“Two o’clock. The one with the rucksack.”
“Too short.”
“Eleven o’clock. Just coming out of that shop.”
“Too young… Hey, how do you manage it?”
Caterina shrugged. “Just pretend we’re teenagers again. Remember how we used to check out the boys without them noticing?”
“Except that I always wanted them to notice.”
“Just relax, Poldi.”
Easier said than done. Poldi did get the hang of it after a while, though. She melted into her surroundings and imitated Caterina’s radar sweep. The only trouble was, Mr X failed to surface amid the never-ending stream of faces that flowed down the Corso under the two aunts’ gaze. German families in clamdiggers, scruffy young backpackers in flip-flops, hand-holding English gays, American youngsters with coffees-to-go, boisterous children romping around the piazza, chic Spanish ladies with strident voices, good-humoured, sunburnt Dutchmen, old men chatting in groups, pallid priests carrying briefcases, locals in a hurry and leisurely businessmen – as though propelled by strange tidal forces, this ever-murmuring, shuffling stream flowed back and forth between Porta Messina and Porta Catania, meandered into side streets, eddied sluggishly around street painters’ easels and debouched into the Piazza Duomo, where photos were taken, sandwiches munched and the view enjoyed. And all of this monitored and commented on by Poldi and the other aunts.
In the meantime, Poldi’s mobile beeped almost hourly with text messages from Montana: Call me. Where are you? Can we talk? Please call. The sort of messages that rent her heart and made the position unmistakably clear: that it was over before it had begun.
With a bitter taste in her mouth, Poldi deleted all these messages and blocked Montana’s number. She felt a little better after that.
Caterina was relieved around noon by Teresa, and Luisa took on the evening shift late in the afternoon. Poldi and her cheerful assistants changed cafés frequently so as not to be too conspicuous. They drifted across the Corso in the crowds, consumed an ice cream here, a panino, orange juice, iced tea, coffee or pastry there. Anything but alcohol – not even a little prosecchino or a tiny limoncello as a sundowner. It was a genuine struggle, but Poldi remained steadfast. No alcohol and finding Mr X was her plan.
Except that Mr X didn’t cooperate.
Poldi knew, of course, that the success of a stake-out depends on two factors: patience and stamina. One has to emulate the gecko, which crouches on a rock, rigid and motionless, awaiting the moment when it can unexpectedly pounce on its prey.
She did spot the Vigile again, but he had long ceased to interest her. On the contrary, she now found him far less attractive, positively conceited, affected and stupid-looking. Not to be compared with Montana – worlds apart, in fact.
Ah yes, Montana. Whenever she thought of him, a little ache detached itself from her heart like scree breaking adrift from a mountainside and sliding into the valley with a lingering sigh.
“Forget about him,” said Aunt Luisa. “Look around you. This place is teeming with hundreds of good-looking men in their prime.”
Poldi made a dismissive gesture. “They’re all gay.”
“Not from the looks they’re giving us.”
“Giving you, you mean.”
“You really think so?”
“You’re hot,” Poldi said earnestly. “As an inconspicuous assistant on a stake-out, you’re almost useless.”
Luisa beamed. “Franco would blow a gasket if he heard that. Have you any idea how long I’ve been wanting to do something like this? I mean, go out and about again, mix with people, chew the fat, have a little adventure, maybe indulge in a harmless flirtation.” She grasped Poldi’s hand and squeezed it. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
But one swallow doesn’t make a summer, and even the most diligent stake-out failed to come up with Mr X. After three days of shift work in Taormina the aunts were running out of steam and even Poldi was feeling rather jaded.
A mass of thoughts whirled through her head when she came home late at night and sank down exhausted on the sofa. Thoughts of a certain policeman, of Valentino, of Luisa’s words, of the topographical map, of Mr X, of Valérie and Russo, even of her parents. Sentimental thoughts of opportunities missed, precious time squandered and botched goodbyes. It was in this state of mind that she received a letter from Tanzania, which she burned, unopened, in the ashtray. And then, out of the blue next evening, Montana appeared in the Corso Umberto.
Poldi had just paid the bill and left her usual generous tip, so she was temporarily distracted. That’s the thing about stake-outs: something always happens just when you aren’t looking. When she did look up he was standing beside her table in his creased grey work suit. His grumpy face lit by the setting sun, he might have been magicked there by some genie with a taste for bad jokes. He shook hands with Aunt Luisa and introduced himself. It was all Luisa could do not to beam at him, because that would have been bad form without Poldi’s all-clear.
“I’ll leave you two alone together,” she managed to say without grinning, and hurriedly withdrew, though not without giving the commissario an appraising glance.
Montana sat down on the vacant chair. No kiss, no word of greeting.
“What are you doing here, Poldi?”
“I could ask you the same thing. How did you find me?”
Montana shrugged. “Mobile phone tracking.”
Poldi was speechless for a moment. “You mean I’m still under suspicion?”
“Why don’t you answer your phone? Why didn’t you respond to my texts?”
She looked at him. “Because we’ve nothing to discuss, Vito. And, my dear, because I’ve been busy.”
Montana looked even more downcast than before. “What are you doing here, Poldi?”
“Just sitting. It isn’t against the law, is it?”
“All day long?”
“No, just at this moment.”
Montana shook his head. “We had an agreement, Poldi.”
“Yes, thanks for the reminder, and goodbye,” she growled in German.
“What?”
“Our agreement concerned Russo, and I’ve kept it. Have you discovered the identity of Mr X?”
He shook his head. “Have you?”
Poldi rose from her chair with a sigh. “It’s getting late; I must go home.” And because she couldn’t resist, seeing him so downcast, she gave him a little pat on the head. “So long, Vito Between-Two-Stools.”
“I’ll call you,” said Montana, and Poldi actually managed a smile.
“Whenever it’s convenient.”
She left the café without once looking round and collected Aunt Luisa, who had been loitering in front of a shop window.
“My, he’s sexy,” Luisa whispered.
“I don’t want to talk about him.”
Luisa nodded. “Of course not. He is sexy, though.”
“Luisa.”
“I was only saying.”
Poldi pulled herself together. She went to the multi-storey with Luisa, paid for her ticket in the machine, found her Alfa, sat behind the wheel for a moment, and only then wept a little. Only a little, because she didn’t really have much time for self-pity, but there are occasions when one just can’t help it. Not even my Auntie Poldi could, so she shed a tear or two and Luisa held her hand the whole time and kept saying, “There, there, Poldi.”
Mr X didn’t show up the following day either, but that evening Poldi was overtaken by her past in the shape of an old acquaintance: black leather suit, shades, rings on every finger. He was on his own. No one had recognized him, no one was hassling him for an autograph; he simply walked down the Corso, spotted my Auntie Poldi, and sat down at her and Luisa’s table.
“Why, Ringo,” Poldi cried, profoundly touched, and threw her arms around him.
“Just a minute,” I interrupted suspiciously when she described the scene in detail on my next visit in September. “Ringo who?”
“Why,
Ringo Starr, of course.”
“You don’t mean the Ringo Starr?”
“I was surprised myself that he recognized me after all those years, but he homed in on me as if it was only yesterday when Peppe and I had a meal with him and his Barbara. Such a nice couple, those two.”
I stared at her. “I don’t believe you.”
“Don’t, then.”
“What did Ringo Starr want?”
“Nothing. A bit of a chat, that’s all. How was I, and how was Peppe doing – he didn’t know that Peppe wasn’t with us any more, you see. We’d completely lost touch. Oh yes, and he wanted to know what I was doing in Sicily. He promptly started to flirt with Luisa, and he invited us to his open-air concert at the Teatro Greco the following night. Backstage, of course.”
“Of course.”
“And then he said we’d be welcome to visit his house in Surrey any time we got sick of our Mediterranean paradise, the winters there were so splendidly dank and dreary. ‘Wonderful, darling,’ I told him, ‘we’ll give it some thought.’ And what do you think I did then?”
“You showed him the photo of Mr X.”
“Cento punti. And just imagine, Ringo recognized him.”
8
Tells of Inspector Chance and how Poldi discovers the identity of Mr X with his help. She has to swallow her pride several times in quick succession, and she isn’t the only one. She gets a lecture on aerodynamics, is able to hold Montana’s hand and eat a dumpling, and eventually has every reason to feel satisfied.
One of the most successful investigators in the whole history of crime since Oedipus, Poldi knew, is Inspector Chance. No case has ever been solved without him, and he’s always needed at some stage. Poldi liked to picture Inspector Chance as an ill-shaven slob whose mother still does his washing. Trainers, old jeans, scruffy hoodie, nerd glasses, never really grown up. An unreliable colleague with no particular ambition except in regard to his work–life balance. He does the minimum of work in his office at the far end of some corridor, where the air smells of cleaning fluids and stale coffee – a cubbyhole where junk and old files are stored and he’s sometimes simply forgotten. That’s all right with Inspector Chance, just as long as no one bugs him and he can work at half-speed ahead. He seldom shows his face at departmental meetings or operational briefings, on the firing range or in the field. He prefers to be warm and cosy. No stress – if he’s hassled, he simply clams up. If prevailed on to process a file at the start of a case, for instance, Inspector Chance can be relied on to send the investigation down the tubes. Inspector Chance has a problem with authority. He’s moody and has a mordant sense of humour. An only child, Poldi surmised. No wonder Inspector Chance isn’t popular with his colleagues, who tirelessly compile facts and leads and toil away in order to render him redundant. Given his lax work ethic, he should have been kicked out long ago, public servant or no. Ironically enough, however, Inspector Chance can point to some notable successes. Completely belying his puny appearance, he can pounce with unexpected speed and precision, can unravel knotty problems, collate leads and shine a light on hidden mysteries. He is needed, and he knows it. On the other hand, he never complains if colleagues deck themselves with his laurels – he’s quite relaxed about it. He usually profits from their meticulous spadework, after all, so he expects no thanks. A little namaste at most, and Poldi made sure to give him one.
Namaste, Inspector Chance. Namaste, Ringo.
Ringo had already spent a week in Taormina for the concert and a video shoot. In keeping with his status, he was staying at the Timeo, the best hotel in town, and it was in the lobby of that luxury establishment that he had seen Mr X deep in conversation with someone. Ringo had recognized that someone as a person to be avoided after being buttonholed and bullied into accepting his business card the day before. That was why Ringo remembered Mr X. And because he had heedlessly pocketed the business card and forgotten it instead of throwing it away, he was able to give it to my Auntie Poldi. The business card was that of Corrado Patanè.
“Well, well, well,” I exclaimed when she told me. I was impressed.
“That surprised you, didn’t it? Yes, but you only win the lottery if you buy a ticket.”
“So you hurried over to the Timeo and made inquiries, of course.”
“It was the logical thing to do, but I might have known they wouldn’t give me any information about a guest, the smart-arses. They wouldn’t even tell me if Mr X was a guest.”
“They’d probably have told Montana, though.”
“Yes, I thought of that, naturally.”
“So what stopped you?”
Her pride, of course. My aunt was determined to solve this case on her own and then rub Montana’s nose in it. To hell with him.
But Poldi also knew that she mustn’t push her luck too far. Inspector Chance was capricious, and he liked to knock off early sometimes. Her persevering stake-out had rewarded her with a lead – namaste, Inspector Chance, namaste, Ringo – but how to proceed further?
She could, of course, seek out Patanè and ask him point-blank about Mr X. The surprise effect might even elicit an honest answer, but it was likelier that Patanè would flatly deny having seen or even met him, let alone known him personally. After all, the sole weapon in Poldi’s armoury was an old acquaintance’s recollection of a fleeting encounter several days ago. And besides, Ringo was no spring chicken and his memory might not be entirely reliable on account of his widely publicized – though decades-old – prior history in regard to the consumption of mind-expanding substances. Fundamentally, therefore, Mr X was still a phantom.
And possibly Valentino’s murderer.
And consequently a potential danger to Poldi.
She could of course run the risk of entering the lion’s den alone and wait for Mr X at the Timeo, but my aunt had never been one to let pride and vanity stand in her way when the chips were down. The solving of this case was her top priority, even if she had to swallow her pride. And Poldi knew a thing or two about swallowing one’s pride.
With a sigh, she unblocked Montana’s number in her mobile phone and sent him a text:
Can u come to the Timeo? It’s important.
Pling-plong-pling. The reply came back at once.
Now?
Poldi:
Please.
Then she sent Aunt Luisa home and waited for Montana. Less than an hour later, from a comfortable sofa right at the back of the lobby, she saw him enter the luxury hotel and look around for her. She savoured the sight for a moment before she waved to him, feeling a familiar tension permeate her body as she did so; the sort of tightening of the skin that’s a prelude to sunburn, a presentiment of the special pain for which one yearns on lonely nights.
“Tell me,” she said once he had sat down beside her, “have you made a vow or something?”
“Meaning what?”
“Well, to go on wearing that awful grey suit on duty until it hangs off your body in rags and tatters.”
Montana’s face creased in a sour smile.
“Is that why you sent for me?”
“No.” Squaring her shoulders, Poldi gave him a succinct account of her investigation to date. Montana didn’t interrupt her once, just knit his brow briefly at the mention of Ringo. Then, without a word, he rose and went over to the reception desk. Poldi saw him show his ID to the snotty youth with gelled hair behind the counter, saw the snotty youth raise his hands defensively, saw Montana add something to which the snotty youth clearly took great exception, saw a manager summoned and his fingers speed over a keyboard, whereupon, quite magically and unbureaucratically, a printout slid out of the printer and was discreetly handed to the commissario, with a look of indignation.
Montana signalled to Poldi that he would be busy for a little while longer and put in a call on his mobile, pacing up and down the lobby as he did so. Poldi found that she enjoyed watching him pace up and down, even in that eternally crumpled suit. After a while, he closed his mobile and came over
to her.
“There’s good news and bad news. The good news is, we know who the man is: a Dr Frank Tannenberger. Lives in Munich.”
Munich, of all places. Poldi heaved a sigh of surprise.
“He flew back the day before yesterday,” Montana added.
“And the bad news?”
Montana looked harassed. “It’s a crock of shit. The man is a senior official in the…” – he glanced at the printout – “Bayerische Staatskanzlei.” He almost dislocated his tongue pronouncing the words. “What the hell’s that?”
“A kind of department of the Bavarian state government.”
“What do you mean, ‘state’? I thought Bavaria was a German province.”
“Are you crazy? We’re a Freistaat, a free state. We could go independent any time we chose and do our own thing. Federally speaking and in spaghetti Western terms, the Bavarian Free State is a loaded Colt pointed at the heart of Germany.”
“I see. Anyway, this Dr Tannenberger visits Taormina regularly on official business and always stays at the Timeo. A regular guest at government expense, it seems.”
“So where’s the crock of shit?”
“Don’t you understand? If I want to question him I’ll have to put in an official request and indent for travel expenses. Have you any idea of the paperwork that would entail? It could take weeks. And all because of some vague hint from an ex-Beatle and a German woman who came briefly under suspicion and has been obstructing my inquiries ever since. Madonna, they’ll bust a gut laughing at the prefecture. Besides, the man’s a government official – I’d be stirring up a hornet’s nest again, and me with my prior history with that senator? Thanks a lot.”
Auntie Poldi and the Sicilian Lions Page 13