Page 64 of The Venice Murders

Many of the restaurant’s customers, already alarmed by the arrival of the police and the sight of handcuffs, were aghast at this latest development, abandoning dinner plates and gathering their belongings for a hasty departure.

‘Luigi Tasca?’ Flora asked.

‘It has to be.’

‘Dead,’ the policeman confirmed, coming forward and nodding with satisfaction at the scene beyond.

‘So, now, Matteo is a murderer as well as a kidnapper. Poor Filomena. She loved her nephew.’

And therewaspoor Filomena, released from captivity and carried in the arms of a burly officer. Very carefully, he lifted her down into the third of the police launches.

Flora’s heart went out to her. ‘What a dreadful ending to a dreadful experience.’

Jack’s hand slipped beneath the blanket to find hers. ‘She’s going home,’ he said. ‘Home to Father Renzi. That must count for something.’

24

It was well after midnight, Flora saw from the boat’s dashboard, before their rescuer, having left his colleagues still working at La Zucca, dropped them at the Cipriani steps. Disturbed from his doze, the evening porter jumped guiltily to his feet as they walked through the entrance and scurried across to the reception desk to hand them their key.

‘A shower and bed, I think,’ Jack said, taking her hand.

But their ordeal was not yet over. The policeman who’d brought them to the hotel had followed them into the foyer.

‘There are some questions,’ he said, stopping them in their tracks. There was a smile on his face which Flora didn’t entirely trust. ‘We do them now or we do them tomorrow?’

‘Now,’ Jack said emphatically and she supposed he was right. Better to get this terrible evening finished for ever.

‘Please.’ He gestured to the comfortable furniture that lined one wall and, obediently, they walked over to a sofa and sat side by side. It was fortunate that, by now, their clothes were a good deal drier.

The officer took out his notebook. ‘You were at the restaurant?’

Both of them nodded.

‘And you were locked in the cellar?’

They nodded again.

‘Why were you at La Zucca?’

‘We’d gone for a drink on the terrace,’ Jack said calmly. ‘It was another beautiful evening and we wanted to make the most of it.’

The policeman looked sceptical. ‘Other customers had a drink on the terrace. Why did the owner lockyouin the cellar? It makes no sense.’

‘I’m fairly sure it wasn’t the owner who took us prisoner.’ Jack remained calm. ‘It would have been one of the young men, though I don’t know which.’

The man shrugged. ‘But still…why?’

Flora had a sudden sinking of the heart. Was the man suspicious ofthem? Thoughttheymight have something to do with the theft of the painting? Surely not.

Jack must have decided to come clean, she realised, or at least half clean, because he admitted, ‘We were hoping to discover if Filomena Pretelli was being held there. Father Renzi, her employer, asked us for help when she went missing.’

The officer frowned. ‘This is a matter for the police in Venice.’

‘The police in Venice weren’t interested,’ Jack said drily, ‘and the priest was exceedingly anxious.’

‘But why would you think this lady was being held at La Zucca?’

‘There had been trouble before between Father Renzi and the young man who died this evening – he seemed to us to have a strong connection to the restaurant. It was a guess on our part, but it turned out to be right. Flora – my wife’ – he took her hand – ‘went to the washroom and thought she heard noises in one of the locked rooms and was listening at the door when she was swooped on by this individual, pushed into another room and the door locked.’

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