Page 14 of Murder on an Italian Island
Virgilio and I talked through the other suspects, including the owner and staff of the hotel. On Saturday evening, there had been seven people working here: Rita in Reception, the chef, an assistant chef, a waiter, a waitress, the night porter and Signor Silvano, the owner. The kitchen and serving staff had all left at ten along with Rita, and Signor Silvano had retired to his private apartment on the top floor shortly afterwards. This left the night porter as the only staff member actually here at the time of Graziani’s death. No doubt the inspector’s people would already have interviewed the staff, but as we were not part of the investigation, we had not been given access to the results.
It was possible that one of the foreigners might turn out to have a suspicious past, but I wasn’t holding my breath. I was still convinced that the murderer was to be found far closer to home here on the island.
Rousing Oscar from the floor at my feet, Virgilio and I went downstairs to Reception, where we found Rita. She gave Virgilio a concerned look when she saw him.
‘Ciao, Virgilio, how did it go with the police last night?’
He gave her a smile in return. ‘As you can see, I’m a free man. They still don’t know whether it was an accident, suicide or murder, but you probably know that they’re doing a fingertip search among the trees on the clifftop. They’ve also got divers in the water looking for a possible murder weapon, but Dan and I tend to think that they’re unlikely to come up with anything.’
‘So you think it wasn’t murder after all? That’s what I think.’ She sounded quite convinced. ‘I’ve been looking at some of the CCTV footage on Saturday night, and the victim looked as though he was blind drunk – and the serving staff confirm that. I reckon he just fell over the cliff edge in the dark. It’s easily done.’
Virgilio gave a guarded reply. ‘I’m not sure whether it was an accident or something more, but you’re right, Graziani was certainly drunk, and he might easily have fallen. That seems to be what the inspector thinks. I imagine that if the police don’t find anything significant today, Inspector Bellini will probably call it an accident and leave it at that. Tell me, did you know the victim? Was he a regular here and who were his dinner companions – a man and a younger woman?’
She hesitated before replying. ‘I wasn’t familiar with the man who died, but I know who he was. His brother, Aldo, comes here now and then.’ She glanced across at me. ‘You’ve been doing a windsurfing course, haven’t you, Dan? Aldo Graziani owns the windsurfing academy, as well as the campsite behind the beach. There’s quite a good pizzeria there, but Aldo likes his food, and our restaurant is a step up from the pizzeria.’
Virgilio and I exchanged glances. So the two men had been brothers. This was very interesting. Virgilio took up the questions again. ‘And the young woman who was with them on Saturday and who was here last night with Aldo Graziani, who’s she?’
‘Her name’s Teresa, but I’m afraid I don’t know her other name. She works for Aldo. She often comes in with him and some of us have been wondering whether there might be something going on between them – even though she’s much younger than he is.’
‘What about the man who died, Ignazio Graziani? Was he staying with his brother?’
Again, there was a momentary hesitation from Rita. ‘I believe so.’ She paused. ‘I imagine you know where he’s been for the past twenty years and why.’ There was clear revulsion in her voice.
Virgilio nodded. ‘Yes, indeed. What about other people around here? Did they know what he’d done?’
Her reply was uncompromising. ‘Everybody knew. It’s been the talk of Santa Sabina for the last month, and I heard that some people are thinking of organising a petition to get him to move away.’
This was also potentially interesting. If the victim had been universally hated by the locals, maybe there had been somebody who had decided to take direct action. I queried Ignazio’s relationship with his brother.
‘Assuming he was staying with his brother, was that because they were close?’
‘I very much doubt it. You can imagine the shame he brought on the family.’
I could imagine that only too well. ‘And yet his brother still took him back?’
‘That’s what it looks like, but I’m quite sure it was under duress. Presumably, Ignazio had nowhere else to go, and Aldo felt he had no choice.’ She caught my eye. ‘Mind you, Aldo’s no saint himself.’
‘Does he have a wife, family?’
‘He was married, but his wife divorced him and moved away years ago. As far as I know, they didn’t have any children.’
‘And does he live at the campsite?’
‘Aldo lives in the villa on the little hill behind the beach. He inherited some land and a little campsite from his father, who died five or six years ago, and since then, he’s bought more land, quadrupled the size of the campsite, opened the windsurfing academy and built the villa – we call it Villa Ostentatious. You should see it – talk about a modern monstrosity! God knows how he got planning permission – it sticks out like a sore thumb. I don’t like that sort of thing myself, but there’s no accounting for taste, is there?’
Virgilio thanked Rita and he and I went out. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky, and the sun was already scorching hot. I reminded myself that I would need to slap on some sunscreen before my windsurfing lesson. As soon as we were out of range of anybody, we stopped in the shade of a big umbrella pine to discuss what we’d just heard. Something Rita had said had struck both of us as potentially significant and Virgilio voiced it first.
‘If Aldo Graziani inherited the land from his father then, according to Italian law, Ignazio must also have inherited a share. I wonder whether we’ve just found a motive for murder. How about this? Aldo is making a good living here while his brother languishes in prison. Then the prodigal son reappears and wants to claim his share. Maybe Aldo didn’t feel like sharing and he came up with the solution of taking his brother out for dinner, making sure he consumed a few bottles of wine, and then pushed him off the clifftop.’
‘The same thought’s been going through my head. When I go to the windsurfing beach later on to have my lesson, I’ll do a little bit of asking around. Ideally, it would be good to sit down and interview Aldo as well as the woman, Teresa.’ I gave a frustrated hiss. ‘If only we were the investigating officers, but of course, I’m nothing to do with it, and you’re outside your jurisdiction. Are you going to mention this to Inspector Bellini as a hypothesis?’
‘Let’s see if his people come up with a murder weapon first but, yes, he needs to know. Of course, if he’s been doing his job properly, I would hope he would already have this information, so it could be that he’s already spoken to Aldo. I’m not holding my breath, though, because it’s pretty clear to me that Bellini’s still convinced it was an accident. Please do keep your ears open, and I’ll sit down and call Marco in Florence to see if, between us, we can dig a little deeper into what happened twenty years ago. It had a powerful and lasting effect on me, but it’s not as though the victims were members of my family. I can only imagine the grief and the anger felt by the women themselves and their nearest and dearest. Yes, Aldo, the brother, might be our man, but I still think Ignazio Graziani’s death could be a revenge killing, relating to the terrible things he did all those years ago. I’ll come along and join you after lunch, ostensibly to watch you falling in the water again, but mostly to see if I can chat to a few people there who know the background to the family.’
‘It was interesting to hear that the locals are up in arms about Ignazio coming back here. It sounds as though tempers have been running high.’
‘And creating a potentially very embarrassing situation for his brother. Apart from the question of the inheritance, I imagine that Aldo can’t have been best pleased when his jailbird brother reappeared – especially as Rita says that what he’d done was common knowledge around here.’ He gave me a knowing look. ‘Another reason for doing away with him maybe?’
‘Yes, indeed.’ I changed the subject. ‘What about our twoCarabinierifriends? Do we talk to them?’
