Mr Proietti frowned. ‘How’s that?’
‘Because I don’t think the Calabrians were involved in this kidnap. The Calabrians were patiently waiting for your son to pay — well, in the way those guys do patient, which is regular doses of intimidation, progressing in their intensity. They weren’t quite ready to kidnap for the debt, but unfortunately Davide Stasio thought they were. When he decided to take matters into his own hands, the whole situation ran away from him, and his own sister ended up dead — killed in the crossfire. It was people from your son’s work who really staged this kidnap; the Calabrians had nothing to do with it.’
Mr Proietti’s mouth was agape, and Scamarcio noticed a gold molar.
‘Jesus, what a mess,’ said Proietti eventually.
‘Yeah,’ sighed Scamarcio. ‘And I’ve got a feeling it’s about to get a whole lot worse.’
35
‘SO I TALKED TO THE CONCIERGE, and that flat is owned by a Mrs Giacobbe,’ said Sartori, slurping noisily on a king-size bottle of Coke. The man was on the fast track to diabetes, and Scamarcio wondered if he should introduce him to Moia, and give him a taste of what awaited him.
‘Giacobbe — that’s not a common name,’ said Scamarcio.
‘Yeah, can’t find a link to this case, though.’
‘Course not,’ snapped Scamarcio. Sometimes it felt like Sartori didn’t actually want them to get anywhere.
‘No need to be like that, Leo. We’re all trying our best here.’
Scamarcio sighed and got up from his chair. It was time for a second approach with Chiara Bellagamba. When he’d first spoken to her half an hour ago, she claimed she had no idea who owned the flat where they’d found the boy. Giacometti had just provided her with the address, and told her that the boy would be delivered there and that she should look after him. When it came to who had done the delivering, again she claimed not to have seen them. The boy had arrived alone in the elevator. If this were the case, why hadn’t the boy tried to run off, tried to sound the alarm, Scamarcio wondered. Her story had far too many holes in it for his liking.
When he entered the interview room, Chiara Bellagamba was sipping slowly out of a plastic cup from the vending machine. Her eyes were red-rimmed, and when she set down the cup, bright-orange liquid splattered onto the table. Scamarcio thought it looked carcinogenic.
‘So let’s try this again,’ he said. ‘Chiara, you need to understand that the more difficult you make this, the less lenient the courts will be.’
‘I have no idea who owned that place,’ she said. ‘I’d tell you if I knew.’
‘What were you trying to achieve with all this?’
‘I just wanted to please Paolo — he said it was a little skit, that nobody would get hurt.’
‘Two people are dead, Chiara.’
She sniffed, and pricked at her eyes with the sharp point of a paper tissue. ‘I had no idea,’ she murmured, ‘no idea that it would end up this way.’
‘Neither did Mr Giacometti, but that doesn’t mean much now.’
Scamarcio took a slow breath and looked around the spartan interview room, trying to locate some calm, some inspiration. ‘Chiara, these are very serious charges. You’re a young woman; you had a good career ahead of you. If you cooperate, you’ll return to your old life, be able to start again so much sooner. Do you really want to live out your days being bothered in the shower by the dykes at Rebbibia?’
Chiara Bellagamba turned paler. She was a pretty girl, but under the strip lighting she looked washed-out and haggard. He watched her swallow, moving a shaky hand to her temple in search of a memory. Her fingers stroked her forehead as if she were trying to comfort herself, reassure herself that everything would be OK. Scamarcio could tell he was losing her. It would be up to him to pull her mind back into focus, keep it sharp. She was unravelling; soon she’d no longer be capable.
He leaned forward in his chair and rested his arms on the table. ‘Chiara, look at me.’
She blinked at him a few times, and her breathing steadied slightly.
‘Tell me about the shoot in Trieste. How did Mr Giacometti seem?’
She coughed gently and unballed the paper handkerchief from her fist. ‘He was preoccupied.’ Then, as an afterthought: ‘Obviously.’
‘If you had to describe his mood, what words would you choose?’
‘Angry, sad … worried.’
‘Out of those three descriptions, which do you think best describes his general demeanour over the past weeks?’
‘Angry,’ she hesitated: ‘Then, later on, worried.’
‘How was his relationship with the crew?’
She swallowed, and grimaced as she did so. ‘He was curt with them. Well, apart from the camera guys. He maintained a good rapport with them — I guess he had to.’
‘And the director?’
‘There were two directors; they’d replaced Andrea, who we’d had before. Paolo was polite towards them, but I know he didn’t like them. They were there because the channel wanted them there.’
‘And the actors?’
‘Paolo was really tight with a few of the actors; they’d hang out together after we’d wrapped for the day. He called them his old-timers,’ she said flatly.
‘Why was that?’
She sniffed and wiped her nose once more. ‘They’d been in a lot of his successful shows; he’d known them a long time. In some cases, he’d launched their careers, I think.’
‘Were you ever there when he hung out with the actors?’
She frowned, the tissue poised in mid air. ‘Me? You joking? It was a clique; it was clear that Paolo only wanted certain people to come along — nobody dared gatecrash.’
‘What did they do when they hung out together?’
‘No idea. Perhaps they played cards, or watched the football. Paolo had recently become a fan.’ She shrugged. ‘God knows what they did.’
‘Drink perhaps?’
‘Paolo wasn’t into drinking on shoots. It was always an early call-time the next morning; he didn’t want the talent hungover.’
Scamarcio scratched at his nose and decided to change tack. ‘Why were you on the CCTV at the studios that day? As you know, we traced a kidnap call from that location at the time you were there.’
She nodded slowly and looked into her lap, colour in her cheeks now. ‘I made that call. Paolo told me to.’
‘And the other people with you?’
She looked up, surprised. ‘Oh, they had nothing to do with it. They were a team from Milan who’d come down for a few days’ shooting. Paolo asked me to help them out with the location.’
That explained why they hadn’t been able to find them when they trawled the Rome production companies.
‘So, when did you make the call?’
‘After we’d finished filming — when we were on our way out.’
‘So, you weren’t actually holding Proietti’s family there?’
‘No.’
‘Didn’t you ever want to stop? Didn’t you want to tell Paolo that it was all a bad idea?’
She sighed, her large brown eyes welling with tears again. ‘He was my boss; he’d promised me great things. Besides, you don’t argue with Paolo. He kept saying it was just a bit of fun.’
‘And you never doubted that?’
‘Not at the beginning, no. But when we’d been looking after that boy for more than a couple of days and he kept asking for his mum, I did think it was wrong, that it had gone too far. When Paolo asked me to take the boy to the other place, it was clearly much harder for him; he was too young to be away from her.’
‘Why did he separate them?’
‘No idea,’ she said, shaking her head.
Scamarcio rubbed at his eye; he felt as if he were having some kind of allergic reaction, or was it just stress? He looked down
at his notepad and tried to focus on the question mark he’d just scored a dense box around.
‘These actors that Giacometti hung out with, can you give me their names?’
‘It was Dandini, Fernando, and Pepe — the big guns. The three amigos, we called them.’
Scamarcio tapped his pad, remembering the names from the newspaper piece. He was surprised Bini wasn’t in the clique, though. Perhaps he was too young for them, too much the rising star.
There was a sharp knock at the door, and he ground his teeth in frustration. He thought he might have had the beginnings of an idea, but the interruption had made it vanish.
Sartori was standing in the doorway, not looking particularly apologetic. ‘Sorry, Scamarcio, but can I have a moment?’
Scamarcio reminded himself that he wouldn’t be asking unless it was important. He rose from the table, avoiding eye contact with the girl.
When they were out in the corridor, Sartori handed across a scrap of paper. ‘As you know, we traced the ownership of that house to a Mrs Alessandra Giacobbe.’
‘Yes …’
‘Well, I couldn’t see a connection to this case, but then I found out that she’s married to that famous orchestra conductor, Stefano Sevegnini.’
‘And that’s significant because …?’
Sartori ran a hand through his hair and looked nervous for a moment. ‘Look, Scamarcio, I don’t know if I’m onto something, but Stefano Sevegnini happens to be the half-brother of Zac Dandini, the TV actor who is starring in Giacometti’s current series.’
‘Why the different surnames?’
‘Different fathers. I know it’s a long shot, but …’
Scamarcio grabbed him by the forearm. ‘It is a long shot, but it’s good work.’
He snatched the piece of paper and hurried back to Bellagamba.
36
THEY WERE FILMING A SCENE in the main square in Trieste when Scamarcio arrived. Two young actors Scamarcio didn’t recognise were walking arm-in-arm through the evening light, a steadicam retreating in front of them. Scamarcio turned away from the harsh lights, and immediately spotted Zac Dandini and Enzo Fernando sitting in two foldout chairs next to the catering truck. They appeared to be deep in conversation.
Scamarcio scratched at the back of his neck as he made his approach. He felt a tightening in his gut. He’d never been one to be intimidated, let alone by a couple of actors, but something felt newly amiss — as if he were about to enter unchartered territory.
He felt his mobile buzz in his pocket, and he reached for it reluctantly. His first impulse was to kill the call, but then he figured it could be important.
‘Leone.’
The tightening in Scamarcio’s gut became fiercer. It was properly painful now. ‘How did you get this number?’
There was a tutting-down the line that sounded like a series of strange clicks. ‘Goodness, you do get hung up on the small stuff.’
‘What do you want?’
‘That’s no way to talk to someone who just saved your life.’
‘I’m in the middle of an investigation. I don’t have time for this.’
‘I was calling as a courtesy, but frankly I wish I hadn’t bothered.’
‘Yeah, me too. Goodbye.’
‘Hold your horses, Scamarcio. If I were you, I’d try much harder to be nice.’
‘And why the fuck should I do that?’
‘Cos I might blow your secret.’
‘What, and blow yours at the same time?’
‘There’s a way of doing these things.’
‘You don’t scare me. Either cut to the chase or hang up.’
‘How is Trieste this time of the year?’
Scamarcio swallowed. What the fuck? Then the rational part of his brain told him to just accept that there were a million ways that someone like Dante Greco could get hold of this kind of information.
‘So, what’s it to be?’ Scamarcio asked, trying to sound calm.
‘I thought you might like to know that I’ve been helping Davide Stasio with a small problem.’
When he thought his voice might sound less fragile, Scamarcio asked: ‘What kind of problem would that be?’
‘His brother-in-law got into a mess with Piocosta’s boys. Frankly, I don’t like them, don’t want ’em; I need a clean slate, a fresh start, up in Rome, but don’t want a splinter group, if you know what I mean. Stasio needed a favour, so it was what the Americans would call a “no-brainer”— the perfect “two birds, one stone” situation. A bit like you and me.’
Scamarcio wanted to scream. ‘So, what did you do for Stasio?’
‘On an open line, Scamarcio?’
Scamarcio said nothing.
‘Let’s just say that poor Davide is an amateur — he fights shadows. Piocosta’s boys are far too lazy to have come up with that kind of plan. I should have known, trusted my instincts, but there you go. Even at 65, you still live and learn.’
There was a buzzing in Scamarcio’s ears. He wanted to run around the square howling.
‘Anyway, I won’t tell anyone that you and I know each other, or that you’re aware of the little slip-up with Maia. I’d imagine that might make life difficult.’
Scamarcio remained silent.
‘You know what’s so funny in all this? I was planning to rub out Piocosta anyway — I had the whole operation set up and ready to roll. Then you turned up, and it seemed like a gift from God.’
The line went dead, and Scamarcio just stood there, holding his phone as if he’d forgotten its purpose. He took a long breath and told himself to let it go. It came with the territory; it meant nothing. He could survive this.
He must have been standing there for quite some time, because when he looked up, Fernando and Dandini were staring at him. He pocketed his phone and approached the two actors, his blood still humming in his ears.
37
‘WE’RE ALL IN DEEP SHOCK HERE,’ said Enzo Fernando, sweeping a liver-spotted hand through his mane of shoulder-length grey hair. He was an extraordinary-looking man, like a cross between a lion and an American Indian, thought Scamarcio. His face was extremely wide, with strong, chiselled cheekbones, thick, dark brows, and an elegant but enormous Roman nose. Water had collected in his deep, green-brown eyes, and he made no show of disguising his tears, wiping them away ostentatiously with a white silk handkerchief. ‘We’d known Paolo Giacometti for many, many years. I think I speak for all of us when I say we wouldn’t be where we are without him.’
Dandini and Pepe nodded and looked solemn. They’d all taken refuge from the sea wind in a small café off the square. Scamarcio was conscious of the eyes of the other customers upon them.
‘We’re trying to work out what Paolo had got himself into, how he could possibly be connected with this Proietti business,’ Fernando went on. He was wearing a light-blue silk scarf around his neck, and he began unwinding it and refolding it, smoothing out the frayed edges against his skin.
‘Yes, it does seem odd, I grant you,’ said Scamarcio.
‘I mean, Micky was one of Paolo’s biggest clients. Why would he want to harm him in this way? It makes no sense,’ said Dandini, leaning in across the table. Scamarcio noticed that the man looked exhausted. He also noticed something slightly off about his posture, something that he couldn’t quite put his finger on.
Scamarcio took a sip of his cappuccino and studied the three men in front of him. They were the foremost actors of their generation. Could they be rallying, pulling out all the stops to deliver one of their best performances?
‘Are you sure you’ve got it right, Detective? I mean, we don’t mean to insult you, but might there be another explanation?’ asked Dandini, his surprisingly unlined face a picture of innocence, his sparkly, blue eyes hooded in confusion. Scamarcio couldn’t shake the sensation that this man didn’t
truly believe what he said. The words were right, even the delivery was right, but it was as if the soul behind the eyes told a different story. Scamarcio had seen something like this before, and recently. But where? He couldn’t quite pin it down; it was like a tune he couldn’t place. He dragged his mind back to the conversation and said: ‘Well, we kept all avenues open for as long as we possibly could, but in the end it came back around to Giacometti. And when I interviewed him, he confessed.’
Fernando brought a quick hand to his mouth. ‘Paolo confessed? I can’t believe it.’
Pepe tut-tutted. ‘It just does not add up.’
‘Another thing that doesn’t add up is why Proietti’s son was found in an apartment belonging to Mr Dandini’s sister-in-law,’ said Scamarcio, in as matter-of-fact a way as he could manage. Scamarcio watched Dandini’s face fall for the smallest fraction of a second before he recomposed his features.
‘What?’ blinked Fernando.
‘You heard me. So, Mr Dandini can you explain it?’
Dandini shook his head limply. Far from being a polished professional actor, he now looked like a bewildered geriatric. ‘I haven’t seen my sister-in-law for months. We don’t get on.’
Scamarcio sighed and tapped out a cigarette from his pack, and then, as an afterthought, offered the box around.
Fernando shook his head angrily. ‘Don’t touch ’em — lost my pa to lung cancer.’
Scamarcio took a long drag and eyed him through the smoke. ‘Stories like that should get to me, but they don’t.’
‘Then you’re a fool, Detective,’ said Fernando, fixing a huge, watery eye on him.
‘Fool,’ repeated Scamarcio. ‘There are a lot of fools in this case. More than I’m used to.’
Pepe shifted in his seat and pinched his nose. Scamarcio saw Fernando frown and angle his head slightly towards him. The lion was seething with anger, but was wrestling with it, trying to get control of it.
A thought occurred to Scamarcio. ‘This newfound football obsession of Giacometti’s …’
The Hit Page 27
