“If you don’t mind,” the inspector said to Enzo, “I would like to speak to her alone.”
“I don’t mind,” said Enzo, going out and closing the door behind him.
The young woman clearly felt awkward and intimidated.
The inspector beamed her a big smile of encouragement. The girl replied with a forced smile.
“A pretty nasty experience, I guess.”
“I’ll say!” said the girl, shuddering at the memory.
“Do you feel up to telling me what happened?”
“Well, I live with my boyfriend in a small new apartment building in Via Ravanusella. Do you know where it is?”
“Yes, on the outskirts of town, on the way to Montelusa.”
“Exactly. I was driving home alone after going to the movies with a girlfriend, since my boyfriend didn’t want to come. It was just past midnight. The last stretch of road is pretty deserted. At one point, up ahead of me I saw in my headlights a car stopped by the side of the road with its hood raised. There was a man tinkering with the motor, and he looked up and gestured for me to stop. Which I did instinctively. But the man immediately came up to the car, pointing a gun at the window, and ordered me to get out. As soon as I did, he told me to turn around and then violently pressed a pad soaked with chloroform over my face. I woke up two hours later, somewhere just outside of Montelusa. So I called up my boyfriend and told him to come and get me. He’d been searching desperately for me for the past couple of hours, after finding my car beside the road with the door open and no one inside. But I was okay. Nobody did anything to me physically, no violence, not even a bruise or a scratch. And nothing was stolen, either.”
“So, as I seem to have gathered, you got a good look at the man.”
“Yes, but I couldn’t describe him to you.”
“Why not?”
“Because he had a cap on his head pulled all the way down over his brow and was wearing dark glasses and a scarf covering his mouth and chin.”
“Now think hard before answering. Did he seem to you like a young man or an older man?”
“But I just said . . .”
“I’m sorry, but normally a woman gets a sense of these things by instinct. Just try thinking back on those moments . . .”
The girl furrowed her brow and searched her memory.
“He was an older man,” she finally said with assurance. “The way he walked up to me, I’d say he didn’t have the gait of a young man.”
“Excellent. And when he pulled you towards him to chloroform you, did you smell anything in particular? Like cologne or aftershave?”
This time she answered readily.
“No, I got a whiff of sour perspiration. The guy seemed to sweat like a pig. And it was even cold outside, though it’s only September.”
“Let’s continue. You were apparently the victim of an overnight kidnapping. And you’re probably asking yourself a lot of questions about it. Have you formed any opinion of who it could have been and why he might have done it?”
“What do you think? Of course I have a lot of questions! Especially because I’ve been unable to come up with a single answer.”
“Could it have been a former lover trying to take revenge?”
“What kind of revenge is that? He didn’t do anything to me. If somebody wanted revenge they would have tried to rape me or knock me around.”
Made perfect sense.
“What kind of job do you have at the Banca di Credito?”
“I was hired just three months ago. For now I’m the manager’s secretary.”
“Where did you work before that?”
“In a notary’s office.”
“I have no further questions,” Montalbano said, standing up.
They shook hands. The young woman went out and Enzo came in.
“What do you think, Inspector?”
“I don’t think it’s anything directly personal against your niece or her father. There’s just some nutcase out there going around kidnapping young women and fortunately not harming them. Don’t worry, we’ll catch him.”
But, deep down, he wasn’t really so sure.
* * *
Since he’d stayed late at Enzo’s, the inspector decided to skip his usual walk along the jetty and go straight back to the station.
“Ahh, Chief, Signor Pitruzzo jess called, the same Pitruzzo ’at was lookin’ f’yiz poissonally in poisson ’iss morning, an’ ’e tanks yiz fer takin’ ’im to the haspital, an’ ’e says ’at seein’ as how ’is ’ead don’t feel so good, ’e can’t come in but ’e’ll come by tomorrow at ten,’im bein’ ’im, meanin’ Signor Pitruzzo.”
So Pitruzzo was the guy Adelina bashed in the head with the skillet.
“Okay. Now get me Augello and Fazio and tell them to come into my office.”
He went into his room, and when the other two arrived, he told them about the latest lightning-quick, consequence-free kidnapping of another young woman.
“The two episodes have only one thing in common,” he concluded.
“Both girls work at a bank,” Augello and Fazio said together, almost in unison.
“Right. But I don’t think we’re looking at someone who was denied a loan, or anything like that.”
“Why do you rule that out?” asked Augello.
“Why the hell would someone like that give a shit about a teller or some little secretary? You want to take revenge, you plant a bomb and good night.”
Silence fell.
“At what time is Manuela Smerca coming?” Montalbano then asked.
“At five,” Fazio replied.
“So let’s meet back up here in an hour. I want you both present.”
* * *
Manuela didn’t feel the least bit intimidated to find herself in a room at a police station together with Montalbano and his two assistants.
She was beautiful and knew it, and was also confident that she could always defend herself with her looks.
Indeed, when she sat down she made sure to leave her long, perfect legs in full view, and the three men couldn’t help but look at them spellbound.
It was the inspector who, with a quiet sigh and a twinge of regret, broke the spell.
“Your father has already told us, in a general way, about your brief kidnapping. But I unfortunately have to ask you some more detailed questions that will force you to relive those unpleasant moments. Is that all right with you?”
“Yes, please go ahead.”
“At what time were you assaulted?”
“The circle line takes about twenty minutes to get to the stop where I get off. Let’s say it was a little before seven.”
“So there was still plenty of daylight. The assailant was running a big risk.”
“I suppose so, but I don’t think it was really all that risky. The road is very straight there, and you can see cars or people coming from far away. But it is pretty rare to see other cars or people along the road.”
“Did you get a look at the man’s license plate number?”
“No, I forgot to look.”
“What kind of car was it?”
“I couldn’t say.”
“What color?”
“Dark.”
Why, after all, would she have paid such close attention to a car stopped at the side of the road?
“Your father said you weren’t able to get a good look at the man’s face. Is that so?”
“Yes, I can confirm that.”
“When he was pressing the pad with the chloroform against your face, I imagine the assailant held you against his body and—”
“Yes, he was holding me tight, pressing my body against his.”
“Did you notice any kind of smell? More precisely—”
“I see exactly what you’re getting at.
Yes, he smelled bad, as if he was sweating profusely.”
“And as he was squeezing you, could you tell whether he was sexually aroused?”
The question elicited a broad smile from Manuela.
“No, he wasn’t at all aroused. On the contrary.”
“What do you mean?”
“I think he was afraid.”
“Of what?”
“Of what he was doing.”
“So he was afraid of getting caught?”
“That, too. But I had the feeling—though I couldn’t really tell you why—that he was scared by his own actions.”
A kidnapper afraid to kidnap? Now that was a new twist!
3
“Are you telling me he seemed reluctant to do what he was doing?” Montalbano asked with surprise.
“I could be mistaken, but that was the feeling I got. He wasn’t rough and wasn’t even terribly aggressive. He was just as forceful as he needed to be.”
Smart girl.
“Did he seem young to you, or more like an older man?”
“Definitely an older man.”
“Do you have any explanation for what happened?”
“I’ve been lying awake for several nights now, I assure you, and I still haven’t been able to come up with a plausible explanation.”
“Are you married or engaged?”
“No. I don’t even have a steady boyfriend.”
“Well, attractive as you are, you must have many suitors.”
“Thanks. I can’t complain, I guess.”
“Could it have been a rejected suitor?”
“I was lying there lifeless, at his complete disposal, and he didn’t take advantage of me. So, I don’t think so.”
“Is there anything else you can tell me?”
“No, not really. He didn’t undo a single button on me, and he didn’t even search through my purse.”
“How can you really tell?”
“I always keep my stuff in a specific order in there, and when I opened my purse to get my cell phone, I could see that everything was in its proper place, even though I was a bit dazed.”
“Did you know that just the day before, there’d been another overnight kidnapping exactly like yours?”
“Really?!” the young woman said in astonishment.
Then, after thinking about it for a moment, she asked the most logical question possible:
“Did she look like me?”
“Not in the least. The other woman had dark curly hair and was rather petite . . . But, like you, she worked in a bank.”
Manuela was silently thoughtful for a moment. Then she said:
“If I were you I wouldn’t lend too much weight to the fact that we both work in banks. It has to be a coincidence.”
“Why?”
“If they really wanted to hurt the banks they would have done something else. This doesn’t make any sense. But . . . have you been able to establish that the assailant was the same in both cases?” she asked.
It was an intelligent question.
“Yes, it was the same person.”
The girl threw up her hands.
“I don’t know what to say.”
After Manuela left, Montalbano, Augello, and Fazio sat there in silence, staring at each other.
Nothing about this whole affair made any sense. As the girl herself had said.
“Maybe he’s some kind of maniac who gets off on hugging women after they’ve lost consciousness,” Augello ventured.
But he said it in the tone of someone who doesn’t really believe what he’s saying. And so he immediately formulated another hypothesis.
“Or maybe he photographs them in strange poses.”
“There’s one thing I’m sure of,” said Fazio, “which is that there will be more assaults.”
“I agree,” said Montalbano. “But there was something Manuela said that really intrigued me, something she was quite insistent about, which is that the assailant was frightened by what he was doing.”
“Explain,” said Augello.
“The fact that he was afraid tells me at least two things: First that the assailant is new at this kind of thing—he’s a beginner, and so we can rule out him being some sort of pro with a whole organization behind him. In all likelihood he’s acting alone. The second thing is that he’s in some kind of situation where he’s forced to commit lightning-quick kidnappings.”
“Do you mean for a third party? That other people are forcing him to kidnap these girls?”
“Maybe. But it might also be a situation where he did something and is now in a position where, for whatever reason, he’s forced to kidnap young women. In short, these kidnappings might be just red herrings.”
“So, what are we going to do?” asked Fazio.
“I haven’t the slightest idea,” replied the inspector.
They sat there a few moments in silence, meditating on their powerlessness and inability to make any sense of these apparently senseless acts.
As the passing minutes began to weigh heavier and heavier, Montalbano broke the silence.
“Still, despite the fog we’re in, we do have one point in our favor,” he said.
Augello and Fazio surfaced from the depths of their thoughts and focused their attention.
“So far none of the newsmen in town knows anything about these kidnappings, and the gossips haven’t found out yet, either.”
“Why do you consider that a point in our favor?” asked Augello.
“It’s possible the attacker was hoping to create a big stir with his kidnappings. Maybe the silence will disappoint him and lead him to do something more drastic to provoke a reaction.”
“You mean something like a third kidnapping, but this time one that lasts several days and forces the family to make a public appeal for our help?” asked Fazio.
“Something like that. And, if so, I hope that in so doing he’ll make a false move.”
* * *
He feasted on Adelina’s pasta ’ncasciata out on the veranda.
Every so often, as he was eating, the thought of the two kidnappings would pop into his head, and he would banish it at once.
He had nothing at hand to go on, and so it would have been pointless, and possibly even counterproductive, to speculate idly.
When he’d finished eating, he phoned Livia in Boccadasse.
At a certain point in their conversation she asked him what he was working on, and Montalbano told her about the two young women who had been kidnapped.
Livia remained silent for a moment, then spoke.
“Something similar happened once in Genoa, a very long time ago. I was still in high school.”
“Tell me about it.”
“I don’t remember much. The guy who did it was impotent, and he could only get aroused by sniffing women’s panties, which he was able to do by rendering his victims unconscious.”
“He would take them off the women?”
“No, he left them on them.”
“I don’t think my case is the same.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know. Just a feeling.”
“Well, no offense, Salvo, but your instinct is not what it was, say, thirty years ago.”
This reference to his age upset him, but he realized, deep down, that Livia was right.
Why not follow her advice as well? Dismissing the idea of a maniac out of hand might prove to be a big mistake.
* * *
He slept well that night, and therefore arrived at work the following morning sharp and elegant, fresh and well rested. The skin around his eye was turning light blue, and his ear was only about half as swollen as the day before.
“Call Fazio and tell him—” he started saying to Catarella upon entering.
“He in’t onna premisses, Chief.”
“Where is he?”
“’Ere was a larcenous fire at a store lass night, an’ so ’e went to the scene o’ the crime.”
“Then get me Inspector Augello.”
“’E ain’t onna premisses, neither, Chief.”
“And where’d he go?”
“’E called sayin’ as how ’e—meanin’ ’im, Isspector Augello—’ad to take ’is son—’is own son bein’ ’is, I mean—to the haspital ’cause ’e hoit ’is leg.”
Montalbano felt horrified.
This meant that he would have no choice but to spend the morning signing papers, those hated papers piled up in precarious stacks on his desk.
If it had been up to him, all such documents would remain “outstanding” for the rest of eternity.
He went into his office, sat down in the small armchair, cursed for five minutes without interruption, then took the first document, signed it, then grabbed another. After he’d been at it for a good spell, the telephone rang.
“Chief, ’at’d be the poisson of Signor Pitruzzo, poissonally in poisson.”
The inspector looked at his watch: ten minutes to nine. But wasn’t the man supposed to come at ten?
“Show him into my office.”
He would have been willing to receive even the devil in person, just to stop signing papers.
Pitruzzo came in, they shook hands and smiled, and the inspector sat him down.
“How’s your head?”
“Much better, thanks. I apologize for not coming yesterday, as promised, but I didn’t feel up to going out. I preferred to stay at home, and I think it did me a world of good.”
“So, what can I do for you, Signor Pitruzzo?”
The man smiled.
“Virduzzo’s the name, Alfredo Virduzzo.”
Montalbano cursed under his breath. Why had he trusted Catarella yet again, when the guy was constitutionally incapable of getting anyone’s name right? Why did he always fall for it?
“I beg your pardon. So, please tell me.”
The Overnight Kidnapper Page 3
