Read Online The Marshal at the Villa Torrini by Magdalen Nabb - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Magdalen Nabb
Tags: Suspense
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the company commander. Didn't you hear what I said? Don't look like that, it's not the end of the world. Just keep your eyes and ears open more . . .'
They crossed back over the river.
'Don't go in, I'll get out here. You go and eat and I'll walk back. Do me good.'
Fara's face was pink. He was perplexed and embarrassed. He drove back to Pitti thinking that before things got any worse he should try and find someone who could give him a word of advice.
Captain Maestrangelo was, indeed, a serious man. Journalists on the local paper, La Nazione, referred to him—though not to his face—as The Tomb. A nickname indicative both of his solemnity and the amount of chat and information to be extracted from him.
Nevertheless, it would be an even more serious man who could resist just a flicker of amusement at the sight of Guarnaccia, hands planted squarely on his big knees, a deep furrow between his brows, come to confess that he'd failed to solve a most intractable case in one and a half days. The flicker was an internal one. The Captain had no intention of offending the Marshal for whom he had a respect which Guarnaccia would not have believed had he known about it. Besides, he'd already guessed where the real problem lay, and that Guarnaccia would get to the point. Eventually. Over the years he'd become accustomed to the Sicilian baroque as expressed by the Marshal. The longest, most complicated line between points A and B. It was a slow business, but experience told him it got slower if you tried to block a curlicue and nudge him towards the horizontal. The result was invariably a flourish of minor curlicues to cover the embarrassing glimpse of the horizontal pointing straight at point B. Sometimes, the Marshal lost his way in the minor curlicues. So the Captain held his peace apart from suitable murmurs on request.
'After all, if he does have another woman, he must have friends who know . . .'
'Surely.'
The Marshal gazed down at his hands for some time and then emitted a brief sigh that was almost a snort.
'And money . . . I don't know what a writer would earn . . .'
'No.'
'But there could be money, family money. The daughter hasn't turned up yet and, of course, I can't even be sure there wasn't someone else there. Though you'd think if there had been, Forbes wouldn't have lost an opportunity to shift the blame. He was drunk, though. It's a funny business . . . man lying drunk next door to his wife's body.'
He consulted his hands again. The Captain, very discreetly, consulted his watch. But still he held his peace.
'Not a mark on her. Not a scratch or the tiniest bruise. And nothing at all in her stomach, clean as a whistle. So why should a perfectly healthy young woman faint or something . . .'
'Perhaps because of the empty stomach. Women go on excessive diets sometimes, I believe.'
The remark had the effect of an electric shock on the Marshal. He sat bolt upright, his face red. 'I never thought . . .'
'Well, I wouldn't get too hopeful about it, just check it out.'
The Marshal sat there looking stunned.
'I know it must be difficult for you,' prompted the Captain against his better judgement. 'It's a bit much for you to take on when your only really experienced man is Lorenzini and he has to be in the office when you're out. I'd send you someone if I could—I know what it's like when you're feeling under pressure from a prosecutor who forgets you've also got a whole Quarter to police—'
'No, no,' protested the embarrassed Marshal to his shoe. He then fixed his gaze on a seventeenth-century landscape in oils on the wall to his left and discoursed doggedly on staffing problems for seven minutes.
The Captain felt he was losing his grip. He'd done precisely what he knew he shouldn't have done and, after all, it was perfectly comprehensible that the Marshal couldn't bring himself to come here openly protesting about the Substitute Prosecutor he'd been given, like a schoolboy unhappy with his new teacher.
With
They crossed back over the river.
'Don't go in, I'll get out here. You go and eat and I'll walk back. Do me good.'
Fara's face was pink. He was perplexed and embarrassed. He drove back to Pitti thinking that before things got any worse he should try and find someone who could give him a word of advice.
Captain Maestrangelo was, indeed, a serious man. Journalists on the local paper, La Nazione, referred to him—though not to his face—as The Tomb. A nickname indicative both of his solemnity and the amount of chat and information to be extracted from him.
Nevertheless, it would be an even more serious man who could resist just a flicker of amusement at the sight of Guarnaccia, hands planted squarely on his big knees, a deep furrow between his brows, come to confess that he'd failed to solve a most intractable case in one and a half days. The flicker was an internal one. The Captain had no intention of offending the Marshal for whom he had a respect which Guarnaccia would not have believed had he known about it. Besides, he'd already guessed where the real problem lay, and that Guarnaccia would get to the point. Eventually. Over the years he'd become accustomed to the Sicilian baroque as expressed by the Marshal. The longest, most complicated line between points A and B. It was a slow business, but experience told him it got slower if you tried to block a curlicue and nudge him towards the horizontal. The result was invariably a flourish of minor curlicues to cover the embarrassing glimpse of the horizontal pointing straight at point B. Sometimes, the Marshal lost his way in the minor curlicues. So the Captain held his peace apart from suitable murmurs on request.
'After all, if he does have another woman, he must have friends who know . . .'
'Surely.'
The Marshal gazed down at his hands for some time and then emitted a brief sigh that was almost a snort.
'And money . . . I don't know what a writer would earn . . .'
'No.'
'But there could be money, family money. The daughter hasn't turned up yet and, of course, I can't even be sure there wasn't someone else there. Though you'd think if there had been, Forbes wouldn't have lost an opportunity to shift the blame. He was drunk, though. It's a funny business . . . man lying drunk next door to his wife's body.'
He consulted his hands again. The Captain, very discreetly, consulted his watch. But still he held his peace.
'Not a mark on her. Not a scratch or the tiniest bruise. And nothing at all in her stomach, clean as a whistle. So why should a perfectly healthy young woman faint or something . . .'
'Perhaps because of the empty stomach. Women go on excessive diets sometimes, I believe.'
The remark had the effect of an electric shock on the Marshal. He sat bolt upright, his face red. 'I never thought . . .'
'Well, I wouldn't get too hopeful about it, just check it out.'
The Marshal sat there looking stunned.
'I know it must be difficult for you,' prompted the Captain against his better judgement. 'It's a bit much for you to take on when your only really experienced man is Lorenzini and he has to be in the office when you're out. I'd send you someone if I could—I know what it's like when you're feeling under pressure from a prosecutor who forgets you've also got a whole Quarter to police—'
'No, no,' protested the embarrassed Marshal to his shoe. He then fixed his gaze on a seventeenth-century landscape in oils on the wall to his left and discoursed doggedly on staffing problems for seven minutes.
The Captain felt he was losing his grip. He'd done precisely what he knew he shouldn't have done and, after all, it was perfectly comprehensible that the Marshal couldn't bring himself to come here openly protesting about the Substitute Prosecutor he'd been given, like a schoolboy unhappy with his new teacher.
With
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