Read Online Cold Tuscan Stone by David P Wagner - Free Book Online Page B

Mexico, but here the language was Italian, not Spanish.
    He checked his phone, saw that he had been sitting for a half hour, and wondered if he should inquire at the desk about Conti. Just at that moment the desk sergeant answered the phone. When he heard the voice his body stiffened slightly and he glanced over at Rick while nodding at the unseeing person on the other end of the line. After hanging up he looked back at Rick and smiled, again nodding slightly.
    Twenty minutes later Rick was the only occupant of the bench, like the worst player on the basketball team. He glanced up and saw a man in his sixties appear at the doorway and walk to the desk. The color of his baggy suit matched his thinning hair, and he walked as if his feet hurt. Must be another pensioner needing a permit of one sort or another. The sergeant, now on his feet, silently pointed to Rick with his chin and the new arrival strode to the bench. Rick stood up and shook the man’s hand.
    â€œSignor Montoya? Conti. Piacere . I very much regret that you have been kept waiting. Unfortunately it could not be avoided. Please come to my office.” Already annoyed by the wait, Rick was now disturbed by the thin smile on the Commissario’s face as they shook hands. Was Conti late on purpose, to show who was in charge? If the man got his enjoyment from such games, this could become a tedious exercise. Rick murmured an answer about not minding the wait and followed the man through the door, then along a wide corridor with doors off it at regular intervals. At its end was Conti’s office. The policeman motioned Rick to sit in a chair in front of the desk. Rick was expecting to be offered a coffee, but no offer was forthcoming.
    â€œAn unfortunate accident delayed me, Signor Montoya.” Conti settled into his institutional metal chair, leaning back with a slight squeak. “A man jumped to his death from a high wall at the north side of the city.” He looked at Rick as if waiting for him to answer.
    â€œI’m sorry to hear that,” Rick said, for lack of anything more profound.
    Conti continued to gaze at Rick for several seconds before speaking again. “Signor Montoya, I spoke to the man’s employer.” Another pause. “It seems that you were the last person to see the dead man before his fall.”
    â€œCanopo?” Rick immediately remembered the encounter outside the shoe shop and the man rushing off down the street.
    â€œThat is correct. Signor Landi said that you had left his store to visit their workshop. We checked, and apparently neither of you arrived there. Can you tell me what happened?” Conti eased his chair back and folded his hands over his stomach, but kept his eyes on Rick. The chair gave another squeak.
    â€œWe were together only briefly,” Rick began, trying to recall the details while gathering his thoughts. But they were difficult to gather. He had spent barely ten minutes with Canopo, but in that time they had somehow connected, like two strangers in a foreign land. “After we left the shop we went into a bar on the street and had coffee. As we were leaving he stopped to talk to someone, and—”
    â€œWho was that person?”
    â€œI have no idea. It was a man, I’m sure of that.”
    â€œDid you hear any of the conversation?”
    â€œNo, Commissario, Canopo stepped away from me and spoke to him at the entrance to a shoe store. When he finished the conversation and came back, he asked to postpone the visit to the workshop until tomorrow, since something had come up. Then he rushed off.”
    â€œWhat did the man look like?”
    â€œI didn’t really see much of him. He mostly had his back to me, and was inside the entrance to the shop.”
    â€œDid Canopo leave with this man?”
    â€œNo, after he gave me his excuses and hurried off, I didn’t see the other man.”
    â€œWhich way did Canopo go?”
    â€œDown the street,