constructing a prima facie case against Cinzia Miletti. The gun used to kill Ruggiero was the same calibre as the pistol registered in her name, and the old salad-gatherer said that the driver of the Fiat had blonde hair. Cinzia claimed to have gone to Perugia to meet Ivy Cook, but Zen had discovered that she’d lied about the copy of Ruggiero’s letter, and that lie too had been intended to throw suspicion on Ivy. Cinzia could have arranged the appointment in town, gone to avenge herself on the man who had abused her innocence, then driven into Perugia and made a point of accosting Zen in order to strengthen her alibi. She’d had the motive, the means and the opportunity, and if her second name hadn’t been Miletti they would have run a ballistic check on that little pistol of hers, questioned her in detail about the time during which she claimed to have been waiting for Ivy and staged an identification parade to find out if the witness who had seen the blue Fiat and its blonde driver could pick her out. As it was, that was out of the question. Luciano Bartocci might have risked it, which was precisely why he had been replaced. Rosella Foria wouldn’t make the same mistake. If only one of those nylon threads they’d found on the floor of the SIMP Fiat had been a blonde hair instead, Zen thought. But hair is either fair or yellow, Lucaroni had told him. It sounded like a line from a pop song, and he murmured it over and over to himself as the car burbled over the cobbles of Piazza Matteotti.
Rosella Foria turned out to be a rather primly dressed, fragile-looking woman in her early thirties. Although her manner was suitably authoritative, her face seemed to seek approval. Her office, although almost identical to Bartocci’s, was impeccably neat and tidy.
‘There are two matters which I wish to discuss with you, Commissioner,’ she began. ‘The first concerns a car belonging to the Miletti family which I understand has been impounded by the police.’
Zen had been expecting something of the kind.
‘Two days ago I was informed that a blue Fiat Argenta saloon had been found abandoned near the scene of the murder,’ he replied. ‘Since such a car had been sighted by a witness near the scene and at the time of the murder I followed normal procedure and sent the vehicle for forensic analysis with a view to eliminating it from suspicion.’
‘Yet you failed to notify the Public Prosecutor’s office of this development. Why?’
Despite her uncompromising tone, she was still smiling. Zen was used to dealing with men, whose signals, ritualized over centuries of aggressive display, were clear and simple to follow. But Rosella Foria was unencumbered by such traditions.
‘Because the correspondence with the car mentioned by the witness was only superficial, and I saw no reason to anticipate a positive identification.’
The magistrate drew her well-plucked brows together.
‘I don’t understand how you could fail to see the significance of your action for the investigation, given that the car belonged to the Miletti family.’
‘I didn’t know that it did.’
Rosella Foria’s frown deepened.
‘Do you mean to say that you failed to take the elementary step of tracing the registered owner of the vehicle?’
‘On the contrary, that was the first thing I did. The car proved to be registered to a Fiat dealer. From what you have just told me I assume that it was one of those leased by the Miletti firm and used by the family.’
‘It didn’t occur to you to contact the dealer in question?’
‘I certainly should have done so if the tests had produced any positive results. But in fact they were inconclusive.’
She looked at him long and hard, but he noticed her shoulders relax and knew that it would be all right. She might or might not believe him. The main thing was that he had given her a story she could pass on to Di Leonardo and the Milettis. She was off the hook.
‘All the same, it’s most unfortunate that this has happened. Needless to say, the family are extremely displeased.’
Zen did not need to ask how they had learned of it. Like every top family, they would have a contact in the force.
‘The car was apparently stolen from outside the cemetery while they were attending their father’s funeral,’ the magistrate added, watching him carefully.
Zen’s grey eyes remained impenetrably glazed.
‘Probably some youngsters took it for a joyride and then dumped it.’
‘Possibly. In any event, we may consider the incident closed. But in the present situation misunderstandings of this kind are to be avoided at all costs. I should like your assurance that you will take no further initiatives without consulting me.’
‘Are you suggesting I have exceeded my powers?’
He knew very well that she wasn’t, of course, just as he knew what she was doing: telling him to forget the legal niceties and please not lift so much as a finger without her consent, because the situation was so delicate, the moment so critical, the stakes so high.
‘I don’t feel it’s the letter of the law that we ought to be concerned with here,’ she went on in a conciliatory tone, fingering the single-strand pearl necklace which looped above the neck of her Benetton cardigan. ‘It’s more a question of not hurting people’s feelings by hasty or ill-considered gestures, of not wounding a family which has just lost one of its members in deeply distressing circumstances. Above all it’s a question of not doing this when it is demonstrably gratuitous and irrelevant to the purpose of apprehending those responsible for this crime.’
‘But it’s not demonstrably anything of the kind,’ Zen protested. Although he lacked the hard evidence he’d hoped for, it was surely time to open this woman’s eyes a little, to remind her of the possibilities that were being swept under the carpet. ‘On the contrary, in my experience it’s unheard of for criminals to phone a number they know is being monitored in order to give the location of the body of a man they have just killed. If they wanted to murder Miletti, why didn’t they do it up in the mountains or wherever they were holding him? Why risk moving him to a spot close to Perugia only to shoot him dead?’
The investigating magistrate carefully rearranged the stack of papers on the desk in front of her so that the edges were perfectly aligned.
‘If I chose, I could answer these objections with a much stronger one. You seem to forget that Dottor Miletti was murdered almost twenty-four hours before the call informing us that he had been released. During that period of time only the kidnappers knew where he was. So how could anyone else possibly have committed the crime? However, this is all beside the point. I said I had two things to tell you. The first concerned the Milettis’ car. The second is that the Carabinieri in Florence have detained a number of men who are believed to be members of the gang which kidnapped and murdered Ruggiero Miletti. I’m going there tomorrow morning to conduct the formal interrogation, but I’m informed that they’ve already made a full confession.’
This was different, this was real. Zen felt like a child on the beach whose sandy battlements have melted beneath the first big wave. Appropriately, Rosella Foria’s concluding words sounded almost maternal.
‘Don’t take it too hard, Commissioner. It’s a pity that your efforts here have not been rewarded with success, but once you’re back in Rome you will no doubt soon find other outlets for your energies.’
As soon as he got outside Zen took out the telegram which had been waiting for him at the Questura. As he had thought, it was from the Ministry, informing him that his temporary transfer to the Questura of Perugia would terminate at midnight on Friday and his normal duties at the Ministry resume with effect from 0800 Monday.
For at least a minute he stood motionless on the kerb, oblivious to the animated scene around him. Then he crumpled up the telegram and walked back to the Alfetta, where he made Palottino’s day by telling him to drive to Florence as quickly as possible.
At Carabinieri headquarters in Florence Zen was received with just that air of polite suspicion that he had expected. When he announced that he had important information about the Miletti case he was taken upstairs and handed over to Captain Rivolta, a young officer with an aristocratic appearance and a languid manner who denied any personal involvement in what Zen referred to as ‘this magnificent coup’.
‘It was a tip-off, I suppose,’ Zen suggested.
Captain Rivolta gave a minimal nod.
‘From a Sardinian gang, I believe. The usual rivalry.’
‘So they were based here in Florence?’
Rivolta repeated his fastidious gesture of assent.
