Dying For Siena (11 page)

“What was your relationship with the dead man, Professor Ball?”

“I beg your pardon?”

It wasn’t a difficult question. “I said, what was your relationship with Roland Kane like? You worked together in the same department for…” Dante made a show of looking at the sheet of paper in front of him, though he knew the answer, “for eight years. That’s long enough to get to know someone very well. Were the two of you friends?”

Ball smiled. “Clearly, you never met Roland Kane, Captain Rossi. I doubt whether Roland Kane ever had a friend. I doubt he even fully realized what friendship was. The man was so emotionally stunted I wouldn’t hesitate to define him a sociopath.”

“Harsh words, professor,” Dante said mildly.

“And one never speaks ill of the dead, right? Well, in Roland Kane’s case, it would be very hard to speak well of him. I’ll spare you having to go check back with the authorities in Deerfield,
Commissario
, and tell you straightaway that I had good reason to hate Kane. Probably to kill him, too, if I were a violent man.” He shifted elegantly in his chair. “Which I’m not.”

Dante had always envied gays their style, as if they were all—every single one—Italian. Being an Italian heterosexual took a lot of work to keep up the image, and Dante wasn’t always up to it. But any gay, from more or less any part of the world, managed to look more elegant than he did without breaking a sweat.

“I’ve had problems with Roland Kane since my arrival at St. Vincent’s,” Ball began. “And I bitterly regret the day I left Virginia.”

Dante didn’t have to check his notes. Griffin Ball had resigned his post as assistant professor at Virginia Tech and had been hired on the tenure track at St. Vincent’s in September, 1996.

“I guess the weather in Virginia was better.”

“Everything in Virginia was better,” Ball answered sourly. “And to think, at the time I thought I was taking a step up. St. Vincent’s has a world-class reputation in mathematics. Roland Kane wasn’t present during the interview process. He never participates—sorry, he never
participated
—in any of the administrative tasks of the faculty. If he’d been there when I interviewed, you can be sure I’d never have accepted the job.”

“You had…problems with Professor Kane,” Dante said carefully.

“You could say that.” Ball’s mouth tightened. “I have two lawsuits against Kane pending—one for harassment and the other for assault. Roland Kane was undoubtedly the nastiest human being I’ve ever met, and I’ve met my share. Besides being a misogynist and an alcoholic, he was also a rabid homophobe. He made my life a living hell. I reported him several times to the dean and to the trustees of the university but to no avail.

“His harassment eventually became so serious I had to report him to the police. That was how I met your uncle, Lorenzo Rossi. He’s the president of the staff committee and he was as disgusted as I was, bless his soul. He went to have a talk with Kane. I don’t know what was said, but the worst of the harassment stopped.”

“And yet you worked together,” Dante said neutrally. “Every day. That must have been a strain.”

“Well, to tell the truth I didn’t see too much of Kane during the working day. He didn’t actually teach many classes. And lately I think his drinking was getting out of control. He was skipping more classes than he taught.

“Mainly I saw him at faculty meetings, but he had to restrain himself with other people around. Mostly, he would try to corner me in the restrooms. He’d leave lurid notes for me, that kind of thing. Luckily, the worst of it stopped once Lorenzo had his talk.”

“Yet you took it to court.”

Ball straightened. “Damned right I did. Kane’s behavior was inexcusable. I called for his resignation time and again, but whenever his situation got serious, he’d pull a rabbit out of a hat. He donated the copyright to a weather prediction software program to the university that earned St. Vincent’s a lot of money.

“And the quantitative methods series of conferences gave the college a lot of luster. He had a genius for pushing a situation right up to the edge and then pulling back at the last possible second.”

Ball’s voice was even and his hands stayed calmly composed on his lap, but Dante could see a vein throbbing in his temple and his breathing had speeded up.

“Someone had to stand up to Kane, and that someone had to be me. I have tenure. I have a generous trust fund from my grandmother, and my partner is a very successful stockbroker. There wasn’t anything Kane could really do to me. Unlike Faith.”

Dante raised his eyebrows. “Murphy?”

“Yes, Faith Murphy. She’s a lovely girl, and a very gifted mathematician, very gifted. Kane made her life miserable from day one. Faith comes from a very poor family and is on contract. Her entire existence is tenuous and Kane preyed on that. And there was a girl—” Ball stared into space. “Coral…” He snapped his fingers. “No, Candace. Candace Simmons. A student. She accused Kane of rape, but before the case could come to trial, she was institutionalized and the charges were dropped. Basically Kane got away with rape. Believe me,
Commissario
Rossi, whoever killed Roland Kane did humanity an immense service.”

Ball was slightly flushed, his jaw tensed. Suddenly he smiled. “But it wasn’t me.”

“That, professor, remains to be seen,” Dante replied.

Ball inclined his head. “Of course.”

Dante drew in a deep breath. “We will keep your passport for the time being. You will get it back in a few days. I must ask you not to leave Siena until our investigation is complete.”

Like Madeleine Kobbel, Ball looked startled at the idea. “Of course I won’t leave Siena, captain. I’m here for the conference. It lasts until the second, by which time I’m sure you’ll have made headway in your investigation.”

By which time,
Dante thought,
the Snail will have won.
“I’m sure we will have. I think that’s about it for now. You might be called in for further questioning, but, in the meantime, you are free to go.”

Ball nodded and rose gracefully, his pants falling softly, perfectly over his suede loafers.

How did the man do it?

The heat of the day had gathered in Dante’s office, bearing down oppressively. Dante was sweating and his clothes stuck wherever his body touched the chair.

Every year the town council swore it would put air conditioning in the
Questura,
and every year the town council fell before it could approve the supplementary budget.

In the summer, Dante’s office was like a furnace. Yet Griffin Ball looked cool and unruffled.
How did the man do it?
Dante wondered.

Ball walked quietly to the door and stopped. After a moment, he turned around. Dante lifted his head. “Was there something else, professor?”

Ball hesitated. “I know I shouldn’t say this,
Commissario
. But…don’t look too hard for Kane’s murderer. Whoever did it should have a monument erected in his honor.”

Chapter Six

Smile…tomorrow will be worse.

The next morning, Faith slid into her seat and smiled at the black-coated waiter pouring more of the delicious coffee so strong it should be classified as a nutraceutical.

Even breakfast, normally a humdrum affair in her life consisting of lukewarm instant coffee and a supermarket donut, was delicious here.

There were croissants, called
cornetti
, still warm from the oven, star-shaped cookies with plum marmalade in the middle, sugary donuts the waiters called
bomboloni
and—on the other side of the diet pyramid—slices of thick, salty country ham and round, sweet melon balls.

Everyone looked up as if surprised to see her. They were frozen in a little breakfast tableau—Tim with bread crumbs from the saltless Tuscan bread spilling down his shirt, Grif, elegant as always with a little round pastry held up between thumb and forefinger, and Madeleine hunched over her plate, long grey hair swinging forward to hide her face.

“Faith.” Grif, always the gentleman, stood while Faith took her seat.

For the thousandth time, Faith wished Grif were straight and that she had had a brief, passionate affair with him, rather than the short, bloodless affair she’d had with Tim.

Grif would have taken her out to some elegant restaurants, and he would have made her laugh and sigh while seducing her. She and Tim had shared a stringy takeout pizza in her apartment followed by very bad sex.

She and Nick had had very good sex, though, of course, her experience was limited, so maybe it hadn’t been as spectacular as her memory insisted. Still, right up until the moment it had been made clear she was one of a faceless series, it had felt pretty special. More fool her. She didn’t seem to have much luck with straight men.

“Sit down, Grif.” Faith smiled. She picked up her cup, drained it and looked around. Before she could signal a waiter, a freshly brewed cup was slipped in front of her. “Can’t fault the service here.” She caught Grif’s eye. “Beats the cafeteria back home, eh?”

“By a mile.” Grif delicately patted his lips dry. “What did Leonardo want with you yesterday, Faith? Is something wrong?”

Much as Grif liked her, he had somehow picked up on the general aura Kane had created for her—that she was an accident just waiting to happen.

With real pleasure, Faith reached out for a
cornetto
and said, “Not at all. As a matter of fact, he asked me to chair the Tipping Behavior Panel.” She felt slightly defiant as she looked up. Grif was looking thoughtful, and Tim seemed slightly shocked.

Madeleine put her cup down sharply in its saucer, two red spots on her sallow cheeks. “There must be some mistake,” she said, frowning. “I was supposed to head that panel.”

Faith tensed. “I’m afraid he didn’t say anything about that at all, Madeleine. Are you sure? Professor Gori—Leonardo—doesn’t seem to be the kind of man who would make mistakes like that.”

Madeleine’s lips tightened at Faith’s use of Gori’s first name. “Last year, I chaired the workshop on viral quantitation. So this year, of course I assumed I’d be chairing the panel on tipping behavior.

“This isn’t fair, Faith. I’m afraid you’ll have to go back to Professor Gori and say you weren’t aware of the situation and that you can’t chair the panel. I came prepared for this.”

Say no
? Over her dead body. Faith drew in an outraged breath, but Grif raised his hand before she could speak.

“Madeleine, the decision is not ours to make. Traditionally, Leonardo draws up the speakers’ list and the workshop panels, and unless something is very wrong, we go along with it.”

“Well, there’s something wrong here.” Madeleine’s flat chest rose and fell quickly. “Having chaired last year’s meeting, I just naturally assumed—”

“You
co
-chaired a panel on a different, though related, subject. That’s not the same thing at all. And Faith is the only one here to have written a paper on tipping behavior. And a very good one, too.” He nodded to Faith and she felt her outrage muscles—the ones running from her nape along her shoulders that had been getting such good exercise while working under Kane—relax slightly.

She had never been close to Madeleine, but by the same token, Madeleine had never gone out of her way to be nasty to her either. By St. Vincent’s Math Department standards, that was practically a torrid love affair. Why was Madeleine being so difficult now?

Madeleine was already co-chairing another panel on pseudo-quantitation and, over the course of the past few years, had chaired and moderated her share of workshops and seminars.

It wasn’t even as if she were an expert on tipping. Faith was.

Faith had been surprised Leonardo had taken the trouble to read her paper, but she was proud of it. Maybe she was lacking in just about everything a normal human being and a normal woman should have but, by God, she was a fine mathematician and had written a fine paper.

At some level, she’d been aware of the fact that part of Kane’s hostility had stemmed from jealousy. Tim, Grif and Madeleine—they were all competent enough. Tim was a decent theoretician and Grif was an excellent teacher.

Madeleine—no one really understood what Madeleine was doing in the department, but Kane wanted her there and so she’d been there.

But none of them were as good as Kane had been. And none were as good as she was.

Faith looked around. A sunlit room in Tuscany, in a restored monastery, in the room where monks used to pray was as good a place as any for an epiphany. Something deep within her shifted, something old and rotten like a piece of ancient furniture moving away to make room for something new.

All her life she’d been put down. By her parents, for being alive. For having that chance at a happy life that had so spectacularly eluded them. At college, for being poor and gangly and overly bright. By Roland Kane, for being almost as good a mathematician as he was.

Even Nick, without meaning to, had dealt her a huge blow. He couldn’t even remember her name after a night of lovemaking.

But, for the first time in her life, she had a glimpse of a life that was more than merely grimly hanging on by her fingertips. She might not be good at much, but she realized she was a talented mathematician.

And another talented mathematician, Leonardo Gori, had recognized it. If he had read her paper and been impressed, then maybe others had as well.

“
Ancora caffè?
”

Faith was jerked out of her thoughts by a handsome waiter hovering over her with a steaming silver coffeepot.

“Si, grazie.”

He bent over to pour, then stood and winked. “
Brava
.”

Faith winked back and was rewarded with a brilliant smile, a thousand watts of teeth.