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some kind of camera equipment rigged up inside the shop, but I thought it unlikely. ‘Tell you what,’ I said, surveying the unlit windows of the property across the way, most of them obscured behind wonky shutters, ‘I’ll keep this phone. You have my number. Call me if you want to talk about returning my book in some other way.’
    ‘No,’ she blurted. ‘You must wait.’ And for some murky reason best known to the most witless part of my psyche, I did just that. ‘I will tell you something now. Something important. Please. You will trust me because of this.’
    ‘Well, make it quick. I have a pressing appointment with my duvet.’
    ‘There is a door at the back of the shop. Do you see it? It is not locked. You must leave that way.’
    I turned and gazed over my shoulder towards a plain internal door that was positioned close to the stationery supplies. It gave no indication of what lay behind it.
    ‘Thanks all the same, but I think I’ll go out the front.’
    ‘But this is what I must tell you. The polizia are coming. I cannot stop it. They will be at the shop in less than a minute.’
    ‘Oh, please.’
    ‘It is the truth. I give you this, and you trust me, yes? Please, I think so.’
    ‘Well, I don’t.’ I frowned. ‘And besides, how could you possibly know the police are on their way?’
    She drew a breath, and when she spoke again, I could detect a note of desperation in her voice. ‘Because I called them. Yes, I see them now. They will be with you very soon.’
    I gripped the phone tight to my ear. ‘Are you serious?’
    Oh, she was serious all right. Quite suddenly, the sound of footsteps reached me from further along the calle . Pressing my cheek against the door, I strained my eyes in the direction of the noise until I caught the blurred reflection of two figures in a slither of window glass. Then the figures themselves came hurtling into view – two men in blue police uniforms skidding to a halt outside. They were young. White-faced. Tense.
    They flinched when they saw me, and I did much the same thing. Fortunately, I also had the presence of mind to hook my toe around the door bolt and slide it home before either of them could think to lift the metal shutter. They thought of it soon enough, but by then all I heard was the clank and shuffle of the grille from behind me as I darted for the rear of the shop.
    The space behind the internal door was pitch-black and damp-smelling. I stretched my hand out in front of my face and the wall I found was wet and cold to the touch, even through the plastic of my gloves. Fumbling for my torch, I pointed the thin beam at my surroundings, but it barely tickled the darkness.
    ‘Which way?’ I yelled into the phone.
    ‘To your right. You should not waste time. They are close.’
    No kidding. A thumping sound came from the shop – the noise of the policemen using their shoulders for a key. They shouted in frenzied Italian.
    I aimed the torch beam down at the ground. The floor seemed to have been carpeted with drenched sponge – water was seeping through and bubbling up around my shoes. To my right, sodden cardboard boxes were stacked one on top of another, covered over with plastic sheeting. Drips splattered the plastic from above.
    A loud bang from behind me was followed by the crack and splinter of wood, the yammer of voices. The dark, slippery corridor beckoned, and I set off along it with my feet slapping through the wetness and my torch arcing dizzyingly from side to side.
    I found myself at another wall. The corridor swung left and I swung after it, stomping along the sodden carpet with the mysterious black liquid seeping through my canvas baseball shoes to my socks. It was as if the building was suffering from some kind of localised exposure to the acqua alta – the high waters that periodically flood the city.
    ‘Where are you?’ panted the voice on the phone. Touching. She almost sounded concerned for my welfare.
    ‘I can see another door,’ I