As Ben watched the man opened the door and went in. Looking upside down from his elevated position, Ben had only the sight of a pair of feet (bare except for sandals), a long, dark dressing-gown and a head covered in slick black hair. But he felt there was something about the man that he recognized.
He didn’t need to be very clever to work out what would happen next. The fellow would see the hole in the ceiling and the mess all over the bed and the floor. Francesca might have found somewhere to hide but it wouldn’t take him long to find her. Within a few minutes the whole house would be alerted and there would be men climbing into the loft to investigate. Ben had to do something – and fast.
In a few seconds he had the hatch fully open and his legs were dangling through. His mind was obsessed with two things. Firstly he must keep quiet. Secondly he must leave the hatch closed so that nobody would think that he had come down into the house before they searched the loft. As he wriggled through the aperture he pulled the loft door behind him and let it rest against his body. He eased his way through the narrowing gap until he was hanging by his arms above the corridor carpet. Now the door was trapping his fingers against the framing of the hatch. It was the last bit which was going to be the most difficult. In the end there was no way he could avoid a nasty graze to his knuckles as he let go and jumped down, landing softly on his toes.
Sucking his damaged fingers he looked round for somewhere to hide but there was nowhere obvious. The corridor was straight with only a couple of large niches containing stands with vases of dried flowers. They weren’t large enough to conceal him. At the end there was a window looking east across the sea towards a grey and troubled dawn.
Loud noises were coming from the open door to Signor Cimbrone’s prison room. Ben’s heart jumped as he heard Francesca answering angrily. She obviously hadn’t been able to hide. But there was nothing he could do at present for her. The best thing would be to get out of sight until he had a better chance of effecting a rescue.
At that moment Francesca let out a squeal of pain. It was that cry which made him change his mind. Ben felt the anger build up inside him as he thought of someone hurting Francesca. There was also a feeling of humiliation stirring in him. It seemed that ever since he had landed in Italy he had been running or hiding from the Vitelli and their henchmen. He decided that now was time for him to turn and fight them. Now was the time to start getting back at them, while he still had the element of surprise on his side.
With a sudden furious resolve that startled him, Ben made for the open door. He paused for a second, just out of sight outside to try and work out where the fellow was. He wanted to catch him off balance. He listened carefully.
There was a heated argument going on in Italian. Occasionally he could hear Papa’s tired old voice interjecting. But nobody took any notice of him. The main argument was between Francesca and the man whom he suddenly recognized from the sneering nasal twang. She was arguing with her intended husband, Dino Vitelli.
There was a sound of a scuffle and somebody grunted. Ben balled his smarting fists and prepared to wade in. Then he heard the noise approaching the door. He waited for a little longer. The next second Francesca was pushed through the doorway. Ben swung his arm back ready.
Francesca saw him and her jaw dropped open. Ben winked at her but he was concentrating on the two hands which gripped her left arm. Aiming a few inches below that level he swung the hardest punch he had ever delivered in his life.
Coming through the door behind Francesca, Dino walked straight into it. Ben felt his fist sink up to the wrist in the man’s soft stomach. Dino’s hands let go his captive’s arms and grasped his paunch as he doubled up in pain. The next second he received a violent upper cut full in the middle of his face followed by another one to the jaw as he straightened up. He collapsed on the floor as though he’d been pole-axed.
Ben stood gasping with the pain to his damaged knuckles and the shock of the anger and hatred which had surged through his body. He’d never been so enraged before in his life. He felt Francesca’s hand flutter lightly on his arm as though not sure whether she should touch him. And when he raised his eyes he found himself looking straight into the startled face of Signor Cimbrone. It brought him back to his senses.
“We must get you away from here before the whole house is awake,” he said. “Can you soon be ready to escape?”
He bent down to check on Dino. The man seemed to be out cold. Ben hadn’t realized the destructive power of his own fists.
He looked up at the girl. “Can you help your father, Francesca?”
There was a gleam of amusement in her eyes as she turned back to the old man. Ben felt embarrassed. She probably thought he had over-reacted. She would be thinking what a fool he was to have lost his temper. In the long run it wasn’t going to help him to get his company back.
He dragged the flaccid body into the room away from the door. He wondered briefly whether he should bind and gag the man, but there didn’t seem to be much point. No doubt Dino would make plenty of noise when he recovered. Even if he couldn’t shout, it wouldn’t take him long to wake the house.
Ben turned back to the others. Signor Cimbrone was already fully dressed except for a coat. That was apparently downstairs. He fancied that he detected a slightly crafty gleam in Papa’s eye.
“OK,” said Ben. “Let’s get moving as quickly as we can before someone else turns up.”
He ushered the others out of the room. At the last minute he remembered to lock the door on Dino and pocket the key. The fellow was groaning and writhing a little already. It wouldn’t be long before he recovered full consciousness. Ben wanted them to be out of the house before then. His mind was grappling with the problem of getting from the front door to the gate past the men in their guardhouse.
Following the old man, who seemed to know where he was going, they set off along the corridor towards the main house. At the end they turned right and almost immediately came to the staircase. Papa peeped over the balustrade and set off nimbly downstairs. At the foot he glanced around almost sheepishly, then he led them to a door into a cupboard under the stairs.
He opened the door and disappeared into the coat cupboard. Ben stood back and waited for him to find his coat and come out again. But the old man turned and beckoned them to follow him into the cupboard and closed the door behind them. Then he switched on the light. With a cheerful comment he burrowed into the coats at the back of the cupboard and pulled them aside to reveal another door which he opened.
He clicked another switch inside the door. A further light sprang on, revealing a flight of stone steps leading down under the staircase. Papa set off down the steps, muttering something as he went.
“Papa says to switch off the cupboard light,” said Francesca.
Ben did so and followed the other two down the winding steps into the bowels of the earth, pulling the door closed behind him as he went. At the foot of the steps they came into a narrow stone-lined corridor. Unhesitatingly Papa turned to the right along the tunnel. Within ten feet this opened out and became a wide, modern corridor of white painted concrete blocks. Ben guessed that they had entered the basement beneath the new wing.
Papa opened the first door on the right and walked in, switching on the light as he did so. Ben discovered they were in a long, low room which was set up like a laboratory. At the far end were dozens of boxes whose labels proclaimed they contained Italian wines. He recognized some of them as brands which the Cimbrone family shipped regularly to him in London. The first stirrings of suspicion began to work away at the back of his mind. Perhaps he was getting nearer to discovering why the Vitelli were so interested in taking over his business.
Some of the crates were open on the central laboratory bench. A stack of full bottles stood on the bench with their foil seals removed. A little further along was a modern corking and sealing machine. To the left of that stood a pack of bottles which had been newly resealed.
“T
hey’re doctoring the wine,” Ben burst out. “No wonder Italian wines get a bad name if that sort of thing still goes on. Toni would never have allowed that sort of wine to get through to us in London. He must have found out about it.” But was that a good enough reason for the Vitelli to kill him?
Papa took no notice of Ben. He walked across to the bench, picked up one of the newly-sealed bottles and tucked it in his coat pocket. Despite his interest in the scene, Ben was beginning to fret about the amount of time they were wasting on the trivial pursuit of messing about with a bottle of rough wine. Any competent taster would immediately pick it out anyway. He was anxious to get away before they were discovered.
Signor Cimbrone beckoned and they followed him back to the door. He switched off the light and led them back into the corridor. He took two paces and froze. Ben was following close behind him and he bumped into the old man’s back. Then he saw what had made him pause.
There, not five yards away, was the hood that he had seen in the guardhouse. He was balancing the same knife that Ben remembered on his thumb and forefinger. Behind him stood the other two gangsters. Ben felt his hair slowly stand on end as he gazed in fascination at the hovering knife.