Annibale canessa still remembered Teresa, Lazzarini’s widow. She was hard to forget, not only because of her looks, but also because of the circumstances in which they’d met. Eight months after her husband’s death, they’d had a coffee at Milan’s Cova café in via Montenapoleone. He’d just got back into service after recovering from the via Gaeta massacre, and had been in town for a meeting with a judge.
Teresa had visited him in Genoa, while he was still in intensive care after the shooting. She’d come specially from Milan, bringing a pack of gianduiotti with her. Had Annibale been conscious, the Carabinieri watching over him would have let her through – no one could say no to her. But he wasn’t, so she left her gift with a note asking him to call her as soon as he was back on his feet. She wanted to meet him.
And so, the night before his return to Milan, Annibale called and they’d arranged to meet in the historic Cova café in the city centre. It had been warm, and ignoring protocol, Canessa showed up in jeans and a t-shirt. 266
‘You look like a teenager,’ Repetto said.
‘I am one.’
‘You wish! You’re older than I am!’
It was a month since what Repetto had dubbed ‘the trip to Rome’. Milan was half empty, and would soon be entirely so.
Canessa wanted to walk from the courts to the meeting. Repetto had tried to talk him out of it (‘Let’s take the car, it’s got air-conditioning’), but nothing doing. After his near-death experience, he wanted to get back to his simple routines, such as a walk in the city centre.
They’d formed a strange convoy: Canessa on one side of the street, Repetto on the other for a wider visual, two Carabinieri in a patrol car behind them (one holding a PM12 machine gun, finger at the ready).
Given the time and day, Cova was almost empty. Teresa had chosen a table in the corner. Her blonde hair was hidden under a foulard tied under her chin, and she was wearing sunglasses indoors. She had on blue silk trousers and a baggy green shirt, with a light cashmere cardigan over her shoulders to shield her from the air conditioning. She’d stood up and shaken his hand in one fluid motion.
‘I ordered a cappuccino. Can I get you anything…’ She paused, thought about his rank, and finished, ‘Major?’
Canessa glanced at his watch. 5.35 p.m. ‘A gin and tonic,’ he told the waiter.
She removed her glasses and looked at him, smiling with the incredible green eyes she’d passed on to her daughter.
‘I thought you couldn’t drink on shift?’
‘I do whatever I want on shift.’ Canessa smiled provocatively, and immediately regretted doing so. 267
Lazzarini’s widow held back a laugh. ‘Yes, they told me what you were like.’
‘And…?’
‘A Carabiniere to the bone, as far as commitment goes, but as for the rest…’ She paused. ‘Well, a little idiosyncratic.’
Canessa was still recovering and he tired easily, but Teresa’s extraordinary beauty was arousing some vital, physical instinct. He kept his mind on the thought of her as a widow and the mother of Caterina, his formidable little ally and witness. His gaze, however, revealed an undeniable attraction to her.
Teresa smiled again – a symphony in itself – clearly not insulted by any of the thoughts Canessa’s eyes betrayed.
‘You’re an unusual man, Major. However, I am here to thank you personally for having kept your promise to my daughter. You got my poor Rodolfo’s killers.’
The man with the scar had been Gennaro Esposito. Tough little Caterina had recognised him in a photo. The taller, bearded one had been Adelmo Federzoni. Several supergrasses had confirmed that the men had been in Milan at the time, and that they usually worked as a pair.
‘If we’re talking the letter of the law, I suppose I did get them. But I’d rather have taken them alive.’
Teresa remained silent for a moment. ‘I understand. Still, at least Caterina is sleeping again now. You know, as soon as I got home, she told me about you and showed me the lion. She was practically quivering with a mixture of sadness and excitement. She was thinking of her father and the horror she’d witnessed, but also about being part of the investigation. Before the via Gaeta operation, she’d stay up all night. She didn’t have nightmares like Piero. She said she had to be ready, in case they came back. 268 She kept a piece of paper on her bedside table with the phone number you gave her.’
‘That child is incredibly strong,’ Canessa commented. ‘How is Piero?’
Teresa leaned against the soft chair and closed her eyes. ‘He’s still terrified. He stopped wetting his bed, but he’s started again. He’ll only go to school if we walk the other way round. We can’t go through piazza Bazzi any more. He’s been assigned a psychologist. Let’s hope it works.’
‘I’m sorry.’ Canessa didn’t know what else to say.
Teresa removed her foulard, and her blonde hair fell over her shoulders and into her eyes. Canessa did his best not to react, despite realising that even a simple gesture from such a woman was enough to stir him up.
‘Life goes on. And knowing that my husband’s killers are no longer around is an even better reason not to look back. I didn’t want them dead, but this way we’ll skip the whole ordeal of a trial. And considering my children, that may be best. In any case, the fact that you spent a whole month in hospital must mean there were no alternatives.’
Canessa simply nodded. He was about to stand up and bring the meeting to a close when she blurted out, ‘I really miss my husband. My life feels so empty since he left us. I know how men look at me. I know what I could have with someone else’ – she looked at him – ‘and every now and then I do meet someone who makes me feel something. But I’m afraid of getting back to my life. There was an alchemy with him that I doubt I’ll find with anyone else. Are you married? Sorry, silly question. How could you be, with your life? I don’t know, maybe I’ll re-marry, maybe not. Rodolfo always told me that only fools say “never”.’ 269
Annibale nodded.
‘But the feelings I experienced in the ten years with my husband… I’ll never have those again. I may find someone to share a bed with, but that’s all. I don’t think I can stay alone for too long. I need warmth, like I need food, drink…’
For years, Canessa wondered if that had been an invitation. Maybe, if he’d said the right thing, he would now be in a room at the Grand Hotel et de Milan with that goddess in his arms, and Repetto holding a gun outside the door.
Invitation or not, Canessa had stood up and kissed her hand, an officer and a gentleman. His action wasn’t motivated by a sense of morality, his position or the uniform he usually wore. Not even respect for a widow in her moment of grief, but respect for himself.
After via Gaeta, he’d decided to change his ways. He’d had it with superficial flings. No more one-night stands, no more chancing it with his colleagues’ wives or girlfriends. He would wait for someone who truly excited the whole of him, and not just his desire.
‘Madam, it has been a pleasure to meet you. And thank you for the gianduiotti. I’m a big fan.’ He walked out swiftly, forcing Repetto to leave half of his fourth soda.
Annibale couldn’t look at Caterina, sitting on the other side of the sofa, her arms wrapped around her long legs, without seeing her mother in her. They were identical, and he was overcome with the memory of their first meeting: the woman, Cova, the walk, her invitation… 270
There was a similar awkwardness with her daughter, now. They sat in silence, exhibiting a shyness that was out of character for both of them.
The layout of the flat had changed completely. The entrance and long corridor had merged into one large living area. The furniture was modern, mostly IKEA. The paintings, rugs, books and objects scattered around the house spoke of refined taste. Rather than a family home, it looked like a single person’s spacious refuge. A professional drawing table in a sunny corner revealed Caterina’s passion for her work.
‘You’re just the way I remember you.’ She was first to break the silence, brushing a strand of hair from her face.
Canessa smiled. ‘Thank you. You’ve obviously changed, but I still recognise the strong young girl I met all those years ago.’
Caterina didn’t blush or react to his words. She seemed lost in thought. She got up from the sofa and walked into another room. She came back with the stuffed lion, and placed it on the sofa beside Canessa.
‘I’ve always had him with me. One time when I was about twelve, I went on a school trip to London and I left him somewhere. I had to move heaven and earth to get him back.’
‘Where are your mother and brother?’ he asked.
Caterina blew her hair out of her face. ‘Mum got married again, seven years after Dad’s death. She had two more kids. Her husband is a good man, and he was amazing with us. But he’s from Florence. Do you know what Florentines call their city?’
‘The Capital.’ Canessa laughed, remembering a Tuscan corporal who’d always said, ‘I’m on leave, going back to the Capital.’
‘Exactly!’ Caterina giggled. ‘While we were both young, Mum forced him to live up here, but when we were older, whoosh! moving 271 out. Piero and I stayed here. Mum’s down there with my stepsiblings, and she seems pretty happy.’
‘How is Piero?’
Caterina hugged her knees tighter, her knuckles whitening. Her voice stayed calm, but there was something wobbly behind it.
‘He never really came to terms with it. His life was shattered that day. He went through alcohol, drugs, rehab, therapists. He’s not even forty and he looks sixty. But recently he does seem to have found some peace. He’s on a Taizé Community farm in Provence.’ She noticed Canessa’s expression, and pre-empted him. ‘No, we haven’t seen him. That’s how he wanted it. I last heard from him two years ago, and he said he was doing well, that he’d finally discovered the best therapy for him. He had to leave here, so he’d never see any place or person who’d remind him of the past. A clean slate and a new language too. We haven’t been in touch since, and he hasn’t called, though we do check in with one of the community leaders. Apparently he’s doing really well, seems a lot lighter.’
Caterina fell silent for a few minutes, as if the brief recollection of her brother’s situation had cost her something. She shifted, letting her eyes wander along with her mind, and then looked back at Canessa. Curious, examining him as she had been ever since he’d walked in. She had questions, no doubt, but was waiting for him to ask his first.
‘What about you?’
‘Nothing, no aftermath for me. What did you call me? Super tough. I wanted to be a Carabiniere until my last year of school, but then I signed up for architecture. I graduated, I travelled to Germany, South Africa, Australia. When Piero tried committing suicide again, I came back here to live with him. Our grandparents 272 on Mum’s side left us quite a sum. Whatever Piero got, he split and gave half to the Taizé Community, half to me. I am,’ she smiled, ‘what you might call a good catch. I work as a freelance interior designer. Do you want to know if I’m single?’ She looked at him with her mother’s eyes.
For a second, Canessa considered letting her go on, entranced by her life story and the strangeness of talking to someone he’d met when she was only five years old. But then the real reason for his being there took over.
‘Listen, Caterina, I’m about to ask you some questions that may seem very strange. Is your father still buried in the Famedio, at the Monumentale? You said your mother and brother aren’t in Milan, but do you ever go to your father’s grave?’
‘You know, I’d thought of various reasons for why you might be here. But not that. This is a surprise.’ Caterina seemed sincere. ‘This is about your brother and Petri’s murder, isn’t it? Are you back in action?’
He couldn’t lie, not to her.
‘It is, and I am.’
‘I go to see Dad maybe once a month. Mum comes along sometimes too. She comes up to Milan just for that. Yes, it’s the Famedio.’
Canessa nodded. ‘The third question may seem even stranger, but have you noticed anything out of the ordinary on the tomb? Flowers, candles, something else you couldn’t explain?’
Caterina couldn’t hold back her surprise. ‘You know, for several months after his death, people brought all sorts of things to Dad’s tombstone. They were all so shocked by how brutal, how ruthless it had been, with the two of us kids there… And also because Dad wasn’t an obvious target like all the more prominent judges. 273 It really was one of the most cruel attacks during the Years of Lead. But then it all just faded, as these things do. So Mum and I were both surprised when we found a bunch of irises and two white candles. One was still burning. How did you know? What’s this about?’
Canessa leaned over and gave her arm a paternal squeeze. Then he stood up.
‘You’d be a good Carabiniere. You’ve got what it takes.’
Caterina remained on the sofa. ‘But won’t you tell me what the flowers were for?’
‘Not yet. I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t you trust me?’ Carla’s sarcasm didn’t bode well.
He usually didn’t mind that side of her. He’d noticed it the first time they’d had sex, and he’d said, ‘Like there’s no tomorrow.’ She’d laughed, and mimicked him. ‘That’s a quote from one of the 007 films with Pierce Brosnan. He says it to Halle Berry.’
‘I missed that one,’ Canessa replied, kissing her. But she pulled away, teasing him some more.
They’d made plans to meet at Porta Genova after his visit to Caterina Lazzarini, and then they’d gone to eat seafood in a pricey restaurant. Canessa wondered if the other customers actually appreciated the excellent dishes, or if they merely went there because it was famous. Its most annoying feature was that it was impossible to have a conversation there, since it was unbearably noisy. Carla’s mood had soured because she was expecting updates from Annibale and she’d been under pressure for a couple of days now, with Strozzi breathing down her neck. She’d have to turn in something soon or lose the piece to a vulture. 274
‘I do trust you, but for your own safety, I’d rather you didn’t know where I live,’ Canessa replied.
Carla, however, was nervous. She didn’t want to hear his reasons. ‘You’re just being paranoid. I don’t think you trust me enough, or you think I might let something slip. I thought you’d be different…’
She turned her back to him and disappeared into the night.
Shortly after, Repetto appeared at Annibale’s side. Despite the trench coat hiding his MP5, he wasn’t suffering from the heat.
‘Trouble in paradise?’
‘Our first fight.’
‘You want to run after her?’
‘I do, but it wouldn’t help.’
So now you understand women? Well, you really have grown!’
Canessa allowed himself to smile.
‘Come on, let’s go. We need to make some discoveries if we can.’
Repetto had made himself a plate of spaghetti with garlic, pepper and olive oil.
When Canessa caught a whiff of the garlic frying in the pan, he realised he was still hungry. ‘Add some for me too, will you?’
They ended up eating outside the loft, protected by tall walls and an arbour. ‘This is a nice place,’ Repetto said. ‘A bit out of the way, but nice.’
There were two sleeping areas in the loft, essentially screened-off corners of the large living area. Sharing the space proved no 275 issue; it was as if the past thirty years hadn’t happened. How many times had they eaten pasta together in the evenings?
Repetto had shown up at the door with two large boxes of groceries. He’d put them in the large fridge, which was empty apart from five or six bottles of good wine, a couple of champagne, and a half-eaten can of tuna.
‘Canessa and tuna: an old pairing makes a comeback. The bottles aren’t your doing though, are they?’
‘A house-warming gift from Rossi. He has a secret cellar downstairs.’
Repetto had always been a drinker, but only the good stuff. ‘See? It was a good idea for me to come here!’
Annibale was still upset by his fight with Carla. But after he’d polished off half a pack of spaghetti and a bottle of Alsatian Gewürztraminer he was feeling much better, at least physically.
‘I still think this is at least a couple of hundred retail,’ Repetto said, draining his glass. He cleared the table and came back with two shots of grappa and two cigars.
‘To old times,’ Canessa said.
His friend raised his glass. ‘To brainstorming, or should that be fried brains?’ They were recapping the investigation.
Canessa began. ‘He went to visit Lazzarini’s tomb, too.’
‘But why?’ Repetto was surprised. ‘Was he making amends for other people’s murders too?’
Canessa drew on his cigar. He wasn’t really a smoker, but enjoying a cigar with an old friend was a good way of clearing his mind.
‘Or maybe he was behind Lazzarini’s murder too, and we got everything wrong.’
A long silence followed.
276 Repetto suddenly slammed his hand on the table. ‘No!’ he said, ‘We weren’t wrong. The one with the scar was Esposito…’
Canessa interrupted. ‘There’s no doubt about him. Caterina recognised him too. But remember, we never really got confirmation about the other one.’
‘The supergrass…’ Repetto’s voice rose.
‘Supergrasses are criminals who snitch. The absolute worst. We’ve all used them – in droves – but I’ve never fully trusted them. Especially if there’s no tangible, external proof. And in this case, there isn’t. They said the other man was Federzoni. Do we believe them? Okay, let’s. Maybe they didn’t intentionally lie, but they knew nothing, and proceeded by deduction. Federzoni was protecting Esposito because he saw him as a promising asset. They were always together, in life as in death.’ His thoughts went back to via Gaeta and his mood turned dark.
Repetto poured out another shot of grappa. ‘So what if Petri was there with Esposito that day? What does that change? Did we cause everything that’s happened in the past two weeks by pinning a judge’s murder on the wrong guy?’
Canessa offered him a wry smile. ‘Yes.’
‘If that’s the case, it means that all these murders – Petri’s, your brother’s, Alfridi’s – have happened to hide the fact that Petri was involved in the attack on Lazzarini. But why?’
Canessa stood up, strangely calm. ‘I don’t know, but what I do know is that it’s not about one killer instead of another. Clearly all this revolves around Lazzarini. Nothing else comes into it. Petri was part of the hit squad, Petri pulled the trigger. Then the murder was pinned on Federzoni and Esposito, and I shot them in via Gaeta…’ He went on, sarcastically. ‘Petri never said a thing. He never collaborated, never disavowed his actions, 277 never claimed them, never said a word. He kept quiet from the moment we got him. Then, a few months ago, something happens, and he’s handing out flowers and candles, as if begging forgiveness. That change of heart isn’t relevant right now, but it might be later. All that matters now is that he was trying to tell me something, and it must have had to do with that murder. He was looking for my brother because he needed to get to me, and he didn’t trust anyone else. And it can only be about Lazzarini, the only anomaly.’
‘You have no proof though.’
‘Not yet. It’ll come.’
‘When?’
‘When they try to get rid of me. Because whoever they are, they don’t want the truth to emerge. They’ve made that clear over and over. And to make sure the past stays buried, they’ll have to kill me.’
Repetto pulled the MP5 from under the table.
‘They’ll have to kill me too.’
At any other moment in time, even just a couple of days earlier, the view of prosecutor Marta Bossini’s back would’ve excited him. Right now, though, Astroni was too troubled by other problems. The last text he’d received had pushed him right over the edge.
He’d hoped that Marta and the gym rat they’d assigned her would find something – anything – but no, their investigation had hit a dead end and he had no other choice but to yield to that phone, to the call that brought him so much pain. 278
Marta also seemed distracted, even annoyed. They’d had sex without any real passion, and she’d faked her orgasm. Noticeably. The whole thing had been pathetic.
‘What’s up?’ he asked before she could explore his feelings.
Marta turned to face him. ‘We’re stuck. There are no leads. I was really happy to be working on this case – something special – but now…’
‘What about the murder of the gay guy? That can’t be a coincidence.’
‘True, but we don’t have anything on that either, other than the fact that he worked in the same office as Petri. They maybe had three conversations out of office hours in five months. They weren’t close. That’s it.’
Astroni reflected. ‘Maybe it’s just that he knew something about Petri, and whoever killed Petri wanted to silence him too.’
Marta agreed. ‘That’s the most probable scenario. But what did he know?’
Astroni was quiet for a second. ‘What about Canessa, our former Rambo? From what you told me, he visited Petri’s office as well. Maybe he met Alfridi. Maybe he questioned him.’
Still naked, Marta stood up and went over to open a window. She’d hoped someone might see her, but all the windows on the opposite building were shut. Damn Saturday!
She sat on the windowsill. ‘He’s still around, running his own investigation, but he’ll come across us eventually, and we’ll have to deal with him then.’
Unless, Astroni thought, someone else deals with him first.
*
279‘Lazzarini, Lazzarini…’
Calandra was fidgeting with the light blue folder his man had handed him. He spoke the name a third time. ‘Lazzarini. It does ring a bell.’
Even if it hadn’t, Canessa had definitely got to the crux of the matter. If he’d stopped on that particular square, it had to be the right one. That Carabiniere was a real force of nature. He was born with it, and exile – no matter how long – would never take it out of him. He just needed to loosen up.
He’d done well to bet on him. Canessa would end up being the winning horse.
Calandra opened up the file and quickly read through a couple of pages. He looked quizzically at his collaborator. ‘I don’t see anything out of the ordinary here.’
‘Because there isn’t,’ he confirmed. ‘Murder solved, killers buried. Literally. The end.’
‘No, it can’t be. If Canessa is looking into it, it means something’s up. Maybe the truth was buried with the killers, so you need to focus on the Lazzarini murder. You need to rummage through everything, and pull out any story on this Lazzarini guy that doesn’t appear in official records: gossip, a cutting that ended up in the wrong file, any relevant notes. If Canessa is betting on him, we need to stack up our poker chips too.’
‘Place your bets,’ said the man. He left.
Calandra noticed that he’d changed to his summer outfit. He also realised that if he’d asked anyone else to look into a thirty-year-old case, they would have objected. Youths and their impatience. And yet his mouse hadn’t squeaked once.
Invaluable. Calandra lit up a Montecristo. Fuck the bans. 280
Nando Panattoni had decided that if he survived (and he was seriously doubting that right now), he would leave Milan, Italy, maybe even Europe the very same day. Whenever he emerged from the situation. The money in his Zurich account (under the name of a ga-ga Swiss eighty-year-old) wasn’t exactly the amount he’d hoped to retire on. The Salemmes never paid until the job was done, and after this one, he was out. Job done or not, what mattered was getting out alive. Those two were worse than a mafia clan. He wondered how Rocco would take it if they offered him a contract to kill him, Nando, after all this time.
On the other hand, the money he’d made after twenty years of dirty tricks would be more than enough to disappear to Santo Domingo with his girlfriend, leaving no trace and living pretty comfortably for the rest of his life. Her family over there would protect them. Put an end to all this shit.
If he made it out alive. Because those two sons of bitches had just told him he was about to take on the hardest job in his life. And to prove just how much of a suicide mission it was, they’d even arranged to meet him in person, at a famous restaurant in the San Siro area. A personal farewell.
Of course, it wasn’t an invitation to lunch. They’d be eating: he was supposed to come in, make himself known, go to the bathroom and they’d meet him there in their own sweet time. Then he’d disappear.
‘Nando, Nando, you seem tense! Is your stomach cramped? You got your period?!’ 281
Mr Big – Nando’s name for Salemme senior, though only with Rocco – was still trying to squeeze himself into suits that were definitely too small, no matter how cool they might have been. Did he really think he scored women with his looks? At his age, power and money were the only pull.
Standing in the small bathroom with the Salemmes, the warm air ramping up the stench of piss, Panattoni felt his anxiety spiking through the roof. Father and son were dissecting him visually and reading his fears, as if they knew about his plan to flee: car to Zurich, withdraw money, train to Munich, plane to Miami, three or four days in the Keys getting used to time zone and climate, boat to Santo Domingo. Four vehicles, three passports. All ready.
Claudio’s eyes were full of contempt. The young bastard was just like all rich, spoiled brats. But his father… he looked like he could actually read Nando’s mind. He was truly dangerous.
Nando Panattoni was waiting.
‘So, Nando, you’ve always been a good worker.’
‘Yes, really good,’ Claudio chimed in.
‘So what we’re asking of you now is the final test.’
‘A love token.’
Mr Big laughed. ‘Good one! A love token. I like it.’
Nando decided to play along. He laughed too, but his laughter soon turned to whimpering when he heard what that love token entailed.
‘You need to kill Canessa and that pesky marshal of his.’
Panattoni had been expecting something more like Petri, or Alfridi, a job with some chance of success.
‘Canessa…’ he sputtered, the sweat spreading under his arms.
Mr Big slapped him on the shoulder.
‘Come on, don’t tell me you’re scared?’ 282
‘I’d be a fool not to be!’
Salemme senior laughed again. ‘Good point, good point. You’re a wise man, and that’s a good start.’
‘Canessa is who he is, and you have two targets,’ Salemme junior cut in. ‘So you’ll receive double the usual fee, and we’re allowing you to bring in reinforcements. What about that associate of yours?’
‘Carletti? He isn’t up to this. He’s only good at snitching,’ Nando whispered.
Giannino Salemme spread his arms, and gestured to his son for him to open the door.
‘C’mon, it’s getting too hot in here. If Carletti can’t do it, ask Rocco to bring someone. He’s bound to know one of those guys in Gomorrah who walk around in their pants with AK-47s. Make sure they wear trousers though.’ The Salemmes burst out laughing.
Panattoni interrupted them. ‘What do you think’s the best way of catching him?’
Claudio stopped laughing. ‘Good question. We could say that’s your fucking job, but what about this: on his way to or from his girl, the journalist. That’s when he’ll let his guard down.’
‘And his pants,’ his father put in. They laughed again.
‘As for the girl,’ Salemme senior turned deadly serious. ‘I don’t want you touching a hair on her head. Is that clear?’ He pinched Nando’s cheek. ‘Good lad. Do the best you can. Get backup. Money’s no problem. But,’ he stopped at the door and patted his cheek, ‘you need to get Canessa on the first try. He’s like Tex Willer. You know Tex?’
Panattoni shook his head.
A sigh. ‘Do you read anything other than porn? Comic-book hero Tex, with his sidekick Kit Carson, never gives you a second chance. 283 And neither do we. Panattoni, from what Rocco tells us, you’ve been doing a lot of the driving and very little dirty work recently. Take a weapon. You’re going to do the shooting this time. Now get out of here. I’ve ordered a Florentine steak and I need time to enjoy it.’
Every now and then, Annibale heard from Sara and Giovanna. Life in Reggio Emilia had gone back to normal. But his sister-in-law would tell him (and sometimes Giovanna, too, when she took the phone) that things were different from the way they used to be: there was an empty space. Canessa was always surprised and moved by the strength of the bond between husband and wife. It was something he’d never experienced.
Now and again, whenever the conversation touched on Napoleone’s memory, there was a crack in Sara’s voice, and she held back tears. Because she was strong, she managed. She would soon turn back to the conversation at hand, telling Annibale about what a help Giovanna was and how mature she had turned out to be despite her twelve years. Canessa liked talking to Sara.
Their conversations were moments of respite from the worries of his investigation. He wasn’t worried for himself, but for the people around him. He couldn’t stop thinking like a soldier, something he hadn’t expected to be again. Yet here he was. His suspicion that his calls might be bugged grew stronger every day. He knew there weren’t any bugs in Carla’s flat – he’d swept the place while she was asleep.
Still, he made a point of not saying anything over the phone to Sara or Carla. But it upset him to think that someone might be 284 sharing their intimacy, recording it, transcribing it for someone else to read and file away somewhere. He thought of giving Sara a burner phone, but he didn’t want to worry her.
Annibale decided to pay Carla a visit. He and Repetto had spent the past two days on the internet looking into Lazzarini, but the little there was they knew already. They’d moved on to the files on the murder but didn’t turn anything up.
Would Carla see something they didn’t? After all, they had got this far thanks to her. A different pair of eyes might help. He smiled, knowing that this was an excuse. He wanted to talk to her, to make up after their fight.
Dog-tired, Repetto had collapsed and was snoring from behind the screen. Canessa knew what a telling off he’d get when he returned – but with any luck he’d be back before his friend realised he was gone.
Friday evening in late May, and Corso Garibaldi was still busy thanks to the unseasonably warm weather. Carla always walked the corso to and from the Corriere. New places and businesses were cropping up all the time. She read some of their names and wondered how long they’d been there.
She was wearing a pair of skinny jeans (maybe too skinny, given the looks she was getting) and a light blue blouse. One of her favourites. She was a bit down about Annibale’s disappearance. Okay, she was the one who’d stormed off in the middle of the road, but he’d really narked her with all his paranoid safety precautions. And then, he’d taken her fuck you literally when she drove off. Jesus, he really was a Carabiniere. So where had he got to?
There he was. Right in front of her. 285
Leaning against the door next to hers.
She felt like she was in a romcom. She walked past him and did a double-take, unable to believe her eyes. She walked back, and Canessa was still there, smiling at her.
Kissing him furiously seemed like the most natural thing in the world.
‘So, what was the “little girl” like?’
A cool breeze lifted the curtains and got into bed with them. Annibale was admiring Carla’s perky, youthful breasts and shaved muff. The first time they’d had sex, he’d been a little surprised by it; he’d suddenly felt old. Was that the norm now? A fad, or her personal style?
He smiled at the thought, and Carla pounced.
‘So, my questions amuse you?’
She plunged a sharp finger into his side.
‘I was thinking of something else. Sorry. Caterina? She’s four, five years older than you.’
‘You’re squirming, Colonel. What is she like? Blonde, brunette, short, tall, a dog, pretty?’
Canessa placed his hands behind his head and closed his eyes.
‘Tall, blonde, sparkling green eyes, gorgeous.’
Carla looked at him. He looked for a smidgen of jealousy in her eyes, but there was almost nothing. Almost…
‘Really? And she still has the stuffed animal you got her? So sweet.’
So sarcastic.
‘It’s true, she was a kid, but she was strong. She was five when she watched her father die, and she described his killer perfectly. Gennaro Esposito.’ 286
‘And now you think the other man was Petri.’
‘I don’t think so, I know it.’
Carla got up and slipped on a t-shirt that barely covered her bum. She went to the kitchen and came back with two mugs of herbal tea (Canessa was a convert).
‘So?’
‘So, nothing. If I’m right, there’s something else behind the murder of Lazzarini.’
‘All because of a case of mistaken identity concerning the hit squad? How is it relevant?’
‘It’s not just that. If Petri was the second killer, then that would be the only murder that has never been credited to him. There’s never been any doubt about the identity of the killers in all the others. Even before the supergrass spilled. There have been confirmations, debates, witness reports, even confessions. The only oddity about Petri’s atonement is his visit to Lazzarini’s tomb.’
Canessa got up and started getting dressed.
Carla said nothing. She’d realised he wouldn’t be staying the night.
He was the first to speak. ‘I need you.’
‘What do you mean?’
He leaned in and kissed her.
‘In every way. Can you get into your archives? During the day, this time. See if you can find anything odd about Lazzarini’s murder. Maybe some gossip in an old cutting, a photo that catches your eye. Follow your instincts.’
Carla jumped to her feet and pretended to click her heels.
‘At your service!’ 287
Rocco and his associate arrived on separate trains at different times, one at Centrale, the other at Rogoredo. To avoid risk – if a hotel was unthinkable for Rocco himself, there was no question of booking in two of the same species – Panattoni had set them up in a small flat in via Teodosio, a former janitor’s quarters converted into a two-room flat and rented out to business people needing somewhere to fuck their new lovers, or visiting managers who hated living in hotels (there were more of the former than the latter).
He’d rented it out for a week. Hopefully that would be enough. Cash payment, no documents required. He’d stocked the fridge – sandwiches, ready-made pizzas, Coca-Cola and other soft drinks, couple of light beers but no other alcohol – and had left a stack of porn films on top of the DVD player. He’d also installed a small camera connected to his smartphone, to keep an eye on the killers. He was particularly keen to know whether they’d disobey orders and head outside to cause havoc.
He picked them up in a single trip, stopping at Rogoredo first, then Centrale. He’d drop Rocco’s associate at the flat on the way. He didn’t show up in his underwear, as Salemme had joked, but it was clearly visible under his rapper-style jeans. He was even wearing a snap-back cap and a couple of heavy gold chains around his neck.
‘Jesus, what a chav!’ Panattoni muttered to himself when he spotted him coming out of the station. No one else seemed to notice him.
They hadn’t agreed on a signal to recognise each other – a newspaper, a flower, a certain colour – but it wasn’t necessary. The guy headed straight for Panattoni and slapped a hand on the car. 288
‘Hey mate, you Nando?’ he asked in a loud voice.
‘I am, but why not raise your voice a little? That way everyone can hear you and remember we were here.’
The guy flashed him a terrifying smile, just like one of Rocco’s.
‘Let’s hope not, huh, or we gotta kill them all!’
At least this one has a sense of humour. Panattoni sighed.
Rocco dropped the fake Louis Vuitton luggage in a corner. He grunted at his associate, gave him a high-five and then sniffed out the place. Literally.
‘Panattoni, this place smells of whores but I see no whores, what? Can you sort that out?’
Panattoni collapsed into an armchair. He’d briefly considered moving in here himself to keep an eye on them. He didn’t trust them.
But no, fuck them. Fuck the Salemmes. He wasn’t going to play babysitter to these psychopaths.
‘With this sort of contract, you have to look sharp. The rule is: look, don’t touch. And don’t be seen. It’s a delicate situation and you need to make an effort. Do you understand who we’re dealing with?’
‘Oof, how hard can it be! We got the brother, we’ll get him.’
Panattoni ran his hands through his hair. They didn’t get it.
He stood up.
‘Okay, well. The fridge is stocked, there’s porn over there, rest up, and get ready. We could be moving as soon as tomorrow evening.’
Fabio Guidoni sauntered into Marta Bossini’s office wearing his regular jeans with a preposterous cream-coloured jacket and a black tie sporting green giraffes. Marta, in her designer suit, stared 289 him up and down. He looked like he’d just been to London to learn how to ‘be eccentric’. He hadn’t brought it off.
Guidoni seemed oblivious – or maybe he didn’t care.
‘I’ve got fantastic news!’ he announced. ‘Interesting developments on the Petri case!’
Marta was all ears. ‘I’m listening.’
‘Nope, not here. For this sort of fireworks, we need a drink. No security. I’ll take care of us.’ He opened his preposterous jacket, revealing a gun in its holster.
A couple of hours later, ‘fireworks’ lit up the night sky on Milan’s west side, though Guidoni and Bossini couldn’t have predicted it. Explosions, not unlike those on the closing night of traditional festivities, were heard from a couple of kilometres away. A famous TV channel called it one of the most violent shootings in Milan’s criminal history, a ‘bloody settling of scores’. No one actually knew if organised crime was behind it, but reporters started citing Chicago in the ’30s, Palermo in the ’80s, even Beirut. Eventually, when the investigations were complete and the results made public, the conclusion was this: there might have been more victims in other cases, but never had there been so much shooting.
Forensics had recovered from the scene a hundred and twenty-six 7.6x39 calibre shells spat out from two AK-47s (the only weapons left behind), a hundred and four 9x19 calibre parabellum, pre-sumably from one or more MP5s and several other guns: a SIG P226, a Beretta 92. According to experts, not all the bullets were recovered, but the ones from the bodies of the two men on the 290 ground and those from the blazing car and nearby scooter were easily recovered by the white suits. Several had fallen into the canal. Five were found embedded in the façade of the Canottieri Olona sports club on the other side of the canal. Witness reports and fingertip searches confirmed that at least four men had been involved. Two had died on the spot and two were wounded, one severely. None had ended up in hospital. According to forensics, there was blood from four different sources. A probable fifth suspect had not been injured; there was none of his blood. There was insufficient information to determine the direction that the fifth person and the two wounded had taken after the shooting. Two cars had been involved, but only one was left in via Lodovico il Moro. Investigating officers agreed between themselves – though certainly not in public – that there was little hope of finding it after all that time, and certainly not in a state that would permit a full investigation. It had probably ended up in a lake or reservoir outside Milan, or locked in an old building on the outskirts, undoubtedly torched.
No one would have imagined, however, that the car missing from the site of the shooting (colour: grey; make: Alfa Romeo; model: unknown) was currently parked behind the high walls surrounding a former printer’s-turned-high-end loft. No one would have imagined, or believed, that the car had moved only a couple of hundred metres. So no one looked for it close by.
A few hours earlier, Canessa had been making his way home from Carla’s place. She’d come to terms with their routine and no longer complained about his secrecy about where he lived.
‘For now,’ he insisted, ‘it’s better if you don’t come to my place. It’s still too dangerous. Later, after I’ve figured things out.’ 291
‘Maybe I won’t care “later”,’ she teased.
Annibale would leave just before dawn, and he’d done so this time too. Repetto had been waiting a few parking spots away from Carla’s front door, and he was now driving with one arm draped out of the window. The MP5 lay between the two seats, hidden under a cloth.
The former Carabinieri sat in silence, wrapped in the sounds of a city neither slumbering nor awake.
Repetto was on edge. He’d had yet another fight with his wife, who was understandably upset about the amount of time he was spending away from home. Barbara Repetto knew her husband well, and she’d realised that this wasn’t technically to do with work, whatever he might have told her. When she got out of him that his former boss was also involved, she’d blown up. ‘That man’s middle name is Danger!’ she yelled. Repetto had tried to reassure her that times had changed and she had nothing to worry about, but even if it had been true, she wouldn’t have believed him. The phone call had ended badly.
Annibale, for his part, was thinking about Carla. By now, it was clear that there was more between them than physical attraction, and even that was a long way from ‘fucking’. He knew he felt something more for Carla, but he was torn. What sort of a future could he have with a woman half his age? He’d seen relationships like that, of course, long-lasting ones where the age gap didn’t matter. But they each had their own situations, their own outlooks. Carla was a young journalist on the rise, he a former Carabiniere living in a small town in Liguria, a place far removed from the world and accessible only by boat or on foot. He worked in a restaurant – or not at all, while her job took her all over. She wasn’t confined to one place, and definitely not to his place, as beautiful 292 as it might be. So what future was there for them? Where could they put down roots? It was hard for him to even think about the word ‘love’. He’d always been afraid of it.
So the two former colleagues had found themselves stewing in their own juices on a night that would prove to be pivotal. Maybe nothing would change, however, since this time, Panattoni (on a scooter) and Rocco and his associate (in an Astra stolen from Linate airport) had perfected their tailing. Their timing was spot-on, and Canessa only noticed when the scooter overtook them and lost control, skidding a few metres ahead of their car as they sped down via Lodovico il Moro near the Canottieri Olona sports club.
Panattoni didn’t know what direction Canessa would take as he left Carla’s place. So he’d placed the two Neapolitans in largo La Foppa, even though he was sure Canessa had parked on the opposite side, near Foro Bonaparte. When he saw the damn Carabiniere walk down the corso and turn onto via Tivoli, he knew his hunch had been right. Canessa got into a car with its engine on. Nando called Rocco and told him to meet him immediately on Cadorna: he was sure they’d pass that way.
‘When the time is right, I’ll overtake them and pretend to fall off the scooter. They’ll focus on me and you’ll get them from behind, got it? Don’t mess up. They’re not new to this.’ Panattoni hoped that Rocco’s man was at least good at killing people. He wanted it to be over quickly.
Then all this shit would be in the past, and he’d disappear without a trace.
*
293The shooting didn’t last long, maybe three minutes.
When Repetto saw the man overtaking them and losing control, he instinctively slammed on the brakes. Canessa, shaken out of his thoughts by the car jerking to a halt, turned around while his partner checked in front of them – old habits were hard to lose. That was how he spotted the two men with AK-47s getting out of the car stopped behind them.
‘Look out!’ he shouted to Repetto.
The shooting started a fraction of a second before Canessa could grab his friend and drag him down to the space between the seats and the dashboard. The splashes of blood told him that Repetto had been hit. He couldn’t waste time. He had to get out of there immediately.
What the attackers didn’t know was that Canessa never lost his cool under fire. He was trained to think and act with lightning speed. A general once said: He is the only person I know who sees things from above.
He leapt into action, Canessa style: no hesitation, no guesswork.
He grabbed the MP5 and threw himself out of the car on his side, while the Alfa was being riddled by bullets. Lying down, he had a good view of the feet of one of the shooters behind the cover of their car, and he opened fire in that direction.
The killer swore and fell to the ground, nursing his foot. Canessa gained a small advantage, since the man from the scooter – he still had his eye on him – was a poor shot: he emptied an entire Beretta in front of the Alfa, into the Naviglio canal and beyond. Too high, too low. Canessa ranked him as the least dangerous of all three. He’d take care of him later.
Meanwhile, the third killer, angered by the shot at his associate, had let loose with his rage, destroying what was left of the 294 car boot and windows with his volley. Canessa decided to bring the whole thing to an end, as half the world would be there soon and he had no intention of explaining things to anyone. Especially not where his weapons came from.
He stood up from behind the right side of the car, and with his back to the Naviglio, he riddled the killers with bullets, the SIG in his right hand and the MP5 in his left. He heard a moan and watched as the driver of the scooter clasped his side.
Panattoni had fired a few shots when he felt a sharp pain in his side. Running his hand down to check, he found his shirt drenched in blood.
His blood.
This was the first time he’d been shot. He was shocked. He pulled the trigger two more times without aiming, then shoved the gun in his jacket and started running down a side alley that came off the main road. He could hear the bullets flying behind him, and Rocco shrieking insults: ‘Panattoni, you motherfucker!’
He didn’t stop. He was just being practical. They’d failed, but he could still save himself.
Rocco, killer for hire, working for the Camorra and whoever else could afford him, fired one more round before reaching the end of his deplorable existence. It was aimed not at the man he’d been contracted to kill, but at Panattoni, the coward who’d run away and left him.
Canessa cursed himself for having been surprised by amateurs. People who only felt good when they snuck up from behind. 295
When he saw one of the killers turn his back to aim at the one on the scooter (definitely the worst of the pack), he reloaded the MP5 and left cover, opening fire on the pair of killers with both the SIG and the machine gun. The one he’d already hit had got up again, and was now using the car door as a shield. Pointlessly, since Canessa unloaded the entire MP5 on him, hitting him eight times, twice in the head. His rapper cap fell to the ground as he slid against the Astra.
Rocco – yelling and swearing – was now firing at random. Canessa trained his remaining bullets on him, hitting him three times in the head, and four in the chest. He died on the spot.
Silence fell over the road, but sirens could be heard moving closer. Canessa tossed his two guns on the front seat of the Alfa before moving Repetto onto the back seat, as gently as possible. In the rear-view mirror he watched as the other car burst into flames.
With a sudden screech of tyres, he sped down a side alley.
The first to be alerted was Chief Magistrate Calandra. The man from the Secret Service had a home in Testaccio, a nice flat he’d shared with his wife for twenty-seven years until she passed away. Despite the regular affairs with beautiful young things while she was still alive, Calandra had always been in love with her, a contradiction he could deal with only through self-justification and indulgence. Since his wife had passed away, he’d rarely slept in the place. The house was a sort of mausoleum he returned to whenever his daughter came back to visit from the States. 296
That night, Calandra was sleeping perfectly well, his memories for company, and no dreams. When his man called him, he realised it must be something big.
‘What’s up?’
‘Shooting in Milan, extremely violent, shower of bullets, two dead.’
‘Who?’
‘Not our hero, don’t worry. Two young killers. But he’s involved. I checked the tapes on several cameras, and his car turned onto via—’ a brief pause as he found the note ‘—Lodovico il Moro, a few minutes earlier. The car that was tailing him was the one from the shooting.’
‘Has anyone asked for the tapes yet?’
‘Not yet, but they will soon.’
‘Soon, maybe, but they’ll be too late. Wipe everything. System failure, hydrogen bomb, plague. Whatever the fuck you have to do, but I want no trace of Canessa in this. In fact, where is he?’
‘Disappeared.’
‘Good. Keep me posted. Constantly.’
Giannino Salemme indulged in the company of young women he preferred not to call ‘escorts’. As with his American ‘girlfriend’, he liked to think they’d chosen him for his miraculous powers of seduction. Of course, there were gifts – jewellery, gadgets, trips, money and in particular, his contacts, possible favours – but nothing was ever agreed in advance. Salemme senior was strict about two things: those were gifts, and he would not meet them in his home.
It had been his lucky night. The brunette he’d snagged at the bar in via Savona came from a good family and had agreed to 297 take him home with her and do it on Mummy and Daddy’s bed. The foreplay had lasted a lifetime and had got Giannino Salemme particularly aroused. But right when the pill he’d popped to keep him going had started to take effect, his phone buzzed. He glanced at the screen: Claudio.
Begrudgingly he told the girl he had to take it. She shook her behind in front of him to show him what he was missing out on, and headed to the bathroom.
‘This better be important.’ Salemme senior made no effort to hold back his frustration.
‘It is. A shooting in via Lodovico il Moro, along the Naviglio. Like a scene from a film. Two dead.’
‘Well, that’s good, isn’t it?’
‘We don’t have IDs yet.’
Salemme senior huffed, ‘Son, I appreciate this caution of yours, but please don’t give in to paranoia.’
Claudio didn’t flinch. ‘Panattoni has disappeared without a trace. He always calls me after a job. But not this time. I’m going after him.’
The girl reappeared at the door. She paused, gave him a naughty look and started teasing her nipples. Salemme senior swallowed hard.
‘Look, Claudio, be careful okay? I need to go now.’
He hung up.
Federico Astroni didn’t want company. The law student who’d come over to talk about her thesis – yet another on the Kickback Affair – would have been an easy catch – her adoring eyes told him as much – but the judge needed to sleep. To rest. He’d only got snatches of rest ever since this thing had started. 298
There wouldn’t be any comfort tonight. He’d been looking out on his beloved square and counting cobblestones instead of sheep, but sleep hadn’t come. A stroke of luck, in hindsight, since the phone – his own, not the other one – rang. It was his mentor, Judge Antonio Savelli.
‘Federico, forgive me calling at this hour, but there’s been a terrible shooting in the Navigli area. Two dead, and we don’t know how many others were involved. The anti-mafia agents are already on site, but I want you to coordinate the investigation. I know you’re busy, but…’
‘Antonio, please, it’s my duty.’
‘Thank you, Federico. I’ll see you in the morning.’ Savelli corrected himself. ‘It’s already morning, I suppose.’
‘I’ll see you later, Antonio.’
Astroni’s reaction was in line with Giannino Salemme’s. Two dead: it added up. He immediately dismissed the thought.
He had nothing to do with this.
Carla wasn’t asleep yet. Canessa had left an hour ago, but she lay there staring at the ceiling, wondering what to do. Her lover was basically her father’s age.
But the point wasn’t that Canessa was too old, actually. She imagined introducing him to her parents in their sanctuary on corso Magenta. Her mother would polish the good cutlery and china like a madwoman. The two men would study one another, each counting the hairs on the other’s head (Canessa would win), especially the grey ones (a draw?). Just imagining it made her feel extremely uncomfortable.
She sensed they were headed for the inevitable showdown, a scene that would sort out feelings and emotions, and it scared 299 her. One of her friends at university, someone who fell in love at least twice a year (or so she claimed), had explained her theory. ‘When people start a relationship, they’re not thinking about making it permanent. You meet a guy, he’s good-looking, you start hanging out. You just have fun together. You don’t think about getting engaged, moving in together, weddings: you’re just two people. You don’t talk about love, even if the word is hovering in the background. But then there’s this random moment when you suddenly ask yourselves: so now what? do we say that word, and all the ones that follow?’
For Carla, everything was very real, especially that June night.
Suddenly the darkness lit up.
Is this a sign? she wondered.
Actually, it was a picture of Caprile illuminating her phone. What was he doing calling at this hour?
‘Carla, hi, sorry,’ – she heard wind in the background – ‘I’m on my scooter. Listen, forensics have just been called out for an emergency: sounds like a big mess, a shooting. I’m headed there, but you’re on my way so I can pick you up if you want? Five minutes?’
Carla jumped out of bed. ‘Three!’
‘Carla, you’re a maniac. On my way.’
Repetto needed surgery. Canessa had cleaned his wounds immediately and given him a massive blood transfusion with medical packs procured by Rossi, but it wasn’t enough. The bullet to his side had gone through, but the one to his left shoulder was still in there. 300
Annibale had good first-aid experience, but Repetto needed medical help. The wounds didn’t look bad, but there was a risk of infection. He needed a specialist, a surgeon, but no hospitals. It was time to resort to the Canessa network. He dialled a number on his Swiss phone.
It rang three times before someone on the other side emerged from sleep.
‘Professor De Micheli, it’s Annibale Canessa, do you remember me?’
There was a pause. Then a voice, remarkably alert given the hour. ‘I thought you’d never call.’
During the Years of Lead and the dark period of kidnappings, Auro De Micheli was a skilled young surgeon, not yet rich and famous. When his first born, only six years old, was kidnapped, De Micheli didn’t have any money. His wife, however, was heiress to a vast property empire, so they had been able to pay the ransom.
The boy had not been returned. The following day, a young Carabinieri lieutenant had shown up at their door, barked orders – including some to his superiors – and sent everyone home.
‘Let’s start over.’
Within thirty-six hours, he’d flushed out the kidnappers. He’d started with the notion that there had to be a mole for a job like this, someone deep inside. De Micheli’s wife’s family didn’t have a factory or any sort of public image, only an office that dealt with their business. Though their wealth was considerable, it was invisible: so someone must have tipped off the kidnappers. Someone who knew exactly how much they were worth. Canessa had interrogated all the insiders, fingered the right one (an accountant with 301 an expensive lifestyle and a brother with addiction problems). Two days after the ransom had been paid, they conducted a dawn raid of the boy’s location. He never told the family about the small hole prepared for the child’s corpse, had it come to that.
As he was leaving the surgeon’s house that afternoon, Canessa felt a tug on his jacket. It was the doctor, his scruffy face still marked by tension and fear.
‘I know you won’t accept a reward or payment, but if you ever need anything in the future, I’ll do anything I can.’
Canessa looked straight at him, his gaze penetrating.
‘I’m going to say to you what I say to everyone who offers me help.’
‘Of course.’
‘Words have weight. I’m going to hold you to it.’
‘You were expecting this.’
It wasn’t a question. The doctor tossed his blood-stained gloves in the bin. He’d lost his hair but not what lay beneath, nor the legendary hands that had earned him the nickname of ‘the Michelangelo of the scalpel’. The only difference between him and the genius of the Sistine Chapel was that De Micheli expressed his creativity by saving lives.
He’d found a full surgical set-up in the loft, improvised behind a screen but stocked with all the necessary. He’d brought his own tools, carried in an IKEA bag as requested, and come over on a scooter.
‘He’s good. Strong fibre,’ De Micheli said, dropping onto the sofa. The day was filtering in through the large skylights. ‘He’ll be able on his feet in a week.’
Annibale, who’d been the perfect nurse, offered him a coffee. 302
‘Do you have any whisky?’
Canessa opened a cabinet. ‘Peated, eighteen years.’
‘Perfect. Make it a double, thanks.’
Annibale poured a glass, and sat next to him.
De Micheli took a large swig. ‘You know, I was waiting for you to call me one day. I really wanted to repay you, even though you’ve left the force. To be honest, I’d almost lost hope. But I certainly wasn’t expecting something like this.’
He threw back the last of his drink and stood up.
‘I was never here, right?’
Via Lodovico il Moro remained closed for several hours. The last of the forensics team left at around sunset, and only then was the road reopened to the public.
At roughly the same time, Panattoni left his safe house, a two-room flat in Quarto Oggiaro officially registered to his girlfriend’s brother. He’d effectively brought her entire family into a web of various fronts. If Marita ever left him, he’d be ruined. But Marita was his girl, his young, beautiful girlfriend. He was going to build an entire new life with her, away from all that scum.
His wound was little more than a scratch, and the sawbones he’d called in had cleaned it up, put a couple of stitches in and handed him a bottle of antibiotics and some painkillers.
The place was minimally furnished with a bed, a table, one or two chairs, a TV and a small kitchenette. Panattoni kept some cash there. He also had a gun hidden away and a stock of nonperishable food. 303
Once the doctor had left, it was late afternoon. He was a good person overall, small coke habit aside – he’d been struck off and survived by taking jobs like this. The doctor had watched over him for a few hours while he slept. Maybe he shouldn’t have slept so much, but he’d been tired and unable to think straight.
When he woke up, he realised it was late, and he turned on the TV to listen to the news reports. The two Neapolitans had been dubbed Camorra killers. They had nothing on Rocco – he’d always avoided jail.
His worries and adrenaline kicked in. He called Marita one more time. No reply. He decided to try her brother.
‘She no está aquí. She go to your place.’
‘What do you mean, my place?’
He heard a muttered ‘arsehole’ from the other side.
‘Your place, your place. Where are you? You no estaying with her?’
All at once Panattoni twigged. She’d gone to via Bergamo, his official home. He swore loudly and hung up on his future brother-in-law. He paced the flat. He’d told her to never go back there: it wasn’t safe. But she hadn’t listened. He’d have to go back too, since all his belongings were still there.
Fuck.
‘Ah, here’s good old Panattoni.’
He should’ve expected the little shithead to be involved. Panattoni had come in, Beretta in hand, but he hadn’t been ready for the scene before him. He vomited onto the glass table by the sofa.
Marita, his girlfriend, was lying on the table, half undressed, with bruises and cuts all over. She’d clearly been tortured: he saw cigarette burns and a bullet hole in her forehead. 304
Nando stood there for three interminable minutes, catatonic. His future, the world he’d built for himself – his escape, the pizzeria on a Caribbean beach, love, sex, children – all erased in a second. He was gutted, useless. He didn’t notice the gun at his head.
Claudio Salemme’s voice droned on.
Despite the scene before him, all he could think of was Santo Domingo, a bungalow on the beach, Marita walking out of the water, an orange bikini on her tanned skin… His very own Bond girl.
None of that would happen now. Die another day? The film was fucking wrong.
The voice spoke again, as if from a great distance.
‘Nando, Nando! You know, I actually wasn’t expecting you here. I was surprised to find her, too. Your girl was tough, she didn’t rat on you. If you hadn’t come in just now, we would’ve missed each other. I was about to leave just when you opened the door.’
Still in a stupor, Nando turned his head to the right. Only then did he feel the cold metal of Salemme’s gun at his temple.
For a second, he considered his options. He even put his hand back to grab his Beretta, momentarily proud. But Salemme took it off him easily. What did it matter anyway? What was the point of reacting?
‘Were you going somewhere, Nando? You wanted to drop it all and leave?’
Panattoni wished he could explain. Not to save himself, but to let Claudio know how little he cared about them and their business. He’d never betray them, never say a word. He just wanted to leave and start a new life. A life away from the shitshow they ran, with their nice homes, their designer clothes, cars, money. Vermin, that’s what they were. Vermin. Worse than him.
‘Scumbags!’ he spat out.
305 The bullet bored through the void that was Panattoni’s life without Marita, shattering the upper half of his skull.
Claudio Salemme, wearing a plastic raincoat, pollution mask, latex gloves and polyethylene shoe covers, placed the gun in Panattoni’s hand, making sure to press his fingers on the stock and trigger. He took the man’s Beretta for himself. Murder-suicide, another case of gender-based violence. The police wouldn’t probe too deep, not with everything else going on.
He opened the door of the flat and looked around. No one. He took the stairs, pausing between the second and third floors to remove the protective gear. He stuffed everything into a paper bag from a high-street shop. Night had fallen by the time he stepped outside again. He strolled towards viale Lazio, where he’d left his bike. Bikes have no number plates.
He was proud of himself. He hadn’t thought killing would be so easy. His first time had been excellent; he’d behaved like a professional. Maybe he should have been the one to deal with Canessa instead of the three stooges they’d hired. He’d mention it to his father, though he knew that was a dead end.
In any case, the old man would have to give him this much: you can’t argue with conventional wisdom. If you want something done right, do it yourself.
Canessa had two phone calls to make. He opted for the most difficult one first.
He called Barbara Repetto from her husband’s phone. 306
‘Ivan, I’m worried about you! Where are you?’
‘Barbara, it’s Annibale, not Ivan.’
He heard a noise on the other end of the line, as if Barbara had just grabbed hold of something to steady herself. She gasped. So he hurried his explanation.
‘Listen, Ivan has been injured but he’s fine. He’s not in danger,
and I’m sorry that—’
‘Bastard.’
She delivered the insult calmly, without raising her voice.
Canessa waited for her to continue, to let it out, but Barbara said nothing else. So he spoke again. Without offering excuses or explanations, only logistics and instructions.
‘We’re not in the hospital. Ivan is resting. I’m sorry, but you can’t come to us. He’ll be able to call you tomorrow, and I’ll bring him home in a couple of days. I’ll never seek him out again after this, I promise.’
He used the Swiss phone to call Carla, withholding the number. She answered on the third tone.
‘It’s me.’
‘Where are you?’
‘I’ll explain later. How are you?’
‘All good, but I’m drowning in work. Things are manic here. Did you hear about that organised crime shooting? Salvo and I were the first on site.’
Canessa bit his tongue to stop himself telling her the truth.
‘I heard. Crazy, huh? So maybe we shouldn’t see each other yet?’
‘Why not come over around 2 a.m.? The night is still young!’ Her tone was full of energy, and he loved what it stood for: her passion for her job, her love of life, no game-playing. 307
‘You’re probably tired. Listen, I need to head to Liguria to sort a few things out. I’ll call you again tomorrow, okay?’
‘I’ll be here! Love you.’
Carla hung up quickly, as if the words coming out of her mouth had surprised her more than him.
She was wrong. On the other end of the line, Canessa stood as still as a statue.
The head of the rapid response team was watching the two prosecutors and trying his best to appear merely confused by their behaviour rather than outraged as he actually was. Flying in the face of all evidence, Marta Bossini and Fabio Guidoni were following their own path. But he had no intention of challenging them. They’d be the ones carrying the can.
Silvestrin had just brought some sensational news to their attention, plus a few smaller, but still interesting pieces. First of all, the second killer, whose prints weren’t in the national database, had finally been identified, thanks to their colleagues in Naples. His name was Ciro D’Alletto, aka ‘Rocco’. Unlike his associate, who was linked to a clan in the Vesuvius area and had a criminal past, Rocco worked for the best offer, whether Camorra business or not. A rare case of a freelancer in Naples. No boss wanted him around for long. He was a ticking bomb, only good as a killer, and dangerous in the long run. According to Silvestrin, he’d been the one with the contract in Milan; the other had been brought in as backup.
‘Because the job was bigger this time. Good precaution, but clearly not enough.’ 308
‘Why “this time”?’ Bossini interrupted. She hadn’t sat down like her colleague, and instead she was leaning against the window looking into the office courtyard.
‘Because one of the two AK-47s—’ Silvestrin went for the suspenseful tone of a noir film, complete with dramatic pause ‘—is the one that was used to kill Pino Petri and Napoleone Canessa.’
‘Well, damn,’ Guidoni said, unable to contain his surprise. Bossini, on the other hand, maintained her icy calm. She moved away from the window and joined her colleague behind the desk.
‘Are you certain?’
‘Complete match: weapon, shells, bullets.’
Guidoni slapped the desk, practically shouting, ‘Bingo! That proves my theory. It’s nothing to do with terrorism. It’s a turf war between gangs, for control over drug-dealing. Like so many former terrorists, Petri turned to other criminal activities.’
The head of rapid response took a deep breath. ‘I’m sorry, your honour, but drugs up here are usually linked to the ’Ndrangheta or foreign interference. The Camorra has nothing to do with it.’
‘They’re trying to expand, my friend, and went against the current dealers.’
‘I’m sorry, I have to insist: it’s just not plausible. The Camorra attacking the ’Ndrangheta in Milan? Not possible. That’s not how organised crime moves. There’s no precedent. They agree on territories and treat it like a business.’
Marta Bossini cut in, her tone glacial. ‘You let us decide what is and isn’t plausible, Silvestrin. The two killers may very well have been employed by the ’Ndrangheta. We’ll see, but at this stage it’s not relevant. What we’re interested in right now is how it ties in with the Petri case. Before the shooting, we received crucial 309 information about the drug trafficker behind it all. Now we have confirmation that it’s not Petri’s past that’s connected with it; it’s his present. Thank you, Silvestrin. You may go.’
The head of the rapid response team nodded and left the room. He found his right-hand man just outside.
‘So? How did it go?’
‘To hell with all of them!’ he blurted.
As soon as the police officer had left the room, Marta called the judge, as Astroni had instructed. ‘From now on, you need to make two phone calls every time. Savelli first, then me. Be efficient and loyal. Ask him for help and suggestions. Your career will greatly benefit. Then call me immediately. Don’t wait any longer than it takes you to dial my number.’
She told Guidoni what Savelli had just said on the phone. ‘The two cases are connected, so we’ll work alongside the anti-mafia agency, but we’ll be in charge.’
Her colleague was excited. He couldn’t wait to show the ace up his sleeve.
‘Excellent. And the other thing?’
‘We’ll play that card as soon as we have more on our final player, our dear Canessa.’
Astroni was waiting for her call.
‘I’m the one who killed them.’
Carla pulled away from a long kiss, and looked at him in shock. She was even more shocked than when he’d told her the 310 true story of via Gaeta. It wasn’t about the deaths, but the danger he’d been in.
Canessa had cheered up. Yet although she’d repeatedly shown him her affection (and maybe something more), his life on the edge might become an obstacle. Weren’t there enough of those already?
He’d suggested they spend the night in a hotel, ‘to celebrate our reunion after all this time apart. We’ll pretend we’re on holiday somewhere nice. Dinner on the balcony, breakfast in bed, and in between…’ They’d booked into a junior suite on the top floor of Hotel Gallia, she in her name, while he’d used a real ID card with a fake identity.
The temperature inside was perfect. Annibale had an urge to open the window, to let the night air come in. He settled instead for the excellent view of the gorgeous square beneath them, the sky turning electric blue behind it.
Canessa had spent days in the loft, never leaving Repetto’s side. Luckily, Repetto’s wounds healed quickly.
‘We’re even,’ Repetto said when he came to. ‘It was my turn to be the fool who got shot!’
‘Well, I was there too, so technically it’s two-one for me,’ Canessa teased.
Repetto wasn’t having it.
‘It was my job to be alert. You were recovering from passionate sex and weren’t in the right state of mind…’ His laugh turned into a grimace: the wound was still fresh.
After the call to Barbara, and in spite of Repetto’s complaints and stubbornness, he’d taken him home to Monza.
‘Very nice,’ Repetto commented as he lowered himself cautiously 311 into the passenger seat of the BMW Series 1. He’d tried convincing Canessa one more time. ‘I need to watch your back.’
‘It didn’t help much last time.’
Repetto hadn’t taken it as well as he usually did. His pride hurt more than the wound.
‘I was an idiot,’ he kept saying.
‘We both were,’ Canessa reminded him. ‘We were distracted. That’s why we need a breather. We can’t let anxiety take over. You head home, I’ll go to Liguria for a couple of days. I’ve been away too long. It’s high season and I need to help my aunt.’
He hadn’t told Repetto – he wouldn’t have been able to drop him off – that that very afternoon he’d seen a photo of the third killer on TV. Fernando Panattoni. According to the news, he’d been found dead in a flat in via Bergamo along with his foreign girlfriend, legally resident in the country. Everything pointed towards a misogynistic murder-suicide, and the politicians and psychologists started having a field day.
But it was a cover-up and he knew it: his handlers had tied up a loose thread. Panattoni had been nothing but a pawn. Plus, the news cited a revolver as the murder weapon, but Canessa knew that Panattoni had shot him with a Beretta. Sure, he might have changed weapons later, but it seemed unlikely. Someone who’s just taken part in a shooting in which he was wounded doesn’t go home, change weapons, then top himself and his girlfriend.
He’d been killed.
Barbara Repetto emerged from the family villa, set within a magnificent garden, to help her husband get out of the car. Canessa spotted Repetto’s grandchildren looking at them through the windows. A small girl with red hair pulled a face at him. Was 312 she angry at him, like her grandmother? Barbara hadn’t even greeted him, but Repetto firmly reminded her: ‘Manners. Please say hello to my friend.’
Barbara held his gaze, but Repetto was as stubborn as a mule.
‘Hello, Annibale. Thank you for bringing Ivan home.’
Husband and wife walked down the cobbled drive lined by the flowerbeds that were Barbara’s pride and joy. They were almost at the door of the villa, where the grandchildren had gathered, when Ivan turned round and signed for Annibale to phone him.
Canessa smiled. He just won’t quit.
She let her dress slide to the floor, and stood wearing only her panties.
‘Fuck me,’ she whispered. She kept her panties on as he entered her, over and over again, from every possible angle.
Eventually, when they woke up towards dawn, she asked him to tell her everything about the shooting. He told her about Panattoni’s death too, and the connection he’d made between the two.
‘Now what?’ she asked.
‘Now we need to find the connecting thread in all this. I’ll head to Liguria, for real this time, and try to piece it together as I deal with trenette al pesto and seafood fry-ups.’
Carla sat on the bed. ‘Two Camorra killers and a private investigator with PTSD who kills himself or is killed along with his girlfriend. It doesn’t make sense.’
‘It does. Petri and Judge Lazzarini are the keys. I’m sure of it.’
‘It seems pretty clear that you’re on the right track if they tried to kill you. But these people clearly have money and contacts. You can’t just look up people like Rocco and his accomplice.’ 313
Canessa agreed. ‘It’s true, they’re powerful. But more than the who and the how, I want to know why. I’m old school that way: motive is the most important thing.’
Carla stood up and opened the window, breathing in the fresh air. She took off her panties and stepped onto the balcony, completely naked. She leaned against the railing, slowly, offering him a view of her behind. Then she turned to face him, opening up her legs.
‘Come here and fuck me like there’s no tomorrow.’
Five hundred people were invited to the wedding of Renata – daughter of Nicola Frugoni, private healthcare king in Lombardy and one of the wealthiest men in the country – and Anton Giulio Castravano, son of the chancellor of Bocconi University, law and business economy graduate and one the leading experts in Italian civil code and family business inheritance.
Both parties were hoping that the guests wouldn’t turn up en masse for the religious ceremony in the small hill church above Bellagio – it held no more than fifty – and would only show up for the reception on the terrace of a glorious villa on the lake. It was quite the event. As it happened, word got around, and they had their wish. Everything went according to plan and the illustrious guests, dressed to the nines, threw themselves at the dancing and the buffet provided by a three-star chef.
It was sunset. The villa’s garden hosted three gazebos, each far enough from the other to offer some privacy, and close enough to the water that you could hear it lapping against the shore. It was refreshing, in all aspects. 314
Astroni sat, alone, under one of the gazebos. The other two were packed with inebriated guests, laughing and talking raucously.
‘Don’t you think buffets are a great invention? You grab, you eat, you grab again, you eat more. You leave plates and glasses around. You do the rounds. You take your own time and when you’ve had enough, it’s an Irish goodbye!’
Giannino Salemme, squeezed into a white suit that really needed to be let out (alternatively, he could have lost some weight), grabbed the chair next to Federico Astroni, who was picking at a plate of pasta tubes with tomato and parmesan, one of the chef ’s signature dishes.
‘That one’s taken,’ Astroni said, clearly annoyed.
Salemme pretended not to hear, and settled in next to Astroni.
‘Have you lost your mind?’ he almost jumped to his feet, then thought better of it. ‘Everyone can see us!’
Salemme spread his arms. ‘Federico, relax! We’re some of the top guests at a boring wedding. We’re chatting, we’ve known each other for forty years, who do you think will care? Give me a break, please.’
Astroni glanced around, but everyone was still eating and drinking. No one was paying them any attention. He still couldn’t relax, however: his mind was spinning with problems, and the presence of this uncomfortable person made it worse.
Salemme moved his chair closer. Astroni tried to appear as normal as possible.
‘We need to talk.’
‘About what?’
Salemme lowered his head.
‘Federico, Federico… still the same I see. Always waiting for someone else to fix your problems.’ 315
‘What do you mean?’
‘Why do you think you’re famous? Was it an act of courage? The brave prosecutor up against the powerful? Come on. You started locking people up when the system was in crisis, and the people,’ Salemme spat out the word while gesturing at the guests around them, ‘started standing under your window to praise you. You’ve wallowed in the muck for years, doing nothing, never making a clean sweep of it, cursing in private while publicly praising the politicians you sentenced to the scaffold when the opportunity arose. You only made your move, you and your accomplices, when you knew you had your backs covered. Not a moment sooner. And now, you’re doing the same.’
‘I don’t have to take this from you. I’m leaving.’ Astroni made to stand up, but a hand pushed him back down onto his chair.
Claudio Salemme flashed him one of his reptilian smiles. ‘Listen to my father, you tosser,’ he hissed.
Astroni was furious. ‘Get your hands off me!’ He turned to Salemme senior. ‘I want nothing to do with this arsehole.’ He knew all about young Claudio’s résumé, though not his recent exploits, or he actually would have fled the scene in horror.
Giannino was more accommodating. ‘I’m sorry, Federico, we got off on the wrong foot here. Let’s keep it civil and quiet. Listen. Whether you like it or not, we’re linked, and it’s a heavy chain. One of us falls, the other is dragged down with him.’
‘What do you want?’ Astroni felt the first drops of sweat rolling down his forehead, despite the cool breeze.
‘We’ve tried containing the problem…’
‘I saw that…’
‘Shut your mouth!’ the man behind him threatened, inching closer. 316
Salemme senior was still playing good cop to his bad cop son.
‘True, it didn’t go too well. But no, we’re a little… how can I say this… low on resources. You need to take your share of responsibility. We heard what your minions told the press. Organised crime, drugs, turf wars.’
‘So?’
‘So we have an idea. Risk free, more or less. A clean, surgical hit. But we need your charm, your clout. We’ll play our part, you’ll play yours. No one will get hurt, no one will fire a single shot – at least, not illegally. If it comes to that, the weapons firing will be the blessed ones of the law and its enforcers. Enough risky business.’
Astroni looked at Salemme. Despite his appearance, he didn’t look much older. All those years, ever since they’d taken their own paths, he’d always been able to get himself out of bad situations. He’d always survived, and he’d got rich. He’d have to trust him, one more time.
‘I’m listening.’
Pasquale Cammello raised a hand to his forehead to shelter his eyes from the sun. He was searching the courtyard for his man, and he spotted him on the other side. In the shade. Of course.
He crossed the one place where the prisoners could finally stretch their legs: outside. The looks that came his way were respectful. Some pulled aside to let him through. When he got closer to the man he wanted to speak to, he slowed down. The Professor didn’t appreciate people approaching him aggressively. 317
The Professor had actually taught maths at university, and was revered by colleagues and students alike. He’d been on a great career path, and then he’d become a revenge killer. He’d slaughtered the people responsible for destroying his family. People who’d avenged a wrong done to them were treated with respect in prison. Respect, by God, was still worth something.
‘That,’ Cammello always said, ‘is a real man of honour. Prison! He should’ve got a medal.’ He knew what De Marinis had done, of course, and he approved.
The Professor was on the other side of the yard, at peace with himself and his life sentences. He was playing chess on his own. He wasn’t a misanthrope at all; people liked him and he liked them back. He helped inmates with their letter writing, translations (who knew how many languages he spoke) and he even taught maths to a few of them. Cammello had listened in a couple of times, understanding absolutely nothing but fascinated all the same. With chess, however, no one was up to his level, so the Professor played alone one day, and taught someone else the next. When he taught, he didn’t want to be bothered, but when he played alone, he was open to seeing people. He had many ‘students’, especially among the Slavic inmates.
‘Oh oh Cammello, was that the song? No, it was oh oh cavallo.’
De Marinis had a ponytail, a long salt and pepper beard and a curious sense of humour.
Cammello chuckled.
‘Professor, sorry to bother you, but I need help with something.’
‘Just a second.’ He looked at the board, considered a move, made another and exclaimed, ‘Checkmate! Okay, what can I help you with?’
‘I shared a cell with Pino Petri.’ 318
‘A good boy, despite his past.’
‘Indeed, may he rest in peace.’
‘Amen. So?’
‘Petri dies, the cops come in, dig around, ask questions, find nothing and leave. I’m left with a Moroccan who shanked his sister’s Italian boyfriend, a Latino gang member who pummelled a taxi driver into a coma and Pelusi, a creep who dealt E outside schools.’
‘Not a great selection.’
‘It sucks. But one’s gone missing. The creep disappeared.’
‘Greener pastures?’
‘No, that’s the point. He still had three years to go. One day, he gets called to the talking room and never comes back. He had some personal effects. The guards come over, box them up and leave.’ Cammello blew on his fingers. ‘Vanished. I don’t like it, but I can’t figure out what’s going on.’
The Professor was slowly resetting the chess board. He nodded. ‘Grasser.’
‘Grasser?’
‘Yes. The prosecutors want something from him. They’re looking for a witness.’
‘That creep? A grass? Come on! He knows nothing about me.’
The Professor wagged his index finger at him, as if he were a naughty student. ‘As you said, there was someone else in that cell with a past.’
Cammello’s eyes widened. ‘Petri! Fuck…’
‘Petri had been in there for years. They knew they’d get nothing from you or the other two. They aimed for the weak link, according to your description.’
‘Maybe, but I was actually close to Pino, and still knew nothing 319 about him. So we’re back to square one: what the fuck did that creep know?’
‘Cammello, Cammello! What matters isn’t what he knows, but what he’ll say.’
‘Fuck, that creep would say his mother landed on the moon just to get out.’
‘Precisely.’
The Professor stood up.
‘Yes, but Petri is dead, so what can he be accused of?’
‘Maybe not him. But someone else may be involved, someone who’s being investigated. That’s how it works. If they have the smoking gun, the physical evidence, the eyewitness, that’s all they need. If they don’t, if they only have clues and unconnected facts, they’ll come up with a theory and try to make it stick. And there’s nothing better than a supergrass to lend weight to that theory. They look for one, without being obvious about it. There are several dishonest prosecutors, sure, but they usually walk this side of the law. They start talking, and if the guy gets it, and realises what they want him to say, that’s all there is to it.’
Cammello slapped his forehead.
‘Fuck! You’re right, and I think I know who they’re trying to ream. Thanks, Professor.’
He stood up and joined a group of inmates in the opposite corner of the yard. As he approached, one of them slipped him a mobile phone. They huddled round protectively while Cammello dialled.
‘Look, I need you to find someone for me right away. It’s urgent.’ 320
Night fell early in San Fruttuoso. But in the summer, when the last ferry boat left later and private boats docked in the marina, the restaurant was always full for dinner.
Annibale helped his aunt with kitchen prep, then bussed between tables and kitchen all night. They were fully booked that night. They had help in the kitchen, a dishwasher and an extra waitress for the entire season.
When the final guest left, Annibale stayed on the terrace, going over the case and wondering what to do next. Yet in that corner of paradise, the gentle sound of the waves encouraged his more romantic thoughts, and all he could think of was Carla. Screw the age difference and everything else. He missed her the way you miss someone you love. It was pointless to try to hide it from himself. He would call her and tell her. Now.
I love you like I’ve never loved any other woman. I want to be with you. You can dump me when I get too old, but until then…
His train of thought was rudely interrupted by the Swiss satellite phone.
It was his lawyer friend, Cordano.
‘Flavio! What’s up?’
Cordano sounded rushed, as if he wanted to hang up as soon as he said what he had to.
‘Annibale, I don’t know if this will make sense to you, and to be frank, I don’t want to know – I have to admit I find it worrying. Pasquale Cammello’s lawyer called me with a message. I asked him to repeat it twice while I wrote it down. 321
Cop, you’d better keep an eye on your stuff. Be careful who you hang out with. To put it bluntly: watch your back. Your former friends want to fuck you over. P.S. I’m doing this for Petri – not you.
‘Does that mean anything to you?’
‘Maybe,’ Canessa replied, his senses suddenly on the alert.
‘Well, keep me posted.’
He waited for the last boat to disappear and then hurried back to the restaurant. He walked across the dark room and went upstairs to his flat. His aunt’s room was at the end of the corridor. He went into his first, and quickly checked it. The weapons he’d used in via Lodovico il Moro were in the warehouse safe in Rapallo. He had only his Beretta and the Ruger, both held legally in his capacity as a former Carabiniere. He hadn’t used the Beretta since the ’80s, apart from training at the gun range. Luckily, he’d never fired the Ruger. He sat on the bed.
Think, Canessa, think.
What had Cammello said? His former friends… so the law, the police, Carabinieri, the magistrates. What was the angle? Was it the shooting? No: they’d already be here.
Suddenly, it hit him: the Camorra, organised crime.
He ran to his aunt’s bedroom and knocked.
‘Come in.’
She was reading a magazine in bed. Small, but full of energy, she had his mother’s face, and also Giovanna’s. When he’d told her, his aunt had welled up.
‘What’s wrong, Annibale?’
‘This may seem like a strange question, but has anything unusual happened while I’ve been away? Any customers behaving oddly?’ 322
She put the magazine down.
‘Let’s see… you got here last night.’ She paused. ‘Actually, something did happen yesterday, at lunchtime. A woman came to ask me about the bathroom because she couldn’t open the door. She’d been trying for some time, she said. We went to check together, and a man in his forties came out. He’d been alone at the table and he didn’t eat much but he ordered an expensive wine. I asked if he needed any help. He said he was okay, and apologised for taking so long. He had already paid, so he left right after that. Before I let the woman in, I checked the bathroom. You know, in case he’d done something… off. But everything was clean and tidy.’
Annibale thanked her with an ease he didn’t actually feel.
He ran downstairs to the restaurant bathroom. There weren’t many places to hide something. He went for the classic one: the toilet cistern. Feeling around, his hand touched something: a sealed plastic bag. He pulled it out: inside was another bag with white powder inside it. He went to the kitchen, took out a knife and slit the bag, spilling some of the powder.
Canessa rubbed a few grains of it on his gums.
Cocaine.
He weighed it in his hand. A good half kilo. Street value? €100,000. Prison term? Twenty years, including consorting with organised crime. If they added a murder charge, it would mean a life sentence. Well played.
So if they couldn’t get him with an AK-47, they’d resort to the might of the law.
At least he’d banished his doubts, and he could call the whole mess exactly what it was: a conspiracy.
The cast was huge, and took in influential members of society, people with means and resources and people who might 323 be hiring the Camorra at the same time they were running law enforcement.
He checked his watch and ran back upstairs. He stuffed his waterproof bag with everything he needed, including the cocaine. Then he went back to see his aunt.
‘Annibale, you’re scaring me. What’s going on?’
‘Auntie, you need to trust me. Listen: you know I’m investigating Napoleone’s death. They tried to stop me by planting cocaine in the bathroom. They’re trying to frame me. I need to get out of here fast.’
‘But you found it…’ She was stumbling over her words. ‘If that man put it there, I can tell the police!’
‘Even if I could prove my innocence, it would take time, and I don’t have any. Go to sleep. Even if you’re not tired, pretend you’re asleep. They’ll get here just before dawn. They’ll break in, but they shouldn’t cause too much damage. Stay in bed, stay calm. Act surprised, indignant. You know nothing. If they ask you about the drugs, tell them about the man in the bathroom, just like you told me. Do you remember his face? Can you help them with a portrait?’
‘Of course! I may be old but I’m not blind!’
Canessa smiled. ‘Good. But don’t tell them anything about our conversation or the cocaine. You can let slip that I sometimes go for a night dive. Act worried. You can do it.’
She hugged him. Her eyes were blazing.
‘I can, but be careful. Please, Annibale.’
Canessa reached Cala dell’Oro easily. He slipped through the town using the smaller streets and alleys, checking to ensure that no officers had been sent ahead to get him. But there 324 weren’t any. The ones on foot were probably much higher up the hill, and the ones who’d come by sea hidden behind the promontory. San Fruttuoso could only be reached by sea or by descent from Monte di Portofino. And that’s how they would come, cutting off all possible exits. They were counting on the surprise element.
The town was practically empty. Voices drifted up from the beach… maybe a group of kids spending the night on the sand in sleeping bags.
Canessa was still a little shocked by the possible ramifications of the situation. He was convinced that whoever had planted the drugs would have done so in his brother’s home in Reggio Emilia, too. Full circle. He thought about Sara and Giovanna: the raid, the fear, a possible arrest. But there was no way to warn them. A phone call would be intercepted and seen as a clear sign of collaboration. They’ll arrest her anyway. This new conviction rose to the top of his list of worries. They would use his sister-in-law as leverage.
How far did this conspiracy go? And who was involved? He was nearly paralysed by his thirst for revenge. He would settle all scores, but not here, not now. For now, his sole aim was to avoid getting caught.
He reached the water. The sea was calm. He retrieved a bag from among the rocks: inside it were an oxygen tank, a suit and a small personal sub device. He’d hidden it there when the whole affair had begun in case he had to make a quick getaway. He’d covered everything with a camo tarp, and the prep had seemed excessive even to him. But old habits die hard.
He freed the device and pushed it into the water. With a silent blessing to Saint Paranoia, he secured the bag to his back and slid 325 into the water. Quickly, soundlessly, the small sub pulled him away from shore and down into the still waters of the Ligurian Sea.
‘Someone tipped him off.’
Guidoni was leaning against the chair in which the inscrutable Marta Bossini was sitting. Federico Astroni sat next to her. The atmosphere in Savelli’s office was nasty, and not just because the windows were shut and the air conditioner switched off (Savelli hated it).
Savelli wasn’t angry about Canessa’s escape. He was irritated because Guidoni had come without a jacket in order to show off his Dirty Harry gun. Unlike these two young prosecutors, Savelli knew the escape was a positive factor in this mess. Instead of the actual allegations against him, the media would now be focusing on the fact that a former national hero was on the run, stalked by the forces of justice he’d served irreproachably before turning to crime. Savelli and Astroni could not deny, with their experience, that the actual allegations were inconsistent to say the least. There were no drugs, no weapons. Sure, they’d found a pack of cocaine during the search of his sister-in-law’s house, but that only implicated his late brother, and there had been no contact between them in years. No ties, no connections.
‘That means nothing. They’ll have found some other way to communicate,’ the two prosecutors objected. Weak. Forensics had found grains of cocaine in the San Fruttuoso restaurant, but a defence lawyer, however incompetent, would have pointed out that any public bathroom in the country would yield the same 326 result. Even in this very building, Savelli thought. And then there was the aunt’s statement.
Savelli was also incredibly irritated at the phone calls he’d been getting. He was used to the threats, warnings, prayers. This time, however, it wasn’t the usual politicians, it was his friends. And they hadn’t threatened him, they’d treated him like a misbehaving child.
The first to call had been the commander general of the Carabinieri. They’d grown up together, their desks side by side in primary school.
‘I’m calling you with a character reference. I’ve worked with Canessa, and I was a young lieutenant just like him. Canessa was a legend, a warrior monk. If you think he’s started dealing in middle age, you’re cracked. I hope you have substantial proof, my friend.’
Then it had been Cosima Marchetti’s turn; her husband, the judge, had been one of his mentors.
‘Shame on you, Antonio! How can you be going after that boy? He’s a good man and a hero. I won’t believe a word said against him. Not even if I see him walk by with a bag of heroin.’
Boy? Really?
After the fifth phone call from an incredulous comrade, a terrorist victim’s outraged relative or just sad old friends, he disconnected the phone.
‘Are we sure about this theory?’ he asked, interrupting the discussion taking place in his office.
Astroni backed him up. ‘The evidence does seem a little weak, I concur. Without the drugs…’
Marta held her lover’s stare.
‘There are no drugs, but there is the escape. Honest people don’t run away – they defend themselves. Plus, there’s the fact that someone warned him.’ 327
Savelli was forced to agree with his young colleague. ‘It’s true, that is suspicious. An arrest warrant makes sense. We need to find him, even if it’s for his own good.’ He paused before continuing with more authority. ‘However, let’s proceed as we should, and consider him innocent until proven guilty. That man has done the unthinkable for this country, including taking a bullet that was meant to kill him.’ He threw a newspaper onto the table. ‘I don’t want another manhunt ending up in a public shootout. I want a memo released: he comes in alive, or he’s released. Is that understood? Now, back to work.’
He closed the file and handed it to Marta Bossini. The meeting was over.
‘If it wasn’t one of us, who warned him?’
Chief Magistrate Calandra was furious. Without the anonymous benefactor, their prized horse would no longer be in the race. Thwarted. ‘But more importantly, how did he escape the ambush?’
His man in grey stood there in front of him looking penitent, as if he were wearing a hairshirt. Calandra suspected he might have self-flagellated before coming to report.
Outside, the Rome evening was beautiful, oblivious to what was taking place. A secret war. Secret, but real.
Calandra had swooped into the offices like a fury, having been woken up in a gorgeous hotel on the coast where he’d spent the night with one of his lovers. He was raging.
He’d even taken off his jacket, and he now stood in just a shirt and his trademark red braces: an unequivocal sign that he was about to start an Inquisition.
The man in grey emerged from his melancholy to make his report. 328
‘I take responsibility for this, your excellency. I took the day off yesterday. It won’t happen again.’
‘Don’t be stupid. How many days off have you taken in the past year?’ Calandra dismissed the apology with a wave.
‘A week, ten days.’
‘Exactly, so none of this self-flagellation. Everyone needs a breather once in a while. My question is: why did your stand-in not realise what was happening?’
‘In all honesty, I must admit that Milan’s prosecutor’s office were very good. Information about the sting was scarce, and the go-ahead only came through on Friday night. As you can imagine, Friday afternoon is very quiet in the courts, especially in summer…’
‘…so you’re saying even our informants took a seaside break?’
Calandra would happily have had a go at anyone at this point.
The man grew increasingly uncomfortable. ‘Unfortunately, we should have been able to avoid that. A careful observer would have spotted the departure of the police tactical unit for Liguria. There were signs, but my stand-in didn’t notice.’
‘Poor showing. Bring them in later. I’d like a word.’ Calandra was simmering down. ‘At least Canessa has avoided capture and if I know him as I do, he’ll be furious – even more so on account of Sara’s arrest. That’s good! But back to the point: how did he get out?’
‘We found evidence of a call from Canessa’s lawyer, a…’ he read his file, ‘Cordano’s the name. Calls went to a Swiss phone, presumably Canessa’s.’
‘And who warned Cordano?’
‘He received a call from an untraceable number… by the police, that is.’ The man smiled. ‘But we know who it belongs to: the lawyer for Pasquale Cammello.’ 329
Calandra, who’d been leaning back in his chair, snapped upright.
‘Cammello helped him? Why?’ Confused, he fell silent momentarily. ‘Of course! Respect for Petri. Petri was looking for Canessa because he’s no longer a cop. A strange ally, somewhat disturbing. But crucial. How did he find out?’
The man in grey practically curtsied. ‘I don’t have any proof, but I do have a theory. One of their cellmates disappeared. Cammello may have had the same hunch: he’s been recruited as a supergrass.’
‘And when there’s a snitch, there’s someone to fuck over, for better or worse. They needed this guy to confirm their theory that Petri had started dealing. Ingenious,’ Calandra concluded.
There was another silence. The chief magistrate tried to imagine Canessa’s whereabouts, and to anticipate his next move. The situation was bad, but the interesting thing was that there were now more possibilities.
The man in grey cleared his throat.
Calandra snapped out of his thoughts. ‘Very well, if there’s nothing else…’
‘Actually, your excellency, there is. You’ll remember you asked me to look into the Lazzarini case. Something about it was covered up, though not well enough. We found it.’ He went from hangdog to mildly triumphant and handed Calandra a piece of paper.
‘This is more than just something. Why was it kept secret at the time?’ The chief magistrate was genuinely surprised.
‘I found some notes. They did conduct an investigation on the down low, but they didn’t find anything or anyone. So they kept quiet. It was after the Moro case, when trust in institutions 330 was at an all-time low. It seemed like the State was unable to abolish terrorism, and the dicey activities of the Secret Service sullied public opinion of the whole system. This would’ve shaken the tree even more. They had no definite identification, so they said nothing.’
Calandra considered the paper, then handed it back. ‘Make sure this gets to Canessa.’
The grey man staggered. ‘How?’
Calandra glared at him.
‘Work it out! We screwed up. We need to score a point to get back in the lead.’
Repetto was as restless as a benched player waiting to step into the game. But his coach was stubborn: even if he’d spotted his restlessness, he was showing no signs of letting him back on the field. His wife had forbidden him from getting involved any further, especially after Canessa had trumped all other dangerous fugitives to become Italy’s Most Wanted.
But Repetto had to get away, and quickly. His wounds had more or less healed, and any lingering discomfort was nothing that a painkiller wouldn’t squash. Annibale needed him, especially now. He might be risking forty years of marriage in one fell swoop, but he had to get out of that gilded prison. He looked out of a window on the first floor of the villa.
He’d already clocked the cars in front of the house. They weren’t trying to hide so much as to discourage. There’d be no arrest. They weren’t stupid: they knew Canessa wouldn’t show 331 up; he’d never openly involve Repetto. They were there to make a point: they had their eye on everything.
Repetto had to laugh. They didn’t know him. At all. Annibale would never get caught. If he chose to disappear forever, no one would see him again. He was out there, somewhere, planning his next move. And Repetto needed to be out there with him. Helping him.
His scanned the garden, which was basically woodland. It would be easy to escape through the trees, breaking through the surveillance. But where would he go? He had no news of Canessa. Had he gone back to the loft? Unlikely. Then there was Barbara. What could he say without making her angry?
He felt a presence behind him. His wife appeared at the living-room door with an envelope.
‘What’s that?’
‘Registered mail, from your phone provider.’
Barbara wasn’t particularly beautiful, but she was confident, a strong woman in all senses.
‘Why are you giving it to me?’ he teased. They often played this game, but both knew who had the final word in the family.
Barbara smiled patiently. ‘Because it’s strange. First of all, it wasn’t our usual postman, and he didn’t look like any postman, really. His hands were too clean, know what I mean?’
She was the wife of a Carabiniere, after all.
Repetto looked at her. She was the best thing that had ever happened to him. He took the envelope and opened it. Inside he found another envelope addressed by hand.
Repetto started. He looked at his wife, then back at the note, signed with the name almost no one knew about.
Max. 332
Carla was reeling, but not due to the heat. Canessa’s story had suddenly blown up. Suddenly. Unexpectedly. Distressingly. All those adverbs. And not one of them positive.
She blamed a dawn phone call from Strozzi – oddly, the same time he’d sent her to report on the double murder in via Vittor Pisani the morning after she’d slept with him. She’d learned to put that aside, but she couldn’t exactly forget it. Maybe, though, things were coming full circle.
Strozzi had given her the news of the day – maybe the year – with no discernible emotion. In fact, it had actually been the news of her life.
‘This morning, a police tactical unit entered the house and restaurant owned by Annibale Canessa and his aunt. He was missing. Word is that someone warned him, and he escaped the raid. He’s wanted for drug dealing, criminal association and as an accessory to murder. No one knows where he is. I just wanted to let you know. Please, Carla, if you hear anything about this, anything at all… This story is becoming dangerous. I’m worried about you.’
She spent the next three hours with her eyes glued to the fan, the blades slowly rotating above her in a sort of unsuccessful hypnosis. Did Strozzi suspect her and Canessa?
She had no idea what to say or think. Of course it was all bullshit. The man she knew wasn’t the one everyone else was describing. She’d skimmed the front pages of all the major news sites. Apart from a few minor publications, no one was questioning the story or attempting an alternative reading.
She’d been on that side of things more than once, but now, at the centre of the circus and knowing the person under attack, 333 she was coming to realise how shitty that approach was. It was entirely devoid of reason. There was no attempt to dig behind the accusations.
It was all maddening! Everything was crumbling around her. The man she loved (yes, damn it, she did), the one who’d called her the night before, tired after a long day at the restaurant… He was now a fugitive from the police, the Carabinieri, even the Guardia di Finanza. She felt hurt in spite of herself. She looked around, but didn’t spot anything out of the ordinary. Were they tapping her phone? Could they do that?
Where was he?
The meeting was set up for Wednesday in the Lampugnano station car park. Evening rush hour, and a man appeared in the crowd: black hair, salt-and-pepper beard, a pair of thick glasses. A bit of a limp. Someone who’d seen better days. Rossi stared for a moment before turning away. His surprise was equalled by his fear when the man opened the door and sat next to him in the Bentley.
‘Rossi, really! Couldn’t you have gone for a less noticeable car this time! Although… they’d never expect me to be sitting in a car like this.’ It was Annibale’s voice.
Rossi’s jaw dropped. He couldn’t get used to the transformation. The clothes, the mannerisms, tone of voice – everything belonged to a different man with a different story to Canessa’s. It was an incredible disguise.
Annibale had called him in Zurich. ‘You’re my last asset left,’ he’d told him.
‘I found you a place in via del Carroccio,’ Rossi said when he recovered from his surprise, ‘at the junction with via De 334 Amicis. It belongs to a foreign pharmaceutical company. It’s not far from the Sant’Ambrogio underground station, just like you asked.’
‘Good.’
‘Do you need any money?’
Canessa smiled. ‘I’m good for money and weapons.’ And he pointed to his feet, where he had dumped a gym bag.
The Bentley slipped into the chaotic evening traffic.
Canessa was silent, batting a single idea around in his brain.
His adversaries were always one step ahead. Whenever he got close, they made sure he fell back a square by setting a trap or blocking his path. They couldn’t be that smart. Sure, they had the tools, the means, the contacts, important allies, but it was all too much.
Rossi was talking to him.
‘Sorry, say again?’
‘What’s your priority? Dealing with the allegations, or continuing the investigation?’
Canessa looked at him, suddenly lighting up.
‘Clearing the air.’
She was nervous about seeing him again. It was odd that he wanted to meet somewhere as busy as largo La Foppa at dusk. But maybe the distraction of a crowd was exactly what he was after.
To let off some steam, she’d worked out in the downstairs gym in the old newspaper building in piazza Cavour. The place was trendy now, filled with models and wannabes. 335
On the exercise bike, she thought back to the call that had come through to Caprile.
‘Okay…’ her colleague had handed her the phone, a little confused but mostly curious. The person on the other end had asked him to put Carla Trovati on without transferring the call.
‘Hello?’ Carla was tentative.
‘Largo La Foppa, via Moscova corner, 7 p.m.’
Click. That was it.
Even though she hadn’t recognised the voice, she knew it was about Annibale.
Since then, she’d been imagining their reunion. She was as nervous and excited as a teenager on her first date. The element of danger made everything stranger and more mysterious. She might be seen to be aiding and abetting a fugitive. She was, however, sure of one thing: she would tell him I love you the moment she saw him. She’d waited long enough.
She left the house without a bra, and now she could feel everyone’s eyes on her tight-fitting sports top. After the gym, she’d headed home, intending to change quickly before her appointment. So she hadn’t noticed the man behind her as she climbed the steps to the lobby. She swung around, coming face to face with a stranger.
‘Follow me. Don’t say a word.’
The voice. That voice.
‘Annibale?’
His hair was black, he had a beard and he seemed bigger. She didn’t recognise him. But the voice was his.
‘Shhhh!’
He shoved her brusquely downstairs towards an emergency exit, then across an inner courtyard and through another door. 336
‘Stop.’
Why was he treating her like this?
He looked outside, then grabbed her arm and forced her to run behind him, to the other side of the street towards the Swiss Centre skyscraper. He dragged her to a small door with a small thread running from it. He pulled on the thread and the door opened. They walked down two flights of stairs and along another putrid corridor until they came to a locked lift. Annibale pulled out a key, and turned it in the lock. The doors opened, and they whizzed to the top of the building.
Once inside the contraption, Carla couldn’t hold back. ‘What is going on? Why are you acting like this?’
In reply, Canessa took a pair of binoculars from the bag slung across his shoulders.
‘Let me show you something.’
The lift stopped and they stepped out onto the roof.
‘Stay behind me and do what I do.’
Annibale crouched over and ran behind a cube of concrete that held up an antenna. He took the binoculars and slowly leaned out. He focused for a moment and then handed them over to her.
‘Right ahead, on the roof with the green tiles.’
Carla followed his instructions, but even when her eyes had adjusted to the binoculars, she couldn’t see anything.
‘There’s nothing there.’
‘Keep still. Watch for movement.’
She was exasperated, confused and hot. Here she was, wanting to tell him how much she loved him, and instead she was preparing a long list of insults.
Just then she saw what looked like a moving metal pipe… then another… Was she was imagining things? Eventually she 337 sighted two people in balaclavas – and those ‘pipes’ were rifles with optical sights. Precision weapons. She spotted a third figure holding an enormous set of binoculars. She started – would she and Annibale be spotted too? But they were focused on the other side of the street. She moved back behind the antenna and handed the binoculars to Annibale. They stood facing each other for what seemed like an eternity.
‘Police special forces. Snipers.’ Annibale seemed distressed as he explained. ‘They’re monitoring the entire largo La Foppa, waiting for me to show up. Standard procedure for an armed and dangerous fugitive. Just in case the ground team needs backup.’
Carla shuddered with fear. They’d been discovered.
‘But how did they know to find us there?’
Annibale shook his head. There was sadness in his voice.
‘I don’t think you meant to betray me. But as I always told my men during a terrorist hunt: sloppiness and distraction are forms of betrayal.’
Carla’s face reddened with anger and hurt. ‘How can you even think—’
‘You’re the only one I told. And I obviously didn’t warn them!’
‘Annibale…’
‘Who did you tell?’
She rubbed her arms, which were damp from the heat, her run, the wave of emotions. She was overcome by dread.
‘Giulio Strozzi. But you don’t think—’
‘Why did you tell him?’
‘Because somehow he found out about that night we went into the archives. He told me I could lose my job and that he was worried for me. I had to promise to tell him everything. I 338 did. I trusted him and I still trust him. He’s a piece of shit as a person, but he’s always behaved professionally. He just wanted to protect me. He swore that everything I told him would stay between us. I reported on your investigation too, but I never told him about us, or about how I feel about you. I… I love you Annibale.’
‘I love you too, but that’s not what matters right now. Because of your carelessness, people have died, I’m a wanted man, and I would have been taken into custody if I’d shown up. They’ve always been one step ahead.’
Carla couldn’t believe that Annibale held her responsible.
‘Giulio can’t have called the police! What does he have to do with anything? You can’t possibly think he’s involved with the murders of Alfridi or those killers!’
‘He is, but that doesn’t matter either right now. We can’t waste time explaining or assembling clues. We have to focus on putting everything back in its place. We need to do the things that need doing. You know, you almost got me killed and you’ve put people I love in danger. But you’ve also given me a chance to look at all this from a different perspective. I should thank you.’
But he didn’t. Annibale put the binoculars back in the bag and walked away before she could say anything. Not that it would’ve mattered.
Carla stood in that strangely surreal place until nightfall. When she left, she was in tears.
Repetto and Rossi were sitting in a black SUV with tinted windows in via Marina. Canessa got in front next to Rossi. He started the engine and drove off. Repetto had understood everything: Carla had somehow betrayed them. She was the mole. He also 339 realised that now was not the time to ask. Canessa would need time to heal.
Another affair with a bad ending, another woman letting him down. He just wasn’t meant to be with them. Damn it! Everything had seemed so right this time.
Rossi, however, was less expert in psychology.
‘So? Was it her?’
‘Yes.’
Canessa’s reply was sharp, cutting.
Good sign, Repetto thought. He’s moving on.
But Rossi was on a roll.
‘Sorry, but how did you know it was her? Couldn’t it have been me or Repetto?’
‘Good point.’ Canessa’s sarcasm was biting. ‘You’re getting better.’
‘So why did you exclude us?’
‘I didn’t. If I hadn’t found out the truth from her, I would’ve moved on to you.’
In spite of it all, Rossi felt hurt. He thought he’d demonstrated his loyalty. He felt part of Team Canessa.
At the first red light, he looked at Repetto for comfort. ‘He’s kidding, right?’
Repetto grinned. ‘Not at all.’
‘It all fits.’
Canessa was stuffing his things into a bag. After three days in via del Carroccio, it was time to change locations. ‘The secret of 340 a safe house is never to let it become unsafe,’ he’d tell his men during the Years of Lead.
Rossi was arranging a series of safe houses across the city, but Canessa told him he’d take care of the one night. He had something in mind but was playing it close, probably still burned from the Carla affair. He had to be alone. Typical Canessa.
Repetto, on the other hand, would be heading home. It was his pact with Canessa: he’d spend every evening at home with Barbara.
The guest flat was cold, but it was better that way. A transient abode. Modern furniture, not anonymous but not welcoming either. No decorations other than a few prints on the walls. On the coffee table, next to Canessa’s bag, was the paper Repetto had received and delivered to ‘Max’. Before Repetto could ask, Canessa told him it was undoubtedly a ‘gift’ from Calandra.
A photocopied police report. Thanks to the intuition of one of the forensics team, a few weeks after the events, detectives had worked out that the note claiming responsibility for the murder of Judge Lazzarini had been written on an electric typewriter. And not just any kind: it belonged to a batch of 250 machines with a defective R key: usually, the stem of the letter was supported by two serifs, the one on the left shorter than the other; on these machines, it was reversed. The numbered batch had been sold to Milan’s courts in the summer of 1979. Which meant that Lazzarini’s killer had worked within the same walls where Lazzarini himself had been serving the State. The mole who’d handed him to the Red Brigade and typed up the note was in there, and probably even knew him personally.
According to the report, however, the investigation had stopped there. It could have been anyone at all. The machines were all 341 over the building, including in the press room, where journalists used them.
Canessa didn’t think it had been someone from the press. However… a clerk, a secretary, a police officer, a judge… Why not? In any case, the fact was that whoever had sold Lazzarini came from the courts.
There was a post-it note on the police report. In elegant writing from a fountain pen it read:
This detail was never revealed. It was impossible to find an exact match, and it was considered too damaging to announce publicly in a country already disillusioned and so far from the end of terrorism.
Canessa had shared his thoughts with Repetto. ‘All of the dead – Petri and my brother, right up to the attack on me – were clearly collateral damage linked to protecting someone or something connected with the Lazzarini murder. Now we have a name: Judge Federico Astroni.’
Repetto’s jaw dropped, but Canessa put up a hand to stop his objection.
‘I know, Astroni is a knight in shining armour in this country. But we know that Carla carelessly revealed information to Giulio Strozzi. And Strozzi is Astroni’s biographer, his go-to reporter, his closest friend in the press. They’ve been closely linked since before the corruption inquiries. They both built their reputation during that period. He’s the only one Strozzi could have told. And now we have a document that links the law courts to Lazzarini’s murder. It can’t be a coincidence.’
‘Strozzi…’ 342
‘No, I don’t think he’s actually involved.’
‘But the camorristi? The murders? Do you think Astroni coordinated all of that?’ Repetto persisted in his role as devil’s advocate. That was their dynamic.
Canessa closed his bag.
‘No, he’s clearly working with someone. Astroni himself is under surveillance, he’s got bodyguards, he’s very visible, and it’s unlikely that he is in direct contact with killers or criminals. But he is in touch with someone who seems respectable and with whom his closeness wouldn’t raise suspicions if it came out, but who still has room to operate. Someone ruthless but short-handed after we cleaned up their team. So they set up this whole charade to get rid of me. But they’ll soon find the right killer to sic on me, and if I could choose, I’d rather I only had to watch my back with the police… We’ve got to stop them. And fast.’
Annibale took Calandra’s paper, folded it and handed it to Repetto.
‘Make some copies of this.’
‘How are you going to proceed?’ Repetto asked as they headed to the door.
‘Like an inspector. I’ve been sort of winging it till now, relying on logic. I mean, we found a trail and I followed it. It’s got us this far, but we need to work like good old-fashioned gumshoes. Starting with Petri and his buried treasure.’
They took the lift down in silence. When they reached the ground floor, Repetto checked the front door for anything out of the ordinary.
‘All clear. I’ll go ahead,’ he told Canessa, ‘but where are you off to?’
‘Going for a rest, actually. I need a couple of hours’ downtime. And then I need to find a way to get my sister-in-law out of custody.’ 343
‘It’s going to rain later, maybe even storm. Good thing I’m leaving now. I’ll miss most of it.’
Giannino Salemme lowered his car window and rested his hand against the door outside. He often did this, no matter the season or the weather.
They’d just turned onto the link road for Malpensa airport. Claudio was driving carefully and his father appreciated the concern. He’d needed to go on this trip for some time now, but he’d kept on postponing. He couldn’t leave before dealing with the situation.
Canessa was still around, but he was a threat with an expiration date. Giannino had said as much to Claudio, who was still anxious to find a Panattoni-Rocco substitute.
‘No, we need to lie low. Under the radar. Is that clear? Wait for me to get back from New York in a week. The police may have solved our problem for us by then. Canessa may get himself killed, or disappear. We might be lucky.’
Claudio pulled up to Arrivals. ‘I don’t think they’ll catch him,’ he said.
‘Neither do I. We just need them to restrict his movement, keep him busy. All we need is a nil-nil score. Go Naples!’
He got out of the car and waved to his son, who revved away. Any other time, he would have sighed with concern, but he was too focused on meeting his companion in New York. His ‘urgent business’ was mostly with her. He hadn’t told Claudio, but he did need some privacy, for heaven’s sake.
*
344 Marta knew she wasn’t the only person in Astroni’s bed, and yet she wasn’t lying naked in Guidoni’s tiny attic flat in revenge. It was a necessity. Astroni had recently seemed preoccupied, and their latest encounter had been unsatisfying. A distracted, flaccid shag.
Marta wasn’t naive. She knew her mentor was battling some sort of demon. So when Guidoni had invited her for a drink at a new place, she’d said yes. The alcohol loosened her up, but she had already planned on ending up in bed with him. She was curious about what he was like in bed.
He wasn’t as kinky and refined as Astroni, but he was a strong and well-built lover. That was good enough.
He came back from the kitchen with two glasses of fine white wine. Who knew?!
Still in the mood, he let his hands wander over her breasts. And why not? They’d done the necessary; all they had to do now was wait for Canessa to fall into the trap.
She couldn’t wait to question him. She wanted to know what had turned that hero to dust.
Canessa’s regrets came like the tide, ebbing and flowing. Usually they were gentle, but more often he was pounded by a breaker, and that hurt. His thoughts of Carla were powerful and relentless. At that particular moment, however, it was Caterina Lazzarini who was moving on top of him, something that gave him both pleasure and comfort.
Unlike the journalist, Caterina was a talker – mostly dirty talk. 345 Her breasts kept rubbing against his face, and he’d grab them, squeeze them, tease them.
How had they ended up here?
When he’d left the place in via del Carroccio, he’d walked to the Sant’Agostino underground station. He’d needed some air, some time to think.
The disguise made him look older, like a retired office drudge on his way home from work. The urgency had been sudden. He was looking for a safe space to think, away from everything else. But he also wanted somewhere warm, with human company. A different kind of company from his usual two allies, something more relaxing. He needed a woman to help him tame the turmoil of his emotions for Carla. Even if he’d wanted to, he couldn’t go to her.
So he’d made his way hopefully to via California and to Caterina. She might not ask him to stay – she might have guests, or be away – but she’d never report him.
The front door was closed, and no one came out this time. After ten minutes of waiting, and checking the building from several approaches, he rang the bell.
‘Yes?’
‘It’s Annibale,’ he whispered.
The door opened immediately.
She’d been waiting for him on the landing. Her fine blonde hair was gathered at the back of her neck and held there by a pencil. She was wearing a black tank top and a pair of jeans.
‘Come in, stranger,’ she teased, and he stepped into the flat.
‘Caterina, I’m looking for somewhere to stay for a couple of days. I’m sorry to involve you in this. I’m sure you know the risk, I’m—’
She’d pressed her finger to his lips.
346 ‘You’re a good man. I don’t believe a word of what they’re saying about you. I know you. Are you hungry?’
She made him a vegan dinner. ‘It’s my only condition for people who want to with me. I do have some good wine though.’
She laid the table, and set down a dish of fava beans and chicory, Apulian style, and a mixed salad. Annibale complimented her.
‘Where did you learn how to cook?’
‘Natural talent!’ She laughed. ‘I’ve always enjoyed it. I worked as a sous-chef during my travels in Peru.’
They sank into the sofa, Sauvignon in hand. Caterina lit a couple of large candles and the air filled with their scent.
She looked at him with her piercing green eyes.
‘But now you have to tell me the truth.’
‘So it was Petri who killed my dad?’
‘Yes, that much I’m sure of.’
There was a moment of silence. Caterina finished her wine and put her glass down.
‘But there was someone behind him, right?’
‘Yes.’
Annibale paused, a little embarrassed. He wasn’t sure he could ask her the question. He feared her reaction, but he went for it.
‘Have you ever heard of Judge Astroni?’
Caterina smiled teasingly.
‘I mean, he is quite famous…’
Annibale was about to speak but she stopped him with her hand. ‘Come on, I’m joking! He was a good friend of my parents, way back from university. I don’t remember meeting him back then. I remember you, but that was different.’ 347
‘And later?’
‘I don’t know. A lot of people came to see my mum. I’m sure that she did mention his name years later, though I wouldn’t be able to tell you why. Some time before he rose to fame. I can ask her, if you want.’
Canessa thought things over in silence. Under the layer of apparently trivial ties – Lazzarini and Astroni had been colleagues, and before that fellow law students – there was something else.
‘Please do, if it’s not too much bother. And apologies in advance if it causes her any pain.’
‘Don’t worry, it won’t.’ Caterina stood up. ‘What are you up to next?’
‘I’m here to think and relax. But I’ll be leaving tomorrow. It’s better that way. I don’t want you more involved than you already are.’
The voice of that strong child from years ago stopped him once again.
‘I am already involved. You can stay as long as you need to. Come on, I’ll help you make the bed.’
‘I can sleep here…’
‘The bed’s much better.’
Canessa was lost in thought, as always when he woke up. He was pondering the life of a cop, the things he’d never done, things he’d told Repetto in confidence. Being a cop meant finding out all there was to know about Petri and his life, and the research he’d done with Carla and Alfridi had taken him forward quite some way. But he couldn’t see the road ahead.
Having gained an important insight into Petri’s pilgrimages to the cemeteries so early in the game had allowed him to see the 348 broader outline. But now he needed to see the picture itself. The investigation that had started in the archives of the Corriere had raised the dust around the Lazzarini murder. But at the heart of that murder lay the motive for the more recent ones. All of these pieces, but he still hadn’t been able to arrange them in any way that was fully comprehensible.
It was time to go back to square one. How had Petri lived? What had he done, other than move between home and office, prison and work? Had he made any friends? He wasn’t thinking about the respect he’d earned in prison from Cammello. Did he have any interests? Did he correspond with anyone? Did he have any family to talk to? And what was the book he never let go of, the one both Cammello and Alfridi had mentioned?
That was where he had to start. But first he needed to free his sister-in-law.
He’d been focused on such thoughts when he noticed a presence in the darkness of his room. He reached instinctively for the Beretta on the bedside table.
The only light in the room came from a street lamp outside the window. And Caterina suddenly stepped out of the darkness into that light.
Naked.
Her body was slender and toned, with breasts pointing upwards and dark areolas. Blonde hair caressed her tanned skin, and a perfect golden triangle crowned her sex.
He looked up to find Caterina smiling, pleased to have caught him with his guard down.
Annibale thought of Carla and her self-righteousness when confronted with her failings. Right now, he was fragile and he needed the warmth of another person. 349
He took the hand Caterina held out to him, and pulled her into his bed.
Caterina was wild during sex, throwing herself into it, body and soul. She only stopped talking when her mouth was busy doing something else. And she was good, very good. Annibale wanted to tell her but he preferred to keep quiet in those moments. One question did escape him.
‘How many men have you been with?’
She stopped to speak, but her hand kept busy.
‘I’ve lost count.’
She moved her mouth back onto him, then straddled him, moving as if to music.
‘Fuck me like I’m my mother!’
Canessa’s clear embarrassment amused her.
She whispered a confession. ‘She told me about the day when something could have happened between you, but you didn’t catch her drift. Or didn’t want to. Fuck me, now, like you would’ve fucked her.’
Annibale pushed her onto her knees and took her from behind, forcing a moan from her. He felt her orgasm build and when she cried, arching her back, her hair stuck to her back with sweat, he came inside her.
If he’d been hoping to keep his thoughts at bay and forget all those bloody deaths, in that moment, he definitely succeeded.
When he woke up – he hadn’t slept for long – the sun was already high in the sky, and Caterina was no longer in bed with him. He looked around the house for her, but she’d gone out and left him a note and some breakfast. 350
I hope to find you here when I get back. I’m hoping to shock my neighbour again tonight like we did last night.
The neighbour! Why hadn’t he thought of that earlier?
Carla walked over to the desk of Pippo Locatelli, deputy managing editor for the news section. For at least two weeks he’d been deputising for Strozzi who, despite all his stories of a ‘troubled marriage’ to women he wanted to sleep with, was on his regular family holiday. Every year, last two weeks of June. As soon as schools broke up, Strozzi would take off with his wife and kids, almost always to North America. That year it was a Canadian coast to coast. Then in July and August, he’d send his wife to Santa Margherita, where her parents had a big house, while he spent his time in Milan chasing after interns and seasonal subs.
He left this morning, Carla calculated, so he should still be on the flight. He wouldn’t land until late, Italian time. If his bootlickers wanted to tell him something, they wouldn’t be able to until he landed.
Carla had been keeping the scoop up her sleeve for three days. She hadn’t got over the pain of Annibale’s disappearance, but at least she had something of his, and the knowledge dulled her pain somewhat.
She grabbed the anonymous yellow file from her desk and walked across the news room to Locatelli’s desk. Strozzi’s deputy was a balding fifty-year-old, still in great shape. He sat there reading a sports paper and looking blissful. He could never take a moment for himself like that with his boss breathing down his neck. The ball-buster’s holidays were the time when everyone got 351 a breather: flexible office hours, fewer humiliations, longer breaks. The mood was good.
So finding Carla Trovati on the warpath definitely soured his mood.
‘What?’ he asked, annoyed.
‘Can I have a moment?’
Locatelli sighed and folded his paper. He crossed his hands in resignation.
‘What’s up?’
‘Let’s go into Strozzi’s office.’
His eyes widened. What?! The boss never locked the door in case someone needed a file, a report, a phone number during his absence – and he never kept anything compromising around – he was too smart for that. But he always warned against entering the office without a valid reason.
Locatelli was about to object but Carla had already stepped in. After a quick check to make sure all Strozzi’s snitches were out, he followed her begrudgingly.
‘Do you remember Canessa’s aunt’s story about the man who hid some drugs in the restaurant bathroom to frame Canessa? The drugs were never recovered.’
‘I do. But it doesn’t add up.’
‘She gave the police a description of the man, but they didn’t believe her either.’
Carla pulled two photos out of the file and placed them next to each other on the desk. Locatelli studied them.
‘I remember this too. We reported the aunt’s version – it was news, after all – but we never published the portrait because Strozzi argued that it was a red herring. So why are you showing me two copies of the same image?’ 352
Carla smiled triumphantly. ‘Because they’re the same man, it’s true, but they weren’t taken by the same person, nor did they come from the same witness account.’
Locatelli was paying attention now. ‘What do you mean?’
‘The one on the left is from Canessa’s aunt’s witness report, while the other is from Napoleone Canessa’s neighbour in Reggio Emilia.’
‘Shit!’
The handful of journalists in the office looked over at Locatelli.
He piped down, only just realising he’d yelled.
‘How did you get the one from Reggio Emilia?’
‘Canessa’s lawyer, along with this.’ She took out three sheets of paper stapled together. ‘This is the official witness report of Cosima Maggese, the Canessas’ neighbour from across the street. She saw this man entering their house one night when no one was home.’
‘So…’
Carla interrupted him. ‘I’ve been to Reggio. The woman is old, but she’s very lucid and has excellent eyesight. She gave me the exact same story as her report, verbatim.’
‘So why didn’t she tell the police?’
Carla smiled again. ‘I quote: If they aren’t smart enough to come and ask me, I’m certainly not going to go to them. But if anyone asks, I’ll tell them what I know and what I saw. Her words.’
Locatelli stared at her, transfixed. She was sly: she’d been sitting on this scoop for days now, waiting for Strozzi to piss off. The boss would’ve buried the story, or at least hedged it with maybes and likes and who knows. He had too many ties to the judges, the ones who’d given him all the juicy previews during the corruption investigations. Fuck, fuck. This was the perfect chance to kick Strozzi up the arse, along with his friends in high places, both inside and 353 outside the paper. Happily, the chief editor hated Strozzi, given his close ties to the publisher and the financial and political VIPs in Milan. Strozzi was clearly out to get him, the fucker.
An opportunity like this might never come again. He wouldn’t waste it. And if things went balls-up, he could blame it on this pushy babe. He stood up, handed her the papers and opened the door.
‘Let’s go and see the chief editor.’
At 6 p.m., the sun was still high in the sky. Cooler air had yet to fall on one of the darkest days for Milan’s courts of law. The lobby was swarming with journalists, wolves out for blood. Anyone’s. If the Corriere scoop had been based on unfounded rumours, they could’ve been sent packing, back to the office. But the story had held, and now this shapeless mass of beasts was ready to maul the magistrates. The internet was already buzzing with terrifying comments. The Association for Families of the Victims of Terrorism issued a scathing press release requesting that the inquest be fast-tracked, an inquest that had ‘carelessly accused a public icon in the struggle against terrorism, a man who had helped like few others to turn the tide in a battle the State was losing’.
‘Look, I’ve already told you about this! Never mind: I’ll say it again. Whenever we’re investigating someone famous, I get phone calls from politicians, lobbyists, middlemen of all sorts, people I have very little in common with. However, when we went after Canessa, it was my friends who started calling, the famous and the not so famous, and all claiming I was mad to let something like this happen…’ 354
‘Antonio…’ Federico Astroni tried to interrupt, but Judge Savelli stopped him with a raised hand.
Canessa had damaged his heroic reputation by playing the fugitive. With the Corriere story, however, the media had splashed his image around to remind everyone of his previous success: Canessa with the general; Canessa in uniform talking to his team on the site of an attack; Canessa dragging handcuffed terrorists behind him; Canessa scolding officers for not having covered Lazzarini’s body; Canessa leaving the hospital after being shot in via Gaeta; Canessa as remembered by ninety-year-old General Verde: ‘He saved my life.’
Savelli went on. ‘Now I’m getting calls from politicians. My enemies are gloating and my friends are distressed, because a new law reform is about to go to the vote. This story could change the laws on wiretapping and the statute of limitations in ways that would hamper our work. And what can I say to any of them? Nothing.’
The Bossini-Guidoni duo sat in front of Savelli’s desk looking exhausted. Guidoni was haggard and perspiring while Marta, usually impeccable, looked ten years older. They’d just come back from Reggio Emilia, where they’d questioned Maggese’s widow.
‘How did it go with the widow?’ Savelli asked.
Guidoni shook his head. ‘She confirmed everything.’
With his usual cunning, Astroni attempted to poke holes in the story.
‘She’s of a certain age, it was nighttime, she might’ve—’
Guidoni interrupted. ‘Look, just drop it. She’s a force of nature. We tried to trap her, hoping to find out just how trust-worthy she might be. We questioned her for hours. She made us coffee and offered us parmigiano and fried snacks, and then just 355 as we attempted to poke holes in her story one last time, she gets up, goes to the wall behind her and pulls down a framed photo of this guy. There was a medal on the frame. She shows us. She goes: “My maiden name is Falaschi and this is my father Zeno, deputy commander of the Garibaldi brigade, active in the Reggio Emilia area, gold medal for his action during the Resistance. The Gestapo captured him, tortured him for five days, then shot him on the main square. He said nothing. I’m his daughter in everything I do. If he resisted the Gestapo, I’m certainly not going to fall for your silly games. I said what I had to say. Now get out of my house.” There’s no demolishing her testimony.’
‘Release Napoleone Canessa’s widow tonight. Take her home to her daughter. I want her out before the main evening news – we need it shown on TV. If you get a move on, we can still make it. Let’s start with damage control, then move on to the next point,’ Savelli said.
Marta and Guidoni said nothing. But Astroni wouldn’t let go. He’d called Strozzi at the paper only to find, to his dismay, that his journalist friend was on holiday. He felt betrayed but couldn’t give up now.
‘Savelli, let’s think about this. Maybe it’s too early to release her. Canessa did go on the run. Let’s say this witness is telling the truth: why didn’t he leave the drugs behind to confirm his aunt’s story?’
Savelli stood up, folded up his copy of the Corriere and placed it inside his leather bag, a gift from his wife. He went to the coat hook and took down his jacket. He didn’t understand Astroni’s insistence. From the very beginning, he’d shown an almost morbid curiosity about the case. He’d always been someone who saw everyone as guilty, but his persistence in this case felt like something personal against Canessa. 356
‘Enough, Federico. Release the woman, tell the press. Let me think about Canessa, and we’ll talk about it tomorrow.’
Astroni made one last attempt: ‘It’s already late, protocol—’
‘Track down the relevant judge, drag him away from whatever he’s doing and threaten him—’ he turned to Guidoni, ‘with a gun to his head. I mean it literally. Call me if he refuses. I want her fucking out of there within two hours.’
Savelli’s swearing, a total aberration, was heard all the way down the corridor – and it surprised him more than it did anyone else. With his hand on the door, he turned round to face the others, who hadn’t moved an inch.
‘Well? Are you planning on spending the night in my office? Don’t you have work to do? Get on with it!’
‘Thank you, Mister President, yes … No, of course… Yes, our hero… You’re too kind, of course, we need to bet on the right horse… A good game, but it’s not over yet. We have a couple more surprises. Too kind, Mister President, I definitely will. My regards to the wife.’
Calandra hung up and exchanged a look of triumph with the grey man.
‘That was the president of the justice committee, the one who signed the reform,’ he explained.
Since waking up to the news of the Corriere scoop, Calandra had spent most of his day answering the phone to compliments from his political contacts. He hadn’t done anything, apart from realising that Canessa wouldn’t be stopped by them. Fuck, the terrorists couldn’t stop him, so how could these newcomers even try?
He was so happy that he took off his jacket again, and placed it on the sofa.
‘Any news of Canessa?’
357 ‘No. He’s in Milan somewhere. Last sighting was two days ago. What do you think he’s planning?’
Calandra picked up his slate-blue Corneliani jacket, and tidied his braces before slipping it back on.
‘My friend, he’s planning his final attack. If I know him, he’s already onto something. In any case, tonight we celebrate. I’m taking you out to dinner.’
The invisible man almost fainted. ‘Your excellency… I… But the surveillance…’
Calandra slapped his shoulder.
‘Screw the surveillance. Enough work for today. We did a good job, we deserve a break. Have you ever been to the Pergola del Cavalieri? My friend Heinz Beck runs it.’
Annibale sat at the large wooden table in the kitchen of Caterina’s flat. She’d left that morning. He’d originally planned to be there for three days, but he’d stayed for almost two weeks. Caterina’s place set his brain on fire – though who knows – it could have been the satisfaction of falling asleep beside her every night after a whirlwind of passionate sex.
The previous night, however, had been the last with that angelic creature. She’d taken him to extreme depths. No fears, no inhibitions. Her entire life was like that. After almost two hours of roller-coaster sex, they’d finally collapsed, exhausted.
‘I’m off tomorrow. I’m going to see my boyfriend in London, but you can stay as long as you want. I’ll leave you a set of keys.’ She kissed him lightly on his lips and smiled in the dim light. 358
‘You’re a fascinating woman. I’m going to treasure these days with you for a long time to come. But I had no idea you had a partner.’
She laughed.
‘Patrick’s Australian. I really love him and I think I’m going to marry him. But when I meet someone like you I can’t help myself. It doesn’t happen that often these days.’
She rested her head on his shoulder, and he wrapped an arm around her. He could still feel her all over his skin in the cool breeze of the fan rotating above them.
‘My mother told me the same thing happened to her. But it stopped once she met my dad. She may have been tempted, but she never gave in. I think that’s a good compromise. What do you think? Anyone waiting for you out there?’
Annibale stroked her cheek. As if in silent agreement, they hadn’t mentioned each other’s personal relationships, despite talking about almost everything else. ‘Yes, there is someone. She’s about your age. But she did something extremely dangerous, and we’ve parted ways. That’s why I came here. I needed a beautiful woman to distract me. It helps me think. Of course, I’m a gentleman, so I never thought…’
‘Idiot.’ They both laughed.
‘Oh, I almost forgot.’ She sat up in bed. ‘I asked Mum about Astroni. She was surprised, kind of worried. She kept stalling but I insisted. When Dad died, she promised to tell me the truth, always. I’ve kept her to it. I got a lot out of her at the time.’ She looked at him. ‘Anyway, she told me she’d had a brief fling with him, just before she met my dad. But he wasn’t like you.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘He didn’t understand. When she told him it was over, he lost his mind.’ 359
*
Astroni again.
What Canessa had turned up so far clearly showed who the main characters were in this story. But he was still missing the plot, the thread that tied everything together: facts, events and names that, as they currently stood, told him nothing. He was missing a motive, and a couple of actors – though the latter would follow.
Petri was the only one who could link things up. He would have to start from there, again. Thanks to Carla’s scoop, the pressure from law enforcement had loosened. His sister-in-law had been released and had pleaded on TV: ‘Annibale, turn yourself in. Together we can prove that this was all made up.’
Sweet, sensible Sara. Seeing her return home and hug her daughter (my niece, Canessa thought with tenderness) had made him happier than he could remember. Sara had made her appeal in good faith, and maybe at someone’s suggestion. But he couldn’t do as she suggested. If he turned himself in, the whole investigation would be put on hold again. And his enemies would have enough time to set another trap or cut the thread. He couldn’t trust them.
He would come out of hiding only when he had proof of the conspiracy, and when he’d tied up all those loose ends.
In a double-knot.
‘What do we know about Petri?’
He started with a question to Repetto, and ended up grabbing one of the handles on the bus that went from the Opera 360 prison to the city centre. At 6.30 in the morning, it was packed and boiling. Number 222 started in Pieve Emanuele and reached Vigentino, the terminal for tram number 24. The tram went up towards the Duomo, but Petri had got off at Crocetta, where he made his second transfer of the morning to the number 3 service on the underground, the yellow line. Petri had taken that route every morning when he left the prison. Annibale was repeating his movements in the hope that it might throw up an answer, help him out of the current impasse. They were reconstructing Petri’s life, starting with that fundamental question – which they’d ignored when they dived directly into the Corriere della Sera archives.
Since Annibale was keeping a low profile, Repetto had gone to visit Petri’s sister on the outskirts of Turin. The marshal had ended up in the middle of a vast council estate, where his presence was immediately noted by the residents, even those with nothing to hide. Cop.
Repetto knew those looks. He wasn’t expecting much from the visit, but he came well armed with patience. The lift was out of order, so he walked up the seven flights of stairs. He’d expected them to be filthy, but found the building as a whole surprisingly clean. Poverty and desperation were everywhere, to be sure, but he also sensed a desire to live with dignity.
Petri’s sister was ten years younger than he was. She might have been a chain-smoker, but she kept herself well, despite the cloud of cigarette smoke that surrounded her.
Repetto showed his badge. It was out of date, but Simona Petri hadn’t seen a cop in a while, and wouldn’t have cared anyway. Repetto had neither the right nor the authority to be there questioning her, but she invited him in without protest. 361
‘That drug affair was bullshit, excuse my French. My brother got up to all sorts, but he’d never deal drugs. Your colleagues are idiots. No offence.’
Repetto grimaced.
‘Well, even if they took offence, I wouldn’t care: they are idiots.’
Simona was warming up to him.
‘I’m sorry if I seem forward, but do you have any idea what he did? Did you know anything about your brother’s life? Any detail, no matter how trivial, could be useful to us.’
She poured herself some lemonade from an ice-filled jug. Repetto had already had two glasses; it was excellent. She thought about it for a while.
‘Hm. Well, he called me and told me he’d discovered something about himself. That’s what he said. “I discovered something about myself.” And I went, “So what? What do you mean?” And he goes, “Just that”. It was about a year ago. Then nothing, until a week before his death he calls me. We chat for a while. I ask him, “So, how’s the discovery?” “Coming along,” he says. “I’m going forward, one step at a time. I’m following the truth right now.” He died seven days later.’
On his way home, he got a call from Canessa.
‘You’ve been in Turin for a while,’ he opened.
‘Simona is good company, as they used to say, very welcoming. She makes excellent lemonade.’
‘Hey, big guy.’
‘Oh please. I got very little out of her. Take down what I tell you.’
‘The truth shall set you free,’ Canessa commented.
‘What’s that about?’
‘Nobody. Everyone.’ 362
Repetto knew these moments well, when everything stagnates and the investigation grinds to a halt. And yet the visit had confirmed something: Petri was going through some sort of turmoil and he’d wanted to share. With Canessa. And given that Canessa was neither a psychologist nor a priest, that something must’ve been a story. It had to be about the Lazzarini murder. Admittedly though, there was no trace of what he might have revealed. Yet Canessa was convinced that someone like Petri always had an exit plan ready, a safety exit. Insurance.
Buried treasure.
The time had come to retrace Petri’s life, hour by hour, step by step. So Canessa forced a tired Rossi to drive him to Pieve Emanuele, where he took the bus Petri had taken every day until a few months earlier.
Giannino Salemme was dripping with sweat. The air over Malpensa was a claggy film of humidity. Only the driver was there to pick him up this time; Claudio didn’t show up. They’d had a heated discussion during his last phone call from New York. Salemme senior had been euphoric: his gorgeous student lover had been particularly great, and all his worries had vanished. He’d felt good, and didn’t share his son’s alarm.
‘Come on, be a little optimistic,’ he’d murmured from across the ocean.
‘Dad, it’s better if I come and join you. Things here are getting seriously out of hand.’
‘So what – we run away? I thought you were less flighty. You 363 seemed so on it. I was hoping you’d grown up a bit, but here you are, trembling like a child.’
His son had shown no sign of being offended. ‘Dad, even though he’s still a wanted man, no one’s looking for Canessa here. After those two E-FITs of Carletti – for the record, I sent him to Hungary where he’s got family – no one is buying the Canessa link to drugs.’
‘It doesn’t matter: we got him out of the game for a while. And there’s no way he’ll find anything, because there’s nothing to find.’
His son had been furious; he’d heard it clearly even on the phone. But he was holding back, and that was a good sign. He had grown up in some ways at least.
‘So why did we set up these killings?’
‘Because it’s always good to prune dead branches.’
‘If you say so.’
No one had ever got Giannino Salemme in a corner, and it wouldn’t happen now.
He waved to the driver and handed him his luggage. He moved towards the car, mopping his brow in the morning heat.
Annibale Canessa was lying on the sofa in Rossi’s safe house number three, in largo Rio de Janeiro. He was waiting for Repetto’s evening debrief and thinking about Petri’s commute to and from the Opera prison. He’d taken the route four times, changing his appearance each time – beard, moustache, glasses, t-shirt, a heavy jacket that made him sweat way too much – and leaving enough time between trips to confuse anyone who might’ve been watching. But no one was following him. Everyone on the bus was wiped out by the heat, their heads either stuck through the small windows or craning towards them to catch the slightest breeze. 364
Despite his freedom, Annibale hadn’t found a single lead. He looked around. This third safe house seemed the most welcoming, but also the strangest. It was on the ground floor, with barred windows looking directly onto the street. Despite this small concession towards security, it was a cheerful place. There were about two dozen paintings on the walls: men and women in ponchos, clearly South American, watching over the place. The Latino atmosphere was rounded off by colourful sofas, chequered pouffes, even a strange llama tapestry. Bolivian? Peruvian? Whatever it was, Canessa liked it and he hoped to stay there a couple of extra days.
The doorbell rang. Canessa grabbed the Beretta, and leaned against the wall next to the door. ‘Who is it?’
‘It’s me,’ Repetto replied. He’d lost a lot of weight since his injury. ‘Barbara doesn’t know whether to curse you or thank you for helping me shift the pounds.’
They went to work. Canessa reported on his trips while Repetto took notes and drew lines. They were trying to find something, but without knowing where to look.
At one point, studying the timing of the route, Repetto muttered, almost to himself, ‘I mean, he could’ve taken his time leaving the prison, if he had to wait in piazza Duca D’Aosta for Ragiomatica to open. Maybe the owner gave him a set of keys.’
Canessa froze in the midst of opening a beer. ‘What time did his shift start?’
‘Nine.’
He grabbed his notes. ‘He didn’t arrive at eight, and he didn’t wait around. Alfridi told me something – where is it?’ He rifled through his notes. ‘Here: I’d see him come out of the underground, and we’d often walk into the office together.’
‘So he didn’t just wait around?’
365 ‘He did wait, but somewhere else. He’d get off somewhere earlier on the route, so we need to find out where. I’d better take a closer look. I missed something.’
‘It’s not easy to spot from a bus.’
‘You’re right!’ Canessa sounded like he’d had a revelation. ‘I’ll walk. But from the final stop of the 24. It doesn’t make sense before then.’
‘It’ll be dangerous to walk.’
‘I’ll ask Rossi to follow me in the car in case I need to make a quick escape.’
Canessa was leaning against one of the pillars outside the building, sheltering from the morning sun and looking at the church. A strange building, with a cross on its façade and an imposing steel statue of the Virgin Mary. It had been hard to see from the tram, that was for sure, as it wasn’t on a main road but an inner square at the end of a street crossing corso di Porta Vigentina. The Church of the Madonna of Fatima was a modern construction in the limbo between the suburbs and city centre. He’d spotted it walking back up the road, but he went on, filing it mentally under ‘irrelevant details’. He’d already walked another two hundred metres when he’d had one of his sudden hunches.
Petri’s change, the mysterious small book, his search for truth, ‘one step at a time’, visiting the cemeteries to atone for his past. It wasn’t so strange. It had happened to many before him. Prison changes your perspective, forces you to look at yourself. So simple, so banal, and because of that, hard to understand, especially in the third millennium.
If I’d gone to church with my aunt, as she’s always wanted me to, I might have thought of this sooner! he told himself off as he retraced his steps. 366
Canessa had always considered Petri’s behaviour – the candles, the flowers – as some sort of reparation, an acknowledgement of the evil he’d done and nothing more. Since his discovery of Petri’s pilgrimage to the tombs, he’d taken a secular view of Petri’s decision, and it left no room for any alternative explanation. He’d thought it had been a moral impulse, and that was saying something. But maybe it was an urge that came from somewhere deeper… It was a risk, but he had nothing to lose and plenty of time.
The bell rang for 7 a.m. Mass. If Petri’s newfound depth was real, he would soon find out, of that he was certain. He gestured for Rossi to park the car and get a coffee – not for the coffee itself, but to avoid sitting in the car for too long and raising suspicion.
He stepped into the church and crossed himself.
Three days after Canessa’s visit to the Church of the Madonna of Fatima, on a Friday evening, northwestern Italy and the entire Tyrrhenian coast, nearly all the way south to Naples, was hit by a storm. One had been forecast, though not at such strength. It was no summer storm, rather a full-blown monsoon, with whirlwinds that wrecked marinas, bungalows and coastal chalets and bit into produce fields.
Surprised by the sudden downpour on his way home, Giannino Salemme somehow managed not to get completely soaked, zigzagging under balconies and ledges. But it had dampened his mood, so he decided to cancel his evening with a willing young woman. The architecture student (or so she’d claimed) in the new bar where he’d stopped for happy hour had mentioned her rates with 367 a twinkle in her eye. Rates? During their initial chat, she seemed to be hanging off his every word… The idea of paying for sex set off an alarm in him. It was easier just to cancel. Fuck her. Or rather, let some other fool do the dirty.
He called his favourite pizzeria in via Vincenzo Monti, and ordered a pizza with Gorgonzola plus a few snacks.
Claudio Salemme had been at home with two young women since earlier that afternoon. He didn’t feel like working. He didn’t actually feel like having fun, either. He didn’t want anything. For the first time in his life, he didn’t recognise himself: he was worried about his future. He’d always lived day to day, but that undertaking, the first in which he’d fought in the trenches with his father, had changed his outlook on life. At first he’d been excited, galvanised. He’d enjoyed the sense of danger and he hadn’t considered the consequences. Until a week earlier, ‘consequences’ were an abstract concept. Not any more. He was waiting for the backlash to everything they’d set in motion by killing Pino Petri, Napoleone Canessa, and the rest. He’d never paid for anything in his life, despite his worst behaviour, from the school bullying and his disgusting attitudes towards women, to fights for the hell of it, car crashes and the first real crimes with his father. He’d never been afraid of consequences, always sure he’d come out of it just fine. He had his protector, his father, to thank.
Right now, all he wanted to do was run away, but he was even more afraid of Salemme senior. Had he been out of the picture, Claudio would already be on a plane to the Cayman Islands, where he could dip into their most sizeable offshore account.
He sat watching the two women pleasing each other: at any other time, the blonde on brunette action would have really 368 got him going. But now he felt not a speck of desire to join in the fun.
It was Carla’s shift at the Corriere. Since Strozzi had come back from holiday, their interaction had dwindled to nothing. Previously, his slimy nature would have led him to compliment her for the scoop, but he was furious: during his break he’d been plagued night and day with phone calls from his legal contacts, accusing him of high treason. It was enough that he had to put up with his family for two weeks, but this had screwed up everything. He’d come back two days earlier.
When he showed up at the office again, he’d nodded to Carla, and that had been it. Before, when she was on the night shift, Strozzi would find excuses to stay behind. Not any more. He left early now.
It was definitely better this way: she’d finally stopped thinking about her night with him. Now she was focused on his deceit, on how he’d repaid her professional trust. Whatever she’d told him he’d passed on to someone else. But who?
Carla dialled Annibale’s number: no answer. This had been going on ever since he’d discovered her betrayal.
The rain was turning into a storm.
Federico Astroni was finishing up his indictment, the one reserved for the last politician who hadn’t come crawling to him. The trial was expected to open four days from now. He wrote by hand, on the living-room table. No Friday evening company for him. He wasn’t in the mood, wasn’t up to dealing with human company, even less anyone’s physical needs. In any case, his harem seemed to have disbanded. The wealthy ladies had 369 disappeared, and Marta Bossini no longer even said hello. She actually looked at him in disgust, in a way that hadn’t happened to him since 1992. The prosecutor was sure she was having a fling with the gym rat, Guidoni. And she held him responsible, he could tell, for pushing her onto the drug-trafficking trail, for having to hunt down Canessa and then leaving her alone to face the aftermath. She wasn’t wrong. Having gone down that route and stumbled, she realised her career was now in jeopardy. The investigation had reached a dead end, and even though Canessa still eluded them, no one believed he was involved with drugs. In a matter of hours, days at most, the allegations would be dropped.
Where was the damned colonel? What was he doing? Astroni wanted to be alone and to work on that upcoming trial. He hoped for darkness to fall and a deep sleep to free him from all of this, from his thoughts and worries. But even when he managed to fall asleep, Federico Astroni always woke up tired and tense. The situation was making him jittery, just like all those years ago.
Chief Magistrate Calandra was in Sabaudia with his special lady friend, the one with the red thong (he was obsessed with lingerie and he liked to categorise his lovers according to the colour and size of their lingerie). He’d promised her a night-time swim, and they had got wet, but not from their swim.
He’d brought a hamper with a selection of treats from the best delicatessen in Rome: foie gras, pan brioche, chicken thighs in aspic, caviar, a few slices of Pont-L’Èvêque, his favourite cheese, a bottle of Sauternes and one of champagne. Calandra had laid towels on the beach and placed the hamper between them, and then she’d taken his hand and invited him to stroll 370 along the beach. He’d removed his socks and shoes, rolled up his trousers. Calandra wasn’t exactly a romantic, but his optimism about the Canessa situation was making him distracted and sentimental, less alert to signs of a storm. Any other time, and he would have noticed the black clouds gathering on the horizon. But how could you focus on the sky when you were hand-in-hand with such an angelic babe? They were walking along blissfully when the sky opened on them. Calandra turned back for the basket.
‘We can’t leave all this good food here!’
Now they sat shivering in the car as they sped back to the five-star hotel. A shame not to be able to finish that romantic moment on the beach. Calandra looked at the creature next to him, her tight dress highlighting the lack of any clothing other than the thong…
At least the night wouldn’t be a total waste.
Annibale Canessa parked the car between two chestnut trees. He spotted the signs of heavy rain in the distance and changed as quickly as he could. He needed to reach his destination before the storm broke.
The sound of the crackling wood fire brought him unexpected joy. A raging storm, with wind blowing through trees that his grandfather had planted in the garden, now grown tall and strong, brought back memories of distant summers and of storms suddenly arriving, just like now: the children, including himself, 371 would run into the house, their faces glued to the window on the lake, squealing in fear at the waves crashing over the boats in the dock, the trees threatening to blow away in the wind.
Milan’s public prosecutor, Antonio Savelli, made for that same window. The fire had been lit by the old caretaker, whose experience told him that although it was late June, the night would be cool. It was just like old times, with the waves crashing over the dock and the trees rustling furiously. Savelli was utterly captivated by it, and he hadn’t wanted to renounce his solitary weekend in the family villa on Lake Maggiore, where the gem of his fleet, the Alessia I awaited him.
He walked over to the comfy armchairs in front of the fireplace, deciding to stay there for a while to warm up, before heading to the kitchen for some food left by the caretaker’s wife. His security detail all slept and ate in the annexe, coming over to check at regular intervals. A police car was parked in front of the main gate, too. Savelli felt safe inside these walls.
So the shock was entirely real when he sat down in his favourite of the two armchairs. He froze halfway, legs bent, his behind hovering ridiculously above the cushion.
In the other armchair, a gun casually resting on his right thigh, sat Annibale Canessa.
‘Please, your honour, have a seat. Make yourself at home.’
He was struck by the former Carabiniere’s wry humour. Nevertheless, he sat down.
‘You’re out of your mind, out there—’
‘Yes, good point: and it’s probably better for them to stay out there. If everyone behaves, no one gets hurt. I don’t intend to cause any harm or suffering, but you need to work with me.’ 372
Savelli nodded. After the initial shock, his mind was firing on all cylinders. If he’d come all the way here, Canessa wasn’t planning on shooting anyone, but he wasn’t intending to turn himself in either, or he wouldn’t have the gun. What was he after?
‘How did you get here?’
Canessa offered him a half smile. ‘The same way I’ll be leaving, but it’s better if you don’t know. For everyone’s sake.’ ‘What do you want?’
‘To tell you a story.’
‘If you’re here to give me your version of your situation, there are approp—’
Canessa interrupted him by raising his hand. ‘Listen, there is no time to follow protocol,’ he emphasised the word. ‘We need to be swift. All I’m asking is one favour: listen to me.’
Savelli found his irony again. ‘Do I have a choice?’
‘You do. If you don’t want to hear what I have to say, I’ll leave, but the consequences will be distressing for everyone.’
Savelli realised from the man’s expression that he had to hear him out.
‘Go on, I’m listening.’
Canessa pointed to a laptop on the table between the armchairs.
‘In there you’ll find a DVD that explains the reasons behind Petri’s murder, and everything that followed.’ Canessa paused. ‘But first you need to hear how I got to it.’
‘Keep talking.’ Savelli had always known that Canessa wasn’t mad, but he was now realising that maybe what he had was actually important. They’d all underestimated him. Canessa had captured his attention.
‘Four days ago, I stepped into a church in Milan, the Madonna of Fatima in Vigentino. It was 7 a.m., and first Mass was starting. 373 I stayed for its entirety. There weren’t many of us, all women except for me and an elderly man. It can’t have lasted longer than twenty, twenty-five minutes. During the service, I got the impression that the priest – in his seventies, but full of an energy that made him look younger – was staring at me. Just an impression at first. I was, shall we say, incognito. But I soon realised he was actually looking at me, almost as if he’d expected me to be there. So when Mass ended and the others left, I stayed behind. Ten minutes later, the priest walked out of the sacristy and came to sit next to me.’
‘You must be Colonel Canessa.’
‘Yes.’
‘I was expecting you.’ The priest paused. ‘Giuseppe told me that if anything went wrong, sooner or later, you’d show up. If anyone can make it here, it’s Colonel Canessa. He was right, may he rest in peace.’
Canessa listened in silence. The priest stood up. ‘Please, come with me.’ Annibale followed him into the sacristy. It wasn’t what he expected, and it looked instead like a cross between kitchen and office. It was a wide room, full of furniture.
‘Oh, by the way, I’m Don Filippo.’
They shook hands.
‘Coffee?’
‘Please, Father.’
They sat at the table and sipped coffee made by the priest. Annibale complimented him.
‘I know, I know, it’s a bit like that song, the one by De André about the camorrista…’
‘Don Raffaé.’
374 The priest stood up again, went to a cupboard and took out a shoe box. He placed it on the table. ‘That’s the one. He sings that the recipe for the coffee made by the inmate was given to him by his mammà. That’s my case too. But enough small talk. I imagine you must have questions. I mean, if you’re here you already know the answer to one of them. Yes, Giuseppe,’ he still called him by his first name, ‘found faith. It happened in odd circumstances, as often with the paths that lead to the Lord. He was working in the prison library and one day they took him to the storage room and asked him to sort the old books, keeping any that might interest the prison’s “contemporary audience”, if you’ll allow me the term, and those that could be repaired. Out with the rest. In that pile of books, Giuseppe found a small one, the one he started carrying around, wrapped in newspaper. It’s called A Little Goodness.’
Another pause, before the priest continued. ‘I’d never heard of it either. I wouldn’t call it one of our major means of conversion. Even if I handed it to one of the oldest, most passionate of our faithful, they’d be quite baffled. But to Giuseppe, that book was the illumination on the road to Damascus. All he needed were the few words in the preface. So one day, he ends up here, with his trail of blood and desire to convert. He didn’t want to repent, but I told him he must. He had to repent before God; he had no other choice. So he did, and I welcomed him in. But there was another step: he had to tell the truth, give in to human justice, render unto Caesar what belongs to Caesar. It took him a little longer to come round to that.’
Don Filippo fought to hold back his tears.
‘He started coming every morning. He stayed to one side, didn’t want to be recognised. All of our regulars saw him, but 375 he never showed his face full-on. And in any case, who would remember him among our elderly visitors? Afterwards he’d stay behind with me, like you just did, to have a coffee and talk, for maybe fifteen, twenty minutes. We talked a lot, and he started confessing his sins. He told me his story. He was embarking on his path. I obviously can’t tell you what he told me during confession. He was baptised and he attended his first Holy Communion, but not his Confirmation. He was going to do that at the end of June. Then one morning, he shows up with this box and asks me to keep it for him. The book is probably also in there, if it wasn’t on him when he died. He told me it was a sort of insurance. Not for me, but for the truth, Father. Please take this, as you take my words during confession and with the same sacrament. Don’t hand it over to anyone, no matter what happens to me. No one – not the police, not the magistrates. No one, apart from Colonel Annibale Canessa. This is a photo of him, he’s younger in the picture, but you’ll recognise him. I did, immediately, despite your disguise – but don’t worry, I’m very good.’ Don Filippo smiled at him. ‘I was frightened. And I was right to be. Three days later, he was killed. That’s all there is to it, really. The box is yours. Would you like to pray with me for Giuseppe? He did some horrific things and he was a cruel man, but he acknowledged his actions before God. And it’s never too late to embrace Him.’
‘I’m not good at praying, Father. I never remember the words.’
‘I’ll think of the words. You can join me in silence.’
Antonio Savelli was enraptured by the story. Outside, the storm had calmed, but the humidity of a house used to the heat and suddenly plunged back into cold weather was starting to creep over them. 376
‘Can I place some more wood on the fire?’ he asked. Canessa nodded. Savelli came back to the armchair.
‘So where’s the box? What was inside?’ Savelli asked.
‘The box is safe. The book was inside. It was written by another priest, Don Giulio Cantù and printed in 1907. It’s old and very well thumbed. Stuffed with iconography. It’s mostly prayers, but at its core, it’s a rewriting of Scripture, with moral stories, sermons and explanations. The priest was right: it’s not a modern tool. But it was enough to convert Petri.’
‘Did he want to confess?’
Canessa smiled. ‘Mostly, he wanted to ask forgiveness. I found out he’d been taking flowers and candles to the tombs of his victims. You can confirm with their families.’
‘Really?’ Savelli grew more surprised with every detail. ‘I still don’t get what his conversion has to do with his death, though.’
Canessa, his hand still on the gun, drew something out of a bag propped against the chair: papers. He handed them to Savelli.
‘This is a transcription of Don Filippo’s deposition, and his witness report on the contents of the box, which I opened in his presence. Besides the book, the box contained Petri’s last will and confession, which he typed up and printed out, and also recorded on DVD and VHS. The VHS is the original. Petri had it converted to DVD format, and the written version is a summary.’
Savelli felt his phone buzz in his jacket. Canessa heard it too. He touched his gun and said calmly, ‘Answer it.’
Savelli complied. ‘Yes? Yes, everything’s fine, thanks. I’m about to head up to bed. I should be able to take the boat out tomorrow. Thank you.’ He hung up.
‘Now what?’
377 Canessa turned to the laptop, opened it and typed something. ‘Don’t you want to know what’s in Petri’s will and confession? Aren’t you curious? All you have to do is press ENTER.’
Savelli remained immobile for some time. He had always been an honest man, honest to the core. And discovering the truth had always been a moral imperative for him. At that moment, however, he was afraid of discovering this particular truth. Rather than setting him free, it threatened to put him in shackles.
Urged on by his conscience, however, he dismissed the thought and angrily pressed ENTER.