Aged for malice, p.19
Aged for Malice, page 19
Finally, she had a clear picture and realized what it meant.
She’d been wrong! They had all been wrong. Things had played out a different way down there in the cellar. Now she was convinced of it.
“Erba, quick!” Olivia broke into a run. “This new theory of mine could turn everything on its head, and it might just free an innocent man. I have to see if it’s true – as fast as I can!”
Breathless and gasping for air, Olivia stumbled up the steep road to her farm. Why did she always have these great ideas when home was an uphill run away, she wondered. She needed to get as fit as Erba. Despite carrying a few extra pounds, her goat was gamboling along energetically while Olivia was spending the last strength in her legs on getting to the gate.
There was Charlotte’s car. She didn’t see Danilo’s. Hopefully he would be here soon.
She jogged to the front door and quickly opened it.
“Charlotte! Mom!”
Charlotte arrived at the door.
“Hello. Your mother’s gone shopping with Danilo. They wanted to buy your dad a local gift. And she’s taking us out to dinner tonight, so we don’t have to cook.” She looked more closely at Olivia and then said, sounding concerned, “What’s up? Something’s happened, hasn’t it?”
“I know what played out in the cellar,” Olivia gasped.
“Yes,” Charlotte said in a calm voice, giving her a strange look. “Heberto was there, stealing the wine, but Bardo climbed down and confronted him and obviously killed him. We spoke about all of this last night in detail. Has the stress caused a memory gap? I’m sure we can find a good supplement to help you get back to normal. Rosemary and lemon balm are great. They do a fabulous herbal tonic here which we’re planning to distribute in the States.”
“No, no!” Finally, Olivia had enough breath to speak in a clear sentence. “Charlotte, I think we’ve all been wrong. I’m convinced that something different happened. All the evidence points to it!”
“But what?” Charlotte paled. “Olivia, you’re not telling me you think Danilo did it? I really don’t think he’d be capable of such a thing!”
“No. I think something else entirely happened. And I’m going to prove it.” Olivia raised her chin determinedly.
“You are? How?”
“By examining the scene.”
“But it’s locked up!”
“Nothing a shovel can’t fix,” Olivia insisted.
Charlotte goggled at her.
“You’re going to get into trouble with the police. Wouldn’t you rather come inside and have a glass of wine?”
“No,” Olivia said firmly. “Right now, I need to go to the cellar with a shovel, break my way inside, and confirm whether my theory is true.” She stared at her friend challengingly. “So the question is: are you going to help?”
CHAPTER THIRTY
Charlotte brightened at Olivia’s forceful words. “Of course I’ll help. I was just checking you were fully committed to the idea. Even if it is crazy enough to get you fully committed!” She laughed at her pun, louder than Olivia would have liked.
“Let’s go,” Olivia said.
They detoured to the lean-to at the back of the house where Olivia had stashed her gardening equipment. She picked out the biggest and sturdiest shovel she could find. This tool was going to have a tough job. The weak point would probably be her own strength, already sapped from her uphill run.
Then they marched to the cellar.
“I’m quite excited about this,” Charlotte confided, as they left the paved path and struck out along the grassy track. “I hope that your theory is going to astound me when you disclose it. You don’t want to give me a preview?”
“No. I want to wait until I’m standing where he fell,” Olivia said.
There was the door ahead. Olivia bit her lip. The police lock was solid and firm. But the chain was less so.
“I’d go for the chain,” Charlotte echoed her thoughts. “Pick one link and stamp down on it with the blade of the shovel as hard as you can. When you get tired, I’ll take over. We will make it the weakest link!” she added confidently.
Olivia placed the shovel’s blade on the gleaming chain. She stamped down hard.
Nothing whatsoever happened. She didn’t even think she’d scratched the metal.
“It takes time,” Charlotte encouraged. “Mighty rivers don’t carve their way through rock in a day. It takes millennia.”
“We don’t have millennia!”
Charlotte grabbed the handle to steady it, and Olivia climbed onto the shovel, pushing with both feet, bouncing up and down, in an effort to make a dent in the chain.
“If the shovel breaks we might have to rethink,” Charlotte offered, sounding doubtful.
“Just stand strong. I am going to snap this link.”
Gaining confidence from Charlotte’s support, Olivia grew bolder, treating the spade as a pogo stick as she stamped it down again and again on the chain.
The shovel was banging and smashing down, plus she was deafened by her own breathing. She was going to persist for as long as it took! Even if she broke a fingernail or sprained an ankle, nothing would stop her. Nothing!
Through the red mist of effort, Olivia became aware of Charlotte speaking loudly.
“You can stop now. You can stop. You’ve broken it.”
Olivia climbed shakily off the blade.
“I have?”
“About two minutes ago. You kept on going. For a while I thought you were planning on hammering straight through the wooden door. I let you carry on because I thought it might be therapeutic. But enough’s enough, right? We need to test your theory now.”
Charlotte grabbed the handle with Olivia, and they hefted the door up and open.
Suddenly, fear flooded through Olivia as she stared at the darkness below.
“What if I’m wrong?” she whispered. “I’ll be in such trouble.”
“No, you won’t.” Charlotte spoke in firm and reassuring tones. “We’ll say it was broken by some other fortune hunter. There have been enough of them for it not to be suspicious. I don’t remember a thing about coming out here. I’m still in the kitchen, researching restaurants for your mother to treat us to dinner tonight, because she wants something that doesn’t specialize in seafood and doesn’t specialize in pizza, and offers a friendly mix of dishes that everyone will like.”
Laughing made her feel better, Olivia discovered.
“Now get down there. If there’s anything to find, let’s find it.”
Charlotte snapped on her phone’s flashlight and handed it to Olivia.
Her brain was buzzing as she descended the stairs. She had to be right. Didn’t she? In her mind’s eye, she saw exactly how the scene had played out. Different from how anyone had imagined.
“You see, Heberto, or Henri, was in the cellar,” she said, carefully stepping down. “He was surprised by Bardo. That was all true. What Bardo said was accurate. Heberto lost his temper. He began shouting and screaming. He lunged forward and tried to attack Bardo.”
Olivia walked onto the cellar floor. It felt cold down here, she realized, shivering. Charlotte was following close behind.
“Then what?” her bestie asked.
“Then Bardo ran away, just like he said he did. But Heberto didn’t follow him. He had more important things to do. He had a plan and needed to get on with it. So he turned back to his work, but as he did so, a rock hit him on the head. Not an intentional blow. It fell from the ceiling.”
Olivia trained the flashlight beam on the exact place where Heberto’s slumped form had lain. Then she shone the light upward, and took a look at the area above.
“Wow!” Charlotte gasped.
In that part of the cellar roof, the concrete had crumbled away completely. The jagged forms of rocks were clearly visible. They looked precariously rooted in the stony soil, as if they might come loose and tumble down at any moment. And, in fact, there was a dark gap among them where one already had.
“Hit by a falling rock. It makes so much sense. Especially after all the shouting and commotion,” Charlotte whispered.
“Exactly. That’s what made me think of it. Marcello made a joke about someone yelling so loudly that plaster fell from the ceiling, and I realized that’s what must have played out. It’s structurally unstable. Begni said so and we’ve seen it for ourselves. Small stones scatter down continually. It’s no surprise at all that a large rock would eventually do the same.”
“The cellar was defending you!” Charlotte breathed, her eyes wide. “So, what are you going to do now?”
“Call the police. They’ve got to see this for themselves and accept that this is what happened. If they do, it changes everything and they might be able to close the case immediately. If they don’t, I’ll be in a world of trouble and you’ll be going to dinner without me. In fact, you’d better wait in the farmhouse. I’ll handle this alone,” Olivia said, feeling terrified about the ordeal that lay ahead.
*
As she watched the trio of police officers tramp along the path toward her, Olivia tried to stand tall and swallow down her nerves. It wasn’t easy, especially when Detective Caputi’s furious gaze locked onto her.
“You deliberately defied police orders and broke the chain? Do you realize that tampering with a crime scene is a serious offense for which you can be arrested?” Anger and triumph warred in the detective’s voice as she spoke the words.
“My theory is that it’s not a crime scene and never was.” Olivia spoke the words firmly. “Signor Heberto was hit by a falling rock. It was dislodged from the ceiling, possibly as a result of the shouting and commotion during his confrontation with Bardo.”
“Hit by a falling rock?” Caputi’s voice sounded incredulous. Olivia could see a total lack of belief in the policewoman’s eyes. But one of the officers behind her was nodding thoughtfully.
“It would explain the angle that the body fell. Remember we could not work out how someone could have approached from the back, and struck him on the head, with so little space behind him?”
Grumpily, Caputi glared at him.
“We will re-examine the scene.” Olivia’s heart leapt at the words. Then Caputi continued. “It may be necessary to get the forensic experts out here. They are in Florence today. If that is the case, we will take Signora Glass into custody overnight, to avoid any further tampering with the scene.”
Olivia’s heart dropped all the way to the cellar floor on hearing that. The detective didn’t believe her, and there was no telling how this would play out.
“Please, not tonight! My mother’s taking us to dinner, and she’s only just started to like Italy.”
Detective Caputi gave no sign of having heard her words. Instead, she led the way down the ladder, snapping on a powerful flashlight as she descended. Her team followed, and so did Olivia, tiptoeing down the rungs, feeling taut with anxiety.
By the time she got down, the three officers were clustered together, speaking in rapid Italian. One of them had an iPad out and was scrolling through photographs of the crime scene, while the other had a flashlight trained on the ceiling above.
Caputi and the officer holding the iPad were frowning disbelievingly. Only the third seemed to accept Olivia’s theory.
Why couldn’t the others see it immediately, she wondered, feeling despairing, as if all her efforts and thinking, not to mention her aerobic struggle with the shovel, had all been a complete waste of time. And, an even more serious question – what would happen to her now?
Detective Caputi was shaking her head emphatically. She began speaking loudly, in rapid Italian, clearly driving home her point as they all stared down at the iPad again.
And then, Olivia saw it. Perhaps triggered by the noisy words, a fine shower of dust from the ceiling was followed by an almost imperceptible tremble.
“Look out!” she cried in panic, knowing her warning would be heard too late. “Get away!”
CHAPTER THIRTY ONE
Acting instinctively, Olivia leaped forward. She grabbed Detective Caputi’s wrist and pulled her out of the way, just as a large boulder dislodged from the ceiling and crashed down so hard that the floor shook with its impact.
Trembling all over, Olivia stared at the rock, and then up at the ceiling again. It seemed no more were ready to fall – for now at any rate. She’d dragged the detective away from probable death, and certain injury. That boulder was even bigger than the previous one!
Shocking as this rock fall was, it certainly couldn’t have happened at a more opportune time.
For someone who’d narrowly missed having their head crushed, Detective Caputi remained remarkably calm. She turned to Olivia.
“Without a doubt, you have saved my life. I owe you thanks. And an apology,” she said. Turning back again, she stared up. “It is clear that the ceiling is far more unstable than we thought. This does, indeed, put a different light on the matter, and confirms Signor Bardo’s version. Let us leave this cellar before any further rocks dislodge.”
She headed for the stairs. At the foot of the steps, she paused, and stared at Olivia with a strange look on her face. Was it kindness? Humor? At any rate, it was highly unexpected.
“You will not be taken into custody, Signora Glass. Go to dinner. We will notify you later this evening as soon as we have closed the murder case and ruled that the death was accidental. In fact, your input in this investigation has been most valuable to us. And I hope your mother learns to love our beautiful country,” she said with a hint of a smile.
Olivia felt massively relieved as she watched the police leave. The case had been resolved, Caputi had praised her efforts, and best of all, the death had been confirmed as accidental.
That meant everyone in her wonderful village, who could be exasperating when they chose to, but who felt like family most of the time, would be in the clear. She was sure Charlotte would be especially thrilled that Olivia herself hadn’t been arrested! But her conscience was still bothering her in one regard, she realized. There was something else she needed to do to make things right.
*
The next morning, Olivia and Danilo waited excitedly outside the small apartment where they had first confronted Bardo. Olivia held a big bunch of flowers together with a card, which contained a voucher for the local pizza restaurant. Danilo was carrying a mixed case of wine.
“He should be home, shouldn’t he?” Olivia asked.
“Yes. The police confirmed he was released last night already,” Danilo nodded.
Swallowing hard, Olivia stepped forward and knocked on the door. Apologizing was never easy but she resolved to do it right.
A few seconds went by. They felt like an eternity. Then the door opened. Bardo, dressed in an old but comfortable looking pair of jeans and a shabby shirt, looked out at them in surprise.
“Signor Bardo, I owe you a huge apology,” Olivia said, stepping forward with the bouquet. “I jumped to the wrong conclusion and got you arrested yesterday. I know nothing can make up for that, but I brought you flowers and wine, and a restaurant voucher, to say sorry. I’d like to help you with anything else you need.”
She felt embarrassed to ask if he might be in need of a grocery delivery or a rental check. Not knowing his situation, but suspecting times were tough, she hoped that he’d suggest what she could do.
“I appreciate the gifts,” Bardo said, taking the flowers from her. “They are very welcome. And actually, my arrest yesterday resulted in a surprisingly positive outcome.”
“Oh, really?” Olivia asked.
He nodded. “Being in need of a lawyer, and not wanting to use my previous one, I used a new one that a friend recommended. When he arrived, we had a long discussion and I was able to explain my previous issues.”
“What did he say?” Danilo asked curiously.
“He was shocked that my other lawyer handled the previous case so badly as there were many options still available to us. He was lazy, gave up, and did not look into things thoroughly enough. After our meeting yesterday the new lawyer promised to act immediately, and open a case to reclaim the property in my name. He will use the relevant points of law that will mean the decision can be easily reversed, and of course, now that the information surrounding his other identities and misdemeanors has come to light, it will further strengthen the case.”
“Bardo, that’s incredible. Does he feel there’s a good chance of success?” Olivia asked.
“Yes. He is confident that the courts will set aside the previous decision, and restore the house into my name. He says I could even claim damages from Henri’s estate, but I will not do such a thing. I do not want to burden his relatives with that, especially since they are willing to testify against him after finding out what he did.”
“That’s wonderful!” Olivia felt thrilled that Bardo had not only had his name cleared, but would see justice done and his rightful inheritance restored. “I’ll be very happy to testify myself, or provide anything you might need.”
“It will hopefully be an open-and-shut case, but I thank you, and will contact you if I need anything,” Bardo reassured her.
Olivia gave him a big hug goodbye. She felt elated as she left. Who would have thought that this dire predicament could have been resolved in such a positive way? She was thrilled that Bardo would soon be the rightful owner of that lovely home.
She glanced at Danilo, who looked as happy as she felt.
“And now, we go around the corner to the local magistrate’s court,” he said.
Yesterday, with Danilo’s help, Olivia had hired a lawyer to contest the claim that the conman had made and to get his case dismissed.
As they walked, Olivia delved in her purse to find the documents she needed.
There was one final step she had to take to handle the court case that Henri or Heberto had opened, and prevent anyone else from trying the same tactic. The lawyer had explained that she must bring an affidavit to the police station. In it, she should state that she had bought the property without any knowledge of the wine cellar. In order to prevent future claims, the lawyer had advised that she should back up this affidavit with actual evidence.
