“She’ll be right, sir,” said Franks and Barker together.
So Alleyn went down to the library.
It came as no surprise to find the atmosphere in that utterly neutral apartment tepid, verging on glacial. Inspector Hazelmere had his notebook at the ready. Mr. Reece sat at one of the neatly laden tables with the glaze of boredom veiling his pale regard. When Alleyn apologized for keeping him waiting, he raised his hand and let it fall as if words now failed him.
The Inspector, Alleyn thought, was not at the moment happy in his work though he put up a reasonable show of professional savoir-faire and said easily that he thought he had finished “bothering” Mr. Reece and believed he was now fully in the picture. Mr. Reece said woodenly that he was glad to hear it. An awkward silence followed, which he broke by addressing himself pointedly to Alleyn.
“Would you,” he said, “be good enough to show me where you found that book? I’ve been wondering about it.”
Alleyn led the way to the remote corner of the library and the obscure end of a top shelf. “It was here,” he said, pointing to the gap. “I could only just reach it.”
“I would require the steps,” said Mr. Reece. He put on his massive spectacles and peered. “It’s very badly lit,” he said. “The architect should have noticed that.”
Alleyn switched on the light.
“Thank you. I would like to see the book when you have finished with it. I suppose it has something to do with this family feud or vendetta or whatever, that she was so concerned about?”
“I would think so, yes.”
“It is strange that she never showed it to me. Perhaps that is because it is written in Italian. I would have expected her to show it to me,” he said heavily. “I would have expected her to feel it would give validity to her theory. I wonder how she came by it. It is very shabby. Perhaps it was secondhand.”
“Did you notice the name on the flyleaf? ‘M. V. Rossi’?”
“Rossi? Rossi!” he repeated, and stared at Alleyn. “But that was the name she did mention. On the rare occasions when she used a name. I recollect that she once said she wished my name did not resemble it. I thought this very farfetched but she seemed to be quite serious about it. She generally referred simply to the ‘nemico’ — meaning the enemy.”
“Perhaps, after all, it was not her book.”
“It was certainly not mine,” he said flatly.
“At some time — originally, I suppose — it has been the property of the ‘enemy.’ One wouldn’t have expected her to have acquired it.”
“You certainly would not,” Mr. Reece said emphatically. “Up there, was it? What sort of company was it keeping?”
Alleyn took down four of the neighboring books. One, a biography called La Voce, was written in Italian and seemed from cover to cover to be an unmodified rave about the Sommita. It was photographically illustrated, beginning with a portrait of a fat-legged infant, much befrilled, beringleted and beribboned, glowering on the lap, according to the caption, of “La Zia Giulia,” and ending with La Sommita receiving a standing ovation at a royal performance of Faust.
“Ah, yes,” said Mr. Reece. “The biography. I always intended to read it. It went into three editions. What are the others?”
One in English, one in Italian — both novels with a strong romantic interest. They were gifts to the Sommita, lavishly inscribed by admirers.
“Is the autobiography there?” asked Mr. Reece. “That meant a helluva lot to me. Yes sir. A helluva lot.” This piece of information was dealt out by Mr. Reece in his customary manner: baldly as if he were citing a quotation from Wall Street. For the first time he sounded definitely American.
“I’m sure it did,” Alleyn said.
“I never got round to reading it right through,” Mr. Reece confessed and then seemed to brighten up a little. “After all,” he pointed out, “she didn’t write it herself. But it was the thought that counted.”
“Quite. This seems, doesn’t it, to be a corner reserved for her own books?”
“I believe I remember, now I come to think of it, her saying something about wanting someplace for her own books. She didn’t appreciate the way they looked in her bedroom. Out of place.”
“Do you think she would have put them up there herself?”
Mr. Reece took off his spectacles and looked at Alleyn as if he had taken leave of his senses. “Bella?” he said. “Up there? On the steps?”
“Well, no. Silly of me. I’m sorry.”
“She would probably have told Maria to do it.”
“Ah, apropos! I don’t know,” Alleyn said, “whether Mr. Hazelmere had told you?” He looked at the Inspector, who slightly shook his head. “Perhaps we should—?”
“That’s so, sir,” said Hazelmere. “We certainly should.” He addressed himself to Mr. Reece. “I understand, sir, that Miss Maria Bennini has expressed the wish to perform the last duties and Mr. Alleyn pointed out that until the premises had been thoroughly investigated, the stattus” (so Mr. Hazelmere pronounced it) “quow must be maintained. That is now the case. So, if it’s acceptable to yourself, we will inform Miss Bennini and in due course—”
“Yes, yes. Tell her,” Mr. Reece said. His voice was actually unsteady. He looked at Alleyn almost as if appealing to him. “And what then?” he asked.
Alleyn explained about the arrangements for the removal of the body. “It will probably be at dusk or even after dark when they arrive at the lakeside,” he said. “The launch will be waiting.”
“I wish to be informed.”
Alleyn and Hazelmere said together: “Certainly, sir.”
“I will—” he hunted for the phrase. “I will see her off. It is the least I can do. If I had not brought her to this house—” He turned aside, and looked at the books without seeing them. Alleyn put them back on their shelf. “I’m not conversant with police procedure in New Zealand,” Mr. Reece said. “I understand it follows the British rather than the American practice. It may be quite out of order, at this juncture, to ask whether you expect to make an arrest in the foreseeable future.”
Hazelmere again glanced at Alleyn, who remained silent. “Well, sir,” Hazelmere said, “it’s not our practice to open up wide, like, until we are very, very sure of ourselves. I think I’m in order if I say that we hope quite soon to be in a position to take positive action.”
“Is that your view, too, Chief Superintendent?”
“Yes,” Alleyn said. “That’s my view.”
“I am very glad to hear it. You wish to see Maria, do you not? Shall I send for her?”
“If it’s not putting you out, sir, we’d be much obliged,” said Inspector Hazelmere, who seemed to suffer from a compulsion to keep the interview at an impossibly high-toned level.
Mr. Reece used the telephone. “Find Maria,” he said, “and ask her to come to the library. Yes, at once. Very well, then, find her. Ask Mrs. Bacon to deal with it.”
He replaced the receiver. “Staff coordination has gone to pieces,” he said. “I asked for service and am told the person in question is sulking in her room.”
A long silence followed. Mr. Reece made no effort to break it. He went to the window and looked out at the Lake. Hazelmere inspected his notes, made two alterations, and under a pretense of consulting Alleyn about them, said in a slurred undertone: “Awkward if she won’t.”
“Hellishly,” Alleyn agreed.
Voices were raised in the hall, Hanley’s sounding agitated, Mrs. Bacon’s masterful. A door banged. Another voice shouted something that might have been an insult and followed it up with a raucous laugh. Marco, Alleyn thought. Hanley, all eyes and teeth, made an abrupt entrance.