A Private Venus

by Giorgio Scerbanenco

  ‘I’ve talked too much, I know, when I’m with you I always talk too much, I just wanted to explain why I want to help you. I’ve done my experiments and I’ve understood where the evil lies, of course I do, they even debated it in parliament: it lies with the pimps. We’ll never be able to eliminate it, but every time we find a pimp we have to crush him.’ Passionately, she put both hands on the table. ‘Tell me exactly what I have to do.’

  Here she was, another apostle, crushing evil. Together, they were crusaders. She really believed she could crush it, but what exactly do you want to crush, my darling? The more of them you crush, the more there are. And that’s all right, but maybe you have to crush them all the same.

  ‘Think it over for a few days, before you agree.’

  ‘You don’t have to speak like that to me, I don’t need to think it over, I’m a quick thinker.’

  Yes, yes, darling. ‘All right, then think of those two girls, they’re both dead. If we get this wrong you could join them.’

  ‘I’ve already thought about that.’

  ‘And remember that we have everyone against us, even the police, and we won’t be protected by anyone.’

  ‘I’ve thought about that, too.’

  ‘Well, then,’ and now there was a solemnity in the way he spoke to her that was more intimate than ever, ‘think about this. Every day you’ll have to go with one or two men, for weeks, maybe to no avail, maybe we won’t find anything, or maybe you’ll be the third victim, but think about that seriously, we’re not playing games here.’ In his anger, he forgot himself and swore. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said.

  Coldly, she said, ‘You didn’t have to say that to me. You’ve introduced a personal note into the question. From what you told me, and from the way you told it, it seems you don’t like the idea of me having to go with men. If that’s the case, it distorts everything, quite apart from the fact that I’m not remotely interested in what you like or don’t like. You asked me to do this work, and as soon as I said yes, you said no. You’re the one who’s playing games, not me.’

  Be quiet, be quiet, why did he always have to get into things he couldn’t get out of, things that ended up as matters of life and death?

  ‘Tell me what I have to do, and that’s it. I’m old enough to know what I’m doing, if I’d wanted to say no I’d have said no. But I can’t.’

  She couldn’t. ‘All right, then let’s go up on the terrace and get some fresh air, the rain has almost stopped.’

  Up there, looking down at the lights of Milan, there was quite a wind: it was damp, like a wet sheet in the face. He explained to her the abominable details of the filthy work they had to do, he gave her the foul instructions that would make it less dangerous for her, he explained the signal: ‘If you put your elbow out of the window once, that means “found him.” If you put it out twice in a row that means “danger.” Tomorrow, I’ll bring Davide to see you and we’ll do a rehearsal together, as soon as there’s something that’s not right, make the signal and he’ll be there.’ Because that was how it was, now he was even getting the other poor bastard involved. When someone was as sick in the head as he was, they didn’t know any limits.

  Then he took his Livia Ussaro and drove her home. At the front door they even shook hands, they might as well have said, ‘Thanks for the company.’ He went back to the Cavour feeling completely nauseated with everything, starting with himself, but not with her.

  PART THREE

  ‘Maybe you never got beyond those girls in leather jackets standing by the jukebox, those scrubbers from 1960 with their long hair all straggly as if they’d drowned: according to you, they can streetwalk in the Corso Buenos Aires at night, but nobody else. I think you’re behind the times.’

  ‘That may be, I’d never thought of graduates in history and philosophy doing it.’

  1

  Here is Livia Ussaro at work, in the last stretch of the Via Giuseppe Verdi, close to the Piazza della Scala, just after half past ten. The area has been carefully chosen, like a rare literary text, after a three-way meeting, with Davide as a listener but without a right to vote. She’s neatly dressed, all in blue, her skirt is short and under her little jacket she’s wearing something so skimpy you couldn’t really call it a blouse. The impression she needs to give, as she walks up towards the Piazza della Scala, is that she’s looking for someone or something, a shop perhaps, or is waiting for a date. And that is indeed the impression she gives.

  Davide has taken up position under the portico in the Piazza della Scala, his Giulietta, thanks to a thousand-lire tip, is parked by the monument to Leonardo da Vinci in such a way that he can pull out easily. For many mornings now, nothing has happened. Yes, there were two gentlemen who spoke to Livia, but one she ruled out because he didn’t have a car—the person they want to meet definitely uses a car—the other because he was a young man of twenty-two or twenty-three, who had started by saying to her, ‘Hey, good-looking!’ and the person they’re looking for is not a young man, he must be over fifty, and he certainly wouldn’t use a phrase like ‘Hey, good-looking!’

  That morning, from under the arcade, Davide saw a tall man in his fifties walk up to Livia as she appeared to be waiting for the lights to turn green. Livia’s conversation with the gentleman continued, rather than breaking off immediately like the others: obviously Livia had thought it was worth a try.

  Indeed it was, and she crossed the Via Manzoni with the man, even smiling at him once, but in a very refined way. The very fact that Livia had accepted his company meant that the man had a car and that she had kindly consented to be given a lift. Davide walked to the Giulietta, now it was all a question of where the distinguished-looking street Casanova had parked his car, but Livia made it easier, slowing her suitor down until Davide was able to catch up with them.

  It was all easy now: the man’s car, a beautiful black Taunus, was also parked by the Leonardo monument, only it was stuck in the middle of the anthill and Davide had time to smoke almost a whole cigarette before the other man managed to get out and he was able to follow him. The route, too, had been carefully chosen: Via Manzoni, Via Palestro, Corso Venezia, Corso Buenos Aires, Piazzale Loreto. The reasons were twofold: Livia would tell her companion she had to go to the beginning of the Viale Monza, a long enough route to give her time to talk to him. If Livia judged that it was worth continuing, she would accept his gallant proposition and tell him to drive in the direction of Monza, where there were some fairly quiet spots. Otherwise, she would convince the man that she had made a mistake, that it was the first time she had accepted a lift and she would never do it again because men always tried to take advantage.

  The Taunus followed the prearranged route under an increasingly hot sun, joined the compact river of vehicles streaming along the Corso Buenos Aires, reached the Piazzale Loreto, did a turn around the metro station, and stopped at the beginning of the Viale Monza. Davide, risking a fine, parked right behind them. He could see Livia and the man: the man seemed to be insisting, but Livia was shaking her head very sternly. The farce lasted a couple of minutes, then the gentleman resigned himself, got out, opened the door to his grouchy passenger, and helped her out, it was obvious he was still insisting, but Livia was unmoveable: virtue personified.

  When the Taunus had left—another basic rule: take the number of all these men’s cars, even when the encounter led nowhere, and he had taken this one—Livia waited for a while, then got into the Giulietta next to Davide.

  ‘He’s a madman,’ Livia said, although with barely a smile, ‘either that or it’s the heat, he has business cards with him and gave me one. Look, give it to Duca.’

  Armando Marnassi, exclusive representative for Alcheno food colouring, there followed two addresses and two telephone numbers. Davide put it in his jacket pocket, he would give it to Duca. ‘Why’s he mad?’ he asked, driving towards the Via Plinio.

  ‘He immediately offered me a job, two hundred thousand lire a month, he needs a trustworthy secretary. T
hen he told me he’s invested his money in various apartments, and if I wasn’t happy with the one where I’m living, he’d gladly give me one. If the journey had been longer and he didn’t already have a wife, he might even have asked me to marry him.’ If he hadn’t given her his business card, she might have thought that all these offers were bait, but a man of that age who gives his name, address, and telephone number is clearly quite serious. Maybe he was one of the few older, but still youthful, men who didn’t have a lady friend with an apartment or a boutique, and was trying to remedy the lack as quickly as possible.

  In the afternoon, after a few hours’ break, they started again. At half-past three Livia Ussaro was in the second area: from the Piazza San Babila to the Piazza San Carlo, making the round of the shopping arcades, apart from the area of the Via Montenapoleone—not because it was sexless, but because it was given over to other equally demanding activities. At that hour, especially in summer, mature men sleep, the most active in heavy armchairs, the spoiled actually in bed. Only at four-thirty or five do they return to their desks, discreetly sprinkled with rare and refreshing colognes, ready to make important decisions. But at the same time, many young women, from Milan or from out of town, often pretty, who don’t need afternoon naps and are immune to the heat, wander that area looking in the windows, making a few purchases or meeting friends. If a middle-aged man interested in such things knows of this habit, he knows that it’s at this time and in the areas richest in shops that he will find what interests him, so he gives up his own afternoon nap, and goes there. It’s actually a discreet hour, with nothing dubious about it: a man over fifty in the company of a slim young brunette doesn’t seem like a faun at that hour, but like her uncle. Assuming the person they were looking for still existed, and was still devoted to his activity, this was the area in which there was most likelihood of meeting him. That was why they combed the same area in the evening, too, from nine to ten-thirty, giving it the name Area 2b: it was the time when the cinemas and theatres were busy, they just had to keep away from the Corso Venezia, where the professionals worked, and concentrate a bit more on the Corso Matteotti, to have the best chance of having a few encounters.

  The command post of this complex system is an apartment in the Piazza Leonardo da Vinci, Duca’s apartment, bought by his father. On the door there’s still a name plate saying Doctor Duca Lamberti, there used to be one by the street door which said Duca Lamberti, doctor and surgeon, which he had immediately removed, but as for the one on his apartment door, he had put a strip of tape over the word Doctor, and one morning found that someone had taken away the tape, the usual stupid delivery boy or local kid. He’d put on the strip again, but once again it was taken off, and he gave up.

  Duca is in charge of the command post, he invented the system down to its smallest details, and now he just has to wait for Davide’s evening reports. Until after eleven at night, when Davide arrives, he has absolutely nothing to do except wait for the phone to ring, Livia Ussaro might spot the target at any moment, and then the phone would ring. But is it likely?

  While he waits, he devotes himself to family life, to his sister Lorenza, to his niece Sara. After three years in prison, spending all this time at home—he can’t leave because the phone call might come while he’s out—he’s discovered many things. He’s discovered, for example, that his sister has become fearful. When he had seen her the last time before being arrested, she had seemed triumphant, triumphant with courage, almost as if his arrest and trial were an honour. She had written to him in prison that all the newspapers were talking about him, that he was becoming a famous doctor, that she was sure he would be acquitted and after it he would have thousands of patients, and very soon his own clinic.

  Things were very different now. He was with her from the time when, together, they got up and took care of the child, together cleaned the house, made something to eat, and the fear was constant. She was afraid of everything. She had been so happy when he had come back and told her he’d be staying for a while, but one afternoon, in the kitchen, while Sara was asleep, he had had to tell her why, talk to her about Livia Ussaro and the two girls who had posed for photographs and then died, and their search for those responsible.

  ‘Why are you doing it?’ she had asked apprehensively.

  It was hard to explain it to her, Lorenza wasn’t like Livia Ussaro who fed on abstract concepts. Lorenza needed facts, concrete concepts such as today is Monday and tomorrow is Tuesday. He replied, ‘I was given the task of treating a young man, Davide, and was even being paid for it. Now what’s wrong with Davide isn’t so much that he drinks, but something else, something deeper: he has to learn to live again, to deal with his fellow men, and to teach him how to do that, I need to give him something to do. What he’s doing now is a treatment on a large scale, which should certainly cure him: it’s hunting for the man who killed Alberta. If he manages to find him, if he manages to catch him and punish him, he’ll finally feel like a living, breathing man, and won’t need to drink again. To him, Alberta was like his first love: he has to avenge her, and revenge both feeds and cures.’ Maybe it was a bit too simplistic, but it was certainly concrete.

  Lorenza had said nothing, but continued to be afraid. ‘What if something happens to that girl? You were the one who made her do this work.’

  Yes, he was in charge, and something could indeed happen to Livia Ussaro. But he was almost certain that nothing would happen to her, for the simple reason that she wouldn’t find anyone or anything. The more time passed, the more often Davide arrived in the evening and reported that nothing had happened, the more far-fetched his plan seemed.

  That evening, too, Davide called from the street and he threw down the front-door key. In the kitchen there was chilled beer waiting for him, but before drinking, he reported the few things that had happened during the day. Livia had accepted two rides that seemed likely, but in the Viale Monza, as usual, she had got out: these were honest married men who had stayed in the city and were driving around in their cars, trying their luck, but without too much conviction.

  In all these days of searching, Livia had come across everything, except what they were looking for. She had even found a lesbian and that had been extremely bothersome: the woman wouldn’t let her go, she had followed her along the street, doing so much propaganda in favour of what she called parisexualism that, as Livia had confessed to him over the phone, she had had to make a certain effort to refute all these arguments. ‘From a theoretical point of view, I assure you I was almost convinced, there are dialectically irreproachable reasons why parisexualism has the same rights as heterosexuality.’ Even over the phone, she couldn’t help indulging in her love of abstraction, and he let her talk: it was the only reward he could give her.

  Everything had happened during these days, except what they were hoping would happen. Livia had even had to confront a violent drunk. She hadn’t realised until she was already in his car, and had had to give the danger signal: twice she had put her arm out of the window and Davide had overtaken the drunk’s car and boxed it in. Davide’s bulk had convinced the drunk not to protest and Livia had been taken safely home. On another occasion, two police officers had approached Livia one evening in San Babila and asked her for her papers. The word schoolteacher on her identity card had reassured them somewhat: they were well-brought-up young men who respected culture and couldn’t imagine that someone who had graduated in history and philosophy was streetwalking in San Babila, but they had advised her to go home anyway.

  But Signor A had not appeared. They called him Signor A rather than Signor X, because the man wasn’t an unknown quantity: he was something specific, the chief pimp. Duca didn’t know his name or physical appearance, but he knew he existed. It’s like when you say the fattest man in Milan: you’ve never seen him, you don’t know if he’s a chemist or a restaurant owner, if he’s fair-haired or dark, but you know he exists, it’s just a matter of finding him and weighing him, and then you’ll immediately re
cognise him because he’s the one who weighs more than anyone else in Milan. Of Signor A, though, there was still no sign.

  ‘Davide, please give me your list of car registration numbers.’ The transistor radio was playing dimly: Lorenza had left it on before going to bed. The good smell of warm concrete came up from the courtyard through the open window of the kitchen, the beer got warm even if you left it there for half a minute, you had to drink it immediately, which was what they did. He leafed through the notes that Davide had given him, there were exactly twenty-three car licence numbers, of which only four weren’t from Milan, one of them was French.

  Mascaranti, who was participating secretly in the operations, unknown to Carrua, had checked these numbers one by one but only to make absolutely sure: they already knew from Livia that these cars belonged to people who were not involved, a fact which Mascaranti had only confirmed. One by one, the owners of the cars had been checked, but Signor A wasn’t one of them. Mascaranti had even found someone being sought by the police in Florence, and had had him arrested, but not Signor A.

  How long would they have to go on with this search? Every evening, he was tempted to wind it up. Carrua could handle the case perfectly well, it was his job, and he’d have the help of Interpol. Why had he, Duca, got so worked up about it, what did it have to do with him anyway, and why had he got Livia Ussaro involved? But then he would put it off for another day.

  He gave the useless list back to Davide. ‘Have a whisky, then we can sleep.’ He still had to give him a bit of whisky, Davide couldn’t function only on beer. But he was a good boy, he didn’t drink surreptitiously, even now when he could, because during the day, following Livia, he was free to enter any bar he wanted, and in the evening he went back to the Cavour to sleep by himself and he could drink whatever he liked. But he didn’t.