The intruder lights went out yet again, leaving Cesco alone with Taddeo’s corpse. He waved his arms to bring them back on. Even that brief darkness had left him unnerved; this place had too many nooks and shrubberies for comfort. It was likely to be several more minutes before the police arrived, so he made his way back up the gravelled drive to the gate. He buzzed it open, then slipped out, leaving it a little ajar so that he could get back in when they arrived. Then he went across the lane and stood with his back to the wall of the property opposite to wait.
A minute passed. He heard an engine. It drew closer. He looked along the lane to the next bend down. A green Audi swung round it at surprising pace, headlights on full beam. He backed up against the wall to let it pass, his arm up to shield his eyes. A second vehicle now appeared, labouring to stay in touch. A van, he noticed, with a lurch. A white van. Pieces clicked together in his mind. How easy to hide a mobile phone or other tracker in his saddlebags outside the studio, then to follow him at will, waiting for the right moment. The Audi drew alongside. He saw Dieter and Knöchel in its front seats at the same moment they saw him. They braked sharply and veered in to ding the wall with their front bumper, cutting him off from his Harley. The doors flew open even as the white van pulled in on his other side, hemming him in.
He turned and leapt, grabbing the top of the concrete wall behind. He hauled himself up, yelling for help as he did so. But he was still suffering from the effects of the stun gun and his ankles were grabbed before he could make it over. He was pulled back down so that he fell tumbling to the ground, knocking the wind out of him. A man built like a tank flipped him onto his back, then knelt on his shoulders and clamped a hand over his mouth.
As quickly as that, it was over.
A second Hammerskin knelt beside him with a roll of black tape. He tore off a strip and put it over Cesco’s mouth to gag him, then bound his wrists and ankles too. Dieter meanwhile knelt on his other side, grimacing in disgust when he saw Cesco had pissed himself. He patted his pockets anyway, took his phone, wallet, memory card and keyring. He detached the Harley’s key from the larger ring, then stripped the battery from the phone and tossed it and everything else over the wall.
A siren down the hill was coming closer. ‘Take him with you,’ Dieter told his crew, holding up the Harley’s key. ‘I’ll follow on my bike.’ He gave Cesco a kick. ‘And remember he’s a tricky bastard. Not even a sniff.’
‘Got it, boss,’ said the tank, hoisting Cesco over his shoulder like a rolled-up carpet. ‘Not even a sniff.’
Even after all these years in the police, it could still take Izzo aback how quickly a crack in the dam wall could turn into a deluge. He sat alongside D’Agostino in the back of the car as Messana drove them out to Secondigliano police station – in part because of the imminent evacuation of Herculaneum, but also in order to interview him and his cousin Claudio in neighbouring cells, to challenge them with any discrepancies in their stories. It quickly became clear, however, that there was little need for cunning, because D’Agostino barely stopped talking.
All Izzo had to do was record.
‘You’re right,’ D’Agostino admitted wretchedly. ‘My wife was screwing that bastard Conte. That little shit. She never even realised he was only ever getting back at me over that damned contract. But he charges too much! You should see how much he charges! Like he’s some great artist. His pictures aren’t even that good. They’re… they’re confected. Everything he shoots, it looks so pretty. But history isn’t pretty. History is true. He never even finished school. Did you know that? Let alone attended university. As if! Everyone knows he only got the contract because his sister is Lucia. Even he knew it. Yet the airs he gave himself! I mean, how hard is photography? You point a camera at a fucking vase and go click. A monkey could do it.’
‘He found out you’d lobbied against him so he went after your wife,’ said Izzo. ‘How did you find out? Was it the ice cream thing?’
‘No. I made that up. I found out because he wanted me to. He rubbed it in my face. We were at this fund-raiser for the museum. I mean he never went to that kind of thing, not if he could avoid it. But he went that night. Oh yes. He was talking to Emanuela. He waited until I was looking and put his hand on her backside. She slapped him away and gave him a glare. But it wasn’t a who the hell do you think you are? kind of glare. It was a not here kind of one.’
‘Did you ask her about it?’
‘In a manner of speaking. In the car on the way home, I told her I’d seen it and what a disgrace it was, him touching her like that; that I intended to report him to the museum board in the morning, to get him fired. She begged me not to. She said it had only been for a moment and she’d dealt with it herself and it was always the women who came out of these things looking bad.’
‘She has a point,’ observed Messana, from up front.
‘Yes. But of course I was suspicious now, I couldn’t stop brooding. Then, one morning, maybe two or three days later, she seemed unusually excited. I asked her about her plans. She told me she had none. I didn’t believe her. I set off as normal, then waited round the corner. She came out a few minutes later, got into her car. I followed. I hung well back in case she spotted me. I wasn’t worried about losing her, you see, because I knew where she was going. Straight to Conte’s place in Rione Sanità. There’s a cafe across the piazza with a view of his block’s front door, and of his terrace too. I sat there nearly two hours before she came back out again. Rossi was with her. They hugged in the doorway. Kissed. And not like friends. Like lovers. Like lovers who’d just made love, you know? Satisfied. Happy.’
Zeno grunted. ‘Go on.’
‘I went to the library for our daily meeting. It was hopeless, I couldn’t concentrate. I returned home early. I got drunk. By chance, me and Emanuela were due at Claudio’s that night for dinner. I took him aside when we got there, I said some stupid things.’
‘What kind of stupid things?’
‘The bastard was sleeping with my wife,’ scowled D’Agostino. ‘Have we really become the kind of country where a man can’t stand up for himself any more?’
‘What kind of stupid things?’
The defiance faded. He slumped like a burst tyre. ‘I didn’t ask him to kill Conte. Not explicitly. But I knew the kind of man he was. I knew who he worked for, what he did for them. So I told him I’d give anything to see Conte dead. That I wanted to see him burn. I actually said that: that I wanted to see him burn. It was after that madwoman had been on TV, you see, ranting about her Sicilian bull. I even joked that if it was done right, it would be blamed on her.’
‘Except it wasn’t a joke, was it?’
‘No. I knew precisely what he’d do, and that afterwards I’d belong to him. And, yes, I was drunk at the time. But I was sober the next morning. I could have phoned him to call it off, blame it on the booze. I kept quiet instead. I kept quiet and I waited. And then it happened, exactly as I’d asked. And it was horrible. Horrible. Not just seeing it or hearing it. But seeing myself too. The kind of man I was. Because Conte looked up, you know? He looked up when he realised what was happening, and he saw me standing there, and he knew. I could see it on his face.’
‘So what happened next?’
D’Agostino let out a long and weary breath. ‘I went home. Emanuela was watching on the news. She knew too, of course. She’d seen me at that party, conspiring with Claudio. We had a fight. She stormed out. Then Claudio called to present me with the bill. I tried to bluff it, but what was the point? The bastard had recorded our conversation.’
‘He played it for you?’
‘No, but…’ He thought back a moment, then covered his face with his hands. ‘Christ. I’m too stupid to live.’
‘What happened next?’
‘I held out that night somehow, but when I got into my car the next morning, he’d put a mobile beneath my seat. It began to ring. It scared the shit out of me. I mean, it’s a bloody Mercedes, it’s supposed to be secure. If they could get into it that easily… Anyway, it was Claudio telling me he wanted an alibi for his friend. You know about that already. I asked him what date. It turned out to be a night I’d gone out with Taddeo, so I told him no. He told me not to worry, Taddeo would never find out. I thought he meant that he’d never hear of it. But obviously he decided not to take even that much risk, so they killed him too. And Taddeo was my friend. My oldest friend. My best friend. This has to stop.’ He lifted his chin once more with a little rekindled pride. ‘And so it stops here.’