“If you hold still, we can be done with this in a minute and then I’ll let you go. Otherwise, I’ll take you down to police headquarters and we can do our talking there. Which will it be?”
This proposition, hissed into the boy’s face like a slap, had the desired effect. Cristiano stopped and stared insolently into the brigadier’s eyes.
“I didn’t do anything wrong. What do you want with me?”
Maione glared back at him.
“Since when do you have to have done something to be brought in to police headquarters? You know how it works: I can always find an reason. I’ll just ask around a little bit. But all I want now is to have a little chat, nice and easy.”
Cristiano look around circumspectly; being seen talking to a policeman wasn’t an especially healthy thing in his world. Maione sensed the boy’s unease and nodded his head toward the dark alley where, a week earlier, the man with a limp had dragged the terrified Tettè.
As soon as they were safe from prying eyes, Cristiano regained the arrogant confidence that he liked to put on.
“I’ve done nothing and I know nothing, I already told your colleague. I’ve got nothing to say.”
Maione grabbed the skin under the boy’s chin between his fingers and squeezed hard, but Cristiano didn’t blink.
“Listen, handsome: my colleague, who’s not my colleague at all, but a police detective, a commissario, has been a little too gentle with you, because you’re alley fodder, carne da strada. I know your type well, and I know when you’re telling the truth and when you’re talking nonsense. Most importantly, I know how to make your life a living hell. Now then, I’m going to ask you once, and once only: What can you tell me about what might have happened to your friend who died of poisoning? And don’t tell me that you don’t know anything, because that would make this the day that you disappear from the street for a good long time.”
Cristiano evaluated Maione with a critical eye. He was barely older than a child, but he’d been out on the street for so long that he had become very good at appraising whoever he was dealing with, and the advantages and risks that a situation could entail for him. This time, his appraisal led to nothing good. He darted to one side, confident that Maione’s attention had dropped off, but the brigadier’s leg shot out fast and tripped him. Before Cristiano hit the ground, Maione had grabbed him by his shirt collar and set him back on his feet.
“Careful: you’ll fall and hurt yourself. Don’t you look where you put your feet? Try that one more time, and I’ll make sure you can’t walk home on your own two legs. You got that?”
Cristiano looked at him again, rubbing his neck. He’d known what would happen, but he still had to try it.
“What do you want from me, can I ask? What am I supposed to tell you?”
“I told you. What happened to your friend?”
The boy smiled mockingly.
“My friend? That fool of a cacaglio was no friend of mine. He was just another kid in the house, the runt of the litter. That’s it.”
Maione went on staring at him.
“Really? And yet someone told us that you were the only one he talked to, now and then. The only one who didn’t torture him.”
“Talked? The cacaglio never talked. When he tried to, he’d get stuck and say the same thing over and over: ma-tte-tte-tte . . . which is why they called him Tettè. But we called him the stupid cacaglio.”
“And why did you call him that?”
“Because he was a cacaglio, and because he was stupid. He believed everything, if you told him, go over there, someone’s calling you, he’d go. He never learned, he always fell for it. And the others got the better of him, and had fun playing pranks on him.”
Maione listened attentively.
“What would they do to him?”
Cristiano shrugged.
“Just pranks. They’d put dead animals in his bed, steal food from his plate. Put dogshit in his shoes. Things like that.”
“What about you? What did you do to him?”
Once again, that contemptuous gaze.
“I didn’t waste my time playing pranks on the cacaglio. One prank’s enough to show everyone what a fool he is: once everyone knows, what’s the point? And then I felt a little sorry for the cacaglio.”
Maione asked:
“Why did you feel sorry for him?”
“I told you, he fell for everything. He was looking for someone—how can I put this so you’ll understand?—looking for someone who wouldn’t hurt him. Always searching, looking you in the face with those eyes, never saying a word. It seemed pointless for me to pile on.”
A simple explanation, but clear. Maione nodded.
“All right. Then let’s talk about the night before, about the last time you saw Tettè. What do you have to say about that?”
“What should I say about it? It’s not like we all look after each other. The cacaglio was minding his own business, and I was minding mine. At a certain point he went out and I didn’t see him again. That’s all there is to say.”
Maione thought he’d noticed a slight hesitation.
“Think harder, try to remember; it’s in your own interest. Did anything strange, out of the ordinary, happen? That day, or the day before?”
Cristiano shrugged.
“I don’t remember. I don’t think so.”
“You don’t think so, eh? Well, I’ve been doing some thinking of my own, and I think you know something that you don’t want to tell me. It seems to me that the air down at police headquarters does a world of good for kids like you. Come on, let’s go there and do some more talking. Maybe the air’ll be good for your memory.”
Cristiano twisted free from Maione’s grasp.
“What do you want from me, anyway? The cacaglio was a fool, period. He died because he was a fool. It was all his fault, his fault, I tell you!”
Maione went on trying to get him on the ropes.
“I on the other hand think you know something. Tell me about the rat poison, then: How is it possible that one of you kids, who know the streets cobblestone by cobblestone, would make a mistake like that and eat a poisoned piece of food, like some stupid stray dog?”
The boy was starting to get exasperated.
“How am I supposed to know? We all knew about them, the poisoned morsels of food at the warehouse. Everyone. In fact, some of the boys even used to bring them back and feed them to cats, just for the fun of watching them die, with all the twisting and jumping they would do. We knew what they were, and the last thing we’d do was eat them ourselves. I don’t know if the cacaglio knew about them, because he never came with us; he was a signorino, the teacher’s pet, and she’d take him to the pastry shop on the Via Toledo to eat sweets. But if he didn’t know what they were, if he didn’t know that eating one would kill you, then he was even more of a fool than he seemed.”
Maione insisted:
“And you didn’t notice anything unusual at all? Am I really supposed to believe that you just can’t remember when he went out and why?”
Cristiano gave him a defiant look.
“Brigadie’, you can go ahead and take me to prison if you like; I have no idea where the cacaglio went that night. And I don’t know why he went to eat rat poison; maybe he ate it because he wanted to die, or else just because he was a fool. I didn’t hate him, the cacaglio. He wasn’t a bad kid, plus he was little, and people who pick on little kids are cowards, and they turn my stomach. So I never did him any harm. What do you think, officer, aren’t people who pick on little kids cowards?”
Maione stared at him for a long time. Then he released his arm, a disgusted grimace on his face.
“Get out of here, beat it. But remember: I’m still looking. And if I find out that you lied to me, I’ll come get you in church if I have to.”
Cristiano ran all the way to
the end of the vicolo; then he turned around, looked back at Maione, and emitted a loud raspberry. Then he turned and vanished.
The brigadier couldn’t help but burst out laughing.
XLIV
Seven days earlier, Saturday October 24
The rain has decided to take a little break.
The boys are standing in a knot near the food and grain warehouse, which is closed.
By now, night is falling. It’s the time of the evening when the colors disappear before the light itself: you can still see, but everything’s gray. From the woods of the royal estate around the palace comes a wind carrying the scents of trees and damp and winter.
A little off to one side is Tettè, with his dog. He’s petting him, whispering into him ear. Amedeo nods his head sharply and Saverio sets off for the street entrance, behind which is the passageway to the interior. The others wait. One of the twins hops from one leg to the other, partly in excitement, partly to keep warm. The other one has a bag in his hands.
After a moment, Saverio emerges from the entrance. He’s holding something.
A loud thunderclap bursts overhead; it’s about to start raining again. A horse-drawn cart goes by, its load covered by a wet canvas tarp. The drayman wrapped in a tattered old overcoat is nodding off, his hat tipped forward to cover his face. The smell of the wood burning in the potbellied stoves hangs in the air. Darkness is falling, minute by minute.
Amedeo takes a couple of pellets from Saverio’s hands. These are the poisoned morsels that Lotti, the owner of the warehouse, has laid out to kill the rats that have been eating his merchandise. When he gives a signal, the twin opens the bag and pulls out a bony, mangy cat with a length of twine tied around its neck. The cat tries desperately to break loose, but unsuccessfully, because the boy is holding the piece of twine tight. Tettè is standing up now, one hand resting on the dog’s head.
Amedeo offers the cat one of the poisoned morsels. The cat sniffs at it and then turns away. The boy snickers, then gestures to Saverio to help him. Cristiano is standing with his arms crossed, glowering, away from the rest of the group but on the opposite side of the boys from Tettè and the dog. In the distance they hear the sound of an automobile coming closer, then whizzing past without slowing down.
Saverio holds the cat’s head and pries open the mouth; Amedeo force-feeds the animal the poisoned morsel. Then they put it down on the ground and take a few steps back, still holding the cat by the twine leash tied around its neck.
The cat takes two steps and then stiffens; it goes on walking, legs extended, comically, like a windup toy. Amedeo starts laughing, and all the others laugh with him, except for Tettè, who clutches the head of his immobile dog, and Cristiano, who looks away.
The cat slams to the ground and its whole body starts contorting, leaping belly-up. Amedeo, Saverio, and the twins are all laughing uncontrollably by now, slapping each other loudly on the back. A yellowish foam issues from the cat’s mouth.
The convulsions go on for a minute, then cease. The cat gets up, dazed, takes a couple of steps toward the street, as if to make its escape, then its legs stiffen one last time and it slams into the pavement again. The boys start laughing again, until the animal, with one last horrible contraction, dies, its paws straight up in the air.
They all go on laughing for another couple of minutes, then they fall silent. In the distance, a woman is singing. There’s another rumble of thunder, closer this time.
Amedeo tells Saverio to give him the other poisoned morsels, and then he turns to face Tettè. Filthy cacaglio, he says: bring that bag of fleas that follows you everywhere over here, right now.
Tettè looks at him and tries pleading with him with his eyes; no, he wants to say, please, he’s not like the cat, he’s my friend. He’s the only friend I have. Tettè wants to say to him: I talk to him, you know, and he listens to me. He talks to me, too, and I understand what he tells me. The dog knows the way I pet him, he licks my hand, we share everything we find that’s good to eat, when the rest of you force me to give you my meals.
That’s what he’d say, if he could speak; if the serpent hadn’t slithered up from his belly, and weren’t trying to suffocate him from within.
Tettè would try to say something, but all that would come out would be a single guttural consonant, and everyone would laugh at him and do just as they pleased, like always. But not this time. This time Tettè has to stop them.
He looks around in desperation; there’s no one going by. Saverio starts walking over to him, but Amedeo stops him: no, he says. He has to bring the dog here to me, with his own two hands; and he has to give it the poison pellets, he has to feed them to that bag of fleas, otherwise it’ll bite us. Get moving, you fool of a cacaglio, hurry up; we need to get this out of the way before it starts raining.
Tettè looks at Cristiano, begging him with his eyes. But Cristiano turns his gaze away, and starts studying the night sky over the forest.
But then he intervenes, saying: come on, cut it out. The dog might bite your hand in its death throes, or piss on you. Amedeo turns to look at him, and asks if he’d like a good hard kick in the ass. No, wait, let’s do this instead, he says: cacaglio, if you don’t bring us the dog and feed it the poison, then you have to eat it. That’s what I’ve decided: either the dog dies, or you die.
That way we’ll see what kind of sound a cacaglio makes when he eats poison. If you ask me, he says, he’d be harder to understand than the cat.
They all start laughing again, except for Tettè and Cristiano.
Cristiano turns and speaks to Tettè: come on, cacaglio, don’t be more of a fool than you already are. Give the poison to that damned useless dog, and let’s go home before it starts raining.
Once it becomes clear to Tettè that no one is going to defend him, he drives the dog away with a kick. The dog, surprised and hurt, yelps and runs off, just ten feet or so. Then Tettè picks up a rock and throws it at the dog, and it turns and trots away along the wall, heading in the direction of Santa Maria del Soccorso.
Tettè turns to face Amedeo, and he glares at him with a light of defiance in his eyes. He can’t speak, because the serpent is suffocating him, but he looks him in the eye all the same.
Amedeo looks around and says: then you’ll have to eat them, you filthy cacaglio. You’ll have to eat the poisoned morsels.
You, or your damned dog.
XLV
Dragging his feet loudly on the floor, Nanni entered the church through the sacristy door, a scrub brush in one hand and a metal bucket full of water in the other. As he walked along he looked at the floor and muttered to himself, his forehead creased, his shoulders bowed.
When he reached the corner at the far end of the nave, near the main entrance that let out onto the street, he noticed a man standing in the shadows, his hands in his pockets, his hair dangling over his forehead. He noticed him because he saw his eyes shining in the dark, like the eyes of a cat. Green eyes.
“You’re the sexton, aren’t you? Nanni, that’s what they call you. I need to talk to you; come outside with me.”
Nanni recognized him: it was that police commissario who kept asking about the cacaglio child. The sexton took fright: the policeman’s face was pale, with purplish circles under his eyes. It looked like he was dead.
“Who do you want, Don Antonio? Is that who you want to talk to? I’ll go and get him for you, he’s resting just now, he has Mass in two hours.”
The dead man shook his head.
“No, I don’t want to talk to Don Antonio. You’re the one I want to talk to. Come outside with me, I said.”
His tone was cold, emotionless. Nanni felt uncomfortable. That man was scaring him more and more.
Outside there was a damp chill in the air. The temperature had dropped even lower, and heavy clouds were gathering, portending another night of rain. It seemed like the rain would never end.
They stopped just outside the church, on the steps, under the overhanging wooden shed roof that kept the entrance dry.
Ricciardi got straight to the point:
“Listen closely, because I have no time to waste. I need information about Tettè’s life, what he did here and who he saw.”
Nanni laughed nervously, a high-pitched titter.
“Those aren’t things you should be asking me about. I’m just the sexton, I see no one and nobody talks to me. You ought to ask Don Antonio; he’s the one who spends the most time with the boys. I don’t know anything.”
Ricciardi’s face was a mask.
“I told you I don’t have any time to waste. I’ve already talked to the priest: now I’m talking to you. In fact, the priest doesn’t need to know anything about what we’re discussing right now. Nothing at all.”
Nanni dragged his feet back and forth on the ground, more anxious than ever.
“Commissa’, forgive me, try to understand: I can’t . . . Don Antonio gives me work, surely you understand that . . . ”
Ricciardi spoke in the same tone of voice, whispering as if they were still inside the church, so that Nanni had to strain to hear what he was saying:
“I must not have made myself clear. Don Antonio may give you work, but I’m keeping you out of jail. You just try keeping the things I want to know to yourself, and tonight you’ll be sleeping next to twenty people, all of them worse than you, and eager to get to know you. Take your pick.”
Nanni tittered again, as if he’d just been told a funny joke.
“Me, in jail? Why on earth would I go to jail, if I haven’t done anything wrong?”
“Nothing wrong, eh? I can file three criminal complaints immediately, from women you’ve molested when you were drunk. Or men, if it comes to that. These days, we don’t need a guilty verdict: it’s enough to spread a rumor. Even if you got out of jail the next day, you’d never work again, and certainly not in a place like this. And you’d find yourself face-to-face with a nice squad of jackbooted enforcers, who’d beat you to death to help keep the streets safe. So what’ll it be?”
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