He arrived there after tramping through two narrow streets jammed with cars. He went in through a side entrance and found a seat in the chapel of Sant’Egidio. It seemed a good idea to say prayers – like the elderly ladies kneeling on arthritic knees, but he found himself unable to perform or act out rites he knew well but no longer practised. His religious feeling, if it could be so called, was more an attitude of the spirit than of overt behaviour.
He heard the bell for vespers ring out again as the women hurried to their seats. It was at that moment that he saw Elvira, dressed entirely in black with a dark scarf over her head. She hesitated at the church door, looked around and made the sign of the cross before advancing slowly in the yellowish light of the candles. She moved towards the pews and tentatively stretched out her hand to touch the end of the second row, as though afraid it might burn her. She sat down, causing the bench to creak. Friar Fiorenzo must have already been in the sacristy, because no-one was going into the confessional anymore. Another priest came out in his vestments and started to celebrate Mass. Elvira took part in the service together with the other women.
Friar Fiorenzo returned before the homily, crossed the nave, genuflected and made for the confessional. The Mass was as brief as the last Mass on a Sunday and was soon over. The priest told the congregation to go forth in peace and left the altar. Soneri remained in the darkness of the chapel. When the other women had left, Elvira got up and walked to the confessional. The commissario came out of the chapel to wait for her. Her confession lasted longer than he expected. He saw her kneeling, but all he could see clearly were her ankles and feet, which moved about from time to time in seeming discomfort. She got up but stopped to say something, bending towards the grate before emerging, adjusting the black scarf over her head as she did so.
As soon as she was out of the church she took off her scarf and tucked it into her handbag. Soneri followed her, worried that she might head for the crowds on Via Repubblica, but instead her route took her through the side streets. Soneri could not make up his mind about stopping her, but hoped to find a quiet spot in the misty silence of Christmas Eve. They walked from the Borgo del Correggio towards Via Saffi. She turned left and strode in the direction of the pensione, reaching No.35 soon afterwards. Soneri had been tailing her and at that point he had no further doubts. “Elvira!” he called out.
She turned, a little surprised, but not unduly, as though she had guessed what was going on.
“We started here and now we’re back here,” he said.
“That’s how it goes. So it’s written.”
Soneri assented in silence. She looked at him challengingly, in keeping with her usual habit of defending herself by attacking others. The commissario could not stand such behaviour and all the accumulated tensions of that day were united into one direct, angry question, “Where is Andrea Fornari?”
She turned pale and pretended not to understand. Before she could open her mouth, the commissario said, “There’s no point in trying to make a fool me. If I don’t get to him first, he’ll end up in the hands of the Digos, and perhaps that’ll be the worse for him.”
Elvira realised the game was up. She took time to think, raising her eyes towards the dripping gutters. A few seconds were sufficient to convince her of the uselessness of flight or self-justification.
“He must be in Milan. He’ll be back in Monchio tomorrow to see his family.”
“Are you supposed to join him?”
“Yes, I was going to set off very soon.”
“But you wanted to pop back here one last time.”
“I know. Stupid sentimentalism, but I have spent many years here.”
“And then there’s the remorse you tried to dispel by enlisting Friar Fiorenzo’s help.”
“I knew nothing about it, believe me, and even now I can’t work out what was going on in Andrea’s mind. Ghitta would never have spoken, I’m sure of that. She was issuing threats only to persuade Rosso to let go of the Landi property. You’ll never understand. In the world of the mountain folk, the old mentality and even some almost barbaric customs are still alive. I am certain she would never have spoken out about Andrea’s past, but he went off like a self-propelled robot. He seemed to hate her for some other reason.”
“I too think there were other motives.”
Elvira stared hard at him, but the commissario said nothing more. “If there was anything else,” Elvira said quietly, “I know nothing about it.” There was a pause during which snatches of conversation in languages unknown to them were carried through the mist.
“You might know more about this story than I do,” she said.
Soneri had no idea if she was acting a part or was sincere in what she was saying. “The more I think about it, the more absurd it seems to become. Ghitta would never have said a thing, of that I am sure,” she said again.
“My job is to bring in the murderer, and the fear that Ghitta might talk is motive enough,” Soneri said, with a certain resignation.
“Perhaps not the main one.”
“Every action of ours is the child of many motivations, but only one is baptised.”
Elvira understood that Soneri could not be moved. “There was nothing I could do to stop him, and he did everything possible to get me involved. Andrea is very insecure. It was always up to me to comfort him and explain the right thing to do. When he confessed to me that he had killed Ghitta, he was already desperate, distraught. He had acted on impulse, moved by hatred for all the threats his father had told him about. His father reproached him bitterly for having been involved with the armed struggle. He failed to realise that Andrea joined the terrorists in a desperate effort to be like his father. Andrea wanted his father’s approval, and all he got was his affectionate contempt. That’s why he was keen on some exemplary action. Because he made him feel a weakling, ‘the vet’ – Rosso, that is – drove Andrea to carry out an act of violence.”
“And then he regretted it and came running to you?”
“Like a child. He couldn’t string two words together, he was stuttering, he was distraught. He told me he’d picked up a pork butcher’s knife at home and set off for the pensione to talk to Ghitta. I’ve no idea what he had in mind, but at some point Ghitta began reproaching him in exactly the way his father did. They’re made of the same unyielding material, forged in the mountains. And so he killed her.”
“So what did you tell him to do?”
“To disappear. It was the only way to avoid worse problems. Once he was away from here, he might have recovered some clarity of mind. I took care of the knife, but when I saw Ghitta dead, I was overcome by panic myself. At that moment, I realised I’d become an accomplice to murder. I should have forced Andrea to turn himself in. He’d thought long and hard about it, but a decision like that was going to bring in other people he didn’t want to involve. How could he conceal his past? He was on police files as an extremist, and he’d been suspected for ages of having been in contact with underground groups. They were just waiting for the right time to nail him, and he knew he wouldn’t have been able to hold out for long. And he would have compromised comrades with whom he’d shared a common passion and years of struggle.”
“It would only have been a matter of time in any case.”
“Perhaps. Meanwhile the issue of bribery and corruption emerged. I hoped that would have changed the course of the inquiry and perhaps muddied the waters.”
“But you did not take the power of remorse into consideration.”
“No, I thought I was immune to that, but there are some things you have to experience in the cold light of day.”
“Why did you go to Friar Fiorenzo? Weren’t you all anti-clericals?” Soneri said, chewing the cigar which had gone out.
“When you’re on your own and there’s a weight like that crushing you, you feel you can’t stand it and then you look around. I was in that position, and the only one I could find was him.”
“Scratch, scratch, and all that’
s left are the priests.”
“With all we set out to achieve with our banners flying . . . When I wanted to haul myself out of the shit, the only support I could find was Friar Fiorenzo.” Elvira laughed bitterly.
“Alright, let’s go,” Soneri said to her gently, relighting his cigar. She nodded and followed him without giving him any trouble. Only when they were at the door of the questura did he turn to her to ask, “Don’t you agree it was a useless crime?”
“In my view, Ghitta would never have spoken out, but we’ll never know for sure.”
13
COFFEE CUPS, SACHETS of sugar and a couple of pages of notes scribbled by Juvara lay on Soneri’s desk. “We’ve reached the end of the road,” the inspector said, resting both hands on the desk to pull himself laboriously to his feet.
Drawing on the cigar, which was almost out, the commissario observed him in silence. It had been dark outside for almost an hour, but beyond the gate of the questura, people were still scurrying about on Via Repubblica.
“We’ll have to inform Saltapico. He’ll need to interrogate Elvira and sign an arrest warrant for Fornari.”
“We’ll also need to go and see Chillemi,” Juvara said.
“I can’t tell you how pleased I am at the thought of ruining his Christmas dinner. Anyway, you see to it.”
Juvara picked up the papers with Elvira’s typed statement and went out. Soneri watched him cross the courtyard wrapped in a raincoat which resembled a cloak. The vice-questore would probably see him as a cross between a jinx and one of the Three Magi.
The enquiry into Ghitta’s murder was complete, but in no sense did Soneri feel victorious. He knew that for the rest of his life he would carry the scars of the case, as also that sense of emptiness and aimlessness he experienced many times during his walks in the mist.
The mobile made him jump. “Well then? When are you coming over?” Angela’s voice was full of enthusiasm.
“Soon. I’ve got to attend to the last formalities before I can close the case.”
“At long last we’ll have a quiet Christmas. Has there been a final twist you’ve kept hidden from me?”
“I’ve just finished interrogating Elvira. Fortunately, there’s still such a thing as conscience, and sometimes it weighs down too heavily on people. Fornari’s a weakling, a lout. She says he had no motive for killing Ghitta because she’d never have spoken, but he felt he was under attack. On top of that, his father thought he had no balls, so he wanted to make the grand gesture.”
There might also have been an element of lingering rancour over Ada’s abortion, but Soneri made no reference to it.
“Stupid people do more harm than villains,” Angela said.
The commissario did not consider Fornari stupid, but rather a weak man in search of some cause which would make sense of his life. Did not life, after all, have a tragic resemblance to homicide? Did it not always end with a death? Did not time kill us by wearing us out day by day with one small slight after another, leading to the final surrender? Time has no more need of an excuse than does an executioner. It simply does its job. It is the victim who must give himself a motivation strong enough to endure the daily grind. Perhaps Fornari was seeking exactly that. Soneri understood him perfectly because he himself, having reached middle age, was still in search of his own cause.
Soneri changed tack. “How about asking Alceste to provide dinner?”
“Don’t even think about it,” came the reply. “I’ve been in the kitchen all afternoon and you know what that costs me. I lack the housewifely vocation.”
“What have you prepared?”
“Roasted vegetables, erbazzone and a selection of soft cheeses.”
“A menu fit for someone recuperating from an operation to remove an ulcer.”
“Can you not make a sacrifice for Christmas Eve?”
“I’ve already made my sacrifice. I’ve had no lunch.”
The very thought of another meal of fasting and abstinence tightened his stomach, but every sign of hunger vanished when he heard Juvara approach, his arrival announced by heavy footsteps and the swish of his thighs rubbing together.
“Chillemi wants to see you,” he said.
Soneri gave a long-suffering sigh. “I’d have been as well going myself.”
Juvara threw out his arms. It seemed he wanted to add something, but Soneri jumped to his feet so abruptly that he had no time to get the words out. “At least this new irritation has got him hot and bothered?”
“I don’t think so,” Juvara said, with the expression of someone apologising for delivering disappointing news.
In his superior’s office, Soneri was faced with the usual scenario. On this occasion, he was met by the secretary with the freshly permed hair, clearly displeased with the amount of overtime she was compelled to put in. Chillemi, on the other hand, seemed in an unexpectedly jolly mood. He launched straightaway into renewed apologies for the newspaper articles which had appeared on the bribery and corruption scandal. “Is there a more shitty class of people than journalists?” he began, choosing one of his classic opening gambits. “Both Saltapico and I went out of our way to tell them that the investigation was initiated by Commissario Soneri on behalf of the crime squad.” He spelled out every word as though he were dictating to his freshly permed secretary, but before he got to the second act, Soneri interrupted him. “I’ve already said it doesn’t matter,” he said, speaking in the coolest and most indifferent tone he could muster.
Chillemi flopped down quite suddenly, like a boxer after an uppercut, and it took him a few moments before he could pull himself together and start up again. “Well anyway, let’s move on. You have concluded that Fornari was the murderer of Ghitta Tagliavini?”
“In view of the statements made by Elvira Cadoppi, I don’t think there’s any room for doubt.”
“Everything’s falling into place. We’ll add this new charge,” he said with studied nonchalance.
“Add it to what?”
“A few hours ago, Fornari was arrested in Milan by the Digos squad for being part of an armed gang.”
Now he understood why Chillemi was in such a good mood. He was happy to be able to minimise the significance of Soneri’s enquiries by announcing that they had already picked up Fornari without his assistance, and on more serious charges than some provincial crime.
“That was the motive for Ghitta’s murder. He was afraid she’d talk,” Soneri said.
“People of greater importance than a landlady have been singing, like those repentant ex-terrorists who have been cultivated for some time by Digos. A major breakthrough. Everyone will be talking about it.”
Now Chillemi was staring defiantly at Soneri. It was clear he had been rehearsing his part meticulously.
Soneri was forced to admit that Chillemi had succeeded in wounding him yet again, but there was nothing he could do about it. He made an effort to feign indifference and not let his rage show. “In any case, I need to get the magistrate to sign the warrant to have him detained pending his appearance in court. The way things are, he’ll be notified in prison.”
“Indeed,” Chillemi said, unable to conceal his delight. “No problem. We’ll add this squalid little incident of provincial life to the charges arising from the main enquiries. And anyway,” he added, twisting the knife in the wound, “it would seem that this Fornari was only small fry.” Fixing a gaze of haughty superiority on him, Chillemi went on, “It’s no more than a sideshow. All you have to do is hand the papers over to the magistrate. There’s no need for you to trouble yourself over it any more.”
“I’m very grateful. I have so much to do,” Soneri said coldly. Pushing back the heavy chair, he got to his feet. Chillemi accompanied him to the door, and tried to shake hands, but Soneri was moving so quickly that he did not even see the outstretched hand.
“Happy Christmas,” Chillemi shouted after him, in a tone which sounded to Soneri like a sneer.
Soneri raised his right hand without
turning. “All the best!” He almost ran into the secretary with the freshly permed hair, who gave him the kind of look that a mother-in-law might give. He said nothing and went out.
“Perfect timing!” Juvara said when Soneri walked in. “It’s half-past seven on Christmas Eve, the time the shops shut and everyone sets off home for the festivities.”
“Never seen a case like it. All we need is a confession and Fornari too will be all set for midnight Mass.”
“Fit for bureaucrats, like the ones in the admin offices.”
“We’ve done a small job of marginal importance, nothing more than a bit of embroidery,” the commissario commented bitterly.
Juvara grasped his meaning. “Chillemi?”
“I could only feign indifference. For the time being it’s the only weapon I have, but one day they’ll push me too far and I’ll smash in one of their faces.”
“So he actually managed to downplay the fact that we’d solved a murder case?”
“Fornari is in a cell thanks to the Digos squad. Terrorism charges. In comparison, our case is a mere trifle, a little provincial tale, in Chillemi’s own words, and besides, Fornari is small fry. Our investigation was no more than an insignificant add-on to a line of enquiry carried out by others. Understand? Alright then, let’s enjoy the festivities.”
He pulled out a fresh cigar and lit it. He held out his hand to Juvara and almost embraced him, this being as far as his character would allow him to go. He made to leave the office.
The inspector detained him one moment more. “Commissario, I must tell you one final thing, even if it’s not very important.”
Soneri gestured to him to go on.
“Elvira had no weight on her conscience. All she wanted was to get out of the whole business and land Fornari right in it.”
The commissario saw the final flicker of light in the case extinguished.
“How do you know?”
“I phoned Friar Fiorenzo and he confided it to me. Not officially, but I picked it up from his tone and allusions. You know what priests are like.”
A Woman Much Missed Page 24
