The Dark Heart of Florence: Number 6 in series (Michele Ferrara)

by Michele Giuttari

  Ferrara was increasingly convinced that this was a highly suspicious death. ‘Is there any proof of his identity?’

  ‘Nothing as yet, but Franceschini will do a dental X-ray.’

  ‘What about the ring?’

  ‘We can show it to a family member.’

  ‘Well, we can’t ask his aunt, she’s in hospital. She fainted while she was in Teresa’s office.’

  ‘There’s Alba Cecchi, she might recognise it,’ Teresa suggested.

  ‘Right. I’ll leave that to you, Teresa.’

  Ferrara told Rizzo about the safe mentioned by Alba.

  ‘Well, we’ll just have to find this safe. But the fire brigade have already sealed the apartment.’

  Ferrara ordered him to prepare a request for a search warrant and take it personally to the deputy prosecutor who had been assigned the case.

  ‘Go early tomorrow morning. The Prosecutor’s Department is closed today and there’s no way the deputy prosecutor on call will authorise anything.’

  ‘I’ll go at eight. Do I need to mention what Fabio’s friend told us as the reason for the request?’

  ‘Keep it vague, say a confidential source of proven reliability.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘And don’t forget, Francesco, there mustn’t be any mention of the fact that Fabio was working for us.’

  ‘OK.’

  This investigation, Ferrara thought as he watched his deputy leave, was becoming a minefield.

  Angelica was going crazy, unable to find any peace of mind.

  Her visit to Don Santo had proved futile, and now, back home, she was moving from one room to another, walking back and forth, sniffing as if seeking out the smell of her girlfriend’s skin, then constantly going out and inspecting the garden.

  Nothing.

  She remembered the sweet words with which she had comforted Guendalina in her saddest moments. She saw her lying asleep beside her with her head resting against her back, heard their sighs and moans during lovemaking, and thought about her doubts and jealousy, their arguments.

  It was useless: she could not calm down. She sat down on the sofa and started to cry. The world around her had changed. It had lost its savour.

  That evening, after dinner, Ferrara sat on the terrace. The heat had subsided a little and a pleasant breeze was coming off the river. After a while, Petra brought him a pullover and arranged it carefully over his shoulders.

  ‘Don’t take it off now,’ she said.

  He lit a cigar and took another sip of the red wine they had been drinking with their dinner. Wine and a cigar, what a great combination, he reflected.

  He thought over everything that had happened and told himself that it was no longer possible to speak about coincidences. He re-read the outline of essential information that he had drawn up at the office.

  Night of 28-29 August

  Victims: Enrico Costanza/Luis Rodriguez. Same 7.65 calibre pistol, fitted with a silencer. Two shots for Costanza, one for Rodriguez.

  Clues or useful elements: video with message from Genius. Also contains images of Madalena’s death. HP inkjet printer. 2004 diary (20 August): entry with word STUPID. Safe-deposit box. Foreign connections? Bank details. Statement by mechanic D’Amato. Anonymous phone call from San Piero a Sieve (Monster of Florence) informing us of envelope with eyes. Note signed Genius. Statement by Kirsten Olsen, Danish waitress. Identikit.

  Suspects: a man, professional. Possible medical knowledge. Likes challenges. Sadist? Probably just under six feet tall. Good knowledge of the area. Woman: drives a dark A-Class Mercedes, long hair (D’Amato’s identikit) or short reddish hair (Kirsten Olsen). Lives in or regularly visits Mugello.

  Night of 31 August-1 September

  Victim: Inspector Antonio Sergi. Strangulation.

  Clues or useful elements: worked for Secret Service. Infiltrated an international criminal organisation. Made reference to the ARCHIVIST (working on same case). Telephone records.

  Suspects: More than one person?

  Same night, 31 August-1 September

  Victim: damage to statue of Perseus.

  Clues or useful elements: two letters, E and G, each followed by a full stop. Evil Genius?

  Suspects: vandals? Or Genius?

  Thursday 2 September

  Victim: Beatrice Filangeri. Suicide?

  Clues or useful elements: none.

  Suspects: None. The Black Rose?

  Night of 4-5 September

  Victim: Fabio Biondi. House fire.

  Clues or useful elements: Statement by Fabio’s aunt. Statement by Fabio’s friend, Alba Cecchi. Safe? Search?

  Suspects: None. The Black Rose?

  He was struck again by the sequence of events. There were too many of them in such a short space of time, too many to all be the work of the same hand at any rate. There did seem to be a connection between the crimes, but in all probability there had been more than one criminal at work. And probably with different motives.

  That was the biggest mystery of all.

  What did Fabio Biondi have to do with the Black Rose? Was he the Archivist? The contents of the safe might be able to provide confirmation.

  Things were sure to become clearer soon.

  PART SEVEN

  TURNING POINTS

  75

  Monday 6 September

  She woke with a start.

  The music, which was coming from hidden speakers, was blasting out at full volume.

  She recognised Aerosmith.

  She rubbed her eyes, got up and went to the iron door, her heart pounding madly. She was convinced the monster would soon be back.

  And she was right.

  After a few moments the door opened and she only just had time to move a few feet away.

  ‘Get back on the mattress!’ he cried, grabbing her roughly by the arm.

  Fear and horror filled the air, along with the deafening lyrics of the song ‘Dream On’.

  That morning, Ferrara found a note Fanti had placed prominently in the middle of his desk, with the word URGENT in block capitals at the top. The note said that there had been a call from a colleague in the traffic police.

  ‘Fanti!’ he called, but there was no reply.

  He sat down and dialled the number for the North Florence traffic police.

  ‘Armando?’

  ‘Ah, Michele!’ Deputy Commissioner Armando Tucci replied.

  ‘What have you got for me?’

  ‘I have some documents in front of me that you might find interesting.’

  Ferrara imagined Tucci surrounded by his colleagues and his maps of the area.

  Tucci told him about the speed camera that had recorded a black A-Class Mercedes travelling at about twenty-five miles over the 55mph speed limit on the Siena–Florence slip road on the night of Friday to Saturday. A check on the number plate had identified the owner as a thirty-six-year-old woman living in the Mugello area.

  ‘That’s very good. Could you fax me the papers as soon as possible?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Thanks, Armando.’

  ‘If it leads to anything, Michele, keep us in mind for an official commendation!’

  ‘I won’t forget.’

  Ferrara called Fanti again. And this time his secretary came running in with some papers in his hand.

  ‘I was downstairs in records, chief —’

  ‘Don’t worry about that, Fanti. We should be getting a fax from the traffic police any moment now. I want you to bring it to me as soon as it comes.’

  Fanti went back into his room, took up position by the fax machine, and stared at it insistently.

  The day had got off to a good start. Feeling encouraged, Ferrara picked up the pile of newspapers, knowing the news there was unlikely to be equally encouraging.

  The front page of La Nazione screamed: MAN BURNT TO DEATH. The work of the elusive lift arsonist?

  In the middle was a photograph of the building, showing Fabio Biondi’s apartment
with its windows blown out and part of the façade blackened by smoke.

  Next to the story was a feature on all the arsonist’s previous crimes, noting the dates and locations of his attacks. The majority had taken place in the area between the Viale Talenti and the Ponte alla Vittoria, very near to the Isolotto. This latest act seemed to signal a new modus operandi, since it had caused the death of a resident and put the lives of other neighbours at risk. They could have been looking at a mass murder.

  How many more times must he strike before he is captured? was the question – clearly aimed at the police – with which the piece ended.

  After this latest incident, Ferrara thought, the Florentines must be feeling especially jittery. Neighbours would start eyeing one another suspiciously, because it had grown extremely likely that the arsonist was someone living a double life, outwardly ordinary, a maniac inside.

  He could imagine the lively discussions that must be going on around the city. People were always interested in the details of such sensational crimes.

  He folded the newspaper, hoping it wouldn’t be the journalists who solved this case.

  76

  It couldn’t have gone better!

  Rizzo had just left the administrative office of the Prosecutor’s Department, where he had been told that the case had been assigned to Deputy Prosecutor Erminia Cosenza.

  Nicknamed ‘La Rossa’ because of her flaming red hair, she was known for her authority, her pragmatism, her stubbornness and her ability to work for up to sixteen hours a day. She was held in high regard, although there were some who accused her of being a prima donna. But this was only because Erminia had never backed down and had taken on cases that no one else would have wanted to be involved in.

  He went up another floor and stopped outside Erminia’s door. The red light was on, meaning that she was not to be disturbed. He sat down on a chair in the corridor, the envelope containing the request on his lap, and waited.

  When the light went out about half an hour later, he knocked.

  ‘Come in!’

  Rizzo went in.

  Erminia Cosenza was not alone.

  Standing in front of her desk, saying goodbye, was Commander Eugenio Fossati, head of the fire brigade. Erminia was wearing a pale blue linen suit and high heels that served to emphasise her lovely legs.

  ‘Come in, Superintendent Rizzo, this is Commander Fossati.’

  ‘We met last night.’ He went to him and shook his hand. ‘As a matter of fact, I’m here about the fire.’

  ‘Go on, Superintendent.’

  Rizzo handed Erminia Cosenza the request and she went back behind her desk and sat down. When she had finished reading, she said, ‘The Commander here has just told me the results of the initial investigation. We’re definitely dealing with an arson attack.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Fossati said. Encouraged by a nod from the Deputy Prosecutor, he went on to say that his men had found fragments of glass bottles with traces of flammable liquid. Everything in the apartment had been completely destroyed, including the apparatus, the CDs, the DVDs, and so on.

  ‘It’s as if whoever started the fire knew that the victim was in possession of something compromising,’ Erminia said. ‘So I think it quite proper to accede to your request, Superintendent Rizzo. I’m going to authorise a search of the apartment. If you do discover a safe or any other hiding place, that may help to clarify matters.’

  Fossati nodded and said that he was willing to help in any way he could.

  ‘Please wait in my secretary’s office, Superintendent Rizzo,’ Erminia said. ‘I’ll have the order ready shortly.’

  She stood up and shook his hand.

  The DNA results had arrived.

  It was quarter past nine in the morning when Marshal Gori found the molecular biology report from Rome on his desk. The expert must have been working on it over the weekend for it to arrive so punctually.

  Let’s see what surprises this damn test has in store for us, Gori said to himself, with a pang of regret for the days when investigators had little more to go on than their intuition. Now the young deputy prosecutors seemed to give priority either to information from criminals who turned State’s evidence – taking their tip-offs, their suggestions, even their hypotheses as gospel – or to the results provided by science.

  But it was of vital importance to link this genetic profile to a specific person, otherwise it would just have been an end in itself. Gori was well aware that that DNA results alone could not solve a case.

  As a first step, he decided to check if this profile was present on their database.

  In Italy, unlike other countries such as Britain, where a database with the DNA profiles of millions of individuals had been in existence since 1995, a single register had not yet been created. However, the Carabinieri had compiled lists of the DNA profiles that had been linked to serious crimes.

  The right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing, Gori said to himself grimly.

  And he immediately sent in a request to the central office in Rome, where all the data from the various regional headquarters was collated.

  It was worth a try, though it might turn out to be futile.

  77

  The stink of burnt plastic filled the air.

  Having had the seals removed, Rizzo ordered the search to begin. He had only just set foot in the apartment when he realised that what the fire had not wiped out, the water and the efforts of the firefighters had. It would be difficult to reconstruct the sequence of events. The devastation was total. The scene of the crime had been completely destroyed. It would be impossible to find fingerprints, shoe prints, fibres, hairs.

  In accordance with the fire brigade’s instructions, the officers started to move cautiously around the apartment. They found that only a few CDs and DVDs had survived, along with a pair of miniature digital recorders. They put them in plastic evidence bags, ready to be passed on to Forensics.

  They moved on to an inspection of the bedroom. It was there that, after shifting pieces of wood, furniture and fragments of roof tile, all burnt and blackened by the flames, they found the safe. They had not seen it at first because it was covered with charred remains.

  Fabio Biondi’s friend had told them the truth.

  ‘Commander, can you get one of your men to open it?’ Rizzo asked Fossati, who had requested to be present.

  ‘We’ll need an oxyhydrogen flame.’

  ‘It’s vital we don’t damage the contents.’

  ‘Don’t worry, Superintendent. I’ve got just the right man on my team. He’ll join us in a few minutes with exactly the equipment we need.’

  ‘Good.’

  While they were waiting, the two men talked, the Commander revealing a fair amount of curiosity. He asked Rizzo whether the fire might be linked to the other crimes committed by the lift arsonist, as La Nazione called him.

  At first Rizzo just shrugged. ‘We don’t have anything to support that theory, but we can’t rule it out. Just as we can’t rule out other possibilities.’

  His instinct told him that this fire had nothing to do with those other crimes.

  On his return from the search of the apartment, Rizzo went straight to see Ferrara, and found him with Teresa.

  ‘Have you got anything for us, Francesco?’

  ‘Some interesting things, I’d say.’

  ‘Go on.’

  His deputy explained that they had found a number of folders in the safe, untouched by the fire. Inside were photocopies of documents, some of which had the word CONFIDENTIAL written at the top. They all referred to well-known criminal cases that had either already been solved or were still open.

  One folder had on its cover the words THE BLACK ROSE. Inside, all the sheets had been labelled SECRET.

  ‘Michele,’ Rizzo said, ‘this reeks of the Secret Service. Fabio Biondi must have been a spook.’

  ‘I think you’re right. One of those experts that nobody would ever suspect, which is precisely w
hy they’re useful. These days they don’t just recruit from the civil service, but from the private sector too.’

  ‘But he couldn’t join the police because he was an inch too short!’ Teresa exclaimed.

  ‘That doesn’t mean anything, Teresa,’ Ferrara said. ‘Being an expert in various areas matters a lot more than height in certain lines of work.’

  By far the most interesting discovery was the file on the Black Rose.