Page 15 of Murder on an Italian Island (Armstrong and Oscar Cozy Mysteries #12)
MONDAY MORNING
Oscar and I went for a walk after breakfast. First, I wanted to satisfy my curiosity and I headed for the coast. I managed to find a spot further along the clifftop from where I could look back onto the beach and see what progress, if any, the police were making as they searched the seabed.
It was a delightful morning and I was relieved to find that there was very little wind.
As far as my stuttering windsurfing career was concerned, all I felt able to handle at the moment was a gentle breeze at best. Looking down from above, I could see not only the people on the beach but also the shapes of the divers underwater.
One of the most stunning facets of the island of Elba is how clean and unpolluted the waters around it are.
For somebody used to the murky waters of the River Thames, it made a very welcome change.
I threw sticks for Oscar to retrieve – inland, away from the cliff edge – while I perched on a rocky outcrop and observed developments below me.
As I sat there, my thoughts returned yet again to the murder mystery I was trying to write.
In a way, I was faced with the same problem in my book as here in real life.
Just like the body at the foot of the tower in San Gimignano, was this death accidental or self-inflicted, or had a murderer been at work?
The more I thought about it, the more I hoped that solving one mystery might help me solve the other.
After sitting there for about five minutes, I had to admit that I was no closer to breaking out of my writer’s block, and it became clear to me that nothing of note was happening here at the beach, so Oscar and I resumed our walk.
This time, I headed inland to check out the village of Santa Sabina sull’Elba, and it turned out to be even smaller than I had imagined.
It took barely five minutes to walk from one end of the village to the other, and as far as I could see, there were only half a dozen narrow streets and not more than a hundred houses in the whole place.
The centre was clearly the little piazza in front of the church where there was a single alimentari shop, advertising everything from ice cream to firewood.
Alongside it was the Bar del Centro with half a dozen tables outside on the grey flagstones, only one of them currently occupied.
The occupants were two elderly gentlemen whose wrinkled skin had been burnt a deep walnut colour by the sun, and it was plain that they had spent most, if not all, of their lives outdoors.
They didn’t look like tourists, so I took a chance on them being locals prepared to talk and sat down at a table nearby.
Oscar wandered over to greet them, his tail wagging good-naturedly, and one of the men rewarded him with a pat on the back.
A waiter appeared through the beaded fly curtain at the door of the bar and asked me what I’d like, so I decided to have an espresso and settled back in the shade cast by the bulk of the church across the square from us.
When the waiter returned, he stopped to chat.
‘I haven’t seen you around. Are you here on holiday?’
‘Yes, I’m taking a week off. I live and work just outside Florence.’
He subjected me to closer scrutiny. ‘From your accent, you’re not from around here. Sounds to me like you’re from the north, maybe Trentino?’
I gave him a smile. ‘Further north than that. I’m English but I’ve been living and working here now for a few years. What about you? Are you a local?’
He nodded. ‘Born and bred.’
I took advantage of his willingness to chat and did a little bit of digging – even if I already knew the answer to my opening question, thanks to Rita. ‘Can you satisfy my curiosity? I’ve been doing a course at the windsurfing academy on the beach. Who does that belong to?’
‘The windsurfing school is owned by the same person who owns the campsite behind the beach. His name’s Graziani, Aldo Graziani.’
I did my best to feign ignorance. ‘I recognise that name. Is he related to that poor man who fell off the cliff, by any chance?’
For the first time, one of the elderly men on the next table joined in. ‘ Poor man? Don’t waste any sympathy on scum like that. He was evil to the core.’
Still doing my best to look clueless, I queried his comment. ‘In what way? What did he do that was so evil?’
The old man gave a theatrical shudder. ‘I couldn’t even begin to tell you, but he was bad news, and we’re all better off without him.’
The other elderly man added a comment of his own. ‘We booted him off the island twenty years ago and we were getting ready to do the same again. We don’t want his sort here.’
This was new. Still doing my best to sound casual, I queried what he had said. ‘Booted out, in what way?’
A sour look appeared on the old man’s face.
‘Back then, he made a pest of himself with the local women and girls – some of them still in their teens. They say he even tried to abduct a girl here, and if she hadn’t managed to jump out of his van and escape before he could drive off with her, who knows what might have happened? ’
‘Did she go to the police?’
He shook his head and the waiter added a few words of explanation.
‘To be honest, that’s just hearsay – a rumour that’s been going around for so long that people believe it even though there’s no proof.
Nobody knows whether the attempted abduction really took place but, even if it wasn’t true, by that time, everybody was sick and tired of Ignazio and something needed to be done. ’
The elderly man picked up the tale again. ‘A bunch of us went around to his home one evening and spoke to Tommaso, his father, in no uncertain terms. Either Ignazio left the island for good, or we would report him to the police.’
I very nearly told him that if they had reported Graziani to the police, maybe those four girls in Pisa would never have been assaulted, but I bit my tongue and stayed silent. Instead, I nodded slowly and continued to press for more information. ‘And he left?’
‘He had no choice. His father threw him out of the house – old Tommaso was no fool; he knew what Ignazio was like. With nowhere to live and with no friends, Ignazio left the island to start a new life in Pisa.’
I didn’t mention the man’s criminal record and just asked what he’d gone off to do in Pisa, but the barman didn’t mince his words. ‘He did some really bad stuff in Pisa and he’s been in prison for twenty years. He came crawling back a few weeks ago.’
‘To get his share of his inheritance.’ The other elderly man picked up the story. ‘And his brother must be rejoicing now that he’s dead. Aldo’s built up a good business. The last thing he needed was to share it with that pervert.’
‘Mind you, Aldo isn’t much better.’ The barista was frowning and I gave him an enquiring look. After a few moments’ hesitation, he explained. ‘I don’t mean he’s a perverted sadist like his brother, but he’s got an awful reputation here as far as women are concerned.’
One of the elderly men joined in. ‘And that includes married women as well. He doesn’t come into town any more, he just stays in that flashy villa of his, and that’s probably very wise. If he did show his face here, he would almost certainly find himself on the receiving end of a beating.’
Before I could ask for any more detail, a pair of elderly women appeared and sat down at a nearby table.
I saw the three men exchange glances and the conversation instantly changed to football – always a fertile topic.
I wondered who the women were. Were they just nosey locals or might there have been a connection with the Graziani family?
Either way, it was clear that I wasn’t going to get any more information, so I swallowed my coffee, paid the waiter, and set off towards the hotel.
All the way back, I was turning over in my head what I’d just heard.
Clearly, the Graziani brothers hadn’t been held in high esteem by a lot of the locals, and the story of the attempted abduction was potentially fascinating – if it was true.
Maybe the girl or her close family had decided to get their revenge.
The list of possible perpetrators was expanding.
* * *
Back at the hotel, the police vehicles were still parked outside, and I could see figures moving among the pine trees, but somehow.
I had a feeling that by this evening, the death of Ignazio Graziani could well be written off as an unfortunate accident – and, indeed, in the absence of any proof to the contrary, that’s what it might have been, in spite of the growing list of people who had wanted him dead.
Anna and I went around to the windsurfing beach at ten-thirty, and I found a helpful volunteer in the shape of the waiter at the beach bar who said he would make sure he kept an eye on Oscar while the two of us were out in the water.
I tied the lead to one of the supports of the awning in front of the bar, told him to be a good boy, and off we went.
He’s normally pretty good about staying put when I tell him, but I could see the sense of injustice written across his face when he saw us heading for the water while he was obliged to stay on dry land.
I vowed to make sure I gave him a good long splash about in the waves as soon as the first half of my lesson finished.