Page 39 of Vengeance in Venice (Murder in Moonlight #6)

With astonishing speed, Lampl flicked the little phial over the side of the bridge.

Solomon was not gullible enough to follow it with his eyes, but he heard it splash into the water below.

Lampl’s coat swung open with the movement of his arm, revealing the other, larger inner pocket on the opposite side to the first.

Solomon caught only the tiniest glimpse—a distinctive shape, a glint of metal, a flash of color—but it was enough to know that their careful scheme had failed.

Constance was right. It was a stupid plan.

*

Hiding at the bottom of a boat on the other side of the canal at Lampl’s back door, Foscolo breathed a sigh of relief.

Berndt, the big man, had followed his master out of the house by the back door and now climbed into the boat with Lampl.

Of course, Berndt was there to do the rowing as well as the protecting.

Berndt seemed to be the one man that Lampl trusted, and normally one of them always remained in the house.

Foscolo had recognized this as the weak part of his plan.

Had Berndt stayed behind, most of the men would have been needed to subdue the brute, and that would have meant they were not searching the house.

And they wouldn’t have long before someone fetched the soldiers, when they would all be sunk.

This was their one risk, and it seemed fortune favored them.

Foscolo spared a sympathetic thought for Grey and his own man Guiseppe at the Rialto, who would now have to deal with Berndt instead.

He thanked God he had thought to recruit Giusti to the cause.

But speed was still of the essence. As soon as they found the dagger, they would have to rush to the bridge to aid Grey.

The longer the Englishman could keep Lampl there and quiet, the better, but they were all prepared for an instant attack.

It was an appalling risk, but one Foscolo had felt obliged to take, for Lampl had to be brought down. As quietly as possible.

Foscolo stretched one cramped leg. He waited until Lampl’s boat turned the first bend, then sat up. Instantly, so did his companion, who reached for the oars.

A massive thump on the back door caused it, eventually, to open a crack. It was a child’s dirty face that appeared there—another stroke of luck—and Foscolo leapt past him into the house.

A woman stood frozen by the kitchen table, gaping at them, her fist clenched as though she were about to pound the dough in front of her.

“Police,” Foscolo said. “Wait there and don’t move.”

His man stayed by the back door, pistol in hand, while Foscolo barged through the kitchen to the stark office beyond.

As he had suspected, there was nothing there but a few sheets of blank paper, a pen, a letter knife, and a bottle of ink.

A quick stamp around the room revealed no obviously loose floorboards.

He moved swiftly on to the front door of the house and yanked it open. His men swarmed silently inside, closed and locked the door, and threw the key to Foscolo, who was already partway up to the next floor. As previously instructed, his men spread out and the search began.

It was not a large house, and Lampl kept surprisingly few servants.

Those who did stumble upon them were too sleepy and astonished to interfere.

Foscolo and his men tore through the house with speed and thoroughness, breaking locks, going through drawers and cabinets and cupboards.

It was not easy to miss a long-bladed dagger with a hilt encrusted with jewels.

Lampl’s bedroom had always been the likeliest place, for it was the most private. Foscolo searched it with gusto, muttering to himself, “Come on, come on, where do you keep it, you bastard? You would never throw anything so valuable away…”

There was always the possibility, of course, that Lampl had sold it, probably to buy Elena Savelli expensive gifts. But Foscolo would not think of that. Even a hoard of money would be something…

But it was not in any of the drawers. The only thing of interest he found, beneath Lampl’s cuff links, was a small lace handkerchief, embroidered E . Clearly stolen from Elena. Foscolo pocketed it with a brief return of elation and turned to the mattress.

Five minutes later, he dragged his hand through his hair and glared at his shuffling men. “Nothing,” he uttered through his teeth. “How can there be nothing? It must be here!”

His men would think he was mad. Lampl would crucify him and go on unhindered, crushing and killing and doing exactly as he pleased to Venice, and then, no doubt, in other places, growing always in confidence and cruelty.

“I cannot allow it,” Foscolo fumed. “Why the hell is it not here?”

Because he was wrong, horribly, unforgivably wrong?

Or… “Oh dear God,” he whispered. “He took it with him!” He raised his voice, yelling, “He took it with him! To the Rialto!”

Unforgivable stupidity… Please, God, let us be in time to save Grey …

*

Constance paced her bedchamber, the coffee Maria had brought to her untouched.

Sometimes she strode to the sitting room and paced there.

When that grew unbearable, she marched downstairs and sat at the dining room table.

Here at last, she sipped some coffee and nibbled at bread, but could not remain still for long.

Abandoning the remains of her coffee, she gazed out of the window, knowing it was far too early to expect Solomon back.

It was not even properly light… And yet all the servants were up.

How did they know? Had Solomon instructed them to protect her?

Or had they just heard her relentless pacing and, like the good servants they were, risen early to serve?

She walked through to the drawing room, which, being much larger, offered more satisfying opportunities for an anxious pacer.

It felt all wrong, letting Solomon face the culprit without her.

They had always confronted the foe together, and somehow, despite a few near misses, it had always worked out.

Admittedly she was weak now, and Solomon faced a specific kind of threat where she could not help and would only distract him, as he had pointed out.

This was the only reason she was not now on the Rialto Bridge, or at least watching it, watching his back…

She wished she had not promised. She could go now, hide and watch in case there was anything she could do. Only, she had promised. And Alvise and one of Foscolo’s policemen were watching over him instead. Surely, he was safe.

The plan was sensible on the face of it.

They were using Lampl’s own bait to bait their trap with Solomon.

While Foscolo collected the evidence from Lampl’s house.

But it was not an official raid—that would never have been sanctioned.

Foscolo was risking everything to find the twin dagger in Lampl’s possession, and if he failed, he fell, and Lampl won, even if Solomon survived.

If Solomon survived.

Dear God…

She hurled herself across the room, unable to bear such possibilities, and gazed out of the window across the canal. It was daybreak. The sun was rising, pale and promising.

It will be fine. It is always fine in the end .

The door opened behind her, and she swung around eagerly, in the suddenly wild, desperate hope that it was Solomon, early and triumphant.

It wasn’t.

It was Pellini, Savelli’s thuggish bodyguard who worked in reality for Lampl.

The man who had abducted her at the beginning of all this trouble walked into her drawing room, closed the door, and turned the key.

She didn’t even need to ask how he had got into the palazzo, for she knew. They did indeed have a spy in the house.

*

Solomon had already seen how fast the apparently stolid Lampl could move, when he threw the rejected phial into the canal.

So as the Austrian whipped the dagger from his swinging coat, Solomon leapt swiftly out of range.

Even so, he was only just in time, for in the same quick, fluid movement, Lampl lunged with deadly accuracy for Solomon’s heart.

Lampl moved his feet to compensate for Solomon’s defense, and the dagger thrust on. It would still have inflicted vicious damage had Solomon not seized Lampl’s wrist in his left hand and wrenched it downward.

He tried to squeeze hard enough to pry Lampl’s fingers loose, but a blow to the chest sent him staggering backward. Then the Austrian was upon him, shoving him against the side of the bridge, his left forearm across his neck, while his right rose and plunged the blade downward.

Solomon fought desperately with both hands to dislodge the arm at his throat, while raising his elbow to block the worst of the dagger’s blow.

At the same time, he kicked with all his might, aiming for Lampl’s knee.

With a satisfying and somewhat sickening crack, Lampl grunted and stumbled, flailing his arms to keep his balance.

Solomon desperately needed people, witnesses. Where the devil was Foscolo’s man? To his left loomed Lampl’s charging brute, who didn’t need a knife to finish Solomon.

But Lampl was not finished either. With a silent snarl of pain, he lunged at Solomon once more.

Solomon lashed out with his right fist, landing a decent blow to the Austrian’s jaw, while with his left he aimed for his stomach and sliced his fingers against the blade.

He followed it up with a savage kick between the legs, which doubled his opponent over.

Lampl sank to his knees, his mouth open in silent agony, but Solomon had no time for triumph. A huge hand closed around his nape.

The powerful fingers of Lampl’s bodyguard reached all the way around to his windpipe. Solomon drove both his elbows backward into unyielding flesh and bone, but the large man didn’t even seem to feel it.

There was, Solomon felt grimly, a certain inevitability about this now. His ears rang, and it took a moment to realize it was men yelling. From what he thought of as his own end of the bridge came a bloodcurdling battle cry as Giusti and Alvise charged into the fray—God knew on what side.

From the other, an entirely different man seemed to have materialized from nowhere, bending over the half-collapsed figure of Lampl and plucking from his fingers the dagger that had killed Savelli.

The unbearable pressure on Solomon’s neck released abruptly and he was shoved, gasping, against the side of the bridge. Giusti and Alvise rocketed into the big man with such force that they knocked him backward. His feet slipped on Solomon’s blood, and he went down under them with force.

“Hold that,” said the man with the dagger to Solomon, who grasped it like the hand of a best friend, and produced iron manacles from his bulging pockets.

Lampl moved at last, hauling himself to his feet. Blood trickled from his mouth where Solomon had hit him. He was panting and clearly in considerable pain, and yet his eyes were bright as they sought and held Solomon’s.

The rest of the noise around Solomon, those chaining the big man, and the curious workers and boatmen trailing onto the bridge from both sides, seemed to fade. He could hear only Lampl.

“It seems we underestimated each other.”

“I didn’t underestimate you,” Solomon said with contempt. The rat had almost killed Constance.

Lampl laughed, showing the gaping redness of his mouth. “You see? You still think you won.”

It seemed he could still move quickly. He hurled himself at Solomon, who lashed out with the dagger. But Lampl barged straight past him and tumbled over the side of the bridge into the canal below.

Solomon was left staring at the reddened blade of the dagger, the murderer’s words ringing in his head, chilling his blood.

“You still think you’ve won.”

“Constance,” he said hoarsely, and began to run.