Plot reminder: Mary and Lucio have just visited Francesco Brancaleone, a former prisoner of camp 106a. He recounted how Vincenzo D'Ambra had planned a tryst with Irene and how the next morning all the men were quickly moved on to other camps. Confirming that Sergeant Reynolds had been on duty that night, he also revealed that a second man was missing, D'Ambra's best friend Ettore Lo Bianco.

~~~~~

The return journey was a wordless one at first, ours a tired silence, yes, but also reflective, our minds shuttling between those many and varied investigative signposts the old man had planted. A mental route map which no matter how many times re-run, no matter how many alternative diversions we explored or dead-end streets we temporarily got lost down, arrived always at the same destination, that chilling inevitable conclusion: the bones which had been unearthed in that dank, dismal field were those of Ettore Lo Bianco, my father's closest friend and chief assistant in the painting of the altar.

This much seemed a given; only the precise dynamics of the incident were still open to debate, historical interpretation. Had Reynolds and the other guard on duty that night come across Lo Bianco's escape attempt during a sweep around the perimeter fence, the prisoner refusing to halt, forcing them to give chase? Possibly, but given the mugginess of the night Francesco Brancaleone had described, wasn't it strange that their calls and shouts hadn't awoken some of the prisoners through the opened windows of the Nissen huts? No, much more probable was the bloodcurdling hypothesis that Reynolds and his accomplices had somehow got wind of Lo Bianco's escape plans and had been waiting in ambush for him beyond the wire. That the whole godless incident had been pre-meditated. Willed.

And if this were indeed true, then there was perhaps a second supposition that an investigator might confidently make: Vincenzo D'Ambra too had been ruthlessly knifed down under the cloak of that terrible September night. Whilst sixty-four years later the mouth of the digger had chanced upon Lo Bianco's remains, his own were still hidden there somewhere beneath the Lincolnshire soil. How else could one explain the unearthing of his ID tags in the vicinity? How else the fact that he was never seen or heard of again?

I wondered if the pair had been attempting to escape together. Or if, given the expertise he'd gained over the previous months at slipping himself beyond the wire to meet Irene, my father had acted only as assistant and accomplice, the thirty shillings borrowed not for himself but for his friend. As Francesco Brancaleone believed, he'd simply had too many reasons to remain. Not just the painted altar, but Irene too.

My mother, yes...

Had their tryst been postponed that night, I wondered, or had she been waiting there vainly in the nearby copse of trees for him to arrive? The blackness of the night blinding her, the rustle of the leaves above covering the hissed whispering voices, the muffled cries of pain.

*

We were back onto the motorway, the rosy tint of approaching sunset framed in the wing mirror to my right, when finally I voiced out loud the thought which like a new bruise had been swelling in my mind.

"Maybe I was wrong."

Lucio swivelled head sideways, observed me curiously for a moment.

"About my mother," I explained. "Maybe it was just a coincidence. She died in her sleep, nothing more than that."

It seemed the only possible explanation, that contrary to my original belief my father's murder and mother's death were two separate events, as distinct from each other as the sun and the moon. I doubted that Reynolds or his accomplices had boasted of the foul deed to their children or grandchildren. Murder wasn't a medal of military valour or some distant sporting triumph. And even if someone amongst later generations had known, it was unlikely that the name Irene Harvey would mean anything to them, that upon discovery of the remains she had been considered some nefarious threat to family honour, to be silenced immediately.

"It's possible," Lucio concurred. "Coincidences are like snow on Punto San Giacomo beach. Rare, but once or twice, I have seen it happen."

He squinted gaze at the road ahead, that consumed focus of his, a poet searching the next line.

"We may never be certain of what really happened," he mused. "All I'm sure of is this: If I'd ever had a daughter, I would hope that she would have been like you. Someone who, if there was ever need, would fight for me." He glanced sideways once more, flickered lips into a smile. "Fight like a boxer in the ring. Like the sea against the rocks."

As the wheels continued to turn beneath us, carry us towards the end of that long, shadow-shifting day, my heart was once more saddened by the thought that tomorrow I would have to say my goodbyes to this sweet, wonderful man.

*

It was a little after nine o'clock that we rolled back into Punto San Giacomo, the rearview sunset having by this time deepened to a dramatic blood red. I'd offered to take over the wheel for an hour or so, allow Lucio to rest his eyes, have a little time out, but he'd merely swept out a dismissive hand. An exaggerated sense of male chivalry perhaps, or else simply hadn't wished to trust his life to someone used to driving on the wrong side of the road.

With nothing else to focus my mind on, I thus found myself settling on a plan of action. I would, I decided, write another anonymous letter to Inspector Kubič detailing the afternoon's revelations. I didn't expect him to act on my word alone of course, but it would be a simple enough matter for him to seek confirmation of Francesco Brancaleone's story via his Italian counterparts. Once convinced of the validity of the hypothesis - the overwhelming probability that what he was dealing with was a double murder - the limited public expenditure of conducting a cadavre search could surely be justified. There were dogs specially trained for such things, I believed, and I remembered the tragic case of a missing ten-year-old girl back in Sussex and how the police had used helicopters equipped with some sort of special ground radar to scan the fields in search of a shallow grave. The chances were high that my father's remains would quickly be found. That my uncle Salvatore, after all those long decades of uncertainty, would finally be able to say his goobyes. And that I, conversely, would in some way be able to say hello.

The task could wait until I got back to Sussex however. Right at that moment my only intention was to enjoy the little time that remained to me there in Italy. Lap up the final hour or two I might be privileged enough to spend in Lucio's company.

"Let me treat you to dinner somewhere," I offered as he veered steering wheel into a precious curbside parking space. "To thank you for all your help."

Twisting key from ignition, he turned me half a smile. "Dinner - yes of course. I'm afraid I'm too old-fashioned to allow a lady to pay for me however. But if you like we could - what's that expression? - go Dutch."

It was a deal.

"There's something I have to check first though. Something my curiosity won't allow me to put on hold." Unclicking seat belt, he pressed finger to lips, nodded towards Dante curled up fast asleep on the rear seat. It had been a long day for him too. "We'll leave him here. It won't take long."

We'd parked just a couple of buildings down from the library, I realised as I stretched myself from passenger door. The evening was full of voices, the buzz of passing scooters; after the soft steady swoosh of the motorway and then main coast road, Punto San Giacomo came as something as a sonic shock.

"Ettore Lo Bianco. Quite an unusual name. And Francesco told us his hometown too: Lecce. I just wonder if we might be able to find a relative. A brother or sister perhaps. Someone who like Salvatore D'Ambra has waited all these years with no news."

And so for the second time that day, twelve hours after the first, I watched as Lucio rattled brass key into library door, with a flourished hand indicated ladies first. Both the coolness and the silence were immediate, refreshing, the main hall faintly illuminated by the diagonal sheens of streetlight which washed across the marble floor from the high windows. I had never been in a library in the dark before. It felt somehow liberating and slightly risque, the sort of thing some silly teenager might do.

I followed Lucio's shadow towards the computer room, his hand reaching instinctively to the mains box like a homeowner's to hallway light switch. In the flickering blue light of the computer screen, I pulled up a chair beside him, watched as he typed the name into the Google search bar. Though unable to decipher much from the thrown up tangle of Italian, results seemed to be numerous. Finger clicking at mouse, Lucio leant himself further towards screen. There was what appeared to be an article from a newspaper entitled 'L'Arena', an accompanying image of some faded rennaissance-era fresco. Lucio's eyebrows lowered in frown - one which at first seemed doubtful before then settling into an unequivocal expression of deepest confusion.

"But I don't understand."

"What is it Lucio?" I asked. Though initially only relative, my interest had now peaked.

"Born in Lecce in 1923 it says."

But still I hadn't quite understood the significance.

As if in explanation, a finger pointed towards the top of the screen. "This article is from 19 years ago Mary. Look - 1988."

He turned towards me, that absorbing contoured face lent added mystery by the contrast of blue flickering light and darkest shadow.

"In 1988 Ettore Lo Bianco was alive and well and working as an art restorer in Verona."

Thus my mental blackboard was once more wiped clean. All those meticulously chalked up notes, the logically formed hypotheses and scenarios, with one sudden swipe of the duster swept from sight. An impenetrable slate-grey, that was all that remained.

If not my father's nor Ettore Lo Bianco's, then whose bones were they which the digger mouth had bitten out of that black Lincolnshire soil?

*

Amongst the other Google search results were numerous newspaper articles similar to the first, almost all accompanied by an image of some renaissance- or medieval-era artwork which Lo Bianco and his regional restoration team had worked on. He even had his own wikipedia entry; although brief in nature and focused principally on the various landmarks of his professional life, it confirmed his date and place of birth as well as the fact of his conscription to military service in 1941. No mention of wife or offspring, so most probably had remained a bachelor all of his life. Most notable amongst the accompanying list of qualifications meanwhile was a first-class honours degree in Art History from Cambridge Univeristy.

"No obituary," I found myself whispering as Lucio continued to click through the search results. "There's no obituary."

My father's closest wartime friend was, it seemed, still alive.

A brief volley of mouse-clicks later and there they were on the screen before us: Ettore Lo Bianco's home address and telephone number. I recall that faint heart thud of anticipation as I stood at the library counter and watched Lucio lift receiver to ear. Peter Harvey, Salvatore D'Ambra, Francesco Brancaleone... Like gentle guiding hands, each successive interview had ushered me a little further into the story, taken me a few more stuttering steps through the mist. Would the voice on the other end of the line finally be able to lead us towards whichever terrible secret was there concealed?

"Signor Lo Bianco? Ettore Lo Bianco?"

Lucio's opening words, their hopeful inflection, were practically all I would understand of the brief subsequent conversation. I was left to interpret the gestural and nonverbal - the way his initial thrilled optimism quickly collapsed to a shock so profound it was almost disquieting to witness. He was left staring at the now-lowered receiver there in his fist like a man who'd been handed a live grenade.

"I asked if he was the same Ettore Lo Bianco who'd been a prisoner at camp 106a in England. If he'd helped paint the altar." Finally, Lucio turned his gaze towards me, his expression dulled with incomprehension. "He told me to please never to call him again. Then hung up."

~~~~~