The Raphael Affair

13

Flavia and Argyll set out for Siena at eight sharp the next morning, Argyll in the passenger seat, Flavia driving her old but well-maintained Alfa Spider like a banshee. In a brief moment of feminine submissiveness she had suggested that Argyll might drive. In a long-standing tradition of English cowardice, he had declined. Nothing, he declared as they forced their way onto the main northern artery, would ever get him to drive in Rome. Not after the last time.

It was a wise decision. Flavia drove with knowledge, skill and determination; Argyll would have driven with his eyes shut. The maniacal early morning traffic died away to something more human fairly quickly, and they made rapid progress north.

It’s a long, five-hour voyage to Siena, even if you drive — as Flavia did — far too fast on the motorway. It’s also a very beautiful trip. The autostrada, one of the best in the country and one of the longest in Europe, starts outside Reggio di Calabria at the very tip of the south-western peninsula. It curls through the parched hills of the south to Naples, then turns up through the poor countryside of Calabria and Latium to Rome. Then it heads for Florence and swings east, through a series of giant tunnels and dizzying climbs, over the Apennines to Bologna. Here it splits, one arm reaching out to Venice, the other travelling on to Milan.

Even on the relatively small segment between Rome and Siena, it takes the traveller within easy reach of some of the most wonderful places in the world: Orvieto, Montefiascone, Pienza and Montepulciano; the Umbrian hill-towns of Assisi, Perugia, Todi, Gubbio. The stepped hills of vines and lowland pastures of goats and sheep mix perfectly with the rivers, the steep drops, and the dozens of often largely ignored medieval fortress-towns, perched on top of their protective hills as if the Medicis still reigned supreme.

It was wonderful. Argyll had travelled around Italy for years, had seen nearly all the major sights several times over, but never tired of seeing them all again. For a brief interlude, he forgot his woes, enjoyed the scenery and tried to pay no attention to his companion’s driving.

Five hours almost to the minute later, they swung off the motorway, paid the fee at the toll and headed down the hilly road through Rapolano to Siena, having spent their journey in a mood of cheerful contentment and buoyant optimism. Contentment on Argyll’s part, optimism on Flavia’s. Then Argyll said: ‘How are we going to go about this little expedition? After all, we can hardly wander into the palazzo, take the picture off the wall and attack it with a knife. Curators don’t like that. It upsets them.’

‘Don’t worry. I thought about it last night. We’ll just go and make sure it’s still there, then make an official visit tomorrow.’

They were a little delayed getting to their hotel. Siena is a town where the streets have changed not at all since the thirteenth century, and to cope with modern traffic flows, the authorities have instituted one of the most ferociously complex one-way systems ever devised. A single mistake anywhere, and you are flung off in entirely the wrong direction without the slightest chance of doing anything about it. They had driven — quite illegally as the area is closed to traffic — past the cathedral twice before Flavia reversed the wrong way down a narrow one-way street and found the road she wanted at the end.

She had chosen a comfortable, elegant and expensive hotel to serve as their temporary headquarters. It also served a remarkable lunch, which Argyll suspected might have weighed more heavily in its favour. They had a preliminary drink, and Argyll leaned back in his chair to gaze at the Tuscan hills out of the window. ‘Wonderful,’ he said. ‘The Italian police really do things in style.’

Flavia shrugged. ‘The very last thing the General said to me was that we were to take care of ourselves.’

‘I don’t think this is quite what he had in mind.’

She spread her hands out wide in a very Italian gesture. ‘Who can tell? Find this picture and no one will care. Besides, I’ve always wanted to stay in this place. And my expenses in London were derisory. This will make up for it a little. I’ve booked us in over the weekend. We can sort the picture out, then have a couple of days relaxing. Do you mind?’

‘Am I complaining? This time last month I was sitting in a sandwich shop in London eating a cheese and pickle roll. This arrangement seems slightly preferable, whatever the dire consequences of failure.’

‘Are you afraid of that?’

‘Of failing or the consequences? Yes and no. I think you will have your proof by tomorrow, whatever happens. Do you carry a gun, by the way?’

Flavia frowned at the apparent non sequitur, trying to work out the mental leaps that took her companion from one subject to another. ‘No,’ she said, giving up the effort. ‘I’m not in the police, remember. Just a civilian. Why do you ask?’

He shook his head and smiled at her reassuringly. ‘No reason. Just wondering. This painting has been unlucky.’

Getting back to a more comfortable topic, Flavia announced that they had more than enough time for lunch, and that, speaking personally, she needed some. Then they examined the local church, slowly and in a relaxing fashion, and walked, equally gently, in to the centre. Striding up the hill was a little tiring, Argyll not having had much in the way of exercise for months, and his enjoyment of the stroll was spoiled by his trying to seem not too much out of breath. Flavia seemed not at all affected by the incline.

They reached the Campo at four, after a brief pause while Flavia did some shopping. How she could think of shopping at a time like this was beyond him, but he put it all down to cultural relativism. Some people do odd things to work off tension, and despite their relaxing start, he could tell that both of them were starting to feel just a little nervous.

The square they were heading for is a bizarre shape, like the outline of a cup, which runs downhill from the curved portion to a flat plane at the end. The straight side is almost entirely taken up by the palace; the centre of administration back in the days when Siena was a major city-state whose power, briefly, rivalled that of Florence itself.

The days of greatness had long since gone, however. A couple of unfortunate sixteenth-century decisions concerning the choice of enemies, a rapid war, and Siena settled into the role of minor provincial backwater. Since the seventeenth century, when some wise burgher had the bright idea of inventing the Palio — the annual horse race round the Campo — it had survived mainly on tourist income.

This year’s contingent was beginning to flow in nicely. All the numerous cafés along the curved sides at the top of the Campo had laid out their chairs, tables and umbrellas and waiters were flitting to and fro, delivering glasses of pastis, coffees, bottles of mineral water and the inevitable Coca-Colas. Little posses of tourists stood around gaping at the sight, or heading for the entrance to the palace.

There was not a lot of time to admire the view. Flavia led Argyll rapidly to the palazzo entrance, paid the two thousand five hundred lire entrance fee and wasted a few minutes complaining to the ticket seller about the disgraceful expense. This preliminary over, they crossed the courtyard and set about being sightseers. They had timed it quite well. Most Italian museums stop admitting new visitors at about twenty-five minutes before closing time; they had bought their tickets with five minutes to spare.

In the lower hall, where the great frescos by Sodoma are displayed, they split up, Flavia to examine the doors and windows, Argyll to locate the Mantini. An unpleasant shock awaited him when he arrived in the upper saloon. According to the picture in his guide book, 1975 edition, the picture should have been in a dark corner at the back, above a glass case of miscellaneous Renaissance silverware and just to the left of a vast nineteenth-century painting of Vittorio Emanuele, unifier of Italy, striking a heroic pose on a horse.

It wasn’t. Instead, there was a group of early twentieth-century town councillors, done in the degenerate style of portraiture that proved that Italy was long since past its best in the picture department. Argyll’s heart sank. After his enormous confidence that his plan would go off smoothly, he was now going to have to explain himself. This would be a little hard for Flavia to swallow. He could almost see the stern look of disapproval on her face, and her opinion of him dwindling into nothing as he told her.

He walked over to the guardian of the room, took out his guide book and jabbed his finger at the photograph. ‘You see this picture? Where is it? I’ve come all the way from England just to see it, and it’s not there.’

The guardian looked at him pityingly. ‘You came from England to see that? Listen: take my advice. Go downstairs to the Mappamondo. It’s much better, one of the finest things in all Siena.’

‘I know that,’ Argyll retorted testily, feeling his aesthetic integrity was being impugned, ‘but I want to see this. Where has it gone to?’

The guard shrugged. ‘How should I know? I’ve only been working here a few weeks. I only know what’s in here. Go next door and ask Enrico.’

He did as he was told and found Enrico, a man of at least sixty, sitting lifelessly on a wooden chair by the door, staring without any sort of interest at the tourists coming and going. He did not look like a man who enjoyed his work overmuch. Argyll explained that Giulio had sent him, and did he know where this was?

Enrico looked at the picture. ‘Oh. That. Yes, that went years ago. The curator reckoned it was cluttering up the room. They took it down when the room was restored. He didn’t want anything before 1850 in there.’

Argyll was annoyed. ‘They took this down and left that monstrosity of Vittorio Emanuele up? That’s a disgrace.’

‘That’s different. It’s after 1850. Besides, it’s so big it won’t go anywhere else.’ The guard shrugged again. The little fads of curators was evidently not a subject that enlivened him.

‘Where’s it now, then?’

The guard looked at the picture again and frowned. ‘Tower room,’ he said. ‘Don’t know why everyone’s so interested in that, all of a sudden. No one’s shown the slightest concern about it for years. Listen, why don’t you go downstairs and look at the Mappamondo. It’s one of the finest...’

‘Everyone? What do you mean? Someone else asked about it? When?’ Argyll interrupted the sales pitch in panic.

‘About an hour ago. Man came in here and asked the same question as you did. Sent him up to the tower room, too.’

‘Who was he?’

‘You think I’m on first name terms with every visitor who comes here? How should I know?’ The guard turned to bellow at some Germans on the other side of the room, and moved away. They weren’t doing anything wrong, but Italian museum guards don’t seem to like Germans overmuch. Besides, it ended a conversation he clearly found tedious.

Jesus, why the hell didn’t he tell me that in the first place, Argyll thought as he ran desperately up the two flights of twisting stone stairs to the tower room. It was a long way up, and the last room en route to the great Campanile that dominates both the Campo and all of Siena. He arrived breathless, in a small bare room, crowded with faded and dirty prints and a jumble of pictures. There was a small table of inlaid wood in the centre. It was evidently where the museum stored the pictures it thought no one wanted to see. Most people probably walked straight through on their way to the platform at the top, three hundred feet above the square below.

His anxieties faded a little. It was still there, at least. He had not been out-manoeuvred yet. There, in one corner, surrounded by old maps of Siena in glass frames, was an undoubted, genuine piece of the oeuvre of Carlo Mantini. It was a landscape, which was a little awkward. Typical stuff: a stream in the middle background, and a few blobs of paint signifying peasants tending sheep or goats. Speaking personally, he wouldn’t have called it a landscape with ruins. But, a small hill on the right had a ruined castle on it, which revived his flagging confidence a little. The sky was clear and, had it not been so dirty, would have been a light blue. All of Mantini’s skies were light blue. He couldn’t paint them any other way.

Argyll stared at it with adoration. There it was. What a beautiful piece. What a gem. What a masterwork. He squinted at it. Looked a little smaller than it should, but that might be the effect of the frame. A pity it would have to be a touch damaged, but he was sure Mantini wouldn’t mind if he knew what it would do for his only biographer’s career. And it was going to be famous, if all went well.

He was still staring when a deafening alarm went off. ‘Christ, please, not a fire,’ was his initial reaction. Then it occurred to him it must be the bell to warn visitors that the museum was closing. He ran down the stairs again, a much easier task, and went searching for Flavia. She was standing in the main council room.

‘Where have you been? I’ve been standing here for hours.’

‘Nonsense. We only arrived twenty minutes ago. I was looking for the picture. They moved it upstairs. Listen, he’s here. He followed us. The guard told me someone was asking about the picture. What do we do now?’

She looked very alarmed at his urgent tone. ‘Who’s here?’

‘Byrnes.’

‘The picture’s not been touched?’ He shook his head. ‘Good.’ She walked around in little circles and rubbed her chin thoughtfully. ‘We’ve no choice,’ she said decisively after a few moments. ‘We’ll have to go ahead now. It’s too risky to go outside and wait until tomorrow. Come on.’

She headed off. ‘Where are you going?’ he called after her.

‘Just to the toilet. Don’t worry.’

Argyll’s leg was long since dead of any sensation. He moved awkwardly, trying to get comfortable. ‘Was this the best you could think of?’ he asked peevishly.

Flavia was sitting on his knee. ‘Keep quiet. I think it’s perfect. They’ve inspected the place already. They won’t come again. Now we just have to sit tight for another three hours or so.’

‘Three hours? We’ve been here for days already. It’s all right for you. You’ve got my warm comfortable knee to sit on. I’m the one wedged into this damned lavatory seat. And you might have said, then I could’ve eaten more lunch. I’m starving.’

‘Stop complaining. You were all secretive so why couldn’t I be? Besides, I told you to eat up. Here, I bought this in the shop.’

She reached down by the side of the toilet bowl, picked up her handbag and fished out a bar of chocolate.

‘Why are you so certain the alarms won’t go off? We’re going to be very unpopular if we’re arrested. Wouldn’t it have been easier to flash your ID card and ask to examine it?’

‘And have everybody know within hours? You know as well as I do that people in the art world are incapable of keeping their mouths shut. Besides, if we wait, it might not be here tomorrow. Anyway, we won’t be caught. The guards will only be round once more; I checked the rota in the entrance. And the alarms are only on the entrances and exits. Obviously they think that any robber will try and get away. We won’t. We just examine the picture, wait until morning, go out with the first visitors, phone Bottando, and finish. There won’t be anything missing, so no one will notice.’

‘We’ve got to spend all night here?’ he hissed in horror. ‘In a women’s toilet? Why not the men’s, at least?’

‘Eucht. What a dreadful idea. Dirty beasts, men.’

Argyll ate his chocolate morosely. ‘Couldn’t we just forget the Mantini?’ he asked hopefully, trying to get his plan back on course. ‘After all, with Byrnes here, that’s enough. I think we should just nip off to the hotel, call Bottando, have Byrnes arrested and come back in the morning.’ He finished the chocolate and remembered he’d omitted to offer her any.

‘What makes you think it’s Byrnes? The guard didn’t describe him or anything like that.’

‘Well,’ said Argyll dubiously. ‘It must be, mustn’t it? I mean, it stands to reason...’

‘Not at all. All we know is that someone asked about that picture. Byrnes is the last person it could be. There’s no way he could have found out where we are.’

Argyll shifted uncomfortably on the toilet seat as she spoke. She took a hard look at him, an uneasy feeling coming over her.

‘Jonathan? What have you done, damn you?’

‘It’s just that I thought, that, well...I told him, that’s all.’

Flavia didn’t reply, but leant her forehead against the cool white tiles of the cubicle. ‘What did you do that for?’ she asked faintly when she’d recovered herself.

‘It seemed a good idea,’ he explained feebly. ‘You see, even if we found the picture, it wouldn’t get us any further in finding who was responsible. So I thought, if I told Byrnes, he’d have to do something about it. He’d come trotting out to Siena, and the police could arrest him as he entered the city.’

‘And you didn’t think it worth mentioning this before? Perhaps it just slipped your memory? One of those little details, of no significance, that you just forgot about? You great dolt.’

‘Of course I didn’t forget,’ he protested, his voice rising in pitch as he realised that his masterstroke wasn’t getting the appreciation it deserved.

‘Don’t squeak at me like that.’

‘Well, why not? I’m getting tired of this,’ he continued — might as well let off steam now — ‘everything I’ve done so far you’ve taken as evidence of my guilt. You’re rude, objectionable and too clever for your own good. Obviously I couldn’t tell you what I planned. You would have locked me up. And if we’re now in a mess, it’s just as much your fault as mine. If you hadn’t known best all the time, and maybe trusted me a little more, I would have been more forthcoming. Besides which...’

‘Oh, no. Don’t say that. I hate it when you say that. Besides what?’

Argyll positively squirmed, as much as any man can when sandwiched between a lavatory seat and a semi-official member of the Italian police. He shouldn’t have said it. His burst of wounded indignation had been very impressively delivered, and now he’d gone and spoiled the effect.

‘Besides which,’ he went on reluctantly, ‘I’m not entirely convinced I’ve got the right picture. I think I have,’ he hurried on before she could say anything, ‘but I did say I had to cut a few corners.’

‘God preserve me,’ Flavia said quietly, to no one in particular. ‘We’re up here, possibly on a fool’s errand. Bottando is fast asleep in Rome and knows nothing about it. You appear to have successfully lured a murderer here without bothering to get any protection at all either for us or the picture. Well done. A fine achievement.’

‘I’ll protect you,’ Argyll said gallantly, hoping to make some form of amends.

‘Gee. Thanks, mister. That makes me feel a lot better.’ She would have continued in this vein, but felt it hardly worth wasting her breath.

Argyll had lapsed into a sullen, morose silence and ate his way steadily through the contents of Flavia’s handbag. She had stocked it with enough food to withstand a siege. He desperately craved a cigarette.

Flavia had also lost her conversational flair. Clearly little could be done to repair their once promising relationship until that picture had been looked at. Then, perhaps, all would be forgotten and forgiven. He still thought it was a good plan, and was a little hurt that she’d reacted so badly. Maybe she was jealous of him for thinking it up?

When she finally decided that it was safe and time to go, it took about ten minutes to restore life to his leg. When he stood up for the first time, it collapsed under him and he fell, knocking over a large bucket with a toilet brush in it. It rattled over the floor, and the noise echoed around the room. They watched as it rolled slowly to a halt in the corner. ‘Be quiet, for God’s sake,’ Flavia yelled in fright.

‘You’re making as much noise as I am. At least I’m not shouting my head off,’ he hissed back.

‘I don’t want us to get caught now. It would be very embarrassing.’

He smiled in a half-way attempt to be conciliatory. ‘I’m sorry. I’m not used to this sort of escapade. It’s not included in the introductory course for art history graduates.’

She glared at him, still not ready to forgive. ‘Just keep quiet, all right? Now, let’s get going.’

She poked her head into the corridor, then disappeared through the door, gesturing for him to follow. They walked down to the main saloon again, and tiptoed, quietly and cautiously, over to the door that led to the staircase. It opened. No alarms. That at least was one worrying part over.

Once on the top floor, she flicked on a small torch, another purchase from the shop. ‘Now tell me I don’t think of everything,’ she murmured to him as they walked. She went lightly and without a sound. Argyll, wearing his usual heavy, metal-tipped brogues, clattered after, despite all attempts to keep quiet. Had she mentioned she was proposing amateur cat burglary, he would have dressed appropriately.

The room was as he had left it six hours earlier. Flavia went over, quietly closed the heavy wooden shutters over the windows, and flipped the metal fastener to keep them secure. Then she closed the door, and pushed down the light switch.

‘There. I don’t see why we shouldn’t be able to see what we’re doing for a bit. No one will be along here for at least an hour. How long will this take you?’

‘Not long at all,’ he replied as they gently took the picture off the hook that kept it on the wall and blew off the thin coat of dust all over it. ‘I’ll have to be careful, but no more than five minutes, I reckon.’

He had taken a book on the restoration and cleaning of pictures out of the library and had read the subject up on the plane flight. In principle it was simple. You just needed some form of solvent and a cloth. Then you brushed away until the right amount of dirt or paint was removed.

He pulled the tools he had bought in the art supply shop in London out of his pocket. A very small but very sharp knife, a large bundle of cotton wool and a small aerosol. ‘Combination of acid and alcohol. The man in the shop said it’s the best thing you can buy.’ He grinned at her. ‘I think of everything, you see.’ No response.

As is often the case, practice turned out to be more complex than principle suggested. Argyll wanted to be careful not to do too much damage to the painting; after all, he was no restorer and had only the vaguest idea of what he was doing. So he concentrated on a very small amount of canvas in the bottom-left corner. But this meant he could only spray a small squirt from the aerosol at any time, in case it spread out too far.

So he settled down to squirt and rub, squirt and rub, only removing a tiny amount of dirt, varnish and paint at a time. It was hard work that required a lot of concentration. Every time he swabbed the cotton wool over the canvas, he hoped to see the tell-tale signs that indicated a masterpiece underneath.

‘How’s it going? You’ve been at it for nearly twenty minutes now.’ She spoke quietly but urgently, leaning against a table a few feet away to give him light. She rubbed her arms. ‘It’s freezing in here.’

He rubbed for another five minutes, the pile of dirty cotton-wool balls getting ever bigger. Then, as he gently slid a new ball across the paintwork, he stopped, and stared intently, scarcely believing his eyes.

‘What is it? Have you found it?’ She spoke excitedly, leaning forward for a better view.

‘Paint,’ he said. ‘Green paint underneath...Flavia, put that light back on. What are you doing?’

Flavia didn’t hear the rest of the sentence. The room was plunged into darkness. If both of them hadn’t been concentrating so hard on the picture, they might have noticed the movement of the door opening. But they didn’t, and the first time Flavia realised something was wrong was when she was hit on the side of the head with a thick length of wood. She fell on the floor, silent, with blood flowing swiftly from a broad cut in her scalp.

Argyll looked up at the sound, saw her collapse, and saw a shadowy figure advancing towards him. ‘Oh my God...’ he began, but had no time to finish the remark. He had never been kicked in the stomach before, certainly not that hard, and had never imagined that anything could hurt so much.

Badly winded, he doubled up in agony, clutching at his stomach as though that might lessen the torment. He was pushed away from the picture and fell heavily on the floor. He liked, later, to think that he was moaning softly. In truth, his groans were probably a good deal louder. He didn’t notice; his stomach fully occupied his consciousness, but he did reach out and touch Flavia, afraid of what he might discover.

‘Don’t you dare die on me. Keep going or I’ll kill you,’ he whispered in her ear. He felt for her pulse, and couldn’t find it. But he’d never been able to find his own either. He reached for her head and brushed her hair lightly, and felt the soft breath coming from her mouth and nose. She was still alive. But she wouldn’t be for long unless he got his act together here. Nor would he, for that matter. ‘Looks like neither of us thought of everything,’ he said to her sadly.

Try as he might, he couldn’t move. The pain was too intense. All he could do was watch as the dark outline of the man who had given him such misery took a small, and evidently very sharp, knife and cut the painting, swiftly and without fuss, out of the back of the frame. At least, he assumed that was what was going on; all he could see was the occasional glint of metal. He didn’t like the look of that knife, which was evidently a versatile instrument which could be put to many uses. He wheezed on the floor as the man rolled up the canvas, put it in a cardboard tube, and sealed it. Very methodical, in no rush at all.

That done, he picked up his knife again. ‘Oh, Lord,’ thought Argyll. ‘Here we go.’ He exploded from his sitting position and cannoned into the man’s chest, knocking him off balance by sheer fluke. It used up all the reserves of energy and will-power he had. More, in fact. Men with knives can bring out the best in you.

But it was immediately obvious that his best wasn’t enough. His antagonist slipped over, but Argyll simply didn’t have the resources to do what was plainly required; that is, leap decisively up and down on his head with his heavy, metal-tipped shoes. Instead, he just stood there, still half hunched over with pain as his opponent rolled over, recovered his knife and began coming towards him again.

There was only one course left, and he took it. In the gloom, he could dimly make out that the infernal creature was between him and the door leading to the staircase down. So Argyll dashed through the other one and began to climb up. It was the best he could do to fulfil his promise to Flavia to protect her, even though she’d plainly been dismissive of his offer. With luck her assailant would follow him, giving Flavia a chance to regain consciousness and raise the alarm.

I hope he comes after me, anyway, he thought as he wheezed and puffed his way up the stairs. But what if he does something to Flavia first? Maybe I should have stayed down there.

It was a noble thought, and the fact that it was plainly impractical didn’t make him feel less awful. He would have been killed and Flavia would have followed soon after. Which may yet be the case anyway, Argyll reflected.

He ran blindly up the stairs in the pitch dark, half-tripping, missing steps, but going as fast as he could. It got harder and harder. Earlier in the afternoon even the climb up the hill had been enough to wind him; the way he felt now, the man behind wasn’t even going to have to bother sticking in a knife. It was what came of sitting in libraries when he should have been out jogging away and lifting weights. If he survived this, Argyll promised himself, he’d buy a rowing machine. The next time some tall, dark forger tried to knife him in a Sienese tower in the middle of the night, he’d be prepared for it. Up the stairs like the wind, he’d go.

His thoughts were getting confused from the combination of fright, pain and cramps. At one stage he stopped climbing. Doing so scared him to death, but he simply couldn’t go on. He listened over the whistling, rasping sound of his breath; the soft pad of footsteps was just audible. He evidently had a lead, and his pursuer didn’t seem to be hurrying. But then, why should he? — Argyll thought with a flash of despair — it’s not as if I can get away. Perhaps he’s as out of condition as I am?

The thought of his pursuer keeling over with a heart attack half-way up the stairs cheered him momentarily, but dissipated as he realised it was hardly likely. Whoever it was, the man with the hefty kick was not Sir Edward Byrnes — an elderly gent who, whatever the circumstances, would hardly go around kicking people in the stomach. He could just about see Byrnes knifing someone, but this sort of crawling around with wooden clubs and boots and knives didn’t really seem the man’s style.

Argyll began climbing the stairs again. He was going slowly, but making progress. The apparent inevitability of death doesn’t mean that you will do nothing to postpone it for as long as possible. He doggedly kept on going to the top. Had circumstances been different, he could have stared at the view from the parapet for a very long time: bent double over the wall, choking as he dragged air into his much abused and protesting lungs, he saw the whole of Siena laid out like something out of a fairy-tale. A crescent moon illuminated the Campo and the jumble of medieval buildings around it. It lit up the black and white marble stripes of the cathedral tower. Twinkling lights from dozens of windows showed where the town’s inhabitants were still up and about, watching the television, drinking wine, talking with friends. A light, warm and refreshing breeze. Beautiful, safe and normal.

But Argyll was in no mood to ponder over either the scenery or his unfortunate situation. I could shout, scream bloody murder from the rooftops, he thought. But he didn’t. No one would work out where it was coming from in time. And anyway, in the state he was in at the moment, he doubted that he could raise much more than a faint squeak.

He turned round at the creak of the door. The man was standing, quietly and still in the doorway, evidently evaluating how best to go about things. When Argyll had seen Flavia collapsing in a bloody heap, he had initially been furious, then desperation had sent him flying up the stairs. Now all these impulses had gone, and he was just frightened.

Knife me, push me over, or both, Argyll thought. Spoiled for choice. Probably push me over, he decided. More ambiguous.

An arm went round his neck, pushing him back so his head rested on the parapet wall. He saw the flash of the knife in the moonlight. He was choking. He grabbed the wrist below the knife, not that it made any evident difference. The planned resistance was useless; the unplanned response was much more effective: reflex action brought his knee up between the other’s legs so fast and so sharply that the impact hurt it. To Argyll’s faint astonishment, the grip relaxed as his attacker clutched at the offended area and let out a deep, and very satisfying yelp of pain.

But the respite was only brief. His assailant had kept hold of the knife and was still much too close. Argyll clenched his fist and hit him. He’d never hit anyone before, having led a quiet and largely withdrawn childhood in a world which disapproved of shows of temper among the young. He should have got into more fights when he was small. It was odd how small his fists felt, and how much his knuckles hurt when he punched the man in the general area of the chin. He made a few more desultory taps, then stopped. He could do no more and it didn’t seem to be much use in the long run anyway. His assailant, at least, also seemed less than happy after his brief contact with Argyll’s knee. They both paused, breathing heavily and looking at each other, eyes less than a foot apart. In the dim light, Argyll saw his face clearly for the first time, and was briefly shocked into inactivity.

Then the knife hand swung back for the last time, and Argyll reached into his pocket for his last weapon. A pity he hadn’t thought of it before. He aimed the aerosol, and pressed the button.

There was a scream of agony, the knife clattered to the stone flagging. Argyll was appalled. He hadn’t even considered what he’d been doing, just grabbed the one faint chance the moment it occurred to him. He backed away, and stood, dumbly, watching the torment he’d just caused.

One hand still trying to rub the acid out of his eyes, Argyll’s assailant was scrabbling in the pocket of a heavy blue jacket.

Oh, Christ, not a gun as well, Argyll thought. This man’s a walking bloody arsenal. It was no good even thinking of another round of fighting to try and disarm him. There was no strength left for that. With the certainty that only desperation can provide, Argyll ran forward once more and pushed with every drop of muscle-power and will-power he had left.

Without a scream, a cry, or any noise at all, Antonio Ferraro, deputy director of the Italian National Museum, disappeared over the edge and hurtled to the ground, three hundred feet below.