Return to Umbria

by David P. Wagner

“Pazzi, get down!”

  Another shot whizzed by, but fear had turned the journalist to stone.

  “Pazzi!”

  The third bullet found the lower part of the man’s neck. He instinctively grabbed the wound as he fell to the ground on his side. Dark blood poured through his fingers and seeped around his shirt collar. He still stared in disbelief, but without focus.

  Rick crawled toward Pazzi while he looked toward where the shooter must have been. He saw only trees and shadow, but as he reached the wounded man the sound of a car speeding off rolled across the grass. He also heard shouting coming from the opposite direction, where the police station stood.

  Pazzi now could see Rick and was trying to speak. Blood trickled from the side of his mouth as he made the effort. Rick put his ear close and tried to understand the words, which came out in a rough whisper. Pazzi’s mouth stayed open but his sightless eyes glazed over.

  Rick looked up to see two uniformed policemen pounding along the gravel path toward him. Behind them was LoGuercio. Rick got to his knees and pointed toward the far end of the park.

  “The shooter was over there, I think I heard him drive off,” Rick called to the policemen, who had come to a halt at the sight of the body.

  “Get over there and see what you can find,” ordered LoGuercio, out of breath. He reached Rick and stared at Pazzi’s now lifeless body. “Tell me what happened, Riccardo.”

  Rick rose to his feet and realized that his heart rate was higher than when he did his morning run. He took a few breaths before answering. “I was just starting through the park when Pazzi appeared. He was barely into his second sentence when we heard a shot. Pazzi froze and I hit the ground. The second bullet missed him and hit the tree, but the third did this. He died almost immediately after the bullet hit his neck, but I crawled over to him and he said something.”

  “And that was?”

  “It was difficult to understand, since the bullet hit his throat, but I think he said ‘sono morto.’”

  “‘I am dead’? A bit dramatic, but certainly accurate.” LoGuercio bent down and examined the body without touching it. “If the shot had been a bit higher he would have died instantly. Which might have been better for him.”

  He got to his feet and pulled out his cell phone. Rick stood silently while the policeman made phone calls. After three he punched off his telefonino.

  “The crime scene unit is on its way, and fortunately the forensics person is too. She finished her work in Terni.” He looked up to see one of the policeman trotting back toward them.

  “We found one shell, Sir, in the street near the curb. Aurelio is guarding it until the area can be roped off. If there were other shells the shooter must have picked them up.”

  “I heard the tires of a car speeding off,” Rick said. “The guy could have used the car roof to steady his aim.”

  LoGuercio walked to the tree and rubbed his finger over a small hole in the bark. “It looks like a nine millimeter slug, but I’ll leave it to the forensic people to pull it out and tell me for sure.”

  Rick stood aside and watched as the park filled with officials and equipment. LoGuercio gave orders, including sending two of his men to the houses along the street to find if anyone had seen or heard anything.

  Rick’s phone rang and he fished it from his pocket and checked the number. It didn’t seem possible that Piero could already have gotten news of the journalist’s murder. He hit the answer button.

  “Uncle, you called at just the right time, I’m standing here doing nothing and have time to talk.”

  “I wish I could say the same. I was calling about Vincenzo Aragona.”

  Rick’s eyes stayed on the activity on the grass. “I’m all ears.”

  “It’s very curious. His record appears to be clean, but I can’t be sure.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Nor do I. There is something missing, but how much and what it deals with, I don’t know. Without trying to explain our arcane records system, Riccardo, I’ll just say that I can detect a gap. Someone has removed information from his record.”

  “How could that happen?”

  “You’ve heard me rant many times about the overlapping and often conflicting agencies of our security services. You know: Polizia, Carabinieri, anti-mafia, Guardia di Finanza, anti-terrorism, art cops; the list goes on and on. I suspect that someone from another branch lifted this material from Aragona’s record.”

  “Which means they’re investigating him.”

  “That, or someone in power has made it disappear.”

  “Either way, chances are that Vincenzo Aragona is not a model citizen.”

  “Precisely. But I will keep digging. I have some friends in the records office who might have a clue as to what happened. Listen, I have to go. Anything new on our murder investigation?”

  “Only that now there’s another one.”

  “Non capisco, caro nipote.”

  Rick brought his uncle up to date on the events of the previous half hour. There was no equivalent expression in Italian for “dodged a bullet” or he would have used it.

  “Your friend LoGuercio has his hands full. We should be ready down here for a request for assistance.”

  “That’s a bit of a bureaucrat’s reaction, Uncle. What about concern for your nephew?”

  “Every time in the past when I’ve told you to be careful, Riccardo, something bad happened, so I won’t say it.”

  After he ended the call, Rick saw that LoGuercio was walking toward him. He decided not to tell Paolo about his conversation with Piero. The man had enough on his mind.

  “Nothing much more I can do here right now. Let’s go back to my office and see if anything is happening in the other case.” They started along the path to the station, leaving the crime village behind them on the grass.

  “What did Pazzi say to you before the shots?”

  “He was trying again to get something from me about the murder.”

  “Again?”

  “He stopped me in the street in front of the hotel yesterday afternoon, having found out who I was after seeing me with you earlier. I told him I didn’t know anything and if I did, I wouldn’t tell him.”

  “Pazzi could be very persistent.” He looked up. “Oh, great. News certainly travels fast in this town.”

  A car had stopped in front of the police station and Mayor Boscoli was getting out. He spotted the two men and strode across the street toward them.

  “Another murder, Inspector? This is getting to be regular occurrence.” He squinted at Rick. “And Signor Montoya is already involved. Again the victim is an American tourist?”

  “No, sir,” LoGuercio answered, “the dead man is Luciano Pazzi.”

  “Pazzi? That bastard? You’ll have no shortage of suspects for this one, Inspector.” He rubbed the stubble on his chin, as if considering what more to say. “Orvieto doesn’t need this kind of publicity.” His muttered words were more to himself than to the two men. He shook his head and walked back to his car while Rick and LoGuercio watched.

  ***

  LoGuercio wearily lowered his body into the chair behind his desk. His work area had been almost bare on Rick’s last visit, but now it was cluttered with papers, empty plastic espresso cups, and multiple ashtrays. Light had begun to fade from the view through the large windows, giving the grass and ivy a dark green color that would soon be black. The policeman gestured Rick toward the chair in front of his desk.

  “We have some news, Riccardo. The fingerprints found on the belt of the victim were not hers.”

  He opened a file, found a photograph, and pushed it across the desk. It was a close-up of a belt, its style something Rick had seen many times in New Mexico, usually on tourists. He recalled seeing it on Rhonda in the funicular. The large silver buckle’s design, including turquoise insets,
was matched in smaller size by silver disks along the leather. Santa Fe Style takes another victim, he could not help thinking.

  “The prints were on the buckle,” LoGercio said, “which fortunately was wide enough to provide a nice surface. They are checking them against Italian and Interpol records. Now I have to get the prints of anyone who could remotely be considered a suspect.”

  “Aren’t their prints already on file? I would have thought that in Italy it’s a requirement that everyone be fingerprinted.”

  LoGuercio lit a cigarette before leaning back in his chair, causing a slight squeak. “Surprisingly, the answer to the question is probably no. Only in the last few years, thanks to the European Community, have Italian citizens been required to get fingerprinted to obtain or renew their identity card, or get a passport. So most Italians, certainly those over a certain age, do not have their impronte digitali on record. And unless they need to renew their identity card, or get a passport, or get in trouble with us, they never will.”

  “Which would take in about everyone connected with this case.”

  “Correct. Maybe Donato has had some contact with the authorities, so he might be in the files, but I’ll get his prints anyway. If nothing else, telling him when he comes in that he has to do it could elicit an interesting reaction. Can I offer you a coffee, by the way? Water?” He pulled out a cigarette and lit it.

  Rick looked at the plastic cups on the desk and waved his hand. “No, thank you. It occurs to me that Rhonda, being wealthy, could have a maid or cleaning person back in America, someone who could have touched the belt.”

  LoGuercio nodded, his fatigue evident. “We should be hearing back from Arizona on that.”

  “Were the fingerprints a man’s or woman’s?”

  The policeman shook his head and blew some smoke toward the ceiling. “There’s no way to know. Age, they can tell to a certain extent, but gender, no. Prints will often show if the person works with their hands, like a carpenter, through little cuts and scars, though the tiny nicks tend to disappear over time.”

  “No scars on these prints.”

  “Precisely. So nobody is ruled in or ruled out until we get them in here to get printed.”

  Rick digested his Fingerprints 101 lesson. “What about the two American women? They’ll have to come in as well. I can call them.”

  “That would be helpful. But don’t tell them we need their fingerprints. I’m telling everyone that we need them in here to sign a formal statement.”

  Rick nodded. “In case someone figures it out that a print was found on the body and they then decided to disappear.”

  “Exactly.” LoGuercio, realizing how messy his desk appeared, shuffled some of the papers into neater piles. “You said you saw the Americans today?”

  “One of them, the daughter. Signora Linwood was also in Todi, but was trying to recover from her hangover. I didn’t see her.” Rick recounted the conversation with Gina.

  “Interesting,” said LoGuercio when Rick was done. “It seems that both the daughter and Signora Linwood could be beneficiaries of the estate of our victim. Indeed, very interesting. Linwood tells you yesterday that she thinks the daughter and mother had a bad relationship and now today the daughter says that her mother had an affair with her friend’s future husband. It appears that each one is trying to implicate the other.” He rubbed his chin in thought. “Are you sure these two women aren’t Italian?”

  “Not that I know of, Paolo. In other suspect news, I also saw Signora Cappello, on the way here just now. She was with Morgante and they were heading off for a tryst in the campagna.”

  “It couldn’t have been much of a tryst if they told you about it. And I checked around; their relationship is not a big secret. Were they really going out to the countryside?”

  Rick nodded. “She is checking on a couple properties, and dragged him along with the promise of an intimate dinner under a leafy pergola somewhere nearby. I may be embellishing it a bit. I told them I was coming here, and didn’t get a reaction.”

  LoGuercio again got up from his chair, and walked to the window. The backyard was now completely in shade. “Something occurs to me, Riccardo. Could it be that Morgante’s interest in the case is not just based on his concern for local tourism? Perhaps he’s worried that his lady friend is a suspect, and is probing to find out if we’re getting on her trail.” He turned to Rick. “If you hadn’t mentioned seeing them it wouldn’t have come to mind.”

  “The other possibility is that she put him up to it, asking him to use his influence to find out how much progress you’re making.”

  The inspector wiggled his index finger. “No, that doesn’t work, because he came to the station to ask about the case before we told her the victim was her old friend.”

  “Unless she knew already, and only acted surprised.”

  LoGuercio thought about that one for a few moments. “They could both be in on it, she planning it and he doing the dirty work.” He rubbed his eyes. “Let’s get back to reality.”

  “Yes, let’s. How did your meeting go with Signora Vecchi? Did she remember anything about Rhonda?”

  LoGuercio returned to his chair, pulled out a paper, and then put it back into place. “I was surprised to find she was very coherent, and remembered quite a bit. Our victim made an impression back then, so the signora was able to give me a good sense of what she was like. Not very helpful in finding our murderer, but good for building a picture of Rhonda Van Fleet. And speaking of pictures, she had a photo album and showed me photographs from that time. There was one of interest, Rhonda Davis arm in arm with a bearded Crivelli.”

  Rick leaned forward. “Really? That is interesting. Do you remember what he told us?”

  “Exactly my reaction. That he didn’t socialize with the students. One photograph doesn’t really prove anything, but it got me more curious about Crivelli.”

  He got up and leaned over his desk, retrieving a file at the far corner. After sitting back down he opened it and thumbed through the papers inside, finding the one he wanted. “Crivelli was politically active enough in the late seventies to have gotten himself into the records of the police, but back then we were paranoid about such things, apparently. Bombs going off around the country, kidnappings, that sort of thing, and most of the time it was politically motivated.”

  “Was he ever picked up?”

  “There was a protest demonstration in the north that he was involved in that turned violent and he was arrested, but immediately released. Pretty standard for those years, I understand. Unfortunately they couldn’t put everyone in jail, and many of the protesters came from prominent families. What I find fascinating is that our anti-capitalist of those years has become a wealthy businessman and prominent member of the community, dining regularly with the mayor. Fascinating, but not surprising.”

  Rick recalled a favorite quote from Shakespeare: “youth’s a stuff will not endure.” The bard was likely talking about just getting old, but somehow it fit in Crivelli’s case. He was thinking how to translate it for LoGuercio when his cell phone rang.

  “Montoya.” He listened and looked at LoGuercio. “Yes, Francine…I’m with him now…I will tell him, but I’m not sure—wait on the line, I’ll tell him now.” He took the phone from his ear. “Signora Linwood says you can take the guard off the villa. They feel safe enough, and perhaps he can be put to better use. To solve the crime.”

  LoGuercio grunted. “She’s telling me how to run my operation?” He flicked his wrist in disgust. “Certainly, whatever she wants.”

  Rick put the phone back up to his ear. “Done, Francine. But be sure to lock your doors well tonight, and keep your cell phone handy.” He was tempted to tell her to stay off the wine, but decided against it. Instead he said goodbye and slipped the phone back in his pocket.

  He snapped his fingers. “I forgot to tell her she needs to come here fo
r fingerpr—I mean to sign a statement.”

  “Call her tomorrow and I’ll send a car and driver to bring them both here. I’ll use the corporal who they are so kindly returning to me.” LoGuercio became lost in thought which Rick interrupted.

  “What’s your first hunch on the murder of Pazzi, Paolo?”

  “Ah, yes, our second murder.” He ran his hand through his dark hair. “I was thinking that the American woman is more of a story for the press. But the killing of one of their own, even though he was despised by most journalists, will be considered important to cover. Press freedom, professional solidarity, and all that. But who killed him? The mayor was correct, Pazzi was not a beloved figure among our civic leaders, he even did an exposé on Boscoli himself last year. It was some murky payoff or kickback, without any real evidence but filled with innuendo. Classic Pazzi. So I will reserve any guesses about who could have done it and hope that the ballistics or the neighbors can lead us in the right direction.

  “There’s a chance the two killings could be connected.”

  LoGuercio had been lighting another cigarette. He stopped and eyed Rick warily. “I haven’t had time to formulate any theories in that regard, but it seems you have. Tell me.”

  Rick tapped his two index fingers together. “Isn’t it obvious? Pazzi’s been trying to find out who killed the American, and the murderer, knowing the man’s reputation, either thought he was getting close or was afraid he would do so eventually. So he decided to get rid of him.”

  LoGuercio raised his index fingers now, and pointed them at Rick. “If that’s a possible theory, then there is another one which is equally plausible.”

  “Cioé?”

  “Just this: the killer needed three shots, so he couldn’t be an expert marksman. It’s possible that he hit the wrong person.”

  “He was aiming at me?”

  “Well, you were looking into the murder, helping the police, and could be getting close.” LoGuercio let the idea sink in, then broke into a smile, his first of the day that Rick had seen. “No, Riccardo, I don’t think so. You were already on the ground and the guy kept shooting. He was after Pazzi, and as the mayor said, there are dozens of people who dreamed of doing him in. But your first theory could be the right one.”