48

SCAMARCIO SENSED A HUNDRED eyes upon him, including those of the chief of police from Florence, a man he’d heard very little about previously but who was now making his presence very much felt.

‘Do you have any idea how much it has cost to pull these men out of Piombino today?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘The world’s media are watching our every move — we simply can’t afford these kinds of mistakes. It’s all very nice to have a drugs bust, but Chief Genovesi convinced me that this would take us to the girl. It seems that you have been pursuing the wrong path right from the start.’

Scamarcio didn’t know what to say, but there was no need, as the Tuscan chief was in full flow, addressing both Scamarcio and Genovesi now. ‘It’s clear to me that you haven’t got the faintest idea where this little girl is. We have the eyes of the world upon us, and we don’t have a clue. I’m going to send you some of my best men from Florence, the crème de la crème. There must be no more mistakes now. No more time wasted.’

With that, he turned on his heel and barked something at one of his Piombino officers. Genovesi hurried after him — no doubt to lament the fact that Scamarcio had been thrust upon him against his will, and that he’d never really gone along with this whole theory.

Scamarcio felt a crushing tiredness overwhelm him. He had indeed fucked up; there was no doubt about that. It was a dud hunch, and he’d probably have to take the hit career-wise. Case-wise, once the Tuscan chief got onto Garramone down in Rome, he’d probably be pulled off. Stacey Baker’s disappearance was becoming political, and when the Americans got onto the PM, he’d be feeling the heat on that, too, and would want to get things done right. Scamarcio’s time on Elba would soon be over.

He trudged back to the Cinquecento, his limbs heavy and his head pounding. Yet, despite the tiredness, one thought kept circling, coming back at him like a hungry shark: Ratsel said Dacian had killed an associate, and that associate could well have been Ella — would have to have been Ella, surely? Indeed, if the stab wounds on Ella matched the stab wounds on Dacian, he’d tried to use the same knife to kill Ratsel as well. Hadn’t Barrabino said the knives were similar? He needed to ask Ratsel about the knife. Was it his or Dacian’s? And returning to the nub of it all: Ella had child porn on his computer and Stacey Baker’s bite-marks on his arm. Those drugs were an unintentional red herring — they had to be. Or was Mr Y simply running two parallel operations? It wasn’t unheard of. His own father had had his finger in so many different pies. But how to prove that Mr Y was linked to Stacey Baker? How to pin down this elusive online presence — for now, nothing more than an avatar? After today, persuading Genovesi and the chiefs that there was more to it than the drugs seemed impossible. It felt like his chance with them had gone forever.

His mobile buzzed in his pocket, and he was surprised to see it was Cepparo from Milan calling. He couldn’t think what he’d have to say to him, now that Ella was dead and the Milan case was closed.

‘Scamarcio, is now a good time?’

‘You’re a welcome distraction from my troubles, Cepparo.’

‘Sounds bad. Listen, I’m not sure it’s of interest, but we’ve got some sad cases up here in our tech department. So much so that they have nothing better to do in their spare time than take their work home with them, regardless of whether the case is open or shut, it seems. Tragic, really.’

Scamarcio felt a quickening in his chest. ‘Go on …’

‘They were so challenged by that guy Ella’s computer that they took a bet on it. The first one to crack those emails gets a new piece of software or some such sad shit.’

‘And?’

‘Well, they got in. I’ve got those emails, if you still need them.’

‘You’re kidding me. Anything interesting?’

‘I haven’t taken a look, to be honest.’

‘Cepparo, this could not have come at a better time. I could kiss your guy up in Milan.’

‘I wouldn’t do that, Scamarcio. He’s butt-ugly.’

Cepparo said he’d forward the emails to Scamarcio’s address, and now he lounged on the bed in his hotel room, scanning the inbox on his laptop. Cepparo’s colleague had managed to get around 1,000 emails dating back one year, but they all seemed to be from Ella’s inbox rather than his outbox. There was one contact, a Leka Ymeri, who piqued Scamarcio’s interest — if only for the simple reason that he was the only person whose surname started with a Y. As far as he could see, there were around ten emails sent between him and Fabio Ella, their correspondence beginning six months before.

In the first, Mr Ymeri wrote: ‘My clients are discerning, they are prepared to pay above the odds for a second-to-none service. If you wished to get involved in our supply chain I can guarantee rich rewards both of a financial and personal nature.’

The second email from Ymeri, sent a few days later, was even more cryptic. Scamarcio could not find Ella’s response to the first, although he later saw it was contained in the body of Ymeri’s reply. Ymeri wrote: ‘I don’t think you should concern yourself too much with the risks. This operation is well under the radar and has been for a very long time. Remember that these clients are highly influential so it is unlikely that we would ever be subject to “outside interference”.’

Ella’s original reply beneath read: ‘I can confirm that I am very interested. I only wish to check with you that this operation is watertight. I am a family man with a business in Milan and cannot afford complications.’

Another email from Ymeri came in two days later: ‘I am pleased to have you on board. I will be in touch soon with some more detailed information.’ Ella’s original email below had said that, on reflection, he was now up for the job in hand.

Then there seemed to be a month’s hiatus in their communications, until Ymeri wrote: ‘We have been asked to procure a specific set of goods and I’m wondering whether this might be the right order for you to cut your teeth on. Stand by for further details.’

Two days later, Ymeri brought him up to speed: ‘You will be required to travel to some of your popular tourist beaches when the summer months arrive. I will leave it to you to choose the resort, I only ask that it not be too far from Rome …’ For the first time, Scamarcio sensed that this might possibly be about something other than drugs, and his pulse quickened. Ymeri pressed on: ‘The preference this season is for blonde and blue eyes, female, no more than nine, minimum fuss, minimum hassle. Our clients do not want street riff-raff or runaways, they want premium. Clear?’

Scamarcio felt his stomach turn over: a mixture of queasiness, disgust, and excitement that he might finally be on to something. In the next email, Ella had written underneath that he understood and Ymeri had replied that he would be wiring him his agreed fee in advance. There was no mention of the sum.

One month later, Ymeri wrote: ‘Our clients are ever more demanding, any chance you could get down there earlier?’ Scamarcio had the sense that other emails may have been exchanged that for some reason had not been retrieved. The next email from Ymeri contained Ella’s reply: ‘I need to wait for the good weather otherwise the tourists won’t be there.’

That seemed to shut Ymeri up for a few days, until he wrote. ‘When this is all over you should come to Trastevere for a drink. Stand by for delivery instructions.’

Trastevere! Scamarcio felt vindicated. They had a location for Mr Y and, better still, it tied him to Arthur. He could be sure now that he had not been mistaken in his initial hunch. All he needed was information on where they were planning to send the child whom Ella found. But when he scanned the remaining emails, he could find no mention of this — the talk was just of money transfers and whether they had been received or not, and then a final note wishing Ella luck in his ‘endeavour’. The use of the word brought bile to Scamarcio’s throat.

He slammed shut the laptop in frustration. Why was there no talk of the delivery? Was Ella supposed to hand the child to Dacian, who would then pass it on — was that how it was going to work? He couldn’t understand why there was no email explaining this, and then he wondered whether this part had been organised by telephone. They were taking a huge risk even using email in the first place.

He dialled Garramone in Rome, and brought him up to speed.

‘Good work, Scamarcio,’ he said when he’d finished. ‘I can tell that cock in Florence where to stuff it now.’

‘Which cock in Florence?’

‘The one you infuriated today. I’ve had him bending my ear for the last forty minutes.’

‘We need to find Ymeri in Trastevere. I doubt he’s in the book. Maybe the station down there has heard of him, or maybe we could get a PI onto it? When we find him, we need to put a tap on him.’

‘You think he’d be stupid enough to use a landline to run this kind of thing?’

‘I doubt it. We’d need to organise a break-in, and put a bug on his mobile.’

‘I’m onto it,’ said Garramone. ‘We’ll find him.’ Then he sighed and said: ‘I still don’t know how this takes us back to Ganza and Arthur.’

‘I’m not clear on it either yet, but if that guy who accosted me in the alleyway is to be believed, they are linked, and now we have Ymeri living in Trastevere, along with the photos on Arthur’s camera. These elements are connected somehow.’ Scamarcio paused a moment. ‘What are you going to tell your friend?’

‘Nothing, for the moment. He’s busy. I haven’t heard from him in a while, and I’d prefer to leave it like that.’

‘What about Trastevere? How much are they sniffing around now?’

‘Minimal — they’ve got their hands full with their upcoming drugs bust.’

‘Right.’ Scamarcio couldn’t help thinking that this all felt rather convenient. What strings had Garramone pulled? Or the PM, for that matter?

‘And, Scamarcio, it seems to me that you could get off Elba for the time being, and bring this back to Rome. It will keep some of the stuffed shirts happy, too.’

‘I was thinking the same thing.’