Death in the Dolomites

by David P. Wagner

  “May I ask what the loan will finance?”

  “That too is not a secret, since almost nothing in this town is. I want to purchase and develop a plot of land. Vacation apartments.”

  “I wish you luck on that.” Melograno nodded, and Luca continued. “You had met with Signor Taylor before, I assume?”

  “In addition to business? Our paths had crossed. He comes up to Campiglio frequently to ski.”

  “And how was his manner this time, in comparison with the other times you had met? Did he seem different? Preoccupied?”

  Melograno rubbed his chin and thick neck with his right hand to help him remember. “I wouldn’t say so. He is always very serious, very correct, when talking business. Not that I have seen him in any social occasions. That was the way he was on Thursday. Very correct.”

  And that matches the way his sister had described his business dealings, thought Rick. “Did you notice anything which could be a clue to his disappearance? Did he mention anything he was planning to do while in Campiglio?”

  He looked at Rick for a few seconds before answering. “We only talked about the loan.”

  “Your meeting was here?” Luca asked.

  “Yes, Inspector, he sat where you are sitting.”

  “So the meeting was cordial and businesslike?” Melograno did not answer, but nodded slowly, as if running out of patience with the questions. “And you haven’t talked to Signor Taylor since that meeting?”

  This time he spoke. “No, no, of course not. Otherwise I would have told the police.”

  Luca flipped his notebook closed. “Naturally you would have. You don’t want to have problems with the police.” Melograno’s eyes narrowed but he remained silent.

  ***

  “What was that last comment about?” asked Rick when they had descended the stairs and emerged into the cold air.

  “The local sergeant told me that our friend Melograno was involved in a bribery scandal last year. Something involving a regional politician. It never made it out of the investigation stage since someone obviously stepped in to quash it. Melograno didn’t seem very happy when I made what he deduced was a very indirect reference to that case. Correctly deduced, I might add.” Luca’s face became even happier when he carefully placed his new hat over his head of thick dark hair and turned to catch his image in the glass of the shop window. “I’d better check in with the station. Perhaps Taylor has turned up.”

  The phone call lasted several minutes and involved a few gestures that indicated he was not pleased with what he heard. As Luca was speaking, Rick looked at the merchandise in the shop window—hand-knitted children’s clothing. He tried to calculate what size his two nephews back in Albuquerque would be, but without success since he hadn’t seen them in almost a year. A wool sweater from Italy would be a nice gift, since their birthdays were coming up soon. As least he thought it was soon. He made a mental note to email his mother to find out.

  Luca snapped the phone closed. “The mayor of Campiglio wants to see me. He just called the station.”

  “Does he have some ideas to help your investigation?” They had walked to the edge of the porch and flakes began falling on their hats and clothing.

  “A logical question for an American to ask. No, my friend, the sindaco is worried about how all this will affect tourism. The sergeant thinks the man wishes to make his concerns known to the investigative officer. That’s me. We will call immediately on Mayor Grandi at his shop on the piazza. Perhaps you could assure him, as a tourist, and even better, an American tourist, that missing countrymen play no part in your euro spending decisions. Then we will get back to our work and interview Gina Cortese.”

  Rick chuckled as they stepped off the porch. It seemed that he was now Luca’s permanent sidekick. They reached the main square five minutes later and Luca marveled again at what a tiny gem of urban architecture it was, framed by the mountains. Rick pulled out his phone and checked the time. “This might be a good time to call the bank, Luca. It shouldn’t take long.”

  “Go right ahead, I’ll check out the wares of this shop.” He walked toward a window filled with chocolate. Rick smiled and opened his phone.

  It was surprisingly easy to get through to the banker. Only two secretaries, the first Italian and the second American, blocked the way. Apparently Rick had made some kind of positive impression. The man’s voice boomed so loudly Rick pulled the phone from his ear.

  “Rick, so good to hear from you.”

  “My pleasure, Mr. Fries.”

  “What’s this Mr. Fries stuff? It’s Mark.”

  “My pleasure, Mark. Though I would rather be calling under better circumstances. I’m up here in Campiglio, in the mountains, and the local police have pulled me in to help with a missing persons case.”

  “Some cloak and dagger work? I always suspected that you—”

  “No, Mark, local police work, but the missing person is Cameron Taylor.”

  “Cam? What’s happened to him?”

  “That’s what the police are trying to find out. His sister is here, which is why I was asked to help, since she doesn’t speak Italian.” He watched Luca enter the chocolate shop. “I can tell the police that you don’t know where he might be? He wasn’t called back to work?”

  “No, absolutely not. He wasn’t going to be back in the bank until Thursday at the earliest. Could he have been lost on some ski trail? I know he’s a good skier, but—”

  “They’ve searched the trails and found nothing. Mark, was there also some business he was doing up here?”

  “Yes, that’s right, I’d forgotten. It’s a loan, but not a very large one for us.” The banker voice intruded, like he didn’t want to discuss private business. “Cam has complete discretion on such transactions.”

  It would be a big loan for me, Rick thought, and also for Melograno. “Is there anything else that might help us discover where he is? Anyone else who he might have gone to see?”

  “He was going there to ski, as far as I know. And that loan, of course, but he was really taking some days off to spend with his sister. Have you met her?”

  “Yes, about an hour ago. Do you know her?”

  “No. She’s been to Milan a few times, I think, but I’ve never had the pleasure.”

  That confirms what Cat said, Rick thought. “Well, if you think of anything, give me a call. You have my cell number?”

  “My secretary has it in her Rolodex.”

  They exchanged pleasantries, with the usual promises to get together, and the call ended. Rick closed his phone and watched Luca emerge from the shop carrying a small bag. The smell of chocolate pushed out into the piazza before the door closed again.

  “Tartufo?” Luca extended the open bag to Rick.

  Rick couldn’t resist. Mass-produced Baci were his favorites, but he had to admit that any handmade cioccolatini, just cooled, couldn’t be rivaled. This truffle was filled with a smooth gianduia ganache. After enjoying one and fending off a second, Rick recounted his phone conversation with the banker.

  “That doesn’t help much,” said Luca before popping another chocolate ball into his mouth.

  ***

  Mayor Elio Grandi’s shop sold wood objects of all shapes and sizes. Most of its wares were handmade and carved in clean natural pine, keeping alive the artisan traditions of a snowy mountain hamlet. Rick almost expected to see elves sitting at small benches in one corner, hard at work and chattering happily in Munchkin voices. Instead, one corner of the shop revealed someone who had to be Grandi himself, chipping away at a large block of wood, its eventual shape not yet recognizable. Rick remembered the sculptor who was asked how he did his work and replied, “If I’m sculpting a hippopotamus, I just chip away everything that doesn’t look like a hippopotamus.” Grandi, when he’d been told by his assistant that Inspector Albani was here to see him, said he’d be
with him in a moment.

  “He’s the mayor, after all,” Luca said to Rick while twirling his new hat in his hand. “He can make us wait. Mayors do that.”

  The two walked around the shop checking out all the wood—and a lot of it there was. The smell reminded Rick of the pine logs he used to split for his grandfather in northern New Mexico. Luca went to a section filled with carved figures, mostly animals. Rick’s eye was caught by one corner near the window which had several shelves of wooden toys. Among them was a set of trucks and machines, including a crane and a steam shovel. He reached down to turn the crank on the crane, lowering a small wooden hook on the end of a string. As he did, he thought again of his nephews. It occurred to him that no little boy, after getting a toy for his birthday, had ever said he would have preferred a nice wool sweater instead. He checked the price. Wow.

  “Inspector Albani? I am Elio Grandi.” Rick turned to see the mayor shaking hands with Luca. “I regret,” continued the mayor, “that you are here under these circumstances, but I welcome you to Campiglio no less warmly. I hope you will return in an unofficial capacity once this unfortunate business is resolved.”

  If Grandi wanted to foster the image of the little village wood-carver, he failed, looking instead like a football lineman Rick had known in college. He had taken off his long apron and hung it—on a wooden peg, of course—in the work area, revealing a pair of well-tailored jeans and a dark blue turtleneck. He was bald, though probably by choice using his own razor, giving his appearance even more authority, but also making him appear older than his what Rick estimated to be about forty years.

  “And this must be Signor Montoya,” Grandi said, turning with an outstretched hand. The word of Rick’s presence was around town, no use even asking how he knew.

  “My pleasure, Signor Sindaco.”

  “I have some chairs over here. Why don’t we sit while we talk?” He gestured toward a round table surrounded by four chairs. The card on it read nine hundred euros for the set, but the decorative inlay on the tabletop, which matched the chair backs, may have justified the price. “Needless to say,” Grandi said when they were seated, “I am very anxious that this business be cleared up as soon as possible.” His eyes jumped from one face to the other as he spoke, a serious look on his own.

  “I could not agree more,” said Luca. “We all hope this is simply some terrible misunderstanding.”

  “The man is here with his sister, I understand? You’ve spoken to her already, I trust.”

  Rick had the sense that the mayor knew exactly who they’d seen. “She was the first person Inspector Albani interviewed.”

  Grandi nodded in approval. “Excellent. Do you have any leads? Any idea where the man could be?”

  “Nothing yet, Signor Sindaco,” said Luca. “We were just going around interviewing people who had seen Signor Taylor before his disappearance, when I got word from the station that you’d called.” The policeman was smiling, but Rick hoped the mayor would get the message that there was work to be done if Cameron Taylor was to be found. Apparently he didn’t.

  “Yes, of course. No one has been able to help so far? Who else have you spoken to?

  “Just Signor Melograno. He apparently had a meeting with the missing man.”

  “I’d heard that Umberto was looking for a loan, that’s probably what the meeting was about.” He looked at the policeman for a reaction but none came. “The missing man is a banker, is he not?” This time Luca nodded, but stayed silent. It seemed, at last, to work. “But I should not be keeping you from your investigation. I just wanted to emphasize how important for Campiglio it is that this man be found, our only industry here is tourism, and as you can appreciate—”

  “I understand completely,” said Luca, “and you can be assured that we are doing everything in our power to find him.”

  They got to their feet. “If there is anything I can do to help, anything the municipality of Campiglio can assist with, you will let me know.” It sounded like an order.

  “You can be sure of that, Signor Sindaco,” Luca said, extending his hand.

  ***

  “That was a waste of time,” said Rick as they adjusted their hats outside the store.

  “I’m not sure I would say that, my friend.” Luca looked around the street as if he were seeing it for the first time.

  “I saw something interesting in Grandi’s shop. Perhaps it is of no consequence, but interesting nonetheless.” Rick waited for Luca to continue, and after adjusting the new cap, he did. “Among the carved animals for sale on one of the shelves was a bear. Not as large as the one in Melograno’s office, but the resemblance was striking. Given the price on the one at the shop, I think Melograno must have paid quite a lot for the bigger model.”

  “Maybe Grandi sells a lot of bears. I noticed that one of them is on the coat of arms of Campiglio.”

  “True. And this is a small town. That was the other benefit of meeting the mayor, Riccardo. We were reminded how small this town is. And that, I dare say, could be the key to finding our missing man. Someone here knows something, and likely there are others who know that that someone knows something, so we just have to discover which someone that someone is. Did I explain that right?”

  “I think I got it. Where to now?”

  The policeman looked at his watch. “According to the sergeant, Signora Cortese should be finishing her classes right about now, and can be found in the bar at the bottom of the lift over…” He twisted his head around, getting his bearings, before pointing to the east. “Over there. He said we should be able to walk to it easily. But then everything is within easy walking distance here.” He slapped Rick on the back. “This isn’t Rome, is it?” They began to walk, and Luca continued to chatter. “There is something to be said for the small town, isn’t there, Riccardo? I grew up in Rome, just outside the walls near San Giovanni in Laterano, and getting anywhere was problematic. Always buses, taxis, or the metro, if the metro happened to go somewhere you wanted to reach, which wasn’t often. Look around us. Few cars, everyone walking, the air is fresh. I now wonder why our friend Flavio left here to move to Trento. True, Trento isn’t very big, either, but this place, well, it’s so—what’s the phrase?—misura di uomo. That’s it, human-sized.”

  They had left the center of the town, such as it was, and were walking along a sidewalk below the mountain. On their left the mountain rose steeply behind houses, its upper reaches visible through the trees as they walked. On the other side of the street a treeless park formed a white bowl in the center of the alpine valley, its curving paths cleared to give access to a small frozen lake. Three solitary skaters moved around the ice under the light snowfall, reminding Rick of a snow globe he had as a kid. Whatever happened to it? Could Mamma have given it away along with his Topolino comics?

  On their left, past a few apartment buildings, a field opened up where two skiers took off their skis, hoisted them over their shoulders, and walked stiffly off in heavy ski boots. Beside the field rose a large structure concealing the machinery for the ski lift that served this part of the mountain. High above its roof the egg-shaped capsules descended from the mountaintop or rose toward it. Fortunately for Rick and Luca, who were without snow boots, there was a cleared stairway leading to the entrance.

  The bar at the top of the stairs looked out over the end of a pista. It was an unpretentious establishment: scuffed cement floors, no wall decorations, and a dozen wooden tables and chairs served by a bored barman. On the snow outside the windows a few skiers, all of them young, pushed hard on their poles to reach the waiting line for another ride to the top. They knew it was getting late in the afternoon and the lifts would be closing soon. The trick was to come back down just before the line closed, get on one of the last cabine to the top, then make that final, relaxed run before the ski patrol did its sweep of the trails.

  It was not difficult to spot Gina Cortese. The
ski instructors sitting at a table in one corner of the bar were dressed the same, their matching ski coats sporting the round patch of the Scuola Italiana di Sci. All the faces were evenly tanned and all the bodies were athletic, but she was the only woman. A variety of drinks stood on the table, from coffee to mineral water, but in front of her was what appeared to be a small glass of grappa. As Rick and Luca watched, she ran her hand through her hair, then shook it out with a rapid snap of the head. Despite her efforts, and its relatively short length, the hair remained matted from a day spent under a knit cap. Rick stood back while Luca approached the group.

  “Signora Cortese? I wonder if I could have a word with you?”

  “If you need good skiing lessons, Signore, you should talk to one of the rest of us.” The man’s comments brought laughter from the group.

  “Perhaps he needs lessons in something other than skiing,” said the one sitting next to her.

  She got to her feet, seeming to ignore the comment, but then lashed out an open hand against the back of the man’s head. The man cowered, a look of anger on his face, while the group reacted with a roar. She picked up her glass in one hand and the jacket in the other. “Let’s go over to that table. We can talk about when I could schedule you this week.” She looked more closely at the policeman. “Or is it for some family member?”

  “We can sit over here.” Luca gestured toward the table where Rick was already standing. “In fact, Signora Cortese, I do not want to set up lessons, though I have never learned to ski. I am Inspector Luca Albani, and this is Riccardo Montoya.” He flashed his police ID.

  She took the seat offered by Rick and gave them a puzzled look. “Police? Why would you need to talk to me? I paid off that traffic ticket a month ago. Is that what this is about?”