The Marshal at the Villa Torrini (5 page)

Well, now he'd killed her. She'd been lying there drunk on Christmas Eve and he'd kicked her and kicked her with the others until they got frightened and dumped the groaning body on the Marshal, pretending to be passers-by. He'd thought at first, when he put the blanket over her as he waited for the ambulance, that he'd detected a pulse—

'You
thought
you detected?' inquired the Prosecutor with heavy irony. 'Was the woman dead or was she not?'

'I'm not a doctor,' protested the Marshal, 'I thought she might still be alive. She was badly injured but sometimes when people are drunk—'

'Pardon me for interrupting you, Marshal, but I seem to remember, the jury will no doubt also remember, that only moments ago you told us that it was the husband who was drunk! Not only drunk but drunk enough to be lying unconscious on the bed while his wife's body lay next door!'

Where had he gone wrong? He tried to consult the copy of his written report, but it was as blurred as the judge's voice had been because of the grease spots.

'I'm afraid—'

'You're afraid? I'm afraid, Marshal, that I shall have to ask for an adjournment, at least until after the autopsy!'

Everyone was leaving. Well, that was it, for now, anyway.

The Marshal opened his eyes for a moment, registered the fact that he was in bed and dreaming, and then the fact that, dreaming or not, he was going to wake up to those same problems plus the diet.

'Blast!'

He sank back into unconsciousness.

CHAPTER 3

'It's mostly just a very sore throat and fever. I've kept him in bed . . .'

'It starts like that with everybody, but then it attacks the intestine, you'll see.'

'I never get the fever, I don't know how it is . . .'

The queue hardly seemed to diminish, not just because someone else always joined it as each customer left, but because everyone expected a bit of advice and commiseration along with an expensive package of ineffective 'flu remedies. Not many people called the doctor out, except for children, and a comfortable chat with the chemist or his wife was a perfectly good substitute—more cheerful, too, than the surgery.

The Marshal waited and watched. He wasn't in the 'flu queue, but sitting to one side where the chemist kept a café table and two chairs so that, during quiet periods, he could catch up on local gossip or talk politics. That was why the Marshal liked coming here. The shop was bright and in every other respect modern, but it was still a centre of information and a visit was always a social occasion.

'It's not what I gave you before, it's a bit stronger. See how you get on with it. Shall I give you something for your throat? . . . How's your mother's foot doing? . . .'

She was still a good-looking woman, the chemist's wife, and with her blonde hair she looked glamorous in her white coat. Mind you, her husband was a handsome man, slim and suntanned, never a grey hair out of place. The Marshal regarded him with envy as he approached—he must be at least eight or ten years older to look at him.

'There you are!' With a flourish, the chemist dropped a box of capsules on to the table by the Marshal's elbow.

'That's the one.'

'Sleeping pill?'

'A common or garden sleeping pill. Overdose, is it?'

'I don't know.'

'In a screw of paper, you said? No box or bottle?'

'No . . . That's what's so odd.'

'You think so?'

'Don't you?'

'Not in the least. People are always passing out their medicines to friends, especially women. Is it a woman?'

'Yes. Yes . . . it was. She died.'

'And you think it might have been these?'

'I've really no idea. She was in the bath. Could have drowned. I'm just checking.'

'Well, you check her female friends and neighbours and you'll find I'm right. Aah . . . !' He sat down on the chair facing the door and stretched his legs. 'We could do with a sharp mountain wind to clean the 'flu away, but isn't it a treat when it's so quiet?'

The Marshal turned and glanced out at the little Piazza San Felice which was normally snarled up with traffic since it was a busy junction between four roads. The warm, overcast weather which let the 'flu settle also let pollution settle, so that the alarms went off and the traffic would be banished from the city centre, like today.

'Trouble is, we like to ski at the weekends and there's no snow to speak of.'

So no wonder he was slim and tanned. The Marshal felt depressed and hungry. To cheer himself up he said, 'My two boys are off skiing with the school.'

'In Abetone?' It was where most Florentines went for convenience since it was in Tuscany.

'No, no . . . They've taken them further north, I forget the name of the place.'

'I gather it's the same everywhere. They manage to keep the pistes covered with the snow cannons and so forth but it's not the same. Keep these capsules if you need to.'

'If you wouldn't mind. I'll send them over to the Procura with these two . . . Would they be dangerous taken with alcohol?'

'Most drugs are dangerous taken with alcohol. Depends on the quantity, of course, though too rich a mixture of sleeping pills and alcohol usually provokes a fit of vomiting rather than a successful suicide. Mind you, someone sufficiently befuddled might well choke on the vomit.'

The Marshal remembered the bloody water draining away. If she'd vomited into it, the smell . . . A smell that reminded him of the drunken husband. He got to his feet.

'I'd better get out there . . .'

The chemist shook his hand. 'And remember what I said about the female friends.'

'I will. Thank you.'

As they drove away, young Fara said, 'I wish it was always like this.'

Thinking he meant the excitement of going out on a case, the Marshal said, 'Not much happens at Pitti. You'll have to be content with snatched bags and missing bicycles as a rule.'

'But . . . I meant the traffic'

'Oh. Well, it's nice for us but it must be a nuisance for most people. Do you remember the way?'

'It should be easy enough in daylight. Excuse me, Marshal . . . Your'seatbelt . . .'

'Eh? Hmph . . . ' Female friends. He'd bet his life savings that it would turn out to be the Signora Torrini.

There hasn't been anything like that between them for some time.
Celia tells me things.

And gets sympathy and a sleeping pill no doubt. If Forbes hadn't been sleeping with his wife he'd been going elsewhere. It was just what you'd expect from someone like Forbes, thought the Marshal, who was disgusted by him. Going elsewhere, that happened to most men lucky enough to attract women, but neglecting his wife was something else. If there wasn't enough to go round he should stop at home. A woman shouldn't have to turn to sleeping pills and tranquillizers and the like. It wasn't right.

'Marshal?'

'Eh?'

'I said, are you going to visit the signora you told me about last night? The one who apologizes?'

'No. Her next-door neighbour . . . ' He got his notebook out.

'Signorina Müller.'

He had no intention of mentioning the sleeping pill business to the Signora Torrini unless the results of the autopsy made it inevitable—and then he'd leave it to Fusarri if he possibly could. Imagine if she really had something to feel guilty about and apologize for! There'd be no end to it. And as for what Giorgio would say . . . !

They wound their way up the broad avenue through trees that afforded an occasional glimpse of the red roofs and marble towers of Florence as they left it behind. Could stopping the flow of traffic have such an instant effect, or was the weather starting to change? At any rate a thin, watery sun was breaking through the greyness, producing just the sort of glare that hurt the Marshal's sensitive eyes most. Even behind his dark glasses they began to water slightly and he had to fish in his greatcoat pocket for a handkerchief to dry them.

Fara braked. 'Drat it . . . ' Even though he'd seen the line of cypress trees he'd been looking out for, he'd still missed the turning, which came immediately after a bend in the road. He backed up and signalled left. 'It's a wonder we found it at all last night. What a place!'

Even in poor weather and in such an unlovely month, with its dead leaves and bare branches, the Villa Torrini was indeed quite a place. Not elegant or imposing like so many minor Tuscan villas which tried to compete with the Medici villas and failed. There was something very different about this house, something that suggested a home and not a showpiece. It had everything a country house ought to have, a paved yard, a loggia, a vineyard sloping gently down in front of it. But why was the peasant's cottage attached to the smooth stone villa instead of at a discreet distance? And the barn with its brick lattice-work only a metre away from that? Such a tiny barn, too, which in itself was unusual and smacked of country living for the joy of it rather than serious farming.

The Marshal got out of the car and breathed the damp grassy air. The weather, he thought, really was changing. There was a tiny breeze. An almond tree in the yard was just showing the tips of feathery pink blossom.

Fara got out, too. They found themselves, quite unconsciously, staring at the pretty miniature barn as though some ogre might suddenly burst from it. There was no sign of life there.

'Do you think he' in?' Fara's voice was almost a whisper in response to the quiet around them.

'How should I know?' growled the Marshal. But he did know, in the way that people always do know, though he didn't understand why it should be so. What is it about an empty house that tells you it's empty as you knock on the door or hold the telephone receiver, knowing no one will answer? You just know. In this case the Marshal knew that Forbes was in there somewhere and, what's more, he was watching them.

'He'll be sober by now, anyway,' Fara said.

'If he hasn't started drinking again.'

He had no intention of admitting it but the Marshal had already decided that he wouldn't care to tackle Forbes sober, not without knowing just what the wife had died from. Nothing would budge him from the conviction that whatever that was, Forbes had something to do with it. But he'd be clever, much cleverer than any Marshal of Carabinieri. It was better to wait and watch.

'Aren't you going to talk to him at all?' ventured Fara, looking sideways at the Marshal.

'No.'

'I wonder what this old lady will be like. The one last night sounded quite a character.'

'This one, according to the Substitute Prosecutor, is worse.' But he didn't take Fara's obvious hint. 'Wait here and watch the barn.'

'Then you do think he's in?'

'Mph . . .'

'That's him!' It was only a movement. The lattice-work, which had been glassed in behind, didn't permit any clear view of what was inside. A pale flash that translated itself in their minds as a bearded face. 'He's watching us, I think.'

'Then you watch him.'

'He could feel he was being harassed.'

'I hope he will.'

The trouble with very old ladies is that they use their age as a weapon. They bully you with it and there's no defence. They remind you of it in a triumphant, accusing voice at every turn in the conversation. Not that you could call this a conversation. It was more of a lecture, interrupted at intervals by an examination, a test in comprehension and concentration which the Marshal failed miserably each time.

'You did say the Pitti Palace? I'm not deaf, you know, though I am ninety-one!''

'No, no . . . of course not. I did say the Pitti, yes. That's where I'm stationed . . .'

'Well then! You must have some opinion on the silver collection.'

'I—It's—I'm not a curator or anything like that . . .'

For God's sake! Perhaps she thought he was some sort of museum guard.

'I didn't think you were a curator since you presented yourself as a Marshal of Carabinieri. But you do have a pair of legs.' A glance at them suggested she didn't think much of them. 'The silver museum must be about two paces away from your office.'

'Yes, yes, it is . . .'

'Surely you've been there!'

'I . . . yes, but it's years ago,' he lied bravely.

'Prefer the paintings in the Palatine Gallery, I imagine,' she said drily.

'Not really . . . ' He didn't want to have to answer questions on those.

'The arrangements there leave a lot to be desired. Barn of a place. You can't
see
the paintings. Been to Vienna?'

'No.'

You could see she thought he was a hopeless case but still she didn't give up on him. If only she would.

She was quite small and without any very definite shape under the knobbly greenish wool suit . . . She had hair that stood on end in a way that made her look at once alarmed and alarming, and the gimlet eye of a public prosecutor.

'Well, when you do go to Vienna, go to the Kunsthistorisches.'

'I will.'

'Good. You'll no doubt enjoy Bruegel's work. You're something of a Bruegellian figure yourself.'

The Marshal thanked her. She grinned at him wickedly, showing front teeth like a chipmunk's. The grin vanished as suddenly as it had appeared and the gimlet eyes narrowed. 'Well, we've established that you don't know much about Florence, young man, but we can hope at least that you know your job. Aren't you supposed to be investigating the death of Celia Carter?'

'Yes, that's why . . .'

'Well, if you don't mind my saying so, I think we should get on. At my age time is rather valuable.'

'Of course. I'm sorry. I came to see you because I understand their daughter stays with you when she's over here.'

'Yes!'

That was all. He was disconcerted.

'I . . .'

'Go on! I'm answering your questions.'

She had seemed such a chatterbox that he'd rather hoped she'd have volunteered some useful family gossip. Now it looked as though he'd have to question her like a suspect. He looked down at the gold flame on his hat, turning the hat round and round on his knee as he tried to formulate suitable questions so as to elicit suitable answers. It wasn't the way he liked doing things. The best information came spontaneously, but the Signorina Müller was only spontaneous about the history of art . . . He glanced at her. She, too, had lowered her eyes as though waiting submissively for his next question. Unable to believe in this submissiveness, he was bothered by the feeling that she might be making fun of him. But she looked very serious, solemn even. Her eyes remained lowered.

'Hm . . . ' He coughed and made an effort. 'Did the daughter ever talk to you about the relationship between her parents? Were there problems with the marriage?'

She didn't answer. Possibly she was thinking it through. He prompted her gently.

'There could have been another woman . . .'

But Signorina Müller's chin dropped on to her chest. She was fast asleep. She'd been fast asleep, he now reaiized, ever since the conversation had turned from history of art to other matters.

'Signorina . . . ?'

He waited, looking about him. The furniture wasn't what he was used to seeing. Perhaps she'd brought it with her from Vienna when she retired from being—of course—a museum curator. It was amazing to think that, if you worked it out, she'd been retired longer than he'd been working. She had every excuse, poor thing, for nodding off. He felt guilty for having tired her. She probably never saw anyone apart from her landlady, Signora Torrini, next door. And of course the girl Jenny when she was here. She wasn't here now. At least he'd managed to establish that before she'd taken over the conversation. Also, she wasn't any longer expected today. It was something. Apparently, she'd telephoned putting off her arrival.