‘Well, that’s the big mess I was referring to. We had no choice but to inform the ministry. Someone called La Cava to suggest that he pass it off as a hunting accident. But La Cava retorted that he had the wrong person. He said that the dead, at least as far as he knew, were not granted parliamentary immunity, and therefore he was going to institute proceedings against unknown persons for murder. He said he was going to turn Mongibello’s life inside out like a sock. He would start with trying to find out what he was doing wandering about in some godforsaken place at midnight, carrying a briefcase with two million counterfeit euros in it.’
‘Counterfeit euros?!’
‘Yes, though very skilfully made. I think Mongibello got them from the Cuffaros and didn’t even know they were counterfeit. I think La Cava, for his part, wants to scare the living daylights out of the Cuffaros. And we’re going to do our level best to help him.’
Montalbano felt himself grow jubilant at the sound of these words – despite Sponses’s overuse of clichés.
‘Thanks,’ he said.
‘Thank you,’ said Sponses, ‘and good night.’
*
A wolflike appetite suddenly came over him. He laid the table on the veranda and went to see what was in the fridge.
Adelina had prepared two vegetarian dishes for him: an aubergine Parmigiana that practically made him faint with its fragrance, and a salad with everything in it from lettuce and passuluna olives to potatoes and cucumbers.
He sat down outside. It was a dark night, but peaceful. Far out at sea he could see a few fishing lamps.
As he put the first forkful in his mouth, Montalbano thought that, when all was said and done, things could not have gone any better.
Author’s Note
This novel was written a number of years ago. Any attentive reader who notices the more or less accentuated crises of ageing, or the more or less decontextualized quarrels with Livia, and so on, should not blame it on the author but on the secret alchemy of publishers’ schedules. The names of the characters, companies, situations, and places are entirely the fruit of my imagination. I need to say this so that nobody gets the wrong idea.
Notes
Pagelink – Ragonese had applauded the police after the ‘Mexican butchery’ they’d imported to Genoa for the G8 summit in 2001. During the G8 summit in Genoa in 2001, Italian police used heavy-handed tactics against protesters who’d come from all over Europe. Perhaps the worst incident involved raiding the youth hostel where many were sleeping, dragging them violently out of bed, inflicting serious injury on several of them, and then arresting them. Later a young man was killed when he threatened carabinieri with a dustbin during a demonstration.
Pagelink – ‘Congratulations on your run of luck.’ / ‘You can even call it by its proper name: culo.’ In Italian slang, culo (ass, arse, buttocks) means ‘good luck’. It can have the negative connotation of ‘undeserved luck’, especially in sporting situations.
Pagelink – . . . a man who’d been a minister and Prime Minister a great many times had been found definitively guilty of the crime of collusion with the Mafia, and yet continued to enjoy the status of senator for life? A reference to Giulio Andreotti (1919—2013), repeatedly a fixture at the head of the Italian government for many decades.
Pagelink – ‘Ever since your government made it legal for people to shoot at thieves.’ In one of his several terms as Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, trying to emulate lax American laws concerning firearms and their use, used his parliamentary majority to break with tradition and eased national restrictions on the possession of firearms and their use, making it legal to shoot at burglars and trespassers, even when the shooter’s life isn’t endangered.
Pagelink – He’d once had a similar lapse of memory involving a horseshoe and had nearly lost his life over it. This occurs in the novel The Track of Sand (Mantle, 2011).
Pagelink – Cillintano: that is, Adriano Celentano (b. 1938), an Italian rocker who has been a steady fixture on the pop music scene since ca. 1960.
Pagelink – The three biggest private television stations are the personal property of the head of the majority party, and two of the state television stations are headed by men chosen personally by the head of the majority party. This novel was written when Silvio Berlusconi was still Prime Minister.
Notes by Stephen Sartarelli
Also by Andrea Camilleri
Inspector Montalbano mysteries
THE SHAPE OF WATER
THE TERRACOTTA DOG
THE SNACK THIEF
THE VOICE OF THE VIOLIN
EXCURSION TO TINDARI
THE SCENT OF THE NIGHT
ROUNDING THE MARK
THE PATIENCE OF THE SPIDER
THE PAPER MOON
AUGUST HEAT
THE WINGS OF THE SPHINX
THE TRACK OF SAND
THE POTTER’S FIELD
THE AGE OF DOUBT
THE DANCE OF THE SEAGULL
THE TREASURE HUNT
ANGELICA’S SMILE
GAME OF MIRRORS
BLADE OF LIGHT
Short stories
MONTALBANO’S FIRST CASE AND OTHER STORIES
Other novels
HUNTING SEASON
THE BREWER OF PRESTON
Andrea Camilleri is one of Italy’s most famous contemporary writers. The Inspector Montalbano series has been translated into thirty-two languages and was adapted for Italian television, screened on BBC4. The Potter’s Field, the thirteenth book in the series, was awarded the Crime Writers’ Association’s International Dagger for the best crime novel translated into English. He lives in Rome.
Discover more at facebook.com/AndreaCamilleriAuthor
Stephen Sartarelli is an award-winning translator. He is also the author of three books of poetry, most recently The Open Vault. He lives in France.
First published 2016 by Penguin Books,
an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC
First published in the UK 2016 by Mantle
This electronic edition published 2016 by Mantle
an imprint of Pan Macmillan
20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR
Associated companies throughout the world
www.panmacmillan.com
ISBN 978-1-4472-6469-9
Copyright © Sellerio Editore 2012
Translation copyright © Stephen Sartarelli 2016
Jacket illustration: Jeff Fisher
Author photograph: Gattoni / Leemage / Writer Pictures
Originally published in Italian 2012 as Una voce di notte by Sellerio Editore, Palermo
The right of Andrea Camilleri to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Pan Macmillan does not have any control over, or any responsibility for, any author or third-party websites referred to in or on this book.
You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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