Claudia laughed effortlessly.
‘For God’s sake, Raffaela! The whole thing was just a misunderstanding. Ricco mentioned the news item, and I thought for some reason that he knew the poor man. I was just being sympathetic, that’s all.’
Abandoning them abruptly, she returned to the living room, where Danilo was sitting at the coffee table idly shuffling the pack of cards. Claudia subsided on to the sofa beside him and started an intense monologue about the celebrity scandal of the moment. It was conducted in an almost inaudible undertone, and she paid not the slightest attention to the Zuccotti couple when they emerged from the kitchen.
‘Thank you so much, cara!’ cried Raffaela, taking charge of the situation as always. ‘Everything was perfect. We have so enjoyed ourselves, but we really must be going. It looks like rain, doesn’t it? Come on, Ricco.’
Her husband presented the most extraordinary spectacle, staring at Danilo with a mute fixity that Claudia found completely inexplicable.
‘Riccardo!’ his wife admonished.
‘ Certo, si. Arrivo. Anzi, andiamo. Cioe… ’
Claudia vaguely waved and smiled.
When the front door finally closed behind her guests, she rose from the sofa.
‘I’m going to slip into something more comfortable,’ she said, turning her back but not moving.
Danilo obediently stood up and unzipped her dress. Claudia walked off into the hallway leading to her bedroom, the garment already tumbling off her shoulders and down to her waist. Leaving the door open, she unhooked her brassiere and breathed a soft sigh as it fell to the floor. She kicked off her shoes and wriggled out of the dress, then stripped off her stockings and unlatched the hateful corset. With a lilt she stepped across the ruins and slipped silk on like a younger skin.
‘So what was all that about?’ she remarked, returning to the living room.
Danilo was now standing by the sideboard stacked with photographs of Claudia’s son Naldo at every age from birth to twenty years. He was still nervously shuffling the cards.
‘Raffaela seems to be taking life terribly hard, poverina. Not that maturing is easy for any of us, but imagine a steady diet of four decades with the ghastly Riccardo, and then realizing that the clock has run out. It must be like being confined to one’s bed with some terminal illness when one’s never done anything or travelled anywhere.’
‘Whereas you’ve travelled from bed to bed, done everything and never been confined anywhere.’
Claudia wound the ankle-length robe loosely about her and uttered a practised laugh.
‘Honestly, the things you say! I always behaved perfectly while Gaetano was alive.’
Danilo raised an ironic eyebrow.
‘I mean I never screwed anyone in our social set,’ Claudia retorted. ‘What more can you ask?’
Danilo didn’t seem inclined to ask, or to say, anything. But he didn’t leave either. Another little anomaly. They were piling up this afternoon.
‘Would you like a pastry?’ Claudia asked him pointedly. ‘Some more coffee?’
Danilo put the cards down and turned to face her. He seemed about to say something, then gave one of his trademark boyish guffaws which always charmed Claudia, even though she knew he could produce them on demand as and when it suited him.
‘Why do you laugh?’ she asked.
‘Oh, I just remembered what Gaetano used to say about cards. You know that our pack is different from the one used in every other country? Not just the suits of swords and cups, but the fact that there are only forty cards, because the ten, nine and eight are missing. Gaetano claimed that this symbolized everything that was wrong with the Italian military. Almost a third of the total force consisted of senior officers while the rest were cannon fodder. The former weren’t always stupid and the latter were often brave, but what was missing was a solid, dependable corps of sottufficiali to pull the whole unit together and get things done on the ground. That’s what kept the Germans in the war, even after Stalingrad and Normandy. Their NCOs were the best in the world.’
‘Yes, Gaetano could be quite boring on military matters,’ Claudia replied languidly. ‘But I had to put up with it from him. He was my husband. I don’t have to put up with it from you.’
Danilo’s glance seemed to be trying to spare her something. An uneasy silence fell.
‘Well, I think I’ll have a bath,’ Claudia announced briskly, heading for the inner hallway of the apartment. ‘Feel free to let yourself out when you’re ready.’
Danilo strode across, gripping her wrist and pulling her back into the room. Astounded, almost excited, Claudia let herself be drawn. Danilo was her casual companion and card partner, an endless source of scurrilous gossip, a creature of varied charms and indeterminate sexuality. The one thing he never had been was physical.
‘There’s something I have to tell you,’ he told her. ‘Sit down. Let me get you a drink.’
‘I don’t drink.’
‘Yes, you do, cara. I can smell it from here. Vermouth, I’d say. The sweet variety.’
Her shoulders sagged. She was aware that her robe was hanging open in an unseemly manner, showing half her bosom, but that was the last thing on her mind. Danilo was busily opening and closing the doors of the sideboard.
‘In the kitchen,’ she told him. ‘Above the sink.’
Opening a silver box which looked entirely decorative, Claudia helped herself to one of her rare cigarettes as Danilo returned bearing a tumbler filled almost to the brim with Cinzano Rosso. He handed it to her and, in what he managed to make appear the same smooth gesture, proffered a flame from his lighter.
‘Well?’ she asked with marked sarcasm. Whatever was going on had already gone on much too long.
There was no reply. Danilo just stood there, gazing into space. Claudia took a gulp of the red liquid, which tasted even more sickly than usual. But Cinzano was a ladylike drink. She could name some women who had moved on to gin and vodka and never found their way back.
‘Danilo, over the years you’ve made me laugh, you’ve made me cry and you’ve made me angry. Once or twice you’ve even made me think. Now you’re beginning to bore me. I never thought you’d do that. If you’ve got something to say, for God’s sake say it!’
Danilo smiled nervously.
‘Sorry, I’m just not sure how to start. Riccardo was supposed to do this, you see. He’s had time to think the whole thing through, work out the best way to put it. But Raffaela interrupted and then hauled him off, so I’ve had to step into the breach. Anyway, basically it’s about that body they found in the mountains last week.’
‘So I gather. What about it, for the love of heaven?’
He made three futile attempts to begin, then spread out his hands in appeal.
‘How much did Ricco tell you?’
‘Nothing. He was just getting to the point when Raffaela marched in on marital patrol duty.’
With evident relief, Danilo seized the opportunity to laugh.
‘Ah yes, I see! Well, the point is that while the body hasn’t been officially identified as yet, sources in Rome close to the regiment have informally advised various people here as to certain relevant facts. Some of them in turn informed Riccardo, who told me, and we both agreed that it would be better if you heard it from us first.’
‘Heard what, for God’s sake?’
Danilo faltered again for a moment, then plunged on like a horse taking a fence.
‘Leonardo Ferrero.’
Claudia didn’t move or speak, didn’t react at all for at least a minute. Shock has its uses, and comes in various forms. Hearing that name on Danilo’s lips was like hearing a poodle pronounce the secret name of God.
She reached forward to flick the ash off her cigarette, then slowly stood up, looking around her with the startled expression of someone who has fallen asleep on the bus home from work and awakened to find herself in a foreign country.
Danilo coughed.
‘You knew him, I believe.’