'It is a ruin.' Cuccaro was also staring. 'It is ... a maze? How do you say — ? There are many walls, and staircases . . . and arches ... on many levels, on the hillside. A maze?'
'A labyrinth?' All he could see was a hint of a platform among the trees.
'A labyrinth — yes!' Cuccaro welcomed the word. 'And ... it is a long walk up there, by a narrow path between the houses. A dummy1
path not for cars, you understand — ? The cars — the taxis . . . they go only from the Marina Grande to Capri town, below. Then you must walk, between the houses and their gardens to reach the . . . excavations.' He turned to Audley, as though questioning his ability to make such a journey. 'It is a long walk, Professore.'
But maybe that wasn't what he was thinking about at all. And quite rightly, too! Even, in all these new circumstances, quite predictably?
'Well . . . that's good, then.' He nodded from Cuccaro to Mitchell.
'Good?' Mitchell frowned at him. 'How is it "good", David?'
'Good for a rendezvous.' Audley nodded, pursing his lips.
'Only one way in — one way out . . . that's usually bad. But a long way in — then you can sit down somewhere, and see who's coming. And decide accordingly?' He cocked his head at them both. 'The Major has a bad conscience, maybe? And, although I'm an old colleague —an old friend ... I could be setting him up — for the Guardia di Finanza, if not the Mafia?' He concluded with Mitchell. 'And we trained him —
remember?' He gave Mitchell a thin smile, even as his own personal memories of Richardson increased his own doubts.
'What would you do, if you thought the roof was falling in on you, Dr Mitchell?'
Mitchell stared at him. Because what Mitchell would do in that event was to be somewhere else, far away from trouble and even further away from old friends and colleagues. But dummy1
he couldn't admit that in front of the Italian.
'So Major Richardson will be watching out up there, and waiting.' Audley nodded, home at last. And then nodded towards Monte Tiberio. 'But if I turn up with someone he doesn't know ... if Captain Cuccaro accompanies me, or gives me an escort. . . then, if he has been up to no good all these years, he'll sit tight, wherever he is. And he'll walk off, eventually, when he knows the coast is clear — right?'
'Is that what you really think, David?' Elizabeth unwound suddenly.
'What I really think, Miss Loftus, is that we don't really have any choice in the matter. Because, if I take a long walk, up there . . . with you and Dr Mitchell in attendance, never mind whatever quite unnecessary protection the Italian authorities may have imagined is appropriate ... if that's what we do, then we'll all have wasted our valuable time. Because the Major is waiting for me, and no one else. And I haven't come this far to waste my time, Miss Loftus.'
They all hated that: they were agreed on that. But they also couldn't argue with its logic effectively, in front of each other, without aborting the mission, never mind questioning his authority. Which put them all on the line.
'So that's agreed, then.' He chose to accept their silent hate as agreement. It was only like it always was, after alclass="underline" they weren't about to reward him with their approval, any more than he ever applauded Jack Butler for making logical dummy1
decisions with which he couldn't argue, however much he disliked the profit-and-loss calculation involved.
And, anyway, what was agreeable was that it was like the old days, when there wasn't a car and a driver in attendance, and another talkative committee meeting at the other end: it wasn't boring.
'Well — let's get on with it, then.' He pointed at Capn.
5
He was just getting into the taxi when Paul Mitchell appeared out of nowhere, pushing his way through the late-season tourists who thronged the quayside of the Marina Grande.
Audley decided not to frown, although that was his first inclination. For he had half-expected Mitchell to try something like this, he realized. So he merely raised his eyebrows instead.
'What is it now?' He had to concede that it had been Mitchell, at the very last moment before he disembarked, who had remembered to supply him with a wad of Italian Monopoly-money, without which he could probably not have penetrated the Villa Jovis ancient monument itself, let alone hired transport to get him near it. 'What else have I forgotten?'
Mitchell gave the taxi-driver a friendly grin. 'Speak English?
No? Well then . . . momenta per favore?' He turned to dummy1
Audley. 'Give me your coat, David.'
'Why?' Audley saw that Mitchell was carrying some sort of alternative garment.
'You don't look like a tourist.' Mitchell eyed his crumpled second-best suit with distaste. 'You look like a businessman who's slept in his suit. And that won't do.' He thrust the garment at Audley. 'Take off your jacket.'
'F—' But then he decided to give in gracefully while he still seemed to be winning. 'Oh — very well!'
He peeled off his jacket. And then remembered to rescue his passport, warrant card, credit cards and Eurocheques, without all of which he never felt he really existed when he was far from home.
Mitchell accepted the jacket in return for what seemed to be some sort of lightweight windcheater, and fretted as Audley bestowed the proofs of his real existence in its breast-pockets. 'Now the tie, David.'
'The tie?' But, of course, tourists didn't wear West Sussex Yeomanry ties.
'Get in the taxi.'
That, at least, was sensible: in the taxi he was out of sight, if there were any prying eyes hereabouts. But then Mitchell held the door so that he couldn't close it, and leaned into the gap.
"This isn't one of your very best ideas, David. Aren't you getting a bit long in the tooth for fun-and-games?'
dummy1
Audley gave up trying to wrestle the door closed. Arguably, the substitution of the jackets might be sensible. But that had simply been Mitchell's excuse to Captain Cuccaro, rather than another belated bit of sense. 'You are supposed to be making polite conversation with Cuccaro, Mitchell. So that he doesn't queer my pitch.'
Mitchell screwed up his second-best jacket. 'Your pitch is already too bloody queer for my liking, David. What the hell are you up to?'
'I'm not "up" to anything. I'm obeying orders. Just as you are.'
'Oh yes?' Mitchell held the door rock-firm. 'I thought my orders were to watch your back. And yours were not to take any unnecessary risks.'
'Your orders were to obey my orders.' The real trouble with Paul Mitchell was that he'd never been a soldier. But the immediate problem was to get the taxi-door closed. 'I'm not taking an unnecessary risk, Paul — I'm taking a calculated one. Because everything I said on the boat is true. Or ...
everything I said about Peter, anyway. And I know him better than you do: I know how he was trained to think. So I know what he'll do if he's running scared.'
'That was a long time ago.' Mitchell's face was like his hold on the door.
'It was — yes.' He slackened his own hold deliberately. 'But he won't have forgotten. And he'll know that I haven't, dummy1
either.'
A muscle on the corner of Mitchell's mouth twitched. 'But we still don't know what's really going on, David. So . . . you're going in blind.' He glanced uneasily at the taxi-driver, who had settled down with a tattered newspaper. 'After what happened in ... to Elizabeth, David?'