The Lost Girls of Rome (40 page)

‘Are you trying to tell me that when you found out he had kidnapped another girl it was almost a consolation?’

‘If Lara is still alive, obviously.’ Camusso smiled bitterly. ‘Even that’s quite monstrous, don’t you think?’

‘Yes, it is. It’s as if we’re making her salvation dependent on Jeremiah Smith’s recovery.’

‘The man will probably be a vegetable for the rest of his life.’

‘What do the doctors say?’

‘Strangely, they’re rather in the dark. At first they thought it was a heart attack, but after running a lot of tests, they’ve ruled that out. They’re looking for neurological damage, although they still can’t locate it.’

‘It might be the action of a toxic agent, maybe a poison.’

‘They’re analysing his blood to trace the substance,’ Camusso admitted grudgingly.

‘But if that’s the case, then someone else is involved. Someone who tried to kill him.’

‘Or to have him killed by the sister of one of his victims …’

The Figaro case, thought Sandra. There was a similarity between the way Federico Noni had been killed and what had happened to Jeremiah Smith. Both appeared to be executions. Both men had been punished for their crimes. Or for their sins, she said to herself.

‘Wait a minute, I want to show you something.’

Sandra had been lost in thought and did not take in at first what Camusso had said.

The superintendent took a laptop out of a case, switched it on and placed it in front of her. ‘One week before the disappearance, there was a graduation ceremony in the faculty of architecture. The father of the graduate filmed everything.’ He clicked to start the video. ‘These are the last images we have of Lara before she vanished.’

Sandra leaned in towards the screen. The camera was moving around a lecture hall. There were about thirty people present. They were milling around, chatting in small groups, some laughing. Drinks had been set out on a desk and many of the people were holding glasses. There was a cake, but only half of it remained. The person doing the filming was moving among the guests, inviting them to say a few words to the camera. Some waved, others made witty remarks. The camera lingered on a young man who launched into a sarcastic monologue about the latest events at the university. His friends laughed. Behind him, in the background, was a girl who seemed not to be taking part in the festivities. She was leaning on a desk, with her arms folded and her eyes staring into the distance, unaffected by the joy around her.

‘That’s her,’ Camusso said, as if there was any need.

Sandra looked closely at Lara. She was swaying on her heels, biting her lip. She had the look of a creature in pain.

‘Strange, isn’t it? It makes me think of when the media publish the photograph of a crime victim. They always seem to have been taken at some event that has nothing to do with what happened to them later. A wedding, an excursion, a birthday. Maybe they didn’t even like that photo. While they were posing they certainly never imagined that one day that image would end up in the newspapers or on TV.’

The dead smiling out of the photographs of their past: Sandra was very familiar with that.

‘In the course of their lives it probably never occurred to them that they might become famous. Suddenly they die and people know everything about them. Weird, don’t you think?’

While Camusso was still pondering this, Sandra, her instincts as a forensic photographer to the fore, noticed a slight variation in Lara’s expression. ‘Do you mind going back a bit?’

Camusso looked at her, then did as she asked without demanding an explanation.

‘Now slow it down.’ Sandra leaned forward, waiting for the miracle to appear again.

Lara’s lips suddenly moved.

‘She spoke,’ Camusso said, surprised.

‘Yes, she spoke,’ Sandra confirmed.

‘And what did she say?’

‘Let me see it again.’

Camusso ran the video several times, while Sandra made an effort to catch every vowel and consonant.

‘She’s saying, “Bastard.”’

Camusso looked at her. ‘Are you sure?’

Sandra turned to him. ‘Yes, I think so.’

‘And who is she angry at?’

‘Definitely a man. Go forward and let’s try and see who it is.’

He started the video again. The cameraman had been a bit haphazard, rarely taking time to focus on any of the guests for very long. All at once, the camera moved abruptly to the right, almost as if following the direction of Lara’s gaze. She wasn’t staring into the distance, as Sandra had thought at first: she was looking at someone.

‘Can you pause it for a moment?’ she asked Camusso.

He did so. ‘What is it?’

Sandra had spotted a smiling man of about forty, surrounded by a group of female students. He was wearing a blue shirt and his tie was loose. An irreverent air, brown hair, clear eyes: a charmer. He had his hand on the shoulder of one of the girls.

‘Is that the bastard?’ Camusso asked.

‘He looks the type.’

‘Do you think he’s the child’s father?’

Sandra looked at Camusso. ‘There are some things you can’t tell from a video.’

The superintendent realised his gaffe and tried to make a joke of it. ‘I thought that sixth sense of yours might tell you.’

‘Not really,’ she said, pretending to regret what she had said. ‘But it might be useful to have a chat with him.’

‘Wait, I can tell you who he is.’ Camusso walked around the desk to check a file. ‘We made a list of all those present that day. You never know.’

Sandra was surprised at the efficiency of her Roman colleagues.

‘Christian Lorieri,’ the superintendent announced, after looking through the list. ‘He’s an assistant lecturer in art history.’

‘Did you question him?’

‘There was no reason to. He had no contact with Lara.’ Camusso guessed what was going through her head. ‘Even if he was the father of the baby she was carrying and knew it, I doubt he’d be prepared to talk to us: he’s married.’

Sandra thought this over. ‘Sometimes it’s worth provoking a reaction,’ she said, with a wicked gleam in her eyes.

‘What do you intend to do?’ asked Camusso, curious.

‘First I have to print some photographs …’

The corridors of the faculty of architecture were filled with students coming and going. Sandra had always found it strange that university students started to bear a resemblance to one another, depending on the subject they studied. As if they answered to a kind of genetic code that identified the group they belonged to and brought out similar characteristics in everyone. For example, law students were undisciplined and competitive, medical students strict and lacking a sense of humour, philosophy students melancholy and always dressed in outsize clothes. Architects, on the other hand, were unkempt and went about with their heads in the clouds.

She had been directed by a porter to Christian Lorieri’s office and now she was looking for his name on the plates next to the doors. At Headquarters she had printed the photographs stored in the memory of her mobile phone. There were the pictures of Jeremiah Smith’s villa, but also copies of those from David’s Leica, which luckily she had duplicated in the bathroom at the guest apartment. There were the images of Lara’s apartment and, above all those of the chapel of St Raymond of Penyafort. And to think that she had wanted to erase them, believing they were no use to her! They might well prove vital now.

The door of Lorieri’s office was open. He was sitting with his feet on the desk, reading a magazine. He was a handsome man, just as he had appeared in the video. The classic slightly rumpled forty-year-old who drove his female students crazy. The essence of his personality was summed up by the Converse All Stars he wore on his feet. They communicated a message of peaceful revolution.

Smiling, Sandra knocked at the door.

Lorieri looked up from his reading. ‘The exam has been moved till next week.’

She sat down without being invited to come in, emboldened by the relaxed climate that prevailed in the room. ‘I’m not here for an exam.’

‘If you want to discuss your work, you have to come back on an odd-numbered day.’

‘And I’m not a student.’ She took out her badge. ‘Sandra Vega, police.’

Lorieri did not seem surprised and did not lean forward to shake her hand. His one gesture towards politeness was to take his feet off the table. ‘Then I should say: What can I do for you, Officer?’ He smiled ingratiatingly.

Sandra hated his charm. He reminded her of Schalber, and the poor assistant lecturer could not have imagined at how much of a disadvantage this put him. ‘I’m conducting an investigation and I need some advice relating to art. I was told you could help.’

Surprised, Christian Lorieri put his elbows on the table. ‘Well, well. What’s the case? Is it one I might have read about in the newspapers?’

‘That’s confidential.’

‘I see. Well, I’m at your disposal.’ He gave her another smile.

If he does that again, I’ll stick my gun in his face, Sandra thought. ‘Would you mind taking a look at these and telling me if you recognise the place.’ She handed him the photos of the chapel of St Raymond of Penyafort. ‘We found them in the pocket of a suspect, and we can’t figure out where the photographs were taken.’

Lorieri put on a pair of glasses and started examining the images. He took the photographs from the pile one at a time and then lifted
them up in front of him. ‘There are tombs, so I’d definitely say a chapel. It’s very likely to be in a church.’

Sandra was watching him, waiting for his reaction when the moment came.

‘There are various styles, so it’s difficult to establish where we are.’ He had looked at more than ten images when he came across the first photograph of Lara’s apartment. ‘There’s one here that doesn’t seem to …’ When he saw the second one and the third one, his smile vanished. ‘What do you want from me?’ he said, without having the courage to look her in the face.

‘You’ve been in that apartment, haven’t you?’

He put down the pile of photographs and folded his arms, on the defensive now. ‘Only once. Maybe twice.’

‘Let’s say three times, and stop there. Is that right?’ Sandra was being deliberately provocative.

Lorieri nodded.

‘Were you there the night Lara disappeared?’

‘No, not that night,’ he said firmly. ‘I’d already dumped her more than two weeks before.’

‘Dumped?’ Sandra said, horrified.

‘I mean … Well, you know what I mean: I’m married.’

‘Are you reminding me or yourself?’

Lorieri stood up and went to the window. He ran a hand nervously through his hair, keeping the other down by his side. ‘When I found out she had disappeared, I wanted to go to the police. But then I thought of all the questions they would ask me and my wife, the rector, the university … I knew I wouldn’t be able to keep the thing hidden any longer. It would be a tragedy for my career and my family. I thought the whole business was some whim of Lara’s, I thought she’d run away to get my attention, and that she’d come back eventually.’

‘Did it not occur to you she might have done something rash because of your rejection?’

Lorieri turned his back on her. ‘Of course,’ he admitted.

‘Nearly a month has passed and you haven’t said anything.’ Sandra made no attempt to hide her disgust.

Lorieri was clearly under pressure now. ‘I did offer to help her.’

‘To have an abortion, you mean?’

Lorieri knew he was in trouble. ‘What else could I have done? It was a fling, nothing more, and Lara knew that. We never went out together, didn’t talk on the phone, I didn’t even have her number.’

‘The fact that you didn’t speak up after her disappearance makes you a suspect in her murder.’

‘Murder? What are you talking about?’ He was beside himself. ‘Have you found her body?’

‘We don’t need to. You have a motive. Sometimes that’s all it takes to arrest someone.’

‘I haven’t killed anyone, damn it.’ He was on the verge of tears.

Strangely, Sandra felt sorry for him. In the past she would have applied the law of the good policeman: never believe anyone. But she sensed he was telling the truth: it was Jeremiah Smith who had taken Lara; the way she had been taken from her apartment was too well thought out. If Lorieri had wanted to kill her, he could have simply lured her to an isolated place, Lara would have followed him without question. And even if he had killed her in a fit of madness, perhaps after a quarrel at her apartment, there would have been traces of the murder.

Death is in the details, she remembered. And there was nothing to suggest that Lara was dead.

‘Get a grip and sit down, please.’

He looked at Sandra with reddened eyes. ‘All right.’ He sat down again, sniffing.

Sandra had a good reason to feel compassion for this cowardly adulterer. I’m no different from him, I’ve cheated too, she told herself, remembering the green tie.

But she had no desire to share that story with Lorieri.

Instead, she said, ‘Lara didn’t want to present you with a fait accompli. She told you she was pregnant to give you a chance. If she is alive and comes back, please listen to her.’

He was unable to say a word. Sandra quickly recovered the photographs from the desk because she wanted to get out of here. She was putting them back in her bag when she carelessly dropped them.
They scattered over the floor and Lorieri bent down with her to pick them up.

‘Let me.’

‘It’s all right, I can manage.’ She noticed that among the photographs that had ended up on the floor was the one of the priest with the scar on his temple.

‘The penitenziere.’

She turned to Lorieri, not sure she had heard correctly. ‘Do you know this man?’

‘Actually I have no idea who he is. I wasn’t referring to that one, but to this one.’ He picked up another photograph and showed it to her. ‘St Raymond of Penyafort. Did you want to know about the chapel, or was that just an excuse?’

Sandra looked at it. It was a photograph of the altarpiece in the chapel, the one that depicted St Raymond himself. ‘What can you tell me about this?’

‘About the painting, not much: it’s from the seventeenth century and it’s in the basilica of Santa Maria sopra Minerva. No, actually I was referring to the saint.’