City of Devils

by Diana Bretherick

  ‘I’m just paying Signor Ratti a visit,’ James said. ‘But he doesn’t seem to be at home.’

  ‘He’s there, all right. He probably thinks you’re a bailiff or the police.’

  ‘Well, can you ask him to open the door?’

  ‘I don’t know about that. Are you?’

  ‘Am I what?’

  ‘Are you a bailiff or the police?’

  ‘No, I’m just a friend.’

  ‘You say that,’ the old man said doubtfully, ‘but you’re foreign – you might be a murderer. There’s one on the loose. It says so in the papers.’

  James took a deep breath. ‘I am from Scotland. I am not a bailiff. I am not a policeman and I am not a killer. I am, however, getting tired of waiting.’

  He took a few coins out of his pocket and jangled them in his hand.

  ‘Now why didn’t you say?’ the old man said lugubriously, holding out his own hand. James gave him the coins and the man went down the steps and started to unlock the door.

  ‘He must be in. I heard a row only a few minutes ago,’ he said, standing back to allow James to enter.

  The room smelt almost as bad as the old man. Some of the fog began to swirl in through the door and James squinted through the gloom. There were piles of newspapers stacked precariously in every available space, looking as if they might topple over at any moment. He saw what looked like a heap of rags in the corner – and – was that blood seeping out from underneath? Steeling himself, he looked more closely. It was a body, almost certainly that of Ratti, although from the state of him it was difficult to tell. He was clutching a note in his left hand and it had the familiar bloody writing on it.

  Before he could perform even a perfunctory examination he heard a noise in an adjoining room, a movement of some kind – casual, almost careless. He froze.

  James looked at the old man who stood in the doorway and stared at him as if he was mad. He put his finger to his lips and walked slowly towards the noise, moving carefully through the debris so as not to alert whoever it was. Then there was the sound of a loose floorboard creaking. James stopped. It creaked again. He began to move once more. He crept slowly, like a hunter after its prey, foot after foot, his nerves making his whole body seem to tingle.

  Suddenly there was a loud crash as one of the piles of papers, disturbed by movement, fell over onto another and then another and another in a domino effect. He heard a door slamming. He rushed towards the noise and saw someone climbing some steps at the back of the building. James ran out and found himself in a narrow alleyway. He looked to the left and right but could see little through the swirling fog. He thought he saw movement to his left, so he ran towards it but he could barely see ahead of him, so thick was the murky cloud. Then he thought he heard the sound of footsteps running so he followed that. There were openings into all kinds of backyards and buildings – it was a veritable labyrinth with possible hiding places everywhere he looked – but they were deserted. Then he came to a dead end. Whoever he had pursued had escaped. He slapped the wall in frustration. It was the killer. He was sure of it. Slowly he trudged back to Ratti’s place.

  When he got back he found two carabinieri officers kneeling by Ratti’s body, as if worshipping at a shrine. One was middle-aged with a jutting chin and a defiant expression. The other was very young, little more than a boy really. His ears were large and stuck out from his head almost at right angles.

  ‘He’s had it,’ said the older one with an air of fascination. He looked up at James. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘I found the body. Will you send for Inspector Tullio and Professor Lombroso?’

  ‘What about Marshal Machinetti?’

  James sighed. ‘Him too.’

  The officer nodded and the younger boy scrambled to his feet and left the room, still looking over his shoulder at the body as if he could not bear to shift his gaze.

  Once he had left, James began to search the scene. The carabinieri stood guard by the body so he could not examine Ratti further. He knew that if he waited for Machinetti and reinforcements to come there was every possibility that they would tramp all over the area and obscure any trace of evidence that might have been left. As he moved through the room he could hear Dr Bell’s mantra in his head, words from A Manual of Medical Jurisprudence.

  ‘The first duty of a medical jurist is to cultivate a faculty of minute observation . . . A medical man, when he sees a dead body, should notice everything.’

  Carefully he looked about him, gently pushing the debris from the fallen piles of papers aside to make sure that nothing of significance lay beneath. At first the officer watched his every move but he soon got bored. Before long he was leaning against the wall, his eyelids drooping as James conducted his search.

  Initially he thought that there was simply nothing to find and then he saw it, not far from Ratti’s broken body. It lay next to an overturned glass, almost as if it was mocking him: a small but distinctive red and gold band made of cardboard. At first he didn’t think it was necessarily significant but then it hit him. He had seen something similar before.

  24

  We can conclude that abnormalities of moral character, which in an adult would constitute criminality, appear in greater proportions in the child.

  Lombroso, 1884 p 196

  An hour or so later a crowd of people had gathered and there were some reporters too. James was standing outside at a distance from them with Lombroso and Ottolenghi. He had told them about his pursuit of the killer but not about the piece of cardboard. He needed to work out where he had seen it before. He was certain it was important but he didn’t yet know why. Besides, there was some further information he was waiting for, something that might make all the difference to their investigation. But he wanted to wait until all the strands were complete before he presented them to Lombroso.

  Machinetti and Tullio had disappeared inside the building. A few moments later Machinetti came out. Uncharacteristically he said nothing but merely nodded at Lombroso as a familiar figure carrying a notebook ran towards him from the crowd. Machinetti looked with distaste at his thin face with its sharp features. It was Baldovino, no doubt seeking another scoop for the People’s Voice.

  ‘Marshal, this is the sixth murder in a short period of time – our readers are beginning to wonder why you haven’t caught the brute.’

  Machinetti’s face began to redden but he still was silent. He tried to move away but the reporter danced around him, preventing him from escaping.

  ‘Is it carabinieri incompetence? Is it true your position is under review?’

  ‘Giardinello!’ Machinetti bellowed.

  As Giardinello approached, the reporter raised his hands in mock capitulation.

  ‘Just informing our readers, Marshal. Six murders . . .’ He held up his fingers in Machinetti’s face.

  ‘Get lost, Baldovino. I have nothing to say. Giardinello!’ Machinetti bellowed again.

  ‘Nothing to say to the People’s Voice! Now how’s that going to look, Marshal? The people have a right to know.’

  Machinetti scowled at Baldovino. He looked as if he wanted to say a great deal but was making every effort to keep quiet. Fortunately, at that moment Giardinello arrived and escorted Baldovino away, to Machinetti’s evident relief.

  ‘I take it the victim is definitely Ratti?’ Ottolenghi said.

  ‘Looks like it,’ replied Machinetti curtly. ‘Giovanni Ratti, army deserter and recidivist. One of your interviewees . . .’ he added malevolently.

  Lombroso seemed momentarily crestfallen.

  ‘May I examine the body?’ he asked in an unusually polite manner.

  Machinetti paused, as if wondering whether or not to be difficult. He apparently decided that he couldn’t be bothered and nodded. Baldovino’s words seemed to have shaken him. According to Tullio, Machinetti had been trying his best to keep any hint of police incompetence out of the press by encouraging them to focus on stories involving Lombroso. Until DeClichy’s murder he
had mostly succeeded. But now the public were frightened, just as Baldovino wanted them to be, and Machinetti looked to be distinctly unsettled by the prospect of further press attention, particularly as it was likely to be negative. He had been subjected to it before when the girl was kidnapped and murdered and it had cost him a promotion. Now he was hoping for a political career, he could not afford a repeat. But Baldovino was reputed to be almost as aggressive and ambitious as Machinetti was.

  It seemed to James that if the reporter smelt a story he would pursue it like a terrier until he got what he wanted – and the way things were going that was likely to be Machinetti’s head on the mayor’s block. Ottolenghi had often spoken of Machinetti’s ambition to be mayor himself one day and the power that the position would give him.

  Lombroso, Ottolenghi and James went into the building, escorted by Tullio who handed Lombroso the note.

  ‘Mmm. That’s interesting,’ he said, passing it to James. ‘What do you think, Murray?’

  ‘It isn’t like the others, though it still looks to be written in blood. There is just one word: FINITO?’

  ‘The end? The end of what?’ Tullio wondered.

  ‘The murders, perhaps,’ Lombroso said, looking mournfully down at the body. ‘Who knows?’

  The face had been bashed in and it looked as if some effort had been made to carve away the chin. As if this wasn’t bad enough, a piece of skin had been carved from Ratti’s chest and was draped over his neck. On it was written, in the form of a rudimentary tattoo, ‘I will come to a miserable end.’

  ‘He got that right, well enough,’ Tullio said.

  Lombroso winced as he looked closely at the carnage before him. ‘The murderer carved that into Ratti’s chest himself. The worst of it is that I cannot say for sure that he was already dead. There is quite a lot of blood so I fear that he was mutilated whilst still alive, though I doubt he was conscious. I’m guessing that he would have died from blood loss soon after.’

  ‘Did you know him well before the interview?’ asked James.

  Lombroso stood up and said, sadly, ‘Not really. I spoke to him briefly while he was in military prison and he showed me his tattoo. See, here on his arm?’

  James peered at the body and saw the figure of a naked woman etched on Ratti’s arm, with Mother written at the base.

  ‘He was so proud of it. I remember us laughing at the inscription. He was trying to be ironic, I think. Then I invited him to take part in our foot measurement experiment.’ He sighed and took off his glasses in order to rub his eyes. James thought that he was looking tired.

  ‘Are you certain that it was blood loss that killed him?’ Tullio asked. ‘How did the murderer keep him still enough?’

  Lombroso examined the body more closely. ‘Yes, I am certain. Prior to the mutilation I think he may have been given some kind of a sedative – chloral hydrate would do the trick. And look at his left hand.’

  The man was clutching an empty hip flask.

  Lombroso went on, ‘It looks to me as if he was offered some drink laced with the drug. Once it took effect he was at the mercy of the killer. It would have had an almost total paralytic effect.’ He continued to examine the body, paying particular attention to the left shoulder. He stood up and looked at them significantly. ‘It is exactly as I thought.’

  James started. He could swear that he had a seen a faint movement from the body. There it was – nothing more than a slight twitch of a finger, but it was unmistakable.

  ‘The man’s still alive!’ he exclaimed. He knelt by the body, lifting the hand to feel for a sign of life. ‘Yes, there is a faint pulse. Get this man to an infirmary now!’

  Suddenly there was a roar of pain and the ‘body’ tried to sit up. Ratti tried to speak and James put his ear to the man’s lips.

  ‘What are you trying to tell me?’ he asked gently.

  At that moment Machinetti arrived with Tullio close behind him. ‘That is enough! Come away from the body,’ he barked as if they had been trespassing.

  ‘Firstly, this man is not a body. He is alive!’ Lombroso beckoned to James, who left Ottolenghi to tend to Ratti, groaning more loudly now with the pain of his dreadful injuries.

  Machinetti looked on in shock as two carabinieri approached and began to lift the man onto a makeshift stretcher ready to be taken to the infirmary.

  ‘Did he speak? What did he say?’ Machinetti asked James, completely ignoring Lombroso.

  ‘He said “Do not trust him”.’

  ‘Who did he mean?’ Machinetti said.

  James shrugged. ‘He did not say anything else.’

  ‘Are you sure? Did you listen carefully?’

  ‘Of course I’m sure,’ James replied indignantly.

  He watched as Machinetti tried to speak to Ratti as he was being taken away but the man had lapsed into unconsciousness. James wondered if Ratti would say anything more. It didn’t seem likely, given the amount of blood he had lost and his rather cryptic comment merely served to deepen the mystery further. Who should he or they not trust?

  Lombroso paused, as if taking stock. ‘Now, it’s back to the museum, gentlemen. There is much to discuss.’

  They followed him as he strode away from the scene. James put his hand into his pocket and felt the piece of cardboard there. If he was right, it could provide the answer to this dreadful puzzle. But if he was wrong, then they would have to rely on Ratti. He shivered. The fog was even thicker now and glowed a ghastly yellow colour. This was certainly a devilish city in so many ways. Still, they had a surviving victim and a clue. Perhaps they were nearer to a solution now than they had ever been.

  Back at the museum, Ottolenghi, Tullio and James sat in the laboratory, deep in their own thoughts. A message from the infirmary had been delivered. Ratti was deep in a coma from which he was not expected to wake. Having heard this, Lombroso had gone to his study ‘to think’.

  James took this opportunity to update Tullio on his thoughts that the killer might have practised his horrific skills before attempting the ‘tribute’ killings.

  Tullio frowned. ‘That’s an interesting theory. You think that there may have been attacks prior to Soldati’s murder.’

  ‘It has to be possible at least, given the way everything seems to have been planned,’ James said. ‘Could it be checked?’

  ‘I don’t see why not.’

  ‘I hope you’re right, James. Without it, unless Ratti wakes up, we are no nearer to tracking the killer down than we were at the beginning,’ Ottolenghi said.

  James was about to contradict him – they did have some leads to work on – but he was interrupted.

  ‘Don’t be so sure of that,’ announced Lombroso, who was standing in the doorway. His usual certainty seemed to have returned. He wore a strange expression – not quite triumphant but certainly there was an air of smugness about him as if he had just won an argument. James wondered how much of their conversation he had overheard.

  ‘Has the killer left some other trace behind that we can use?’ asked Ottolenghi eagerly.

  Lombroso shook his head. ‘No, he is too intelligent for that, I’m afraid.’

  James almost contradicted him but thought the better of it. He wanted to be sure of his ground before he said anything.

  Tullio got to his feet. ‘So what have you deduced, Professor?’

  ‘I believe that we are looking for a new kind of criminal type!’

  ‘And what are the characteristics?’ Tullio asked.

  James felt more than a little disappointed. It seemed to him that they had been here before.

  ‘Let us examine the evidence,’ Lombroso said as he strode into the room towards the blackboard.

  He went through each criminal type from morally insane to mattoid – detailing again each characteristic both in body and mind. James thought that Lombroso kept restating his theories because they were comforting in their familiarity. They were his only constant and he returned to them with a sort of desperation in an effort to
explain the terrible events that threatened to bring a premature end to his career. But James was struggling to find any relevance in the application of Lombroso’s ideas to the matter in hand. The criminal they were seeking seemed to not only defy description but also any classification as a type. He wanted to focus on real tangible clues, not just theoretical concepts.

  ‘I believe that we are on the threshold of a new discovery,’ Lombroso announced dramatically. ‘I have not encountered a criminal before who is so artful, so creative in his activities. He must be a fully functioning member of society to have avoided detection for so long and yet his crimes are so hideous that they must be motivated by something extremely potent, such as intense hatred. This person is two-faced in that he is, to all intents and purposes a fully functioning and probably rather charming individual. However, he has a dark side that allows him to commit his crimes without compunction. Gentlemen, may I introduce you to the schizoid criminal.’

  At this point Lombroso actually stood aside as if he was revealing a person who was present in the room with them. They sat in silence for a moment, taking in what he had said. James did not think these conclusions were particularly new. That the killer hated Lombroso had become only too clear over the last few weeks – but could it be more complex than that?

  ‘Is it just hatred we are seeing here?’ he suggested.

  Lombroso looked at him, nodding. ‘You are right, Murray. He may well love or hate me, perhaps even both, given his apparent obsession with me. But the important factor to understand is that he has learned to hide his true feelings.’

  ‘That would be quite an achievement if the emotions are as intense as they seem,’ James said.

  Lombroso looked over his glasses at him. ‘It is as if he is two people, Murray. The world sees one person and yet his inner life reveals another; hence the term “schizoid”, from the Greek meaning separate or apart.’

  James suddenly remembered hearing something about this kind of condition before. ‘Hasn’t Oskar Reiner written a paper on something similar?’