the table next to his gloves. She could see he had already written out some questions, leaving spaces for her answers beneath. He was obviously a meticulous man.
‘You are a friend of the director, Vicenzo Lucchese?’ he began.
‘I am yes.’
‘You have been staying in his house, I understand?’
‘Yes.’
‘Are you lovers?’
Isabella blushed – something her interrogator noted on his pad.
‘No,’ she replied firmly. ‘We are friends, that’s all.’
She saw him write down the word ‘friends’, pick up another pen and underline the word in red.
He looked up. ‘Does he work for you?’
‘What on earth do you mean?’ she asked, genuinely confused now.
‘I think perhaps you are the ringleader of his Resistance cell.’
‘What an absurd idea!’ Isabella said boldly. ‘I don’t have the faintest idea what you’re talking about. What Resistance cell?’
‘First, you live in his house, a house where we found caches of arms. Then, you are in Via Rasella on the day of the bombing. I think perhaps you are the mastermind behind this bombing.’
‘That’s ridiculous! I was on my way home, if you must know, from the market. Fortunately I stopped to look in a shop window when the bomb went off, or I’d have been blown up as well.’
He laughed. ‘You expect me to believe that? No civilians were killed in Via Rasella. Everyone was prevented from entering the area, you included.’
‘I knew nothing about the bombing,’ Isabella retorted. ‘The fact that I wasn’t badly injured can’t be used against me – if it wasn’t so ludicrous it would be laughable.’
He flushed slightly, pursing his lips, as if considering his response. ‘It would be better for you,’ he said, ‘if you admitted your part in it, admit you are a partisan, and if not the leader, at least a member of the GAP cell here in Rome.’
She shook her head defiantly. ‘I will not admit to something that is totally untrue.’
He stood up and walked behind her. It was unnerving. She sensed his eyes examining her. His tone softened. ‘If you admit it now, things will be easier for you.’ He moved round in front of her, his thin mouth curling itself into a smile.
‘There is nothing to admit to,’ Isabella said, drawing herself up in her chair. ‘How dare you accuse me of these things?’
He sat down again. ‘You live with your mother?’ he asked.
‘Yes, and my aunt and my grandmother – what of it?’
‘They are partisans too?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ she exclaimed in disbelief.
‘You have had other lovers, before the director?’
‘No. And I’ve already told you, he’s not my lover. My only other friend was an officer in the Italian Fascist army, if you must know – Baron Ludovico Albani – a loyal member of the Fascist forces. He is the only man I’ve ever…’ she paused, blushing slightly, ‘ever had a relationship with.’
He wrote down Ludovico’s name in his notebook, underlining the words ‘Baron’ and ‘Fascist’ twice.
‘You spend time at the Acquasanta Golf Club. You were a friend of the traitor Count Ciano.’
‘I knew him, yes. But he was not a friend. Most definitely not.’
‘And Mario Chiari? You were seen talking to him at the police station. He is a communist and a partisan. What were you discussing?’
‘Nothing, I scarcely know him. He’s a film-set designer. I had met him once at a party, I think. I merely wondered what he was doing there.’
Koch continued to make notes, glancing up at her from time to time.
‘How can you be so distant and cold?’ he asked her eventually.
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘I have seen many people crack under pressure, strong men drop to their knees begging me for mercy. You seem almost relaxed. What is wrong with you?’
‘There is nothing wrong with me. I am simply innocent of everything you accuse me of.’
He took a piece of writing paper from his inside jacket pocket and laid it on the table in front of her. Vicenzo’s signature leapt out at her.
‘You should know… we have your friend.’
Isabella, who until now had remained calm throughout the long and exhausting interrogation, felt her resolve crumbling. Tears welled up at the thought of what might be happening to Vicenzo.
Her interrogator leapt up suddenly and came around the desk, pulling her roughly up onto her feet. ‘Why do you care about this man?’ he shouted, shaking her, his face close to hers. ‘How can you be mixed up with a man like this? Don’t you know who he is? He is a pervert, of the worst kind. Italy doesn’t want people