They buzzed up to the tenant again to ask her to open the apartment house entrance, a glass-and-metal door. This time the old woman didn’t even reply. She just buzzed the door open.

“Where are we going to go now, though?” asked Barbara. “We don’t have the keys.”

Rocco said nothing. Corrado’s door was the first one on the right. “I’m going to wear this damned thing out,” said Rocco as he pulled out his Swiss Army knife. For a while now it seemed as if he hadn’t been doing anything but picking locks. The good thing was that he was getting his old skills back.

“What are you doing?” asked the bookseller with a smile.

“What do you think, Signora?” And twenty seconds later the mechanism clicked the door open. Barbara and Tatiana exchanged an uncertain glance. Finally Barbara worked up the nerve to ask the question. “Can we be certain you’re actually from the police?”

Rocco, with the door half open, looked at her. “Yes, Signora, do you want to see my badge?”

The policeman’s glare set her back on her heels. “Stay outside, the both of you, what’s inside here may not be a pretty sight.”

He turned on the light. The two women did as they were told, but they still peeked in the doorway to see what they could see. Rocco went into the kitchen. There were two plates in the sink and a dripping faucet. Outside the breakers roared. Lupa followed him with her nose to the floor. She had turned into a veritable vacuum cleaner. In the bedroom the bed was unmade. In the bathroom he found a toothbrush and various toiletries. An empty bottle of hydrogen peroxide lay on its side in the bidet. The bathrobe that hung on a hook on the back of the door was dry. As was the shower stall. He went into the living room. There was a sofa with pillows on it. An old television set. A cabinet with bric-a-brac of various sorts. Next to the sofa, on the light-colored tiles, there were some very distinct dark stains. They looked like rust. Rocco bent down. He imitated Lupa and put his nose to the floor. No doubt about it.

Blood.

He prevented Lupa from licking the blood, and together they all left the apartment. He locked the door behind him. The two women’s eyes were four question marks. “You don’t think he was alone, do you?”

“No. There was someone with Corrado. But what did you find?”

Rocco’s only response was to reach for his cell phone. “I’m calling police headquarters in Chieti . . .” he said.

Tatiana and Barbara listened in silence. Barbara threw her arms around her friend.

“Deputy Chief Schiavone . . . put me through to the mobile squad . . . Francè? Rocco Schiavone here . . . Fine, thanks . . . We’ve got a problem here in Francavilla. Via Treviso, 15 . . . I’ll wait for you here . . .”