LITMIR.BIZ

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questions. Lots of them.

      Too much crime was making Flavia a bit callous; for some reason the evening’s events had put her in an exceptionally good mood. No more mucking about with minor thefts of gilt cups from churches, or trotting about interviewing petty thieves about disappearing jewellery. No. For the first time in several months, she had something half-way decent to have a go at.

      She had, in fact, been hard-pressed to stop herself humming cheerfully as she and Argyll had sat in her office, taking down a detailed statement about his role in the affair. But she was professional enough to make Argyll a little unnerved; he had not had the busy police side of her directed at him for many years and had forgotten how intimidating she could be behind a typewriter. It was the little details that bothered him; having to give her, of all people, his passport number, and recite his date of birth and address.

      ‘But you know my address,’ he pointed out. ‘It’s the same as yours.’

      ‘Yes, but you have to tell me. This is an official statement. Would you rather dictate it to Fabriano?’

      ‘Oh, very well,’ he sighed and gave the information. Then there was the long process of going through the statement, his words being knocked into bureaucratically approved shape with her help. So he paid a business call on J. Delorme, picture dealer, rather than saw him; proceeded to the railway station to make his way back to Rome instead of heading for the station to catch a train. Had aforementioned person unknown attempt to abscond with said painting rather than was nearly suckered by a crook.

      ‘So you then caught the train and travelled straight back to Rome. And that’s it?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘I do wish you’d reported it to the French police. Life would have been much easier.’

      ‘It would have been much easier if I’d never seen it in the first place.’

      ‘True.’

      ‘At the very least I would never have come across this Fabriano creature. What did you ever see in him?’

      ‘Giulio? He’s not so bad, really,’ she said absently. Why she was defending him temporarily escaped her. ‘In a good mood he’s fun, lively and quite good company. He tends to be a bit possessive, mind you.’

      Argyll produced one of his non-committal grunts; the sort that indicated that he could scarcely disagree more profoundly.

      ‘Anyway,’ she went on, ‘we’re not here to talk about my youth. I must retype this thing. Keep quiet for a few minutes while I do it.’

      So Argyll fidgeted and looked bored while she put the finishing touches to her work, tongue between her teeth, frowning slightly, intent on making as few errors as possible.

      ‘Now in Rome …’ she went on. And so the enterprise continued, for nearly an hour until she had it down to her satisfaction. Eventually, she leant back, took the piece of paper out of the machine and handed it to him.

      ‘Read this, assure yourself it’s a full and accurate account,’ she said formally. ‘Then sign it, whatever you think. I’m not going to retype it.’

      He gave her a grimace, and read it over. There were bits missing, of course, but in his judgement they were scarcely relevant. Full and accurate seemed to be the right description. He put his mark on the dotted line and handed it back.

      ‘Pouf. Thank God that’s over,’ she said with relief. ‘Splendid. Didn’t take long at all.’

      ‘How long does it normally take?’ he asked, looking at his watch. It was nearly ten o’clock, they’d been cooped up for over two hours and he was getting hungry.

      ‘Oh, hours and hours. You’d be surprised. Come on, let’s go and see Bottando. He’s waiting for us.’

      He was waiting patiently and placidly, staring at the ceiling, with a pile of miscellaneous papers spread over his desk. His initial instinct when Fabriano had turned up had been to rush off himself and take on the department’s end of the investigation. Reason, however, intervened. This was a Carabinieri matter and, much as he wanted to get involved, it would never do for someone as senior as himself in the rival Polizia to end up as the virtual assistant of a mere detective. So Flavia would have to do that bit. He was a bit uneasy about her clear personal involvement; hence his desire to find out as quickly as possible in her absence about Argyll’s picture. If it was stolen and he, in effect, had smuggled it out of France, the matter would be clear; whoever took on the investigation it could not possibly be her. Think of the headlines in the papers. Think of the disapproving frowns on the faces of superiors. Think of the pleasure of his assorted rivals in making sure everybody knew that he had sanctioned the investigation of a series of linked offences by an officer who was the girlfriend of one of the felons.

      On the other hand, the problem was how to stop Flavia investigating. What could he say? If he gave the case to someone else her reaction would be predictable and none too agreeable. If he did give it to her …

      A conundrum. An ambiguity in the universe, and Bottando didn’t like imponderables. He was thus even more irritated and perplexed when the long-awaited phone call from Paris came through and, despite his hopes, muddied the waters still further.

      Was the picture stolen or not? A straightforward question, surely, and one that should produce a straightforward answer. Like yes. Or no. Either would do. What he did not anticipate, or approve of, was Janet’s response.

      ‘Maybe,’ the Frenchman said.

      ‘What do you mean? What sort of answer is that?’

      There was the uncomfortable sound of Janet clearing his throat at the other end. ‘Not a very good one. I have been trying my best, but not with a great deal of success. We did have a note from the police proper notifying us that a picture of this description had been stolen.’

      ‘Ah. There we are, then,’ said Bottando, clutching at the information.

      ‘I’m afraid not,’ Janet replied. ‘You see, we were then told that no action by our department was required.’

      ‘Why not?’

      ‘That’s the problem, isn’t it? It means either that it has already been recovered, or that it’s too unimportant to bother about, or that the police investigating know what happened and don’t require our special skills.’

      ‘I see,’ Bottando said, not at all sure that he did. ‘So what, exactly, is the status of this picture that is leaning against my desk? Does it have a right to be here or not?’

      Can you give a perfectly honed and practised Gallic shrug down a telephone? Perhaps you can. Bottando could almost see his colleague delivering a masterly demonstration of the art.

      ‘Officially, this painting has not been notified to us as stolen, so as far as we’re concerned it hasn’t been stolen. We have no interest in it. That’s all I can say at the moment.’

      ‘You couldn’t do something simple and ask the owner?’

      ‘If I knew who the owner was, I could. But that is one of the little details that we were not given. To be on the safe side, it would be best if Mr Argyll brought it back, but I’m not in a position to say whether we have a right to it or not.’

      And that was that. How very intriguing. No further on at all, Bottando put the phone down and thought. Damn picture, was all he came up with. And odd Janet. Normally the most effusive of people, but this time he had not gone out of his way to help. Normally, with any sort of request, the man swamped them with details. Usually he would put somebody on to it to dig up everything he could. But not this time. Why not? Perhaps he was just busy. Bottando knew the problem. Priorities. If you are really strapped, you can’t waste too much time on minor stuff. But still …

      Then he went and sat on his armchair, cupped his chin in his hands and looked carefully at the painting. As Flavia had said, it was decent enough, quite well done, in fact. If you like that sort of thing. But nothing special. Nothing

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