Page 6 of Murder at the Ponte Vecchio

‘Lina’s worried. She told me he’s been like it for days now and, just like with you, he refuses to tell her what’s the matter. Isn’t there any way you can sit down with him man-to-man and get him to talk? It saddens me to see him so troubled.’

It saddened me too. What, I wondered, had he meant when he’d said, ‘It’s not the kind of thing I can talk about’?

4

SUNDAY MORNING

Next morning, I received a call while I was out with Oscar for our early-morning walk. It was Marco.

‘Ciao, Dan, sorry to bother you on a Sunday. Are you busy this morning?’

‘Nothing special planned. Why, what’s the problem?’

‘It’s the family of the victim. They don’t speak Italian.’

‘The old man sounded fluent to me, although he had a bit of an accent. What language do the relatives speak?’

‘They’re Dutch, but they claim to speak English. The victim was originally from the Netherlands, but he moved here thirty years ago after his wife divorced him, but his children – two boys and a girl – stayed in Amsterdam with the mother.’

‘So do you want me to call them in Holland and explain what happened?’

‘No, all three kids are here in Florence. They arrived yesterday.’

Or were they already here on Friday night? Warning bells started ringing in my head. Might the murderer be one of Berg’soffspring, maybe keen to get hands on an inheritance? ‘Where are they staying?’

‘At the victim’s home in Signa, not that far from your house. I’ve arranged to go around there to speak to them at ten o’clock this morning. I could probably find an interpreter by then, but if you felt like coming along, I’d be happier. I’d be grateful to have another pair of eyes on them.’

‘Yes, of course, I’m only too pleased to help out, but what about Virgilio? Isn’t he involved?’

There was a pause before Marco answered. ‘I told thecommissarioabout it, but he wasn’t interested. He just told me to get on with it myself…’ His voice tailed off uncertainly before he added, ‘To be honest, Dan, I’m worried about him. He doesn’t seem to be himself.’

This certainly wasn’t news to me, but I remained non-committal for now. ‘Maybe he’s had a hard week. I hope he hasn’t got a health problem.’

‘I really don’t know. I’ve been trying to get him to tell me what’s bothering him, but he just clams up.’ Another pause. ‘You and he get along well. I don’t suppose you feel like sitting down with him one of these days, do you? Maybe he might be prepared to tell you what’s bugging him. I hope it’s not me. I don’t think I’ve made any serious blunders recently, but there’s no mistaking the fact that he’s uptight about something.’

I promised him that I would see what I could do and he sounded relieved. He dictated the victim’s address to me and we agreed to meet there at ten. When I asked him whether he thought I should bring Oscar, he was all for it.

‘Yes, bring him, by all means. We’ve got to give these people some pretty grim news, so they might appreciate having a friendly dog around.’

‘Don’t they know their father’s dead?’

‘Yes, but they don’t know that he was murdered yet.’

I couldn’t help adding, ‘Unless one of them did it.’

‘My thoughts entirely.’

Anna wasn’t exactly happy, but at least she looked resigned when I told her I had to go off and help Marco. As for Oscar, he’s always happy to go for a ride in the van – unless it’s to the vet.

Signa is situated to the west of Florence, just past the last of the industrialised suburbs surrounding the city. The land there is predominantly flat, but there’s a single hill dominating the little town and this overlooks the River Arno below. This hill is home to a number of wealthy Florentine families looking for some respite from the cloying heat that descends on the city when summer comes around.

David Berg’s house was a delightful Tuscan villa set in its own gardens, and access from the road was up a private drive that curled up the hill to the house through olive trees and immaculately pruned shrubs. Close up, I could see that it wasn’t a genuine old building, but an authentic-looking, twentieth-century reproduction of a traditional-style villa, complete with a dovecot in the middle of the roof, no doubt no longer housing doves, but serving as a spectacular lounge with panoramic views back towards Florence as far as the Duomo itself. Such a house in such a location was no doubt worth a lot of money and I wondered, not for the first time, who was going to inherit the old man’s wealth.

Marco’s squad car arrived thirty seconds after I did, just as I was opening the back door to let Oscar out of the van. The parking area was pretty full by now. Four cars were already parked outside the villa: an Italian-registered Fiat and threeDutch-registered cars – a big BMW saloon, a Japanese SUV, and a Jaguar sports car. All these three vehicles looked nearly new, so clearly, the family had money.

Marco and I shook hands and headed up four stone steps to the front door. I couldn’t help noticing no fewer than three CCTV cameras located at strategic positions around the exterior. This was a man who had liked his privacy.

The hefty wooden door was opened for us by a stern-looking woman dressed in black. In spite of the recent death of David Berg, I had the feeling that this was probably the way she normally dressed. Only her apron was white. She could have been anything from forty to sixty years old and she had one of those expressionless faces that could tell a lot of stories – but probably wouldn’t say more than the bare minimum. She ushered us in, shooting Oscar a suspicious look as she did so, and informed us that, ‘The family are in the lounge.’ Maybe I was reading too much into her tone, but I got the impression that her opinion of ‘the family’ wasn’t particularly high.

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