commendable humility. If your discretion matches your other qualities — as is fervently to be hoped — then your eventual beatification can be only a question of time.’
He glowered at the nun, who gazed back at her tormentor with an expression which to Zen’s eyes at least appeared frankly erotic.
‘Such a degree of sanctity no doubt makes any contact with the secular world both painful and problematic,’ Lamboglia continued remorselessly. ‘Nevertheless, I’m sure that someone as resourceful as yourself will find a way to procure us two coffees, easy on the milk but heavy on the foam, and a couple of pastries from a good bakery, none of that mass-produced rubbish.’
Abandoning her mop, the nun scampered off. Lamboglia slammed the door shut and returned to the table. He rewound the tape to the beginning of the interruption and replaced the recorder in front of Zen.
‘You say you found this twine attached to the upper gallery. But what made you look there in the first place?’
‘I examined the lower gallery, the part that is closed to the public, overlooking the spot where Ruspanti fell. It was at once obvious that no one had thrown himself from there. There was an undisturbed layer of dust all along the top of the guardrail, and even on the floor. Besides, there was no sign of the missing shoe there. The upper gallery was the only other possibility.’
Lamboglia frowned with the effort of keeping up with all this new information.
‘But we found the shoe in the basilica, under one of the benches. You said it had fallen there separately from the body.’
Zen nodded.
‘Separately in space and time. Several hours later, in fact, while I was searching the gallery.’
There was a timid knock at the door and the elderly nun appeared, carrying a tray covered with a spotless white cloth. She set it down on the table and removed the cloth like a conjuror to reveal two steaming bowls of coffee, an appetizing assortment of pastries and a glass ashtray. The cleric gave a curt nod and the nun slunk out.
‘So none of this can now be proved?’ Lamboglia asked.
Zen selected a pastry.
‘Well, there were some marks on Ruspanti’s wrists. I thought at first that they were preliminary cuts showing where he’d tried to slash his wrists, but in fact they must have been weals made by the pressure of the twine. A post-mortem might reveal traces of the chloroform or whatever they used to keep him unconscious, but I don’t suppose there’s the faintest possibility of the family agreeing to allow one.’
‘But if the killers left before Ruspanti fell, how did they release the bonds that were holding him to the gallery?’
Zen washed down the pastry with a long gulp of the creamy coffee and got out his cigarettes.
‘They didn’t. He did.’
Lamboglia merely stared.
‘This is just a guess,’ Zen admitted as he lit up, ‘but they probably tied him up with a slippery hitch and looped the free end around his wrists. The family said that Ruspanti suffered from vertigo, so when he came round from the chloroform to find himself suspended two hundred feet above a sheer drop to the floor of the basilica he would have panicked totally. The witnesses all talked about the terrible screams which seemed to start several seconds before the body appeared. During those seconds Ruspanti would have been desperately struggling to free his hands so that he could reach the railings and pull himself to safety. What he didn’t realize was that by doing so, he was clearing the hitch securing him to the gallery.’
Lamboglia stuck one finger between his teeth for a single moment which revealed him to be a reformed nail- biter.
‘You should have informed us.’
Zen shrugged.
‘The way I read it, you either knew or you didn’t want to. Either way, it was none of my business to tell you.’
Lamboglia stood up. He switched off the tape-recorder and replaced it in his briefcase.
‘Look, there’s no problem,’ Zen told him, getting up too. ‘Just deny everything. I’ll back you up. Without hard evidence, the media will soon drop the case.’
Lamboglia buttoned up his coat and took his hat.
‘There is also the question of the mole.’
‘You want me to tackle that?’ offered Zen, eager to show willing. ‘Someone must have supplied Ruspanti’s killers with keys to the galleries. I could make a start there.’
Lamboglia stared at the wall as though it were an autocue from which he was reading a prepared text.
‘The matter of the keys can be left to our own personnel. As far as the mole is concerned, we already have a suspect. The anonymous letter was faxed to the newspapers from a machine in the offices of Vatican Radio. At ten in the evening, there is only a skeleton staff on duty, and it was a fairly simple matter to eliminate them from suspicion. The only other person who had access to the building that evening was the duty security officer, Giovanni Grimaldi.’
Zen let his cigarette fall to the floor and stepped on it carefully.
‘The man who showed me round on Friday?’
Lamboglia inclined his head.
‘He was at the scene when Ruspanti fell, wasn’t he?’ Zen demanded. ‘Was he already involved in the case in some way?’
The cleric looked at him blankly.
‘That is neither here nor there. We are concerned to determine whether or not he sent that letter to the press, and if so to prevent it happening again. The problem is that Grimaldi is himself a member of the force which normally undertakes operations of this kind.’
‘ Quia custodet ipsis custodies,’ murmured Zen.
‘ Quis custodiet ipsos custodes, actually. But you’ve got the right idea. Who is to investigate the investigators? We normally have every confidence in our staff, but in this case it is simply too much of a risk to expect Grimaldi’s colleagues to act against him. It is essential that the mole shouldn’t be tipped off before we can act.’
He looked at Zen.
‘Which is where you come in.’
Zen returned his stare.
‘You want me to… “act”?’
Lamboglia placed his hands on the table, fingers splayed as though on the keyboard of an organ.
‘A positive and decisive intervention on your part would contribute greatly towards bringing this unfortunate episode to a mutually satisfactory conclusion,’ he said.
Zen nodded.
‘But this time, perhaps you’d better tell me exactly what you want done,’ he said. ‘Just to avoid the possibility of any further confusion.’
‘The first thing is to search Grimaldi’s room. With any luck, you might find some incriminating material which we can use. He’s on duty this afternoon, so you won’t be disturbed.’
He handed Zen a brown envelope.
‘This contains his address and a telephone number on which you can call us this evening to relay your findings. Any further instructions will be conveyed to you at that stage.’
He turned to go.
‘Oh, there’s just one more thing,’ Zen said.
The cleric turned, his glasses gleaming with reflected light like the enlarged pupils of a nocturnal predator.
‘Yes?’
‘Can you recommend a good doctor?’
He closed the door with great care, lifting it slightly on its hinges to prevent the tell-tale squeak, and stood
