through the flames in his panther form. Had the other Carnevares caught up with him? Michele would show no mercy to the man who had saved her life.
At the Mulinello exit they left the expressway and raced along Route 117, going south. After a while the domed church tower of Piazza Armerina and the rooftops of the town appeared behind the bare trees. Rosa had expected to feel uneasy on her return, but it was just the opposite. She was glad to be back.
A good six miles outside of the town, right after the road forked off for Caltagirone, a driveway on the left led into the wooded hills. When the two guards recognized the car and its driver, a heavy iron gate slid aside on a guide rail, clattering.
As they closed the gate behind the limousine again, Rosa glanced through the rear window. A silver BMW passed the entrance to the drive and continued south. It had been following them ever since they’d left the expressway. Judge Quattrini’s anti-Mafia team had only a limited number of cars at its disposal, and Rosa knew most of them. This one had shadowed her a few weeks ago. She sent the judge a text message with a brief thanks for the welcome committee.
The driveway rose gently uphill for just over a mile. Gnarled olive and lemon trees covered a large part of the slope, and pines grew here and there. When the rooftops of the Palazzo Alcantara appeared above the crowns of the trees, she finally felt the uneasiness that she had been expecting ever since she landed. There was only one car parked in the courtyard of the palazzo: a decrepit red Toyota, none of the flashy roadsters that her business managers drove. Thank God. The old rust heap belonged to Signora Falchi, Iole’s private tutor.
The fountain with the stone statues of fawns wasn’t back in working order yet, but the gardeners had stopped collecting birds’ nests in it. One of Rosa’s first acts had been to revoke Florinda’s orders for the regular removal of all nests from the trees around the palazzo, to be burnt in the stone basin of the fountain. She’d decided to make sure that water flowed from the blackened jets again as soon as possible.
The palazzo had four wings, arranged in a square around an inner courtyard. Plaster was peeling off the pale brown facade in many places. And the tuff statues looking out of niches and down from the edge of the roof were also in urgent need of restoration. Wrought ironwork on the balconies nodded to the property’s former magnificence. Today it was a sad, neglected sight.
The limousine rolled through the tunnel beyond the gate in front of the house. The flower bed in the center of the inner courtyard was still overgrown with weeds; the four facades around it were the color of terra-cotta that had been outdoors for too many winters.
The car stopped at the foot of the double flight of steps leading up to the main entrance on the second floor. Rosa got out before the driver could open the door for her. The smell of damp, crumbling stone was everywhere, even in high summer, and you certainly couldn’t ignore it in February. Once again she wondered whether it would be a better idea to find somewhere else to live. Another decision that she kept putting off.
There was a sound of frantic barking as a black mongrel raced down the steps, leaped at Rosa, and planted his paws on her shoulders. He exuberantly licked her face, panting with excitement.
“Hey, Sarcasmo!” she managed to say, crouching down to hug the dog. Smiling, she ran her hand through his woolly coat, scratched him behind the ears, and buried her face in his neck. “I’ve missed you, boy. Wow, you still smell just as good as I remember.” No wonder; Sarcasmo lounged about on the antique sofas and rugs in the palazzo all day long. At night he jumped up on Iole’s bed and snored for all he was worth.
The driver carried Rosa’s suitcase into the house, and almost collided at the door with a frail-looking woman who came hurrying out at the same moment. She wore wire-framed glasses and a white blouse, and her jeans had creases ironed into them.
“Signorina Alcantara,” she cried, sounding as if she might suffer a stroke any minute. “Ah, signorina, it’s high time you were back here!”
Rosa hugged Sarcasmo one last time, and stood up. The dog ran