Day of the Dead

by Maurizio de Giovanni

  The sexton ran his tongue over his chapped lips, looking around as if in search of help. He was in a transitory state of sobriety and knew that the commissario was right: if he felt like it, he could toss Nanni into a world of trouble.

  “What do you want to know, Commissa’?”

  “You just need to tell me what you know. I want to know anything and everything that Tettè did that was different from the other boys, no matter what it was, even things that seem unimportant. And fast.”

  Nanni ran his tongue over his lips again: evidently a habit with him, and an especially disgusting one.

  “The cacaglio . . . the child was good, he never did anything wrong. But the others picked on him, they made fun of him because he was a cacaglio. They played pranks on him.”

  “I know all about that. Go on.”

  “He was the favorite of one of the two ladies, the younger one. She’d given him a new suit of clothes. Don Antonio put the clothes away in a little cabinet. He kept it locked, and we only got them out when the child was going on an outing with her. The signora was fixated on him. She petted him, she kissed him. I don’t understand: why didn’t she just have a child of her own?”

  Ricciardi let the comment go unacknowledged.

  “That’s not what interests me, and it’s none of your business, either. Go on.”

  “The priest, Don Antonio, he exploited this thing, this fixation of the signora’s. Because she’s rich, very rich, and when Don Antonio smells money, he grabs on to it and never lets go. Every time she’d talk to us, she’d say, the child needs this, the child needs that, and she’d give us money. One time, she even gave me a gift, when the boy had a fever, to make sure I’d keep an eye on him and give him his medicine.”

  Ricciardi was so keenly focused on every word that he didn’t even blink.

  “How did Don Antonio act with him? How did he treat the boy?”

  Nanni waved his hand.

  “That Don Antonio only cares about money. He doesn’t care about the children at all. To him the cacaglio was just another kid; if you ask me, he barely knows one from the other. But the child was his way of getting money, so he punished him a little less. Only when it was necessary; otherwise the others would have killed the cacaglio out of envy.”

  “Why, if he punished Tettè the others wouldn’t envy him? They wouldn’t envy what the signora did for him, the gifts and the outings: didn’t they envy him for that?”

  “Of course they did; but it worked out well enough for them, because he’d always bring back something for them, too. Now that the cacaglio’s dead, they don’t get any more treats.”

  That must have struck the sexton as funny, because he started tittering again. Ricciardi’s icy glare shut him up immediately.

  “Now I want you to tell me something else. I need you to talk to me about the man with the limp, the man who came to see Tettè.”

  A silence fell between them, as cold as the air that surrounded them. Nanni looked at Ricciardi, afraid to breathe, his eyes open wide. How could that damned policeman know about the man with the limp? Who could he have talked to, if the cacaglio was dead and he himself hadn’t told a soul? He tried to stall for time.

  “What are you talking about, Commissa’? I don’t understand.”

  Ricciardi said nothing. Then he said, all in one breath:

  “Very well then. Then let’s go get your things. You’re coming with me.”

  The sexton turned pale and staggered, as if he’d been slapped.

  “Commissa’, I beg you, don’t ruin me. I wouldn’t know where to go, if they kicked me out of here.”

  “Then don’t make them kick you out. All you have to do is tell me everything you know about the man with the limp. This second.”

  The man looked down at the ground. His tongue darted first in one direction, then in the other over his lips.

  “Ten days or so before the . . . death of the cacaglio, this man stopped me, just outside the church. A gentleman, well dressed, with a walking stick with a handle made of bone. He gave me money to bring the child to him.”

  “Which child? Tettè in particular, or just any child?”

  “No, that one, the cacaglio. I thought that . . . sometimes it happens that a gentleman, or even a lady, sees a boy and wants him. They say it’s just to do a little work around the house; I don’t believe them, but what does it matter to me? If they give the boys gifts, money, and there’s a little something in it for me, then everyone wins, right? I just thought that it was the same thing with the cacaglio. I brought the cacaglio to meet the man with the walking stick. But I never heard anything more about it.”

  Ricciardi realized that rarely in his life had he been in the presence of anyone slimier and more repugnant than the sexton.

  “How many times did you arrange for them to meet? How many times did Tettè see the man with the walking stick?”

  Nanni concentrated, trying to remember.

  “Three, four times, as far as I know. No more. Then he died.”

  Then he died. Ricciardi shivered. He was increasingly finding the dead less frightening than the living. The man was disgusting, but he didn’t seem to have the courage to actually hurt anyone.

  It was becoming more and more important to find out who the man with the limp was, and what he wanted from Tettè.

  He turned on his heel and walked off, leaving the sexton standing on the church steps, filled with new fears. As for him, he was even more baffled than before.

  XLVI

  Maione tracked down Cosimo the saponaro late that afternoon, after asking around a little in order to reconstruct his route. It wasn’t very hard; he was a fairly well-known local character.

  He caught up with him outside an upper-class apartment building, over Montecalvario, addressing a little crowd of half a dozen women. He watched Cosimo from a distance for a while, without making his presence known. The junk seller’s whole manner was contrived and affected: he gesticulated wildly to emphasize the nonsense he was spouting; he was wearing an ancient, tattered frock coat, with a crooked, slightly dented top hat; he displayed his wares as if they were fine jewelry; and somehow he managed to come across as attractive rather than ridiculous. Maione thought once again that he lived in a city of actors.

  He waited until nearly all the women had left, many of them carrying something, a saucepan or a rag. One woman stayed behind, and Cosimo grew confidential; he took a quick look around, then furtively pulled open a secret compartment in his handcart and extracted a bundle, which he unwrapped. A metal object of some kind emerged, perhaps a piece of silverware. It gleamed in the grayish light. Maione chose that moment to step forward.

  “Good evening. What are we talking about, over here?”

  At the sight of the brigadier, the good-looking young woman’s eyes opened wide.

  “Oh, buona sera, Brigadie’. You’ll forgive me, I was just about to leave; my signora wants dinner served early tonight. Arrivederci, Cosimo. I’ll see you the next time you come through.”

  The junk seller was conflicted between his desire to complete the transaction, which he felt sure he was about to close, and his fear of the cop. After a second’s hesitation, his fear won out decisively.

  “My good Brigadier, what an honor! I was just passing the time of day with this lovely young signorina at the end of my rounds, to finish the day with a face that’s so easy on the eyes. But now, as you yourself just pointed out, it’s evening, time for weary workers to rest their bones, and so I think I too had better be going; it’s been a long, hard day. If you’ll excuse me, then . . . ”

  Maione stared at him, his hands in his pockets.

  “Not so fast, Cosimo Capone. I have a feeling your weary bones aren’t going to get to rest just yet. First we need to have a little conversation.”

  The junk seller’s mind registered the fact that the
oversized brigadier, whom he had never met, seemed to know him very well, first name and last. A long shiver ran down his back, and the dampness in the air had nothing to do with it.

  “Have we met, Brigadie’? I don’t remember being introduced, but such a notable and important personage as yourself would certainly have stuck in my memory. I guess I’m just getting old, is all.”

  Maione smiled satanically.

  “I know you, and that’s all that matters, Capone. I know you and I know your sort. That’s my line of work, people like you: the same way you work with copper pots and washerwomen.”

  Capone put on a baffled expression.

  “Brigadier, I don’t know what you mean. I’m a hardworking man who spends all day on the job, pushing this handcart all over Naples, just to get a crust of bread to eat. I have a family to feed, up on the Vomero. What are you talking about?”

  “I also have a family to feed. Everyone has one. And they feed theirs without slipping their sticky fingers into other people’s possessions.”

  A scandalized expression appeared on the junk seller’s face.

  “I don’t know what infamous wretch told you that, but it’s a lie! I swear on my honor, Brigadie’, that I’ve never dreamed of stealing a thing! I’ve been accused in the past, but all due to the malevolent envy of some son of a good woman bent on destroying my reputation. I’ll let you speak to my customers, all good women who love me dearly and have been buying from me for years, and they’ll tell you . . . ”

  Maione broke in with a curt wave of the hand.

  “Capone, you can’t charm your way out of this one: you’re a burglar and a thief. And the worst kind, too, because you don’t look like a thief. I have a certain respect for thieves who creep out at night, with their jimmies, dressed in black. We catch them and we throw them in a cell; it’s our job to be policemen, and it’s their job to be thieves. They don’t deny what they’ve done, and once we’ve cornered them, they resign themselves and come along quietly. They’re proper thieves. It’s their profession. Thieves like you, on the other hand, will be the ruin of this city. You pretend to be honest but you’re rotten to the core.”

  Capone was starting to get genuinely scared.

  “Brigadie’, I don’t understand. Why are you saying these things to me? What are you accusing me of?”

  Maione shrugged.

  “I could easily find a reason to lock you up. And I wouldn’t rule out the possibility that, once I’m done with the case I’m on now, I might come pay a little call on you and search this handcart thoroughly.”

  He landed a kick at the approximate location of the compartment from which the junk seller had pulled out the bundle to show the young woman. A rattling of metal came from inside. Capone’s face turned white, and he tried his luck, playing the wrong card entirely:

  “Brigadie’, don’t ruin me. I’m a father, with a family to provide for. I have some valuable merchandise in there; let’s just do this, I’ll give you half and you . . . you can return it to the rightful owners on my behalf. And we’ll each go our own way.”

  At first Maione couldn’t believe his own ears. That half-man was trying to bribe him! He shut his eyes tight and counted to ten. Then he reached out his hand and grabbed Capone’s arm in a vise grip. The man emitted a cry of surprise and pain.

  “Listen up and listen good, you useless bag of bones: I’ll break every bone in your body and then I’ll throw you in jail, and I’ll just say you resisted arrest. A lie for a lie, that seems like a fair trade. You aren’t even worthy of looking me in the face, you know that? Much less doing business with me.”

  The junk seller started stammering:

  “But . . . but . . . B-Brigadie’, what on earth did you think I meant? I would never dare . . . Let me go, you’re breaking my arm!”

  Maione loosened his grip and heaved a deep sigh. Then he resumed his relaxed tone of voice.

  “All right, let’s get this over with, since it disgusts me to have to talk to you. I’m not interested in you; you’re practically worthless. What I want is information about the boy, and it’ll go better with you if you tell me what I want to know, and right away.”

  Capone looked thunderstruck.

  “The boy? What boy?”

  “Tettè, the boy from Santa Maria del Soccorso. The little boy you used to take on your rounds, the one who died.”

  The junk seller was now completely confused; it was getting dark and that enormous brigadier seemed to be out of his mind, and he was really scaring him.

  “Certainly! That boy was like a son to me. He used to help me out, I was teaching him the business, and . . . ”

  Again, the vise grip.

  “Capo’, do you still think you can go on pulling my leg? I told you I want the truth! I know what you were doing, I know what you were using that poor child to do, that you sent him into people’s apartments to steal while you distracted your little audience of idiot housewives with your gift of gab. I know everything.”

  Cosimo felt like he’d fallen into a nightmare.

  “But if you already know everything, what do you want from me? I’ll say I’m sorry, I’ll promise I’ll never do it again! If you’ll let me go . . . ”

  “First, you have to tell me about the little boy. Everything you know about him, everything you did to him.”

  The junk seller stiffened in terror.

  “What is it you think I’ve done, Brigadie’? I absolutely refuse to stand by while you think this horrible thing! Besides, I heard that the boy ate poison—I had nothing to do with it!”

  Maione looked at him gravely.

  “Go on. I want to know what this child was like. And don’t try telling me that he was like a son to you, because fathers don’t send their sons out to steal.”

  By now Capone had finally gotten it through his head that he needed to tell it straight, and do his best to shorten this nightmare:

  “He was just a boy, Brigadie’. A boy, like thousands of other little boys, living on the streets. He never talked, and when he tried, he stuttered; but he was small, and he melted women’s hearts, so he came in handy to me. I . . . I told him that if he told anyone anything about what we did, I’d hurt him, but I never would have, never. After all, it was hardly in my interest, was it? After I’d taught him how to do what . . . how to do what he did, why should I get rid of him?”

  Maione was disgusted, but inclined to believe him.

  “Tell me about the last few days. When did you last see him? Did you notice anything strange or unusual? Did you see anyone with him? Talk!”

  “No, Brigadie’, I haven’t seen the boy since Thursday. I just assumed he’d gotten sick, he was so skinny, so weak, it always looked as if he was about to fall to the ground, or blow away with the breeze. I didn’t know what had become of him, and I didn’t go looking for him because I didn’t have time. Then, the day before yesterday, his friend, Cristiano, the other boy from the parish, comes around, and he tells me that Tettè is dead and asks if I can take him to work in his place. That’s how I found out he was dead. And there was never anyone with him, just that bastard dog that used to follow him everywhere. That’s all I know, I swear it!”

  The brigadier looked at him long and hard. He wanted to make sure that his contempt seeped into the man’s soul and stayed with him, like a threat: if he found out that the man had lied to him, if he and the man crossed paths again, if he ever heard that the man had stolen or burgled or mistreated another living soul, that would be the end of him. Capone understood, and looked down.

  “I can track you down, Capone. The same way I found you just now, I can track you down whenever I want. Remember that. And you’d better just pray to God that you haven’t lied to me.”

  The junk seller looked up again.

  “I didn’t lie to you, Brigadie’. It’s one thing to steal, it’s another thing to mur
der, or to let someone be murdered. I don’t know anything about what happened to the child; and I wouldn’t even know who to ask. I told you, he was just a child like so many other children, living on the street.”

  On his way back to police headquarters, Maione couldn’t seem to get the saponaro’s last words out of his head: a child like so many other children, living on the street. With a shiver, he realized that he’d thought the same thing, when he couldn’t seem to figure out the reason for Ricciardi’s fixation on this death.

  The thought terrified him: a child like so many other children. What if he, Maione, had died the same way his son Luca died, his son the policeman, stabbed to death by a criminal? Then would his children, his sons and daughters, have wound up like that, “like so many other children, living on the street”?

  Once again, he thought, the commissario had been right. Children living on the street were somebody’s children; in fact, they were everybody’s children. And he, Maione, was ashamed not to have seen that right from the start. You can’t write off a child’s life with a couple of words in a police report. You have to understand it. And as their investigations had shown, some strange, dark things had happened in Tettè’s short life.

  As Maione went by the corner of Via della Tofa, where he’d found Ricciardi waiting for him that morning, he heard a faint whistle and instinctively turned around. Bambinella was waiting for him in the shadows, with a handkerchief on her head and wrapped in an overcoat that had been patched and repatched, mended and remended.

  “Bambine’, is that you? What are you doing here? Is something the matter?”

  Bambinella the femminiello had a serious expression on her face that Maione had never seen before, with deep creases at the corners of her mouth.

  “Good evening, Brigadie’. I need to talk to you.”

  XLVII