The Savage Garden (26 page)

    "Who?"

    "Flora."

    "Not her—him. Who the fuck is Federico?"

    "Her husband. He killed her because she was having an affair."

    Harry took a sip of wine and nodded sagely. "Seems a little . . . excessive."

    Harry wasn't too happy about being dispatched into the wood to recover Adam's trousers, but he perked up a bit when they arrived back at the amphitheater and Adam pointed out the anagram on the triumphal arch and the nine circles of Dante's
Inferno.

    Harry was on board, a happy passenger, by the time they reached the grotto. In fact it was here, standing before the story of Daphne and Apollo, that Harry figured out Federico Docci's chosen method of murder: poison.

    It took them more than an hour to complete the circuit, hampered by Adam's injured ankle as well as their protracted discussions.

    They only left the garden when they were both satisfied that the new hypothesis held.

    Nearing the villa, Harry stopped suddenly and turned to Adam. "That's got to be the weirdest thing we've ever done together."

    "Weirder than when we nipped over the back wall to spy on Mrs. Rogan?"

    "Okay, second weirdest."

    Harry managed to make it through to the evening before reneging on his promise not to break the news about the garden.

    Maurizio and Chiara were long gone by then, but Antonella had shown up for dinner, arriving directly from work with a leg of cured ham—a gift from her grateful boss, because of the lucrative order they'd just received from one of the American buyers.

    Maria sliced ham from the bone and they washed it down with vintage champagne. Cases of the stuff had been delivered that afternoon and it was in need of "testing" before the party, said Signora Docci. Even Maria permitted herself a glass.

    Adam raised a toast to Antonella and the fact that her creations would soon be on sale in New York.

    "But what if they don't sell?" she asked with a pained expression.

    "That's easy," said Harry, "they won't order any more." He then called for another toast. "To Adam. He's also got some good news." "Do I?"

    "You know you do."

    "Harry—"

    "Stop bleating and tell them."

    "The garden . . ." guessed Antonella.

    "There's more to it than meets the eye," said Harry. "Much more."

    Antonella was smiling at Adam. "You solved the rest of it?"

    Signora Docci leaned forward in her chair. "The rest of it?"

    Antonella turned to her grandmother. "He told me a bit already."

    "Traitor."

    "I don't share everything with you, Nonna."

    "That's clear to me now."

    They turned their eyes on Adam, waiting.

    "I couldn't have done it without Harry."

    "It's true," confirmed Harry, "he couldn't."

    Signora Docci raised her hand abruptly. "Don't say. I want to be there when you say. In the garden."

    "Nonna, we're about to eat and it's getting dark."

    "Tomorrow, then. Tomorrow morning before you go to work."

    "How will you get down there?"

    Signora Docci slapped the top of her thighs. "On these of course. And I have two strong young men to help me."

    "But I want to know now."

    "Then you can ask—once I've gone to bed."

    But when Signora Docci made her way upstairs after the meal, Antonella didn't ask. She chose to live with the anticipation for a while longer. Harry assured her she wouldn't be disappointed.

    The three of them took their glasses and made for the lower terrace. They lay on the grass under the stars and talked about films they had seen, books they had read, life in England, life in Italy, and even—until Adam told Harry to shut up—Crystal Palace Football Club's recent promotion to the newly formed national Division Four.

    Adam felt good, stretched out there on the grass, basking in the soft night air and the conversation, the quiet satisfaction of the breakthrough on the memorial garden washing over him. Only now that it was lifted could he appreciate the true load he'd been shouldering since that first visit to the dark valley down the hill. The place had unsettled him immediately, infected him. It had consumed most of his waking hours, and many of his sleeping ones too. Life had gone on, but it had unfolded around him in a half-haze. He had lived it at one remove.

    Now that the spell was broken, things were falling back into focus. Even Antonella appeared different: sharper, crisper, more distinct. And more desirable than ever. He wished, a little guiltily, that Harry wasn't there, that he was on his own with her. He even flattered himself that she was thinking the same thing.

    It was annoying that she'd arrived by car; it denied him the opportunity of walking her home. He hadn't forgotten that it was while strolling through the garden with her on just such a night that she had kissed him. He could still recall the soft cushion of her full lips against his own, and the way her hand had snaked around his waist and drawn him against her.

    He reached for his cigarettes and caught sight once again of the chapel down the end of the terrace, lurking at the periphery of his vision, as it had been all evening. He had managed to put it from his mind before. This time he was less successful. While Harry prattled on to Antonella about the neglected heroines of early blues music, Adam found his thoughts turning to Emilio's bones sunk beneath the flagstone floor. A life cut short by two bullets—one to the chest, one to the head—Chiara had been very specific.

    He couldn't help thinking that there was something unnatural about this level of detail. Chiara could only have heard it from Maurizio, but what kind of man would describe his own brother's murder with such clinical precision? And the other details too: the shot fired into the gramophone player, the Germans glancing at their abandoned weapons. It smacked of a piece of theater hatched in the mind of a playwright. Like a bad lie, it was weighed down with unnecessary information.

    He had made the same mistake himself the summer before, when, driving too fast, trying to impress his friends, he'd lost control of his mother's car, crumpling the Morris's fender against a tree. He had told his mother that he'd swerved to avoid a springer spaniel in the road. "Welsh or English?" she had inquired with that knowing look of hers.

    Then there was Benedetto, Signora Docci's husband. What had induced him to preserve the site of Emilio's slaughter, obliging his family to live with the memory while denying them access to the scene itself? He had consulted no one on the matter, and had clearly felt no need to justify his decision. Even allowing for his grief-stricken state, there remained something uncharacteristic, unkind even, about his behavior. It had the faintly fanatical whiff of an act of penitence, as if he were punishing himself. Or punishing someone else, perhaps?

    Maybe Benedetto knew the truth of what happened that night.

    It was certainly an explanation. And a good one. Yes. Benedetto had somehow unearthed the truth but he had chosen to keep the discovery to himself. The best he could bring himself to do was close off the top floor, a constant reminder to Maurizio—

    Adam caught himself in this act of folly—speculating about the guilt of a man he had already acquitted. Why couldn't he shake off his suspicions? They were still there, like a wind at his back.

    "Well?" said Harry.

    "What?"

    "Off with the fairies, were we? I said what about another bottle?"

    Antonella held up her hands in surrender. "Not for me. Any more and I won't get home."

    "So stay," said Harry. "The place is a little pokey but I'm sure we can find you a corner to bunk down in."

    Antonella smiled. "No, I must go."

    "I'll see you to your car."

    "Adam will see you to your car, and you will remind him to come back with another bottle of champagne."

    Antonella kissed Harry on both cheeks. "Good night, Harry."

    The moment they were lost to Harry's view behind a screen of yew, Antonella asked, "Why does he call you Paddler?"

    Adam explained that it had been a very young Harry's first stab at his newborn brother's name. Somehow it had lived on over the years, probably because Harry knew that it irritated Adam.

    "I like it," said Antonella, hooking her arm through his. It was a simple gesture—intimate and formal at the same time—and it gave Adam the courage to ask the question he had just vowed to himself he wouldn't ask.

    "Have you ever been up there?"

    "Where?"

    He pointed to the top floor of the villa. "There."

    "No."

    "Aren't you intrigued?"

    "Of course I am. But it's not possible."

    "What if I asked your grandmother?"

    "She would say no."

    "How do you know?"

    "Because I asked her. It was my eighteenth birthday. I thought it would make a difference. It didn't. I was so angry I almost took the key and did it anyway."

    "You know where she keeps the key?"

    Antonella drew to a halt. "Why are you so interested?"

    "Same as you, I suppose. Curiosity. Morbid curiosity. It must be a weird sight. And it'll be gone soon, gone forever."

    "And we'll all be happy when it is."

    Her car was parked at the edge of the courtyard.

    "Are you okay to drive?"

    "I think so."

    "Take it slowly."

    "I'm trying to," she said, "but it's hard."

    He could make out enough of her expression in the moonlight to know that he hadn't misunderstood her meaning. "Then take it quickly."

    Her teeth shone pale behind her smile. "Okay."

    They kissed more urgently than they had the first time. His hand strayed to her buttocks, his palm drifting over the firm, round contours, absorbing the information and sending it to his brain. She didn't attempt to remove his hand. Quite the opposite. Her fingers pressed into the muscles of his back in encouragement.

    When they finally broke off, he said breathlessly, "God, you have a beautiful . . . rear."

    "Thank you. So do you."

    He held her close and ran his fingers through her long hair.

    "When are you leaving?" she asked.

    "I don't know. Soon. That's why I didn't want Harry to say anything about the garden. I don't have an excuse to stay around now."

    "Were you right? Did something bad happen?"

    He hesitated. "Yes."

    They kissed again, briefly, and then she got into her car. Peering up at him through the open window, she said, "I'll tell you where the key is if you promise not to get caught."

    "It's a promise."

    She told him. She also reminded him to grab another bottle of champagne for Harry. Then she fired the engine and pulled away.

    It might have been a trick of the shadows, but he could have sworn he caught a flutter of movement behind one of the second- floor windows as the headlights swept the courtyard.