Everyone in Their Place

by Maurizio de Giovanni

  As had often happened whenever he talked to the priest, Ricciardi was somehow entranced. This man’s faith was practical, social, and active. None of the empty words he remembered from the Jesuits he’d studied with as a boy, with their otherworldly doctrine. All the same, time was passing, and that long night had left its marks.

  “Father, I don’t want to take too much of your time. You say mass, I’m told, in the home of the Duke of Camparino.”

  Don Pierino’s dark and expressive face contracted in a pained expression.

  “Yes, the poor duchess. A terrible thing. So you’re looking into the case. I wouldn’t have thought so.”

  Ricciardi was surprised.

  “Why not?”

  The assistant pastor shrugged his shoulders and spread his arms wide.

  “It’s an influential family. And you don’t have a reputation for being particularly diplomatic, you know.”

  The commissario shook his head.

  “I never knew that I was so famous; yesterday a journalist, and today you. No, I’m really not very diplomatic, Father. What interests me is the truth: and you, with the work you do, know very well that the truth isn’t diplomatic.”

  “The walks of life where I spend my time, Commissario, are where you find the people who need comforting. And often those are places where the police are well known and feared. But no one says anything bad about you. They say that you’re quiet, and mysterious, too; there are a few superstitious souls, and I’ll tell you this with a smile, who say that you bring bad luck, and that you’re friends with the devil. But the poor say that an innocent man never suffers at your hands. Tell me, if I may ask; what do you want to know?”

  “Whatever you can tell me, Father. Relations between the two dukes and the duchess, for instance. The household help. Or the duchess’s friends.”

  A sad expression appeared on Don Pierino’s face.

  “Commissario, why would you insult me like this? Do you think somehow that it’s my job to gather gossip? I go to bring spiritual comfort to a very sick man, who’s too sick even to kneel and pray. I’m certainly not going to pay any attention to who they welcome into their home, or what they say to each other.”

  Ricciardi shook his head vehemently.

  “No, no, Father: don’t even think such a thing. I know what kind of a person you are. But something terrible happened in that house, and the same thing could happen again. Murder, to borrow your own words, is a scar that often tears open again, and it’s my job to keep that from happening. I’m not asking you for gossip, which is of no more interest to me than it is to you. I just wanted your impressions.”

  The priest smiled, reassured.

  “There’s not much I can tell you, I arrive and I say mass, then I leave. The housekeeper, Signora Concetta, is so silent and discreet that sometimes she frightens me, the way she appears suddenly. You’ve seen Sciarra, the doorman, yourself: he’s a funny little man who spends his time watering the hydrangeas and playing with his children: I’ve never seen children eat so much in my life. You never hear or see his wife. No, I’d say that the scar you’re looking isn’t to be found among the palazzo’s servants.”

  “What about the duke?”

  “The duke made a mistake. He was a widower, he had a difficult son on his hands, one whom he never spent much time with. He thought that he could regain his youth by taking up with a younger woman, but then he fell sick. He gradually lost interest in the things of this world, formal considerations, social conventions. He’s a good man, you know, Commissario. He’s not afraid of death; to him it only means an end to his pain and a chance to be reunited with his first wife, whom he loved very much.”

  But the commissario remembered the words of scorn that the old man had uttered concerning his second wife.

  “But he clearly felt some resentment toward the duchess. I noticed it when we questioned him.”

  “That’s only human, I think. The duke is dying, he’s bedridden. The duchess was . . . a free woman, who allowed life to sweep her away, and who chased after it the way a leaf chases after a mountain stream. She wasn’t wicked, she was just lively, like certain children chasing after a rag-ball. I didn’t see her much; I doubt she was very religious. Her husband wouldn’t forgive her for losing all interest in his home and his family, perhaps. I couldn’t say, he’d never talked to me about it.”

  Ricciardi thought it over.

  “What about the son? How did he get along with his stepmother? On this topic everyone’s evasive but him, and he says it, loud and clear: he hated her.”

  Don Pierino shrugged his shoulders.

  “Ettore is no ordinary young man. He’s very well read, and he’s deeply religious. But he’s also a young man with very strict principles. He never forgave his father for his second marriage: he broke off all relations with him, I don’t think they’ve spoken in years. The duchess was the exact opposite of his poor mamma, and the memory of his mother is very important and immediate to him. I think his attitude is really quite normal. But I don’t think he’s capable of violence; let me say it again, he’s very religious.”

  “What kind of life does he lead, Father? Who does he frequent? Why hasn’t he married?”

  Don Pierino smiled again, after hesitating briefly.

  “Everyone has their own personality and their own friendships, no, Commissario? And neither you nor I are married, it strikes me. We’ve followed our own paths, and neither of those paths led to a wife or children. And neither, it seems to me, did Ettore’s. But that doesn’t mean we’re not children of God. That doesn’t mean we don’t have our parts to play.”

  Ricciardi sat for several long seconds, looking at the assistant pastor’s seraphic expression, and following the thread of his thoughts. In the end, he said:

  “All right, Father. I thank you for your help. There’ll be a funeral, eventually; will you be officiating?”

  “Yes, Commissario. I’m the closest thing that family has to a spiritual father, I believe.”

  “Then we’ll see you at the palazzo. I believe that Brigadier Maione and I will both be attending.”

  XXIV

  It hadn’t gone according to her rosiest hopes, but it hadn’t gone all that badly either. While she was finishing her makeup in front of the mirror, in her room at the Hotel du Vésuve, flooded with sunlight and the bracing smell of salt water, Livia was thinking back on Ricciardi, the day after her meeting with him at Gambrinus.

  He was exactly the way she had remembered, as she’d thought about him a thousand times, over the last few months. Dark, smoldering, mysterious. Those eyes that stared without intent, green as the wintry sea, chilly and transparent as glass; he made no attempt to be likable or attractive. And instead he was attractive, terribly so; Livia found him wonderfully different from any other man she’d ever known, any man who’d ever courted her. He could be surly, no doubt about it, and he seemed remote: and yet her sensibilities allowed her to detect, behind the appearance of those somewhat brusque manners, the kindness and gentleness that would make the woman who succeeded in drawing them out of him a very happy woman indeed.

  As she ran the lipstick brush over her lips, Livia thought about Ricciardi’s hands: those fine, tense hands that he usually concealed in his pockets. And she thought about what it would be like to feel them sliding over her body, at first hesitant and then increasingly confident.

  She tilted her head slightly to one side and tried out her most seductive smile: the mirror reflected the face of a woman in the prime of her loveliness, her large dark eyes melting and captivating, her lips parted to reveal gleaming white teeth, a coquettish dimple on her chin. She decided that she would pick up Ricciardi at police headquarters that very night, when his shift ended. She’d ignore any objections he might raise: and she’d absolutely forbid him to have his say.

  After all, she was Livia Lucani: no man alive, however mysterious and reserved he might be, could resist her charms.

  Maione stuck his head into R
icciardi’s office.

  “Commissa’, buon giorno. It’s hotter today than it was yesterday, impossible as that seems. Shall I bring you a cup of freshly made ersatz coffee?”

  Ricciardi shook his head.

  “Heaven forbid, the day’s already looking bad enough, let’s not make things even worse. Why don’t you come in and sit down, instead: let’s try to figure out where we are with things.”

  Maione let himself drop into one of the chairs in front of the desk. The office was shrouded in shadow; to protect against the morning sun, Ricciardi had, as usual, left his shutters half shut. The noises of the city as it awakened rose from the street below. The sound of a ship’s horn as it set sail split the air.

  “Lucky them, that they’re going somewhere, eh, Commissa’? There are times when I feel like leaving myself. New places and new faces. I wonder if it would be better or worse.”

  “What would you expect? I doubt it would really be any different. People are the same wherever you go. The same passions, the same crimes. Today we’re going to the duchess’s funeral.”

  Maione was surprised.

  “Why on earth would you want to go, Commissa’? We never attend the funerals: all that curiosity, all that mistrust; after all, we’re policemen.”

  Ricciardi was resting his elbows on the desk, knitting his fingers together in front of his mouth.

  “I know; but usually we avoid going to keep from causing the family problems. Here I doubt the family cares very much. I’m interested in seeing who’s there and who isn’t, and I want to see the faces of those who are attending.”

  Maione tried to figure out who the commissario’s suspicions were focusing on.

  “Who are you thinking of? If you ask me, given what we know right now, the suspects are Capece and the young master, Ettore Musso. And that’s a problem because they’re exactly the people that that idiot Garzo says we’re supposed to leave alone.”

  Ricciardi nodded in agreement.

  “That’s right. Ettore makes no mystery of how much he hated the duchess, and everyone who’s been willing to talk to us confirmed that. Even Don Pierino, whom I went to see early this morning, admitted that relations weren’t good, and you know that if he says it, that something wasn’t right, it must have been unmistakable.”

  “Still, Commissa’, I’m not ready to discount the duke entirely as a suspect, perhaps with a little assistance from the housekeeper. If you ask me, she has all the strength needed, and it also strikes me that anything the duke tells her to do, she does. And the duke didn’t seem to cherish her all that much, his wife.”

  Ricciardi responded, pensively:

  “That’s also true. Then there’s the whole question of Capece, who, unless you’re able to track down some elements of evidence, has no alibi, just like the young master. Listen, let’s split up the tasks; that’ll save us some time: Ettore to me, Capece to you. Aside from making the rounds of the taverns, gather some information on the family, the life he leads, where he lives, and so on. We don’t have a lot of time, and we’ll need to be discreet, otherwise Garzo will weigh in and stop us from doing anything.”

  Maione smiled.

  “Commissa’, forgive me if I venture to say, but you don’t have to tell me to be discreet. After all, sometimes you ask people questions that are like a slap in the face. And with a tone, moreover . . . Just promise me that if you do decide to talk to the journalist, the duke, and the young master, at least wait for me, so we can go together: that way at least I can act as witness.”

  “A witness? Who’d ever listen to you: you’re false as a three-lira coin. Come on now, let’s get moving. Let’s not keep the duchess waiting.”

  You know, I remember, Mamma. I remember it, when we were together: when we laughed, when we talked. When I could even choose who to talk to. When my father would sit beside me and help me to study. I remember when he’d hold my hand with a pen in it, dipping it into the ink; I even remember the pages and pages of upright strokes, the smell of the paper.

  I remember, Mamma. I remember walking holding hands with you both, you on one side and him on the other, in the Villa Nazionale; you greeted the people you met with a smile, sometimes he’d even doff his hat. You were beautiful, Mamma. I wonder if you remember it, too, how pretty you were when you smiled.

  Then you were gone, you from one side, him from the other. I looked away, perhaps, because I didn’t even notice; but then at a certain point you were both gone. When is it, Mamma, that a child is no longer a child? When he’s tall and strong, and can make his own decisions? Or when he knows how to help, or has a job and children of his own?

  You know, if you ask me, Mamma, you’re a grown-up when you can finally see the way things are. And if you see the way things are, then you have to intervene, you have to solve the problem.

  Or at least try to.

  When Ricciardi and Maione turned the corner of Piazza Santa Maria La Nova, they found themselves in the presence of the customary trappings of a high-society funeral. The hearse had already arrived, a horse-drawn carriage, and it was a spectacle in itself. Eight horses in all, harnessed two-by-two, black, tall, and formidable. They were foaming at the mouth from the weight they were pulling and the great heat; on each horse’s head, a high plume, black like the harnesses. Specially trained, the magnificent beasts made absolutely no noise: they neither scraped their hooves, neighed, nor blew. Behind them, the hearse itself, a complex Baroque construction of inlaid wood and stucco and gleaming glass. One last journey in grand style, before the admiring eyes of one and all. Only the passenger would fail to appreciate the show.

  The piazza was immersed in an unnatural silence. A motley crowd was massed around the palazzi and the church; only around the hearse was there an empty space, as if the people were fearful of being contaminated by death in its purest and most popular image. The coachman, with his long black tailcoat and his likewise-black top hat, was standing waiting with the whip in one hand, next to the rear wheel which towered over his head. Further along, vainly seeking a patch of shadow, the eight musicians who would walk before the funeral procession playing solemn marches stood smoking and complaining about the heat; the sun flashed golden off the instruments that lay on the ground.

  The arrival of the two policemen caused an immediate wave of murmuring, like the sound of the wind springing up in a forest. Behind the friends, the authorities, and all those who wanted at all costs to be standing at the side of that influential family in this grim moment, there were hundreds of simple onlookers: the murder had made an enormous impression, even though the press, in accordance with instructions received, had devoted little space to it, with none-too-veiled references to the possibility of a banal robbery gone horribly wrong. The duchess’s life, which she’d lived without any false modesty, did not allow for privacy even in death.

  They were waiting for the coffin to be carried out of the palazzo. At the duke’s request the religious service had been performed by Don Pierino in the family chapel, where the corpse had been transported from the morgue at dawn of that day. Everyone, therefore, would have a chance to give one last farewell in the short distance from the front door to the hearse, and then during the procession to Poggioreale Cemetery.

  The large church in the piazza however still demanded attention, with the mournful sound of its death knells ringing out regularly.

  Ricciardi looked around. In the front row, he recognized the prefect and the chief of police with their wives, surrounded by the other municipal authorities. Sitting near them, a step behind but strategically visible, was Garzo. The eyes of the two men locked for a brief instant, and in that time Ricciardi managed to detect a mute disapproval for his inopportune presence. The commissario held the man’s gaze without even hinting at a greeting.

  Around the hearse, leaning against the walls of the palazzo, and even up against the gate of the nearby church, stood a vast number of flowered funeral wreaths; the black ribbons adorning them bore the names of families who w
ished to pay homage.

  Maione, who as always seemed to be half asleep, was focusing on the contrasting attitudes of the various groups that made up the crowd. Those who were in tears, sincerely heartbroken, young, and well-dressed must have been the companions of the duchess’s riotous nightlife, the gilded youth of Neapolitan high society. There weren’t many of them. Grim-faced and uneasy, dressed in black and with expressionless faces, on the other hand, were those there to pay their respects to the elderly duke and to his family, and they were for the most part prominent officeholders and members of the city’s highest nobility. Behind them stood the inevitable crowd of rubberneckers, drawn by the dead woman’s reputation as a libertine and by the horrible manner of her death.

  The brigadier looked for Capece but couldn’t see him, neither in the front row, which was certainly understandable, nor in the crowd at large. Maybe he just couldn’t bring himself to come: that was something he could understand.

  From the open half of the front door emerged Don Pierino, dressed in his funeral vestments, with two altar boys beside him. Behind him came the coffin, in ornately carved dark wood, carried on the shoulders of four pallbearers. The priest blessed the bier which was placed, with some visible effort, in the carriage. The heat that came beating down from the noonday sun was intolerable.

  In a wheelchair, the duke was pushed across the threshold of his home, and he looked like another corpse. His unnatural pallor, the horrifyingly skinny neck, which lay enfolded in the collar of his shirt, the equally sticklike limbs, and his blank expression spoke of death even more than the hearse, the horses, and the coffin could. The black suit, matched by the tie and shoes last worn some time before his illness, gave some idea of what his physique must once have been and how it had been laid waste by illness.