Page 35 of Murder in Verona

‘You lived in England?’

My surprise must have shown since she shot me a little smile and answered in perfect English. ‘It’s hard to study at a UK university without living there.’

University courses, particularly postgraduate courses, inEngland are notoriously expensive these days and I wondered how she had managed to fund a minimum of four years as a student. Had her mother given her an allowance? But if she had, it clearly hadn’t extended to housing. I filed that question away for now and listened as the inspector continued.

‘You know why we’re here, don’t you? We’re investigating the murder of your brother, Rodolfo. I was hoping you might be able to help us.’

The smile that had appeared on her face disappeared instantly, to be replaced by blank amazement. ‘Did you say “murder”? You think Rodolfo was deliberately killed? I thought it was an accident.’

‘New evidence has come to light, indicating that the brakes of his car may have been tampered with.’ Ventura and I now knew this to be less likely than we had hoped, but I didn’t blame him for mentioning it. ‘We have no definite proof as yet, but I’m afraid that for now, we’re treating his death as suspicious. Anything you can tell us about him or the family will be helpful.’

She was still looking stunned but she nodded. ‘I’m happy to help, but I imagine you’ve heard that I left home eighteen years ago and I haven’t been back since.’

I decided to answer this one. ‘Your mother already told me that – admittedly reluctantly. Would you mind telling us a little bit more about what happened?’ I caught her eye. ‘We’re not trying to pry into your private life, but this is a murder investigation and any information that relates to your brother might potentially be of interest to us. Could I ask why you felt you had to split from your family?’

She looked me straight in the eye as she answered. ‘The split was from mymother. I never knew my father but I loved my brother. Unfortunately, when I decided that I had no choice but togo off and leave my mother, she took over my brother’s life completely and kept him from me.’

‘But you were both adults? If you were eighteen, he would have been in his twenties.’

‘You’ve met my mother, haven’t you? If so, you must know what sort of person she is. She’s always been used to getting her own way. The relationship she had with Rodolfo was suffocating, and he never had the strength to react against it. Putting it simply, she told him I was bad news, and he just accepted what she said.’

Ventura and I exchanged glances. This was what we had already heard about the unhealthy relationship between mother and son, and now it was clear that this had been to the detriment of the daughter. He picked up the conversation. ‘I understand that you were invited to his wedding last September, so you must have been in contact with him?’

‘Only since the Christmas before last. Before that, I had had almost no contact at all – all thanks to my mother and her obsession with keeping him all to herself. I was living in London and I happened to see that he was performing at the Royal Opera House. On the news, they said that he was staying at the Savoy with one of his women – an American actress. It occurred to me that if the actress was with him then probably my mother wasn’t so, on impulse, I dropped a letter into the hotel for him, not really expecting it to get to him and certainly not expecting a reply. To my surprise, the very next morning, I got a phone call from him and he took me out for lunch.’

‘With his girlfriend?’

She shook her head. ‘No, just the two of us, and no sign of my mother, I’m pleased to say. She was back in Tuscany. I spent all afternoon with him and it was wonderful. It was as if all the intervening years had disappeared and I’d got my big brother back,even if I felt sure it would only be until he returned to Italy and the clutches of my mother.’

‘So you and he got on well together?’

She nodded emphatically. ‘Like I said, it just seemed so natural. He talked to me about his career and I told him how I’d fled to England all those years ago, desperate to get away from my mother. I told him about my university course, about all the different jobs I’d done to try to make ends meet after my mother cut me off without a cent, and he told me he wanted to help me.’

‘You mean financially?’

‘Yes, even working all hours and selling what little jewellery I’d brought with me from Italy, I’d still racked up a massive debt and he told me he’d sort that out. Barely a week later, he sent me enough money to pay off all my debts in England plus, to my amazement, the news that he’d bought me a lovely little house here in Verona.’ This time, when she looked up, there were tears in her eyes. ‘I cried all that night. He told me he wanted his little sister near him again and you can’t imagine how that made me feel after years of separation.’

‘I thought you said this was a rented apartment?’

‘This is just a temporary solution. The house Rodolfo gave me is four hundred years old and the builders have been working there for months – all pre-paid by my wonderful brother. They’ve promised me it’ll be finished by the middle of next month and I can’t wait to move in.’ She ran the back of her hand over her eyes and the emotion in the room was palpable. If she was our murderer, she deserved an Oscar. Sensing the atmosphere, my very own Oscar got up and went around the table to sit alongside her, his head resting on her lap as he did his best to cheer her up.

She ruffled Oscar’s ears with one hand while reaching for a tissue with the other. The inspector gave her a few momentsbefore pressing on. ‘Since coming back to Verona, did you see your brother regularly?’

She nodded. ‘Every few weeks – he was away a lot for work and, of course, he’d just married Alessia. But it was so good to reestablish relations after so long.’

‘Did your mother know that you and he were talking or that he was helping you financially?’

‘He told her, and I’m surprised she didn’t have a stroke. He told me she didn’t like it one bit. Quite recently, maybe four or five months ago, she came up from Tuscany to see him and from what he told me afterwards, they had the biggest argument of his life. She ordered him to stop seeing me and he refused point-blank. Like I told you before, my mother can’t stand not getting her own way, and according to him, she was incandescent.’

‘But he carried on seeing you and helping you? After almost forty years of obeying his mother, what do you think made him finally stand up for himself?’

‘I honestly don’t know. Maybe seeing me as an adult and hearing how tough life had been for me while he’d always had everything. Maybe he felt guilty – although the fault lay with our mother.’

‘And did you ever see your mother?’

‘Apart from very briefly at the wedding and the funeral, no.’

‘Did the two of you speak?’

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