'Thank you,' said Signora Docci. 'I love him and I will live with him for the rest of my life.'
Before carrying her prize off to bed with her, she told them that they needn't worry about what to wear to the party; something had been sorted out for them. She also told them that she'd be heading down into Florence in the morning with Maria for the final fitting of her dress. They both declined the offer of a lift, though for different reasons.
Adam knew that Maurizio and Chiara also planned to be away in the morning—they were dropping in on some friends who lived to the south. The timing was good. An opportunity for a snoop around the top floor of the villa was shaping up nicely.
'What's the matter?' asked Harry, the moment they found themselves alone together.
'Nothing's the matter.' 'Come on . . .'
'I wasn't lying, Harry, I love the sculpture.'
'That's not what I mean and you know it.'
'I'm fine, I'm just tired and a bit drunk.'
'It's Mum and Dad, isn't it?'
He felt bad snatching at the line Harry had thrown him, but it would keep his brother happy. And it did. They chatted some more about the situation at home. Meanwhile, Adam's head was on another matter altogether. He was thinking about the morning and how to shake Harry off before visiting the top floor.
The counterintuitive solution came to him as they were making their way upstairs to bed.
'Do you want to have a look around the top floor?' he asked.
What could Harry say? Adam had already told him enough of the story for it to be an intriguing prospect. By the time he'd ladled on some of the more graphic details gleaned from Chiara, Harry was raring to go.
SIGNORA DOCCI AND MARIA LEFT FOR TOWN SOON AFTER breakfast. Harry was all for making a move there and then, but Adam was more cautious. It seemed like an eternity before Maurizio and Chiara's top-of-the-line sedan glided past the front of the villa and down the driveway.
The key was exactly where Antonella had said it would be: in a hidden drawer in the bureau in Signora Docci's bedroom. It was smaller than Adam had imagined it to be, but it worked. It fitted the door at the top of the staircase and, with some judicious force, turned the mechanism.
The first impression was disappointing.
They found themselves in a stark, square hallway with two corridors running off it. This was about all they were able to discern until Harry applied his cigarette lighter to the gloom. They found the light switch and Adam twisted the ceramic knob. Nothing. Hopefully it was just the bulb.
The flickering flame revealed a tall door leading off the hallway toward the rear of the villa. It was locked, although the key was in place. They located the light switch on the other side, but that didn't work, either.
'Shit,' said Adam.
'Shit,' said Harry, dropping the lighter and plunging them into darkness. 'I burnt my bloody hand.'
Adam could hear him groping around on the floor for his lighter. 'Let's just wait a moment, let our eyes adjust.'
Sure enough, out of the darkness three faintly glowing panels emerged: three sets of windows leaking light through their louvered shutters on the far side of the large room.
'We'll have to open one,' said Adam. 'Give me the lighter.'
The fluid was running low, but he made it to one of the windows, picking his way past furniture. He pulled open the center window and forced the shutters apart. They groaned on their rusty hinges, and a desiccated bird's nest floated down to the terrace below.
The sunlight cut a rude swath across the room. The first thing Adam noticed were his footprints in the thick dust coating the floor—evidence of an intrusion, not that there was anything to be done about it now.
Though not as lofty as those downstairs, the room still had a certain grandeur about it. There was an imposing fireplace of white marble, the walls were paneled up to the dado rail, and the ceiling was bedecked with frescoes.
'Jesus,' said Harry, 'what a mess.'
Broken and twisted pieces of furniture lay scattered around the room. There were rococo console tables, upholstered and gilded chairs, a delicate divan with shattered legs and a broken back.
An intricately carved frame was all that remained of the antique mirror above the fireplace. Its broken glass was strewn across the floor in front of the hearth, and in this debris lay the marble ashtray that one of the Germans had evidently hurled at the mirror.
'Paddler,' said Harry. He was staring up at the ceiling.
The frescoes were eighteenth century from the look of them: overblown and slightly suffocating, with lots of ballooning flesh and ruddy-cheeked cherubs on show. The centerpiece was a depiction of Diana and her hunting party, but it looked more like the aftermath of a bloody skirmish. Diana had been shot between the eyes. She also sported two bullet holes instead of nipples. One of her attendants had been blasted in the groin and the cherubs had been picked off like hapless birds.
'Fucking philistines,' murmured Harry.
Adam lingered when Harry wandered through to the adjacent rooms. The gramophone player on the table against the wall suggested that this was the scene of Emilio's murder.
According to Chiara, Emilio had fired into the gramophone to kill the music and attract the attention of the
