Colin was gone when I rose the next morning, off to meet Darius somewhere. He’d left a letter he’d written to Kat, with room on the last page for me to add greetings. It read like a lighthearted travelogue. I scrawled a message at the bottom, thanking her for letting us use her house, but did not expand on her father’s fiction that everything was fine. She might forgive him for misleading her, but I was unlikely to receive the same treatment. I left it on a tray to go out with the afternoon post and collected the envelopes that had already been delivered. The day was unusually warm, so I decided to have my tea and toast in the open air of the roof terrace, with its sweeping views of the city. A missive from the boys had arrived, and I was reading it, laughing despite myself at Henry’s account of having tricked his brothers into joining him on a snipe hunt.
As your own dear friend Mrs. Michaels was the source of my information about this novel American tradition, I know you will not scold me for what I’ve done. The snipe is not real, Mama, so there was no danger that any of us would get shot.
The image of three armed (and preternaturally articulate) seven-year-olds would have terrified me if I’d not first read the other letter contained in the envelope, written by the gamekeeper at Anglemore Park, our estate in Derbyshire. He explained that the young master had asked for his help and that he’d agreed, thinking it was wiser to have the expedition supervised than not. He’d made sure the shotguns weren’t loaded and accompanied the boys on their trek across our land. Cook, he added, consoled them afterward with their favorite pudding.
Henry’s version of the events was decidedly more colorful. Richard, always the most likely of the three to believe any sort of legend, exhibited excitement unmatched by Tom, but he had been disappointed by his inability to find any information on the snipe in our library.
He considered it a great failing of our collection, never once suspecting the absence was due not to oversight but to the snipe not existing in real life. He wanted to send a wire to Papa before we set out, asking for books to be ordered. I stopped this foolishness not to spare my brother embarrassment but because if Papa replied fast enough it might have ruined the hunt. Please take note of my honesty in making this confession to less-than-gentlemanly motives. Tom proved an excellent tracker, following signs of an animal that turned out to be one of Papa’s foxhounds (I am certain it was Iphitos, but Richard wrongly insists it was Pollux. You shouldn’t believe him—he does not know the dogs so well as I). Both of them were angry when I told them they were hunting an imaginary animal but if they are man enough to acknowledge the truth, they will admit they enjoyed the excursion, even if I might be accused of laughing rather too much when I revealed I’d duped them. I expect to be in disgrace when you return home. I ask only that you remember I did not go so far as Americans do. They leave their victims alone all night, still trying to find a snipe. I told my brothers the truth once Richard’s loud attempts at calling the beast started to get on my nerves.
“What is so amusing?” Cécile asked, dropping onto the chair next to mine. She’d slept even later than I, yet still appeared fatigued. Her eyes were puffy, but her skin glowed.
“Henry has played a rather successful prank on his brothers,” I said. “I’m glad to have learned about it while away, so I can laugh openly instead of having to look stern. Did you sleep well?”
“Henry is a dear boy and I’d appreciate your not mentioning how dreadful I look,” she said. “I was up late.”
“Doing what?” I wondered if she’d gone out with Signore Tazzera after Colin and I retired. It would explain the glow.
“Nothing that concerns you.” She poured herself a cup of coffee. “What did Monsieur Hargreaves have to say about the gun?”
“Very little beyond its being Russian,” I said.
“Russian?” She frowned. “Is that significant?”
“Marzo works for the British, reporting to Darius. I don’t know how that could connect to Russia, but Vittoria’s story compels me to think there is something—was something—between Marzo and Signore di Taro. We’ve seen the dead man’s street. Why would Marzo have randomly decided to include it on his walks with the girl?”
“Maybe like Carlo, he was inspired by a pretty face.”
“The description certainly applies to Vittoria, but Marzo showed little interest in her. He was using her as an excuse to be in the neighborhood.”
“And the street was not a place one would go to without a specific purpose,” Cécile said. “I wonder … do you think Lena knows about Vittoria?”
“I can’t imagine she does.”
“Marzo made no attempt to even kiss Vittoria, but he must have wanted something from her, and I agree that something was an excuse to be near Signore di Taro’s house. If he was seen frequently in the vicinity for a period of time before the murder, it would be far less likely that anyone would take notice of him on the day of the crime,” Cécile said. “Given that we have no reason to suspect there was anything romantic between him and Vittoria, he might well have told Lena what he was doing.”
I folded Henry’s letter and slipped it back into its envelope. “Colin said that the manner of Signore di Taro’s murder suggests assassination. Marzo needed money to afford the house Lena wanted. Perhaps in the course of his work for the British, he came across an underground network of odious individuals who offer murder for hire and decided to work for them in an effort to earn something on the side.”
“An underground network of odious individuals who offer murder for hire?” Cécile asked. I braced myself for her reply, but she did not heap scorn upon me as I’d expected. “This, Kallista, sounds most promising. We all know there are evil men who lurk in the shadows, bidding others to do their dirty deeds. I’ve read enough of Monsieur Le Queux’s book to know spies and those who work with them come into contact with this sort of person more than an ordinary man.”
“I admit it’s something of a ludicrous theory, but it may have some merit. Let’s talk to Lena.”
We walked directly to her father’s shop in the Oltrarno, but she was not there, and Signore Bastieri had no idea where she’d gone.
“Marzo’s funeral was yesterday,” he explained. “As you can imagine, she was terribly upset. I struggled to get her home afterward. She could hardly walk. A foreign gentleman offered his carriage and I was glad to accept. When I woke up this morning, she was gone.”
“Who was the gentleman?” I asked.
“I don’t know his name. It was difficult to understand his accent, which was quite heavy. It appeared that he’d been at the funeral, too, so I saw no harm in accepting his kindness. I didn’t have much time to think about it, as I was afraid Lena was on the verge of collapse.”
“What did he look like?”
“He was wearing a top hat and a scarf. I remember his hair was on the dark side and he had a large moustache. Not too old, not too young.”
“Did he accompany you in the carriage?”
“No, Lady Emily, he did not. He said his home was not far away and, as he could see we needed the carriage more than he, he would happily leave it to us and walk.”
“He lives in Florence?” I asked.
“I assume so,” Signore Bastieri said. “He said home, not hotel, and has a carriage here.”
“Did you recognize his accent?”
“It was foreign, but I couldn’t tell you from where. Does it matter?”
“Could it have been Russian?”
“It might have been. It sounded vaguely Eastern.”
It wasn’t firm confirmation, but better than nothing. “Did Lena receive any messages after you got home?”
“No,” her father said, “but something came for her this morning. She left the envelope on the kitchen table. I will get it for you.”
He disappeared upstairs and returned with an envelope that was perfectly ordinary in every way but one: it had been sealed with wax, stamped with an impression of a coat of arms bearing a bat, an arrow, and a caltrap. What could this mean? Had Lena been searching for the treasure hidden in our house? And, if so, had she angered someone else who also sought it?
“Mon dieu,” Cécile said.
“Is this something bad?” Signore Bastieri asked. “Should I be worried?”
“I wouldn’t say it’s necessarily bad, but as to whether you should worry…” I looked at him and saw the concern in his eyes. I had to tell him the truth. “I’m afraid I would be worried.”
“I will summon the police and ask them to start a search for her.”
“She hasn’t been gone long enough for them to believe she’s missing, and it is entirely possible she decided to go for a walk or to the market or something else wholly innocuous. Signora du Lac and I will see what we can find out. Lena told me if she ever needed to contact me, she would leave a note at Dante’s cenotaph in Santa Croce.”
Her father gave a sad smile. “That sounds like her, always looking for adventure. May I come with you?”
“There’s no need,” I said. “Better that you stay here in case she comes home. I’ll keep you abreast of any and all developments.”
“I would appreciate that.”
I wished I could do more to reassure him. “My husband has a great deal of experience locating missing persons. I can promise you he will do everything in his power to help find your daughter.”
“Grazie, signora,” he said.
We left the shop and walked to the river, following it to the Ponte alle Grazie, which would take us across the Arno near Santa Croce. “Do you really think something bad may have happened to Lena?” Cécile asked.
“Let us not forget that the original reason Colin wanted to come to Florence was because Kat’s house had twice been burgled,” I said. “Marzo wanted money, and the house may have something of value hidden in it. He might have been killed for trying to find it.”
“And Lena could have known what he was doing,” Cécile said.
“Marzo’s connection to the house keeps niggling at me. It belongs to Kat, not Colin, and Marzo works with Darius, not my husband.”
“The legend of the treasure is known throughout the city. His interest in it needn’t have stemmed from anything to do with his work.”
“True. But if the household staff is involved in Crown business, which I suspect they are, Marzo may have been a frequent visitor to the house long before we ever arrived in Florence.”
“It would be much simpler for us to figure out what is going on if Monsieur Hargreaves would take us into his confidence,” Cécile said. “Surely he knows we can both be trusted.”
“Of course he does,” I said, “but it’s not always for him to decide whom he can tell what. There’s a man above him whom I believe supervises it all. He’s called Sir John Burman. I overheard him and Colin talking about the situation in Florence before we came here. He’s a decent, honorable man whose role is to protect the empire and all her citizens. I’ve never heard a word spoken against him and am confident that Colin would not follow his direction if he had even the slightest doubt as to his character.”
“I should like to meet this Sir John and explain to him that his goals would be met with far greater speed if he would let you and me help. I could persuade him.”
“I have infinite faith in your ability to persuade, but Sir John would never succumb to any such temptation. He is a man of unshakable principle.”
“That leaves us with you,” Cécile said. “Surely you could tempt Monsieur Hargreaves into telling us more. In exchange, you could give him timely updates of our own investigation instead of making him wait until we’ve solved the crime.”
A stab of guilt pierced my abdomen. If only she knew my proposal for just such an arrangement had resulted in my agreeing to give information without receiving anything in return. “It would be wrong of me to entice him to act against his principles.”
Cécile narrowed her eyes and remained silent for the rest of the walk to Santa Croce. Colin had been right. Deceiving her was exacting a heavy price from me.
Inside the church, we went straight to Dante’s monument. Reaching the spot on it that Lena had chosen as her ersatz postbox proved a challenge. Santa Croce, as usual, was crowded with tourists and their guides. I would not be able to hide what I was doing from all of them. Better, I decided, to abandon discretion entirely.
I let out a loud sob, threw my arm across my face, and spoke loudly. “Oh lasso, / quanti dolci pensier, quanto disio / menò costoro al doloroso passo!” There is no greater sorrow / Than to be mindful of the happy time / In misery, and that thy Teacher knows. “There can be nothing but sorrow for us, Great Poet, to know that we shall never have a new poem from you.”
I stepped forward and onto the bottom of the cenotaph. I had to get up higher, and gripped the wreath held by the sculpted mourner, but could tell it would not support my weight. As destroying Florence’s monument to her favorite son was unlikely to be met with favor, I looked for something I could use to boost myself up to the top of the next level of the sculpture, the rectangle upon which the empty sarcophagus sat. I put my arm around the waist of the female figure, got one foot onto the base, and heaved myself up. Then, as quickly as possible, I felt around beneath her arm and found an envelope. I grabbed it, shoved it into my jacket, and then tugged at my hat, removing one of the flowers decorating it. This, with great flourish, I placed on the top of the stone sarcophagus.
“You will never be forgotten, Dante Alighieri!” I wished I could remember another quote from The Divine Comedy, but, alas, I’d already used the only one I’d memorized. I leapt down from the monument. A herd of tourists had gathered to watch my antics, and a docent was approaching, a stern look on his face. Before he could scold me, I looped my arm through Cécile’s and dragged her out of the church, loudly reciting Oh lasso, / quanti dolci pensier, quanto disio / menò costoro al doloroso passo over and over until we escaped back into the piazza.
“That was quite a display, Kallista,” Cécile said. “Although a broader knowledge of Dante would have made it more impressive.”
“I entirely agree, but as I did find a message, we succeeded despite my limitations.” We stopped beneath the statue of Dante in the center of the piazza and I opened the envelope. The paper inside was covered in a girlish scrawl:
Meet me in the Cappelle Medicee today, as soon as you read this note. I will wait there for you, however long it takes, in a secret room reached through a trapdoor in the Sagrestia Nuova. Be careful not to be followed. There is grave danger.
“Good heavens,” I said. “She really did expect us to check every day. It’s fortunate we went to see her father.”
“For all we know, she left this for us days ago, and obviously, given she went to Marzo’s funeral, didn’t remain indefinitely in the Medici Chapel,” Cécile said. “As for her warning of danger, even her father admits that she longs for adventure. This may be nothing more than a game to her.”
I was not convinced.
We raced to the Duomo, skirted around the Baptistry of San Giovanni, and turned into the Piazza San Lorenzo. Inside the church, I inquired as to where we would find the New Sacristy and was informed that it had a separate entrance, in the Piazza Madonna. Fortunately, this was only a couple hundred feet away, so within moments, we entered the chapel Michelangelo constructed to house the Medici dead. The artist never completed his work on the space, and to this day, the most famous member of the family, Lorenzo the Magnificent, remains interred beneath the floor, with no spectacular monument to mark his resting place. Ironically, the only tombs Michelangelo finished belong to the least interesting of the Medici.
Today, though, there was no time for musing about the Medici; we were searching for a trapdoor. The chapel’s brightly colored marble floor revealed nothing, and I thought it unlikely that there was anything beneath it other than tombs. We turned our attention to the small rooms that came off the chapel and in one of them, beneath a well-worn rug, was a trapdoor.
“How did Lena know this was here?” I mused.
“The girl is clearly in possession of hidden depths,” Cécile said.
As the vestry was not of much interest to tourists, we had the room to ourselves. I tugged at the ring on the door, which opened with remarkable ease to reveal a set of narrow stone stairs. I pulled out the candle and matches I always kept in my reticule—one never knows when one might need to illuminate a dark space—lit the candle, and started down the steps, Cécile following immediately behind.
At the bottom was a small room, slightly more than twenty feet long, but only about six and a half feet wide, its walls covered with charcoal sketches. Lena had indeed come here to wait for us, but we’d arrived too late. She was there, on the floor, lying in a dark pool of blood.