Inspector Lynley 18 - Just One Evil Act

he’d be able to do the same.
    She pointed to herself. “I,” she said, “want you”—pointing at him—“to watch”—pointing to her eyeballs—“this”—pointing to the screen of a laptop that she was holding.
    “Ah. You want I must to watch something,” he said in his terrible English. Then, “
Che cos’è? E perché? Mi dispiace, ma sono molto occupato stamattina
.”
    “Bloody goddamn,” the woman muttered to herself. “What’d he just say?”
    She went through the pointing and speaking routine a second time. Salvatore realised it would be quicker to watch whatever she wanted him to watch than it would be to find someone who could translate what he already understood. So he gestured that she was to follow him to his office. On the way he asked Ottavia to find the usual translator on the chance that what the English detective wanted him to see was going to prompt him to ask her questions. Barring that individual’s availability, he told her, find someone else. But not Birgit.
Chiaro?
    Ottavia raised an eyebrow at the Birgit part, but she nodded. She shot a look at the detective sergeant that managed to convey an Italian woman’s incredulity that a member of the same gender would wander about thus garbed, but then she went about her business. She would find someone and she would do it quickly.
    Salvatore ushered the detective sergeant into his office. He said politely, “
Un caffè?
” to which Sergeant Havers went on at some length. Among her words, Salvatore caught one:
time
. Ah, he thought. She was telling him they did not have time. Bah, Salvatore thought. There was always time for
caffè
.
    He went to make it after gesturing her into a seat. When he returned to his office, she’d set up her laptop in the middle of his desk and she was standing at the ready. She’d lit a cigarette, which she looked at, gestured to, and said, “Hope it’s
buono
with you.” Salvatore smiled, nodded, and opened a window. He indicated the
caffè
he’d brought her. She put two sugar cubes into it, but during the course of their meeting, she never took a sip.
    As he stirred his own
caffè
, she said, “Ready?” with lifted eyebrows. She pointed to the laptop and smiled encouragingly. He shrugged his acceptance. She left-clicked on the laptop and gestured Salvatore over to join her at the desk.
    She said, “Right. Well, watch
this
, Salvatore,” from which he presumed she meant
guardi
, so that was what he did. In short order he found himself viewing the interview of Angelina Upman and Taymullah Azhar that had appeared on the television news. It contained their appeal for the safety of their child and their appeal for her return. It also contained Piero Fanucci’s frothing rant about bringing the malefactor to justice one way or the other. Salvatore cooperatively watched the sequence, but he gained absolutely nothing from it. When it was over, he looked at Barbara Havers, frowning. She pointed upward with a finger and said, “Wait,” and she directed him to watch the screen where the film continued.
    The sequence comprised conversation that was mostly inaudible during which people removed their microphones. Salvatore didn’t see what any of this had to do with anything. Then Lorenzo Mura appeared with a tray. On it were an array of wineglasses and plates that he began to hand out to the film crew. He then set a plate and a glass in front of Fanucci, gave the same to the reporter, and then to Taymullah Azhar. To Angelina he gave only a plate.
    Barbara Havers froze the picture at that moment. She pointed to the screen and said with excitement in her voice, “There’s your
E. coli
, Salvatore. It’s right there in the glass he gave to Azhar.”
    Salvatore heard “
E. coli
.” From where she was directing his attention—her finger pointing to the glass sitting in front of the professor—he understood what she meant. He was less clear when she went on, her voice so rapid that only individual names were clear to him. She said, “He intended Azhar, not Angelina, to drink the wine with the
E. coli
in it. But he didn’t know that Azhar’s a Muslim. He has one vice that he shouldn’t have—he smokes—but he doesn’t drink. And he does the whole Muslim bit from A to Z otherwise. The hajj, the fasting, the almsgiving, whatever. But he
doesn’t
drink. He probably never has. Angelina knew that, so she took the wine from him. Here, watch.” And she showed the next sequence of the film. In it,