Death of an Englishman Read Online Free PDF Page A

at ease, knowing that his English was too basic for him to converse with the Chief Inspector at first hand. The Chief was a bit put out by this deficiency of the Captain's himself, but he persevered.
    'I imagine we can make ourselves useful by interviewing Mr Langley-Smythe's English friends and so on, building up a picture of the sort of person he was—we already know, of course, that he was a gentleman of independent means and extremely well-connected. You probably know that he worked at the Embassy in Rome up until his retirement five years ago.'
    'We always consider it an honour,' offered the Captain gallantly in return, 'when someone chooses to remain in our beautiful country when no longer detained by business.'
    'Yes …' mused the Chief Inspector, on receiving a translation of this morsel of eloquence, 'I suppose so. Rum thing to do, really, but I suppose he'd got used to it by then, made friends and so on —there are quite a few English people here, are there?'
    'Many. It is also marginally possible, of course, that Mr Langley-Smythe might have made some Italian friends too.' The irony was lost in Carabiniere Bacci's translation.
    'Mmm …' The Chief thought it more polite not to answer that one. 'He seems to have made an enemy, at any rate.'
    'Unless the motive was an entirely impersonal one, that of robbery.'
    'No, no. I wouldn't think so. Armed robbery means professional robbery and something worth stealing. Mr Langley-Smythe was comfortably off, of course, but nothing spectacular, and what money he had was invested in England. According to his bank, he drew out a very modest amount each month, presumably for his living expenses. He wasn't a great spender or a collector either so it doesn't seem—was there anything stolen?'
    'No. Nothing stolen, as far as we know.'
    'Well, then … ?' The Chief Inspector looked at Carabiniere Bacci for an explanation, then at the Captain who was looking down at his own hands on the desk.
    'Nothing was stolen, Chief Inspector, but there was a great deal that might have been. My men found a safe in the bedroom wall, open, containing, in various currencies, a little less than half a million pounds sterling. He would also seem to have had other investments than his English ones. According to his lawyer here in Florence, he had considerable investments in this country and a numbered account in a Zürich bank. Possibly your … gentleman of influence did not feel able to be entirely frank with you in this respect.'
    Carabiniere Bacci's embarrassment over the translation of this speech was greatly increased by his conviction that he had just seen one of Inspector Jeffreys's bright blue eyes wink at him.
    'Not at all, not at all.' The Chief was red-faced. 'Of course, there was no time to discuss these things at any length. We had a report of a murder, not a robbery.'
    'Quite. However, the possibility remains that there might have been an attempt at robbery, perhaps disturbed by the victim. Shall we come to the cause of death …'
    Inspector Jeffreys gazed out of the tall window at the lights in the building opposite. He could hear a lot of traffic going by in the wet and the occasional police car leaving with its siren going. His Italian had more or less given out after the polite preliminaries, and he had no interest in this case if they were only here to do a whitewash job. Bloke was probably queer, the foreign service was full of them. He followed the Captain's words spasmodically.
    '… 6.35. One shot, fairly close range from behind. The bullet pierced the left ventricle and death was virtually instantaneous. He had been dead for some hours, when we find out where and when he ate we can be more accurate, but Professor Forli tells me that death probably occurred during the early hours of the morning.'
    'The weapon?'
    'My men are still looking for it. A large number of different fingerprints were found in the living-room of the flat, so we must assume, since he lived alone and