Peroni did manage to keep up though, which was probably the point.
The door to the Gabriel apartment was open. Falcone stood there, a look of blank fury growing on his face. Peroni went ahead and walked through.
The entire floor seemed empty save for a single chair on which Joanne Van Doren sat, head down, fingers tapping at the keyboard of a tiny laptop computer. Every chair, every table, every book and personal effect, every last shred of possible evidence had disappeared. What had been the Gabriels’ home a few days before now resembled the gutted, empty spaces in the storeys below.
Peroni went over to the woman and, when she kept on typing, coughed loudly.
She looked up at him and said, ‘Yes?’
‘Where’s the bedroom?’ Falcone asked.
‘Which bedroom?’ Joanne Van Doren wondered, eyes wide open with apparent innocence.
They were still pink. Peroni thought she looked even more miserable than the day before. ‘Follow me,’ he said.
They walked into Mina’s room, the one at the corner, with the double French windows opening onto the shattered terrace. Everything was gone: the books, the shelves, the curtains, the compact desk and chair. The bed and all the sheets.
‘Is there a problem?’ she asked, joining them.
‘You didn’t mention you were going to clear the apartment,’ Peroni said, trying to quell his own anger.
‘You didn’t ask. Cecilia Gabriel’s taken what she wanted. This is the only part of the building with working heat, power and water. I can lease it. Maybe I can even sell it if I’m lucky. The bank keep saying they need money straight away.’
‘Signora,’ Falcone interrupted. ‘A man died here in the early hours of Saturday night. There’s an investigation into the circumstances.’
‘I told Di Lauro I was clearing the place. He didn’t say a thing.’
‘Di Lauro?’ Falcone asked.
‘The city building inspector,’ Peroni murmured.
‘A building inspector?’ Falcone looked livid. ‘We’re police officers.’
The skinny American looked close to the edge, ready to burst into tears.
‘Will you get off my back!’ she screeched. ‘The only people who stuck around here yesterday were Di Lauro’s. I told them what I was doing. They didn’t look interested. Why should they be? The accident happened outside. I haven’t touched anything there.’
The inspector glanced unpleasantly at Peroni.
‘Get onto the Questura. Get a warrant for this place. All of it. I want a court order barring any further construction work anywhere in this entire block until I say so. Nor do I want anyone allowed in.’
‘You can’t do that!’ she shrieked. ‘I have a buyer coming.’
His sharp eyes scanned the bedroom.
‘Your buyer can wait. The things from here. Where are they now? With the Gabriels?’
‘Some of them. What they wanted. Cecilia’s still got a key. I told her to come in last night when we were gone and take whatever she liked before the men dumped it. Probably best we didn’t meet, what with everything. Look, seriously. You can’t. .’
Peroni found this interesting.
‘You paid people to clear this building on a Sunday evening? Isn’t that expensive? Why not wait until today?’
Her pale face coloured for a moment.
‘This is my place. For now, anyway. I can do what I want. Please. I might have someone coming round who’s going to buy.’
‘The bedclothes?’ Falcone said. ‘The furniture? The personal items? Cecilia Gabriel has them now?’
‘Some, I guess. I told you. I wasn’t here when she came round. She took what she wanted and the workmen got the rest.’
‘Where did they take it?’
‘Wherever trash goes in this city. You tell me.’
Falcone demanded the name and phone number of the contractors and told Peroni to get someone to try to track down the material.
‘Talk to forensic and get a team in here to see if there’s anything they can find in this mess. We can go and see the Gabriel woman ourselves.’
‘What?’ the American barked. ‘Did you hear a word I said? I’m desperate.’
‘Why did you let the Gabriels stay here for next to nothing?’ Peroni asked, trying to bring the temperature down a little. ‘I don’t understand. You could have got someone in paying a proper rent, couldn’t you?’
‘With all this construction work going on?’
‘It’s going on now and you think you can sell it.’
The question discomfited her.
‘It was a favour. OK? Bernard Santacroce, Malise’s boss, asked me. They’d lodged with him at the Casina when they first came here. It didn’t work out. Bernard and Malise were. . on opposite sides of some philosophical fence I didn’t begin to understand.’
Falcone was interested.
‘Why should you do this Santacroce a favour?’
‘Because. .’
‘Because what?’
She placed her thin hands together and pleaded with him, ‘Why are you doing this to me? I need the money.’
Falcone scanned the room.
‘I’m not happy with Malise Gabriel’s death, Signora. You’ve removed what may be material evidence from these premises in circumstances I still do not understand. As long as I remain unhappy I will keep the keys to this building. Why did you do these people a favour?’
She looked angry. And worried too, Peroni thought. Close to the edge. Falcone could have tackled this with a little less aggression, even if it wasn’t his usual style.
‘Because I felt sorry for them! OK?’ The blood had drained from her face. ‘I felt sorry for Mina most of all. It wasn’t her fault her father couldn’t walk down the street without picking a fight with someone. They were all going nuts in that crazy little place of Bernard’s. They had to leave.’ She got a little closer. ‘Look. I’m sorry if I’ve done something wrong here. I didn’t mean to. I can help you out. Tell me what you want. It can be fixed. But I’ve got to let these people in to view. If I don’t. .’
Falcone dismissed her with a wave of his hand.
‘I want this entire apartment closed except to my people and a forensic team until further notice. No one is coming in without my permission. Including you.’
‘Are you trying to bankrupt me?’
He wasn’t interested.
‘You may stay here until the forensic team arrive. After that you’ll have to leave. We will tell you when we’re finished.’
‘This is going to a lawyer right now,’ she said and stormed off.
Falcone walked over to the window and looked at the broken scaffolding. Then he leaned out and peered down to the street below. Peroni joined him. The Via Beatrice Cenci was open again now. This part of Rome looked the way it usually did, quiet, residential, a little run-down.
‘Why would she clear this place so quickly?’ the inspector asked. ‘On a Sunday night? Without giving you a clue it was on the cards when you came here yesterday afternoon?’
‘It’s annoying. I wouldn’t read into it any more than that. Go easy on that woman, will you? She looks in a bad way. Worse than yesterday I think.’
Falcone raised his eyebrows and said nothing.
‘OK,’ Peroni sighed, thinking about it. ‘I agree. Something here stinks. I’ll get Teresa’s people in straight away and see if they can find something in all this muck and dust. One of the juniors can start hunting the dumps to see
