At length the constipated press of traffic in which Carla’s Fiat Uno was embedded passed through the succession of tunnels where so much expensive and urgent repair work was not being done, and she completed the drive down to the north coast of the island and then westwards to her destination. The Hotel Zagarella turned out to be a modern monstrosity on what must at one time have been a stunning peninsula, with extensive views along the neighbouring bay and out to sea. Next to the hotel was yet another construction site, one of those timeless projects which look like a nuclear power station being built by two old men with buckets, spades and a rope hoist.
Of the grand villas belonging to the Palermitan nobility which had once stood here, there was almost no sign. Those that did remain were imprisoned in a perspectiveless absurdity, a concrete Gulag constructed by the ‘state within the state’, where the memory of what might have been was perhaps the bitterest punishment in this society of latter-day zeks, where even the winners were losers.
When Carla pulled up outside the hotel, a flunkey rushed over and opened the door.
‘Signorina Arduini! You’re expected inside. I’ll see to the car.’
So whoever ‘they’ were, they knew the number of her telefonino and the make and registration of her car. But the most disturbing aspect of the situation was that they were evidently making no effort to hide the fact that they knew. Carla handed over the keys and walked up the plush red-carpeted steps. At the top, another functionary opened the door for her with a respectful bow. Once inside, a small rotund man in a suit and tie came bustling over to her.
‘Welcome to the Zagarella, Signorina Arduini! I trust your journey was not too arduous. Your friends are waiting for you in a private room at the rear of the premises. If you permit, I shall be happy to accompany you there myself. This way, please!’
She had visualized the ‘private room’ as an intimate space to one side of the hotel’s dining area, sectioned off perhaps by a slatted wooden partition. It turned out to be the size of a football field. Rows of metal tables and chairs stretched away in ranks towards a series of narrow windows reaching up to the ceiling. Despite the massive concrete columns supporting the latter, everything looked cheap, vulgar and temporary.
At the middle of the room stood a table heaped with food and centred by a vase roughly the size of an average sink, from which protruded a huge bouquet of flowers. Three men were seated around the table. All three stared blatantly at Carla as she made her way across the scuffed industrial flooring towards them.
Having reached the corner of the table, Carla stopped. After a significant pause, the middle of the three men jumped to his feet as though noticing her presence for the first time. He was dressed in the standard uniform of the professional classes: tweed jacket, blue shirt and red tie beneath a yellow pullover, brown trousers and highly polished shoes.
‘Good day, signorina,’ he said coolly. ‘So glad you could join us. May I introduce my assistant Carmelo. And this is Gaetano, an esteemed colleague visiting from Rome.’
He waved alternately at the two men. Carla nodded briefly to each, then turned back to the speaker.
‘And you are?’
The man frowned.
‘But surely that was …’
He tapped his forehead lightly with the heel of one hand.
‘But I forgot, of course you didn’t get our message!’
He turned to the other two.
‘Apparently she didn’t get our message,’ he said.
The two men sat impassively, with the air of people who had better things to do.
‘My name is Vito Alagna,’ the man announced, turning back to Carla with a ceremonial bow.
‘How did you know my cellphone number?’ asked Carla, wondering at her own temerity. These people had power the way some had muscles.
‘I left a message late yesterday with the porter at the Palace of Justice. When you didn’t return it, I called again and was told you were working at home, so I called you there this morning. Please, take a seat!’
He waved towards the enormous buffet table, on which stood a huge variety of cold foods. Carla took a chair at random, the nearest one. No one at the Palazzo di Giustizia except Corinna Nunziatella knew her cellphone numbers, private or professional. She had been very careful not to give them out, to avoid endless harassment.
‘Forgive the seeming mystification,’ Vito Alagna went on. ‘It’s really quite simple and straightforward. I work for the autonomous parliament here in Palermo which oversees the internal affairs of this little island of ours. We have naturally collaborated with our colleagues in Rome on the creation and development of the various specialized bodies set up to investigate so-called “criminal activities of the Mafia variety” within our political and administrative jurisdiction.’
He glanced at the other men, as though for corroboration. If so, none was forthcoming. As though embarrassed by his colleagues’ lack of response, Alagna gestured to the food.
‘But please! Help yourself!’
Carla looked at him, then at the other two, and lastly at the food itself. Although superficially attractive, even luxurious, there was something rather odd about the selection on offer. It included both smoked and poached salmon, a block of smooth meat pate in its wrapper of congealed butter and gelatin, a haunch of cold roast beef, and a selection of cheeses including Stilton, Brie and some sort of cream cheese smothered in nuts. A moment later, Carla had worked out why it seemed so odd: every single item was imported.
‘Aren’t you eating?’ she asked Vito, who smiled and shrugged.
‘We’re not hungry yet,’ he said.
Carla nodded.
‘Neither am I.’
The man at the end of the table, whom Vito had named Gaetano, suddenly spoke.
‘Perhaps later,’ he said. ‘We have all day.’
Carla recalled what Corinna had said.
‘Unfortunately I haven’t. I have to be back in Catania by six this evening. A friend of mine is expecting me for dinner.’
‘Who’s that?’
The question came from Gaetano.
‘Dottoressa Nunziatella,’ Carla replied succinctly. ‘She is a judge for the AntiMafia pool, where I work.’
‘You two must be very close.’
Gaetano again.
‘We’re friends, yes,’ Carla retorted.
Gaetano looked up at the ceiling, where a glass lamp like a melting zeppelin gathered dust at the end of its black cord.
‘And you’re having dinner with her again tonight? Two evenings in a row. Now that’s true friendship!’
The men all sniggered quietly.
‘How do you know about all this?’ Carla snapped.
The three men exchanged a glance, then resumed their purposefully purposeless gaze.
‘Eh, it’s a small place, Sicily!’ the one called Carmelo said at last.
Vito Alagna’s suave tones were almost a relief.
‘Be assured that we won’t detain you for long, signorina. We just need a brief update on the current situation with regard to the system you are working on. A sort of progress report, as it were.’
‘I’ve provided the director of the DIA in Catania with a series of progress reports,’ Carla replied.
Vito Alagna shrugged wearily.
‘Yes, I’m sure you have, but you know how it is! What with bad communications and the usual rivalry and backbiting, these reports are not always passed on as quickly as they should be, if at all. Now I’m sure that all you want to do is finish this assignment and get back to your home up in the north, right?’
Carla Arduini could not resist a decisive nod. Alagna laughed.
‘Excellent! In that case, our interests coincide. So let’s just run over the status of the project at this time, and touch briefly on any problems that may have arisen and your personal prognosis for a completion date.’
Which is exactly what she had done, Carla reflected in the car on the way back. She’d given the three men a succinct and professional overview of the situation to date, omitting all reference to ‘Count Dracula’, and provided them with her estimated best-case scenario for a handover to the AntiMafia authorities. Vito Alagna had listened quietly and intently, taking no notes but giving the impression of absorbing every detail Carla mentioned. The other two sat looking at their nails, saying nothing. It was around three o’clock when the one called Gaetano leaned heavily over on to his right buttock and emitted a loud fart.
‘Time we were going,’ he said to no one in particular.
‘Of course, of course!’ Vito Alagna exclaimed, rising to his feet. ‘Thank you so much for coming, signorina. It’s been extremely helpful. The valet will fetch your car. Thank you once again. Goodbye, goodbye!’
Her return journey was easier, since the westbound tunnels on the A19 were not affected by the notional repair work. The only problem was a motorcyclist stuck just in front of her, riding some sort of powerful red machine no doubt capable of over 200 kmph. Carla’s little Fiat didn’t have enough power to overtake him, and since he seemed content to cruise along at a steady 90 kmph the whole way, she had no choice but to stare at his stubborn, leather-clad form all the way to Catania.
Back in her flat, she tried calling her father, but there was still no reply. She had a shower and then went back into the bedroom of her modern apartment, searching for the thick white terry-towelling gown she used to dry off in. It was not on the hook where she kept it, and it took a moment to locate it on a similar hook on the other side of the closet. The jacket and slacks she had hung there, still in their plastic wrapping from the cleaners where she had picked them up two days earlier, were hanging on the other hook, the one where Carla always kept her towelling gown.
Her personal mobile started to ring. Carla sidled towards it, glancing at the open doorway and the various inner recesses of the apartment, as yet unchecked.
‘Signorina Arduini?’ a charmless male voice asked. ‘This is the Bar Nettuno. We have a message that was left by a friend of yours. She said to phone you and tell you to pick it up immediately.’
‘Can’t you give it to me now?’ asked Carla irritably. ‘Who is this supposed friend, anyway?’
‘She didn’t leave a name, signorina, just a written message sealed in an envelope. She told me to ring you at six o’clock precisely and tell you to come and pick it up.’
Carla glanced at the clock. It was just after six.
‘Very well, I’ll be there shortly,’ she said.
Naked except for the towel clutched around her belly, she opened every door in the small apartment and verified that no one was hiding there. Nothing seemed to be missing, either. Carla switched on her Toshiba laptop and turned away to look for some clothes. When she returned to the table, the screen was glowing. In the centre was a box with a circle slashed red and the words FATAL ERROR MESSAGE! THIS COMPUTER HAS PERFORMED AN ILLEGAL OPERATION AND WILL BE SHUT DOWN. Looking out of the window at the apartment block across the street, Carla felt for the power switch and pressed it gently, stilling the computer, then closed the lid.
The Bar Nettuno was only a few steps away, an undistinguished enterprise installed on the ground floor of the apartment block visible from Carla’s window. Hurriedly dressed in jeans and a pullover, Carla strode in and identified herself to the barman, who nodded expressionlessly and passed her an envelope with her name on it. Inside she found a handwritten note: ‘I’ll call the pay phone in the corner, beside the video game, at six fifteen, then every five minutes until I get you. CN.’
Carla glanced at her watch. It was six twelve. Three minutes later, the phone started to ring. Corinna Nunziatella sounded embarrassed.
‘I apologize for all this nonsense, cara, but if we’re going to do this, we’d better do it properly.’
‘You think your phone is tapped?’
‘Under the circumstances, that’s the only sensible assumption to make. Yours too, for all I know. And cellphones are notoriously insecure. So this seemed the best way. How was your day in Palermo?’
Carla told her. There was silence the other end, then a long sigh.
‘This means we’re going to have to be even more careful about our arrangements for tomorrow.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’ll explain when we meet. Have you got a pen and paper? Now listen carefully. Take the 10 a.m. AST bus to Aci Castello. Go down to the coast and walk north to Aci Trezza. It’s only a couple of kilometres along a very pretty path with a view of the rocks which the Cyclops named Polyphemus threw at Ulysses and his men after they blinded him. Do you know your Homer?’
‘Surely that happened somewhere in Greece?’
‘In Homer’s time, Sicily was somewhere in Greece. Are you paying attention? In Aci Trezza there’s a hotel called I Ciclopi. Go into the bar and wait for me. If I haven’t contacted you by midday, go home. Don’t mention my name, don’t ask questions, don’t try to call me, just go home. And another thing. After what you’ve just told me, it’s possible that you may be followed. If you notice anyone following you, try to lose him. If you can’t, again, just go home. Above all, on no account bring a tail to our rendezvous. Do you understand?’
‘Of course, but why should I be followed? No one’s interested in me.’
‘I’m interested in you, cara, and they’re interested in me. Your little lunch in “the triangle of death” proved that beyond a doubt.’
‘But that was…’
‘Please just accept what I’m telling you. As far as they’re concerned, we’re a couple. They will therefore be watching you.’
‘This is like some stupid movie!’ Carla exclaimed dramatically, sounding like a character in just such a movie.
‘All the more reason not to be stupid ourselves,’ Corinna Nunziatella replied calmly. ‘A domani, cara.’
Six men sat around the metal table set up in the shade of the ancient carob and palm trees in the centre of the small square. On the table, painted green and chipped and flecked with rust, lay a chessboard. The six men were seated on folding chairs of a similar colour and condition. Only two of the men were actually playing, but the other four watched as though their lives depended on the result. So, to a lesser degree, did a larger group, about ten in all, who stood in a rough circle at a respectful distance from the players and their immediate entourage. Beyond them, cars lay as though abandoned in the empty street, ranks of shuttered houses kept their counsel, while above all Etna smouldered like a badly doused fire.
‘The queen,’ said the man playing White, placing his cigar in the ashtray to the right of the chessboard.
All the onlookers perked up, but for a long time no one spoke.
‘She’s exposed,’ the other player agreed at length.
‘But that pawn is only a few moves from queening itself,’ the first mused. ‘If I move against the queen, the pawn will have a chance to get through to the back file. What to do?’
‘Try the Sicilian Defence!’ said a voice from the surrounding crowd. Ironic but anonymous guffaws broke out all around, as though to protect the speaker against the possible consequences of this insolence.
The man at the table picked up his cigar and leaned back slowly, looking up at the shards of blue sky visible through the thickly massed leaves overhead. There was a terrible silence. The speaker exhaled an expanding galaxy of smoke.
‘We really must respond to the recent communication from our friends in Corleone before too long,’ he said. ‘Not to do so might appear discourteous.’
‘But how?’ asked his opponent, shifting a rook forward five squares and then instantly withdrawing his hand, so quickly that the piece might have moved by itself.
The man playing White did not even look at the board.
‘I think an invitation to lunch,’ he said.
‘They’d never come!’ burst out the voice in the crowd which had spoken before.
‘Not to Catania, of course. But if the invitation came from Messina…’
He glanced down at the table and took the threatening rook with a knight.
‘Then we’d have to give them something in return,’ remarked Black.
‘Precisely. We give them the judge.’
‘Nunziatella? She’s already been removed from the picture.’
‘From our point of view, yes. But she’s still investigating the Maresi business, which spills over in all sorts of ways into the interests of our Messina friends.’
There was a long silence.
‘If we do that, then the authorities will crack down on us,’ said Black.
‘No, they won’t,’ White replied. ‘No one will know it was us. As you pointed out, we have no reason to be interested in Nunziatella. Why should we stir up trouble when everything has been sorted out so nicely?’
‘In that case, they’ll go after Messina. And our friends there won’t like that.’
‘Who cares what they like? By then it will be too late. They’ve been getting a bit above themselves recently, anyhow.’
He took a long satisfied draw on his cigar, then glanced back at the board and moved his queen diagonally from one side to the other.
‘Check.’
The man playing Black looked at him in astonishment.
‘How do you do it, Don Gaspare?’
‘You like it?’ the cigar-smoker enquired coyly.
‘It’s beautiful!’
A frown came over his face.
‘But what about the Corleonesi?’
‘What about them?’
‘Well, supposing they come to this lunch …’
‘They’ll come all right! Now that Totò is in prison and Binù’s in deep hiding, they need allies. I happen to know that they’ve been flirting with our friends in Messina for some time. An invitation like that? They’ll cream in their pants!’
Another round of laughter from the onlookers.
‘All right, so they come,’ said Black. ‘What then?’
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