Death in Sardinia

by Marco Vichi

  The burst of a firecracker woke him up. The water had turned cold, and he had to get out of the tub. Whenever his thoughts turned to the war, time started passing very fast. As he was getting dressed he wished he could have a quiet evening, without spending the whole time rehashing this or that or thinking about Milena. Things would turn out however they turned out, and the same was true for everything. As he was putting on his shoes, the telephone rang. It was De Marchi.

  ‘I’ve just finished, Inspector.’

  ‘And?’ said Bordelli, holding his breath.

  ‘The hair you gave me and the hair found in Badalamenti’s flat belong to the same person.’

  ‘Ah …’ said the inspector.

  ‘But I haven’t written anything up yet, as you asked.’

  ‘Good, thank you so much. Now go and get some rest.’

  ‘Have a good evening, Inspector.’

  Bordelli hung up and ran a hand over his face. The hair you gave me and the hair found in Badalamenti’s flat belong to the same person. This was no small matter. He returned to the bedroom to finish getting dressed. If Odoardo had admitted having been in Badalamenti’s flat at least once, then it might mean nothing. Shedding hair is not unusual. But Odoardo had lied, and clearly had his reasons for lying. Of course, he could have gone to Badalamenti’s just to pay off his mother’s IOUs or to try to get back the photographs and had lied only for fear of being considered a suspect …

  Bordelli heaved a sigh. Aside from the hair that had betrayed him, there wasn’t any hard evidence against Odoardo. All the same, from the very start, he’d had the distinct feeling that the lad was lying to him. Whereas Raffaele had always given him the opposite impression: a difficult, instinctual young man, even a bit of a blowhard, but as transparent as glass in sunlight. He had to go back to see Odoardo. It would almost certainly be the last chapter of an unamusing novel. Perhaps he would go back the following morning. Perhaps. He no longer was in such a hurry. Before going out, he remembered the ballistics test and rang Piras.

  ‘I tried calling a little while ago, Inspector, but your line was busy,’ said the Sardinian.

  ‘Any news?’

  ‘The arrest has been upheld. The shell under Pintus’s shoe was fired from the same gun that killed Benigno Staffa.’

  ‘That sounds a lot like something someone told me just a minute ago.’

  ‘What’s that, Inspector?’

  ‘Nothing. I’ll tell you when you get back. I wanted to let you know I called up an old friend with the Secret Service and gave him all the information on Frigolin. We’ll see if anything turns up …’

  ‘Pintus has changed his story. Now he says he went to see Benigno to try and persuade him to sell that land, and he found the door open, went inside, found him dead, and ran away because he didn’t want any trouble.’

  ‘With a good lawyer, he might even get off,’ said Bordelli.

  ‘Pintus is the Fascist Frigolin, Inspector, I’m sure of it. You should have seen his face when I provoked him …’

  ‘Being sure doesn’t help, Piras. You need proof.’

  ‘If that son of a bitch wriggles out of this, Benigno will turn in his grave.’

  ‘Talk to Stella. Send a photograph of Pintus express to the RAI and ask them to broadcast it on the evening news. Maybe somebody’ll recognise him as Frigolin and we can nail him for war crimes.’

  ‘Shit, Inspector, I hadn’t even thought of that.’

  ‘It would have come to you tonight, Piras.’

  ‘Can you imagine, Inspector? All Frigolin had to do was look once at the sole of his shoe, and he would have got off scot free.’

  ‘As far as that goes, he would have got off scot free if nobody had shot you in the legs.’

  ‘I suppose I have to admit that every cloud has a silver lining … Be sure to watch the news on Thursday,’ said Piras.

  ‘You’re very optimistic.’

  ‘No, I’m Sardinian. Goodnight, Inspector, I’m going to go and read a little Maigret.’

  ‘Give him my best.’ They hung up. Bordelli went into the kitchen to make a cheese sandwich and drink a glass of wine. By the time he left the house it was already half past nine. The rain had stopped, but the sky was still choked with clouds. On the other side of the street the little boys sat on the kerb in the dim light of a street lamp. They were lighting firecrackers. As soon as they saw Bordelli, they all got up and ran towards him.

  ‘Have you arrested the killer?’ asked Mimmo.

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘There’s only four days left. You’re not gonna break your promise, are you?’

  ‘I never break a promise,’ said Bordelli, walking towards his car.

  ‘If you don’t get us a new football we’re gonna ring your doorbell every single day,’ said Rabbit-teeth. Bordelli got into the Beetle and rolled down the window.

  ‘Actually I think you’d better all get ready to wash my car.’

  The little boys giggled with delight. They waited for the inspector to set off, then hurled firecrackers after his car before retreating to their territory.

  Bordelli crossed the bridge and turned down Via Tornabuoni. There was some traffic, and at moments the cars ground almost to a halt. Despite the cold, there was a good deal of bustle, and more than a few foreigners. The shop windows were already full of Epiphany stockings and sweet coal. Every so often one heard firecrackers popping. He crossed the centre of town and came out on the Viali. Holding the steering wheel with his knees, he lit a cigarette. He only wanted to take a few drags, he told himself, and then he would throw it out. He drove through Piazza delle Cure, and when he got to the end of Via Maffei, he still had the fag in his mouth. Turning left, he arrived at the Mugnone and parked the car. He got out and started walking down Via Boccaccio. He wanted to have a quiet stroll undisturbed. Dogs barked in the dark gardens of an immense villa. He continued down the dark road with his hands in his pockets. The asphalt was still wet, and there was nobody about. He could see the bluish light of televisions filtering through a number of windows. At that hour there must have been a film on. Here and there he heard dogs growling behind locked gates.

  He was almost at San Domenico. On the ground floor of an ancient building that gave on to the street was a lighted window through which came some highly rhythmical music. Bordelli went up to it to look through the bars. Behind a thin curtain was a large, smoke-filled room with some thirty or more young men and women dancing and shaking their heads. Those not dancing had drinks in their hands. A lot of bare legs and childish faces. A blonde in a miniskirt jumped up and down as if suffering from tarantism, hair tossed about in the air. He could never jump around like that, he would feel too embarrassed … even in the privacy of his home, with nobody watching. He felt a twinge of envy for those kids’ light-heartedness and continued spying on them. When at last he pried himself away from the window, he could think only of his own youth spent under the watchful eye of Mussolini. He returned towards Le Cure. When he got back in the car, it was almost eleven. He started it up and drove off. He didn’t know what to do, and he didn’t feel the least bit hungry. There was a present waiting for him at Rosa’s, but at that hour her friends would still be there, rehearsing the play. He didn’t feel like being with other people. He would go to Rosa’s the following day before supper time, when she was alone. He was curious to see his present. She always got him very unusual things. When he’d turned fifty, she’d given him a beautiful stone, scaly and shiny.

  ‘It grows like a rose in the desert,’ she’d said, laughing, lips red with lipstick. ‘Even the desert has its flowers, as you can see.’

  It was a beautiful stone, and he’d put it in the kitchen, using it now and then to crush walnuts. He drove on slowly, headed nowhere in particular. Maybe he could take a spin up to Fiesole, turn towards Montebeni and then come back down by way of Settignano. Or he could take the Chiantigiana and just roll along nice and slow all the way to Siena if he felt like it. The third possibility was to g
o home and watch the late-night news broadcast.

  28 December

  He woke up early that morning, left home without shaving and went straight to the office. The previous evening he’d fallen asleep in front of the telly almost at once and woken up a while later in front of a blizzard of static on the screen.

  He sent Mugnai to fetch him some coffee and then got some bureaucratic stuff out of the way. He had to pay a call on Odoardo, there was no getting round it. And he would do it one of these days, just not today.

  Behind him he could feel the presence of that postcard. It was just a view of Montevideo, but it had a hold on the back of his neck. At a certain point he got up and threw it into a drawer.Adieu, Milena, he thought.Then Marisa came to mind, the little girl who already looked like a woman. He felt he needed to clear things up a bit, but it wasn’t easy and so he put it all off till a more propitious moment.

  Around eleven o’clock, a phone call came through from the General Staff of the Navy. A young woman’s voice told him that Admiral Agostinelli was on the line.

  ‘Don’t tell me you’ve already found something,’ said Bordelli.

  ‘Not just something … we’ve found out everything there was to find out, just as you asked.’

  ‘In less than a day?’

  ‘We’re not the police, you know,’ the admiral said.

  ‘You are starting to frighten me.’

  ‘In a little bit I’ll have an official telex sent your way, but I wanted to give you advance notice personally.’

  ‘I’m all ears,’ said Bordelli.

  ‘I quote: “… Ruggero Frigolin, born 18 July 1913, at Martellago, Verona province, where his parents resided. The Frigolin family moved to the city of Milan on 21 May 1922. His father died in Africa in April 1943, shortly before the capitulation. His mother is still alive and a patient at a hospice on the outskirts of Milan, suffering from a degenerative disease that has left her non compos mentis. With the creation of the Operazione Nazionale Balilla45 in 1926, Ruggero Frigolin joined the association of the Avanguardisti di Milano. In 1928, he became a member of the Avanguardisti Moschettieri; in 1930 became a Giovane Fascista, and in 1934 entered the Fasci di Combattimento of the National Fascist Party. He attended the Istituto Superiore Agrario in Milan for one year with lacklustre results. On the other hand, within the ONB, and later in the Fascist Party itself, he distinguished himself with his tenacity and ability to command and was appointed to a variety of positions of increasing importance. These qualities soon won the admiration of Alessandro Pavolini, who wanted him at his side for the constitution and organisation of the Black Brigades. In September of the same year, Pavolini again recommended him to Mussolini for the post of Second Commandant of the Luigi Viale Brigade of Asti, which Frigolin was promptly granted. He immediately became known in the region for his cold ferocity, which earned him the nicknames of ‘Lucifer’ and ‘the Kappler of Venice’. He surrounded himself with personally hand-picked men and carried out bloody actions that never left any witnesses behind, not even women or children. He devoted himself with vicious intensity to hunting down Jews, arresting whole families who were later deported to Poland, and saw personally to the confiscation of their possessions. He actively participated in the preparation and execution of the Langhe round-up alongside his Nazi colleagues. His name came up in many of the war-crimes trials of Salò officials, but he was never personally indicted. Ruggero Frigolin officially died on 4 April 1945. His dead body was found in a stable near Mondovì with its face disfigured by machine-gun fire. It was identified by the documents found in the corpse’s pocket. Many believed that this death had been staged and that Frigolin managed to escape under a false name, but there is no proof of this. Ruggero Frigolin did not like to be photographed and indeed there are no extant photos of him …” He was a true gentleman, in short,’ Agostinelli concluded.

  ‘He may still be. He may be alive, you know.’

  ‘Why are you looking for him?’

  ‘I want to invite him to dinner at Epiphany.’

  ‘Then don’t overcook the steak. He’s the kind that likes it blood rare.’

  ‘How the hell do you office moles always manage to know everything about everybody?’

  ‘Our motto is: never throw anything away. You never know when you may need it. Our archives are the envy of the CIA itself.’

  ‘God knows what my file looks like.’

  ‘Rest assured we know everything: how many women you’ve slept with, what books you read, how many times you threw up as a baby and all the rest.’

  ‘Too bad there’s not a single photo of Frigolin available. That would have made things a lot easier.’

  ‘Have the man’s mug broadcast on TV and maybe someone will—’

  ‘That’s already been arranged.’

  ‘So you gumshoes aren’t really as feeble-minded as they say.’

  ‘We even know how to drive cars, as far as that goes.’

  ‘You don’t mean to tell me why you’re looking for this revenant?’ Agostinelli asked.

  ‘A few days ago, in Sardinia, a man killed himself with an automatic pistol, but the shell was never found …’ Bordelli went on to recount in a few words the whole story of Benigno.

  ‘He’s good, this Sardinian. Think he might want to change jobs?’

  ‘Piras is mine,’ said Bordelli.

  ‘Ah, then never mind.’

  ‘If our suspicions are right, this Frigolin has been living in Oristano under a false name since ’46, even though his papers are authentic.’

  ‘He may have obtained them himself, using real municipal records. It happened a lot during that period.’

  ‘He left nothing but scorched earth behind him …’

  ‘Those who were best prepared had already started arranging their escape in ’44, when it became clear how it was all going to end,’ said Agostinelli.

  ‘The guy’s been living undisturbed for twenty years, mixing concrete and money … I hardly think that’s right.’

  ‘I’ll try again and see if I can’t find a photograph,’ said Agostinelli.

  ‘If you don’t succeed I’ll start to think that none of you does a bleeding thing all day in your cushy offices,’ Bordelli said, laughing.

  ‘Even if there’s only one copy of something in all the world, we’ll find it, rest assured.’

  ‘Call me at any hour of the day or night, even at home.’

  ‘Sorry to ask, but isn’t it enough for Frigolin to be convicted for premeditated murder?’ asked the admiral.

  ‘Well, yes and no, but that’s not the point. What worries me most is that if through some legal quibble this Frigolin manages to slip out of jail for even a minute, we’ll never find him again.’

  ‘You can be sure of that. I’ll get moving straight away.’

  ‘Thanks, Carnera, really.’

  ‘Thanks, Beast.’ Bordelli hung up. It was true, one of his nicknames during the war had been

  ‘Beast’. He’d forgotten. Lighting a cigarette, he rang Piras at once to tell him about Ruggero Frigolin’s accomplishments under the Republic of Salò.

  Shortly before five o’clock the hospital rang him. Sergeant Baragli was unwell and wanted to talk to him. Bordelli put on his trench coat and went out.

  He got to Careggi in only a few minutes. Driving through the hospital gate, he parked in front of the ward. As he climbed the stairs, he thought of all the people he’d seen die. The list was long and included his father and mother. And he would see more, until the day when he too joined their number. Turning down the corridor, he imagined Rosa at his funeral, a black veil over her face and Gideon in her arms. A mysterious blonde weeping in silence amidst the deceased’s relatives and his law-enforcement colleagues, immobile as her spiked heels sank into the ground …

  Baragli was in a pitiful state. He lay motionless with his eyes closed, face like a mask made of wax. His wife and son were sitting beside the bed and watching him in silence. As soon as she saw Bordelli, th
e wife took him by the arm and led him out of the room. In the hallway she burst into tears and pulled out her handkerchief. The inspector embraced her and awkwardly patted her head. He didn’t know what to say. The son also came out, and they shook hands.

  ‘If you’re going to stay a little while, Inspector, I’d like to take my mother out to eat something.’

  ‘I don’t want to eat,’ she said, sobbing.

  ‘Mamma, please, you have to eat. What’s the use of acting this way?’

  Bordelli took one of the woman’s hands in his. It was as cold as if it had just been taken out of a refrigerator.

  ‘Your son is right, signora. You can even take your time. I’ll stay until you return,’ he said. The son put an arm round his mother’s shoulders and led her away. The inspector watched them walk down the corridor, then went back in and sat down beside Baragli’s bed. The sergeant was asleep. Every so often his lips moved, as if he was dreaming. Bordelli took the cards out of the drawer and started playing solitaire on the bed. After a few minutes of this, he looked up. Baragli was awake and watching him.

  ‘Ciao, Oreste.’

  Baragli took a breath and moved his lips, but only a whisper came out of his mouth. The inspector brought his chair closer.

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘I have a beautiful family,’ Baragli said in a faint voice.

  ‘They’ve gone out for a bite to eat. They’ll be back soon.’

  ‘I’m afraid I’ve reached the end, Inspector.’