Inspector Lynley 18 - Just One Evil Act

Fanucci projected.
    “So the British police believe we need a liaison with the missing girl’s family,” he said, more or less. “This is absurd. We are keeping the family fully informed. We have a suspect. It is a matter of one or two more interrogations before he directs us to this child.”
    Lynley said, as he had said to Lo Bianco, “It’s merely a matter of public pressure in England, generated by our press. The relationship between our police and our journalists is an uneasy one, Signor Fanucci. Mistakes have been made in the past: unsafe convictions, overturned imprisonments based on poor investigations, revelations of officers selling information . . . Oftentimes when the tabloids speak, the higher-ups react. That’s the case here, I’m afraid.”
    Fanucci steepled his fingers beneath his chin. He had, Lynley saw, an adventitious finger on his right hand. It was hard not to look at, considering the position in which the public minister—doubtless deliberately—had placed them. “We have not that situation here,” Fanucci declared. “Our journalists do not determine our movements.”
    “You’re very lucky in this,” Lynley said with all seriousness. “Were that only the case at home.”
    Fanucci scrutinised Lynley, taking in everything from the cut of his clothes to the cut of his hair to the adolescent scar that marred his upper lip. “You will, I hope, remain out of our way in this matter,” he said. “We do things differently here in Italy. Here
il Pubblico Ministero
from the first involves himself in the investigation. He does not depend solely upon the police to present him with a case tied in ribbons.”
    Lynley didn’t comment on the oddity of a system that, on the surface, appeared to have no checks and balances. He merely told the public minister that he understood how things proceeded and, if necessary, he would make certain that the parents of the missing girl also understood since they would, perforce, be used to a rather different system of law and justice.
    “Good.” Fanucci waved his hand in an off-with-you-then motion that gave the advantage to his sixth finger. They were being dismissed but not before he said to Lo Bianco, “What more do you have on this business of the hotels, Topo?”
    “Nothing as yet,” Lo Bianco said.
    “Get something today,” Fanucci instructed him.
    “
Centamente
” was Lo Bianco’s evenly spoken reply, but once again that tightening of his jaw demonstrated how he felt about being so directed. He made no further remarks until they were out of the
palazzo
and standing in the enormous piazza
.
Chestnut trees newly in leaf lined two sides of this, and in its centre a group of boys were elbowing each other, shouting to one another as they kicked a football in the direction of a carousel.
    Lynley said to him, “Interesting gentleman,
il Pubblico Ministero
.”
    Lo Bianco snorted. “He is who he is.”
    “May I ask: What did he mean about the hotels?”
    Lo Bianco shot him a look but then explained: a stranger coming to enquire about this same missing girl and her mother.
    “Before her disappearance or after?” Lynley asked.
    “Before.” It was, Lo Bianco told him, six or eight weeks earlier. When the girl disappeared and her photo was shown in the newspapers and on posters round Lucca, a few hotels and
pensioni
reported a man who had been seeking either her or her mother. He had, Lo Bianco said, pictures of them both. The receptionists and the
pensioni
owners all agreed upon that. They all, interestingly enough, agreed upon the man himself. Indeed, they remembered him quite clearly and were able to provide Lo Bianco with an adequate description of the fellow.
    “From eight weeks ago?” Lynley asked. “Why are their memories so clear?”
    “Because of who it was who came to ask about this child.”
    “You know? They knew?”
    “Not his name, of course. They did not know his name. But his description? That would not be so easy to forget. His name is Michelangelo Di Massimo, and he comes from Pisa.”
    “Why was someone from Pisa looking for Hadiyyah and her mother?” Lynley asked, more of himself than of Lo Bianco.
    “That is a most interesting question, no?” Lo Bianco said. “I am working on an answer to it. When I have it, then it will be time to have some words with Signor Di Massimo. Until then, I know where he is.” Lo Bianco shot him a look, shot another look at the
palazzo
behind them, and smiled briefly.
    Lynley read