Black August

by Timothy Williams

  She thought he had been joking. But when he repeated that Anna Ermagni had been kidnapped, Rosanna Belloni told Trotti about a visit she had received a few months earlier from the girl’s father. Ermagni had come to see her, asking for help.

  Trotti asked, “What did you tell him?”

  “About his daughter?”

  “Yes.”

  “Commissario Trotti, I’ve never had children of my own.” The hint of a sigh as the cardigan lifted slightly. “I never married, not because I didn’t want to.” She looked at the fingers of her left hand. “There are other reasons that I need not bore you with. However, I’ve been in this school for twenty years and I’ve been teaching for twenty-seven. In twenty-seven years, you learn a lot about children—and adults, too. And one of the most important lessons that I’ve learned is that you can’t change people. You can help them, you can advise them—but you can’t change them if they themselves don’t want to change. Change people, force them to be different, to be not what they are but what we want them to be—that’s Fascist philosophy. Fascist thinking. And I hope that you and I have had enough of that.”

  Rosanna Belloni had smiled, showing brilliant, even teeth. The corners of the hazel eyes had wrinkled.)

  Trotti ran a hand over his hot eyes.

  At one o’clock Pisanelli went back upstairs into the building to where Rosanna Belloni now—more than a decade later—lay battered to death.

  4: Barley Sugar

  At half past one Trotti left the courtyard looking for a bar that was still open. He returned, carrying a couple of plastic cups.

  The two men drank the hot coffee.

  They waited another hour before seeing Merenda leaving, his head bowed and deep in conversation with the pretty procuratore from Rome. Her heels clicked on the pitted floor, her voice was hoarse in the windless air.

  The two Carabinieri were behind them, walking ponderously with their hands behind their backs.

  The gate was closed and the last siren died in the hot summer night.

  “Let’s see if we can get something out of this Boatti.”

  “How am I going to get married if you keep me up at these impossible hours?”

  “You should never’ve phoned me.” Irritably, Trotti added, “You should’ve stuck to medicine, Pisanelli. Or gotten a job in the town hall.”

  Taking the stairs slowly, Pisanelli and Trotti went past Signorina Belloni’s door. A police notice had been pinned up, access had been cordoned off. The door was open and inside an NCO sat waiting. The shadow of his feet and a cloud of cigarette smoke were all that was visible. From behind the door came the sound of hushed voices.

  “What makes you think my teeth’ll fall out?”

  “With all that tooth decay, Commissario?”

  “Been eating these things since the end of the war.” Trotti laughed. “One of the rare pleasures in my life.”

  “Feeling sorry for yourself?”

  “Only too glad to be alive.” They went up the last flight. The door to Signor Boatti’s flat was ajar. “Rosanna Belloni was a couple of years younger than me. She was born in ’29 or ’30. We both grew up during the years of Fascism.”

  “You age well, Commissario.”

  “It’s all that barley sugar.” Trotti tapped at the varnished wood, calling out, “Anybody there?”

  Behind the ground-glass window, a light was burning inside the flat. Trotti pushed open the door. The two policemen found themselves in a small hallway. The walls were white and bare except for a couple of Oriental etchings.

  There was movement and then the far door opened.

  “Signor Boatti?”

  The man’s glance went from Pisanelli to Trotti. “Yes?”

  “Commissario Trotti of the Polizia di Stato.”

  Boatti sighed. “I thought I had already answered all your questions.”

  Trotti held up his hand. “I realize it’s late.”

  “Very late.” Boatti had dark eyes, dark hair, fleshy red lips and a pale round face. He was dressed for the street, and despite the late hour, his shirt looked fresh, his blue trousers uncrumpled.

  “I saw the light on,” Trotti continued, apologetically. “If you don’t mind our coming in.”

  “I’ve answered enough questions for one evening.” Boatti glanced at his watch.

  “I once knew Signorina Belloni. Not very well—but I’d like to think she considered me a friend.”

  “Friend of a policeman?” Boatti said flatly.

  “May we come in?”

  Again the journalist glanced from Pisanelli to Trotti. He stepped back. “If you think it’s absolutely necessary.” The intelligent face was tired. There were circles under his eyes. “I really don’t see what I can tell you that I haven’t already told your friend Commissario Merenda.”

  5: Equatorial

  The blades of the ceiling fan turned indolently.

  There was a beige computer on a mahogany desk. The walls were hidden behind bulging bookcases. An expensive Persian carpet was strewn with magazines—military magazines in several languages. On one of them a kitten had curled up and fallen asleep.

  “My wife’s gone to bed. I must ask you to speak quietly.” Boatti smiled a boyish smile. In his early thirties, Trotti thought, as he lowered himself on to the leather settee.

  “She’s working on a translation and she needs her sleep.” He added as an afterthought, “My daughters are with their grandparents on holiday.”

  “I have a daughter, too,” Trotti said, not quite knowing why. “Married and now expecting her first child.”

  Boatti smiled frostily. “A drink, gentlemen?”

  “Not when we’re on duty.”

  “On duty at three o’clock in the morning?”

  Pisanelli remarked innocently, “This heat builds up a thirst.”

  Boatti was standing with his hip against the sill. He glanced through the open window that gave on to Piazza Teodoro and the church. “When the wind drops and the heat lies motionless over the Po valley, you could be in equatorial Africa.” For a moment he was lost in thought. “Some mineral water, perhaps, Commissario?”

  Trotti nodded.

  Boatti went into the kitchen. Trotti studied the bookcases.

  Science fiction and crime novels. There were many titles in foreign languages. Trotti recognized the yellow paperbacks of the Mondadori detective collection. Il Poliziotto È Solo. Trotti winced.

  A green light blinked on the computer’s screen.

  There were more framed Oriental drawings on the wall, tigers and other exotic animals, with Chinese pictograms down one side of the image.

  “You knew her well, Commissario?” Boatti said, returning with a tray.

  “Signorina Belloni? We met a few times—on police business. I didn’t know her outside the school—I’d no idea she lived here.”

  Boatti’s smile hardened. “You don’t consider this part of the city as being the right sort of place for a retired headmistress.”

  Trotti took the bottle and poured water into a tinted glass. “That’s not what I meant. Our paths crossed professionally. I liked her and respected her. That’s all.”

  Boatti raised an eyebrow. “You feel she could have retired to somewhere better.”

  “A bit surprised to see how small her flat is.”

  “She didn’t require much. In many ways, Rosanna was very ascetic.”

  “An intellectual?”

  “Not at all. She had worked her way up to being headmistress. The hard way. She didn’t have a university education, you know.”

  “I left school at seventeen.”

  “You surprise me.” Boatti turned to serve Pisanelli with a glass of wine. “Eighty-seven vintage—Grignolino, guaranteed free of anti-freeze,” he said, almost conspiratorially. “No label—but D.O.C.” Then
he sat down in a swivel chair in front of the computer and crossed his legs. He pressed a switch and the light on the monitor disappeared. “I was very fond of her,” Boatti said, turning back to face Trotti. “Both my wife and I were very fond of Rosanna Belloni. She was very good with the little girls. Always a hug when they went past her door. But Rosanna knew children too well to be patronizing.”

  “Who d’you think killed her?”

  “No idea.” Boatti shook his head.

  “She had enemies?”

  “Rosanna was a very retiring person. She must’ve known a lot of people. She’d taught in various schools in this province and Milan for over thirty-five years. She was originally from Milan, but she felt happier here in our city. She didn’t have many friends. Apart from a few old ladies living in this part of the city, I never saw her with anybody.”

  “She had men friends?”

  “A brother. I met him once. He came up from Foggia for the funeral of a nephew who was killed in a car crash.”

  “A nephew?”

  “Rosanna has two sisters. One’s married and lives in Milan. The other . . .”

  “Yes?”

  “The other has problems. Some kind of schizophrenia, I don’t know what it is—Rosanna didn’t like to talk about it. For a long time the two sisters lived in via Mantova.”

  “And now?”

  “About five years ago the sister was found wandering about the city in a nightdress. Rosanna sent her to a special home outside Garlasco.”

  “Home for the insane?”

  “Rosanna was upset. She wanted to keep her sister here in the city, but it was not possible. She could . . .” Boatti stopped.

  “Yes?”

  “There were times when her sister could be violent. Otherwise Rosanna would have stayed with her in via Mantova. But once Maria Cristina took a knife to her . . .”

  “You met the sister?”

  “Maria Cristina?” Boatti nodded. “On several occasions, I drove Rosanna to Garlasco.”

  Trotti asked, “Is Maria Cristina ever allowed out of the home?”

  “I think she has a part-time job in Garlasco. With Rosanna, she’s been down to Foggia. And on another occasion, the two sisters went to Livorno. You know, Rosanna was very good to her.” Boatti shrugged. “Rosanna was a good person—a genuinely kind person. Yet . . .” The young man paused.

  “Yet what?”

  Boatti stood up. He held a glass of wine in his hand and he returned to the window. He looked out across the piazza at the dark silhouette of San Teodoro.

  Neither Trotti nor Pisanelli spoke.

  “Maria Cristina was perhaps the one person that Rosanna was capable of hating.”

  6: Geraniums

  Tuesday, 7 August

  It was nearly five o’clock in the morning by the time Trotti got home. He watched the lights of Pisanelli’s car disappear into the night then went up the stairs. The potted geraniums needed watering. He fumbled with his keys and let himself into the empty house.

  He kicked off his shoes, threw his jacket over the back of a chair and went into the bathroom. Trotti showered noisily, letting the water splash against the plastic curtains. There were dark marks where the damp had caused fungal growth in the plastic. The walls of the shower needed cleaning, too.

  “Too many corpses.”

  Trotti turned off the hot tap. The cold water ran through his hair and into his eyes. He then stepped out of the shower and looked at himself in the mirror. “An old man, Piero Trotti,” he told himself. “Time you retired.”

  Trotti was wrapping a towel around his waist when the telephone rang.

  He glanced at his watch before picking up the receiver.

  “Piero?” A woman’s voice.

  His hand trembled slightly. “Who’s speaking?”

  “Been trying to get through since before midnight.”

  “That you, Pioppi?” Trotti asked, frowning. “How are you? How’s the pregnancy coming along?”

  “I’m phoning from the station. I’ve got nowhere to go.”

  There was a long pause. Trotti could feel the water running down his legs on to the floor. “I told you not to phone me, Eva.”

  The South American voice confused the Bs and Vs. “I must see you.”

  “No.”

  “I need your help.”

  “I can’t help you, Eva. You must help yourself.”

  “I swear I’ve tried.” A hesitation. “Please, Piero.”

  “There’s no point.”

  There was a long silence. Hissing over the line and the faint sounds of movement in the railway station. “Please, Piero. I have no one else to turn to. Only you. You’ve always been kind.” The voice caught. “Please.”

  “Please what? I’m an old man.”

  “I want to go home.”

  Trotti looked down at the puddles forming at his feet.

  “Please, Piero.”

  He gave a sigh. “Oh, for God’s sake.”

  “Please.” Like a child.

  He hesitated.

  “You helped me before.”

  He sighed again. “You’d better get a taxi.”

  “I spent all my money on the train ticket.”

  “I’ll pay the driver when you get here.” Trotti put down the receiver, angry at his own weakness.

  The first light of day was discernible through the blinds.

  7: Questore

  “You seem to have a very flexible timetable, Commissario Trotti.”

  With the renovation of the Questura, they had installed a modernistic clock above the desk. “A bit late, I’m afraid.” It was ten past ten.

  “I am not criticizing.”

  “I didn’t get to bed until after five.”

  The questore gave Trotti a knowing smile. “At your age, you certainly know how to enjoy yourself.”

  “I was working on a case.”

  “You’ve got bags under your eyes.”

  “No worse than usual.”

  A pause, then the questore asked, “The San Teodoro murder, Piero?”

  Trotti did not reply. He was tired and he could feel ulcers beneath his tongue.

  “Merenda’s already briefed me about the Belloni woman.” The questore held up his hand. “The Reparto Omicidi will be in charge of all enquiries.”

  “Pleased to hear it.”

  “Merenda was at San Teodoro until late. But he was back at work at eight.”

  “Commissario Merenda is a young man.”

  “Getting too old for your job?” Behind the smile, there was the edge of authority. The questore was from the Friuli. Long years in the Po valley had made no inroads into his accent.

  “Too old, Signor Questore?”

  “A little joke, Piero.” A short, forced laugh. “You take everything so seriously.”

  The third floor had been devitalized like a decaying tooth; there was a newness that had the meretricious charm of bright, white dentures. Cosmeticized and soulless. Italo-Californian architecture, brass and marble. A real palm tree in a tub, surrounded by plastic ferns. The old desk where Gino and Principessa used to sit had been replaced by a wafer-thin table in black. Gino’s seat was now occupied by a peroxide-blonde woman. An ample chest beneath the blue uniform shirt and the computerized identity badge. Fingers heavy with nail varnish and gold rings.

  (Principessa, Gino’s dog, was long since dead.)

  “Another two years, Signor Questore, and I will be out of your hair.”

  The questore laughed. He approached Trotti and put a friendly arm around his shoulder. “You really are too sensitive.”

  “I’m beginning to feel my age.”

  “Nobody wants you to go, Piero—you know that. I need you here—we all need you here.”

  “I appreciate your
support.”

  “You and I have been friends for over six years. We’ve worked together.”

  Trotti nodded.

  “You are very cynical, Piero Trotti. There are times when I wonder who you trust.”

  “I have learned that it is always best to count on oneself.”

  Again the humorless laugh. “You can count on me.” The questore started to walk down the corridor towards his office. “You know that.”

  With the questore’s arm around his shoulder, Trotti had no choice but to accompany the younger man.

  “You know that you can count on me, don’t you, Piero?”

  Awaiting a reply that did not come, the questore said, “Care for a coffee? And a chat—it’s a long time since we last had a serious conversation.”

  “Real coffee?”

  “Something to wake you up before lunch.”

  They entered the office—functional, large and decorated in the same modern, antiseptic style. The air smelled of synthetic carpet. The questore released his grasp as Trotti lowered himself into a white leather armchair.

  President Cossiga on the wall.

  The questore ordered two coffees over the phone and then, sitting behind his desk—bare except for a couple of cordless telephones and an ashtray—he smiled at Trotti. “I’ll be perfectly frank with you, Piero.”

  “Please do.”

  “I can’t have you in on the San Teodoro murder.”

  Trotti was silent.

  “You were there last night. You arrived before Merenda. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was Pisanelli or Toccafondi who contacted you.”

  “I got to San Teodoro about five minutes before Merenda and the procuratore woman.”

  “It’s August and it’s hot. Relax, Piero. I don’t like it when you’re working on murders.”

  “So you’ve already told me.”

  “Murders attract attention—precisely because in this city and in this province they’re not very common. In Italy there are something like fourteen hundred murders a year, yet here there are never more than eight, often fewer than two in a year. No Mafia, no Camorra, no ’Ndrangheta, no organized crime—a provincial backwater. Nothing worse than a bit of drug traffic in the university. So understandably when a murder occurs, it attracts a lot of attention—from the local press and sometimes beyond that.” He shook his head. He was still smiling. “You’re a good man, Piero Trotti. One of the best. Honorable in a way”—a vague gesture to beyond the door—“that very few other people are. Honorable and untainted. But you have never hidden the fact that you don’t like Commissario Merenda.”