Cosi Fan Tutti

by Michael Dibdin

  ‘Why don’t you take them under your wing?’ Gesualdo had retorted. ‘You know as many people as we do, and your reputation certainly can’t suffer from hanging out with a couple of illegal immigrants with legs up to here.’

  As a matter of fact, Dario had already decided that he was going to do just that, but in his own good time. First he wanted to collect the commission which the Squillace family were offering if he managed to get Gesualdo and Sabatino off their backs, which in turn involved getting Libera and Iolanda on to theirs. The question was how.

  ‘They’re so cold!’ complained Libera, producing a cigarette from her bag and looking around helplessly. The young man she had been eyeing earlier immediately sprinted over with an outstretched lighter. He seemed inclined to linger, but De Spino gave him a look which soon sent him back to his companions.

  ‘The other Italian boys we’ve met have been all over us,’ Iolanda commented. ‘But those two …’

  A light suddenly appeared in Libera’s eyes.

  ‘They’re not … how do you say?… faggots, are they?’

  ‘They’re as normal as you or I,’ Dario assured them blandly. ‘They’re just distracted by their personal and professional responsibilities. The problem is how to get their attention.’

  Iolanda finished her coffee and set the cup down with a bang.

  ‘I think we should try killing ourselves,’ she said.

  Passi subito!

  In retrospect, there were plenty of clues to what was about to happen, but, as so often, Zen did not spot them until it was too late.

  To avoid awakening the suspicions of Pasquale – who knew him as Alfonso Zembla, a humble employee of the port authority – he had asked to be dropped outside the Central Post Office and then walked around the corner into Piazza Matteoti. Like so many streets and squares in Naples, this piazza has been renamed more than once, most recently to celebrate the most famous victim of the Fascist era. In this case the renaming also constituted a symbolic act of restitution, for the square in question is the one which Matteoti’s opponents had chosen as the heart of their administration, and is lined with monumental buildings erected to serve the needs and proclaim the might of the new Italy.

  Similar structures are to be found all over the South, even in quite small and seemingly insignificant towns. Elsewhere, Mussolini appeared above all a dramatically unique figure, unlike anyone who had preceded him on the political stage. Whether you supported or opposed him, his novelty was undeniable. But to Southerners he was a familiar figure, a capo who ran the toughest mob in town and ruthlessly disposed of anyone who got in his way; a man who demanded and commanded respect, fear and grudging admiration. Those who supported him would be protected, those who did not would be destroyed.

  This was a code all Southerners had imprinted in their genes, and after decades of fine talk and patronizing neglect from the proponents of liberal democracy, it was a relief to have someone finally cut through all the bullshit and tell it the way it was, the way they knew it always had been and always would be. And they were rewarded, for the Duce kept his side of the bargain. In return for the over-whelming support they received south of Rome, the black-shirts extirpated every other species of banditry which had plagued the area for centuries, capital investment flowed south, jobs were created, and the secular temples of the new regime began to rise. Police stations received particular attention. The Polizia dello Stato was the creation of Mussolini, who was always suspicious of the loyalty of the Carabinieri with their royalist, élitist traditions.

  When it came to constructing a suitable headquarters for the Fascist police chief, named after the ancient Roman quaestor, no expense had been spared. In Naples, the result was a building resembling a monstrous enlargement of one of the granite blocks from some aqueduct or amphitheatre. This trick of perspective may have been partly responsible for Zen’s failure to spot the clues until it was too late. Riveted by this spectacle of petrified power, he failed to take proper notice of various persons in his immediate vicinity. The beggar, for example, his left arm picturesquely drooping inside his shirt, his haggard and unshaven face piteously appealing to the Christian instincts of the passers-by. Or the street kids, the scugnizze, swarming all over the wide pavement in a continually shifting envelope of ordered chaos. And to one side, at the street corner, a skinny male in his late teens revving the motor of a scooter and scanning the scene with apparent idleness, as though awaiting the arrival of a friend or lover.

  Such were the individual elements, but it was only in retrospect that Zen was able to describe the way in which they meshed together, and to identify the purpose of the machinery or the signal which set it in motion. Everything happened very quickly. First a sudden manoeuvre of the scugnizzi blocked his path with their boisterous, high-spirited chase game. While he waited for them to disperse, the beggar closed in, beseeching charity with some long incoherent narrative. Zen had barely started to reach for his wallet when both he and the beggar were surrounded anew by the street kids, none of them more than twelve years old, settling around them like a flock of starlings, uttering weird high-pitched yelps. Something flew over Zen’s head, away towards the man seated on the scooter, and at the same moment a grip like pliers closed on his rump in an agonizing pinch.

  He whirled around indignantly, but the offender had already melded back into the juvenile collective, which was on the move again, streaking away across the piazza into the ambient bassi, there to dissolve without trace in the porous tenements and alleyways. With a shrug of resignation, Zen turned back to settle accounts with the beggar, but he too had vanished. He was about to continue on his way when the noise of a revving engine attracted his attention, and there was the beggar, inexplicably clinging to the pillion of the scooter with both hands as the machine roared off around the corner and disappeared. It was only then that Zen realized that something else had gone – his wallet.

  The uniformed policeman cradling a machine-gun outside the Questura denied having seen anything with a massive shrug which suggested that such incidents were very common, principally the fault of the victim, and in any case too trivial to warrant his attention. Zen proceeded to pull rank, thus at least giving himself the satisfaction of seeing the man cringe, only to realize that one of the items in the missing wallet was his police identification card.

  More serious consequences of this loss soon became apparent. Without any tangible proof that Zen was who he said he was, the guard on duty at the rear of the entrance hall refused to admit him to the upper reaches of the building, which were strictly reserved for high-ranking servants of the Italian public and hence off bounds to the public itself. Matters were not helped by the fact that the only form of identification remaining to Zen was the small box of printed cards identifying him as Alfonso Zembla.

  ‘But I’m here on official business!’ he protested to the guard. ‘They’ve been trying to get hold of me all night. Let me phone through and they’ll confirm it.’

  As if bestowing an immense favour, the guard waved negligently at the internal phone at his elbow. Zen got through to the operator and was connected to Vice-Que-store Piscopo’s office. The deputy police chief was not available herself, but an underling confirmed that no one could be admitted to the official presence without suitable identification.

  ‘But this is ridiculous!’ spluttered Zen.

  ‘It has perhaps escaped your attention that a new terrorist group is operating in this city and has already claimed three victims,’ the voice replied icily. ‘All agencies are on triple-red alert as per a ministerial communiqué. There are no exceptions.’

  Under the patronizing gaze of the guard, Zen replaced the phone and retreated to the centre of the cavernous entrance hall to consider his next step. He had been very careful to have no contact whatsoever with the Questura since his arrival in Naples, and as a result there was no one in the building who knew him by sight and could vouch for him. He could get Caputo to come downtown, but that would leave no one t
o cover for him down at the port, and, besides, with the Questura on triple-red status following the Strade Pulite attacks, it was by no means certain that the mere word of an underling like Caputo would be enough to convince the authorities that Zen was indeed worthy of admission to the inner sanctum of power.

  He was still debating these and other possibilities when a presence made itself felt at his elbow.

  ‘Having problems, duttò?’

  The speaker was slim, slight and dapper, and might have been aged anywhere from forty to sixty. He was wearing an odd collection of items, each showing signs of long use and careful maintenance: an antique three-piece grey suit, a wrinkled white shirt buttoned tight at the collar, a green V-neck pullover and a camel-hair overcoat mottled by age or damp and worn unbuttoned. The man’s hands were covered by white cotton gloves. The left carried an old but immaculately blocked felt hat, the right a small ivory case. One gloved finger flicked up the silver lid, revealing a stack of business cards. With a resigned sigh, Zen took one. The inscription, elegantly printed in relief, read ‘Professore Gennaro Esposito: Magician, Astrologer, Clairvoyant’.

  ‘I don’t believe in magic,’ said Zen.

  The ivory box snapped shut and vanished.

  ‘That’s just to present myself,’ Professor Esposito replied calmly. ‘I’ve virtually retired from practice, anyway. The competition is fierce these days, and if you don’t advertize on television no one takes you seriously. But that’s neither here nor there. The question is, what can I do for you?’

  Zen gave the man a sour look.

  ‘Not a damn thing, unless you can magically spirit me up to the fourth floor.’

  ‘To see whom?’

  ‘The Questore’s acting deputy. A certain Piscopo.’

  The professorial eyes rolled impressively.

  ‘Ah!’

  Zen nodded.

  ‘Impossible, even for retired magicians.’

  A wave of the splayed gloves.

  ‘We’re in Naples, duttò. Everything is improbable, but nothing is impossible. Even the price is not exorbitant. I can offer you two options. The first, at thirty thousand, will take about an hour, give or take, depending who’s on duty today. Or if you decide to go for the express service, I can have you there faster than you could walk up the stairs. That costs fifty thou, but it’s worth the extra.’

  Zen smiled wearily.

  ‘I’m sure it is. Unfortunately I can’t take advantage. The reason I’m cooling my heels here in the first place is that my wallet just got stolen, along with my identification card and all the cash I had on me.’

  The man studied Zen with renewed interest.

  ‘You’re a policeman, duttò? In that case, I can offer you the professional discount. Five per cent off the normal service fee, ten off the express.’

  ‘I still haven’t got it.’

  ‘No problem.’

  The gloved fingers darted out, grazed Zen’s wrist and vanished again with his watch.

  ‘With your permission, duttò, I’ll keep this for security.’

  The man turned away, melting into the crowds of people entering and leaving and queuing and jostling all around. Zen stood there, looking helplessly about him. First his wallet, now his watch. It was time to leave while his shirt was still on his back. But he seemed powerless to move. Despite his sarcasm about the professor’s magical powers, it was almost as if a spell had been cast upon him.

  ‘This way, duttò!’

  He turned round. Professor Esposito was beckoning to him from the checkpoint at the back of the hall where Zen had been refused entrance earlier. He made his way through the throng towards the impassive guard, who gave no sign of ever having seen him before. His guide led him to a set of three elevators and inserted a key into the right-hand one. The doors slid open.

  ‘The Questore’s private elevator,’ Esposito whispered conspiratorially, ushering Zen inside. ‘Goes direct to the top floor. Like I said, you’ll be there quicker than climbing the stairs!’

  La sorte incolpa

  ‘No, that’s not the problem. It’s that you’re unlucky.’

  The speaker – a woman, judging by the pitch of her voice – was in police uniform. She was smoking a small cigar and wearing dark glasses. The large room was dim, the shutters closed.

  ‘Anyone can be unlucky,’ Zen replied.

  Vice-Questore Piscopo rapped her cigar, unloading a neat package of ash into a steel ashtray on her desk.

  ‘Once, yes,’ she replied. ‘Several times, even. But there is a logic in this, as in everything else. Occasions do not contradict the rule. Statistically, you have proved to be unlucky.’

  She lifted a paper from the file in front of her.

  ‘There’s a pattern here, dottore, which I recognized long before hearing of your latest problem – I refer to your allowing your wallet to be stolen. A pattern which none the less might have enabled me, in a certain sense, to predict it.’

  A pause.

  ‘In Milan, you wrongfully arrest a man for the Tondelli murder and twenty years later he tries to kill you after his release from prison. In Rome, you single-handedly “solve” the Moro kidnapping, unfortunately too late to save the victim. Same thing two years later, in Perugia, with the Miletti family. In Sardinia, you concoct a convenient solution to the Burolo murders to satisfy your contacts at Palazzo Sisti – who then disappear from the political spectrum within a year or so. As if to demonstrate the degree of your incompetence, you then go on to make absurd allegations against a leading regional politician, now mayor of Venice and a close ally of our own minister. And now this.’

  Zen said nothing. In the ten minutes since he had been admitted to the room, Vice-Questore Piscopo had said nothing relating to the case in hand. It had been, he now realized, a mistake to mention the theft of his wallet. He did so by way of excusing his failure to appear earlier, but it merely made him look incompetent and helpless, and confirmed the thesis which the authorities had apparently formulated as regards his record in general. When Piscopo finally got around to mentioning the incident of the night before, her interpretation was fully in accord with the line already established.

  ‘On the basis of our investigation, we can rule out the possibility of a planned attack. The killers aboard the stolen municipal vehicle were unaware of the presence of the patrol car carrying your men until the traffic accident, in itself completely unpredictable, occurred.’

  Zen gazed at the reflective lenses.

  ‘Who were they?’ he asked.

  ‘The gunmen?’

  Another gesture indicating that this case had already been filed away in a capacious category labelled WEIRD STUFF THAT HAPPENS WHEN AURELIO ZEN IS AROUND.

  ‘According to witnesses, there were anywhere from four to eight men aboard the refuse truck. All were dressed in blue overalls, like regular municipal employees, but we have questioned all the personnel concerned with this work and are satisfied that they are not involved. The truck itself went missing from the municipal depot two months ago.’

  The Questore’s deputy puffed on her cigar.

  ‘Which leaves the question of what your men were doing there in the first place.’

  Zen felt himself stiffen up. The woman’s uniform, an unusual affectation in one of so elevated a rank, left him feeling as naked as he had been when Valeria came into the room that morning.

  ‘Three days ago,’ he began laboriously, ‘a stabbing occurred in the port …’

  ‘I am only too aware of that, dottore! We have been subjected to the most insistent pressure for a solution ever since.’

  Zen nodded, as though she had acknowledged a shared bond.

  ‘Yesterday the prisoner – who was still unidentified and who refused to make a statement of any sort – complained of severe abdominal pains. I summoned a doctor …’

  ‘You were on duty?’

  The question was laden with ironic emphasis.

  ‘Naturally. The gravity of the case clearly dema
nded that I set aside all other matters and devote myself to finding a solution without regard to personal comfort or to bureaucratic norms.’

  ‘And yet we have been trying without success to contact you for over forty-eight hours now. Your subordinates certainly did a masterly job of covering for you, but I must say that we all had the impression that you took a distinctly – how shall I say? – relaxed view of your duties.’

  ‘Unfortunately my home telephone line is temporarily out of action,’ Zen replied. ‘I called SIP, but you know what it’s like trying to get any emergency work done at the weekend.’

  ‘So the prisoner complained of abdominal pains and you summoned a doctor.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘A police doctor?’

  Zen hesitated fractionally.

  ‘There was none available. And since it was clear that the prisoner was in considerable pain, and given the importance of this case, I summoned a civilian doctor who was able to come immediately. He confirmed that the prisoner was suffering from gastrointestinal complications and required urgent medical attention. He signed a medical report to this effect, a copy of which I will forward in due course. I immediately authorized the release of the prisoner into the custody of two of my most experienced officers, with orders to convey him to hospital and remain at his bedside until the necessary medical intervention had been completed. It was while they were carrying out these duties that the attack took place.’

  Vice-Questore Piscopo nodded and smoked, smoked and nodded.

  ‘So not only do we still know nothing about the principal suspect and material witness in a case with enormous international repercussions, but the individual himself has escaped from custody.’

  She opened her hands in mock appeal.

  ‘What would you call that, dottore, if not bad luck?’