Although luxuriously housed on the ninth floor of the Grand Palazzo Sorrento, Paolina Marchetti had been unable to sleep, perhaps because of the failure of her carefully arranged assignation. That failure was certainly not the end of her assignment, but it was irritating. As irritating as the poor excuse for a meal she had shared with a chance American acquaintance after an afternoon spent exploring Sorrento, which Paolina had undertaken so as to be unavailable should Ruggiero call to make excuses for his absence.
He hadn't called. Probably he was chasing after some new woman, which would inconvenience Paolina in that she would have to seduce him all over again. She didn't doubt her ability to do so-even if Ruggiero had caught wind of her inconsequential tryst the night before she left Catania. Could Gracia Sindacco-that nosy, old witch--have found out and told their mutual employer?
"Basta," she muttered and sprang from the comfortable bed. She would go for a swim, an activity strictly forbidden by the hotel at this hour. Why have such a series of lovely pools tumbling down the mountainside if they could not be used for midnight swims? Slipping out of the transparent silken nightgown that she had chosen to overwhelm the easily over-whelmed Ruggiero, Paolina donned a skimpy, sea green bikini. She pulled on the soft robe provided by the hotel and dropped a notebook that had lain beneath her pillow into the pocket. Then she grabbed a large pink towel from the bathroom, although it was forbidden to take both the room towels and the hotel robes to the pool area. Towels were rented to swimmers at the bar, which was, of course, now closed.
Most of the hotel patrons she had seen at dinner were middle-aged and stodgy, except for those who were limping and elderly, she mused, as she walked down the empty hall to the pool. That explained their being in bed before midnight and their willingness to eat what the Grand Palazzo Sorrento served for dinner. Hospital fare. It tasted like the food served to her father, the General, after Mafiosi in Palermo had attacked him. Having left her convent school and flown south to be with him, she had told Papa the food was undoubtedly a second attempt to kill him through deprivation rather than violence. Papa had been amused by her indignant opinion, but he had doubted it. Having been hospitalized before, he explained that hospital food was seldom meant to do anything but feed the body, certainly not the soul, as a good Italian meal should.
The night sky was a stunning blue, deep and dark above her, when Paolina nudged open the glass doors at the end of the hall and padded barefoot into the pool area. A light breeze brushed her cheeks, and the stars seemed close and bright. All her irritation disappeared under the gentle blandishment of night in Sorrento. Like a sinuous creature from the sea, she eased herself into the pool and swam. Ten minutes or so was enough to complete the rehabilitation of her mood. Lifting herself from the water, she trailed droplets to a cushioned lounge chair beside a small glass table, draped the forbidden pink towel around her shoulders, and stretched out. In such delicious and beautiful solitude, Ruggiero's absence became something to enjoy. Too bad he would be here tomorrow. Of that she was sure. He wouldn't miss his own meeting.
She removed the small leather journal from the pocket of the robe, extracted the pen from its holder on the cover, and flipped to a clean page:
A toast to the absent lover
Who disappears, unmourned,
While dark indigo skies. . .
No, she didn't like the lines. They were trite. Uninspired. Ruggiero was not a man to stir her muse. And what of last night's lover? Danger was always a spur to passion. Since she had no lover tonight, the evening would end nicely if she could sample a tasty snack and write a few perfect lines before returning to her room to sleep.
As if her thought had been another's command, a visitor came through the door that Paolina had left ajar, a visitor carrying a tray with two glasses of bubbling wine and two plates on a tray. Without rising or offering a greeting, she studied the newcomer and the offering from beneath her eyelashes. Not a particularly welcome person, but as the plates and goblets were set down on the table and a chair pulled up across from her, Paolina could see, in the misty lights that shone on the pool, the rich red of tomato slices, the contrasting white of the fresh buffalo mozzarella, small green basil leaves, a pool of olive oil, and a sprinkle of pepper. She would have welcomed the devil bearing Caprese, so she tucked the journal into the pocket of her robe and waved her hand for the visitor to be seated.
The conversation was slow and of no consequence, but the mozzarella was moist and fresh, the tomatoes ripe and sweet, the basil adding a hint of anise flavor to the salad. Perfect. Except that a drizzle of balsamic vinegar had been added. No native of Capri would have approved of that. Still, she would not complain because she was enjoying both the salad and the contrast of the sweet-tart fizz of Spumante from her goblet. Only when she began to feel surprisingly drowsy, too drowsy to follow the visitor's words, did it dawn on Paolina that she had been drugged. Fool, she thought, as the possibility of poison drifted through her fading consciousness. She whispered a curse in the dialect of her native Umbria, but the words never rolled completely off the numbness of her tongue.
With silent patience her visitor waited for unconsciousness to overcome the beautiful young woman. Then the pink towel was pulled from her shoulders and dropped onto the pavement poolside, the robe left draped on a third chair, Paolina's chair rolled toward the water, where a wrought iron rail warned swimmers away from the waterfall. The visitor studied the barrier, then hoisted the body onto the rail and maneuvered it over, head down. Once the fingers grasping Paolina's ankles released, she plunged in a clumsy dive over the side, her head glancing off the edge of the pool below at the shallow end before she sank into the water. A dark stain trailed her to the bottom, where she floated, unconscious, in a limp sprawl, the white of her buttocks glimmering through the water.
With a nod, the visitor rolled the chair back to its place; retrieved the notebook from the pocket of her robe, having already searched her room for it in her absence; placed the goblets and plates on the tray; and departed. Below, the unconscious Paolina breathed in water and drowned.