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September 17th

The two women stood at the top of the path, waiting. It had started to rain and seeing them through the light mist, Moretti thought of the Widow’s Walk at Saumarez Manor, the railing around the centre of the highest storey, as on some old houses in New England facing the sea. Sydney Tremaine would never again have to pace and wait and wonder where her husband was. This time he had set out on an adventure that had cost him his life. As he started to walk up the slope, she moved away from Giulia Vannoni and came toward him.

“He’s dead, isn’t he?”

She looked like one of the women beloved of the Pre-Raphaelites — Ophelia drifting in her watery grave, her skin bloodless, waxen.

“Ms. Tremaine — Sydney.” He took her by the arm, and she did not resist as he led her to his car. He opened the passenger door, and she got in and sat there, obediently, like a child going on an outing. Moretti got in the other side and sat down. Her hands were folded in her lap, and she did not look at him.

“Yes. Your husband has been killed in the bunker, Sydney. A knife was used, but not the same type of knife. That doesn’t matter now. I shall want you to tell me again every word you can remember of what he said to you last night. If we go into the manor, can you manage that?”

“No.” She turned to look at him, and he could not read anything in her eyes. They seemed as blank as a painted surface. “Not the manor. I shall never go in there again.”

“Then we’ll go to the station, or back to the hotel, if you’d prefer. But for now I’d like someone to be with you. My partner, DC Falla, would —”

“Betty Chesler — I’d like Betty.”

She was weeping now, tears falling on her hands.

“I’ll get her.”

Strike while she’s vulnerable, he told himself. Forget about the lipstick stain on your pillow, the faint scent left on the sheets that was probably dreamt up by your overheated imagination. Remember, this woman is not frail.

“Who was on the cliff path, Sydney?”

“Giulia. Giulia running.” She turned to look at him and this time he could read the expression in her eyes. She seemed angry. “She knows something. They all know something. About the daggers, Ed. It’s all about the daggers.”

Then she wept again, and when he put his arms around her this time he did not care about the onlookers, and gave no thought at all to Chief Officer Hanley.

When the SOC crew had taken over, Betty Chesler had left with Sydney Tremaine, and reinforcements had arrived to take statements, Moretti and Liz Falla went into the manor.

Giulia Vannoni was waiting for them in her aunt’s sitting room. She was dressed in black: the black leather pants she had worn when Moretti had first seen her, a black shirt of some kind, and a black leather jacket that fastened over the firm disks of her breasts with one large leather button. The only note of colour was her scarlet lipstick that flamed against her tanned skin. Beneath the plucked arch of her eyebrows and the fringe of heavy black mascara her green eyes glittered with what looked like contempt.

“You wish me to accompany you to the police station, no? Trust the great minds of the police to go for the obvious.”

“We have some questions to ask you in connection with the death of —”

“Gilbert Ensor. Are you going to handcuff me?”

“You’re not under arrest, Signorina.”

Which was, of course, true. So why would a highly intelligent woman be carrying on as if they were about to accuse her of murder? Maybe she saw herself as some sort of a decoy, running ahead of us and dragging her wing so that we’d follow her instead of — whoever and whatever it is in her family we should be following. So let’s do that, he thought, and see what happens.

“Would you like to call a lawyer?”

“I will. Later. Let’s get this farce started, and see how far it goes.”

Giulia Vannoni walked between Moretti and Liz Falla, towering over the policewoman, her head about level with Moretti’s eyes. She must be nearly six feet, he thought, and her shoulders are about as wide as mine. She said nothing during the journey, but her physical presence in the back of his car was as potent as the perfume she had worn the first time he met her.

And she is capable of causing uproar, with her connections. We’ll have to tread damn carefully, or Hanley will have me on the carpet, thought Moretti. I’m sure he’s hoping our murderer is some benighted foreigner on the film crew who did this, and not a member of a prestigious local family.

Their arrival at Hospital Lane did not go unnoticed. Giulia Vannoni strode through the building as though she owned it, returning the stares of those passing by with a parting of her scarlet lips that was more a rictus than a smile. Once in Moretti’s office she sat down on a chair without waiting to be directed.

“Signorina —”

“How is Sydney?”

“Not good, as you can imagine. She asked for a member of the film crew, Betty Chesler, to be with her.”

“So she is safe with Betty? Of course, since you suspect me, you would think that, wouldn’t you?”

She gazed around Moretti’s office as though the decor offended her sensibilities, her eyes washing over him in contempt, and Moretti knew he must establish his control over the interview or she would run it, and him. Which was how they were all here together, instead of back at the scene of the crime, or interviewing Mario Bianchi — which was what he had originally intended. He slammed his hand down on the desk, and saw Liz Falla start, taken by surprise at her Guv’nor’s uncharacteristic outburst.

“Signorina, your arrogance is helping no one, least of all yourself. We are in my office, not in an interrogation room, and there is no tape recorder. You are a smart woman — Mr. Lord calls you the cleverest of the Vannonis — and yet you have deliberately drawn attention to yourself as a possible suspect. Why did you not tell me you were out running on the cliff path near the Héritage Hotel when the first attempt was made on Gilbert Ensor’s life?”

“So. Sydney told you.”

“Yes, but she waited until today. Did you ask her not to tell us?”

“Of course not. I suggested to her that maybe she wished whoever it was had not missed.”

“What was her reaction?”

“Confused. That was some love-hate relationship, that one. Most are, in my experience.” Giulia Vannoni leaned back in her chair, and Moretti sensed that her act of bravado — if that was indeed what it had been — was over.

“Do you have an alibi for last night?”

“No. I was alone in my castello. You accuse me of drawing attention to myself, but this is the fact. I am a suspect.”

“Yes. But there is something more, Signorina, than your lack of alibi, or your presence on the cliff path. From the beginning I have felt a conspiracy of silence around these three episodes — from the apparently trivial incident of the damage to the costumes to the death of these two men. And I am certain that you, among others, could tell me a great deal more than you have. Why is that, Signorina?”

If I could capture the reactions of the Vannoni family to that kind of question, thought Moretti, and bottle them, the contents of those bottles would all look exactly the same. The sudden stillness of Giulia Vannoni’s body was unmistakable, the sense of withdrawal palpable. Like the regret of Anna Albarosa for drawing attention to the family crest. If Giulia Vannoni could have hung up on him, as her uncle had done, the line would now have gone dead.

“I accused you of pursuing the obvious, Detective Inspector. I was wrong, it seems. You also pursue flights of fancy — or is it that you are more paranoid than I thought? A conspiracy theory now — what next!”

She laughed scornfully but she was rattled, Moretti could see it. He remembered why Hanley had been so keen to get him back. You speak Italian. In this investigation, it would take more than his knowledge of the language to uncover the truth; it would take an understanding of his father’s people.

La famiglia, for instance.

For a man who rarely returned to his roots, his father talked a great deal about the importance of the family in Italian society — not in such grandiose and abstract terms, but it permeated his conversation about his native land. In spite of a growing divorce rate, a dropping birthrate, and the perennial problem of unfaithful wives and husbands, lovers and mistresses, that ancient institution remained the crux, Moretti knew, of the most profound and significant elements in Italian society. Its hold on the loyalty of its members was as tenacious as ever, the basis of much that was precious and good — and some that was bad.

This woman had talked about love-hate relationships, which was how his father had spoken about family: family loyalty, family obligation. He could only hope that the element of surprise would work with Giulia Vannoni where bullying or reasoning would be so much wasted breath. He asked his next question without preamble or explanation.

“This house, Signorina. The one near the sea. Where is it, and what does it have to do with these murders and Rastrellamento?”

He heard the intake of breath, and then she said, “What is all this crap? I want a lawyer.”

Without another word, Moretti picked up his phone and handed it to her.

“What a ball-breaker, eh, Guv!”

“Bit of a misnomer in her case, Falla, but I know what you mean.”

“What with one thing and another, I forgot to tell you — Giorgio phoned last night. He’s found the birth. Sophia Maria was born in Pistoia to Maria Colombo. Father unknown.”

“Pistoia was my godmother’s home town. Father unknown? Then where does the name Catellani come in?”

“She was adopted by a Franco and Rosa Catellani. Now he’s checking on the whereabouts of Sophia Maria — the Catellanis’ home town was given as Montecatini, near Pistoia and it seems she’s still alive — or at least, there’s no record of a death.”

So his godmother had given birth to a child out of wedlock. And had kept silent, a silence only broken after her death. A complete human life, obliterated by silence.

“Please thank him for me.” He had completely forgotten about Sophia Maria Catellani. “We’re going back to the manor, but first I want to see if any of the crime-scene investigators have returned.”

As Moretti and Liz Falla came downstairs, some of the crew were just coming into the building chattering like magpies, the adrenalin still pumping from the scene in the bunker.

“Hey, Moretti. We’ve left everything like you said, but there’s a problem.”

“Problem?”

Of course there’s a bloody problem, thought Moretti. There’s a mountain of problems, a bunkerful of problems. There’s a family conspiracy problem, and the fact that I may be pursuing a chimera anyway. A red herring of a house. Because, above all, there’s a change of dagger motif problem. The roots of this business may well be right here on the island, and not in Florence, or Fiesole, or the Maremma after all.

“Yes. The medico says there may be trouble establishing time of death, because of the temperature and humidity down there — Christ, what a hellhole! He may call in a pathologist from the Met for a second opinion.”

“I see. Could he at least establish if death was immediate — as in the case of Albarosa?”

“Of that he’s sure. It wasn’t. There was a struggle — Ensor fought back. And that’s not all. There’s a possibility the dagger wasn’t the cause of death. Seems the victim crawled to where he died. And the doc thinks there’s a chance he died of suffocation. Or fright. He’ll get a preliminary report to you tomorrow.”

“That confirms one thing for us, Falla,” said Moretti as they crossed the courtyard together, “Toni Albarosa was probably surprised to see whoever it was on the terrace, but was not aware he was in danger. Gilbert Ensor did not see the person he expected to see, and knew immediately he was in trouble.”

“Couldn’t he have been forced down there?”

“Possibly, but I think he was lured there, and I’m sure you’re right — he thought he was going to an assignation. From something he said to his wife I think he was expecting some sort of erotic thrill — maybe having sex in that fake command centre — I don’t know. For a man like Gilbert Ensor, sexual experimentation was as necessary as — as —.”

“A good single malt, Guv?”

Moretti looked at his colleague, who was backing the Mercedes out of the narrow parking space with practiced ease.

“I was going to say bread and butter, but that’s certainly more accurate in Ensor’s case.”

“Guv —” Moretti sensed that his partner was treading delicately, “— isn’t it possible his wife has something to do with this? I mean — I shouldn’t be saying this as a police officer, but can you blame her? And couldn’t she and Giulia Vannoni be in this together?”

“Which is why I’ve arranged for a police guard on the door of her hotel suite. And since there is also the possibility she herself is in danger, the guard serves a double purpose. As for the signorina, it’s more likely she was the decoy for someone other than Sydney Tremaine. When we get to the manor, park around the back, Falla. We are going to obey the Vannonis’ commands, and go in through the tradesmen’s entrance.”

“May I ask why, Guv?”

“Because the only mini-break we’ve had on this case came from a contact of the Vannonis’ servants. I want to see if we get lucky again.”

Security had obviously been beefed up since the discovery of Gilbert Ensor’s body in the bunker. As Liz Falla brought the car to a halt alongside a jeep and a row of motorbikes, they were immediately approached by one of the private security staff, who peered into the car, acknowledged them with a touch of his cap, and moved on. The back door of the manor was locked, and Moretti rang the ponderous iron bell pull alongside it. The sound reverberated inside the house.

“You’d expect a zombie or something to answer that, wouldn’t you, Guv?” said Liz Falla with a theatrical shiver.

The door was opened instead by a tiny black-clad woman, who fixed them with a baleful glare.

“Yes?”

“Police,” said Moretti, pulling out his identification.

“You go front,” she said, starting to close the door.

“Signora, come sta? Italiana?”

“Si.” Cautiously, the door opened a little wider.

“Mi chiamo Eduardo Moretti. Mi padre era Italiano — da Pistoia.”

“Ah — Pistoia!” The door opened wider again.

Still talking, Moretti eased himself into the hallway, with Liz Falla close on his heels.

Where the passage of time and the outlay of money had bestowed a mellow richness and a warm and mature patina on the formal and family areas of the Manoir Ste. Madeleine, the servants’ areas of the building were in need of, at the very least, a fresh coat of paint. The corridor in which they stood had a general air of neglect, with faded wallpaper peeling off the walls, and some rather ratty linoleum underfoot.

“Signora, your name is —?”

“Teresa Stecconi. I’ve been housekeeper here longer than I care to remember. Oh, what a business this is! That poor man, and the poor signora and her fatherless children!”

“Indeed. You know Anna Albarosa?”

“Of course. I’ve known her since she was a little girl. I came here with them, to help them move, and I never went back. They are my family — I have no one else.”

“So you knew Patrizia.”

“Of course. Now, she knew the marchese and his father when he was a little lad — such a wild one, the marchese’s father, she said. Who would have thought he’d become such a pillar of society!”

“So he was wild, but aren’t all young ones wild? Like the marchese’s son, Gianfranco, for instance?”

The old woman snorted. “Ah, Gianfranco! He is signor perfetto compared to the marchese at his age. Mind you, that was just boyish wildness, not the crazy madness that Patrizia used to speak of. But that’s all gone now. Still waters run deep, she used to say. Who would have guessed?”

“Crazy madness? This would be when the family were still in Florence, or Fiesole?”

“No, no, before that. But I wasn’t with them then.”

“So,” said Moretti, hoping that he sounded reasonably interested but not interrogatory. “This would be when she was with them at the other house.”

Teresa Stecconi looked sharply at Moretti. “You know about that? That’s the past. Bury the past, I always say, with its dead.”

“But now there are dead in the present, Signora, and perhaps the reason for that lies in the past.”

Moretti watched the shutters come down. The old woman turned away from him.

“We are here now,” she said. “I have left the memories — the bad and the good — behind me. Patrizia should have done the same thing, always moaning about how much better it was — there. Buona sera, ispettore.”

She turned and, with a speed that took both Moretti and Liz Falla by surprise, she zipped off down a side corridor and out of sight.

“So, where does that leave us, Guv?” asked Liz Falla, peering after the spritely octogenarian.

“I’m tempted to say in limbo, but that’s not quite true. What she told me was interesting, because she more or less confirmed there was another house. And something more than that — something happened in that house that was so terrible everyone has been sworn to silence.”

“I must ask you, Detective Inspector — where have you been? The security guard says he saw you into the house about half an hour ago!”

Flushed with anger, gold chain rattling, the marchesa faced Moretti across the broad expanse of the main salon, which was still encircled with lights and cameras. Beside her sat Monty Lord, holding her hand. He looked haggard and worn.

“Marchesa — there has been another murder, as you know, and part of my responsibility is to check the security of you and your family.”

“There was no need to disturb my domestic staff — and we have private security for that.”

“Need I remind you they were unable to save the life of your son-in-law, Marchesa.”

Thank heavens Monty Lord is here, thought Moretti. He seems to have a calming influence on her. The producer sat staring at them across an elaborate malachite table, as though hoping for some kind of miracle.

“This is a disaster, Detective Inspector Moretti. A tragedy. I got in from the shoot only to hear that Gil was missing. Selfish as it may sound, I must tell you that I have been on the phone to our lawyers to check we are covered for such an eventuality, that we may go on filming Rastrellamento. It would help nobody and serve no useful purpose if the whole project went up in smoke.”

“And are you?”

“Covered? Yes. Death is covered — the nature of it is not significant. If you understand what I mean.”

“Of course. You say you were on the set — the shoot, you called it?”

“Yes. This morning we were filming some of the action scenes out at L’Ancresse. Mario was not with us, he needed a rest, he said. So much of the war stuff is logistical, and his associate director had plenty to be getting on with.”

“Where is he now?”

“Sedated.” It was the marchesa who answered. “He was very upset.”

Moretti decided to leave that for now. Instead he turned his attention to Monty Lord.

“I understand you went to see Gilbert Ensor yesterday morning.”

“Yes. I wish now I’d kept an eye on Mario, because I knew how angry Gil was. But I’d no idea he’d get up the energy to come here and that they would run into each other when Mario returned from checking the bunker.”

“Checking the bunker?”

“Yes. We had planned to start shooting there in the next few days. Now, of course, it’s yet another scene of the crime, isn’t it?”

“I’m afraid so. When you took me down there, Mr. Lord, the door was locked. Was it always kept locked?”

“Supposedly.”

“Who had keys?”

“Myself, Mario, and I think there was a key in the house — wasn’t there, Donatella?”

“Yes. When this happened, I went to make sure it was still there and it was.”

“Where was ‘there,’ marchesa?”

“In a drawer in my bedroom. I had two copies made for Monty and Mario.”

“I see. Was anyone around when Gilbert Ensor and your director had their confrontation?”

“I was. It was unbelievable.” The marchesa was disturbed enough to get up from her seat by Monty Lord and start pacing. “I thought Gilbert was going to attack Mario physically — hit him, I mean, not just scream at him. We were all getting used to that.”

Spoken with the contempt of one who has conveniently forgotten her own assault on Ensor after the first murder, reflected Moretti. “Did he have to be restrained?” he asked.

“Yes. By me. He was out of breath from just the screaming. It wasn’t difficult.”

I believe it, thought Moretti. A very strong woman, this one. Like her niece.

“Then what happened?”

“Piero Bonini came in and ordered Gilbert off the premises. He told him he would get an injunction to keep him away from the shooting, if he did not do so voluntarily.”

“Where did all this take place?”

“Out on the terrace.”

“So any number of people saw what happened?”

“Yes. It was disgraceful. Mario tried to reason with him, explain the nature of the changes, talk about his personal philosophy of filmmaking, but he was shouted down.”

“Did you see Signor Bianchi leave, Marchesa?”

“Yes. It was I who took him away when he broke down, and I made sure he got something to eat and a rest before he went into town. He had an appointment.”

“With whom, do you know?”

There was an exchange of glances between the marchesa and Monty Lord, and it was Monty Lord who replied.

“Mario has regular appointments with a psychiatrist, and we were able to make a similar arrangement for him here. I imagine you know he has had problems with substance abuse in the past.”

“And those problems are, you are sure, part of the past?”

“I’m certain of it.”

Moretti stood up. “If Signor Bianchi has taken sedatives, there is little to be gained by questioning him now. We will come back.”

As they left the room, Moretti looked over his shoulder. The marchesa had her head on Monty Lord’s shoulder and he was patting her hand. Beneath the shining dome of his shaved head, the expression in the American producer’s eyes was panic-stricken.

“Now, are you sure you’ll be all right?”

Betty Chesler thumped the pillows behind Sydney Tremaine’s head and tugged at the bedcovers with the grim determination of someone erecting ramparts around a threatened and vulnerable keep. The two women had met on the Pavlova movie and had kept in touch with the odd letter and card over the years.

“Thank you for coming with me, Betty. I’m so grateful. I’ll be fine now — I’ll take one of the sedatives you put by the bed and get some sleep.”

“You know, pet — it’s hardly the time to mention it, but you should think of getting back into the swing of things. You have so much to offer.”

“Oh, Betty, honey, I couldn’t dance professionally again!”

“I don’t see why not, but I was thinking of how well you worked with those children on the Pavlova set with their dancing. It’s been a while, but people still remember you. You should take advantage of that while you can.”

“Oh Betty, I don’t know —”

But the thought lingered after Betty Chesler had left. Sydney heard her speaking to the police guard outside the door, and then there was silence.

She leaned over the side of the bed, fingered the bottle of sleeping pills, and shuddered at the thought of sleep. The last thing she wanted to do was sleep, perchance to dream. She got out of bed, took a shower, and made herself a coffee.

For the first time in her relationship with Gil she was grateful he was an only child and both his parents were dead. In the past, she had thought that being a much-adored child had only made matters worse when fame arrived on the scene, because it had prolonged his indulged childhood into a self-centred manhood. Gil expected to be worshipped. She couldn’t bear to think of where he was now, and what would happen before he could be laid to rest — a new state of being, or non-being for Gil. Laziness came naturally to him, but not restfulness.

Sydney forced her mind away from the thought of what had to be done over the next few days, and concentrated on what Betty Chesler had said. Once or twice she had suggested to Gil she might like to put her talents to some use, only to be discouraged. No, she thought, not just discouraged. Derided. Gradually, the fragile flower of hope and belief in herself had withered and, she had thought, died. It would be ironic if it took the death of her husband to bring it back to life again.

Sydney finished her coffee, went into the bedroom, and pulled out a leotard from a drawer. She changed into it, went through into the sitting room, and put some music on the stereo. Slowly, with a sense of strangely unbroken continuity rather than that of a return after an absence, she started to put her body through the sequences followed by every classical dancer anywhere in the world.

About an hour later, she stopped. She went back into the bedroom, put on a tracksuit over her leotard and a pair of running shoes, and made a phone call. Then she unlocked the door of the hotel suite.

Outside the door of the suite sat a very young policeman. Sydney smiled at him, prettily.

“Thank you for watching over me. I’m just going down to the lobby to buy cigarettes — I’m gasping.”

The constable jumped to his feet, eager to help. “I’ll get them, miss. What kind do you want?”

“Oh no!” Sydney looked at him in alarm. “I can’t — I just can’t stay here with no one outside. I just can’t.” She allowed a note of hysteria to enter her voice.

“Then I’ll come with you.”

“And leave this place unattended? After what happened out on the patio I could never relax again, even if you searched it. Please — just stay watching for me, will you? If I’m not back in five minutes, then, of course, I’d expect you to come after me — okay?”

“Five minutes.” The young constable looked worried and confused.

“Right — thanks!”

She ran down the corridor, waving as she went.

Five minutes. Please God, she prayed, may the taxi get here in five minutes.

The lobby was quiet, with only the desk clerk in attendance.

“Mrs. Ensor — should you —?”

“I’m going in to the police station — they’re sending a car. The constable is staying to watch over my suite.”

Beyond the revolving doors, a taxi was pulling up. Sydney whisked through the doors and into the car.

“The tower on Icart point.”

As they exited through the gates of the hotel, she saw the young police officer standing in the doorway with the desk clerk.

She had no problems unlocking the gate, and the key worked easily in the lock of the Martello tower door. There was no sign of Giulia’s Ducati on the terrazzo by the door, and the place was in darkness. Feeling for the switch, Sydney found it and put it on, feeling relief at the sudden brilliance that flooded the space. She didn’t need a cigarette, but she needed a drink, badly.

In Giulia’s small kitchen she found the Aperol and poured herself a glass. It did not produce instant cessation of pain, but it did give an illusion of pleasure.

About fifteen minutes later, she heard a key in the door. Giulia appeared, pushing the Ducati ahead of her. She started when she saw Sydney and her hand went to the pocket of her leather jacket.

“Don’t kill me. All I took was a little Aperol. A large Aperol.”

“What are you doing here? You should be under guard somewhere, not tempting fate. Idiota!”

“You called me that before, I remember. Okay, so you didn’t sleep with Gil, but you did keep your mouth shut about — whatever it is that’s behind all this. About that I am no idiot, Giulia.”

Giulia paused, sighed and took off her jacket. “Bene. I’ll tell you about the past, but don’t think I have the answer, because I don’t. I’ll have some of that also.”

They carried the drinks into the living area and sat together on a sofa covered in soft black leather.

“The past, Giulia — how can this be about the past? Gil only spent time in Italy when he was researching Rastrellamento. Why kill him?”

“Rastrellamento is about the past. Do you know if he based the book on any actual events?”

“Not as far as I know, but Gil didn’t talk much about the process of writing — at least, not to me. Knowing Gil, I think he’d have preferred the world to feel Rastrellamento was entirely a product of his genius. His imagination.”

“Perhaps it was, but I think he stumbled on to something. And I know that clever policeman feels the same way — that’s where I’ve been, at the police station.”

“Clever policeman — Ed Moretti?”

“You are on first-name terms?” Giulia raised her eyebrows.

“Yes — well, I am, anyway, and I spent a night in his bed, and none of this is as it sounds.”

“Pity. You could do worse.”

“I did. I married Gil.” Sydney put down her empty glass. “So far I’ve answered most of the questions, Giulia. Tell me about the past. Your father, I guess, was a Vannoni.”

“My grandfather. My mother was not married, and she herself was the child of rape — no, don’t say anything, not yet.” Giulia got up, went into the kitchen, and brought the bottle back with her. “These things happen all the time, yes, since the beginning of time, and this was wartime. The man who was actually my grandfather was probably not a German, and possibly a partisan, but I don’t know. It was a small village, and one of the agreements between my grandmother and the man who married her and became father to her child was that she would never say, never talk about it. I imagine she was quite happy to go along with the deal, no?”

“I’m sure. So a Vannoni made an honest woman out of your grandmother? Forgive me, Giulia, but with what I know about your family, I find that hard to believe.”

Giulia threw back her head and laughed. “Cara, you know us well in so short a time! There were what the lawyers call mitigating circumstances: first, my grandfather was the younger son, and second — and much, much more significantly, he was almost certainly what was then called a degenerate. A homosexual. He had shown no desire to marry and had never been in the least interested in women. Given how things were then, it is unlikely he got much further than that. Oh, there was talk, and he was told by the family to silence the gossip. So he married my grandmother, who had been a close friend since schooldays, and was a sweet and kind husband to her and father to my mother. My mother was a wilful and wild woman, quite unlike her mother and stepfather — there is a lot of her in me. She became pregnant and refused to name the father — there is a chance she didn’t know who the father was — and so I was born, and kept the Vannoni name.”

“So, by blood, you’re not a Vannoni at all. Is your mother alive?”

“No. She died when I was eight, and I was raised by the marchesa. Donatella is a difficult, proud woman, but I will always have a place in my heart for her, because she was good to me, and treated me like family.”

Sydney reached out and poured herself another glass of Aperol. “I’m trying to work out how Gil’s death — and Toni’s — could have anything to do with your unknown father and your grandfather.”

“Maybe so, maybe not, but I think it has to do with another mystery in the Vannoni past. Not about my step-grandfather, but about his sister, Sylvia Vannoni, the eldest child. I didn’t even know there was a sister; I thought there were just two brothers. But about ten years ago, I decided to look into my past.” Giulia’s smile had more of pain than pleasure in it. “At that time I was facing up to the fact that I preferred girls to boys, cara, and that made me wonder if my grandfather Vannoni was indeed gay, and if he was, in fact, my real grandfather. It turned out that he was probably gay, but that he was not my grandfather.”

“How did you find this out?”

“Not from records. It was much easier to conceal the truth during wartime, and records were often not kept, or were inaccurate. I talked to every old family retainer I could find — there were more of them around ten years ago. And the woman who told me about Sylvia once lived at the manor. Her name was Patrizia. So the chances are that someone else on the island knows about this — and that is how your clever policeman friend asks the questions he asks.”

“Giulia,” Sydney stood up, feeling her legs shaking beneath her with stress, anxiety and Aperol combined, “shouldn’t Ed Moretti be told anything that would help him catch Gil and Toni’s killer?”

“But what do I know, in fact? Will any of this help him catch the man, or woman?”

“Woman?”

“It could be. I think your policeman friend has even wondered if you and I are together in this.” Sydney sat down again, and Giulia gave her a wry glance. “And you come here, no, is that what you’re thinking? Family honour is just as important to a woman, and this is about honour, of that I’m sure. Patrizia told me that Sylvia died, and that she was forbidden to speak about her, or even to remember she had ever lived.”

“But that’s terrible! Wiping out the memory of a human being’s existence from the face of the earth! I still don’t understand why you won’t tell the police.”

“Because it’s a mystery no one in the family will talk about. Because when I tried to talk to Donatella about Sylvia, for the first and only time in my life I was afraid of her. She threatened to throw me out of the family and, more importantly, out of the family business. I love what I do, and I would be lost without my professional life. In a toss-up between Donatella and Eduardo Moretti, Donatella wins, hands down.”

“You say all this goes back to the war years — could it have anything to do with the war?”

“I think so. In Rastrellamento there is a love affair, isn’t there, between the daughter of the house and an escaped British prisoner, and I wonder if that is what happened to the unknown Sylvia. Did she have a child by the prisoner? Did she die in childbirth? Did the child survive?”

“Where did all this happen? Couldn’t you get some answers from people living in Fiesole or Florence?”

“If that’s where it happened. But it didn’t. It happened, I think, at another house. A house that no one talks about, because they say there never was another house.”

“Who says there was another house?”

“Patrizia. She said it was closer to the sea, and claimed that she first worked for the Vannoni family in the Maremma, where she came from.”

“Then it must be there.”

“Unlikely, at that time. The Maremma then was a wild, uncivilized place. Patrizia may well have come from the Maremma, but any great house must have been on the edge of the area, to the north or to the east.”

“So, Gil was killed because he told a fiction he thought his own, that was a fact about your family. What about Toni?”

“Ah, Toni. An oversexed son of a bitch who would have sold his soul for the right price. I have asked myself whether he gave away something to — oh, I don’t know, somebody working on the movie — for forty pieces of silver.”

“Who, Giulia — who?”

This time it was Giulia who stood up, towering over Sydney. “Who. The big question, yes. I think — I think it could be Donatella. Oh yes, I think it could be. Not on her own, perhaps, but with the help of someone else. Gianfranco perhaps, although I think he has not enough courage. I think you, but especially Mario and Monty, should be careful.”

“Shouldn’t you warn them?”

“And have Donatella find out? That is why I cannot tell Moretti and you must not. He will have to work it out on his own.”

“Why daggers, Giulia? It could be someone crazy.”

“Oh, they are crazy all right — crazy enough to use a specific weapon, because they are saying something to those in the know. Come on.” Giulia pulled Sydney to her feet. “Let’s get you back to your hotel before the police send out a search party for you. And you know what is the only thing worth remembering from this conversation?”

“To keep my mouth shut?”

“That whoever it is, is crazy. That’s the only thing worth remembering, Sydney. Carry the key I gave you, always. No one in my family has keys to this place, and no one knows that you have one.”

Night was falling when they left Giulia’s castello. Against the darkening sky the Martello tower took on a more sinister aura as its shadow against the ground reached out to touch the two women walking the Ducati to the gate. Sydney could hear the sound of her own breathing, swift and shallow with tension. Beside her, Giulia lengthened her stride.