Murder possesses a ritual dimension. Certain things are predictable, but not always. Human nature is infinite, complex, and there are random elements. This is what a homicide detective told me later, an American woman from Los Angeles—part Chinese, part Anglo, very crisp in her dark-blue suit—who was an expert in such matters. For people who take pleasure in killing, she told me, there’s a pattern, a signature. Often the signatures are apparent, the same thing with every victim: dismemberment, a bashed head, a staged accident, suffocation, poison, a knife in the heart. Other times, the cause of death is dissimilar, at least on the surface. The killer varies the modus operandi, either deliberately or because something situational demands improvisation. The detectives look for hidden similarities, connections, motivations. An accomplice, maybe, who takes secret pleasure in things she pretends not to know. Or a professional working for pay. Even when everything falls into place—when all the clues align—the investigation sometimes fails. Like anyone, the detective admitted, we police have blind spots. We are susceptible to certain influences, pressures. We see what is convenient to see.

7.

The night evaporated, slipping away. Across the room, Orsini mingled with his guests. I watched him, how he moved, how he talked, and he watched me back. There wasn’t much pretense about it. He watched the way I sat myself down in an overstuffed chair, folding my legs up beneath my skirt. Isabella had vanished from the party. Frank lingered in the adjoining room, caught up in conversation about the Palio, about the betting odds and the horses.

My brother sat next to me. He was high. He toyed with my hair like he sometimes did, and I tilted my head against his shoulder. I still stung from my encounter with Isabella, but I took comfort in the champagne and in my blouse from Biagiotti, the feel of it, the sheer material. I liked how the fabric caught the light. I caught a glimpse of Frank in the next room talking with some redhead in a green dress, and I caught, too, fragments of a conversation closer by, between Orsini and his hangers-on. The men lobbied for a card game to take place upstairs.

My brother nodded toward the redhead.

“Frank’s quite popular with the ladies.”

“I see that.”

“A dowager.”

“She doesn’t look like a dowager to me.”

“She has money, at least. See her jewelry.”

“Maybe it’s not her money.”

“She seems to like your husband.”

The redhead was older than me, though not too much older. She wore pumps to match her dress. I’d seen her earlier with the grandson of the American mobster.

Orsini moved to the landing above.

“Your face is red,” said my brother.

“No.”

“Beet red. Why do you suppose?”

“I’ve no idea.”

My brother motioned again toward the redhead flirting with my husband. “Perhaps you have emotions you don’t admit to. Your jealousy rises to your face.”

“Stop it.”

“I’ve hit something tender.”

“Don’t be silly.”