The Paper Moon

by Andrea Camilleri

  When he arrived at his parked car, a rather troubling thought came over him—namely, that he had an appointment with the commissioner to which it was not clear he would make it in time. What was he going to do about this? The following: He was going to blow off Mr. Commissioner’s summons. The guy had done nothing but postpone the goddamned appointment day after day. Surely he was allowed to miss one? He got in the car and drove off.

  Going from Enzo’s restaurant to Cosma and Damiano’s place in Fanara was like changing continents. Asking Enzo for a dish like the rabbit cacciatore he was slurping down would have been like ordering pork ribs or cotechino at a restaurant in Abu Dhabi.

  When he got up from the table, he immediately felt the need for a walk along the jetty. But since he was in Fanara, there was no jetty, for the simple reason that the sea was fifty miles away. Though he’d already had a coffee in the trattoria, he decided he’d better have another at a bar right next door to the bank.

  To the door—one of those revolving kinds with an alarm—he must have seemed disagreeable, for it reopened behind him and commanded:

  “System alarm! Deposit all metal objects outside the door!”

  The guard sitting inside a bulletproof glass booth glanced up from a crossword puzzle and looked at him. The inspector opened a little drawer and dropped in about a pound of europennies that were making holes in his pockets, closed it with a plastic key, and entered the tubelike door.

  “System alarm!” it repeated.

  So it just didn’t like him. That door was dead set on busting his balls. The guard started looking at him with concern. The inspector took out his house keys, put them in the drawer, went back in the door, the half tube closed behind him, the door said nothing, but the other half of the tube, the one in front of him, didn’t open. Imprisoned! The door had taken him hostage, and if he wasn’t freed in a few seconds, he was fated to die a terrible death by suffocation. Through the glass he saw the guard engrossed in his crossword puzzle; he hadn’t noticed anything. Inside the bank there wasn’t a living soul to be seen. He raised his knee and gave the door a powerful kick. The guard heard the noise, realized what was happening, pushed a button on some contraption in front of him, and the back half of the tube finally opened, allowing the inspector to enter the bank. Which consisted of a first entrance with a small table and a few chairs and led to two doors: The one on the right was an office with two vacant desks; the one on the left had the usual wood-and-glass partition with two tellers’ windows over which were plaques saying WINDOW 1 and WINDOW 2, in case anyone wasn’t sure. But only one had a teller behind it, and that was indeed Window 1. One could not in good conscience say the bank did a lot of business.

  “Hello, I would like to speak with the manager. I’m Inspector—”

  “Montalbano!” said the fiftyish man behind the window.

  The inspector gave him a puzzled look.

  “Don’t you remember me? Eh, don’t you?” said the teller, getting up and heading toward the door at the end of the partition.

  Montalbano racked his brain but couldn’t come up with a name. Meanwhile the teller came straight up to him, un-shaven, arms half open and ready to embrace his long-lost friend. But don’t these people who expect to be recognized after forty years realize that time has done its work on their faces? That forty winters, as the poet says, have dug deep furrows in the field of what was once adorable youth?

  “You really don’t remember, do you? Let me give you a little hint.”

  A little hint? What was this, a TV game show?

  “Cu…Cu…”

  “Cucuzza?” the inspector took a wild stab.

  “Cumella! Giogiò Cumella!” said the other, leaping at his throat and crushing him in a pythonlike grip.

  “Cumella! Of course!” Montalbano mumbled.

  In truth he didn’t remember a goddamned thing. Night and fog.

  “Let’s go have a drink. We need to celebrate! Matre santa, it’s been so many years!”

  When passing in front of the guard’s little cage, Cumella informed him:

  “Lullù, I’ll be at the bar next door with my friend. If anyone comes, tell ’em to wait.”

  But who was this Cumella? A former schoolmate? University chum? Student protester from ’68?

  “You married, Salvù?”

  “No.”

  “I am. Three kids, two boys and a girl. The girl, who’s the youngest, is a beauty. Her name’s Natasha.”

  A Natasha in Fanara. Like Ashanti in Canicattì, Samantha in Fela, and Jessica in Gallotti. Didn’t anybody name their little girls Maria, Giuseppina, Carmela, or Francesca anymore?

  “What’ll you have?”

  “A coffee.”

  At that hour, one coffee more or less made no difference.

  “Me, too. Why did you come to our bank, Inspector? I’ve seen you a couple of times on television.”

  “I need some information. Perhaps the manager—”

  “I’m the manager. What’s this about?”

  “One of your clients, Angelo Pardo, was murdered.”

  “I heard.”

  “I couldn’t find any of your statements in his apartment.”

  “He didn’t want us to send them to him. And he sent us those instructions in a registered letter! Imagine that! He would come and pick up the statements in person.”

  “I see. Could you tell me how much is in his account and if he made any investments?”

  “No, unless you’ve got a judge’s authorization.”

  “I haven’t.”

  “Then I can’t tell you that until the day he died he had somewhere around eight hundred thousand.”

  “Lire?” asked Montalbano, a little disappointed.

  “Euros.”

  That put things in a whole new light. Over a billion and a half lire.

  “Investments?”

  “None whatsoever. He needed ready cash.”

  “Why did you specify ‘until the day he died’?”

  “Because three days before, he’d taken out a hundred thousand. And from what I’ve heard, if he hadn’t been shot, within three days he would have made another withdrawal.”

  “What have you heard?”

  “That he lost it all gambling, at Zizino’s den.”

  “Can you tell me for how long he was a client of yours?”

  “Less than six months.”

  “Was he ever in the red?”

  “Never. Anyway, for us at the bank it wasn’t a problem, no matter what happened.”

  “Explain.”

  “When he opened the account, he came accompanied by MP Di Cristoforo. But now that’s enough, let’s talk a little about old times.”

  Cumella did all the talking, reminiscing about episodes and people the inspector had no recollection of. But to make it look like he remembered everything, Montalbano had only to say, every now and then, “Right!” and, “How could I forget?”

  At the end of their conversation, they said good-bye, embracing and promising to stay in touch by telephone.

  On the way back, not only was the inspector unable to enjoy the discovery he’d made, but his mood turned darker and darker. The moment he got in the car and drove off, a question started buzzing about in his head like an annoying fly: How come Giogiò Cumella could remember their grammar-school days and he couldn’t? From a few of the names Giogiò had mentioned and a few of the events he’d recounted, elusive flashes of memory had come back to him in fits and starts, but like pieces of an unsolvable puzzle with no precise outline, and these inklings had led him to situate the time of his friendship with Cumella in their grammar-school days. Unfortunately, there could be only one answer to his question: He was beginning to lose his memory. An indisputable sign of old age. But didn’t they say that old age made you forget what you did the day before and remember things from when you were a little kid? Well, apparently that wasn’t always the case. Obviously there was old age and old age. What was the name of that disease where you forge
t that you’re even alive? The one President Reagan had? What was it called? There, see? He was even starting to forget things of the present.

  To distract himself, he formulated a proposition. A philosophical proposition? Maybe, but tending towards “weak thought”—exhausted thought, in fact. He even gave this proposition a title: “The Civilization of Today and the Ceremony of Access.” What did it mean? It meant that, today, to enter any place whatsoever—an airport, a bank, a jeweler’s or watchmaker’s shop—you had to submit to a specific ceremony of control. Why ceremony? Because it served no concrete purpose. A thief, a hijacker, a terrorist—if they really want to enter—will find a way. The ceremony doesn’t even serve to protect the people on the other side of the entrance. So whom does it serve? It serves the very person about to enter, to make him think that, once inside, he can feel safe.

  “Aahhh, Chief, Chief! I wannata tell you that Dacter Latte wit’ an s called! He said as how the c’mishner couldn’t make it today.”

  “Couldn’t make what?”

  “He din’t tell me, Chief. But he said that he can make it tomorrow, at the same time of day.”

  “Fine. Getting anywhere with the file?”

  “I’m almost somewhere. Right at the tip o’ the tip! Ah, I almost forgot! Judge Gommaseo also called sayin’ you’s asposta call ’im when you get in so you can call ’im.”

  He’d just sat down when Fazio came in.

  “The phone company says that it’s not technically possible to retrace the phone calls you received when you were at Angelo Pardo’s place. They even told me why, but I didn’t understand a word of it.”

  “The people who called didn’t know yet that Angelo’d been shot. One of them even hung up. He wouldn’t have done that if he didn’t have something to hide. We’ll deal with it.”

  “Chief, I also wanted to mention that I don’t know anybody in Fanara.”

  “It doesn’t matter. I figured it out myself.”

  “How did you do that?”

  “I knew for certain that Angelo had an account at the Banca Popolare in Fanara. So I went there. The bank manager is an old schoolmate of mine, a dear friend, and so we reminisced about the good old days.”

  Another lie. But its purpose was to make Fazio believe that he still possessed an ironclad memory.

  “How much did he have in the account?”

  “A billion and a half old lire. And he really gambled big time, as you told me yourself. Betting money he certainly didn’t earn as a pharmaceutical representative.”

  “The funeral’s tomorrow morning. I’ve seen the announcements.”

  “I want you to go.”

  “Chief, it’s only in movies the killer goes to the funeral of the person he killed.”

  “Don’t be a wise guy. You’re going anyway. And take a good look at the names on the ribbons on the wreaths and pillows.”

  Fazio left, and the inspector phoned Tommaseo.

  “Montalbano! What are you doing? Did you disappear?”

  “I had things to do, Judge, I’m sorry.”

  “Listen, I want to fill you in on something I think is really serious.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “A few days ago, you sent Angelo Pardo’s sister, Michela, to see me, do you remember?”

  “Of course.”

  “Well, I’ve interrogated her three times. The last time just this morning. A disturbing woman, don’t you think?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Something troubled about her, I’d say, don’t you think?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  And you had a ball in those troubled waters, like a little pig under your august magistrate’s robes.

  “And what unfathomable eyes she has.”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “This morning she exploded.”

  “In what sense?”

  “In the sense that at a certain point she stood up, summoned a very strange voice, and her hair came undone. Chilling.”

  So Tommaseo, too, had witnessed a bit of Greek tragedy.

  “What did she say?”

  “She started inveighing against another woman, Elena Sclafani, her brother’s girlfriend. She claims she’s the killer. Have you interrogated her?”

  “Sclafani? Of course.”

  “Why didn’t you inform me?”

  “Well, it’s just that…”

  “What’s she like?”

  “Beautiful.”

  “I’m going to summon her immediately.”

  How could you go wrong? Tommaseo was going to dive into Elena like a fish.

  “Look, Judge, I—”

  “No, no, my dear Montalbano, no excuses. Among other things, I must tell you that Michela accused you of protecting Mrs. Sclafani.”

  “Did she tell you why Mrs. Sclafani would—”

  “Yes, jealousy. She also told me that you, Montalbano, have in your possession some letters Sclafani wrote in which she threatens to kill her lover. Is that true?”

  “Yes.”

  “I want to see them at once.”

  “Okay, but—”

  “I repeat, no excuses. Don’t you realize how you’re acting? You hid from me—”

  “Don’t piss outside the urinal, Tommaseo.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I’ll explain. I said don’t piss outside the urinal. I’m not hiding anything from you. It’s just that Elena Sclafani has an alibi for the evening Pardo was killed, and it’s one you’re really going to like.”

  “What does that mean, that I’ll really like Sclafani’s alibi?”

  “You’ll see. Make sure she goes into great detail. Have a good evening.”

  “Inspector Montalbano? It’s Laganà.”

  “Good evening, Marshal. What can you tell me?”

  “That I’ve had a stroke of luck.”

  “In what sense?”

  “Last night, entirely by chance, I got wind of a huge operation that’s going to be revealed to the press tomorrow. We’re going to make a big sweep of over four thousand people, including doctors, pharmacists, and representatives, all accused of corruption and graft. So today I called a friend of mine in Rome. Well, it turns out the pharmaceutical firms represented by Angelo Pardo haven’t been implicated.”

  “That means Pardo couldn’t have been killed by some rival, or for not making payoffs.”

  “Exactly.”

  “And what do you make of those four pages covered with numbers I gave you?”

  “I turned them over to Melluso.”

  “Who’s he?”

  “A colleague of mine who knows all about that sort of thing. I’m hoping I’ll have something to tell you tomorrow.”

  “Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh!”

  A high-pitched, piercing, prolonged yell terrorized everyone who was still at the station. It came from the entrance. With a chill running down his spine, Montalbano rushed into the corridor, crashing into Fazio, Mimì, Gallo, and a couple of uniformed policemen.

  Inside his closet stood Catarella, back glued to the wall, no longer screaming but rather whimpering like a wounded animal, eyes popping out of his head, pointing with a trembling finger at Angelo Pardo’s open laptop on the little table.

  Matre santa! What could have appeared on the screen to frighten him that way? The devil? Osama bin Laden?

  “Everybody stay outside!” Montalbano ordered, going into the closet.

  He looked at the monitor. It was blank. There was nothing.

  Maybe Catarella’s brain, having so strained itself in the struggle with the passwords, had completely melted. Which, in any case, wouldn’t have taken much.

  “Go away!” the inspector yelled to his men.

  When he was alone with Catarella, he embraced him. Feeling him trembling, he told him to sit down.

  “There’s a good boy,” he murmured, stroking his head.

  And, just like a dog, Catarella started to calm down. When he saw him no longer trembling, Montalbano asked him:

/>   “Can you tell me what happened?”

  Catarella made a gesture of despair.

  “Come on, try to talk. Do you want a little water?”

  Catarella shook his head no and swallowed twice.

  “It…it…deleted isself, Chief,” he said in a voice about to break into a heartrending wail.

  “Come on, speak up. What deleted itself?”

  “The third file, Chief. And it deleted the other two, too.”

  Therefore everything that might have been of interest in the computer had been lost.

  “How is that possible?”

  “Oh, iss possible, Chief. There musta been an abortion pogram.”

  Abortion? Maybe Angelo Pardo, aside from performing illegal abortions on women, had also found a way to perform them on computers?

  “What have abortions got to do with this?”

  “Chief, whatta you say when you got a militiry operation going an’ you wanna stop it?”

  “I dunno, I guess you could say you abort it.”

  “And in’t that what I said? Iss what I said. Iss got an abortion pogram pogrammed to delete what’s asposta be deleted in the abortion pogram pogrammed to be deleted after a week, a month, two months, tree months…You follow?”

  “Perfectly. A timed deletion program.”

  “Just like you say, Chief. But iss not ’cause of my fault or negleck, Chief! I swear!”

  “I know, Cat, I know. Don’t worry about it.”

  He patted his head again and went back into his office. Angelo Pardo had taken every possible precaution to make sure nobody ever found out how he got the money he needed to gamble and buy expensive gifts for his girlfriend.

  16

  The first thing he did when he got home was attack the salmon. A hefty slice dressed with fresh lemon juice and a special olive oil given him by the person who made it. (“The virginity of this olive oil has been certified by a gynecologist,” said a little ticket that came with it.) After eating he cleared the veranda table and replaced the dish and silverware with a brand-new bottle of J&B and a glass. He knew at last that he held the end of a long thread in his hand. And if you even think of calling it Ariadne’s thread, I’ll slash your face, he warned himself. But that thread might in fact lead him, if not to a solution, at least down the right path.