The Fallen Angel

FIVE

Bernard Santacroce was about fifty years old, perhaps a little more, shortish, fit and handsome in an expensive dark suit, pale pink shirt and grey tie. He had a full head of reddish hair and the tanned, unlined face of a banker or a surgeon, knowledgeable, confident, content with himself. The man sat behind a vast wooden desk, polished until it looked like a mirror, in a study at the summit of the tower that was the Casina delle Civette. Beyond the window stood two majestic palm trees, feathery fronds swaying in the light breeze. There was a glorious view down to the garden, and across the river to the Vatican. Peroni had never been anywhere so solitary and peaceful in the centre of Rome. The tower was magnificent and unique, one reason, perhaps, why Santacroce looked so pleased with himself as Cecilia Gabriel led them in.

Falcone’s cheek had lost a little of its colour. The heat was still inside him, though. Whether she knew it or not, the Gabriel woman had guaranteed that he would not turn aside from what she presumably believed was merely a tentative inquiry into a death in suspicious circumstances. He had his pride too.

Santacroce waited for her to leave then bade them sit down.

‘I don’t need to be a genius to understand what this is about,’ he said ruefully. ‘It’s Malise, isn’t it?’

‘Some simple questions, sir,’ Falcone replied.

‘Nothing was simple with that man, unfortunately. Odd really. He was constantly telling me God was dead. Now God says the same of Malise. One wonders who to believe.’

Peroni took his chair and engaged Falcone with a raised eyebrow, nothing more.

‘Mind you, I’m a Catholic. So I won’t have to wonder for long,’ Santacroce added with a smile. ‘And an Oxford man. Fortunate to have acquired all this. .’ He swept his arm around the room. ‘. . as well as the palazzetto, which furnishes both a home and an income. I imagine it was inevitable that Malise, being a vitriolic atheist, of Cambridge, and now dirt poor, would despise the likes of me. Though given the generosity I showed him and his family, it still seems a touch ungrateful. I’m sorry he’s dead, Inspector, but I’m afraid I’m rather too old and comfortable to pretend I much care. Cecilia and Mina deserved rather better than he gave them but please keep that to yourselves. They’re both rather tender at the moment.’

Falcone made a few scribbles in his notebook then asked, ‘Where were you exactly around midnight on Friday?’

Santacroce stiffened, as if astonished by the question, placed his chin on his hands and stared across the desk, like a professor considering some weighty problem.

‘Why on earth would you want to know that?’

‘I’m trying to understand the precise circumstances of Malise Gabriel’s death,’ Falcone said. ‘It’s important we establish the whereabouts of those who knew him.’

The man toyed with a well-chewed fingernail, watching them, then pointed back to the main building.

‘I was in my apartment. Alone. From the close of play here, around six o’clock, until early the next morning when Cecilia phoned me with the terrible news. I immediately agreed that she and Mina could come and stay in their old apartment in the Casina. They were not the reason I asked them to leave in the first place.’

‘The son? Robert?’ Peroni asked.

‘Never met him. He arrived in Rome, from London I think, after they moved into Joanne Van Doren’s place.’

Santacroce’s bland face creased in a frown.

‘I must confess I don’t understand the reason for these questions. Malise’s death was a shocking accident. Why the interest?’

They didn’t respond. Falcone pushed, instead, for information on Gabriel’s recruitment to the small academic institution which Santacroce headed. This was obviously a subject the man enjoyed; it allowed him to display his knowledge and magnanimity, and to boast about an organization which one of his own ancestors had created four centuries before, and he himself had revived after a successful career in the City of London.

Peroni listened and made notes, realizing that in such circles he was hopelessly out of his depth. The Confraternita delle Civette, as far as he understood it, was a self-elected brotherhood of scientists from around the world whose primary function was to pat each other on the back and hold the odd meeting in exotic locations. Its stated purpose was to promote the importance of science, and the role of Italy and Rome in the field particularly. There was no budget for actual research, no formal set of focused principles. From time to time the organization would publish papers by its members, but these would normally be philosophical works on the nature of science itself, not academic reports. It was, it seemed to the old cop, a rather intellectual and upper-class dining club, one paid for through Santa-croce’s generosity and bequests from members over the years, with a small staff and, latterly, Malise Gabriel to handle the lazy flow of publications that emerged from the Confraternita and its members.

‘Was he good at his job?’ Peroni asked.

The man behind the desk stared out of the window for a good ten seconds before answering.

‘Malise was a very capable man. He had a fixed idea of his role. It did not always coincide with mine. Since I was his employer, my opinion was bound to prevail.’

‘What was he working on?’ Peroni asked.

‘Most recently? Principally a paper of mine. Preparing it for publication. Checking facts. Establishing arguments. Proofreading.’

They waited.

‘About what?’ Falcone asked when Santacroce said no more.

‘Inspector. Do not take this the wrong way. These are very specialized intellectual issues. I really don’t have the time to try to explain them to people who, through no particular fault of their own, cannot possibly understand them.’

‘Such as. .’ Falcone began.

‘Such as non-overlapping magisteria. I’m sure you take my-’

‘Malise Gabriel wrote about them in that book of his,’ Peroni said. ‘He thought they were a bad thing. How about you?’

There was a sour smile on Santacroce’s face. He didn’t like being caught out.

‘I think there’s room for us all to get along. Church and science. Provided we keep our noses out of each other’s business.’ He leaned forward. ‘Which is, as I’m sure you’ll appreciate, a poor and clumsy summary of what non-overlapping magisteria actually means.’

Peroni nodded and caught Falcone’s eye.

‘So,’ he continued, ‘you wrote a paper saying this and asked Malise Gabriel to edit it, even though he believed the exact opposite? Wouldn’t that have been a bit demeaning in the circumstances? Though very welcome for you.’

Santacroce stared at the large grandfather clock by the wall. It was next to an impressive painting of a bearded man standing defiantly in front of three angry-looking clerics, a dramatic scene, full of motion and imminent danger.

‘Is this really relevant?’ Bernard Santacroce asked eventually.

‘Probably not,’ Falcone replied. ‘But send us the draft of your paper, please. We have a colleague who is very interested in these matters. I’m sure she’d be delighted to read it.’

‘How did Gabriel get on with his wife?’ Peroni asked.

‘I really think that’s a question for her, officer.’

‘In time. Right now I’m asking you.’

The smile and apparent good nature that had greeted them were gone.

‘There’s a word in English,’ Santacroce said. ‘Uxorious. You don’t have a direct equivalent in Italian, which is odd since the derivation is Latin, of course. I suppose the closest translation would be along the lines of “sottomesso alla moglie”, though it’s not quite the same. Malise was uxorious in the sense that he was utterly devoted to her, and to his family, to the extent that he was almost beneath their thumb. Not literally. He could shout and rant for England when he chose. Nevertheless he was consumed by a fear that he would somehow fail them. Understandable really. He’d done it often enough in the past. The idea that he might stumble one last time — and, trust me, this was his final chance of any gainful academic employment — made him a little weak, to be frank. Call me old-fashioned but I believe a man should be the head of his family in all matters. Had he fulfilled that role, perhaps his unfortunate son wouldn’t now be running round Rome in the company of drug dealers.’

Santacroce picked up a pen and made a note to himself on a pad on the desk.

‘Let me be candid with you. I’m no fool. I’ve no illusions about my own talents. Without. .’ A glance around the room. ‘. . all this I’d be nothing. A middling degree from Oxford gets you nowhere. Malise was a genius of a kind. A somewhat diverted one, but a genius nonetheless. Had he kept good counsel and his hands to himself, he’d probably be master of a college by now. Instead he was little more than an itinerant and very intelligent beggar dependent upon the mercy of lesser men like me. He had no discipline. No sense of politics. His emotions got the better of him and he, and his family, suffered the consequences. I did my best to help and found myself threatened as a result. They had to go. There was no option. How Cecilia coped with him. .’ For the briefest of moments he appeared almost regretful. ‘. . I really can’t begin to imagine.’

‘Was he violent towards her?’ Peroni wanted to know.

‘I’ve no idea. Nor do I wish to know. Ask her. I will send you this paper of mine provided you agree to keep it private. It’s not yet ready for publication. Malise never finished the task I gave him. Now, is there anything else I can do for you?’

Falcone put away his notebook.

‘You can direct us to the office Gabriel used when he worked here. We’d like to look around.’

‘The ground floor,’ Santacroce said. ‘Where you came in. They were the servants’ quarters originally. It was the only place I could put him.’

Peroni stood up and eyed the large canvas next to the grandfather clock.

‘It’s Galileo, isn’t it?’ he asked. ‘When they called him to the Inquisition?’

Santacroce nodded.

‘What cultured policemen we have these days. It’s a little over-dramatic for my taste but there you go. Galileo Galilei was a greatly misunderstood man. He was much more than a scientist. A philosopher too. Without him mathematics, astronomy, physics. . none would have been the same, perhaps for centuries.’

‘He still found himself arguing for his life,’ Peroni replied.

‘He did. Which was wrong. This brotherhood was founded to defend him, to let him know he wasn’t alone. We do not forget what our cousin from Pisa did for us. Every work that appears under the name of the Confraternita delle Civette must, by order of our constitution, make some reference to him also, however slight. It’s one of the few rules we have. My own paper, the one that Malise found somewhat obnoxious, is entitled “E pur si muove”, a phrase that. .’

Santacroce stopped in mid-sentence, smiled awkwardly. The attention this comment had raised in the two police officers had brought the slightest rush of colour in his face.

‘It’s a technical term,’ he added quickly. ‘You wouldn’t know what it means.’

‘No,’ Peroni agreed. ‘But my friend might. Please.’ He pulled out his notebook and pen and handed it over. ‘Write it down for me. I’d like to look it up. I’d like to learn.’

Bernard Santacroce passed the notebook back, the page blank.

‘As I have already indicated, I will ask Cecilia to give you a copy,’ he said, then gestured towards the door.