His Last Bow, Arthur Conan Doyle [love books to read TXT] 📗

come.”

 

The beautiful Italian looked with awe at my companion.

 

“I do not understand how you know these things,” she said.

“Giuseppe Gorgiano—how did he—” She paused, and then suddenly

her face lit up with pride and delight. “Now I see it! My

Gennaro! My splendid, beautiful Gennaro, who has guarded me safe

from all harm, he did it, with his own strong hand he killed the

monster! Oh, Gennaro, how wonderful you are! What woman could

every be worthy of such a man?”

 

“Well, Mrs. Lucca,” said the prosaic Gregson, laying his hand

upon the lady’s sleeve with as little sentiment as if she were a

Notting Hill hooligan, “I am not very clear yet who you are or

what you are; but you’ve said enough to make it very clear that

we shall want you at the Yard.”

 

“One moment, Gregson,” said Holmes. “I rather fancy that this

lady may be as anxious to give us information as we can be to get

it. You understand, madam, that your husband will be arrested

and tried for the death of the man who lies before us? What you

say may be used in evidence. But if you think that he has acted

from motives which are not criminal, and which he would wish to

have known, then you cannot serve him better than by telling us

the whole story.”

 

“Now that Gorgiano is dead we fear nothing,” said the lady. “He

was a devil and a monster, and there can be no judge in the world

who would punish my husband for having killed him.”

 

“In that case,” said Holmes, “my suggestion is that we lock this

door, leave things as we found them, go with this lady to her

room, and form our opinion after we have heard what it is that

she has to say to us.”

 

Half an hour later we were seated, all four, in the small

sitting-room of Signora Lucca, listening to her remarkable

narrative of those sinister events, the ending of which we had

chanced to witness. She spoke in rapid and fluent but very

unconventional English, which, for the sake of clearness, I will

make grammatical.

 

“I was born in Posilippo, near Naples,” said she, “and was the

daughter of Augusto Barelli, who was the chief lawyer and once

the deputy of that part. Gennaro was in my father’s employment,

and I came to love him, as any woman must. He had neither money

nor position—nothing but his beauty and strength and energy—so

my father forbade the match. We fled together, were married at

Bari, and sold my jewels to gain the money which would take us to

America. This was four years ago, and we have been in New York

ever since.

 

“Fortune was very good to us at first. Gennaro was able to do a

service to an Italian gentleman—he saved him from some ruffians

in the place called the Bowery, and so made a powerful friend.

His name was Tito Castalotte, and he was the senior partner of

the great firm of Castalotte and Zamba, who are the chief fruit

importers of New York. Signor Zamba is an invalid, and our new

friend Castalotte has all power within the firm, which employs

more than three hundred men. He took my husband into his

employment, made him head of a department, and showed his good-will towards him in every way. Signor Castalotte was a bachelor,

and I believe that he felt as if Gennaro was his son, and both my

husband and I loved him as if he were our father. We had taken

and furnished a little house in Brooklyn, and our whole future

seemed assured when that black cloud appeared which was soon to

overspread our sky.

 

“One night, when Gennaro returned from his work, he brought a

fellow-countryman back with him. His name was Gorgiano, and he

had come also from Posilippo. He was a huge man, as you can

testify, for you have looked upon his corpse. Not only was his

body that of a giant but everything about him was grotesque,

gigantic, and terrifying. His voice was like thunder in our

little house. There was scarce room for the whirl of his great

arms as he talked. His thoughts, his emotions, his passions, all

were exaggerated and monstrous. He talked, or rather roared,

with such energy that others could but sit and listen, cowed with

the mighty stream of words. His eyes blazed at you and held you

at his mercy. He was a terrible and wonderful man. I thank God

that he is dead!

 

“He came again and again. Yet I was aware that Gennaro was no

more happy than I was in his presence. My poor husband would sit

pale and listless, listening to the endless raving upon politics

and upon social questions which made up or visitor’s

conversation. Gennaro said nothing, but I, who knew him so well,

could read in his face some emotion which I had never seen there

before. At first I thought that it was dislike. And then,

gradually, I understood that it was more than dislike. It was

fear—a deep, secret, shrinking fear. That night—the night that

I read his terror—I put my arms round him and I implored him by

his love for me and by all that he held dear to hold nothing from

me, and to tell me why this huge man overshadowed him so.

 

“He told me, and my own heart grew cold as ice as I listened. My

poor Gennaro, in his wild and fiery days, when all the world

seemed against him and his mind was driven half mad by the

injustices of life, had joined a Neapolitan society, the Red

Circle, which was allied to the old Carbonari. The oaths and

secrets of this brotherhood were frightful, but once within its

rule no escape was possible. When we had fled to America Gennaro

thought that he had cast it all off forever. What was his horror

one evening to meet in the streets the very man who had initiated

him in Naples, the giant Gorgiano, a man who had earned the name

of ‘Death’ in the south of Italy, for he was red to the elbow in

murder! He had come to New York to avoid the Italian police, and

he had already planted a branch of this dreadful society in his

new home. All this Gennaro told me and showed me a summons which

he had received that very day, a Red Circle drawn upon the head

of it telling him that a lodge would be held upon a certain date,

and that his presence at it was required and ordered.

 

“That was bad enough, but worse was to come. I had noticed for

some time that when Gorgiano came to us, as he constantly did, in

the evening, he spoke much to me; and even when his words were to

my husband those terrible, glaring, wild-beast eyes of his were

always turned upon me. One night his secret came out. I had

awakened what he called ‘love’ within him—the love of a brute—a

savage. Gennaro had not yet returned when he came. He pushed

his way in, seized me in his mighty arms, hugged me in his bear’s

embrace, covered me with kisses, and implored me to come away

with him. I was struggling and screaming when Gennaro entered

and attacked him. He struck Gennaro senseless and fled from the

house which he was never more to enter. It was a deadly enemy

that we made that night.

 

“A few days later came the meeting. Gennaro returned from it

with a face which told me that something dreadful had occurred.

It was worse than we could have imagined possible. The funds of

the society were raised by blackmailing rich Italians and

threatening them with violence should they refuse the money. It

seems that Castalotte, our dear friend and benefactor, had been

approached. He had refused to yield to threats, and he had

handed the notices to the police. It was resolved now that such

an example should be made of them as would prevent any other

victim from rebelling. At the meeting it was arranged that he and

his house should be blown up with dynamite. There was a drawing

of lots as to who should carry out the deed. Gennaro saw our

enemy’s cruel face smiling at him as he dipped his hand in the

bag. No doubt it had been prearranged in some fashion, for it was

the fatal disc with the Red Circle upon it, the mandate for

murder, which lay upon his palm. He was to kill his best friend,

or he was to expose himself and me to the vengeance of his

comrades. It was part of their fiendish system to punish those

whom they feared or hated by injuring not only their own persons

but those whom they loved, and it was the knowledge of this which

hung as a terror over my poor Gennaro’s head and drove him nearly

crazy with apprehension.

 

“All that night we sat together, our arms round each other, each

strengthening each for the troubles that lay before us. The very

next evening had been fixed for the attempt. By midday my

husband and I were on our way to London, but not before he had

given our benefactor full warning of this danger, and had also

left such information for the police as would safeguard his life

for the future.

 

“The rest, gentlemen, you know for yourselves. We were sure that

our enemies would be behind us like our own shadows. Gorgiano

had his private reasons for vengeance, but in any case we knew

how ruthless, cunning, and untiring he could be. Both Italy and

America are full of stories of his dreadful powers. If ever they

were exerted it would be now. My darling made use of the few

clear days which our start had given us in arranging for a refuge

for me in such a fashion that no possible danger could reach me.

For his own part, he wished to be free that he might communicate

both with the American and with the Italian police. I do not

myself know where he lived, or how. All that I learned was

through the columns of a newspaper. But once as I looked through

my window, I saw two Italians watching the house, and I

understood that in some way Gorgiano had found our retreat.

Finally Gennaro told me, through the paper, that he would signal

to me from a certain window, but when the signals came they were

nothing but warnings, which were suddenly interrupted. It is

very clear to me now that he knew Gorgiano to be close upon him,

and that, thank God! he was ready for him when he came. And now,

gentleman, I would ask you whether we have anything to fear from

the law, or whether any judge upon earth would condemn my Gennaro

for what he has done?”

 

“Well, Mr. Gregson,” said the American, looking across at the

official, “I don’t know what your British point of view may be,

but I guess that in New York this lady’s husband will receive a

pretty general vote of thanks.”

 

“She will have to come with me and see the chief,” Gregson

answered. “If what she says is corroborated, I do not think she

or her husband has much to fear. But what I can’t make head or

tail of, Mr. Holmes, is how on earth YOU got yourself mixed up in

the matter.”

 

“Education, Gregson, education. Still seeking knowledge at the

old university. Well, Watson, you have one more specimen of the

tragic and grotesque to add to your collection. By the way, it

is not eight o’clock, and a