‘How do you mean?’
‘Do you agree that things are either knowable or unknowable?’
‘I suppose so.’
‘In that case, the identity of the killer is either unknowable, in which case your question makes no sense, or it is knowable and therefore by definition known. I really don’t see your problem, dottore. To me it’s all as clear as day.’
He broke into another helpless fit of giggles and passed the joint back to Irena, who swerved to avoid a truck which had suddenly materialized in front of them.
‘Take the conversation which my protegee and I were having before you raised this interesting philosophical issue. Thanks to his treatise L’art de toucher le clavecin, we know a considerable amount about Couperin’s preferences in quilling and other matters, but we have no idea at all what Scarlatti expected of his instruments — or even if he gave a damn one way or the other. The man was clearly a total degenerate, probably an obsessive gambler, quite possibly a drug addict.’
More gales of giggles.
‘But nevertheless he was harpsichord tutor to the Infanta of Spain, and the molecular structure of the stone used to build several rooms in the Escorial must be impregnated with the sounds produced from whatever instruments he used. It’s like this eclipse this morning. We know how, why and when it will happen, but people used to think it was caused by a dragon eating the sun.’
‘The what?’
‘ The sun! ’ Lucchese replied loudly, as though to a deaf person.
‘What son?’
Outside the window, the landscape had started to ripple and break into waves, curling lazily over like the slow, spent wash of Adriatic storms fetching up on a mudbank in Zen’s native lagoons. But the sky looked threatening, the light had waned and the wind might get up at any minute.
‘Speaking of L’art de toucher,’ said Irena, hurling the Bugatti round a tight bend, ‘how long will it take to plant this relative of yours? Or maybe we could have a quickie at the cemetery? I’ve always wanted to do it on a grave.’
‘ What son?’ Zen shouted at Lucchese. ‘I never told you I had a son! And I don’t. He’s dead. She killed him, and I wasn’t even there!’
Eons passed in the blink of a celestial eye.
‘Right at the next turning, Irena,’ said a voice.
Everything came to a stop. There was a house and lots of cars. People, too, all wearing black.
‘I suggest you let me do the talking, dottore,’ said Lucchese, getting out of the car. Zen followed, hastily wiping the tears from his face. Irena kissed him on the cheek.
‘It’ll be all right,’ she said in a kindly voice. ‘It’s not your fault.’
Zen watched her fade in and out of focus for a while.
‘What was it you said? “ Cherchez la femme.” Do you mean a woman did it?’
But Irena had turned away to join her partner, who was surrounded by a dense knot of family members bent on lengthy and loud commiseration. The prince’s voice came floating back towards Zen like the commentary to an unwatched television programme.
‘… but before we go any further, I regret to say that I have an unpleasant but equally unavoidable duty to perform. Ah, there you are, my dear. This is my niece, Irena Francavilla, whom I have taken under my wing after she fell into some bad company in Turin. I’m glad to say that she’s now almost completely recovered, although as a safety measure I am continuing the treatment thrice daily on a regular basis for the moment lest any relapse occur.’
‘When’s my next shot due, principe?’ moaned Irena.
‘Soon, my child, soon. Where were we? Yes, of course, the unpleasant duty I referred to earlier. As you may be aware, it has been customary since time immemorial for members of my family to undergo cardiac puncture post-mortem. I have no reason to suppose that my dear cousin would have wished to break this tradition, although, given the tragic circumstances leading to his unexpected demise, it was naturally impossible for him to confirm this.’
‘What are you talking about?’ one of the women in mourning asked. ‘What tradition?’
‘In principle it dates back at least three hundred years, but in practice it was reinstituted by my great-great-grandfather, Guido Andrea.’
Andrea, thought Zen. Cherchez la femme! Suddenly it all made sense.
‘Guido’s morbid horror of being entombed alive was notorious in our family. Indeed, the memory of it survives to this day. I recall mentioning it on one occasion to my brother, and his replying that all we need do was to bury his portable phone with him! But, joking aside, I feel sure that poor dear Bruno would have wished to receive the usual formalities, and I have therefore come prepared. It won’t take long.’
‘What won’t?’
‘A simple medical procedure, my dear,’ the prince replied, ‘but you might prefer to be spared the details.’
‘ Medical? But Bruno’s not… I mean, he’s…’
‘Dead. Yes, I’m sure he is, to all appearances. But these things are not always as certain as they might seem. There have been several cases of “corpses” showing signs of life during their own funeral service, which, needless to say, is extremely embarrassing for all concerned. Still more distressing is the case of those for whom reanimation has occurred a little later — too late, in fact. Scarcely a graveyard is excavated without at least one skeleton being discovered in a kneeling position, straining in vain to lift the lid of the coffin lying under several tons of solid earth.’
The women gasped and clutched their throats. Prince Lucchese nodded gravely.
‘It was to avoid the possibility of just such a fate that my great-great-grandfather instructed the family physician to drive a spike into his heart prior to the funeral. I believe they originally used a simple nail, but some time later an instrument was specifically fashioned for this purpose out of solid silver by a local craftsman. It is presently in my possession, and I now propose to put it to use, thus allowing my beloved cousin to rest in assured peace. My colleague, Dottor Aurelio Zen, will assist me.’
He waved to Zen, who followed him inside the house.
Afterwards, of course, it was clear to Aurelio Zen that he had been a victim of passive smoking. Although he had declined Lucchese’s offer of the hashish-spiked cigarette, the fumes circulating in the closed car had been quite strong enough for him to become drugged by proxy. All this was clear in retrospect, but at the time he had only the evidence of his senses to go on, and they told him a completely different story.
There were, for a start, three versions of Prince Lucchese. One was preparing to do something, the next was doing it, while the third told Zen the results of whatever had been done by the other two. This activity was disturbingly ambiguous, at once a hideous scenario involving a dead body, surgical knives and some very primitive butchery, and an entirely innocent, even praiseworthy activity of vital importance for reasons which, however, were not immediately apparent.
Under the circumstances, Zen decided to take a back seat — literally, in this case. There was a wicker chair near the door where he sat down, watching the trinity of princes at work and responding as best he could to their baffling comments. The centre of the room was occupied by a dining table on which stood an ornate, oblong wooden chest. The threefold Lucchese opened the black bag he had brought with him and set to work on whatever was inside, talking in a low, purposeful voice the whole time.
‘No visible injuries apart from some superficial lesions to the thorax… Probably gouged himself on some metal edge on the way in… Massive loss of blood pre-mortem, though, and visible traumas don’t account for same… Now let’s have a look inside… God, look at this subcutaneous fat… Just hack through the costal cartilage and whip out the… Forgotten how easy all this is… That’s odd… No trace of wine in the lungs, but he must have sucked some in unless… Heart attack before he hit the surface, perhaps… Let’s take another look at that neck… Ah… Well, now, that’s interesting…’
The doctor and his two assistants left the room, returning in due course as one person. Confronted by this miracle, Zen emerged from his wake with a sense of panic.
‘What? Who? When?’ he spluttered, leaping to his feet.
‘Probable homicide, person or persons unknown, at or about the stated time of death,’ Lucchese replied succinctly, wiping his blood-stained instruments on a filthy rag.
‘Are you sure?’
‘I’m sure that he was dead when he went into the wine vat. And I’m almost sure that it was not a natural death. That lesion in his neck is a lot deeper than it looks. The artery is severed, and there are small fragments of broken glass embedded in the surrounding flesh.’
‘And you’ll testify to that?’
Lucchese looked at him haughtily.
‘Of course not. I haven’t been invited to examine the cadaver, and therefore no such examination has taken place. I’m merely performing the last secular rites for my cousin, according to a long-standing tradition in our family. Speaking of which, I suppose I’d better do the damned thing, just in case anyone checks.’
He took the silver spike and set it down on the dead man’s chest, then lifted the mallet. There were a number of dull-sounding blows, the last accompanied by a guttural grunt from Lucchese. Feeling nauseous, Zen went back outside. The cloud had burned off and the sun shone softly in a flawless azure sky.