Authors: Christobel Kent
By ‘no one’, he meant Sandro; by ‘all this’ he probably meant Vito. Giuli imagined he knew nothing about Carlsson yet, not even he would be so crass. Maybe he wasn’t so much crass, as inept.
Giuli had shut the door behind her carefully. The kitchen had suddenly seemed very small indeed, as Elena looked at her, knowing what was about to happen. Time stood still.
‘John Carlsson’s dead,’ she said. ‘Your John. They found his body in a suitcase. He was murdered.’
She didn’t know if it was shock or stoicism, or if Elena hadn’t heard, but she didn’t blink or speak. Giuli had to repeat it.
‘Murdered.’ Elena was expressionless, as if she didn’t recognise the word. She was very pale. ‘People always say they’d rather know,’ she said, looking up through the glazed kitchen window to the grey sky, the reflection in her eyes turning them opaque. ‘Don’t they? When people disappear, and they don’t know if they’re alive or dead. They say they just want to know.’
Giuli cleared her throat. ‘It’s what they say. It’s not always true.’
‘Murdered.’ Elena rubbed her eyes then and turned to fill the coffee pot. ‘I only knew him a couple of months,’ she said,
head down over the sink, not turning round. ‘I’ll be fine.’ She sounded choked, and when she turned, her face was bleak.
‘Murdered,’ she said, for a third time, and her eyelids trembled. Her eyes were like dark stones at the bottom of a river. ‘I’ve never . . . murder. It’s not something that happens to ordinary people.’
‘Was he ordinary, though?’ said Giuli. And raising her head abruptly, Elena seemed to really see her for the first time that day. ‘Sandro is pretty sure John was killed by Vito, the security man over the road.’
Elena fixed on her, hungrily, waiting.
Giuli went on. ‘Perhaps because he knew something about him. Or worked something out.’ She looked away. ‘They found traces of blood in Vito’s bathtub. In the drains.’ She held Elena’s gaze, thinking of the lurid headline on the newspaper stashed in her backpack:
Gay Killing
. ‘At the moment they – the authorities – seem to be working on the theory that he killed John, then . . .’ She hesitated. ‘Killed himself, or sort of. Engaged in risky behaviour, out of remorse.’
‘I don’t know what you mean by that,’ said Elena, frowning. ‘That doesn’t make sense.’
‘No,’ said Giuli. And slowly she withdrew last night’s paper from her backpack. ‘Not to Sandro it doesn’t, either.’
Elena studied the front page in silence for a moment that turned into five minutes, and eventually she raised her head. ‘Oh, I see,’ she said. ‘They’re saying John was gay?’ She tilted her head. ‘I suppose it’s possible. That I knew him so little.’ And to Giuli’s astonishment she laughed, with an edge of hysteria. ‘It’s surreal,’ she said when she’d finished, quite calm.
‘Do they think anyone will believe it?’
‘It’s in the paper, isn’t it?’ said Giuli, and putting her arms around Elena drew her close.
The new pot of coffee began to bubble, and the room filled with the smell – of morning and comfort, of a thousand bars Giuli had walked into for breakfast and company. She opened the door, and at the front of the shop Lludic turned, and it was as if life creaked back into painful motion.
Elena lifted the coffee pot in weary invitation. Edging apologetically into the small space, he settled against the sink. On the little wooden counter where she’d set it down, Giuli’s phone jiggled with an incoming call. She lifted it hastily and pressed
Reject call
, only registering as she set the phone back down where it had come from.
Centre
, it said: the Women’s Centre calling.
Lludic swallowed the coffee in a gulp and set the cup down. ‘Not that I’ll be sad to see them go,’ he said. ‘Van Vleet was a sleaze.’ He rubbed his arms, his pouchy face thoughtful. ‘Don’t know if I’d miss any of them, come to think of it.’ He tipped his head on one side.
‘None of them?’ said Elena. She refilled his cup.
‘Your boyfriend,’ he said. ‘Carlsson. He was after Cameron: that’s who he came for, did you know that? He was investigating some bridge collapse in the Middle East somewhere; people died, negligence. He asked me about Cameron, that first night, the night of the launch. Only I think he maybe got sidetracked when he recognised Giancarlo and worked out what he was up to.’
‘He recognised Vito,’ said Elena.
‘And what was Vito up to?’ said Giuli.
Lludic downed the second cup. ‘Dunno,’ he said, chewing his lip. ‘I think he was in the business of getting information. On whoever, just in case. Finding out secrets. He knew mine, all right, and he made sure I knew he knew. He knew who’d stolen Athene’s bracelet, and got rid of Therese’s dog, he knew who paid for Athene’s room and what Magda Scardino liked in bed.’
‘So they all might have wanted to get rid of him,’ said Giuli. ‘Do
you
know anyone’s secrets, Danilo?’
There was something appraising in the look he gave her, something shrewd. Not unfriendly. ‘I’m just a hack,’ he said, wiping his mouth. ‘Hack artist. What do I know?’ But he smiled. ‘I suppose I’ve got eyes,’ he said, shrugging. ‘I know Van Vleet liked threesomes. I know Ian Cameron left marks on his wife’s arms. And I know,’ and he sighed, ‘I know poor old Athene liked to stay up late. Who knew what she saw?’
Giuli felt her mouth tighten. Lonely old woman, with that expression when Giuli had walked away from her. Athene Morris couldn’t have killed him. But perhaps she knew who had.
‘You said it was the Englishman,’ said Giuli slowly. ‘Sir Martin Fleming, in there with her, the night she died.’
‘Was he at the hospital?’ It was Elena again, and they both turned to look at her. ‘When you went in to look for her. Did you see him in there?’
Danilo Lludic was pale under the beard. ‘They said she’d had enough visitors,’ he said slowly. ‘Enough visitors for one day.’
‘So there’d been others,’ she said.
*
They hadn’t insisted on escorting him from the building, at least, although Sandro had witnessed a little tussle between Bottai and Cornell even over that, muttering over by the window while Sandro stood there. The attaché eventually turned to him to say, ‘If your departure could be accomplished in a civilised manner, please, Mr Cellini. There’s been enough drama in this place.’
‘You can call me Sandro, Alessandra,’ he’d said. ‘After all, we’re both civilians now.’ Bottai looked put out. ‘I’ll gather my things,’ he added, and at her nod, he had left the room.
He put away the laptop and locked the door of the tiny office behind him.
Hugging his briefcase, Sandro didn’t even pause before turning – not back towards the library, where Ian Cameron sat at the bar, nor via the doors outside to where the cold wind ruffled the neat hedges, but down the stairs. It would be his last chance, after all, and the building’s cellars had sat there all this time, waiting for him.
He smelled the damp, leaching up through the earth and stone into the expensive carpet, as he took the first step into the gloom. He could hear voices, maybe Bottai and Cornell coming in search of him, and he hurried down, two steps, five; he groped for a light switch as he went, but found nothing. The deep chill of the underground came up to meet him, and at the foot of the stairs Sandro stopped, feeling his heart pound in his chest. There were only so many more years he could get away with doing this to himself. He breathed steadily, waiting for his
eyes to adjust, moved his hand along the wall, up, down, and there was the switch.
The wall lights were muted, part no doubt of the spa atmosphere they were trying to create down here, but it felt like nothing so much as a tomb to Sandro. A wide, deep corridor led away from him, a door to his right with a plaque, an etched icon of waves and steam in Art Deco style.
Centro Benessere/Spa Complex
, it read: a discreet slot beneath the door handle for a keycard.
Slowly he reached into his pocket for the bunch of keys. He’d decided to leave them with Lino rather than return to Cornell’s office; had it been at the back of his mind that he might find a last use for them? A metal and plastic key to his office, a large brass one to the front door of the building, the passkey he’d opened Athene’s door with, the plastic card marked
Spa
. Another, smaller, brass key. He turned it over in his hand, wondering. A cupboard? Lino’s cubbyhole in the foyer?
He slid the plastic card into the slot beside the steam room door without much expectation, but it sprang open with a soft click. Inside, it was dark, a smell of chlorine overlaid with eucalyptus, a dripping from further in. There was another slot inside the door, for the lights; he pushed the keycard in and saw dark slate walls, downlit, some glass panels. Out of habit he went after the source of the dripping and found a shower head, turned it tight off, came back to the door as quickly as he could.
Magda Scardino had heard Marjorie Cameron, locked in there. What had the Professor’s wife been doing down here?
Overhead, feet moved, muffled voices filtered down, a woman pleading with a man, although he couldn’t have said
which man and woman, nor even which language they were speaking. Sandro became aware, with a sense of dread, of the great weight of stone above him, the massive cornices and lintels and slabs imprisoning the sounds, turning them inhuman. And he saw something.
They were here and there around the city, allowing access to the ground floor and subterranean part of great palaces, carved or painted to resemble stonework but visible if you knew how and where to look. Another door, disguised in the marbled paintwork, at what Sandro had taken to be the dead end of the corridor. Reluctantly he took a step, and saw a tiny keyhole. Not bricked back up, after all. He looked down at the bunch in his hand.
Chapter Thirty-One
T
HE SUITCASES HAD BEEN
in the hall for a good hour already: Magda Scardino had recruited Mauro, poor sap, into lugging them down for her. The others had managed their own, even Juliet Fleming. Lino had offered to help her – the woman looked smaller and greyer every time he saw her. She’d shaken her head with a wintry little smile and turned to find her husband.
Lino had been widowed too long: what did he know? But when you looked at the Flemings together, to think he’d been the ambassador and she just the wife – she seemed like the one holding the reins. Maybe that was women for you.
The Americans were gone. Lino looked at his watch. They would be in the air, on their way to St Louis, Missouri. She’d tipped him as he opened the car door for them and he’d almost shaken his head, no; only came to his senses at the last moment. Did she know they knew? The Van Vleets wouldn’t be back, the lease would be re-sold. It was all an illusion, masters and servants, Lino knew that better than anyone, but a tip was a
tip. The notes rustled in his pocket.
There’d be no tip from Magda Scardino. Mauro had helped her only because he was a gentleman, not in the expectation of reward. A Sardinian.
The stacked suitcases had taken over the foyer now. Lino looked at them with a curious mixture of emotions. He wanted them out, cluttering up the cool marble perfection of his workspace; if he admitted it, he wanted the guests out too, all their murmuring in corridors. Perhaps he was in the wrong job. He had the feeling Cornell thought he was. But it was all a bit sudden; they were running, all right. And it wasn’t Lino’s job to stop them at the border, ask questions. Look what had happened to Sandro Cellini when he tried it. In the corridor Lino could hear voices.
It had been not much more than an hour since, no suitcases yet piled by the door, Sandro Cellini had come into the foyer with his briefcase under his arm, a funny look in his eyes.
He’d held out a hand, and Lino had taken it in confusion. ‘You all right?’ he said. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’
Cellini had just shaken his head and pulled a bunch of keys from his pocket. ‘See these get back to Miss Cornell, will you? They’re Vito’s keys. I’m done here. Going.’
‘Going?’ Lino hardly knew the guy, but he felt it like a thump in the chest. ‘No,’ he said feebly.
The keys sat in Cellini’s upturned palm. ‘Didn’t work out,’ the detective said, looking down then up into his face. ‘Have you ever been down in the basement, Lino? Seen the room down there?’
Oh, that, thought Lino. ‘It’s old wives’ tales,’ he said, uncertainly. ‘Superstition. It’s just a room, they bricked it back up, I
heard.’ He paused. ‘Someone said something about bloodstains, but I think . . . say it had been used as a cellar, once upon a time? A broken bottle of wine, is all.’
‘So no one goes down there now? Uses it . . . for anything? Storage, anything like that?’
Lino felt a prickle. ‘I don’t think so,’ he said. ‘Why?’
‘Vito had a key to it,’ said Cellini, and he picked up Lino’s hand, turned his own palm over and dropped the keys into it. ‘There was a chair, that’s all, nothing more. But I wouldn’t go down there again, not if you paid me. Never mind.’
Cellini turned away, but he didn’t go. He paused, then turned back.
‘That night,’ he said, and Lino knew straight away, which night. ‘Vito died between eleven and midnight. Van Vleet and Lludic were the only ones unaccounted for, you said.’
Lino shrugged uncomfortably, and despite himself he glanced over at the door to his little cubbyhole.
‘So you saw the others come in?’ said Cellini lightly.
‘Well, saw. . .’ Lino said uneasily. ‘I heard them. I was having a little . . . I was resting. It’s permitted. When I heard voices, I came out. Lady Fleming was talking to Mr Cameron, they were going inside. She said her husband was on the doorstep with his cigar.’
‘And did you see him?’
Lino wondered if Cornell might suddenly appear, or Bottai, to see Cellini off the premises, but there was no sign of them. He shook his head. ‘I was so tired,’ he said, suddenly not caring. ‘So I went back in.’ He nodded over to his cubbyhole. ‘In there. I only meant to close my eyes a moment, but when I woke up
again it was after twelve, no one was there.’ He sighed. ‘Except Miss Morris, I heard her down the corridor, talking to someone.’
Sandro Cellini looked at him then, weary, and in his gut Lino knew what he wanted to know.