The Measure of Time

by Gianrico Carofiglio

  However, his past being known to everyone, nobody ever dreams of asking him for money by way of protection, insurance, help to prisoners’ families or anything like that. Let’s put it like this: he’s found a legal way to make use of his far from spotless track record.

  The restaurant is situated over in Via Amendola, near the Mungivacca district. By the time I arrived, after an hour’s walk, Tancredi and Annapaola were already there.

  “So, how did your interviews go?” Tancredi asked.

  “With Marinelli, fine. We agreed that we’d go to the hearing, and in the preliminary phase I’ll make a request for an extension. He’s promised me a month. It was pretty much as I figured: he doesn’t want it to come out how badly Costamagna defended Cardace at the trial. I discovered Costamagna was actually a cousin of his wife’s.”

  “And what about with your client?” Annapaola asked.

  When she doesn’t like the clients, they’re my clients. In other cases, they’re ours. I didn’t respond to the provocation.

  “So-so. My first impression was very bad. Then we talked and it improved.”

  “Yes, when we first meet a person,” she said, “we always get a clear, irrational but reliable intuition of how they are. And then we think it over and everything gets mixed up.”

  “Damn, this is high-level stuff, worthy of a psychology textbook. I must write it down. Anyway, just to satisfy you, I will say that in the final part of our interview he turned into an arsehole again.”

  Having exhausted our skirmishing, we ate the raw seafood antipasto, which was very good, and then got back to the subject in hand.

  “So, did the kid tell you anything useful?” Tancredi asked.

  “Yes, it seems Gaglione worked as a nightclub bouncer. A few weeks before the murder, he beat up the wrong person outside a place called Chilometro Zero and was apparently very worried about reprisals. That’s why he didn’t go out much and was even thinking of getting away from Bari for a while.”

  “This is a serious lead, if it’s true. Who did he beat up?”

  “Cardace says he doesn’t know. I got the impression he was telling the truth.”

  “This didn’t come out at the trial,” Annapaola said.

  “Costamagna advised him not to mention it. Too vague. It wouldn’t have helped in court. And on the other hand it might have alarmed these dangerous individuals, or worse. People involved with organized crime, that’s what Cardace understood from what Gaglione told him. The argument makes sense.”

  “Anyway, it’d be good to check it out,” Annapaola said.

  “Yes. We need to know if the fight really happened. And if it did, who was involved. Maybe somebody ended up in Emergency, which means there’d be a record. I don’t think it’ll be easy, but if we can prove that Gaglione got in a fight with somebody dangerous, there’d be a glimmer of hope we could suggest an alternative to the narrative that’s in the ruling.” I turned to Tancredi. “Have you talked to your former Flying Squad colleagues?”

  He placed the shell of the last oyster on his plate and heaved a sigh before answering. As if it was a burden to go from that sublime taste to trivial matters of work.

  “I went to Headquarters today. The boys in Homicide and Narcotics are totally convinced it was Cardace. Without knowing about the fight in the disco, I asked them if as far as they knew Gaglione had been having problems with anybody, but there was nothing like that. So, if this fight did happen, they never knew about it. They told me everyone knew Gaglione was dealing Ecstasy and cocaine. The investigation that involved them tapping his phones was aimed specifically at him – they’re weren’t keeping an eye on him to get to anybody else. In fact, after the murder they stopped the intercepts and the case was closed.”

  “The fact that the Squad didn’t know if Gaglione was having problems with anyone,” Annapaola said, “doesn’t mean he wasn’t.”

  “No, of course,” Carmelo said, “it doesn’t mean he wasn’t. Normally, if a member of an important family is involved in a fight and somebody actually takes the liberty of beating him up, the news gets around. But obviously that’s not an absolute rule. So let’s find out who provides, or provided, security at Chilometro Zero and have a chat with them. Although these guys aren’t usually especially cooperative.”

  “Now that I come to think of it,” Annapaola said, “I know a disc jockey from Chilometro Zero.”

  “Do they still put on discs?” I asked, foolishly. “Don’t they just select tracks on a computer?”

  “You’re elderly, Guerrieri. You shouldn’t say anything about these subjects. Vinyl evenings are going great guns, old-style DJs are making a comeback. Maybe you remember – even you were a kid once. If they do an eighties night, or even a seventies night, I’ll take you.”

  Orazio appeared with three portions of spaghetti in parcels and told Annapaola he liked beautiful women who didn’t make a fuss when confronted with a little pasta.

  “I also like beautiful women who love to eat,” she replied with a broad smile. “I like them a lot.”

  I assumed Orazio didn’t grasp the full meaning of the words, or the smile (Annapaola isn’t exclusively attracted to the male of the species). He put the plates down in front of us and walked away. We opened the parcels and waited for the three-thousand-degree heat inside to die down.

  “All right,” Tancredi said, picking up his fork. “I’ll talk to someone in security, and you, Annapaola, question your DJ friend. Let’s see if anyone mentions this supposed fight.”

  For a few minutes, we devoted ourselves to Orazio’s special recipe. Spaghetti with seafood, cooked in the oven in parcels with the addition of coriander and a special chilli unsuitable for delicate palates.

  “We also have to track down the guy Cardace had a coffee with,” I said. “He said his name is Sabino, that he’s more or less the same age as him and that he thinks he works in a garage.”

  “What’s the point?” Annapaola said. “What’s so special about the fact that they met? The police didn’t even look for him.”

  “Yes, but if he could give us some indication of the time they met,” I said, “and confirm what Cardace says, it might be useful to us to maintain that Cardace was in the cafe after seeing Gaglione. Not before, which is what’s in the ruling.”

  “We’ll see if we can find him, sure. But in my opinion you’re overestimating how much you can use any testimony he might give. Let’s suppose he testifies and confirms the meeting, what’s to stop the court maintaining that Cardace went back to Gaglione’s place after this meeting and killed him then?”

  Annoyingly, she was right. I replied that we’d deal with that if and when we found Sabino, and if and when Sabino agreed to testify.

  “Then I need to figure out the business of the shooting practice and the powder found on the jacket,” I said, eliminating the final vestige of food from Orazio’s parcel. “How long can it stay on? Do we need to talk to somebody in Forensics or with a pathologist?”

  “There’s no need,” Carmelo replied. “I can tell you. The powder from a gunshot stays on leather for a few hours, but can stay on fabrics for several days. So in theory, things could actually be the way the kid says. But did he tell you who he went shooting with?”

  “No. He keeps saying he doesn’t want to get his friend into trouble.”

  “Or maybe he simply made him up to explain the residue on the jacket,” Annapaola commented. “If he doesn’t tell us who he went shooting with, we can’t do anything with this information.”

  “Actually, the problems remain even if he does tell us. We’d have to ask this person, whoever he is, to accuse himself of unauthorized possession and carrying of a firearm. Do you think anyone would do that?”

  “Anyway,” Tancredi said, “Cardace has to tell us something more about this phantom guy in the quarry. Then we’ll figure out how to use the information.”

  “Agreed. I’ll go and see him again in the next few days.”

  “Let’s go togethe
r,” Annapaola said. “We can play good cop, bad cop. It may work.”

  Orazio approached the table and asked us if we wanted a nice frittura mista. It was ten in the evening and a frittura mista struck us as something that would finish us off, so all three of us declined.

  “Not even a portion to share, just a taster?”

  “We’ll have it next time, when we come for lunch,” Tancredi said. “This beautiful girl is young and might be able to indulge herself, but Avvocato Guerrieri and I are both elderly gentlemen, and our doctors advise moderation.”

  This didn’t strike me as amusing. I had to repress the impulse to point out that he was almost ten years older than me. I was even tempted to take a nice dish of frittura mista away with me – I’d eat it all by myself, just to show that I could.

  “Yes, Orazio,” Annapaola cut in. “I brought my old uncles to dinner with me, but we mustn’t overdo it. One evening I’ll come with my young girlfriends and we’ll have whatever you suggest. For now, bring us some wild fennel liqueur and we’ll finish up.”

  Orazio did an elegant about-turn and went to fetch the bottle. The fact that he would serve us himself was a mark of great consideration. There were actually several waiters moving around the restaurant. At least some of them, to judge by their faces, looked like they’d been with Orazio in his previous life, too.

  “Anyway,” Annapaola resumed, “you may be interested to know that I went for a little stroll near Gaglione’s apartment. Former apartment, I should say. Anyway, I went over there, asked a few questions in the vicinity, and even went inside the building, where I discovered something that doesn’t appear in the case file.”

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “He lived on the mezzanine. The apartment doesn’t face the street but has a window and a balcony overlooking the courtyard, which you can gain access to through a little gate at the far end of the entrance hall. The gate was open when I was there. If someone had come in that way, it wouldn’t have been too difficult to surprise Gaglione. The prosecution case was that the killer came in through the front door. And if he did, then the argument that the victim knew him would be correct. But what if the killer, or killers, had come in from behind, from the courtyard?”

  “I have to reread the papers to see if anyone thought of that. If they didn’t, that’s another thing we can try to bring up in court. Are there any security cameras in the area?”

  “I didn’t see any. There might be some that I didn’t notice. I don’t think there are any in the block where Gaglione’s apartment is, but, I repeat, I might have missed them.”

  “Anyway,” Tancredi said, “the prosecutor at the original trial was good.”

  “Cotturri,” I said. “I’ve never been in a major trial with him, but he strikes me as a sound person.”

  “He is. He arrived in Bari just as I was retiring, but my former colleagues are keen on him. He puts them at their ease, makes them feel their backs are covered. Not that he lets them do whatever they like. But he’s someone who does his job properly.”

  I sighed. Another piece of news that wasn’t positive for us. If the assistant prosecutor who had been all through the investigation and the trial was so good, that reduced the likelihood that there were any significant gaps in the prosecution case.

  Soon afterwards, having finished the fennel liqueur, we said goodbye to Orazio and left the restaurant. The air was mild, already almost springlike.

  “Anybody want a lift?” Tancredi said.

  “I have my bike,” Annapaola replied. “Guerrieri came on foot because he’s keeping fit. I’ll take him home.”

  Tancredi looked at us in turn. He nodded, said all right, goodnight, and set off for his car.

  “Was I brazen, Avvocato?” Annapaola said, with her most dangerous of smiles, when we were alone.

  “You couldn’t be brazen even if you tried. You’re beyond brazenness.”

  “Then will you invite me over to your place for a drink, Uncle?”

  “I’m elderly, you said. Or so I thought.”

  “You are elderly, but you’re in good shape. As far as I recall, you keep fit. Are we going to start arguing about it, or shall we go?”

  “Let’s go,” I said, taking the helmet she handed me and thinking that she was still having the same effect on me after several years. A rare stroke of luck.

  Lorenza

  Two days went by. My hangover had been quite bothersome, but it had passed. I kept wondering how to track down the girl from the party, but couldn’t think of a satisfactory way. The one possibility was to contact Verio, but I didn’t have his telephone number and didn’t even know where he lived. In any case, with all the people who’d been crammed into the professor’s apartment, it was likely that even Verio didn’t know her.

  I have the distinct memory that my boss – the lawyer I was a trainee with – had given me the task that afternoon of writing an appeal against a sentence for repeated aggravated theft. The verdict struck me as indisputable. The defendant was definitely guilty of a series of raids on apartments in the centre of town and the magistrate had given him three years, which I actually thought was too lenient.

  So I did the task I’d been instructed to do, I wrote the appeal, but I can honestly state, thirty years later, that I didn’t believe a single word. By the time I left the office I was very dissatisfied, and quite unconvinced – even more than usual – that I’d made the right choice in becoming a lawyer, which meant I was very worried about what the future had in store with me.

  I had gone a few yards when I heard a strangely familiar female voice call to me.

  “Avvocato Guido!”

  She crossed the street, came up to me and gave me a kiss, all in a totally natural way.

  “I came to get you because I wanted to invite you to dinner.”

  “Dinner?”

  “Yes. It’s something people do around here in the evening. You get given food and you eat it, something like that.”

  “Did I tell you where I work the other night?”

  “You have no idea how many things you said. But not where you work.”

  “So how did you find me?”

  “I have my methods. Enough of that now, or I’ll get bored. And if I get bored, I’ll withdraw the invitation and leave you to spend a sad, lonely evening regretting what might have been.”

  “No, no regrets. Never. Where shall we go?”

  “I fancy a pizza. With that one premise, I’ll leave you to choose the place.”

  I suggested a pizzeria near the prison, where they were in the habit – impeccable from a fiscal point of view – of writing the bill by hand on the paper tablecloth; a printed receipt was an arcane concept as far as they were concerned. But the pizzas were good and very cheap. She knew the place and approved of my choice.

  “I have a car. But what kind of lawyer are you, without even a briefcase?”

  “Technically I’m not a lawyer, I’m a trainee prosecutor and, between ourselves, it’s not at all certain that I’m going to become a lawyer. Anyway, I do have a briefcase, a rather nice one, that I was given when I graduated. I use it when I go to the courthouse in the morning.”

  We reached her car, a cream-coloured Alfasud somewhat past its prime, parked a hundred yards from my office.

  As we set off I realized I didn’t know what her name was. Maybe she’d told me and I’d been so drunk by then that it hadn’t registered. To avoid making a gaffe, I decided to proceed with caution and guile.

  “You know, I don’t have a very clear memory of all the things I said to you the other night.”

  She gave a quick laugh. “I don’t think you remember anything you said the other night.”

  “Was I … indiscreet?”

  “That’s what I find adorable about you. I mean, the way you express yourself. Obviously it’s something to do with the circles you mix in, but there’s a touch of irony I find irresistible.”

  “I’m pleased you find it irresistible, but just to
put ourselves on an equal footing, could you give me a summary of the most … let’s say, the most embarrassing things I told you?”

  “What’s my name?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “My name. What’s my name?”

  There it was. She had me.

  “Actually, I was just thinking… Yes, I know, I’m making a fool of myself, but I’m sorry, I can’t remember…”

  “I didn’t tell you. And to tell the truth you didn’t ask me. But it was an amusing chat, you made me laugh a lot. That’s such an unusual thing that I thought: let’s see if he makes me laugh even when he isn’t drunk, this young lawyer Guido. Or if it’s just down to the wine.”

  Before telling me her name and providing me with a bit more information about herself, she waited until we were sitting over the double-purpose (service and bill) paper tablecloth. Her name was Lorenza, she’d graduated in Letters with a thesis on classical philology, she was a substitute high-school teacher, gave private lessons in Latin and Greek, wrote short stories for literary magazines, and also worked as a freelance editor for a number of publishers.

  “I’m a country boy, so I hope you’ll excuse the question, but what does a freelance editor do?”

  She ate a triangle of four seasons pizza and took a sip of her beer. “The publisher hands me the manuscript the author has sent. I read it and identify the inconsistencies, the repetitions, the faux pas, any actual errors. I mark everything in the margin, the manuscript is sent back to the author with my annotations, and he or she decides which to accept and which to reject. After which the book is put into proof form, the proofs are corrected and the book is finally printed.”

  We continued talking about what she did – there were points about which she was rather evasive and I didn’t insist – and about lots of other things. It occurred to me that I’d never met a girl – a woman, actually – who was simultaneously so beautiful, so fascinating and so funny. The fact that such an exceptional woman was here with me, having dinner and chatting away, and that she’d actually been the one who’d come looking for me, was a mystery I preferred not to delve too deeply into.