‘Signor Fallucci walks there every evening,’ Anna said, just behind her. She had come into the room to collect the tray. ‘Always he goes to visit his wife’s grave.’

‘She’s buried here?’

‘In a patch of ground that was specially consecrated.’

‘How long has he been a widower?’

‘Eight months. She died in a train crash, last December, and the little girl was badly hurt.’

‘Poor little mite.’

‘You can just see the monument, there-where the setting sun just touches the tip. Every evening he stands before it for a long time. When it’s dark he walks back to the house, but here there is only more darkness for him.’

‘I can imagine,’ she breathed.

‘He says he will see you in his study in twenty minutes,’ Anna added, departing with the tray.

Earlier, the high-handed message would have annoyed her. Now, watching him moving in the dusk, she realised that there had been a subtle change. He looked lonely, almost crushed. She began to feel a little more confident. Perhaps he wasn’t so fearsome after all.

At the exact time she knocked on the study door, and received a cool, ‘Avanti!’

Entering, she found herself in a room, dominated by a large oak desk, with a table lamp that provided the room’s only light. Outside its arc she was dimly aware of walls lined with leather-bound books.

He was standing by the window, looking out, and turned when she entered. But he didn’t move out of the shadows, and she couldn’t make out much more than his outline.

‘Good evening, signorina.’ His voice seemed to come from a distance. ‘You would prefer that we talk in English?’

‘Yes, thank you, Signor Fallucci.’

‘Your room is to your liking?’