Just One Evil Act

risk further censure from Stewart for checking on it herself. So what had he managed to glean? she asked Winston. Was Azhar as good as his word? Had Doughty been telling her the truth when he’d pursued the Berlin story?

“’S good, Barb,” Winston told her sotto voce. He made a show of pulling out a manila folder, flipping it open, and looking down upon its contents with a studious frown. Barbara glanced to see what he was using as the “evidence” under discussion. Insurance papers for his car, it appeared. “It all checks out square,” he said. “He was at the hotel in Berlin the whole time. He presented two papers like Doughty told you. He was on a panel ’s well.”

Barbara felt the relief of having one less thing to worry about. Still she said, “D’you think someone could’ve been posing as Azhar?”

Winston gave her a quirky look. “Barb, the bloke’s a microbiologist, yeah? How’s someone goin to pretend to be that and talk the lingo with th’other blokes? First, a poser’d have to be Pakistani, eh? Second, a poser’d have to be able to talk the talk: present his paper and . . . what else d’they do? . . . answer questions ’bout it? Third, a poser’d have to wonder why the hell he was in Berlin actin the part of Azhar in the first place while Azhar was . . . what? Off in Italy kidnappin his own kid?”

Barbara chewed on her lip. She thought about what Winston had said. He was right. It was a ludicrous line of enquiry, no matter how she felt about Dwayne Doughty’s half-truths. Still, she knew the wisdom of pursuing every angle, so she said, “What about someone from his lab? What about a graduate student? You know, someone wanting to oil the waters of his path to an advanced degree? How do these things work anyway, being a graduate student? I dunno. Do you?”

Winston tapped at the battle scar on his cheek. “I look like a bloke knows ’bout university, Barb?” he enquired pleasantly.

“Ah. Right,” she said. “So . . .”

“Seems to me ’f you want more information, it’s comin from Doughty. I say you put pressure on him. If there’s more to know out there, he’s the one to tell it.”

Winston was right, of course. Only pressure on Dwayne Doughty was going to get her any further. Barbara flipped her notebook closed, stowed it in her bag, said, “Right. Got it. Thanks, Winnie,” for John Stewart’s benefit, and went on her way.

When it came to using the thumbscrews on anyone, the best way was always a visit to the local nick. So on her way to her car, Barbara rang the Bow Road station. She identified herself. She told them that in conjunction with an ongoing case in Italy that officers from Scotland Yard were dealing with, one private investigator Dwayne Doughty needed questioning. Would someone from the local station pick him up, haul him in, and hold him till she got there? Indeed, someone would, she was told. Glad to oblige, DS Havers. He’ll be twiddling his thumbs, stewing in his own juices, or whatever else you wish in an interview room whenever you arrive.

Excellent, she thought. She gave a look to the locations of the interviews she needed to conduct for DI Stewart. One was south of the river; the other two were in north London. Bow Road was east. In the world of eenie, meenie, minie, and moe, there was no question in her mind where she would go first.

LUCCA

TUSCANY

By the time Salvatore and DI Lynley had returned from their questioning of Carlo Casparia in the prison hospital, the officers tracking down the cars driven by every member of Lorenzo Mura’s squadra di calcio had finished that job. There was one red car among all the vehicles, but it was not a convertible. No matter, Salvatore told them. It was now time to trace the cars belonging to the families of every child Lorenzo coached in his private calcio clinic at the Parco Fluviale. Get the name of every child he coaches from Mura, get the name of every parent of every child, check their cars, then speak to each parent individually about meeting Lorenzo Mura there for a private conversation. Meantime, get a photograph of every father of every child and dig up pictures of Lorenzo’s fellow team members as well.

DI Lynley remained silent during this exchange, although Salvatore could tell from the expression on the Englishman’s face that he hadn’t followed the rapid-fire Italian around him. So he explained how they were proceeding, and to this Lynley indicated the nature of the report he would make to the parents of the girl. Obviously, reporting anything having to do with Lorenzo Mura was out of the question. For the moment, then, it was best to tell them that information from the television appeal was continuing to be followed up on, that Carlo Casparia was attempting to be helpful, and to leave it at that.

Lynley was departing when a uniformed officer dashed down the corridor to speak to Salvatore. His face was flushed and his news was good: Regarding the red convertible seen by the driver on his way to visit his mamma in the Apuan Alps? the young man said breathlessly.

“Si, si,” Salvatore responded tersely.

It had been found. Checking every lay-by on the road into the Alps prior to the turnoff for the mamma’s village had gleaned them nothing, as the chief inspector would recall. But an enterprising officer had on his own time continued up that mountain road and six kilometres farther along he had found a crash barrier destroyed on a hairpin turn. The car in question had been discovered at the bottom of a gully beyond that barrier. There was no body inside. But there was a body some twenty metres away: the driver’s, apparently thrown from the vehicle.

“Andiamo,” Salvatore said at once to Lynley. Pray God, he thought, that there was no small girl’s body nearby as well.

It took nearly an hour to reach the turnoff, their route coursing along the River Serchio, first on the great alluvial plain, then into the hills, and at last into the Alps. The river was a fast-moving torrent at this time of year since snow at the highest elevation in the mountains had been melting for weeks. The result was waterfalls, sunstruck cascades, and glittering pools, all of which could be glimpsed as the police car rushed past them. The new growth of spring was thick and lush as they climbed into the mountains, and the wildflowers splashed yellow, violet, and red in swathes of colour along verges and into the trees. And the trees themselves—pines, oaks, and ilexes—grew right to the edges of villages that had no vehicular access, forming a wall of greenery that seemed to prevent the mountains themselves from descending upon and swallowing up the scattering of terracotta-roofed buildings perched precariously on the edges of cliffs that dropped hundreds of feet into more forest beneath them.

With each turn they made into a secondary or tertiary road, the way narrowed until they were at last on a route the width of the car itself. One hairpin curve followed the next. It was an ear-popping, white-knuckle ride, a by-the-grace-of-God course in which God’s grace was defined by having the luck not to encounter a vehicle on its way down. Finally, they came to a police roadblock. They got out of the car, and Salvatore nodded at the uniformed officer who approached. He asked him only, “Dov’e la macchina?” although this was mere formality since the likely position of the red convertible was indicated some fifty metres farther along and up, by the remains of the crash barrier through which the vehicle had shot to its final resting place.

As Salvatore and Lynley approached the broken barrier, an ambulance crew came into sight, heaving a stretcher between them. On it, a body bag was strapped, its zip tightly closed, sealing the corpse from sight.

“Fermatevi,” Salvatore told the two attendants. He added, “Per favore” as an afterthought and introduced both himself and DI Lynley to them.

They did as he asked, halting their progress to the waiting ambulance. They set the stretcher on the ground, and Salvatore squatted. He steeled himself—only on television, he thought, did detectives unzip the body bags of corpses who’d lain for God only knew how many days in the hot Italian sun without preparing themselves for what they were about to see—and he lowered the zip.

Had the man been handsome in life—indeed, had he possibly been the individual behind Hadiyyah in the photographs taken by the tourists in the mercato—it was now impossible to tell. Those forensic specialists of the open air—the insects—had found the body as they would do, and they had worked their ways upon it. Maggots still writhed in the man’s eyes, nose, and mouth; beetles had been feasting on his skin; mites and millipedes scurried into the open neck of his linen shirt. He had come to rest facedown, as well, and the settling of blood to this part of his body rendered his features purple while the gas forming within the protective covering of his skin as his tissues disintegrated had created pustules wherever he was exposed. Soon these would leak their noxious fluid, which would also seep from his orifices. Death in this manner was a horrifying sight.