Augusto Ventrone looked the angel in the eyes.
He admired its light-blue coloring, its intense expression, which was at once pitying and determined; ready to provide comfort and to inflict punishment, annunciating and exterminating. That’s what an angel should be like.
He put the statue back on its shelf, next to the shop’s front door, and looked outside: afternoon sunlight filled the street, and a few flies were flitting around in the low light. Spring had come. Punctual as ever.
Augusto allowed himself a quick smile. Not that he was in the habit of smiling: he was the most unsmiling twenty-year-old in the neighborhood, and possibly in the whole city. And really, why would he smile?
First of all, the merchandise they offered in their shop had to be sold with earnest sobriety, in certain cases with something approaching grief: and he was a born salesman. Their customers came in expecting a murmured recommendation. “Award-Winning Purveyors of Sacred Art, Vincenzo Ventrone and Son,” read the sign. Sacred art. Nothing playful, nothing funny. The religious expected a sophisticated adviser; private individuals interested in decorating a home chapel, a family tomb, or even just a nightstand in their bedroom, wanted the understanding of a professional: for smiles, they were welcome to try the undergarment shop, just fifty feet down the street, on the opposite sidewalk.
Nor had life given Augusto any particular reasons to be cheerful. A mother who’d died too young, no brothers or sisters, and a father who’d lost his head over a whore.
At first, Augusto had actually been quite tolerant. After all, after five years as a lonely widower, one could understand why Vincenzo Ventrone, who wasn’t so old that he couldn’t hear the call of the flesh, should have gone in search of comfort. And all things considered, better a brothel—with a discreet side entrance where you’d pay no more than a few lire—than a money-grubbing young lady from a well-to-do family looking to get herself situated, or even worse, a fortune hunter with children of her own, who could replace him as the heir to the family business.
But then matters had taken a strange turn. His father’s visits to Il Paradiso (how blasphemously ironic, that name: astonishing that the authorities should allow it!) had multiplied until he was going daily, sometimes even more frequently. It was inevitable that other customers, that even a number of high prelates from the bishopric, would see him emerge from the bordello with a stupid, ridiculous grin stamped on his face, his celluloid collar unbuttoned, his tie askew, traces of lipstick smeared on his cheeks. And the idiot, instead of hiding in the shadows, just doffed his hat and called out hello.
With a shudder, Augusto remembered how he had learned that his father’s affair with a whore had by now become public knowledge. One day the Contessa Félaco di Castelbriano had come into the shop, an elderly crone who weighed at least 225 pounds and collected statues of St. Anthony; she’d stopped at the front counter and stood there for several minutes silently staring at him, wearing a pained, sympathetic expression. He’d waited, as was befitting a serious shopkeeper in the presence of a first-rate customer. Finally, in her cavernous voice, the contessa had told him: “Your poor mother is turning over in her grave over this indecency. For the shame that your father is heaping on her, even in the afterlife.” Then she’d turned on her heel and left the shop.
At that point, Augusto had felt it was his duty to have a man-to-man talk with his father, in part because he’d recently noticed a slight drop in the number of customers, and he was a very keen observer of these kinds of things, having inerhited from his mother a certain, let’s say, attention to the practical side of life. He’d said to him, not in so many words: Papà, if you want to have fun, that’s your business; but discretion, in a business like ours, is a necessity. Given that, I have to beg you to stop letting people see you enter and leave that place, which after all is only a few hundred yards from our shop.
That fool had looked at him and said: my son, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m not doing anything wrong, I’ll spend my money and I’ll go wherever I want. And after all, I only play cards there. You know that I live for the memory of your sainted mother.
Augusto was left with no alternative but to pray that Vincenzo would come to his senses, while every day more and more people came to see him, feigning compassion, to tell him the details of his father’s affair with the famous Viper, the most notorious prostitute in town.
That day, however, something new must have happened. His father had come home much earlier than he usually did, pale as a ghost and trembling, the very opposite of how he’d looked when he’d walked out, frisky and fragrant, into the fresh spring air. He’d muttered something about not feeling well and needing to go to bed (his own bed, for once). Augusto had told him not to worry, that he’d look after the store. As if that were somehow a novelty.
Dusting off angels and saints, the young man indulged in the second smile of the day: a real record. And he decided that there are times when prayers are even answered.
Especially if you lend a hand.
Maione had understood perfectly what the commissario wanted him to check up on, when he’d nodded his head in the direction of the door to Lily’s room—she was the woman who’d claimed to have found Viper’s body—and he’d understood exactly what doubts his superior officer was entertaining.
They went back down to the main hall, followed by an increasingly concerned Madame Yvonne. They went over to the group that had clustered in the corner furthest from the staircase, as if death was contagious, as if its miasma might condemn them too.
There were about a dozen girls, of varying ages: there were very young ones, no more than twenty, and women who were probably past thirty, the marks of hard living just beginning to appear on their faces, their expressions hard and suspicious.
All different in their features and origins, brunettes, blondes, and redheads, dyed hair and natural colors, shapely and lean. Clothing and makeup designed to titillate and attract, and in that new and terrible context it all seemed like a grotesque masquerade. A few of them were weeping softly, blowing their noses every so often.
There were also three men. One was introduced by Yvonne as Amedeo, the piano player: a fidgety little man with tapered fingers and a wispy mustache that was being shaken by terrified shivers. A dapper, elderly gentleman in a tailcoat was announced as Armando, the butler, who actually made a formal bow, as if he were at a ball. The third, a strapping, shifty young man who grunted hello, was Tullio, Madame Yvonne’s son: the woman explained that he was a handyman, in charge of maintenance, and also took care of security. All three of them swore that they hadn’t left the main hall all morning.
Once they’d taken names and gathered what little information was forthcoming, Ricciardi summoned Lily.
The girl hadn’t changed expression or attitude; now that he’d seen all the girls, including the victim, the commissario had made up his mind that the blond was the most attractive, with the possible exception of Viper herself: but her physical beauty clashed with the girl’s hard and determined features.
“Signorina, can you confirm the statements you made earlier? That you found the body, by looking through the half-open door in the victim’s room, while you were walking to the balcony for a new customer?”
The woman held Ricciardi’s gaze confidently; that didn’t happen often.
“Yes, that’s what happened. I found her. Around three.”
“And did you call for help immediately, calling for Madame?”
“Certainly.”
Ricciardi exchanged a glance with Maione, who was desperately trying to keep his eyes from resting on Lily’s spectacular breasts.
“I don’t believe you.”
The young woman betrayed no surprise.
“Ah, no? And why don’t you believe me, Commissa’?”
“First: because Viper’s bedroom is at the end of the hallway, and you wouldn’t have gone by it on the way from your room to the balcony. Second: because you said that you had finished and that you normally tidy up your room before bringing in another customer, and Maione saw for himself that your bed is rumpled and unmade. Third: because through the gap of the half-opened door you can’t see the leg dangling from the bed, but only the fingertips of one hand.”
Lily had listened to Ricciardi’s tirade without blinking, her hands on her hips.
The commissario said:
“Who are you covering for, Signorina? And why?”
The question was met with silence. The girls looked at one another, no longer weeping. Madame Yvonne was twisting her hands, in a state of anxiety. Ricciardi said loudly:
“If that’s the way things are, then this establishment is going to remain shuttered and you won’t get to leave until I’ve discovered who actually found the body and in what circumstances; this is necessary information, and without it you all can’t get back to business. On the other hand, I want to be clear that finding a corpse does not amount to the commission of a crime, and therefore this stance may only be casting suspicion on an innocent person. We have all the time in the world. We can wait.”
Madame Yvonne took a step forward, her eyes on Lily, and said in a broken voice:
“I can’t allow this, if we have to stay closed, we’ll be finished. Already, having a death in here is a terrible tragedy for our establishment’s good name: our only hope is to get right back to work. Commissa’, Viper’s body was found by one of our clients: Cavalier Vincenzo Ventrone, proprietor of the sacred art shop.”