“Do you know who Ben Dhahab was?”
“A Tunisian looking for work.”
“No, my friend, he was one of the biggest names in narcotics traffic.”
While Prestìa was turning pale,Valente understood that it was now his turn. He secretly smiled to himself. He and Montalbano made a formidable duo, like Totò and Peppino.
“Looks like you’re in a fix, Mr. Prestìa,” Valente began in a compassionate, almost fatherly tone.
“But why?!”
“Come on, can’t you see? A drug trafficker the caliber of Ben Dhahab signs on with your fishing boat, sparing no expense. And you have the past record you do. I, therefore, have two questions. First: what is one plus one? And second: what went wrong that night?”
“You’re trying to mess me up! You want to ruin me!”
“You’re doing it yourself, with your own two hands.”
“No! No! This has gone too far!” said Prestìa, very upset. “They guaranteed me that . . .”
He stopped short, wiped off his sweat.
“Guaranteed you what?” Montalbano and Valente asked at the same time.
“That I wouldn’t have any trouble.”
“Who did?”
Captain Prestìa stuck his hand in his pocket, dug out his wallet, extracted a calling card, and threw it onto Valente’s desk.
Having disposed of Prestìa,Valente dialed the number on the calling card. It belonged to the prefecture of Trapani.
“Hello? This is Vice-Commissioner Valente from Mazàra. I’d like to speak with Commendator Mario Spadaccia, chief of the cabinet.”
“Please hold.”
“Hello, Commissioner Valente. This is Spadaccia.”
“Sorry to disturb you, Commendatore, but I have a question concerning the killing of that Tunisian on the fishing boat—”
“Hasn’t that all been cleared up? The government in Tunis—”
“Yes, I know, Commendatore, but—”
“Why are you calling me?”
“Because the crew chief of the fishing boat—”
“He gave you my name?”
“He gave us your card. He was keeping it as some sort of . . . guarantee.”
“Which indeed it was.”
“Excuse me?”
“Let me explain. You see, some time ago, His Excellency . . .” (Wasn’t that title abolished half a century ago? Montalbano wondered while listening in on an extension.) “. . . His Excellency the prefect received an urgent request. He was asked to give his full support to a Tunisian journalist who wanted to conduct a sensitive investigation among his compatriots here, and who, for this reason, among others, also wished to sign on with one of our fishing boats. His Excellency authorized me to oversee the matter. Captain Prestìa’s name was brought to my attention; I was told he was very reliable. Prestìa, however, had some worries about getting in trouble with the employment office. That’s why I gave him my card. Nothing more.”
“Commendatore, I thank you very much for your thorough explanation,” said Valente. And he hung up.
They sat there in silence, eyeing each other.
“The guy’s either a fuckup or he’s putting one over on us,” said Montalbano.
“This whole thing’s beginning to stink,” Valente said pensively.
“Yeah,” said Montalbano.
They were discussing what their next move should be when the phone rang.
“I told them I wasn’t here for anyone!” Valente shouted angrily. He picked up, listened a moment, then passed the receiver to Montalbano.
Before leaving for Mazàra, the inspector had left word at the office as to where he could be found if needed.
“Hello? Montalbano here. Who’s this? Ah, is that you, Mr. Commissioner?”
“Yes, it’s me. Where have you run off to?”
He was irritated.
“I’m here with my colleague, Vice-Commissioner Valente.”
“He’s not your colleague. He’s a vice-commissioner and you’re not.”
Montalbano started to feel worried.
“What’s going on, Commissioner?”
“No, I’m asking you what the hell is going on!”
Hell? The commissioner said “hell”?
“I don’t understand.”
“What kind of crap have you been digging up?”
Crap? Did the commissioner say “crap”? Was this the start of the Apocalypse? Would the trumpets of Judgment soon begin to sound?
“But what have I done wrong?”
“Yesterday you gave me a license-plate number, remember?”
“Yes. AM 237 GW.”
“That’s the one. Well, I immediately asked a friend of mine in Rome to look into it, to save time, at your request, and he just called me back, very annoyed. They told him that if he wants to know the name of the car’s owner, he must submit a written request specifying in detail the reasons for said request.”
“That’s not a problem, Commissioner. I’ll explain the whole story to you tomorrow, and you, in the request, can—”
“Montalbano, you don’t understand, or perhaps you won’t understand. That’s a cloaked number.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means the car belongs to the secret services. Is that so hard to understand?”
That was no mere stink, what they had smelled. The air itself was turning foul.
As he was telling Valente about Lapècora’s murder, Karima’s abduction, Fahrid, and Fahrid’s car, which actually belonged to the secret services, a troubling thought occurred to him. He phoned the commissioner in Montelusa.
“Excuse me, Commissioner, but when you spoke with your friend in Rome about the license plate, did you tell him what it was about?”
“How could I? I don’t know the first thing about what you’re doing.”
The inspector heaved a sigh of relief.
“I merely said,” the commissioner continued, “that it involved an investigation that you, Inspector Montalbano, were conducting.”
The inspector retracted his sigh of relief.
“Hello, Galluzzo? Montalbano here. I’m calling from Mazàra. I think I’m going to be here late, so, contrary to what I said, I want you to go immediately to Marinella, to my house, pick up the old Tunisian lady, and take her to Montelusa. All right? You haven’t got a minute to lose.”
“Hello, Livia? Listen very carefully to what I say, and do exactly what I tell you to do, without arguing. I’m in Mazàra at the moment, and I don’t think they’ve bugged our phone yet.”
“Oh my God, what are you saying?”
“I asked you, please don’t argue, don’t ask questions, don’t say anything. You must only listen to what I say. Very soon Galluzzo will be there. He’s going to pick up the old woman and take her back with him to Montelusa. No long good-byes, please; you can tell François he’ll see her again soon. As soon as Galluzzo leaves, call my office and ask for Mimì Augello. You absolutely must find him, no matter where he is. And tell him you need to see him at once.”
“What if he’s busy?”
“For you, he’ll drop everything and come running. You, in the meantime, will pack François’s few possessions into a small suitcase, then—”
“But what do you want—”
“Quiet, understand? Quiet. Tell Mimì that, on my orders, the kid must disappear from the face of the earth. Vanish. He should hide him somewhere safe, where he’ll be all right. And don’t ask where he intends to take him. Is that clear? You mustn’t know where François has gone. And don’t start crying, it bothers me. Listen closely. Wait for about an hour after Mimì has left with the kid, then call Fazio. Tell him, in tears—you won’t have to fake it since you’re crying already—tell him the kid has disappeared, maybe he ran off in search of the old lady, you don’t know, but in short you want him to help you find him. In the meantime, I’ll have returned. And one last thing: call Palermo airport and reserve a seat on the flight to Genoa, the one that leaves aroun
d noon tomorrow. That’ll give me enough time to find someone to take you there. See you soon.”
He hung up, and his eyes met Valente’s troubled gaze.
“You think they’d go that far?”
“Farther.”
“Is the story clear to you now?” asked Montalbano.
“I think I’m beginning to understand,” replied Valente.
“Let me explain better,” said the inspector. “All in all, things may have gone as follows: Ahmed Moussa, for his own reasons, has one of his men, Fahrid, set up a base of operations. Fahrid enlists the help—whether freely offered or not, I don’t know—of Ahmed’s sister, Karima, who’s been living in Sicily for a few years. Then they blackmail a man from Vigàta named Lapècora into letting them use his old import-export business as a front. Are you following?”
“Perfectly.”
“Ahmed, who needs to attend an important meeting involving weapons or political support for his movement, comes to Italy under the protection of our secret services. The meeting takes place at sea, but in all likelihood it’s a trap. Ahmed didn’t have the slightest suspicion that our services were double-crossing him, and that they were in cahoots with the people in Tunis who wanted to liquidate him. Among other things, I’m convinced that Fahrid himself was part of the plan to do away with Ahmed. The sister, I don’t think so.”
“Why are you so afraid for the boy?”
“Because he’s a witness. He could recognize Fahrid the way he recognized his uncle on TV. And Fahrid has already killed Karima, I’m sure of it. He killed her after taking her away in a car that turns out to belong to our secret services.”
“What are we going to do?”
“You, for now, are going to sit tight. I’m going to get busy creating a diversion.”
“Good luck.”
“Good luck to you, my friend.”
By the time he got back to headquarters it was already evening. Fazio was there waiting for him.
“Have you found François?”
“Did you go home before coming here?” Fazio asked instead of answering.
“No. I came directly from Mazàra.”
“Chief, could we go into your office for a minute?”
Once they were inside, Fazio closed the door.
“Chief, I’m a cop. Maybe not as good a cop as you, but still a cop. How did you know the kid ran away?”
“What’s with you, Fazio? Livia phoned me in Mazàra and I told her to call you.”
“See, Chief, the fact is, the young lady told me she was asking me for help because she didn’t know where you were.”
“Touché,” said Montalbano.
“And then, she was really and truly crying, no doubt about that. Not because the kid had run away, but for some other reason, which I don’t know. So I figured out what it was you wanted me to do, and I did it.”
“And what did I want you to do?”
“To raise a ruckus, make a lot of noise. I went to all the houses in the neighborhood and asked every person I ran into. Have you seen a little kid like so? Nobody’d seen him, but now they all know he ran away. Isn’t that what you wanted?”
Montalbano felt moved. This was real friendship, Sicilian friendship, the kind based on intuition, on what was left unsaid. With a true friend, one never needs to ask, because the other understands on his own and acts accordingly.
“What should I do now?”
“Keep raising a ruckus. Call the carabinieri, call every one of their headquarters in the province, call every police station, hospital, anybody you can think of. But do it unofficially, only by phone, nothing in writing. Describe the boy, show them you’re worried.”
“But are we sure they won’t end up finding him, Chief?”
“Not to worry, Fazio. He’s in good hands.”
He took a sheet of paper with the station’s letterhead and typed:
TO THE MINISTRY OF TRANSPORTATION AND AUTOMOBILE REGISTRATION:
FOR DELICATE INVESTIGATION INTO ABDUCTION AND PROBABLE HOMICIDE OF WOMAN ANSWERING TO NAME KARIMA MOUSSA NEED NAME OWNER AUTOMOBILE LICENSE-PLATE NUMBER AM 237 GW. KINDLY REPLY PROMPTLY. INSPECTOR SALVO MONTALBANO.
God only knew why, whenever he had to write a fax, he composed it as if it were a telegram. He reread it. He’d even written out the woman’s name to make the bait more appetizing. They would surely have to come out in the open now.
“Gallo!”
“Yes, sir.”
“Find the fax number for Auto Registration in Rome and send this right away. Galluzzo!”
“At your orders.”
“Well?”
“I took the old lady to Montelusa. Everything’s taken care of.”
“Listen, Gallù. Tell your brother-in-law to be in the general vicinity of headquarters after Lapècora’s funeral tomorrow. And tell him to bring a cameraman.”
“Thanks, Chief, with all my heart.”
“Fazio!”
“I’m listening.”
“It completely slipped my mind. Did you go to Mrs. Lapècora’s apartment?”
“Sure did. And I took a small cup from a set of twelve. I’ve got it over there. You wanna see it?”
“What the hell for? Tomorrow I’ll tell you what to do with it. For now, put it in a cellophane bag. Oh, and, did Jacomuzzi send you the knife?”
“Yessirree.”
He didn’t have the courage to leave the office. At home the hard part awaited him. Livia’s sorrow. Speaking of which, if Livia was leaving, then . . . He dialed Adelina’s number.
“Adelì? Montalbano here. Listen, the young lady’s leaving tomorrow morning; I need to recuperate. And you know what? I haven’t eaten a thing all day.”
One had to live, no?
15
Livia was on the veranda, sitting on the bench, utterly still, and seemed to be looking out at the sea. She wasn’t crying, but her red, puffy eyes said that she’d used up her supply of tears. The inspector sat down beside her, took one of her hands, and squeezed it. To Montalbano it felt as if he’d picked up something dead; he found it almost repulsive. He let it go and lit a cigarette. Livia, he’d decided, should know as little as possible about the whole affair. But it was clear she’d given the matter some thought, and her question went right to the point.
“Do they want to harm him?”
“Actually harm him, probably not. Make him disappear for a while, yes.”
“How?”
“I don’t know. Maybe by putting him in an orphanage under a false name.”
“Why?”
“Because he met some people he wasn’t supposed to meet.”
Still staring at the sea, Livia thought about Montalbano’s last words.
“I don’t understand.”
“What don’t you understand?”
“If these people François met are Tunisians, perhaps illegal immigrants, couldn’t you, as policemen—”
“They’re not only Tunisian.”
Slowly, as if making a great effort, Livia turned and faced him.
“They’re not?”
“No. And I’m not saying another word.”
“I want him.”
“Who?”
“François. I want him.”
“But, Livia—”
“Shut up. I want him. No one can take him away from me like that, you least of all. I’ve thought long and hard about this, you know, these last few hours. How old are you, Salvo?”
“Forty-four, I think.”
“Forty-four and ten months. In two months you’ll be forty-five. I’ve already turned thirty-three. Do you know what that means?”
“No. What what means?”
“We’ve been together for six years. Every now and then we talk about getting married, and then we drop the subject. We both do, by mutual, tacit consent. And we don’t resume the discussion. We get along so well just the way things are, and our laziness, our egotism, gets the better of us, always.”
“Laziness? Egotism? What are you t
alking about? There are objective difficulties which—”
“—which you can stick up your ass,” Livia brutally concluded.
Montalbano, disconcerted, fell silent. Only once or twice in six years had Livia ever used obscenities, and it was always in troubling, extremely tense circumstances.
“I’m sorry,” Livia said softly. “But sometimes I just can’t stand your camouflage and hypocrisy. Your cynicism is more authentic.”
Montalbano, still silent, took it all in.
“Don’t try to distract me from what I want to say to you. You’re very good at it; it’s your job. What I want to know is: when do you think we can get married? Give me a straight answer.”
“If it was only up to me . . .”
Livia leapt to her feet.
“That’s enough! I’m going to bed. I took two sleeping pills and my plane leaves Palermo at noon tomorrow. But first I want to finish what I have to say. If we ever get married, it’ll be when you’re fifty and I’m thirty-eight. In other words, too late to have children. And we still haven’t realized that somebody, God or whoever is acting in His place, has already sent us a child, at just the right moment.”
She turned her back and went inside. Montalbano stayed outside on the veranda, gazing at the sea, but unable to bring it into focus.
An hour before midnight, he made sure Livia was sleeping profoundly, then he unplugged the phone, gathered together all the loose change he could find, turned off the lights, and went out. He drove to the telephone booth in the parking lot of the Marinella Bar.
“Nicolò? Montalbano here. A couple of things. Tomorrow morning, around midday, send somebody along with a cameraman to the neighborhood of police headquarters. There are some new developments.”
“Thanks. What else?”
“I was wondering, do you have a very small videocamera, one that doesn’t make any noise? The smaller the better.”
“You want to leave posterity a document of your prowess in bed?”
“Do you know how to use this camera?”
“Of course.”
IM03 - The Snack Thief Page 15
