Just One Evil Act il-18

by Elizabeth George

  Barbara considered what she knew once she’d smoked the fag down to a dog-end the size of her little finger’s nail. She flicked this into the street—apologies to the litter patrol, but her ashtray was teeming with six months of Players smoked down to various lengths and crushed therein—and she tried desperately to reason everything out. From Lynley she knew that Di Massimo was pointing every finger he had and all of his toes at Dwayne Doughty in London. Emily Cass appeared to be doing the same. Doughty had everything to lose if culpability came down to him. He knew that better than he knew anything, which was why, of course, he’d have ordered every indication that he’d been in contact with anyone in Italy wiped from the records.

  Bryan Smythe could confirm this. Back him into a corner, guarantee that no visit from the Bill was going to occur if he spilled his beans onto a porcelain plate, and Bob was, let’s face it, going to be your uncle. Barbara knew that she probably didn’t even need to visit the bloke. These computer types? In her experience their bravado was limited to what they could accomplish behind closed doors, in a darkened room, with the glow of a computer monitor shining in their eyes. Hearing that the cops were onto him, he’d cave in an instant. He’d tell everything he knew, just as fast as his vocal cords could vibrate. Barbara just wasn’t sure she wanted to know what that everything was.

  Truth was, he was going to confirm, and she bloody well knew it. Emily Cass wouldn’t have given her the bloke’s name if there was any doubt in the matter. Barbara told herself that this was probably because Emily would have put him in the picture the moment Barbara and she had parted ways. And following up on that, Dwayne Doughty would have rung the bloke and given him the word. The private investigator would have concluded instantly that Emily Cass was the person who had named Smythe to Barbara, for there was no one else to do the naming. He’d deal with her later, but upon Barbara’s departure from his office, Smythe would have been his very next move. Ring him and say, “There’s a cop coming. She can’t prove a damn thing so hold your tongue in this business and there’s a bonus coming your way.”

  So he would hold his tongue. Or he would break and spill. Or he would run for cover. Or he would head for Scotland, Dubai, the Seychelles. Who the bloody hell knew what Smythe would do because Barbara’s head was spinning, so she lit another fag.

  Reality in a tablespoon? She knew what her next step was. It involved ringing Lynley with the information she had and giving him everything. But God, God, God, how could she ever do that? For surely there was an explanation somewhere and all she really had to do was to find it.

  She could give Lynley Bryan Smythe’s name. That wore the guise of progress being made. He’d tell her to haul Smythe into the nick for a proper go at him—or he would ask her why she hadn’t already done so—but in any case that would buy her time. The only question was: What was she going to do with time bought? And once she admitted to herself what it was, she set her course upon doing it.

  LUCCA

  TUSCANY

  Salvatore had no choice once Michelangelo Di Massimo named the man in London. His next encounter with Piero Fanucci wasn’t going to be pleasant, but it had to be got through. Once that was taken care of, he was intent upon the Apuan Alps and that convent at which Domenica Medici was the caretaker. It was the only lead they had as to the location of the missing little English girl and, Piero Fanucci or not, Salvatore intended to follow it.

  He spoke to il Pubblico Ministero by phone. In advance he’d done what little there was to be done to prove to Fanucci that no connection appeared to exist between Carlo Casparia and anyone else they had discovered having ties to the kidnapping case. Piero snapped that he hadn’t been looking closely enough. Get back to that at once, Fanucci ordered. At this, Salvatore bridled. At this, he made a crucial error. Patiently, he said, “Piero, capisco. I know that you are heavily invested in the guilt of this Carlo—” At which point Fanucci morphed into il drago and Salvatore felt that dragon’s wrath.

  He listened to Piero’s roaring and railing. Il Pubblico Ministero called into question everything from Salvatore’s capabilities as a member of the police force to the various reasons—most of them having to do with Salvatore’s masculinity—for the breakdown of the chief inspector’s marriage. The peroration of il drago’s diatribe was the unsurprising information that Piero was replacing him as head of the investigation into the girl’s disappearance. Someone who could follow the directions of the magistrate in charge of the investigation would be taking over, and Salvatore was to hand to this person every bit of information he had.

  “Don’t do this, Piero,” Salvatore said. His blood had long since boiled, especially when il Pubblico Ministero had ventured into the area of his marriage. Indeed, Salvatore felt he had no blood left, just the burnt-copper scent of it in his body. “You have decided upon the guilt of this man based upon your fantasy. You have decided that Carlo saw an easy way to make money by following a child, grabbing her from a public market, and selling her to . . . Who, Piero? Allow me to ask you this: Is it even reasonable for you to conclude that anyone would go into the business of buying a child from a person like Carlo? A drug addict who is likely to tell the tale of such a sale to the first person willing to offer him the money for another purchase of whatever it is he is shooting into his body? Piero, please listen to me. I know that you are compromised in this investigation. I know that your use of Prima Voce to make a case for—”

  That mentioning of the tabloid had done it.

  “Basta!” Piero Fanucci roared. “È finito, Salvatore! Capisci? È finito tutto!”

  Il Pubblico Ministero had slammed the phone down at his end. At least, Salvatore thought wryly, he would have no need of informing the magistrato about the convent in the Apuan Alps since Piero’s poor phone would now probably be out of order. He would also have no need of telling him that more details had been amassed about one Lorenzo Mura, his fellow players on Lucca’s squadra di calcio, and his private coaching of young giocatori in the Parco Fluviale.

  His officers had been busy. He had photographs now of all the other city team players, which had admittedly been easy enough to come by. Less easy had been the gathering of photographs of all the parents of young boys coached by Lorenzo Mura. Getting the names of those parents had been difficult enough. Asking for them had aroused Lorenzo’s suspicions and had prompted the man to demand what the parents of his football students had to do with little Hadiyyah’s disappearance. Salvatore had told him the truth of the matter: Everyone whose life touched even remotely upon Hadiyyah’s had to be looked at. Perhaps the parent of a child he coached was unhappy with him and felt he needed to be taught a lesson, dealt with in some way, put in his place . . . ? One never knew, Signor Mura, so every avenue had to be explored.

  With pictures of those parents and the Lucchese players in hand, officers were even now on their way to the prison to show these to Carlo Casparia in the hope that what went for his memory after years of drug use might be stimulated. He had, after all, remembered a man meeting Lorenzo Mura at the place of his coaching in the Parco Fluviale. There was a slight chance that he would be able to pick this person out of the pictures with which he would be presented. And then they would have another avenue to explore.

  Salvatore didn’t have much time for this manoeuvre, though. He knew that Piero Fanucci would be quick about assigning this case to another. Purtroppo, Chief Inspector Lo Bianco would be out of his office when that individual showed up to go over the finer details of the investigation. He would be high in the Apuan Alps.

  His decision to take the Englishman with him had to do with language. If by the slightest chance on earth this English girl had been taken into the Alps to that convent by Roberto Squali, then the liaison officer who spoke her own language was going to be helpful in communicating with her. If, on the other, more horrible hand, what developed from this was the news that the worst had happened and the little girl was dead, then Lynley’s presence would allow him to gather information on the s
pot and to discuss with Salvatore in advance what details the child’s parents needed to know about her death.

  He fetched Lynley from their regular luogo di incontro by Porta di Borgo. To the Englishman’s “Che cosa succede?” he tersely explained where they were with the collection of photos, with Lorenzo Mura, and with the need for swiftness. He spoke of this latter matter by using terms that dealt with “concerns of il Pubblico Ministero.” What he didn’t tell him was that he had been officially removed from the investigation.

  He didn’t seem to need to, as things turned out. The Englishman’s brown eyes observed him steadily as he parted with those details he had. He even suggested politely that perhaps a siren would speed their journey . . . ? It would assist in bringing matters to a swift conclusion for you, Ispettore, he pointed out.

  So it was with the siren blaring and the lights flashing that Salvatore and Lynley left the city. They shared little conversation as they stormed in the direction of the Alps and a convent hidden high among them.

  It was called Villa Rivelli, he’d discovered. It housed a cloistered order of Dominican nuns. It was situated northwest of the point at which the unfortunate Roberto Squali had met his end, and the road that Squali had been driving upon was the single route to get to the place.

  There was virtually nothing nearby, as they found when they reached the area, just a cluster of houses perhaps two kilometres in advance of the turnoff. At one time long ago these houses would have served the needs of whoever had lived within the great villa. Now they were the shuttered vacation homes of foreigners and of wealthy Italians who came to the mountains from cities like Milano and Bologna, to escape urban bustle and summer heat. It was early in the season yet, so the likelihood of anyone within the houses seeing Roberto Squali pass by several weeks ago with a child in his car was too remote to be considered. Wisdom would have dictated that Squali make his move with the child in midafternoon anyway. At that time of day, no one stirred in a place like this. People moved from pranzo directly to letto for a nap. They would have noticed nothing, even if they’d been at their houses this time of year.

  When they reached the lane that led to Villa Rivelli, Salvatore nearly missed it altogether, so sheltered was it by looming oaks and Aleppo pines and so untravelled it appeared. Only a small wooden sign topped with a cross saved him from passing it by altogether. It was carved with V Rivelli upon it, but the letters were worn and the wood was lichenous.

  The lane was narrow, cluttered with the woodland debris of a hundred winters. It had never been paved, so they lurched their way down it. They came to a great iron gate that stood open far enough to allow a car’s passage. When he’d eased the car past the ornate wrought iron, he followed the driveway to the left, along a tall hedge from which birds burst, past a few decrepit outbuildings, a huge woodpile, and a ruspa that was more rust than steel.

  The silence was complete. As the lane climbed upward, nothing broke into the stillness. So it was with some surprise that Salvatore turned into a car’s-width opening perhaps a kilometre from the road below and saw, beyond the hedge, a great lawn at the other side of which stood the baroque beauty of the Villa Rivelli. Aside from the fact that it was completely abandoned in appearance, it didn’t seem like a dwelling for an order of cloistered nuns. For the front of the building was fashioned with tall niches in which marble statues stood, and a single glance at them told the tale of the identities, which had more to do with Roman gods and goddesses than with saints of the Roman Catholic Church. But these were not what surprised Salvatore. It was the presence of three cars from the carabinieri that caused him to glance at Lynley and to worry that they might be too late.

  The arrival of police at a cloistered convent was not a simple matter of knocking on the door and gaining admittance. The women within did not see visitors. Chances were better than good that if the carabinieri were present, it was because the carabinieri had been summoned. It was with this in mind that Salvatore and Lynley approached two armed officers who were gazing at them expressionlessly through very dark glasses.

  It was, Salvatore discovered, much as he’d thought. A telephone call from the convent had brought them to this remote villa. Captain Mirenda had been admitted, and she was presumably speaking to whoever had made the call. As for the rest of them . . . ? They were having a look round the grounds. It was a beautiful spot on a beautiful day, eh? Such a pity that the ladies who lived here never got to enjoy what it had to offer. Giardini, fontane, stagni, un bosco . . . The officer shook his head at the waste of such pleasures.

  “Dov’è l’ingresso?” Salvatore asked him. For it didn’t seem conceivable that access to the convent was gained by merely knocking upon the two great front doors. In this, he was right. The superior officer of the two carabinieri had gone round the side of the building. Salvatore and Lynley did the same. They found yet another officer stationed outside of a plain door set down a few steps. To him, they showed their identification.

  The police were notoriously territorial in this part of the world. Because there were so many divisions of them, turf wars were common when it came to an investigation. Often the first branch of polizia on the scene was the branch that wrested control of an investigation, and this was particularly the case when it came to the polizia di stato and the carabinieri. But things were much different on this day, Salvatore found. After examining their identification and gazing at them both as if their faces held secret information for him, the officer stepped away from the door. When it came to entering the convent, they could suit themselves.

  They went in through a vast kitchen, which was completely deserted. They climbed a stone stairway, their footsteps echoing between the plastered walls. The stairway took them into a corridor, which was also deserted. This they followed and finally arrived in a chapel, where a candle lit for the Sacrament was the first indication of life in the building since someone from within would have had to light it unless Captain Mirenda had done the honours.

  Four separate corridors led from the chapel, each of them at a corner of the room and one of which they’d just travelled. Salvatore was trying to decide which of the remaining three might lead them to a human presence, when he heard the sound of women’s voices, just a quiet murmur in what otherwise would have been a place of silence and contemplation. Footsteps accompanied these voices. Someone said, “Certo, certo. Non si preoccupi. Ha fatto bene.”

  Two women emerged from behind a wooden lattice that served to cover the doorway of the corridor nearest the chapel’s altar. One of them wore the habit of a Dominican nun. The other wore the uniform of a carabinieri captain. The nun halted abruptly, the first of them to catch sight of the two men—both in the clothing of civilians—standing in the convent chapel. She looked behind her for a moment, as if to retreat to safety behind the lattice, and Captain Mirenda spoke sharply.

  “Chi sono?” This was, she told them, a cloistered convent. How had they gained entrance?

  Salvatore identified himself and explained who Lynley was. They were there, he said, on the matter of the English girl who had vanished from Lucca, and he felt confident that Captain Mirenda was aware of that case.

  She was, of course. How could she be otherwise since, unlike the nun who’d stepped into the shadows, she did not live in a protected world. But it seemed that she had either been summoned to the convent on another matter entirely, or she had not connected the reason she’d been summoned to anything that had gone before this moment, especially in a mercato in Lucca.

  The nun murmured something. In the shadows, her face was hidden.

  Salvatore explained that he and his companion were going to have to speak to the Mother Superior. He went on to say that he knew it was irregular for any of the nuns to meet with an outsider—particularly if that outsider was male—but there was an urgent need since a direct relationship existed between a young woman of the name of Domenica Medici and a man who had taken the little girl from Lucca.

  Captain Mirenda glanced at the o
ther woman. She said, “Che cosa vorrebbe fare?”

  Salvatore wanted to tell her that it was not a matter of what the nun wished to do at this point. This was a police matter, and the traditions of the cloister were going to have to be set aside. Where, he enquired, was Domenica Medici? Her parents had indicated she lived in this place. Roberto Squali had died on his way here. Evidence in his car proved the child had been a passenger at some point.

  Captain Mirenda told them to wait in the chapel. Salvatore didn’t like this, but he decided a compromise was in order. The carabinieri had sent a woman for obvious reasons, and if it was down to her to open doors in this place, he could live with that.

  She took the arm of the nun, and together they disappeared behind the lattice from which they’d emerged. In a few minutes, though, the captain was back. With her was a different nun altogether, and she didn’t shrink from their presence as had the other. This was Mother Superior, Captain Mirenda told them. It was she who had summoned the carabinieri to Villa Rivelli.

  “Your wish is to see Domenica Medici?” Mother Superior was tall and stately, appearing ageless in her black-and-white habit. She wore the rimless spectacles that Salvatore remembered on the nuns of his youth. Then those glasses had seemed quirky, an antique fashion long out of vogue. Now they seemed trendy, striking an odd note of modernity out of keeping with the rest of Mother Superior’s attire. Behind the glasses, she fixed upon him a gaze that he remembered only too well from the classroom. It demanded truth, and it suggested that anything less would be quickly uncovered.