Kiss of Hot Sun (16 page)

I realised I’d only been thinking as far as this point—of getting Philip alone and showing him the letter. I hadn’t considered the problem beyond that. Now I could see the difficulties.

My face was stiff with the effort of forced smiling.

“Won’t it look suspicious if we go off together?”

“Why should it? What more natural than for me to ask you out? They’ve probably been wondering why I didn’t get around to it sooner.” He flashed a quick grin at me. “Don’t worry, I’ll fix it.”

But there was still one thing I’d kept back and without knowing that, Philip couldn’t appreciate the possible dangers of the situation. It was only fair to tell him now, before he got involved any deeper.

“Adeline said something else, Philip. Something I didn’t tell you...”

“What is it?”

“About Carlo.”

“What about him?”

“She thinks it wasn’t a vendetta killing, like the police said. She thinks Zampini had him killed.”

The skin around Philip’s eyes was still crinkled in a friendly smile, but I could see a cold glint way back in the dark pupils.

“She’s not the only one to think that, Kerry,” he said slowly. “I do, as well.”

Etna smoked sullenly into the brassy morning sky.

For a while we had edged our way around the volcano’s skirt before striking north into wild secret hills. I was glad to turn my back upon Etna.

The lesser mountains lay before us like stiff crumpled paper, roughly smoothed, burned to pale straw by the savage sun heat.

Philip had worked out our route in advance. He soon found the minor road, little more than a dusty track, that struck off to the right. We climbed steadily, winding through a scrub-filled valley, a brooding, baking wasteland.

Getting away from the villa had been surprisingly easy. At breakfast Philip had strolled across to our table on the loggia. He gave Adeline a winning smile.

“
I wonder whether Miss Lyndon would care to come for a bit of a drive with me? That is, if you can spare her.”

“How nice!” Adeline glanced at me with an exaggerated head-on-one-side archness. But I was glad to see this reaction. If she imagined Philip was merely inviting me out because he found me attractive, then so much the better.

“You’re sure you don’t mind, Miss Harcourt?”

“I’m delighted for you to have fun, Kerry darling. And for goodness’ sake don’t hurry back—not in this heat.”

The moment we were alone together in the car I’d asked Philip the question that had refused to leave my mind all night.

“What makes you suspect Zampini was responsible for Carlo’s death?”

“Just a hunch.”

But I knew he was being evasive.

“It’s more than that,” I pressed. “You’ve got a good reason for thinking so, haven’t you?”

The rear wheels scrabbled loosely on the dusty surface for a moment as we took a bend that was sharper than it looked.

“I don’t know anything for sure, Kerry.”

“But you do know more than you’ve admitted to me,” I said sharply. We were in this thing together now, and I didn’t see why he shouldn’t come clean. “When you tried to make out I was talking nonsense yesterday morning— you knew it was all true, didn’t you?”

He nodded. “Yes.”

“So why...?”

He didn’t answer, as if he needed to give all his attention to the narrow winding road.

“I asked you a question, Philip.”

Reluctantly, he said at last: “I wanted to protect you.”

“But I knew what they were up to. How were you protecting me by refusing to believe me? By pretending I’d got it all wrong?”

His answer, if it could be called an answer at all, was very oblique. “Yorke is obviously pretty scared. Look at the care he’s taken to stop them discovering that he’s contacted us.”

“What’s it all about, Philip? Why did Carlo have to be killed? And why is Giles so scared? It isn’t as though they were involved in something really serious...”

“Don’t you think art forgery is serious?”

“Oh, of course I do! But... well, as Adeline herself pointed out, the buyers ask for it, really. It only works because they all think they are cheating her, instead of the other way round...”

I dried up. Philip was looking so grim. “You’re on dangerous ground, Kerry. If you really believe what you’re saying, then you could justify every confidence trick that’s ever been pulled.”

“I know you’re right in a way, but it isn’t exactly the end of the world. There’s a lot worse crimes perpetrated every day. I still can’t see why they’re so...
desperate
about it.”

“It could be...” said Philip in a voice of quiet foreboding. “It could well be that they’ve got something to be desperate about."

“What are you trying to say?”

He shook his head. “I was just pointing out that if people take desperate measures, it’s a pretty safe bet that they’ve got good cause.”

I couldn’t get him to say any more. I guessed the antagonism and suspicion between us these last few days had bitten too deep. Philip still wasn’t ready to trust me completely.

For some distance the valley had been steadily narrowing. Now it looked as if we were coming up against a blank wall of stark brown mountain. But as we got nearer I saw that the road began a crazy zigzag ascent, a narrow twisting ribbon that was the only man-made thing in all this brutal landscape.

For a while we drove through a deep channel hewn into bare rock. Then suddenly, on our left, the ground fell away steeply. The road ahead curved to the right, following round the hillside. Philip edged back the throttle slightly, and we coasted into the bend.

The drop to our left wasn’t quite as sheer as I’d first thought. But even so it was steep enough, sliding away down for what looked like hundreds of feet of rocky savagery.

“It would be awkward,” Philip observed mildly, “if we met something coming down the road.”

There wasn’t really much danger of that. For miles we hadn’t seen another car, even another human being. Giles had certainly chosen well for a meeting he wanted to keep absolutely secret.

Smoothly Philip eased the car round the long curve, careful to avoid any harsh braking. The loose surface looked wickedly dangerous.

And then with a sharp crack we were out of control. The car lurched into the rockface on our right, scraping violently against it. The rear tyres lost their grip, and we were slithering sideways across the width of the road.

There was nothing I could do but hold on. It seemed inevitable that we should be flung over the cliff edge to an absolutely certain death.

Somehow Philip held the car on that narrow ledge of road. By a miracle of driving he countered every terrifying skid and came to a stop only inches from the edge. He pulled on the handbrake and cut the ignition.

But the mountain had the last word. There was a curious protesting noise and very slowly I felt the car heel over. It was only a slight movement but so amplified by my frightened mind that it seemed the whole mountainside was on the move.

Then with a thud we hit firm ground again. We were poised on the very edge, one wheel right over. In the stillness we could hear dislodged chunks of rock scrambling away down the steep slope.

“Quick,” said Philip, clutching my arm. “Get out before some more gives way.”

I didn’t argue. With the car leaning at such an angle it wasn’t so easy, but Philip gave me a hard shove. Then he climbed out himself.

Together, we backed to the safety of the rock wall behind us.

“What... what happened?” I asked shakily.

“God knows! I think a tyre must have burst.” He laid a protective arm around my shoulder, and oddly his gesture made me tremble more violently than ever. I’d managed to keep a grip on myself so far. Now I felt like breaking down and crying.

Philip sensed my weak knees and his arm tightened. “Sit down for a bit,” he said gently. “You’ll feel better in a minute.”

We sat there on the hot dusty surface of the road and stared at one another in silence. We were grateful to be alive at all. For the moment we didn’t think beyond that. We weren’t worrying about what to do next.

The car didn’t shift again. Presumably it had found the one weak spot on the rocky verge and was settled down now. But even if it wasn’t going to topple over, neither could Philip and I hope to get it back on the road. That job would need a lot of help—a tractor maybe, or several men and a strong rope.

Already, in those few minutes out of the car, the sun had become our enemy. It pulsed above us, filling the entire sky with its stridency, seeming to reach out vicious claws.

The air all around vibrated with the metallic resonance of thrusting insect life. Close by, a tiny lizard darted out, a quick startled scurry. With a flick of the tail it was gone again, back to its crevice in the rocks. Maybe it had seen us, or maybe the vindictive sun was too much even for a lizard.

I wished we could find some shade so easily.

Philip got to his feet. “The map’s in the glovebox. It’ll help fix just exactly where we are.”

“You mustn’t go near the car!” I jumped up quickly, afraid for him. Any small movement might upset such a precarious balance.

Philip turned back to me. “Don’t worry, Kerry. She’s well bedded down now.”

“Please...!”

He waved aside my protests. “But we need that map. I’ll just open the door and reach inside. Then if the car does start sliding, all I have to do is let go.”

He pretended it was as simple as that, but I felt petrified.

The map wasn’t very encouraging. It was too small a scale for us to pinpoint where we were to within a mile or two. But clearly, unless we were lucky enough to get a lift, we had a long walk ahead of us. The place Giles had asked us to meet him was about nine miles further on.

We decided to go back. The thought of tramping that long dusty road in the ever-mounting heat appalled me. But staying here was senseless. It was probable that no other vehicle would come this way for ages.

There was a flask of coffee in the car, but I wouldn’t allow Philip to get it. I wasn’t going to let him take the risk a second time.

“After all,” I said decidedly, “it’s not as if we were in a desert. At the very worst two or three hours’ walking will get us somewhere.”

Philip looked at me strangely, as if he had a foreboding that our escape was not going to be so easy. Then he switched mood, smiling cheerfully and taking my arm.

“Let’s get going, then.”

But we weren’t to get very far. As we started round the bend, back the way we had come, a spurt of dust jumped in the road by Philip’s feet. A sharp crack came almost simultaneously.

We stopped dead. The crack was repeated, echoing at us from the opposite side of the valley. And then silence.

Even the insects were quiet.

Philip sprang alive. He dragged me down, hard against the rock wall.

“That was a bullet,” he yelled, “Somebody’s shooting at us.”

There were no more shots.

Philip and I were crouched in the minimal shelter of a small rock projection. It offered no shade; just a shield between us and anybody looking down from the hillside above.

We waited for minutes on end for a sign of life, a movement. But nothing happened. The myriad insects started their strumming again; maybe they had never really stopped, and it was only my shocked brain that had registered silence. Now their noise was irksome, because we had to strain to hear the possible sound of a footfall.

The heat was almost beyond bearing. The hot rock was scorching my bare arm where I pressed against it. There was no air to breathe. I had to check myself from fainting, fighting off attacking waves of nausea.

At last Philip muttered: “We’ve got to get out of this. We certainly can’t stay here.”

“But... who is it?” I whispered. “Why shoot at us?”

His voice was grim. “God knows! It could be bandits, I suppose.”

I’d read about the lawless men of Sicily who took to the hills. I had thought they were legend, but now I was faced with the reality. I shivered violently.

“Or it might be Giles...” Philip said under his breath.

“Giles!”

“It could be. That letter—maybe it was a trap to get us out here.”

I felt stunned. “But why...?”

“He is one of the gang, after all. Maybe he thinks we know too much already. It might even have been Giles who did for Carlo.”

“Oh no! I can’t believe it. Not Giles...”

Philip said quietly: “Well somebody’s after us, Kerry, that’s for sure. And we’ve got to get away somehow.”

“What can we do?” I asked hopelessly.

“We’ll have to make a run for it.”

“But the minute we stand up we’ll be an easy target.”

Still crouching, Philip turned his head, looking back along the curving road. “No, I don’t think so. I reckon that gunman’s working his way round so as to take us by surprise. If we run hell for leather down the road, we should stand a fair chance of getting away.”

It sounded horribly risky. But then so was staying where we were. I decided I’d rather be shot taking some sort of action, than be picked off like a sitting rabbit.

“All right, Philip.”

“That’s my girl!” His hand gripped mine. “When I give the okay, we’ll stand up together and belt off as hard as we can go.”

For a hundred yards we ran like mad. Nothing happened; no more shots; no sound of running feet in pursuit. I began to think that maybe we were going to get clear away, after all. And we might have done, too, if I hadn’t caught the heel of my left sandal on a big stone and ripped it clean off.

The heel had only been about an inch high, but without it I was crippled, cut to half speed. And I wouldn’t last a dozen steps barefoot on this stony surface.

“
Oh Philip, I’m terribly sorry...!” I felt as if I were criminally responsible. This might cost us our slender chance of safety.

He wasted no time on reproaches. “Never mind that. Give me the other shoe, quickly.”

Wondering, I watched him hitch the heel over a sharp edge of rock and rip it off with a single pull.