The Art of Killing Well Read Online Free PDF Page A

very much and b) even if she had slept, the feral scream produced by her nurse a little while earlier would have woken even the bedspread.
    Sure enough, as the housemaid pulled back the curtains, the old lady asked acidly, “What on earth was that squawking earlier?”
    â€œEr … Signorina Barbarici, Baronessa. She had a terrible fright.”
    â€œAh, I see, Barbarici had a fright,” the baroness said with a sigh. “Just as well. That’ll keep her quiet for a while.”
    The housemaid had not replied, obviously, but instead of withdrawing from the room with a curtsey she had remained there, with her feet converging and her hands tightly clasped. The dowager baroness was not accustomed to regarding the members of the staff as actual human beings, which was why she continuedin a bitter tone, without looking at the girl, “And what happened, pray, to give the idiot a fright?”
    â€œShe says she saw a dead body in the cellar, Baronessa.”

    â€œAre you sure, signorina?”
    Signorina Barbarici, uncomfortable at being the centre of attention, had nodded fervently in answer to the baron’s question, all the while continuing to look down at the floor as if she herself were responsible for the supposed body in the cellar. Around her stood all the occupants of the castle, from the baron down to the lowliest of the scullery maids – apart from the estate manager, who by now was already in the fields supervising the labourers, and Lapo, who had gone down to the village the previous evening and must have lingered in the brothel with his debauched friends.
    â€œAnd why on earth did you close the cellar door?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œThe cellar door, my dear. That door is always open. Why on earth did you close it? Was it really so frightful?”
    Basically, the baron wanted to know what sight awaited him beyond the door. That Signorina Barbarici had seen something, there could be no doubt. What he wanted to know was whether, before opening the door, he should dismiss all those present in order to spare them a horrific spectacle. But the signorina looked at him like a startled dog. “I didn’t close anything, Barone,” she said. “The door was already closed.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œThe … the door, as I said. I even tried to open it, but …”
    â€œSo how did you manage to see what’s inside?”
    The poor woman turned as red as a watermelon (the inside of a watermelon, of course, otherwise she would have turned green) and uttered something like “… ole”. Nobody understood. At the third attempt, a complete sentence emerged:
    â€œI looked through the keyhole.”
    Consternation. Anything might have been expected of Signorina Barbarici except that she would take to looking through other people’s keyholes. Once a few moments had passed, the questions came thick and fast.
    â€œThrough the keyhole?”
    â€œWhat on earth made you think of looking through the keyhole?”
    â€œWhy did you try to open the cellar door?”
    â€œWhat were you doing awake at half past six in the morning?”
    Before the chronological progression of the questions reached the point of asking her how she could ever have taken the liberty of being born (a question she often asked herself anyway) the baron raised a hand to demand silence. Having obtained it, he looked at Signorina Barbarici.
    â€œI wake up early in the morning,” she said. “I walk around the castle while everybody is asleep. I like it.”
    She omitted to explain that this was the only opportunity she had to spend an hour alone without the dowager baroness breathing down her neck.
    â€œI walk along the corridors, down the stairs, into the cellar … it’s nice and quiet … everything’s always the same. But thismorning, the cellar door was closed. It’s usually open.”
    Here, too, the good signorina passed over the fact