The Fatal Touch

by Conor Fitzgerald

  “As rare as a white fly, aren’t you?” said Blume.

  “Whatever that means. Look, Alec, eighteen months ago you agreed, as an American citizen, to leverage your particular competencies to contribute to the knowledge base of the embassy, correct?”

  Blume looked over at Kristin, but got no sympathy.

  “Alec, I was talking to you?” said Greg.

  Blume picked up the remote control and turned on the TV where the studio guests were shouting as they watched a slo-mo replay of a disputed offside by Zlatan Ibrahimović.

  “Alec, turn off the TV,” said Kristin.

  “No, wait a moment . . . I want to hear this. Jesus, Roma lost to Siena. Can you believe that? Siena!”

  “Alec!” Kristin walked over and turned off the TV. “Come on, this isn’t helping.”

  “Stop wasting my time, then,” said Blume. “Let’s talk about Colonel Farinelli. You’re interested in him, or you and your boy wonder wouldn’t be here.”

  Kristin laughed. “Alec, grow up. Greg has something to tell you. It concerns events that happened before he was born, but he’s learned all the details.”

  “OK, Alec,” said Greg. “I’m going to cut right to the chase if that’s OK with you: the embassy fears embarrassment.” He paused to see if this had any great effect on Blume, then continued: “It’s all ancient history, so it’s not that important, but it would be nice if Farinelli and this Treacy investigation did not mushroom, and open some old wounds.”

  “It’s not the history that’s ancient, it’s you that’s young,” said Blume. “After Moro got killed, Cossiga took the reins of power, then handed over to Andreotti who shared with Craxi who passed it on to Berlusconi, and here we all are happy in the present again.”

  “That’s pretty simplistic,” said Greg. “And you left out a lot of prime ministers.”

  “Simplistic? I’ll tell you what’s simplistic . . .” began Blume, but Kristin intervened.

  “OK, Greg, I’ll take it from here,” she said. “Alec, have you heard of Richard Gardner?”

  “Wasn’t he the American ambassador back then? I remember my parents got invited to a few opening nights when he was in charge.”

  “Right. He was ambassador from 1977 to 1981.”

  “During the Carter administration,” said Greg.

  “Thank you for that, Greg,” said Blume. “What about him?”

  “He wrote a book about his experience here, called Mission Italy. It came out a few years ago,” said Kristin. “It’s a pretty good book. Well written, elegant, polite, learned—a bit like Gardner himself.”

  “Well, that’s nice,” said Blume.

  “Yes, it is. It reflects well on the embassy, and gives a lucid and straightforward account of US policy in Italy during the Moro kidnapping and murder.”

  “What was the policy?”

  “To be helpful without getting too involved. Hands-off. Our Chief Security Officer, a guy called Arthur Brunetti, wrote a sort of bible on the Red Brigades and the Moro murder. The US administration sent over a guy called Steve Pieczenik, a hostage negotiator; see if he could help the Italian government by speaking with all sides. Turns out he couldn’t, so he went home.”

  “Couldn’t what, speak?”

  “Maybe. I don’t know. He spoke French, Russian. He spent fifty-five days in the company of Cossiga and a few Carabinieri.”

  “Including Farinelli?”

  “Possibly.”

  “Is Pieczenik still alive?”

  “Yes. He’s over seventy now. You know Tom Clancy, the writer? Well, Pieczenik is his co-author. He co-writes all those Net Force and Op-Center thrillers.”

  “How do you spell Pieczenik?”

  Kristin spelled out the name. “One of his books is about the Moro kidnapping,” she said. “He couldn’t get it published with a real publisher . . .”

  “If he writes with Tom Clancy, but couldn’t get this published, the only reason is someone stopped him.”

  “He couldn’t find a mainstream publisher, so he self-published, and that should be enough to dispel your conspiracy ideas about some agency trying to suppress his revelations. His book is called Terror Counter Terror. And it may have lightly fictionalized versions of real people in it.”

  “This is just a can-of-worms situation?”

  “Basically. We far prefer Gardner’s and Brunetti’s elegant narratives of those years to any other. If Farinelli gets back in the news and starts reminiscing about his days with the forgers Treacy and Chichiarelli, it might force us into a position where we have to issue damage limitation statements. We can do that, but we would prefer not to.”

  “No problem. I think Colonel Farinelli shares the embassy’s opinion that the less said the better.”

  “As a matter of fact, he does. But a man died last night who may have written a draft of a book that talks about precisely those things the embassy, Farinelli, the government, and most of the opposition parties would prefer to forget about.”

  “How do you know this?” asked Blume.

  “By funny coincidence, not long after you called about the Colonel, the Colonel called about you. He seems convinced you might have these writings in your possession. Do you?”

  Greg decided it was his turn. “It’s not like we want to suppress anything, we’re not . . . Iran or China. But it would be nice if we could see what sort of stuff to expect.”

  “Prevention is better than cure, even for a minor chill,” said Kristin.

  “This could mean suppressing publication?” asked Blume.

  “No way,” said Greg. “That’s just not us.”

  “Who says anyone would want to publish the ravings of a discredited art forger anyhow?” said Kristin. “By the way, it sounds to me like you do have them, Alec.”

  Blume stood up, went into the kitchen, opened the window, and leaned out, scanning the courtyard gate and the street three floors below. The blue car was still there.

  He turned back from the window, picked the notebook off the refrigerator, and returned to his guests.

  “Hey, Greg,” he said pleasantly, “let me read you a bit from the notebooks, tell me what you think.”

  He located the passage on Moro he had seen earlier and read it out.

  “In May that year, the two American students J. had been talking to found a leather bag in the back of a taxi. It contained a Beretta pistol, an unopened packet of Muratti cigarettes, the brand that the assassinated Prime Minister used to smoke, eleven 7.65 bullets, the same number as were pumped into Moro’s body, an ink-stained golf ball, a key ring and keys, a false driving license, camera flashcubes, a piece of paper, a packet of Paloma tissues, the same make stuffed into the bullet holes on Moro’s body, and a map showing the Vigo lake area and several pages in code . . . The two students brought the bag to the Carabinieri barracks of Podogora, and were interviewed by Captain Farinelli. Farinelli never laughed, but even he must have smiled sardonically to see the evidence he and Tony had so carefully planted in the taxi come straight back to his own desk. If those American kids had only brought the evidence to another station, or better still, to the Polizia. Instead, it all came back like a boomerang, and suddenly everyone was suspicious of Farinelli. A lot of people suspected the two American kids were in on the plot, but they weren’t.”

  Greg looked stunned. “Eleven 7.65 bullets. The same number as were in Moro’s body . . . it’s all there!” He looked up at Kristin and said, “I don’t get the bit about the golf ball, though.”

  Blume answered for him. “A golf ball from an electric typewriter, not one you hit.”

  “Oh shit, yeah. I knew that,” said Greg.

  “You can’t be expected to remember everything you learn, Greg,” said Blume. “Tell me, did you come here on your own, or were you accompanied by Kristin?”

  Kristin arched her eyebrows at him.

  “Is this like a jealousy thing?” asked Greg. “Because there’s no way . . .”

  “Yes or no?” said
Blume.

  “Of course I came in my own car. Kristin phoned and we agreed to meet here.”

  Blume held up his hand. “That’s fine. That’s all I needed to know. Well, that and your cell number.”

  “What d’you need it for?” Greg sounded worried.

  “You’ll see. You got mine?” Greg hesitated, and Blume said, “I see you have. Good. Call me.”

  Greg picked up his phone and a few seconds later Blume’s rang in his pocket.

  “OK. I’ll save that number in a minute.”

  “Alec, please tell me what you’re doing,” said Kristin.

  Blume pulled the notebook out of Greg’s lap. “This is just one,” he said. “The other two are in the study.”

  He went into his parents’ study, hid Treacy’s notebooks under the horsehair sofa. He pulled down three of his father’s blank notebooks, dropped them into a plastic bag he found in the kitchen, and brought them into the living room. He gave Greg a flash of the contents of the bag.

  “I don’t want to have these anymore,” he said. Greg began to pull them out of the bag to look, and Blume said, “No, seriously. I’ve had enough of this ancient history. As I’m sure you two already know, the Questore has taken me off the case. This is something that is useful for my country, I’m glad to be able to help. But those notebooks are also part of an inquiry I had begun, and—well, let’s just say I’d like to see them again someday.”

  “We appreciate you doing this, Alec,” said Greg. “It’s very helpful.”

  “What are you playing at, Alec?” asked Kristin.

  “I am being helpful. Is that so hard to understand?”

  “Yes, actually. It is,” said Kristin.

  “Greg,” said Blume. “I’m breaking Italian law here, but I’m sure the Colonel won’t object if he knows they are in safe hands. But your hands must be safe. These notebooks cannot go missing, is that clear?”

  “Sure, I’ll look after this.”

  “No, Greg. I need a solemn promise from you. I want you to take these notebooks and put them in a safe place in the embassy. Right now. It can be your room, but it’s got to be in the US Embassy. It’s about the most guarded place in the city. Can you do that for me?”

  Greg hesitated, sensing a trap but unable to see what it might be.

  “As soon as you get there, you can read them, copy them, do what you need to do. But these originals—they have to stay safe. You understand that?”

  “Why are you trusting me instead of Kristin? I understand you two are good friends.”

  “Exactly,” said Blume, winking at the young man and lowering his voice. “So if I have to choose which one of you I want to stay here with me this evening . . .”

  Greg grinned. “Yeah, I totally get that.”

  Blume stood close to him, pressing the plastic bag into his hand, urging him to leave. Greg looked for guidance to Kristin, who merely shrugged.

  As soon as Greg had left, bag in hand, Kristin said, “I don’t know what game you’re playing.”

  “No game,” said Blume absently. “Excuse me. That chili. I need to go to the bathroom again.”

  “I think I’ll leave, too.”

  “At least wait till I’m finished in the bathroom before you do.”

  Kristin’s nose wrinkled. “Do you have to be so explicit?”

  “Forthright, you mean. Explicit would involve description . . . give me three minutes.”

  Blume locked the bathroom door, stood in the bath, opened the window, and peered out. He heard the squeak and clash of the front gate closing, and then Greg came into his line of vision on the sidewalk. Blume pulled out his phone and hit the redial button, then watched as Greg put the bag between his knees to search for his phone.

  “It’s me,” he whispered when Greg answered. “Did I give you all three notebooks?”

  He watched as Greg opened the bag, peered in, pulling one of the notebooks out a little.

  “Yeah, I got three here.”

  “Cool,” said Blume. “Maybe you should hand them in to the marines at the gate, you know?”

  “I can handle it, Alec. It’s my job.”

  “Great.” Blume hung up and watched Greg tuck the volumes firmly into his armpit and disappear into the night.

  He came out of the bathroom. Kristin had redone her buttons and was looking severely at him. “You’re not being cooperative, Alec. It’s written all over your face.”

  “Don’t you want to stay?”

  “I don’t think so. I get the feeling you want me here as some sort of alibi. We can talk again another time. Thanks for the lovely dinner.”

  She left. Blume went over to his kitchen window, which afforded a more generous view of the street below. Greg was out of sight now. As he watched, Blume saw the blue car pull out of its place, its metallic sheen glinting briefly as it passed a streetlight. Three minutes later, Kristin appeared. She glanced up at the window and he waved.

  She did not wave back.

  Blume made himself a sweet espresso on the stove and heaped sugar into his small cup. He blew it cold, then gulped it down like a shot of bourbon and kept the cup tilted to allow the sugary sludge at the bottom to slide into his mouth. Then he phoned Greg again.

  “Me again. Do they teach you countersurveillance?”

  “What’s this about?”

  “Maybe you are being followed. I wouldn’t go home until you’re sure. Get the notebooks to the embassy. I’ll call you back in five.”

  “Wait, I . . .”

  Blume had a second coffee, with less sugar this time. Five minutes later he phoned again.

  “Well?”

  “You’re right. I am definitely being followed. I don’t think they are even trying to hide it.”

  “They probably are,” said Blume. “It’s just they’re no good at it. Carabinieri. Can’t get anything right.”

  “Is that who they are?”

  “That’s what I would guess. You had better make the trip from your car to the embassy gates as short as possible.”

  “I have a permit, I can drive right in,” said Greg.

  “Well, thank God for that,” said Blume.

  He opened the first notebook and began to read from where he had left off. Two hours later, he made another pot of coffee. It was not until six in the morning that he finally shut the second book.

  Chapter 17

  Blume slept like a baby for four hours. At ten, he went for a run in the park, already filling up with the Sunday crowds. He was still enjoying the ache and stretch of his leg muscles when he reached the station. Saturday nights were the busiest, late Sunday mornings were the quietest. Grattapaglia was standing by the coffee machine in the corridor, stirring sugar into the mini plastic cup that made coffee and everything else the machine dispensed taste like crude oil. Blume touched him on the elbow.

  “You’re doing the reports?”

  “Yes.”

  “Glad to hear it. But things aren’t looking good for you. A special investigator is being appointed tomorrow. He’ll take a day or two to get started. You want to keep working right up to the suspension.”

  Grattapaglia nodded calmly.

  Where was all this serene acceptance of the veteran yesterday morning, Blume wondered.

  Blume went into his office, the reinvigorating effects of his run already fading. He was about to call Caterina to find out where she had got to with Treacy’s notebooks, when the phone on his desk rang. It was the Questore, phoning from home, reminding him of the need to cooperate in the disciplinary action for the policeman who had assaulted the diplomat. Blume gave bland assurances and hung up not quite while his boss was still speaking, but almost.

  Kristin phoned him on his cell.

  That took longer than I thought, said Blume to himself. He had been expecting her call in the wee hours of the morning.

  “I suppose you think that was a very clever thing to do?” she said as he answered.

  “More than anything else, it was funny,�
� said Blume, though he heard his own voice say the word “funny” in a flat and unapologetic tone. “When did Greg find out?”

  “This morning. I’m the only one he’s told, as you can imagine. He wants to kill you now.”

  “I’d enjoy seeing him try.”

  “I doubt you’d enjoy it really. Look, Alec, I need to know what you are doing. Not cooperating with the embassy is one thing. We’re fine with that, up to a point. But actively working against us . . .”

  “I wasn’t. I’ll cooperate with you. I just need a little time to look into them.”

  “This giving him blank notebooks was what, a practical joke?” asked Kristin. “Uno scherzo da prete.”

  “Sure it was.”

  “What about Greg saying he was being followed and that you tipped him off. That was a joke, too?”

  “You can’t believe anything Greg tells you after that,” said Blume.

  “Did you use him as some sort of decoy?”

  Blume’s phone beeped in his ear to indicate another caller was trying to contact him. He took the phone from his ear and looked at the display. Another unknown number.

  “. . . waiting for an answer, Alec.”

  “Look, Kristin, I’ll get back to you on this.”

  “I really think you should.”

  Whoever had been calling him had given up. His desk phone rang.

  “Commissioner Blume.” Farinelli’s voice sounded softer on the phone, almost girlish. “In the office on a Sunday morning, and what recognition do we public servants get?”

  “How can I help you, Colonel?”

  “I thought you might be interested to get the autopsy report on Treacy.”

  “It’s ready?”

  “Not yet. Tomorrow, afternoon. We could look at it together over lunch. And before you ask: no, I have no idea what to expect in the report.”

  “Sounds fun, but I’m not sure I can make lunch.”

  “I am flexible with my mealtimes. Three o’clock is a good time for a snack. So is five. I’m sure you can make time during the working day. You are a commanding officer. Delegate, then call me to find out which restaurant.”

  “I’ll see what I can do, Colonel.”