Cosi Fan Tutti

by Michael Dibdin

  Bisogna pigliarlo

  Like so many things in Naples, the so-called Metropolitana wasn’t quite what its name suggested. True, a purpose-built underground railway was now under construction – and had been for as long as most people could remember. One fine day it might even open, but meanwhile the name was attached, like a fake designer label, to a stretch of the national railway network which happened to run between the western and eastern suburbs of the city through one of the more recent portions of the complex and only partly charted system of tunnels, reservoirs and subterranean quarries which underlay the city.

  And Zen was not entirely surprised to discover, when he finally made contact with Pasquale outside the station in Piazza Cavour, that the news that John Viviani ‘isn’t missing any more’ also contained an element of euphemism.

  ‘I got the call when I was on my way in from the airport with a couple of tourists,’ Pasquale told him. ‘Normally I’d have given them the scenic route via Pozzuoli plus the statutory one hundred per cent surcharge, excess baggage fees, motorway tolls with handling charges and twenty per cent tip, all rounded up to the nearest hundred thou. But seeing as it was you, duttò, I let them off lightly.’

  ‘Remind me to reimburse you, Pasquale. At the rate things are going, I may need to use that line of credit you mentioned after all.’

  Pasquale gestured casually to show that it was unnecessary if not slightly vulgar even to mention such matters.

  ‘“I’m sure it was him,” Fortunato told me. “I remember the face. And he was definitely a foreigner, didn’t speak a word of Italian.” He’d got the poster from Decio at the rank in Piazza Dante, and the moment he saw it he recognized the fare he’d just dropped off in Via Tribunali. Of course there’s no knowing where the guy is by now, but sooner or later he’ll have to pick up another ride, and this time we’ll be ready.’

  ‘That’s if he’s still alive,’ his passenger remarked morosely.

  ‘Why wouldn’t he be alive? Unless he drinks himself to death. Fortunà said he was pretty far gone even then.’

  ‘Great. So he’s drunk, lost, doesn’t speak the language, and is probably waving a wad of banknotes around in one of the roughest parts of town. Plus there’s a fairly good chance that the mob is after his blood.’

  Pasquale’s eyes narrowed in the rear-view mirror.

  ‘Wait a minute, duttò! I thought this job was strictly private enterprise. If there’s a corporate interest in this guy, then I don’t want any part of it.’

  ‘I’m not sure there is. But I just found out that a certain item of merchandise for which Viviani may have acted as courier has inadvertently been switched for another. As a result, it’s just possible that the interested parties may believe – wrongly, as it happens – that Viviani double-crossed them.’

  A complex counterpoint of electronic chirping filled the air. Both men reached for their mobile phones and started talking at once.

  ‘Good evening, Don Orlando,’ said Zen’s caller.

  ‘I’m afraid you have a wrong number.’

  ‘No, no. I obtained it personally from Signora Squillace, with whom I believe you are staying. I also understand that you are currently using another name. I will of course respect your wishes in that regard.’

  The male voice was mature, urbane and intimate, that of an old friend or relative.

  ‘Who is this?’ Zen demanded.

  ‘Under the circumstances, I would prefer not to identify myself on a channel of communication which is notoriously insecure. Let’s just say that I have information regarding a matter of mutual interest, and wanted to establish contact. I’ll call you with more details later tonight.’

  ‘I’m going to the opera,’ Zen replied automatically.

  ‘Really? I hear the production’s a mess, but a couple of the voices are quite tolerable, particularly the bass. Buon divertimento.’

  ‘I still think there’s some mistake. My name is not …’

  But the line was dead.

  ‘Got him!’ exclaimed Pasquale, starting the engine.

  ‘Don Orlando?’ murmured Zen.

  ‘Immacolata picked him up five minutes ago. It couldn’t have worked out better. I told her to take him down east and keep him in a holding pattern until we get there. She’s perfect for a job like this. If it was a man, he might try to cut up rough, but ‘a signora Igginz? Never!’

  They drove off along a wide boulevard, cutting and running through the traffic.

  ‘Who?’ Zen demanded distractedly. Not only was the plot slipping from his grasp, even the names of the cast appeared unfamiliar.

  ‘That was her late husband’s name,’ Pasquale explained. ‘A foreign soldier. She still uses the name to add a bit of chic, but no one teases her about it. You don’t mess with Immacolata.’

  They veered off to the right through the dismal back streets where Zen had recruited the two ‘Albanians’. Already fires were flickering at every corner and figures loomed out of the shadows as they approached. Pasquale picked up the phone and dialled.

  ‘So how’s the grand tour of Naples by night? Really? Great. Just crossing Piazza Nazionale. How about you? OK, let’s rendezvous in Via Laura. You pull over, pretend the engine’s playing up. I’ll pull over and offer help to a fellow cabby, discover there’s nothing to be done, then we transfer the guy to my car and take off. What? ‘Mmaculà mia, let’s not talk about money! No, but … I’ve given you my word that … We’re talking about …’

  He switched off his phone with a sigh.

  ‘Women! La Igginz may have more balls than most men I know, but when all’s said and done even she owes allegiance to San Gennaro.’

  ‘How’s that?’ Zen murmured abstractedly. A problem had just occurred to him which he should have foreseen long before, one which made a mockery of the whole enterprise.

  ‘The blood, duttò!’ exclaimed Pasquale. ‘Every time it liquifies, you’re in trouble. And if it doesn’t, then you’re really screwed.’

  ‘Pascà.’

  ‘Duttò’.

  ‘I don’t speak English.’

  ‘Me neither.’

  ‘And despite his name, this American doesn’t speak Italian.’

  ‘My cousin’s family in New York, the kids don’t even speak dialect any more, never mind Italian.’

  ‘So how are we going to communicate?’

  Pasquale made an expansive gesture which necessitated taking both hands off the steering wheel.

  ‘You never told me you wanted to talk to him!’ he protested.

  ‘Look out!’

  Pasquale swerved violently to avoid two men in police uniform standing in the darkened street.

  ‘Eh, eh, the old trick! They get you to stop, then mug you and take the car. But you won’t catch Pascà that way, lads!’

  ‘Good work, Pasquale. Those caps are no longer standard issue. Also they were using an unmarked car, which uniformed officers never do.’

  ‘I didn’t notice that,’ Pasquale admitted. ‘But this street is a dead-end loop. The only thing that ever comes along here is courting couples and garbage trucks on their way back to the depot. That’s why I chose it for the hand-over. It’s nice and private, and if the American tries to make a run for it, there’s nowhere for him to go. And if you need to work him over, I know just the place. You want to make him talk, right?’

  Zen sighed.

  ‘Yes, except that I won’t be able to understand him. This has all been a waste of time.’

  ‘If you could waste time, duttò, life would be nothing but a rubbish dump,’ Pasquale replied.

  Zen gave a contemptuous snort.

  ‘Isn’t it?’

  Pasquale jerked his thumb across the road at a group of low concrete buildings surrounded by a barbed-wire fence. Orange garbage trucks stood parked outside in rows.

  ‘You mean we’re not waiting for the grim reaper but for those guys?’

  He burst into laughter.

  ‘In that case, we’d live for
ever, duttò! But that’s impossible. Time’s like wine and love. You can have it or lack it, lose it or abuse it, but you can’t waste it.’

  ‘Thanks for the words of wisdom,’ retorted Zen. ‘The fact remains that I still don’t have an interpreter. Unless you’re going to tell me that this precious Immacolata of yours is bilingual into the bargain.’

  Once again leaving the taxi to look after itself, like a well-trained horse, Pasquale turned to his passenger with an expression of astonishment.

  ‘Now how in the world did you know that, duttò?’

  Mi confondo, mi vergogno

  He should never have had that second litre of wine, but the guy was so persuasive, he didn’t want to hurt his feelings. In fact, face it, he should never have had the first litre. Not the one before the second, but the very first of the series, dating back … well, that’s a little tough … a heck of a long way, anyways … maybe even to sometime back in the Plasticine Age when giant monsters such as Bronta (large, warm, vegetarian, kind, sweet, loving, maternal) and Tranno (small but vicious, cold, flesh-tearing, sarcastic, totally evil step-father from hell) roamed the house …

  Whoa! Let’s have a statute of limitations here. Nothing that happened before the ship docked counts, right? Check. It’s since then that things have gone down the tubes at such an alarming rate. Particularly after he got his hands on the actual dosh, the fat pack of banknotes, crinkly, sweated, smelly, tough, ageless, totally corrupt and corrupting. He hadn’t foreseen that at all. In his mind, the whole transaction was as abstract and unreal as those in the merchandise itself, where you could kill and die many times, rack up lives and points, find the hidden stash of treasure, then switch off the game and get on with your real life …

  Right from the start, this deal had felt like a game, something you made up as you went along. If Pete hadn’t starting bitching at Christmas about getting canned, or if Larry’s uncle hadn’t been on an extended visit because of some tax problem or something he was having back in the old country … Above all, if the ship hadn’t been posted to the Mediterranean because of the Bosnia crisis … But one thing had led to another, from Pete sneaking a prototype of the new game out of the factory just days before he had to clear his desk, to the Pagan – as zio Orlando was known – setting up a surprisingly sweet deal over the phone.

  That just left the question of delivery. The original idea had been for Pete to hop on a plane and drop it off in person, but that had to be ditched when the company found out about the missing game and, by a process of elimination, tied it to one of the most recent and bitter casualties of corporate down-sizing, Peter Viviani. The software developers might all be American, but the executives and the funding was Japanese, and those guys didn’t fuck around. The original game of which this was an enhanced sequel – same characters, more levels, upgraded graphics, plus a bunch of other cool stuff – had sold something in the region of two million copies world-wide at around thirty bucks a pop. This one was expected to do even better. You didn’t need a maths degree to figure out why the samurai didn’t want anyone cutting themselves a slice of that market by pirating a virtually identical product at half the price three months before the official release date.

  So it was too risky for Pete himself, or any other member of the extended Viviani clan, to act as personal courier. The company knew that there was no risk of the game being duplicated in the States. To cash in, they had to get the stolen prototype out of the country, and as soon as possible, to maximize profits before the game became legally available. But wherever any member of the extended Viviani clan went, the local customs would have been alerted – and, if necessary, heavily bribed. As Zi’Orlando put it, they wouldn’t be able to smuggle in a gnat’s turd, never mind a chunk of pilfered intellectual property the size of a brick. The same went for anyone from Naples he might have sent over to pick it up.

  So when John Viviani got his sailing orders, it seemed a heaven-sent solution. As one of hundreds of crew members aboard the aircraft carrier, he could easily slip ashore, rendezvous with the purchaser’s representative and make the delivery in person. It was a clean deal, cash for merchandise, with no risk and no loose ends. Above all, it kept the whole transaction in the family. What could go wrong?

  Sure enough, the hand-over had proceeded without incident. The only problem was that the courier had been late arriving at the little bar where they were to meet, and to wile away the time John had ordered a couple – OK, maybe more like half a dozen – garishly coloured liqueurs from the extensive selection displayed on glass shelves behind the bar. This was the first time he had ever set foot in the city from which his paternal grandfather’s family had emigrated at the turn of the century, and he was naturally excited. Every sound and smell and flavour, each overheard snatch of raucous dialect, seemed at once colourfully exotic and insidiously familiar.

  The instructions he had received from Zi’Orlando were simple and precise. When he took possession of the money, he was to return immediately to the ship and stash it away in his locker. He was not to go ashore again, and under no circumstances to leave the port area. The city, he had been warned, was a den of thieves, con men and worse who would gobble up a young innocent such as himself and spit out the remains.

  But by the time the courier finally showed, got up in a fake Navy uniform like some outsized organ-grinder’s monkey, these orders had come to seem remote and ridiculous. He wasn’t a child, after all! To make matters worse, there was the cash itself, fat bundles of it, packed with power and possibility. US currency had always seemed solid, staid and stuffy. It was what you got for doing dead-end jobs and spent on rent and food and dental work. This Italian stuff was quite different. It looked sleazy and enticing, racy and unreal, like the token fortunes made and lost with fabulous ease in a board game. Once the game stopped, it was worthless, but until then there were no limits to what you could do.

  So instead of going back to his ship, John had a couple more drinks and then headed off the other way, out of the port and into the pulsating streets of the city beyond. He was rather vague about what had happened after that. In fact he wasn’t even sure exactly how much time had passed. He remembered waking up in a hotel bedroom, very much the worse for wear, and realising that he had failed to show up for muster and would therefore have been posted AWOL. This thought had plunged him into a state of panic which had required the best part of a bottle of Scotch to assuage. The great thing about Italian bars was that they would serve you hard liquor at any time of the day or night – even, as in this case, seven in the morning.

  After that things went kind of hazy again. At some point he had decided that enough was enough and headed down to the port to rejoin his ship, only to discover that it had already sailed. This discovery had plunged him into a state of panic which had required the best part of another bottle of Scotch to assuage. The lousy thing about Italian bars was that they would serve you hard liquor at any time of the day or night – even, as in this case, three in the morning. After that, one thing had led to another, and by now he had nothing left to lose, except of course the remaining wad of the fascinating currency which he had been handed, however many days ago it was, in trust for the Viviani clan back Stateside.

  The bundle of notes seemed quite a bit thinner than it had originally been, but at least he had something to show for it. This fabulous coat, for example. Whatever exception the family might take to other aspects of his spree – something he was almost as worried about as the problems arising from his failure to report for duty, all present and correct, sir! – they’d have to admit that he knew a bargain when he saw one. A genuine Versace, pure mohair, the latest autumn line, and all for a mere 300,000 lire! In dollars that’s just … say 2,000 lire to the dollar, so you divide by … knock off the zeroes and then it’s …

  But the zeroes refused to stay knocked off. They not only came back, but brought their friends with them, a mob of plump little manikins running around in threes, arms linked, singing that numbe
r the old man who’d sold him the coat had taught him, some marching song. He hadn’t understood the words, of course, but it had a great tune. A great tune, great wine, great company, a great deal on the coat … But now it was definitely time to get back to his hotel and sort things out.

  Speaking of which, where the hell were they? He’d told the woman driving the cab to take him to that place on the seafront, the best hotel in town, what’s its name, the one where Clinton stayed when he was here for that conference. It cost the earth, probably, but what the hell? It would be comfortable, familiar and safe, all sensations he was rapidly losing contact with amid the splendours and miseries of the last however-many-it-was hours on the town … ‘Il meglio!’ he had told the cabby impatiently. ‘Take me to the best place!’ She’d know which the best was. Cabbies always knew that. But wherever the best was to be found, it didn’t seem likely to be anywhere near where they were now, and had been for … however long they had been there, going round and round what looked like the same broad, empty streets, lit with a cold, menacing glare, and quite deserted.

  It was only now that he realized what should have been obvious long before, even to someone as innocent and – let’s face it – frankly dumb as John Viviani now realized he had been. Clearly he was being set up to be robbed, maybe even murdered! The tough-looking broad up front was keeping him on ice until the heavies arrived. She’d looked at him in a kind of weird way when she picked him up, almost like she recognized him, then made some sort of call on her mobile phone right away. The drunk back there at the fast food place must have set the whole thing up. Maybe it hadn’t been such a smart idea to bring his whole wad of cash out when he paid for the coat. And there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it now. The taxi was going too fast for him to jump out, and, even if he did, there was nowhere to hide in these inhospitable, brutally utilitarian streets. To the left, the modernistic monolith they were circling, as empty as an architect’s sketch. To the right, the ambient wastelands, partly developed, partly cleared, old industrial sites, factories whose products no one wanted, stockyards, a fenced-off area where ranks of orange trucks were drawn up like mothballed tanks …