The Body in the Piazza (6 page)

Another click brought the Borghese, the gardens and the museum itself. The Berninis seemed to breathe, even tremble, Proserpine forever seeking to free herself from Pluto. In the next picture they were sharing a mound of mouthwatering
fritto misto
at 'Gusto followed by an equally outstanding crunchy, thin-crusted pizza covered with cherry tomatoes, black olives, tomatoes, arugula, and two kinds of cheese—Parmesan and fresh mozzarella. Faith had had to wander in the adjacent
emporio
with its array of cookware and cookbooks. Tom had suggested a cab back to the hotel, what with the wine at lunch and what with . . .

And then back to the views. Ancient Rome at last. The cab driver, Stefano, had proved to be an accidental tour guide, providing a running commentary on everything they passed, interjecting his own description of his native Roma: “We are a historic lasagna!” Really quite an ideal way of thinking about the layers and layers that made up the Eternal City, the people, the food. Faith resolved to write a postcard to Freddy with the metaphor. And then, click, there was the Colosseum (“When it falls, so will Rome,” Stefano had quoted the old saying, adding that it was publicized now to discourage people from chipping away at it). Click: wildflowers growing in the Forum next to pieces of the grandeur that once was there, scattered about like a child's discarded building blocks. A final shot: dinner at a place that looked and smelled good from the outside, proving even better. And now the question.

“Happy?” Tom said again, muffling his wife's obvious reply with a long kiss.

A kiss that was abruptly interrupted by the sound of people running. Faith broke away from Tom to look. There were two people, and one appeared to be chasing the other. They were racing across the piazza toward the fountain just in front of the Fairchilds. Tom grabbed his wife back and folded her in his arms, pulling her out of their path. The second figure gained on, then tackled the first. Faith watched, aghast as the two were locked together in a violent embrace, thrashing about on the hard cobblestones. Suddenly there was a single shout, an exclamation almost of surprise. Tom and Faith stood frozen, staring. What had come before had occurred with stunning speed and now time briefly stopped. One person got up; the other didn't. Faith buried her face back against her husband's chest, afraid to look.

And then speed again, the noise of racing footsteps, but only one pair. She lifted her head and caught sight of the fleeing figure. It was a man. Young. A face like the faces they had been seeing astride scooters, sitting in
caffès
, on the sidewalks all day. Nothing out of the ordinary. Except what had just happened, she was sure, wasn't ordinary at all.

The person on the ground was trying to sit up. The face was in the shadows, but as they went to help, they could see it was also a man, dressed from head to toe in black.

Not quite to toe. His shoes were brown. Well-worn desert boots. Faith knew those shoes. Knew the man.

It was Freddy—and he was clutching at the handle of a knife that had been thrust into his body just below his heart.

Fate, not coincidence?

C
HAPTER
3

F
reddy's eyes were closed. He was clutching at his chest, fumbling for the knife. The blood from the wound was beginning to seep onto his dark shirt.

“Freddy, no! Don't try to pull it out!” Faith screamed. His hand dropped to his side and his eyelids fluttered open. “We're getting help! Just hold on!” Dimly aware that Tom had his phone out, she moved nearer and gently cradled Freddy's head in her lap, Tom knelt down beside Faith. “I've called one-one-two,” he said. “The operator spoke English, thank God. I told her a man had been attacked and was seriously injured. She said help would come immediately.”

The Italian equivalent of 911 is 112, and it was one of the things both Fairchilds had learned before the trip. Tom was spreading his jacket over Freddy—surely in shock—and Faith quickly added the cardigan she was wearing.

“Faith, Tom,” Freddy whispered.

“Don't try to talk,” Tom said. He took Freddy's hand.

Freddy shook his head. “Too late. Stupid. Should have known.” He was groping inside his jacket with his other hand.

“My pen.” The words were barely audible. With obvious effort, he repeated them. “My pen.”

Tom reached into one of the inside pockets and pulled out a fountain pen. “Look for his notebook, Tom,” Faith said. “He must want us to write down what he's saying.”

A name? Did he know who had attacked him? she wondered.

The previously empty piazza was rapidly filling up with people, but it felt as if the three of them were completely alone on a stage.

“His notebook's not here,” Tom said. “His wallet and anything else he was carrying are gone, too. Just the pen.”

Freddy brought his hand up and pushed at the pen. “You have to stop them. They're going to ki . . .” He slumped back, exhausted by the effort. “Pen,” he said once more, and then all was silent save the welcome sound of the police—the raucous two-note wails Faith had noted until this moment with mild annoyance. Now they sounded like the horn of Gabriel.

Guards from the French embassy were streaming out from the entrance on the piazza, joining the
polizia
who were jumping from vehicles ranging from motorcycles to Lancias. The French force had what looked like small machine guns at the ready; the Italians were holding pistols. It was terrifying. Faith assumed that Tom's call must have been followed by so many others that the police decided to send a battalion. The ambulance arrived, and one of the Italian police shouted into a bullhorn. The onlookers melted back against the perimeter. Faith and Tom didn't move.

“
Non parlo l'italiano,
” Tom said loudly. “
Sono un americano
.”

The EMTs rushed to Freddy and the Fairchilds moved out of the way. One of the policemen walked over to them after speaking to two others from the force that was rapidly encircling the area. He did not look friendly. He
did
look in charge “Your names?”

“Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Fairchild. We are in Rome on vacation. The injured man is Frederick Ives, British. A friend of ours,” Tom said.

They were loading Freddy into the back of the ambulance. Faith cried, “Where are you taking him? We need to go, too!”

The policeman didn't pay the slightest attention to her request and the vehicle sped off. Suddenly she felt the full weight of being in a foreign country. “We have to be with our friend! Please!”

He ignored her again. “Your address here in Rome?”

Tom gave him the information and answered the questions that followed as well. Home address in the United States, arrival and departure dates. Occupations. The inspector appeared to be filling out a form. Faith had heard about Italian bureaucracy—one friend described the lengths she had had to go through simply to buy postage stamps—but this was intolerable. Next it would be mother's maiden name. But it wasn't.

“Which of you was holding the knife?”

A nightmare. A complete nightmare!

Tom asked, his tone puzzled, “Do you mean did we touch the knife?”

“
Did
you touch the knife?”

Was the first question a trick? Could the man possibly think they had attacked Freddy? Faith wondered. That they were somehow a team of deadly U.S. crooks who were expanding their turf to Rome?

“No, neither of us touched the knife. We did not want to do any further injury to Mr. Ives.”

“Then who did?”

Tom sighed and described the attack, finishing with the statement: “His wallet is gone as well as any other papers like his passport that he may have been carrying.”

Their interrogator raised one eyebrow. “You seem to know the contents of Mr. Frederick Ives's pockets well, Mr. Fairchild. While sadly Rome suffers from pickpockets, purse snatchers, and other forms of petty crime, violent crime of this sort associated with a robbery is uncommon here.”

His somewhat smug expression conveyed his opinion that brutal muggings were to be found on every street corner in the United States. He shrugged. “But there are always hotheads who might carry a knife like this as a persuader and then get carried away. Tell me, did your friend use drugs often?”

“I'm sure he didn't use them at all!” Faith exclaimed. “And we need to go to him
pronto
!” She wasn't sure that was the correct word. It was how Italians answered the phone, but she hoped her tone would convey her urgency.

“
Sì.
” The inspector walked away from them and pulled out his mobile. He listened, said something, and motioned to the same two men he'd spoken to earlier, one of whom promptly tossed the cigarette he had been smoking onto the cobblestones. After a brief conversation, the inspector returned alone to the Fairchilds.

“I am sorry. Your friend is dead.”

Tom tightened the arm he had around Faith's shoulder.

“Are you sure?” she said.

He nodded. The fact of death had softened his expression.

Out of the corner of her eye, Faith could see the police unwinding crime scene tape, kicking the still smoldering cigarette butt out of the area.

And then she started to sob.

I
t was a Rome not many tourists get to know—the Serious Crime Squad headquarters. The Fairchilds were offered coffee. Tom took it; Faith knew it would choke her. Hours passed, most of them spent waiting to tell their story, and whatever they knew of Freddy's, to what seemed like an endless stream of officials. Tom was quizzed more closely than Faith. He had seen enough of the assailant's face to provide a good likeness using an Identi-Kit. To Faith the only unusual features were thick dark eyebrows that stretched across his forehead in a straight line, as if drawn with a marker. But she was able to add that his black sneakers were Converse—she'd noted the blue All Star logo when he ran off—and that he'd also been wearing black Diesel jeans with a short black Ferragamo leather jacket. Unlike the United States, where this sort of information had met with extreme doubt in Faith's past police investigations—who noticed things like this?—the police in Rome seemed to expect that a woman of taste would have instantly recognized such labels.

Finally, they were told they were free to go but not before yet another individual told them how rare this sort of robbery gone wrong was in Italy. And especially in that part of Rome. “Now if it had been around the train station at that time . . .” several people had told them, shaking a verbal finger, as if Freddy had somehow become an affront to the city by being murdered in a good part of town.

A police car drove them back to the hotel, dropped them at the entrance, and sped off, almost grazing the sides of the narrow street. They rang the bell next to the ancient door, locked for the night, although little was left of its hours now. When there was no answer, Faith lifted the heavy iron knocker, feeling Shakespearean and wishing with all her heart she could, in effect, “Wake Duncan with thy knocking!”

Paolo answered, pulling back the door and securing it to the wall. His eyes were red. He'd obviously heard the news.

“
Signore
Ives. I cannot believe it. None of us can. Come in, come in.” He took Faith's hand and pulled her into the lobby. “Go to your room and I will bring you some
camomilla
. Could you eat anything? A little
pane
? Or better, some
brodo
?”

She shook her head. He started to tear up, as he had apparently done before. “He has been coming here for many years. A friend to us all. I'll bring the
camomilla
. You need to have something and then sleep if you can. You must stay here until you feel you can travel. I will call Francesca.”

But what Faith wanted most was to leave Rome. It would pass. It would have to. Freddy would be upset to know he'd put them off his beloved Città Eterna for long. As she thought of his reaction, she told herself she had to stop thinking of him as if he was alive and not just off temporarily on a journey.

“The train isn't until the afternoon. If we could stay in our room until then . . . ,” Faith said.

“But of course.” Paolo looked a bit hurt. As if she needed to ask was written all over his face. Gravely solicitous, he walked them to the elevator.

“Mr. Ives told us he was checking out,” she said. The thought that had been plaguing her all night returned full force. Freddy said he was leaving early. Why had he stayed—and where?

“He did, even though he had the room for another week. He had paid in advance, so I told him it would be here if he changed his mind.”

The fatigue and shock of the night dropped from Faith so abruptly that for a moment she was startled. Her mind began to race.

“So there isn't anyone there now? Freddy wanted us to see it and said we were to ask you to let us in. That it was the finest room in the hotel, with some interesting features.”

Paolo nodded. If he thought her sudden request odd, he gave no indication. Her husband, however, was looking at her with an expression she knew all too well. “Stay out of it, Faith” could have been written in a comic strip balloon coming from his mouth.

“I will bring the key with the tea.” Paolo bowed slightly as the elevator doors opened.

“Faith . . . ,” Tom began as soon as they were in their room.

“You said his pockets were empty and so did the police. I just want to find his notebook. Maybe he left it in his room. I noticed at the restaurant that it had one of those alphabetical address sections in the back. The only address we have is a post office box in London, and something tells me the same is true on the hotel register, especially as he has been coming here so long. He probably doesn't even have to sign in at all. There may be some next of kin and it's only decent we find them. They can't ship a body to a post office box.”

“The British embassy was sending someone and will take care of all that. You heard the inspector. I know how you feel. It's rare to meet someone and become such instant close friends, especially at our age, but we only knew Freddy briefly, and our part in both his life and death is over.”

There was a knock on the door and Paolo entered with a tray. He set it down and told them he had instructed the staff not to disturb them. He handed Faith the key to Freddy's room as well and left.

Faith sipped the hot tea. Chamomile blossoms were the Italian answer to Sominex, or for that matter Prozac as well. A cure for sleeplessness, anxiety, and all sorts of other ills. Paolo had added honey, and soon the sweet liquid was making her both drowsy and calmer. Tom was already lying down. She joined him, resolving to only close her eyes for a moment before going to search Freddy's room.

An hour later she was awakened by a shaft of sunlight streaming across her face through the windows they had neglected to cover. For a moment, she luxuriated in the warmth of the bed, Tom's steady breathing, and the thought of the beautiful city surrounding them. And then she remembered.

Freddy was gone. Forever. And she owed it to him to find out what had happened. Robbery gone wrong—the detective's conclusion? She didn't think so. Thieves in Rome preyed on tourists in daylight, snatching purses, drawing your attention to a pigeon dropping or other mess on your back, then grabbing your wallet or backpack. Or the gangs of children employed to surround and cut off a target, creating a disturbance while one of them, or an adult, stole your camera, phone, and suitcase. The area around the train station
was
dangerous, and not just at night.

No, this wasn't like that. Both men dressed in black, dressed so as not to be seen. Had it started with Freddy tailing his killer or someone else, discovered and forced to flee? Then there was the young man's expensive clothing. Well, that could be due to the nature of his work—pickings good lately?

Yet, it all still came down to Freddy. Who
was
Frederick Lancelot Ives?