“WHEN DID YOU LEARN this, Aldo?”
“I’ve known about it for some time.”
“Who else knows of it?”
“Maybe two—maybe three others. His closest associates.”
“Can they be trusted?”
“To the extent that you can trust crazy people. Who else would be drawn to such an organization?”
Aldo Pettigrilli lifted his cup of tea and sipped. As he did so, Isobel noted how his hand trembled.
They were seated on the flagstoned patio behind the Villa Tranquillo. Isobel wore jeans, a sweatshirt, and sandals. Pettigrilli sat in a badly rumpled suit, the collar of an un-laundered shirt poked up above his soiled lapels. There was a touch of the ludicrous in a man so attired extending a pinky finger as he sipped tea.
Isobel tipped the steaming spout of the teapot into his outstretched cup, refilling it as she continued to speak. “And, I take it, you don’t believe that anyone else knows?”
“That Borghini has the drawings?” Pettigrilli shook his head in the negative. “And in future, Isobel, please don’t send any more of your friends to me regarding that matter. It’s my neck that’s at risk here. Moreover, may I ask, why in heaven’s name you would send this Mr. Manship to me in the first place?”
“Rumors, Aldo. That’s all. You used to run with that bunch.”
Pettigrilli regarded her with an air of haughty disbelief.
“Have you told anyone else, Aldo?”
“Whom would I tell? I can’t very well go to the police.”
“Why not?”
“Are you mad? I told you, these people are crazy. You know that as well as I do. They kill the way you and I eat or breathe. It’s nothing to them.”
“You think they would kill you if they knew you knew about the drawings?”
“In a minute. Dead—kaput. And I don’t mind telling you that your knowing—”
“Puts me at risk, too.” She sighed. “So knowing that, you told me anyway.”
“I told you because you sent me this man, asking me very specific questions about those drawings.” Pettigrilli banged his cup down on the table. “Oh, come on, girl. I just gave him an address in Parioli. I told him nothing.”
“And you have no idea whether he actually went or not.”
“No. That was the end of it. I walked out of the restaurant and washed my hands of it entirely. Now I regret having even given him the address. If he’s serious about locating those drawings …”
“He’s serious. Take my word for it.”
Pettigrilli brooded into the palms of his hands.
“Let’s assume he went.” Her eyes closed, focusing hard on something. “If he’d found something of importance, wouldn’t he have notified one of us? You or me?”
“No doubt you.” Pettigrilli fretted. “I left no forwarding address.”
“But if he’d found something truly of significance, wouldn’t he have first notified the police?”
Pettigrilli paled. “The police?”
“Surely. That would have been the most logical thing. The drawings are stolen goods, and he couldn’t very well have gotten them out of the country—not to mention exhibit them—without first notifying the police.”
The thought of the police plunged Pettigrilli into a fit of gloom.
“But since we’ve both heard nothing,” Isobel went on, “I can only assume he found nothing in Parioli.”
Pettigrilli’s hand rose in protest, then dropped back limply into his lap. “What exactly is your interest in these drawings, Isobel?”
“None at all,” she shot back.
“They’re of no financial interest to you?”
“None whatsoever.”
“And they have nothing to do with the gentleman?”
“The gentleman? Oh, you mean the curator chap.” She laughed. “God no.”
Pettigrilli’s mouth curled into an unpleasant smirk.
She went on, ignoring the smirk. “He’s a perfectly decent fellow. He gave me supper once, and I thought it would be nice if his show were to be a success.”
“Of course.”
“Don’t be bitchy, Aldo,” she said, then changed the subject. “Do you still see any of that crowd?”
“The Pugno?” He made one of those consummately Italian gestures with his hand. “Finita la commèdia. Seven years is more than enough for me.”
“And, besides, the world has changed.”
He conceded the point, then nodded gloomily. “Trouble is, they haven’t. They never change. They’re still waiting for the ghosts of Almirante and Pino Rauti to arise so they can all put on their uniforms and go goose-stepping up and down the Forum.” Pettigrilli lay a palm against his flushed cheek and laughed bitterly. “Borghini is madder than ever. Better I’m out of there, and my advice to you, Isobel …”
“Yes?”
“Don’t go near him. Stay far away. Don’t go poking about in Parioli if you know what’s good for you.”
“You think I’m mad?”
Eyes squinting, he watched her, nodding slightly to himself. “A bit, yes. That’s your appeal. That enchanting, tricky madness of yours. That’s why he’s always been so drawn to you. One madness infatuated by another.”
“I was young and a bit seduced by the whole thing.”
“So were we all. It was seductive—the unity, the power, the oaths, the cabala, the great mission. All very glamorous in a kind of stupid, juvenile way.”
His eyes closed and he appeared to have drifted back over the years to better times. A smile played around his lips as he savored memories. But then the eyes shot open. The old petulance returned and he was glaring at her. “Take heed, Isobel. Hear what I say. Stay far from Parioli. Don’t go near Palazzo Borghini. You wouldn’t recognize it today. It’s a house of horrors.”