pool at the Beau Sejour Centre tonight before I have my rehearsal.”
“Rehearsal?” Moretti didn’t know why he should feel surprised. After all, he knew nothing about Detective Constable Liz Falla. “Are you a member of the Island Players like your uncle?”
“God, no!” Falla seemed to find this funny. “I’m a member of a group. We call ourselves ‘Jenemie.’ A Guernsey word, but don’t ask me what it means. We just liked the sound of it.”
“Group? You mean you’re a musician, Falla?”
“Not like you, Guv. I play some guitar — acoustic — but mostly I’m a singer.”
“I didn’t know.”
There was the old-fashioned look again. “Why would you, Guv? I don’t go around Hospital Lane singing my little folkie heart out.”
“So you’re a folk singer.”
“More like — do you know Enya’s music? A New Age folkie singer. Sort of like that. My real heroine’s a Canadian called Loreena McKennit.”
“Interesting,” said Moretti. It was his favourite fallback word. This time he meant it, although whenever anyone said “New Age” he usually ran fast in the opposite direction. “I think I will go to Torteval after all, have a word with Dan Mahy. Oh, and Falla, next time you’re in touch with Benedetti, perhaps you could ask him to see what he can find out about this person. No rush.” Taking out his notepad, Moretti wrote down the name “Sophia Maria Catellani,” added a couple of details, tore out the page, and handed it to Liz Falla.
“Okay, Guv.” His partner looked at the paper, but she asked no questions. He liked that.
“Rain’s starting,” said Moretti, standing up and putting the notebook back in his pocket. “They said it would by afternoon. You enjoy your cake, and I’ll see you at the manor.”
No need to tell Liz Falla he was making a stop on the way to see if his overnight guest had left his bed.
Rastrellamento. It’s all in there somewhere, Moretti thought. I’ve got to talk to Gilbert Ensor again. Rain was now pattering steadily against the windshield of the Triumph.
I thought about you.
Miles Davis’s version of the Johnny Mercer standard played in his head. In his mind’s eye Moretti saw the auburn hair of Sydney Tremaine burning against his pillow, her backless gold mules slipping off her feet.
She was gone, as he had expected. On the note he had left she had written, “Thank you. I took the shirt.”
He felt a pang of something that felt disconcertingly like regret, got back in the Triumph and set out to Torteval.
Chapter Seven
People have long memories.
But was it a long memory that Dan Mahy had? Or none at all? Was everything he said the product of delusion?
Torteval, on the south coast of the island, was a parish divided by another parish, St. Pierre du Bois. Dan Mahy lived in the western portion in one of the cottages once used by the families of the Hanois lighthouse-keepers, that had been his parents’ home. The cottages had fallen into disrepair during the German occupation, as every piece of timber had gradually been removed from the homes and used for fuel, and after the war there had been plans to rebuild them and make them fit for use again. This had not yet happened, and probably never would, but Dan Mahy had refused to leave.
Moretti’s route took him past the airport. As he drove past the Happy Landings Hotel a small private plane was coming in to land, and he made a mental note to himself to get someone to check the comings and goings of private planes over the past two or three days. He thought about his next move when he returned to the manor to meet Liz Falla. Should he see the marchesa and her son again, push a little harder. Dig a little deeper into the past?
No, he thought, leave them alone. Don’t tip your hand, not yet. He had little enough to go on, and at this stage he’d prefer the family to have no idea he suspected some past secret quite as much as some present indiscretion for the murder.
But if Toni Albarosa was not the intended victim, then who was? For it seemed much more likely that the murderer, knife in hand, was en route to a preplanned target rather than merely lurking about the manor on the off chance of finding someone to stick a dagger in. The most likely candidates were the marchesa or her son — if his theory about the murder were correct, that is.
And the most likely perpetrator? Well, if you took the usual elements of investigation into account — motive and opportunity — the list would include most family members, and some of the crew. Moretti felt reasonably safe at this stage ruling out the cast: they were chosen by the producer and the director, and thus were not proactive participants. Family motives would include jealousy and revenge — and it might still be a crime of passion in the usually accepted sense, after all. He must beware of getting too clever about the whole business. As for the crew, director Mario Bianchi was a prime suspect; he was responsible for the rewrites and he was Italian. And, for the moment, the most likely candidate was Italian. Which would be a great relief to Chief Officer Hanley.
If, that is, he was right about the war and past events being the motive for murder. As Sydney Tremaine had pointed out, there was a lot of volatility on a movie set. It could be that the art director, Piero Bonini, and the co-designer, Eddie Christy, hated Betty Chesler’s guts, and decided to sabotage the project. It could be that anyone hated Gilbert Ensor’s guts and decided to sabotage the project.
Ahead of him, shrouded in a misty grey drizzle, Moretti could see what remained of the Hanois cottages. The lighthouse itself could not be seen from this point, because of the towering granite slab around which the coastal road wound itself, but on that rocky platform, in the days before radio and telephone, the lighthouse keepers’ wives used to send messages to their husbands with flags. Now, the summit was empty, and only traces remained of the massive shelter and the tank traps erected by the occupation forces.
He brought the Triumph to a halt and got out. Because of the miserable weather, the place was deserted and silent, except for the sound of the sea on the rocks below the point. Gulls wheeled overhead, their cries suddenly climaxing in a raucous cacophony, and Moretti could hear the piping shriek of an oystercatcher somewhere, looking for the winkles and barnacles exposed by the low tide. He experienced a moment of suspension in time, as a past embracing all those hundreds of ships lost on the Hanway rocks, the earthworks thrown up and the great guns and powder magazines mounted to fend off Buonaparte on this vulnerable coastline, the debris left behind by a more recent enemy, hung in the swirling fog, tangible as the pebbles beneath his feet. Which past, indeed, did Betty Chesler mean?
“Wharro! Lookin’ for me?”
A small gnome-like creature materialized through the mist in front of Moretti.
“Dan Mahy?”
“Don’t look so surprised, lad. I got second sight, me, but I also got a phone!”
The gnome cackled.
“Can we have a word?”
“Why you came, innit?”
On closer inspection, the gnome was not so small after all. His back was nearly bent double,
