really the place to come to for that sort of thing, you know.”
And where was Jonathan Argyll? Flavia thought to herself as she lumbered slowly on a bus full of excited tourists into the center of the city. How on earth could he disappear just when he was needed? She relied on him at moments such as these to sit and listen and make remarks, some useless, some perceptive, but always helping her think and explain and work through whatever was going on in her mind. Without him around she felt she wasn't as clearheaded as she needed to be, and no one else she knew came even remotely close to being able to stimulate her powers of reason. The nearest, perhaps, was Bottando, but he was a distant second.
But there it was. The phone at home still went unanswered; she even tried Bottando but he had also vanished off the face of the earth. She had been, in effect, abandoned at one of the most important moments of her life by the two people she really relied on.
It was enough to make the most sensible person feel resentful. And after five minutes thinking about it, Flavia did feel resentful, so she picked on a spotty adolescent sitting down minding his own business and harming no one.
'No one ever tell you to get up for pregnant women?' she barked in a motherly tone.
He looked up at her in alarm.
'Go on,' she said, 'up you get,' and watched with mild satisfaction as he blushed shamefacedly and reluctantly moved away, muttering darkly.
'Thank you, young man,' she said brightly, and sat down herself. That was the good thing about Italy, she thought. Maternal authority still had a bit of bite in it.
Now then, she thought as she settled down and slipped a shoe off so she could massage her toes, Dossoni. Radical-cum-informer-cum-journalist. Which presumably Maurizio Sabbatini did not know, otherwise he would not have involved him . . .
But Aldo had said everyone knew, and despite his manner he chose his words carefully. The implications of this sank in slowly as she worked on her big toe. Would Sabbatini be so stupid as to bring in someone he thought might well be a police informer, if not worse? Surely not. Therefore, Dossoni's source of information on the theft could not have been Sabbatini. And she wasn't it either. And she doubted that it was the director of the museum. And there was only one other place the information could have come from.
And any further thoughts stopped dead. The bus had arrived at her stop, and she found for some reason that she couldn't get her shoe back on. At least the sight of her hopping to the door gave the pimply youth some small satisfaction.
16
Age had withered her somewhat, but what remained was still decidedly handsome.
Mary Verney had the sort of face that improved as it settled into an age that revealed more of the bones. She was as oddly dressed as she often was, with what looked very much like a drying-up cloth wrapped around her head to fend off the sun, but such eccentricities were for private moments; when on display she could be remarkably elegant.
She also had the charm and manners that come from years of practice, although, it seemed, surprise could occasionally put even this well-honed instrument under some strain. She was not expecting a visitor. When Argyll finally gave up postponing and presented himself at her house an hour later, the welcome was not as wholehearted as it might have been had she been given a few moments' notice.
Even so, she did quite well, enthusiastically presenting both cheeks for a peck, chirruping about delightful surprises, how pleased she was, do come and sit down. The matter taken out of his hands, Argyll smiled, and let himself be led up the four worn steps to the terrace, forward toward the table, and then introduced to the guest. Not that any introduction was needed.
'Good afternoon, Jonathan,' said Taddeo Bottando, rising to his feet to greet him.
'I'm most surprised to see you here. What can we do for you?”
'Just passing. Thought I'd drop in,' he said, then smiled foolishly. 'No. In fact, I came to ask you about a painting,' he said, thinking that in the circumstances dithering and polite talk really ought to be dispensed with. 'You're the only people who can help.”
A good start, which he then went and spoiled with delaying tactics. 'I tracked you down, you see, and was in the area. Just down the road, in fact. I had lunch in that little restaurant in the square. Very agreeable. And saw the church. Have you seen the church? The altarpiece? Liked it enormously.”
'Many times,' Mary Verney said patiently. 'Are you here on your own?”
'Oh yes.”
'And where is your wife?”
'Flavia?' Argyll asked.
'You have more than one?”
'Oh no. Just the one. Quite enough, really. She's back in Rome. Trying to tidy up after this Claude business. Not very happy, I must say. A bit discouraged, in fact.
Disillusioned, you know.”
'Why is that?”
Argyll thought. 'I don't know, really. She's been a bit off-color recently. Distracted.
Grumbling. She has discovered what General Bottando has known for years, I suspect, that her superiors are almost as pernicious as the art thieves themselves. Just less straightforward.”
'I did mention it to her,' Bottando said with a faint smile.
'But you rather protected her from the direct experience,' Argyll commented. 'And she's just coming round to realizing how grateful she was. But your going, and the way you went, removed the last illusions. That and the Claude thing, of course. She's more fed up than I've ever seen her.”
Bottando looked sad for her.
Argyll went on, reinvigorated now that that part of the conversation was disposed of.
'This painting I want to ask you about.”
Mary Verney poured him a glass of wine, and smiled encouragingly. He drank. In fact, he thought, he'd had quite a few of these today. The heat didn't help either.
'And a crime,' he added, in order to make them more comfortable, to bring both back into a world with which they were all too familiar. The comment did not succeed, however; rather they just sat there, side by side. Had Argyll been less in turmoil, he would have found it touching. And would have been glad for both of them, that they could take such comfort from, and pleasure in, each other's company.
For they were a perfect match, if you looked at it elliptically and disregarded all the practical details of why they shouldn't even be talking to each other. Like the fact that Mary Verney had spent her life stealing pictures, and Taddeo Bottando had spent his trying to get them back again. Both were kindly, intelligent, with, as far as Argyll knew, many of the same interests, even if they did approach them somewhat differently. Both (Flavia had long suspected, as she was given to speculating on such matters) were desperately lonely, and growing more so as the years went by.
This train of thought had made him drift off a little, while the other two sat there patiently, waiting for him to get his bearings.
'Now, then,' he resumed with an attempt at decisiveness. 'This painting. And theft
...”
'Do get on with it, Jonathan,' said Mary Verney a little tartly. 'I know you like to affect absentmindedness, but you really are overdoing it a little. Say what you've come to say. Then do whatever you've come to do.”
Argyll peered at her, wondering whether to take offense, and decided she was probably right. 'Very well, then,' he said. 'Buonaterra. Nineteen sixty-two.”
The look of surprise on both their faces was carefully controlled, but just enough sneaked through for Argyll to realize that all the connections he'd been making were correct. So he went on.
'A perfect crime,' he said. 'Or very nearly. That is, a crime hidden inside another one. But it is the point of it, and the ending of it, that confuses me. That's why I'm here.
'So, the events. Someone steals a painting for reasons that have nothing to do with money, and hides it. Then Mary Verney comes along and steals it from the thief. The first bit I know; the second bit I guess. Perfect cover. The thief can't complain, and the police are hardly likely to connect you with the matter. After all, you weren't around when the original theft was committed. You were here.
