Death in Sardinia

by Marco Vichi

  ‘Knowing you, you’ll probably end up dressing up as an old lady,’ said Bordelli.

  Rabozzi chuckled.

  ‘I just might, you never know,’ he said.

  Porcinai raised a finger to say something.

  ‘I did that search for you, Rabozzi …’

  ‘You’re looking thinner, Porcinai! Are you eating enough?’

  Rabozzi then put a hand on the back of Porcinai’s neck and tried to rock him in his chair, without success. Porcinai didn’t like Rabozzi’s manner, but let it pass and continued looking for that paper for him.

  ‘It was right here …’ he said, rummaging through the papers on his desk.

  Rabozzi laughed and cuffed his head.

  ‘You probably used it to wrap some sausage, eh?’

  19 December

  The following morning Bordelli opened his eyes around nine. He snorted and remained in bed, staring at the ceiling. It was Sunday. He would have liked to fall back asleep and not wake up until the next morning. Getting out of bed, he went and put the coffee on the stove. He wanted the day to go by quickly, so it would soon be Monday and he could get back to work on the murder. He was anxious to talk to the girl in the photographs.

  The best plan he could come up with was to go out, get in the Beetle and drive to Grassina, where he could pick up the Chiantigiana. He drove slowly, looking distractedly at the hillsides dotted with houses and castles. He’d always liked this road.The sun was out, but the countryside had the dead colours of winter. He liked them too, however. When he was at university, he’d gone several times to Siena on his bicycle, to let his brain unwind before or after an exam.

  He passed the Villa l’Ugolino and stopped at the inn at La Martellina, where he ordered a panino with prosciutto. Then he got back in his car and took the road for Impruneta. Every so often a Bianchina or station wagon passed in the other direction. He drove slowly while eating the panino, with the window half open. The air was nice, the bread too. The prosciutto was a masterpiece. He was in a place where he would have liked to spend the last years of his life.

  When he got to Impruneta, there was a small market in the church square. He parked the car in front of the town hall and started making his way through the stands of vegetables and cheeses, asking the peasants whether they knew of a farmstead for sale in the area. They all said he should go and talk to the barber or, better yet, the treccone, who would know – and if he didn’t, then nobody would. Bordelli had once seen a treccone as a little boy, when he’d gone to Greve with his father to buy olive oil from a farmer. The treccone was a chap who went from house to house on a bicycle, asking people whether they had a ladder in need of repair, a chair in need of a new seat, or a broken tap, things of that sort. But he would also trade things. He would get eggs from the peasants and sell them in town to regular clients, or else swap a pair of boots or a hoe for a chicken, which he might then pass on to someone else for a couple of litres of olive oil or something else. He chatted with everyone and always knew when there was something to be sold or bought.

  ‘Where can I find him?’ Bordelli asked a short, squat peasant.

  ‘When there’s a market he’s always around. He’s tall and skinny, with a face that looks like it got crushed in a slamming door.’

  Bordelli continued to circulate through the stands, still looking around, but saw no one who fitted that description. While he was at it, he bought some vegetables, a piece of aged pecorino, and some thick slices of finocchiona, the Tuscan salame flavoured with fennel seeds, and went and put it all in the car.

  He kept on looking around, but there was still no sign of the treccone. At last he decided to try the barber at the far end of the piazza. He found him sitting on a bench, leafing through La Domenica del Corriere. His hair was as red as an Irishman’s.

  ‘There might be a house at Terre Bianche, a nice big one,’ he said.

  ‘What you mean, there might be?’

  ‘Well, it’s there all right, but nobody wants it.’

  ‘Why not?’ Bordelli asked, curious.

  The barber leaned forward, as if to confide a secret.

  ‘People say that at night …’

  ‘Ghosts?’

  ‘Just one, a woman,’ the barber explained.

  ‘Is there any land?’

  ‘Five hectares, mixed.’

  ‘Mixed?’

  ‘Olives and vineyards, all in the sun. But it needs some work, ‘cause nobody’s done anything for a while.’

  The former owner, an old peasant, was dead, and his children had all moved to the city. Bordelli had the barber tell him how to find the house, then thanked him and left. As he was heading back to his car, he saw the treccone coming out of a bar. It couldn’t have been anyone else. Tall, skinny as a rail, with a thin, pointy face. He went up to the man, introduced himself, and asked whether he knew of any houses for sale in the area. The treccone said they were practically giving away a beautiful farmstead at Terre Bianche, with a barn and five hectares of land. It was being sold with all its furniture and everything else.

  ‘If you’re interested, they’re even leaving the fodder-cutter for rabbits,’ he said. His breath stank of wine.

  ‘Isn’t that the house with a ghost in it?’ Bordelli asked. It had to be the same house the barber had been talking about.

  ‘Nah, c’mon, what ghost? It’s the deal of a lifetime. If I had the money I’d buy it myself.’

  ‘How much do they want?’

  ‘That I can’t tell you, but I know it’s a great deal. Old man Antero is dead and the kids don’t want to hear any more about pigsties and chickenshit.’

  ‘Yeah, the barber told me they left.’

  ‘All five of ’em went down to Florence to live some time ago, and the owner decided to sell everything. What’s he gonna do, stay behind in the country? The man owns a brickworks and has a villa down in San Casciano that’s as big as a castle.’

  ‘Thanks. I think I’ll go and have a look at the house.’

  ‘Take that road over there downhill, and you’ll see that it starts to go up again. Just when it starts to descend again, there’s a path on the left …’

  ‘Thanks, the barber’s already explained it to me.’

  The treccone raised a hand by way of goodbye and went off in the direction of the vendors’ stands. The inspector got back into the Beetle, took the same road he’d come in by, and shortly thereafter he noticed a small dirt road on the left. That had to be it. He turned left and advanced a few hundred yards, and when he came out of the woods he began to slow down. The barber had said the house was big and white, with three tall, beautiful cypresses behind it. He saw it from afar and began to draw near. He was expecting a farmhouse in a state of disrepair, whereas this looked like a fine, solid house with the roof and windows in good condition. To one side there was a sort of garden overgrown with weeds. Both the barber and the treccone had said that it was uninhabited, but on the brick pavement in the courtyard there was a Fiat 600 Multipla. He parked beside it and got out. It was a lovely spot, with an open view of the hills. He walked around a bit, and when he returned, he saw a fat man in jacket and tie standing next to his Beetle.

  ‘Good morning,’ he said in a loud voice, going up to the man.

  ‘Hello,’ the man said. He was tall and massive but had a high voice. His huge hands stuck out from the jacket’s sleeves and hung down almost as far as his knees.

  ‘I’m sorry, the treccone told me this house was for sale,’ Bordelli said, stopping in front of the man.

  ‘It’s true.’

  ‘Could I have a look inside?’

  ‘It’s not mine, it’s the landlord’s,’ the man said, looking at Bordelli as if he couldn’t wait to be rid of him.

  ‘Where can I find him?’

  ‘He lives in San Casciano, but his mother lives in Impruneta, just above the bar del Piro.’

  ‘How big is the house?’

  ‘Fifteen rooms, plus the sheds and the barn.’

>   ‘How much do they want for it?’

  ‘Eighteen million lire for everything, including the land and all the furniture,’ said the man, still staring at him without the slightest interest.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Bordelli.

  He looked one more time at the house’s enormous façade, then got in his Beetle and drove off. Eighteen million wasn’t really so much for a fortress like that. His flat in San Frediano was worth more or less the same amount. He could sell it and start a new life. But the farmhouse was really too big for him. He had to keep looking.

  Back on the main road, he turned left at one point, to go by way of Falciani. There was still half of Sunday left to kill, and when he got to Tavarnuzze he decided to stop at Careggi, where the forensic medicine lab was.

  ‘Are you examining the urine of Lorenzo the Magnificent?’ Bordelli asked, going into the lab and seeing Diotivede with a test tube in his hand, looking at it against the light. Though it was Sunday, both of them often paid no mind to the fact.

  ‘To each his own,’ the doctor said caustically. He hardly ever laughed. At best his lips curled a little when he was about to say something naughty.

  ‘I went to see Baragli, he sends you his greetings.’

  ‘How’s he doing?’

  ‘He’s not long for this world …’

  ‘One of these days I’ll go and see him,’ the doctor muttered.

  He knew Baragli and had always admired him.

  They both remained silent for a few moments, as if embarrassed by the sergeant’s imminent death. The inspector looked at what Diotivede was doing but didn’t understand a thing.

  ‘Did you do Badalamenti?’ he asked.

  ‘I said this afternoon.’

  ‘You know I’m not very patient.’

  ‘At any rate, I’ve finished,’ the doctor said.

  ‘You see? I was right to drop by.’

  ‘My first scribbles are over there.’

  ‘May I?’

  ‘If you can manage to make anything out …’

  ‘Just a quick look.’

  The inspector picked up a small handwritten piece of paper with a number of dark splotches on it. By now he could find his way through Diotivede’s notes as surely as an augur through the entrails of a bird. Aside from the time of death and things already said, they listed specific scientific details on the cuts and perforations of tissue. By studying the angle of the cut and other minutiae, it was surmised that the killer was about six feet tall, rather strong, and left-handed.

  And quite likely a man. The blow had been dealt to Badalamenti from behind, and the point of the scissors had slid between two vertebrae, shattering one of them. Like at a bullfight, Bordelli thought. Within seconds the victim was dead. The traces of adrenalin in Badalamenti’s blood might bear witness to great anger, but not to the terror of death. In short, he hadn’t been aware of what was happening right behind him.

  Bordelli sighed and put the stained paper back in its place. It wasn’t much, but it was better than nothing. Diotivede was busy smearing something on a slide for the microscope. Bordelli drew near.

  ‘Forgive me for asking … but are you absolutely sure the killer was left-handed?’ he asked, defying the pathologist’s sensitivity.

  ‘Don’t you ever get tired of asking me if I’m sure?’ the doctor said.

  ‘Don’t take offence. I only want you to explain to me how you arrive at such a conclusion, so I can learn.’ The doctor looked back into the microscope’s eyepiece.

  ‘I’m a hundred and ten per cent certain. First of all, the inside cutting edge of the blades goes from left to right,’ he said in the tone of someone explaining something very simple to a complete idiot.

  ‘But couldn’t he have done it like this?’ asked Bordelli, and he raised his right hand over his left shoulder, pretending to have a knife in his hand, and cut the air from left to right. Diotivede observed his gesture without interrupting his work.

  ‘No,’ he said.

  ‘Why not?’ asked Bordelli. The doctor sighed and came away from the microscope.

  ‘That’s impossible for three reasons. First: a right-handed person striking in that fashion will generate much less force and will be considerably more hampered and therefore less precise. Second: he will block his field of vision with his arm. Third: that sort of movement isn’t instinctive, and at certain moments instinct is of paramount importance. And there is even, if you will, a fourth reason.’

  ‘And that would be?’

  ‘That never in all my life have I seen anything of the sort,’ the doctor concluded.

  ‘So, in short, you have no doubt.’

  ‘Tell you what. If you discover that the killer was not lefthanded, I’ll retire immediately.’

  ‘Say no more, you’ve convinced me … the killer is left-handed.’

  ‘I’m ever so grateful.’

  Diotivede leaned forward again and looked into the microscope, for another glimpse of the wondrous world of bacteria. He sat there motionless, scowling slightly, and turning the knobs. Bordelli stretched and yawned.

  ‘Have you decided about Christmas?’ he asked.

  ‘I think I’ll accept your invitation. Who else will be there?’

  ‘I still haven’t asked anyone else, but I was thinking of Dante Pedretti and Fabiani … And if they let him out in time, Botta might also come, that way he would cook.’

  ‘Sounds good,’ said the doctor, still engrossed in ogling his orgies of microorganisms.

  ‘If they won’t let him out we can bring home some dishes from Cesare’s,’ said Bordelli.

  ‘How’s Piras doing?’ the doctor asked.

  ‘He seems well.’

  ‘The boy was really very lucky.’

  ‘That depends on your point of view …’

  ‘Don’t always say such banal things,’ the doctor said, still turning the little knobs of the microscope.

  ‘You’re so kind,’ said Bordelli, smiling. All at once Diotivede raised his head from the microscope, looking doubtful.

  ‘I’m sorry, what day is it today?’ he asked.

  ‘Sunday.’

  ‘The eighteenth?’

  ‘I think it’s the nineteenth,’ the inspector said.

  ‘And I believe I heard tell that they’re casting the second ballot today in France. Who do you think will win?’

  ‘It’s already the nineteenth? I could have sworn it was the eighteenth,’ said the doctor, still perplexed. Bordelli had picked up a pair of scissors from the table and was fiddling with them.

  ‘Eighteenth, nineteenth, twentieth, what difference does it make, Diotivede? Whatever day it is, you’re always in here sticking your nose in the bellies of the dead.’

  ‘Is that a sin?’ Diotivede asked without looking at him.

  ‘Perish the thought,’ the inspector said, raising his hands. The doctor ignored him and started writing something on a sheet of paper. He then opened a cylindrical glass receptacle and started scraping a yellowish goo from the bottom with a thin iron rod. Returning to the microscope, he spread some of the slop on to another slide. Bordelli couldn’t stop yawning. He really hadn’t been sleeping very well and always woke up feeling tired.

  ‘What would you like to eat for Christmas?’ he asked.

  Diotivede switched slides and leaned over the microscope again.

  ‘I would love some French onion soup. I’ve been wanting some for quite a while,’ he said.

  ‘For Christmas?’

  ‘What’s wrong with that?’

  ‘Well, if Botta’s done any time in France, I’m sure he knows how to make it.’

  ‘Then let’s hope he has,’ said the doctor, looking up.

  ‘We must also hope they let him out before the twentyfifth …’

  Piras was eating supper with his parents as they all watched the evening news on television. There was a fire burning, as usual, and the little flames licking the wood were reflected in the ornaments on the Christmas tree. There was a
knock at the door, and Gavino went to open it. It was Pina Setzu, a neighbour. She looked upset. Wrinkling her nose and squinting, she said she was a little worried about her cousin Benigno.

  ‘He was supposed to come by at seven but there’s been no sign of him,’ she said, arching her eyebrows.

  ‘Maybe he’s tired,’ said Gavino.

  ‘He always comes every Sunday …’ she whimpered, huddling up in her shawl.

  ‘Come in,’ said Gavino, shuddering from the cold. Pina had been living in the house next door since marrying Giovanni thirty-five years before.

  ‘I just know something has happened, I can feel it,’ she said, coming into the kitchen and crossing herself.

  ‘What’s happened?’ asked Piras. The woman opened her shawl and repeated what she’d just said to Gavino.

  ‘When did you last see him?’ Gavino asked.

  ‘He came on Friday to bring us cheese and said he’d come again today …’

  ‘You should go and have a look,’ said Maria. They all knew that Benigno lived alone in a big, isolated house and didn’t have a telephone.

  ‘Maybe he just fell asleep,’ said Gavino, pretending not to be worried. He too was beginning to imagine the worst, but he didn’t want Pina to get even more upset.

  ‘I’ll go,’ said Piras, standing up. As he was adjusting the crutches under his arms, his mother gave him a worried look but said nothing.

  ‘How will you get there?’ asked Gavino. Neither they nor the Setzus owned a car or even a motor scooter.

  ‘Ettore’s got a Five hundred,’ said Piras, taking the torch his father kept over the fireplace. He put on his coat and went out with Pina. It was quite cold outside.

  ‘Is Giovanni coming too?’ asked Piras, stopping at the edge of the road.

  ‘He’s not feeling well and has a little fever,’ Pina said, shaking her head.

  They headed towards Ettore’s without another word. Pina walked fast, stopping every ten paces or so to let the hobbling Piras catch up. They climbed the street to Ettore’s house and knocked at the Cannas family’s door. Ettore was having supper with his parents and five-year-old sister, Delia.

  ‘Pina’s worried about Benigno,’ said Piras, and he explained the situation to everyone. Ettore put the last piece of rabbit in his mouth, took a sip of wine, then grabbed his torch and went to take the car out of the stable. All three got into the tiny vehicle and took the road to Milis. Piras sat in the back. Nobody spoke. After Tramatza they turned on to the Carlo Felice highway in the direction of Oristano. The heating system was blowing very hot air that smelled of exhaust fumes. But it was better than the cold.