Chapter 14

14

MONDAY EVENING

We took the ferry back from Santa Margherita to Portofino just before seven after I'd had a chance to try to convince Anna that I wasn't going to get involved, and that this was now all going to be handled by the Carabinieri . I told her that all I was going to do was to act as an intermediary, relaying the message from Vaughan to the lieutenant, and then I would wash my hands of the whole affair. In spite of my best efforts, she didn't look convinced, and equally worrying was the fact that Oscar didn't look convinced either. Dumb animal he may be, but that nose of his doesn't miss much.

La Conchiglia, the shell restaurant, was a two-minute walk from the Carabinieri barracks and when I gave the lieutenant's name, a friendly looking woman sitting at a table on the terrace jumped to her feet and held out her hand towards us.

‘Good evening. You must be Guido's friends. I'm Marina, his wife. He's just called me to say he's been held up but he'll be here in five minutes.' She gave us a little smile. ‘Knowing him, that may well turn out to be ten minutes or more, but he promises he's coming.'

We all shook hands and sat down. Oscar went over to make friends with Marina, and Anna was soon telling her about her work at the university in Florence. It turned out that Marina was a teacher of history at the liceo in Rapallo and they discovered that they had a lot in common – not just being unfortunate enough to be partnered with detectives.

In the end, it was almost twenty minutes before the lieutenant arrived, sounding most apologetic. ‘I'm so sorry to be late, but a Greek sailor and a Turkish sailor from two different yachts decided to get very drunk and restage the Trojan war down at the harbour. I've just been dealing with them. Too much wine, I'm afraid.' He pulled out his chair but before sitting down, he glanced down at the table. ‘Talking of wine, I can't see any on the table. Are you just drinking water? I need to sort that out straight away.'

He turned and headed through the door into the restaurant, so I got up and followed him. As Anna and Marina were still happily chatting, and Oscar was fully engaged in begging for breadsticks from the soft-hearted Marina, I thought this might be the perfect opportunity to talk shop without disturbing the two women. Inside, I found the lieutenant being embraced by the owner, a jovial man with a fine restaurateur's stomach. The lieutenant – ‘Call me Guido' – introduced me and we discussed the choice of wine. The owner told us he'd just taken delivery of a few dozen bottles of white from a new producer near Bolgheri in southern Tuscany and he insisted on opening one and filling three glasses so we could taste it before making a decision. It was excellent and Guido asked him to put a bottle on the table for us. When the padrone went off to organise the wine, I took Guido to one side and related what Neil Vaughan had told me. He listened intently before responding.

‘That could well be very interesting. We're getting absolutely nowhere with Mario Fortunato and I've got the Libyan embassy – and the public prosecutor – on my back to either charge or release the two Libyan nationals. Fortunato has been steadfast in denying he could possibly have participated in murder and, without proof, I'm not sure there's much more I can do to link him to the murder. Mind you, I won't be releasing him. There's the little bag of weed found in the cabin, but that's hardly a criminal offence these days, but, of course, we can get him for possession of contraband arms. The thing is, I'd love to get him for something bigger.'

‘Did you get any joy out of the people on the Regal Princess this afternoon?'

He shook his head. ‘Not much. I interviewed Schiller, the crewman who was on anchor watch the night of the murder, and he stuck to his story of not having seen or heard anything apart from the dinghy leaving but, just like Veronese said, I thought he was acting a bit suspiciously. I'm at a loss to think of any reason he might have had to murder one of the guests, but I'm certainly not ruling him out for now. The woman, Susie Upton, struck me as pretty straight but, given her profession as a television performer, maybe it was just a good act. I tried pressing her on whether the murder victim had made inappropriate advances towards her in return for promotion and she denied it most forcefully, insisting that she would never have stooped to anything as base as that. The other comedian, Martin Grey, came across as very full of himself and decidedly slippery, but he still totally denies having had anything to do with the murder, although it sounds as though the big argument that night did involve him. When I pressed him about his allegations of something going on between Susie Upton and the victim, he started backtracking, so maybe it was just a story he made up like Anna's friend on the yacht said.'

‘And the other men on the Regal Princess ? Are they still not admitting to having been involved in the Lucca restaurant conversation I overheard?'

‘Absolutely not. I couldn't even get a hint of anything suspicious from any of them except for Edgar Beaumont. You were pretty sure about him being one of the people you heard but he still denies it, but there's something about him that makes me think he's lying. The trouble is that I know, just like he knows, that there's nothing more I can do without finding the man he was talking to. Just to make matters worse, the Coastguard radar trackers have now informed us that there were actually as many as seven vessels in the area that night that might have passed close to Fortunato's boat. The problem we face is that we have no evidence against any of them so we can't stop and search all those boats – there would be one hell of an uproar.'

He drained the last of the wine from his glass and set it down on the bar before reaching over and clapping me on the shoulder. ‘You have at least one small success to your name. I got the purser – in the strictest confidence – to check the steak knives, and he confirms that, instead of having the full two dozen, they now only have twenty-three. Not that this helps us a lot as it's without doubt lying somewhere at the bottom of the sea now, but it does increase the likelihood of the murderer being on the yacht. All we can do is keep trying, can't we? What about you? Are you going to take on the case of the missing money? If you want to start questioning people on board the yacht, I'm going to hold it until tomorrow late afternoon, but then I'll have to let them go.'

I found myself in a really difficult position. Every investigative bone in my body was telling me that I couldn't let a murderer get away scot-free. If it wasn't Fortunato or his friends, I was now ever more convinced that the killer was to be found on the Regal Princess and yet here I was, about to walk away from the investigation. And that didn't sit well with me.

Of course, any intervention by me was complicated by the presence of my girlfriend sitting outside on the terrace talking history with Guido's wife. Anna had been feeling justifiably miffed that our relaxing long weekend away together had turned into more of a busman's holiday for me and, in consequence, a frustrating one for her. I owed it to her to turn the job down and stick by her side even though Neil Vaughan's telephone call had now handed me a golden opportunity to get back on board the yacht and start asking questions of my own. The problem was how Anna might react if I went down that road and, to make matters worse, she had an important meeting in Florence the following afternoon so I was up against it from a time point of view. Before I could give Guido an answer, I felt his hand, still on my shoulder, give me a reassuring squeeze before he released his hold.

‘I've got a good idea of what's going through your head, Dan. You and I are both familiar with juggling the pressures of work and home life. Take your time; you don't have to make a decision now. Let's go and eat and then you can talk it through with Anna later. You have my phone number. If you decide you want to go back on board early tomorrow morning to start sniffing around to get to the bottom of the allegations of financial irregularities being made by Mr Vaughan, we can go out to the boat together. I'm going to have to go there anyway to follow up with him but, I'll be quite honest, I need all the help I can get at the moment.' A smile crossed his face. ‘But think of it this way: if you take Mr Vaughan's contract, you will at least be being paid for your time and not just donating it generously like you have been doing so far.'

I gave him a sincere smile. ‘Thanks, Guido, I appreciate that. You're right, I need to talk it over with Anna, but I really would like to get to the bottom of what's happening. The trouble is that I need to get away tomorrow by noon at the latest as Anna has to be back in Florence by five. I'll give you a call later this evening or, more probably, first thing tomorrow morning when I go for a walk with Oscar on my own, say between seven and seven-thirty.'

‘That's fine but remember this – I still want to catch this murderer, so don't think you'll be leaving things in limbo if you decide not to be involved any more. But, like I say, two heads are better than one. If you decide not to carry on any involvement, I will understand, and you can rest assured that I'll still be on the case. At least you being here has meant that I've been able to meet and make friends with a fellow professional from a different country and that's always good. Now let's get back outside to Anna and Marina and make sure we talk about anything at all, as long as it isn't murder.'

I swallowed my wine and followed him out to the terrace. The meal that followed was excellent even though, with everything we had eaten at lunchtime, Anna and I were unable to do it real justice. We all started by sharing a wonderful platter of mixed seafood antipasti loaded with everything from crab to squid, prawns to scallops. Guido tried to insist that we had a plate of pasta before the main course and I resisted manfully until we finally hit on a compromise. Anna and I would share a plate of the house speciality spaghetti alla marinara .

I've always quite liked pasta and since moving to Italy, I've inevitably consumed an increasing amount of it, whether pasta fresca or pasta asciutta – that's the hard, dry stuff you find in packets on the shelves. I've had tagliatelle, lasagne, ravioli and pappardelle – plus a load of other types whose names escape me – but this was the first time I'd ever been served a plate of spaghetti where there was more sauce than pasta. The plate was absolutely piled high with clams and mussels in their shells and, with just a hint of freshly made pesto – the Ligurian speciality – in the sauce, the resulting taste was exquisite.

In spite of Anna's protestations that she was still full from lunch, I noticed that even she very quickly shed her scruples and the two of us managed to clear the plate, much to the chagrin of my ever-hungry dog whose nose had told him exactly what we humans were eating. I bought him off with a couple more breadsticks but I could tell he was feeling hard done by. The proprietor, who came out to check that everything was all right, must have intercepted a longing look from the Labrador because two minutes later, a waitress emerged with the remains of a T-bone steak that somebody hadn't been able to finish. Oscar's eyes lit up and the rest of the evening was punctuated by sinister crunching noises from beneath the table as he enjoyed his very own feast.

As we ate, we chatted, and I discovered that Guido and Marina had been married for five years and lived in an apartment in Rapallo. This, he told me, was partly for Marina's convenience for her teaching job, but also because property prices in Portofino were astronomical. He told me ruefully that even a general in the Carabinieri would find it hard to afford a two-bedroom flat here. I could well believe it. This tiny little place was clearly the domain of the super-rich, and I wondered who had been out to catch what we were eating tonight. Where did the fishermen live and how did they manage to survive in this playground of the wealthy?

The pasta course was followed by another massive platter, this time of grilled fish. I counted at least seven different species but could name only a couple of them. What they all had in common, however, was that they tasted great. With a simple mixed salad as accompaniment, it was outstanding.

I was just sitting back with a cup of coffee, after having managed to summon the self-control to refuse a dessert, when a phone started ringing. For once, it wasn't mine. It was Guido's. As calls go, it wasn't the longest.

‘Hello. What? Where? I'll be with you in two minutes.'

He reached for his coffee cup and drained the last of it before standing up. I could see him doing his best not to catch my eye, but I couldn't miss the expression of shock and exasperation on his face. His wife must have seen it as well because she reached out her hand, caught hold of his arm and looked up at him.

‘What is it, Guido? What's happened?'

‘There's been another murder.'

Her hand flew to her mouth in disbelief. ‘Two in three days! Where's this one?'

This time, he definitely did make eye contact with me. ‘It's on board the Regal Princess .'

I felt as stunned as he did and a sudden feeling of premonition settled on me. Surely it couldn't be Neil Vaughan so soon after voicing his suspicions but, significantly, without naming names. With a feeling of dread, I looked up at Guido and asked the all-important question.

‘Who is it?'

The answer wasn't what I was expecting.

‘Heinrich Schiller, the deckhand. His body's been found in a pool of blood.'

Although every investigative bone in my body was screaming at me to leap to my feet and accompany Guido to the yacht, he pre-empted any action from me by laying a calming hand on my shoulder, preventing me from having to make a difficult decision. ‘I'm sorry but I have to go. Don't worry about trying to pay the bill; I've already spoken to the owner. Before you say anything, Dan, I'll go out to the boat with my people now. There's no need for you to get involved. We'll talk in the morning, all right?' He turned to his wife. ‘I'm sorry, my love, but you know how it is. Will you give Dan and Anna a lift back to Rapallo?' He bent down to kiss her, shook hands with Anna and me and disappeared at the double.

I stayed in my seat as bidden, but it was a struggle.