The Marshal and the Madwoman

by Magdalen Nabb

  'I know,' the Marshal said, 'I've been in her flat.'

  'Then you probably noticed that there's no heating at all in the place, not even a little stove.'

  He hadn't noticed. It had been so hot . . .

  'In winter she'd sit in Franco's bar all day watching TV because it was warm there. I always thought—I'm no expert, of course, it's just my idea—but I always thought that she was much more normal than she let on to be, apart from her mania, which she really couldn't control.'

  'What made you think so?'

  'I don't know but—yes, sometimes when I saw her during the day when she was quiet, there was something about the way she looked at me—she had very piercing blue eyes— and she seemed to be saying, "You know I'm not as crazy as they think but I have to keep up the game." At those times she seemed very lucid and it made me think that playing up to her image as a madwoman had become her method of survival. I don't know if I'm making any sense?'

  'I think so. I'm beginning to understand. Especially as she wouldn't have been let out of San Salvi to live alone if she'd been all that bad.'

  'I didn't know about San Salvi until I saw it in the paper. She never talked about her past. But after all, just think how many old women are dragging out their existence without enough money to eat properly or keep warm. If they've no family they're often left to fend for themselves because they give nobody any trouble, they're too proud, so no one notices them much. Everybody always used to say that Clementina liked attention, especially when she hung around the men—but if she hadn't behaved the way she did she wouldn't have got half the help she got, if any. Because of her pottiness she was an institution.'

  'And you think she worked all that out for herself?' Even as he questioned it he believed her, thinking of Angelo sitting there alone hour after terrified hour, trying to be good while the noisy, disruptive patients got all the attention. Clementina had been in a good school, watching it silently before forming a new survival personality. Ten years of that. . .

  'I said it was only an opinion,' Linda Rossi said, taking his silence for dissent. 'And it wasn't as cold-blooded as that since she really did go batty at times. I just think she kept the image up the rest of the time, that's all, because it served. Apart from that, who's to say she wasn't clever? Clever people do go crazy, perhaps more easily than stupid ones. Anyway, I'm supposed to be telling you about that day when I went up there. I was upset, of course, by that dreadful man, but I was curious as well because I'd always understood that Clementina didn't rent her flat.'

  'Did she say so?'

  'Not in so many words. She did say something to that effect but not then, a long time ago, about a year and a half ago. Our rent had been raised and I remember thinking: Poor Clementina, she must have had the same bad news this morning in the post. I'll take her something up. She wasn't there, and I was amazed when I eventually found her down at the front door mopping at the step with a dirty old rag as usual, chirpy as ever.

  '"I've made you a bit of soup", I told her.

  '"Is there a bit of bread with it as well? Because I have none."

  'She was never humble or grateful and she would even go so far as to complain if she didn't think much of your cooking. I mentioned that the rent had gone up and that if she hadn't had a letter about it already one would arrive.

  '"Not me," she said, "I don't pay rent."

  'She may have been inventing it, but I'd swear she was telling the truth.'

  'Well,' the Marshal said, 'I found no rent book or receipts of any kind in the flat. Did she explain why?'

  'No. But I didn't want to appear nosey, though I was curious. That's another thing—I often got the impression that she was very secretive and that acting crazier than she was kept people at a distance. Everybody knew about her craziness but nobody really knew her. I don't think a soul knew about her being in San Salvi until yesterday.' She turned to her husband who had been stroking her hand throughout the conversation. 'You said you felt the same, that she was secretive.'

  'About her flat?'

  'About everything! We talked about it!'

  'I know, but we're not psychiatrists. If she was all those years in San Salvi. . .' He gave the Marshal one of those man to man glances as if asking him to make allowances for his wife's emotional state. The Marshal privately wished Rossi would go out and have a coffee somewhere. Up to now, the only person who had told him anything useful about Clementina had been poor Angelo. And now this young woman was embarrassed and was sure to clam up.

  Avoiding the husband's eye, he said, 'I'm no psychiatrist, either, but I'm inclined to think there's a lot in what you say. One of the things that bother me about Clementina is that she appears to have no past. There isn't so much as an old snapshot in her house, for instance, which struck me as odd.'

  'Isn't there? That is odd . . .' Linda frowned. 'She had that picture she cut out from the newspaper, though. It wasn't from her past, of course, it was an article they did last year or the year before, I forget. But it shows she does keep photographs of herself, even if it was only cut out from the paper. She once showed it to me.'

  'Where did she keep it?'

  'In a drawer in the kitchen table with a lot of bits and pieces. Didn't you see it when you were looking about up there?'

  'No, I didn't . . . unless . . .' There had been a crumpled sheet of newspaper in he drawer but it was very old and yellowed and looked as though it had been lining the drawer. 'Was it a full sheet, or even a double sheet?'

  'No, it was just a small picture with a short piece written underneath it. She'd cut it out very carefully.'

  'In that case it wasn't there. She must have thrown it away.'

  'It was there that day I went up after the limping man had been here.'

  'What makes you so sure?'

  'The drawer was open. I told you Clementina was undressed. She was looking through the drawer for a button to sew on her frock which she'd just washed—she had hardly any clothes—and the cutting was right there on top in the open drawer. It struck me because in the picture she was wearing that same frock. Goodness knows how long she'd had it. I remember wishing I could give her something to wear but she was much shorter than I am and plumper.'

  'Well, if you say she was busy with her dress and so on when you went up, I gather she was no more upset by that man's visit than she'd been when you told her about the rent going up.'

  'Oh no. She was upset this time—she always got more active when she was disturbed. There she was, half naked, looking for a button in the drawer and her dress was half in and half out of a little bowl of soapy water in the sink so that it was dripping on to the floor, and her face was all red. She was talking and swearing to herself loudly and she hadn't answered my knock so, since the door was ajar, I went in.

  '"Clementina, it's me."

  'She didn't answer but went on talking to herself.'

  'What was she saying? Try and remember, it could be helpful.'

  'She seemed to be just rambling. I couldn't make any sense of it, I'm afraid. Oh—she did repeat a number of times "I won't go . . . Whatever happens I won't go and they can't make me!' That's all I can remember having heard clearly. I gathered that Bianchi, as he called himself, had threatened her in some way as he had us. I knew she had no money and couldn't have paid him off. What I didn't understand, though, was what he could have threatened her with. She lived alone and didn't have our problem. Of course, there was this business of her not paying rent and I did wonder if she'd simply not paid up—you know, playing her crazy old dear act and thinking she could get away with not paying.

  'She didn't explain anything to you?'

  'No. She was working herself up into hysterics. It happened now and again. She started swearing senselessly, just a string of foul language without rhyme or reason. At the end she was crying too. I tried to tell her that the man had been to me with his threats, too, but she took no notice. She wasn't just being her crazyself then, Marshal, she was really frightened and I'm su
re that's why she killed herself. Even I—it's true that we don't have money to spare and we've been pretty desperate about being evicted—but I'm not alone in the world and not so poor as she was. I wasn't surprised when I heard what had happened.'

  'Are you sure,' the Marshal asked, 'that she'd received an eviction order, too? It's not the sort of thing you throw away and I didn't find it. . .'

  'I'm not sure, since she never told me so. All she ever said was that she didn't pay rent—and since Bianchi went up there too . . .'

  'Yes, but if he was on the make on his own account he may just have been guessing.'

  'Then why was she frightened? And why did she kill herself?'

  The Marshal considered telling her the truth but then he said nothing. What good could it do at this stage? It would only serve to frighten her since she was alone in the house all day. At last he said, 'Bring your baby home—is it a boy or a girl?'

  'A little girl. She's two and a half months old. Do you have any children?'

  'Two. Both boys.' He looked at Rossi. 'If that fellow should come back, don't give him money.'

  'We won't.'

  'Did he give you a deadline?'

  Rossi looked at his wife.

  'No, he didn't... I assumed he'd just come back again, but he never did and it must be about four weeks . . . Now that you mention it, there was something odd about that. I was too upset to take it in at the time but I've got a clearer idea about his behaviour now. There was something . . . improvised about the whole thing. I think, looking back on it, that he wanted what he could get out of me then and there.'

  'Come on, now, Linda,' said her husband, squeezing her hand. 'He could hardly have expected you to produce three million from your purse.'

  'Listen to me!' She removed her hand from his, 'Marshal, I'm convinced he was improvising and that he wanted or needed money right away. After all, I could have given him a cheque if I'd had the money to cover it—and I told you I found him looking about in a way that bothered me. I'll bet he was sizing us up and deciding how much to ask for.'

  'He decided wrong, then,' said Rossi, 'since we haven't a penny.'

  'But I'm right, even so. Marshal, look around you. This is a very tiny flat but everything in it is good. That's because when his mother died we inherited a bit of good furniture. My husband has a brother and sister so that when everything was divided there wasn't all that much, but you see that coffee service? It's silver, and the two rugs are Persian. The few things we've bought ourselves come from the cheapest department store, but the general impression is of more money than we have.'

  'That's true . . .' The Marshal was no expert. The first time he'd come in here he'd only noticed how cheerful and pretty it was, especially after Clementina's flat, but this Bianchi had been looking with a different pair of eyes.

  'I'd swear,' said Linda Rossi, 'that he'd have gone away contented if I'd given him that coffee service, and that it was only because I was too terrified about the rental contract and the baby, etcetera, to realize, that stopped him getting what he wanted.'

  'Did he seem desperate?'

  'No, not that . . . no, because he was too cheerful in a leering, sarcastic sort of way. Not desperate, just improvising and definitely in a hurry. It's true, I thought at the time he'd be back, otherwise we couldn't have gone to the Tenants' Association, but I wasn't thinking very straight because I was frightened—not just of him but because of the hearing coming up, everything.'

  'You don't know if he asked Clementina for money?'

  'She didn't say so, but I've told you she wasn't very coherent. The next day, I told her we were going to the Tenants' Association and asked if she wanted us to take her with us. She calmed down by then and was downstairs as usual mopping the doorstep.

  '"If I want to go there, I'll go! I can find my own way!"

  'She was down on her knees and she looked up at me with that sharp, blue-eyed glance that meant she was lucid and only shouting to keep up appearances. I wonder if she went. . .'

  'I'll check,' the Marshal said. He got to his feet and took a card from his top pocket. 'This is my number. If you remember anything else or if Bianchi comes back . . .'

  'But surely,' Linda Rossi said, 'if you've already talked to him and he admits he's seen me . . . Can't you arrest him?'

  The Marshal, much embarrassed by his deceit which, to tell the truth, he'd quite forgotten until now, could only say, 'I'd rather just keep watch on him until I have more to go on. I can't arrest him yet or I would.'

  Well, that was true enough, he thought as he stumped off down the stairs. They had promised to call him if anything happened, but where the use was in leaving his cards all over the place in case two men about whom he knew nothing should be so kind as to make a second visit for his convenience he didn't know. What he did know for sure, as he lowered himself gingerly on to the burning car seat yet again, was that he wanted a cold shower and a meal and, if humanly possible, a rest.

  All he got was the shower. He barely got time to put on a fresh uniform before he was summoned to the Public Prosecutor's office.

  CHAPTER 7

  By four o'clock that afternoon the weather was so sultry that it was becoming difficult to breathe. Almost everyone in the streets was wearing sunglasses like the Marshal because the blinding white glare of the vapour-screened sun was so painful. He had a headache which was getting steadily worse. It might have been hunger or the bad temper provoked by the Substitute Prosecutor, but it was more likely the weather since, as he looked about him, everyone else seemed to have the same beaten look. He walked across the Santa Trinita bridge slowly. On days like this there was no point in hurrying because everything you tried to do went wrong, so the fewer things you tried to do the better. You can fight against some things but not against August. The only thing to do in August is wait for it to be over. The Marshal had reached this conclusion at half past two when he had got back into his car ready to leave for his interview with the Prosecutor on an empty stomach and found that the engine refused to start. It was his own car, of course, not a squad car, but he would normally get one of the mechanics over at Headquarters to look at it. What was the point of telephoning when they would be sure to say that since it was August. . .

  All the anger and frustration that had welled up in him when the car wouldn't start sagged, leaving a sort of blank lethargy behind it. He could have taken the van that was parked next to his 500 but he just got out and walked away, perhaps to spite himself or perhaps to spite the Prosecutor who would, in turn, be annoyed when he arrived late.

  The Prosecutor had been annoyed. Not because the Marshal was late, since he had even kept the latter waiting for a quarter of an hour. He was angry in the first place about the San Salvi business, and the Marshal's account of it in which there was no avoiding the fact that, had he got there yesterday, he might have encountered the mysterious visitor, was bound in the nature of things to make him angrier. He had been annoyed, too, by what he saw as the Marshal's sullen attitude, the way he didn't rise to the bait when criticized. Couldn't he see that it was just too hot to bother? For his part, the Marshal could understand well enough that the Prosecutor was as exhausted by the weather as everyone else. His face was pallid and damp and there were dark rings under his eyes. Not only was he at the end of his tether because of the heat but he was also threatened with having his long-awaited holiday postponed. The Marshal couldn't in all conscience blame him but nor could he work up any energy to react to him. It wasn't a pleasant interview. The Prosecutor concluded it by saying:

  'If you have the keys to the flat on you, leave them here.'

  'Of course.' The Marshal had taken them from his top pocket and placed them on the desk.

  'The agents dealing with the letting have been in touch with me and I see no good reason, at this point, for asking them to wait. I'm having the seals removed today and I'll give them back the keys tomorrow.'

  'You don't think—'

  'Think what?'

 
; 'This man I told you about. . .'

  'What about him? I've no reason to believe he has anything to do with this case.'

  'They didn't say, the agents, whether they'd had any problems with Clementina not paying her rent? Or that she'd received notice of eviction?'

  'Nothing of the kind. It seems to me that these people in the flat below—what did you say their name was?'

  'Rossi.'

  'Rossi. These people are just trying to attract your attention to their own little problem by making out that the Franci woman upstairs was somehow involved. If you keep your mind on this case and the things that really are relevant to it we might get somewhere.'

  The Marshal thought of the young couple whose 'little problem' might end in their being out on the streets with their two-month-old baby in its mother's arms and their furniture piled up around them on the pavement. He stared down at his big hands which were planted on his knees and then across the desk at the Prosecutor whose thin fingers were fidgeting with a pen that left red spots on their tips. What was he agitating about now?

  'I'll inform them this evening. I can see nothing to be gained . . .'

  He kept on saying that, the Marshal noticed. 'I can see nothing to be gained ... I can see no good reason ... I can see no point. . .'

  Well, no doubt he was right. There was probably nothing to be gained by finding Clementina's murderer. No point. . . No good reason . . . You just went through the motions and life continued as before. Somebody had once thought there was a good reason for closing the asylums and now the same patients were in private asylums at public expense and everything went on as before. What was the point, the good reason, for looking after human wreckage like Angelo? Or for neglecting him?

  'Are you following me?'

  The Marshal gave a little start and his big troubled eyes met those of the Prosecutor. Just like school when he would suddenly hear the teacher rap out: Guarnaccia! Are you paying attention?

  Yes, sir.

  What was the last thing I said?