A Walk in the Dark gg-2

by Gianrico Carofiglio

  Well, you’re right about that. Damned right.

  “Or maybe we could ask for a postponement. Let’s tell the judge we need a robed magistrate for this case and ask him to postpone it to another session. What do you think?”

  “What’s your name?”

  She looked at me, puzzled. Then she told me her name was Marinella. Marinella Something-or-other, because she spoke quickly and swallowed her words.

  “All right, Marinella, listen to me. Listen carefully. You just sit there calmly in your seat. As you said before: don’t do anything. This is what’s going to happen. Counsel for the defence will examine the defendant. When it’s your turn the judge will ask you if you have any questions, and you’ll say no, thank you, you don’t have any questions. None at all. Then the judge will ask me if I have any questions and I’ll say yes, thank you, I have a few questions. In an hour, maybe more, it’ll all be over, before you’ve even realized it. But don’t even think about asking for postponements or anything like that.”

  Marinella looked at me, even more scared than before. The expression on my face, the tone in which I’d spoken, hadn’t been pleasant. She nodded, looking like someone talking to a dangerous madman, someone who’d rather be somewhere else and hopes it will all be over really soon.

  Caldarola took off his glasses – he was long-sighted – and looked towards Delissanti and Scianatico.

  “Now then, at today’s hearing, we are due to hear the examination of the defendant. Does he confirm his intention to undergo this examination?”

  “Yes, Your Honour, the defendant confirms his willingness to testify.”

  Scianatico stood up resolutely, and within a second had covered the distance between the defence bench and the witness stand. Caldarola read out the ritual caution. Scianatico had the right not to answer, but proceedings would still follow their course. If he agreed to answer, his statements might be used against him, and so on, and so forth.

  “So do you confirm that you wish to answer?”

  “Yes, Your Honour.”

  “In that case, counsel for the defence may proceed with the examination.”

  The early stages of the examination were fairly tedious. Delissanti asked Scianatico to tell the court when he had met Martina, and in what circumstances, how their relationship had started, that kind of thing. Scianatico replied in an almost affable tone, as if trying to give the impression that he didn’t bear a grudge against Martina, in spite of all the harm she had so unjustly done him. A role they had rehearsed over and over in Delissanti’s office. For sure.

  At a certain point he broke off in the middle of an answer. For a moment, I saw his eyes move towards the entrance to the courtroom, I saw him wince slightly, I saw that damnably smug expression of his crack just a little.

  Martina and Claudia had arrived. They sat down behind me, and I turned and greeted them. Martina, following the instructions I had given her the day before when she had come to my office, handed me a package in such a way that nobody in the courtroom could fail to notice. In such a way that Scianatico, above all, couldn’t fail to notice.

  From the shape and size, it was clear the package contained a videocassette.

  Delissanti was forced to repeat his last question.

  “I repeat, Professor Scianatico, can you tell us when, and for what reason, your relationship with Signorina Fumai started to break down?”

  “No… I can’t pinpoint a particular moment. Little by little Martina’s – that is, Signorina Fumai’s behaviour changed.”

  “Can you tell us in what way her behaviour changed?”

  “Mood swings. Increasingly sudden and increasingly frequent. Verbal attacks, alternating with bouts of weeping and depression. On a couple of occasions she even tried to attack me physically. She was beside herself. I had the impression-”

  “Objection, Your Honour. The defendant is about to express a personal opinion, which, as we all know, is not allowed.”

  Caldarola told Scianatico to avoid personal opinions and stick to the facts.

  “Tell us what happened when Signorina Fumai was having one of her attacks.”

  “Mostly, she shouted. She said I didn’t understand her problems and being with me would make her ill again.”

  “Excuse me if I interrupt. She said that she would become ill again? To what illness was she alluding?”

  “She was alluding to her psychiatric problems.”

  “Go on. Continue telling us what happened during these attacks.”

  “As I’ve already said, she shouted a lot, wept hysterically, tried to hit me and… oh yes, then she accused me of having lovers. It wasn’t true, of course. But she was jealous. Pathologically jealous.”

  “It isn’t true,” I heard Martina whispering behind my back. “The bastard. It isn’t true.”

  “… increasingly often, she told me I’d pay for it. Sooner or later, one way or the other.”

  “Was it during one of these arguments, in front of a number of mutual friends, that you used the words ‘you’re a compulsive liar, you’re unbalanced, you’re unreliable and you’re a danger to yourself and others’?”

  “Unfortunately, yes. I lost my temper as well. I shouldn’t have said those things in front of other people. The sad thing is, they were true.”

  “Let’s try to analyse these words, which you would have preferred not to have said in front of other people, but which you couldn’t hold back. Why did you say she was unreliable and a danger?”

  “She’d have these violent tempers. On two occasions she attacked me. On others she went so far as to mutilate herself.”

  “Why did you tell her she was a compulsive liar?”

  “She made things up. I don’t like to say this, in spite of what she did to me. But she made up the most incredible stories. That time in particular, she told me she knew for a fact that I was having an affair with a lady who was there that night at our friends’ house. It wasn’t true, but there was no way to make her see reason. She told me she wanted to leave, I told her not to behave like a child, not to make a scene, but the situation soon degenerated.”

  I had to resist the temptation to turn to Martina.

  “Did you ever threaten Signorina Fumai?”

  “Never. Absolutely not.”

  “Did you ever use physical violence against her, during or after the period when you lived together?”

  “Never of my own accord. It’s true that on two occasions when she attacked me I had to defend myself, to stop her, try to neutralize her. Those were the two times she had to have emergency treatment. I hasten to add that I took her to hospital myself. And I took her to hospital on another occasion too. After she’d mutilated herself particularly badly. As I said, it was a habit of hers.”

  “Could you tell us exactly what form this self-mutilation took?”

  “I can’t remember exactly. Certainly when she lost her temper during arguments, because she couldn’t get her own way, she’d slap herself, even punch herself in the face.”

  “After you stopped living together, did you have any contact with Signorina Fumai?”

  “Yes. I called her many times on the phone. A couple of times I also tried to speak to her in person.”

  “On these occasions, either on the phone or in person, did you ever threaten Signorina Fumai?”

  “Absolutely not. I was… I feel embarrassed saying it, but the thing is, I was still in love with her. I was trying to convince her that we should get back together. Apart from anything else, I was very worried that her mental condition might deteriorate and she might do something rash. I mean self-mutilation or worse. I thought that if we could get back together we might be able to patch things up and help her to solve her problems.”

  It was a moving story. A real tear-jerker. The son of a bitch should have been an actor.

  “In conclusion, Professor Scianatico, you are aware of the charges against you. Did you in fact commit any of the acts attributed to you in those charges?”

/>   Before answering, Scianatico gave a kind of bitter smile. A smile that meant, more or less, that people and the world in general were bad and ungrateful. That was why he was here, being tried unjustly for things he had not done. But he was a good person, so he didn’t feel any resentment towards the person responsible. Who, apart from anything else, was a poor unbalanced woman.

  “As I’ve said, we had two small fights during the time we were living together. Apart from that, as I’ve also said, I did make a lot of phone calls, some of them at night, to try to convince her that we should get back together. As for everything else, no, of course not. None of it is true.”

  Of course not. He couldn’t deny the phone calls, because there were records. The madwoman had made up the rest out of her destructive delusions.

  That was the end of the examination. The judge told the public prosecutor that she could proceed with the cross-examination. Marinella Something-or-other, obeying my instructions, said, No, thank you, she had no questions. From the tone of her voice and the look on her face, you’d have thought the judge had asked her, “Excuse me, do you have AIDS?”

  “Do you have any questions, Avvocato Guerrieri?”

  “Yes, Your Honour, thank you. May I proceed?”

  He nodded. He also knew that this was where the hassles started. And he didn’t like hassles. Tough luck for you, I thought.

  No point in leading up to things in a roundabout way, not with this case. So I got straight to the point.

  “Am I correct in saying that you made a photocopy of Dottoressa Fumai’s medical records during the time you lived together?”

  “That’s correct. I made a photocopy because-”

  “Could you tell us exactly when you made this copy, if you recall?”

  “You mean the day, the month?”

  “I mean the period, roughly speaking. If you can also recall the day…”

  “I can’t give you an exact answer. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t early on during the time we lived together.”

  “Did you ask Dottoressa Fumai’s permission to make these photocopies?”

  “Look, my intention-”

  “Did you ask her permission?”

  “I wanted-”

  “Did you ask her permission?”

  “No.”

  “Did you subsequently inform Dottoressa Fumai that you had made a copy of her private records without her knowing it?”

  “I didn’t inform her because I was worried and I wanted to show these records to a psychiatrist friend of mine. So that we could both see exactly what Martina’s problems were and how we could help her.”

  “To recap, then. You made this copy without asking Dottoressa Fumai’s permission, in other words, secretly. And you didn’t subsequently inform her that you’d done it. Is that correct?”

  “It was for her own good.”

  “In other words, for Dottoressa Fumai’s good, you were prepared to do things without her knowing it, invading her private space without permission.”

  “Objection, Your Honour,” Delissanti said. “That isn’t a question, it’s a conclusion. Inadmissible.”

  “Avvocato Guerrieri,” Caldarola said, “please keep your conclusions for your closing speech.”

  “With all due respect, Your Honour, I consider this a genuine question, regarding what the defendant was prepared to do according to his own quite subjective idea of what was for Dottoressa Fumai’s good. But I’ll happily withdraw and move on to another question. Did Dottoressa Fumai tell you herself where she kept her medical records?”

  “I don’t understand the question.”

  “Did Dottoressa Fumai tell you, ‘Look, the copy of my medical records is in such and such a place’?”

  “No. At any rate, I don’t remember.”

  “So you had to search for these records in order to photocopy them? You were forced to rifle through Dottoressa Fumai’s private effects. Is that correct?”

  “I didn’t rifle through anything. I was worried about her, so I searched for those papers to show them to a doctor.”

  Scianatico no longer seemed so at ease. He was losing his cool, and his image of manly, serene patience. Exactly what I wanted.

  “Yes, you’ve already said that. Could you tell us the name of the psychiatrist to whom you showed these papers, after you had photocopied them clandestinely?”

  “Objection, objection. Counsel for the plaintiff must avoid comments, and the word clandestinely is a comment.”

  That was Delissanti again. He was perfectly well aware that things weren’t going very well. For them. I spoke before Caldarola could intervene.

  “Your Honour, in my opinion the word clandestinely exactly describes the way in which these records were obtained by the defendant. However, I’m quite happy to rephrase the question because I’m not interested in getting into an argument.” And because I got the result I wanted anyway, I thought.

  “So, could you tell us the name of the psychiatrist?”

  “In the end I didn’t use the records. Our relationship quickly deteriorated and then she left. So in the end I didn’t do anything with them.”

  “But you kept the photocopies?”

  “I put them away and forgot all about them, until this… this business started.”

  There was rather a long pause. I unwrapped the package Martina had given me, and took out the video cassette and a couple of sheets of paper. For almost a minute I pretended to read what was written on these sheets. It was just a sideshow, and had nothing to do with the trial. The sheets of paper were photocopies of old notes of mine, but Scianatico didn’t know that. When I thought the tension had risen enough, I looked up from the papers and resumed my questioning.

  “Did you ever force Dottoressa Fumai to make a video recording of your sexual relations?”

  Exactly what I had expected happened. Delissanti rose to his feet, shouting. It was inadmissible, outrageous, unprecedented, to ask such questions. What did the things that happened between consenting adults in the privacy of the bedroom have to do with this case? And so on, and so forth.

  “Your Honour, will you allow me to clarify the question and its relevance?”

  Caldarola nodded. For the first time since the start of the trial, he seemed annoyed with Delissanti. He’d pried into the most intimate and painful aspects of Martina’s life. In order to ascertain the plaintiff’s reliability, he’d said. And now he’d suddenly remembered that a couple’s private life was sacrosanct.

  That, more or less, was what I said. I said that if it was necessary to evaluate the plaintiff’s personality, in order to be sure she was reliable, then the same requirement existed with regard to the defendant, given that he had agreed to be examined and, among other things, had made a series of defamatory and offensive statements about my client.

  Caldarola allowed the question, and told Scianatico to answer. He looked at his lawyer, searching for help. He didn’t find it. He shifted on his chair, which seemed to have become very uncomfortable. He was desperately wondering how I could have come into possession of that cassette. Which, he was convinced, contained an embarrassing record of his most private habits. In the end he asked me.

  “Who… who gave you that cassette?”

  “Could you please answer my question? If it isn’t clear, or if you didn’t hear it properly, I can repeat it.”

  “It was a game, something private. What has it got to do with this trial?”

  “Is that an affirmative answer? You videotaped sexual relations with-”

  “Yes.”

  “On one occasion? On several occasions?”

  “It was a game. We both agreed to do it.”

  “On one occasion or on several occasions?”

  “A few times.”

  I picked up the video cassette and looked at it for a few seconds, as if reading something on the label.

  “Did you ever videotape sexual practices of a sado-masochistic nature?”

  There was silence in the court
room. Several seconds passed before Scianatico answered.

  “I… I don’t remember.”

  “I’ll rephrase the question. Did you ever request or indeed perform sexual practices of a sado-masochistic nature?”

  “I… we played games. Just games.”

  “Did you ever demand that Dottoressa Fumai submit to being tied up, or other practices involving sexual restraint?”

  “I didn’t demand. We agreed.”

  “So it’s correct to say that the sexual practices I’ve mentioned did in fact occur, but you can’t remember if you videotaped them or not.”

  “Yes.”

  “Your Honour, I’ve finished cross-examining the defendant. But I have a request to make…”

  Delissanti leaped to his feet, in so far as his bulk allowed him.

  “I object very strongly in advance to the admission of cassettes relating to the sexual practices of the defendant and the plaintiff. I still have strong reservations about the relevance of the questions put by the counsel for the plaintiff, but, be that as it may, the fact that certain practices occurred has now been admitted. So there is no need for pornographic material to be admitted in evidence.”

  Exactly what I wanted to hear him say. It had been admitted that certain practices had occurred. Precisely. They had swallowed the bait, both of them.

  “Your Honour, the objection is unnecessary. I had no intention of asking for this or any other cassette to be admitted in evidence. As counsel for the defence has rightly said, the fact that certain practices occurred has been admitted. My request is quite different. In the introductory phase of the trial, counsel for the defence requested – and you, Your Honour, granted the request – that an expert witness be allowed to give evidence of a psychiatric nature about the plaintiff, with the purpose of ascertaining her reliability in relation to an overall picture of her mental state. Applying the same principle, what has emerged from the cross-examination makes it necessary to perform a similar evaluation on the person of the defendant. The psychiatrist you appoint to examine the defendant will be able to tell us if the compulsive need for sexual practices of a sado-masochistic nature, and particularly those which involve restraint, are habitually connected to impulses and actions of a persecutory nature, involving the invasion of another person’s private life. In other words, if both phenomena are – or can be – expressions of a compulsive need for control. Of course, I wish to make it clear that I am not suggesting any evaluation or hypothesis at the moment as to the possible psychopathological nature of these propensities.”