‘That’s shooting too, Mr. Frost,’ Silk said with a wintery smile. ‘No immediate rush. I’ll keep the grand I owe you and you give a cheque to Mr. Umney for four thousand. He’ll give it to me.’ He walked over to the elevator, leaving Frost alone with Moses who continued to grin.
‘That Mr. Silk sure is a big conner, boss,’ he said. ‘He sure makes a lot of bread down here.’
Frost stared sightlessly at the negro, then dropping the target, he walked slowly over to the elevator and stood waiting until the engaged signal flashed off.
Three
Catching the last rays of the sun, Gina Grandi lay on a lounging chair, and stared across the big, lonely swimming pool.
She was wearing an emerald green bikini which went well with her Venetian red hair. Her heart shaped face was expressionless. Her body, heavily sun tanned, was well proportioned: her breasts a little heavy, her hips rounded and solid, her legs long and slim.
She spent most of her days thinking back into the past when she had been the toast of Rome’s Dolce Vita. Because of this stupid kidnap attempt, she was confined behind an electrified fence, and she had no idea when her father would relent.
How she hated her father!
For the thousandth time she thought of that disastrous night when she was getting into her Lamborghini, and four men had suddenly surrounded her, guns in hands.
She had been dining at one of the fashionable cellar clubs with a party she had found boring. She had excused herself, leaving them half drunk and shouting. As she was unlocking her car, these four men appeared out of the darkness. They were all young, thin, dressed in shabby jeans and leather jackets. They were all bearded and, to her, excitingly dirty looking.
She immediately realised they intended to kidnap her. The realisation sent a sensual wave through her body. To get away from the boredom of luxury, to be hidden in some sleazy apartment, to be raped even, was something she had realised, with a slight sense of shock, she had been subconsciously yearning to happen.
But how stupid and incompetent these four had been! They had been waiting outside the club, all hoping for millions, but without a plan in their retarded minds. Their furtive movements had attracted the attention of two alert policemen who had taken cover behind a car and had watched them.
Kidnapping in Italy was rife, and every policeman had been instructed to watch for any suspicious action.
As the four young men surrounded Gina, she had smiled at them, unafraid of the guns in their hands. Her heart began to pound with excitement.
‘Come with us,’ the tallest of the four had said. ‘This is a snatch!’
Then out of the darkness, a voice barked, ‘Police! Drop those guns!’
The tall youth, who could not have been more than eighteen years of age, swung around and fired.
The policeman who had moved out from behind the car was hit, but before dropping, he shot the youth, killing him.
There was an immediate panic among the other three. They turned to run. The other policeman, shielding himself behind the car, his gun hand on the roof of the car, picked off two of the youths as they ran. The fourth youth, short, thickset, had dodged behind the Lamborghini. He caught sight of the policeman’s head. Standing up, he fired as the policeman fired. Both shots were killers.
Gina had stood motionless during the gun battle. She was still standing, staring at the six bodies as her friends spilled out of the club and press photographers appeared from nowhere. While standing amidst the screams, popping flashlights and seeping blood, she had a sick feeling that something very special in her life had been snatched away from her.
The publicity had been worldwide. Every newspaper carried a front-page photograph of her, surrounded by bodies. The snide papers had underlined that she had just left a club which had an unsavoury reputation: the haunt of gay men, reefer smokers and kinky women.
When her father heard what had happened and had read the reports in the papers, he took instant action.
Carlo Grandi was a ruthless tycoon who had fought his way up from a Naples slum to being the richest man in Italy. He spent every hour of his waking life controlling his vast financial kingdom. His wife, bored and lonely, scarcely ever seeing her husband, had had an affair with a playboy whom she had met at a party, given by one of her women friends. The playboy had tried to blackmail her. Terrified of her husband, sick of her empty, rich life and sick of herself, she drank a bottle of vodka, swallowed sleeping pills and died. Grandi returning from a business trip, found her with a sad little note that read: Forgive me, Carlo. Your standards were too high. The suicide had been hushed up. Gina, then seventeen years of age, was at a Swiss finishing school. She had a cable from her father which read: Mother died. Heart attack. Coming to see you.
Grandi arrived at the Montreux school. Gina had little love for her mother and none for her father. She knew he was far too occupied to have much interest in her, and she knew he was a man incapable of affection. When he said that she should stay at the school for another year, she agreed.
At the end of the year, she arrived in Rome. Grandi was far too occupied to give her any attention. He gave her a generous allowance, made her a member of various high-class clubs, checked to see that she had amusing and well born friends, then left her to her own devices. Every month, he arranged to take her to a stately, dull dinner at Alfredo’s. When he had time to think of her, he imagined she was thoroughly enjoying herself, and was behaving as the daughter of the richest man in Italy should behave herself.
When he read of the kidnapping and about the club, he flew into a towering rage. He had her locked in one of the upper guest rooms, and called for an inquiry to be made of her past activities. A discreet detective agency produced a report that Grandi could scarcely believe. She had not only been behaving like a whore, but was on drugs. There was also a serious possibility now of further kidnap attempts.
Grandi decided to remove Gina from the Italian scene. One of his aides found Orchid villa and Grandi rented it. The electrified fence was installed and all the security gimmicks, and within a month, Gina was taken there by her father and Frenzi Amando.
Gina was too awed by her father’s fury to think of protesting. She had no idea who Amando was, but she hated the sight of him.
Before leaving her to return to Rome, Grandi talked to her.
‘You have behaved disgracefully,’ he said. ‘You will remain here until I decide when you are fit to mix with decent people. If, at the end of a year, I get a good report about you, I will then consider giving you supervised freedom. You have betrayed my trust in you, and no one does that without bitterly regretting it.’
Gina moved uneasily. How she hated her father! To have done this to her! To have her caged behind an electrified fence, to have this cold blooded, snake of a man as her custodian! This man continually watched her. She could feel his eyes on her now. He was probably watching her from one of the upper windows of the villa.
Although, from time to time, she missed drugs, she really suffered from the lack of lovers. Sex tormented her day and night.
Apart from the servants who scarcely spoke to her, there was this tough ex-cop who had as much sex in him as the gun on his hip. The other guard was revoltingly fat and he had a hairy wart on his nose. She was sure he was a voyeur. He was always watching her from behind shrubs, giving her leering smiles, his little eyes stripping her.
The one saving grace of this gilded cage was Suka, the Japanese general factotum who ran the villa. Although he was inscrutable, she sensed that he was sorry for her. It was Suka, as he was serving her tea, who told her that the guard Joe had been caught by Amando sleeping and had been dismissed.