Die Rich Die Happy

'No,' said Craig. 'Naxos forgot to give me one.' T find that strange,' said Trottia. 'So do I,' said Craig. 'So do I.'

Grierson said: 'People can wander about both floors?' 'And the roof,' said Trottia. 'The roofr

'It's laid out as a garden. One can take supper there and hear the gondola serenade. It will be splendid.'

The two men left him, and he thought again how splendid it would be, after Craig died. A hard man to kill. Trottia shivered, and went to wait for the actors.

The roof, too, was a maze—of trees in enormous tubs, of fairy lights, of chairs and tables, bars and buffets, and banks of flowers. Craig looked at it in despair. Below him the Grand Canal glowed like oil, the molo glittered with lights.

'We might as well get drunk,' said Grierson. 'If anybody wants to get your friend, we haven't a chance.'

'We have,' said Craig. 'Just one. The steward.'

He led the way down to the ballroom again, to the kitchens where stewards, chefs, and sous chefs worked like demons preparing a reception for the Hilton Hotel in hell. Theseus had told them who they were, and nobody bothered. They were too busy. They went back into the ballroom again and waited until the steward came in. Craig waited until he'd put down his load of glassware and spoke softly in Greek. 'Walk to the end of the hall,' he said, 'or I'll kill you.' The steward spun round, and Craig pulled the mask down from his face, a face devoid of any emotion, not cruel, not vengeful; pitiless. The steward went. From upstairs in the duehng room came the clash of steel and Trottia's squeals of pleasure. The actors had arrived. Craig led the way to a room off the hall, the room he'd been given as an office, then grabbed the steward and shoved him. The steward slammed into the wall, moaned but said nothing.

'Yell,' said Craig. 'That's what respectable people do. Yell for the police.'

'You would kill me,' the steward whispered.

'I might,' said Craig.

The steward turned to Grierson, trying to reach beyond the mask for a sign of mercy, of pity.

'Please, sir,' he gabbled. 'I've done nothing, I know nothing—if the gentleman thinks I've wronged—'

The words faded in a babble of terror. Craig*s hand was thrust before his face. It held a bottle of suntan lotion. The band crashed into one last rehearsal of samba.

'You've got a touch of the sun,' said Craig. 'You're all red. Use some of this. Go on. Use it.'

'I don't need it,' said the steward.

'Use it anyway,' said Craig. 'Go on.'

'But why should I?'

'It costs two thousand lire a bottle. I'll give you ten thousand if you'll use it. Twenty thousand. I'm kinky for blokes who use suntan oil.'

The steward moaned and covered his face with his

hands.

Craig grabbed his hair and pulled his head up. 'Watch,' he said.

He unscrewed the cap with extreme care, and turned to Grierson.

'Hold him,' he said. Grierson's arms came round him, and the steward was helpless.

'What's your name?' Craig asked. 'Nikki.'

'Don't you like suntan oil, Nikki?' 'I have an allergy,' the steward said. 'To this kind? Everybody does,' said Craig. 'Who gave it to you?'

The steward was silent.

'1 saw what it did to a piece of wood,' Craig said. 'Went right through it. Who gave it to you?'

Nikki moaned aloud: 'Suit yourself,' said Craig, and tilted the bottle.

'No,' Nikki screamed. 'No. It was Mrs. Naxos.'

The band finished, on three hard chords like right hooks to the body.

'You're lying,' said Craig, and his hand moved closer.

Nikki opened his mouth to scream, and Craig's free hand flicked him like a cobra striking. The scream became a gasp.

'We haven't much time,' said Grierson.

'Nikki's got no time at all,' said Craig. 'Look, I'll ask you once more. Who gave it to you?'

'Mrs. Naxos,' said Nikki, his voice a wheezing gasp. 'I swear it. She said it was a joke. It would make you turn blue, she said.'

'Then why are you so scared?' Craig asked.

'I tried it on a piece of paper.'

'Who got you your job, Nikki?' Craig asked. 'Who do you work for?'

The hand holding the bottle was over his head now. The bottle was tilting, tilting.

'I don't know his name,' Nikki said. 'I swear I don't. An Englishman. Big. Bigger than Theseus.'

'And what did he tell you to do?'

'I have to take my orders from Mrs. Naxos—do whatever she says. Mr. Naxos isn't to know.'

'What orders?'

'I can get her the white stuff,' said Nikki. 'Heroin.' 'How many times?'

'Not yet,' said Nikki. 'But she knows I've got it if she wants it.'

As he spoke the band blared again, and Craig's hand tilted, spilling suntan oil on Nikki's face. The steward screamed and fainted.

Grierson cursed.

'It's on my hand,' he said.

Craig shrugged.

'It's only suntan oil.'

He looked at the unconscious steward.

'Let's have his jacket and pants,' he said. 'They may come in useful.'

'Tie him up?'

Craig looked at the steward; tall, soft-muscled, running to fat.

'No,' he said. 'He's harmless.'

Behind the mask, Grierson winced. Craig always reduced things to fundamentals. It was how he had survived. But it left no room for dignity in anybody else.

'Besides,' Craig added, 'Once he sees he isn't marked he won't want to run away—not without his pants.'

At midnight, Craig and Grierson watched Naxos arrive. From somewhere or other Trottia had found him a carnival barge, six oars a side, two cox'ns with crossed boathooks in the prow, the flag of Greece and Venice's lion fluttering at the stern, and beneath a silken canopy supported on four brass rods, Aristides I, the pasha of petroleum, his wife beside him, indolent, beautiful, while launches, gondolas, san-dolos swarmed around them, darting like gnats, the gondolas beaked prows cruel in the lamplight.

'He's mad,' said Grierson.

'No,' Craig said. 'Just big. Bloody big. That means big risks too. And big enemies.' 'Nikki's friends?'

Craig nodded. 'I don't think hell be along himself— he's too conspicuous. But he'll send some pals. Look out for anybody Swyven talks to. Or Trottia. And if you have to handle anybody—keep it quiet.' He chuckled. 'If you can,' he added. 'This place'll be a nine-ring circus.'

He looked again at the flotilla. The barge's crew were dressed as eighteenth-century sailors. Andrews, at the helm, wore the tricorn hat, blue coat, bullion epaulettes of a naval lieutenant of the time of George III.

'H you need help, ask Andrews if I'm not there.'

'Will do,' said Grierson. There was silence as he lit a cigarette, inhaled deeply. The flotilla moved up to the steps of the palace, the coxns sprang ashore, hooked on, held the barge steady as the crowd cheered.

'It's extremely vulgar,' Grierson said. 'But very beautiful.' They went back into the ballroom. Both champagne fountains were playing now. Stewards and barmen were poised like greyhounds.

'There's someone else we'll have to watch for,'

Grierson said. The band blared Mozart's Turkish March, and Grierson winced as