‘Unfortunately, my plasters were relatively new and well stuck down over my nose. I didn’t dare rip them off. I must have forgotten in my panic that I was going to be killed anyway, so the rules didn’t matter. I couldn’t overcome my habits of submission. Even at such a moment it cost me to do the unforgivable thing I had promised Woodcutter I would never do: I picked at the strips of plaster over my nose and loosened them so that I could lift my face and peer down below the eye pads. I put my head near the tent opening and peered. I was pelted with rain but the world was black. I could see nothing, nothing! What was happening? Why did nobody come? I got hold of my chain and crawled outside, my hands slipping in swirling mud and water. I had never seen the world outside my tent. Inside it didn’t matter because I knew exactly where everything was, which was as good as seeing. Out here was a void. I only knew one thing: my tree. If I followed the chain on my ankle I would find my tree. I lifted the chain, my breath noisy inside my head, and pulled it towards me. When I reached my tree I hugged its soaked trunk. I held on to it for a long time with my forehead pressed against its wet bark, for the comfort its presence gave me. My chain and my tree were all I had left of a whole world that was swirling away in the storm, leaving me stranded. Had they decided to abandon me here instead of killing me? It could make little difference to them. If there was going to be no money they might as well get away as quickly as possible.
‘As to the difference it would make to me … I would perhaps be attacked by wild boars and eaten alive instead of dead but that made no impression on me since it was impossible to imagine. The real difference was that Woodcutter had lied to me. He had promised to come back. “I’m responsible for you.” He had promised me and let me down and that was unbearable. Hugging my familiar tree, abandoned by my captors, my children, my trusted executioner, I sank down in the mud and let my tearless groans loosen themselves and rise from my stomach. Their rhythm was loud in my head, and the noise kept me company, like my tree, for many hours.
‘Then something changed. The rhythmic animal groans in my head were accompanied by other noises. I couldn’t stop my noise, which wasn’t under my control, more like breathing than anything, but I tried to understand what else it was I was hearing. Not thunder, a muffled phut-phut-phut from far away and a nearer drone. Something else. Below my forehead, still pressed painfully hard against the tree trunk, there was a sliver of light. Keeping one arm around my precious tree, I poked at the plasters, lifting them more. It had stopped raining and it was dawn.
‘I found it difficult to stand up but my tree helped me. I held on tight and raised my head to peer out below the loosened plasters. There was someone there! Big brown rubber boots, greeny brown trouser legs, the shining muzzle of a machine gun. He must have seen me with my head raised! I had done the unforgivable—seen the man, seen, behind him, the shelter, the mattresses, the table, the others asleep. Woodcutter had come back for me and I had let him down. I turned away, sticking the plasters down like a child caught with its fingers in the jam pot. “My eyes were shut! I didn’t see anything, I didn’t. Please, please, forgive me!”
‘I didn’t fight against him when he got hold of me, only bowed my head and begged him, “Please …”
“‘Contessa Brunamonti.”
‘I could smell by then that it wasn’t him. He got away…’
It was a question though she tried to make it sound like a statement.
‘Yes, he got away. He’s still up there somewhere with Puddu.’
‘Puddu?’
‘The one you call the boss.’
T never saw him.’
‘No. He would never have let you see him. We know that. You don’t need to be afraid.’
‘I never saw any of them.’
‘No.’
‘The man I saw this morning was one of your people?’
‘Yes.’
She seemed relieved. Perhaps, now she had her other senses, that of smell didn’t reassure her as it had before. By the time she had passed a few days in hospital, the civilized world would have reasserted its claim on her and what she recounted afterwards would be told from a false viewpoint, filtered through the channels of other people’s expectations. Nevertheless, the Marshal refrained from asking any questions.
She said, ‘I’m warm now, in these blankets…Whose is this tracksuit I’m wearing?’
‘Bini’s wife lent it. Bini is the marshal of this station. Don’t you remember? She dried and changed you when we arrived, in their quarters.’
‘I don’t remember…’ Because she had caught sight of herself in a mirror, a staring-eyed, haggard face in a tangle of straggling grey hair, she who a few months before had been mistaken for her daughter. She had fainted. ‘Will you thank her for me? What’s that noise?’
‘The siren? That will be Captain Maestrangelo arriving with the Prosecutor in charge of the case. They will have to ask you a few questions because you may forget things later. If you’ve already told me the information I’ll give it to them. Then we’ll drive you to the hospital. Do you feel all right?
Do you need anything?’
‘I need to use a bathroom.’
‘Of course. Can you wait just one moment? They’re all men here. I imagine Bini would like to check that everything’s as it should be.’
‘What could it matter after all that…’ But the Marshal got up and went out of the small office. Bini was opening the door, ready for the new arrivals.
‘Bini, she needs to use the bathroom.’
‘There’s one right here.’
The Marshal opened the door and peered into the little room. It was raining heavily again, beating against the tiny high window through which filtered gloom and dampness.
‘The light switch is here,’ Bini said, then watched, puzzled, as the Marshal went in and carefully unscrewed the light bulb.
Twelve
ROME—
The Minister of Justice was about to leave Palazzo Chigi when we stopped him to ask:
Are you pleased, Mr Minister?
‘About what?’
About the outcome of the Brunamonti kidnapping.
‘Naturally, I’m happy that we’ve saved the victim. The Contessa Brunamonti has returned to her family.’
And the polemic about how this was achieved?
‘What polemic?’
Some people are saying that the kidnappers would not have released her unless the ransom had been paid. It has also been reported in the newspapers that a spokesperson for the Brunamonti family had declared only days before that they couldn’t pay.
‘I can’t comment on what newspapers choose to put about.’
The same person also said in a published interview that they were collaborating with the State and that the State should, in turn, collaborate with them.
‘I don’t know what you mean by collaboration. We have rescued the victim and arrested three members of the gang. Our business now is to find and arrest the two men on the run.’
Excuse my insistence on the point, but how was the rescue achieved? Was some arrangement made to exchange money for the victim which then turned into an arrest? Did the captured men talk?
‘I’m sure you’re well aware that I can’t give that sort of information at this stage.’
Kidnapping is evidently still a profitable business since it still goes on. People are concerned, not unreasonably, about kidnappers being allowed out of prison. Isn’t something wrong here, Mr Minister?
'This case has been solved. The victim is free. A number of arrests have been made and we have every reason to hope that the information we hold will lead to the arrest of the remaining culprits. Any change in the legislation must be discussed at the appropriate time and in the appropriate place. We are already discussing corrective measures to the prison benefits system, which must, of course, respect the indications laid out by the Constitutional Court, as regards the perpetrators of this particular crime, particularly since it invariably involves a group of crimina
ls and can therefore be considered as organized crime.’
So the same rules should apply for Cosa Nostra?
‘That may well be. Kidnapping is organized, professional crime as is Mafia crime. Professional criminals go back to work if released.’
And in the meantime?
‘In the meantime, the Contessa Brunamonti has been saved. Naturally, I am delighted.’
‘Naturally, he was furious.’ The Captain passed the article across the desk to the Marshal. He knew that the Minister had already answered these same questions a dozen times to as many journalists and on two occasions had lost his temper and said the wrong thing. Had the accusations about the State’s having paid the ransom been true, he would have been prepared and kept his cool. Since they were not, he was at a loss. The only story he had been given was of ‘information received leading to the pinpointing of the hideout.’ Who was going to prefer that to a nice bit of scandal? Who would even believe it—that and the conveniently heavy sleep of the guards, who hadn’t so much as opened their eyes when they were handcuffed? It had been decided that this part of the story should be omitted since, without recounting Salis’s part in the affair, it would not be credible. Nobody believed the rest, anyway. Not the newspapers, not the opposition, and not the public either. The Minister had said as much to the Colonel in command in Florence, who took it out on Captain Maestrangelo. Captain Maestrangelo was unhappy about the irregularity of this affair but at least he wasn’t unprepared. Prosecutor Fusarri, relaxing behind a cloud of smoke in the Captain’s leather armchair, was as satisfied by the irregularity of the affair as by its success. Suddenly he leant forward and jabbed towards the Marshal with his cigar.
‘Now I’ve got you. Yes, the Maxwell kidnapping. I can’t remember precisely what it was you did but you did something that…’
‘No, no…,’ the Marshal said, shifting his gaze from the newspaper cutting to the painting behind the Captain’s head. ‘It was Captain Maestrangelo here who dealt with it.’
‘Hm.’ Fusarri raised one eyebrow, pursed his lips in a half-smile, and murmured, ‘Maestrangelo, call a press conference.’ The Captain did so and brought in someone from the Special Operations Group and they concentrated on the operation itself. It went down well, especially the helicopter decoy. This story was being worked up into a TV documentary with a reconstruction of the rescue. The Captain saw the necessity for this shift of focus but, being an honest and serious man, he regretted that as much of the true story as could have been made available would have been of no interest to anyone. The fashion was for Special Operations Groups, dangerous midnight shoot-outs, camouflage outfits, and expensive weapons. ‘Information received’ wasn’t much of a headline. You couldn’t work up a television documentary about a dull NCO in a country village who told bad jokes and spent his days quietly attending to the problems of his people. What could you add to that? That an equally unimportant marshal from a small station in Florence had listened to him? So the Captain did what he had to do. The journalists were happy. The Captain was put out and said so when he recounted all this to the Marshal, who had waited the press conference out in the Captain’s office. The Marshal only said, ‘As long as the poor woman was saved …’ and, as soon as he decently could, asked permission to get back. Something about an urgent appointment.
The Marshal was more than put out, he was very disturbed. When Teresa caught sight of his looming black shape out of the corner of her eye she was a bit sharp with him.
‘Salva, get changed. We’ve to be there in ten minutes.’
‘It’s only round the corner.’
‘Get changed. It’ll look bad if we’re late.’
The looming black form retreated.
They walked down the slope in front of the palace and waited to cross. It was six-thirty and the traffic was heavy but there had been rain that morning and now that the sky was clear the scent of lime blossom on the evening air overpowered even the exhaust fumes. Further on, the narrow pavement was blocked by a mother having trouble with a small girl.
‘That’s enough. I said that’s enough!’
The little girl screamed and hit out at her mother with clenched fists. I hate you and I’m telling my dad on you! I hope you wet your knickers! I hate you!
‘Will you stop that? And mind you get out of the way. There are people trying to pass.’
The mother pulled her child aside and smiled at the Marshal and his wife apologetically. ‘They get too much,’ she remarked, quite unperturbed by the small girl’s red-faced rage.
Teresa had always wanted a little girl. She smiled at the woman as they squeezed past. ‘Small children, small problems, as they say.’
When they were past, she laughed and repeated, ‘“I hope you wet your knickers”—did you hear her? That must be the worst disaster she could think of wishing on her mum.’
The Marshal wasn’t amused.
‘What’s the matter with you? You were just as bad at lunchtime.’
‘Nothing. It’s nothing … bit tired.’
‘Well, if you weren’t up to it I could have come by myself.’
‘No.’ They reached Via dei Cardatori and went in at the school entrance.
How could you know what was right for your children? Nobody told you. You just muddled along, doing your best, inventing solutions to one problem after another. There was a time when parents just followed age-old rules which nobody had ever questioned. He couldn’t imagine his own mother ever having been in doubt about what to do, fully occupied as she was with keeping her children clean, fed, and respectable. And she saw their future in terms of getting a safe job and so continuing clean, fed, and respectable. What did he know about whether Toto would have done better in the English language stream with his friends than he had without them, doing French in less crowded classes? He was frightened and angry at the thought of his son’s being held back a year and, in his anger, continued to say, ‘It’ll do him good, teach him a lesson.’ How did he know? And more difficult decisions loomed ahead about which he had no information, no experience, no confidence. How did Teresa take it all in her stride the way she did? Did it never occur to her that her child might one day in the future turn on her and accuse her of some unfathomable wrong?
‘Salva!’
‘What?’
‘Sit down.’ Then, as the teacher turned to answer a question from one of her colleagues, Teresa whispered, ‘At least try and look as if you’re listening, for goodness’ sake.’
That morning he had been at the hospital where Olivia Birkett had been kept for two weeks because she had developed bronchial pneumonia. There had been photographers in the Contessa’s room and he had found himself waiting in the corridor. There he saw Elettra Cavicchioli Zelli in furious conversation with Caterina Brunamonti. Their fury was such that he could hear every fiercely whispered word long before he was near enough for them to notice him. Elettra’s voice came to him first.
‘It isn’t a question of it’s being none of their business. It’s only natural that they would look around for some flowers to include in the photos. Damn it, even her doctor was asking where they were. So where the bloody hell are they, starting with mine, which were freesias, her favourites?’
‘The nurses complained. There were far too many. This is a hospital, not an opera house. She can’t be playing the prima donna here.’
‘I can’t believe this. And Patrick’s orchids? You’re not going to tell me you threw a whole basket of orchids away?’
‘I didn’t throw them away. I took them home for her.’
‘For her? Or for yourself?’
One of the photographers put his head round the door. ‘Signorina. Could we have one with you by your mother’s bedside?’ Her smile already in place, Caterina hurried into the room.
‘Marshal! Oh, I’m so glad you’re here. Can you believe what’s going on? Listen, Olivia’s out of danger. The fever’s gone and the doctor says she’ll recover better at home now, but he says Leo has asked
him to keep her in here another week!’
‘Her son asked that?’ His eyes followed in the wake of the daughter, the more likely perpetrator of this betrayal.
T know! But it wasn’t her, it was Leo. He asked for an appointment, said he was worried about her and would feel happier if she stayed in here longer. He’d feel happier! Never mind what Olivia feels if she finds out.’
‘You’re sure she doesn’t know? Wouldn’t they have told her first of the decision to discharge her?’
T don’t know and I daren’t ask. We’re not supposed to upset her. You’ve got to talk to Leo.’
‘Me? Wouldn’t it come better from you? I mean, as a friend of his mother’s…’
‘I’ve been trying for two days but there’s no getting past that little pot of poison who’s in there now smiling for the cameras.’
‘Even so, they can’t prevent her going home.’
‘She’s changed the locks! Didn’t you notice? The closed doors, the porter, that whole business? She’s taken over. Olivia doesn’t know it yet but she can’t even get in. A nice homecoming after what she’s been through. Listen, I’m going to suggest she comes to my house for a week or so with the excuse that Tessie’s there and recovering better in the country than she would in the city. If you want Olivia to do anything, you’ve got to tell her it’s for somebody else’s good. She has no sense. And you must talk to Leo. He doesn’t talk to anybody much but he talks to you, doesn’t he?’
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