Death of a Dutchman (16 page)

They were both silent for a moment, thinking of the pale, tight-lipped face, the defiant look of righteousness, 'I don't believe it,' said the Marshal stubbornly, glowering at the print-out of her embarkation card. He thumped the table with his big fist and then remembered where he was.

'Excuse me, Lieutenant . . .'

'That's all right. I feel the same way, but there's no getting round the facts. You're certain the man said nothing else before he died?'

'Not a word. It's a wonder he managed to say what he did. Even so, it wasn't much help because if we ever did find the mysterious woman visitor we'd be faced with his having said, "It wasn't her," which would leave us back at square one.'

'If it was true, it would . . . but, you know, since he was expecting his stepmother, and since no one knew about his meeting this other woman, he might have been afraid of our suspecting Signora Goossens—which, in fact, we did—and he was just trying to protect her.'

'I suppose he could, but I don't think . . .' The Marshal frowned, remembering the Dutchman's voice and the way one sightless eye had opened as he died. 'If he'd been capable of thinking that out, and I don't honestly think he was, he'd have been capable of being clearer, of saying it wasn't my stepmother, or something of that sort. No, I'm sure it wasn't that. And then—I may not have told you, but it was one of the
Misericordia
Brothers who remarked on it—he sounded
surprised.
Why should that be?'

'Surprised?' The Lieutenant rapped his fingers on the desk. 'Well ... if he was surprised that it wasn't her, it can only mean he thought it should have been her because she was the only person he'd seen.'

'That's true . . . and obviously he didn't think of the coffee, or he wouldn't have drunk more of it. Well, I suppose that must be it, then.'

'You don't sound very convinced, Marshal.'

'No . . . no, I'm sure you're right . . . it's just that he didn't say it in exactly that tone . . . but I expect you're right.'

The Lieutenant regarded him for a moment but the Marshal's bland expression gave nothing away. Even so, he was cautious enough to ask:

'You don't have any other ideas as to why he might have said it?'

'Well, only the obvious one.'

'Which is?"

'That the woman wasn't who he'd thought she was.'

'That's a great help! We don't know who she was and now we have to guess who he
thought
she was!'

'I realize it's not much help .. .' The Marshal's great eyes rolled around the room which was all in darkness now except for the pool of white light on the Lieutenant's littered desk. 'It's just that it seemed the obvious reason ... I mean, it couldn't have meant it wasn't she who poisoned him, could it? If he'd done it himself he could have said so or left a note, and he couldn't have thought it was anyone other than this woman because he hadn't seen anybody else.'

'As far as we know.'

'That's true. As far as we know . . .' The Marshal looked down at his notes. 'I suppose this isn't what you could call evidence; it's only hearsay and general information really.'

'Exactly. Most of it depends on people having told the truth, and I can name at least one among them,' pointed out the Lieutenant, 'who's much given to telling elaborate lies.'

'Signora Giusti? It's true that a lot of this information came from her. Did she tell
you
lies?' The Marshal was truly astonished. He couldn't believe that she would dare treat an officer in the way that . . .

'She told me the Council social worker had tried to rob her.'

'She did? What of?'

'Her burial money—I promised not to tell anybody it existed, but really . . . Apparently she came into the bedroom and found this young woman with her hands under the mattress.'

'And she couldn't have just been making the bed as she does every day, I suppose.'

'Of course not. Attempted robbery. She may also, I understand, be attempting a slow poisoning job as well.'

'I see.' The Marshal began to realize that, by virtue of his mature years and the profiteroles, he had got off lightly. 'Nevertheless, the Dutchman's family seems to have brought out the best in her—such as it is—I'm almost convinced that what she's told us about them is the truth, unless . . .'

'Unless?'

'I was thinking that, if it's not, then she's been very clever. She might have invented the mysterious woman .. . though of course, that was before we went in there, before she knew anyone was dead.'

Or was it? The Marshal could see the wicked old woman chuckling maliciously among her cushions, see her with the Dutchman's keys in her hand, see her rattling along the corridor saying, before she'd seen anything at all, 'What have you found? Is somebody dead?' And in the Dutchman's hands were her keys. It had been easy to assume that he had been going to Signora Giusti for help, but how did they know that he hadn't just come back from there, or was about to return there, after a previous visit, to find out what she had given him that could have made him ill?

'Is something the matter, Marshal?'

'I . . . I'm trying to stop thinking about Signora Giusti as just an old woman, as someone not to be considered. It's what we do to old people, as if their age made them less than human, less than an individual. And it was Signora Giusti herself who warned me against it. She likes attention, you see . . . not popularity, just attention.'

'You surely don't think . . . ?'

'Why not?'

'Well, because . . .'

'Because she's old. That's what I'm trying to explain, Lieutenant. I know I'm not expressing myself very well. I was never a great brain . . .'

The old keyhole, lower down. You should be able to see
the entire house through it.

Had -she seen something? Had there, in fact, been another woman?

If he came back, the first thing he would do would be
to come and see me.

And if he hadn't? Could the poison have been meant for the woman, whoever she was, and the Dutchman have died by mistake?

'Surely,' the Lieutenant pointed out, 'it's simply that at her age she could have nothing to gain?'

'At her age she has nothing to lose. As for what she might gain, we really don't know that . . . revenge, jealous satisfaction, even a small legacy.'

'I know about that,' said the Lieutenant. There was a photostat of the will, obtained from the Dutchman's solicitors, in the file before them. 'But you don't murder an old friend for a couple of million lire. Even if she could get about, she wouldn't get very far on that. It might buy her a few new clothes, I suppose.'

The Marshal thought for a moment and then said quietly, 'It would bury her.'

"What?'

'It would bury her. Probably that's what it's for. It's the only thing, I think, that matters to her now.'

He could feel her tiny fingers clutching desperately at his arm.

What will happen to my poor old bones?

'She cared about being buried respectably, all right. I wonder ... Do we have the number of the goldsmith? His home number, I mean?'

'Yes, we do. There is the list at the back of the file.'

'We might ring him, I think, sir, if you agree . . .'

'Go ahead. I can't say I share your suspicions but you're right in saying that we shouldn't ignore her as a possible suspect. It won't be difficult, anyway, to find out whether she had sleeping pills or any of this Viennese coffee, since she can't get out to buy anything for herself—really, Marshal, you must admit she's a pretty unlikely suspect. Even if she knows nothing at all about police laboratories and the like, she must have known we'd find her out.'

'Only if we stopped treating her as an old woman of no importance. And she called us,' the Marshal said as he dialled. 'She called us twice. And when I got there she kept me talking for over an hour before telling me there was something wrong next door. And what if we did find her out? What would we do about it? She'd perhaps be put in a home for the senile but would anybody take her legacy off her, knowing what it was for? She'd still get a respectable resting-place for her bones. Funerals!' The Marshal slapped a hand down on his knee. 'Funerals, quarrels and diamonds! It's all there, if only . . . Hello? Signor Beppe? Excuse me for disturbing you at home. Marshal Guarnaccia speaking . . .'

'Ah! Good evening, Marshal. And were you able to speak to her?'

'Speak to . . . ?'

'Signora Goossens! you went off after her in enough of a'

'Ah yes ... I... ah ...' He could feel the Lieutenant's eyes on him and he kept his own averted. 'It was another matter I wanted to ask about.'

He hadn't thought at the time, but it was fortunate that the Lieutenant had let him make the call himself, otherwise . . .

'You mentioned that in his will the Dutchman left a small legacy to Signora Giusti.'

'That's right, yes. Nothing much because she's very old, you know, and it didn't seem likely, he thought, that she would live to claim it ... he was wrong about that, God rest his soul. If she'd had any descendants, of course, he'd have left her something more substantial, but under the circumstances . . .'

'Yes . . . Tell me, was he a generous man, would you say?'

'Generous? I've already told you how much I owe to him. They were all of them generous, his father the same.'

'And his stepmother?'

'And his stepmother, too. Exceptionally so.'

'I see. I was just wondering about Signora Giusti . . . she seems to have had to sell most of her furniture, so . ..'

'So you wondered why Toni never helped? Well, I can tell you that. He did. But she wouldn't knowingly take a penny off him, not a penny. She's a rum old creature and she's proud. She was once pretty well off, you see, when her husband was alive, so the idea of accepting charity was one she couldn't stomach at any price. What Toni did was to make arrangements with the social worker to have her bills paid through his bank, and he pays for her to go to a place out in the hills in summer so she doesn't suffer the worst of the heat. I suppose she imagines it's free.'

'She knows nothing about these arrangements?'

'Not as far as I know. She may have had a suspicion and turned a blind eye, I couldn't say. Nevertheless, every now and then, when she wants some ready cash for any reason, she sells bits of her furniture, getting practically nothing for it, of course, needless to say, but no one can stop her.'

'Did she know about the legacy?'

'Oh, I should think so. I mean, that was the point of it, to give her some peace of mind. She has this idea, you see, that there's nobody to bury her with her having no family left. Naturally, Toni promised to see to everything, but she was still terrified that nobody would let him know, or that something would happen to him before she died; hence the legacy. It's just enough to give her a decent burial. Even so, she's forever trying to make alternative arrangements, just in case. She doesn't know, for instance, that I know anything about the will or about Toni's having promised to see to things, and she's made me promise that I'll arrange her funeral. She has this bit of money under the mattress . . .'

The Marshal couldn't help smiling.

'Does she think it's enough?'

'You know about it, then?' .

'The same way that you do.'

'Then you know what I mean. Goodness knows how many people are going to be arranging her funeral! As for whether she thinks it's enough money, it's difficult to say, really. Remember that, these days, she has no contact with the outside world and that it must be impossible for her to realize how little her money's worth. Just think what you would have been able to buy with a hundred thousand lire in her day . . .'

'I can imagine.'

'Even so, she must have noticed the cost of some things and be worried about it. She told me that there was still the rest of the furniture to sell, if necessary. The house isn't hers.'

'Who owns it?'

'Toni; his widow now. It came up for sale five years or so ago and Toni bought it. There was always the danger that a new owner would try to evict her or at least put up the rent to the current level which she couldn't possibly have paid. He planned to sell it again after she died.'

'I see. Well, thank you. I don't think there's anything else.'

'Glad to be of service. Is there any further news about what exactly happened to Toni?'

'Not really. Is there someone with the body?'

'We got a woman in for the night and I'll take over early tomorrow morning. Will you be at the funeral?'

'Yes, I think I will, and so will Signora Goossens—you don't happen to know, do you, who told her about the Dutchman's death? It wasn't you?'

'Me? You know I only got a glimpse of her. I must admit I thought she'd have been in touch with me by now, but she hasn't. I imagine anyone in the piazza could have told her. There were a couple of lines in yesterday's paper, too, of course. Do you know where she's staying? She's not in the flat, I've been up and knocked. Not that I blame her ..."

'She's at the Pensione Giottino in Via Guicciardini.'

'Right. I'll give her a ring about the arrangements for tomorrow.'

'Thank you again, and excuse my disturbing you . . .'

'Don't mention it.'

The Marshal replaced the receiver and met the Lieutenant's expectant gaze.

'Well,' he said, T was right about the legacy. It is for her funeral. But she had alternative arrangements. Nevertheless, it might be as well to have a look round her flat and a word with the social worker. It can't be done now, of course, she'll be asleep. But tomorrow . . .'

'I'll see what I can do. But it will be difficult, if not impossible, to get a search warrant.' The younger man blushed at his own powerlessness, but what he said was true.

'It may not be necessary,' pointed out the Marshal blandly. 'I should think a word with the social worker when she arrives tomorrow will be enough to tell you whether she might have had the sleeping pills and the peculiar coffee—or at least the coffee; the pills she could have had tucked away for years. I'll go to the funeral; it's my day off.'