“Or perhaps you would like to ruin a few more of my books.” He nodded towards the table where the books and the inkstand had been replaced in the same disorder as before.
“Where is your uncle?”
There was surprise in Baldassare’s eyes.
“Your uncle, Signor Professore.”
“I don’t have any uncles.”
“The Giudice Dell’Orto.”
A thin smile. “The uncle of my wife.”
“The person to whom you go crying once the police start asking a few questions.”
He stroked his chin. “I suppose you could call beating me up, striking me, intimidating my colleague and casting all my books to the floor—I suppose you could call that asking questions. Semantics is not my field. I must refer the problem to my colleagues.”
Magagna said, “Refer it to your lawyer.”
“The parrot talks, I see.”
“Baldassare, let’s be reasonable.”
“Commissario, up until now, it’s you who’s refused to be reasonable.”
“I continue to believe that you’re involved in the death of Maltese. Your cooperation will no doubt help to dispel such beliefs.”
“Ah.” The smile remained, but there was a hint of fear in the dark eyes. “Please tell me how I can be of use.”
“Where is Dell’Orto?”
Baldassare shrugged.
Trotti leaned forward. “Dell’Orto, Professore. Tell me where he is.”
The professor stroked his face. “I suppose this is your way of influencing people and making friends.”
“I’ve no need to make friends with men whose idea of fun is playing with the emotions of impressionable adolescent girls.”
“How is your wonderful daughter, Commissario?”
“Tell me where Dell’Orto is.”
“You must know, Commissario, that there are laws in this country. Laws that even you are bound to respect.”
“Did you know that Dell’Orto was a freemason, Baldassare?”
“I think I must take the advice of the parrot.” He reached towards the cumbersome green telephone. “Perhaps it would be better for us all—and for Dell’Orto—if my lawyer were here.”
“Your lawyer can wait.”
Baldassare shrugged, ran a hand through his unkempt hair and picked up the receiver. Magagna moved away from the window and walked to where the telephone cable joined the wall. He removed the jack from its socket.
“I think, Commissario, that you’re trying to intimidate me. I don’t want to make threats …”
“Good.”
“But I must warn you that despite your position …”
“Where’s Dell’Orto?”
Baldassare bit the corner of his lip. The eyes were small and they looked at Trotti without wavering. “I don’t know.” He pointed to where the telephone cable lay like an inert snake on the floor. “You have no right …”
“Tell me where Dell’Orto is.”
“I said I don’t know.”
“Then guess.”
“I don’t know where the old fool is—and I don’t care.”
“But you phoned him up.”
“I phoned him at the Hotel Ambassador. I told him that I’d been beaten up by a madman. By an ineffectual policeman with delusions of grandeur but who is incapable of looking after his own daughter. By a man who must go around hitting anybody who has the misfortune to have to deal with his daughter—a horrid, ugly, spoiled little witch. I told Dell’Orto that. I told him than I’d been roughed up by a peasant with grease in what hair he’s got left. I told him about Commissario Trotti whose aristocratic wife has got the hottest thighs in the city—and having worked her way through every available man, has gone off to America to try out what’s there.”
He laughed but there was no laughter in his eyes. His hand rubbed at the flesh of his cheek.
“You know, Commissario Trotti, I think Dell’Orto must have a soft spot for you. Perhaps he was a cuckold, too.”
Trotti did not move.
“D’you know who she’s screwing, Trotti?”
“Where’s Dell’Orto?”
“D’you know who your wonderful, beautiful, so sophisticated wife is screwing in America, Signor Commissario?”
Trotti said nothing.
“That’s right. She likes them all. But she loves bankers. Even Pergola. The little runt from the Banca San Matteo. Christ, she must be hard up. What woman would want to climb into the same bed as that narrow-shouldered pansy? A limp-wristed faggot?”
“Dell’Orto?”
“A woman whose every orifice has been profaned by the dignitaries and notables of this little town of ours.”
“Dell’Orto, Baldassare.”
“Poor, neurotic kid. With a mother who’s a nymphomaniac and a father who’s no more than a peasant, a thug—is it any wonder that with parents like that the poor child should turn into a starving wreck?”
Trotti stood up and turned on his heels. His face was white as he left the office. He did not glance at Magagna.
A pigeon was strutting across the university courtyard.
56: Matriarchy
PISANELLI WAS SWEATING in his suede jacket. Half walking, half running, he crossed the quadrangle. Then he caught sight of Trotti.
“Commissario.”
Hs stopped. Surprised, Pisanelli changed direction and came towards the shop. It was a small bookshop within the university precinct that specialized in academic textbooks. It was now closed.
Trotti stood by the shop window, apparently engrossed in the display. Matriarchy in the Po Valley and The Terrorist State were on display. A yellow paperback, The Policeman Is Alone.
As Pisanelli approached, his eyes went from Trotti to the books and back again.
Trotti did not move.
“I thought you were with Baldassare.”
Trotti continued to stare at the books.
Somewhere a girl laughed—a student heading up the marble stairs to the university library. She wore yellow shoes.
“Where’s Magagna?”
Trotti gestured with his thumb. Then he turned away and Pisanelli noticed the eyes. They appeared smaller, harder. Trotti’s face looked strange, taut and yet devoid of emotion. Lines of red along the eyelids.
“What d’you want, Pisanelli?”
“I’ve been looking for you.”
“Why?”
Pisanelli looked again at the books on display. “I thought Magagna was with you.”
“He was with Baldassare.”
Pisanelli bit his lip. “There’s a message for you.”
“In the Questura?” He turned.
Pisanelli nodded. “A phone call from New York.”
“Agnese?”
“A man who left a message. I took the call.”
“What did he want?”
“Your wife—he said that your wife will be flying into Malpensa this evening on the Alitalia Flight. Flight AL 322. Time of arrival twenty-one hours—Italian time.”
Trotti turned back to the books.
“I think …” Pisanelli shrugged. He ran his hand through the hair at the side of his head. “I think it might be a good idea to go and meet her. If you wish, Commissario, I can drive you.”
Trotti said nothing.
“In five and a half hours’ time—and you must reckon on at least an hour and a half to get to Malpensa.”
“Is your friend still angry with me, Pisanelli?”
“My friend?”
“The psychiatry student. Etta.”
57: Ambulance
“THANK GOD YOU’RE here.” She pushed through the crowd and caught him by the wrist.
Trotti allowed himself to be pulled along. Pisanelli followed him.
Sitting in the same chair. The Provincia Padana lay unopened on the table in from of him. The head lolled forward onto the chest.
“How long’s he been here?”
Dell’Orto.
Signora Allegra’s face was pale, worried. �
�I was surprised when he ordered a cup of coffee. But he insisted. He said that I must let an old man have his way. ‘A strong cup of coffee, signora,’ he said.”
The sound of an ambulance came from the Corso.
Trotti glanced at the crowd of onlookers—shopkeepers and serving girls who had come upstairs from the underground market. Nobody spoke but they stared at the well-dressed old man who sat in the sunlight.
Before long, the sun would move down behind the houses and Piazza Vittoria would be in the shade.
“He wanted a strong cup of coffee,” the woman said, “and so I put in an extra spoonful.” A tear glistened at the corner of her eye. “You know, he was a friend of my father—when Papa owned the Bar Duomo, Signor Dell’Orto was a regular customer.” More tears. “He came to my wedding.”
“Is he breathing?”
She took a handkerchief from her skirt pocket. “Like Papa, he was a freemason.”
Pisanelli was kneeling down—the crowd had drawn back—and he had put his ear to the old man’s chest.
“Papa said that he was a very good man. Very kind. And when my poor husband died and I was waiting for the insurance, he helped me. Without a word—but I received money from him. And when I paid him back, he refused to take any interest.”
On the far side of the Piazza a cat was playing with something. A dead bird, perhaps.
“Well, Pisanelli?”
The white ambulance pulled into Piazza Vittoria. Two men in overalls jumped out from the front seat.
Softly, Pisanelli said, “Dead.”
Trotti placed his hand on Signora Allegra’s sleeve. “The other cup.” He pointed to a second cup on the small table. Red marks along the rim.
“Oh, she left a long time ago.”
“She?”
“A large woman.” She dabbed at her eyes. “I thought perhaps Signor Dell’Orto had found a girlfriend. But she left a long time ago—it must be over an hour ago.”
“What did she look like?”
“She seemed very pleasant—but there was a smell of …”
“What?”
“There was a smell of cats about her. Like an old spinster. And I couldn’t help noticing that she had large hands—very large hands.”
The dying sound of the ambulance siren echoed against the walls of the houses in Piazza Vittoria.
58: Malpensa
THE WHITE LETTERS on the electronic board fluttered and then the new times were announced.
“Where on earth is Lahore?” Magagna asked but received no answer.
Trotti stood at the bar, drinking his fourth cup of coffee.
On the drive to the airport he had not spoken but had stared out at the flat countryside as night fell. Now he drank and ate in silence. His third brioche.
Magagna turned back to face him. “Her flight is on time.”
“Good.”
“Let’s go and sit down.”
“I’m all right here.”
Magagna sighed and took a cigarette from his pocket. “You see, Commissario, it would make sense.”
Trotti lifted the cup.
“Both Belluno and Dell’Orto were members of the same lodge. That’s why Maltese went to see Pergola. He wanted to get into the Lodge, find out what happened in 1960. He suspected that Dell’Orto had deliberately wanted to keep his father out of the way. And that was why Dell’Orto insisted upon taking Ramoverde to court. Rivalries within the Lodge, things that were kept secret. But by coming back to Italy and digging into the past, Maltese suddenly made things difficult for Dell’Orto.”
Trotti finished the cup of coffee.
“He was a journalist—but he realized that because of the Night of the Tazebao he would be out of work for a long time. And anyway, he feared for his life.” Magagna shrugged. “So he started work on a book—a book about the killings at the Villa Laura. And as he was hiding in viale Lodi, there wasn’t much else for him to do with his time.” He ran a finger along the new mustache. “That’s what scared Dell’Orto.”
There was an announcement, made in Italian and English.
Trotti turned round.
The airport was a different world, already part of somewhere else, of London, or Paris or New York. He looked at his watch, then at the flight arrivals board. Flight AL 322 from Kennedy Airport, New York had already touched down. He could feel a tightening in the pit of his belly.
“The woman saw him.”
Trotti turned. “What woman?”
“You told me you talked to her in Gardesana. The woman who lives above the bakery. She said she’d seen Maltese arrive in the village. In a big car. With another man, an older man. Don’t you see that was Dell’Orto? Of course, as there’s only one road out of Gardesana she thought the car belonged to one of the German tourists who live in the apartments. But …”
“What, Magagna?”
Magagna lit his cigarette. “They arrived earlier. They were expecting you and they’d had time enough to drive through the village and turn round.”
“And the car?”
“Dell’Orto probably hired it.” He added, “That shouldn’t be very difficult to check up on. Probably hired it at the Hotel Ambassador. Don’t you see? It was Dell’Orto who wanted Maltese killed. It was Dell’Orto who lured Maltese into going to Gardesana.”
“To be murdered in front of me?”
“Possibly it was the only way of getting him out into the open.” He shrugged, took the cigarette from his mouth and blew the smoke away sideways. “Maltese had gone into hiding—and he had to be gotten out. As for the killing, it was professional—carried out by professionals. The same people who were behind Novara’s assassination in Paris.”
“How did Dell’Orto know I was going to Gardesana?”
Magagna smiled. “Baldassare told him.”
Trotti looked at the empty coffee cup, then pushed it away along the zinc bar. Again he looked at his watch.
“We’d better go to the arrival lounge.”
Trotti smiled.
“If you want, Commissario, I can drive you home.”
He shook his head.
“Why not? It’s no bother.”
“Agnese will be tired after the flight.”
“It would be a pleasure for me, Commissario.”
“Not tonight. Agnese and I—we’ll go into Milan and spend the night in a hotel. Perhaps at the Ambassador. A good meal, a good night’s rest and a good breakfast tomorrow morning. It’ll be like a second honeymoon after being apart for so long.”
Magagna laughed, caught Trotti’s eye and gave an exaggerated wink.
59: Booth
THEY WENT TO reception and Trotti gave the phone number.
“In America?” The receptionist was a man in a dark serge uniform. A brooch in the form of the letter A on his lapel.
Trotti nodded.
“Are you a guest of the hotel?”
Magagna showed his identity card.
“As you wish, gentlemen.” A thin smile. “The number, please.” He wrote it down in a large book and then pointed to a telephone cabin on the far side of the lounge.
“You write all numbers down?”
“I beg your pardon?” The man looked up, offended.
“Do you write down all outgoing phone calls?”
“Of course, signore. There is no automatic dialing from the rooms—and records must be kept.” Primly, he folded his arms.
Trotti went over to the telephone and waited. The booth smelled of perfume. There was a leather armchair and notepaper by the side of the telephone—notepaper with the same large A for the heading.
The phone started to ring.
“Hotel Ambassador, Milan. Hold the line please.”
Trotti said, “Pronto.”
Several voices in English. Then the lady who could speak Italian.
“This is Piero Trotti—I’m phoning from Italy. I should like to talk to Signora Trotti—Mrs. Trotti.”
“I’m afraid your wife is not available.”
>
“Where is she?”
“There is a meeting of representatives.”
“I must talk to her. It’s very important.”
“I don’t think that will be possible.”
“Signora, it’s very important. Our daughter—she’s ill. It’s urgent.”
“Please hold on.”
Trotti sat down in the armchair and his finger ran along the brass studs of the curved armrest. He looked at his reflection in the pink tinted mirror. His eyes stared back at him, unsmiling.
“Piero?”
“Agnese, what the hell are you doing in New York? I got a phone call this afternoon, telling me to go to the airport. I go to Malpensa, I wait an hour for the plane—another hour for you to come through customs. For heaven’s sake, is this your idea of a joke?”
“Piero?”
“Well?”
“Give me time to explain.”
“As much time as you want, Agnese. Where were you?”
“Didn’t you get the message?”
“What message?”
“I asked a friend to tell you that I had changed my mind—there’s no point in coming back now.”
“Of course there’s a point. Your daughter needs you. For God’s sake, I need you.”
Mocking. “You need me, Piero?”
“Don’t you understand, Agnese? Don’t you understand that without you …?”
“Is this what you phoned me up for?”
“I want to know why you got me to go to the airport.”
“I told you, Piero, I changed my mind. But I left a message.”
“I received no message, Agnese.”
“That’s not my fault.”
He raised his eyes to look at the reflection. “So you’re not coming back?”
“Not immediately.”
“And Pioppi?”
“She’s getting better, isn’t she?”
“She needs you.”
“She’s an adult, Piero. She’s over eighteen. She can’t expect me or you to go on holding her hand all the time.”
“Can’t you understand that she’s ill?”
“She was ill—but she’s getting better. You know that if I thought she really needed me, I’d be on the first plane.”
A long pause. Trotti waited while his breathing returned to normal.
“Agnese, listen.”
The Puppeteer Page 21