Her face turned pale. “The Direttore will know where you can find whomever you’re looking for.” She looked down at Trotti’s hand gripping her wrist and frowned unhappily.
“Where is Silvi?”
She looked up.
“Dottor Silvi—where is he?”
She caught her breath; the small breasts rose and fell. “In the south.”
“Where?”
“I believe Doctor Silvi’s on holiday. I believe he’s returned to Calabria.” She nodded unhappily, her eyes on Trotti’s hand. “He won’t be back with us for another couple of weeks.”
Trotti turned and looked at Maiocchi and Pisanelli.
Pisanelli grinned, running a hand through his long, lank hair. “Boatti would’ve made a good detective, the fornicating bastard.”
69: Dyed Hair
At first Trotti did not recognize Carnecine.
The director of the Casa Patrizia had dyed the grey out of his hair. He looked healthier, fitter. He had been sitting in a stuffed leather armchair. “Ah, please come in.” He now stood up, a forced smile on the narrow face, and held out his hand.
Trotti ignored the outstretched hand. “Silvi told you, didn’t he?”
“I’m sorry.”
“You were looking for Belloni and you didn’t know where she was. You were worried.”
“Worried?” Carnecine’s smile slowly changed into a frown. “Gentlemen, please be seated. You would like something to drink, perhaps.” He gestured to where his name had been placed in sculpted wooden letters on the desktop. “Please come in and sit down. A vermouth?”
“I’m talking about Maria Cristina Belloni, Carnecine.”
“Now how can I be of help? I’m not sure I understand what you’re talking about.”
“Maria Cristina Belloni—the same Maria Cristina Belloni that you murdered last Saturday night in San Teodoro.”
A bland smile. “You’re joking, I presume.”
“Silvi told you where she was.”
“Dottor Silvi? Dottor Silvi’s on holiday, I’m afraid.” He turned to look at Maiocchi and Pisanelli, shaking his head in embarrassed amusement. “A joke? You’re sure you wouldn’t like something to drink?” Carnecine was wearing a clean white shirt with epaulettes. His dyed hair was very short and very black. “Please sit down, sit down.” Carnecine lowered himself into the leather chair and placed his ungainly hands on the desk. Trotti noticed that the nails had been recently manicured.
“For several years you’ve been getting money out of her.”
Carnecine shook his head. “I feel there must be some misunderstanding.”
“Out of Maria Cristina Belloni—through drugs. And perhaps through sexual manipulation. You’ve been appropriating her money. The golden goose. The golden goose who’s too drugged to react.”
“You’re making a lot of allegations, Commissario.”
“Then the golden goose broke loose. All of a sudden you were scared. You were scared, weren’t you, Carnecine?”
There was a long silence. As if looking for support, Carnecine glanced at Pisanelli and Maiocchi; then at the two photographs on the wall, one of the Pope, the other of Mother Teresa of Calcutta. “Am I right in thinking you’re accusing me of murdering Signorina Belloni?” An apologetic smile flittered across the small face. He did not appear particularly worried.
“Of drowning her, Carnecine—of drowning Maria Cristina in river water.” Trotti made a vague gesture to the distant row of plane trees beyond the window.
“Maria Cristina Belloni? Our patient?” He raised his shoulders. “I didn’t even know she was dead.”
“She’s dead, believe me. Battered severely in the head and then drowned.”
Carnecine lowered his head. “How upsetting. I was led to believe it was her sister who died. How very upsetting.”
“You had no choice, Carnecine. You had to kill her.”
“I don’t understand you.”
“Better dead than alive. She’d started telling people how you’ve been skimming her fortune. She already had an allowance, transferred from the Banco San Giovanni. But you wanted more.”
“Really?” Carnecine nodded briskly. “You believe I murdered my patient?”
“We know you murdered her.”
“You’re joking, of course.” The eyes were intelligent and dark. “Until a few seconds ago, I didn’t even know she was dead.”
“Strange—given that you killed her with your own hands. Premeditated murder. Drowning her in a few liters of river water.”
“The Finanza was here several months ago. We came to an agreement.” Another nod. “I’m sure that the forces of order can reproach me with nothing.”
“I know nothing about the Finanza. Murder, Carnecine. We’re talking about premeditated murder. You killed Maria Cristina Belloni, holding her head under water.”
“Why?”
“Why did you drown her? So that when the corpse was washed up, it would be assumed she’d committed suicide. That she’d drowned in the river and not in her sister’s flat in the city. That she had thrown herself into the Po beneath the covered bridge. Suicide out of her frustrated love for Luca.”
“I don’t know any Luca. Really, Commissario, as much as I respect you, I can’t help feeling . . .” He laughed.
“But you didn’t realize that it would be possible to identify the water. You used water from the river where it is relatively unpolluted.”
“Luca? I know no Luca.”
“Luca needed a doctor and he called his friend Silvi. There was no way that Luca should’ve known Maria Cristina was a patient at the Casa Patrizia. Luca told your Dottor Silvi about his adventure with her. And Silvi told you. You knew about the whole affair. Because of Silvi, you knew where Maria Cristina was hiding—and you now had a way of murdering her with impunity.”
“I’d kill one of my patients? Seems a very strange way of running a home for people who need above all love and attention. People who as often as not meet with very little affection in their own homes.”
“Very strange indeed, Carnecine.”
“A wealthy client—why on earth should I want to kill Signorina Belloni?”
“Because you were scared.”
Carnecine raised a dark eyebrow. “Of what?”
“You couldn’t control her. She was running out of control, out of your control. You couldn’t keep Maria Cristina quiet, you couldn’t get to her with your tranquilizers. Perhaps even she contacted you—wanting her money back. Threatening you. But you didn’t know where she was. You couldn’t get your hands on her to silence her. You didn’t know where she was until Luca unwittingly told Silvi.”
Again Carnecine glanced at the other two men. He smiled and nodded. “Most interesting theory.”
“Maria Cristina left here at the end of July.” Trotti tapped the desk. “She had gone to stay with her sister—she went away every year for the Ferragosto. You thought she would stick to the drugs you were giving her—neuroleptics, the drugs you’ve been feeding her over the years. At San Teodoro she should’ve been under her sister’s control. Only this time her sister couldn’t really be very bothered with Maria Cristina. Rosanna Belloni’s mind was occupied elsewhere. For once Maria Cristina was left to herself—for the first time in five years. And left to herself in her place in via Mantova, Maria Cristina gradually stopped taking your stuff.” Trotti snorted. “She started feeling better. The mist started to clear from her head. What was it you and Silvi were giving her? Massive doses of valium? Or something stronger like chlorpromazine? Fluphenazine? She came off your poisons. Probably she compensated with marijuana and alcohol. And uppers. And once she started feeling human again, she understandably started looking for help. Help because she wanted her money back. For the first time in five years she was able to understand what was happening to her, what you’
d been doing to her. And she started talking. With Luca. And with others. Talking about how she was being robbed by the director of a home for the mentally unstable.”
Carnecine nodded repeatedly, like a plastic puppy at the rear window of a car, while the deep-set eyes remained on Trotti, assessing him. Then he glanced at the other two men. “Some gin, perhaps, signori?”
Trotti briskly took the armchair, sitting down close to the desk, his face close to Carnecine’s.
Pisanelli remained standing. Maiocchi was leaning against the wall by the window.
A sigh. “Not always very easy to run a home for . . .”
“For what, Signor Direttore?”
“You know, Commissario, that here in Italy, there is no such thing as a mental asylum.”
Trotti banged his hand down on the desk. The lamp, a yellowed edition of La Repubblica and the wooden name block jumped. “I can do without your pious cant, Signor Direttore. I’m not interested.” Trotti had raised his voice. “I’ve seen too many corpses. I loathe murder.”
“You make allegations . . .”
Anger. “I loathe murder and I loathe murderers.”
“Accusing me of murder, Commissario?” There was astonishment in his voice.
“You murdered her because once she got her mind back and she could think straight, you were no longer safe.”
“Commissario . . .”
Trotti leaned forward and grabbed Carnecine by the collar. The movement was rapid and Carnecine’s face sagged. “Be careful,” Trotti said. His jaws clamped together. Then he released his grip and Carnecine slumped back.
Carnecine adjusted his shirt. He grinned, both amused and frightened. “Signor Commissario, I can’t help thinking it’s you who should be careful.”
The anger was cold but it was still anger. Anger with the evil man in front of him. Not sex, but money. With a brushing movement, Trotti cleared the desk of everything. Of the telephone, of the outdated Repubblica, of the wooden name block. They fell to the floor; the telephone clattered noisily against the side of the desk, still supported by its flex.
70: Gin
“You’re crazy.”
Trotti leaned forward. With an outstretched index finger, he prodded hard against the man’s chest. “Why didn’t you throw the body in the river, Carnecine? I want to know why you left her corpse in the flat in San Teodoro. Wasn’t the idea to drop her body downstream?”
Maiocchi had moved away from the window and placed a restraining hand on Trotti’s shoulder. “How could he remove it during the day, Commissario? By the time he’d killed Belloni, it was probably daylight. This man left the body there, waiting for night to fall. Unfortunately for him, Boatti had a key to the flat. Boatti went down to Rosanna Belloni’s flat later in the day and found the corpse. And Boatti phoned 113, calling in the police.”
Trotti turned. “That was Monday night, Maiocchi—but the body was there for two days—Sunday and Monday. Why so long?”
“Rigor mortis.”
There was a cupboard in the desk. Carnecine opened it and took out a bottle of London gin and a grimy glass. Carnecine gave Maiocchi an ingratiating smile.
“He could have cut it up,” Pisanelli remarked cheerfully.
Carnecine poured himself a drink. The hand shook almost imperceptibly. Carnecine’s pink tongue licked the edge of his glass.
“Then why the phone call about the woman jumping in the river?” Trotti was looking up at Maiocchi. “We’d already found the body. There was no point.”
“Probably all prearranged—and then he”—Maiocchi gestured towards the director—“couldn’t reach the woman. When precisely 113 were alerted didn’t matter. The corpse could be found in the river at any time. What was necessary was that the corpse should be identified as Luca’s lover. With the help of his woman, Carnecine wanted Maria Cristina to be seen as a suicide.”
“What woman?”
“The female accomplice. The pretty little thing at reception, perhaps. She made the two phone calls, not realizing that the body had been discovered.”
“You must be crazy.” Carnecine took another swallow of gin. “You must be crazy, all of you.” The Adam’s apple jumped in the wiry throat.
Pisanelli had not spoken. He came forward, slid casually onto the desk, sniffed at the bottle of gin, gave a nod of approval and drank from the neck. He wiped his lips with the back of his hand and jerked his thumb in the direction of Carnecine. “It was all premeditated, Commissario. He needed to get rid of Maria Cristina—you heard what Silvi said on the phone. Silvi found her in via Mantova when Luca called him in. Silvi informed our good friend here who came looking for her.”
Somewhere a train hooted, one of the slow commuter trains along a rural branch line.
“Maria Cristina recognized Silvi when he came to help Luca out. So she moved out of her place in via Mantova and moved into her sister’s flat. She thought she’d be safer in San Teodoro.” Again Pisanelli took a swig of gin. “Out of the frying pan.”
“The front gate to the place in San Teodoro was locked as was Rosanna’s flat.” Trotti shook his head. “How did Carnecine get in, Pisa?”
Carnecine asked, “Did Dottor Silvi tell you this?”
Trotti shook his head. “I don’t see how he got in. Or rather, how they got in. If we accept the account of our font frog—the little old lady in San Teodoro—Carnecine was accompanied by a woman.”
“Dottor Silvi told you this?”
Pisanelli lowered the bottle back on to the desk. He turned and looked at Carnecine. His finger caressed the director’s cheek. “With a bit of persuasion, I’m sure that Signor Carnecine would like to tell the truth.” He placed a hand on Carnecine’s head.
“The old woman in San Teodoro must’ve confused Carnecine’s lady friend for the Roberti girl. And the man she took to be Roberti’s new boyfriend was undoubtedly Signor Carnecine here.” Trotti rubbed his chin. “But how did he get into the building? Maria Cristina had cleared out of via Mantova because she was scared. Not very likely that she’d let anybody in if she was scared for her life.”
“Jehovah’s Witnesses,” Maiocchi said.
“But not at three o’clock in the morning, for heaven’s sake.”
“The first time.”
“What do you mean, Maiocchi? What first time?”
“Carnecine had a female accomplice. Perhaps that’s how she got into the flat, posing as a Jehovah’s Witness. Once inside, she got hold of the key—or made a copy.”
“And then Carnecine returned in the middle of the night?”
“Premeditated. He knew he was going to drown her—and then throw her into the Po. But she was difficult, and he had to use considerable force before he succeeded in killing her.”
Pisanelli said, “Signor Carnecine wants to help us. Of that I’m quite sure.”
“Perhaps he left it too late, perhaps it was already dawn. For some reason, they didn’t move the body out of the flat on Sunday morning. And then they had to wait.”
“Wait?”
“Because of the rigor mortis. But they had time to tidy up Rosanna’s flat. Afraid of leaving fingerprints, no doubt, in case anything else went wrong. And it did. Boatti turned up.”
Pisanelli raised his voice. “I think you ought to tell us, Signor Carnecine. Don’t you?”
Carnecine drew back his shoulders. He had started to sweat and he was no longer smiling. “We live in a backward country. A backward country which nonetheless has all the pretensions of the West and of advanced western thinking. Italy. Yet we have no mental asylums. Asylums need a lot of money if they’re to be run efficiently—a lot of money.”
Pisanelli hit him with the back of his hand. The blow was not hard, but the movement was swift and unexpected.
The small dark eyes opened in surprise.
“I think you really should
tell us everything that you know.”
“It is not always easy . . .”
Pisanelli was drawing his arm back menacingly when the door was opened suddenly.
Commissario Gabbiani stood there, looking more like a successful journalist than a policeman. “I think Tenente Pisanelli can leave Signor Carnecine alone.” He smiled, shaking his head. “There are easier ways of getting to the truth.”
71: BMW
“About time—it’s going to rain.”
“How did you know I was in Garlasco?”
“I guessed, Trotti.”
“You know Carnecine?”
“Yes.”
“And you knew that Carnecine murdered Belloni?”
“Yes.”
“You knew he killed her?”
“I can put two and two together.”
“You didn’t tell me, Gabbiani.”
“When I saw you, Trotti, I didn’t know it was the younger sister who was murdered.” Gabbiani laughed. “You know, you really do need a rest.” A brief, mocking glance at Trotti. Both irritation and affection. “I hope you are going to take a holiday now. Drive down to Bologna and see your daughter.” He tapped the telephone between the two leather seats. “Has she had her baby?”
The large BMW was almost silent on the country road; just the gentle hum of the wheels along the tarmac. Pisanelli and Maiocchi were following in the Lancia. Mosquitoes battered into the windscreen.
Clouds were building up in the southwest, from the Mediterranean beyond the hills; less than an hour and then rain should at last return to the parched plain.
“I’m supposed to be on holiday.” Gabbiani was wearing green corduroys and a check shirt without a tie. His face looked clean, as if he had just shaved. “You know, you should do the same. Now you’ve found the murderer, why stay on in the city?”
Trotti caught sight of himself in the car mirror. His face looked back solemnly at him—thin face, narrow nose and thin creases running down his cheeks. “You knew all along what was happening at the Casa Patrizia? You knew that Carnecine needed money to keep his home running? And you didn’t tell me that?”
Black August Page 27