‘I’m afraid there’s no sign of her, sir.’
Virgilio looked aghast. ‘What do you mean? She can’t just have disappeared into thin air.’
‘I’ve got officers going through the villa room by room and I’ve contacted the others spread around the grounds, getting them to check for her.’
‘What about the main gate? Have you spoken to the officers on duty there?’
‘Inspector Innocenti is talking to them right now, but I imagine she can’t have got out that way.’
A few seconds later, the door burst open and Marco appeared. His expression mirrored what we were feeling: frustration and annoyance. ‘Still no sign of Cortez, but the constable on the gate tells me the only person to leave the villa over the last half-hour was Amedeo Rospo in his old van, on his way up to the bakery in Fiesole to buy bread.’ Seeing the expression of irritation on his boss’s face, he offered some mitigation. ‘The constable said Amedeo has been going out every morning at the same time, and so he saw no reason why he should stop him today.’
Virgilio was glowering by this time. ‘And of course it didn’t cross the idiot’s mind to check inside the back of the van to see if there were any stowaways?’
Marco shook his head and I had a feeling the constable at the gate was going to get a real rocket – and a well-deserved one.
Virgilio checked his watch. ‘It’s gone ten. What time did Amedeo leave?’
‘Only about five minutes ago. I’ve already sent a squad car up the road to intercept the van.’
Virgilio looked slightly mollified. ‘Where’s the bakery?’
‘In Fiesole, just past the piazza, behind the town hall. Do you think this means Cortez is the killer?’
I could see that Virgilio was still fuming so I answered for him. ‘It certainly looks that way. The information from the Spanish authorities indicates that she had a knowledge of Arabic and she worked with asylum seekers, so it could well be that she was behind the Shabah emails that led to Angel’s murder in the duomo.’
Virgilio roused himself from his reverie. ‘Dini, any word from Air France yet?’
‘No, but I’ve got people on it. We should hear very soon.’
‘Let me know as soon as you do. In the meantime, go and check that everybody else is still here. We can’t afford to lose any more suspects.’
She hurried out of the door, leaving Virgilio pacing impatiently up and down. Oscar was on his feet by this time, looking similarly concerned, and I wasn’t feeling much better. Could Emilia Cortez really have slipped through our hands?
The sergeant returned only a few minutes later.
‘All present and correct, sir. I’ve collected them all in the dining room and the only one that’s missing is Cortez. I’ve been up to her room and there’s no sign of her handbag. It looks likeshe’s taken it with her, so she’ll have money. Of course, we still have her ID, so she shouldn’t be able to go far.’
At that moment, the radio strapped to her chest crackled into life and there was a brief conversation. When it finished, she gave us the bad news. ‘That was Fiesole. The van is there, parked right outside the baker’s. It’s unlocked, and the back door’s hanging half-open. Looks like that’s how she got away and now she’s running free.’
Virgilio uttered a couple of colourful expletives. ‘Right, Dini, you stay here with a handful of officers and send all the others up to Fiesole straight away. Get a message down to Florence to stop and check all buses and taxis coming from this direction and set up roadblocks to check all vehicles leaving Fiesole. Tell them to send as many units as they can up to Fiesole to join the search. I want boots on the ground now!’ He turned to Marco. ‘You and I need to get up there straight away. Come on.’ He glanced across at me as he made his way towards the door. ‘You coming, Dan?’
He didn’t need to ask twice. Oscar and I ran out with the two of them and we jumped into Marco’s car. I sat in the back holding onto Oscar as Marco powered the car up through the hairpin bends, siren blaring. It took barely three minutes to get to Fiesole, but in that short time there were two interesting developments. First, Virgilio took a call from the lab and turned back towards me, a triumphant look on his face.
‘That was Forensics – they’ve found fingerprints belonging to Cortez on a little shovel in the greenhouse.’
Seconds later, he took a call from Diana Dini confirming that Cortez had arrived on the nine o’clock Air France flight on Monday morning, and so she would have had ample time to check out the duomo and the confessional before taking a taxi up to the villa.
Virgilio beamed. ‘She’s our killer, all right.’ His expression became more serious. ‘Now all we have to do is to find her.’
Marco screeched to a halt at the top of the piazza outside the impressive old town hall. This elegant building had a row of pillars supporting a terrace, with yet more pillars on top of that, supporting the roof. The façade was covered in plaques and sculptures, and an Italian and a European flag hung limply from a flagpole. But we had no time for sightseeing today as we jumped out of the vehicle and headed towards a gaggle of officers standing at the corner of the square. A narrow road led steeply upwards to where two police cars were parked by Amedeo’s van on the left-hand side, only about fifty metres up, outside the baker’s shop. Standing on the pavement were two officers with a bewildered-looking Amedeo between them.
Virgilio ran up and spoke briefly to the gardener before turning back towards us. ‘Marco, get back into the piazza and organise a door-to-door search of this whole area. Send some officers to the top of the hill with orders to circle round and head back in this direction. Hopefully, we can box Cortez in. She has only a five- or ten-minute start on us, so she can’t have got far. Tell them to fan out and check everywhere – and I mean everywhere, from garden sheds to manholes. Go.’
Over the next ten minutes, more officers began to arrive and a meticulous search was initiated. I stood with Oscar and wondered how best I could help, and it was while I was still trying to think myself into the head of a fugitive trying to hide that I heard the clock on the bell tower of the duomo strike ten-thirty, and this suddenly reminded me of my promise to Anna and Tricia. The wedding hotel was only a five-minute walk, or a two- or three-minute run, from here so I reckoned I should be able to go there, take a look around the place and be back in less than twenty minutes. I tapped Virgilio on the shoulder andasked him if he’d mind if I disappeared for a few minutes to check out a possible wedding venue with Tricia, and he didn’t hesitate.
‘Thanks, Dan, it’s kind of you to help, but this is just good old police legwork now. You go and do what you’ve got to do, and I’ll keep you posted.’
24
