“Correction: a woman digging.” Pendergast set off down the path with a vigorous step. Reaching the vineyard, they stepped gingerly through clods of freshly turned earth. The woman watched them approach, leaning on her shovel.
Pendergast paused to offer the woman his hand, giving his usual little half-bow. In response, she removed her straw hat, shook out a mass of dark glossy hair, and took the hand.
D’Agosta froze. This is no middle-aged woman.
She was stunningly beautiful, tall, athletic, and slender, with spirited hazel eyes, high cheekbones, skin tanned and freckled from the sun, nose still flaring from the effort of digging.
After a moment, he realized Pendergast, after having bowed, had straightened again but seemed rooted to the spot, still holding her hand, saying nothing but looking into her eyes. The woman appeared to be doing the same. There was a moment of utter stillness. D’Agosta wondered if they had known each other before—it almost seemed as if they recognized each other.
“I am Aloysius Pendergast,” Pendergast said after a long moment.
“I’m Viola Maskelene,” she replied in a rich, warm English accent.
As they released each other’s hand, D’Agosta realized Pendergast had uncharacteristically forgotten to introduce him. “And I’m Sergeant Vincent D’Agosta, Southampton Police.”
The woman turned to him, as if noticing him for the first time. But the smile she gave him was full of warmth. “Welcome to Capraia, Sergeant.”
Another awkward silence. D’Agosta glanced at Pendergast. He had a most uncharacteristic look of surprise on his face, as if somebody had just dropped a scoop of ice cream down his back. What was going on?
“Well,” said Lady Maskelene with another smile, “I assume you’re here to see me, Mr. Pendergast?”
“Yes,” he said hastily. “Yes, we are. It concerns—”
She held up her finger. “A hot vineyard is no place to have a civilized conversation. Let’s go back to my house and enjoy something cool on the terrazza, shall we?”
“Yes, of course.”
She smiled again: a dazzling, dimpled smile. “Follow me.” She set off across the field, her big boots clomping through the clods of earth. The terrazza was shaded by a pergola draped with wisteria, and bordered by blooming rosemary and miniature lemon trees. It was like being perched on the edge of the known world, the cliffs dropping away to an infinity of blue, stretching to the horizon and merging imperceptibly with the sky. The expanse was broken by a single, tiny black reef, about a mile offshore, which only served to increase the sense of distance, of infinity.
Lady Maskelene seated them around an old tiled table, in battered wooden chairs, and then disappeared into the house. A minute later she returned with a wine bottle without a label, filled with a pale amber liquid; some glasses; a bottle of olive oil; and a battered clay platter heaped with thick pieces of rough-cut bread. She set down the glasses and, moving around the table, filled them with white wine. As she passed D’Agosta his glass, he caught her faint scent, a perfume of grapevines, earth, and the sea.
Pendergast took a sip. “Is it yours, Lady Maskelene?”
“Yes. The olive oil is mine also. There’s something marvelously satisfying about working your own piece of ground.”
“Complimenti.” Pendergast took another sip, dipped a piece of the rough bread in a dish of olive oil. “Excellent.”
“Thank you.”
“Allow me to tell you why we’ve come, Lady Maskelene.”
“No,” she said in a low voice, looking not at him, but far out to sea, her hazel eyes almost blue in the intense light, a strange smile on her lips. “Don’t spoil this . . . particular moment just yet.”
D’Agosta wondered just what particular moment she might be talking about. The faint sound of surf and the cries of seagulls drifted from the edge of the cliff.
“What an enchanting villa you have here, Lady Maskelene.”
She laughed. “A villa it is not—just a simple seaside bungalow. That’s why I love it. Here I have my books, my music, my vines, my olive trees—and the sea. What more could you ask for?”
“You mentioned music. Do you play an instrument?”
A hesitation. “The violin.”
Now we’re getting somewhere, thought D’Agosta. As usual, Pendergast was sliding into the subject sideways.
“You are here year-round?”
“Oh, no. I’d get bored. I’m not that much of a recluse.”
“Where do you spend the rest of your time?”
“I lead a rather decadent life. Fall in Rome, December in Luxor, at the Winter Palace.”
“Egypt? That’s a curious place to spend the winter.”
“I’m directing a small dig in the Valley of the Nobles.”