The Dance of the Seagull im-15

by Andrea Camilleri

  “Poifickly, Chief.”

  “Now I want you to sit down at my desk, grab a pen and a sheet of paper, and write down every name you can remember. And in the meantime I’m going to go outside to smoke a cigarette.”

  “I’m sorry, Chief, but I coun’t do that.”

  “You can’t remember who called?”

  “No, no, Chief, I can’t sit atcher disk.”

  “Why not? The chair’s the same as any other.”

  “Yessir, ’ass right, sir, but iss the ass, if you’ll ascuse the ’spression, o’ the poisson sittin’ in the chair ’at makes the chair wha’ it is.”

  “All right, then just stay seated where you are.”

  He went outside the building, smoked a cigarette while walking slowly around the parking lot, then went back inside.

  3

  Catarella handed him a sheet of paper. There were three names written on it. Loccicciro (which must have been Lo Cicero); Parravacchio (only God knew what the real name was); and Zireta (here the error was slight: Ziretta).

  “Only three?”

  “No, Chief, there’s four.”

  “But you wrote only three names.”

  “I din’t write the fourth cuz I din’t need to. Y’see how, ’tween Garavacchio an’—”

  “Here you wrote down Parravacchio.”

  “Iss not important. Y’see, how ’tween Saravacchio an’ Zireta ’ere’s a blank space?”

  “Yes. What’s it mean?”

  “Blank, Chief. It means blank.”

  “I don’t get it.”

  “Means the fourth poisson ’at called’s name’s Blank.”

  Brilliant.

  “Listen, isn’t Blanc the guy who was arrested last week for brawling?”

  “Yessir, Chief. An’ Loccicciro was callin’ cuz summon livin’ onna floor above ’is floor’s pissin’ on ’im—if you’ll pardon my lankwitch—every mornin’ from the overlookin’ balcony.”

  “And do you know what Parravacchio wanted?”

  “Nah. But Taravacchio’s a rilitive o’ Fazio’s.”

  “Between Parravacchio and Ziretta, do you know which called more often?”

  “Yessir, ’twas Pinetta, but he’s calling ’bout a application fer applyin’ fer a passpott.”

  Montalbano felt disappointed.

  “But insofar as concerning the continuous pain-in-the-ass calls in continuosity, ’twas Mansella doin’ the callin’ till five days ago.”

  “Is that Mansella with an S or a Z?”

  “Wit’ a S like a Z, Chief.”

  “And did this Manzella go through the switchboard when he called Fazio?”

  “Chief, Mansella call true the swishboard insofar as cuz Fazio’s sill phone’s always busy. Or swished off. An’ so he tol’ me ’e’s Mansella an’ ’at I’s asposta tell summon a tell Fazio ’at ’e’s asposta call ’im, ’im bein’ Mansella. Or ellis ’e’s asposta toin ’is sill phone on.”

  “And did Fazio call him back?”

  “I dunno, Chief. Insofar as cuz I’s never present. If he called ’im back, ’twas witta sill phone.”

  “I guess you don’t remember the first time this Manzella called.”

  “Wait a seccon’, Chief.”

  He went out of the room, then returned at a run, holding a notebook with a black cover. He started leafing through it. The pages were densely covered with names and numbers.

  “What’s that?”

  “Chief, innytime innyone calls, I write down ’is name, who’s they want, the day, anna zack time o’day.”

  “Why?”

  “Cuz ya nivver know.”

  “But aren’t they automatically registered?”

  “Yessir, ’ass true, but I don’ trust nuthin’ attomattic. Who knows ’ow the attomattic feels about it! Awright, ’ere we are: Mansella calla foiss time tin days ago. Then ’e call ivry day till five days ago. A lass time ’e call tree times. ’E’z noivous. An’ ’e tol’ me a tell Fazio ’at ’e better toin ’is sill phone on.”

  “And then?”

  “An’ ’enn ’e din’t call no more. But after ’twas Fazio allways askin’ a’ least twice a day if Mansella a call askin’ fr’im. An’ ivry time I say no, ’e says if ’e calls to put ’im true straightaways cuz iss a rilly important matter.”

  “All right, thanks, Cat. You’ve been very helpful.”

  “One more ting, Chief, if I mays.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Wass’ goin’ on wit Fazio?”

  “Nothing, just some chickenshit, no need to worry.”

  Catarella went out, not very convinced.

  Montalbano took a deep breath and decided to do something he really had no desire to do. Might as well start with the worst. He dialed Dr. Pasquano’s phone number.

  “Hello, is the doctor in?”

  “The doctor’s busy.”

  “Montalbano here. Please get him for me.”

  “I’m sorry, Inspector, you’ll have to excuse me, but I’m really not up to it. He’s darker than a storm cloud this morning, and at the moment he’s right in the middle of an autopsy.”

  Pasquano must have dropped a lot of cash playing poker at the club last night. When this happened, one was better off dealing with a starving polar bear.

  “Maybe you know the answer to my question. Did any new bodies come in last night?”

  “You mean fresh corpses? No.”

  The inspector heaved a sigh of mild relief.

  He got up, went out of the office, and when passing by Catarella, told him:

  “I’m off to Montelusa. I’ll be back in a couple of hours. If Inspector Augello asks for me, tell him to call me on my cell phone.”

  There were three hospitals and two private clinics in Montelusa. It used to be that all you had to do was tell them over the phone that you were with the police, and they would tell you anything about anyone. Then, with the advent of pain-in-the-ass privacy laws, if you didn’t go in person and show your badge, they wouldn’t tell you a goddamn thing. At any rate, Fazio wasn’t in any of the three hospitals. Now came the hard part: the private clinics, whose concept of secrecy outdid even that of Swiss banks. How many fugitive mafiosi had been operated on in those clinics? The reception area of the first clinic Montalbano visited looked like the lobby of a five-star hotel. Behind a front desk so shiny it could have been used as a mirror were two women dressed in white, one young and the other old. He went up to the latter and donned a very serious face.

  “I’m Inspector Montalbano, police,” he said, taking out his badge.

  “How may I help you?”

  “My men will be here in ten minutes. I want all the patients to remain in their rooms, and no visitors who are already here can leave.”

  “Are you joking?”

  “I have a search warrant. We are looking for a dangerous fugitive named Fazio who we believe was admitted here yesterday.”

  The woman, who had turned pale as a ghost, reacted.

  “But no one has been admitted here for the past two days! Look for yourself!” she said, turning her computer screen towards him.

  “Listen, there’s no point arguing! We have learned that the Materdei Clinic—”

  “But this isn’t Materdei!”

  “It’s not?”

  “No! We’re the Salus Clinic.”

  “Oh my god, I’m so sorry. I’ve made a mistake. I’m terribly sorry. I’ll be on my way, then. Ah, but one very important thing: you mustn’t, under any circumstances, notify the Materdei.”

  At the second clinic they actually threw him out. There was a head nurse of about sixty, at least six-foot-one, skinny as death and just as ugly, the spitting image of Olive Oyl.

  “We don’t accept wounded people off the street.”

  “Fine, signora, but—”

  “I’m not married.”

  “Well, don’t despair. You’ll see, one day your prince charming will come.”

  “Out!”

  As he was getting
back in his car, he heard someone call him. It was a doctor he knew. The inspector explained the situation to him. His friend told him to wait outside, then returned five minutes later.

  “We haven’t had any new admissions for two days.”

  What was going on? Was everyone bristling with good health, or did they simply not have enough money to pay the bills of the private clinics? Whatever the case, he had to conclude that Fazio hadn’t been hospitalized anywhere around there. Then where had he gone off to hide?

  As he was driving back to Vigàta, his cell phone rang. It was Mimì Augello.

  “Salvo, where are you?”

  “I was just now in Montelusa making the rounds of the hospitals. There’s no sign of Fazio anywhere. I’m on my way back.”

  “Listen . . . Maybe you should . . .”

  Montalbano immediately understood.

  “Don’t worry, he’s not at the morgue, either. How about you? Got any news?”

  “That’s what I was calling about. Can you come to the port? I’ll wait for you at the entrance.”

  “Which one?”

  “I’m just outside the southern gate.”

  “I’ll be right there.”

  The southern gate, the one closest to the eastern jetty, where the inspector often went for a walk after eating, was used mostly by the steady flow of cars and trucks about to get on the ferryboat for Lampedusa. The ferry left at midnight. Once the season began, that area of the port was a bivouac of foreign kids waiting to board.

  On either side of the enormous gate was a sort of sentry-box for the customs police on duty, who checked the comings and goings.

  But at that hour of the morning, all was quiet. The pandemonium of cars and passengers began around five P.M.

  “At night this gate and the central one are closed. Only the northern gate stays open,” Mimì explained.

  “Why’s that?”

  “Because that’s the area of the port where the trawlers dock and put out and where the cold storage houses and refrigerator trucks are. It’s basically the hub for the seafood business.”

  “Well, if something has happened to Fazio, it happened at night.”

  “That’s my point.”

  “Then why are we standing at the wrong gate?”

  “It may be the wrong gate, but the Customs cop on duty, whose name is Sassu, was working the northern gate last night.”

  “Did he see anything?”

  “Come, you can talk to him yourself.”

  Sassu looked to be just over twenty, but he seemed to be a quick, intelligent kid.

  “The fishing boats start to come in just after midnight,” he said. “They unload, and then one part of the day’s haul is immediately warehoused; another part is loaded onto the refrigerator trucks, which then leave at once. There’s usually a lot of bustle until about three in the morning. Afterwards, there’s about an hour of calm. And it was just before four o’clock that I heard the shots.”

  “How many?” Montalbano asked him.

  “Two.”

  “Are you sure they were gunshots?”

  “Not at all. It might have been a motorbike backfiring. And, in fact, just a few minutes later a large motorcycle drove by. And that reassured me at the time.”

  “Was there a second rider in back?”

  “No.”

  “And you didn’t hear any cries or yells?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Were you able to tell where the shots were coming from?”

  This time Sassu seemed less certain.

  “It’s strange,” he said softly.

  “What’s strange?”

  “Now that I think about it . . . It couldn’t have been a motorcycle.”

  “Why not?”

  “There was an interval of a couple of seconds between the two shots. The first one sounded like it came from over by the slips, but the second one was a lot farther away, out past the second or third storehouse . . . If it was a motorbike, the two bursts should have come from the same spot.”

  “Did it sound like someone chasing someone else trying to run away and firing at him?”

  “Yeah, something like that.”

  They thanked the Customs officer.

  “I don’t like the look of this,” Augello observed darkly.

  “Let’s go for a little walk,” the inspector said.

  “Where to?”

  “To the area between the slips and the two storehouses.”

  There were about ten cold storage warehouses, all in a row on the outside part of the central wharf, which was a sort of arm jutting out right in the middle of the harbor. The trawlers would moor directly there, and once they’d unloaded their haul, they would go over to the inside part of the wharf, where they would dock at their respective berths and their crews would disembark and go home to sleep.

  Montalbano and Augello walked up and down the slipway as far as the second storehouse, eyes glued to the ground.

  The road was a mire of mud grooved with deep furrows left by truck tires. The storehouses were all closed except for the third one, which had a Ford Transit van in front of it with its doors open. Inside the van one could see electrical cables, quadrants, knobs, and valves. Perhaps the refrigeration system had failed and was being repaired. Despite the van, there wasn’t a living soul about.

  “Let’s go, we’re not going to find anything here,” said Mimì. “We’re wasting our time. We would have to dig through the mud to find any clues. Anyway, the stink in the air is starting to get to me. I feel like I’m gonna throw up.”

  To Montalbano, however, that smell not only was not a stink, he actually liked it. It was the product of a combination of algae, rotting fish, dilapidated cordage, seawater, and tar, with a light touch of diesel fuel thrown in. Delicious, indeed exquisite.

  At the very moment they’d given up hope and were about to go back to the office, Mimì saw something sparkle parallel to the slipway. It was an empty shell that hadn’t been buried in the mud because it had fallen onto a piece of rotten plank. He bent down, picked it up, and wiped it with his hand. It wasn’t the least bit rusted or damaged. Clearly it had been there for only a few hours, not days or months.

  “Now we know for certain that it wasn’t a motorcycle,” Montalbano concluded.

  “At a glance, I’d say a 7.65,” said Augello. Then he asked: “What should we do with this shell?”

  “Make soup.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Mimì, how do you expect that cartridge to help us? All it gives us is confirmation that a gun was fired. For the moment, it can’t tell us anything else.”

  After hesitating for a moment, Augello put it in his pocket.

  Montalbano, having stopped, made no sign of resuming his walking.

  He was thinking, head bent as he stared at his shoe tops. He had a cigarette between his lips but had forgotten to light it. Mimì stood there in silence. Then the inspector started talking, but more than talking to Augello, he was thinking out loud.

  “So they fired the first shot at Fazio—assuming it was Fazio—as he was going back towards the northern gate. Apparently he’d already finished doing whatever it was he had to do in the area of the storage houses and was now heading out of the port, but someone was waiting for him here and fired at him.”

  “But why would they wait till he was at the slipway?” Mimì asked. “It’s the most dangerous spot because it’s the closest to the gate where there’s always a Customs agent.”

  “They had no choice. Say they grabbed him and killed him in front of one of the storehouses. If they didn’t get rid of the body real fast, they would have been forced to leave it there. But once the corpse was discovered, we definitely would have searched the storehouses. Which they didn’t want. The slipway, on the other hand, is a no-man’s-land. Everyone who docks at this wharf is forced to pass that way. It would be like shooting him on the main street in town.”

  “At any rate, they didn’t get him with
the first shot.”

  “Right. But then Fazio realizes he can’t keep running towards the gate. His path is barred by the guy who shot at him. So what does he do?”

  “What does he do?”

  “He turns tail and runs straight back the way he came, that is, towards the storehouses.”

  “But that’s even worse!”

  “Why?”

  “Because the road that passes in front of the storehouses ends at the sea! There’s no access to the wharf. Therefore he wouldn’t have been able to escape his pursuer. There was no way out. He ran straight into his own trap.”

  “But he knew exactly what the situation was at that moment, whereas we don’t.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Maybe there were some storehouses still open where he could ask for help. The fact is, as the Customs officer told us, they fired a second shot at him when he’d reached the second or third storehouse. And the fact that he didn’t hear any other shots is a bad sign.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning that that second shot may have wounded or killed him.”

  “Jesus Christ!” Augello cried out.

  “But it’s also possible that Fazio, seeing there was no way out, put his hands up and let them capture him.”

  “Listen, what if we requested a search warrant for the storage houses?” Augello proposed.

  “A waste of time.”

  “Why on earth?!”

  “If they killed him, they certainly wouldn’t have kept the body. And even if he’s wounded or captured, they couldn’t keep him in a cold storage facility for more than a couple of hours, or he’d turn stiffer than a stockfish.”

  “Okay, but if he’s dead, where’d they put the body?”

  “I think I have an idea. Want to hear it?”

  “Of course.”

  “In the sea, Mimì. Well ballasted.”

  “What the hell are you saying?”

  “It’s just an idea, Mimì, no need to get upset. Try to think. If they did in fact kill him, throwing him into the sea was the easiest and safest thing to do. I’m convinced there was no way they could hide the body in one of the storehouses. Even if most of the heavy work was already done at that hour, there had to be a few people still about. It would have been too risky. Trust me, we should stop thinking about it.”