|
Peter Van Greenaway ~ Further Information ~ Biography
The author was born 1929 and died in 1988, originally a lawyer before turning full-time author. HI s
main series character was Inspector Cherry.
Sample from The Killing Cup
THE MARCHESA is undoubtedly mad"
Delivered of indictment the little priest paused, to rest and reflect, on a mossy bridge straddling the icy waters of the Orno, or was it some fugitive tributary from the not so distant Alps in the Gran Paradiso region? The bridge marked the boundary between his parish and the latifondi of the Marchesa Vittoria del Deodati—Madame la Marquise as she was much known.
Padre Gaspare Carrema sleeved his perspiring brow, removed his round black hat, not in salutation to the illustrious name fresh in his mind, but as tribute to the Piedmont sun bouncing and rolling off the mountains to bring swelter to the scores of Elysian valleys aspersing the province.
Comfortably warm; the stones of the parapet to his touch; cool to the mind that swirl of streamwater below; but the sun above seemed more than usually pitiless, fit, verily, for pagans to worship.
Piano! Don't let yourself be upset by godless unmentionables since she is one. With such an errand to perform you must be calm, collected and—and most circumspect.
Well pleased by the mot juste he fanned his heated face all the more vigorously.
"Indeed, the Marchesa is mad," he repeated, before taking a step that brought him entirely out of his world and into hers.
Not a bad world at that, Carrema seemed to convey by his predatory survey. The blossom of a great cherry orchard to his left spread like a linger of snow, mocking the far white of the alpine peaks. To the right an ancient grove of chestnuts bordering the stream's bank followed the turn of the road for half a mile, very nearly to the eastern slopes of the foot-hills on which stood the Castello Deodati itself. |
