Chapter 14
The blow hadn't knocked me out. I was stunned and dizzy, and I seemed momentarily paralyzed. I could see her running out the door, but I couldn't seem to make my legs respond. When I got to my feet precious seconds later, I bounced off the wall as I tried to steer myself through the doorway. Finally I got through it and stumbled down the stairs.
I saw Zora running out of the narrow passageway, and I started after her. She ran towards the crowd of people who were moving around the beach, then she was weaving, and ducking as she slipped through them.
By the time I'd worked my way through the crowd, Zora was already running up the flight of steps. I sprinted towards them and when I reached the bottom one, a little girl toddled out from somewhere and stood swaying and smiling in my path. I had to pull up sharply, to avoid running into her and knocking her down. A woman lunged forward, grabbed the child and screamed angrily at me. I ignored her and scampered up the steps. At the top I glanced about, but I didn't see Zora.
Then I caught a glimpse of someone jumping into a convertible with the top down. It was a woman with blonde hair. The next second I noticed the puff of smoke spurt from the exhaust, and the convertible shot away.
I took the town car-the Mercedes-simply because it was headed in the direction Zora was going.
My German horses under the hood went to work, and before long I caught sight of the convertible and Zora's hair whipping wildly in the wind. After another half mile I'd pulled up to within fifty yards of her, and I stayed right there. I saw that the convertible was almost new, and I wondered whether it was Zora's or whether she'd taken it because it had been parked with the key in the ignition. It didn't make any difference, because she knew how to drive.
To keep up with her, I kept the kilometer needle above the 100 mark. We roared along the narrow road, with our tires screeching on the tight turns, and the pedestrians and bicyclists jumping off the road like scared chickens.
Zora was headed for Nervi, and at that moment I was already mentally picking out the spot where I was going to try to pull up beside her and cut her off.
At that second she barely missed a scooter coming towards her, and now he was headed straight for me. I swerved to the right, and he cut to his right. The scooter hit a kilometer stone marker, and the rider went sailing off in one direction while a loose wheel flew off in another direction. There was a streetcar ahead of Zora now, coming towards Genoa. On a sharp curve Zora passed it and I stayed right behind her and did the same thing.
Then I saw a big wood-burning truck coming towards us. Or rather, the driver of the truck saw us because he pulled off the road. Zora missed the truck, but I heard my left rear fender scrape some part of the truck as I shot by.
Now we were on the outskirts of Nervi, and I expected Zora to take the road that went around it. I'd hoped for that because then I could cut her off. For some reason she headed right into the narrow one-way street leading into the center of the town. That was where she made her mistake.
Coming toward her, up that one-way street, was a religious procession. There was a priest out in front and a bunch of altar boys, and strung out behind them for about three blocks were a mass of singing citizens, walking about ten a-breast and taking up every bit of the street. I could see a statue being carried on a high platform, and a mass of flickering candles twinkled in the hands of the crowd.
I held my breath, expecting Zora to plow right through them, but she suddenly slammed on her brakes, with the convertible swerving violently and finally slowing down. Before it had stopped completely she was out of it and slipping in between the oncoming crowd and the wall of the buildings on the right.
I braked hard and stopped about a yard short of hitting the convertible. I shot out of the Mercedes and ran after her. The procession had stopped now, with only the priest moving forward. I almost knocked him down, but I swerved to one side just in time.
Then I slipped in between the people and the buildings, feeling the hot wax burning my face and arms as I jarred hands and arms of the people while burrowing through the crowd. I'd lost sight of Zora, but I kept going down that street until I was out of the procession. Behind me the people had begun singing again, and in the distance police whistles were beginning to shrill.
I pulled up when I hit the end of the street. To the right I saw the big square, the center of Nervi, and it extended toward the sea. There was a wide sidewalk on each side of it, but both were quite dark because they were lined with trees. On the right sidewalk, and about a hundred yards away from me, I caught sight of a slim figure walking very fast.
If Zora had been a brunette all over I never would have caught sight of her again, but that blonde head was as prominent as a beacon.
As I started down the sidewalk, I saw her cut sharply to her right and duck into what appeared to be a tunnel. Now I really sprinted. I found that the tunnel was for pedestrians, and that it led down to the water. I hurried through it, and when I came out on the other side, I was on a wide cement sidewalk.
I recognized it immediately as the world-famous Nervi promenade that skirts the edge of the sea for perhaps a mile.
I glanced to my right, but Zora wasn't in sight. I looked to my left, and I saw her, walking quickly so as not to attract attention, and weaving in and out of the people who were taking a walk.
I didn't run. I just walked quickly, always keeping her in sight. There were a number of bars located on the edge of the promenade, some of them with small bands playing. Couples were dancing out in the open, and the tables and the chairs were occupied with folks having drinks.
The sea was about thirty or forty feet below the level of the promenade at this point. The bank dropped sharply downward, right at the edge of the walk, and below me I could see the water surging and foaming around huge, jagged boulders.
Some of the people on the promenade were standing at the edge of the walk and looking down at the sea below. Others merely walked very slowly. The fact that Zora and I were the two fastest walking people on the promenade didn't attract any attention.
Suddenly I saw Zora glance over her shoulder, and now that she'd seen me, a surprised look crossed her face. She broke out into a dead run. So did I, and when she was no more than twenty feet away from me, I sprinted.
I leaned forward and grabbed her shoulder. She ducked away, twisting and squirming and slipped out of my grasp. I lunged after her and grabbed her arm. The purse banged against the side of my head. I saw stars. She fought savagely and got away from me again.
What a tigress.
And the filthy names she was calling me. In English.
She jerked out of my grasp, spun around, and started to run. Her foot slipped off the edge of the walk, one knee buckled, and the next instant she was tightroping along the edge of the promenade. If she fell to the right, she'd go over the side.
I grabbed for her hand, but all I got was a handful of air. The hand had disappeared. And so had Zora.
I leaned over the side and peered downward. Forty feet below I could see a large boulder.
Zora was draped motionless over one side of it. One hand was in the water, moving gently with the surge of the sea.
People were shouting and yelling now, and I knew they would be at this spot in a minute. Quickly I clambered down the steep sides of the wall, holding onto bushes and shrubs to keep from falling. I crawled over the mossy, damp and slippery rocks until I'd reached her side. I lifted the hand out of the water and felt for her pulse. There wasn't any.
Zora was dead.
Bobbing around nearby in shallow water was her purse.
Above me I could hear the voices getting louder. That meant people were beginning to gather. I opened the purse and quickly rummaged through the mass of stuff inside. I finally found her passport and the visa and some other papers. I stuffed the entire handful into the front of my shirt. I hoped I had everything George had given her, but I didn't have time to check because the voices were directly above me now. I closed the purse and set it into the water, the way I'd found it.
When I glanced up I saw nothing but eyes staring down at me. A second later a Carabinieri, with drawn Beretta, began climbing down the side of the wall.
He yelled something to me in Italian, but you seldom understand even your mother tongue at a time like that. I stood perfectly still and waited for him to come to me.
The only thing for me to do was to ask him to take me to his leader. When he was close enough I said, "Take me to Dottore Longo."
He seemed bewildered for a moment, but then his face brightened as he glanced up at the crowd. Johnny Longo was on his way down to us.
Longo gave me a quick glance, and then he clambered over the rocks to Zora's side. He bent over her for several seconds, and then he straightened up again.
To me he said, "Well, I see we meet again."
I nodded. "And I'm glad to see you, Johnny."
We were being joined by three more Carabinieri, as well as a man in civilian clothes who must have been Johnny's partner.
Longo spoke briefly to them and then he looked at me. "We can go now."
"Anything you say, Johnny."
I followed him back up the side of the wall to the promenade. The crowd became very quiet as we moved through them, but the moment we started walking away, they began chattering excitedly again.
Neither Longo nor I said a word as we walked along the promenade, through the tunnel, and then up the walk on the left side of the square. There weren't many people out in the town of Nervi, and the narrow street that had been jammed up a short time ago was now deserted.
Johnny said, "We'll drive back to Genoa in the Mercedes."
It had been moved out of the one-way street, standing now at the far end where the street joined the main road. I wondered who'd moved it. Maybe the priest had done it so that his procession could get through. And then I remembered the two guys I'd tied up.
Johnny slid behind the wheel of the Mercedes, and I got into the front seat beside him. I said, "There were two of them-they may still be tied up in Boccadasse."
"Not anymore," he said. "We already found them."
I asked, "Do you want to hear what happened?"
"Yes. But wait until we get to the Questura. There's no need in telling your story twice."
"All right."