Page 89 of Vengeance in Venice
*
Constance paced herbedchamber, 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, shehadpromised. 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 alreadyseen 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.
