The Sudden Disappearance of the Worker Bees

by Serge Quadruppani

  “I’m sure they’ve told you Bertolazzi was gay and that he had a turbulent personal life. But that only started recently. For the last three months he was in a steady relationship with a young shepherd, an Albanian man who watches over several flocks of sheep in the pastures in the mountains. Up there,” he said, brandishing the croissant in the direction of the windowpanes. But while one end of the pastry was pointed toward the mountaintop, the other, dripping with coffee and milk, was pointing toward the edge of the forest a mere stone’s throw away. In precisely that spot a man in a camouflage jumpsuit, unseen by them, was lying on a carpet of pine needles and starting to adjust a Scrome J10 10x40 scope with a Mil-Dot reticle mounted on a STANAG 2324 rail.

  As the man framed the door of the café in the scope’s crosshairs, Felice explained to an astounded Simona that most cheese from the Italian Alps, Fontina included, was produced using milk from flocks tended by immigrants. Then he returned to the subject of Bertolazzi.

  “I wouldn’t be surprised if Calabonda considered Mehmet—that’s the name of our engineer’s lover, Mehmet Berisha—anyway, I wouldn’t be surprised if he considered him Suspect Number One. Mehmet is extremely jealous and Bertolazzi was famous for being an incorrigible flirt . . . In fact, he liked to play at seducing women as well as men. Mehmet started one of their usual fights right here the day before yesterday. At this time of day this place is deserted, but you should see it at night—it fills up and becomes very lively. There were a lot of people around when Mehmet told Maurizio that he’d kill him if he had betrayed him. I’m sure that our maresciallo is already up to speed on all of this.”

  Caught up in what he was saying, he had plunged the tip of the croissant back into the cappuccino. When he didn’t bite into it, suspending it somewhere between the cup and his mouth, a big, soft, brown piece broke free and splattered across the table, recalling to this author’s mind some (immediately repressed) scatological comparisons. Simona encouraged the reporter to finish his breakfast; they had as much time as they needed. He drank, ate, and threw himself body and soul back into the topic at hand.

  “You know, I’ve given this some thought. Minoncelli is a very handsome man, and, contrary to what one might think, there was more than just hatred between him and Bertolazzi. It’s true that the beekeeper would go to the engineer’s open information sessions, which were an attempt to dispel the perception in the valley of Sacropiano’s GMOs and pesticides as dangerous, and systematically wreak havoc. But then several times I saw them having friendly chats right here at Café Gambetta, and also one time as they were leaving a debate at Claudiana, the bookstore in Torre Pellice, during which they’d argued violently. To tell the truth, I was struck by the extent of the beekeepers’ knowledge of Sacropiano’s products. Their platform is generally more ideological than scientific, but that time they were very well informed. They even knew the results of some classified studies conducted by the company, in which isolated culture samples indicated that the GMOs could lead to the death of 40 percent of all bees.”

  Felice paused, staring Simona directly in the eye. The head commissario of the National Antimafia Association, who had come up from the capital, whom he’d seen on television so many times, was hanging on his every word. He inhaled deeply. He no longer felt timid.

  “You mean . . . that Bertolazzi could have provided Minoncelli with this information?”

  Felice drew his hands back and gave the slightest nod of his chin, his eyes directed skyward—a gesture that was difficult to interpret, but may have meant “maybe.”

  “And for what reason?”

  “I don’t know. Bertolazzi was a complex person. It’s possible that deep down he doubted the justness of his organization’s cause, and it’s possible that he thought the beekeepers’ group, deep down, wasn’t entirely in the wrong. But he may not have had the courage to expose the truth and risk losing his position.”

  “And how could this tie in with his murder, aside from helping to exculpate Minoncelli?”

  “Well, there could be another reason why Bertolazzi would have confided in Minoncelli . . . Have you seen Minoncelli?”

  Simona shook her head.

  “No. Not yet. As far as I know he’s still being held at police headquarters.”

  “He’s a good-looking man. Tall, athletic, blond, and tan, with light blue eyes and enough charisma and smooth- talking to make him the undisputed leader of his group.”

  “You think Bertolazzi may have been interested in him?”

  “I am sure he was interested in him. I could see it when I was watching them talking one on one, even from a distance.”

  “What do you mean, you could see it?”

  “The engineer’s eyes would sparkle. It was like he was devouring his conversation partner’s mouth with his eyes . . .”

  All right, Simona thought, this Felice guy may not be a secret agent, but as far as snoops go, he’s first-rate. She decided to take full advantage of her informer.

  “And could there have been something else aside from the engineer’s simple attraction to the beekeeper, something the beekeepers might have exploited in order to get information?”

  “It’s not impossible. I was passing by Minoncelli’s house three days ago, just by chance—”

  Just by chance my ass, thought the commissario, but she chose not to interrupt this momentum.

  “—and I saw Bertolazzi’s car parked in front of his house. So I said to myself, What have we here! If little Mehmet ever suspected that his beloved was having a secret affair with the beekeeper, things could get ugly . . . That’s what I thought at the time. Funny coincidence, don’t you think?”

  “That’s all very well,” Simona said, “but this morning Minoncelli set out to occupy Bertolazzi’s villa. Does that seem very friendly to you?”

  “What makes you think Bertolazzi didn’t give him the keys?”

  The commissario pulled back a wisp of white hair that had fallen into her eyes, allowing Felice to see that she was frowning.

  “Have you been talking to Calabonda about this?”

  Felice snorted.

  “The maresciallo won’t speak with me and has denied me entrance to police headquarters.”

  “And why’s that?”

  The reporter shrugged.

  “A stupid mistake. All it took was a single letter to land me in deep shit, I might add.”

  The commissario raised an eyebrow with an inquisitive expression, while Felice assumed a woeful one. “When he arrived here a year ago and took his place as maresciallo, I dedicated an article to him as a way of saying welcome. But unfortunately I spelled his name incorrectly—I called him ‘Cacabonda’—and from that moment on the nickname has stuck. He can’t come into the café without someone calling him that, and seeing as he’s made two or three major blunders that had the whole valley cracking up, they’ve also coined the expression ‘pull a Cacabonda,’ meaning to really fuck something up.”

  “Two or three major blunders? What were they?”

  Felice crossed his arms.

  “Oh no, I’m not telling you. I don’t want to make my situation any worse. You’ll have many chances to hear about them from other people. You know, Caca—excuse me, Calabonda is already looked down on by his superiors and by a good part of the population. They were talking about transferring him. And so for him this case is double or nothing. If he solves it, he can make up for his mistakes and earn himself national renown. If he fails . . .”

  Felice brought his hand up to his shoulder in imitation of someone throwing away something completely worthless.

  The commissario’s eyes landed on her watch, then rose again.

  “By the way, I have an appointment with him in fifteen minutes. I don’t want to make him wait.”

  She extended her hand and the little carrot-haired man stood up to shake it.

  “Thank you for agreeing to answer my questions,” Felice mumbled, then turned a deep shade of red. “Excuse me,” he stammered. “F
orce of habit.”

  Simona gave him her brightest smile.

  “I hope I get the chance to see you again soon and chat with you some more . . .”

  “Well hey,” the reporter said, “I come here to drink my cappuccino at the same time every day.”

  “Then I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  As she was making her way to the door, her cell phone rang. It was Marco. He was dying to let her know that he was embarking for Palermo from the mainland and he’d met a female colleague from the police force while he was waiting for the boat. She was going to be spending fifteen days at the very same little hotel in Salina, Michele’s. They’d be riding together on the ferry over. Funny coincidence, no? Apparently the weather down there was magnificent. As Simona asked him how old this lady cop was, and if she was fuckable, and he answered that, well, yeah, she was, and they started fighting, she exited the café and stood near the entrance. The man who was lying at the edge of the forest captured her right at the center of his gunsight. He inhaled deeply. He gently fingered the trigger, but he didn’t pull it. And he said, “Pow! You’re dead.”

  CHAPTER 3

  SHE HAD ALL OF THE HALLMARKS OF SLOVENIAN ANCESTRY: the rounded curves, the sweet temperament, the golden hair, and a long tongue, apt for licking, sucking, drawing in inexhaustibly. But the male hominids will have to bring their disgusting fantasies to an end at this point, because she was also outfitted with two curved antennae made up of twelve hairy segments, and most important, a highly venomous stinger. Her belly was so full of nectar that it was on the verge of exploding, and it was time to return home. As the Apis carnica took flight, the orange-yellow ball lodged in her pollen basket was so large that a few grains fell out onto a pistil whose destiny it was to produce a chestnut, which in turn would eventually become a marron glacé. Having just discovered the first blossoming chestnut tree of the year, the lone foraging bee headed for the hive. She was able to use the sun to orient herself, in spite of the dense forest foliage made up of oaks, beeches, and chestnut trees (although how this occurs is still unclear to researchers). As she approached the apiary she was met with a wave of Nasonov pheromones. But unlike her fellow workers, the elderly forager—ten days old already!—could find her way directly to the hive without the aid of these emissions. There she would begin a euphoric, figure-eight dance that would indicate, through careful positioning in relation to the sun, the way to the blooming chestnut tree whose inebriating perfumes she was already conveying to her companions by fanning the scent from her loaded abdomen with her wings. She flew slowly because the tree was at a slight distance. Even though the sky was clouded over, the creature’s three so-called simple eyes registered the intensity of the light around her, allowing her to point herself in exactly the right direction, while the eyes on either side of her head viewed the world in shades of dark blue, ultraviolet, orange, and aquamarine through their forty thousand lenses.

  This is how she saw the silhouette of the man in the jumpsuit and hood as he made his way among the hives in the apiary: orange and green. He carried an ax and walked in long strides toward the hive where the chestnut- foraging bee’s queen was tirelessly laying her eggs. The blade swung, bringing everything crashing to the ground at an incredible speed: the neat stack of perfectly formed flying insects, honey, brood, beehive frames. It all exploded in pulsating waves of chaos, smells, alarm signals, and muted buzzing.

  * * *

  As Simona entered the courtyard of police headquarters, Maresciallo Calabonda was walking in long strides toward the first of two police cars waiting with engines humming and their sirens already lit. When he saw the policewoman, he gave a little smirk.

  “Ah, Commissario. I’m sorry, but I have an emergency,” he announced without stopping. “We’ll see each other later. Call me sometime before noon,” he said as he opened the passenger door.

  “Does it have to do with our case?” asked Simona.

  “I don’t know anything about it,” he shot back, with a dubious expression. “I’ll keep you informed . . .”

  Apparently, he didn’t mind letting this star policewoman know who was in charge. As he raised his hand in a gesture of good-bye, the commissario signaled to him to roll down the window.

  “You should speak with Felice,” she suggested.

  Under the effect of a general tightening in his face, the carabiniere’s black mustache hairs curled up into his nostrils, hermetically sealing them. Calabonda removed his sunglasses to reveal the lightning bolts shooting out of his eyes.

  “The reporter? As though I would waste a moment of my time with that redheaded mythomaniac—it’s out of the question!”

  With this he nodded at the driver and the car departed, tires shrieking, followed closely by the second car as the sirens began to wail. Thank God Marco left me with the car, Simona thought as she set off for the hotel to get their blue, German-built two-cylinder car from the garage. Twenty minutes later she was in Pinerolo. While she was looking for parking in the little street in front of the building, built on an ancient French fortress, her car found itself face to face with a more expensive black vehicle driving down the street. Next to the driver she recognized the wiry frame of Evangelisti, the prosecutor. The magistrate opened the door and got out to shake her hand and speak with her through her rolled-down window.

  “I’m headed to the site of another crime . . . Sadly, the crime rate in our region is rising. If you like, you could park your car and join us. We could talk during the drive. It seems it may be connected to our case.”

  Simona didn’t make him say it twice. A few minutes later, the black car was advancing as rapidly as the narrow streets in the city’s historic center would allow, its police beacon flashing. The prosecutor turned around and nodded in the direction of the newspaper sitting next to her on the backseat.

  “You’ve become a local celebrity.”

  Simona picked up the Quotidiano delle Valli, which had a photo of her plastered across the front page. It had been taken from her Wikipedia page and was so horribly pixilated that even she struggled to recognize herself in that portly, helmet-haired woman. The headline announced that celebrated antimafia commissario Tavianello was “involved in the murder of Bertolazzi, engineer.” That wording was ambiguous to say the least, and the photo caption confused things even further by making it known that she had “agreed to enlighten Maresciallo Calabonda with her counsel.” So that’s why the maresciallo was acting so put out when he saw me, Simona thought. The prosecutor’s voice tore her away from her reading.

  “Maybe they’ll even ask you to be the Man in the Iron Mask next year.”

  “The Man in the Iron Mask?” Simona repeated, raising her eyes to meet the amused look of Evangelisti in the rearview mirror. “I don’t see—”

  “The city of Pinerolo was part of the Kingdom of France for many years and it was precisely in our city’s fortress that Louis XIV would have kept the famous prisoner. Every year, during the first weekend of October, the legend of the Man in the Iron Mask is commemorated through a costumed event called ‘The Man in the Iron Mask and the Musketeers.’ Many different groups participate, coming from all over the province of Turin.”

  The prosecutor paused as the driver sped up to pass a big rig so they could get onto the ramp to a provincial road. For a split second it seemed as though the magistrate wanted to say something to the driver, a little bald man, then decided against it. When they’d overtaken the truck and the car had turned off at a breakneck speed, the policewoman resumed the conversation.

  “Yes, that’s very interesting, but I don’t see what it has to do with me.”

  Evangelisti smiled and shook his head.

  “The Man in the Iron Mask comes to life for the entire weekend in the form of a celebrity whose identity is revealed only at the very end of the festivities, in Piazza Fontana. Last year it was a TV comic, what’s his name. Right now his name escapes me . . . Long story short, up until now we’ve only had men, but I don’t see why we
shouldn’t insist on gender equality in this arena as well.”

  Seeing as Simona maintained a neutral expression, he changed his tone.

  “Well, all joking aside, one might say that our case has become more complicated. There’s been another death—”

  “Another murder? Where?”

  “I didn’t say another murder . . . It’s still not clear. What’s certain is that there’s a dead body in Minoncelli’s apiary, which has apparently been destroyed.”

  “But where’s Minoncelli? Still at headquarters?”

  “He spent the night there and he’s still there now, though not for much longer. I won’t ask the preliminary investigation judge to order precautionary detention. Based on Forensics’ analysis and Minoncelli’s statement, Bertolazzi was killed while Minoncelli was at Torre Pellice debating with the owners of Claudiana Books.”

  They slowly made their way up the great embrace of the mountains, which opened their arms behind Pinerolo. They crossed bridges that went over streams; there were vertical views, luminous mists, far-off mountain ridges, shaded tunnels made of coniferous trees, and unexpected panoramas. Then they walked across the field behind Minoncelli’s house and Simona recalled a passage from the novel We by Yevgeny Zamyatin:

  Spring. From beyond the Green Wall, from the wild, invisible plains, the wind carries the yellow, honeyed pollen from I know not which flowers. This sweet pollen causes the lips to dry out—you are constantly licking them with your tongue—and most likely all of the women one meets have sweet lips (and the men too, of course). This disturbs logical thinking somewhat.

  Beyond the fluttering yellowish cloud, out in the field, the overturned beehives and their contents were spread out across the grass. The commissario, who had never given much thought to beekeeping until that day, felt something akin to grief as she gazed out at it. It was a scene similar in every respect to the ruins of a city after an earthquake. There was something else that she found unsettling, something that it took her a few moments to identify. It was the silence. The men on the Forensics team were surveying the scene and taking photos without speaking a word. Calabonda and his men watched them, their arms crossed. But there was no buzzing to be heard, neither in the flowering pergola where the forager bees had busied themselves the day before nor in the hives. Where had they gone?