A Season for the Dead

by David Hewson

  ‘Oh, I think you do. You tell yourself you’re like this because of what you do. But is it just faintly possible there’s another reason? That you pick this stupid profession because it allows you to be what you are and never have to take the blame?’

  ‘Yeah,’ he grunted, thinking that she could have been talking to herself. Teresa was a quasi-cop. That much had become obvious over the past few days. What turned them on, turned her on too. ‘That’s right. You see through us all.’

  Her hand touched his knee. The tears stood big in her eyes now. ‘I’m sorry, Nic. I’m so sorry. I’m just lashing out because it feels good, except it doesn’t. I didn’t mean it.’

  He folded his arms around her, felt her over-large body against his.

  ‘Don’t apologize,’ he said. ‘Anyway, you’re right.’

  She wiped her streaming nose with her sleeve. ‘Maybe for Luca. You … I don’t know. You want to do something, don’t you?’

  ‘Do I?’ he asked mournfully, not wanting an answer. He nodded at the activity across the nave. ‘What happened here?’

  ‘Someone had a barbecue. Let the dogs in to clean up afterwards.’

  ‘Jesus.’

  ‘It was that TV creep, Valena. Ask your boss. Falcone’s livid, which I guess ought to impress me, except that it’s weird. You’d almost think this was about him, not two dead cops and God knows who else. Seems to think he knows all the answers too. When this is over, Nic, I’m taking a break. Maybe I’ll go back to the university, teach for a while. I don’t mind the work. Truth is it’s the best there is. It’s just the people. Falcone in particular. He’s … I don’t know. Luca loathed the man and I trust his judgement. Let’s leave it at that.’

  He said nothing. It was unwise to be drawn.

  ‘How’s she doing?’ Teresa asked.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Sara Farnese. She’s still staying with you, isn’t she?’

  ‘She’s fine,’ he said automatically.

  ‘Fine?’

  He wilted under the ferocity of her gaze.

  ‘Nic. Whatever she is, and I sometimes wonder if you’re even mildly qualified to judge, she is not “fine”. Look at what’s happening here. Look at what someone’s doing because of her.’

  ‘You sound like Falcone. It doesn’t mean it’s her fault.’

  She sighed, exasperated. ‘I didn’t mean it was, not for an instant. I meant that she knows this is to do with her. She feels responsible to some extent, however much she may try to hide it. She’s not “fine”. And one other thing. She slept with Valena apparently. She never told us about that.’

  ‘She said there were some others. She just didn’t know the names.’

  The look on her face was just a couple inches short of contempt. ‘She didn’t know the name of Arturo Valena? The moron was on the box every night. In the papers too. Where does she live, this woman of yours? In a convent? Except when she’s out screwing?’

  She waited for an answer. Nothing came. Then she watched the team working on the iron grille, watched the men examining the dogs for traces of Arturo Valena’s flesh. It was all pointless. Everyone knew what happened. A lunatic stepped out of the dark and death followed in his shadow. No, that wasn’t enough. There was a reason behind it all. There had to be.

  ‘I’ve got work to do,’ she muttered, and joined the team with the dogs.

  Nic Costa felt as if his head would burst. He was exhausted. He was confused. Then he heard a commotion at the door. Falcone walked in, flanked by some cops he recognized only by sight. Costa knew the investigation was moving away from him. Now the big man was gone, now he was reduced to little more than a bodyguard for Sara, Falcone had brought in a larger, more experienced team. He wondered what could be left for him to do.

  Falcone caught his eye and waved him over. He was carrying a briefcase and Teresa Lupo was right. He wasn’t himself. His eyes refused to meet Nic Costa’s at first. He looked lost, distraught, furious.

  ‘How’s she doing?’ he asked. ‘Crazy Teresa. I heard they were an item.’

  ‘Pretty cut up.’

  ‘Join the club. Jesus. How dare this asshole touch my men? Does he think there’s some kind of equivalence between them and dirt bags like Valena? I’ll put the fucker down myself if I get the chance.’

  ‘Wouldn’t help.’

  Falcone glowered at him and there was a little of his old self in the expression, asking: is that so? He took Costa to one side. ‘You watch TV?’

  ‘Not a lot.’

  ‘You should. It’s good sometimes. Going to get better too now that fat jerk’s not preaching at us every night.’

  Falcone barked at the team to start questioning forensics and anyone they could find living in the vicinity. Then they walked outside, into the fast rising heat and Falcone opened the door of the police Mercedes, ushering him into the passenger side and sitting next to him.

  ‘Where are we going?’ Costa asked. ‘Do you know where Fosse is?’

  ‘No idea. Be patient.’

  Costa nodded at the door of the church. ‘No time for patience.’

  Falcone shrugged. ‘Show a little trust, kid, we’re almost there. Remember what I asked you? About Gino Fosse’s family?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Falcone looked at his watch. It was just coming up to six. Then he flipped open the cover of the little LCD screen in the dashboard, switched off the navigation system and tuned into the TV channel. ‘Well, watch. After that you can go and see Rossi’s sister. Act sympathetic. We don’t want to get sued.’

  ‘His sister?’ he asked, furious with himself that he didn’t even know Rossi had a relative in the city.

  Falcone read his reaction immediately. ‘He didn’t tell you? They lived together in some apartment out near Fiumicino. Go talk her down from whatever state she’s in. Tell her I personally guarantee the bastard who did this is going down for good. After that … take the day off. Go spend some time with that father of yours. Go fishing. I don’t care. You’re not going to be around when Denney runs. I want people with some real time under their belts.’

  He said nothing, hating himself for the way he took this. Then the news came on. They extended the newscast from five minutes to fifteen. Valena’s dreadful death led the bulletin. Costa listened to the details they gave.

  ‘Is that right?’ he asked.

  ‘Should be. I gave them the briefing myself,’ Falcone replied.

  ‘You didn’t hold anything back?’

  Falcone scowled. ‘What’s the point? We know who we want. I could put him in the dock today without a scrap more evidence.’

  ‘But we don’t know why.’

  Falcone put a finger to his lips, gave him that cold smile, then pointed to the screen. There was a stock picture of Michael Denney there, and a recent photo of Gino Fosse too. He listened to the newscaster, amazed. Then he turned to Falcone.

  ‘The DNA? That’s why you wanted something from his apartment? To prove this?’

  ‘The DNA report doesn’t come back until this morning. That was the idea but I didn’t need it anyway. A little bird behind those walls started to sing for me. I’ve got documents. I’ve got pieces of paper that are proof, just as much as some stupid lab test.’ Falcone smiled. ‘Gino Fosse is Denney’s son. We still don’t know who the real mother was. But he was taken from her at birth and given to that couple in Sicily. Denney’s managed to hush it up for years.’

  Nic found it impossible to think. Nothing made sense. ‘Why leak it to the media? What does it mean anyway?’

  ‘I want that crooked bastard. I want him out of that place where he’s sitting pretty, looking out of his window, thinking nothing can touch him. If we let him run from there anything can happen. If we cut a deal I’ll stick to it. As long as the rules stay the same. But if the son comes in, that’s different. We get him too and take the father in for protection. Because that’s what this is all about. That’s what Gino Fosse is trying to say. That he keeps o
n killing until he gets the one he wants. His old man.’

  It was wrong. It was impossible. ‘But why? Because he was fired from his job?’

  ‘Are you serious? Sara Farnese was the old man’s woman. She slept with these people – Vaccarini, Valena, some of the others, because Denney told her to. It was her attempt to get him safe passage out of that prison of his. She slept with Rinaldi. He tried to fix the judicial commission. Vaccarini the same. She slept with Valena. Four months ago he came out on that show of his arguing for wider diplomatic immunity in the Vatican on the grounds – get this – that the Church needed protecting in a godless world. You think maybe Sara Farnese performed a few favours on the fat fucker afterwards? The Englishman … I don’t know. Maybe he was trying to swing something for Denney with the EU.’

  He remembered her insistent denial of just a single accusation. The Englishman was her lover, he realized. A liar and adulterer. But he was unlike the rest. That much, Nic Costa now believed, was true.

  ‘Maybe he was just standing in the wrong place at the wrong time,’ he said.

  Falcone nodded, surprised that Costa agreed with him so readily. ‘It doesn’t matter any more. If Denney runs, they’re both out in the open. Maybe I’ll let the cardinal get on the plane, maybe not. Doesn’t matter. If he makes it to America we extradite him anyway.’ He shook his head, as if the game was already won. ‘And Gino Fosse, he stays here. He’s ours the moment he steps out into the sun and if he so much as sneezes I’ll shoot the bastard myself.’

  Falcone waited for Costa’s reaction. ‘You’re quiet. Aren’t you going to tell me I’ve got her all wrong? That she didn’t know Michael Denney? This can’t be true?’

  ‘I don’t know anything any more.’

  There was a pained grimace on the inspector’s tanned face. ‘Say that again. You should watch the eight o’clock news. Take a break. Buy yourself a coffee and enjoy the fun. You have to stage these things with the media. You don’t give them it all in one chunk or it just goes to waste. Come eight they’ll have another little item to add to the public’s knowledge about His Eminence Cardinal Denney.’

  The triumph in his voice was muted. There was a despairing note of bitterness behind it. Leo Falcone felt the loss of Rossi and Cattaneo, more deeply than Costa would have expected. ‘What else?’

  Falcone reached for his briefcase on the back seat of the car and took out an envelope. He opened it and thrust the contents onto Costa’s knee. It was a black and white photograph of dubious quality, taken from some distance judging by the flatness and the grain of the picture. A telephoto lens from slightly above the subject, perhaps, shot through a window. It showed Denney in a grand apartment, the one, Costa guessed, he used to occupy by right, before they threw him into the rat hole where he sweated now.

  Denney stood with his back half turned to the camera. He wore a white shirt and dark trousers. His grey hair was neatly groomed. Sara Farnese faced the lens, smiling, a wonderful, open smile, full of love, an expression he’d seen for himself the previous night. Her arms were around Denney. She was coming forward as if to kiss his cheek or his neck. Sara and Denney would soon be one, her body merged with his. She held him, tightly, in a way which brooked no mistake. It was impossible to fake. This was the two of them engaged in a loving, close embrace. A prelude to what? He looked again and knew. Denney’s right hand was already reaching for the curtain at the apartment window. In a few seconds the two of them would be snatched from sight.

  The photo had the same grainy quality as the ones they’d found in Fosse’s flat. It wasn’t hard to guess where it came from.

  ‘Where are the rest of the pictures?’ he asked.

  ‘That’s all I have,’ Falcone replied. ‘Look for yourself. He’s getting himself a little privacy. This is the Vatican, after all. What do you want? To see them in bed?’

  Something still nagged at him. ‘Where did it come from?’

  Falcone scowled and looked at his watch. ‘Come on. You’ve figured that out, surely?’

  He had. He just didn’t want to admit it. ‘Fosse took it. Just like he took the others. He kept the ones of Sara, of the other women, for his own purposes. Really he was there to provide backup. To make sure that if they didn’t bend from the favour, they’d bend from a little blackmail.’

  ‘Precisely,’ Falcone said, pleased with Costa’s analysis. ‘Fosse drove for Denney. He was the chauffeur on these little night-time escapades. For the Farnese woman. For the more conventional hookers Denney used too. He hung around peeking through the curtains with his lens while they got on with their work.’ He paused for effect. ‘They knew what was going on. She knew.’

  Costa thought of her face in the pictures in the Clivus Scauri. The way she was looking towards the lens. Falcone was right but Teresa Lupo had seen this first: Sara was party to the trick.

  ‘She knew,’ he agreed. ‘And Denney thought this was all his doing. He never realized Fosse was working on the side for someone else too. Maybe giving them the same information. Spying on Denney as well.’

  He looked Falcone in the eye. ‘Who was that? Who’s pulling the strings? Hanrahan?’

  ‘Hanrahan’s just a servant. Like me. What does it matter? We’ve got what we need. At eight o’clock these go public. Match that up with the news about Fosse and I don’t see how the Vatican can continue to hold him. He’s an embarrassment. He’s a visible scab they’ll want rid of.’

  Costa put the photograph back into the envelope.

  The older man took it and said, ‘If you breathe a word of this to anyone before it appears I’ll have your hide. And I mean her in particular. This is all beyond you now. I don’t want any more accidents, understand? So you just talk to Rossi’s sister then sit back, get some rest. You look like you need it.’

  ‘Accidents?’ he demanded, his voice rising, some red stub of anger beginning to fire in his head. ‘I lost a partner to this lunatic. I want to be there when he’s taken.’

  Falcone looked offended. ‘Hey. Gimme a break here. I got two dead cops squatting on my conscience. I don’t want your skinny hide added to the pile.’

  This was the limit, this was the moment. Costa reached into his jacket pocket and took out his police ID card.

  ‘Fuck you,’ he said and threw the thing into Falcone’s lap, then got out of the car, out into the fast rising heat of the morning.

  FIFTY-THREE

  She walked out to the gate at seven and spoke to one of the cops. It was easy to get what you wanted with a smile. The man took her money, looked a little puzzled, and drove off to the nearby nursery. It wouldn’t be open yet but he was a cop. He’d bang on the door till they came.

  Then she stayed near the lane, mutely watched by the other policemen, trying not to think, trying not to expect too much from the day to come, waiting. Half an hour later he returned with the plants housed in a battered cardboard box. There were three sets, each wrapped in damp newspaper. She looked at the seedlings of cavolo nero, little taller than an index finger. It was hard to believe they would grow through the coming harshness of winter, thriving in the cold and damp, becoming stronger each day until, in spring, they would be ready for harvest.

  Sara walked back to the house and found Marco and Bea on the porch drinking coffee. He sat happily in his wheelchair, Bea at his side. She thought about the expression on his face. Marco finally looked at peace with himself. He’d lost the impatient energy, the need to make some kind of point at every opportunity which she had noticed since the moment she stepped into the farmhouse. The internal, gnawing need to settle accounts had been resolved, for the time being at least. There had been a debt to be settled, she thought, and one he’d forgotten, which only made things worse. In a sense he looked older, wearier, more resigned. Perhaps these were steps along the way, stations of love, of insight, which needed to be passed. This was the luxury – and the agony – of a lingering death. It gave one the time to consider, to make decisions. It contained, too, sufficient space for bot
h regret and, with a little luck, reconciliation.

  Bea stood up and took the box from her, smiling at the slender green forms that lay inside.

  ‘You remembered?’ Marco said, amazed.

  ‘Of course.’

  He laughed. ‘It was the wine. I didn’t mean you to do this. You can’t really want to get down on your hands and knees and plant these damned things. What for?’

  Bea patted him on his grey head. ‘I thought we’d agreed. Because it’s a farm, silly man. Things should be growing here. It looks barren otherwise.’

  Marco scanned the arid, yellow ground. He gazed at both of them. ‘I’m a fool, aren’t I?’

  ‘You’re a man,’ Bea said.

  ‘Well, at least I won’t be grubbing around planting something no one’s going to look after come the winter.’

  ‘They’ll grow,’ Bea said. ‘I promise.’

  He harrumphed, though there was still an amused satisfaction in his eye neither of them could miss. ‘What’s happening to my life?’ he asked, then shot Sara a glance. ‘You heard from Nic?’

  ‘He left early,’ she said, not committing herself. She understood they knew where she had spent the night. Perhaps Marco and Bea had heard them. She’d no idea how much noise they had made. Her time with him, in his arms, astride him, touching his hair, feeling him inside her, all this now seemed like a dream. They had parted on bad terms. It was her fault. She knew this and she regretted hurting him. Nevertheless there were boundaries that had to be established. She wondered whether she would ever see Nic Costa again. Whether he would even want to see her. The future rose ahead like a mist, full of so many formless possibilities.

  ‘We should watch the news,’ she said.

  Sara saw the expression cross Marco Costa’s lined face, followed the way he looked at Bea. It was something bad. It had to be.

  ‘I did,’ he said. ‘While you were down at the gate.’

  ‘I need to know …’

  ‘No you don’t. Not right now. All that would mean is that we’d have to watch you go through the agonies again, Sara. This is not about you. These people aren’t your responsibility.’