Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh. ‘My thanks for the job and your hospitality. I’ll report for duty the moment I have the doctor’s certificate in my fist. I bid you goodnight, sir.’
He saluted smartly, picked up his shoes and walked down the gang-plank without a backward glance. He sat on a bollard while he slipped on his shoes then set off down the marina, whistling the jaunty little tune which is called ‘The Low-backed Car’. From the afterdeck Lou Molloy called after him.
‘My father used to sing that tune to me. Five dollars if you know the words, Cavanagh.’
‘You’ve lost already, Mr Molloy! ‘Twas my mother that taught them to me!’ And to prove it, he began to sing in a clear, true baritone.
When first I saw sweet Peggy,
’Twas on a market day,
A low-backed car she drove and sat
Upon a load of hay.
The song rang out, sweet but alien across the sleepy little port. The sea birds rose clattering from their roost along the ramparts.
Declan Aloysius Molloy smiled happily to himself as he watched his new bridge officer stride jauntily down the dockside. He believed in the luck of the Irish, who were the favoured children of the Church, beloved by the Pope and by God. This young sprout of the Cavanagh clan was the latest proof that God looked after his own.
Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh also believed in the luck of the Irish, but he was a mite more sceptical about divine intervention in his personal affairs. Even in his own short life he had met a dozen Lou Molloys in as many settings and aliases: wearing the black cassock of the Brothers or the clergy, or a bookie’s check suit at the track, making secret corner-of-the-mouth talk at the Hibernian Club or bluffing their way out of a brawl with the shore patrol in Trincomalee.
All of them had the same leery eye, the same ready smile, the same dash of the bully and the opportunist. Sober, they could charm the birds out of the trees, drunk or with the black angers upon them, they were bad and dangerous company. In love? Come to think of it, he had never seen one of them in love – which accounted for his shock at Molloy’s sudden ranting outburst about his bride-to-be, which also raised the question of who she was and where she came from and why Lou Molloy was making such a song and dance about his late spring wooing.
Properly speaking, Cavanagh admonished himself, none of it was his business. For seventy-five bucks a week, all found, in a soft berth, he should be deaf, dumb and blind – and if Lou Molloy wanted to marry Medusa herself, so be it, Amen! Alleluia!
For himself, he was planning a celebration. He would take Marie-Claire into Cannes. They would dine in a small but chic Indochinese restaurant, and then try their fortune at the casino. Afterwards, win or lose, they would climb to his attic room in Madame Audiberti’s pension and make what Marie-Claire called, in her Corsican dialect, little love-games, which in English translated into long and very passionate encounters. Marie-Claire had already told him she would regret to see him leave Antibes. On the other hand she was betrothed to a Corsican cousin, and was working to supplement the modest dowry her father had promised. So, much better to make a happy ending than a messy one, no? With which simple proposition Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh had no quarrel at all. His own Irish luck was holding better than he deserved.
Within forty-eight hours, he was signed on to the ship’s manifest and took up residence in the crew’s quarters of the Salamandra d’Oro. Giorgios Hadjidakis, lean, dark and laconic, introduced him to his shipmates:
‘. . . . Leo and Jackie, deckhands, bunk-mates, members of the Corps de Ballet in the Boston dance ensemble . . .’
They were a good-looking pair, lithe as cats, muscular as feral animals. Leo was the spokesman and his speech was brief but loaded.
‘Welcome aboard Bryan. Good to have some young blood in the forepeak . . . Anything we can do to make you comfortable . . . anything at all.’
‘Thank you Leo. Thank you both.’ Cavanagh offered a firm handshake and a guileless grin. ‘Which of you is the helmsman?’
‘I am,’ Leo blushed and bridled at the admission. ‘Jackie’s the front-of-the-house person. He knows how to pour wine and which side to serve the vegetables and how to keep the Chef happy in the kitchen.’
‘Our Chef.’ Giorgios made the announcement with a spartan dignity. ‘Our Chef is Signor Marcantonio Caviglia, late of the Grand Hotel du Lac, Lugano, Switzerland.’
‘I offer you my most profound respects, maestro.’ Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh was already in vein with the occasion. ‘I was bred in Australia, which rides on the sheep’s back, and where the most important and highly paid functionary is the shearers’ cook. He lives and works at great risk, since hungry shearers have been known to turn violent. So maestro, you have my respect, my very great respect.’
‘And if you, my friend, have any special dietary needs . . .’
‘Thanks for the thought maestro. I’ll try to spare you any problems.’
The introductions over, Hadjidakis spelt out the laws of his narrow kingdom.
‘Topside and aft, Lou Molloy is God. Down here in the forepeak, I, Giorgios Hadjidakis, am God’s anointed. There’s not much space, so we eat, sleep, shave, shower and use the head according to the roster pinned on the door. We don’t like noise. We don’t make arguments. We stow our gear neatly and dump our dirty laundry in the container provided. Each man’s locker, his drawer space and his bookshelf are sacred. Any problems or questions?’
‘None. I’m house-broken and Navy-trained.’
‘That’s what you told Lou. That’s what Lou told me. So here’s the programme. First light tomorrow we take ourselves out for a little cruise. On the way we pump the bilges and flush out the sewage-holding tanks. After that you get down under the floor boards and sluice down with disinfectant. While you’re down there, you’ll inspect the drive shaft bearings and glands, and make yourself familiar with the plumbing and electrical layouts. By the end of the day we’ll have the whole plant greased and polished so that you could eat your dinner off the engine-blocks. How does that grab you, Navy man?’
‘Right where I live,’ Cavanagh assured him cheerfully. ‘I like a tidy ship. Lighten up, Mr Hadjidakis. Stop trying to scare me. I’ve been hazed by experts. Besides, some of my best friends are Greeks.’
He offered his hand. Hadjidakis hesitated a moment, then a reluctant smile dawned on his dark saturnine features. He accepted the handshake and offered an invitation.
‘Chef and I are eating ashore tonight. Would you like to join us?’
‘Sure! I’d like that; but seeing I’ve just signed on, Mr Molloy might want . . .’
‘Lou’s spending the next two nights in Monte Carlo. You’re not rostered for duty until tomorrow. Besides, it’s the custom of the ship: on the Salamandra d’Oro we embalm you first and let you die afterwards!’
The embalming was a long but painless operation. It began with drinks on the afterdeck, served by Leo, with canapés prepared by Jackie, which earned high praise from the Chef. Then followed a taxi ride to Biot, followed by more drinks in a roadhouse where the patron was an old friend of the Chef and the meal was a Provençal epic, three hours long.
The Chef, in his cups, proved a garrulous tale-teller. Hadjidakis, on the other hand, displayed a waspish temper and an oddly proprietorial attitude towards the ship and all who sailed in her. Cavanagh, schooled from his youth in wardroom etiquette, listened respectfully, and asked only an occasional discreet question. Somewhere between the fish and the fowl, the talk turned to Lou Molloy and the significance of this cruise in his life history.
The Chef announced emphatically:
‘I know you don’t agree Giorgios, but I think this marriage a good match, wealth on one side, on the other a noble and ancient lineage. Lou Molloy always does things in style.’
‘That’s his problem,’ Hadjidakis gave a gloomy assent. ‘He’s obsessed with bloody style. So much of him is genuine, I can’t think why he stoops to the fakery. He doesn’t have any illusions about himself. He’ll tell you straight that he’s a peasant who’s going to be a prince – I understand that. My grandfather was a dirt-farmer from Crete. In his cups he’d swear he was descended from the Kings of Mycenae.’
‘Whatever his origins,’ Chef persisted in his argument, ‘Molloy has the presence of a great actor. From the moment he makes an entrance he dominates the company. You talk of him as a peasant. I see him as one of the great condottieri, a mercenary if you like, but one who has earned his own title and his own fiefdom. This marriage he’s about to make is in the same grand manner.’
‘You’re cooking up fairy tales,’ Hadjidakis mocked him testily. ‘Lou’s a very rich man. He has money spawning money. But that isn’t enough for him. He wants gilt icing on the cake. The Brahmins of Boston won’t accept him. So he’s marrying back into the old aristocracy – spent bloodlines in a Europe that’s already dead. He doesn’t seem to understand that he’s making himself ridiculous in all sorts of ways.’
‘Forgive my ignorance,’ Cavanagh posed the mild question, ‘but whom exactly is he marrying?’
Hadjidakis shrugged.
“You tell him, Chef. I’m bored with the whole business.’
‘You’re jealous,’ said the Chef, amiably. ‘You and Lou Molloy have been roistering bachelors ever since the war. Now, you can’t bear the thought of breaking up the party.’
‘That’s not true. I happen to believe he’s making a big mistake.’
‘So it’s his life. He’ll live it the way he wants!’
‘Why don’t you tell Cavanagh the whole story? You know the bride’s family. You worked for them at one stage didn’t you?’
‘Look! There’s no hurry!’ Cavanagh felt the need to damp down the argument. ‘I’m the new boy. It’s none of my business anyway.’
‘Oh, but it is!’ Hadjidakis was emphatic. ‘Tomorrow we clean ship. The day after we taken on water, fuel and stores – and my lady’s personal stewardess arrives from London. She used to be a first-class cabin attendant with Cunard no less! Then we leave for Monte Carlo to pick up Lou Molloy and his guests. Our cruise begins from there. So my young friend you’d better know exactly what you’ll be dealing with for the rest of the voyage. Go on, Chef! Tell him!’
‘Pour me more wine, Giorgios. This is a complicated story and you always read it upside down!’
‘How so?’
‘You make Lou Molloy the hunter, instead of the hunted. He didn’t come to Europe looking for a bride. He was looking for business: reconstruction projects using Marshall Aid dollars and local partners. The Farnese were eager to make an alliance with American capital. So they offered him a bonus, the daughter of the house, the little Princess Giulia Farnese.’
‘And Lou leapt at it, like trout at a mayfly.’
‘Of course he did! It was a match made in heaven – or at least the Vicar of Christ and a bunch of his most powerful henchmen, Cardinal Spellman of New York, Count Galeazzi of the Vatican Bank, Prince Pacelli, the Pope’s nephew, the Cardinal Secretary of State, not to mention the father of the bride, Prince Alessandro Farnese di Mongrifone.’
‘That’s a heavy group of matchmakers.’ Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh was impressed. ‘But why did they need so much muscle? Is the bride a bearded lady or what?’
Giorgios Hadjidakis groaned in theatrical despair. It was Chef who supplied the answer.
‘O God! The ignorance of the man! Even I know that Giulia Farnese di Mongrifone is one of the most beautiful women in Italy. The Italian gossip magazines are full of her. Every so often Visconti or Rossellini makes a big song and dance about offering her a film role – which of course she always refuses. Noblesse oblige! She’s named for her ancestor, Giulia the Beautiful . . .’
‘So explain please!’ Cavanagh made a dramatic appeal. ‘I come from way down under – next door to the Antarctic penguins. What do I know about Boston carpet-baggers and bartered brides in the Holy City?’
‘What indeed!’ The Chef was gentle with his ignorance. ‘On the other hand you’re a Roman Catholic, so you’ll understand when I tell you that in this doubtful and dangerous time, the most stable organisation in Europe is the Vatican. It controls or influences a huge body of international sentiment. All its wartime sins, all its shabby bargains with the Nazis and the Fascists, are conveniently forgotten because the new bogeymen are the Communists. It has a new crop of martyrs in Eastern Europe and China. It has brought out the Confessional vote for Christian Democracy in Italy. It’s funded from all round the world, so it encourages wealthy and loyal adherents like Lou Molloy; and if they’re hard-nosed carpet-baggers as well – which Lou most certainly is! – then so much the better. Money has no smell anyway; but good Christian money like Lou’s earns a special blessing in Rome. Now does it make sense to you, young man?’
‘It begins to, yes.’ Cavanagh ruminated on the idea for a few moments. ‘But everything you’ve told me is general. What’s the precise ground of business interest between Prince Farnese and Lou Molloy? And what’s the relationship between Giulia herself and Lou? A woman with a history like hers would hardly let herself be bartered like a chattel – or would she?’
There was a long moment of silence, then the Chef burst into laughter.
‘Now it’s your turn, Giorgios. Answer the man!’
‘There’s nothing to answer! It’s Lou’s business. If he wants to discuss it with Cavanagh, he will.’
‘Giorgios is right.’ Cavanagh was swift to placate the irascible Greek. ‘I’m the new boy. I do my job and keep my trap shut! It seems to me we need another bottle of wine for the cheese. If you’ll be good enough to choose it, Chef, I’ll be very happy to pay for it . . .’
Hadjidakis gave him a swift, grateful glance while the Chef buried his nose in the wine list. Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh was suddenly aware that he had just missed making an enemy and might, just possibly, have made a friend.
It was two in the morning before they stumbled back on board the Salamandra. Now he was thoroughly embalmed, Cavanagh thought it would be a sweet and decorous end to die quietly in his sleep. That mercy, however, was denied him. He thrashed about for hours in a series of nightmares in which he pursued a naked Marie-Claire through the alleys of Antibes, while Lou Molloy thundered at his heels with a cleaver from the galley and Giorgios Hadjidakis laid bookmakers’ odds on whether he would bed the lady or be butchered by Molloy.
At six in the morning, bleary-eyed, dry-mouthed with a head full of rattling stones, he was rousted out of his bunk and ordered to report to the bridge, showered and shaved, in fifteen minutes flat. Hadjidakis, spruce already in clean coveralls, was implacable. He wanted to be out of the harbour and heading south by six-thirty – and now was as good a time as any for the new boy to demonstrate his skills at pilotage and ship handling.
Cavanagh made it to the bridge with a minute to spare. Hadjidakis had the charts laid out for him. Chef was ready with coffee and croissants. Jackie was standing by the anchor winch, Leo was ready to slip the stern lines.
‘Ready when you are, Mr Cavanagh,’ said Hadjidakis.
‘Aye, aye sir!’ said Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh. He switched on the intercom and announced, ‘Stand by forward. Stand by aft. Acknowledge loud and clear, please, gentlemen!’
He knew exactly what Hadjidakis was doing: handing him a million dollars’ worth of vessel to manoeuvre at close quarters, in the middle of the worst hangover of his life. If he failed the test, no harm would come to the ship; Hadjidakis was standing only a pace away from the control console, and the seamen fore and aft could go through the motions in their sleep; but Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh would be finished as a bridge officer, paid off probably in Monte Carlo.
If he made no mistakes – fine! – he would have passed the first test. He had been embalmed and had still woken up with all his wits about him. But every day would bring new and subtler tests, because Hadjidakis was a Greek and jealous of anyone, man or woman, who intruded into the private domain of his friendship with Lou Molloy.
When they had cleared the harbour, Hadjidakis told him to head for Cap Camarat, a forty-mile run south-westward along the coast. Just before the Cap they would anchor in the quiet bay of St Tropez. Cavanagh laid off the course on the chart, wrote up the log and took over the wheel. Hadjidakis went below with the two deckhands to lift the carpets in the cabins and expose the entrance hatches into the underbelly of the ship. Grinning like a satyr, he warned Cavanagh that there was no way he could escape his crawl through the bilges. Cavanagh shrugged and laughed.
His hangover was on the wane. The ship handled like a contented woman. There was a small breeze off the land, bearing with it the faint, elusive scent of spring flowers and mountain herbs. The saddles of the Maritime Alps were dark against a bright sky, the ruffled sea sparkled like champagne in the morning sun. The radar screen was empty of traffic. Cavanagh perched himself in the helmsman’s chair, switched to autopilot and settled down to enjoy the dead straight run from Cap d’Antibes to Cap Camarat.
In his Navy life these were the hours he had loved; the quiet sunlit times with a fair wind and an easy sea, and the battle no more than an uneasy murmur left far astern. There was a block of blank paper on the chart table, to be used for course calculations and for watch-keeper’s notes, which might later need to be copied into the log. Cavanagh set it in front of him and began to make a series of fluent but precise sketches of the landmarks on his route. It was one of the oldest maritime arts, and the products of it still adorned the British Admiralty charts: carefully hatched drawings of capes and bluffs and inlets and rocky outcrops that warned of hidden reefs. It was also a tranquil exercise in coastwise navigation, dead reckoning by time and speed and available landmarks, all of which could be checked against the radar screen and the shifting graph of the depth sounder, which traced the contours of the underwater shelf.
Suddenly the Chef was standing beside him with a steaming mug of beef broth, laced with cognac. Cavanagh blessed him eloquently.
‘God love you, Chef! May he give you health, wealth, cheerful women and a long life to enjoy them.’
The Chef, however, was not listening. His attention had been caught by the sketches scattered on the chart table. He asked:
‘Are these yours?’
‘Yes.’
‘They’re good.’
‘They’re passable. The Navy put me through a crash course in mapping and topography.’
‘Mr Molloy would be very interested. He is himself a skilled draughtsman. He has sketchbooks full of drawings of every port we have ever visited.’
‘It’s an agreeable hobby.’
Cavanagh altered course to pass under the stern of a tanker heading southward from Saint Raphael. The Chef pursued his own thought.
‘With him it is not a hobby. It’s all connected with his master-plan in Europe.’
‘And what would that be?’
‘Molloy believes there will be an explosion of pleasure-boating all through the Mediterranean. So he plans a series of marina developments in Italy from Portofino in the north to Anzio in the south, then out to the Islands – Sardinia, Elba, Ponza, Ischia, Stromboli. Already the boat designers and builders are gearing up; wartime shipyards are being modernised. Once the craft start coming off the slips, there will be need of all the ancillary services: harbourage, fuel points, provisioning, dockside accommodation – everything! This is what brought Molloy and Farnese together. Molloy has the money connections, the business experience, and high friends like Cardinal Spellman in New York. Farnese served in the Ministry of Marine. He is one of the old Black Aristocracy, a close friend of the present Pontiff and of Galeazzi, who runs Vatican finances. He sees this as a splendid chance to liquidate coastal real estate which has become a liability on the Church’s books: old monasteries and convents, unproductive peasant farms, run-down fishing ports which can be dredged and redeveloped.’
‘It sounds like a gold mine.’ The tanker had gone now. Cavanagh eased the Salamandra back on course. ‘Why is Hadjidakis so hostile to it?’
The Chef gave a small but eloquent shrug.
‘He is hostile not to the business but to the marriage. Molloy and Hadjidakis are old shipmates. They have never been equals; but in a democratic America it was easy for them to be friends. Most of the year they lived in separate worlds. In the summer they cruised together, drank, chased women, shared the company of sailing folk. You know how it is at sea. There are no half-measures. You are blood brothers or sworn enemies.’
‘But now it’s changing?’
‘How can it not change? There is a new woman, a permanent one this time, born to the old feudal traditions of Europe. Once the Farnese and their entourage come aboard, there will be no easy comradeship any more. We will be invited to an occasional cocktail. That will be the end of it. Already Hadjidakis is resentful. Already he is working up an anger about old wrongs: the Italian invasion of Greece, the German occupation which followed it. A pity he wastes so much energy on things he cannot change. I am very fond of Giorgios but he is like a man beating his head on a stone wall just so he can feel better when he stops.’
Cavanagh asked another question.
‘Did I understand that you yourself once worked for the Farnese family?’
‘That was the way Hadjidakis put it. The facts were slightly different. Long before the war the Farnese owned a large villa property in Lugano, on the Swiss side of the lake. When the war began to go badly for Italy, the Prince moved his family across the border. I had known him a long time. I had organised business luncheons and political dinners for him at the hotel. Now he offered me, rent-free, a house in the villa domain if I would act as unofficial major-domo and manage the domestic affairs of the Princess, hire the servants, keep the accounts and so on. I was happy to do it. I was well paid. The hotel profited from the extra business I brought in. It worked well for both sides. Unhappily the Princess died in 1943. That was a bad time. The Allies had just invaded Sicily; the Germans were the real masters of the peninsula. So I had to arrange the funeral and act as temporary guardian of the young family.’
‘So you know Molloy’s fiancée?’
‘Since she was a young girl.’
‘What is she like?’
‘Beautiful, intelligent, very spoilt. Her father indulges all her whims; but in traditional style he also exploits her.’
‘How?’
‘As a family asset, negotiable in the marriage market.’
‘I thought you approved of this match, Chef?’
‘I do. I most emphatically do! It’s a marriage of convenience, yes! But, by all I know of history, it will work better than most romantic follies. Giulia la Bella will lead the dance for a while, but Molloy’s had enough women in his life to know all her moves by heart. He’s strong enough to tame her, wise enough to give her a loose rein when she needs it, and cold enough to shame her and keep her jealous if she misbehaves. But what’s much more important,’ he gave a short, dry chuckle, ‘and what’s the core of the whole argument, is the marriage settlement. I know the lawyers have been haggling over that for months. There’s no divorce in Italy, the Farnese are too close to the Vatican to countenance an offshore arrangement. Molloy’s an Irish Catholic. So he’s going to make an annulment by church or state too expensive even to dream about. Therefore, according to me, Marcantonio Caviglia, if this isn’t a marriage made in heaven, it’s the next best thing! But why the hell should you care? You’re the luckiest of us all my young friend! No ties, no regrets – and whatever you own of history is twelve thousand miles away, south of the equator! Pass me your mug. I have to get back to my galley.’
‘Thanks, Chef! You’re one of God’s good men!’
‘Present me to him one day! We haven’t been introduced yet.’
Then he was gone. Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh watched the landfall open up on the radar screen and altered course to make the dark axe-cut that marked the Bay of St Tropez. With half an hour cruising time on his hands he tried to work out the permutations and combinations of life aboard the Salamandra d’Oro: an owner skipper who demanded clean hands and hearts in the service of his betrothed, yet maintained a jealous Greek friend of the heart; a bachelor Chef from the Grand Hotel du Lac in Lugano; two comely athletes from the Boston ballet – and himself, the passionate pilgrim under scrutiny by them all.
It took him no time at all to decide that, apart from the social comfort, their opinion didn’t matter a damn. He had a soft berth, on a sweet ship, all found with seventy-five dollars a week to jingle in his white duck pants. Softly at first and then, more strongly, he picked up the refrain of ‘The Low-backed Car’.
But when the hay was blooming grass,
And decked with flowers of spring,
No flower was there that could compare,
With the charming girl I sing,
As we drove in the low-backed car,
The man at the turn-pike bar,
Never asked for the toll,
But just rubbed his old poll,
And looked after the low-backed car!
Ten minutes after they had dropped anchor off St Tropez, Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh stripped down to his jockey shorts, buckled on a tool-belt and, armed with a torch and a plan of electrical circuits and plumbing conduits, started his long, claustrophobic crawl through the bilges of the Salamandra d’Oro.
He began right at the stern where the propellor shafts pierced the hull, and the cables of the steering system were connected to the rudder. He inspected the bearings and the watertight glands. He ran his fingers over the shafts in search of tell-tale irregularities. He shone his torch on the plumbing outlets in search of leaks.
He was just about to climb out of the well and move on to the next section when he caught a dull gleam of metal in the torchlight. He reached for it and his groping fingers found a gold coin, a Swiss twenty-franc piece coated with oil and dust. He studied it for a moment then shoved it into the small leather container clipped to his tool-belt, which held a miscellany of small nuts, bolts and assorted fasteners.
On the next stage of his journey he had to lie on his back with his nose against the bottom of the fuel tank, draining off water from the sump where it had settled out from the diesel oil. There was more of it than he expected; which meant that somewhere along the line the Salamandra’s fuel supplier had pumped in watered stock. There was only one remedy: to refuse to accept delivery until the consignment had been tested by pumping a sample into a clean glass demijohn and waiting until any water content settled out. Many tanker drivers raised a stink about the slow procedure. Most came swiftly to see reason, under the threat of a complaint to the company and to the police.
The most complicated area was under the engine room itself, where the big diesels were bedded and all the electrical wiring converged on the main fuse box. By the time that was all checked Cavanagh was black as a coalminer and greasy as a fairground pig. Only two more areas remained to be inspected, the plumbing under the forepeak and the chain-locker. No sooner was he down in the darkness again when Hadjidakis called to him.
‘The crew toilet’s packed up. I’ll pass you down a bucket and a wire probe, see if you can clear it, like a good man!’
Cavanagh said nothing. He unwrapped the sweat-rag from his forehead and tied it in a mask around his nostrils. Then he prayed quietly that he wouldn’t throw up . . .
Later, when the last chore was done, he dived overboard and swam a thousand yards down the bay and back again, purging his angers with the long, flailing crawl which had won him a long-distance championship in his last year at college. Later still, shaved and showered and dressed in clean shorts and a tennis shirt, he sat on the afterdeck and ate asparagus and fresh lobster washed down with a local blanc de blancs that lay clean and crisp on the palate.
When the coffee was served, he took the gold piece from his pocket and slapped it on the table in front of Hadjidakis.
‘I found that under the owner’s cabin this morning.’
Hadjidakis glanced at it, then pushed it back with the tip of his index finger.
‘Finders keepers. It’s yours.’
‘I don’t want it, thank you.’
‘The offer offends you?’
‘You offend me, Hadjidakis.’
‘How so?’
‘You planted the damn thing! You’ve got wealthy guests coming aboard. You need to be sure the new boy isn’t a bandit. I understand that; but you insult my intelligence with a childish trick!’
‘Don’t take it too hard, Cavanagh.’ Hadjidakis gave him a big happy grin. ‘I’ve met a lot of dock-rats in my time. I’ve learned to be careful.’
Cavanagh gave him grin for grin and added a piece of advice for good measure.
‘You’ve had your fun, Georgy-boy; but now the game’s over! Next time anyone stops up the plumbing with cotton waste from your engine room, I’ll personally shove it down your gullet and stand by while you eat it. Do I make myself clear?’
‘Anything else you want to get off your chest?’
‘No. That’s the lot – except to pass a compliment to the Chef. That was a splendid lunch.’
‘You earned it,’ said Giorgios Hadjidakis amiably. ‘Now can we call a truce?’
Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh thought the word was ill-chosen. A truce signified only a temporary break in hostilities. However he raised his glass and toasted it in the dregs of the wine.
Early next morning they took on fuel and water, and the tanker-man waited, cursing, until his product was tested. A van-load of provisions was checked and stored. Bedrooms and bathrooms were made up with fresh linen and expensive toiletries. Flower arrangements were delivered for the saloon, the dining room and the guest cabins. When the last messenger had stepped ashore, the decks were scrubbed and pumiced, the brass and bright-work polished, the windows and port-holes wiped mirror clean.
Just after lunch, a taxi drew up on the dock and decanted one Miss Lenore Pritchard, late of the Cunard Steamship Company Limited. She looked like a very superior nanny. She carried herself straight as a guardsman. She wore a blue serge costume, low-heeled black shoes, a white blouse and a basin-like felt hat that hid the upper part of her face. Hadjidakis handed her aboard with more than casual respect and took her immediately to her quarters – a small single-berth cabin opposite to his own and separate from the rest of the crew’s quarters in the forepeak.
Half an hour later, she emerged a different woman. Dressed in summer whites she looked five years younger, with auburn hair, a peaches-and-cream complexion, an athlete’s figure and a devil-may-care look in her bright blue eyes. She was obviously at ease in shipboard company. She raised a ready laugh from Leo and Jackie. She gave Cavanagh a thorough inspection and a final grin of approval. She managed a passable French and a fluent Italian with the Chef. To Hadjidakis she delivered a set of trenchant judgments.
‘. . . So far, no complaints! The deckhands are good-looking. The navigator can read. The Chef knows how to make English tea. The engine room’s as clean as a new pin. I only hope the guests are able to live up to the crew!’
‘We’ll soon know.’ Hadjidakis had summoned all hands to the afterdeck for coffee and a final briefing. ‘I spoke to Mr Molloy last night. These are his orders. We leave Antibes at 1600 hours and coast quietly down to Monte Carlo, arriving at 17.30. All crew will wear summer whites, and in addition to the courtesy flags we’ll fly the pennon of the Farnese family. Cavanagh, you’ll take us into harbour. Our berth is number seven; that’s on the starboard hand as you enter. I know you’ll give us a classy docking, because Mr Molloy will be waiting with his guests to see us in. The moment we’re secure, all personnel will assemble on the afterdeck to welcome Mr Molloy and his guests. There will be two ladies, the Princess Giulia Farnese and her aunt, the Countess Lucietta Sciarra-Tebaldi. Miss Pritchard, you will take them below and get them settled. Leo, you’ll look after the Prince and his friend, who is Count Galeazzi from the Vatican.
‘The moment they’re all below, we clear harbour and set course for Calvi at the northern end of Corsica. It’s a hundred-mile run, and the forecast is for light and variable winds with low seas; so it should be a comfortable shakedown cruise for the guests. Cocktails will be served on the afterdeck at seven, dinner in the saloon at eight. That’s all for now. All hands will be ready to winch out at 1600 hours . . .’
The small gathering dispersed. Cavanagh went up to the bridge to mark up his charts and read the pilot books for the ports they were to visit. Hadjidakis had made it clear that, unless Molloy decreed otherwise, Cavanagh should act as navigator on the voyage. It was a left-handed compliment which at once affirmed Cavanagh’s competence and relieved Hadjidakis of responsibility for piloting the vessel in unfamiliar ports and seaways.
A few moments later, Miss Pritchard came up to the bridge and perched herself in the pilot’s chair.
She announced calmly, ‘I thought we should get acquainted before the circus begins.’
‘Good idea.’ Cavanagh gave her a cheerful grin. ‘How do you like to be called?’
‘In front of the guests, Miss Pritchard. In private, Lenore. And you?’
‘For the guests, Mr Cavanagh. The rest of the time I answer to Cavanagh, Bryan, hey-boyo, whatever the mood dictates.’
‘Are you moody then?’
‘No. Most of the time I’m a happy chappie.’
‘Good! I’m a happy soul myself, and I like clear signals. Are you married?’
‘No. Are you?’
‘Not any more. Tried it once and didn’t like it. Don’t get me wrong. I like men and I like sex. And I like the job I do, which is coddling the wealthy and the famous for the Cunard Line. With the wages and the tips, it pays well. What I don’t like is me making the money for some layabout husband to spend. How do you feel about women, Cavanagh?’
‘I love ’em all. I have sex with some of them, by mutual consent for mutual pleasure. Does that answer the question?’
‘It will do for now. But listen Cavanagh! I’ve been working the Cunarders for a lot of years now. I’m good at my job because I know it’s a chameleon act. You change colours to suit the customer – and the crew too for that matter, because you serve the customer but you have to live with the crew. Leo and Jackie, for instance, they’re as camp as a canvas tent, but we’ll get along fine. Live and let live is my motto. The Greek fellow – Mr Hadj-whatever – he’s much harder to read. He’s all dark and screwed up inside. Mr Molloy on the other hand . . .’
‘You’ve met Molloy?’ Cavanagh stared at her in surprise.
‘Sure I’ve met him! How the hell did you think I got this job? Won it in a parish raffle? Molloy made several trips with Cunard. Each time he had the same cabin suite, but a different woman. Each time I was the stewardess. He liked me. He had friends in top management. He arranged with my boss that I could take a summer leave to do this job . . . So here I am!’
‘Obviously Mr Molloy gives very clear signals too.’
‘Clear as a bell!’ Miss Pritchard gave a high, happy laugh. ‘With him it was always simple: “Do you, don’t you? Will you, won’t you? If the answer’s yes, lock the door and let’s have your skirt up and your knickers down. I’ll pay a hundred quid for your time and my pleasure.” I like that sort of man. He must like my sort of woman, otherwise he wouldn’t have offered me this job, would he?’
‘I guess not. Our Mr Molloy is a man who knows his own mind.’
‘But he needs someone who knows how his mind works.’
‘Which is you?’
‘Which is me, of course. He told me so in plain words. “Listen, Lenore,” he said, “I’m marrying a young and beautiful woman, the flower of the old nobility in Europe. This is tradition with a capital T. We’re going to be cruising for three months, and Giulia’s going to be chaperoned every hour she’s on my ship. That’s fine. I wouldn’t expect less. I wouldn’t want it otherwise; but if I’m going to last the distance I’m going to need some regular relief from an understanding woman. I’m going to need discretion too – and that’s what I’ll be paying for, and paying generously . . .”’
‘So why,’ asked Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh, ‘why would you be telling me all this, when the whole essence of the deal with Molloy is discretion and secrecy?’
‘Not secrecy, Cavanagh! You’ve that part wrong. How do you keep a secret on any ship, let alone one this size? The answer is that you don’t try. The crew are one world; the guests are another. The crew see everything and say nothing because their jobs are on the line. The guests say nothing because they’re too busy with the scenery and their own gossip. And why am I telling you? Because Mr Molloy pays well, but he plays rough. He knows I’ll need a change, and I won’t get it from the dancing boys, or the Greek – and the Chef just isn’t interested.’
‘But you’re sure I will be?’
‘I’m sure.’ Her eyes were bright with cheerful malice. ‘It’s going to be a long cruise. Mr Molloy promised me a playmate for when he couldn’t be around. You’re the chosen one, Cavanagh!’
‘And if I have other ideas?’
‘Feel free. Enjoy, enjoy! But remember, I’m the only woman available on board and you’re too lusty to waste your nights baying at the moon! Never fear! We’ll get together sooner or later! Ciao for now, Cavanagh!’
She touched the tips of her fingers to his mouth then left him staring into the empty space where she had stood. Suddenly, the madness of it all hit him, and he found himself choking with uncontrollable laughter.
So this was the great Molloy, banker to princes, friend of cardinals, betrothed to a princess, soon to be dubbed a knight by the Pope himself. This was the stern moralist demanding clean hands and hearts of all who would serve his virgin bride, while he himself bought in a whore to be her chambermaid, and picked a vagabond from down-under off the beach to be a gentleman of the whore’s bedchamber.
And yet, and yet, the Chef was right. Molloy did have style; but it wasn’t the wild baroque excess of the Borgias or the Farnese themselves, but rather the finicking conspiratorial ruthlessness of the Black Irish who would rather win than enjoy the game, who would rather surround themselves with complaisant minions than risk their potency in the jousts of love.
Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh knew them well; he had, after all, been born into the clan; but he himself was still untested. Now, like a character in an old-time melodrama, he was faced with almost comic questions. What would he do when Lou Molloy clapped him on the shoulder, man to man, and told him to keep Pritchard happy because the last thing in the world Molloy needed was woman-trouble on the Salamandra d’Oro? Came then a more sinister query: what would Molloy do if he felt himself betrayed or his great project jeopardised?
For the moment, however, it was all theory and conjecture, based on the dubious word of Miss Lenore Pritchard who might well turn out to be the most monumental liar since Baron Münchausen. So Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh turned back to his charts, laid down the short courses to Monaco and Corsica and then began to study the Admiralty directions for pilots entering the harbour of Monte Carlo and mariners homing from the north-east on the Calvi light.
The boarding ceremony for Molloy’s princely guests turned into a minor disaster. In the late afternoon there was a buildup of local weather behind Monaco. The clouds piled up over Mount Mounier and a small, treacherous wind began searching down the valley of the Var. Hadjidakis ordered extra speed, and Cavanagh was safely tied up in Monte Carlo harbour fifteen minutes before the appointed time.
Exactly on the half-hour a big limousine arrived; the chauffeur handed Molloy and his guests on to the quay and then began unloading a small mountain of suitcases. Hadjidakis went down the gang-plank to welcome them. Jackie and Leo followed him to deal with the baggage.
The party was still bunched on the quay, admiring the vessel, when the rafale hit: a flurry of wind and rain and hail that swept across the exposed quay and sent them scurrying like drenched cats up the narrow gang-plank and into the shelter of the lounge. As soon as the last piece of baggage was on board, Hadjidakis snapped out an order.
‘Start engines, Cavanagh, and let’s get the hell out of here. This is local weather only. There’ll be clear skies to the south.’
Which was how it came to pass that Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh was presented in private audience to the Principessa Giulia Farnese di Mongrifone. He was at the wheel, heading southward into sunlight and quiet water, when Molloy brought Giulia up to the bridge. Beside Molloy, she looked small, young and very vulnerable. Then, as if by some inner transformation, she was suddenly imperious and full of fire. Her glance was a mockery; her smile a condescension. Was she beautiful? Cavanagh made silent answer to the unspoken question. Yes, by God, she was beautiful; but arrogant as one of Lucifer’s angels, demanding deferment, quizzing anyone presented to her like a royal visitor. Cavanagh bowed over her hand and greeted her in Italian. She gave him a small smile of approval and a patronising compliment.
‘Your accent is very good. Where did you learn?’
‘There are many Italian migrants in my country. Some families have been there for several generations. I was taught by a distinguished scholar, a friend of Pirandello.’
‘That’s a surprise!’ She was teasing now. ‘I thought all Australians walked upside down and talked out of the sides of their mouths.’
‘Regrettably, my dear Principessa, you have been cruelly deceived. But that is the fate of many beautiful women.’
‘Perhaps you may find time to instruct me more accurately, Mr Cavanagh.’
‘I, too, am in need of instruction. I have always been interested in the history of your illustrious namesake, Giulia the Beautiful.’
It was a risky line; but she took it without a blush. Molloy, excluded from the talk, cut in abruptly.
‘What’s he telling you, my dear?’
‘He’s showing me – very politely, I must say – that he knows more about my country than I do about his.’
‘He’s a surprising fellow, our Mr Cavanagh. We haven’t seen half his talents yet.’
To change the subject, Cavanagh suggested that the Princess might like to take the wheel. She agreed readily. Cavanagh snapped off the autopilot and stood back, while Molloy demonstrated the feel of the steering mechanism and showed her how to manage the swing of the sea, to read the radar screen and the depth sounder.
Watching the small sexual rituals between them, his lips brushing her cheek, his hands smoothing a trailing wisp of her hair, Cavanagh felt a sharp pang of jealousy, a sudden irrational urge to wrench them apart and take Molloy’s place beside the woman. The swift onset of the madness startled him. He had to mock himself back into sanity.
What was Giulia Farnese to him? What could he ever be to her? Her betrothal to Molloy was already half a sacrament, contrived and blessed by God’s anointed, ratified by the ministers of mammon in a pre-nuptial agreement. The three circles of religion, family and money were already linked together and closed. There was no standing-place within them for a vagabond lawyer from the Antipodes.
Then, mercifully, the little interlude was over. With a nod and a murmur of thanks, the couple left the bridge. Ten minutes later Molloy returned, alone. He asked:
‘What time are you due to be relieved?’
‘In about ten minutes.’
‘Good! I’d like you to join us for cocktails. I need some help.’
‘What sort of help?’
‘Giulia says your Italian’s very good. I want you to help me entertain her aunt. She says she doesn’t like speaking English, although she can rattle along in most European languages. The fact is she doesn’t like me. She thinks I’m too old for Giulia, too American, too vulgar – but still rich enough to be tolerable. The dislike is mutual. I happen to think she’s a royal pain in the arse. Like a lot of Italian women with too little to do, she’s always complaining about her liver, her migraines, the weather, the decline of manners and morals. However, I’ve got to put up with her for Giulia’s sake. Also, I’ve got serious business to discuss with Farnese and Galeazzi. I can’t have the old girl moping about like Lady Macbeth. So, you’re elected to keep her happy. If it gets too tough, maybe you can enlist Leo and Jackie to amuse her for a while.’
‘You hired me as a bridge officer, Mr Molloy, not as a lady’s companion.’
‘Correction, Mr Cavanagh!’ Molloy gave him a wide shark-toothed smile. ‘I hired you as a bridge officer on a pleasure cruise. That entails certain social responsibilities. This isn’t an ocean liner. It’s a small, private world – my world, Cavanagh – and it runs to my rules. Remember our first talk in Antibes?’
‘I do.’
‘You offered me your skill in languages.’
‘I did.’
‘Now I’m calling on it. So why the fuss?’
‘You took me by surprise: I was out of line. I apologise. I’ll do the best I can.’
It was his first admission of defeat and it lay bitter on his tongue. Molloy laughed and clapped a comradely hand on his shoulder.
‘You never know what you can do until you try. It’s my risk, not yours. Besides, you’re not the only one doubling in brass. Miss Pritchard has to help entertain the males of the party, at least until Galeazzi leaves us. He’s the laconic type, hard going at the best of times, but Pritchard will handle him. She’s good value.’
‘I’m sure she is. We haven’t had too much time to get acquainted.’
‘It would be a kindness if you’d spend a little time on her. She’s the only woman in the crew. She’s got all the guest cabins and two ladies to look after. I’m sure she’d appreciate a little tactful attention. A word now and then, that’s all that’s needed.’
‘Of course.’
‘Good man!’
Abruptly as he had come, he left. Cavanagh cursed him in a silent tirade:
‘Who the hell do you think you are? What the hell do you think I am? The cruise has hardly begun and already you’ve set me up with a whole dance-card. I’m navigator, interpreter, surrogate lover to your surrogate lover and fan-carrier to an elderly Italian lady with a melancholy disposition! God damn your Irish eyes Molloy! God damn you!’
It was Lenore Pritchard who described the first cocktail hour as ‘a sticky mess, like over-cooked rice’. The Countess Sciarra-Tebaldi anchored herself in a deck-chair and forced the rest of the party to coagulate around her. The talk limped along until Molloy ordered background music and Miss Pritchard mounted a frontal assault on the uneasy little group. It was she who instructed Cavanagh on the tactics.
‘You take the Countess. Get her out of that damned chair. Walk her round the deck and show her the moonrise. The lovers can take care of themselves. I’ll draw off the males. I’m interested in Farnese anyway. He’s a handsome brute with a roving eye and a nice, crooked smile. Galeazzi’s closed up like an oyster at low tide; but I’ll try to prise him open. Christ! Three months of this and I’ll be overboard and swimming with the dolphins. Let’s move!’
Together they converged on the group with smiles, champagne, canapés and coaxing. Within three minutes, Lenore Pritchard had Farnese and Galeazzi leaning on the taffrail on either side of her, while Cavanagh and the Countess perched themselves on the rope-locker on the foredeck and watched Leo and Jackie play out a chess game on the hatch-cover under the rising moon.
After two glasses of champagne the Countess was a changed woman. Her liver trouble seemed to have subsided; her migraine was in remission; her down-drawn mouth twitched upward into a smile and her talk became more voluble and less discreet.
‘. . . Your Mr Molloy thinks I’m just a crotchety old woman who talks fashion and fiddle-faddle . . . I do that just to annoy him because he annoys me so much I could scream! . . . He is so certain of everything – including himself. America is the saviour of the world. The dollar is a passport to heaven . . . I think this is the thing that angers me most of all. He has no curiosity about anything that does not touch his own affairs . . . That’s why my brother and Papa Pacelli and that terrible little American Cardinal Spellman have been able to put a ring through his nose and lead him round like a stud bull. He trots wherever they tell him – which is always to the bank for more investment to create employment, to keep the Communists from taking over the country . . . Stalin is the big black bogeyman. Communism is the reign of the Antichrist! What everyone’s conveniently forgotten is that it was Churchill and Roosevelt who handed him half of Europe on a platter . . . My brother would kill me if he heard me talking like this; but I find you very sympathetic. You don’t tell tales out of school do you?’
‘No, Contessa, I don’t tell tales. But you must do something for me.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Smile a little! Enjoy the cruise. This is a beautiful vessel and you are a beautiful woman – especially when you smile.’
‘It’s hard to smile when I think of my lovely Giulia marrying that . . . that crude upstart.’
In spite of his anger against the man, Cavanagh was moved to defend him.
‘I don’t know Mr Molloy very well. I’ve only been working for him for a few days, but I think you do him less than justice. It’s one thing to inherit a great name and a long history and a clear place in an old society; but to carve out a career in the new world of industry and commerce, that requires a special kind of talent – courage too, and toughness. Your own family had it in the old days. They were upstarts too. They were soldiers, adventurers, traders, rough fellows with strong women as well . . . Besides, with great respect, Contessa, your Giulia is a free agent. Surely she can marry whomever she chooses.’
‘Naturally, you would think that. You’re a very young man. You live far away at the end of the world and your history is very short. My country is old. It’s been overrun many times by many invaders. Now, once again, it has been reduced to ruin; but it still survives, and the secret of that survival is the family. The family isn’t just a bloodline. It’s a whole complicated network of relationships, of debts, favours, duties, insurances against future disaster . . . Giulia is as closely bound as anyone, more so perhaps because of the attachment to her father . . . I have said enough. This is a painful subject for me . . . I like you, Mr Cavanagh.’ She held out her hands so he could steady her as she stepped on to the deck. ‘I like young people. They’re so full of hope and bright illusions. Will you walk me back please? I’m feeling much happier now!’
As the guests filed in to dinner, Cavanagh helped Miss Pritchard to reset the afterdeck and clear away the glasses and ash-trays. It was a function of the small closed economy of shipboard that no task should be deferred, no mess should be allowed to accumulate.
Pritchard asked: ‘How did you make out with the old girl?’
‘I liked her. She relaxed and seemed to enjoy talking. She’s much shrewder than she looks.’
‘Like all of us,’ said Pritchard with dry malice, ‘she needs a little attention.’
‘You seemed to be commanding quite a bit of it yourself – and I mean that as a compliment.’
‘Thanks. Farnese was easy. He’s a very accomplished womaniser. All the words, all the moves! With Galeazzi it was like talking to an abacus. I know he works at the Vatican. It was on the tip of my tongue to ask whether he had to be celibate too. Luckily Molloy came along and rescued me . . . Can I ask you to take the glasses to the galley?’
‘Sure.’
‘I’ve got to go below, straighten the cabins and bathrooms and turn down the beds. After that we could have supper on the foredeck.’
‘Not tonight I’m afraid. I have the midnight watch. I need some sleep.’
‘You still have to eat.’
‘There’ll be sandwiches and a thermos of coffee for me on the bridge. You can join me there if you feel like it.’
‘After midnight? You must be joking. By then I’ll either be sleeping or screwing Molloy. He won’t know and I won’t know until he’s put the gentry to bed. That’s the only problem when you go on the game this way – you’re a disposable item!’
To which Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh had no adequate response; but it gave him something to muse about as he climbed into his bunk, set the muted alarm on his wristwatch and slid gratefully into sleep.
At five minutes before midnight he woke, sluiced his face, ran a comb through his hair and climbed into the thermal jumpsuit which he had bought in Singapore, and which was both light and warm enough to be comfortable in the chill of the small morning hours.
To reach the companionway which led to the deck level and thence to the bridge he had to pass Lenore Pritchard’s cabin. Above the steady throb of the engines, he heard voices and then a burst of woman’s laughter, quickly stifled. He paused for a fraction of a second then climbed up to the deck to breathe in the sharp night air and take a quick turn around the deck before going up to the bridge.
It was an old habit. On a small ship the new officer of the watch made sure that all was secure topside before he took over the bridge. On the deck there was another combination of sounds; footsteps in brisk rhythm, a low voluble exchange of talk in Italian. Galeazzi and Farnese were making a circuit of the deck together. As Cavanagh approached, Farnese greeted him.
‘Good evening Mr Cavanagh. I hope we have not disturbed you?’
‘Not at all, sir. I’m just taking over the watch from Mr Hadjidakis.’
‘What time do we arrive in Calvi?’
‘If you’ll give me five minutes, sir, I’ll be able to tell you exactly and show you on the chart where we are. Why don’t you come up to the bridge when you’ve finished your stroll?’
‘Thank you. We’ll do that. A presto: see you shortly Mr Cavanagh.’
Cavanagh turned about and hurried up to the bridge. Hadjidakis was just making the last entries in the log. Cavanagh interrupted him.
‘I think we’ve got a problem Georgy-boy.’
‘What is it?’
‘Farnese and Galeazzi are taking a stroll on deck. Molloy, I think, is screwing Miss Pritchard in her cabin. A meeting might be embarrassing.’
‘You’re damn right it would! What makes you so sure it’s Molloy?’
‘The Chef and the boys are asleep. You and I are here. Who else is there? I’ve invited Farnese and Galeazzi up to the bridge when they’ve finished their stroll. As soon as I’ve got rid of them I’ll buzz down to Lenore’s cabin; but you’d better warn Molloy when you go below.’
‘I will.’ Hadjidakis was weary and irritable. ‘Christ! This was a crazy idea from the start; but it’s the way Molloy has always played the woman-game.’
‘A pretty risky game!’
‘To him? Not at all. His motto is that if he’s rich enough to pay, he’s rich enough to play.’
‘He’s engaged to a beautiful young woman for Christ’s sake!’
‘His answer is that she’s not available to him yet; so why should he sleep alone?’
‘And if she or her family finds out?’
‘They’ll be like the three wise monkeys: no hear, no see, no say. There’s too much money at stake. Molloy knows that. Therefore he resents the way they try to patronise him, especially the Countess and Galeazzi. So he cocks a snoot at them, gives them his own whore as a chambermaid!’
‘A pity she’s a whore.’ Cavanagh quoted the old tag. ‘I like her.’
‘So do I.’ Hadjidakis was equally frank. ‘She makes no secret about what she does; she’s amusing and gives value for money. Molloy likes her and trusts her; which is good for us all. When he’s out of humour, he’s dangerous. Farnese doesn’t know it yet, but he’s riding a tiger.’
‘And you’d better get below and tweak the tiger’s tail!’
‘This is nothing,’ Hadjidakis shrugged. ‘We’ve both played wilder games than this one, in much more dangerous places.’ He switched on the small spotlight to illuminate the chart-table: ‘Our heading is a hundred and twenty-five. We’re forty-five miles off the Calvi light, which has a ten-mile visibility and occults to green every six seconds. You should pick up the loom about sixteen miles out. I’ve slowed us down to eight knots so we can drop anchor by six. We’ll stand off in mid harbour, because the dock is reserved for mainland ferries and freighters . . . The best spot looks to be about two cables offshore, right in front of the Hôtel de Ville . . . All systems are functioning . . . I’m out of here.’
‘I’m impressed.’ Cavanagh offered a sober compliment. ‘It’s a pleasure to take over from a tidy watch-keeper, and that’s not bullshit, Mr Hadjidakis!’
Hadjidakis gave him a swift, suspicious glance: then his drawn, sallow features relaxed into a rare smile.
‘You show a certain promise, yourself, Mr Cavanagh . . . She’s your ship . . . Goodnight!’
When he had gone, Cavanagh switched off the chart-light so that the view outside became clearer and the only illumination on the bridge was the faint glow from the binnacle and the instrument panel. The radar was masked, but when he thrust his face into the mask he could see only the sweep of the vector across a blank screen; but somewhere in the next half hour the first outlines of the Corsican coast would show up on the outer rim. Outside, the sky was black velvet and the stars were like a runnel of diamonds.
He toyed with the idea of taking a star-sight, just to refresh his mathematics; then he decided against it and addressed himself instead to the coffee and sandwiches. The Chef had scribbled a note on the napkin: Hai fatto una conquista. La contessa canta i tuoi lodi. Sei bello, cortese, colto . . . You’ve made a conquest. The Countess is singing your praises: you’re handsome, courteous, well educated . . . Molloy, of course, takes the credit. He recognised all your good qualities at first glance.’
Cavanagh chuckled over the message, then crumpled the napkin and wiped his lips with it when he heard Farnese and Galeazzi mounting the steps to the bridge.
He offered them a light-hearted greeting and what he was pleased to call ‘the five-dollar tour of the nerve centre of the vessel’. Farnese entered immediately into the spirit of the moment. He moved around the chart-table and the console, examining each item with a practised eye. Galeazzi pursued a line of private inquiry.
‘You interest me, Mr Cavanagh. I understand you have seen war service and that you now have a degree in law.’
‘For what it’s worth, yes sir.’
‘And what sort of career do you plan for yourself?’
‘I don’t know yet. That’s why I’m here, doing something I know, while I cope with all the things I don’t know. The whole world’s in a mess; but sooner or later the mess has to be sorted out. Diplomatic relations have to be normalised, trade patterns established and enforced. I’d like to be part of that process. How, I don’t know yet . . .’
‘Good!’ Galeazzi was suddenly alive and interested. ‘I like that! Did you hear, Alessandro? Here is a young fellow who doesn’t know! Splendid! May I offer you some advice my young friend?’
‘Of course.’
‘So long as you can work and eat you should keep travelling and learning. Come to Rome and I will find you a scholarship of some sort to study Canon Law for a year. Go to France, master the Code Napoléon. Go to Russia too, see how closely the Soviets have copied the Codex Justinianus . . .’
‘It’s late, Enrico,’ Farnese interrupted. ‘You lay too much all at once on our young friend.’
‘Please! I’m grateful, believe me. I’m very much the innocent abroad.’
‘I believe you are,’ said Galeazzi. ‘Therefore I seek to instruct you before you lose your innocence – as inevitably you will.’
‘I suggest,’ said Farnese with smiling malice, ‘he may have lost it some time ago. What say you, Mr Cavanagh?’
‘I’ll say anything you want, sir,’ said Cavanagh, amiably. ‘So long as you don’t require it to be the truth.’
‘In other words,’ said Galeazzi, calmly, ‘Mr Cavanagh is offended. I can’t say I blame him. He invited us to the bridge. He did not offer us his private confession.’
‘Then we should apologise. We do, most humbly, Mr Cavanagh.’
‘No apology is necessary, sir. I am employed to navigate you safely and, in between times, serve you in any way I can. For the rest, my private life is exactly that – a reserved matter. I’m sure that’s a familiar phrase to you both.’
‘Very familiar, Mr Cavanagh.’ Galeazzi gave him a sour smile of approval. ‘We thank you for your five-dollar tour. It was cheap at the price. Goodnight.’
‘Before we go.’ Farnese was suddenly a commanding presence in the narrow space. ‘This man you are taking us to meet tomorrow, what do you know about him?’
The question caught Cavanagh off guard. ‘What man? What meeting?’
‘Mr Molloy told us . . .’
Instantly Galeazzi cut him off.
‘Whatever he told us, Alessandro, he has not yet communicated it to Mr Cavanagh.’
Cavanagh was in command of himself again. He gave them a smile and a shrugging gesture of deprecation.
‘Nothing unusual in that, gentlemen. Mr Molloy doesn’t waste words. When he wants something done, he’ll tell me. If he wants me to know the why of it, he’ll tell me that too. I’ve always been comfortable with that kind of skipper.’
‘And from what he tells us,’ said Farnese blandly, ‘he is equally comfortable with you. Thank you again, Mr Cavanagh.’
‘Think about my advice, young man,’ Galeazzi insisted quietly. ‘You have a good mind. It would be a pity to waste it . . . Goodnight.’
Cavanagh waited while their footfalls receded along the deck and were finally cut off by the closing of the heavy bulkhead door into the saloon. Then he lifted the intercom and buzzed the signal to Lenore Pritchard’s cabin – one short, one long – repeated three times. Miss Pritchard might not grasp the irony, but Molloy most certainly would: in Morse code the signal meant, ‘Full stop. Period. End of conversation’. It was perhaps a subtle piece of wit to waste upon a man sated with sex; but Cavanagh himself had wit enough to know that Molloy’s own games in this love match were only beginning, and that like it or lump it, Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh was one of the pawns on the board.
At four in the morning Lou Molloy came to the bridge, freshly shaved, clear-eyed and smiling, smelling of bath soap and after-shave. He carried two mugs of black coffee and a basket of hot croissants. His greeting was cordial if a shade theatrical:
‘The top of the morning to you Mr Cavanagh. I trust you had an easy night. If you’ll show me where we’re at I’ll take over the watch, while you drink your coffee in peace.’
Cavanagh recited the helmsman’s litany: course, speed, position.
‘. . . Fifteen miles from the light, sir. The loom is visible now. The radar gives us a clear picture of the approach to Calvi. There are no hazards. We should have anchors down at 0600 hours, as near as be-damned. I’ve spoken to the harbour-master’s office by radio. No pratique is necessary for vessels coming directly from mainland France or Monte Carlo . . . I’ve signed off the log, as you see.’
‘Tired?’
‘No. I’ll wait up until we enter harbour. Everything is new to me. I don’t want to miss any part of it.’
‘In that case, I’d like a chat with you.’
‘Now?’
‘Any problem about that?’
‘None. What’s the subject of discussion?’
‘Last night’s little party. You handled yourself very well. I owe you one.’
‘It was on the house.’ Cavanagh was studiously casual.
‘Whatever.’ Molloy gave him a conspirator’s grin. ‘I like your little touch on the buzzer: dit-dah, dit-dah, dit-dah. It made – what do you call it in music? – a nice coda to the evening. Very dramatic.’
Cavanagh sipped his coffee and reached for a croissant. Molloy gave him a long, searching look then challenged him.
‘I take it you don’t approve of my shenanigans?’
‘No comment.’ Cavanagh bristled with sudden anger. ‘I thought we finished this discussion yesterday. This is your ship, your world. They run to your rules. I don’t question that. Now may we drop the subject?’
‘Sure. You seem to have grasped the elements of it very well. We pass to the second item.’
‘Which is?’
‘Immediately after breakfast, I want you to take a message ashore for me and bring me back the answer. It’s a private matter, so you’ll go alone. You may have company on the way back.’
‘It sounds simple enough.’
‘It is. It’s also very important.’
‘In that case, I have a request.’
‘Which is?’
‘Don’t tell me anything more than I need to know. That way, if anyone questions me I don’t have to lie and there’s no chance of my dropping an unguarded word about your private business.’
‘That would make good sense for both of us. Now let me ask you a question. How well are you read in recent church history?’
‘How recent?’
‘The last twenty years.’
Cavanagh laughed in genuine amusement.
‘What could I know, for Christ’s sake? I stepped straight from college into naval training and war service. For four years after my discharge I was chasing a buck, an education in law, and women – in that order . . . I haven’t even begun to fill all the gaps in my experience and education.’
‘I like that. I like it a lot!’ There was genuine pleasure in Molloy’s tone. ‘No better pupil than a man who knows the depth of his own ignorance. It’ll be my great pleasure to give you some personal instruction, beginning now. We’ve got the best part of two hours of plain sailing and since you’re waiting up, let’s talk about the two gentlemen you had on the bridge. Count Galeazzi is officially known as the “Architect of the Sacred Apostolic Palaces”. That, of itself, makes him an important man, a high Vatican official. However, and much more significantly, he is an old friend and adviser to the Holy Father. Because he’s a layman, he is not bound by clerical constraints and he deals, at the highest levels, with banks and other financial institutions all round the world. He is also Giulia’s godfather – although that’s not the reason he’s on board now. Prince Farnese, Giulia’s father, is head of one of the old papal families. He is a consultor to the Pontifical Commission for Vatican City State. He is connected to most of the old Catholic aristocracies of Europe. That’s the circle I’m marrying into: old families, old alliances, Vatican politics. Let me tell you Cavanagh, I’ve had to do some very fast study to bring myself half-way up to pace with these people. They need me; but they think they can bend me to all their purposes. They’re wrong! I don’t have any illusions about them. I’m important to them only because I’m one of their lifelines to the power and the money and the political networks of the United States. Also they trust the Irish. We’re like the Poles – undiluted Catholics, with all our prejudices intact. We’re totally impervious to reason or the virus of the Reformation. Spelly taught me that – Francis Cardinal Spellman – God bless his cotton socks and his devious Irish soul. He also taught me that the only loyalties you can count on in Rome are those you buy on the instalment plan – because you know they’ll stay bought until the last instalment is paid. And the most important lesson of all perhaps, was the one he repeated over and over: “Lou, this Church of ours, Holy, Roman, Catholic and Apostolic, is an empire, bigger and more complicated than the Roman or the British or any other in the last two thousand years. You can live in it for a lifetime, as I have, and never figure out the complexities of it and the conflicts and contradictions that go on within it every day. How do you cope? I’ll tell you. You make your profession your faith, loud and clear, and you make sure everybody hears it. That makes you part-way safe. Nobody can accuse you of heresy or schism – no matter what else they can cite against you. Next you come out hot and strong against the Communists. They’re the real Antichrist, and the Holy Father is committed to a worldwide crusade against ’em. The United States is in the forefront of that crusade, with the President and Joe McCarthy and John Foster Dulles and me too, by God! With those two points on the board, you’re half-way to winning. But,” says Spelly, “when you get to Rome, you have two other rules to learn: never assume that what you see is what is; never believe that what you’re told is the whole truth. It’s only when you’ve grasped that – and the Romans know you’ve grasped it – that you begin to win respect and make progress . . .” Do you understand what I’m telling you, now?’
‘I think I do.’ Cavanagh gave him an embarrassed grin. ‘But I’m asking whether it’s worth walking such a long way round to get the eggs. I’m a simple soul. I learned my first religion from the penny catechism – and asked my first real questions when a torpedo hit us and I lost four shipmates. I have no intention of marrying into the Almanach de Gotha or staying celibate and getting my name in the Annuario Pontificio as a household prelate!’
‘The latter I can understand.’ Molloy laughed. ‘The Almanach de Gotha? Don’t knock it Cavanagh! You’re young yet and you’ve still to learn how many secret rooms the law can open to you. A simple soul is it? I hope I’m not around when you discover how devious you really can become. Anyway let’s finish your briefing for this morning’s excursion.’ He pulled the note pad towards him and began to jot down the names for Cavanagh. ‘First item: you go ashore and walk to the Café Aleria in the square. You’ll find a man sitting alone at one of the sidewalk tables. He’ll be drinking a Pernod and reading a copy of yesterday’s Nice-Matin. He’s American. He answers to the name of Jordan. You tell him Lou Molloy sent you and that you’ll pick him up on the way back. Grab a taxi and head out to the Mas de la Balagne, which is a farm about half-way to Île Rousse. At the Mas you ask for a man called Sampiero Paoli.’
‘Let’s hold it there a moment. What language are we speaking? The name is obviously Italian.’
‘The family is old Corsican. The language is Corsican dialect, or French.’
‘Who am I? How do I identify myself?’
‘You’re nobody, a messenger, a mail-man. You hand over a letter. You wait for the answer.’
‘Which should be.’
‘A man, a Frenchman. You deliver him to Jordan and bring them both back to the Salamandra.’
‘And that’s it?’
‘That’s it. Any problems?’
‘No problems, just a question.’
‘Ask it.’
‘Why the double shuffle? You need me to drive the boat, sure; but why do you need a go-between to deliver an envelope and pick up a live body?’
‘I quote,’ said Lou Molloy, softly. ‘I quote verbatim, from young Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh himself. “Don’t tell me anything more than I need to know. Don’t explain who, why or wherefore . . .” Did I get it right?’
‘You did, Mr Molloy. I must be wearier than I thought. If you’ll excuse me I’ll take the coffee mugs down to the galley, then freshen myself up with a shower and a shave.’
‘If you need to get laid as well,’ said Molloy cheerfully, ‘call on Lenore. She’ll oblige you any time. I like to keep a happy ship. Remember that Cavanagh! A happy ship!’
From the deck of the Salamandra d’Oro the harbour of Calvi looked like a large, land-locked lake, surrounded by broad sandy beaches, with the old town tucked into the north-east corner out of reach of the winds. The flat hinterlands of the Balagne were closely farmed, with olive groves, orchards of citrus, almonds and peaches, plots of vegetables, and flocks of goats grazing on the coarse pastures near the seashore. It looked peaceful and prosperous, but Galeazzi, in his trenchant fashion, pronounced it ‘. . . unhappy, unhealthy and economically unsound. Italy occupied it during the war with eighty thousand troops. The Germans sent in about fifteen thousand. Their casualties from malaria were much higher than their combat losses. The population has been halved since 1936 by emigration and, although they’ve got rid of the anopheles mosquito, the place is still rent by family feuds and vendettas. Most of the criminal activities of the French Riviera are run by Corsican families . . . If the place has a future at all, it must be in tourist development . . .’
Which raised again for Cavanagh the elementary question of why they had come here. No one else was going ashore. The boys had put out the swimming ladders and stretched the sun awnings on the afterdeck. Molloy had given him what he had been pleased to call ‘the envelope’, which was in fact a flat sack of unbleached cotton, containing unspecified materials, taped like an old-fashioned poultice around his chest and covered by his shirt. Cavanagh protested mildly.
‘It’s bloody uncomfortable and it makes me feel foolish, as though I’ve strayed into a B-movie.’
‘You’d feel a lot more foolish if you dropped it in the water or left it in the taxi.’
‘Aye, aye sir!’ said Cavanagh glumly, and made his way to the waiting dinghy. He was ashore within a couple of minutes and tied up at the little stone jetty near the fishing basin.
The town itself was already as hot as an oven. The striped awning of the Café Aleria provide a small relief from the glare, but none from the eddies of hot, dusty air that rose from the cobbled sidewalk.
The café was clearly a resort for local fishermen who had wisely occupied the shady interior. The solitary fellow drinking Pernod at a sidewalk table looked like Marcello Mastroianni with a crew-cut. He was dressed in cotton slacks and shirt and a pair of local espadrilles, and he had an engaging schoolboy smile. Cavanagh approached him and put the question:
‘I am.’ The accent was eastern seaboard USA.
‘I’m from the Salamandra d’Oro. Mr Molloy sends his compliments.’
‘That’s nice; but I hope you’ll be bringing me more than compliments.’
‘I’ll bring what I’m given. Those are the only instructions I have. You’ll be waiting here?’
‘I’ll be waiting.’
‘Where can I pick up a taxi?’
‘You have to telephone.’ He flipped Cavanagh a jeton. ‘Inside the bar. The number’s just above the telephone.’
‘Thanks.’
‘My pleasure.’
The taxi took ten minutes to arrive and was driven by a laconic fellow with dark, greased hair, a drooping moustache and a leery eye. The vehicle and the driver stank of stale Gauloises: Cavanagh wound down the window, stuck his head out into the slipstream and prayed he wouldn’t be sick.
The Mas de la Balagne was about five miles out of Calvi. It was approached by a driveway which wound through an impressive avenue of old chestnut trees to a stone farmhouse built four-square around a cobbled courtyard with a double door of ancient hewn timber. Outside the door was a rusted bell, mounted on a wooden pillar. Cavanagh rang the bell, which had a cracked, discordant sound. A few moments later, an elderly woman appeared in the doorway at the far side of the courtyard and beckoned him to come to her. By the time he reached the door she had disappeared and in her place stood a dark, stocky fellow with greying hair and no trace of a welcoming smile. He asked in French:
‘Who are you? What do you want?’
‘I have a message for Sampiero Paoli.’
‘I am Paoli. What’s the message?’
‘I don’t know. I’m wearing it under my shirt.’ He opened the buttons of his shirt to display the cotton envelope. ‘May I come in?’
The stocky one stood aside to let him enter a big stone-flagged kitchen with a long, scarred table, a carving block made from a tree trunk, onions and leeks hanging from the beams and a big iron stewpot steaming on an old, black, wood oven. Cavanagh stripped off his shirt, peeled the strapping from his body and handed the fabric envelope to Paoli. He said:
‘I was told there would be an answer.’
‘Wait here. There’s wine on the table. Help yourself.’
He walked out carrying the package and a long, pointed knife which he picked up from the carving block. Cavanagh crossed to the table and poured himself a cup of wine from an earthenware pitcher. It was white and cool but rough and unwelcoming as the country itself. The first mouthful gave him heartburn, so he sipped the rest of it slowly and carefully. He was almost at the dregs of the cup when Paoli came back, empty handed. He asked:
‘What did you think of our wine?’
‘It’s rough,’ said Cavanagh with a grin, ‘very rough.’
‘It’s rough country.’ A faint flicker of humour lit up his dour features and he beckoned Cavanagh to follow him through the rear door of the kitchen, down a long passageway that gave onto a stretch of cultivated land. Beyond the plots were a series of hillocks rising to a low escarpment. Paoli pointed upwards:
‘It is necessary to walk a little.’
They walked perhaps half a mile, winding through the first low mounds, then climbing to the plateau of the escarpment. There, dark against the sky, stood three dolmens, each a flat slab of stone resting upon huge, rough-hewn uprights. Cavanagh stared at them in amazement, groping through the ragbag of memory for fragments of archaeology. He asked Paoli:
‘What are these?’
‘We call them the table-stones. They are the burying places of the ancient people. There are many such, all over the island. Since the war, more and more scholars are coming to study them.’
He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted in French:
‘Holà Tolvier! Your man has arrived!’
There was a brief period of silence, then a man emerged from the shadow of the furthest dolmen. He was dressed in rough peasant clothes and he carried a shotgun. He approached with slow, cautious steps. His voice was harsh and hostile.
‘Hands up. Palms towards me.’
Cavanagh raised his hands slowly. He turned to Paoli.
‘Who’s this?’
‘This is the answer to your message. You’re taking him back to Calvi.’
Cavanagh turned back to the armed man. Suddenly and irrationally he was angry. He shouted in French:
‘I’m putting my hands down. If you want to shoot, go ahead. I’m unarmed. I was sent to fetch you. Only a damned fool kills the messenger before he’s heard the message.’
Tolvier lowered the gun and took a few more steps towards them. He demanded curtly:
‘What’s the message?’
‘You are to come back to Calvi with me. There’s a man called Jordan waiting for you at the Café Aleria. If you’re the man he’s expecting, I’m taking you both out to the Salamandra d’Oro, which is a motor vessel registered in the United States. That’s all the orders I have.’
‘And this Jordan?’
‘He could be a man from Mars. I think he’s American. I had thirty seconds’ conversation with him.’
Tolvier turned to Paoli.
‘Is this true?’
Paoli shrugged.
‘The money has been paid. This fellow delivered it. What more can I tell you? I kept my part of the bargain. Now you have to make your own decisions.’
Tolvier stood for a moment, looking from one to the other. Then he snapped the safety catch on the shotgun and tossed it to Paoli. To Cavanagh he said abruptly:
‘I’m ready. Let’s go.’
Walking in Indian file they made their way back to the farmhouse. Paoli, carrying the shotgun, made a sinister rear guard to the small procession.
The moment the taxi drew up outside the Café Aleria, Jordan leapt inside the vehicle and ordered the driver to make all speed to the fishing dock. During the short drive he conducted a swift but clinical check of Tolvier.
‘Turn your face to the right.’
As he did so, Jordan traced with his finger tip two parallel scars on the left cheek.
‘How did you get those?’
‘Sabre practice.’
‘Where?’
‘A salle d’Armes in Lyon.’
‘Who ran it?’
‘Louis Claude Barrault.’
‘Give me your right hand.’
Jordan examined it carefully. The small finger had been broken at the first joint. It had been badly set and was permanently swollen with arthritic growth. Jordan released his hold and turned to Cavanagh with a grin.
‘Mission accomplished. Thanks.’
‘What now?’ asked Cavanagh.
‘You take us back to the ship.’
‘You pay the taxi.’ Cavanagh returned his grin. ‘I’ll get our friend into the dinghy. That way you can cover us both.’
‘A sound thought,’ said Jordan. ‘But our real threat is out there.’
He pointed out across the wide bay where, far from the docks, a rusted Fairmile flying the British flag and a tricolour courtesy pennant was just dropping anchor. Cavanagh strained to decipher the name on her transom, but she was too far away. Jordan enlightened him:
‘She’s the Jackie Sprat. British registry, Corsican skipper. Bad news. The good news is she’s later than we expected. Let’s get the hell out of here!’
As he drove them back at speed to the Salamandra, Cavanagh could see Molloy and Giulia playing a game of water polo with Jackie and Lenore Pritchard. Farnese and Galeazzi were leaning on the rail looking at the rusted hull of the Fairmile. Hadjidakis stood watch on the foredeck with a pair of binoculars, while the Countess lay on a chaise-longue under the awning, with an unread book on her bosom and a pitcher of iced lemonade beside her.
When the dinghy came alongside, Hadjidakis was there to hand the two newcomers aboard and hurry them below decks. Cavanagh hung the dinghy astern, then hurried down to the forepeak to change into a pair of swim-trunks. When he came on deck he saw Giulia and Molloy swimming back to the ship. They waved to him. He ignored the signal. He was off duty. He was hot, tired and irritable. The last thing he needed was another interrogation. He hoisted himself onto the guard-rail, balanced himself for one precarious moment, then dived overside and swam far out into the centre of the bay.
Hadjidakis, back on deck, focussed the glasses on him and frowned unhappily. He liked to keep all his brood – visitors and crew alike – well within hailing distance. Although no one wanted to admit it, there were sharks in the Mediterranean; people did get cramps and have to be hauled out of the water. Add to which, Lou Molloy was an unpredictable fellow who had been known to order engines started and anchors up at the first whiff of a weather change or a woman’s wave from a neighbouring cruiser.
This morning – so far at least – Molloy seemed calm and content, enjoying an innocent playtime. Hadjidakis prayed that the mood might last, that the visitors were good news and that Cavanagh, a chancy fellow himself, would do nothing to upset the master of the Salamandra d’Oro. He need not have worried. After a night on watch, a troubling excursion ashore and a long swim, Cavanagh was dog tired. He collected a plate of cold cuts and a bottle of beer from the galley, ate and drank without relish, then tumbled into his bunk and slept until seven in the evening.
That night the crew were not bidden to join the guests; so while Leo and Jackie served the cocktails, Hadjidakis, Lenore and Cavanagh ate an early supper and then sat chatting together on the foredeck. Hadjidakis had news for them:
‘A change of plan. We’re not cruising Corsica. We’re heading for Italian waters. We leave after midnight. Your watch again, Cavanagh.’
‘Suits me. What’s the route?’
‘North-east to Cap Corse then south-east to the island of Elba. I’ve laid out the charts and put markers in the pilot books.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Read the pilot carefully. There’s a notable magnetic deviation around Elba because of the large mass of iron ore on the island.’
‘Interesting. How long is the run?’
‘About forty-five miles on each leg. We’ll time it to eat breakfast in port.’
‘Why the sudden change?’ It was Lenore who put the question.
‘I didn’t ask. Molloy was like a bear with a toothache all afternoon. You were lucky to be asleep, Cavanagh. All the rest of us were rousted for something or other.’
Lenore Pritchard pursed her lips in disapproval.
‘I don’t envy the bride-to-be. Once she marries him she’ll be on a real roller-coaster ride.’
‘You might be surprised.’ Hadjidakis gave a humourless grin. ‘Just before cocktail time they were on deck together. She was giving him the rough edge of her tongue, and Lou was taking it without a murmur.’
‘That’s bad news!’ Lenore Pritchard was not at all happy. ‘The more he took from her, the more he’ll dish out to me.’
‘What does he dish out exactly?’ Cavanagh’s concern was obvious. Lenore Pritchard tried to skate around the issue.
‘I told you he plays rough games; but then so do I. I guess it balances itself out.’
‘You’ve shocked the boy!’ Hadjidakis goaded her softly. ‘He’s very young. He has a lot to learn.’
‘I’ve offered him free lessons. So far he’s been too shy to accept the offer.’
‘It’s not that I’m shy, colleen oge,’ Cavanagh gave her his widest, sunniest smile, ‘but I don’t like pain myself and I hate to inflict it on anyone else – certainly not as a form of amusement. Which is not to say I am not grateful for your kind invitation, but who am I to be claiming privileges in my own captain’s bedchamber?’
‘He told me he offered them to you himself.’
‘Indeed he did, but he made it sound as though he owned you, which is not the way I like to receive a woman – at the gift of another man.’
‘But I made the offer too.’
‘Indeed you did.’
‘So why haven’t you accepted?’
‘Well now, that’s not an easy question to answer without sounding rude: but let me try. When I was growing up and just beginning to spend money and chase girls, my father took us away for a holiday in a fashionable seaside pub. One of the first things he showed me was the notice screwed to the bedroom door. It listed the innkeeper’s liabilities and also the charge for the room. He made me read it carefully and added his own footnote: “Bryan,” he said “there’s no such thing as a free bed or free board. Both of ’em have to be paid for, in cash or kind. So before you have lunch or get laid, just be sure you’re prepared to pay the score or scrub the dishes.” So, you might say that’s what’s holding me back: I can’t read the price tag on these fabulous offers. However . . .’ he reached out to stroke her cheek, ‘if you’re ever in real bother with Molloy, give a yell. I’ll come running.’
‘If you do,’ said Hadjidakis, ‘Molloy will break your back! You’d better believe that!’
‘I’d expect him to try it. Whether he’d succeed or not is another question altogether. But thanks for the warning.’
‘You get that for free,’ said Hadjidakis. He heaved himself to his feet and left them a hand’s breadth apart, watching the last light fade over the black hills behind the town.
That night, the guests sat late over dinner and later still over coffee and liqueurs on the afterdeck. For the first time, they seemed to be at ease with each other. Their laughter and their talk rose high and voluble, like fountains spurting suddenly in a silent garden.
The Chef had finished his work and retired. Lenore Pritchard was in bed, ‘alone tonight – and God! am I glad of it.’ Jackie and Leo were cleaning up in the galley. Hadjidakis and Cavanagh were on the bridge, waiting for Molloy to call a halt to the evening, so that they could square away for the overnight run to Elba.
Hadjidakis switched on the talk-back microphone normally used to acknowledge bridge commands when docking or casting off. The conversation on the afterdeck was immediately audible. Molloy was at the tail-end of a statement . . .
‘. . . If you’re on the run from people with worldwide connections, like the Mafia or the intelligence services, or a freelance assassin, it isn’t easy to disappear. Tolvier is wanted for at least seven murders in 1944, as well as crimes against humanity while he was acting as interrogator for the German and the Vichy French in Lyons. We’ve just lifted him out of hiding, and tonight we’re handing him over to the CIA while we’re at sea.’
‘It sounds like a plot for a thriller,’ Giulia’s tone was dismissive, ‘a particularly cheap one.’
‘Not cheap, my love!’ Molloy’s laugh had an edge of irritation to it. ‘This was a very expensive operation.’
‘But an important one!’ Galeazzi added a hasty postscript. ‘Important to His Eminence in Lyons, to the whole French Church and to our other Eminence in Rome.’
To which Farnese added his own rider.
‘Most important of all perhaps to American Intelligence, who are buying up these characters like horse-flesh at an auction.’
‘Which I find entirely scandalous!’ The Countess was emphatic, if a trifle tipsy. ‘These people are criminals, traitors, torturers. Tolvier was a professional interrogator for the Germans and the Vichy Militia. By helping him, you have dirtied yourselves!’
‘My dear Lucietta!’ Galeazzi was, as always, the voice of pure reason. ‘In war one uses whatever allies one can muster, whatever weapons lie to hand. Make no mistake, we are still at war with the Marxists all over the world. No matter that the war is undeclared or that it is fought by subversion instead of by armies, it is still a mortal combat. So, those who are useful to us in the struggle must be able to count on our protection. Whatever their past villainies, they must be able to count on the compassion and forgiveness promised by Christ, through the Church, to the repentant sinner.’
‘Poppycock!’ said the Contessa. ‘I hope God can forgive the Holy Father for all he didn’t do in the war and what is going on under his very nose in his own city! The French Church and Rome itself are still providing escape routes for war criminals. Now you are aiding and abetting them!’
‘Enough, Lucietta!’ Farnese was furious.
‘It’s late,’ said Galeazzi. ‘Let’s leave this discussion for another time.’
‘We should let the crew clear up,’ said Lou Molloy. ‘We weigh anchor at midnight . . .’
Hadjidakis reached up and switched off the intercom. He turned a quizzical eye on Cavanagh.
‘Well now! What do you make of that?’
Cavanagh grinned and shook his head.
‘I didn’t hear anything. You didn’t either, because we’re too polite to eavesdrop on Mr Molloy and his distinguished guests.’
A reluctant smile dawned in Hadjidakis’ dark eyes.
‘For a dumb mick, you learn fast, Cavanagh! I like you, Molloy likes you too, though sometimes we both think you’re a cocky young bastard – but you have to know there are no secrets between Lou Molloy and Giorgios Hadjidakis. We’ve shared too much to let anyone drive a wedge between us. So long as you remember that we’ll get alone fine. Understand?’
‘I’ve always understood it,’ said Cavanagh mildly. ‘You’re old friends. I’m just the hired help. No argument.’
‘Good! Now let’s give our dancing boys a hand to straighten up the deck. They’ve been working their pretty little tails off and I want ’em up bright and early to scrub decks and clean windows before we dock in Elba . . .’
At fifteen minutes to midnight they had the decks cleared and the ship secured for the overnight passage. At five minutes to the hour the anchors were up and Cavanagh, with Molloy and Hadjidakis beside him, was nosing out of the harbour and heading north-east to Cap Corse. The wind was light, the sea calm. The forecast promised an easy passage. Molloy, however, had new orders for him:
‘We’re getting rid of Jordan and Tolvier tonight.’
‘How and where?’
‘At sea, half an hour out. I’m told there’s a US submarine running submerged on a parallel course. When she surfaces and signals, you heave to and wait for them to send a rubber dinghy to collect our friends. I’ll be glad to set ’em off my hands. I don’t like either of them very much, but at least Jordan is our spook. Any questions, Cavanagh?’
‘No, sir. You’ve told me all I need to know. If you want to go to bed, I can handle things.’
‘I’m sure you can.’ Molloy gave him a sardonic grin. ‘But Giorgios will hand over the bodies. After that you’ll have an easy watch. There’ll be no shenanigans with Lenore tonight. I’m bushed. If the Queen of Sheba presented herself mother-naked and fresh from the bath, I’d have to send her away. God rest ye merry gentlemen!’
Abruptly he left the bridge. Hadjidakis made a pinpoint mark on the chart and told Cavanagh:
‘I’ll walk up to the bows and take some fresh air while I’m watching. By the way, no mention of this in the log.’
‘Thanks for telling me,’ Cavanagh was testy. ‘I hope we’re not going permanently into the body-lifting business.’
‘I think you can count on that,’ said Hadjidakis. ‘Lou had some markers to pay off to the Intelligence community. This took care of a whole batch of them.’
‘It might also make him some enemies.’
‘It will; but that’s his problem, not yours.’
‘Of course. Foolish of me to think otherwise! Downright stupid of me to ask!’
‘Sometimes,’ said Giorgios Hadjidakis, ‘sometimes you really are a dumb mick!’
The transfer of Jordan and Tolvier went off without a hitch. The submarine broke surface and lay like a great sea animal dead in the water fifty yards from the Salamandra. Two seamen in a rubber dinghy came to pick the men from the stern of the Salamandra and ferry them back to the submarine. Hadjidakis watched until they were aboard and the hatch was sealed again; then he went up to the bridge to deliver a laconic order to Cavanagh.
‘They’re gone and good riddance! Your ship, mister. I’ll see you in the morning.’
Cavanagh bade him goodnight and wished him quickly gone so that he could enjoy the purest pleasure of his life: a soft sea, a sky full of stars, the lights of a strange shoreline and himself alone and wakeful at the helm, a new Ulysses, dreaming of an ancient world which he had crossed oceans to discover.
At twenty-to-two in the morning he was trying to identify a vessel following steadily in his wake about two miles away. He guessed it to be a trawler or, more probably, a long-line fisherman trolling for swordfish on the edges of the shallow feeding grounds and the deep trenches. Then, remembering Jordan’s words on the dock, he wondered if it could be the Jackie Sprat. He was tempted to put on speed to see if the other vessel would try to match him, but he rejected the idea in case it might disturb the passengers.
It was not an important matter; rather, it was part of a nightly game played by a lone helmsman to keep himself awake and attentive. While he noted the event in his log, he was anchored in the small luminous pool made by the spotlight on the chart-table. The rest of the bridge was in twilight, while outside there was only starshine and the distant, sparse illuminations along the Corsican shoreline.
Then, sudden and silent as a phantom, Giulia Farnese was standing beside him. He had not heard her approach. Her animal heat and the heady swirl of her perfume were the first indications of her presence.
She was barefoot, dressed in silk pyjamas with a woollen sweater pulled over the top, so that she looked like a schoolgirl ready for a dormitory party. She wore no make-up and there were dark shadows under her eyes. Cavanagh stammered a greeting in Italian. She answered with an apology and an oddly desperate plea.
‘I’m sorry to disturb you. May I stay up here for a while?’
‘Of course. Take the helmsman’s chair.’
He helped her hoist herself onto the high stool. She launched immediately into a babble of explanations.
‘I couldn’t go to sleep for a long time. I never can after a talkie evening. When I did fall asleep, I dropped straight into a terrible nightmare. Even when I woke up, the cabin seemed full of it. I couldn’t stay there. I had to get out.’
To which Cavanagh had an instant but unspoken reaction: ‘If I were that scared and two doors away from the one I loved, I know where I’d be at this moment – and it wouldn’t be on a ship’s bridge with a stranger!’ What he said, however, was quite different:
‘There are no nightmares here. Just the sea and the stars – clean, beautiful things. Look out there . . .’
‘You don’t understand!’
‘So make me understand. Tell me. Talk it out of your brain-box.’
The story she told had an odd, disjointed quality, as though she were still brushing away the cobwebs of the dream.
‘. . . During the war I lost my only brother. He was a pilot, killed in Libya. He was a beautiful, beautiful young man and I adored him. I still dream about him sometimes, and always the dreams have been happy ones, so that I’m sorry to wake up and lose them . . . Tonight was different. After dinner we were talking about that horrible man Tolvier. He was a collaborator who worked with Klaus Barbie, interrogating his own countrymen under torture. For some reason the Archbishop of Lyons is protecting him and hiding him. There are other high people in France who want to have him out of the way without a trial. Cardinal Tisserant at the Vatican also wants him free. That’s how Galeazzi and my father are involved. Lou has supplied money and contacts with US Intelligence who want Tolvier to work with them . . . But that’s all by the way. Somewhere in the talk Lou said the best way to disappear was to die and get resurrected. That’s what I saw in the nightmare; my beautiful brother rising out of an open grave . . . But he wasn’t beautiful any more. He was horrible, horrible . . .’
Suddenly she was out of control, her hands shaking, teeth chattering, her body torn with deep, racking sobs. Cavanagh put his arm around her and held her close, crooning to her:
‘. . . Easy now! Easy! It was only a dream. It’s over and gone. Your brother’s at rest . . .’
Her panic subsided slowly. When, finally she was calm again, Cavanagh poured coffee from the thermos and steadied her hand as she held it to her lips. He wondered – not at all irrelevantly – what Lou Molloy would do, say or think if he came upon them now. Giulia Farnese gave voice to the same thought.
‘Look at me! I’m a mess. What would Lou think if he saw me now?’
Cavanagh gave a small, humourless laugh.
‘He’d probably try to punch me in the nose.’
‘And would you let him do that?’
‘Let’s say I’d try very hard to stop him; but what would the Princess Giulia Farnese be doing during the fight?’
A mischievous smile twitched at the corners of her mouth.
‘I’m not sure. It would depend on who was winning. But I would stay until the end so I could patch you up. I’d owe you that at least, after what you’ve done for me tonight.’
‘You owe me nothing. I’m glad I was here to help.’
‘Aunt Lucietta told me you were good value. I have to confess I didn’t believe her at first. She gets crushes on half the young men she meets. I don’t blame her. She’s been widowed a long time, and in the last days of the war she lost a lover who was very dear to her. My father and the rest of the family didn’t approve of him, because, although he came from an old and noble family, he joined the Communist Party and took to the hills with one of their partisan groups. The Germans captured him and he died under Gestapo interrogation. That’s why Aunt Lucietta is so critical about Vatican policies and some of the things my father is involved in . . .’ She broke off abruptly. ‘But this is old history, our history; it has nothing to do with you. Tell me about yourself. What brought you to Europe? What will you do when this summer is over?’
‘I’ll put on my pack and go wandering again, picking up jobs as I go. I’ve given myself a year before I settle down.’
‘To what?’
‘To the law, which is what I’ve been trained for.’
‘I can’t imagine you stuck in some stuffy office surrounded by briefs and books!’
‘Frankly, neither can I; but there is another side to the question. We’re just coming out of one of the most lawless periods in world history. Sooner or later, if we’re to become half-way human again, the rule of law has to prevail. We have to be able to settle disputes without killing each other, make bargains that will hold, defend the rights of people who have neither the strength nor the knowledge to do it themselves. I’d like to find a role for myself in that process; but before I do I have to understand history, which I’m rediscovering every day, and the present, which is why I’m working on languages and people, the idioms of their lives.’
‘Is that what you’re doing now? Working on me?’
‘This isn’t work. It’s pleasure. My only regret is . . .’
He broke off in mid sentence.
‘Go on. Say it!’
‘My only regret,’ he told her gravely, ‘is that the pleasure has to be brief and is constantly curtailed by social circumstances . . . and if that sounds impertinent, I trust the Principessa will forgive me.’
‘Please don’t call me Principessa.’
‘Courtesy demands it.’
‘Not here. Not now.’
‘What should I call you then?’
‘Giulia. That’s my name, after all!’
‘Giulia.’ The word tasted sweet on his tongue. ‘Giulia la Bella. Strange isn’t it? I know more about your ancestor than I do about you.’
‘Would you believe I hate her?’
‘For God’s sake, why?’
‘Because even after all these centuries I live in her shadow. She dominates my whole life. After my brother was killed, all my father’s hopes and ambitions for the family were centred on me. When that first Giulia became the mistress of the Borgia Pope, she became the patroness and protector of the whole family. My father dreams the same role for me!’
‘That’s a hell of a load to carry!’
‘Sometimes I’d like to cast it off and disappear – just like Tolvier!’
‘Why don’t you?’
‘Where would I run? To a garret in Paris?’
‘Your father, what does he say about all this?’
‘Nothing. He takes my duty for granted, as he takes everything else in his history and his life. This marriage, for instance; it is not by his standards an ideal one, but in today’s world it is much better than any European union that could be arranged. Lou is rich. He is well connected politically in the United States, he is a friend of the man they call the American Pope, Cardinal Spellman, who is himself a close friend of Papa Pio . . . Papa Pio will confer a papal decoration on Lou before we are married. So for today it’s a very good arrangement.’
‘And for tomorrow?’
‘For tomorrow there are other possible arrangements. There will be no divorce, but if I am unhappy I may take a lover. Lou himself most certainly would – as he does now.’
Cavanagh stared at her in amazement. For the boy from ‘down-under’, the respectable lace-curtain Irish Catholic, whose modest fortunes were founded on the gold fields of Ballarat and a string of country pubs, all this was history reenacted in technicolor. But far beyond the surprise was a sense of pathos and of waste. He expressed it in a single, blunt statement.
‘So far I’ve heard duty and money and arrangements; but nothing about love.’
‘Because love’s a private matter and it’s different with every man and woman. Sometimes it comes soon, sometimes late. Sometimes it wears out quickly. In the lucky ones it lasts a lifetime.’
‘And for Giulia Farnese?’
‘She doesn’t know enough yet to discuss it.’
‘That’s a great pity.’
‘But you, Mr Cavanagh, will not presume to offer her pity.’
‘I beg your pardon, Principessa. I should know better. Lou Molloy read me a long lecture about how I was expected to behave in noble company.’
‘I’ll assure him you have behaved impeccably.’
‘Better you didn’t.’ Cavanagh gave her a crooked Irish grin. ‘He might get the wrong idea.’
‘In what sense?’
‘He might think his lady and I have something to hide.’
She was smiling now, feline and conspiratorial, Giulia the Beautiful, straight out of the history books.
‘But we do! Lou has never seen me as you saw me tonight. I wouldn’t want him to either. So, I have to trust you not to tell him or anyone else.’
‘There would be no reason to tell – unless you told him first and he asked me a direct question. I won’t lie for you; but I certainly won’t gossip either.’
‘If you did, we would become enemies. I want us to be friends, Cavanagh.’
‘Then that’s another secret that has to be kept, Giulia mia.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I’m paid to be a servant. I made that contract with Molloy. My role, like yours, is fixed. Of course we can be friends, but it’s better for everyone’s peace of mind if we let the service signify the friendship.’
‘You talk like a Jesuit.’
‘I was trained by them.’
‘Are you afraid of Molloy?’
‘No. He employs me. He doesn’t own me. The worst he can do is fire me.’
‘Are you afraid of me?’
‘No; but I am afraid of myself. A man could break his heart and his neck reaching too high for forbidden fruit.’
‘How will you know whether it’s too high unless you stretch or jump for it?’
‘Because I can measure what you’re marrying: money, power, position, experience. I can’t match Molloy in any of those things.’
‘Would you want to match him, Cavanagh?’
‘One day I might just be mad enough.’
‘I wonder how love will happen to you?’
He laid his large hand over hers, ready to withdraw in an instant. She made no movement, uttered no word of protest as he answered her.
‘For me I think it will be a swift thing, a risky one too perhaps; but it will be all or nothing, a wild ride to the edge of the world and back.’ He gave a small, rueful laugh. ‘So be warned, my little Princess, don’t tease the sleeping tiger . . . Now it’s time you were in bed. I have a watch to keep and you’re very disturbing company.’
He raised her imprisoned hand to his lips and then released it. She sat silent a long moment, studying his face, tracing the structure of it with the tip of her finger. Then she said very softly:
‘Some woman trained you well, Cavanagh.’
‘There was a house full of ’em! My mother and three sisters. Even my father, who was no pussycat, kept his shoes wiped and his temper under control and his language polished in their living-room. So yes, you might say I’ve been woman-trained. Maybe you’ll feel moved to write me a letter of reference when the summer is over.’
‘You’re a clown, Cavanagh.’
‘That’s what Molloy called me. I hope, before summer’s end, you’ll find a better name.’
‘I’ll keep thinking, I promise . . .’
She leaned forward, kissed him lightly on the lips then slid sideways out of the chair to avoid any answering embrace. Instantly, she was the old Giulia, closed, imperious, cold as moonlight. Only the smile in her eyes betrayed her.
‘The coffee was most welcome, Mr Cavanagh, the talk most instructive and your manners are beyond reproach.’
‘My simple duty, Principessa – and my great pleasure also.’
He gave her an ironic salute and watched her walk barefoot down the companionway to the deck. When he turned back to the chart-table he saw that she had left her handkerchief, a small wisp of cambric and lace. He touched it to his lips, then folded it carefully and buttoned it into the pocket of his shirt. A man could be hanged on evidence like that – or he could be moved to dance a jig and shout canticles of joy. Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh checked the compass heading and the radar screen, then tuned into the radio programme from Nice on which Charles Trenet was singing ‘La Mer’ . . . it seemed a nice, romantic postscript to a very enigmatic encounter.
It was bright morning when they made the approach to Elba. Hadjidakis was at the helm. Molloy and Farnese stood beside him, studying the configuration of the northern coastline, the traffic of fishermen and ferries across the seven-mile channel between the island the mainland port of Piombino.
Their talk was technical: of water supplies and power sources, the planned extension of the single island airstrip, the range of local agriculture, the sources of tourist traffic from the Ligurian coast and the cities of Tuscany.
Cavanagh, off watch and off duty, was standing in the prow of the vessel, sketching the foothills and the peak of Monte Capanne, the marching cypresses which wound about the slopes, and the patterns of vineyards and olive groves and vegetable plots and the dark shadows of the pinewoods near the shore. Over on the mainland had lived the Etruscans, a serene and hedonistic people, whose frescoed tombs still stood among the wheat fields. Their city was called Populonia, and there they smelted the iron ore which their galleys brought from Elba. There was smelting on the island too and the Greek traders called it Aethalia, the smoking place, because of the vapours from the kilns . . . On the mountain he was sketching there were deposits of gemstones: beryl and tourmaline and garnet which the ancients fashioned into ornaments.
Galeazzi stood a pace away, watching him work, making his own reminiscent commentary . . .
‘There has always been a boat-building industry here and on the mainland, and the fishing is good: sardines and anchovies and tuna . . . But these resources are all limited and rapidly diminishing, so the economic future will depend more and more on tourism. I have recommended to Molloy and Farnese that they make their first venture here, because there is a good substructure already in existence: ferry services from Livorno, Piombino and Genoa, a good coastal highway on the mainland and a parallel railway system. On the island there is property available; freehold and leasehold. There are shipyards in Spezia and Livorno which already are setting up for pleasure craft. Also there are places which can be developed as tourist attractions; Napoleon’s Villa, the local museum, the old Spanish fort, sites for undersea exploration. We know that there are several ancient wrecks around the coastline. My own son has dived here and brought up a few bronze pieces and fragments of pottery . . . I have advised both Molloy and Farnese that they should establish themselves on the south of the island where the development is still sparse, and where the harbourage for small craft would be much safer . . . I hope they will listen to me . . .’
A comment seemed to be called for; Cavanagh tried to keep it strictly neutral.
‘I can’t speak for Prince Farnese; but I’m sure Mr Molloy will be very responsive to your advice. He can be brusque and blunt, but he listens carefully and doesn’t miss too many details.’
‘He certainly knows his own mind – and speaks it!’ Galeazzi’s comment was as neutral as Cavanagh’s. ‘That is, of course, the strength and the weakness of Americans. In business they are both thorough and ruthless. In other matters like diplomacy and social relationships they often lack a certain acuteness of perception, an awareness of nuances . . .’
The words he used were sottigliezze and sfumature. Cavanagh pondered them for a moment and then realised that, as a man from the new world, he was as much under fire as Molloy. So, coolly at first, then with increasing eloquence he made his speech for the defence.
‘With great respect sir, I suggest you misread all of us who come from migrant societies. My country is even younger than Mr Molloy’s. It is just as large as the United States, but there are only twelve million people in it. It is potentially very rich, but it holds both threats and promises for the future . . . You have to understand something about migrant societies. Across their history there lies a fault-line, a steep escarpment which separates them from the physical and spiritual homeland of their ancestors, and effectively prevents their return to it. The continuity of their history is broken. It can never be wholly restored. Take me for instance. Like Mr Molloy I have Irish forebears, but I am Australian, born and bred. I am a Catholic, but of a special kind, not French, not Roman, part Irish, yes, but not wholly that either. I’ve come here of my own volition to re-establish for myself some of the continuities. I come with a reasonably prepared mind. At this moment, I am speaking your language, I am not asking you to speak mine. But when you talk of “subtleties” and “nuances”, of course, you are right. I miss many of them. I am like the Dorian Greek making his first visit to Athens or Alexandria. More appropriately perhaps, I am a Roman, come from the confines of the Empire to Rome itself . . . I’m not explaining myself very well, but . . .’
‘On the contrary, my dear Cavanagh,’ Galeazzi encouraged him cheerfully, ‘I find you a most eloquent advocate, and your points are well taken. Far from belittling your background, I confess myself more and more impressed by it. I hope you are giving some thought to the suggestions I made about your future career?’
‘Yes sir, I am. But there’s the whole of summer to run yet. I’m enjoying myself too much to think beyond that.’
‘Bravo! That’s exactly as it should be.’ The Countess moved in to join them, grasping Cavanagh’s arm to steady herself as the Salamandra rolled in the wash of a passing ferry. Galeazzi asked:
‘Where’s Giulia? She’s missing all this.’
‘She’s resting. She had a disturbed night. Miss Pritchard has served her breakfast in the cabin.’
‘She’s not ill, I trust?’ It was Cavanagh’s question.
‘No, Mr Cavanagh.’ The Countess gave him a bright and tolerant smile. ‘She is a princess. She can be upset even by a rose-petal in her bed.’ Then she addressed herself to Galeazzi . . . ‘Dear God, Enrico! This place brings back memories for me! I came here with my husband when we were first married, thirty-five years ago. He had rented a big house with a park, near the Villa Napoleone, and we used to drive all over the island in an open carriage with two dapple-grey horses. . . . Later, during the war, I used to meet my Corrado here. He would come across from the mainland with one of the sardine fishermen, working the nets with them. At night he would change his clothes and come up to join me for dinner and stay the night. It was a terrible risk, but none of the island folk ever betrayed us. Once I made the trip back with him. We were dropped off at night on a deserted beach and had to walk five miles before dawn to make a rendezvous with the partisans . . . I know you didn’t approve of him Enrico, but he was a brave and noble man and I loved him very much.’
‘I have never denied that, Lucietta.’ Galeazzi laid a protective arm around her shoulders. ‘Your loss was ours too – but ours was the greater. The Church and the Democrats and this new Italy we are trying to build, were all damaged when people like Corrado joined the Communists. I will go further and confess to you that we deserved to lose them because they felt themselves betrayed by politicians and prelates and diplomats and time-servers, fickle as weather-cocks. I think – though I cannot say it publicly – that the Vatican is making a huge mistake by mounting a confessional vote against the Communists. I know all the fears they have, I know all the financial and political pressures they are under, but if democracy means anything, if religion means anything, it means making a free choice – this party or that, faith or unfaith . . .’
‘I wish,’ the Countess was near to tears. ‘I wish so much, Enrico, you had said this a long time ago!’
Cavanagh was embarrassed and made a stumbling excuse to withdraw from the group. Galeazzi damped a surprisingly firm grip on his forearm and commanded him to stay.
‘There is no need to be embarrassed. We are a dramatic people. We love an audience. Consider this as part of your European education. Lucietta means that I could have saved her much heartache if I had been more publicly supportive of her love affair with Corrado, or even more publicly respectful of his memory. She’s right of course . . . But, my dear Lucietta, there were then and there are now, mitigating circumstances.’
‘During the war, yes. When the Germans were here in force, yes. All of us lived behind some kind of mask. But now that the war is over . . .?’
‘What was once my mask, Lucietta, is now my everyday face. I could not shed it, even if I wished.’
‘I don’t believe that.’
‘You must. Think Lucietta! Who am I? What do I do?’ He waited a long moment for her answer. When none came, he talked on, sombrely and persuasively. ‘I am the treasurer, the financial comptroller of a monarchy, whose subjects number more than five hundred million people, all over the globe. They all pay tribute, through the parish, the diocese, by levy and donation, and the funds come finally into my hands to be managed and invested in viable securities round the world. But consider something else – and you too should meditate on this my young friend from the Antipodes! – What am I? I am a layman in a court full of celibate clerics, for whom the exercise of power is the only indulgence left, and intrigue is the most fashionable diversion. I have the ear of the Holy Father, I am the keeper of his public and private purse. So I am the natural object of jealousy, the readiest target of intrigue. My lightest words are memorised, reported, weighed . . . A single indiscretion on my part could start a run on the stock markets of the world. My master is a proud and princely man, an ascetic, an intellectual, an absolutist. No whiff of scandal has touched his private life – yet his household is dominated by a German nun, Sister Pasqualina, who has been with him since his diplomatic days in Munich and who, more rigidly than any Lord Chamberlain, controls the approaches to his sacred person . . . I can handle her because she is afraid of me. I am the silent one in the golden mask who comes and goes and offers no more than a nod of recognition. The prelates on the other hand depend on her favour: some of them fawn, some offer presents, none dares risk a hostile encounter. Do you understand me, Lucietta?’
‘I understand; but I pity you, Enrico.’
‘Better you should pity than hate me. And you, Mr Cavanagh, what comment do you have on my sad little tale?’
‘None at all sir. Like you, though in a much lower grade, I am a servant of the servants of God. I too go about my task masked and silent!’
He laughed as he said it, turning the joke against himself. The Countess laughed too and said:
‘Now there’s a courtier for you Enrico!’
‘More than a courtier,’ said Galeazzi with cool humour. ‘A man with a risky talent for irony. Are you a gambler too, Cavanagh?’
‘A modest one, so far, because I’ve played with my own life and my own money. Could I be tempted further? I guess so, if the stakes were high enough . . . I’m going to get myself some coffee. May I bring either of you a cup?’
They both declined and turned immediately to their private talk. Cavanagh took himself off to the galley where the Chef and Lenore Pritchard were having their own Kaffeeklatsch.
‘We’re pulling in to Porto Azzuro,’ the Chef told him. ‘With luck we may get a night ashore.’
‘Sounds good to me,’ said Cavanagh.
‘Sounds even better to me,’ said Lenore Pritchard. ‘You can take me dining and dancing in Porto Azzuro!’
‘If there’s dining and if there’s dancing, you’re on, Miss Pritchard!’
‘A miracle!’ said Lenore Pritchard in mock wonderment. ‘A true, bloody Roman Catholic miracle! And you’re a witness to it, Chef!’
‘No miracle! It just looks like one because it always happens on the third day out. Intimacy sets in. Two more days and you’ll find it hard even to get people off the ship. They’ll take a turn around the docks of whatever port we’re in, then they’ll be back on board, content to look at the world from over the rail. You must have seen this Lenore, even on the big Cunarders?’
‘I know it, Chef . . . I know it by heart. It’s the back-to-the-womb syndrome. We’re all locked in this floating world, and we really don’t want to be born again – until of course we enter the stage of prenatal conflict, where we’re ready to scratch each other’s eyes out . . .’
‘And when you’re bored even with my cooking!’
‘Hard to believe that could happen, Chef!’ Cavanagh sat relaxed over his coffee.
‘Nevertheless, it does, my young friend. Then even I, the most calm of men, am tempted to run mad with a meat cleaver.’
‘I’m told our Giulia is indisposed?’ Cavanagh tried to make the question as casual as possible. Lenore’s answer had more than a touch of malice in it.
‘Our little Princess is suffering from a variety of complaints. She is bored to tears with a fiancé who is spending all his time discussing business with her father, and all his sexual energies with me. I have to tell you this is the weirdest wooing I’ve seen. Whether the bride-to-be is virgin or not – and I’ll stake my salary she isn’t – she’s still a lusty young woman and she’s getting precious little relief from Lou Molloy. I don’t know what surprises either of them expects to get or deliver on the wedding night, but they’ll need to be big ones . . . I see her every day. In spite of myself I like her, but sometimes I feel I’m watching a package being gift-wrapped for delivery . . . Hell! why should we care? It’s not our wedding!’
‘I feel sorry for the girl,’ said Cavanagh.
‘I don’t.’ Pritchard was suddenly snappish. ‘She’s as much a party to the bargain as Molloy. She’s marrying rich and she’s got youth and family on her side. Molloy’s marrying a title and a whole cartload of new liabilities, not least of which will be a discontented Italian wife in a society he only half understands. No matter how hard he plays – and he does and he will – he’s going to end up a lonely and bitter old man. I’d hate to see that . . .’
‘So would I.’ Suddenly the Chef was back in the talk. ‘I’ve known Molloy a long time. He’s hard and he’s wild; but he enjoys life. He savours every mouthful, as if it were one of my meals. I don’t agree with Lenore. I think he’ll manage this Princess of his. I think in the end it could turn into a love match – or at least into a very comfortable matrimonial contract! More coffee, Cavanagh?’
‘Why not? I’m wide awake now. I’ll have my sleep when everyone’s off the ship.’
‘I’ll see you’re not disturbed,’ said Lenore Pritchard. ‘And I’ll polish your dancing shoes. I need you bright-eyed and bullish for a night out in Porto Azzuro!’
Which seemed to answer the question he had asked himself on the day of their first meeting: what would he do when she beckoned him into her cabin? Accept, of course, enjoy; be grateful and gracious and leave no smouldering embers of anger or disappointment to mar the new intimacies of their little floating world. That decision, once made, put a new complexion on the conduct of Declan Aloysius Molloy. His was more calculated, because he could afford the extra care; but it was based on the same logic: keep the conventions and keep the peace, don’t compromise a complex business arrangement by a sexual solecism. And let no one talk too loudly about the morals of it, because morals, like politics, were the arts of the possible – as the Farnese had learned very well down the centuries.
It was a real web of casuistries, conspiracies and consents; but all the threads unravelled when the Salamandra d’Oro was moored stern-to in Porto Azzuro and Lou Molloy addressed his crew on the foredeck:
‘. . . My guests and I will be out of your hair for forty-eight hours. Enjoy yourselves; but make damn sure there’s a deck-watch night and day and the ship is clean as a new pin when we come on board again. Chef, you get your shopping done and take a rest from the galley. The crew will eat ashore. Mr Hadjidakis will pay each of you twenty dollars per diem, which in this place, at the present rate of exchange, will keep you a long way from starvation . . . Miss Pritchard, you will collect and list the ship’s laundry. Have the boys deliver it ashore and collect it before you leave port. Mr Cavanagh . . .’
‘Sir?’
‘You’re coming with me. Pack an overnight bag. Bring the charts and pilot books for Elba, a sketchbook and pencils, a notebook. Giorgios, get him a wetsuit and a tank. Your papers say you’ve had scuba training.’
‘They do, yes. But . . .’
‘But me no buts, Mr Cavanagh. You live by the book, you die by the book.’
‘Yes sir, Mr Molloy.’
‘That’s all. The rest of you have a nice day and a pleasant night.’
‘I’ll work on it,’ said Lenore Pritchard, glumly. ‘But my guess is that Leo and Jackie will score long before I do.’
The conference at the Marina di Campo provided new surprises for Cavanagh. The Farnese party had taken over one whole floor of the Club Hotel (seventy rooms, golf, tennis, heated swimming pool!) and there were already in residence two architects, a Roman advocate, an American attorney, two representatives of the Comune, a provincial official from Livorno and two senior members of the Ministry of Marine.
They all boarded a hotel bus and rode down the winding road to the bay where the architects laid out their plaster models on a flat rock and talked eloquently of the fashionable haven which would soon spring up under the sheltering bulk of Capo Poro. Molloy listened in silence, while Farnese translated the architects’ explanations. Then, abruptly, he summoned Cavanagh and instructed him in an undertone.
‘I want you to get into your wetsuit and do a square search of the area marked for moorings. Tell me what the bottom’s like, and whether there are any outcrops that could constitute hazards. How much air have you got in your bottle?’
‘You’ll be back in twenty. You don’t have to bust a gut. This is just a softening-up exercise. One more thing – before you enter the water, make a big scene about studying the models . . . Got it?’
‘I’ve got it.’
‘On your way!’
While Cavanagh was making his undersea circuit, Molloy conducted a critical examination of the models and the accompanying plans. His interrogation was curt and impersonal and he would not leave any point until it had been clarified to his satisfaction.
‘The link road from the town of Marina di Campo to the new port area is presently gravel.’
‘An all-weather surface, yes.’
‘No sir! Already it’s rutted and harmful to traffic. It will need to be tarmac. The cost must be built into the estimates.’
‘At a later stage, of course, but . . .’
‘At stage one, my friend. This is to be a yachting port. Supplies will have to be trucked in – fuel, foodstuffs, liquor, everything. That road, short as it is, will be a vital artery . . . Next point, where is your water coming from?’
‘The reservoir behind Monte Capanne.’
‘That’s clean drinking water?’
‘Yes indeed.’
‘Does it ever have to be rationed?’
‘Very occasionally in the height of summer.’
‘Are there any other sources of fresh water?’
‘There are bores and wells, but the water is not potable.’
‘Could we sink a bore anywhere within our area?’
‘Quite probably. The water table is not overly deep.’
‘Then we should do so. The bore water can be used for flushing toilets, washing decks and sluicing down the docks. Make a note to get a hydrographer on the job . . .’
‘All these prescriptions are very costly, Mr Molloy.’
‘Not half so costly as an empty port if everybody’s parking on the mainland because our facilities are substandard. This is an island, for Christ’s sake! People will have to be seduced to leave their vessels here! Now let’s take a look at the dockside layout . . .’
And so it went on for the best part of thirty minutes while Cavanagh finished his circuit of the mooring area, slipped off his gear and returned to make his report. This time Molloy conducted the questioning for the benefit of the whole audience.
‘What’s the bottom like, Mr Cavanagh? The answers in English if you please, Prince Farnese will translate for our colleagues.’
‘The bottom is weed and sand, good holding ground, except close inshore where there is a continuous rock shelf, less than a metre below the surface.’
Instantly the senior architect was on the defensive.
‘The rock shelf is known and calculated into my plans. It is in fact the foundation of the retaining wall of the promenade area.’
‘According to the plans and models,’ said Cavanagh, ‘the retaining wall is on the inner edge of the shelf. There is a further projection into the harbour area, three metres wide in some places. I swam right along it. That means that any vessel with a draught of a metre cannot moor stern-to on the buttress wall.’
‘That means gentlemen,’ said Lou Molloy, ‘you have to put your buttress wall four metres further out and back-fill to enlarge the promenade.’
‘More cost!’
‘More space also for shore installations – which we still have to discuss. Any other comment, Mr Cavanagh?’
‘None that falls within my competence, sir.’
‘But you obviously have a question?’
‘Yes. The bottom is as I have said, weed and sand. I have no means of knowing how deep that deposit is, or what kind of rock foundation lies beneath it.’
‘Gentlemen?’ Molloy faced his experts with the problem. Their answer was a shade less than precise.
‘We estimate an average sand depth of two metres. The underlying rock will, of course, be the continuum of the central rock structure of the island: eocenic serpentine, porphyry and granite.’
‘Upon which you propose to lay out a series of stone finger wharves, to provide an enclosed harbour basin.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Have you considered the possibility of a pontoon construction, which could be erected quickly, would be easily extendable and would almost double our carrying capacity? It would also enable us to begin the major structural work on the dockside development.’
‘Frankly, no. The idea was not presented to us in those terms.’
‘Then we’ll table it for discussion this afternoon. Now let’s walk over the shore site itself . . .’
As they moved away Cavanagh heard the Countess berating Farnese.
‘I don’t know how you can put up with that man. He’s a peasant, a boor and a bully.’
‘Who will save us, and make us a great deal of money.’ Farnese silenced her angrily. ‘I am tired of academic fools who still think they are designing immortal monuments to their own talent!’
‘I agree with Papa,’ said Giulia Farnese. ‘These are the moments when I most admire Lou. He is so much the man in command . . .’
The next moment they were out of earshot and Molloy took Cavanagh’s arm to steer him away from the group heading to the proposed construction area.
‘Next job, Cavanagh. Get your sketch book. Go back to where we were standing and try to visualise a series of pontoon mooring pens – walkways to give access to all craft, to carry water and power lines, with enough turning room for entrances and exits. Use the new retaining wall as the dock space for vessels over twenty metres. Can you do it?’
‘I can try . . . but don’t expect Leonardo da Vinci!’
‘I’ll settle for a lesser name, Van Vitello, maybe? All I need is something I can slap on the conference table and say, “There gentlemen! That’s what you should be thinking about . . .” You wouldn’t think you’d have to tell ’em that the moment you put down rock and concrete, you’re going to change the whole configuration of the waterway. Mediterranean tides aren’t big, and the currents are minimal, so these dumb bastards have decided to discount ’em . . . Then when they see the results, the Marine Ministry will start suing us for reparation of irreparable damage. Anyway that’s the shape of the problem – get working on the sketch . . . See if you can have something half-way presentable by three o’clock . . . You do know what a goddamn pontoon walkway looks like, don’t you?’
‘I do, sir. The Navy even taught us to make ’em. I just hope I can remember.’
Molloy gave him his widest grin and clapped him hard on the shoulder.
‘I told you I used to write Navy reports, didn’t I?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Sometimes they’re bullshit; but if you present ’em in evidence, as you did boyo, you have to live with ’em. But, courage Camille! You’re not doing too badly!’
‘Damn nice of you to say so, Mr Molloy, sir!’
‘I’m the nicest fellow in the world, so long as I get what I order.’
He threw back his head and laughed so loudly that the group ahead turned to look at him and the sea birds rose screaming from the crannies of Capo Poro. Cavanagh didn’t blame them. His own rage against the man was rising fast. Nonetheless, he delivered the drawings at the hotel five minutes before the meeting.
‘They’re the best I could do in the time. I used the admiralty chart for the harbour plan and a school ruler for working out the scale. There are three drawings: an aerial plan, a perspective elevation of the walkways and a sketch of the typical pontoon float and coupling, Navy-style.’
Molloy, preoccupied and irritable, studied the sheets in silence, then offered only a grunt of approval.
‘Not bad. They’ll serve the purpose.’
‘Do you want me at the meeting? I could . . .’
‘Hell no! I’ve got my Rome attorney and Farnese; he has to fight his section of the battle, or he loses the deal. I won’t invest and Galeazzi won’t put in a nickel of Vatican money unless the contracts are all our way and tighter than a fish’s arse. You can do me a favour though. Meet Lucietta and Giulia for drinks in the bar at seven-thirty and take ’em to dinner at eight-fifteen. We may or may not join you at table. I’m going to work this bunch until their eyes are popping, and we’re not leaving the conference room until our version of the agreements is accepted.’
‘I wish you luck.’
‘Luck has nothing to do with it.’ Declan Aloysius Molloy recited his act of faith. ‘You know what you want. You know how much you’re prepared to pay for it. If you can’t cut the deal you walk and never look back.’
To which Cavanagh added a small comment.
‘I guess the trick is to judge the moment to get up from the table and head for the door.’
‘You might say that, yes.’
‘I wish I could be there to see it.’
‘Not tonight.’ Molloy’s voice was suddenly flat, his eyes cold and dead as agates. ‘Don’t reach too high too fast, young man! There are vultures in the tree who will nip your fingers off. Just do what you’re asked, when you’re asked – and keep the ladies happy until we’ve finished our business. Understand?’
‘Aye, aye sir,’ said Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh – and hated the man’s guts.
As the afternoon wore into evening, Cavanagh’s anger against Molloy cooled, and his hatred congealed into a small pellet of ice at the root of his brain. Reason, frozen into calculation, now told him that he had no one to blame but himself. He had been well and truly warned – by Lenore Pritchard, by Molloy himself, for God’s sake! Nevertheless, he had persisted in his wide-open, smilin’-Irish-laddie approach, which almost invited a clip on the jaw. Molloy had delivered it, with curt brutality. Amen! So be it! But never again, by God! Henceforth he would comport himself with politeness and reserve, working out his bond-service with total detachment, which he admitted, with a wry grin at the fellow in the shaving mirror, would be no easy matter for Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh.
When he came to the bar, a few minutes before seven-thirty, he found the Countess already settled, with a bottle of champagne and a dish of canapés and a waiter hovering by her table. Cavanagh offered an apology for his lateness. She laughed it away.
‘Nonsense! I am early. Giulia is having one of her tantrum days and I’m too old for amateur theatricals. Champagne?’
‘Please.’
The waiter was instantly at his elbow pouring the liquor. The Countess raised her glass.
‘Will you make a toast, Mr Cavanagh?’
‘I wish you, my dear Contessa, the best that you wish for yourself.’
‘Altrettanto . . . I wish the same for you.’
They drank. There was a moment’s silence before she laid down the challenge:
‘I would guess, my young friend, that you’ve had a bad day.’
‘Let’s say I’ve known better.’
‘Mr Molloy is an impossible man. He’s boorish, brutal and . . .’
Cavanagh, rich in new, cool wisdom held up his hand to stay the conversation.
‘That’s your privileged opinion Contessa. Unfortunately, I’m not free to discuss it. I am paid to serve Mr Molloy, not to pass judgment on him.’
‘I am reproved, Mr Cavanagh!’ She laughed and made a great ceremony of submission. ‘You must have had a very bad day!’
‘So why don’t we give it a happy ending and change the subject.’
‘Certainly, what would you like to talk about?’
‘Something romantic.’ Cavanagh grinned at her over the lip of his glass. ‘Yourself for instance, and the man who risked his life to spend nights with you on this island.’
‘Now you’ve stepped over the line, young man!’
Cavanagh was instantly penitent.
‘When I’m out of sorts – which I admit I am, because it was a lousy day – this tongue of mine runs away with me. I apologise. Now please, may we start again?’
‘Certainly. Try one of these canapés. They’re very good . . . And remember, I’m a very old hand at the conversation game – much better than you’ll ever be, Cavanagh. I can make love in six languages and be a bitch in two or three more.’
‘You should have warned me.’ Cavanagh dabbed a crumb of paté from his lips. ‘You win, Contessa.’
‘You’re warned now! So, let’s reset the board and begin the game again. I move first. You had a bad day, we all did, because your Mr Molloy was being rude and boorish. He is also a bully and I hate bullies.’
‘No comment.’
‘You’re not asked to make a comment. I haven’t finished yet. Your Mr Molloy, whom I hate, is about to marry my niece whom I love dearly, in spite of the fact that she is spoilt, wilful and obstinate. She’s a high, proud spirit and I’d hate to see her broken by marriage to a beast.’
‘Do you want a comment on that, Countess?’
‘If you have one to make, yes!’
‘Marriage is a free contract.’
‘In these circumstances? The hell it is!’
‘Please! I haven’t finished yet. Your niece whom I know only slightly . . .’
‘But who likes you very much.’
‘That’s pleasant to hear, but it doesn’t change the facts. Your niece is, in law, a free agent and she’s chosen to marry Lou Molloy. I can believe she’s been pressured by her father, who, if I read the situation even half correctly, has much to gain from this alliance. But Giulia’s not blind and she’s not stupid, and nobody in this day and age can force her into marriage.’
‘In short,’ said the Countess mildly, ‘you’re almost as upset about it as I am.’
Instantly Cavanagh was on guard again. This was a more formidable adversary then he had expected. He set down his answer very carefully.
‘I have no standing in the matter, my dear Contessa. Therefore, I can have no cause to be upset. However, there are no secrets on shipboard and everyone has an opinion about everyone else . . . This is, to say the least, an exotic union. It could hardly fail to excite the interest of the crew. It must have raised comment already in the Italian press.’
‘It hasn’t been announced yet . . .’
Cavanagh gave a long whistle of surprise.
‘Now I begin to understand . . .’
‘You don’t understand a fraction of it! How could you? This is a piece of theatre, stage-managed by Alessandro Farnese. Why are we travelling? So that the gossips can’t reach us, so that Molloy and Alessandro and Galeazzi can complete their investment plans and present themselves as strong financial contributors to the new Christian Democratic Italy. Thereupon the Pope confers a knightly order on our vulgar American, the marriage is celebrated with a certain pomp but a great degree of privacy at Mongrifone. It’s a business deal made in heaven, which will turn, very soon, into a hell!’
‘But Giulia is a signatory to the contract.’
‘I know, and I will tell you a secret, young man! If I could persuade Giulia to elope with a decent young fellow of her own age, I would willingly spend what’s left of my inheritance to finance their flight.’
‘I’d keep that offer to myself, if I were you.’
‘Why?’
‘Because then you’d be setting another snare, and what you’d catch would be every fortune-hunter from Rome to Hollywood! Any man who would accept an offer like that would be a pretty poor specimen . . . Besides, the more plans you make for your niece, the more she’ll delight in frustrating them.’
‘You’re a very astute young man,’ said the Countess.
‘I’m an idiot,’ said Cavanagh with feeling. ‘I shouldn’t have let you seduce me into this game.’
‘You’re not a bad player, Cavanagh; but you do, most definitely, need practice. Are there any women in your life at this moment?’
‘None that I’m breaking my heart over. I’m in what you might call the transit of Venus.’
‘The transit of Venus! What a beautiful phrase!’
It was Giulia who spoke. He slewed round in his chair to find her standing behind him. He fought back a sudden surge of anger and managed a reasonable facsimile of a laugh.
‘For my part, Principessa, I seem to be caught in a Venus fly-trap!’
‘I’ve often wondered about that,’ said the Countess. ‘How does it feel to die at the heart of a flower?’
‘I imagine it might be quite pleasant, dissolving into sweetness and then turning into a flower oneself.’
‘There! I told you he was a poet, didn’t I, Lucietta!’
‘I seem to remember that you did, child. Please join us.’
Giulia sat down beside Cavanagh. The waiter hurried to fill her glass, while she bit into an elaborate canapé. Then, still eating, she demanded to know:
‘What was this deep discussion about anyway?’
‘I was trying to seduce him,’ said the Countess. ‘And if you hadn’t come along I might have succeeded!’
‘Now he must choose between us!’ Giulia raised her glass in a mocking salute. ‘If we were on offer, Cavanagh, which of us would you take?’
‘It’s a dilemma,’ said Cavanagh amiably, ‘but it’s familiar to any man with a drop of Irish blood in his veins. Tommy Moore even wrote a song about it. It doesn’t scan too well in Italian but in English it says: “How happy could I be with either, were t’other dear charmer away!” It sounds even better when you sing it . . .’
‘There’s a piano in the alcove,’ said the Countess, ‘why don’t we take our drinks over there. You can give us a session of Irish songs – a contribution to Giulia’s education for marriage.’
‘A most necessary part.’ Cavanagh was beginning to enjoy himself again. ‘We Celts are very much like the Italians: vulnerable to music and to tender sentiment, but hard as nails in pursuit of money. Shall we go, ladies? The waiter will bring our drinks over to the alcove.’
It was there that Molloy came upon them, high on melody and champagne, with Cavanagh at the piano, leading them, con molto sentimento, through the final chorus of ‘I’ll Take You Home Again Kathleen’. Cavanagh spotted him first, glowering over the piano lid. He was not encouraged by what he saw; but he finished the song with a flourish and an announcement:
‘Ladies, my duty is done. Mr Molloy is here.’
As the women turned to greet him, Molloy’s expression changed. Instantly he was the smiling lover, sweeping Giulia into his arms, bestowing a cousinly kiss on the Countess, and offering a double-edged compliment to Cavanagh.
‘You’re full of surprises, Cavanagh! An Irish bard in a bar on Elba. That’s one for the books!’
‘You shouldn’t be surprised, sir, you auditioned me before you hired me.’
‘Did I indeed?’
‘You did, sir. You heard me singing “The Low-backed Car” and you bet me five dollars I didn’t know all the words.’
‘I remember now. And – God bless my soul! – I never paid you, did I?’
‘No, sir, you didn’t; but I always knew you would, one day.’
‘And what better day than today, when we’ve just got our first project signed, sealed and delivered. You had your own part in that Cavanagh: a bigger one than you know. I’d like you to join us in a celebration dinner with our colleagues.’
‘What a splendid idea,’ said the Countess.
‘Please,’ said Giulia the Beautiful, ‘and maybe afterwards we can have a session of Italian songs.’
‘If you’ll forgive me, sir, ladies,’ Cavanagh was studiously formal, ‘I’ll beg to be excused. There’s work to be done on the Salamandra before you come on board again tomorrow. Also, I promised to take Miss Pritchard dining and dancing in Porto Azzuro. If she hasn’t already found another partner I’d still like to do that. I’m sure you understand. She’s the only woman in the crew and you did ask me to pay her some attention.’
‘Very thoughtful of you, Cavanagh. Just sign out at the desk. The concierge will call you a cab. Thank you for the art work and for entertaining these two dear ladies.’
‘My pleasure, sir.’
‘Oh, before I forget.’ He fished out his wallet and riffled through the notes until he found a five-dollar bill which he presented to Cavanagh with a wide, white smile as a bonus. ‘The bet was five dollars. The ladies will witness that Lou Molloy always pays his debts.’
‘Thank you. I’ll be leaving now.’
‘We’ll miss you,’ said the Contessa. ‘Thank you for your company and for the music.’
‘Enjoy your evening Cavanagh,’ said Giulia Farnese, ‘and be kind to the admirable Miss Pritchard!’
‘Goodnight, Principessa,’ said Cavanagh; but what he really meant was an untranslatable Irishism: ‘the back of me hand to yez all!’
It was after ten when the taxi dropped him on the dock at Porto Azzuro. The gang-plank of the Salamandra d’Oro was down; there was a light in the saloon and the sound of a Mozart symphony played at low level. He walked up the gang-plank and peered into a scene of touching domesticity. The Chef and Lenore Pritchard were curled up in armchairs sipping coffee and cognac and listening to the music. The Chef’s eyes were closed and he was beating time to the score. Lenore had a book laid face down on her lap. Under the muted light they looked like father and daughter in an old-fashioned genre picture. It seemed a shame to disturb them. Cavanagh waited until the movement was finished, then he tapped quietly on the door and walked in.
The welcome they gave him was like the mood in the picture, warm but muted. Lenore grinned and said:
‘Hi, Cavanagh! We’ve had dinner but you’re welcome to drink with us.’
Chef stirred only a fraction in his chair and told him:
‘We wondered whether you might be back. Lenore cooked me scrambled eggs for supper. It made a change from haute cuisine.’
‘And what about you, lover-boy?’ Lenore set coffee and brandy in front of him. ‘Tell us about your day.’
He told them, in bardic style, glad at last to translate his angers at himself and Molloy into a Gaelic comedy.
‘. . . I was like a featherweight up against the champ. The moment I thought I was getting close to him, he’d pop me one, right on the snout, and then haul off and give me that big toothy grin . . . Then to cap everything, the Contessa gave me a bumpy ride; but she put some fun into it. I like that woman. I didn’t mind it when she swatted me around like a shuttlecock. You should have seen Molloy’s face when he saw us singing our heads off in the bar. I thought he was about to blow a fuse. But sure as be-damned he won the last round. He invites me to dinner with all his entourage. I decline gracefully. I tell him I’m taking Lenore out to dinner. He pays off his bet as if he’s tipping a bloody janitor . . . and tells me to sign out at the desk! I wanted to kill the bastard; but I couldn’t even shake him. What’s the matter with me?’
‘Youth,’ said Chef, with a smile. ‘You’ll be cured of it in time.’
‘Money’s another problem,’ said Lenore, amiably. ‘Take my word. It’s very hard to bite the hand that feeds you. Don’t worry, Cavanagh. I’m rather proud of the fact that you came back to take me to dinner. If you like, I’ll make you scrambled eggs too. I’ve got a limited repertoire, but what I do, I do well.’
‘Not for the moment thanks. I’ll sit with the coffee and cognac. Where have the others gone?’
‘Brothel-crawling,’ said Lenore.
‘Here? In Porto Azzuro?’
‘Why not?’ asked Lenore. ‘Boys will be boys; girls will be girls!’
‘Here on Elba they don’t call them brothels.’ This by way of explanation from the Chef. ‘They are houses of appointment, and because summer’s coming in and times are hard and the Comune is angling for the tourist trade, a couple of rather stylish places have opened up – big, old villas on the fringes of Porto Ferraio, with discreet driveways and sheltering gardens . . .’
‘How do you know all this?’
‘Hadjidakis sent the boys ashore to scout the scene. They found a place that welcomes all three sexes. Expensive but agreeable was how they described it. However, with the favourable exchange on the dollar, and some cartons of cigarettes from the ship’s store, they figured they could afford a night out. So Hadjidakis has gone ashore with them. In case we want to go to bed, he told us to lift the gang-plank. One of the boys can shinny along a mooring line to lower it.’
‘Very athletic, they are.’ Lenore sipped meditatively at her brandy. ‘I hope Hadjidakis can stand the pace.’
‘He’s not a boy any more,’ said the Chef, ‘but he’s tough, like an olive tree. He’ll be on deck in the morning – how do the Americans say it? – bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.’
‘Bright-eyed and sore-tailed, more like.’
‘Whatever.’ The Chef shrugged, indifferently. ‘Every man to his taste. Every woman to hers.’
‘Is Hadjidakis married?’ It was Cavanagh’s question.
‘Sure. He has a wife and two beautiful daughters in Boston. He’s very proud of them.’
‘He can afford to be,’ said Lenore acidly, ‘when they’re three thousand miles away, and he’s catting around with Molloy and the dancing boys!’
‘So what’s new?’ Chef shrugged off the whole debate. ‘His ancestors were forced to be either dirt-farmers or deckhands. They sailed to Africa with the north winds. They were away six months of the year. Provided they survived the infidel and the terrors of the deep, they came back with the first southerlies of winter. That was their life: to survive and provide. No one asked what they did with their spare time, if indeed they had any.’
‘You’re scolding me, Chef.’ Lenore was embarrassed.
‘You’re a big girl,’ said Chef, mildly. ‘You should know better . . . But I forgive you, because you do make good scrambled eggs and you do enjoy Mozart. I’m off to bed. Goodnight children. Golden dreams!’
He got up stiffly from his chair and walked out, a man with the first chill of age around his heart.
Cavanagh said, tentatively: ‘You’ve had dinner. Would you like to go dancing?’
‘No thanks. I’m too comfortable here.’
‘More brandy?’
‘Just a touch.’
He poured for her, then topped up his own drink and made the toast.
‘Slàinte!’
‘Slàinte!’
They drank. There was a small embarrassed silence. Then Lenore said calmly:
‘Do you know what I’d really like, Cavanagh?’
‘Tell me.’
‘Some old-fashioned, strictly-for-pleasure sex. No strings, no regrets, no heartburn and no scuttling about like midnight mice afterwards. What do you say?’
‘Your place or mine, madam?’
‘Neither. We can use Giulia’s stateroom. The bed’s huge and I have to change the linen in the morning anyway.’
‘I’m waiting for an old-fashioned kiss,’ said Lenore Pritchard.
‘Happy to oblige m’lady,’ said Bryan de Coucy Cavanagh, and this time felt no shame in the surrender.
Their mating was all that she had desired of him; a bawdy, boisterous romp, with teasing and laughter, a leaven of unexpected tenderness, a high, prolonged climax and a slow pleasurable descent into languor. She told him, drowsily:
‘. . . It doesn’t happen like this very often. I feel like a girl again . . . It was so right and easy. One jump and we were both over the wall and into the apple-orchard. I’ll give you a reference any time . . . Any time at all, Cavanagh . . .’
The words trailed off into a vague murmur. She rolled away from him, curled herself into a foetal ball and lapsed instantly into sleep.
Cavanagh folded his hands behind his head, and lay naked in the dark, listening to the faint slap of the sea against the hull, the creak of the mooring-lines and the drifts of night music from some tavern near the docks. He felt relaxed and released, not only from sexual tension, but from the irk of an unresolved social situation in the crew quarters. Lenore, in her pragmatic fashion, had expressed it perfectly: ‘One jump and we were over the wall and into the apple-orchard.’ The trick now would be to resist the promptings of casual lust, and the temptation to lapse into an attachment of habit. Rightly or wrongly, he felt no fear of Lenore Pritchard. She would keep her bargains. She was a woman who expected little, was happy when she got more, and who had learned the most valuable lesson of all, not to close her hand on the butterfly when it rested a moment on her palm. She had the primal simplicity and the courage of the born survivor.
For himself, Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh, it was not so simple. He carted around with him a whole baggage of inherited belief and education and family manners, which, even had he wished, he could not quickly shrug off. The sexual encounter troubled him little. It was an agreeable incident between needy and consenting adults. The circumstances of it lay more heavily on his conscience.
The moment he had entered Giulia Farnese’s cabin he had felt like a lout invading her private domain. When he had tried to withdraw, Lenore had turned it into a joke: ‘I tell you Cavanagh, I’ve been laid in all the best staterooms: Royal, Presidential, Owners’ and de Luxe. It’s my social protest. Up the Proletariat. Workers of the world rejoice! Come on boyo! I’m not asking you to read her diary – which she keeps every day – or wear her underthings, or anything kinky at all! It’s just the bed. Look at the size of it, feel how it bounces . . .’ It was easier to go along with the joke than have a resentful woman on his hands.
However, from that moment, Giulia Farnese was a presence in the cabin and in the bed and in their wildest couplings. When he came to climax it was with her and not with Lenore Pritchard. As he lay in the dark he tried vainly to remember whether he had spoken her name in the babble of the final release.
He slid out of bed, dressed hurriedly, drew the covers over Lenore and crept out of the cabin. He paused in the saloon to drink a glass of mineral water and clear away the last cups and glasses. When he looked at his watch it was three in the morning. He went out on deck. The gang-plank was still up. Hadjidakis and the boys had not returned.
He was wide awake now; so he surrendered to old habit, picked up a torch from his cabin and made the rounds of the ship. Once again he found himself awarding full marks to Hadjidakis for care of his vessel. Knowing that he was going out on the town with the working members of his crew, he had cleaned the ship from stem to stern. The windows had been washed, the bright-work polished, the decks scrubbed, the cordage coiled. The logs was written up to date, with an engine-room report and a note of fuel and water levels. There was also a record of radio traffic received during the five o’clock relay transmission from Portishead: two messages, one in clear from New York, the other in code from Washington. There was a note: ‘Texts delivered to owner’s cabin 1830 hours.’
Cavanagh picked up an orange in the galley, then went on deck again. He perched himself on the port-rail and began to peel the fruit, dropping the scraps of peel into the oily water below. The port was quiet now; the music had ceased; the last lights in the tenements were going out, one by one. There was only the faint wash of the water, the rare piping of a bat and the occasional squawk of a sea bird. Then, in the distance, he heard the sound of sirens and the tinny noise of automobiles driven at high speed over the cobbles. There were lights now, flashing beacons and bobbing headlights. The next minute two cars marked Carabinieri drew up on the dock right under the transom of the Salamandra d’Oro. A fellow wearing the insignia of a brigadiere stepped out of the car and hailed the ship. Cavanagh came forward to respond in Italian.
‘Yes, brigadiere, what can I do for you?’
‘Who are you?’
‘Cavanagh, officer of the watch.’
‘Let down the gangway, we’re coming aboard.’
‘An instant please.’
The moment the gangway hit the dock, the officer signalled the other car. Leo and Jackie were bundled out, staggering, onto the pavement. The officer asked:
‘Do you recognise these men?’
‘Yes, they’re crew members, listed on our manifest. Where’s the other one?’
‘In the clinic in Porto Ferraio. The doctor’s looking at him now. If you want to see him you’d better come with us.’
‘Are there any charges against these two?’
‘Not yet; but you are to keep them aboard until morning. There will be more questions.’
‘Let me get ’em aboard first. Would you gentlemen care for a whisky while you’re waiting?’
‘That’s very courteous of you, sir.’
Shepherding Leo and Jackie before them, the carabinieri – suddenly there were three – mounted the gangway and stood expectantly on the afterdeck. Cavanagh summoned up as much authority as he could muster.
‘Leo, get below and spruce yourself up. I’ll need you on watch while I’m away. Jackie, serve whisky for the officers, please. Excuse me gentlemen. I’ll be with you in a moment.’
He hurried down to the guest cabin to waken Lenore Pritchard and alert her to what was happening. Then, while Jackie dispensed drinks, he went up to the forepeak for a hurried briefing from Leo.
‘What the hell happened?’
‘We were in this joint. Things got pretty wild. In the end it turned into an old-fashioned orgy. Our Giorgy was pissed out of his mind. One of the guys was making a big play for him. They went into a bedroom together. When we were ready to leave, he still hadn’t showed up. We went looking for him. He was lying in a heap on the floor. He’d been terribly beaten. There must have been more than one, because Giorgios is a real street fighter . . . Anyway, I stayed with him, while Jackie got the madam to phone the carabinieri. They took Giorgy to the clinic and brought us back here. End of story.’
‘I’ll go with the cops and see what’s happened to Giorgy. When I’m gone, haul up the gangway and make sure no one else comes aboard. Where does Hadjidakis keep the ship’s cash?’
‘In his cabin. The cash-box is in a drawer under the bookshelf.’
‘I’m on my way.’
Back on deck he waited with careful patience while the carabinieri finished their drinks. These were no common policemen, they were military personnel, charged with keeping order inside the confines of the Republic. Courtesy was the watchword, courtesy and respect and a co-operative attitude, if you didn’t want to be bounced off a wall. His Tuscan accent had already impressed them. The generous shots of scotch had helped too. He decided to clinch the entente cordiale.
‘Jackie, be so kind as to break out three bottles of Johnny Walker, wrap each one in a paper napkin and bring them to me, please.’
He offered the bottles, one to each of the carabinieri, as ‘a compliment from the ship, a thanks for your courteous handling of this matter’.
On the way back to Porto Ferraio he rode with the brigadiere and heard his version of the affair.
‘. . . You must understand, my friend, that we do not normally preoccupy ourselves with what goes on inside a closed house. If a major crime is committed, of course we must intervene; but such places are designed as the safety valves of society, so we absent ourselves. By the time we were called, the fracas was over, and because your other man was injured we have had neither the time nor the opportunity to make further inquiries. Who is the victim by the way?’
‘He is our first mate and engineer, an American citizen named Giorgios Hadjidakis. He is a long-time friend and confidant of the owner, Mr Molloy, and of his distinguished guests, Prince Alessandro Farnese and Count Galeazzi. I presume you are aware that they are visiting the island to conclude arrangements for a major tourist development?’
Even if he wasn’t aware, the brigadiere wasn’t going to admit it; but he was suitably impressed. He hastened to assure Cavanagh:
‘The clinic is small but well-equipped. It was set up for the mining community. The director, Doctor Emilio Spinelli, resides on the premises. He is both competent and careful. You may trust what he tells you.’
‘That’s very reassuring, brigadiere. One can only hope he may be able to help Mr Hadjidakis.’
‘As you say, one can only hope. We should be there in ten minutes.’
Giorgios Hadjidakis had taken a brutal beating. One eye was closed, a cheekbone was crushed. An arm and several ribs were broken. His head was bandaged. He was still unconscious. The doctor, a crisp, efficient fellow in his early fifties, displayed a series of X-rays.
‘. . . The ribs, the wrist, these we have taken care of. The face will need expert reconstruction. Most worrying of all, however, is this fracture of the skull, depressed as you see at this point. I do not have the means to estimate or repair the damage. It requires expert cranial surgery.’
‘Where is it available?’
‘In Milan certainly. In Livorno only possibly, but certainly at the American Hospital in Naples. I thought that, as your officer is an American citizen, and they are fully equipped for combat casualties . . .’
‘Is there a phone I can use, Doctor?’
‘Through there, in my office.’
It took Cavanagh five minutes to raise the night clerk at the Club Hotel and another five minutes of clattering dialogue to persuade him to connect the call to Molloy’s room. Molloy was rasping and irritable.
‘Don’t you know what time it is? What the hell’s going on?’
Cavanagh told him. Molloy was instantly wide awake.
‘Naples? That’s the Sixth Fleet. I know the deputy commander-in-chief. I’ll try to call him now and see if he can send a chopper in to evacuate Hadjidakis to the US hospital. It would make sense for us too, we’re heading south. If Giorgy is OK we can pick him up on the way down. If he’s not, then we can make arrangements to get him home to Boston. Are the police still with you?’
‘Yes. The brigadiere is waiting outside.’
‘Ask him if he can nominate a landing place for a helicopter.’
The brigadiere was helpful.
‘There is a large garden at the back of the clinic. It will be light before the helicopter gets here. We can mark the place with a white cross . . .’
Cavanagh relayed the message. Molloy had other instructions.
‘Stay at the clinic until I get back to you.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘I’m going to be tied up here all morning. I daren’t leave until we’ve got the essential documents signed. Can you handle things at your end?’
‘Sure. But we should have a contingency plan in place.’
‘Read it to me.’
‘In case the Navy people don’t come through, I’d suggest we put Giorgios aboard the Salamandra and run straight up to Livorno. I could have an ambulance waiting at the docks. It’s a fifty-mile run, but the sea’s flat and we could make him comfortable. After he’s settled in hospital I’d come back to Elba and pick you off the beach.’
‘I agree, but I’m sure the Navy will come through. Can you handle the vessel?’
‘Sure. I’ll move Leo up to watch-keeper’s duties. Then I’d like to find us an extra hand, preferably an engine-room mechanic who could double as deckhand. But you let me worry about that for the moment. I’ll wait here for your call.’
He read off the number and hung up. It was nearly five in the morning when Molloy finally called back.
‘We’re in luck, Cavanagh. There’s an aircraft carrier about a hundred miles south of Elba, and heading north to Villefranche. They’re sending a helicopter which will evacuate Giorgios to the ship. While the chopper refuels, the surgeons will take a look at him and then arrange to move him down to Naples.’
‘When can we expect the aircraft?’
‘They gave me a rough estimate of 0700 hours this morning.’
‘Fair enough. I’d better make sure the landing pad is adequately marked . . . By the way, I’ve taken possession of the ship’s cash – I may have to dispense some of it.’
‘That’s fine. Call me when the lift-off has taken place.’
‘Will do. Next question: do you want me to bring the ship down to you, or will you come back to Porto Azzuro?’
‘We’ll come back. Tell Chef there’ll be ten extra guests for a buffet lunch on the afterdeck. We’ll give them a cruise round the island and dump ’em on the dock about five in the afternoon. Now what’s the latest on Giorgios?’
‘No change, sir. He’s stable but comatose.’
‘If he wakes, give him my love – and tell him he must be losing his touch.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And Cavanagh?’
‘Sir?’
‘Thanks. You’re doing a good job.’
‘A compliment to your own good judgment, Mr Molloy.’
‘The luck of the Irish more like – let’s pray we can keep it running for Giorgios Hadjidakis.’
‘Amen to that,’ said Bryan de Courcy Cavanagh.
As always with Lou Molloy, a thing promised was a thing done. At ten minutes after seven in the morning a Piasecki helicopter from the US Navy set down on the pocket-handkerchief park behind the clinic. Hadjidakis, still comatose, was strapped to a stretcher and hoisted aboard. The helicopter took off leaving one brigadiere very impressed and one medico glad to be rid of a patient whose prognosis was, to say the least, dubious.
Cavanagh invited them to join him for breakfast as soon as he had made his phone call to Molloy, with whom, unconsciously, he slipped into the idiom of command.
‘If Hadjidakis dies, this turns into a murder case. If he survives, the whole affair can be hushed up. I’m suggesting to the brigadiere that he make his inquiries, but keep them off the books for the time being . . . No, sir, I’m not pre-empting your orders, but I’m here and you’re miles away. I have to make decisions. Next item: without Hadjidakis we’re travelling at risk. We need at least an engine-room mechanic . . . With your permission, I’d like to make some inquiries locally, and if necessary, on the mainland. You’ve got Swedish diesels. Their dealers have been operating in Italy since before the war. With luck we should be able to find ourselves a passable mechanic. It’s not the perfect solution, but it reduces the risk and Hadjidakis has already walked me through the manual . . . We’ll be ready at lunchtime for you and your guests.’
In a bar on the waterfront Cavanagh bought coffee and pastries for the doctor and the brigadiere. When he offered payment for his medical services, the doctor, Tuscan to his boot-soles, refused. A guest on the island had been assaulted. His service was a small amends. He wished only that he could have done more, and that he could be more optimistic of the outcome. The brigadiere, already recompensed, approved this magnanimity.
Next, Cavanagh broached the question of an engine-room mechanic. The brigadiere regretted that he could not help. It was the custom of the carabinieri to post their officials far away from their birthplace, so that, in theory at least, they would not become involved in local conspiracies. The doctor offered at least a possible candidate:
‘. . . My nephew, a good boy who has completed an apprenticeship in the naval yards at Livorno. He has also had work as a temporary engine-room hand on the ferries. The problem is that since he has completed his apprenticeship, he must be paid a full wage . . . So in these bad times, nobody wants him.’
‘What is he doing now?’
‘He works two days a week with Ugolini who services the fishing fleet. He also works part-time with Fischetti who services air-conditioning plants around the island.’
‘Well, let’s talk to him. Tell him to be on board no later than eleven this morning. We’ll be cruising from lunchtime till evening. Even if he isn’t hired he’ll be paid for his time.’
The doctor gulped down his coffee and hurried off to track down his nephew. The brigadiere raised a more delicate question: how to deal with the affray at the ‘house of appointment’ and the very grievous matter of the assault on Hadjidakis. So far, no depositions had been taken, no inquiries instituted, no complaints made. However, once anything was on paper a long, wearisome and perhaps scandalous process would begin.
Cavanagh needed no spectacles to see that hole in the ground, yet he had no intention of digging a pit for himself. So, in his best Tuscan and with his most elaborate Irish blarney, he explained:
‘You and I, brigadiere, are in the same galley. With the best will in the world we cannot dictate to our superiors. I cannot commit my owner, who is in fact the captain of the vessel. If Mr Hadjidakis dies, you have a murder case on your hands. If he survives, we shall all benefit by a discreet handling of the case. These are hard times for everyone and Mr Molloy, with his Italian colleagues, is embarking on a huge work of reconstruction on this island . . . Certainly he will feel offended and abused by what has happened; but if I could tell him that you were prepared to conduct your own discreet inquiries with a view to identifying the culprits, and dealing with them – how shall I put it – in a local frame of reference . . . You do understand what I am trying to say?’
‘Perfectly, my dear sir, perfectly. As you put it, we are in the same galley. This is the kind of affair that can quickly become scandalous. But fortunately, nothing happens until pen touches paper. So, unless your man dies or your owner lodges a formal complaint, nothing will be done officially. We do, of course, have our own method of dealing with such delinquents. May I drive you back to your ship . . .?’
‘A great courtesy, brigadiere . . . Thank you. And your own impression of the doctor’s nephew?’
‘A fine young man, of reasonable education and much good will. He promises well . . . This would be a splendid chance for him.’
‘Leave it to me, brigadiere; I’ll see what I can do.’
Back on board, his first act was to deliver a bulletin on Hadjidakis; his second was to announce the luncheon party. This brought a small chorus of protest, which was quelled quickly by the Chef:
‘. . . The food and the liquor we have in abundance. All we have to do is organise the service. Let’s start now, my children!’
Next Cavanagh conducted a brusque briefing session with Leo and Jackie.
‘I’ve told Mr Molloy exactly what you told me about the punch-up at Porto Ferraio – no more, no less, no comment. You can be damn sure he’ll want to question you himself. My advice is not to lie, even if it means changing the story you told me. Next, I’m bringing in a local lad to try out as engine-room mechanic. If he’s half-way good we’ll keep him. Help him, and don’t play games – any sort of games. You’re both deep enough in the dreck already. Leo, subject to anything Mr Molloy may have in mind, I’m going to train you as watch-keeper, Navy style. You’ll have lives in your hands, so don’t foul up on me. Clear?’
‘Loud and clear, Mr Cavanagh.’
‘Good. Now go make yourselves useful to the Chef, and the minute Mr Molloy and his guests arrive, step lively! Make a ceremony of it.’
Finally he drew Lenore Pritchard aside for a very private exchange.
‘. . . I didn’t have time to say thank you before I left. I’m saying it now. Grazie infinite.’
‘My pleasure, Mr Cavanagh.’ Her attitude was guarded. She gave him only half a smile. ‘I wish you hadn’t left so soon.’
‘You were dead asleep. It would have been a crime to wake you.’
‘I’ll accept the apology but I’ll be interested to see what happens next. How is Mr Molloy taking this?’
‘I wish I knew. He’s very restrained, very curt. He hasn’t raised any objection to my moves for damage control.’
‘He won’t. He knows he’s lucky you’re prepared to move into command. What’s really in question here is his whole relationship with Hadjidakis.’
‘I know they’re very close; but that’s as much as I can say.’
‘So leave it just like that. Don’t clutter your mind with guesswork or complicate my life more than it will be.’
‘And what does that mean?’
‘For God’s sake, Cavanagh! Use your brains! With Hadjidakis gone I’m going to be working overtime to keep the great Molloy contented. I’m not looking forward to it, not one little bit.’
‘If there’s anything I can do . . .?’
‘Not much. It would be nice if you could take over Hadjidakis’ cabin. I’d feel more comfortable knowing you were just across the way.’
‘Molloy will have to suggest that.’
‘I know. It’ll be interesting to see what he does.’
‘If we’re neighbours,’ said Cavanagh with a grin, ‘for God’s sake don’t clown us both into trouble.’
‘I thought you were the clown,’ said Lenore Pritchard, soberly, ‘or has all this sudden responsibility gone to your head?’