The Arena (Colonel Russell series Book 3) by Haggard William

Author:Haggard, William [Haggard, William]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Three Castles Media Ltd.
Published: 2016-06-12T22:00:00+00:00

Enzio Bonavia went to his bedroom. He rang the bell, and when a maid appeared said: ‘Tu! Send me Giacomo.’

The maid bobbed quickly, and five minutes later the driver came in. He was wearing tight trousers and a singlet, and he began to apologize. ‘I was working in the garage. Anna said it was urgent so . . .’

Enzio, from his bed, cut him short. ‘It doesn’t matter. Play to me.’

The boy went to a cupboard, fetching a violin; he began to play softly, very badly, but Enzio wasn’t a music snob. The banal southern airs soothed him deliciously. He let himself think.

He was thinking of Walter Hillyard. He had always liked him, but to a Neapolitan he had never seemed wholly adult. This Baker and Looe – Enzio had heard things about Baker and Looe. They were a front. Well, the Hillyards too had been a front for the Bonavias, as Baker and Looe was one for Steiffer.

Enzio Bonavia knew a great deal about Steiffer.

If Steiffer was Baker and Looe, then Bonavias was finished. Enzio felt no resentment. Fronts . . . They were useful, often necessary, but they were no sort of match for the men who stood behind them. Baker and Looe were a front for Steiffer – he must be fifty, a stripling – but what had once been the Bonavias’ front now ran Bonavias. Clearly that was hopeless, quite past saving; it wasn’t worth worrying about. Not at eighty. There was much he could have said but hadn’t. Not to Walter Hillyard. The Hillyards were unimportant and the Bonavias were done for, one of them uncaring, near to death, the other, his nephew, some English lordling. Neither had sons. There was a law in these things, a necessary rise and fall. You didn’t fight it, or not at eighty.

Enzio Bonavia grunted and for a moment the boy stopped playing. ‘I’m not asleep yet.’

The boy began again and Enzio watched him. Under his singlet his chest was superb. His waist was tiny, his trousers extremely tight. Enzio thought him beautiful.

Forty years ago – no, twenty . . .

Enzio Bonavia sighed in his sleep.

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