The prince was otherwise engaged for some time.
‘Ah, but we’re not telling!’ he said when he finally exhaled. ‘Around here, we like to hoard our little secrets. Keep them dark, like truffles. They’re the only thing we have, you see.’
‘ Cherchez la femme,’ commented Irena.
The car was now filled with fragrant dark smoke. Zen tried to open the window, but the handle spun round without effect.
‘So everyone knows, eh?’
The prince laughed merrily.
‘Of course! If they didn’t, it wouldn’t be knowledge.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Do you agree that things are either knowable or unknowable?’
‘I suppose so.’
‘In that case, the identity of the killer is either unknowable, in which case your question makes no sense, or it is knowable and therefore by definition known. I really don’t see your problem, dottore. To me it’s all as clear as day.’
He broke into another helpless fit of giggles and passed the joint back to Irena, who swerved to avoid a truck which had suddenly materialized in front of them.
‘Take the conversation which my protegee and I were having before you raised this interesting philosophical issue. Thanks to his treatise L’art de toucher le clavecin, we know a considerable amount about Couperin’s preferences in quilling and other matters, but we have no idea at all what Scarlatti expected of his instruments — or even if he gave a damn one way or the other. The man was clearly a total degenerate, probably an obsessive gambler, quite possibly a drug addict.’
More gales of giggles.
‘But nevertheless he was harpsichord tutor to the Infanta of Spain, and the molecular structure of the stone used to build several rooms in the Escorial must be impregnated with the sounds produced from whatever instruments he used. It’s like this eclipse this morning. We know how, why and when it will happen, but people used to think it was caused by a dragon eating the sun.’
‘The what?’
‘ The sun! ’ Lucchese replied loudly, as though to a deaf person.
‘What son?’
Outside the window, the landscape had started to ripple and break into waves, curling lazily over like the slow, spent wash of Adriatic storms fetching up on a mudbank in Zen’s native lagoons. But the sky looked threatening, the light had waned and the wind might get up at any minute.
‘Speaking of L’art de toucher,’ said Irena, hurling the Bugatti round a tight bend, ‘how long will it take to plant this relative of yours? Or maybe we could have a quickie at the cemetery? I’ve always wanted to do it on a grave.’
‘ What son?’ Zen shouted at Lucchese. ‘I never told you I had a son! And I don’t. He’s dead. She killed him, and I wasn’t even there!’
Eons passed in the blink of a celestial eye.
‘Right at the next turning, Irena,’ said a voice.
Everything came to a stop. There was a house and lots of cars. People, too, all wearing black.
‘I suggest you let me do the talking, dottore,’ said Lucchese, getting out of the car. Zen followed, hastily wiping the tears from his face. Irena kissed him on the cheek.
‘It’ll be all right,’ she said in a kindly voice. ‘It’s not your fault.’
Zen watched her fade in and out of focus for a while.
‘What was it you said? “ Cherchez la femme.” Do you mean a woman did it?’
But Irena had turned away to join her partner, who was surrounded by a dense knot of family members bent on lengthy and loud commiseration. The prince’s voice came floating back towards Zen like the commentary to an unwatched television programme.
‘… but before we go any further, I regret to say that I have an unpleasant but equally unavoidable duty to perform. Ah, there you are, my dear. This is my niece, Irena Francavilla, whom I have taken under my wing after she fell into some bad company in Turin. I’m glad to say that she’s now almost completely recovered, although as a safety measure I am continuing the treatment thrice daily on a regular basis for the moment lest any relapse occur.’
‘When’s my next shot due, principe?’ moaned Irena.
‘Soon, my child, soon. Where were we? Yes, of course, the unpleasant duty I referred to earlier. As you may be aware, it has been customary since time immemorial for members of my family to undergo cardiac puncture post-mortem. I have no reason to suppose that my dear cousin would have wished to break this tradition, although, given the tragic circumstances leading to his unexpected demise, it was naturally impossible for him to confirm this.’
‘What are you talking about?’ one of the women in mourning asked. ‘What tradition?’
‘In principle it dates back at least three hundred years, but in practice it was reinstituted by my great-great- grandfather, Guido Andrea.’
Andrea, thought Zen. Cherchez la femme! Suddenly it all made sense.
‘Guido’s morbid horror of being entombed alive was notorious in our family. Indeed, the memory of it survives to this day. I recall mentioning it on one occasion to my brother, and his replying that all we need do was to bury his portable phone with him! But, joking aside, I feel sure that poor dear Bruno would have wished to receive the usual formalities, and I have therefore come prepared. It won’t take long.’
‘What won’t?’
‘A simple medical procedure, my dear,’ the prince replied, ‘but you might prefer to be spared the details.’
‘ Medical? But Bruno’s not… I mean, he’s…’
‘Dead. Yes, I’m sure he is, to all appearances. But these things are not always as certain as they might seem. There have been several cases of “corpses” showing signs of life during their own funeral service, which, needless to say, is extremely embarrassing for all concerned. Still more distressing is the case of those for whom reanimation has occurred a little later — too late, in fact. Scarcely a graveyard is excavated without at least one skeleton being discovered in a kneeling position, straining in vain to lift the lid of the coffin lying under several tons of solid earth.’
The women gasped and clutched their throats. Prince Lucchese nodded gravely.
‘It was to avoid the possibility of just such a fate that my great-great-grandfather instructed the family physician to drive a spike into his heart prior to the funeral. I believe they originally used a simple nail, but some time later an instrument was specifically fashioned for this purpose out of solid silver by a local craftsman. It is presently in my possession, and I now propose to put it to use, thus allowing my beloved cousin to rest in assured peace. My colleague, Dottor Aurelio Zen, will assist me.’
He waved to Zen, who followed him inside the house.
Afterwards, of course, it was clear to Aurelio Zen that he had been a victim of passive smoking. Although he had declined Lucchese’s offer of the hashish-spiked cigarette, the fumes circulating in the closed car had been quite strong enough for him to become drugged by proxy. All this was clear in retrospect, but at the time he had only the evidence of his senses to go on, and they told him a completely different story.
There were, for a start, three versions of Prince Lucchese. One was preparing to do something, the next was doing it, while the third told Zen the results of whatever had been done by the other two. This activity was disturbingly ambiguous, at once a hideous scenario involving a dead body, surgical knives and some very primitive butchery, and an entirely innocent, even praiseworthy activity of vital importance for reasons which, however, were not immediately apparent.
Under the circumstances, Zen decided to take a back seat — literally, in this case. There was a wicker chair near the door where he sat down, watching the trinity of princes at work and responding as best he could to their baffling comments. The centre of the room was occupied by a dining table on which stood an ornate, oblong wooden chest. The threefold Lucchese opened the black bag he had brought with him and set to work on whatever was inside, talking in a low, purposeful voice the whole time.
