31 
Kapellbrücke

Luzern’s two famous wooden bridges across the River Reuss, the Kapellbrücke and the Mühlenbrücke, had been the site of more rendezvous, clandestine and otherwise, than any other site in the whole of Switzerland.

Something about meeting above the middle of the river, on a covered wooden bridge, with flower boxes and paintings everywhere and people walking back and forth, must have appealed to an innate sense of the dramatic, for politicians and businessmen, lovers and friends, hoodlums and beggars, had all been making use of the city’s two bridges to conduct their business almost from the day they were built.

As Ramsay Halifax now stood in the center of the Kapellbrücke awaiting his first meeting with the man called Fabrini Scarlino, he could not help an occasional twinge of trepidation as he recalled the grim words of Matteos. He had put on a brave face in front of the Italian. But in truth he had never pulled the trigger of his Luger except in the direction of a target when learning to use it—a target which he had not once come within two yards of putting a bullet into. And in fact, the Luger was now safely back in a drawer in his hotel room. He didn’t want to take any chance of angering this Scarlino fellow, and judged it prudent to be weaponless for their initial interview.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw a man eying him suspiciously—short, balding, dressed in a business suit, with beady eyes. He looked like the kind of man who would kill you and not think twice about it if you so much as—

“You Halifax?” came a gravelly voice at his side.

Startled, Ramsay spun around. There stood a tall man in his mid-forties, stocky and muscular, staring out across the Reuss, to all appearances paying Ramsay not the slightest heed.

“Yes, I’m Halifax,” replied Ramsay.

“Then follow me,” said the man, turning and walking away.

With one final glance back in the direction of the short balding man, who continued to observe everybody who passed with a suspicious eye, Ramsay obeyed.

“Finding one person in all Switzerland is not an easy task,” said the stocky man when Ramsay had hurried up alongside him.

“I was told that you—”

“Forget what you were told. Now it is just you and me, Halifax. Do what I tell you and she will be found. I hope you are prepared to pay.”