Dante's Numbers

by David Hewson

  “You saw it?” she asked them. “When it was here?”

  “We were kids,” Hank replied. “It was fun to go somewhere movie stars had been. To stand on the same spot. Like touching the hem of God. Not that we would have put it that way back then.” He nodded at the mission. “Much more fun than that place, anyway.”

  “The funny thing is,” Frank went on, “they left that fake gravestone there for a while. It was a tourist attraction. The mission needed the money. You can't blame them. Then…” He glanced back at the little chapel again. “… someone said it was disrespectful. An insult to the real dead people here.”

  “As if they're going to complain,” Hank added. “No one's been buried here in years.”

  “Does that matter?” she wondered.

  Frank shuffled, uncomfortable. “When you're dead you're dead. Only fools and children believe in ghosts.”

  She felt the same way, usually. “That's what Scottie thought. Was he right?”

  Frank nodded earnestly. “Yes. He was bang on the money, even if it did cost him. Is there anything else you need to see? Churches give me the creeps, to be honest with you. Also, if we're in time, we can hit the happy hour at a little bar we know…”

  “No. I don't think so…” she began, and then her eye caught the tree.

  What was it Catherine Bianchi said? In California, almonds flowered at the end of February. That would mean they would bear fruit during the summer.

  Next to the place where the grave of the fictional Carlotta Valdes had once stood was an old, crooked almond tree, little more than the height of a man. Its leaves fluttered weakly in the early evening breeze; its feeble, arthritic branches were black with age and dead fungi. On each, visible, still a little green from their newness, stood lines of nuts in their velvet, furry shells.

  She took two steps towards the tree, reached up, and tugged one from the nearest branch.

  “You're going to get us in trouble,” Hank warned.

  “Perish the thought…”

  Teresa crouched down and found a stone. Then she placed the nut on its surface and cracked the shell open with a rock. There was a loud bang that ricocheted around the walls of the tiny graveyard. She studied the shards of the inner fruit, white and mashed against the stone.

  There was no lab in San Francisco she could use. So she picked up the largest piece and put it in her mouth.

  Even before she got to her feet, she was coughing. It was painful. Someone—she couldn't see who—was thumping her on the back. There was a new voice, a woman's voice.

  With no grace whatsoever, she spat out every last piece of the almond she could. Even so, the taste lingered.

  It was the most bitter thing she'd ever known.

  “What are you doing? What are you doing?” The face of a severe, dark-skinned Mexican-looking woman hove into view and began castigating her.

  “It was…” She started coughing, gagging for breath.

  Another woman, a nun, with a blue headdress, arrived, carrying a plastic cup with water in it. Teresa drank greedily and found herself spitting out more pieces of almond.

  “I'm sorry,” she said, and found herself coughing again.

  “Why did you do that?” the nun asked. “This is a cemetery. Not an orchard.”

  “I was curious. The fruit was very…harsh.”

  The two women were silent.

  “It's a bitter almond,” Teresa asked, “isn't it?”

  The nun crossed her arms in anger. “They say the first priests planted it. Two hundred and fifty years ago. Do we need to put up a sign saying ‘Don't steal the almonds'?”

  The Mexican woman touched the branches. “It's dying. We feed it. We try to care for it. Nothing helps.” She shook her head. Her eyes were sad. “Perhaps it's for the best. If people keep coming here and taking away what's not theirs…”

  Teresa felt her heart skip a beat and prayed it wasn't a side effect of the bitter nut she'd just eaten. “Someone else ate the almonds?”

  “A man,” the Mexican woman said. “And he had a bag! He took many, and wouldn't give them back when we caught him.”

  Hank and Frank were looking at her and licking their lips in anticipation.

  “This man,” Teresa asked, “do you know who he is? I really need to know.”

  The nun took the plastic cup and gave her a withering look. “We don't know his name. We told the police, of course. This is a nice neighbourhood. We don't want people coming in and stealing things. The police said we were wasting their time. There are worse crimes in this city than stealing almonds from a graveyard.”

  The Mexican woman waved her fist in the air. “But we had a photograph! A photograph!”

  Teresa wanted to laugh. She still felt giddy. The nasty taste wouldn't go away. “Can I see it?”

  The two women stared at her and said nothing.

  “Please. It may be important.”

  “The parroco has it,” the Mexican woman said. “The pastor. He is out for a little while.”

  “Then I'll wait.”

  “Not here,” the nun ordered. “In the basilica, please.” She patted the trunk of the withering almond tree. “Out of the way of temptation.”

  MARTIN VOGEL'S APARTMENT WAS PAST UNION Square, the department stores and gift shops, the cable cars and the constant presence of street people pestering for money. It lay in a nondescript commercial building down a dark, dank lane. SoMa, Nic learned from the guidebooks, was a trendy part of the city, up and coming, aspiring to be cultural, in much the same way as Testaccio in Rome. In parts it had the same tough, rough, urban aspect, too.

  He found a discreet, half-hidden set of nameplates by a set of side doors. One, number 213, which he took to mean the second floor, had the scrawled name Vogel by it.

  His finger lurked over the bell push for a moment. Then Costa chose another name, a few doors along, pressed the button, and waited.

  A woman's voice, taut, angry, and hurried, barked out of the speaker.

  “Pizz—” he began to say.

  “Jesus Christ!” the woman screeched.

  The buzzer on the lock bleated. He pushed the door open and found himself inside a spare, cool atrium that smelled of bleach.

  Without thinking, he patted his jacket. There was no gun there. He was just another civilian.

  He walked upstairs, trying to think of what he'd say. He hadn't just broken the photographer's arm. He'd stood on it. This didn't worry him any more now than when it had happened. Vogel had been stalking them for reward and the paparazzo had been determined to get out of there without helping once he had his pictures. Costa had needed to know where they were, to extract from him the exact location so that an ambulance could find them. Costa felt he'd had little alternative.

  There was a sound from the floor above. A dog barking. A woman's cry. Music. From somewhere the shriek of a baby. There was the smell of stale food and rotten trash. Down the stairwell fell the noise of people arguing several floors up.

  When he got to the top of the staircase, he found himself in near darkness. Two of the strip lights in the corridor ceiling had failed. A third flickered sickly, on and off.

  The baby wailed again, its cries echoing off the walls so much he had no idea from which direction the sound came.

  Each door had a little light behind the bell push. The nearest read 256. He walked along. The next read 257.

  The wrong side, and the wrong direction. It was turning out to be one of those days.

  He wondered whether this was a good idea at all. Then he thought about what Falcone would say if he came back and admitted he'd pulled out at the last moment. The good mood that the presence of Catherine Bianchi instilled in the inspector was, like most things surrounding Falcone, transient. The inspector's private life consisted of a series of short, intense relationships followed by periods of mute, surly celibacy. The pattern was well established now. Costa didn't want to bounce it out of phase prematurely.

  He recrossed the stairwe
ll and strode down the opposite corridor. Only one light was out here. As he walked, the sounds of the apartment block receded. There were no crying babies in this part of the building, no angry voices.

  Costa reached the door of apartment 213. It was ajar, just a finger's width, enough to let a shaft of orange artificial light stumble through and fall on the tiled floor of the apartment in an eccentric shape.

  Decisions, he thought.

  He edged his foot forward until it reached the cheap painted wood that was supposed to keep Martin Vogel safe from the world beyond. The door moved steadily inwards at his touch, on hinges that needed a touch of oil.

  THE LATER THE HOUR, THE MORE UNCOMFORTable Hank and Frank became. Churches really didn't suit them and the bar was calling. Finally, just before eight, she lost patience and sent them on their way. She could ride a bus home. One went from the street outside all the way down to the waterfront at the Marina. She liked buses. They put you in touch with people.

  Predictably, the priest appeared moments after the two brothers departed. She took one look at the man in the familiar black frock and felt her heart sink. He had a long pale face, pockmarked cheeks sagging with age. His eyes were sad and rheumy, as if they'd seen rather too much. A drink with the twins might be welcome relief after a little time in the gloom of Mission Dolores. She was glad she'd made a note of their favourite bar.

  Then she told him who she was and where she came from. The priest opened his mouth and her opinion changed instantly. His voice did not match his appearance in the slightest. It was bright and young and engaged, as if some lively inner spirit was trapped inside an older, more fragile frame. The parroco introduced himself as Dermot Gammon, originally from Boston, but a resident of Rome for several years before returning to the U.S. and ending up in San Francisco.

  “Where do you live?” he asked her.

  “Off Tritone. The Via Crispi.”

  He rubbed his hands together and a beatific expression put fresh light in his eyes. A comprehensive list of local stores and restaurants and wine bars streamed from his lips.

  “You know Rome well,” she said sincerely.

  They spent a few happy minutes discussing her home city. Finally the priest asked her why she was there. She told him a little about the case and the movie, then said, “They told me you had a photograph. Of the man they found stealing something in the cemetery.”

  His long, sad face fell into a frown. “A bag full of almonds. The ladies…” He sighed. “Sometimes their desire to protect this place goes to extremes. We exist to cater to souls, not bricks and mortar. They saw the man, they took some photos. I showed them to the police. Our local captain was not, I have to say, terribly interested or impressed.” He edged forward, as if making some statement in confession. “Which pleased me greatly. I don't wish to see the mission in the newspapers. Only for births and marriages and deaths, and a few charitable occasions. Certainly not as part of something as serious as this dreadful investigation you mentioned. Am I making myself clear?”

  “I'll be discreet. I promise. Besides, it's probably nothing. I'm shooting arrows in the dark, hoping one will land somewhere sunny.”

  “That's work for a priest. Not a scientist.”

  “I wouldn't presume to teach you your job, Father. Science and religion aren't enemies.”

  “Really?” He didn't look convinced. “I must disagree. Nothing wonderful that I recall of Rome has to do with science.”

  “Not the Sistine Chapel? Michelangelo thought himself more an architect than a painter. And Bernini. Those statues. How could he create them without knowing anatomy?”

  “I was always a Caravaggio man myself. I like real human beings, frail men and women, not make-believe perfect ones. With out the fallible…” The priest opened his hands and looked around the dark interior of the mission. “…I'm out of a job.”

  “Without mysteries we both are. Please, Father. The photographs. Just to satisfy my curiosity.”

  He excused himself for a few minutes. When he came back, he sat down by her side and retrieved a snapshot from the inside of his gown. It was too dark to see much of it, so she went and stood beneath the electric candles close to the altar.

  The priest followed, looked over her shoulder, and said, “The gardener told me to chop that tree down two years ago. He said it's dying. Too old.”

  She peered at the figure in the picture. The man was holding a supermarket bag that, from its bulging shape, appeared to contain a good collection of nuts. He was arguing with the Mexican woman she'd seen earlier.

  “I told them all, ‘It's a tree,'” the priest went on. “ ‘Not a human being. The thing is insensate. It feels no pain, has no consciousness of its impending end, or its present feeble state. We can wait a little while,' I say. Not thinking…” His glassy eyes stared into hers. “I've been here thirteen years, Ms. Lupo. We've never had a single person take something from the cemetery. Not something supposedly edible anyway. Now two in a matter of weeks.”

  “It's not edible. It's a bitter almond. Poisonous in quantity.”

  He looked shocked. “That's why the man took those nuts? Because they're poisonous?”

  “Someone with a little knowledge might know, I imagine. Most people would simply see an almond tree…”

  Its gnarled, failing form stood next to the patch of ground where the imaginary Carlotta Valdes's grave had been created for the film, and stayed, for a few uncertain years, in real life, too, until someone deemed it unsuitable for a real cemetery. It was a link, one that, like the rest, seemed to lead into some opaque and unrelenting San Franciscan fog.

  “Do you know this man?” the priest asked.

  She gave him back the photograph. “He's wearing sunglasses, Father. And he's turned away from the camera…”

  He took the snapshot from her. “I'm sorry. I gave you the wrong one. Here. There's a better picture.”

  Father Gammon scrabbled again in his clothes. A crumpled packet of cigarettes fell to the floor. He apologised and looked a little guilty, then picked them up. In his other hand was a new photo.

  This was clear and distinct, even in the fusty yellow light of the electric altar candles.

  “Do you know him now?”

  “I believe so,” she answered. “Will you excuse me, please?”

  Falcone was furious at being interrupted halfway through what sounded like a nervous dinner with Catherine Bianchi. But not for long.

  COSTA PUSHED THE DOOR AS FAR AS IT WOULD go. It was pitch black in the apartment.

  There was a smell, though. Something familiar: the harsh odour of a spent weapon and behind it the faint tang of blood. From a tinny radio in a room beyond the entrance came the sound of music. Tannhäuser. He thought of the burly photographer squealing as he stood on his shattered arm. The man hadn't looked like an opera fan.

  He stopped and listened. Not a sound except the music, but that was so full and insistent… Costa found the wall inside the entrance, making sure he stayed inside the shadow as much as possible. It wasn't a good idea to be a silhouette in a doorway. He couldn't see a thing. Then, in the middle of a line, the music stopped abruptly.

  “Police,” he said quietly into the dark.

  All he could hear was his own voice in the dark of an apartment where the smell of spent ammunition was so strong it seemed like the mark of some murderous feral cat.

  When it came, the racket made him jump. The electronic wail of the mobile phone cut through the black interior of Vogel's apartment like the scream of a child.

  It was the tone he'd set for Falcone. Costa swore, ducking further back into the pool of gloom by the door, desperate to avoid becoming an easy target.

  He yanked the phone out of his pocket and killed the call.

  There'd been another noise, though. Someone moving in the blackness ahead of him. A new smell, too, one he couldn't place.

  Costa stared at the bright blue screen in his hand, got Falcone's number, and texted four words, URGT VOGEL A
PT NOW.

  Then he threw the phone across to the other side of the room and pressed back against the wall. The ring tone went off seconds after. The space in front of him was briefly filled by sound, the bellowing roar of gunfire fighting to escape the confined space that enclosed it.

  He froze where he was, cold and sweating. Someone was scrabbling around on the floor, maybe three or four strides to the right, struggling to say something. The unseen figure's breathing was laboured, words unintelligible. He sounded sick or wounded, in some kind of trouble. But he was a man with a gun. The strong, noxious smell was beginning to overwhelm everything.

  Finally he worked out what it was. Petrol.

  Down the corridor someone screamed. The baby was wailing again. Lights were coming on, voices were rising.

  He wanted to kick himself. They'd called the police before. The woman had let him in immediately, not because she thought he was a pizza deliveryman, but because she thought he was the police. The gunfire had started before he'd blundered onto the scene. That was why everything was so quiet, so deserted. Sane people stayed out of the way.

  As he moved a fraction further into the room, Costa stumbled, found his fingers encountering the familiar hard metal frame of a photographer's tripod. He pushed it over, heard it clatter.

  There was no shooting this time. He fell to the floor, rolling, turning, turning, out into the corridor, scrabbling on hands and knees to get out of the deadly frame of the doorway.

  Breathless and sweating, but outside the apartment, finally, he heard nothing more. As he started to scramble upright, he found himself staring into the barrel of a gun. The man who held it was black, stocky, and wore the uniform of an SFPD cop. He looked terrified. The weapon trembled in his hands.

  “I'm a police officer,” Costa said, slowly, carefully raising his hands. “My ID's in my jacket pocket.”

  The gun was sweaty in the young cop's grip. He passed it from one hand to the other, then back, the barrel staying straight in Costa's face. He nodded at the open doorway. “You gonna tell me what I might find in there? And why you was looking?”