And all they had to do was ask in the first place. May the Good Lord defend us from such imbecilities.
“That’s a pity,” Argyll said when she finished and he offered her a towel.
“You can say that again.”
“Is he a regular customer?”
She shook her head. “Not that I know of, no. Never heard of him before. We’ve put out enquiries to the Greek police, to see if they know anything about him. God only knows how long that will take. Last time we asked them anything the man we were interested in died of old age before we got a reply.”
“Sort of makes the case for Bottando’s international bureau, doesn’t it?”
“Sort of makes the case for people answering enquiries. I don’t think you need set up huge expensive organizations.”
“What do you do now?”
“Go to bed, I think.”
“I mean about this icon.”
“Sit and wait. The carabinieri can look for this Charanis character; I can’t do much with Mary Verney at the moment. Apart from talking to Father Xavier tomorrow there’s not a lot to do.”
She dried herself, with Argyll helping, and breathed a sigh of relief. “Human again,” she said. “You didn’t find anything interesting, did you?”
“Depends.”
“Depends on what?”
“On what you think is interesting, of course. Hang on.”
He walked out of the bathroom, letting a draught of cool night air blow in as he went, and came back a few minutes later.
“Look.” He held up a Xerox, then flicked it over to show a mass of scribbling on the other side which indicated how hard he’d been working on her behalf.
“Spirits,” he said. “Visitations by. Anthropological study of. Structure and meaning in the magical appearance of gifts. It’s an article Burckhardt published three years ago.”
“So?”
“That icon was brought by angels, remember?”
“What does it say?”
“According to this, it’s a common enough story. Angels seem to have worked overtime as delivery boys in the Middle Ages. Forever running around with paintings and statues, even whole houses in the case of Loretto, and leaving them in unlikely places. The general argument is that it is often enough a folk memory with some substantial foundation.”
“Such as what?”
“The example he quotes here is a church in Spain, near the Pyrenees, which has a miraculous statue. Also delivered by an angel, according to the legend. He reckons it was donated by a generous benefactor who distributed money to the poor to mark the occasion. This got confused as the generations passed and the gift of the statue became associated with the money, then it was thought that it was the statue which gave the money, so naturally it became a miracle. And the person who gave it turned into a delivering angel.”
“San Giovanni is associated with a cure for the plague.”
He nodded. “Better food, more resistance to disease. I suppose it fits.”
“Does it say that?”
“No. That’s me making it up. However, there is one reference to San Giovanni; nothing relevant, but he was obviously in the archive there once. That’s interesting, don’t you think?”
She nodded dubiously. “Not much to go on, though.”
“I’m doing my best. There’s a lot of stuff to digest here, you know. It’s hard when you’re starting from scratch.”
“And I can’t think of anyone better to scratch away. Would you mind keeping on going? See if you can dig up anything more specific?”
He nodded. “All right. But only for one reason.”
“What’s that?”
He grinned at her. “I quite enjoy it.”
Flavia barely got into the office the following morning when a dire message came through from Alberto. Foreign ministry, please. Now. Heavy-duty stuff indeed, the sort of thing Bottando would do. But he was not around and she was in charge. She had never been in the building before, let alone been summoned to a meeting headed by a full-blown, senior smoothie.
He also, it seemed, was not used to dealing with members of the police and managed to convey the impression very swiftly that he strongly suspected that all such people had sweaty hands and probably did not bathe all that frequently. He sat behind his desk for all the world like someone preparing to make a last stand against the barbarian hordes, and made polite but condescending conversation until the distinguished visitor was ushered in.
This was, oddly enough, a trade representative from the Greek embassy, which caused confusion all round until it was explained that just because he was a trade representative, it didn’t mean he had anything to do with trade, you see.
“May I ask why the head of the department is not here, as I ordered?” the Italian said. Flavia bristled slightly, and she noticed an amused look from Alberto.
“I am the head of the department,” she said, and noticed how well and easily the words rolled off her tongue. “And you ordered nothing. You asked me to come, and I agreed. Now, do I gather that you, sir, are a spy, and we’re playing silly games here?” she continued, ignoring the Italian completely.
“Exactly, dear lady,” he enthused. “Silly games. Exactly that.” He gave her a large stage wink as he nodded approvingly.
“Good. I’m glad we’ve got all that sorted out,” said the Italian in a suit. “Perhaps we might proceed. I don’t have all day, and Signor Fostiropoulos is a busy man as well.”
“That’s a pity,” Flavia said. “We have all the time in the world. What’s a murder or two, after all?”
“That’s what we’re here for, is it not?” Fostiropoulos said.
“I don’t know. Why are we here?”
“You have been making enquiries, about a Signor Charanis.”
“We have.”
“And I am here to inform you that you have made a bad mistake. The idea that he could be in any way involved in any disreputable activity is quite ludicrous.”
“I don’t even know who he is.”
“He is a very wealthy man. Huge interests, all absolutely above board. He is a greatly respected man.”
“And a powerful one, if he sends you along to defend him.”
“Don’t be flippant. Or rude, signorina,” said the Italian diplomat.
Fostiropoulos nodded. “Quite all right. He is indeed powerful. I have come along merely to save you from wasting your time on a fruitless line of enquiry.”
“He wouldn’t collect paintings, would he?”
“Very much so. But that is hardly a crime.”
“You still haven’t told me why you are so sure it’s fruitless.”
“Firstly because Signor Charanis is at this moment in Athens, and has been since last week. Secondly because the man you are interested in is in his thirties while Signor Charanis is seventy-two. And thirdly because it is simply absurd to consider the idea that he would ever consider doing such a ridiculous thing. He could buy this picture—could buy the entire monastery, in fact—out of his small change.”
“I see. Nonetheless, we do have a rented car with our victim getting into it, and it was rented in the name of Charanis.”
“Criminals have been known to use pseudonyms in the past.”
“Have you seen his photograph?” Flavia handed over the grainy reproduction taken from the video machine. Fostiropoulos took it and, she noted, kept it. The difference between a spy telling the truth and a spy telling a lie was, she supposed, difficult to detect; and Fostiropoulos had probably had years of practice. Flavia’s instincts, more than her observation, told her the man instantly began covering something.