The Wings of the Sphinx

by Andrea Camilleri

  “They had probably escaped from their—how shall I say?—exploiters, without giving notice.”

  “What makes you think they were being exploited? They weren’t prostitutes, as far as we know, but dancers.”

  “Of course. But maybe they hadn’t finished paying whoever it was who had them come to Italy. You know how these expatriations work, don’t you? Their friend, on the other hand, arrived a week later.”

  Certainly a surprise blow to the head from a billy club would have had less of an effect on Montalbano.

  “Th-their . . . f-friend?”

  The cavaliere was bewildered by Montalbano’s extreme bewilderment.

  “Yes . . . Sonya Meyerev, also from Schelkovo. She—”

  “Where did you place her?”

  “We didn’t have enough time to place her, because after a week with us, she didn’t come home to the villa one evening. She disappeared.”

  “But didn’t you ask her friends if they knew anything?”

  “Of course we did. But Irina reassured us, saying that Sonya had run into a friend of her father’s and that she—”

  “Was it Masino who persuaded all three to come to your association?”

  “No. They showed up of their own accord.”

  “Have you got photos of the girls?”

  “I’ve got photocopies of their passports.”

  “Let’s go back inside. I want them.”

  As the cavaliere was printing them off the computer, Montalbano asked him:

  “Would you give me the address of the villa where the girls live?”

  “Certainly. It’s on the road to Montaperto. Just past the filling station. It’s a rather large villa . . .”

  “How large?”

  “Three floors. You’ll recognize it at once.”

  The little villa had suddenly grown considerably in size. “Do the girls eat there?”

  “Yes. We employ a cook and a maid. There’s also a woman, a sort of manager, who sleeps there with them. Sometimes our guests get a little restless. They quarrel over the silliest things, get into fights, do things to spite one another.”

  “Can I go there?”

  “Where?”

  “To the little villa.”

  The cavaliere did not look pleased.

  “Well, at this hour . . . The night watchman is already on duty. He has explicit orders not to let anyone in. As you can imagine, with all those women there, some good-for-nothings might try to . . . If you like, I could phone ahead and . . . but I don’t really see why you . . .”

  “Do the maid and the cook also sleep there?”

  “The cook, yes. The maid, no. She comes in at nine in the morning and works until one P.M.”

  “Write down the first and last name of the maid, along with her address and telephone number.”

  It was the first thing he did as soon as he got home. He set the photocopies down on the table and phoned.

  “Signora Ernestina Vullo? This is Inspector Montalbano.”

  “Inspector for what?”

  “The police.”

  “Listen, I kicked my son ’Ntoniu right outta the house on ’is ass. Is he a legal adult?”

  “Who?” asked Montalbano, a bit numb and wondering if the question was addressed to him.

  “My son. Is he a legal adult?”

  “I wouldn’t know.”

  “Of course he’s a legal adult! He’s thirty years old! So you just go look for ’im wherever the hell he happens a be jerking off and don’ come lookin’ for him anymore at my house. Good-b—”

  “Wait, signora, don’t hang up! I’m not calling you about your son, but about your job with the Benevolence Association, where they lodge—”

  “—those sluts! Those nasty little tarts! Hussies! Whores! Easy women! Forget about it, Inspector! Just imagine, in the morning the bitches walk all around the place naked!”

  Exactly what he wanted to know.

  “Listen, signora, please try to think calmly before answering. Try to remember as best you can. Some time ago there were three Russian girls at the villa: Irina, Sonya, and Katya. Do you remember them?”

  “Sure. Katya was a good girl. Sonya ran away.”

  “Did you happen to notice if all three girls had the same tattoo near the left shoulder blade?”

  “Yessir, a butterfly.”

  “All three of them?”

  “All three of them. All the same exack butterfly.”

  “Did you notice when the television news showed—”

  “I don’t watch television.”

  Was it any use having her come down to the station to show her the photos?

  He decided against it.

  “One time, but iss been two years now,” the woman continued, “I saw a tattoo on a Russian girl’s left shoulder blade, in the same exack place where the others had a butterfly.”

  “Was it a different kind of butterfly?”

  “No, sir, it wasn’t no butterfly . . . Wait a second, I can’t remember how iss called . . . iss called . . . ah, that’s it: cululùchira.”

  O matre santa, what could that be? A buttock tattoo? Wasn’t that a bit excessive, even for a nightclub dancer?

  “Could you explain to me what that is?”

  “Don’tcha know what it is? Good god, everybody knows what that is! So how’m I gonna ’splain you what it is?”

  “Try.”

  “Well . . . less say iss almos’ big as a fly, it flies around at night, an’ it makes light.”

  A firefly.

  The moment he set down the receiver, the phone rang.

  “Signor Montalbano? Adelina here.”

  “Hello, Adelì. What is it?”

  “Did you forget, signore?”

  “Forget what, Adelina?”

  “That my boy wanneta see you.”

  He’d completely forgotten about it.

  “You know, Adelì, I’ve been so busy that—”

  “My boy says iss urgent.”

  “I’ll go see him tomorrow morning, I promise. Good night, Adelì.”

  Since he had the phone in his hand, he used it.

  “Fazio?”

  “What is it, Chief?”

  “Sorry to bother you at home.”

  “Come on, Chief!”

  “Did you manage to find anything out at the furniture works?”

  “Inspector Augello and I decided that I would go check out the two in Montelusa. Took me only an hour to do everything. The first one makes modern furniture, without any gilding. The second one used to gild occasionally, up until two years ago. I asked the owner if he kept any purpurin around, and he said that the little they had left they threw away.”

  “So are we on the wrong track, as you were saying?”

  “I’d say so.”

  “Let’s wait and see what Augello says, then we’ll decide. So, will you have a little time tomorrow morning?”

  “Of course. What do you want me to do?”

  “I found out that the Russian girls we’ve been talking about were lodged in a villa rented by Benevolence, which is an association presided over by Monsignor Pisicchio, the purpose of which is to find work for these girls. The monsignor’s right-hand man, Cavaliere Guglielmo Piro, who has a real estate agency, told me the villa belongs to a Montelusa company called Mirabilis. It’s large, a three-story villa on the road to Montaperto, after the filling station.”

  “You want me to go there?”

  “No. I want to know who’s in this Mirabilis company, the names of the people on the board of directors, the other members . . . I want to find out what’s officially known, but, above all, what is being kept from becoming officially known.”

  “I’ll try.”

  “I haven’t finished, sorry.”

  “Go on.”

  “I also want to know everything about this Cavaliere Guglielmo Piro since the time he was born. As I said, he runs a real estate agency in Montelusa. I want to know what people say about him.”

&n
bsp; “He seems fishy to you?”

  “What can I say? This whole association seems fishy to me. It’s just an intuition, though. Maybe the Monsignor doesn’t even know, but it’s possible that, behind his back . . .”

  “I’ll get going on it early tomorrow morning.”

  It wasn’t raining, though the weather remained bad. The sea had withdrawn from the edge of the veranda, retreating halfway down the beach. He could eat outside.

  He savored a bowl of caponata, accompanying it with bread made of durum wheat, a bread he liked so much that sometimes, when it was fresh, he would break it with his hands and wolf it down by itself, pure and simple.

  Before starting to ring, the phone politely waited until he had finished eating.

  10

  “Salvo, it’s me.”

  Livia!

  He had stopped waiting for her call. After what they had said to each other the last time, he didn’t think she would call him back. If anything, it was he who should have called back. And he had tried to do so, but had found nobody home and thus given up. Without persisting, and feeling even a bit relieved at having avoided the discussion. Because to continue to talk to each other by phone would have been pointless; it might even make things worse. They had to meet in person and talk. And this was precisely what frightened him. The tiniest thing, the wrong word, a minor angry outburst, might send them both down a path of no return. Meanwhile they were both left hanging as though in midair, like children’s balloons which, half-emptied of helium, can’t manage either to rise to the sky or fall to the ground.

  With each passing day, this sort of limbo became worse than a living hell.

  Immediately the sound of her voice made his heart jump. He felt his mouth go dry and had trouble speaking.

  “I’m so happy to hear from you. Really.”

  “What were you doing?”

  “I’ve just finished eating dinner on the veranda. Luckily it stopped raining, because it’s been days—”

  “Here it’s not raining. Were you able to sit outside in shirtsleeves?”

  “Yes, it wasn’t cold.”

  “What did you eat?”

  Then he understood. Livia was trying to be there with him, at his house in Marinella. She was imagining him the way she had seen him so many times before, trying to annul the distance by picturing him as he performed the customary acts he did every evening. He was suddenly overwhelmed by a feeling that was a mixture of melancholy, tenderness, regret, and desire.

  “Caponata,” he said in a choked-up voice.

  How on earth was it possible to get a lump in one’s throat simply by uttering the word “caponata”?

  “Why did you stop calling?”

  “I tried a few nights ago, but you didn’t answer. After that I didn’t—”

  “You didn’t feel like trying anymore?”

  He was about to answer that he hadn’t had the time, but he refrained, preferring to tell the truth.

  “I didn’t have the courage.”

  “Me neither.”

  “How come you decided to call tonight?”

  “Because we can’t go on this way.”

  “That’s true.”

  Silence descended.

  But Montalbano continued to hear Livia’s slightly panting breath. Was it only because she was talking to him that she was breathing like that? Was it emotion, or was it something else?

  “How are you?” he asked her.

  “How do you think? What about you?”

  “I’m certainly not feeling very good.”

  “But are you working?”

  “Yes, I’ve got a case on my hands that—”

  “You’re lucky.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you can distract yourself. I, on the other hand, couldn’t take it anymore.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I called in sick. It’s not a complete lie; I have a little fever every day.”

  “Every day? Have you called the doctor?”

  “Yes, it’s nothing serious. I have to take a boring series of tests. At any rate, starting yesterday, I can stay home for two weeks. I couldn’t take going to the office any longer. You know what I mean?” She laughed cheerlessly. “For the first time, I made a big mess at work and was reprimanded.”

  Then, without thinking, since it came from the bottom of his heart, he said:

  “But if you’re not going to the office, why don’t you come down here?”

  A few moments passed before Livia resumed speaking.

  “Is that really what you want?”

  “Get on a flight tomorrow. I’ll come get you at the airport. Come on, there’s no need to think it over.”

  “Isn’t it better to wait?”

  “Wait for what?”

  “For you to solve the case you’re working on. I don’t think you’d have much time for me if I came tomorrow.”

  “I’ll drop everything.”

  “Salvo, you know that in the end you wouldn’t be able to. You would start finding excuses that I don’t think I could stand to hear, the way things are now.”

  “I promise I’ll—”

  “I know all about your promises.”

  Montalbano thought: Here are the wrong words I was afraid of. Now the usual squabbling will begin. Instead, Livia added:

  “Anyway, I don’t think we would be able to talk about us if we just saw each other on the run.We have to be able to look one another in the eye as we speak, for however long it takes.”

  She was right.

  “So, what’ll we do?”

  “Let’s do this. As soon as you know you’re going to have a few days off, really off, call me up, and I’ll come. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “We’ll talk again soon.”

  “Okay.”

  “Have a good sleep.”

  “You too.”

  “I . . . I’ll be in touch.”

  And they hung up. Montalbano had the distinct impression that Livia was about to say I love you, but her embarrassment had prevented her. He felt so moved that he could hardly breathe. He ran out on the veranda, grabbed the railing with his hand, and took a deep breath. Then he sat down and laid his head on his folded arms.

  There was a note of sadness in Livia’s voice so profound that it was making him feel ill. Only one other time had he heard the same note in Livia’s words: when she had spoken about the child she could no longer have.

  He slept poorly, the usual tossing and turning, the usual getting up and going back to bed, the usual flicking the light on and off to look at the hands of the clock, which seemed to be moving in slow motion.

  At last he saw the glow of a clear dawn filter in through the window.

  He got up feeling hopeful. Maybe the fisherman had been wrong about how long the bad weather would last. And that was indeed the case. The sky was pure, the air cool and crisp. The sea wasn’t calm yet, but neither was it so rough as to prevent the fishing boats from going out. He felt comforted by the thought that he could finally eat fresh fish at Enzo’s.

  So comforted that he went back to bed and slept for three hours straight to make up for the sleep he’d lost.

  Leaving the house, he decided not to drop in at the station but to go immediately to the prison a few miles outside Montelusa. He had no authorization whatsoever to speak with the inmate, but he was counting on his good friendship with the warden, a woman who understood things.

  And, in fact, it took him no time at all to find himself in a small room face-to-face with Pasquale, Adelina’s son.

  “When are they going to grant you house arrest?”

  “Just a few more days. Supposedly the judge needs to think it over. What’s there to think about? The horns on his head? But I couldn’t wait any longer to tell you what I have to tell you.”

  “And what do you have to tell me?”

  “Inspector, this is very important. I mean it. Even though I’m in here with you, I never said anything to you. Kn
ow what I mean?”

  “Exactly.”

  “So that’s the deal: You never met with Pasquale Cirrinciò in prison. I don’t wanna get a reputation for being a rat.”

  “I give you my word.”

  “Have you identified the dead girl you found at the dump?”

  “Not yet, unfortunately.”

  Pasquale stopped to think this over a moment, then said:

  “The other evening when I was watching TV, they showed two photographs.”

  Montalbano pricked up his ears. He had been ready for anything, except for Pasquale to tell him something connected to his ongoing investigation.

  “You mean the butterfly tattoo?”

  “Yessir.”

  “You’d seen it before?”

  “Yessir.”

  “On a girl’s body?”

  “No, sir, in a photograph.”

  “Go on. Don’t make me have to pry the words out of you.”

  “Do you remember Peppi Cannizzaro?”

  “No. Who is he?”

  “He was charged with armed robbery at the Banca Regionale of Montelusa. They kept him inside for a few months, then let ’im go ’cause they din’t have no proof.”

  “But did he do it?”

  Pasquale brought his face so close to the inspector’s that it looked like he wanted to kiss him.

  “Yes, but they din’t have no proof.”

  “Okay, and what’s Peppi Cannizzaro got to do with—”

  “Lemme explain. They took Peppi Cannizzaro and put him in the same cell as me.”

  “Did you already know him?”

  Pasquale became evasive.

  “Well . . . we worked together a few times.”

  Better not ask what kind of “work” they had done together.

  “Go on.”

  “Inspector, you gotta believe me. This wasn’t the same Peppi I used to know. He was changed. Before, he was always jokin’ around, all friendly, laughing over the littlest bullshit. But now he was all silent and gloomy and nervous.”

  “Why?”

  “He’d fallen in love.”

  “And that was the effect it had on him?”

  “Yeah, ’cause he couldn’t be without the girl. At night he would groan and call her name. I felt really bad for the poor guy! He was always holdin’ up a picture of her, and now and then he’d kiss it. Then one day he let me see it. She was really a beautiful girl.”