Free Mozzarella Most Murderous by NANCY FAIRBANKS

after I’d had to bring the children to the dinner. “Shall I take the little ones up to bed, Bianca?” she asked, although I was sure she had no intention of being left out of the fun.
    “Don’t make us go upstairs, Mama,” cried Andrea, who had been devouring his fish with gusto. “The dinner’s so delicious. We want to finish, don’t we, Giulia?”
    Constanza beamed at them. “Such sweet children. Of course, they must stay. It pleases me to see little ones appreciating good food.”
    My daughter nodded vigorously over a pretty dress, now dotted with sauce from the pasta and a few sprigs of rosemary from the fish. Since she had a forkful of fish waving in time to her nods, a bit of rosemary sailed in my direction. However, used to such problems, I quickly draped a napkin over my shoulder in case it landed.
    “Can’t Granny have dinner here, and then we’ll go upstairs?” Andrea asked. “Signora Blue is telling me and Papa what’s in everything, so we can tell you, Mama, and you can make these things. And then Granny can tell us a story before we go to bed.”
    Lorenzo stood up to kiss his mother, who was then duly introduced and took a seat beside Hank Girol. He rose courteously to pull out her chair and greeted her warmly. Violetta is an amazing woman, all curls and flounces and pretty ways. She flirted right back over the next course, a caponata that raised questions about the capers from Constanza. She detected that they had been preserved in vinegar rather than brine, as was preferable. The dish was delicious. Obviously, she just liked to complain.
    I could hear my mother-in-law telling Lorenzo that she had taken the wrong plane from Rome and ended up in Milan, rather than Naples, where a charming employee of Alitalia had been so sympathetic that he had taken her out for a wonderful meal, a risotto , which the Milanese do so well, until such time as she could get a plane to Naples. No one but my mother-in-law could manage to get on the wrong plane—she’d probably been flirting with the ticket-taker—and cap that off by getting a free meal and a free ticket to her original destination. However, she was good with the children and an amiable woman in general—she’d come to live with us after Lorenzo’s father died—except for her propensity to accuse me of a desire to be unfaithful to her son.
    “Well, my husband’s colleagues are scandalized that we have a third child on the way,” I said in response to a remark from Ruggiero about the fecundity of beautiful women.
    “There is no scandal in children,” said Constanza. “Children are a gift from God. What fault could Romans find in—”
    “Oh, the good things of life that are taken away from the first children by each additional child—education, cottages on the beach, cultural opportunities,” I replied airily.
    “Years of sleeplessness for the parents,” my husband added.
    “One hires a nursemaid to take care of wakeful children,” said Constanza. “You should pay no attention to your husband’s colleagues, Signora Massoni. God has blessed you.” Then she looked at me narrowly, with the eye of a woman who has borne her own children, and added, “And he will bless you again very soon. I am surprised you felt able to leave Rome in your condition.”
    “My doctor doesn’t seem to think the baby will arrive this week,” I replied, and switched the subject. “Having heard of how beautiful Paolina was, I’m surprised that she wasn’t married with children of her own.”
    “You seem amazingly interested in a woman you did not know, Signora,” said our hostess.
    “I did not know her, but Carolyn spent time with her before she died and was quite taken with Paolina, weren’t you, Carolyn?”
    Carolyn nodded and swallowed a mouthful of her caponata . “Yes,” she agreed. “We had a mutual interest in poetry. In fact, Paolina wrote poetry, which I found admirable. Signora Ricci, this caponata is marvelous. I do love eggplant,