A Rich Full Death

I saw that he was trying to trick me into naming Browning, but I refused to be drawn.

‘I am fortunate enough to have many friends in Florence, Signor Talenti.’

‘I know. I consulted your file before speaking to you this morning, and I find that you are indeed a man with extensive connections. But I am happy to say that none of them-with the exception of this individual, whose acquaintance with you appears to be relatively recent-is such as to excite the interest of this Department. The same, however, cannot be said for him, or more especially for his wife. They are considered persons of suspect views-she in particular. And it was in fact from her, according to Caterina, that her late sister learned of this rumour concerning the deaths of DeVere and la Eakin. You will not continue to pretend that you do not know whom I mean, will you?’

I felt it would be decidedly unwise to do so. It was becoming ever plainer that Commissioner Talenti’s animus was directed not at me but at Browning. It would benefit neither of us if I were also to get on the wrong side of him.

‘I believe that you mean Mrs Browning.’

‘Certainly I mean her-a bedridden invalid who amuses herself by writing verses in praise of Liberty and the French Emperor, by criticising our ruler, denigrating our time-honoured institutions and impugning our virility! They make me sick, such people!’

The mask of urbanity had slipped from the police official’s face for the first time.

‘They come to Florence and lecture us Tuscans on the shortcomings of our government, knowing that we dare not lift a finger against them. I am no radical, Signor Boot. It’s my job to see that the laws we have are obeyed. If tomorrow Tuscany becomes a republic, I shall serve my republican masters as faithfully then as I serve the House of Lorraine now, and they, recognising this fact, will retain my services-for you may be sure that if the men I put in prison today put themselves in the Pitti tomorrow, the day after tomorrow there will be others to take their place in prison.

‘But them at least I respect, for they play the game like men, for real stakes-their liberty, their lives. But not these Brownings and their like! These foreign intellectuals who blame our government and praise our terrorists! Let them praise and blame their own! I’d like to see them! But of course there’s no chance of that, for any disturbance in that quarter just might deprive them of the handsome little stipend which goes so far in thrifty Italy, and which depends on law and order prevailing mightily in rich England. Which it does! Just ask the English Chartists and farm workers! Let them try and better their lot, and straightaway the troops are called out-and meanwhile these so- called liberals look the other way and condescend to pity the poor Hungarians or Poles or Italians. But if a humble Tuscan police official such as myself, having good grounds for suspicion, dares set a man to watch one of these great champions of Liberty, immediately he runs to his friends at the Embassy, and the humble policeman finds himself officially reprimanded by his superiors and warned never to do such a thing again unless he wants to spend the remainder of his career in Leghorn!’

‘But what were these grounds you had for suspecting Mr Browning?’ I asked, as deferentially as I knew how.

‘Ask him yourself!’ snorted Talenti contemptuously.

‘I did. He wouldn’t tell me.’

I did not for a minute think that Talenti would tell me either-I was, after all, prying most fearfully into official secrets. If he did so, it was clearly just to spite the hated Browning!

‘The maid, Beatrice Ruffini, deposed in evidence that she had summoned Browning to the villa because he was a friend of the family,’ Talenti recited, as though before a court. ‘Contradicted by the gate-keeper, who denied that he had ever seen him, she changed her story: the Englishman, she now said, had been a friend of Signora Eakin-the implication was of course that he had been her lover. At this point Browning asked to speak to me alone, and I granted his request. I then asked Browning about the maid’s accusation that he had been intimate with la Eakin.’

‘Which he denied,’ I murmured.

The policeman looked at me with some surprise.

‘On the contrary!’

16

On some other occasion recently, I believe I compared my nerves to a pianoforte struck with an axe. On hearing these words I felt as though the axe had just been buried deep in my own skull.

‘On the contrary,’ Talenti continued in an even, unruffled tone, ‘the suspect admitted that he and Signora Eakin used to meet secretly. She let him in through the garden entrance, which is why the gate-keeper did not recognise him. He tried, however, to claim that there was nothing illicit in their relations, nothing carnal: they were simply friends. They used to sit and talk. He treated her like a daughter. He just liked to sit and look at her, to watch her comb her hair. It was all completely pure.

‘Naturally I did not believe this for a moment. Men and women do not behave like that! But then a doubt crept into my mind. These people-they were English, and the English are crazy. Their blood is so cold it is a mystery how they ever manage to breed. So I thought perhaps-just perhaps-there was some truth in this incredible story. Or on the other hand this Browning might just be arrogant enough to think that a stupid Tuscan would believe any nonsense if it came from an Englishman’s lips. There it was-I didn’t know. So I followed the standard procedure in such cases: I started to make enquiries about our Signor Browning, and meanwhile set a man to watch him.’

‘But did it really matter whether Browning’s relations with Mrs Eakin had been pure or not?’ I asked. ‘After all, she was dead, and by her own hand.’

Talenti smiled.

‘I know that now, Signor Boot,’ he replied dryly, ‘because my superiors have instructed me that such is the case. But at that time they had not yet pronounced, and I myself was very far from being so sure. Suppose for a moment that Signora Eakin did not commit suicide-suppose that she had been murdered.

In that case Signor Browning’s relations with the dead woman would have been of vital importance. For who would have killed her, if she had been killed in such a way, at such a time and place? A jealous lover was the obvious answer, and jealousy supposes carnal love-platonic lovers do not murder each other.’

Before I had any time to respond, Talenti’s whole demeanour suddenly changed, and he became brisk, efficient and ironical again.

‘But why do I bore you with this stale news?’ he exclaimed. ‘The Eakin case is closed. Indeed, it was never open, any more than the DeVere case-although there again I might have found elements to interest me, had my superiors not determined that his death was of no concern to the Department. And now we have another accidental death! Signorina Chauncey was rather less well-connected than the first two victims, so no decision on the affair has yet been communicated to me-it may even be that I shall have to make up my own mind!

‘Who knows? Perhaps the old lady really did fall downstairs. I wish you could have helped me with the message we found in her hand, though. Nevertheless, we have had an interesting talk, Signor Boot. Please do not make the mistake of attributing to me any of the things which I have said, or I shall be obliged to deny ever having said anything of the kind-which, as I shall be believed, will have the effect of making you look foolish. Good day!’

And with that he left the room, and a few minutes later the same surly constable who had fetched me led me back to the gate, and vouched for me to the sentry. A moment later I was at liberty!

I am not in the habit of drinking spirits in the morning, but the first thing I did was to enter a cafe and order a large glass of brandy. Just try to imagine for a moment how you would feel if you were unceremoniously roused from sleep one morning by the police, hauled off to a mediaeval dungeon, and interrogated for an hour about the mysterious death of a ‘medium’ with whom you had spent the previous evening-whose spirit-show, which had so profoundly affected you at the time, you now learned to have been all sham. And imagine then that you further discovered that the new friend you so admired, and of whom you had hoped to make a high Ideal and a beacon for the future, had been systematically lying to you about his relations with a married woman with whom you had once