It was indeed, Montalbano confirmed, and for the third time he explained his reasons for acting in this manner. Father Baldovino seemed persuaded, yet begged the inspector to hurry up, “to avoid untoward speculation and spare the already distraught family yet another torment.”
~
“Inspector Montalbano? This is Mr. Luparello.”
“What the hell! Didn’t you die?” Montalbano was about to say, but he stopped himself in the nick of time.
“I’m his son,” the other continued, in a very educated, polite tone that had no trace of dialect whatsoever. “My name is Stefano. I’m afraid I must appeal to your kindness and make what may seem to you an unusual request. I’m calling you on my mother’s behalf.”
“By all means, if I can be of any help.”
“Mama would like to meet you.”
“What’s unusual about that? I myself was intending to ask your mother if I could drop by sometime.”
“The thing is, Inspector, Mama would like to meet you by tomorrow at the latest.”
“My God, Mr. Luparello, I really haven’t got a single free moment these days, as you can imagine. And neither do you, I should think.”
“Don’t worry, we can find ten minutes. How about tomorrow afternoon at five o’clock sharp?”
~
“Montalbano, sorry to make you wait, but I was—”
“On the toilet, in your element.”
“Come on, what do you want?”
“I wanted to let you in on something very serious.
The pope just phoned me from the Vatican, really pissed off at you.”
“What are you talking about?!”
“He’s furious because he’s the only person in the world who hasn’t received your report on the Luparello autopsy. He felt neglected and told me he intends to excommunicate you. You’re screwed.”
“Montalbano, you’ve completely lost your mind.”
“Can you tell me something, just out of curiosity?”
“Sure.”
“Do you kiss ass out of ambition or natural inclination?”
“Natural inclination, I think.”
The sincerity of the response caught the inspector by surprise.
“Listen, have you finished examining the clothes Luparello was wearing? Did you find anything?”
“We found what you’d expect. Traces of semen on the underwear and trousers.”
“And inside the car?”
“We’re still examining it.”
“Thanks. Now go back to the toilet.”
~
“Inspector? I’m calling from a phone booth on the provincial road, near the old factory. I did what you asked me to do.”
“Tell me about it, Fazio.”
“You were absolutely right. Luparello’s BMW
came from Montelusa, not Vigàta.”
“Are you certain?”
“On the Vigàta side the beach is interrupted by cement blocks. You can’t get through. He would have had to fly.”
“Did you find out which way he might have come?”
“Yes, but it’s totally crazy.”
“Why? Explain.”
“Because, even though from Montelusa to Vigàta there are dozens of roads and byways that one can take to avoid being seen, at a certain point, to get to the Pasture, Luparello’s car would have had to pass through the dry bed of the Canneto.”
“The Canneto? But it’s impassable!”
“Well, I did it, and therefore somebody else could have done it. It’s completely dry. The only problem is, my car’s suspension is ruined. And since you didn’t want me to take a squad car, I’m going to have to—”
“I’ll pay for the repairs myself. Anything else?”
“Yes. As it was pulling out of the riverbed and turning onto the sand, the BMW’s tires left some tracks. If we tell Jacomuzzi right away, we can get a cast of them.”
“Fuck Jacomuzzi.”
“Yes, sir. Need anything else?”
“No, Fazio, just come back to headquarters. And thanks.”
5
The little beach of Puntasecca, a compact strip of sand sheltered by a hill of white marl, was deserted at that hour. When the inspector arrived, Gegè was already there waiting for him, leaning against his car and smoking a cigarette.
“Come on out, Salvù,” he said to Montalbano.
“Let’s enjoy the fine night air a minute.”
They stood there a bit in silence, smoking. Then Gegè, having put out his cigarette, began to speak.
“I know what you want to ask me, Salvù. I’m well prepared. You can ask me anything you like, even jumping around.”
They smiled at this shared memory. They’d known each other since La Primina, the little private kindergarten where the teacher was Signorina Marianna, Gegè’s sister, some fifteen years his senior. Salvo and Gegè were listless schoolboys, learning their lessons like parrots, and like parrots repeating them in class. Some days, however, Signorina Marianna wasn’t satisfied with those litanies, so she’d start jumping around in her questions; that is, she wouldn’t follow the order in which the information had been presented. And this meant trouble, because then you had to have understood the material and grasped the logical connections.
“How’s your sister doing?” asked Montalbano.
“I took her to Barcelona. There’s a specialized eye clinic there. They say they can work miracles. They told me they can get the right eye, at least, to recover in part.”
“When you see her, give her my best.”
“I will. But as I was saying, I’m well prepared, so you can start firing away with the questions.”
“How many people do you have working for you at the Pasture?”
“Between whores and fags of various sorts, twenty-eight. Then there’s Filippo di Cosmo and Manuele Lo Pìparo, who are there just to make sure there’s no trouble. The smallest thing, you know, and I’m screwed.”
“Gotta keep your eyes open.”
“Right. Do you realize the kind of problems I’d have if there was a brawl or somebody got knifed or OD’d?”
“Still sticking to light drugs?”
“Yeah. Grass, coke at the most. Ask the street cleaners if they ever find a single syringe, go ahead and ask ’em.”
“I believe you.”
“Then there’s Giambalvo, chief of vice, who’s always breathing down my neck. He says he’ll put up with me as long as I don’t create any complications and bust his balls with something big.”
“I know Giambalvo. He doesn’t want to have to shut down the Pasture or he’d lose his cut. What do you give him, a monthly wage? A fixed percentage?
How much does he get?”
Gegè smiled.
“Get yourself transferred to vice and you’ll find out. I’d like that. It’d give me a chance to help out a poor wretch like you, who lives only on his salary and goes around dressed in rags.”
“Thanks for the compliment. Now tell me about that night.”
“Well, it must have been around ten, ten-thirty, when Milly, who was working that night, saw some headlights coming from the Montelusa side near the sea, heading up toward the Pasture at a good clip.
Freaked her out.”
“Who’s this Milly?”
“Her real name’s Giuseppina La Volpe, thirty years old, born at Mistretta. She’s a smart girl.”
He took a folded-up sheet of paper out of his pocket and handed it to Montalbano.
“Here, I’ve written out everyone’s real name. And address, too, in case you wanted to talk to somebody in person.”
“Why did you say Milly got scared?”
“Because there’s no way a car could come from that direction, unless it passed through the Canneto, which’d be a sure way to bust up your car and your ass into the bargain. At first she thought it was some brilliant idea of Giambalvo’s, a surprise roundup or something. Then she realized it couldn’t be vice: you don’t do a roundup with only one squ
ad car. So she got even more scared, because it occurred to her it might be the Monterosso boys, who’ve been waging war on me, trying to take the Pasture away, and maybe there would even be a shoot-out. So, to be ready to hightail it out of there at any moment, she kept her eyes on that car, and her client started complaining. But she had enough time to see that the car was turning and heading straight for the bushes nearby, driving almost inside of them. And then it stopped.”
“You’re not telling me anything new, Gegè.”
“The guy who’d been fucking Milly then dropped her off and went back up the path, in reverse, to the provincial road. Milly waited around for another trick, walking back and forth. Then Carmen arrived at the spot where she’d been a minute before, with a devoted client who comes to see her at the same time every Saturday and Sunday and spends hours with her. Carmen’s real name is on that piece of paper I gave you.”
“Her address, too?”
“Yes. Before the client turned off his headlights, Carmen noticed that the two inside the BMW were already fucking.”
“Did she tell you exactly what she saw?”
“Yes. It was only a few seconds, but she got a good look. Maybe because it had made an impression on her, since you don’t usually see cars like that at the Pasture. Anyway, the girl, who was in the driver’s seat—oh, I forgot to mention, Milly said it was the girl who was driving—she turned, climbed onto the lap of the man beside her, fiddling around with her hands underneath, but you couldn’t see them, and then she started going up and down. You haven’t forgotten how people fuck, have you?”
“I don’t think so, but we can check. When you’ve finished telling me what you’ve got to tell me, drop your pants, put your pretty little hands on the trunk, and stick your ass up in the air. If I’ve forgotten anything, you can remind me. Now go on, and stop wasting my time.”
“When they were done, the girl opened the car door and got out, straightened her skirt, and shut the door. The man, instead of starting up the car and leaving, stayed where he was, with his head leaning back.
The girl passed very close by Carmen’s car, and at that exact moment a car’s headlights shined right on her.
She was a good-looking lady, blond, well dressed, and she had a shoulder bag in her left hand. Then she headed toward the old factory.”
“Anything else?”
“Yes. Manuele, who was making the rounds in his car, saw her leave the Pasture and walk toward the provincial road. Since she didn’t look to him like Pasture material, by the way she was dressed, he turned around to follow her, but then a car came by and picked her up.”
“Wait a second, Gegè. Did Manuele see her standing there, with her thumb out, waiting for someone to give her a ride?”
“Salvù, how do you do it? You really are a born cop.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because that’s exactly the point Manuele’s not convinced about. In other words, he didn’t see the chick make any signal, but the car did stop. And that’s not all: although the car was moving along at a pretty good clip, Manuele had the impression the door was already open when it put on the brakes to pick her up.
But Manuele didn’t think to take down the license number—there wasn’t any reason.”
“Right. And what can you tell me about the man in the BMW, Luparello?”
“Not much. He wore glasses, and he never took his jacket off to fuck, even though it was hot as hell.
But there’s one point where Milly’s story and Carmen’s don’t jibe. Milly says that when the car arrived, it looked like the man had a tie or a black ascot around his neck; Carmen maintains that when she saw him, he had his shirt unbuttoned and that was all. But that seems like an unimportant detail to me, since Luparello could have taken off the tie while he was fucking. Maybe it bothered him.”
“His tie but not his jacket? But that’s not unimportant, Gegè, because no tie or ascot was found inside the car.”
“That doesn’t mean anything. Maybe it fell out onto the sand when the girl got out.”
“Jacomuzzi’s men combed the area and didn’t find anything.”
They stood there in silence, thoughtful.
“Maybe there’s another explanation for what Milly saw,” Gegè suddenly said. “Maybe it was never a question of ties or ascots. Maybe the man still had his seat belt on—after all, they’d just driven along the bed of the Canneto, with all its rocks and sticks—and he took it off when the girl climbed onto his lap, since the seat belt would surely have been a bother.”
“It’s possible.”
“I’ve told you everything I was able to find out about this, Salvù. And I tell you in my own interest.
Because for a big cheese like Luparello to come and croak at the Pasture isn’t good for business. Now everybody’s eyes are gonna be on it, so the sooner you finish your investigation, the better. After a couple of days people forget, and we can all go back to work in peace. Can I go now? These are peak hours at the Pasture.”
“Wait. What’s your opinion of the whole thing?”
“Me? You’re the cop. But just to make you happy, I will say that the whole thing stinks to me. Let’s imagine the girl is a high-class whore, a foreigner. Are you gonna tell me Luparello doesn’t have a place to take her?”
“Gegè, do you know what a perversion is?”
“You’re asking me? I could tell you a few things that would make you puke on my shoes. I know what you’re going to say, that they came to the Pasture because they thought it would make it more erotic. And that does happen sometimes. Did you know that one night a judge showed up with his bodyguards?”
“Really? Who was it?”
“Judge Cosentino. See, I can even tell you the name. The evening before he was kicked out of office, he came to the Pasture with an escort car, picked up a transvestite, and had sex with him.”
“What did the bodyguards do?”
“They went for a long walk on the beach. But to get back to the subject: Cosentino knew he was a marked man and decided to have a little fun. But what interest could Luparello have had? He wasn’t that kind of guy. Everybody knows he liked the ladies, but he was always careful never to let anyone see him. And where is the woman who could make him risk everything he had and everything he stood for just to get laid? I don’t buy it, Salvù.”
“Go on.”
“If we suppose, on the other hand, that the chick was not a whore, then I really don’t know. It’s even less likely—downright impossible—they’d let themselves be seen at the Pasture. Also, the car was driven by the girl, that much is certain. Aside from the fact that no one would ever trust a whore with a car like that, that lady must have been something to strike fear in a man’s heart. First of all, she has no problem driving down into the Canneto, and then, when Luparello dies between her thighs, she gets up like nothing, closes the door, and walks away. Does that seem normal to you?”
“I don’t think so.”
At this point Gegè started laughing and flicked on his cigarette lighter.
“What are you doing?” asked Montalbano.
“Come over here, faggot. Bring your face to the light.”
The inspector obeyed, and Gegè illuminated his eyes. Then he extinguished the lighter.
“I get it. All along, you, a man of the law, were thinking the exact same thoughts as me, a man of crime. And you just wanted to see if they matched up.
Eh, Salvù?”
“You guessed right.”
“I’m hardly ever wrong when it comes to you.
Gotta go now. Ciao.”
“Thanks,” said Montalbano.
The inspector left first, but a moment later his friend pulled up beside him, gesturing for him to slow down.
“What do you want?”
“I don’t know where my head was. I wanted to tell you this before. Do you have any idea what a pretty sight you made this afternoon, hand in hand with Corporal Ferrara?”
Then he accelerated, putt
ing a safe distance between himself and the inspector, his arm waving good-bye.
~
Back at home, Montalbano jotted down a few of the details that Gegè had provided, but sleep soon came over him. He glanced at his watch, noticed it was a little past one, and went to bed. The insistent ringing of the doorbell woke him up. His eyes looked over at the alarm clock: two-fifteen. He got up with some effort; the early stages of sleep always slowed down his reflexes.
“Who the fuck is that, at this hour?”
He went to the door just as he was, in his briefs, and opened up.
“Hi,” said Anna.
He’d completely forgotten; the girl had indeed said that she would come see him around this hour.
Anna was looking him over.
“I see you’re wearing the right clothes,” she said, then stepped inside.
“Say what it is you have to tell me, then go back home. I’m dead tired.”
Montalbano was truly annoyed by the intrusion.
He went into his bedroom, put on a pair of pants and shirt, and returned to the dining room. Anna wasn’t there. She had gone into the kitchen, opened the refrigerator, and was already sinking her teeth into a bread roll filled with prosciutto.
“I’m so hungry I can hardly see.”
“You can talk while you’re eating.”
Montalbano put the espresso pot on the stove.
“You’re going to make coffee? At this hour? Will you be able to fall back asleep afterward?”
“Anna, please.” He was unable to be polite.
“All right. This afternoon, after we split up, I found out from a colleague, who for his part had been told by an informer, that starting yesterday, Tuesday morning, some guy’s been going around to all the jewelers, receivers of stolen goods, and pawnbrokers both legitimate and illegitimate to alert them that if someone came in to buy or pawn a certain piece of jewelry, they should let him know. The piece in question is a necklace, with a solid-gold chain and a heart-shaped pendant covered with diamonds. The kind of thing you’d find at some cheap department store, except that this one’s real.”
The Shape of Water Page 4