Death of a Dutchman [antikvár]

One'Signora Giusti!' protested Lorenzini, holding the receiver away from his ear and throwing open his free hand in despair. Across the room, the plump, pink-faced carabiniere who had been about to roll a fresh sheet of paper on to the typewriter stopped and grinned. He could hear everything that the chattering voice on the other end of the line was saying from where he sat, and when it stopped he was still grinning.'That's twice today and three times yesterday,' he said.'Oi-oi-oi!' grumbled Lorenzini, replacing the receiver with a grimace. But he added, 'Poor old biddy.'Last time she'd got him round there she had kept him for most of the morning, telling him the story of her life, interrupting herself each time he got up to leave to invent some new complaint against one or other of her neighbours. The Florentines hated her, she claimed, because she was Milanese. As she recounted the persecution she had to suffer, huge tears rolled down her face and splashed on to her tiny hands which were as thin and pale as a sparrow's legs.'And I'm ninety-one years old!' she would wail pitifully. 'Ninety-one years old I'd be better off dead . . .''No, no. Signora, come on, now.' And each time the unfortunate young man sat down on the edge of a hard chair and tried to quieten her, off she would go again about the quarrel that had broken out over her engagement - seventy-three years ago but it seemed like yesterday! - and the tiny hands would gesticulate happily, the moist eyes glitter with malicious delight at having recaptured her victim.7