He looked around the breakfast room and quickly spotted her sitting alone at a table in the corner, her cell phone and a folded newspaper next to her plate. As he worked his way among the other tables, he noticed her face and became concerned. She stared down at the cup directly in front of her with an expression indicating she had just lost her best friend. When he sat down, she barely glanced up.
“What’s happened, Betta?”
“I just talked to my boss in Rome. He’s pulling me off the case.”
“That’s all?” He poured hot coffee and hot milk into his cup.
Now she looked at him. “Isn’t that enough? Just what I feared would happen has happened. He said to turn the investigation of the missing drawing over to the local police and come back to Rome.”
“He must have some other case for you to work on.” He added sugar to his cup and stirred while checking out the buffet.
“I hate to think what that might be. Rick, we were almost there. I could feel it.”
He hadn’t felt it; he had the impression they were spinning wheels, but he kept the thought to himself. What he now felt was hunger. “Let me bring back some breakfast and you can tell me what’s in the paper.” He got to his feet. “What can I get you?” Her answer was a head shake, and he walked to the buffet, still well stocked despite several tables of tourists. He took a plate and filled it with an almond croissant, a yogurt, a crusty roll, two small plastic containers of Nutella, and an orange. When he got back to the table, he was relieved that Betta’s face had the suggestion of a smile. “Something good in the paper?” He poured more coffee into his cup.
“Some comic relief. The story on the front page is written by that journalist we saw at the event last night. She cites unnamed sources who told her, under the condition of anonymity, that the leading suspect in the murder of Somonte is none other than…?” She looked at him over her half glasses.
“Since you’re laughing, it must be Florio.”
“None other. And he has to be the anonymous source.”
Rick took a bite of the croissant. Almond was his favorite, along with chocolate. “How can you be sure? Alfredo could have told her that to have some fun.”
“The article also notes the jump in attendance at the Orto Botanico, with numbers.”
He nodded. “You’re right—it was Florio.”
Slowly the plate in front of him was emptied, and Betta decided to help him with half the orange, after which she went to the buffet and brought back a yogurt for herself. She pulled back its cover and picked up a spoon. “Let’s take a different route back to Rome. Along the Adriatic?”
Rick was happy to get her mind off her work—or lack of it. “We could also go back to Sansepolcro and then straight south around Perugia. We could have lunch at the place outside Todi where we ate on our Orvieto trip. Or if we’re hungry before that, there’s the Tre Vaselle in Torgiano, just south of Perugia.”
“You’re filling yourself up on breakfast and already planning lunch?”
“We’re in Italy, Betta. It’s the law.” That managed to get a good smile from her. “But before we depart, let’s go to Raphael’s house. I ran past it this morning and realized it’s the one important sight in Urbino we haven’t visited.”
“Certainly, Rick.” She pushed her empty yogurt cup to the side and picked up her cell phone. “Let me call Alfredo to tell him that the investigation is now completely in his hands. And I’ll pass on our agreement with him that the attack on Bruzzone yesterday morning may have been a warning to keep him quiet.” She started hitting buttons and then paused. “At least last night it sounded to us like a good theory. Now in the light of day I wonder if it was just the wine talking.”
“That will be for Alfredo to decide.” He picked up his cup and found that the coffee was cold.
* * *
Rick and Betta came to the Piazza della Repubblica and turned left to start the climb up Urbino’s main street. Via Raffaello was busier than when Rick had jogged down it earlier. A good number of the people they saw were tourists, but most were pensioners and other locals gossiping and enjoying the pleasant weather. The San Francesco church was not yet open, though it must have been about to since a group stood waiting outside the closed doors. Just past it in the small courtyard people sat at tables under large umbrellas enjoying their last taste of coffee and watching the passing pedestrians. Humans were not the only ones enjoying the fine morning. While their masters chatted, two dogs—who by their shapes and coloring could have been related—eyed each other with tongues flapping. Just ahead was Bruzzone’s gallery.
“He must not be in yet,” said Rick. “No police in front.”
“I think you’re right. I doubt Alfredo would have pulled the guard off only twenty-four hours after the attempt.”
Casa Raffaello had the same fifteenth-century look as the other stone buildings on the block but was set apart by a banner hanging from the facade. They walked up a short step into the hallway where they bought tickets, were given a brochure, and pointed toward the stairs. After taking the stone steps up to the next floor, they found themselves in the spacious room appropriately called the Sala Grande. Rectangular paving stones, which Rick guessed not to be the originals, covered the floor. This was the heart of the home, where the family had gathered in front of a large, deep fireplace, where they ate at a long table, and where guests were entertained. Carved decorations filled in the space between ceiling beams that had their own carvings to match. While the house was not a palace in the English sense of the word, this room said that young Raphael had enjoyed a comfortable childhood. Large, dark paintings, mostly of religious themes, hung from the walls. None of them were originals by the master himself.
The only decoration in the next room, except for a fresco painted on the wall, was two chairs and two small framed paintings. The room was identified in their brochure as the Camera di Raffaello, which would indicate that this was where the artist had slept, or perhaps where he was born. The small fresco was clearly the most important feature of the room, and perhaps the entire house, since cords and stanchions prevented visitors from getting too close. It showed a woman holding a naked infant on her lap while reading from a book propped on a wood stand. There were no religious symbols that Rick was accustomed to spotting in portraits of the Madonna and Child. This was simply a woman cradling her baby.
“According to tradition,” Betta said, “this was painted by Raffaello and is a portrait of himself as an infant being held by his mother.”
Rick studied the fresco. “There’s that ‘according to tradition’ line again. You can’t fool me.”
“Bravo, Rick. His father was a second-rate painter, of course, so it could have been by him.”
“Or somebody could have sneaked into the place one night and painted it, hoping it would be taken for Raffaello himself.”
“A good forger couldn’t make any money that way. But it does have some of the features that Raffaello became known for later, like the long neck and the delicate features. Who knows? Maybe it really was painted by him. That’s what the people who run this place would love to have proven.”
They walked into another room, an antechamber with one door leading out to a courtyard and the other into the kitchen. Going into the kitchen first, they found that an open fireplace took up most of one side. Like everything else in the room, it was clean and neat, with only a few lines of soot which could have been spray-painted on for effect. The hearth was rigged with an ancient gadget of weights and pulleys that looked like something from a grandfather clock, but was in fact an ingenious system to turn a spit. Rick studied it before they walked through the open door into the cortile. The rough brick walls of the building closed in the four sides of the courtyard, its coldness softened by the green of potted plants in the corners. Against the wall nearest the kitchen sat a well, covered by a metal grate. Rick leaned over and could n
ot see the bottom through the darkness, though he suspected there would be coins to be found if anyone ventured down the shaft.
“With all the wonderful views in this town, it’s unfortunate that Raffaello’s family didn’t have one from this courtyard,” he said and looked up at the shuttered windows of the top floor. “Maybe from up there the view is as good as from Morelli’s living room.”
Betta was staring at one of the potted plants, though her eyes were not focused. Suddenly she fumbled in her purse and pulled out her phone. “You got it, Rick. Why didn’t we think of that sooner?” She looked at the small screen, found what she was searching for, and pressed the button.
“What did I say?”
“I’ll explain. Let me get through to Alfredo.”
* * *
Betta’s eyes darted up and down the street, unsure from which direction DiMaio would come. “Let’s go in—I can’t wait any longer.”
“Why don’t you call him again?”
She shook her head. “Look, Rick, we figured this out, and the missing drawing is my case. An officer from the art fraud squad should be the one to arrest him. I want to see his face when we confront him.”
“Betta, this isn’t only an art fraud case.”
She wasn’t listening. When she pulled roughly on the door handle they heard the faint ring of the bell somewhere in the back of the shop. Rick held open the door, and they walked inside. It all looked the same as when they had been there twenty-four hours earlier, including the case of miniatures. If any had been sold yesterday to some passing tourist, Bruzzone had replaced them with others. The door to the office in the back of the gallery was open barely a crack, and Rick thought he heard the voice of the owner, though it was so low he couldn’t be sure. When the door opened, Bruzzone stared at them with a lack of recognition but quickly composed himself. He was dressed in the same suit, shirt, and tie as the previous evening, and he pulled a handkerchief from a pocket and quickly cleaned his glasses. Stubble on his face competed with the neatly trimmed goatee. The bandage on his forehead was new, but the blue edges of the gash were visible at its edge. Mechanically, he raised his hand to cover it.
“Dottoressa Innocenti, Signor Montoya. You have come by to check on me? How kind of you. As you can see, I am recovering nicely.”
He stood just inside the doorway to the office and made no move to approach them. Was there someone else in the office? Betta stepped forward. “There was no guard outside, Signor Bruzzone, and we wanted to be sure you were all right.”
He clasped his hands like a priest greeting his flock. “Yes, of course, the guard. I requested that he be removed. As you can imagine, having a policeman standing outside the door does not help business. Have you brought news of the missing Piero? I didn’t sleep well last night thinking that it may never be found.”
“We think we know where it is.”
He froze but quickly recovered his composure. “Really? Why, that’s excellent.” His eyes started to move to his side before he looked back at Betta. “I had always thought it was tossed away by someone who didn’t understand its value. Has one of your colleagues in the art fraud police found it already on the black market?”
“No, it’s still here in Urbino. In fact, it is very close to where we are now standing.”
Bruzzone swallowed hard and stood frozen in place. His eyes moved to Rick. “Signor Montoya, I don’t understand what she’s saying. Can you help?” It was as much a plea as a question.
“What she means, Signor Bruzzone, is that the missing drawing, since the night Manuel Somonte was murdered, has been in your possession.”
Betta pointed over Bruzzone’s shoulder at the bulletin board. “You told me that you had made a copy of the Piero sketch and very cleverly offered it to me to use in the investigation. But that drawing on the wall is the one you took from Somonte’s leather case.”
Bruzzone now scrambled behind the desk and pulled the sketched face off the wall, sending a pushpin flying. “Are you saying that I murdered Somonte for this?” He waved the drawing in the air while Rick and Betta stood transfixed.
Rick held up his hands. “Signor Bruzzone, please—”
Bruzzone stared at the paper in his hand and then dropped it on the desk. Keeping his attention on Rick, he reached down and opened the top drawer. His right hand came out with a dark pistol that he pointed at Rick and Betta. Still looking at them, he held up his left hand, as if keeping someone back.
“We will be all right, my dear. Stay where you are, and I will take care of these two.”
“Signor Bruzzone, put down the gun,” said Betta. “Inspector DiMaio will be here at any moment—you won’t be able to escape. This is only making matters worse for you and your wife.”
Rick slowly moved in front of Betta. “She’s right—it will only make your situation worse. If you’ll just—”
The door crashed open, causing Bruzzone to take his eyes off Rick and Betta.
“Drop the pistol!” DiMaio shouted while pulling his own weapon from his belt holster.
Rick shoved Betta down just as a shot rang out. As he was dropping to the floor to cover her, another was fired. He heard a woman’s scream and turned to see Bruzzone sprawled facedown on top of his desk, the pistol spinning slowly on the floor below. The woman who had screamed was now standing next to the desk, staring at his body and sobbing.
Other police officers burst into the gallery with guns drawn, but DiMaio ordered them out and told one to call an ambulance. As Rick and Betta were getting to their feet, he retrieved Bruzzone’s pistol from the floor using a handkerchief and placed it on top of the glass case.
“It’s fortunate he wasn’t a very good shot.” DiMaio looked back at the office. “I will call a policewoman to take care of Signora Bruzzone.”
“That’s not Signora Bruzzone,” said Betta. “It is Loretta Tucci, the director of the museum in Monterchi, the Piero specialist who verified the drawing’s authenticity.”
As they watched, Tucci pulled the drawing from under Bruzzone’s body and tore it to pieces.
* * *
Loretta Tucci sat in the same chair that Morelli had used three days earlier, and the same microphone was propped up in front of her. DiMaio sat directly across from her, and a female uniformed police officer stood against the wall behind her back. The bloodstained blouse and skirt she had worn when taken into custody the previous morning were replaced by a drab dress provided by the police. She did not appear to notice anything in the room but instead stared at the scratched surface of the table before her. DiMaio adjusted his microphone and stated the time, place, and participants, before centering a yellow pad in front of him and removing a pen from his jacket pocket.
“Would you like to have an attorney present, Signora Tucci?”
She looked at him as if he was speaking another language. After a few seconds she shook her head.
“Please speak into the microphone.”
She leaned forward and looked at the red light on the base. “No need for an attorney,” she said before leaning back. “What do you want to know?”
“Let’s start with how long you have known Ettore Bruzzone.”
She closed her eyes tightly, then opened them while letting out a low breath. “We met many years ago, at an art gallery in Milan owned by a mutual acquaintance. He was there looking at the work of a new artist he was thinking of putting in his shop. I was studying at the university. He was there without his wife, so he asked me if I had dinner plans. We became friends.” Her voice was a clipped monotone.
“And you kept in contact after that.”
“You could say that. Whenever he came to Milan he called me. After I got my degree I tried to get work in Milan but was rejected for several positions. A friend in the Cultural Ministry told me about an opening as the assistant curator in Monterchi. It didn’t pay much, but it was a stead
y job and Piero della Francesca was my area of interest at the university. That eventually led to the position I have now. Or had, until this.”
She noticed a bottle of mineral water, opened it, and splashed some into a plastic cup. DiMaio waited while she drank.
“I started seeing more of Ettore once I moved to Monterchi. We’d find an excuse to be in Florence at the same time. It was on one of those days that I came up with the plan.”
DiMaio looked up from his pad. “So it was your idea.”
Tucci appeared about to laugh. Instead, she smiled sadly while composing an answer. “He is not the most innovative person you’ll ever meet. And looking back now, it’s clear to me that I was more motivated. I was at a dead end in my life, working in a tiny museum without much hope of moving up to something better. In the cultural world you need a network of contacts, and especially someone high up who takes you under their wing. I was never good at working the system.”
DiMaio almost pointed out that it was the same in police work but decided it would not look good on the transcript. He let her continue.
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