A Known Evil

by Aidan Conway

  “Allow me to carry your bag, Signore,” he said, grabbing the well-travelled holdall. “What have you got in here?” he added, giving it a shake feeling now as if he too had been reborn.

  “Bricks, and old pipes. If I was going to be a workman, I had to be a convincing one.”

  “Workman?” said Rossi. “The plot thickens.”

  “Don’t worry,” Iannelli laughed, “once you get me a drink and get that fire of yours stoked up I’ll give you the full gen. But only you, mind, for now. You do know that I am a somewhat wanted man, don’t you? Or I will be, once they realize there aren’t any of my pulverized bones on the Palermo-Messina.”

  “Well, they’ll have their work cut out trying to sift through that crime scene,” commented Rossi. “I’d say you could sit easy for quite some time, possibly forever, if you were so inclined.”

  “I would kind of like to have my identity back,” said a more concerned-looking Iannelli now as the initial euphoria began to subside and something of the strain started to show through. “And a bite to eat. I’ve been lying low since I got back to Rome.”

  “And your folks?”

  “I bit the bullet, made a call. They’re sworn to secrecy and hey, we might even start talking again. Who knows.”

  “Come on,” said Rossi, “I’ll smuggle you in. If anyone sees you I can say I’ve got a burst water main. But where were you exactly?” he continued as he shepherded Iannelli back towards the safety of the flat. “Are you going to keep it a secret? Was there someone else in your car …? Did you …?”

  Fifty-Nine

  In another part of the city, another tired but determined wanderer had been having rather less luck in tracking down his missing friend. For two nights he’d received no communication. Up to then, they had always managed to keep their appointments in one way or another. Calling the public telephone was a tried and trusted channel. Even if it was busy they would manage to find a window when they could talk. He had tried for an hour one night, two hours the next, but nothing.

  And as time passed he began to worry for his friend’s safety as well as his own, for he was alone in a city he knew only from a crumpled tourist map and the hearsay advice and anecdotes of fellow migrants and asylum seekers. “Refugees”, as they used to say. But where was the refuge? Or “displaced” people. But that made him feel like a piece of furniture or a chess piece moved from one square to the next often by an unseen and sometimes sadistic hand.

  He had surprised himself with the rapidity of his journey but knew he’d got lucky. While the guards had been watching football, he and a bunch of assorted fugitives had slipped out of the Detention Centre through the fence which had already been cut but never properly repaired. Then they’d wandered towards the motorway and on to the service stations. Learning on the fly, they had identified a HGV with a Roman registration and had tried their luck. It was a simple (simple!) case of getting behind the vehicle when it slowed down, or stopped, opening the doors and swinging up inside it. But not a refrigerator truck, if you wanted to get out alive. Closing the door behind you, you sat tight or hid, praying the oxygen would last. Those already inside made the rules and decided how many was the safe limit. Not like those godforsaken creatures packed by traffickers into trucks out of Serbia, forgotten or abandoned and left to asphyxiate in an unimaginable final circle of hell.

  It was never easy having to turn others away. They had pleaded with him, some of them even carrying children in their arms. He’d had to use violence, too, when stubbornness got the better of one or two. As such, he had distinguished himself among the little brigade they then constituted – like Greeks in the belly of the horse before Troy. He had displayed the necessary qualities of leadership: decision, ruthlessness, and charisma. On the anxious journey it was he who kept their spirits up and he who managed to convince them to hold their nerve whenever doubts crept in.

  To their astonishment, the truck had taken the Messina-Calabria ferry and then set off on another long road journey. By listening to the sounds outside and decoding their significance they had managed to work out that it was all consistent with a sea crossing and when the driver left the vehicle they allowed themselves to relax for a while. The door had been left on the latch, as it were, and had not been one of those to be checked. God was smiling on them, for sure, on this day at least.

  When the vehicle came to an abrupt and decisive halt and its contents were about to be unloaded, they’d had to make their decision. Make a run for it? Go quietly? Bribe the first person they could? Jibril had cautioned them to hold onto their precious savings, to hide their jewellery or currency, if they had any left, and to first evaluate the situation. His language skills would be their first gambit. They would pretend first that they had no real knowledge of Italian. He could then ascertain what, if any, were the intentions of their hosts by way of his faked ignorance. If there were a crisis, he would use English.

  It had all been much easier than they had envisaged. After some initial consternation on the part of the two sleepy youngsters that had opened the doors, the warehouse they had ended up in had become their gateway to the Italian capital. Most of the staff that had gathered round to savour the welcome break in their routine had seemed not unsympathetic to their plight and, despite some protestation by one decidedly fascist-looking forklift driver, they had concluded that turning a blind eye would be safer for all involved. Less paperwork, less hassle for everyone. “Vai! Vai via!” They had repeated, as Jibril and the others, following their strategy of near total non-comprehension to the letter, had dithered and gesticulated. “On yer way! Go! Go!”

  They had found themselves on the outskirts, somewhere to the south-east, and in the absence of viable public transport had begun to walk. As they neared the city proper, each had taken his own road, some with plans to head towards the north and Milan or Bologna, others to France, Switzerland, Sweden or even England. Finally, Jibril was left alone with only the telephone number and address of his friend.

  By the map it seemed he was not so far away, but the reality was different. He walked and walked, his constant motion at least tempering the worst effects of the biting cold. Apart from a change of underclothes, he was wearing everything he owned. But he needed more precise directions as he risked wasting time and energy in the city’s bamboozling design.

  Getting the attention of local people was not so easy. He had washed as well as he could but knew that the voyage had taken its toll on his appearance and thus his demeanour. Being also physically big, he understood that he must have appeared threatening, so he tried to work out who would be less frightened by his periodic requests for information, even stooping slightly, as if supplicant.

  Sometimes they thought he needed money and either averted their eyes or, in some cases, gave him small sums despite his attempts to convey embarrassment. Where to get a bus ticket, which bus went where? How to find this street or that street in Rome’s often nonsensical urban tableau. All required information and orientation until, late in the evening, he found the area with its landmarks as his friend had described them – the elevated stretch of motorway in the distance, the small, forlorn park with its insignificant ruin of a crumbling Roman watchtower, the square, the street, the building, and the name on the intercom, an Italian name, the name of the owner of the property where Victor lived.

  When he had once again given his friend’s name and again explained in English to a rapid selection of interlocutors speaking variously broken or more or less coherent English, he was allowed to enter the building. The flat was on the ground floor, the most dangerous and crime-susceptible, yet he noted there were no bars on the windows.

  A plump, late middle-aged man wearing bright traditional clothes showed him in. He imagined he might be from Cameroon, judging by his French cadences. Jibril brought out letters to show him, letters which proved that their friendship was real, going back many years. His host didn’t appear overly interested in checking his credentials but rather more in public rela
tions concerning what he grandly called “the residence”.

  “We have been asking the landlord – I am only his agent, shall we say – for heaven knows how long, to make the residence secure. But each time he fobs us off, or promises, and nothing happens. Four times we have been broken into now,” he added, shaking his head, “four times.”

  “These are my quarters,” he appeared to joke, indicating a small but well-appointed box room with the most solid door in the house. The next slightly larger room was an improvised dormitory. There was a mattress in the corner, a bed by the wall, a wardrobe fashioned out of a clothes rail and a curtain.

  “We are all nationalities here,” he said, “but we get along very well.”

  Jibril explained how he had not heard from his friend for nearly three days. The self-styled agent listened and nodded, fiddling with a button on one of his long sleeves.

  “Do you know anything?” Jibril asked, urging him for a shred of news.

  The man looked away as if in search of something. Another, younger occupant was returning. He was strong, probably once athletic but now with the beginnings of a middle-aged man’s pot belly stretching his work-soiled T-shirt. Jibril imagined he was a construction worker, a labourer, probably Eastern European.

  “No,” he replied. “I do not. But there have been rumours.”

  “Rumours?” Jibril enquired, turning back to the agent. “Rumours of what?”

  The labourer had begun undressing, removing his T-shirt to reveal a tattooed upper torso, then continuing as if uninvolved but listening nonetheless.

  “Must I tell him,” he said, shooting a glance at the agent, his senior by at least ten years.

  “Well, there have been stories,” the agent said. “About a murder. A terrible, terrible murder.”

  “A body was found,” the younger man broke in, “after Victor disappeared. An African. His throat cut and dumped in a plastic bag.”

  He turned to the agent.

  “He has the right to know. Maybe then he will be able to identify him if we are all too cowardly to.”

  Jibril felt his knees giving way and the blood leaving his head. A chill went through his body but he managed to summon the strength to ask again.

  “And the rumours?” he urged. “What are these rumours?”

  It was clear to Jibril now that if he were to discover something it could only be through this straight-talking if coarse man and not the seemingly gentile sibyl who had welcomed him.

  “That he might have been involved, caught up in something bigger than he realized. With the Vatican. You know he went there? Had friends?”

  “And did anyone contact these friends?” asked Jibril, clutching now at any shreds of hope. “Is there a number, anything, a diary he left?”

  “I made a call,” said the younger man, “useless though I knew it would be, but they said they had never heard of Victor. They knew no one of that name. Then they asked questions, too many questions for my liking.”

  He walked to the corner where there was a small bookshelf and a collection of personal items above a neatly made mattress bed.

  “Here,” he said, “have a look for yourself, if you think there’s anything that might help. Here are all his possessions, just as he left them. And if you are wondering, I didn’t stick my nose into his personal affairs.”

  With that he slung a towel over his shoulder, slipped into his flip-flops and walked out of the room.

  “I will leave you now,” said the agent, at which point it occurred to Jibril that no one had actually introduced himself and neither had he. Why? For fear? Fear that names might mean trouble. “I’m very sorry I couldn’t be more helpful. But if by the end of this month he does not return, we will have to give his place to newcomers. We have a rent to pay, you know. Unless you want to rent it. We can discuss the price.”

  “I will not be staying,” Jibril replied. He picked up what looked like a diary and a notebook and stuffed them into his bag.

  “If these help me find him, I will take them.”

  “You can take them. Take what you want, really,” he said extending his hand in a gesture of implied largesse. “But there is, I am afraid, no money.”

  Sixty

  “Right,” said Rossi, “so you jumped from a moving car seconds before a roadside bomb detonated and you survived to tell the tale?”

  “Look,” said Iannelli, jerking up one leg of the baggy corduroys he was wearing courtesy of Rossi’s limited wardrobe, “where do you think I got a bruise like that from? Five-a-side football?”

  “I believe you,” said Rossi. “How else would you be here? But I didn’t think it was actually that dramatic. I didn’t think you had it in you that’s all. It is all rather James Bond, isn’t it?”

  Iannelli tossed back the remaining wine in his glass.

  “I had thirty seconds to make a choice. I was in Sicily. I had just been propositioned by a figure from God knows what part of the underworld or ‘deep state’ and I’d had the temerity to turn him down. Then I get a phone call telling me I’m about to become the next Giovanni Falcone or Paolo Borsellino. Given the circumstances, it didn’t feel like a practical joke. I’m afraid it felt all too real. So I did it. I made a decision and I jumped.”

  “And lost all those books and wine.”

  “Had to put something on the accelerator.”

  “Jesus,” said Rossi. “You’ve only gone and set the bar just about as high as it can go, haven’t you?”

  “I could have done without the hassle, actually.”

  “And then you walked all the way or what?”

  Iannelli reached out with a slight grimace to pour himself some more wine.

  “I had no choice. I wasn’t really so ‘with it’, as you might imagine. I felt the power of the fireball where I was, even in all those trees. My ears were ringing from the shockwave and I’d taken a nasty blow on the head. I was conscious but just about. I had to get moving. It was nearly dark anyway, which gave me cover, and to cut a longish story short I ended up at a bus stop in the middle of nowhere and decided to throw caution to the wind. I was that exhausted I couldn’t think straight. I got lucky, I suppose, and I told these Romanian guys I was on the run from the Mafia, that they were going to kill me and I needed help.”

  “Just like that?”

  “Must have been the bump on the head. But it worked.”

  “And they gave you the outfit? Right?”

  “Yep. Turned out they’d had run-ins with the gangmasters on a farm and didn’t hold the local Cosa Nostra in very high esteem. They were only working there to get enough money so they could move on up the country and they just happened to be heading back to Romania for a wedding. A thirty-six hour coach journey. So, I became one of them and slipped through unnoticed, if anyone was looking for me or might have recognized me. I had enough cash to get us a hire car at Reggio and we made good time in the end.”

  “And then you casually made your way over to my place?”

  “Where else could I go? I didn’t know who or what or how many were after me. I was pretty sure that you weren’t though.”

  “I appreciate the trust.”

  “Think nothing of it. Well, as long as they think I’m spattered across the Palermo-Messina, I can sit tight, I suppose.”

  “And then?”

  “You tell me. It’s uncharted territory. I mean this isn’t my style.”

  “Well,” said Rossi, exhaling and leaning back in his chair, “it looks like you’ll be getting yourself an escort, 24/7.”

  “A virtual prison sentence then? Means they’ve won, doesn’t it?”

  “It’s either that or a new identity.”

  “Not much of a choice, is it?”

  “No,” said Rossi. “But, you’re alive. More wine?”

  A more despondent looking Iannelli shook his head.

  “Now,” said Rossi, filling his own glass, “let’s see what I can knock up in the line of food. Then we can start thinking about the next
move. Hungry?”

  “I could eat a horse’s head.”

  “And then do you think you might share with me something of what you were sniffing out down in Sicily?”

  “Perhaps,” said the journalist. “But only if you tell me something about what you and Carrara are up to. And who’s the blonde by the way?”

  “Asked you first,” said Rossi.

  Sixty-One

  “We’ll be fine!” Each word was accompanied by a nervous nod in the direction of the three most concerned-looking public officials before him. “It will be just like in ’85 – a dusting of snow, the kids’ll be able to scrape together a few snowballs before it all melts and then it’ll be over again, for another twenty years. What do you expect to happen? This is Rome, not Turin!”

  The committee of public officials, civil protection officers, and party functionaries gathered before him for the breakfast briefing did not appear to share all of his certainty.

  “If I may, Sindaco,” began the skirt-suited manager responsible for coordinating the hypothetical gritting of the city’s roads, referring to the notes on her clipboard: “latest reports mention ‘possible significant coverage’ – we are still waiting on the exact figures for precipitation and the night-time minimum temperatures, but despite what you say, it does seem to be going in that direction.”

  Basso was getting agitated. He was behind with his appointments – official and non – and the meeting had been dragging on well beyond the allotted time frame.

  “Dottoressa,” restraining his natural urge to bawl her out of it, “I have seen those reports and, as I said before, my team and I are monitoring the situation. We keep a contingency plan running anyway, but on a skeleton basis, as the plant and overtime costs are, as you might imagine, rather high.”