The Paper Moon

by Andrea Camilleri

  “I’ll go get your keys and the present,” said Michela.

  She went out. What present was she talking about? Was it maybe his birthday? But when was he born? He couldn’t remember. He stopped asking himself questions, closed his eyes, and abandoned himself to the relief he was feeling. Later, when he heard her return, he opened his eyes to little slits. But they popped open at once, for in the bathroom doorway stood not Michela but Angelo, his face ravaged by the gunshot, blood still running down his shirt, the zipper of his jeans open and his thingy hanging out, a revolver in his hand, pointed at him.

  “What do you want?” he asked, frightened.

  The bathwater had suddenly turned ice cold. With his left hand, Angelo gestured for him to wait, then brought his hand to his mouth and pulled out a pair of panties. He took two steps forward.

  “Open your mouth!” he ordered.

  Clenching his teeth, Montalbano shook his head. Never in a million years would he let him stick those panties in his mouth. They were still wet with the spittle of that entity, who, being a corpse, had no right, logically speaking, to be threatening him with a gun. Or even to walk, if one really thought about it. Although, all things considered, he still looked pretty well preserved, given the fact that it had been many days since the murder. Whatever the case, it was clear that he now found himself in a trap laid by Michela to abet her brother in some shady affair of his.

  “Are you going to open up or not?”

  He shook his head again, and the other man fired. A deafening blast.

  Montalbano jolted awake and sat up in bed, heart racing at a gallop, body covered in sweat. The shutter, blown by the wind, had slammed against the wall, and outside, in fact it was storming.

  It was five o’clock in the morning. By nature the inspector didn’t believe in premonitions, forebodings, or anything to do with paranormal phenomena in general. Normality itself seemed already sufficiently abnormal to him. There was, however, one thing he was convinced of: that sometimes his dreams were nothing other than the paradoxical or fantastical elaborations of a line of reasoning he’d begun to follow in his head before falling asleep. And as for the interpretation of these dreams, he had more faith in the self-appointed interpreters of Lotto numbers than in Sigmund Freud.

  So what did that muddle of a dream mean?

  After half an hour of turning it over and over in his mind, he managed to isolate two elements that seemed important to him.

  One concerned Angelo’s keys. The first set was still in his possession, after the crime lab had returned them to him. The other set, the one he’d had Michela give him, he’d given back to her. All this seemed normal, and yet something about those keys had set his brain going, something that didn’t add up and which he couldn’t bring into focus. He would have to give this more thought later.

  The other element was a word, “present,” that Michela had said to him before leaving the bathroom. When Michela had actually spoken to him about presents, however, it had always been in reference to the expensive gifts Angelo gave to Elena…

  Stop right there, Montalbà. You’re getting warm, warmer, warmer, hot, hot! You’re there! Shit, you’re there!

  He felt such immense satisfaction that he grabbed the alarm clock, pushed down the button that turned off the alarm, laid his head down on the pillow, and fell immediately asleep.

  Elena opened the door. She was barefoot and wearing the dangerous half-length housecoat she’d had on the previous time, face still dotted with a few drops of water from the shower she’d just taken. It was ten o’clock in the morning, and she must have woken up not long before that. She smelled so strongly of young, fresh skin that it seemed unbearable to the inspector. Upon seeing him she smiled, took his hand, and, still holding it, pulled him inside, closed the door, and led him into the living room.

  “Coffee’s ready,” she said.

  Montalbano had barely sat down when she reappeared with the tray. They drank their coffee without speaking.

  “You want to know something strange, Inspector?” asked Elena, setting down her empty demitasse.

  “Tell me.”

  “A little while ago, when you phoned to tell me you were coming by, I felt happy. I missed you.”

  Montalbano’s heart did exactly what an airplane does when it hits an air pocket. But he said nothing, pretended to concentrate on his last sip of coffee, and set his demitasse down as well.

  “Any news?” she asked.

  “A little,” the inspector said cautiously.

  “I, on the other hand, have none,” said Elena.

  Montalbano made an inquisitive face. He didn’t understand the meaning of those words. Elena started laughing heartily.

  “What a funny face you just made! I only meant that for the last two days Emilio hasn’t stopped asking me if there’s any news, and I keep saying, ‘No, there’s no news.’”

  Montalbano was not convinced. Elena’s explanation only confused matters; it didn’t clarify them.

  “I didn’t know your husband was so interested in the case.”

  Elena laughed even harder.

  “He’s not interested in the case, he’s interested in me.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Inspector, Emilio wants to know if I’ve already taken steps to replace Angelo, or if I’m intending to do so at any time soon.”

  So that’s what this was all about! The old pig was apparently in crisis, with no more lewd stories being told to him by his wife. Montalbano decided to give her a little rope.

  “Why haven’t you?”

  He was expecting her to laugh again, but Elena turned serious.

  “I don’t want there to be any misunderstandings, and I want to feel at peace. I’m waiting for the investigation to be over.” She smiled again. “So you should hurry up.”

  And why would a new relationship with another man create misunderstandings? He got the answer to his question when his gaze met hers. That wasn’t a woman sitting in the armchair in front of him, but a cheetah at rest, still sated. The moment she began to feel the pangs of hunger, however, she would pounce on the prey she had already singled out long before. And that prey was him, Inspector Salvo Montalbano, a trembling, clumsy little domestic animal who would never manage to outrun those extremely long, springy legs that for the moment were deceptively crossed. And, most troubling of all, once those fangs sank into his flesh and that tongue began to savor him, he would quickly prove bland to the cheetah’s tastes and disappointing to the schoolteacher husband in the story the cheetah was certain to tell him. His only hope was to play the fool to avoid going to war, and pretend not to have understood.

  “I came today for two reasons.”

  “You could have come anyway, for no reason at all.”

  The beast had her eye on him, and there was no distracting her.

  “You told me that, aside from the car, Angelo had given you jewelry.”

  “Yes. Would you like to see it?”

  “No, I’m not interested in seeing it. I’m more interested in the boxes the jewels came in. Do you still have them?”

  “Yes, I’ll go get them.”

  She stood, picked up the tray, and took it away. She returned at once and handed the inspector two black boxes, already open and empty. They were lined with white silk and each bore the same inscription:

  A. Dimora Jewelry—Montelusa.

  This was what he wanted to know and what his dream had suggested to him. He gave the boxes back to Elena, who set them down on the coffee table.

  “And what was the other reason?” the woman asked.

  “That’s harder to say. The autopsy revealed an important detail. Two threads of fabric were found stuck between the victim’s teeth. The crime lab informed me that it is a special fabric used almost exclusively in the manufacture of women’s panties.”

  “What does it mean?” asked Elena.

  “It means that someone, before shooting him, stuck a pair of panties in his mouth to
keep him from screaming. Add to this the fact that the victim was found in a state suggesting he’d been about to engage in a sexual act. It being rather inconceivable that a man would go around with a pair of women’s panties in his pocket, that must mean the person who killed him was not a man but a woman.”

  “I see,” said Elena. “A crime of passion, apparently.”

  “Exactly. At this point in the investigation, however, it’s my duty to report all my findings to the prosecutor.”

  “And so you’ll have to mention me.”

  “Of course. And Prosecutor Tommaseo will immediately call you in for questioning. The death threats you made to Angelo in your letters will be seen as evidence against you.”

  “What should I do?”

  Montalbano’s admiration for the girl increased a few notches. She hadn’t become afraid or agitated. She asked for information, nothing more.

  “Find a good lawyer.”

  “Can I tell him that it was Angelo who made me write those letters?”

  “Certainly. And when you do, tell him he should ask Paola Torrisi a few questions.”

  Elena wrinkled her brow.

  “Angelo’s ex? Why?”

  Montalbano threw his hands up. He couldn’t tell her. That would be saying too much. But the mechanism in Elena’s head worked better than a Swiss watch.

  “Did he also have her write letters like mine?”

  Montalbano threw his hands up again.

  “The problem is that you, Elena, haven’t got an alibi for the night of the crime. You told me you drove around for a few hours and therefore didn’t meet with anyone. However…”

  “However?”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Do you think I killed Angelo?”

  “I don’t believe that you didn’t meet with anyone that evening. I’m convinced you could produce an alibi if you wanted, but you don’t want to.”

  She looked at him, eyes popping.

  “How…how do you…”

  Now she was indeed agitated. The inspector felt pleased for having hit the mark.

  “The last time I asked you if you’d met with anyone during the time you were wandering about in your car, and you said no. But before speaking, you sort of hesitated. That was the first and only time you hesitated. And I realized you didn’t want to tell me the truth. But be careful: Not having an alibi might get you arrested.”

  She suddenly turned pale. One must strike while the iron is hot, Montalbano told himself, hating himself for the cliché and for playing the tormentor.

  “You’re going to have to be escorted down to the station…”

  It wasn’t true. That wasn’t the procedure, but those were the magic words. And indeed Elena began to tremble slightly, a veil of sweat appearing on her brow.

  “I haven’t told Emilio…I didn’t want him to know.”

  What did her husband have to do with this? Was the schoolteacher fated to pop up everywhere like Pierino’s famous puppet in the story his mother used to tell Montalbano as a child?

  “What didn’t you want him to know?”

  “That I was with a man that evening.”

  “Who was it?”

  “A filling-station attendant…It’s the only station on the road to Giardina. His name is Luigi. I don’t know his last name. I stopped to get gas. He was closing, but he reopened for me. He started flirting, and I didn’t say no. I wanted…I wanted to forget Angelo, forever.”

  “How long were you together?”

  “A couple of hours.”

  “Could he testify to that?”

  “I don’t think it would be a problem. He’s very young, about twenty, unmarried.”

  “Tell that to the lawyer. Maybe he can find a way to keep your husband from getting wind of it.”

  “I would be very unhappy if he found out. I betrayed his trust.”

  But how did this husband and wife reason? He felt at sea. Then Elena suddenly started laughing hard again, her head thrown backward.

  “Let me in on the joke.”

  “A woman supposedly stuck her panties in Angelo’s mouth so he couldn’t scream?”

  “So it seems.”

  “I’m only telling you because it couldn’t have been me.”

  She had another laughing fit that almost brought tears to her eyes.

  “Come on, out with it.”

  “Because whenever I knew I was going to see Angelo, I wouldn’t wear panties. Anyway, look. Do these look like they could be used to gag anyone?”

  She stood up and hiked up her bathrobe, spun around in a circle, then sat back down. She’d performed the movement perfectly naturally, without modesty or immodesty. Her panties were smaller than a G-string. With that in his mouth, a man could still have recited all of Cicero’s Catilinarian Orations or sung “Celeste Aïda.”

  “I have to go,” said the inspector, standing up.

  He absolutely had to get away from that woman. Alarm bells and warning lights were going off wildly in his head. Elena also stood up and approached him. Unable to keep her away with his extended arms, he stopped her with words.

  “One last thing.”

  “What?”

  “We’ve learned that Angelo had recently been gambling and losing a lot of money.”

  “Really?!”

  She seemed truly puzzled.

  “So you know nothing about it.”

  “I never even suspected it. Did he gamble here, in Vigàta?”

  “No. In Fanara, apparently. At a clandestine gambling den. Did you ever go with him to Fanara?”

  “Yes, once. But we came back to Vigàta the same evening.”

  “Can you remember if Angelo went into any banks that day in Fanara?”

  “Out of the question. He had me wait in the car outside of three doctors’ offices and two pharmacies. And I nearly died of boredom. Oh, but I do remember—because I heard about him on TV after he died—that we also stopped outside the villa of Di Cristoforo, the Parliament deputy.”

  “Did he know him?!”

  “Apparently.”

  “How long did he stay inside the villa?”

  “Just a few minutes.”

  “Did he say why he went there?”

  “No, and I didn’t ask. I’m sorry.”

  “Another question, but this really will be the last.”

  “Ask me as many as you like.”

  “Did Angelo do coke, as far as you know?”

  “No. No drugs.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Absolutely. Don’t forget that I was once quite an expert on the subject.”

  She stepped forward.

  “Bye, see you soon,” said Montalbano, running for the door, opening it, and dashing out onto the landing before the cheetah could spring, grab him in her claws, and eat him alive.

  Dimora Jewelers of Montelusa—founded in 1901, as the religiously restored old sign in front said—were the best-known jewelers in the province. They made their hundred-plus years a point of pride, and in fact the furnishings inside were the same as they’d been a hundred years earlier. Except for the fact that now, to get inside, it was worse than entering a bank. Armored doors, tinted, Kalashnikov-proof windows, uniformed security guards with revolvers at their sides so big it was scary just to look at them.

  There were three salespersons, all of them quite distinguished: a seventyish man, another around forty, and a girl of about twenty. Apparently they’d each been expressly selected to serve the clients of their corresponding age group. Then why was it the seventy-year-old who turned to speak to him, instead of the forty-year-old, as should have been his right?

  “Would you like to see something in particular, sir?”

  “Yes, the owner.”

  “You mean Signor Arturo?”

  “If he’s the owner, then Signor Arturo will do.”

  “And who are you, if I may ask?”

  “Inspector Montalbano.”

  “Please follow me.”


  He followed the salesman into the back room, which was a very elegant sort of little sitting room. Art nouveau furniture. A broad staircase of black wood, covered by a dark red runner, led to a landing where there was a massive, closed door.

  “Please make yourself comfortable.”

  The elderly man climbed the stair slowly, then rang a bell beside the door, which came open with a click. He went inside and closed the door behind him. Two minutes later there was another click, the door reopened, and the old man reappeared.

  “You may go upstairs.”

  The inspector found himself in a spacious, light-filled room. There was a large glass desk, very modern in style, with a computer on top. Two armchairs and a sofa of the kind one sees only in architectural magazines. A huge safe, the latest model, that not even a surface-to-air missile could open. Another safe, this one pathetic and certainly dating back to 1901, which a wet nurse’s hairpin could open. Arturo Dimora, a thirty-year-old who looked straight out of a fashion advertisement, stood up and extended his hand.

  “I’m at your disposal, Inspector.”

  “I won’t waste your time. Do you know if there was a certain Angelo Pardo among your clients over the last three months?”

  “Just a second.”

  He went back behind the glass desk and fiddled about with the computer.

  “Yes. He bought—”

  “I know what he bought. I would like to know how he paid.”

  “Just a minute. There, yes. Two checks from the Banca Popolare di Fanara. Do you want the account number?”

  15

  Exiting the jeweler’s shop, he weighed his options. What to do? Even if he left for Fanara at once, he probably wouldn’t get there till after one-thirty; in other words, after the bank was already closed. Thus the best thing was to go back to Vigàta and drive to Fanara the following morning. But his anxiousness to discover something important at the bank was eating him alive, and surely his nerves would keep him up all night. Suddenly he remembered that banks, which he scarcely frequented, also had afternoon hours these days. Thus the right thing was to leave immediately for Fanara, head straight for the local trattoria called Da Cosma e Damiano, where he’d eaten twice and been very well served, and then, after three, make an appearance at the bank.