Roman Count Down Read online

  A FUNERAL IN MANTOVA

  The Fifth Rick Montoya Italian Mystery

  “Following Return to Umbria, Wagner’s fifth series outing features a likable amateur sleuth who carefully analyzes other people. Rich in details of the food and culture of Italy’s Lombardy region, this atmospheric mystery will be appreciated by fans of Martin Walker’s French-flavored “Bruno” mysteries. Readers of Frances Mayes’s Under the Tuscan Sun may enjoy the colorful descriptions.”

  —Library Journal

  “Wagner’s fifth series entry provides his usual deft mix of art, travel, and suspense.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “...the many details of meals that Rick enjoys on his trip are a highlight, as are the author’s appended notes on the food and wines of the area...”

  —Henrietta Verma, Booklist

  “This is a book for armchair travelers as much as it is for mystery lovers.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  RETURN TO UMBRIA

  The Fourth Rick Montoya Italian Mystery

  “Translator Rick Montoya is in Orvieto to persuade his cousin to return home to Rome when he gets drawn into investigating the murder of American Rhonda Van Fleet. Did Rhonda’s past in Orvieto, studying ceramics, lead to her death? The setting almost overwhelms the plot, but Rick is a charming and appealing amateur sleuth.”

  —Library Journal

  “Wagner skillfully inserts nuggets of local culture without slowing down the narrative pace, and perhaps even more importantly, he gets Italy right. He understands the nuances of Italian manners and mentality as well as the glorious national preoccupation with food.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “With taut pacing and enough credible suspects to keep the reader guessing until the end, Return to Umbria makes for an engaging read.”

  —Shelf Awareness

  MURDER MOST UNFORTUNATE

  The Third Rick Montoya Italian Mystery

  “Returning in his third outing, Rick Montoya travels to Bassano del Grappa to work as a translator at an art seminar. When one of the attendees ends up dead, Rick can’t keep himself from investigating, along with Betta Innocenti, the daughter of a local gallery owner. Rick, as always, is a charming sleuth.”

  —Library Journal

  “Though he spent his childhood in Rome, Montoya proudly kicks around Italy in the cowboy boots he brought with him from the years he spent in New Mexico. He is an easygoing, empathetic protagonist—with just enough American irreverence to keep his Italian colleagues entertained.”

  —Karen Keefe, Booklist

  DEATH IN THE DOLOMITES

  The Second Rick Montoya Italian Mystery

  “Like Cold Tuscan Stone, the novel is light on its feet, with a protagonist who will strike readers as a good guy to hang around with.”

  —David Pitt, Booklist

  COLD TUSCAN STONE

  The First Rick Montoya Italian Mystery

  “David P. Wagner gives us a compelling new character in a setting so romantic and redolent of history it pulls us in immediately and holds us until the surprising ending.... This is a wonderful start to a series, which should have immediate legs, and surely will thrill everyone who has lived in Italy, been to Italy, or would like to visit. As a boy I lived in both Firenze and Napoli, and reading Wagner takes me back deeply and instantly.”

  —Joseph Heywood, author of The Woods Cop Mysteries, The Snowfly and The Berkut

  “If you are interested in Italian art and artifacts, Italian history and culture, Italian food and wine, or even just good storytelling, then Cold Tuscan Stone will be right up your cobblestone alleyway. Set in the ancient Tuscan town of Volterra, David P. Wagner’s atmospheric debut novel delivers all of the above and more... Simply put, this exciting, intriguing, well-written mystery extends an offer no reader should refuse. Capiche?”

  —Amanda Matetsky, author of The Paige Turner Mysteries

  “Wagner hits all the right notes in this debut. His likable protagonist engages, plus the Italian angle is always appealing. Perfect for readers who enjoy a complex puzzle, a bit of humor, and a fairly gentle procedural. Don’t miss this one.”

  —Library Journal (starred review)

  “Like the Etruscan urns he seeks, Rick’s debut is well-proportioned and nicely crafted.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “The intriguing art milieu, mouthwatering cuisine, and the team of the ironic Conti and the bemused but agile Montoya are bound to attract fans.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  Copyright © 2019 by David P. Wagner

  Cover and internal design © 2019 by Sourcebooks

  Cover design by The Book Designers

  Cover images/illustrations © Tomasz Wozniak/Shutterstock

  Sourcebooks, Poisoned Pen Press, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks, Inc.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks.

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious and are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

  All brand names and product names used in this book are trademarks, registered trademarks, or trade names of their respective holders. Sourcebooks is not associated with any product or vendor in this book.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data is on file with the publisher.

  Published by Poisoned Pen Press, an imprint of Sourcebooks

  P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60563-4410

  (630) 961-3900

  sourcebooks.com

  Printed and bound in the United States of America.

  SB 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Contents

  Roman Count Down

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Food and Wine

  Author’s Note

  In loving memory of Baffi, my feline muse

  for this book and all the others.

  No man is lonely while eating spaghetti.

  —Robert Morley

  Chapter One

  Count Umberto Zimbardi was surprised when the bus slowed down and pulled ahead of him. He’d expected to climb on through the front door, but fortunately there was enough light from a nearby street lamp to see “Entrance” stenciled above the back doors that banged open when the bus stopped. He stepped from the curb to the door, clutching the metal railing. As his foot touched the second step the door slammed shut behind him and the bus started up. Fortunately, he managed to grip the pole at the top of the steps.

  Now came the part he was most concerned about. He looked around for someone to take his ticket and saw only a few passengers staring out the windows. Far in front he could make out the head of the driver, and written on the metal barrier behind him was an official admonition that he should not be bothered. The count kept the ticket at arm’s length, wondering what to do next, and then spotted a box attached to a pole ahead of him. Could it be? He staggered toward it, hands moving from pole to pole to steady himself while grasping the ticket between his fingers. Yes, the i
nstructions above the metal contraption were clear, and he followed them carefully, inserting his ticket in a small opening. It made a kerchunk, almost loud enough to startle him, and when he pulled it out, he could see the time stamp.

  He’d done it.

  Suddenly, he was back in school. The headmaster sat at his desk and stared at young Umberto with dark, piercing eyes, sinister even through the thick glasses. What a disappointment. A lad with such potential. What would your parents think of what you did? The count had successfully repressed the memory of that humiliating meeting for years, and now it flowed back.

  Calming himself as best he could, he took a window seat in the middle of the bus and gazed at Rome by night. The view was quite different from what he saw regularly from the backseat of his car when he was usually reading the newspaper while Rocco dealt with the traffic. He’d glanced out of the window of his car, as often as not staring at the side of a bus. Now he was inside the bus, admitting that, except for the hard, plastic seat, it was not unpleasant. A plus—he could see over all the cars. Even late at night there was a thick stream of traffic with drivers alternately charging madly ahead or impatiently growling while stopped at a traffic light. Beyond the cars’ roofs the sidewalk ran along the Tiber River. He watched a young couple, oblivious to the sounds of the street, leaning on the stone wall and looking at the water. It was too dark to see any debris floating down from the northern part of the city, so their romantic moment was not spoiled.

  Umberto sighed deeply as he recalled strolling along the Thames embankment all those decades ago with his first love, Samantha Peabody. Whatever became of Samantha? She would be married, no question about that, probably various times, with a brood of children. And grandchildren. He smiled to remember the weekend he escaped from school and took the train into London to see her. Once again he thought of the headmaster. The old goat made sure Umberto paid dearly for that escapade, but it was worth it. Well worth it. He never told his wife about Samantha, not that some minor incident in his youth was anything to hide from the countess. She’d probably had a fling or two herself, when she was a girl. Well, perhaps not…

  The bus started moving, and his thoughts returned to the issue at hand. The Zimbardis always stood for honesty, so he knew what his decision had to be. Probitas was the only word on the family crest, after all, inscribed under the crossed lances and the unicorn. The single exception to this family fixation on honesty was his Uncle Guidobaldo who, rather than face the music and the judge, decamped to the Sudan where he set up a pizzeria that did quite well. Guidobaldo’s name did not come up often when the Zimbardi clan gathered during Umberto’s childhood, and then only in hushed conversation. When Umberto misbehaved, the worst threat he could receive from his mother was, “If you keep that up we may have to send you to the Sudan.”

  The phrase had sent shivers down his small spine, but it also piqued his interest in the black sheep of the family. He pictured giant fans wielded by nubile maidens, cooling his uncle as he kneaded his pizza dough—an image inspired by a copy of National Geographic that Umberto kept under his mattress. It was about that time when he was sent to school in England, where he never mentioned his uncle to any of his schoolmates. Nor to Samantha Peabody.

  He must be getting close to what would be his stop, but since he never took the bus, he wasn’t sure. It would be close to the bridge across Tiberina Island, he assumed. He saw a passenger pull the cord and the bus stopped; could he just do the same when he got to where he wanted to get off? Unsure of the protocol, he decided it would be better simply to be ready for the scheduled stop, wherever it might come. He got to his feet and walked unsteadily down the aisle toward the front of the bus where other passengers had gotten off previously. There were only three other people remaining, in addition to the driver. One was asleep, and the second, who looked North African, stared out the window. The third, who’d squeezed through the door as it was closing, just after the count got on, was wedged in the rear seat out of sight. He wanted to get a better look at the man in back, but decided it would be better not to stare. It could draw unwanted attention, which was the last thing he needed. It crossed Umberto’s mind that the second man could be from the Sudan. When he got home he would check his office globe to get the country’s exact location. Near Egypt, if he remembered correctly.

  Sure enough, the bus ground to a halt and the front and rear doors banged open. The driver braked with such suddenness that Umberto had to grab a seat back to keep himself upright. Once he got his balance he walked past the driver and stepped down to the pavement. Something caught his eye in the darkness, maybe someone exiting from the rear of the bus. That confused him, since he was under the impression that leaving by the driver door was required. Could it be the man in the backseat? Once again he supressed the urge to look, taking deep breaths to calm his nerves. At least now he was off the bus, his feet on solid pavement, and his destination would soon come into view. Knowing he was returning to familiar surroundings helped him relax, as did the thought of enjoying a tumbler of whiskey in his study. The driver put the bus into gear and groaned ahead as the count watched. Should he have thanked the driver? Perhaps a gratuity? No, likely not. He would ask Gonzalo, his butler, about bus protocol, though, in fact, he was not planning on riding another one any time soon.

  He was left standing on the sidewalk, surrounded by the fumes of the departing bus along with the slightly less toxic exhaust of the cars. Ahead was the traffic light at the narrow bridge over the river, the only way to get a vehicle on and off the island. Isola Tiberina looked like a ship floating in the middle of the Tiber. In ancient times, the Romans, who knew a thing or two about monumental architecture, built a huge prow of a boat at the northern end of the isle, now long gone. The island still kept part of its original vocation—healing—being the site of a large hospital. As Umberto walked across the bridge an ambulance shot past him, siren blaring, toward the Emergency Room entrance. He edged toward the rail and pitied the poor devil inside. Despite its proximity to the Zimbardi residence, Umberto had never been in this hospital. Like most wealthy Romans, he used a private clinic when needed, eschewing the Italian National Health Service. He walked past the side of the hospital where the cars and mopeds of the night-shift staff parked in jumbled lines.

  To his right was a small piazza, beyond which beckoned the facade of the San Bartolomeo Church, which he always called Saint Bartholomew. Sora Lela, the restaurant, was closed at this hour, without so much as a light visible through the dingy windows. The light was also dim on the bridge that would take him across the other arm of the Tiber split by the island. He could almost see the ancient Teatro Marcello, site of the Zimbardi residence.

  As he started across the bridge he noticed a group of feral cats gathered around paper plates, licking the sauce off spaghetti left there by one of the city’s mysterious cat ladies.

  Suddenly, he stopped. “What are you doing here?”

  It might be said that if one were going to be the victim of a physical attack, what better place to have it happen than a few steps from a hospital? But the proximity of medical help was of no use to the count. The emergency room doctor at the Ospedale Fatebenefratelli estimated that the victim left the world at the instant his head hit the bridge pavement. The irony, which would not have been lost on Count Umberto Zimbardi, was that his first visit to the hospital on Tiberina Island would also be his last.

  Chapter Two

  “Are you going to eat that or just stare at it?”

  For the moment, at least, Rick was merely going to stare at the plate in front of him. It wasn’t exactly a plate, but a red plastic basket, lined with checkered paper and containing a green chile cheeseburger and fries. His sister was already two bites into her lunch, a large chef’s salad with Thousand Island dressing. She stabbed at a slice of tomato with her fork and waited for her brother to answer. She was in no hurry. They sat in a booth on plastic seats, a small jukebox on the wall be
tween them. Outside, it was a perfect day, typical for New Mexico, which would still be the Sunshine State had Florida not stolen the name. But Land of Enchantment worked just as well.

  “Anna, this may be the last green chile cheeseburger I’ll eat for years. It never occurred to me that they won’t have green chile cheeseburgers in Rome.”

  “That city is a culinary backwater, Rick. You’ll probably waste away to nothing.”

  He picked up his glass and held it out, studying the brown liquid. “And Alien Ale. They won’t have it, either.”

  “You’ll have to drink water. But you’ve always been ingenious; you’ll find a way to survive.” She opened a packet of Saltines.

  “You’re right, I’ll muddle through somehow. But will I be able to make it without my dear sister constantly…?”

  “Giving you excellent advice?”

  “Nagging was the word that came to mind.”

  “Mom and Dad are in Brazil, someone had to do it.” She poked at the salad. “You’re not really nervous about making this move, are you, Rick?”

  He finally bit into his cheeseburger, and she waited for him to swallow.

  “Boy, that’s good,” said Rick. “The best this side of San Antonio.” He took a sip of beer. “Why should I be nervous? I’ve sold all my belongings and taken my savings out of the bank so I can move to another country with the tenuous hope of restarting a business which, I might add, was doing quite well here in Albuquerque.”

  “We’ve been through this, Rick. You know a lot of people there, and Uncle Piero will help.”

  He took another drink of beer, this one longer. “Piero will probably start on his thing about me becoming a cop.”

  “I thought that was just a joke.”

  “I’m not so sure, Anna. The e-mails I’ve been getting from him keep mentioning cases he’s working on that I might find interesting.”