At first they did not have a great deal to say to each other but were not troubled by this circumstance. Grant let fall one or two remarks about Navona. ‘It was a circus in classical times. Imagine all these strolling youths stripped and running their courses by torchlight or throwing the discus in the heat of the day.’ And after one of their silences. ‘Would you like to know that the people in the middle fountain are personifications of the Four Great Rivers? Bernini designed it and probably himself carved the horse, which is a portrait.’ And later: ‘The huge church was built over the site of a brothel. Poor St Agnes had her clothes taken off there and in a burst of spontaneous modesty, instantly grew quantities of luxurious and concealing hair.’

‘She must have been the patron saint of Lady Godiva.’

‘And of the librettists of Hair.’

‘That’s right.’ Sophy drank a little more champagne cocktail. ‘I suppose we really ought to be asking each other whatever could have happened to Mr Mailer,’ she said.

Grant was motionless except that his left hand, resting on the table, contracted about the stem of his glass.

‘Oughtn’t we?’ Sophy said vaguely.

‘I feel no obligation to do so.’

‘Nor I really. In fact, I think it’s very much nicer without him. If you don’t mind my saying so?’

‘No,’ Grant said heavily. ‘No, I don’t mind. Here comes the car.’

IV

When Alleyn got back to his fine hotel at ten past six he found a message asking him to telephone Il Questore Valdarno. He did so and was told with a casual air that scarcely concealed the Questore’s sense of professional gratification, that his people had already traced the woman called Violetta to her lair which was in a slum. When he said they had traced her, the Questore amended, he did not mean precisely in person since she was not at home when his man called. He had, however, made rewarding inquiries among her neighbours who knew all about her war with Sebastian Mailer and said, variously, that she was his cast-off mistress, wife or shady business associate, that he had betrayed her in a big way and that she never ceased to inveigh against him. Violetta was not popular among the ladies in her street, being quarrelsome, vindictive and unpleasant to children. She was also held to poach on certain begging preserves in the district. It emerged that Mr Mailer in his salad days had abandoned Violetta in Sicily, ‘Where, my dear Superintendent,’ said the Questore, ‘she may well have been one of his contacts in the smuggling of heroin. Palermo is a port of transit as we well know.’

‘Yes, indeed.’

‘All are agreed that she is a little mad.’

‘Ah.’