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  Despite the similarity in elevation between Orvieto and Todi, it felt colder. It may have been the cooler air blowing down the Tiber River Valley from Perugia, or simply that Todi’s hill was more exposed, but the temperature was lower. They locked the car and walked toward the contraption that would take them up to the town itself. The lot was a third full, and the line of long spaces marked for tour buses had only one occupant. It would be filled in July and August, but now the tourist season was winding down, despite the near-perfect weather.

  “Mannaggia.”

  “What’s the matter, Rick?”

  He jerked his thumb at a car parked at the end of the row. “Let’s hope there’s more than one silver Mercedes in Umbria. The two American women’s rental car is just like that.”

  “I’m sure it’s a common model and color. And you promised you would stay away from the investigation today, so it couldn’t be them, could it?”

  They picked up a ticket and waited for the next ride up. Unlike Orvieto’s antique funicular, the machine the Todini chose to carry their tourists up to the town was a rectangular glass and metal box that ran up and down a single, steep track. For the hearty, or those who didn’t want to wait or pay for the next run, metal steps ran the length of the line. Rick looked up and saw the empty car slipping into its berth. They got on with five other people, and after a few minutes the doors sealed shut and they climbed through the trees. At the top was a paved area between a street and the wall, what would be called a scenic overlook in America. Benches and trees broke up the expanse, but not enough to block the view of the valley below and the hills in the distance. Rick and Betta enjoyed it for a few minutes before starting up the street into the centro storico of Todi.

  Betta took out her red Umbria guidebook and read from it as they walked. The church of San Fortunato appeared high above on their right at the top of a long set of stairs, but they decided to continue on to the main square, the jewel of the town. They passed a couple tourist shops on the left, as would be expected for the route visitors took from the funicular into town. Rick remembered that Crivelli’s other ceramics store was somewhere in Todi, but he expected it to be found in a more prestigious location. The street bent to the left after passing the town theater and narrowed to an almost car-width canyon before reaching the long, rectangular piazza. They stopped to survey the space before them.

  To draw tourists, many town squares in Italy had become the site of summer theater and concerts, but Rick and Betta agreed that this one would work especially well for such events. It was small, almost intimate by Italian standards, and its rectangular shape lent itself to rows of chairs. The cathedral facade at the far end was the perfect backdrop for a concert, its raised steps the ideal place to set up a stage, and the buildings around the other three sides would help the acoustics and provide window seats for a privileged few.

  “I wonder if the Romans had that in mind,” Betta said, holding her book, “when they laid out their forum here a couple thousand years ago.”

  “It looks like there’s nothing left from that time,” Rick said as his eyes moved around the piazza. “Not even a couple columns. That’s a shame.”

  “Still, it’s quite spectacular.” She read descriptions of the buildings around the square, starting with the three massive palazzi closest to them.

  Rick listened and then they walked to one of them. “The thirteenth century must have been a prosperous time for Todi to get those three constructed. It couldn’t have been cheap, and as we can see, back then they built them to last.” He rapped his knuckles on the stone.

  Betta snapped her book shut. “Let’s go to the cathedral and work our way back.”

  Rick nodded and they headed toward the far end of the square.

  “Rick!”

  He looked up and saw Gina waving as she came down the stone steps of the Civic Museum. “So it was their car,” he said to Betta. “Go ahead. I’ll meet you in the Duomo in a few minutes.”

  Betta sized up the woman coming down the stairs. “That’s all right, I’ll wait. You can introduce me. I can practice my limited English, since you never let me do it with you.”

  “Don’t start on that again. You know what I’ve told you about relationships fracturing when one person tries to teach a language to the other.”

  “I think you made that up.”

  Gina was dressed in the same outfit she’d worn on the funicular, making Rick conclude that she liked to pack light. She was almost out of breath, even though she’d been coming down rather than ascending the stairs. She looked at Betta and back at Rick.

  “Hi, Rick. Thank you for what you did yesterday morning, it made it much easier to deal with what happened to Mom.” She looked at Betta and back at Rick.

  “Gina, this is Betta. You remember her from the funicular. Betta, Gina.”

  “I was going to ask about her when I saw you at the juice bar, Rick, and then I was so upset yesterday morning that I didn’t ask then.”

  Rick wondered if Betta had understood Gina’s rapid speaking style.

  “How are you coping, Gina?”

  “As well as can be expected, Rick. Thank you for asking. We decided to get out and see things rather than mope around the villa. My mother would have wanted it that way.” She rubbed her nose with her fingers to prevent a sniffle.

  “Where’s Francine?”

  She shook her head before pointing across the square. “She’s over there drinking a cappuccino and nursing a headache. She got completely trashed last night in Orvieto. I had to drive us back to the villa, in the dark and all those winding roads with her carrying on. Rick, it was terrifying.” She grasped Rick’s arm without thinking and quickly let it go, the move not lost on Betta.

  Apparently Francine had not told Gina that she’d seen Rick in the outdoor cafe the previous afternoon. So he wouldn’t mention it either. “People show their grief in different ways.”

  Gina snorted as if Rick had told a bad joke, bringing a surprised look to Betta’s face. “I’m beginning to wonder if it’s in her to grieve at all.”

  This was a new side to Gina. “That’s a pretty strong statement.”

  She glanced at the other side of the square, perhaps to be sure that Francine was still well out of ear shot. “Well, Francine will be getting some part of my mother’s inheritance, given their friendship. I’m sure of it. Likely some guilt from the way she treated her.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Years ago, when Francine was about to be engaged, my mother had an affair with the man. There was no engagement after Francine found out. My mom always said that the man wasn’t worth it, and that she saved Francine from a bad marriage, and Mom knew about bad marriages. But I think she felt guilty for what she’d done.”

  Rick thought about what Francine had said about guilt while drinking her wine the previous afternoon. Guilt seemed to be a big issue in Arizona.

  “So bottom line, Rick, Francine will manage her grief just fine. I think she’s now focused on the joys of being in Umbria, and I don’t mean the museums.”

  Rick and Betta walked slowly toward the cathedral after saying their goodbyes to Gina.

  “Were you able to get what she was saying? The woman talks fast and runs her words together.”

  “You met her at a juice bar?”

  Rick couldn’t tell if the question was mocking or serious. For sure it was annoying. “I forgot to mention that. When I was coming back from seeing Fabrizio the first time she was standing outside a bar. We exchanged a few words.”

  “Oh.”

  He decided not to explain Gina’s comments about her mother and Francine. If Betta didn’t understand them, it was her problem.

  They crossed the piazza and went up the steps of the cathedral, then left the sunlight for the subdued darkness of its interior. After dipping hands into the stone font just inside the doo
rway and crossing themselves slowly, their eyes moved naturally to the altar before pulling back to take in the space in its entirety. Rick was pleased to spot what he regretted not seeing in the piazza outside: the columns that lined the nave had to be Roman. Over the centuries the Italians became masters at recycling building materials, and one of the most common examples was using Roman columns in churches. Besides the practical aspect of such re-use, there was also the symbolic message of Christianity taking the place of paganism. Italians loved symbolism. They walked to the front and sat in one of the pews. Betta pulled out her red guidebook and opened it to the pages on Todi. Rick looked around while she read silently.

  “What should I know about the cathedral?” he said after a few minutes. “So far I like it. Nobody came in and ruined it with changes when Gothic architecture went out of fashion, thank goodness.” It was one of Rick’s pet peeves.

  “To begin with, si vuole, it was built on the site of a Roman building.”

  Rick laughed. “You have to love the Italian language. So if we wish to believe it, the guy who wrote the book won’t mind, even though it may not be true. Well, I for one am going to accept that we’re sitting on top of a Roman foundation.”

  “I will too,” said Betta firmly.

  She read the rest of the section about the cathedral while Rick turned at the appropriate times to see what was being described. The biggest surprise, they agreed, was the painting of the Last Judgment which covered the entire inside wall of the church entrance. Neither had noticed it behind them on the way in, but now they walked back toward the door to appreciate its power. Christ sat on a throne at the top with the blessed, while down below the writhing figures of the damned struggled vainly with grotesque devils pulling them into the inferno. The location was intentional, a warning to the faithful as they left the piety of the church for the temptations waiting outside its doors.

  Rick stopped to zip his jacket before they started down the steps outside. Clouds had moved in, and with them a light but chilling wind. Betta pulled the light wool coat she was wearing tighter.

  “Can I see the map in your book?” Rick asked. Betta passed it to him. “Unless you want to go to the Pinacoteca,” he said, holding the book open to the map page, “why don’t we go down one of these streets, get on one that clings to the side of the hill, then work our way up to Via Cavour?”

  “And avoid encountering the American women?”

  He chose to ignore the inference of the question, as well as the tone. “Not just that. It will give us some good views, and we can’t get enough of them. But mostly we can see another part of the town. No telling what interesting building we might come upon.”

  The small side streets were narrow, as expected, to the point of being wide enough only for foot traffic. They were also so steep at points that steps appeared in the pavement and metal handrails had been attached to the stone buildings on each side. Even with those walking aids, these would not be streets to be traveled on a snowy winter day. Winter would also wipe out the flowers in the window boxes, their colors made more brilliant in contrast with the street’s canvas of gray stone. The alley emptied onto a level street that ran along the side of Todi’s hill, a pleasant change after the steep descent. The hill on the left side of the street dropped off steeply, giving the houses on the right a perfect view of the valley below. A hundred meters ahead they found a long, rectangular pool under a portico supported by seven columns. Betta pulled out her trusty red book, did some searching, and found that the Fonte Scarnabecco, a public well, dated to 1241. Each capital at the top of its seven thin columns was different from the next, but the book wasn’t able to tell them why.

  “You were right, Rick. This is lovely, and if we hadn’t come this way we would have missed it.”

  At the next corner they made a right turn and started climbing up another narrow street. They crossed under arches which appeared to have no purpose other than to brace the upper floors of the two buildings. The buildings were all residential, with wood doors at street level and small windows that offered only a view of another stone building across the pavement. It was a good way to get to know the neighbors, if nothing else. The street bent left and right before emptying on what the map indicated as the main street leading from the Porta Romana up to the main square. The main gates of Todi, like so many towns in Italy, were named for the destination reached by passing through them. Rick assumed there was a Porta Perugina at the north end of the walls, and a Porta Orvietana on the west. Where else would anyone be going to or coming from? Though as narrow as the one they’d just been on, this street was populated by a few shops as well as residences. The closer they climbed to the center of town the more commercial it became. Rick stopped Betta and pointed at a sign hanging above a doorway.

  “There’s the other shop of the guy I told you about, the one who taught the victim pottery techniques when she was a student.”

  “Studio Crivelli,” Betta read. “There doesn’t seem to be much to it. Let’s go in, I’m curious to see his work.”

  “You go ahead. Crivelli goes back and forth between his two shops, and could be here today. I don’t want to run into him again. But I’ll be interested to hear what you think of his ceramics’ designs.”

  It didn’t take her long. Rick was standing a few doors up gazing through the window of a salumaio, realizing he was starting to get hungry. His eyes rested on a platter with thick slices of porchetta, stuffed suckling pig with rosemary and other herbs. It was a favorite of his in Rome, going back to roadside stands on Sunday trips to the countryside when he was a kid. Of course in Todi they would claim theirs to be the best in Italy.

  Betta’s voice jolted him out of his culinary musings.

  “Your man Crivelli has found a style he likes and sticks with it. It must work, the girl there says he exports it all over the world. She gave me a card with his website so I can order.”

  “He wasn’t there?”

  “No. Unless he was in the back somewhere, creating art.”

  “My guess is that he has other people actually getting their fingers in the clay.”

  After passing a small square with a fountain decorating its back wall, the street leveled out and they passed the obligatory statue of Garibaldi, staring down at Todi from a tall pedestal. Dressed in his signature hat and cape, the Liberator folded his hands on top of his sword, unsheathed as if to signal he was ready to fight again for a united Italy should he be needed. They continued on and found themselves back in the main square, at the opposite end from the cathedral, the completion of a large loop. The question at that point was a simple one: go to the museum or go to lunch. Neither Rick nor Betta found it difficult to answer.

  The restaurant they chose from the guidebook sat among the fields in the valley below the town. Enough Fall had arrived in this part of Umbria to allow the trattoria to have a few dry branches burning in a brick fireplace in the corner. The odor of the fire wafted lightly through the dining room, matching the rustic décor of wood and brick. They were early, just one other table was occupied by three men in leather jackets. A waiter gestured to the new arrivals, indicating that anywhere they wished to sit was fine with him. Betta chose a table close to the fire.

  “This looks perfect,” she said, rubbing her hands together as if it had been below zero outside. The waiter brought menus and turned over the glasses that had been sitting at each place. Rick ordered mineral water and a half liter of the house red, and the waiter scurried off.

  “I’ve been turning over in my mind what Gina told me up in the piazza.”

  “I suspected that, Rick. Your head seemed to be elsewhere since you talked to her. Tell me again what she said, I doubt if I got it all.”

  “Well, to begin with, she thinks Francine will be getting some of her mother’s inheritance. In addition, several years back there was some issue about a man they were both interested in.”

 
Her eyebrows went up. “Really? All the money wouldn’t all go to Gina?”

  “She didn’t think so.”

  “Both those revelations make this Francine woman a stronger suspect. But if the daughter gets most of the inheritance, she’s a suspect as well. And she has no alibi.”

  “Nobody does; the murder happened in the middle of the night.”

  The water and wine arrived, along with a basket of warm bread that the waiter proudly noted had just come out of the oven. They turned their attention to the menu and decided, since they made their own bread in the place, to start with the crostini di caccia, toasts with pâté made from various things hunted. It seemed like an appropriate dish for a cool autumn meal. Staying in the same seasonal mood, they both ordered the fettuccine al profumo di bosco. Rick guessed that the “scent of the forest” on the fresh pasta would include, at a minimum, some type of mushroom. After the pasta course they would decide what else they wanted, if anything. He poured each of them wine and they tapped glasses.

  Rick was bringing the wine to his lips when he heard the familiar sound of the Lobo Fight Song. He put down his glass and pulled his phone from his pocket.