humid, drowsy day. And the room was dimly lit; wall lights turned low, and a shaded bedside lamp. But I'm way ahead of myself. At first I didn't see a damn thing, I only felt the pain in the back of my skull.
'Then, as I gradually came to, I heard voices speaking in Italian. I knew the language well enough to know they were talking about me… and Natasha. 'After the girl,' one voice said, 'then you can have him. But first, I want him to see and understand — the spoiled English brat! I would have had her myself, a long time ago, except that might have been problematic. Even so, I was tempted. And if she'd been a little more willing… but I won't force any woman, it's too demeaning — to myself, I mean. Anyway, our colleagues in Moscow think highly, much too highly, of this bitch. And now this brat has spoiled her. Well for me, at least. I don't take anyone's leavings, Jean Daniel, so this is your lucky day; you get to do it for me. Let's face it, you've watched her often enough, and I'm sure you've fancied her just as frequently, eh? So, what better way to pay him back for what he did to you?'
' 'Fancied her?' the other voice said. 'Hey, I'm only human, Luigi.' And this is… this is a lot… a lot of woman
Jake's own voice as he told or relived his story had sunk very low, become guttural, until at this point he was choking on his words, having difficulty getting them out. Trask saw this and said, 'Jake, we can leave it there if you like?'
But the other shook his head. 'No,' he said grimly. 'No, I think I'd like to finish it Maybe it's good for me to remember what went down. Because then I'll be sure I was right in what I did. Yes, and it also serves to remind me of what remains to be done…' And after a moment:
'These-voices,' he went on, 'were very distinctive. The one belonged to Castellano, as I was about to find out. It was very deep and powerful; like a rumble, a purring sound, even when he was speaking quietly. And the other, this Jean Daniel's voice, it had an obvious French accent in keeping with his name. But it also had something of a lisp, which explained itself as soon as I saw him.
'Anyway, I must have twitched, moved my head or something. Maybe I groaned, but suddenly they knew I was awake. Then shadows moved in that dim room.
'They came from behind me, one pausing to stand beside my chair, the other moving towards the bed, positioning itself in an easy chair on the other side of the lamp. They were men, of course, but to my blurred vision they were more like shadows. But as my eyes adjusted and my head stopped swimming, finally I saw Natasha, spreadeagled there on the four-poster. And because she'd lifted her head she could see me, too. Maybe that — that look on her face, expressing her relief that I'd finally come to — was how they knew I'd regained consciousness. But in any case, it was an expression that didn't last much longer.
'The one beside the bed spoke, and his deep purring voice told me that this was Luigi Castellano. 'Ah, Natasha, Natasha.''
he rumbled, as she turned her pale, frightened face to look at him. 'First the injury and then the insult,' he said. 'To have spurned my friendship, my warmest offerings of affection, for this… this Englishman's. Perhaps you didn't understand that in the game we play it's always business first — no such thing as mixing business with pleasure, Natasha. And if there was we might reasonably expect you to take your pleasures with one of us, not with some stupid outsider. Perhaps it's my fault; I allowed you too much leeway? But no, for I hate to blame myself.'
'I tried to look at the speaker but he was still a shadow, a dark silhouette hunched behind the cone of faint yellow radiance from the bedside lamp. And he went on speaking:
' 'But then again, what if this foreign playmate of yours wasn't so stupid after all but a member of one of those agencies we haven't yet got to, eh? You took too many chances, Natasha — took too much pleasure, I fancy — and now you must pay. Ah, but what price? Well, since you don't seem to care too much for the company of a business partner, I was obliged to find a punishment to fit your… your what, your crime? Ah, but no — too harsh by far — your error of judgement, then. A punishment to fit both participants, that is. Tit for tat, if you like. Or, better far, tits for tat?' Castellano's tone was much harsher, harder now. 'Yes, and the rest of your more than ample charms into the bargain…'
'He looked up and beckoned to Jean Daniel. My chair was a swivel. The man beside me spun it, and I went turning, turning, feeling sick as a dog as the room revolved around me. At least it gave me a chance to identify my tormentor, his cold, smiling face passing before me as the chair slowed down. It was Natasha's tail, of course, and Castellano's tall pale-faced watchdog^
'Finally he spoke to me in broken English through a broken mouth, which accounted for his lisp. I hadn't realized how hard I'd hit him. 'Bastard!' he said. 'Stupid, English, pig bastard! When I finish with her, then is your turn. We see who hit hardest, eh?' He made to move towards the bed.
''If you hit her,' I mumbled, 'if you strike her just once, I swear I'll—' But he turned, cut me off, said:
''Hit her? With fist?' For a moment he frowned, looked puzzled. But then, grinning as best he could through split lips, he said, 'No, stupid, I not hit. I fuck her!'
'And he did…' Jake's voice was a growl now, a sob, a low moan. 'With that dog Castellano watching, and laughing. And me: I couldn't look away. I had to look.' He ripped her underclothes right off her. The skinny bastard — he didn't pause to get undressed — he just… he just… And Natasha, she didn't even speak, didn't cry out. But she did cry. I heard her sobbing…'
Trask cut in, Til take it from here, Jake, okay?' And before the other could protest:
'You were found in an alley badly beaten. Four broken ribs, and your nose much as we see it now. The rest of your face was a mass of bruises. You'd been kicked, too — someone had really worked on you — so badly that for a day or two the French doctors couldn't be sure they'd be able to save… everything. But you still had your plastic, and paper money in your pockets, so it looked like the motive wasn't theft. In fact they never discovered what the motive had been; even when you could talk you weren't telling anyone, said you didn't know. Now why was that, Jake?'
'I was going to handle it my own way,' Jake answered, dispassionately now. 'And I did, eventually.'
'Yes, you did,' Trask nodded. 'But that came later. Do you want to pick the story up again?'
The other's face was white, drawn, but he nodded…
'I was three weeks in hospital,' Jake eventually continued. 'No word from Natasha; I didn't know what had happened to her, but I prayed it wasn't physical. Or rather, nothing more than she'd already suffered. As for what
— I was her man. HuhlThat old motto of mine: 'Who Dares Wins.' Well, I dared for sure, because I loved her. See, I still hadn't learned my lesson. Then again, do fools in love ever learn?' He managed a wry grin. 'How about that: Jake Cutter, philosopher!
'About Jean Daniel, which was the only name I ever knew him under: my initial intentions towards that bastard had been very bloody. At first… well, I admit that I'd equipped myself. And I had gone looking for them, too — the Mob, I mean — but carefully. And as I healed, so I quit abusing my system with booze and maybe some other stuff. The army had trained us hard: 'body maintenance,' my Section Commander had used to call it. But now I found it really difficult to get back into the routine. Oh, I was still young, but as you've pointed out, Mr Trask, that Jean Daniel had done a hell of a good job on me. Such a good job, it took me four long months to put the damage right.
'I completed my recuperation in England, went back to Marseille. But time was passing and I still hadn't heard from Natasha, I had given her both my English and French telephone numbers; if she couldn't speak to me, she should certainly be able to speak to friends of mine. Still I hadn't heard from her, and time seemed against me, seemed to be flying. But where Natasha was concerned: it was like some kind of paradox, the months passing like so many years! I couldn't forget her
— I still wanted her — and the debt that the Mob owed us was slowly slipping out of memory and into the past
'Earlier, however, not long after leaving the hospital, I had found Castellano's villa. I did it the easy way, by tailing the tail. I'd grown a designer beard, tinted my sideboards grey and changed my mode of dress, even developed a limp. Or rather, I had deliberately held onto the limp I'd been left with, legacy of Jean Daniel. In all I looked quite a lot older. And I was staying out of bars, places where people might have been warned to look out for me. But one lonely night — I don't know, maybe I was hoping against hope that Natasha would be there — I went back to the bar where I'd first met her.
