“Ach. There is no sign that the Composer is returning to the farmhouse in the country.”
Rhyme and Spiro were alone in the situation room in the Questura. Rhyme, with no need to be anywhere but here, and bodily functions taken care of, had given Thom time off again to see the sights. The aide—irritatingly—kept checking in. Rhyme had finally said, “Hang up! Have some fun! I’ll call if there’s a problem. Phone reception’s better here than in parts of Manhattan.” Which it was.
He now digested Spiro’s news. Unlike at the aqueduct scene, with Ali Maziq, the Composer had no warning system at the farmhouse to alert him that his hidey-hole had been breached. Rossi had set up surveillance at the house and around the organic fertilizer company, hoping he might return. They’d held off running the crime scene. But two hours had passed and Rossi now yielded to Rhyme’s—and Beatrice Renza’s—pressure to walk the grid.
Rhyme called Sachs and told her to go ahead with the farmhouse search. She, Ercole and the Scientific Police had finished with the factory in the Spanish Quarters, where Khaled Jabril had nearly been strangled.
Beatrice, in the doorway of the situation room, nodded approvingly when she heard the scene would be searched. “Bene.” She cocked her head, crowned with a Tyvek bonnet. “‘Even seconds can mean the difference between the successful preservation of evidence and its destruction. Scenes must be searched, evidence collected and protected, as quickly as possible.’”
The grammar and syntax were perfect, even if the delivery was mired in her thick accent.
Spiro shot her one of his glances. “And you are lecturing me for what reason, Officer Renza?”
Rhyme had to chuckle. “She’s quoting, Dante. Not lecturing. And she is quoting me. My textbook. And I believe that’s verbatim.”
She said, “It is used here but only in English. It should be translated.”
“That may very well happen.” He explained that just this morning Thom had received a call from one of the best literary agents in Italy, a man named Roberto Santachiara, who had read the press account that Rhyme was in Naples and wanted to talk to him about an Italian translation of his book.
“It will be on the bestseller list. Among us, the Scientific Polices, at the least.” Beatrice then lifted a file folder. “Now. I have made a discovery that is pertains to something else. This is relating to the Garry Soames case. The wine bottle Ercole wished me to run an analysis.”
The bottle at the smoking station on the deck the night of the attack.
She handed the lengthy report to Dante Spiro, who scanned the text and said to Rhyme, “I will translate. There were the same results as in the first analysis, the friction ridges, the DNA, the Pinot Nero wine, which showed no traces of the date-rape drug. But there was new trace found on the surface of the bottle.”
“And?”
“Beatrice found present cyclomethicone, polydimethylsiloxane, silicone, and dimethicone copolyol.”
“Ah,” Rhyme said.
Spiro looked his way. “Is this significant?”
“Oh, yes, it is, Dante. Significant indeed.”
She was stunningly beautiful.
Though in a different way from Amelia Sachs, Rhyme reflected. Sachs radiated a hometown, neighborhood-girl attractiveness. The sort you could approach and talk to, without intimidation.
Natalia Garelli was a different species of beauty—an appropriate word, for there was something animal-like about her. High, hard cheekbones, eyes close together, the color an otherworldly green. She wore tight black leather pants, boots with heels that boosted her height three inches over Spiro’s, and a thin, close-fitting brown leather jacket. As supple as water.
Natalia looked over Rhyme and Spiro, the only people in the situation room at the moment, though Rhyme saw Beatrice cast a curious look at her from the lab. The Scientific Police officer turned back to a microscope.
The woman had no interest in Rhyme’s disabled condition. Her thoughts were elsewhere. “Have you brought me here for, come si dice? For a lineup. To identify a suspect?”
“Sit down, please, Signorina Garelli. You are comfortable with English? My associate here does not speak Italian.”
“Yes, yes.” She sat, flipping her luxurious hair. “Allora. A lineup?”
“No.”
“Why am I here then? May I ask?”
Spiro said, “We have more questions about the sexual assault of Frieda Schorel.”
“Yes, of course. But I spoke to you, Procuratore, and to Ispettore…What was her name?”
“Laura Martelli. Yes. Of the Police of State.”
“That’s right. And then I spoke to that American woman and, curiously, a Forestry Corps officer the other day.”
Spiro tossed a wry look Rhyme’s way. He turned back to Natalia. “One detail I am curious about. You say you and your boyfriend had a meal of Indian food the day of the party.”
A pause. “Yes, that is correct. Dinner.”
“What did you have?”
“I cannot recall for certain. Possibly korma and saag. Tikka masala. Why?”
“And you did laundry in the afternoon?”
“Yes. As I told you. Or told someone who asked. So I might have clean linens in the event a guest wished to stay the night.”
Spiro leaned forward slightly and asked in an abrupt tone: “The night of the party, for how long was Frieda Schorel, the victim, flirting with your boyfriend, Dev?”
“I…” He had caught her completely off guard. “They weren’t flirting. Who told you that?”
“I cannot talk about witnesses who give statements in cases.”
Even nonexistent ones, Rhyme reflected.
The green eyes widened momentarily. A potent color. Shamrock green. Rhyme suspected contact lenses. She sputtered: “They were joking, Dev and Frieda. That is all. Your witness is mistaken. It was a party of university students in Naples. A beautiful autumn night. Everybody was having fun.”
“Joking.”
“Sì.”
“Do you know if Dev has ever bought Comfort-Sure condoms?”
She blinked. “How dare you ask me a personal question like that?”
Spiro’s tone was persistent. “Please respond.”
After a hesitation she said, “I do not know what he buys.”
“You are his girlfriend and this you don’t know?”
“No. I don’t pay any attention to such things.”
“If I were to look in your medicine cabinet would I find Comfort-Sure condoms?”
“I resent that question and I resent your attitude.”
Spiro gave a Gallic sneer, his lower jaw extended. “It is of no matter. After you left to come here, an officer went through your apartment. She found no Comfort-Sure.”