Il Pane Della Vita (29 page)

The nun and Brother Salvatore sauntered around the room, looking at the artwork.

“This is beauti
ful,” she said. “I wonder if he gives lessons. I would love to do work like this.”

“It’
s my understanding, Sister, that you already possess two vocations. Maybe the bishop would let you do it if you move to a monastery like this one. The Cistercians have a monastery in Cortona, and the Benedictines have one for nuns right outside Firenza.”

Sister Angela
turned to Brother Salvatore. “Where on earth did you learn about monasteries for women?”

“B
ecause I have a sister in one of them. I helped her find a place She’s in Cortona.”

“I didn’t know that. It was nice of you to guide her.”

Brother Valente suddenly interrupted them. “Hello, you must be the famous detective. Welcome to my studio.”

“You make beautiful things, Brother. I was telling Brother Salvatore that I would love to learn something I could do with my hands. I’ll bet it’s harder to do than you make it look.”

“It does take years of effort, and even now I make mistakes. I had to clean up a bit of a mess in the other room. I miscalculated and made a bowl wall too thin. I didn’t achieve what I had in mind.”

The nun slipped a picture of the knife across the table, and Brother Valente suddenly smiled. “You found my knife. Do you have it? I tend to get attached to my tools. I can do without people
, but not my implements.”

“So you don’t have it now.”

“No. It disappeared a few weeks ago. I was devastated. I searched the kitchen drawers for another filleting knife, but alas, I couldn’t find any.”

“I think Brother Alonzo is now locking up his knives.”

“Ah, yes. Thou shalt not steal. I’ll have to confess it now that I think of it. I guess I’ll have to charm Brother Alonzo into showing me what he has—unless you return my old friend to me.”

Brother Salvatore rounded on
e of the tables but suddenly stopped. “What’s this? New software? Cool. Is that the bowl that shattered in the kiln? It’s beautiful.”

Brother Valente walked over to the computer and turned the monitor to f
ace Sister Angela. “Yes. That
was
my current baby. Why do children have to have minds of their own?”

“Look, Sister. He sees his work in three-dimensions. That must make it a whole lot easier to
create.”

“It makes it easier to visualize, yes.”

“How did you get this software? It must have been expensive.”

“Is it? I’m not a computer guru. Bro
ther Bruno said he had some special software for what I do. He came in and installed it for me. Is the abbot stuck with the bill? I hope not. I’m already attached.”

“When did Brother Bruno come in here to w
ork on it?” asked Sister Angela.”

“I would say it was a week or so ago. He came in when I was at dinner and introduced us afterward.”

“And the knife went missing after his visit?”

“I don’
t know,” said Brother Valente. “I didn’t miss it right away. I only used it to cut the clay. What would Brother Bruno want with a filleting knife?”

“He
was
right,” said Sister Angela, walking across the drive. “Brother Bruno has no motive. Anyone could have come into the studio and taken the knife.”

“There’s nothing to ti
e Brother Bruno to the murder. I can’t even imagine him as the monk who followed Brother Donato up the path. There might have been two monks.”

“And how did the monk inside the perimeter fence get out? How did Brother Pietro get out? Was Brother Pietro alive when he left? If not, how would one person carry the body down?” There are lots of questions, Brother Salvatore. Hang on. It’s getting exciting.”

Sister Angela took Brother Salvatore to the library. “Why didn’t you tell me you had a library?”

“Give me a monastery that does
n’t have one,” said Brother Salvatore. “Did you think I bought my mysteries at the bookstore? If I did that, there would be no money left over for our once-a-month Thursday nights in Avalle.”

“Sit down on the couch across from me. We have to talk about what information we have.”

Brother Salvatore sat down and took out a pad of paper. “Okay. We have that monk that isn’t an
eremita
. We don’t know where he went or how he got out of there but we realized that he must have because there was no body found in the explosion.”

“Very good. We have a woman visitor who visited Brother Pietro regularly. She has been identified as a niece
, but we know nothing else about her, except that she was involved in an event that spread red wine all over the floor and on his curtains. That’s a sign of passion, and passion only comes if there is an intimate connection between the two.”

“We have a potter with a missing fileting knife, the murder weapon,” said Brother Salvatore. “He claims it must have been stolen, but the only person he knows
who was in the studio was the computer guru, Brother Bruno.”

“Does Brother Valente keep the studio locked?” asked Sister Angela.

“We have no locks here, Sister, except for the VIP rooms. You have a keycard for one of those. Otherwise we do not lock doors—unless Brother Valente had an anxiety attack. Then he would have had to install the locks himself.” Brother Salvatore looked up from his notes. “I’ll check.”

“And we have a s
ecurity system that’s gone awry,” said the nun. “Somehow two people got out of the perimeter fence and hermitage without being seen. We don’t have the help of either of the two doormen or the president of PEur because it isn’t in their interest to reveal that an error in their system that defeats the whole purpose of that system. It’s a must that we figure that one out.”

“Is that it? I think we’re close, Sister. Let’s just concentrate on the fa
ct we have only four questions we have to answer. I’ll take the one about Brother Valente locking his door. I’ll do that when he’s at dinner. If not, the whole of Santo Velo is implicated.”

“
What about the security gate? Maybe you can get with Monte tomorrow and see what he thinks about it. I would prefer that you not try approaching the doormen by yourself, even if you are able to figure it out in bed tonight. Promise me that. A good detective has to be smart enough to stay out of harm’s way. I think you’re so intelligent that you’ll be able to convince Monte you see a clue that could reveal how the crime came about.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I have a feeling our murderer has left the area. I’m going to find out where our perpetrator went and follow to see if I can get an interview.”

Sister Angela sat down to lunch.

Brother
Alonzo himself served her soup. “I heard you found our filleting knife. Who stole it?”

“I trust you
won’t punish the perpetrator, Brother. I would let the police take care of that. It was Brother Valente, and he didn’t steal it. He adopted it.”

“Ah yes. Brother Valente
has a collection of tools he’s adopted. I should have guessed.”

“Do you suspect him of more nefarious crimes?”

“I’ve never even seen him pay any attention to people,” said Brother Alonzo, grinding a bit of pepper into her soup. “I suppose, however, that if someone stole one of his implements, he might feel a need to save it. Who knows what a man like that might do to the suspected kidnapper?”

Sister Angela had just finished her soup and served herself a cup of espresso
when she heard the fuss. She craned her neck to see a small group just coming into the
sala
from the outdoor corridor. It was the abbot with Brother Pascal. They were approaching her.