Creasy is hired to protect Pinta

Creasy is hired to protect Pinta after Rika Balletto demands that her daughter’s safety be taken seriously and Ettore Balletto, facing financial constraints, seeks a compromise. The appointment is conceived not as a conventional investment in close protection but as a relatively inexpensive way to reassure Rika and reduce insurance costs. It brings Creasy, a disillusioned and physically unfit former soldier, into the household; the work he initially treats as a technical assignment develops into a consequential personal bond with Pinta.

The Demand for Protection and the Financial Compromise

Rika’s insistence follows the kidnapping of a child from one of Milan’s wealthiest families, taken in broad daylight outside his school. She argues that Pinta must not be exposed to the same danger and presses Ettore to find a way to protect her. Ettore counters that the family is not wealthy and that its financial troubles are becoming known in the city’s financial circles. His explanation does not settle Rika’s concern: she continues to insist that their daughter’s safety is at stake.

Ettore brings the problem to Vico Mansutti, his friend and lawyer, who is also Rika’s friend. Vico’s first proposed solution is simple: hire a bodyguard. Ettore objects that the expense makes this impractical, and the conversation turns from protection alone to the economics of insurance. Vico explains that the Italian government does not permit domestic insurers to cover kidnap ransoms, on the grounds that such policies might encourage kidnapping. Overseas coverage is available, with Lloyd's of London a major provider; its conditions include paying the premium outside Italy and keeping the insurance secret. Vico’s explanation makes the proposed guard less a straightforward security expense than a way to affect the price of insurance.

The figures he gives are an illustration, not a disclosed account of Ettore’s own policy: for one billion lire of kidnap coverage, a premium might reach fifty million lire at five percent, while employing a full-time guard could reduce the rate to three percent, or thirty million, saving twenty million lire. Vico adds that security measures such as watchmen and guard dogs can reduce insurance rates. His recommendation is to hire a low-cost guard for a few months and later dismiss him, supposedly for incompetence. The arrangement would provide a visible gesture of protection, lower the insurance premium, and allow Pinta to return to school while preserving Rika’s sense that her concerns have been answered.

Creasy’s Reluctant Recruitment

The proposed job reaches Creasy through Guido Arrellio, after Elio suggests him. Guido knows that Creasy is in poor condition and virtually an alcoholic; Creasy himself thinks accepting a protection job would be misleading because he is not fit for it. The scheme’s limited demands change Guido’s view: this is a low-paid, temporary position, not the work of a professional bodyguard hired for a serious threat. Creasy is unconvinced at first, joking that in his state he could not guard a corpse, and Guido has to press him gently. He eventually agrees to go to Milan and see what is available, still incredulous at the prospect.

Finding a guard who suits Rika’s requirements proves less simple than Vico had implied. When Creasy meets Ettore, he says he is not good at social conversation and will simply do the job as well as he can. Ettore asks whether he has a gun. Creasy explains that the agency supplies one and that Ettore must provide a letter so the agency can arrange a police permit; the cost will be billed to him. Creasy is ready to start immediately. Ettore sets a three-month trial period, after which both men can review the arrangement, and asks that Creasy’s drinking problem be kept from Rika. The secrecy surrounding that weakness contrasts with the visible security role the family is arranging.

The Assignment Takes Shape

Rika responds to the appointment by organizing the practical details of Creasy’s stay. She and Pinta furnish a large room at the top of the house with a table, an easy chair, rugs, and the room’s existing brass bedstead, chest of drawers, and wardrobe. Creasy is to eat in the kitchen with Maria, the housekeeper, and Bruno, the gardener. Rika draws up his duties: the most important are driving Pinta to school and collecting her in the afternoon; between those journeys, he can take Rika to shopping and lunch engagements. Thus the job is built around the family’s ordinary movements and routines, not just around the possibility of an attack.

Creasy, by contrast, initially reduces the assignment to military terms. He regards Pinta as an asset and considers where an attacker might try to seize her: at the house, at another frequently visited place, or on the road between them. Before beginning, he oils his holster, loads his Beretta, studies a road map between Milan and Como, and marks places where a kidnapping attempt might be possible. He expects an attack to be most likely on the road and decides that the daily route should vary randomly. His professional habits are still available even when his body and drinking have made him doubt his fitness for the job.

The school inspection gives that planning a concrete setting. On the first journey, Creasy studies the Como–Milan road for bends and other possible ambush points. At the school he notes the spike-topped outer walls, the heavy gates, and the absence of cover in front of them. Inside, he sees the large grounds, playing field, running track, and a small copse set back from the perimeter. He judges the school itself reasonably secure. The inspection shows how he tries to translate his military experience into a guard’s daily practice: observe the terrain, identify vulnerabilities, and consider how predictable routes and locations could expose Pinta.

Protection, Failure, and the Meaning of the Job

The danger the arrangement was meant to address eventually becomes immediate. While Creasy waits by the car, a black car mounts the curb and four men appear. He recognizes the kidnapping attempt, tells Pinta to run, and reaches for his gun. When two armed men pursue her, he hesitates to shoot because she is between them; one catches her and carries her back toward the car, while the other fires at Creasy. Creasy shoots that attacker twice in the chest, but Pinta is taken. The episode exposes the limit of treating protection as an insurance-saving formality: a guard is present and acts, yet the attackers still exploit a moment in which the child is separated from him.

Pinta does not return. Guido later tells Creasy that the ransom had been paid two days before and that she was meant to be released that night. After the kidnappers became nervous during a police sweep for a Red Brigade gang, they went to ground; Pinta was found the next morning in the trunk of a stolen car. Her hands and mouth had been taped, she had vomited, probably because of petrol fumes, and the autopsy found that she had choked to death. The outcome makes the original hiring decision’s promise of safety painfully inadequate: the family’s visible precautions did not prevent the kidnapping, and the ransom did not secure Pinta’s release.

The job’s emotional consequence emerges in Creasy’s later account to Nadia Schembri. He tells her how Guido and Elio arranged the position, how he deliberately kept Pinta at a distance during the first days, and how they nevertheless grew close. He recalls the day in the mountains when Pinta gave him a crucifix as the happiest and most natural day of his life. Nadia says she is crying for Pinta, whom Creasy has made vivid to her through his story, and not because he is leaving. The hiring therefore marks a reversal in Creasy’s own understanding of the work: what he accepted reluctantly as a temporary, functional role becomes the relationship through which Pinta awakens his capacity for attachment, and her death gives that bond its lasting force.