The Nosferatu Scroll

49

Bronson tensed as the sound of the boat drew closer, and a moment later he felt a slight bump as some part of the other craft touched his boat. He kept his eyes half-open, and lay as still as possible, the Browning held loosely by his side but ready to fire.

He could hear the two men talking as they manoeuvred their boat alongside his, their efforts hampered by the fact that the engine of Bronson’s craft was still running, and the boat was describing a small circle at the junction of the two canals.

‘I can see him,’ one of the men said. ‘He’s not moving.’

‘He must be dead then,’ the other replied, ‘or at least he’s badly wounded. Let’s get out of here before a police launch comes along.’

Bronson heard the noise of another boat’s engine approaching, he thought from the opposite direction, though it was difficult to tell. But what he was quite certain about was that the blue boat was moving away. That sound was unmistakable.

For about thirty seconds he did nothing, then he eased himself up cautiously, and risked a quick glance over the side of the vessel. There was a slight bend in the canal to the east and, as he looked in that direction, he saw the blue powerboat disappear around it. The moment it was out of sight, he sat up, centred the steering wheel to stop the circular motion of the boat, grabbed his map of the Venetian waterways, and quickly worked out where he was.

He’d ended up in a canal called the Rio della Racchetta, and the men he’d been chasing would have to continue down the adjoining waterway until they reached the larger Rio del Gesuiti, because they’d already passed the only other canal entrance. What he didn’t know was which way they’d turn when they reached it. Left would take them the shorter distance, out into the Canale delle Fondamente Nuove, the open water that lay on the north-east side of Venice. If they swung right, they’d have a longer run down the canal until they reached the Canal Grande – the Grand Canal – itself.

A wooden launch – its engine had been what Bronson had heard – swept down one side of the powerboat, the driver staring at him with some curiosity as he passed. He had obviously seen the pirouettes that Bronson’s craft had been describing in the water, and probably thought he was drunk.

Bronson ignored him. His only concern was to try to second-guess the men he was following. The trouble was, he had very little to go on. When the blue powerboat had pulled away from the Island of the Dead, the driver had headed south-east. If his destination had been one of the islands at the north-eastern end of the Laguna Veneta, somewhere near Burano, for example, Bronson would have expected them to head in that direction. The fact that they’d continued along the north side of Venice suggested that they were going to sail around the eastern end of the island, and perhaps then turn south-west, towards the other end of the lagoon, where he knew there was a scattering of small islands.

It was a long shot, though, and for perhaps half a minute, Bronson sat at the wheel of the boat, his mind racked by indecision. He had just one chance. If he guessed wrong, he’d never see the blue boat again, which would mean he’d lose Angela. He had to get it right.

His mind made up, he spun the wheel and opened the throttle, sending the boat speeding south down the Rio della Racchetta, retracing the course he’d followed just minutes earlier. At the end of the canal, he turned the boat right and almost immediately left, back into the Rio di San Felice, where he’d seen the jam caused by the gondolas. As he made the turn, he prayed that this time the waterway would be clear.

It wasn’t, but there were far fewer boats in the way. Bronson kept the speed up as much as he dared, then pulled the throttle back as he reached the nearest gondola. He started to weave his way through the jostling boats, his passage attracting a torrent of abuse in high-speed Italian, all of which he ignored.

A couple of minutes later he was through, and swung the boat to the left, into the Canal Grande itself. As he did so, he glanced to his left and saw a long wooden-hulled launch bearing down on him, just yards away. Bronson knew immediately that if he continued turning towards the boat, he’d never miss it. He reacted instantly, spinning the steering wheel to the right and pushed the throttle forward, sending his boat straight across the bow of the oncoming vessel.

There was a bang from the rear of Bronson’s boat, as the bow of the much larger launch hit the left-hand rear of his powerboat, cracking the fibreglass and scattering paint flakes across the water. But the outboard motor was undamaged, and he was certain that the impact had been well above the waterline, so there was no danger of him taking in water. And in fact fibreglass boats of the type he was in were so full of air pockets that they were virtually unsinkable.

The driver of the launch immediately reduced speed, obviously intending to do the Italian marine equivalent of exchanging names and addresses. But Bronson had not the slightest intention of stopping or even slowing down. His boat’s throttle was still wide open and the outboard engine roaring, so he twitched the steering wheel to the left and sped away, heedless of the angry shouts echoing from behind him.

The Grand Canal in Venice follows an S-shaped course from the Stazione Ferrovie dello Stato Santa Lucia, the railway station, to its southern end near the Piazza San Marco, where it opens out into the Bacino di San Marco and the much wider canale of the same name. Bronson had joined the canal about a third of the way along, so he knew he would have to contend with the fairly heavy water traffic for some time before he could get into the clearer and more open waters to the south of the city. And then, of course, he would have the even more difficult task of spotting the blue powerboat carrying the two men, amongst the hundreds of similar craft that plied the waters in and around Venice. And that assumed that he’d been right in his guess that the boat would be heading into the waters of the lagoon somewhere to the south of the city.

He also knew that although the men he’d been following now believed that he was dead or badly wounded, they would still be keeping their own eyes peeled for any sign of pursuit, and paying particular attention to anybody who looked like him. There was nothing he could do about the design and colour of his boat, but Bronson realized that there were things – three things, in fact – that he could do to try to change his own appearance.

He was wearing his black leather jacket, so he took this off and dropped it on the floor of the boat beside him. Underneath, he had on a plain white shirt, which would give him an entirely different appearance to anyone viewing him from a distance. And in his shirt pocket he had a baseball cap and a pair of large sunglasses with impenetrable mirrored black lenses. He took out the sunglasses and slipped them on as he powered the boat down the Grand Canal towards the open water at its end, then settled the cap on his head, ensuring that it completely covered the dressing over the wound on his scalp.

Unless he got so close to the other boat that the men in it could actually see his features, Bronson guessed that he now looked quite different. Rolling his shoulders to ease away some of his tension, and trying hard not to think about what could be happening to Angela, he focused on the task in hand: spotting the other vessel, a challenge that made finding a needle in a haystack seem easy by comparison.