A Lucky Star Read online

  ‘They shout and I wish I could fathom their dialect and understand what they are arguing about. If it concerns me or the Earl, then I want to know.’

  The three men were furiously berating the boy who had just arrived back, still holding the ransom note.

  “The English Earl, he was not on the ship,” pleaded the boy. “There was only a sentry and he would not let me past the gangplank.”

  “They must have found out that the girl is missing,” said Gianni, “but how can we make our demands known if they don’t know who has kidnapped her?”

  “They will know,” came in the tall man, with an air of assurance. “This Earl – he is not stupid – he will guess that we have taken action against him.”

  “But how will he find us?” bellowed the third man.

  “We shall make his daughter write us another note and send it in the morning. They will never find us here, and by the time that the Earl has it, he will be so desperate to have her back, he will do whatever we ask.”

  “So, a delay could work in our favour. Excellent!” sneered Gianni.

  The three men broke into hearty laughter, much to Anthea’s consternation.

  ‘What do they find so amusing?’ she worried, her mind running riot. ‘Have they yet decided what they will do with me? Surely the Earl will have their ransom note by now and will be on his way?’

  But, as the hours ticked by and Gianni brought her a half-spent candle and a hunk from a stale loaf to eat, she began to lose hope.

  *

  Back at The Sea Sprite, a clearly distraught Linette had been brought back from Roberto’s house and locked in her cabin on her father’s orders.

  Jackson greeted her grimly as she was escorted up the gangplank.

  “I am sorry, my Lady, but these are his Lordship’s orders. You are not to leave the ship until he returns.”

  “Is there any news at all of Anthea – I mean, Miss Preston?” she asked, as her bottom lip trembled.

  “None, my Lady.”

  “Oh, it is all my fault!” she cried, rending her skirt with her hands. “If I had not been so selfish and intent on having my own way, Anthea would be safe.”

  Jackson steered a weeping Linette along the deck to the portside and then locked the cabin door behind her.

  “You will come and inform me the moment there is any news, won’t you?” she sobbed, as he turned the key.

  *

  The Earl and his party reached the Benedetti Office just as they were locking up.

  “Signor Benedetti, where he is? It is most urgent that I see him,” he demanded imperiously.

  The clerk shook his head,

  “Mi dispiace, signor, non parlo inglese.”

  The Earl immediately understood what the man was saying. He repeated himself, this time in Italian.

  “É alla sua casa,” said the man, writing an address.

  The Earl took the piece of paper and showed it to Captain MacFarlane.

  “Yes, I know this district well, my Lord. It’s in the smarter part of the City.”

  “Come, we have no time to lose,” insisted the Earl, leaping athletically into the carriage.

  Some time later he was knocking on the door of an immense villa surrounded by lush gardens and iron gates.

  A servant answered the door and was stunned to see the grim-looking party standing in front of them.

  “I must see Signor Benedetti at once!” ordered the Earl, stepping inside the hall.

  The stunned servant stood with his mouth open, as the Earl repeated his request.

  “It is all right, Cosmo,” came a voice from the top of an imposing marble staircase. “I have been expecting this. My Lord Earl – it is the Camorra, non?”

  “I am afraid so, they have kidnapped my daughter’s chaperone.”

  “La bellissima Signorina Preston,” cried out Signor Benedetti. “This is terrible! What can I do to help? I have men of my own – ”

  “We need to find where they have taken her.”

  “Have they sent a ransom note yet? It is their usual way of doing things.”

  “I don’t know – I left the ship the moment my man alerted me that she had gone missing.”

  “They will have sent one without doubt, demanding substantial sums of money and your withdrawal from our deal,” sighed Signor Benedetti.

  “Perhaps we should return to the ship?”

  “No, they will be expecting you to do that. I know how desperate you are to find your Signorina Preston, but I advise caution. To outwit the Camorra, we have to be as crafty as they are.”

  “What do you suggest, Signor Benedetti?”

  “Let me send for two sailors I know well. Although they work for me, they move in the same circles as this lot.”

  “You hire criminals?” asked the Earl shocked.

  “To be a step ahead of the Camorra, it is sometimes necessary for me to soil my hands,” replied Signor Benedetti, ringing for his servant.

  “Come, you and your men must rest awhile. I will send for my contacts. The Camorra will not do a thing until they have delivered the ransom note. Waiting for them is second nature.”

  Feeling rather uneasy, the Earl signalled to Captain MacFarlane and his crew to join him.

  They sat down on the fine Venetian furniture in the drawing room and waited.

  “It’s getting dark,” murmured Captain MacFarlane. “It will be harder to flush these men out at night.”

  “I have confidence in Signor Benedetti,” replied the Earl. “He has no wish to be intimidated by these men and, furthermore, he knows that he will have to pay me a large amount of compensation if the deal does not go through – that is the Italian way.”

  The time ticked by and the Earl could not remain seated. He rose from his chair and began to pace the room.

  ‘Anthea! I pray you are safe!’ he said to himself, over and over again.

  His patience was about to wear thin, when Signor Benedetti’s doorbell rang.

  Everyone leapt to their feet and moved towards the hall. Outside the sound of voices in the Neapolitan dialect could be heard conversing with Signor Benedetti.

  “Do you follow what they are saying?” whispered the Captain.

  “It’s too dashed difficult,” replied the Earl. “I have never mastered it and can make no sense of it at all.”

  At last Signor Benedetti came to join them with a smile on his face.

  “Gentlemen, we are in luck,” he started. “My men know exactly where to find them, they are outside and will take you to their hideout.”

  “Thank you, thank you so much,” replied the Earl, shaking his hand warmly.

  “I am afraid I cannot come with you, but I will be waiting for news. Promise me you will send word when you have liberated Signorina Preston?”

  “I will.”

  The Earl ran outside to where the two sailors were waiting and although they did not understand English, the Earl managed to converse with them in Italian.

  Soon, they were all on their way – into the depths of Naples where no foreigner would dare set foot.

  The further they advanced into the docks area, the more the Captain’s men seemed uneasy.

  “Captain,” cautioned Midshipman Jones, “this is no place for a gentleman like his Lordship.”

  “His Lordship is more than capable of taking care of himself,” retorted the Captain.

  But even he began to feel nervous as the two sailors produced pistols and asked Midshipman Jones in Italian to halt the carriage.

  Pulling up the horses, the crew watched as the two sailors jumped out. They crept into a nearby tavern and a few moments later emerged shaking their heads.

  “They are not there?” asked the Earl.

  “Non,” replied the sailors.

  They made another stop and the Captain noticed the Earl becoming increasingly agitated.

  “There is still hope, my Lord. Remain steadfast.”

  “You are right,” replied the Earl. “But it is now so d
ark and I fear for her. It’s not safe for even us to be out in this place, let alone a young woman.”

  “They will almost certainly have her hidden away and she will not be out wandering the streets.”

  The carriage halted once again and the two sailors climbed out and entered another even seedier tavern.

  But this time when they emerged, they had satisfied looks on their faces.

  “It is here,” they indicated quietly. “The hideout is in a basement beneath this tavern.”

  “Right, men. This is what we do,” ordered the Earl, taking charge. “I will investigate the area with one of you, while the others stay on lookout. Signor Benedetti’s sailors – you go into the tavern and look out in case they try and escape out the back way.”

  “Aye-aye, my Lord,” they all chorused.

  The Earl then drew out his pistol from his coat and, taking Midshipman Jones, he crept along the outside wall of the tavern, searching frantically for an entrance.

  “My Lord – look. There’s a window there, it might be something?”

  He followed Midshipman Jones’s finger and could just make out a dirty window at the foot of the tavern wall.

  Looking over his shoulder the Earl crept over to the window.

  Bending down, he tried to get a good look, but the panes were too filthy for him to see through.

  Taking out his lawn handkerchief, he rubbed at the glass and removed just enough dirt so that he could view what lay inside.

  What he saw made his heart leap, for sitting hunched over a lone candle and weeping, was Anthea!

  He tore off his overcoat and picked up a rock lying nearby. Wrapping the rock in his coat he smashed through the filthy window – much to Anthea’s shock.

  “Anthea,” he hissed through the broken glass.

  “My Lord!” she cried out, turning her white face to him. “You have come! I prayed and prayed you would.”

  “Now don’t make a noise. Here is what we will do. I have my men with me and we are all armed.”

  Anthea looked alarmed.

  “Don’t worry – you will be safe if you do exactly as I tell you,” he whispered. “Stay quiet and then hide under the bed as soon as you hear us break down their entrance door, is that clear?”

  “Do be very careful, my Lord?” she beseeched him, stretching her hand up to the broken window to touch his.

  The Earl took her cold hand carefully and squeezed her fingers.

  “I will. Climb down and be ready to get under the bed. Remember – as soon as you hear us break in, you must hide yourself.”

  Anthea gazed into those warm amber eyes and her heart went out to him.

  ‘How I love him! I cannot pretend otherwise,’ she sighed, as she crouched by the bed.

  Silently the Earl motioned to Midshipman Jones to follow him and they started to run round the building.

  Halfway they met the Captain who was standing by a concealed entrance that led down to a basement.

  “It is here,” whispered the Captain.

  “Everybody ready?” hissed the Earl quietly.

  The four men nodded in unison.

  “On the count of four, we break down the door – one, two, three, four!”

  With a frantic leap the Earl threw himself headlong at the door shoulder-first and the door cracked open.

  “Good work, my Lord!” cried the Captain, as they all ran inside, firing their pistols at the ceiling.

  At the first shot Anthea dived under the bed and lay there quaking. She could hear shouting and the sounds of fighting – and then more shots – and then it all went quiet.

  Her heart was beating so fast it made her feel ill.

  There was no sound coming from the other room and, as she crouched beneath the bed in the dirt and dust, she convinced herself that the Earl had been shot and that, any moment, the Camorra men would burst into the room and kill her too.

  She closed her eyes and started to pray fervently – to her Mama in Heaven and to God.

  ‘Please keep the Earl safe,’ she pleaded desperately, more concerned for his wellbeing than for her own.

  She was still lying in the dirt with her hands tightly clasped together when the door to the room burst open.

  She screwed up her eyes and was moving her lips in prayer as footsteps drew near.

  “Anthea, it’s safe for you to come out now – my darling, are you all right?”

  Filled with joy, she crawled out from under the bed and leapt straight into the Earl’s arms.

  “Darling Anthea!” he cried, stroking her bedraggled hair and dirty face. “I was so dreadfully worried.”

  Then, his lips moved towards hers as he pulled her closer.

  Anthea could scarcely believe what was happening as she sank into a passionate kiss that went on for ever.

  Pulling back from him, she fluttered her eyelids – feeling certain that she would swoon.

  “Am I dreaming?” she murmured, her mouth still quivering from his kiss.

  “No, my darling one. This is real. I was so worried about you. I have only just realised what you mean to me and I would have died had anything happened to you.”

  “Can this really – be true?” she stammered, taking his handsome face in her hands.

  His amber eyes were like deep dark pools of love as he looked down at her.

  “It is true,” he answered, kissing her eyes and then her forehead. “I love you and never want to be away from your side.”

  Just then the Captain came into the room.

  “My Lord, the Police are outside. Someone must have called them. They wish to speak with you and to see if Miss Preston is safe and well.”

  “She could not be safer,” he replied, holding Anthea close and gazing into her eyes. “My darling one, I must go and speak with them. Captain MacFarlane will assist you. There is a carriage outside waiting to take you back to The Sea Sprite.”

  In the street the Policemen had all three Camorra in handcuffs about to take them away.

  As Anthea was helped into a carriage, Gianni threw her a look of hatred.

  “You are dead!” he spat at her in English.

  “Don’t pay any heed to him,” said the Captain as he settled her down. “He is a doomed man and will be thrown into prison for many years. It is rare for the Police to intervene in Naples with the Camorra, but as the Earl is involved and they want to avoid an international incident, they really have no choice.”

  “Who called them?”

  “It may have been Signor Benedetti himself, but it might have been a local. We made so much noise breaking into the basement that they probably heard us on Capri!”

  Anthea laughed weakly.

  She was so exhausted that all she wanted to do was sleep in the Earl’s arms.

  Yet she felt unbelievably exhilarated.

  ‘He loves me! He loves me!’ she told herself with a secret smile. ‘I cannot believe it, but it’s true.’

  The Earl finished talking to the Police and watched as they started off with the three Camorra ruffians in the back of their wagon.

  He then asked the Captain to go and find Signor Benedetti’s two sailors in order to thank them.

  “Make certain that they are well rewarded,” he said, pulling out a sheaf of high-denomination lira notes.

  The Captain saluted and the Earl ran to the carriage, and climbed in beside Anthea.

  Putting his arm around her, he ordered Midshipman Jones, who sat on the box, to take them back to the ship as quickly as possible.

  “Has Linette returned?” Anthea asked him, as the carriage pulled off down the street.

  “I had her brought back to The Sea Sprite,” replied the Earl. “She is safe and well.”

  He did not mention Roberto and nor did Anthea.

  Rather, she let herself sink wordlessly against him, enjoying the feeling of his warmth against her aching skin.

  *

  Back at The Sea Sprite, everywhere was alive with the sound of running feet and men shouting
as the carriage containing the Earl, Anthea and their fellow crewmembers drew up alongside on the quay.

  “They have returned!” went up the shout.

  The Earl and the Captain helped Anthea aboard as Midshipman Jones brought up the rear with the rest of the crew.

  Everyone saluted as they came on board.

  “Send for the ship’s doctor,” called the Captain, as the Earl carried Anthea into the Saloon.

  “Is Lady Linette in her cabin?” asked the Earl, as he placed Anthea gently down on a sofa.

  “Yes, my Lord,” replied one of the crew.

  “Will you go to her and let her know that we are all safe and unharmed?”

  “At once, my Lord!”

  Jackson appeared with water and a bottle of brandy.

  “Anthea, would you mind if I left you for a while?” murmured the Earl tenderly, as he stroked her hair and gave her a glass of water.

  “Linette?”

  “Yes. I have been far too indulgent with her and it is time for me to remind her of her duties as my daughter. Perhaps I have only myself to blame.”

  “You are too hard on yourself. Linette is a wilful young lady, as I have discovered.”

  The Earl discreetly squeezed her hand and then left the cabin.

  Then the ship’s doctor arrived to examine Anthea. He pronounced her well, if a little shaken, and prescribed lots of rest.

  He was just departing when the Earl reappeared.

  “Is she really all right?” he asked anxiously.

  “She will be fit as a fiddle, my Lord, once she has rested. It has been a terrible shock to her, but she will soon recover,” responded the doctor.

  With that the Earl then shooed everyone out of the Saloon and locked the door behind them.

  “Ssh! Don’t worry, I want us to be undisturbed,” he insisted, smiling at Anthea’s alarmed look.

  Rushing over to the sofa he took Anthea in his arms and, before she knew it, he was kissing her once again.

  Her spirit soared up to Heaven as she gave herself up to his insistent lips.

  As they parted, the Earl gazed into her eyes with so much love that she wondered if she was dreaming.

  “I thought I had lost you before I had even told you how much I love you,” he breathed.

  “Then my heart rejoices to be safe here with you. For I love you too. I have thought of nothing but you since I met you in England.”