‘And that means I get to stay here?’ the other one asked, making no attempt to disguise his irritation at having been finessed into staying there in the cold.

‘You can wait inside. Danieli’s calling the owner. I think he lives around here somewhere.’ He handed his partner the phone. ‘Call in if he doesn’t show up.’

With an attempt at good grace the second officer took the phone with a smile. ‘I’ll stay until he shows up. But next time I get to take the suspect in.’

His partner smiled and nodded. Good feelings restored, they approached the woman who, during their long conversation, had remained exactly where she was, seated on the pillar, eyes studying the damaged window and the shards of glass that spread out in a monochrome rainbow in front of it.

‘Come with me,’ the first policeman said.

Silently she pushed herself away from the pillar and started towards the entrance to a narrow calle to the left of the destroyed window. Neither policeman made note of the fact that she knew the way to begin the shortest route to the Questura.

It took them ten minutes to walk there, during which time neither the woman nor the policeman spoke. Had any of the very few people who saw them bothered to pay attention to them as they walked across the sleeping expanse of Piazza San Marco and down the narrow calle that led towards San Lorenzo and the Questura, they would have seen an attractive, well-dressed woman walking in company with a uniformed policeman. Strange to see at four in the morning, but perhaps her house had been burgled or she’d been called in to identify a wayward child.

There was no one waiting to let them in, so the policeman had to ring repeatedly before the sleep-dulled face of a young policeman popped out from the guard room to the right of the door. When he saw them, he ducked back and re-emerged seconds later, pulling on his jacket. He opened the door with a muttered apology. ‘No one told me you were coming, Ruberti,’ he said. The other dismissed his apology, but then waved him back towards his bed, remembering what it was to be new to the force and dead with heavy sleep.