Читать книгу Moretti and Falla Mysteries 3-Book Bundle - Jill Downie - Страница 10

The Police Station in Hospital Lane had at one time been the workhouse, although it had never been called that. It was a fine mid-eighteenth-century building, L-shaped around a spacious quadrangle, more reminiscent of an old public school than “La Maison de Charité,” as it had sometimes been known. Hospital Lane itself had once been called Rue des Frères, as the original track had led to the old friary, now Elizabeth College.

The police force had relocated there in the mid-nineties, and Moretti had only worked on the island after the move. As he turned the Triumph into the quadrangle that night, he looked up over the elegant old wrought-iron entrance gate, at the stone bas-relief of a pelican feeding its young with drops of blood from her own breast. The white-painted carving that had in the past given the building its popular nickname, the Pelican, gleamed dimly in his headlights as he went through. In this light, he could not see the drops of blood.

In Moretti's opinion, one of the few pleasures of working at the Hospital Lane headquarters at night — the only pleasure of working at Hospital Lane at night — was the amount of work you could get through. The place was quiet, he could play Peterson or Brubeck or Ellington without interruption on the small stereo he kept at the office, and there were very few distractions, apart from some of his colleagues on night duty who dropped in from time to time to hear what was going on in a murder inquiry that involved the kind of exotica rarely found on the island.

And, on the subject of exotica —

Moretti pushed back the pile of papers, got up from his desk, and stretched, feeling the lack of sleep in his back and his leg muscles as well as his tired eyes. Brubeck and his quartet were playing “Audrey,” the sound of saxophonist Paul Desmond’s composition pure and sweet in the stale air of the room. He was caught up now, his reports up to date, ready for Chief Officer Hanley the next day, and he remembered he wanted to take a closer look at the murder weapon. He flicked off the stereo, went down to the duty officer, picked up the key to the incident room, signed for it, and made his way back up the stairs.

Lying there on the tabletop, with its razor-sharp blade exposed, the bevelled centre glinting under the fluorescent light, the dagger looked more lethal than it had buried up to the hilt in the chest of Toni Albarosa. The overall length was marked on the label attached — twelve inches — of which the handle was probably about three inches, intricately carved. Gingerly, Moretti picked it up and took a closer look.

The central part of the hilt was embossed with vines, bearing what looked like grapes, and there was a crown on the pommel. Running across the hilt was either a thick cord, or a branch of some kind, cut in the metal.

“Interesting.”

His voice echoed in the silent room. Near the murder weapon were the two other weapons: the dagger used to slash the costumes, and the dagger thrown onto the hotel patio. They were identical.

Now, he thought, I have to decide — does this all mean something, or did the murderer purchase whatever he could get hold of? He had asked Liz Falla to see if she could track the design, but the possibilities were endless, ranging from the websites that sold similar weapons, to any number of shops and boutiques in Italy or, possibly, France.

“Sleep on it,” he said out loud to himself.

Which was easier said than done, since he would have to sleep in his office. Still, Chief Officer Hanley should be impressed, finding him here as soon as he arrived in the morning, with all his paperwork up to date. Or, at least, he should be impressed, as long as he didn’t find out what the chief investigating officer on the case had done with the drunken wife of Gilbert Ensor.

Left her in his bed, sleeping like a baby.

“Evening, Inspector — or should I say morning? What have you got there?”

Moretti had started off by taking Sydney Tremaine to one of the hotels closest to the Grand Saracen. It was a five-star establishment, comparable to the Héritage, which meant that it would be at Sydney Tremaine’s level of comfort, and that it would still be open, with someone on duty all night at the front desk. Not only would he be able to book her in for the night, but Moretti wanted to be sure that no one got near her — whether it was her husband, or whoever the dagger thrower was. Whoever had killed Toni Albarosa, Moretti believed, had probably been on their way to kill someone else. Oh, the arbitrary quality of life — you’re on your way to carry on your extramarital affair, and you get murdered! But you’re not the intended target.

Or are you? Was this indeed all about sex, as Liz Falla surmised? Were the daggers merely exotic red herrings, after all? The weapon that came to hand? Somehow, Moretti didn’t think so. Anyway, he had taken on the responsibility for Gilbert Ensor’s wife, and now his port of call in a storm was turning out to be anything but.

Les Le Cheminant, the night manager at the St. Andrew’s Hotel, had been there as far back as Moretti could remember, which was another reason he had chosen this particular resting place for his burden. If he could have counted on anyone to take Sydney Tremaine in her present state, no questions asked, it should have been Les Le Cheminant. But the position of night manager involved dealings with drunken arrivals in the small hours more times than Les cared to think about and, as he explained to Moretti, “I get the blame for them waking up the other guests and heaving up their guts all over the new carpets or doing unmentionables wherever takes their fancy — no, not even for you, Inspector. She’s not even a registered guest and she’s in a bad way — why don’t you just put her in one of your cells for the night? Isn’t that what you usually do?”

“Yes, but —”

“Not a local, is she?” The night manager gave Moretti a conspiratorial look and a knowing smile as he glanced across at Sydney, whom Moretti had deposited in one of the armchairs in the hotel lobby. With sinking heart, Moretti realized the impossibility of his task, and faced the inevitable.

“Come on, Ms. Tremaine.”

He pulled Gilbert Ensor’s wife up from the upholstered depths of the chair. She didn’t resist, but leaned against him, featherlight, half-asleep, as he half-carried her back to his car.

The streets were by now deserted, and he could be fairly sure that no one would see them together in his car. There would be no all-night staff at his cottage, but she should be safe enough there on her own. He could not guess how Sydney Tremaine would react on discovering where she had spent the night, and Moretti decided he would be well advised to cover himself by signing in at Hospital Lane and staying until daylight.

Particularly if Gilbert Ensor found out.

He pulled the Triumph up in the small cobbled courtyard outside his home, thanking the gods he had no neighbours close by, extracted his by now sleeping companion and, grateful that she was a lightweight, got her up the stairs to his room. As he opened the door, Sydney Tremaine’s shirt slipped away from one shoulder, and he saw a key on the twisted gold chain she wore around her neck.

To what? he wondered. It didn’t look like any hotel key he’d ever seen, and it looked too solid for a key to a suitcase, or a safety deposit box. But these were not the clothes she had worn that morning, so presumably she had borrowed them from Giulia Vannoni — hadn’t someone said she had a place of her own? On the interview sheets, she had given the hotel as her address.

He carried Sydney Tremaine over to the bed, where he laid her down, her backless gold mules falling off her feet. She is the most exotic creature this room has ever seen, he thought, looking at her spectacular hair spread across the blues and yellows of the bedspread quilted by his mother. Beneath the black spandex tights he could see the long, strong muscles of her calves and thighs, reminding him that her appearance of physical fragility was deceptive. In her own way, she was as fit as her Amazonian escort for the evening.

Why can’t you behave?

He thought he knew the answer to that.

Moretti closed the door quietly behind him — although by now it would have taken a major earthquake to awaken her — and went through to the bathroom, where he took a clean blue shirt down off the shower rail. Then he went back downstairs, took a sheet of paper from his desk, and wrote:

“Ms. Tremaine: you are in my house. Your husband will be told you were invited to spend the night with friends in town — I leave you to work out which friends. I strongly suggest you stick to that story. I have left you a shirt to use in the morning, if you wish. The phone number of a reliable taxi service is on a list over the phone in the kitchen.” He hesitated a moment, and then signed it, “Ed Moretti.”

He went back upstairs, cautiously opened the door, put the shirt on a chair, and the note on the bedside table.

Chief Officer Hanley was not a Guernseyman. He had been brought in to head the police force after a major reassessment of the island’s financial regulations and, not surprisingly, his appointment had been viewed as demonstrating a lack of faith in the local talent, a judgment not tempered by his uncommunicative and lugubrious disposition. Which was probably why he had gone overboard in his congratulatory remarks toward Liz Falla, overcompensating and thus further antagonizing a section of his subordinates. Moretti himself had less of a problem with Hanley’s temperament than some of his colleagues, since he preferred withdrawal over warmth in his superiors. Warmth, in his experience, could be more misleading than reserve.

However, Moretti knew that distrust and hurt egos made the chief tread very warily around certain issues and certain personalities. And members of certain classes — such as the one to which the Marchesa Vannoni belonged.

Chief Officer Hanley looked up from his desk with his habitual lack of bonhomie. He had a face perfectly suited to melancholy, long and thin, with heavy shadows under his eyes and a downturned mouth framed by two heavily etched lines.

“Good morning, Morettti. I see you have your reports with you.”

“Yes, sir, good morning. Just wanted to let you know where we stand — the details are all in here.”

Briefly, Moretti outlined the events of the past three days.

“Would it be fair to say that we have so far got nowhere?”

“Well, I —” Through a haze of sleeplessness, Moretti finally absorbed that what he had originally taken as Hanley’s usual lack of affect was something more abrasive. Like actual, seething, irritation.

“Since I arrived here this morning — which is only about half an hour ago — I have personally been bombarded — well, there have been three calls from a Mr. Gilbert Ensor, and I have to tell you, Moretti, you could have stripped paint with the man’s language. I gather he thinks his wife is missing and could be in danger, that he informed you of this yesterday, and that you have done nothing. Is this true?”

“It is true, sir, that he told me yesterday Mrs. Ensor was missing. But she is alive and well, and safer where she is for the moment than with her husband. She will be returning to the hotel today, so I am informed.”

Oh please God may she, Moretti prayed silently, and please may she have the sense to keep her silly mouth shut.

“Are you saying he is a suspect in this killing?”

“He has no alibi — but then, most of them don’t, sir, not for the small hours of the morning. Which is why progress is slow at this stage.”

“I see. My prime concern, of course, is with our residents who are caught up in all this — the Marchesa Vannoni, for instance. I trust I will not be receiving calls from her of a similar nature to the literary gentleman’s.”

“I hope not, sir. In fact, there’s no love lost between the marchesa and Gilbert Ensor.” Moretti described to Chief Officer Hanley the marchesa’s attack on “the literary gentleman.”

“Good gracious!” exclaimed the chief officer. “The marchesa has always struck me as a very self-contained sort of person — quite unlike the usual idea of the hot Latin temperament.”

“I think she’s from Florence, sir. They tend to be very different from a Neapolitan or a Sicilian.”

“Oh, right — you’re half Italian, aren’t you?” said Hanley, as if something was suddenly explained to him. Possibly the piano playing, thought Moretti.

“Do you think piano playing in such an environment advisable, Moretti?” he had once asked, and Moretti had replied, “I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t, sir.” And had taken his superior’s confusion and half-completed sentence — “Well then” — as a go-ahead.

“What are your immediate plans?”

“DC Falla and I are going back to the manor this morning, sir. Anna Albarosa, the marchesa’s daughter — the widow — is due to arrive today. I want to speak to her as soon as possible. Given Mr. Albarosa’s reputation, it is perhaps fortunate for Mrs. Albarosa that she was not on the island. But I will not be taking that for granted.”

“Good. So he was a lady’s man, the murder victim? Could this be a crime of passion, you think?”

“Oh, I think it’s a crime of passion, sir, but what passion precisely I am not sure.”

“I see,” Chief Officer Hanley responded, sounding as though he did not. “Keep me informed, won’t you?”

“So, Chief Officer Hanley got an earful from Mr. Ensor,” said Liz Falla, shifting gears with a subtle flick of the wrist. “I had a word with the Ensors’ driver, Tom Dorey — he lives near my parents — and he says he’s as nasty a piece of work as he’s driven in a while. Says he feels sorry for his wife, having to put up with him.”

“Did he express an opinion as to whether Ensor might become violent? To his wife, or to others?”

“I asked that. Said it was mostly running off at the mouth, as far as he could see.”

“That’s my feeling too. Here we are, and I think they’re waiting for us.”

As they pulled up in front of the main door to the manor, it was opened. The marchesa stood there, with her son on one side, and Monty Lord on the other. As Liz Falla put out a hand to open her door, Moretti stopped her.

“DC Falla — what I want you to do this morning is watch these women, particularly the widow. I don’t think I need explain what I mean, do I?”

Liz Falla looked at him gravely. “No, sir,” was all she said, but there was something in her eyes that suggested irritation.

“I don’t want to say feminine intuition, but I do mean impressions, that kind of thing, right?”

“Right.” Liz Falla looked toward the waiting group. “Well, I’ll tell you right now, Guv, that the waiting committee looks set to repel all boarders. Talk about a united front.”

The marchesa’s heavy handsome features were sombre, and she was dressed in black — not peasant black, but something chic that suited her well. She still wore the hefty necklace of the day before but, as if responding to the solemnity of the occasion, her black-grey mane of hair was pulled back in a heavy chignon low on her neck. Like his partner, Moretti had the impression of forces marshalled, loins girded, the putting on of public faces. The marchesa spoke first.

“Good morning, Detective Inspector. You are here to see my daughter. She is waiting for you.”

“My sister is distressed,” said Gianfranco Vannoni, in Italian. “You will remember that, Inspector.”

“Oh, he’ll remember that,” added Monty Lord in his impeccable Italian.

They stood side by side in the doorway and, for a moment, Moretti wondered if he and DC Falla would have to charge the trio and break through their line of defence. Then the marchesa moved back into the house and the others followed, with Moretti and his constable behind them. Somewhere in the house someone was playing a Chopin mazurka. It sounded inappropriately frothy in contrast with the joyless trio who had confronted them.

Anna Albarosa was seated at a grand piano in the dining room close to the main reception room in which Moretti had first interviewed Monty Lord and the Vannonis. She stopped playing as soon as they came in, and rose to face them.

Toni Albarosa’s widow had not inherited her mother’s good looks, nor her imposing height. In front of them stood a small, overweight woman, probably in her late thirties, wearing glasses and no makeup, whose short hair was already going grey, and whose clothing was so commonplace that Moretti had difficulty remembering afterwards if she had worn a dress, a skirt, or pants. What stuck in his mind, however, was that she wore pastels, and not black, like her mother. He introduced himself and Liz Falla, and expressed, in Italian, their sympathy at her loss.

“Thank you.” Anna Albarosa replied in English. If she were indeed distressed, as her brother claimed, then she was concealing it magnificently. “Your Italian is good, but I speak English. I spent some time there, at university.” She turned to the phalanx at the door, speaking this time in Italian. “I can manage, thank you.”

The marchesa looked taken aback. As she opened her mouth to speak, her daughter went forward and kissed her on the cheek. “Grazie, mamma.” As the trio turned and left, the marchesa turned and gave a last warning look at Moretti.

“She’s only trying to protect me, you know.” Anna Albarosa’s smile gave her plain face an individual warmth and charm, if not beauty. “So difficult being a mother — you never know what to do for the best. To hold on, or to let go. In my mother’s case, she has always opted for complete control, and never doubted she was right. As in the case of my marriage to Toni. Please sit down.”

Anna Albarosa indicated two chairs near the window, and sat down on a sofa opposite. She seemed quite calm, completely self-possessed.

“You are a mother also?” asked Moretti.

“Yes. I have a boy of ten and a girl of six. I am glad to say that my daughter has inherited her father’s looks.” Her smile contained no rancour, no bitterness that Moretti could see.

“I must ask you first of all, Mrs. Albarosa, to confirm that you were not on the island when your husband was killed.”

“I was at my home in Fiesole, Inspector. I have witnesses up to about midnight, which I imagine would cover even the use of a private plane.” Anna Albarosa suddenly leaned forward and said, “You may have noticed that I am not crying, or emotional, Detectives.” Behind her glasses, her eyes seemed mildly amused. “In fact, you should check out my alibi carefully, or put me at the head of your list of suspects.”

“Why is that?” asked Moretti, although he was sure he knew the answer.

“Because I know where Toni was probably going — or coming from — that night. The poor, stupid man!” There was now some emotion in her voice, but it sounded more like anger than grief.

“I see. Did someone tell you?”

“Oh, I watched him at the party that was held to greet the cast and crew in Florence, lining up Vittoria Salviati in his sights. It was how he usually operated: arrive, reconnoitre, stalk, and then in for the kill. Only this time, it was Toni who got killed.” Anna Albarosa’s laugh had none of the attractiveness of her smile. “I had become quite used to it. I did feel some pity for the girl, who bought Toni’s sweetness and light act. Just as my mother and I did, ten years ago.”

“Did you challenge him at any point, ask him if he was having an affair?”

“Not anymore. After a while, I didn’t care. I had got what I wanted out of the marriage — a name that equalled my own, two children I adore, and the pleasure of being made love to from time to time by Toni Albarosa. In many ways he really was a sweet man, you know, and a good and kind father. Only he just couldn’t keep his pants on.”

“You saved your mother from hearing all this. How much did she know?”

“Not as much as she thought she did,” was Anna Albarosa’s cryptic reply.

“Your father and mother live apart, I believe?”

“What has that to do with Toni’s death?” Moretti had a sense of guards going up, shutters closing.

“I don’t know that it has anything to do with your husband’s death, but at this stage of the investigation we try to build up a complete picture.” Abruptly, Moretti changed tack. “So what do you think, Signora Albarosa? You say you should head our list of suspects. You were not here, so — if not you — then who do you think killed your husband?”

Toni Albarosa’s widow frowned. “At first I assumed it was a jilted lover or a cuckolded husband — there are any number of those in Toni’s past — but it’s not as if he was in Italy when it happened. Then I was told about the attack on the writer and the business with the costumes. Now I simply don’t know.”

“Can you think of any reason why these daggers have been used?”

At this question, there was one of those flickers of expression across Anna Albarosa’s face that reminded Moretti of Sydney Tremaine’s reaction to Giulia Vannoni’s arrival at the murder scene.

“No,” she said. “None.”

“Thank you.” Moretti stood up and Liz Falla followed suit, pocketing her notebook. “I gather you are not directly involved with the making of Rastrellamento?”

“No. It was really my father’s suggestion they could film here.”

“Why? He doesn’t live here, does he? Do you know?”

At this, Anna Albarosa started to laugh. “To annoy my mother, perhaps? You’d have to ask him.”

“Perhaps I will. Will he be coming to Guernsey?”

“No, not unless he is required to do so. You’d have to go to him, Inspector.”

As they walked to the door of the dining room, Moretti thought of something Anna Albarosa had said earlier in the interview. “You said, Signora, that Albarosa was a name that equalled your own. What exactly did you mean?”

“That the two families are of equal standing in Italian society. Let me show you something.”

Instead of turning toward the front door, Anna Albarosa went toward the principal reception room and a short distance along a side corridor. It opened into another smaller reception room with a huge stone fireplace that dominated the space, and above it hung a coat of arms.

Beneath a gold coronet was a quartered shield, holding a device in each quarter: a stylized olive branch and a bunch of grapes across the top, a snake and arrowhead across the bottom. The quarters were enclosed in a wavy border made up of what looked like vines and initials.

“This,” said Anna Albarosa, “is the combined family crest of the Vannoni and Albarosa families. It was not combined for my marriage, I assure you, but many years ago, when Vannonis and Albarosas first united in matrimony. It is quite usual in Italy — I don’t know about other countries — particularly when a father has only a daughter to whom he can leave his fortune and property. If the woman brings that wealth and land into her husband’s family, part of the two original crests is combined, with the woman’s heraldic devices on the sinister side — the left side as you are wearing it, or carrying your shield, but the right as you are viewing it.”

“Interesting.”

Moretti watched Liz Falla’s mouth open. He looked at her. She closed it again.

“Just one last thing, Signora — it is clear from this that your mother has immense pride in her family traditions and still thinks of herself as Italian. Why on earth is she in Guernsey?”

Again there was the flicker in Anna Albarosa’s eyes. “The separation from my father was very painful. Family, you understand. So important in my country. Loss of face. I don’t know. And something to do with money, I think. My mother never talks about such things.”

She sounded stilted, her English no longer fluid, and Moretti sensed she was regretting the impulse that had taken her around a corner to give him a look at the crest. She moved ahead of them and led the way back to the main foyer, where the marchesa erupted from her study at the sound of their approach.

“I hope you have been considerate of my daughter’s feelings. This has been a great shock to her.”

“Mother, I’m fine. It is in all our interests that the detectives do their job.”

“Of course.” The marchesa looked irritated at the patronizing tone in her daughter’s voice, and Moretti decided to ask a provoking question while the woman’s lofty sang-froid was shaken.

“Marchesa — why do you think your husband suggested the filming of Rastrellamento at your home?”

He expected anger, or outrage at his lèse-majesté, and he got it all. Moretti felt lucky those long nails were not scoring his face, as they had Gilbert Ensor’s.

“What has this to do with the murder of my son-in-law? My feelings about the filming here are none of your business, Detective Inspector, and if you try to drag my family’s good name into this inquiry, I shall insist you are taken off the case. The lieutenant-governor is a good friend of mine.”

There was something else in the marchesa’s face, besides anger. She’s frightened, thought Moretti. Something about the question terrifies her. Unfazed, intrigued, he replied. “Your family’s good name is already dragged into this enquiry, Marchesa. It was dragged in when your son-in-law got killed on the grounds of your home at four o’clock in the morning. We can only hope that the mainland press don’t pick up on this too swiftly, but inevitably they will. The murder has already been reported in the Guernsey Press, on BBC Guernsey, and Island FM, but the death of a location manager is not quite as newsworthy as one of the stars would have been. We will do our best to help you avoid the mudslinging a murder like this attracts.”

Moretti could feel the heat from the marchesa’s eyes burning holes in his jacket as he and Liz Falla returned to the car.

“Want my first impression, Guv? She really hates her husband.”

“I’ve no doubt she does, DC Falla, but that’s not what that was about.”

“I nearly said something when we were looking at that shield, but I saw your face. It’s got something to do with dagger handles and that shield thing, you think?”

“Well, I want to keep that to ourselves for a bit. There’s a family aspect to all this we’ve not got a handle on yet — sorry, bad pun. Signora Albarosa showed us that coat of arms of her own accord, and then, suddenly became — or, was it suddenly?”

“She changed her mind, didn’t she? Wished she hadn’t.”

“Yes. When I asked her what her mother was doing here when she’s so proud of her roots. Roots — hold on. I’ve just thought of something. We can drop the car off at Hospital Lane, and walk down to Blondel’s.”

“The grocer’s, Guv?”

“We’ll pick up a bottle of olive oil from the Vannoni estates. I know Blondel’s carry the Vannoni olive oil.”

Blondel’s Grocers were the top such establishment in town, catering to the carriage trade. They stocked most of the luxury products the island uppercrust might require, including a superb range of vintage wines and fine spirits and cigars in their off-licence. Over the years the business had expanded into a couple of supermarkets and more than one joint project with leading banks, such as Barings, but the family had retained the original store between a jewellers and a bookshop on a small street called the Pollett near La Plaiderie.

Moretti and Liz Falla walked down the hill past what had once been the townhome of the De Saumarez family, and was now Moore’s, one of St. Peter Port’s most central hotels. Moretti caught his partner’s wistful glance up the narrow steps that led to Moore’s patisserie.

“Hungry, DC Falla? Me too. We’ll take a break after this.”

“We’re in luck, Guv.” Liz Falla pointed at the window of Blondel’s which was just across the narrow street. “I think there’s a Vannoni bottle in the display.”

The window’s theme was labelled “Harvest Riches.” There were bunches of convincingly realistic plastic grapes, their fabric vine leaves entwined around bottles of wine and various exotic vinegars, and jars of black and green olives, some with the contents spilled out across the space. Among the olives were bottles of olive oil, some of them gigantic, their colour varying from yellow through lime to almost-green.

“There it is, the Vannoni bottle — we’re looking at the shield, right?” said Liz Falla, pointing at one of the more modestly sized bottles.

“Right. There’s one on every bottle — I use their brand. I’ve noticed that much but, like most things one sees everyday, I’ve never really taken a good look at it.”

“From here,” said Liz, her nose almost touching the glass, “it looks just like the one we saw at the manor.”

“From here. But I think not. Let’s take a closer look”

Inside the shop, the warm, complex smell of cheeses, fruit preserves, chocolate, and coffee, mixed with the hospitable fragrance of wines and spirits, reminded both of them they were hungry.

“There you are, Guv. There’s one on the counter.” Liz picked it up. “Looks the same to me. Crown on top, grapes and olives and — just a second, that’s not a snake, is it?”

“No. A dagger.”

“Brilliant, Guv,” said his partner. “Fancy you remembering that.”

“I didn’t, not really, but the quarters up at the manor seemed different to me. Sometimes these heraldic symbols are far from clear — take the balls on the Medici coat of arms, for instance. The French in the sixteenth century spread the rumour they represented poison pills, but nobody really knows what they are.”

Liz Falla nodded sagely. “How come the bottles are different from the shield up at the manor?”

“Remember what Anna Albarosa said about the addition of another coat of arms, when the woman brings her name and fortune into the family? This is what happened here — this shield we’re looking at now is almost certainly the Vannoni coat of arms without the Albarosa addition. And remember what I said about how, like most things you see every day, I’d never really examined it. That, I think, is why Anna Albarosa made the mistake of drawing our attention to the family crest, and then why she got cold feet.”

“Right.” Liz Falla waved across at a well-fed white-coated lady slicing off thickly cut chunks from a succulent roast of pork for an equally well-endowed customer. “Where does this get us? I mean, we have to work out, don’t we, what all this has to do with the attempt on Mr. Ensor, a rack of damaged costumes, and a dead location manager? Sorry, Guv, perhaps you already have.”

“I wish! But we now know for sure that the dagger is not just idiosyncratic or purely decorative. It’s significant. And, second of all — I don’t know. I haven’t yet worked it out. Hello, Mike.”

Mike Le Page, the manager of Blondel’s, was approaching with the look of someone anxious to please, while at the same time hoping to keep any unpleasantness at bay, or at least away from public scrutiny. He was a middle-aged man with the dark hair and eyes that marked his Norman ancestry and, in the midst of constant temptation to overindulge, had managed to keep impressively slim.

“Can I help? Is there a problem? Hello, Liz.”

“None,” Moretti reassured him. “We needed to take a good look at one of the Vannoni olive oil bottles.”

“Terrible business.” Mike Le Page said, shaking his head. “The kitchen staff up there told my delivery man all about it. But why are you looking here?”

Moretti waved a vague hand in the air. “We look into all angles at this stage of the investigation. I imagine you sell the Vannoni brand as much because it’s good as because the marchesa is on the island?”

“Oh yes. We have no dealings with her, but we’ve had some with her niece. She came in and put on a tasting for us once — first time I’ve had as many males as females for a sampling, once word got around. She’s a fine-looking lady, that one. Only, if the stories I hear are true, they were wasting their time. The lads, I mean.”

Mike Le Page gave a knowing laugh.

As Moretti was paying for the bottle of olive oil Mike Le Page said, “Tell you what, Ed, there’s someone who knows more than I do about that lot up at Ste. Madeleine. Dan Mahy. His wife was employed by the family right after they bought the manor. He worked here for years — goes back to the days when we did deliveries by bicycle — but he’s been retired a while now. He lives out at Torteval. Hang on, I’ll get his address for you. We still ask him to our staff get-togethers, although he doesn’t come any longer. But they tell me he still puts in an appearance from time to time at the manor — course, it’s much closer to where he lives than we are. They give him a bite to eat and send him on his way”

Out in the street, Liz Falla said, “Dan Mahy might be a waste of time, Guv. Nutty as a fruitcake, my mother says. Never got over the death of his wife.”

“Talking of fruitcakes, DC Falla, I think we should get some lunch.”

On the other side of the street, a Labrador retriever with his leash fastened around a lamppost began to bark at an approaching collie.

“Dogs, dogs,” said Moretti. “Why didn’t the dog bark in the night?”

“Sorry, Guv, I’m not with you.”

“You know — Sherlock Holmes,” said Moretti, leading the way up the steps past the huge mural painted on the wall of the house adjoining the patisserie. They each ordered a prawn salad and coffee in the restaurant and made their way back outside on to the wide terrace that looked down on a cluster of financial buildings and their closed-circuit cameras.

“Sherlock Holmes, Guv?” asked Liz Falla, pulling in her chair under the shade of the green and white table umbrella advertising Grolsch beer. The cerulean background of the mural behind her nicely complimented the darker blue of her suit. Gamine, thought Moretti, looking at her short dark hair, cut in wisps around her face. Yes, I suppose she is.

“Sherlock Holmes, DC Falla. This afternoon, I want you to go back to the manor and check with the security people if there was any unusual behaviour from any of the guard dogs on the night of the murder. Also, get someone to check our records, and see if there has been any sort of complaint or report of trouble from the Vannoni family in the past few months, however trivial it may seem.”

The salads and coffee arrived, served by a cheerful red-aproned waitress with an Australian accent.

“What are you expecting to find, Guv?” asked Liz Falla, after the server had left.

“That’s just it. I don’t know, and I want you to stay open to anything, even the apparently inconsequential.” The coffee is excellent, almost as good as my own, thought Moretti. “Now, about those two women. Apart from your feeling the marchesa can’t stand her husband, was there anything else that struck you?”

His partner inspected a large prawn impaled on the tines of her fork as though it pleased her mightily.

“Yes, but it’s difficult to put into words — ones that make much sense, that is. There’s something going on, but I have the feeling that neither of those ladies are entirely sure themselves what it is — see,” said Liz Falla, examining the crustacean as though it had the answer to the mystery, “I got the weirdest feeling from them — that they both know something, but they’re neither of them sure if the something they know is the something that caused the murder and the other stuff, and they’re darned if they’re going to say anything in case they let slip something that may have nothing to do with the murder but they don’t want to be public knowledge.”

Moretti watched her silently for a moment as she demolished her plateful of prawns.

“Believe it or not, DC Falla, I understood every word you said.”

Her laughter startled a nearby sparrow, waiting hopefully on the back of an empty chair.

“Thanks, Guv. And thanks for asking my opinion. I never said, but I’m really grateful for the chance to work with you. I’ve felt at a bit of a loss up to now, but your asking me my impressions really helped.”

“Good.” I’m feeling less at a loss myself, thought Moretti — about the partnership at least, if not the case.

A drop of rain splattered on to the umbrella above the table.

“One other thing, Guv.” DC Falla speared a last piece of radicchio. “I get to call you ‘Guv,’ but you have this mouthful to say every time. DC Falla, or Detective Constable Falla —”

“I can’t say your first name,” said Moretti. Had a small joke and a moment of laughter led to distressing personal requests, unprofessional familiarity? She was giving him that look of hers again.

“And I wouldn’t dream of it, Guv. That’s all we need, gossip among the lads.”

“What then, DC Falla?”

“How about just ‘Falla,’ Guv.”

“Very well, if that’s what you’d like.”

“I would. And I’ll tell you something else I’d like —” His partner stood up and attracted the attention of the waitress. “If we’ve got the time, I’d like a piece of their Dobos Torte. I’ll burn it off in the pool at the Beau Sejour Centre tonight before I have my rehearsal.”

“Rehearsal?” Moretti didn’t know why he should feel surprised. After all, he knew nothing about Detective Constable Liz Falla. “Are you a member of the Island Players like your uncle?”

“God, no!” Falla seemed to find this funny. “I’m a member of a group. We call ourselves ‘Jenemie.’ A Guernsey word, but don’t ask me what it means. We just liked the sound of it.”

“Group? You mean you’re a musician, Falla?”

“Not like you, Guv. I play some guitar — acoustic — but mostly I’m a singer.”

“I didn’t know.”

There was the old-fashioned look again. “Why would you, Guv? I don’t go around Hospital Lane singing my little folkie heart out.”

“So you’re a folk singer.”

“More like — do you know Enya’s music? A New Age folkie singer. Sort of like that. My real heroine’s a Canadian called Loreena McKennit.”

“Interesting,” said Moretti. It was his favourite fallback word. This time he meant it, although whenever anyone said “New Age” he usually ran fast in the opposite direction. “I think I will go to Torteval after all, have a word with Dan Mahy. Oh, and Falla, next time you’re in touch with Benedetti, perhaps you could ask him to see what he can find out about this person. No rush.” Taking out his notepad, Moretti wrote down the name “Sophia Maria Catellani,” added a couple of details, tore out the page, and handed it to Liz Falla.

“Okay, Guv.” His partner looked at the paper, but she asked no questions. He liked that.

“Rain’s starting,” said Moretti, standing up and putting the notebook back in his pocket. “They said it would by afternoon. You enjoy your cake, and I’ll see you at the manor.”

No need to tell Liz Falla he was making a stop on the way to see if his overnight guest had left his bed.

Rastrellamento. It’s all in there somewhere, Moretti thought. I’ve got to talk to Gilbert Ensor again. Rain was now pattering steadily against the windshield of the Triumph.

I thought about you.

Miles Davis’s version of the Johnny Mercer standard played in his head. In his mind’s eye Moretti saw the auburn hair of Sydney Tremaine burning against his pillow, her backless gold mules slipping off her feet.

She was gone, as he had expected. On the note he had left she had written, “Thank you. I took the shirt.”

He felt a pang of something that felt disconcertingly like regret, got back in the Triumph and set out to Torteval.