And Then You Die by Michael Dibdin

Gruppo Campari: Campari, Cinzano, Cynar, Asti Cinzano, Riccadonna . Snæbjörn Guðmundsson.’
    ‘What’s Campari got to do with it?’ asked Zen.
    ‘That’s just my private business card,’ the man explained. ‘I’m also the Italian consul here.’
    He indicated the uniformed woman.
    ‘Signora Sigurðardòttir is a police officer. She wishes to ask you a few questions. I will translate. Please sit here.’
    Zen took a chair facing the desk and the interview began. The form was invariable: the woman spoke in a language utterly alien to Zen, the man followed with a question in Italian, Zen answered, the man spoke to the woman in the language she had used, and she made notes on a pad open in front of her.
    ‘Signor Butani, I have already spoken to members of the crew on this flight. I have been given to understand by them that you were boarded ahead of all the other passengers, and through a separate entrance, bypassing the normal controls.’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Why was this?’
    ‘I have recently spent several months in hospital, recuperating after a serious accident. The ground staff had been informed of this fact, and kindly arranged for me to be given priority boarding .’
    ‘What kind of accident?’
    ‘A car crash.’
    ‘What injuries did you sustain?’
    ‘Serious concussion, head injuries, compression injuries to chest including two fractured ribs and a collapsed lung, limb fractures requiring pinning, plus the usual assortment of relatively minor fractures, lacerations and contusions.’
    ‘Yet you now appear to be fully mobile.’
    ‘The accident occurred almost a year ago. I still suffer from limb stiffness and some psychological effects, particularly when forced to spend long hours in a small, crowded space such as an aircraft. Fortunately I had contacts at Alitalia who were able to ensure that I was not inconvenienced any more than was strictly necessary.’
    The female officer made lengthy notes. She was stunningly beautiful, Zen thought abstractly, and would certainly have cut a wide swathe through the herds of ragazzi on any Italian street. But somehow her beauty remained purely theoretical. He didn’t feel remotely interested or excited by her.
    ‘Do you have your boarding pass, please?’ þórunn Sigurðardòttir asked.
    Zen found it in his wallet and handed it over.
    ‘This identifies your seat number as 24A,’ the woman said.
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘But I understand from the crew members I interviewed that you were in fact seated in 25F.’
    ‘That’s right. There was someone sitting in the next seat to mine, and he didn’t really seem the sort of person I wanted to be beside for ten hours unless I had to. The plane wasn’t full, and I spotted an empty seat on the other side of the cabin, so once we were airborne I moved over there.’
    ‘And the passenger who had been sitting next to you then took your original seat, is that correct?’
    ‘It is. May I ask why any of this is of the slightest significance?’
    The uniformed woman spoke rapidly in her incomprehensible tongue. It didn’t sound to Zen’s ears much like English – it was probably some regional American dialect, he supposed – but he had no difficulty in understanding the tone of voice. This was confirmed when the consul translated.
    ‘Signora Sigurðardòttir has indicated that she wishes you to confine yourself to answering her questions.’
    Zen beamed ingratiatingly.
    ‘Please assure la signora ispettrice of my willingness to cooperate to the full with her enquiry, whatever it may concern.’
    Snæbjörn Guðmundsson duly translated, or at least said something to the woman, who had been eyeing Zen sharply. She nodded , then asked another question.
    ‘What is the purpose of your journey to the United States?’
    ‘Business.’
    ‘What kind of business?’
    Here Zen paused for the first time, at a loss how to answer. On the one hand, this woman was an accredited member of an American law-enforcement body, and therefore