The Monster of Florence by Magdalen Nabb Page B

tried to remember whether he’d been round during the eighties when ‘Monster fever’ was at its height, but he was pretty sure not. He’d probably presented himself at Headquarters across at Borgo Ognissanti to whoever was on the case then.
    The door opened behind him. Surely the wretched man wasn’t still—
    “Marshal?” It was Brigadier Lorenzini. “There’s that young man still waiting to see you. Had you forgotten?”
    “Marco. Of course. It had gone out of my head for a minute. Listen, don’t let that character in here again, all right?”
    He reached for his greatcoat from the coat stand behind the door.
    “Give me Signora Dini’s handbag and I’ll go down to Porta Romana with it.”
    “You want me to deal with the young man?”
    “He’ll come with me. Where is he? Marco?”
    Landini stood up as he saw the Marshal come out, buttoning his coat.
    “If you haven’t got time to see me I’ll …”
    “No, no. If you don’t mind a short walk, we can talk on the way.” He adjusted his hat and Lorenzini held out the old lady’s handbag.
    “No, no! For heaven’s sake find a polythene bag for it, I can’t carry it like that. Well, Marco, I should have called you before now and I’m sorry. It’s a bad time.”
    “I can imagine. I heard—well, it’s in the papers, so …”
    “Hmph. Let’s go.” He took the polythene bag and the two of them went off down the narrow stairs together.
    It had been raining on and off for days and the gravel walk they took through the Boboli Gardens behind the palace was soaked. It was both pleasanter and more practical to walk that way rather than down the Via Romana, narrow and busy as it was. The pavement was only wide enough for one person, so it would have been impossible to carry on a conversation, even supposing you could make yourself heard over the echoing din of traffic roaring between the high buildings.
    The gardens, on the other hand, were even quieter than usual since the dampness and fog discouraged the tourists visiting the galleries in the palace from venturing out there. Not a single person was sitting on the damp stone tiers of the amphitheatre as they passed below it, and the cats, whose diet was supplemented by what they could cadge in the way of picnic-lunch leavings, wandered about wet and disconsolate and very much disposed to be quarrelsome.
    “It’s not going to be as easy as I thought.” Marco was searching for a lighter in the pocket of his tweed jacket. “I imagined at the start that it would be quite straightforward because Franchi kept very careful records of every one of his paintings, who commissioned them and how much he was paid. It looked as if all I had to do—since this painting doesn’t belong to my family—was to prove that no such painting existed, as Franchi had kept no record of it. I’m assuming now it’s a forgery. If it isn’t, and it doesshow up in Franchi’s records then I’ll have to face the fact that it might be stolen. Only it seems it’s not that simple. First of all, there are more paintings than he lists, quite a lot more, especially portraits like this one, because during the time when he was court painter here at the Pitti Palace the Grand Duchess, Princess Violante, had him paint all her ladies in waiting for her. Those are all listed by him as commissioned by her, but—and it’s a big but—he made further copies of those same portraits and I can’t count on his having listed all of those.”
    “Why should he copy his own pictures?”
    “Money. It wasn’t always easy to get your money out of people as rich as they were.” He waved a hand to his right where hundreds of orange and lemon trees sheltered from the rigours of winter in the long conservatory. “They were always keen on commissioning work but less keen on paying for it. Franchi made ends meet by copying those portraits for the young ladies themselves. They, not being rich and powerful, paid up. They got theirs cheaper, of