“But if the insurance company guarantees payment,” Phil said, “can’t you just borrow on their guarantee? Argos is a big firm, they have a good reputation.”
Unfortunately no, Vincenzo explained. As with other kidnap insurers, It was strictly against the rules, and possibly against the law, to use the policy itself as collateral. Doing so would invalidate it, so he had to come up with the money on his own. His Aurora stock alone would more than provide the necessary collateral, never fear. He was surprised-angry-that they would demand so much, that was all.
He turned again to Caravale. “What do you propose, Colonel?”
“Well…” Caravale began.
He already knew what Vincenzo had just told them about Argos because he’d looked into it on his own the day after the kidnapping. He also knew that the policy explicitly required that there be cooperation with the police, which meant that Vincenzo’s posturing the other day about how much he trusted him had been so much buttering up. He thought he understood the point of it too. To Vincenzo he was just another version of Comandante Boldini, a petty functionary who was supposed to swell with pride and loyalty at being brought into the confidence of the noble de Grazias. Well, not bloody likely.
In the expectant hush that followed his “well,” he had scribbled two lines at the bottom of the sheet. “Here is the reply that I propose. ‘Prestigious villa, near Oggebbio, mountain view, 1,000,000m;. Contact signor Pinzolo’-that’s me, of course, how do you do?-‘telephone 032358285, fax 032358266.’”
There was a spatter of confusion and surprise.
“One million…!”
“But they said…!”
“How can you…!”
Caravale raised his hand, wrist cocked, like the traffic policeman he’d once been. “It’s not a good idea to give in too quickly to their initial demands. If we do, they’re likely to conclude they asked too little and come back with a higher ransom demand. Better to offer less, but to show at the same time that we’re willing to negotiate.”
Vincenzo was shaking his head doubtfully. “They were very explicit, Colonel-no counteroffers would be accepted. How much clearer could they be? I understand what you’re getting at, but this is my son’s life we’re talking about, not some game. We de Grazias-”
“Signore,” Caravale interrupted before Vincenzo could tell him what “we de Grazias” would or wouldn’t do, “I have to tell you that in a case like this, you can never know for sure what they will do, but I think it’s safe to assume that their threats are empty. What would be the point of harming or killing their captive? What would they gain? They’d come away with nothing at all but the carabinieri hot on their trail. And I assure you, they do not expect to get five million euros.”
“That makes sense,” said Phil. “Otherwise, why would they have made the amount part of the ad they want us to place? It would have said something else-it could have been anything-and not mentioned money at all. Putting in an amount must have been a way of giving us a chance to respond with a different amount.”
“Yes, I suppose that’s so,” said Vincenzo, obviously impressed.
Caravale was impressed too. This rather subtle point hadn’t occurred to him either. He wondered if the kidnappers realized it themselves.
“If we are in agreement, then,” he said, “I expect matters to proceed about like this: We’ll go ahead and offer the one million. They’ll express outrage but make a counteroffer of, oh, four million. We’ll offer two, they’ll come down to something like three-fifty, and we’ll probably settle for three million or thereabouts. It shouldn’t take too long once the process begins.”
Dante laughed. “If it’s as cut-and-dried as all that, why not offer them the three million now and eliminate all this busy work?”
“I’m sorry you don’t find the discussion more worthwhile, Dante,” Vincenzo said. There was no love lost between those two.
“On the contrary, I’m fascinated. I can’t wait to see it happen. It’s like a lesson in the capitalist ethic. One party has a commodity to sell, another party wishes to buy it. They freely work out a price between themselves, without the interference of regulations or the intrusion of government. Do we not have before us the free market system at its most elemental?”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” Francesca said, again lifting her eyes to the low, hammer-beamed ceiling, something she seemed to do pretty often with Dante around. She must once have been quite beautiful, Caravale realized. She still was, he supposed, but now she’d weathered into a collection of hard angles and sharp edges.
The stern, thin, measured voice of Cosimo de Grazia was heard from his corner. “My nephew is not a commodity.”
“Certainly not, Uncle,” Vincenzo agreed. “Colonel Caravale, when do you suggest this advertisement be placed?”
“Not until you do have the money available. It would be a mistake to mislead them on that score.”
“A million, do you mean? That’s no problem. I’ll go into Milan tomorrow morning and see my banker. To be completely safe, the advertisement can appear the following morning. Wednesday.”
Caravale showed his surprise in spite of himself. “You can raise-borrow-a million euros cash in one day?”
De Grazia smiled. “But it’s not cash, Colonel, it’s a wire transfer. No money actually changes hands. Very up-to-date. I assure you, it involves far less in the way of logistics than trying to collect a million euros in ten- and twenty- euro notes, or whatever you’re used to.”
“Of course,” Caravale said, but the truth was that he hadn’t given much thought to this aspect of the demand. All of the kidnap-ransom cases that he’d dealt with had concerned cash ransoms. And de Grazia was right about the logistical difficulties involved. As it happened, Caravale knew from personal experience exactly what one million euros in ten-euro notes involved. It took one hundred thousand ten-euro notes-no easy thing to collect-and when you had them all together, they weighed two hundred pounds and filled four garbage bags to bursting. Even the crooks in that case had been taken aback when they saw what they had to deal with.
He was going to have to get himself filled in on electronic money transfers before this went much further. He didn’t like being behind the times. And he didn’t like being patronized by Vincenzo de Grazia.
“I’ll see that the advertisement runs Wednesday then,” he said. “Who knows, they might even accept, although that’s doubtful. But if not, it’ll give you a chance to raise more while we negotiate.”
“One moment, please,” Bella Barbero said, her nail-chewed fingers playing over her pearls. “I realize I don’t know much about such things, but it seems to me you’re putting quite a lot of confidence in these gangsters knowing these, these ‘rules’ as well as you do.”
“Yes, that’s so,” exclaimed her husband Basilio. “For all we know, we could be dealing with crazy people, or amateurs who don’t know how such things are supposed to work.”
“Oh, I think we can assume that these gangsters, as you properly call them, signora, belong to the class of experienced, professional kidnappers of which Italy, unfortunately, has no shortage. The abduction of Achille was”-a work of art, he almost said-“meticulously planned. The diversion on the Corso, the blockage of the police cars on their lot, were executed with foresight and precision. There was nothing amateurish about them.”
“That may be so, but I don’t agree with your conclusions,” Bella said, openly challenging him. “What about the kidnapping itself? It could hardly have been more botched. All that wild shooting, two people dead. They might easily have shot…” She didn’t finish the sentence.
“True, signora, the execution of the plan was bungled, but that was the fault of those that were hired to do it, not of the men behind it. Kidnappers for ransom often use hired thugs for the most dangerous aspects.”
“I don’t quite see how you can be so confident anybody hired anyone,” Vincenzo said irritably. “Why is it necessary to conjure up some hidden mastermind behind it all?”