Think Wolf

by Michael Gregorio

  As she spoke, her manner became distracted and remote, as if she were going through the thought process once again.

  ‘What conclusion did you reach?’ Cangio asked.

  She shook her head. ‘It isn’t so simple,’ she said. ‘Without dragging you into the complex world of dental morphology, I can tell you what assumptions I was able to make about the teeth that are still attached to the jaw. Judging by their size and shape, and the wear that is evident, especially regarding the shovel-shaped incisors, I would say beyond any reasonable doubt, that this particular jawbone belonged to a healthy Asian man aged somewhere between forty and fifty years old. Now, as the vast majority of Asians are ethnically Chinese …’

  Cangio sat back and took in what she had just told him.

  ‘You’re saying that the jawbone once belonged to a Chinese man?’

  Cristina di Marco shook her forefinger at him. ‘Officially, I haven’t told you anything. We’re just friends having coffee together.’ She raised his coffee cup to him, and took a sip. ‘Cold, but coffee nonetheless,’ she said.

  Should he invite her out to dinner, he wondered.

  Again the ghost of Loredana hovered over his head.

  ‘If you’ll excuse me,’ she said, before he had committed himself, ‘I have to prepare for my lecture.’

  As Cangio left room thirty-four, a question was rattling around in his head.

  Why had a middle-aged Chinese man with good teeth been chopped to pieces in an Umbrian national park?

  TWENTY-FIVE

  ‘What’s the problem, Antò?’

  Simone Candelora already knew the answer.

  The little prick was so see-through, he was transparent. The minute he got to the adventure park in Ferentillo, Marra’s big brown eyes had lit on his, and stuck there fast. Then they’d started to water up, as if Marra was going to cry, reminding Simone of a pup he’d had as a kid, a little black mongrel called Mutt that would follow him around all day. Marra looked like Mutt on a bad day, just begging for a kick.

  Antonio was rubbing his hands together like someone getting ready to confess his sins. Then he clutched his nose between his thumb and forefinger, gave it a tug and let out an audible sniff. ‘I’ve been having a serious think, Simone,’ he said, delivering his speech. ‘About the future, like. It, er … it might be better for you, as well.’

  ‘Better for us,’ he said to Ettore. ‘Hear that, Ettò? Our mate here’s driven all this way to tell us what’s been rumbling around in his head. That’s polite, it really is. No sooner did he have this little think than up he charges, bursting to tell us what it’s all about. He’s the ideal partner in my book.’ He turned back to Marra. ‘OK, partner. Let’s hear it. What’ve you been thinking?’

  Antonio Marra licked his lips. ‘It’s in all the papers,’ he said. ‘Some wolves have gutted a herd of sheep near my … near our reserve. A right mess by the sound of it.’

  ‘So what?’ Simone grinned at him. ‘Were those sheep yours?’

  Marra didn’t answer him. ‘The papers said they’d found some … bones. Human bones, it seems. From years ago. The wolves must have dug ’em up. You know, close to where the ranger was killed. The police were there again.’

  ‘Were they your wolves, Antò?’ Ettore said, which made Simone laugh.

  Sheep and bones were only the half of what was going on in that prat’s mind, Simone reckoned. Antonio Marra had something else on his plate. And what could it be, if not what Arnaldo Capaldi had warned him about the other day at the hotel? He could only hope the little shit hadn’t signed anything, or gone over Capaldi’s head and spoken to someone higher up in the bank.

  Mutt needed kicking, good and proper.

  ‘Come and see what we’ve been up to,’ Simone said. ‘Marra Truffles isn’t the only firm that we’ve put money into. Everywhere you look in Umbria, there’s opportunity going to waste, cash going down the drain. It’s all a question of management. Look around you, Antò. This one here’s a potential goldmine.’

  He laid a hand on Marra’s shoulders and saw his eyes flash wide, like someone who’d been sleepwalking suddenly waking up, as they started walking out onto the narrow metal bridge that crossed the limestone gorge, with its sixty-metre drop, sheer cliffs rising up on either side and the river rushing down below.

  ‘Where are we going?’ Marra asked.

  Terror. Undiluted terror. That’s what he could see on Marra’s face.

  And that was what he wanted to see.

  ‘Just a short walk. What a view!’

  They’d been in Terni that morning, signing papers with the owner of the adventure park, when Marra had phoned him, wanting to meet up straight away. Lunch in Vallo di Nera, dinner that night in Spoleto? No way, Marra said, it couldn’t wait.

  In the end, they’d agreed to meet in Ferentillo at midday.

  The adventure park was a bit run-down, but that was fine. They had planning permission, a building license; all they had to do was decide which bits to develop. Laundering dirty banknotes was easier in some circumstances than others. The bungee jumping, for instance, out there in the middle of nowhere. Who was ever going to check on that? One paying customer a day, or none at all, you could write up a thousand receipts, then burn the tickets at the end of the day. Pay the taxes, that was ten thousand euro washed clean. Do it every day for a year, and you were talking serious money. Don Michele was behind them all they way. ‘I like it when my boys have bright ideas,’ he had said.

  ‘We’re gonna call it Thrillsville,’ he said to Marra as they stopped in the centre of the gorge. All around them air and light, with just the slender metal bridge between them and the abyss.

  ‘Ettore, give him a hand, will you?’

  It was a bit like helping a condemned man onto the gallows.

  An extension had been welded onto the bridge, a viewing platform, or something of the sort. Marra didn’t want to step out there, but he knew he had to, knew he couldn’t say no.

  Next thing, he was staring into space.

  Simone waved his hand through the air. ‘See those rocks, Antò? You ever been rock climbing? What a thrill! People pay plenty to learn how to do it. Little kids, teenagers, mums and dads who fancy doing something a bit different on a Sunday afternoon.’

  ‘People pay to do it?’ Marra muttered sceptically.

  ‘They’ll pay to do anything,’ Ettore said quietly over Marra’s left shoulder. ‘You’d be surprised how much they’ll pay. Now, stick ’em up!’ Ettore jabbed the harness buckle hard into the small of Marra’s back.

  The truffle merchant’s hands shot into the air.

  Ettore dropped the straps over his shoulders, stepped around quickly to snap the buckle shut.

  ‘What’s this?’ Marra said, pulling at the straps, which were tight around his chest.

  ‘Safety gear,’ Ettore told him. ‘Just in case you slip.’

  ‘Thinking, Antò. Serious thinking, you said.’ Simone was leaning so close, he could smell Marra’s breath. ‘About what, in particular?’

  ‘You know,’ Marra said quickly. ‘The company. Our arrangement …’

  ‘You want to rip up the contract, something like that? Getting out of a contract can be costly, can’t it, Ettò?’

  Ettore hissed into Marra’s ear. ‘No telling how much it might cost, Simò.’

  ‘I … I’ll give you the company,’ Marra said, hands together, begging almost. ‘Marra Truffles. Lock, stock and—’

  ‘What about our investment? Good faith, and suchlike? What about the interest?’

  Marra blinked hard at him. ‘You can have it all,’ he said. ‘Everything. The house, the car, the … the … I’ve got some savings stashed away in Switzerland.’

  Simone shrugged, flashed a grin, nodded at Ettore, then stared in Antonio Marra’s eyes. ‘We can’t get along without you, Antò. You know the business. We’re just the money men. The backers, right?’

  Marra was desperate now. ‘You don’t need me,’ he said. ‘M
aria was saying—’

  ‘Maria Gatti? You shagging that piece, Antò?’ Ettore was laughing. ‘Fuck me, I didn’t think you had it in you.’

  ‘Shut it, Ettore.’ Simone narrowed his eyes, stared at Marra. ‘Have you been talking about the business with her?’

  Marra looked down at his shoes, didn’t say a word.

  ‘Have you told her what we’re doing?’

  ‘No. Honest. I haven’t …’

  His voice was more of a whimper now. Just like Mutt when the dog wanted feeding.

  That was when Candelora laid both hands on Marra’s chest and pushed him backwards.

  It was worse than a nightmare.

  This was real.

  His hands grabbed air, his feet kicked air.

  He tried to scream, but all the air had gone out of lungs.

  He saw two heads leaning over the bridge, watching him fall.

  Pinpricks disappearing down the wrong end of a telescope.

  Then he lost them, the metal strip of the bridge getting thinner by the moment, the rock walls rushing past on either side. Not racing upwards, though that was how it seemed. It was him that was rocketing downwards, hurtling down towards the rocks and the river at the bottom of the gorge.

  He closed his eyes, his breath came back and he did scream then, the wind swooshing all around him, pulling at his face, his hair, his clothes, the harness tightening beneath his crotch and thighs, ripping at his armpits.

  The harness.

  Had Ettore locked it?

  The cord was like a wriggling snake above his head, until it started to straighten, pulling taut in a stark black line against the clear blue sky. His ears popped and he heard a loud noise – a twang like a guitar string snapping, then a loud boing, and suddenly he was shooting back up towards the bridge again.

  Ettore had locked it.

  This time.

  TWENTY-SIX

  Foligno was a town that Cangio tried to avoid.

  It was flatter than a compact disc, while he loved Umbria for the mountains.

  Bicycles darted left and right, more dangerous than cars, and no one bothered with anything so trivial as a bicycle bell.

  ‘What are we doing here?’ Loredana asked him, as they walked across the main square. ‘This place really makes me nervous.’

  She glanced up at the truncated steeple of the town hall, a stark reminder of just how big the last earthquake had been and how long it was taking to set it all to rights.

  ‘Well …’ he said, his mind working overtime.

  Foligno was halfway to Todi, and Lori had a half-day holiday, but that was not the only reason Cangio had suggested meeting her there.

  ‘It’s lu centru dellu munnu,’ he joked. ‘That’s what the locals say. Foligno’s in the centre of Italy, and Italy was the centre of the ancient world.’

  She glared at him. ‘The centre of my world is where I happen to be, Seb Cangio.’

  If she was thinking of Todi, the enforced separation, he tried to shake her out of it.

  ‘With me, you mean?’

  ‘Only if I’m the centre of your world,’ she said moodily.

  ‘OK, let’s agree on that,’ he said.

  Had he had made a mistake to bring her there? She was jumpy. He hadn’t seen her since the funeral, but she had kept her promise, phoning at eleven o’clock each night on the dot. She was worried that he might go out into the woods alone.

  ‘I’m home,’ he’d say, whenever she rang.

  Last night he’d been in the park instead, popping the eye cap on his night-vision glasses, telling her he was opening a can of beer. He wasn’t sure she’d believed him, but at least she didn’t hound him about it. He had other things on his mind, and she knew it. One thing in particular. Who had killed Marzio?

  ‘Where are you taking me?’ she asked again.

  ‘It’s a surprise,’ he said for the tenth time.

  ‘There are surprises and … surprises,’ she murmured.

  ‘This is one of those,’ he said as they turned into a side street and headed for a neon sign that read The Szechuan. ‘Have you ever eaten here?’

  She held his arm, stopped him dead in his tracks. ‘Umbria’s got the best food in Italy, and you are taking me to …’

  ‘A Chinese restaurant.’ He grinned, brushed her cheek with his lips. ‘I survived on ethnic food in London. Indian, Chinese, Thai. Man liveth not on egg and chips alone,’ he intoned like a clergyman. ‘Trust me, Lori, you’ll love it.’

  The Szechuan turned out better than he had hoped and Lori had expected.

  They ordered a Chinese banquet for two – wonton soup, spring rolls, beef with mangetout, chicken in black bean sauce, fried shrimp with pork – all washed down with Tsingtao beer.

  Over the meal they talked about Marzio and the ongoing investigation.

  He tried to keep it low key, grateful that she didn’t press him too hard for details.

  Lori had been phoning Linda every day. ‘She’s been interviewed by two carabinieri, a man and a woman. Twice, she said. Have they spoken to you, as well?’

  ‘They’re speaking to everyone,’ he said.

  ‘But I mean to say, after what happened to you the last time?’

  ‘They don’t think organised crime is involved.’

  ‘No?’ Loredana was wide-eyed, staring at him as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. ‘So, who do they think is responsible?’

  ‘I’m sure they’ll tell us when they’ve made up their minds,’ he said.

  He ordered ice cream for Lori, another Tsingtao beer for himself.

  When the sweet arrived, Lori was disappointed.

  ‘This is Italian ice cream,’ she whispered. ‘Stracciatella … Still, I suppose it must be hard for them to find the right ingredients here in Italy. I mean to say, bamboo shoots, spices, and all those funny vegetables. They seemed so fresh and tasty, too. And the rice isn’t the same as ours. Where do think they come from, Seb?’

  It was a smart question, though he didn’t realise it straight off.

  ‘There must be Chinese shops,’ he said, ‘wholesalers, suppliers, that kind of thing.’

  When the waiter came to see if everything was all right, Cangio decided to ask him. After all, it was time to start working around to the question that had brought him there in the first place.

  The waiter turned out to be the owner of the restaurant, and he was happy to fill them in on the details. His name was Heng Lu, he said, and he had been born in Szechuan province, south-west China. The rice and noodles came in plastic packets. ‘Just like Italian spaghetti,’ he said with a grin. The meat and fish were from the local supermarket. The beer, spices and vegetables were from a Chinese superstore outside Rome that did express deliveries.

  ‘You speak excellent Italian,’ Cangio said. ‘How long have you been in Italy?’

  ‘Nearly twenty years,’ the man said proudly. ‘My kids were born here. Not here exactly. One in Rome, the other one in Florence. Then I decided to open a restaurant of my own. We’ve been in Foligno eight years now.’

  The eight years were rubbing off on him; he pronounced Fulignu like a local.

  There were only a couple of other customers left in the restaurant, and Heng Lu seemed to be in no hurry to get rid of them. He was in his late forties or early fifties, Cangio guessed from the deep lines etched in his brow and at the sides of his nose, black hair swept straight back from his forehead. Cangio couldn’t help but study the man’s square-cut jaw, wondering whether it would rock if you set it down on a table. For one unfaithful moment, he imagined the pretty pathologist sitting on the other side of the table taking a careful look at the Chinese man’s jaw.

  ‘My oldest boy is seventeen. He’ll be going to university next year. Have you got any kids?’ Heng Lu asked, which threw Loredana into a flurry. This was the kind of talk she got from her mother, who seemed to think that a woman of twenty-seven should be tied to the kitchen sink and coming up for her second child.


  ‘We aren’t married,’ she said, her mood much better than before. She had enjoyed the meal, and the fact that the police believed the ’Ndrangheta were not involved in Marzio’s murder had set her mind at rest.

  ‘No one gets married these days,’ the Chinese man said.

  Cangio smiled at that, and so did Loredana, though her smile was slower in coming.

  ‘Is there a large Chinese community in Umbria?’ Cangio asked him.

  This was one of the things that he had come to Foligno to find out.

  Lori narrowed her eyes and fixed him with a stare; she was not fooled by his attempts to be casual.

  ‘Not so many,’ Heng Lu told him. ‘There are twenty-odd in Foligno. Slightly more in Terni and Perugia.’

  ‘I work in the national park,’ Cangio told him, ‘and I found something very unusual the other day. I’m curious to know if you can tell me what it is. I thought it might be Chinese. We have quite a few tourists from the Far East these days.’

  Heng Lu spread his hands wide, and shrugged his shoulders. What’s the problem, he seemed to be saying, gesturing like an Italian.

  Cangio took a piece of paper from his pocket, unfolded it and handed it over. He had scanned the symbol from the golden cigarette ends that the Pastore brothers had found, and then blown it up to maybe twenty times the size of the original.

  ‘This is a Chinese symbol for a butterfly,’ Heng Lu said. ‘Where did you find it?’

  ‘It was printed on a cigarette. Like Pall Mall, or Camel.’

  Cangio took a sip of beer and waited.

  Heng Lu looked at the paper again, then folded it up and handed it back.

  ‘It’s not the name of a cigarette,’ he said. ‘It’s the name of a restaurant and supermarket chain in Soho, London. One of the best. I worked in Soho for a while, so I know the place. This symbol means “Come back soon”. Like the butterflies, you know? They give them free to the customers and hope they’ll return.’ Heng Lu laughed. ‘Just think of it! Someone was in London one day, and the next thing he was smoking Chinese cigarettes in your park here in Umbria.’