That meant they had a bit of a walk to get to the Marcoli building. Blessedly.
Even more blessedly, because Giovanna tucked her hand into his elbow. She was almost snuggling him. She’d never done that before.
“If you don’t mind, I’d like to use your arm,” she said sweetly. “The footing is not good here. And it’s very dark.”
The excuse was transparent. The footing was no worse than anywhere in Venice, and Frank had seen her earlier, practically dancing across it with light and sure feet. True, that had been in daylight, and it was now well after sundown. But there was a full moon out, and visibility really wasn’t that bad.
Not that Frank was about to object, of course. He felt quite light-headed. In the moonlight, Giovanna seemed more beautiful than ever.
“Oh, yeah. Sure. Of course. Be my pleasure.”
So, they made their way. Slowly. Giovanna didn’t seem to be in any more of a hurry than Frank.
Alas, it couldn’t have been more than a few minutes before they were in among the alleys and courts inside the block that held the Marcoli building. It seemed like mere seconds. A dim and still-sentient corner of Frank’s mind—insofar as Frank could be said to have a “mind” left at all, between his fretting over Papa’s Fury, the Venetian moonlight on Giovanna, and she on his arm—was trying to shrill a little alarm at him. This neighborhood at night really did have the appearance of a rough one. A downright nasty one, in fact. Distant sounds of arguments in tenements high above the street, the wail of a cat on a roof somewhere, dark and lurking shadows in narrow alleys—
One of those shadows moved, and Frank tasted the cold coppery flavor of fear. All other thoughts fled from his mind, as adrenaline worked its magic.
Another movement.
They were brought up short by two grimy customers stepping out from a doorway in front of them. Grimy customers with knives that were far and away the best-kept things about them. Shiny, bright, and obviously sharp knives.
A low, deep growl came from somewhere behind. “Hand over the purse and strip off the good clothes.”
Frank looked around. Surrounded. Two in front, two behind. A mugging. Just great. The perfect end to a disastrous evening.
He sighed. No way to deal with this heroically, they wouldn’t stop at kicking his ass, not with those knives.
Besides, he was Tom Stone’s son. Frank’s dad considered “macho” a synonym for “moron.” He was known to say that he hadn’t trusted the theory of evolution since he’d seen his first John Wayne movie. His first and only.
So, as reached into his pocket, Frank summoned up the spirit of his hippie father to guide him through this momentary unpleasantness.
“Okay, guys, you got us. Everybody just relax. Take the money with no argument, but we keep the clothes, all right?”
“Frank—” Giovanna’s hand was clutching his arm tightly.
“No, it’s okay. It’s only money. Money can be replaced. And these guys look like they need it more than us, anyway.” That was true, at least. Scruffy wasn’t even close to being the word for the way these guys looked. You’d have to add scrawny, unshaven, mean and ugly to get anywhere close. If you looked upon it as aggressive panhandling, which was pretty much the way his father would, it was almost compassionate to give them some eating money.
Not that Frank looked at it that way. He really didn’t see eye-to-eye with his father on this subject. Granted, Frank wasn’t any too fond of machismo himself. In fact, he’d been known to express pretty much the same skepticism concerning evolution as his dad, except that Frank’s preferred example was the average high school jock. Still, Frank was just naturally more combative than Tom Stone, even if he usually tried to figure out a way to get even instead of getting mad.
On the other hand, as long as all that was involved was money . . . Well, the truth was that Frank didn’t care about money much more than his dad. So piss on it.
But then the guy who seemed to be the head thug spoke again, and all of Frank’s reasoning fled in an instant. Genetics and upbringing can lead a boy to pacifism, but they can’t make him drink.