“It’s pride!” Giancarlo said.
“Pride?” It was the last thing I’d expected to hear.
“I know it sounds stupid, but you have to understand the Italian concept of masculinity. If you’re going to do something better than your peers, you need to go about it carefully so as not to upset fragile male egos. Your alacrity and observations at the Monticchiello murders, and your ability to be so cold and professional when you handled the bodies of those two men, upset many of the local police, who were immobilised, many of them gagging, while you acted like a real policeman should.”
“I was a combat fighter in the war—”
“Yes, I know,” he said, holding up his hands in an effort to pacify me. “But their voices were heard by my superiors—probably egged on by Cristoforo Baldi—and we’ve been given a directive not to involve civilians in our investigation.”
“All right, then, tell me how to go about protecting these fragile masculine egos.”
“Well, you should take me aside, or whisper your thoughts to me privately. Then I can either proceed as if they were my own, or ask one of my men to look at whatever you observe, so that it becomes his discovery, not yours.”
I rolled my eyes and sighed. “It sounds like kindergarten, but if that’s the only way, then I agree.”
“Good. Because tomorrow, after you see Dr Ambrosio, you and I are going on a little drive.”
“Where to?”
“To Radi, of course. I want to show you the crime scene.”
*****
I’d had a mammoth sleep. A siesta that turned into nearly six hours. I’d woken up to hear Giancarlo at his typewriter, so had wandered down to his study and put my arms around him while he typed. That was how the conversation had started. He had described the Radi murders to me, checking his notes while I sat on the floor, my back resting against the wall.
For the second time there had been two men, both tortured in a similar way to the others: cigarette burns in the usual places, no genital mutilations this time, but a curious pattern cut into the flesh of their bellies. Two horizontal lines about five centimetres apart, dissected by six short horizontal lines, incised while they were still alive. Their clothes were found at the back of the abandoned house in which they’d been killed, hung up on a washing line, every item upside down. Both pairs of shoes had been burned in the wood heating stove inside the living room.
The manner of death appeared to be the same as the others: a long, thin blade inserted from above, entering the body behind the collarbone. The reason one had survived for a short while was because during the autopsy, it was found that he was a dextrocardiac: born with his heart on the right-hand side of his body. The killer had stabbed him several times in the same place and the man had eventually died from internal bleeding. There had been the faintest pulse when he’d been found, but he’d died in the ambulance on the way to hospital.
“Have you been to the charcoal-burner’s hut yet?” I asked.
“Yes, on the first day you were in hospital. Did you get a chance to look around inside when you were there?”
“No. I jumped in the window, only to hear the back door close, then collided with Ennio as he tried to get into the room and I tried to get out.”
“It’s an odd construction. One larger room, off it a long narrow store room with its own window. That’s where we think the second man was. We believe he jumped out of the window in the store room and followed after you and the killer.”
“That was risky. One of the Mori boys ran after me.”
“Yes, that was Marco. He would probably have saved you, had you not called out for him to stay where he was.”
“Or been clobbered himself,” I said.
“Yes, or killed. If we assume they were intending to kill the man in the hut, though, there was no sign of the weapon they used on the other victims. It’s likely that the second man had it.”
“Or the one I chased. I told you he hesitated. Maybe he was trying to work out how he could stab me?”
One thing was obvious. The police were no closer to catching the killer, but his timetable seemed to have ramped up recently. Four men killed and a fifth saved at the last minute, all in the space of twenty days. Could the escalation be the result of there being no reports of the more recent killings in the newspapers? The deaths at Radi had certainly been very public. There was no way the police could contain that information; in a town so tiny, too many of the locals were aware of what had happened.
*****
From a distance, Radi looked like one large house surrounded by supporting dwellings. Situated on a small hill, it was tiny.
I was incredibly surprised when Giancarlo pulled up in front of a house in the town itself. Not right in the centre, but perhaps the second house in the main street. A large padlock secured the door and the shutters on the ground floor and the floor above were secured shut.
“Here? This is where the murders took place?”
“Amazing, isn’t it.”
“I don’t understand why no one heard them being tortured,” I said. Giancarlo had told me that both men had been burned like the others, one of them not only around his anus but over all over his testicles and the head of his penis.
“This house and those adjacent on both sides of the street have been abandoned for decades. I told you the entire population is no more than twenty, some of whom live in small farms close by. There’s about a dozen who live in town and no one within a hundred metres from here. Besides, both men were gagged as well as blindfolded.”
“Nothing inserted?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Nothing this time, which says something in itself, don’t you think?”
“No humiliation involved,” I said, idly kicking my feet while I looked around the room. “May I go out the back?”
“Sure. The key to the back door is on the kitchen table.”
The clothes had been taken down from the washing line. It was thin hemp rope. Giancarlo leaned against the doorframe watching me. “Any thoughts?”
“They brought this with them.”
“How can you tell?”
“Come here,” I said. When he reached me, I rotated the rope between my hands in the opposite direction that it had been originally twisted. The grey exterior revealed a golden interior. “If this house has been empty for decades and this rope had been put up by the previous owners, it would have perished by now, or been grey right through to the core. The rain would have seen to that.”
“So …?”
“I’ve had a rather gruesome thought.”
“You think this rope was used to tie the men up?”
“Yes. And because of its length, I wonder if they were both tied up side by side, cigarette burns alternating between them, so each could hear the other suffer, then the rope was used afterwards to make an improvised washing line on which to string up their clothes. Also, if you examine it and compare it to the rope that was used to tie me up and the man in the charcoal-burner’s hut, you might find it’s the same thickness and twist. Maybe the killer has access to a large quantity of it?”
I couldn’t get that image out of my mind: the man in the hut, a gruesome triangle, his arse in the air, his hands and feet tied, offered up as a perfect victim for torture.
“Why the arseholes, Giancarlo? Nipples and underarms are just as sensitive and easier to access. Why do the killers have a fetish about burning that particular part of the body and then inserting objects into their victims? Is it sexual, do you think?”
“It’s on my list of questions to put to the man in hospital when he’s well enough to be interviewed. But …”
“But what?”
“An empty crumpled packet of Chesterfield cigarettes. One of the local zitelle knocked on the door while we were investigating and handed it in to one of the local police, saying they might find it interesting. The cop put it in his pocket and forgot about it until I was just about to leave.”
“Did she say where she found it?”
“No, no one thought to ask. Why?”
“Maybe that’s where they parked their car?”
“I’ll see if anyone in town knows who she was.”
“I’m confused why she should think it was so important to hand it in.”
“I wondered that too.”
We soon found out why she’d found it so important. We ran into an older gentleman in the street, who directed us to the house in which the elderly lady lived. I couldn’t understand a word of what she said, and neither could Giancarlo. She understood everything he asked her in Italian, but her dialect was so thick that even he had a hard time following her. Fortunately, she was good-humoured and indicated we should follow her into the house, making us sit while she made coffee and brought out a plate of home-made biscuits and a glass of water for us each. She then took her walking stick and banged loudly against the wall of the room in which we sat. A few minutes later, a woman about the same age joined us. She translated.
It seemed our hostess, Signorina Rizzo, came from Sicily, her sister having married the owner of the house in which she now lived. As her sister had only died earlier this year, she’d always had her as a go-between and had never felt the need to learn to speak Italian.
“She handed in the cigarette packet because of the man who’d dropped it,” the neighbour translated.
I sensed Giancarlo tense in his seat; he leaned forward a bit, then asked the neighbour to enquire about the man. I waited during the back-and-forth conversation, anxious to know what had been said. Eventually, Giancarlo sighed, sat back in his seat and had a sip of his coffee—I’d finished mine and eaten three biscuits in the meantime.
“She said that about a quarter to eight that night, as the light was getting very dim, a car pulled up in the field behind her house. There used to be a carriageway to the ‘big house’ in the centre of town that ran behind this row of houses. They never get cars in Radi, so she peered around the edge of her upstairs curtains. Two people were sitting in the front seat of the car, smoking. She could see the tips of their cigarettes glowing in the dark. After about five minutes, a man got out of the car and seemed to be urinating in the grass. He flicked his cigarette onto the ground, fumbled in his pocket, then threw something away.”
“Did he get out of the driver’s or passenger seat?” I asked.
He spoke with her interpreter again and the conversation seemed very lengthy for such a simple question. “Driver’s side. She’s never been in a car, so I had to ask her how it was orientated. Anyway, strangers frighten her. She banged on her neighbour’s wall, but her friend was having supper with her son who lives on the other side of the village. She fell asleep in the armchair in her bedroom and was woken by a gunshot, like everyone else. She always picks wild greens for salad, so mid-morning she went out with her basket; that’s when she found the cigarette packet and took it to the local policeman who was standing outside the house, telling him what she’d seen. I tell you, Damson, I’ll kick that man’s ass from here to glory when I get hold of him.”
“Gunshot? What gunshot?”
“We think the killers wanted to prevent us from keeping these murders secret. They fired a shot in the air early in the morning and it woke everyone in the village. They left the front door open and left; that’s how the bodies were discovered.”
“Did she get a good look at the man? Anything peculiar about him? His hat, or his hair colour if he wasn’t wearing one? Clothes? Height? Anything would be helpful.”
Of course, the answer came back as I expected: it was too dark to see any details. However, if she’d been able to see something as small as a crumpled cigarette pack being discarded, I think her eyesight was predicated on her level of fear and not wishing to get any more involved than she had been. After all, two men had been killed fifty metres from her front door.
*****
I declined the offer to revisit the charcoal-burner’s hut, not because I felt anxious about returning, but simply because everything that had happened there was still fresh in my mind and I didn’t need to return. I could close my eyes and revisit the scene clearly.
We arrived at the trattoria about an hour after leaving Radi; lunch was in full swing. Poor Signor Marino looked exhausted. I tried to apologise for not being able to work for him on Sunday, but he shushed me, asking how could I?
It was good to sit outside in the sun. The day was one of those glorious hot days with a good breeze. I could almost smell the flintiness of the market square’s paving stones as the sun beat down on them. In the background was the soft chirp of cicadas, so different from the strong, sometimes almost deafening rhythmic beat of those at home in the Australian outback.
“What are you thinking about, Damson?” Giancarlo asked.
“I was thinking about home.”
“Do you miss it?”
“It’s in my mind every day and I do miss it, but I’m very happy to be here … with you.”
He turned his head and studied something in the distance. I knew it for what it was—a way of not showing a strong emotion in public. “I’m happy too … and grateful.”
“Grateful?”
“Grateful that we’ve become friends.”
“I think we’ve well and truly passed the point of being just friends, don’t you?”
He was about to say something when we were interrupted by the arrival of Fabrizio, who took off his jacket, put it over the back of his chair and sat down with a huge sigh, stretching his arms above his head. “Buongiorno,” he said.
“It’s afternoon,” Giancarlo said. “Nearly one in the afternoon. Why are you so happy?”
“My mother-in-law is looking after the children. My wife and I had our first morning alone in months.”
“Ah, I see,” Giancarlo replied with a smile.
“And you,” Fabrizio said, playfully punching my arm, “how are you feeling? You must be blessing every second of every minute of every hour.”
“Well, I’m happy enough, and so hungry I could eat your lunch too, but why do you say that?”
He looked at me awkwardly. “I’m sorry. I think I’ve said the wrong thing.”
“No, go ahead, say what you were going to.”
He glanced at Giancarlo then leaned forward, placing his hand over the back of mine. “Forget it, Damson. I’m just glad, as you must be, that you didn’t end up like those other victims.”
I had one of those lightbulb moments. I hadn’t thought of it. The killer and his partner had tied me up and left me to be found. Why hadn’t they killed me? It would have been safer for them. I had followed one of them and had him on his knees in front of me. Who knew what I might have noticed?
I stared at Giancarlo. It was obvious too that the thought hadn’t crossed his mind either. Why had they left me tied up and still breathing? They’d known there were two other men with me who would have undoubtedly raised the alarm and people would have come looking for me. Had they thought that I was so badly injured that I’d just perish if not found? No, it couldn’t be that. From what I’d heard, Marco had become disorientated in the dark and the search the next morning had headed off in totally the wrong direction; that was why they hadn’t found me until later in the day.
“Why didn’t they kill me?” I asked.
“Maybe they thought you wouldn’t be found? Perhaps they thought you—”
“I didn’t fit the profile!” I said, slamming my hand on the table. “That’s why. We know they select victims. Perhaps they draw the line at killing bystanders … the people they kill have to fit some sort of brief.”
Fabrizio listened to my rant. I’d spoken in haste in English. Giancarlo translated what I’d said. Fabrizio shrugged then gave me a rather sad look.
“What?” I asked him.
“Perhaps they didn’t kill you because they know who you are?”
“What do you mean, know who I am? Are you suggesting they are people we know here in Pienza?”
“No, not that. You are well-known around town, a foreigner,” Fabrizio said. “If anything happened to you, we’d have to call in senior police from Rome and your consulate might get involved. None of their victims has been identifiable, except for the doctor at Montevarchi, but someone like you, a novelist, one of our community … every man, woman and child in Pienza and for kilometres around would be on the lookout for the killers. It wouldn’t be strangers murdered in abandoned houses, it would be one of us!”
I had to admit that I hadn’t thought of that angle.
“I’m sorry, have I upset you?” Fabrizio asked.
I shook my head. “Five, six years ago I was aware of my own mortality every day of the week. I’ve just become unused to it,” I said, then had to get Giancarlo to translate because my Italian had failed me for the first time in ages.
Lunch was a favourite of mine: Signora Marino’s hand-cut tagliatelle alla puttanesca. The combination of black olives, garlic, capers and anchovies with the trattoria’s passata was heady and moreish. I’d have had a second plate had I not seen other diners tucking into large two-finger-thick pork chops cooked on the grill with broccoli and patate in padella—potatoes tossed in oil and rosemary, browned in a skillet. I desperately wanted to pick up the chop bone and gnaw on it, but had learned that it wasn’t considered the right thing to do in Italy. I realised I was staring at it. Giancarlo had teased me about my brutish Australian eating habits when it came to bones: chicken, beef, lamb, and pork, I loved to chew on them after I’d eaten the meat.
“I had a letter from Renzo,” Fabrizio said, noticing what to him must have seemed a very odd concentration on the remains of my meal.
“Oh? I haven’t heard from him in a while,” I replied. “I guess he’s very busy.”
“You know you sometimes use French words and turn them into Italian,” he said with a big grin. We’d started to become friends. He liked to tease me and I didn’t mind.
“What did Signor Donati have to say?”
“He’s racing his motorbike with his friend Vito. They won some money last weekend, so he’s thinking of entering some professional races.”
“I doubt his Moto Guzzi will compete with some of the newer motorbikes. It’s a very good—”
“He bought a new one. Something German,” Fabrizio said.
I said nothing. I wanted to be angry, to explain the time and effort and … care, I’d put into that machine, but realised my reaction was simply being disappointed once more by a person I’d thought was a friend.
“What else did he say?”
“Just that he was very busy at work and that he was taking three days off work to go to Naples to see the professional motorbike races.”
“You’d think if he could take three days off he might come back here and visit his friends and colleagues,” Giancarlo said. I could tell he was annoyed too, probably on my behalf, but from the tone in Fabrizio’s voice it was obvious that he’d also been disappointed. They’d been very good mates.
After lunch, we decided to walk around to the Bar Azzurro to have a coffee and a digestivo before I headed back home for a siesta. My head still ached and the stitches were beginning to itch. Dr Ambrosio had said this was a good sign, telling me it was an indication the scar was healing.
“I’ve just had a thought,” I said, as we three walked arm in arm—something that would have been unthinkable in my own country. “The car at Radi: if the killers drive to where they commit their murders, where did they park near the charcoal-burner’s hut? They must have driven. I can’t imagine them frog-marching the victim through the woods.”
We took a table at the café and ordered.
“There’s a narrow track off the dirt road from Montefollonico to Madonnino that leads to the charcoal-burner’s hut. It’s narrow, and there are no spaces to pull over and park a car,” Fabrizio said. “The only place the car could have been parked was either on the track itself, in which case they’d have had to reverse all the way back to the road, or in the clearing itself, in which case they could then have turned it around. Are you sure you didn’t see a car?”
“To be honest, I was more intent on getting to the hut. I did do a quick scan of the area to make sure no one else was around, but a car could have been parked on the opposite side of the clearing with the hut blocking my view. Do you think it’s worth checking in case anything else was discarded nearby?”
“I’ll get two men on it,” Giancarlo said.
“I can do that if you like,” Fabrizio said.
Giancarlo thanked him then turned to me. “What are your plans for the afternoon, Damson?”
“I have tomatoes coming out of my ears, so I’ll spend half an hour in the garden. I should never have planted so many. I have jars and jars of passata and bottled tomatoes, chutneys. There’s probably another two bucketfuls to pick—”
“I’ll take them,” a voice said from behind me, in English.
“Cesco!” I was delighted to see him. “Where have you been?”
“To Rome again. But you? I heard what happened. Are you all right? That’s a spectacular number of stitches on the back of your head.”
“Bit of a headache now and again, but that’s all. I’m lucky, I suppose.”
“Did you get a good look at them?”
“Them?”
“Oh, sorry … the story’s all over town.”
“He’s lucky he isn’t dead,” Fabrizio said.
“Well, from what I hear, you’re all heroes for saving his life. What a terrible thing to happen.”
“You said the story’s all over town?” Giancarlo asked.
“I only got back this morning and not only did Ennio Mori tell me, but I also ran into Signor Gagliardi, who has an ear in every corner of the town—mostly gossip from the boys he teaches.”
The very slight narrowing at the corner of Giancarlo’s eyes made me aware that he wasn’t at all pleased to hear that news had got out when he had been trying so hard to contain it.
“To answer your question, Cesco, no, I didn’t get a look at the man I was chasing. It was dark and he had his back to me.”
“That’s a shame. It might have been helpful tracking down this maniac.”
“Well, thank you for thinking of me.”
“Do you need help with anything, Damson?” he asked.
“No. Everything’s in hand.”
“Cristoforo is in town for the party tonight. I hope you’ll feel well enough to attend. We thought we might have a swim at your pool this afternoon, seeing as it’s so hot. Do you mind? We’ll take the back road and walk through the bushes so we don’t disturb you.”
“No, I don’t mind. You heard me say that I have a small amount of gardening to do; after that I’ll have a siesta. But—‘the party tonight’? What have I forgotten?”
“It’s the mayor’s wife’s fiftieth, although we’ve been told to pretend she’s only thirty-five,” he replied. “Surely you got the invitation?”
“It’s probably in the mail I haven’t opened.”
“I told you about it when you were in hospital,” Giancarlo said. “Don’t you remember? I had Randy post your tuxedo.”
“Randy?” Cesco asked.
“A mutual friend from Florence,” I explained, then replied to Giancarlo, “No, I don’t remember. Perhaps I’ll come. The town has been very welcoming to me, although I might only stay for an hour. Is everyone going?”
“My mother-in-law will be looking after the children,” Fabrizio said. “We’ll be there, as will everyone else you know. I think they said there were to be about sixty guests.”
“That’s more people than I’ve seen together at the same time in Pienza since I arrived, even at mass.”
“Well, I must get going,” Cesco said. “I’ll see you tonight.”
“I’ll leave a bucket of tomatoes outside my back door for you if you want to make the trek up to the house and pick them up.”
“I’ll drive round on my Vespa after we’ve had a swim. There’s no way to your side of the pool from the other side. I’ll park up near the gate so I don’t disturb your rest.”
He waved goodbye, then Giancarlo caught my eye. I raised my eyebrow at him, but he glanced at Fabrizio. I understood it as I’ll tell you later. Fabrizio left us about ten minutes later, so I asked Giancarlo why he hadn’t spoken in English when he’d indicated there was something he didn’t want to say in front of his colleague.
“I had an evil thought,” he said with a smile.
“Maybe I had the same one? Did it include accidentally stumbling out onto our rock ledge while Cesco was fucking Baldi?”
“Maybe,” he said, grinning broadly. “I hate that lazy bastard. It would be good to make him feel embarrassed.”
“Who says he’d be embarrassed? Maybe he’d like to be caught with his arse in the air?”
*****
A few hours later, and despite Cesco saying there was no way to walk from the other side of the pool to my side, I watched Baldi walk naked up to my back door, pick up the bucket of tomatoes I’d left there, and wander back down the driveway towards the pool.
I’d not been able to sleep well. It was too hot and I’d got out of bed, found my pipe, tamped it and lit it, then discarded it because I’d become too used to cigarettes. I was leaning on the sill of my bedroom window, wondering when it would be time to start picking apples and pears, when, through the leaves of the olive trees, I’d seen the shape of a person coming towards the house. It was a fairly brazen thing for Baldi to do, especially with his swimming trunks over his shoulder. What would have happened if anyone had turned up to pray at the shrine? But I guessed he’d checked before taking off his trunks and had done it hoping I’d see him. He didn’t glance up. Had he done so, I was prepared to wave then close my bedroom windows. I didn’t want him knocking on the back door with his dick on display.
When I told Giancarlo after he’d returned from work, he shook his head, agreeing with me. What was it with Baldi? I’d made it perfectly clear I wasn’t interested in him sexually, yet he’d continued to flirt even after I’d indicated that his attentions weren’t welcome.
“Maybe he wants some of this?” Giancarlo asked, his hand wound around my erection. We’d just finished round one and I was ready for a repeat performance.
“How would he have any idea what I have between my legs?”
“You said you and Cesco went swimming together. You have to admit yours is impressive even when it’s hanging long and loose.”
“Is that description something you read in one of your Arabic pornographic books?”
He laughed. “Who needs a pornographic book when I have you?”
I pushed him onto his back and got my knees between his legs. “My turn?” I asked.
“Take your time,” he murmured, pulling my head down for a kiss. “I’m in the mood.”
“So am I. Must be your lucky day, Manetti.”
*****
I was rather more than surprised when, after I’d congratulated her on her birthday, the mayor’s wife presented me with a copy of Living with Ghosts and asked me to sign it. She freely admitted she didn’t speak a word of English, but wanted to show her support for the new member of her community.
To Signora Granchi, the Lady Mayoress, on the occasion of her thirty-fifth birthday, I wrote, to be greeted with a delighted blush after Giancarlo had translated what I’d written in English.
“You know how to charm them,” Cesco said. He’d been hovering close to us all evening. I didn’t mind, except that I could tell that Giancarlo, although he didn’t dislike him, wanted to mingle with some of the other guests.
Cesco disappeared when Giancarlo’s associate, Onofrio, joined us. We were among perhaps only a dozen of the men wearing black tie, the rest in their Sunday best. The women, however, seemed to be all dressed to the nines. Signora Gagliardi, who I met for the first time, even wore a sparkling necklace and matching earrings—the family diamonds, so it was whispered to me by Signora Marino.
Toasts were given, glasses of prosecco raised in tribute to the guest of honour’s birthday, after which sliding doors to a side room were opened, revealing a long table laden with food. Two of the staff from the Bar Azzurro acted as servers, ready to fill the plates of each guest with their preferred choices before a pair of waiters brought them to the tables spread around the large hall. As I’d noticed at the reception after my book-signing, Italians didn’t seem to make a bun-rush for the food. They continued to chat, only one or two couples wandering into the dining area. A few waiters roamed among those of us who had remained in the room, carrying salvers with small plates and finger food for those who didn’t want to sit to eat a full meal.
I scanned the room to see where Cesco had gone. I found him standing at his cousin’s side. Baldi had steered clear of me since we’d arrived, nodding a cursory hello then quickly averting his eyes. I had no idea why, but couldn’t care less; he and Cesco were chatting with Fabrizio, his wife, and Silvio, the man who’d jumped off the bus to stay with me on the day I’d discovered the body in the garden. Silvio’s sister was with them, a pleasant woman who spoke a smattering of French. She was delightful.
“Where are you going?” Giancarlo asked me as I excused myself. He’d just enquired whether I was ready to go into the dining room to eat; we were both very hungry.
“I’m going to find Stefano. I saw him earlier and now he seems to have disappeared. There’s no way he’d sit down with us to eat, so he’s probably scampered off to some dark corner.”
“I think he cares more about what people think than they do.”
“I’m not so sure. Ever since he mentioned it, I’ve noticed the downcast eyes and the glances away whenever I’ve walked down the street with him.”
“Tell him that I’ll come looking for him after I’ve eaten, but I’ll wait until you return so we can sit down together.”
I told him there was no need, but he smiled and said he’d prefer to wait.
Stefano wasn’t hard to find. I headed outside into the courtyard, straight to the spot where I’d first chatted with Giancarlo on the night the mayor had hosted a welcome party for the detectives. He was leaning against a column, one hand in his trouser pocket, smoking a cigarette.
“Ciao, bello,” I said.
“Flattery will get you nowhere, Inglese,” he said with a soft laugh. “I’m not for turning.”
“What about your gentleman friend in the brothel in Grosseto who sucks your cock?”
“Ah, that’s different; the girl is there at the same time.” He winked with his good eye. It made me smile.
“Why does everyone insist on still calling me the Englishman? That bloody bus driver, Franco, has a lot to answer for.” This was a complex sentence; I stumbled over the verbs and tenses.
“I know you’ve explained the word ‘bloody’ to me before, but you can’t just translate it into Italian.”
I repeated my phrase, substituting a far filthier word. He laughed out loud.
“Will you eat something if I bring it out to you?” I asked. “There are some tasty-looking canapés being circulated inside. I could bring you a small selection if you like?”
“No. Thank you for the thought, Damson, I ate before we left home.”
I put one hand on his shoulder. “It won’t be long now. When is your surgery?”
“November,” he replied. “I’m so nervous you wouldn’t believe it.”
“From what I understand, from what the doctor told you and your parents, you’ll be much improved but still have some scarring. Don’t worry, Stefano, I’ve seen other people in Italy with bad facial scarring and no one seems to notice.”
“It’s the gap in my cheek—”
“I understand; you don’t have to explain it to me. Now, Giancarlo said he’ll come out and join you as soon as we’ve eaten. I’m going back in now. Whatever painkillers Dr Ambrosio has given me have given me an appetite.”
“Tell him to take his time; I’m used to waiting.”
“He won’t be long.” Then, as I left him, said over my shoulder, “Nice jacket, by the way.”
“Thanks,” he replied. “It’s one of Cesco’s. He gave it to me about three months ago. Have a look at how modern it is. He said he’d only had it for a few months but decided the colour didn’t suit him.” He did a turn, so I walked back, inspecting it, then fingered the fabric of the lapel.
“Nice,” I said. “What colour is it? Blue? It’s hard to tell in this light.”
“It’s grey,” he replied.
I ran my hand over the sleeve, hesitating momentarily, but forcing myself to sound neutral despite the ice in my belly. “When did you say he gave it to you?”
“Hmm, let me think. It was early April. I remember now, it was the day you first came to work for my parents, the week you arrived in Pienza.” He snapped his fingers. “That’s right, it was the sixth of April. I’m sure of it.”
“What else did he give you that day?”
“Why, Damson? Are you jealous? Need hand-me-downs like me, too?”
I laughed, then shook his hand, telling him Giancarlo would be with him soon. He might be delayed, I thought, after I told him what I’d discovered. One of the buttons on the sleeve vent of Stefano’s jacket was missing. And I’d be buggered if the picture in my mind hadn’t matched it exactly to the button Renzo had found wedged between the floor tiles in my living room.