Death of an Englishman (9 page)

CHAPTER 3

"'Unauthorized commerce in precious objects",' recited the perfect student. "Clandestine commerce in antiques". Articles 705 and 706 of the Penal Code.'

'Now why,' asked the Chief, 'couldn't he just set himself up as an authorized antique-dealer, if that's what he wanted? Was it just a question of tax-dodging?'

'More than the usual tax-dodging,' the Captain explained. 'He could, in fact, have set up as a dealer but he would have been up against a great deal of red tape. He wouldn't have been recognized as a competent person to run such a business for one thing—any person here wanting to open even a grocer's shop has to prove his competence before he gets a licence from the local
Comune.
For anyone with no previous business experience there is a course on book-keeping, tax laws, hygiene, fair trading, etc., with an examination at the end of it. Failing that, it's possible to nominate a qualified person as director of the business. However, here we have something much more complicated. Carabiniere Bacci … ?'

Carabiniere Bacci translated and went on to explain the complicated laws governing the exportation of antiques: 'Many of the world's great art collections are built on artworks stolen or secretly exported from Italy. Such collectors are powerful people and, although the works are proven to have been stolen they refuse to return them except on payment of their market value which we cannot afford—although sometimes a rich businessman in the north might pay for the return of a stolen painting or sculpture to the church or museum from which it was stolen.'

'A nice gesture,' commented the Chief.

'No. He makes a
bella figura
… can you understand this? It is good for him and for his business, politically good …' He said it without rancour. 'So, because of this continual plundering of our national patrimony, a law was passed in 1939 to cover all aspects of this problem. Now it is forbidden to export antiques or works of art without a permit for each piece from the Ministry of Fine Arts. If the permit is granted an exportation tax is payable, the percentage rising with the value of the object; it may be as much as thirty per cent. In the case of works of art or craft which are important or fine enough to be considered part of the national patrimony— whether in public or private hands—the permit would be refused. Such works must, by law, be registered with the Ministry and may not be sold, moved or in any way changed or restored without permission. Registered works like this one—' he indicated the Majolica angel— 'have a Ministry seal, as you can see, and are checked on at regular intervals by a competent person from a State gallery in the area.'

'What happens to this one now?' asked Jeffreys. 'Can't you return it to the owner?'

Carabiniere Bacci looked to the Captain who shook his head and explained: 'We can't move it at all without direct permission from the Minister, which should arrive soon. Even then we cannot return it to the owner's villa because the Signora is still away and the servants, who were evidently involved in the theft, have vanished, probably panicked when they heard about the murder. Since the villa is empty and unguarded, it is not a fit place to return such a valuable piece to. As soon as permission arrives it will be taken across to the Palatine gallery at Pitti.'

The same thought struck both Englishmen— permission from Rome for the police to move a terracotta bust a hundred yards!

'Once it's out of here,' continued the Captain, 'we shall no longer be directly concerned. There is a nucleus of Carabinieri in Rome dealing solely with this sort of case; they have taken over and will keep us informed—that means they will be checking on all other villa thefts in this area and watching customs for incoming pieces …'

'Incoming
… ?' the Chief repeated on receiving a translation. 'I'm sorry, I don't follow …'

'I can explain … if I may, sir?' Carabiniere Bacci looked at the Captain, who nodded. 'It's quite a common trick. I told you that well-known collectors feel free to defy the Italian law, especially as their own countries have no laws forbidding the import of antiques, but these days most people prefer not to put their respectability at risk by buying illegally exported works. The only things that can leave the country legally are those that came into the country with a temporary import licence—pictures on loan for an exhibition, for example—these, although they may be Italian in origin, are obviously allowed out again. This can be used by a dealer wanting to export illegally—he smuggles the things out, brings them back in with a temporary permit and the buyer can then take them out. In the case of a registered dealer, naturally, we can keep a check. It's impossible to keep a constant check but sooner or later he would be caught and liable to huge fines and a prison sentence.'

'And this is where our friend the clandestine dealer comes in, is it? Langley-Smythe, in this case.' The Chief was feeling for his matches, for his pipe had gone out while he sat motionless listening to all this. He didn't take his eyes from Carabiniere Bacci.

'Yes, the clandestine dealer is, of course, not subject to any checks. He only requires space and contacts, chiefly a contact at a customs post who can let the goods out and give them a perfectly correct import licence as they come back in. But that's as far as he can go in the deal. The buyer must have an invoice with a registered dealer's name on it, have paid the normal tax, etc.'

'It's complicated enough,' murmured Jeffreys, scratching his head.

'Everything you do in this country is complicated,' pointed out the Captain, when he heard this, 'legal or illegal, and there was a great deal of money involved as you've seen.'

'So,' the Chief leaned back and got his cloud going again, 'this flat is a little centre of commerce. Very nice. Hence the various fingerprints on everything in here except his own desk and chair, as it were. Which brings us to Mr X, the legal dealer, not to mention Mr Y, the crooked customs officer, not to mention the missing couple.'

'We needn't worry about the customs end or the missing couple,' pointed out the Captain. 'As I've said, they'll be tracked down more easily by our people in Rome. They often know about such people already but lack any concrete evidence. What I want is that dealer.'

'The man Miss White saw but doesn't want to name,' put in Jeffreys. 'You could pull in the greengrocer, of course.'

'I could,' agreed the Captain, 'but he's our only link and as long as no one knows that we're on to him we're one step ahead. I've already got men out in this quarter doing spot checks on the books of all the dealers to see if anyone has been exporting an unusually large amount of stuff. That will cause a stir and possibly get us some information without suggesting that we suspect anyone in particular.'

'And do you?' asked Jeffreys.

'Yes, I do, but like Miss White I'm cautious. If I move in on him without evidence I'll never get a warrant.'

'Well, according to what you've just told us about this nice little arrangement — ' the Chief waved his pipe around the room—'you can't pin anything on him if you do know who he is.'

'I'll pin a murder on him, if he's responsible for it,' said the Captain grimly.

They had almost forgotten that one inexplicable fact. The arrangement seemed to be perfect, it had worked smoothly for years, but the Englishman was dead. They were silent for a moment.

'It seems to me,' began the Chief, after prodding carefully at his pipe bowl with a spent match, 'that in your position I'd be inclined to pick up our Mr X on a smallish charge—shouldn't be difficult — and keep him under lock and key for a while. Somebody else might decide to talk, if he doesn't. Or vice-versa, you arrest your greengrocer and put a bit of pressure on him, suggest he might be left to take the rap for the whole thing …'

But Carabiniere Bacci had quickly translated the first part of what the Chief had said and both Italians were shaking their heads before he had finished speaking.

'I can't do anything like that,' explained the Captain, 'because if I arrest anyone connected with the case at all, I shall have only forty days in which to complete my evidence, after which the Instructing Judge must take over. I should need a very strong case indeed before I applied for a warrant.'

'But that's practically preventing you from doing your job!'

'It's preventing me from harassing the innocent on trumped-up evidence, from running a police state, to put it bluntly.'

'It looks like preventing you from catching a villain.'

'It might. But remember that our court debate, unlike yours, is pretty much of a formality. If I get hold of that man I'll keep him.' Something in the Captain's pale solemnity shook even the Chief. To the Chief a villain was a villain; you could take liberties, so could he, but only because he had a fair chance in court. The Captain was scrupulous; he took no liberties but he looked like giving no quarter. The Chief decided he wouldn't like to be in Mr X's shoes. Well, it wasn't his problem; his problem was over. The Chief's problem was that he liked things black and white and he liked things played by the rules, and there were too many grey areas around him these days. He knew where he stood personally, he wasn't going to stand by and see his country insulted, disrupted, untidied, by wildcat strikers, scruffy students or violent immigrants. His instinctual need for order and quiet was deeply felt. But it was a grey area in which you could never be wholly right, there were no rules, no villains, no 'fair cops'. It had been the same with Langley-Smythe; the Chief had known he was being used but that was his job, and he was bound to protect the interests of a fellow-countryman against foreigners who might use him as a scapegoat for any amount of villainy. But it was vague; it was grey. That safe full of illegally imported money, that stolen bust with an indisputable government seal around its neck were like a tonic to him. The man was a villain. The rules were in operation; if they were Italian rules and not English, at least they were rules. In return for his sudden, overwhelming co-operation the amazed Captain had agreed to keep the foreign press at bay until English interest in the case had died down. Langley-Smythe had been more than justly punished for his sins and there was no point in hounding the dead. His property would probably be confiscated and the matter closed. As for how much the family had known …

Jeffreys, who had only ever seen the Chief operating in the grey areas, was even more amazed than the Captain. Every now and then he glanced covertly across at the Chief's placidly cheerful face. 'It's funny,' he said to Carabiniere Bacci, 'that nobody other than Miss White ever saw Mr X. You'd think after four successful years they'd have got a bit careless about their meetings … could have phoned each other, I suppose, apart from the night visits …'

There was something troubling the back of Jeffreys's mind; something he had meant to ask Miss White in that connection but he'd put it off until after hearing the more important part of her story and now it had completely escaped him. He was obliged to give it up. If it did turn out to be something important he could always go back up and ask her. It was, in fact, but it also turned out to be a very long night and he never did find the time.

The four men sat for some time, notebooks on their knees, in the dimly-lit room, as the dusk outside in the courtyard faded to darkness and smoke from the Chief's pipe eddied slowly about in the gloom near the high ceiling. Some things at least were established: Langley-Smythe had been expecting his visitor, had still been dressed under his dressing-gown, whiling away the night with a science-fiction book and a bottle of whisky in the bedroom, covering himself with the eiderdown to keep warm. The night guard did a round at about three, which was, no doubt, the reason why Langley-Smythe remained in the bedroom rather than by the fire which was the only source of heat in the flat; a light in the living-room would have been visible under the door when the guard left his ticket. Once the guard had gone, and his departure as he banged the great door to, would be easily audible to anyone in the building, Langley-Smythe was free to open the door and let his removal men in.

'But he must have come out to open the street door, sir,' put in Carabiniere Bacci hesitantly. 'There's no electronic switch in his room.'

The Captain frowned. 'The man I suspect of being our Mr X,' he said slowly, 'could have done it from upstairs.'

'Someone in the building,' the Chief pondered. 'Yes … but it makes it all the odder, you know, that nobody ever saw them speak or visit each other.'

'But not so odd,' said Jeffreys, 'that Miss White thought she recognized him and didn't like to say …' But she had said something … Jeffreys could swear it was something to do with one of the other tenants. The Captain was going on:

'Let's assume that the removal men rang, and were let in by someone upstairs, someone who came down here and joined them at Langley-Smythe's door. Once inside here somebody shot him.'

'But not immediately,' pointed out the Chief. 'They didn't just step inside and shoot him, he was shot in the back going into his bedroom, so we need to know what went wrong and what he was going into the bedroom for.'

'To the safe,' suggested Jeffreys.

'But what for? Not to get money out, surely? According to what the Captain's told us, they would be paying him a cut, not the other way about; the dealer made the sales. Any money changing hands would be going into the safe, not coming out, and he was empty-handed.'

'What if they had paid him,' said Jeffreys, 'and taken the money off him after the shooting?'