Auntie Poldi and the Vineyards of Etna

by Mario Giordano

“Please go on, Donna Poldina.”

  “I can see to it that these headaches stop. For a while, at least.”

  Russo reacted for the first time. He raised his eyebrows.

  “But there are conditions.”

  “Assuming that what you say makes some sense, Donna Poldina, and that I’m the person you take me for, what—if anything—would you have to offer?”

  “You’ll see that in a minute. First, my conditions: one, I want to know who killed Madame Sahara; two, I want my water turned back on; and three, hands off Femminamorta.”

  “And four?”

  “That’s it.”

  Russo sat back in his chair. “Believe me, I don’t know who killed Giuliana. That’s the honest truth.”

  Poldi shook her head. “Let’s give poor old truth a break for once, it could use a rest. I want a lead I can use.”

  Russo considered this, then picked up the phone and pressed a quick-dial key.

  “Giovanna and Arianna to my office.”

  Two uniformed women appeared moments later. Russo got to his feet.

  “I must ask you to submit to a brief body search, Donna Poldina. I’m sure you’ll understand.”

  So saying, he left the room.

  With a sigh, my Auntie Poldi removed her clothes and jewellery. A trifle embarrassed by her ample nudity, she watched the security guards search her handbag and clothing for bugging devices. But the phoenix tattooed on her left breast spread its wings with every breath she drew, filling her with strength and courage. And then it was over. She calmly got dressed again and waited for Russo to reappear.

  He came in bearing two glasses of white wine and joined Poldi on the sofa, but he didn’t drink.

  “All right, ask your questions.”

  “Who is the Hedgehog?”

  He stared at her. “What are you talking about?”

  “Madame Sahara made a note after speaking with Elisa Puglisi: ‘The Hedgehog has the money.’ I’m convinced that the Hedgehog killed both women.”

  “No, that can’t be.”

  “Then you know who the Hedgehog is?”

  Russo sighed. “Not the Hedgehog, the Hedgehogs.”

  “Oh.”

  Poldi started to speak, but he cut her short.

  “Before I say anything more, I want to know what you have to offer.”

  Poldi took the mobile phone from her handbag and showed Russo a photo she’d secretly taken that afternoon, when returning from the restaurant toilets.

  “Ever seen these men?”

  “One of them is your friend the commissario. The other is the American who’s looking for water, the eccentric Californian who was staying with Achille.”

  “His name is Sean Torso. That’s not his real name, it’s an anagram of ‘Etnarosso.’”

  Russo’s jaw muscles tightened. “FBI?”

  “He’s been dogging your footsteps for the last three months.”

  “What has he found out so far?”

  Poldi shrugged. “Not enough.”

  “What about Montana?”

  “He’d be glad to get rid of the guy, and he wouldn’t be responsible as long as no one got murdered.” Russo looked at my aunt, shook his head a trifle wonderingly and raised his glass.

  “Benvenuto in Sicilia, Donna Poldina. I think this is the beginning of a wonderful friendship.”

  14

  Tells again of hare and hedgehogs, ice caves, ninjas and body signals. Poldi gets her running water back, thinks things over and finally understands which way the hare went. She gets pricked and gets her cheek stroked, is treated impolitely and then, with the friendly assistance of the Fortschau Armoury, obeys her hunting instinct. The trouble is, she ends by overlooking an important detail and has to improvise. A few tears are shed.

  “Okay, shoot. Where did you hide the mic?” I demanded when Poldi inserted a pause for me to express my admiration. “In your ear? In your mouth? Between your . . . er, never mind. Come on, where was it?”

  “Nowhere! I was completely clean. You think I’d run such a risk when there was so much at stake?”

  “Oh, so you really were in earnest?”

  “Of course, what d’you think? In the long run, it was the only way to put a stop to that capo mafioso’s activities, I realised that at once. The end justifies the means, and you can’t afford to be squeamish in a murder inquiry. You have to get your hands dirty occasionally. And besides”—Poldi chuckled to herself—“I got rid of that idiot Torso. Everyone knew who he was inside two days, and the FBI called him off. Actually, I did him a favour, don’t you agree? Vito as well.”

  “Have you told Montana about your deal with Russo?”

  “Are you crazy? That remains my dear little secret, and I’m counting on your own discretion as well, you hear? But sooner or later, when I’ve gathered enough evidence, I’ll light the fuse.”

  “You’re on thin ice, Poldi.”

  A dismissive gesture. “Get on with you! Think I’d shit on my own doorstep?”

  “What if Russo wants . . . well, more? It, I mean.”

  “The rule that always applies in operations like this is, keep the ball in play but never shoot. It would be child’s play for me to make Russo sexually dependent on me, of course, but I’m a pro. I’m on the side of justice—I still know where to draw the line.”

  That’s just what I was doubtful about. At the same time, I knew I was the last person to talk my aunt out of something, for despite her sixty years and wide experience of life, I was beginning to realise that Poldi had remained a child. One of those children who occasionally, when things are going too well and they’re feeling their oats, can’t resist looking over the edge of a precipice, only to give themselves a little shake and scamper home in relief. When that dawned on me, I vaguely sensed that I might not be so helpless after all.

  That life might have had a particular reason for depositing me on Poldi’s sofa.

  It was so that I might look after her.

  Because I might be not only the last but also the only person who could save Poldi from falling into the abyss. It was the sort of task you could neither put off nor delegate to someone else. You simply took it on, said “Namaste” and hoped you wouldn’t blow it.

  “Hey, what’s the matter, sonny boy? Why are you trembling like that?”

  “I’m not trembling, everything’s fine.” I drew a deep breath. “Did Russo meet your conditions?”

  “Don’t be so quick off the mark. Say, d’you have that problem with it as well? If so, no wonder you don’t have a girlfriend. Still, there are ways of curing it—you know that, don’t you? A bit of yoga can work wonders.”

  More deep breathing. “Well, who are the Hedgehogs, and how do pheromone sprays come into it?”

  She laughed. “Damned if I’m giving that away at this stage!”

  “Come on, Poldi, thrillers always invite the reader to guess, so give me something to work on and then surprise me. Or, if I guess the murderer’s identity correctly, do me the favour of a spectacular showdown.”

  Poldi looked at me intently. “My, my, so now we’re an expert on thrillers, are we?”

  I remained adamant. “You’ve got to deliver, Poldi. So who were the Hedgehogs?”

  “Hare versus hedgehogs, that’s all I’m saying. It kept going through my head when Vito and Torso nabbed me. Subconsciously, I’d already caught on. You know the story of the two identical hedgehogs that win every race because one of them is always at the winning post before the hare takes off? They’re in cahoots, that’s the secret, and the hoax can’t be proved as long as they don’t slip up. Mind you, everyone does in the end.”

  When Poldi tried the kitchen tap the next morning, it spat out some rust-brown liquid. Soon afterwards, clear water once more flowed from every tap in the Via Baronessa. Its residents breathed a sigh of relief.

  Satisfied with herself and reconciled with the world, Poldi had her first proper shower in weeks and brewed herself some coffee. Then, for the first t
ime in ages, she braved her aching knees and climbed the steep stairs to her roof terrace, where she sat in the basket chair I’d recently put there for my cigarette breaks. It was still early, and Etna was being gilded by the rising sun. Poldi thought of her Peppe and softly asked him to watch over her.

  “Namaste, Smoky,” she said, raising her coffee cup to the volcano. “Poldi contra mundum!”

  Then she shut her eyes and deliberated. She knew who the Hedgehogs were, and she knew how much money had been involved. A lot of money. A very great deal of money. My Auntie Poldi knew quite a lot by now, but she still couldn’t prove it. She briefly considered calling Montana and telling him what Russo had said about the Hedgehogs. Then she remembered that she’d deleted his number, and besides, first she wanted to understand how Madame Sahara’s murder had occurred.

  But no matter which way she looked at it, everything seemed quite cut and dried until she recalled what Montana had said about the results of his inquiries, and her neat little house of cards collapsed. Things simply didn’t add up. And then, like a derisive comment on the international situation, the nerve beneath her old crown started throbbing again. Poldi swore beneath her breath. A toothache was the last thing she needed for solving a murder.

  Rising from my basket chair with a groan, she went downstairs and shuffled back into the kitchen. She considered aiding her concentration with a small bottle of beer, but she decided to take an ibuprofen instead and waited for it to work. This took time.

  The tooth continued to throb away like a radio beacon pulsating for navigational purposes. Throb, throb, throb . . . And again: throb, throb, throb . . . So as not to be entirely idle, Poldi opened her laptop and re-examined the sad signora’s dossier, filtering the list of names according to various criteria. She clicked around purely for something to do. Throb, throb, throb . . .

  And then she saw it.

  The connection.

  The hedgehog trick.

  Throb, throb, throb . . . Two names with the same address. She hadn’t noticed it before, but that’s life. Fate has some odd ways of nudging us in the right direction. A toothache, for one.

  “Namaste, tooth,” Poldi said softly, surprised to have suddenly grasped how everything fitted together.

  She also grasped that a visit to the dentist was inescapable.

  After a brief phone call to Russo, Poldi bravely set out.

  She was scared, naturally. Who wouldn’t have been? I mean, dentist and murder inquiry—who but my Auntie Poldi would have had the nerve to venture into such a lion’s den?

  She would never have believed that a drunk, neurotic young spouter of crude political slogans could be a dentist, but Dottore Enzo Rapisarda did in fact own a remarkably chic practice in Trecastagni. He also restricted himself to private patients, so she didn’t have long to wait. Moreover, in contrast to her memory of him at the vineyard that afternoon, Rapisarda made a thoroughly calm, composed and—above all—sober impression in his snow-white smock when Poldi’s turn eventually came. There was no trace of the fanaticism he’d displayed on that previous occasion.

  “Oh, you’re German?” he said delightedly in German when Poldi introduced herself. “I love Germany. I studied in Bochum.”

  “But Merkel is the Devil in disguise, wasn’t that it?”

  Rapisarda frowned. “I’m sorry?”

  “Don’t you remember me, Dottore?”

  He stared at her for a moment, then blushed. “Oh yes, of course I do, signora. It was . . .” He stammered in embarrassment. “That’s to say, I was rather . . .”

  “Loaded, but never mind, so was I. Let’s forget it.” Poldi sat down in the dentist’s chair. “After all,” she said with a broad smile, “we’re both professionals.”

  Rapisarda smiled back shyly. He proved to be a remarkably sensitive and sympathetic practitioner. His injections were administered so skilfully that Poldi hardly felt a thing, and he stroked her cheek with his finger as if she were a child. It was a new experience for her.

  “The crown will have to be replaced,” he told her. “For the time being, all I can do is treat the underlying inflammation. That will at least relieve the pain. We can begin the treatment proper in a week’s time, if you’re prepared to place yourself in my hands.”

  Poldi mumbled an assent with her mouth open and surrendered. She had no choice in any case.

  It was all over within half an hour. Poldi’s mouth was numb, but Rapisarda assured her that she would feel no pain when the anaesthetic wore off. He shook my aunt’s hand and prepared to show her out, but her fingers tightened on his.

  “Thank you, Dottore, but I’m afraid we aren’t through yet.”

  Rapisarda looked startled.

  “Eh, what more can I do? All your other crowns look fine.”

  “I want a word with you about your neighbours, the Hedgehogs. And about Madame Sahara and the money she collected for your party. Above all, though, about the way the Hedgehogs killed her and Elisa Puglisi.”

  Rapisarda went red in the face. He prepared to say something, perhaps even to shout something, but Poldi, who was still gripping his hand, drew him a little closer and used her other hand to put a finger gently to his lips.

  “Hear me out before you blow a fuse, Dottore. I can imagine you owe your neighbours a great deal. The interest-free loan for your smart practice, for instance. No, Dottore, don’t deny it. Signor Russo told me, and he got it from your neighbours themselves. In view of their generosity, you naturally made no great effort to discover how a furniture manufacturer on the verge of bankruptcy and a wine grower who had just renovated his entire winery managed to produce so much liquid cash. You were aware that Madame Sahara was collecting donations for your Five Star party, and you somehow discovered that the money never reached it, didn’t you? You should really have put two and two together, Dottore, but you didn’t. You’re a good dentist and you campaign for a just cause, but I’m afraid you’ve got your paws dirty. Gratitude is one thing, but what does your conscience tell you?”

  She released Rapisarda’s hand at last. The young man was trembling. He collapsed onto his treatment stool like a punctured balloon.

  “What do you propose to do now?” he asked in a whisper.

  “It’s quite simple. I propose to ask you two questions, Dottore, and if your answers are satisfactory there’s just a chance you may get off cheaply. I don’t want to lose such a good dentist, and with a bit of luck some of the party donations may yet come to light. So what do you say?”

  Rapisarda nodded.

  “Chin up, Dottore. Look at me.”

  The young dentist raised his head and looked at her.

  “Ask your questions, signora.”

  “Very well. First, what was the usual route Five Star party donations were supposed to take? Second, on the day after the grape harvest—in other words, the day after Madame Sahara was murdered and you woke up late with a god-awful hangover—did you by any chance find yourself in possession of something that didn’t belong to you?”

  Rapisarda stared at my aunt as if she had second sight. “How did you know?”

  “What was it?” Poldi asked, although she already knew.

  The Hedgehogs had lost their last race.

  “Carmelo Avola’s mobile phone,” said Rapisarda. “I took it to him at once, of course. I was so plastered, I must have pocketed it by mistake.”

  “Believe me, Dottore,” Poldi said quietly, “you didn’t.”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa!” I took a paper napkin from the table and waved it in the air in a token of surrender. “I may be a complete knucklehead, Poldi, but I just don’t get it. Mobile phone? Hedgehogs? Party donations?”

  “Well, it is a bit complicated, and I didn’t get it myself, not right away. The thing is, anyone who commits two such murders must suffer from a grossly overinflated opinion of himself, don’t you agree?”

  “Sure.”

  “And pheromones are thoroughly consistent with the image Achille adopted in order to
seduce women. He was a nobody who wanted to be a Cyclops and wasn’t one. He was just a wine grower who robbed his political party of a tidy sum of money in order to finance his new winery, because Italian banks have become so stingy with their loans since the euro crisis. The same went for his brother Carmelo, who was on the verge of bankruptcy. The two of them needed money, lots of money, so they helped themselves.”

  “So the Avola brothers were the Hedgehogs.”

  “Exactly. That’s what they called each other as children, because, being identical twins, they enjoyed fooling their schoolmates. Hare and hedgehogs was a game they were good at, and a nickname like that can stick to you for life.”

  “Why Elisa Puglisi?”

  “Well, she was supposed to launder the cash donations Madame Sahara collected for the Five Star party. Also, she had an affair with Achille, who had used the pheromones on her. He somehow grasped that she was playing a double game with the water Mafia and blackmailed her. In other words, he pocketed the party donations in return for her silence.”

  “And at some stage Puglisi had had enough and refused to play any more.”

  “She was still a district attorney, that’s why. She felt safe enough to threaten to bust him, so he applied the emergency brake and hit her over the head with a bottle of Polifemo. Overinflated self-esteem, as I said.”

  I was beginning to understand. “But she’d told Madame Sahara first, and since the fortune-teller knew who had murdered her friend, she had to die too.”

  “Now you’ve got it. Cento punti!”

  “But how could Achille get away with it?”

  “The brothers simply played hare and hedgehogs—it was the only way. A bit risky, of course, but they virtually had their backs to the wall. And what was the other factor involved?”

  “Overinflated self-esteem?”

  “Spot on. Plus an ego problem. Well now, I knew from Montana that Achille had been seen in a bar in Trecastagni at the material time, and that was consistent with his mobile phone’s location data. Except that it was Carmelo in the bar, not Achille. Carmelo had Achille’s mobile on him, thereby providing his brother, who must just have killed Madame Sahara, with an alibi.”