The Sicilian Method

by Andrea Camilleri

“There’s another possibility,” said the inspector. “That everybody knows everything, but nobody wants to tell us.”

  “Well, that would change things, and in that case we would be dealing with a typical residential building in Sicily,” said Fazio by way of conclusion.

  “We were on our way to the floor below,” Augello said to Montalbano.

  “Best of luck,” replied the inspector. Then he removed the seals, took the keys out of his pocket, and unlocked the door to the dead man’s flat.

  Catalanotti’s apartment consisted of a spacious entrance hall, to the right of which began a corridor, with one wall, on the left, entirely covered by a very long white wooden armoire before giving onto the bedroom and the bathroom next to it. Also off the entranceway were three other doors: one to the kitchen, beyond which was a second bathroom; another to the dining room, which also served as a sitting room; and the third to a rather small study that nevertheless featured a sofa that took up an entire wall.

  Montalbano stopped for a moment.

  The study’s walls were lined with shelves jam-packed with books and magazines, and on the desk, which featured two large drawers, sat an old computer, a printer, a few sheets of paper, and a telephone.

  He retraced his steps as far as the bedroom, and here he noticed something he’d failed to see before. Between the bed and the window was a sort of small door that looked like it gave onto a closet.

  He tried to open it but was unable. It was locked.

  Montalbano was suspicious. With an armoire that took up the whole hallway, what need did Catalanotti have for a closet in the bedroom?

  He tried again to open the door with a key he’d found on a bedside table, but it didn’t work.

  At this point, he became obsessed.

  He had to see what was inside, whatever it took. Taking three steps back to work up a head of steam, he charged, raised his foot as high as it would go, and kicked the door hard.

  He heard the sound of something breaking.

  When he tried again to open it, the door wobbled. Another kick would do it. And indeed . . .

  He found himself looking at a sort of bookcase stuffed with more books, magazines, and folders.

  Stuck on the spine of each folder was a strip of white paper with the name of a person written on it: “Giovanni,” “Maria,” “Filippo,” “Ernesto,” “Valentina,” “Guido,” “Maria 3,” “Andrea,” “Giacomo,” and so on. A long row of folders was occasionally broken up by an object dividing one section from another.

  He grabbed three of the first folders that came to hand, one right next to the other, and brought them to the bed. He opened the first, the one with the name “Maria” on it.

  Inside was a close-up photo of a blond girl sitting down and reading something.

  Then there were two sheets of paper, one printed from a computer, the other covered with handwriting.

  The first was a dialogue of four or five lines.

  He read them:

  —What?

  —The truth.

  —Starting today, you will have to resign yourself to living without any illusions.

  —I’ve lived with illusions my whole life. I’ve never been able to do without them.

  —It’s you who wanted it to come to this, at all costs.

  —Until today, illusions gave me the strength to go on, they helped me to live. I don’t believe in anything else. I’ve had no other kind of help.

  At the bottom of the page were two initials: DC. Montalbano had no idea what the hell any of this was about. He moved on to the handwritten sheet, in the middle of which stood out the name Maria. Written in parentheses were the words first meeting. Then it went on:

  It was very hard to get her to open up.

  It took several hours. She appears to be quite ready for friendship, but as soon as I try to go beyond the first threshold and elicit more personal information on her intimate life, she shuts up like a clam.

  I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s not an inborn personality trait. She must have undergone some extremely negative experience that conditioned her manner of behavior. And that’s exactly what interests me about her. I think she’s still a virgin. She’s an actress, or at least considers herself one, and it’s possible the key to opening her up is in fact the theater. When I asked her a specific question—that is, how far would she go to defend herself against a sexual assault—she gave a confused answer. So I became even clearer: Would you be capable of killing your attacker? And she didn’t answer, but only looked at me. Then she wanted to recite a passage from Antigone. She reacts in unexpected ways. She’s very interesting to me. I will keep meeting with her, as often as possible.

  This time Montalbano understood even less than before.

  He picked up the second folder, the one called “Giacomo,” and opened it. Here, too, he found two sheets of paper, along with a photo of a man in a hat, standing with his mouth open as if he was singing. The inspector read the first page, printed from a computer.

  —What conclusion? You speak as if you knew a lot more about Martin’s account than we do.

  —All I know is that there must have been a reason for him to do what he did.

  —Maybe Martin killed himself because he thought I’d taken the money.

  —The money again! If you think Martin killed himself because he thought you’d taken his money, then you didn’t know your own brother. He laughed when I told him. He found it amusing. He found a lot of things amusing.

  Montalbano’s confusion increased.

  Who were these people? The handwritten sheet for “Giacomo” said:

  Rarely have I met a person with no intention of ever renouncing any pleasure life might have to offer him.

  During our fourth meeting I clearly realized that he would not hesitate to do harm to others so long as he might derive some pleasure from it.

  His main concern is money, in that his pleasures are expensive. Very expensive.

  When I asked him whether, if he came across a check for an enormous amount of money that he could cash without any risk, he would try to pin the blame on someone else, he said he wouldn’t be capable of doing such a thing.

  I had the impression he was lying. I will meet with him again, because if I were somehow able to establish that he’d lied to me, Giacomo would be ideal for my purposes.

  Same two initials at the end: DC. Montalbano felt bewildered, lost in a foggy abyss, with the folder on his lap.

  He made a snap decision. He got up, grabbed the three folders, put them back in their place, closed the closet as best he could, and went into the study.

  He sat down at the desk. The sheets of paper lying there were blank. He made a mental note to look inside the man’s computer.

  Then he opened the first drawer on the left.

  It contained a great many accounting books. Montalbano took out the one for the current year, 2016, and started looking through it.

  When he closed it half an hour later, he had learned that Catalanotti owned quite a few houses, lots, and warehouses that he legally rented out. If he wasn’t a rich man, he was pretty close.

  The inspector then opened the right-hand drawer. Here, too, were many accounts books, and these also had the year written on each. He took out the one for the present year and had a surprise. Each page had a different name at the top.

  At the top of the first page was the name Adalberto Lai. Under it was a declaration:

  JANUARY 8, 2016

  I, the undersigned, Adalberto Lai, declare that I have received the sum of fifteen thousand euros (15,000 €) from Mr. Carmelo Catalanotti, and hereby pledge to repay, within six months of the present date, the sum of fifteen thousand five hundred euros (15,500 €) to the same Mr. Catalanotti.

  In witness whereof,

  Followed by
his signature.

  Under the signature, and this time in Catalanotti’s ornate calligraphy, was another declaration.

  JUNE 10, 2016

  I, the undersigned, Carmelo Catalanotti, hereby declare that I have received, on this day, from Mr. Adalberto Lai, the sum previously agreed upon. I have no further claims.

  This was followed by both Catalanotti’s and Lai’s signatures.

  He flipped the page. The next one had the name Nico Dilicata at the top.

  It turned out that on January 14 this Nico had borrowed fifteen hundred euros, then paid back sixteen hundred three months later, and barely twenty days later had requested another loan, this one for a thousand euros, which he hadn’t yet repaid, however.

  The next pages were all of the same nature.

  When he closed the registers, he came to the conclusion that Catalanotti was a moneylender, a loan shark, but that while the interest rates he charged were indeed high, they weren’t that high. A loan shark with a heart, one might say.

  Montalbano opened the computer and immediately noticed that in the folder called “Loans and Sundry” were copies of the paper documents, all in perfect, precise order.

  At this point he stood up and started looking at the books about the room. They were novels of some quality, as well as journals and other books, most of them to do with the theater.

  In conclusion, Catalanotti’s character seemed to consist of several different people: a cultured reader, a middleweight loan shark, and a fairly moneyed man who, for whatever reason, was quite interested in the personal and psychological makeup of others.

  The latter was the most mysterious aspect.

  * * *

  —

  He was stubbing out a cigarette he’d just smoked at the window when the doorbell rang. It was Fazio and Augello.

  “We thought you’d already gone home to Marinella,” said Mimì. “Signora Contarini, on the second floor, kept us for more than two hours, talking about her grandson, Ninuzzo, who can’t get a job, and asking me to recommend him for work with the police.”

  “Aside from that, did you find anything out?”

  “All the tenants in this building are exactly alike. Nobody knows anyone. Apparently they don’t even have condominium meetings.”

  “Well, I’m done here, too,” said Montalbano. Then, turning to Fazio: “Put the seals back up over the door.”

  As Fazio was doing this, Montalbano said softly to Mimì: “Don’t forget what you have to do tonight.”

  Mimì nodded in assent.

  They descended the stairs. Ammazzalorso wasn’t there anymore. Apparently eight o’clock had come and gone. Montalbano got in his car and headed home.

  * * *

  —

  When faced with the marvelous platter of fried shrimp and calamari that Adelina had made for him, he had a moment of hesitation.

  His eye drifted over to a piece of paper hanging on the refrigerator.

  Just one week before, when Livia had last come and stayed with him, she’d left him a note with a few words, though enough that to him they sounded like a death sentence.

  The note said, precisely:

  Remember [written in red felt pen] that your metabolism has decidedly changed [“decidedly,” too, was in red and underlined twice].

  You don’t need many calories to reach your daily requirement.

  NOT ALLOWED:

  Carbohydrates (bread, pasta . . .)

  Sweets (especially cannoli and cassata)

  Fried foods (especially sarde a beccafico, whitebait fritters, and baby octopus (the kind you like so much)).

  Alcohol: not more than one glass of red wine per day.

  Then there was a drawing of a death’s-head and, underneath it, also in red felt pen:

  NO MORE WHISKY EVER

  Adelina had asked him to explain this message. And he’d replied with a shrug.

  The aroma rising from the frying pan got the better of him.

  He went out to set the table on the veranda and started eating straight out of the pan.

  When he’d finished, he refilled the glass of wine he’d had during the meal and downed it in a single gulp.

  At that moment the phone rang. It was Livia.

  “I’ve just finished eating dinner,” she said. “Have you eaten yet?”

  “Boiled shrimp with a smidge of olive oil and a splash of lemon. Whole wheat bread, and half a glass of wine. I’m following your rules, as you can see.”

  “Great! Just keep it up. I mean it. I wanted to tell you that I’ll probably be able to come down in a couple of days.”

  “That would be wonderful, but I have a new murder on my hands since this morning, and the whole thing’s looking a little complicated . . .”

  Livia cut in.

  “That’s all right. We can try again next week. I might even take an extra day.”

  They chatted awhile longer about everything and nothing, then said good night. Ever so slowly, Montalbano made his way over to the television set and sat down in the armchair.

  Nicolò Zito, the chief newsman at the Free Channel, was reporting the news of Catalanotti’s murder, describing the victim as a well-off man who, most important, had never had any run-ins with the law. The inspector changed the channel to a variety show.

  It immediately sparked his interest. The lead dancer was a perfect copy of Antonia . . . who was certainly a fine-looking woman, but, Jesus, was she ever unpleasant! Certainly not very approachable . . .

  Why, Montalbano asked himself, do you by any chance want to approach her?

  The answer came at once, from the heart:

  Sure, why not?

  He didn’t allow himself any further questions.

  Turning off the TV to avoid seeing any more of the lead dancer, he went and smoked one last cigarette on the veranda, then decided it was time for bed.

  * * *

  —

  It was late at night. The street was rather broad, and the car advanced silently and ever so slowly, drifting past the other cars parked along the sidewalk. It seemed not to be rolling on wheels but sliding on butter.

  All at once the car took off, lurched over to the left side, swerved, and parked in an instant.

  The driver’s-side door opened and a man got out, carefully closing the door behind him.

  It was Mimì Augello.

  He pulled the collar of his jacket up to his nose, tucked his head down between his shoulders, took a quick look around, and then, in three short hops, crossed the road and found himself on the opposite sidewalk.

  Keeping his head bowed, he took a few steps straight ahead, stopped in front of a door, reached out with one hand, and, without even looking at the names listed, rang one of the buzzers.

  The answer came at once:

  “Is that you?”

  “Yes.”

  The latch-lock clicked. Mimì pushed the door open, went inside, closed the door behind him in the twinkling of an eye, then started climbing the stairs on tiptoe. He’d decided that he would make less noise on foot than by taking the elevator.

  Reaching the fourth floor, he saw a shaft of light filtering out from a door ajar. Approaching it, he pushed it open and went in. The woman, who’d apparently been waiting for him in the entrance hall, grabbed him with her left hand while, with her right, she closed and locked the door with four turns of the key in the top lock and two more in the bottom lock, before tossing the key set onto a small table. Mimì made as if to embrace the woman, but she stepped back, took him by the hand, and said in a soft voice: “Let’s go in the other room.”

  Mimì obeyed.

  Now they were in the bedroom, and the woman embraced Mimì and pressed her lips against his. Mimì held her tight, returning her passionate kiss.

  * * *

  �
��

  “I’m sorry,” said Mimì, “but there’s something else I still have to do.”

  “Something else?” she asked teasingly.

  In the meantime Mimì had got up and was quickly getting dressed.

  “I have to find my wallet, which I think I lost during my escape last night.”

  “But I haven’t found anything here.”

  “That’s just it. I fear it may have fallen out in the apartment downstairs.”

  “So what are you going to do now?”

  Mimì hopped athletically towards the French door giving onto the balcony and opened it.

  “Not to worry! This shouldn’t take more than ten minutes.”

  Pulling a small flashlight out of his pocket, he leaned out over the railing, lit the torch, and, hamming it up, carefully examined the balcony below.

  “I don’t see it down there. I’m gonna have to climb down,” he said, vanishing from the woman’s sight.

  As soon as he found himself on the third-floor balcony, he noticed that the French door was still ajar.

  The idea of having to deal with that corpse again made him grimace, but he steeled himself and opened the door all the way.

  Remembering perfectly well the spot where he’d bumped into the chair the last time, he felt around with his hands but encountered no obstacle. Clearly someone had put the chair back in its place. He turned the flashlight on, at a low setting, and left the room without looking at the bed. At a glance the apartment seemed an exact copy of the one above.

  Advancing on tiptoe, he had a look around: another bedroom, a study, a room with a collection of seashells, two bathrooms, and a kitchen. There wasn’t a living soul about. He went back into the bedroom and aimed the beam of his torch at the bed.

  The flashlight fell out of his hand. But Mimì was in no condition to pick it up.

  What he’d seen had turned him into a statue of wax.

  Or, rather, what he hadn’t seen.

  Wasting no time, he grabbed the flashlight, headed for the door, opened it, closed it behind him, descended the stairs, opened the main door, ran to his car, ducked inside, and shot off like a rocket in the direction of Marinella.