Authors: Michael Dibdin
But the rat was no longer there. With an astonishing spiral leap, it twisted up and around and sank its incisors into Minot’s hand. He yelled and lashed out with his other hand, knocking over the glass jar, which shattered on the floor. The rat had already vanished, along with all its fellows.
Minot inspected the wound. It looked insignificant, just a couple of punctures below the thumb. The real problem was the incriminating mess on the floor. With a heavy sigh, he set about cleaning it up, scooping the solid items on to an old newspaper and mopping the blood into a pail. He did his best, but in the event it wasn’t good enough to escape detection by the forensic team which arrived a week later. Aldo’s blood had not only coated the tiles but seeped into the cracks and crevices in the grout between them, from which it was laboriously removed, analysed and identified. Soon afterwards, police dogs discovered the shallow pit where Minot had hurriedly buried the whole mess. The case against Gianni Faigano collapsed and, protesting his guilt to the last, he was released.
But that was all in the future. Having completed his clean-up, Minot drove off to dispose of his truffles, which he did at a price which astonished him. As for the bite, he thought nothing more of it. There was a small red swelling and an irritating itching sensation, but that gradually subsided.
It wasn’t until the following day that other symptoms manifested themselves, a sort of feverish lassitude which felt like some virus or other; a mild case of flu, perhaps. Then that evening, while he was heating up some soup, Minot suddenly collapsed. To his astonishment, he was unable to get up again. In fact, he could hardly move at all, except for an occasional convulsive jerking of his limbs. He tried calling for help, but all that emerged was a feeble croak.
Minot was a notorious recluse, and several more days passed before his disappearance was remarked on. In the end it was Lamberto Latini who found him, having called by arrangement to collect an order of truffles placed during Minot’s earlier visit. By then nearly a week had gone by, and the corpse was almost unrecognizable. Denied their usual food, the rats had had to make do with what there was.
Acknowledgement
The days are past when Poe could get away with having a character demonstrate his wine connoisseurship (in
The Cask of Amontillado,
a few echoes of which may be discerned in the second chapter) by claiming that a rival ‘cannot distinguish Sherry from Amontillado’. To protect myself from similar or worse gaffes I appealed to the incomparable Jancis Robinson, who very kindly read the manuscript and made numerous suggestions, many of which have been incorporated in the final text. Needless to say, responsibility for the opinions voiced by my characters, as well as for any subsequent errors, is mine alone.
The Zen Series from Michael Dibdin
Ratking
Zen is unexpectedly transferred to Perugia to take over an explosive kidnapping case involving one of Italy’s most powerful families.
Vendetta
An impossible murder in a top-security Sardinian fortress leads Zen to a menacing and violent world where his own life is soon at risk.
Cabal
When a man falls to his death in a chapel in St Peter’s, Zen must crack the secret of the Vatican to solve the crime.
Dead Lagoon
Zen returns to his native Venice to investigate the disappearance of a rich American resident, while confronting disturbing revelations about his own life.
Così Fan Tutti
Zen finds himself in Naples, a city trying to clean up its act – perhaps too literally, as politicians, businessmen and mafiosi begin to disappear off the streets.
A Long Finish
Back in Rome, Zen is given an unorthodox assignment: to release the jailed scion of an important wine-growing family who is accused of a brutal murder.
Blood Rain
The gruesome discovery of an unidentified corpse in a railway carriage in Sicily marks the beginning of Zen’s most difficult and dangerous case.
And Then You Die
After months in hospital recovering from a bomb attack on his car, Zen is trying to lie low at a beach resort on the Tuscan coast, but an alarming number of people are dropping dead around him.
Medusa
When human remains are found in abandoned military tunnels, the case leads Zen back into the murky history of post-war Italy.
Back to Bologna
Zen is called to Bologna to investigate the murder of the shady industrialist who owns the local football team.
End Games
After a brutal murder in the heart of a tight-knit traditional community in Calabria, Zen is determined to find a way to penetrate the code of silence and uncover the truth.
About the Author
Michael John Dibdin was born in Wolverhampton in 1947. His mother was a nurse and his father a Cambridge-educated physicist with a passionate enthusiasm for folk music. The family travelled extensively around Britain until Michael turned seven, when they settled in Northern Ireland.
After graduating with an English degree from Sussex University he took a Master’s Degree at the University of Alberta, Canada. Dibdin’s first published novel,
The Last Sherlock Holmes Story,
his self-proclaimed ‘pastiche’, appeared in 1978. Shortly afterwards he moved to Italy to teach for a number of years at the University of Perugia where he was inspired to write a second novel,
A Rich Full Death
, set in Victorian Florence. In 1988 he wrote
Ratking
, the first of the famous crime series featuring the Italian detective Aurelio Zen. The novel won the Crime Writers’ Association Gold Dagger award. Other books in this series include three of his best received titles,
Cabal
(1992), which was awarded the French Grand Prix du Roman Policier,
Dead Lagoon
(1994), and finally
End Games
, published posthumously in 2007. Amongst his best-received non-Zen novels were
The Dying of the
Light
, an Agatha Christie pastiche, and the darkly comic
Dirty Tricks
.
While Dibdin travelled frequently to Italy, he lived in Seattle with his wife the novelist Kathrine Beck, from where he wrote all but the first three Zen novels. The city also provided a new location for his other detective novels including
Dark
Spectre
(1995) and
Thanksgiving
(2000), the story of a British journalist’s obsession with his recently dead American wife.
Michael Dibdin died in 2007 at the age of 60.
By the Same Author
THE LAST SHERLOCK HOLMES STORY
A RICH FULL DEATH
THE TRYST
DIRTY TRICKS
THE DYING OF THE LIGHT
DARK SPECTRE
THANKSGIVING
Aurelio Zen series
RATKING
VENDETTA
CABAL
DEAD LAGOON
COSÌ FAN TUTTI
BLOOD RAIN
AND THEN YOU DIE
MEDUSA
BACK TO BOLOGNA
END GAMES
Copyright
First published in 1998
by Faber and Faber Ltd
Bloomsbury House
74–77 Great Russell Street
London WC1B 3DA
This ebook edition first published in 2011
All rights reserved
© Michael Dibdin, 1998
The right of Michael Dibdin to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly
ISBN 978–0–571–27412–3