Kill the Father

by Sandrone Dazieri

  The hospital psychologist had given her a number to call if she needed support of any kind. In fact, he’d urged her to call him. But Colomba had never told him or anyone else what was happening. All her life, she’d made her way in a world of men, many of whom would have been happier to see her serving coffee than packing a firearm, and she’d learned to conceal her weaknesses and troubles. And after all, somewhere deep down inside, she thought she deserved it. A punishment for the Disaster.

  While she was bandaging her injured knuckle, she thought about calling Rovere back and telling him to go to hell, but she couldn’t bring herself to. She’d limit their meeting to a minimum, the shortest time civil decency would allow, then she’d return home and mail in the letter of resignation she kept in a kitchen drawer. Then she’d decide what to do with the rest of her life, hoping she wouldn’t wind up like those cops who’d taken retirement but kept hanging around police headquarters to make themselves feel they were still part of the family.

  Outside, a cloudburst seemed to shake the world. Colomba threw on a lightweight K-Way windbreaker over her sweatshirt and went downstairs.

  A young man was at the wheel of the squad car, and he stepped out into the rain to greet her. “Deputy Captain Caselli? Officer Massimo Alberti.”

  “Get back in the car, you’re getting drenched,” she said, climbing into the passenger seat. A number of neighbors sheltering under umbrellas were watching the scene curiously. She’d only moved into that apartment building recently, and not everyone knew what she did for a living. Maybe no one did, actually, given how seldom she talked to anyone.

  For Colomba the squad car was like a whiff of home: the reflections of the flashing roof lights on the windshield, the radio and mike on the dashboard, the pictures of wanted men taped to the sun visors were all like so many familiar faces she hadn’t seen in far too long. Are you really ready to give this up? she asked herself. No, she wasn’t. But what choice did she have?

  Alberti turned on the siren and started down the street.

  Colomba snorted. “Turn that off,” she said. “We’re not in any hurry.”

  “My orders are to hurry, Deputy Captain,” Alberti replied, but he obeyed.

  He was a young man, about twenty-five, fair-skinned, with a light sprinkling of freckles. He emanated a scent of aftershave that she found agreeable, though out of place at that time of day. Maybe he carried a bottle of the stuff around with him and had sprayed some on to make a good impression on her. For that matter, his uniform was a little too clean and tidy. “Are you new?” she asked.

  “I graduated from the academy a month ago, Deputy Captain, and I first enlisted as a cop a little over a year ago. I come from Naples.”

  “You got started late.”

  “If I hadn’t passed the admissions exam last year I’d have been too old. I squeaked through just in time.”

  “Well, break a leg,” she muttered.

  “Deputy Captain, can I ask you something?”

  “Go on.”

  “How do you get onto the Mobile Squad?”

  Colomba smirked. Nearly everyone on patrol duty wanted to get onto the Mobile Squad. “You need a recommendation. You file a request with your commanding officer, and then you take a justice police course. But if you do get in, just remember, it’s nowhere near as much fun as you think. You have to forget about the clock.”

  “Can I ask how you got in?”

  “After passing the police admission exam in Milan, I served two years at police headquarters; then I was transferred to drug enforcement down in Palermo. When Captain Rovere was sent up to Rome four years ago, I came with him, as his deputy.”

  “In Homicide.”

  “Let me give you a piece of advice, don’t call it Homicide unless you want everyone to think you’re a penguin.” “Penguins” were newly minted cops. “That’s strictly in the movies. It’s the third section of the Mobile Squad, okay?”

  “Excuse me, Deputy Captain,” said Alberti. When he blushed, his freckles became more noticeable.

  Colomba was sick of talking about herself. “How come you’re out driving around solo?”

  “Normally I make my rounds with my older partner, but I volunteered for the search-and-rescue effort, Deputy Captain. My partner and I found Maugeri earlier today, on the county road.”

  “Just assume I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”

  Alberti complied, and Colomba found out about the vanished picnickers and the guy in shorts.

  “Actually, I haven’t done any searching. I just went to the apartment and then stood guard outside,” Alberti summed up.

  “The family apartment?”

  “That’s right. If the wife ran away, she didn’t take anything with her.”

  “What do the neighbors say?”

  “Nothing helpful, Deputy Captain, but they did have plenty to say,” said Alberti with another smile. The fact that he didn’t make an effort to keep an expression of granite solemnity on his face, the way most penguins did, was a point in his favor.

  Colomba smiled back in spite of herself and it almost hurt her face, she was so out of practice. “Where are we going?”

  “The search coordination center is at the Vivaro riding stables. There’s us, the carabinieri, the firemen, and civil protection. And a bunch of civilians who mostly just get in the way. Word’s gotten out.”

  “Word always does,” said Colomba, discontentedly.

  “There was a little activity three hours ago. I saw two Land Rover Defenders heading out toward Monte Cavo with several officers and a magistrate. Judge De Angelis. You know him?”

  “Yes,” and she didn’t like him. Prosecutor Franco De Angelis was always far too pleased to appear in the press. He had only a couple of years before he’d be eligible to retire, and everyone said that he had his sights set on the Superior Council of the Magistrature. They also said he’d do anything to land a seat on that exalted panel. “How far is Monte Cavo from where they were picnicking?” she asked.

  “A mile and a half through the woods, six miles by road. You want to see the report? There’s a printout in the glove compartment.”

  Colomba got it out. It featured two photos of the missing persons, taken off Facebook. Lucia Maugeri had dark, wavy hair; thirty-nine but she looked older. The boy was plump, with Coke-bottle glasses. The picture had been taken at his desk at school, and he wasn’t looking into the lens. Six and a half. His name was Luca.

  “If they wound up on Monte Cavo, they certainly took a nice long hike, him and his mother. And no one saw them, is that right?”

  “That’s what I was told.”

  The rain started coming down again, and the traffic ground to a halt. Still, with their flashers on, they cut through the line of cars like Moses through the Red Sea. They reached the turnoff for Velletri in half an hour. Colomba began to see official cars and civil protection vans coming and going; soon there was a solid mass of emergency vehicles as they reached the fences surrounding the riding stables. The stables were a compound of one-story buildings, modest in appearance, built around a harness track.

  At walking speed, they drove along the county road cluttered with squad cars, civilian automobiles, carabinieri troop buses, ambulances, and fire trucks. There were also mobile news vans from two television networks, with satellite dish antennas on the roofs, and a field kitchen on wheels that was sending up a dense plume of smoke. The only things missing are sideshow attractions and a shooting gallery, thought Colomba.

  Alberti pulled up behind a camper. “We’re here, Deputy Captain,” he said. “Captain Rovere is waiting for you at the operations center.”

  “Have you already been there?” asked Colomba.

  “Yes, Deputy Captain.”

  “Then show me the way, and we’ll save time.”

  Alberti pulled the hand brake and then escorted her past buildings that seemed to be deserted. Colomba could hear horses whinnying inside and just hoped she wouldn’t run into a runa
way horse, panicking in the rainstorm. They were heading for one of the buildings, guarded by two uniformed officers who saluted Alberti brusquely and ignored her entirely, taking her for a civilian.

  “You wait here,” she said and, without knocking, pulled open a door on which hung a piece of paper that bore the warning STATE POLICE—WAIT TO BE ANNOUNCED.

  She walked into an old records room with metal filing cabinets lining the walls. Half a dozen police officers, uniformed and plainclothes, sat at four large central desks, making phone calls or talking on radios. Colomba spotted Alfredo Rovere, standing over a map spread out on one of the desks. He was a short man, about sixty, with thinning hair carefully combed back. Colomba noticed that his shoes and trousers were spattered with mud up to the knee.

  The officer sitting by the door looked up and recognized her. “Deputy Captain Caselli!” he exclaimed, getting to his feet. Colomba couldn’t remember his name, just the handle Argo 03, which he used when it was his shift at the operations switchboard. Everyone in the room stared at her, and for a moment all conversation ceased.

  Colomba forced a smile onto her face and gestured with one hand for them all to go back to work. “Please, don’t make a fuss.”

  Argo 03 gripped her hand. “How are you, Deputy Captain? You’ve been missed.”

  “You haven’t, that’s for sure,” she answered, pretending to kid around. Argo went back to his phone, and soon the sound of multiple conversations resumed. From what they were saying, Colomba understood that checkpoints had been set up all along the county road. Odd. That wasn’t standard practice in disappearance cases.

  Rovere came over. He gently squeezed her shoulders and looked her in the eyes. His breath reeked of cigarette smoke.

  “You’re looking good, Colomba. For real.”

  “Thanks, Captain,” she replied, thinking to herself that he actually looked aged and weary. There were bags under his eyes, and he needed a shave. “What’s going on?”

  “Curious?”

  “Not in the slightest. But as long as I’m here . . .”

  “You’ll see in a minute,” he said, taking her by the arm and steering her toward the door. “Let’s go find a car.”

  “Mine’s parked at the front entrance.”

  “No, we need a jeep.”

  They walked out, and Alberti, who’d been leaning against the wall, snapped to attention.

  “Are you still here?” asked Rovere.

  “I asked him to wait,” said Colomba. “I’d hoped I’d be heading home soon.”

  “Do you know how to drive an off-road vehicle?” Rovere asked Alberti.

  “Yes, Captain.”

  “Then go to the front gate and requisition one. We’ll wait for you here,” Rovere ordered.

  Alberti rushed outside. Rovere lit a cigarette in open defiance of the sign that said NO SMOKING.

  “Are we going to Monte Cavo?” asked Colomba.

  “I try to keep things from you, and you figure them out anyway,” he replied.

  “Did you think I wouldn’t talk to my driver?”

  “I’d have preferred it.”

  “And what’s up there?”

  “You’ll see with your own eyes.”

  A Land Rover Defender reversed toward them across the courtyard, narrowly missing a highway patrol motorcycle.

  “About time.” Rovere took Colomba by the arm and started to lead her out.

  She wriggled free. “Are we in a hurry?”

  “Yes, we are. In an hour, or possibly less, we won’t be welcome anymore.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’ll bet you can figure it out all by yourself.”

  Rovere opened the door for her. Colomba didn’t get in. “I’m seriously thinking of just going home, Captain,” she said, “I didn’t like riddles even when I was little.”

  “Liar. You’d have picked another line of work.”

  “That’s exactly what I’m planning to do.”

  He sighed. “Have you really made up your mind?”

  “I couldn’t be more determined.”

  “We can talk about that later. Come on, get in.”

  Colomba slipped into the backseat resignedly.

  “Good girl,” said Rovere as he got in front.

  With Rovere giving directions, they left the stables and turned onto the Vivaro county road, following it for a little less than three miles; then they took the lake road until they reached the state road toward Rocca di Papa. They drove past the last few homes and a trattoria where a small knot of police officers were drinking coffee and smoking under a pergola. It seemed the civilians had all gone to ground and only uniforms and military vehicles remained. They traveled another three quarters of a mile and turned off onto the road up to Monte Cavo.

  When they stopped, there was no one else in sight. Beyond the trees at the end of the trail, Colomba glimpsed the glow of floodlights breaking the darkness.

  “From here we’re going to have to continue on foot; the trail is too narrow,” said Rovere. He opened the trunk and pulled out two Maglite flashlights.

  “Will I be looking for hidden notes?”

  “It would be nice if they left such easy clues, wouldn’t it?” said Rovere, handing her a flashlight.

  “Clues to what?”

  “Be patient.”

  They started up the trail, shielded on both sides by trees whose branches twined together to form a sort of green corridor. The silence was practically absolute, now that the rain had stopped, and the air was redolent with the scent of dampness and rotting leaves that Colomba associated with mushrooms. The smell stirred up memories from when she was small and used to go mushroom hunting with an uncle who’d been dead for years. She couldn’t remember whether they’d ever actually found any.

  Rovere lit another cigarette, though his breathing was already labored from the hike. “This is the Via Sacra,” he said.

  “What’s that?” asked Colomba.

  “A road that once led to a Roman temple. You see? The original paving stones are still there,” said Rovere, playing the beam of his light over the gray, time-worn basalt slabs. “Three hours ago one of the search teams took this trail and followed it out to the overlook.”

  “What overlook?”

  Rovere pointed the flashlight at the line of trees straight ahead of them. “Behind there.”

  Colomba ducked her head and stepped under a tangle of branches and out onto a broad flagstone terrace bounded by a metal railing. The overlook surveyed a clearing about thirty feet beneath it, at the center of which was a stand of pine trees, holm oaks, and tangled underbrush. Parked between the narrow road and the trees were two Defenders and a police van used to transport technical equipment. The muttering roar of the diesel generator powering the floodlights could be heard, along with the echoing sound of voices.

  Rovere puffed up beside her, panting like a pressure cooker. “The team halted here. It was pure luck they spotted them at all.”

  Colomba darted the flashlight beam over the edge, following Rovere’s pointing finger.

  There was a bright reflection on a solitary boulder at the edge of the darkness that at first looked to her like a plastic bag caught in a bush. When she trained the beam directly on it, she realized that it was a pair of white-and-blue gym shoes dangling from the branch of a bush, slowly twisting in the air. Even from that distance, she could see they were small, a child’s size nine or ten at the most.

  “So the boy fell down here?” Colomba asked.

  “Look closer.”

  Colomba did, and then she saw that the shoes weren’t simply tangled in the bush, the laces had been knotted together. She turned to look at Rovere. “Someone hung them there.”

  “That’s right. Which is why the team decided to go down. Go this way,” he said, pointing to the lane. “But be careful, it’s steep. One of the men twisted his ankle.”

  Rovere went down ahead of her and Colomba followed, her curiosity piqued in spite of herself. Who’d put
those shoes there? And why?

  A sudden gust of wind sprinkled her with drops, and Colomba jumped, her lungs contracting. That’s enough panic for today, okay? she told herself. When I get home, I can have a nice fat attack, and maybe another good cry to go with it. Just not now, please. Who she was talking to, she couldn’t say. All she knew was that the atmosphere of that place was starting to twist her nerves; she wanted to get out of there as quick as she could. They made their way past the line of trees until they emerged onto a steep embankment, dotted with thorn bushes and underbrush, and surrounded by a number of large rocks arranged in a semicircle. Standing around one of the boulders were a dozen people, including Franco De Angelis and Deputy Chief Marco Santini of the Central Investigative Service. Two guys in white jumpsuits were photographing something at the base of the boulder, but Colomba couldn’t see what it was. Their chest patches displayed the emblem of the Violent Crime Analysis Unit, and suddenly Colomba understood everything, even if deep down she’d known it the whole time. She didn’t work on missing persons cases, after all; she worked on murders. She went over. The rock cast a sharp, dark shadow over a shape huddled on the ground. Please don’t let it be the boy, Colomba thought. Her silent prayer didn’t go unanswered.

  The corpse belonged to the mother.

  She’d been decapitated.

  4

  The corpse lay facedown, legs folded and one arm tucked under the body. The other arm lay stretched out flat, palm turned upward. The neck ended with a cut that sparkled wine red in the glare of the floodlights, with the white of the bones gleaming damp. The head was about a yard away, resting on a cheek, with the face turned toward the body.

  Colomba looked up from the cadaver and found that the others were all staring at her.

  Santini was evidently pissed off. He was an athletic man of about fifty with a narrow mustache. “Who invited you?” he asked.

  “I did,” Rovere replied.

  “And why, if I might ask?”

  “Professional enrichment.”