Street of the Five Moons vbm-2 Read online

  She hadn’t much to add to her original description. She had only seen the apparition once – one night in April, the last time they had visited the villa. She had had a fight with Pietro and had gone for a walk, in order to calm herself, as she put it. The vision had sent her screaming back to Pietro’s willing arms, and at her insistence they had returned to Rome the following day. She had not wanted to come back to the villa.

  ‘But he no longer cares for my feelings,’ she whined. ‘He forced me to come. I think he does not believe me, about the phantom. I swear to you – ’

  ‘Oh, I believe you. But I’m surprised at Pietro. Isn’t there a family tradition about the ghost? Many old families have such stories.’

  ‘He says not. But he lies, perhaps; he is a great liar, Pietro. Now tell me what to do to be safe. And,’ she added firmly, ‘do not tell me to leave this place. If I go, I will lose him. And that I cannot afford to do just yet.’

  I thought she meant ‘afford’ in the most literal sense. Well, that was her business, and I do mean business. It didn’t concern me. On the whole, I preferred to have her stick around; she would distract Pietro, and I didn’t want him following me everywhere I went. I dipped into my childhood memories of horror movies.

  ‘You ought to have a crucifix,’ I said.

  ‘But I have them – many of them.’ She plucked at a chain that hung around her neck and drew out a cross. It was a handsome thing, made of platinum set with diamonds.

  ‘Ah, but has it been blessed by the Pope?’ I inquired seriously.

  ‘No . . .’ Helena took off her sunglasses, frowning. ‘But I have some that were.’

  ‘Wear one of them, then, all the time. You should be perfectly safe then.’

  ‘That is all?’ She sounded disappointed.

  ‘You weren’t wearing it when you saw the ghost, were you?’ I assumed she hadn’t been wearing it, or much else; the quarrel had occurred late at night. ‘Oh, well. To be perfectly sure, what you should do is hang some garlic at every window and door. And over the fireplace, if there is one. Iron is good, too. Something made of iron over each opening – door, windows – ’

  ‘What else?’ She sat up, hands on her knees, eyes bright.

  ‘Well,’ I said, getting into my stride, ‘holy water. Can you get some?’

  ‘Sì’, sì’. I sprinkle it on me, eh? That is good. And perhaps garlic too, on a chain with the crucifix?’

  I was about to agree when I realized that Pietro might balk at embracing the lady if she were reeking of garlic. I didn’t want to break up that romance; it would keep him out of my hair.

  ‘No,’ I said firmly. ‘The crucifix and the garlic don’t go together. They cancel each other, capisce?’

  ‘Ah, sì. It is sensible.’

  ‘That should do it. Stay in at night, of course. Ghosts do not walk by day. And,’ I added cunningly, ‘you are perfectly safe when you are with Pietro. He is the lord of the manor. It is his ghost; it won’t bother him.’

  ‘Sì’, sì’; how clever you are, Vicky!’ She beamed at me. Like most simple souls, she was easily convinced. She hoisted herself to her feet. ‘I will dress now. It is time for lunch.’

  I had suspected it might be. Somewhere in the depths of the villa someone was banging on a gong, and had been doing so for some time.

  I ran a comb through my hair and followed the sound of the gong, which had assumed a slightly hysterical resonance. The closer I got, the more outrageous the noise became; I had my hands over my ears when I came upon it – a mammoth structure as big as the one that is banged in old Arthur Rank movies. Pietro was swatting it with a huge mallet. His tie was up under his left ear and his face was bright red with anger and exertion. When he saw me he dropped the mallet. The gong shivered and echoed and died, and I took my fingers out of my ears.

  ‘It is too maddening,’ Pietro exclaimed. ‘The boy is always late; never is he on time; and now Helena too. And Sir John, where is he? They all conspire to keep me from my lunch. I suffer from a rare disease of the stomach, my doctor tells me I must eat at regular hours.’

  ‘I was late too,’ I said. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know about your rare disease.’

  Pietro straightened his tie, mopped his face, smoothed his hair, and smirked at me.

  ‘But for you it is different. You are a guest. I should have given you more time. Come, we will go in. We will not wait for them.’

  We didn’t have to wait long for Helena and Smythe. She gave me a big grin as she entered; her crucifix, of gold and pearls, was prominently displayed. Smythe followed her in and took a seat next to me.

  The meal was a pattern of the others I was to eat in that house. The boy never appeared at all, nor did the dowager. Pietro explained that his mother often dined in her rooms. That was almost all he said. Smythe didn’t contribute much either. He seemed preoccupied. As soon as we had devoured the vast quantities of food, Pietro went staggering out to take a nap. Helena followed him, and I caught Smythe’s arm as he passed me on his way to the door.

  ‘Don’t you think it’s time we had a talk?’ I asked.

  I forget whether I’ve mentioned that he was just about my height – an inch or so taller, maybe, but the heels on my sandals made up the difference. We were eyeball to eyeball as we stood there, but by some alchemy he managed to give the impression that he was looking down at me – down the full length of his nose.

  ‘I suspect it will be wasted effort on my part,’ he drawled. ‘But I’m willing to give it another try. Let’s stroll in the gardens, shall we?’

  ‘How romantic,’ I said.

  It might have been, if someone other than Smythe had been my escort. The cool tinkle of the fountains followed us through shady walks and avenues lined with flowering shrubs. When I tried to talk, Smythe shushed me.

  ‘May as well find a quiet spot,’ he said.

  We rounded a corner, and I jumped six feet off the ground. Straight ahead was a giant monster’s head carved of stone. It was so big that the open mouth was taller than I am. Its snarling expression and horned, serpent-entwined head would have been startling even in miniature.

  ‘I suppose that’s your idea of a joke,’ I said, getting my breath back.

  ‘Sorry. I forgot the damned thing was there. It’s not a bad place for a private chat, actually. Come on in.’

  He walked through the mouth, stooping slightly to avoid the stone fangs that fringed it.

  I followed him. The stone of which the atrocity was carved was a rough, dark substance, pumicelike in texture, but much harder. Lichen and moss had grown over the surface like peeling skin. It was a singularly unappealing piece of work.

  The hollow head had been fitted up as a summer house. Light came in through the eyes and mouth and nose slits, but it was still pretty dark. Smythe sat down on a bamboo chair and waved me towards another.

  ‘Are there any more little charmers like this around?’ I asked.

  ‘Several. The ninth count got the idea from a friend – Prince Vicino Orsini – back in the sixteenth century.’

  ‘I’ve read about the Orsini estate,’ I said. ‘Bomarzo – isn ‘t that the name of it?’

  ‘I don’t remember. It’s about fifty miles north of Rome. Quite a tourist attraction, I understand.’

  ‘Never mind the guidebook excerpts,’ I said. ‘I want – ’

  ‘My dear girl, you introduced the subject.’

  ‘Consider it finished, then.’

  ‘Did you really leave a letter with your solicitor?’

  ‘I left a letter, but not with my solicitor. I don’t have a solicitor. I admit that the evidence I’ve collected so far isn’t conclusive. If it were, I’d go to the police. But I’m sure you will agree that my demise or disappearance would confirm my suspicions in a particularly inconvenient fashion.’

  ‘Inconvenient for us, certainly. We don’t want publicity.’

  ‘Then what do you intend doing about it?’

  ‘About what?’ His left eye
brow lifted.

  ‘Why, this – the plot – the . . .’

  He leaned back in his chair, his hands folded on his flat stomach, and smiled at me.

  ‘Really, Victoria, you’re being unreasonable. I don’t see why I should do anything. It’s up to you to take action, I should think. What are you going to do?’

  ‘Find out all about the plot,’ I said. ‘Then go to the police and have you all put in jail.’

  ‘How very unkind of you. I do think you are jumping to conclusions. What makes you suppose this is a police matter?’

  I got a grip on myself. His nonchalant, oblique style of conversation was affecting mine; we were talking around the subject and not saying anything.

  ‘You seem to know all about me,’ I said. ‘I suppose you checked up on me after I gave you my name. You know where I work; you also know that your man in Munich – ’

  ‘Lovely title for a thriller,’ he interrupted.

  ‘It’s been done. Stop interrupting. Your man in Munich is dead, and you know he had the Charlemagne talisman – ’

  Smythe sat upright. His smile had faded, and his eyes were bright and speculative.

  ‘So that was it. No, I didn’t know what had stimulated an employee of the National Museum to burglary, but the mere fact was enough to make us suspicious of you. Even so, my dear, the existence of the talisman is irrelevant. What a nasty suspicious mind you must have, to leap to the conclusion that our pretty little copy meant larceny.’

  ‘Where you made your mistake was having me kidnapped,’ I retorted.

  ‘You don’t suppose I would do anything so stupid?’ Smythe demanded scornfully.

  ‘Who did, then?’

  ‘None of your business. Good Lord, girl, you didn’t really imagine I was going to blurt out a detailed confession as soon as you had me to yourself? You can’t prove a bloody thing. You can sit here till moss grows on you, and you still won’t be able to prove anything.’

  ‘Oh, really?’

  ‘Yes, really. We have our tracks very nicely covered, I assure you. You won’t learn anything here, but it is possible that you may get into trouble. My colleagues are harmless souls, on the whole, but one or two of them . . . I spoke quite sharply to them about kidnapping you, and I hope it won’t happen again. But I can’t promise, and I’m damned if I’m going to make a habit of rescuing you. Why the hell don’t you go away?’

  ‘You wouldn’t be so anxious for me to leave if there were nothing to be learned here,’ I said.

  ‘Rudimentary Logic One. How to Construct a Syllogism. That doesn’t follow, you know. I told you, I am not completely certain of my colleagues’ reliability.’ His tone changed. He leaned forwards, his blue eyes softening. ‘Look here, Vicky, it’s really quite a harmless little plot. Why can’t you drop it?’

  ‘If I knew all about it, I might agree with you,’ I said sweetly.

  Smythe opened his mouth as if to speak. Then he fell back in his chair and started to laugh.

  ‘No, no,’ he said, between chuckles. ‘I was tempted to spin you a pleasing yarn. I could do it, you know. But you have a mind that is almost as twisted as mine. You’d never believe me, would you?’

  ‘Frankly,’ I said, throwing tact to the winds, ‘I wouldn’t believe you if you told me the sun rises in the east. Why don’t you give it up? If the plot is that harmless, it can’t be worth much. I’m very persistent, and my friends already know quite a lot about you.’

  Gravely Smythe removed a white handkerchief from his pocket, waved it in the air, and then returned it to its place.

  ‘The parley is over,’ he said. ‘We don’t seem to be getting anywhere. I am going back to the house; I have work to do. Coming?’

  ‘I’m beginning to like this place,’ I said. ‘I think I shall stay awhile.’

  Smythe walked to the mouth – the door, that is. He turned. Against the sunlight he was a dark paper shape, a silhouetted shadow. I couldn’t see his features, but when he spoke his voice had lost its humorous tone.

  ‘I admire your bravado, Vicky. But don’t push it too far. There are things that walk in the garden here – and not only by night.’

  Which was a nice thought to leave with a girl who was sitting inside a monster’s head.

  I fell asleep out there in the monster’s head, lying on a nice soft chaise longue. It was very unusual for me to do that. I never sleep in the daytime. I don’t usually eat lunches like that one either, with almost half a bottle of very potent wine.

  Things started to liven up at about four o’clock, when Pietro rose from his nap – if that’s what he was doing up there in his room. As I was to learn, he was usually somnolent and lazy in the morning, but he revived, like a night-blooming cereus, as twilight approached, and by midnight he was going strong.

  He was a rather engaging little man. Unlike many blasé millionaires, he really enjoyed life. Not that I’ve known that many millionaires; I base that statement on what I read in magazines. Wine may have contributed to his joie de vivre. He started drinking as soon as he got up, and continued until he collapsed. He drank fairly slowly, just a little bit faster than his body could absorb the stuff, so it took him quite a while to get loaded. He passed through several distinct stages along the way. The first sign of inebriation was a profound intellectuality. He would talk about history and politics and philosophy, using a lot of long words and quotations from Greek philosophers I had never heard of. He invented them, I think.

  As the dinner hour approached, sensuality replaced the lure of the intellect. If I was alone with him during that period I had to keep moving, but eating used up most of his libidinous urges, and after dinner he became soft and sentimental. That was when he played old Nelson Eddy-Jeanette MacDonald records on his huge hi-fi and tried to do Viennese waltzes.

  The belligerent mood succeeded this one, but being a noble Italian, Pietro wanted to fight with swords instead of fists. During these hours he often challenged people to duels. At about midnight he became quite vivacious and told a lot of old jokes and did vaudeville routines. He fancied himself as an amateur magician. He had all the paraphernalia, including one of those trick boxes for sawing a lady in half, but by that time his hands were getting unsteady, and even the housemaids refused to be sawed. Sometime in the early hours of the morning he collapsed and was carried off to bed by his valet and Mr Smythe. I don’t know what he needed a mistress for, unless it was during the pre-dinner hour.

  It was during the intellectual stage that first evening that he decided to show me his collections. He warned me that it would take days to study them properly; this was just a quick run-through, to give me a chance to decide what I wanted to concentrate on.

  I’ve seen a lot of beautiful things. Museums are my favourite hobby, as well as my profession. But that was a unique experience. The objects he showed me were not museum pieces, they were part of the furniture.

  ‘But what about thieves?’ I said, midway through the tour. ‘This place is wide open, Pietro; anybody could get in.’

  ‘But how would they get out? Carrying that . . .’ And he gestured at a greater-than-life-size marble torso of Hercules that stood on a pedestal in the salone. ‘You would need a truck, would you not, and a block and tackle. It is not easy to put such an apparatus into my drawing room.’

  ‘That’s right, I guess.’ The little man wasn’t as foolish as he looked. ‘But what about the smaller objects?’

  ‘There are many servants, even when I am not in residence. My housekeeper checks the inventory daily. As for the very small, very valuable objects, naturally I keep them in my safe.’

  ‘Things like jewellery?’ I said.

  ‘Ah, you like jewellery?’ Pietro patted my arm, and for a minute I thought the sensual phase was arriving a little early. But he went on, ‘That I keep in the vault. You would care to see it?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ I said, wide-eyed. ‘I just love jewellery.’

  ‘Ah, women,’ sighed Pietro. ‘You are all alike – even y
ou clever ladies are like all the others where jewels are concerned.’

  The safe was a small room, right next to his sitting room upstairs, and he had sense enough to stand between me and the combination lock as he opened it.

  ‘It is changed yearly,’ he explained, twirling knobs. ‘A little person comes from the bank.’

  At his suggestion I sat down on a velvet divan and he brought out boxes, which he piled on a low table in front of me. Then he started opening the boxes.

  For half an hour or so I forgot I was a well-educated, cynical specialist, gainfully employed in a museum. I wallowed in jewels.

  The pieces that really got to me were the Renaissance jewels. There was a pendant of gold and enamel, with a mermaid made out of a Baroque pearl. Its contours formed the mermaid’s torso; her raised arms and flowing hair were gold. The scales of her fishtail were made of roughly polished emeralds. And there was a necklace two feet long, made of stones as big as the end of a man’s thumb – emeralds and rubies and amethysts and topazes. Another necklace was of square-cut rubies framed in gold, with a cabochon ruby the size of a bantam hen’s egg dangling from the centre. There was a headdress like one I had seen in a Botticelli painting – fine bands of gold supporting a star sapphire with stylized flower petals all around it. A star-shaped brooch set with pearls and rubies and emeralds framed in twisted gold wire. Rings . . .

  I tried to look at these jewels with a critical eye, but it wasn’t easy, because Pietro insisted that I try them on. Rings on my fingers, bells on my toes . . . He was getting to the amorous stage. I was absolutely clanking with jewels when the door burst open and Helena stormed in.

  Alas, it appeared that we were no longer buddies. She glared at me and burst into impassioned speech.

  ‘So this is where you are! You give this to her – never have you let me have so much as a miserable little ring, and you shower this – this – ’

  What followed was a fascinating excursion into Roman gutter slang. I had never known there were so many different words for a lady of ill repute. Pietro stood it for a while, and then he let out a roar.