From the archives of Antonelli’s memory an address had surfaced: Vicolo Santa Croce al Purgatorio. It was a narrow lane just off Piazza del Mercato, a short walk from Piazza del Carmine, named after Our Lady of Mount Carmel.
As they moved down cramped alleys that suddenly widened into broad stretches, Ricciardi and Maione had the impression they were moving, step by step, deeper and deeper into a living organism, driving straight toward the heart. The Pendino quarter had in fact just begun to experience the most important week in its whole year, the week that culminated with the festival of the Madonna Bruna—the Black Madonna.
This wasn’t just another of the countless neighborhood festivals, and it wasn’t limited to the locals: Our Lady of Mount Carmel was a central figure in the city’s traditions, and she was invoked constantly by the faithful, whether in requests for divine assistance or as a lively conversational interjection. When confronted with a tragic or terrible event, or some collective emotion, men, women, and children would cross themselves as they murmured the name of the Signora Bruna—the Dark Lady, Our Lady of Mount Carmel.
The icon took its name from the dark-hued complexions of the Virgin Mary and the Christ Child, clasped tenderly in her arms. On His face, tinged with just a hint of sadness, there is a foreshadowing of the pain to come; cheeks and lips brush together. A mother, a child. A perfect and eternal union that always called the people of that wonderful and unfortunate city to express their love.
The festival began with the procession on the last Sunday in May, in which Mamma Schiavona, as the common folk called her, was carried through the neighborhood, escorted by the highest officials. After that, preparations began for the events that would take place on the 15th and 16th of July.
The frenzy of anticipation was obvious even to passing pedestrians. Pagan and religious aspects were intertwined even more than usual, drawing in everyone who lived in the quarter or happened to be passing through it. People stitched outfits and made panels bearing the image of the Black Madonna with a golden star on Her shoulder, balloons were inflated to be released into the sky on each of the three nights of the festival, lights were arched over the streets that led to the church; the balconies, terraces, windows, and even the simplest apertures giving onto the piazza, were decorated, a blaze of flowers and festoons; and then there were the countless stalls and stands where tons of goods of every description would be on offer to the whole city when it poured into this piazza.
Maione noticed that their presence had not passed unremarked. His trained eye had picked out glances that lasted just a second too long, an old woman who moved a chair, making a loud scraping sound, a little boy who suddenly broke into a run, a man who emitted a shrill whistle. Moving along with the two policemen was an invisible wave made up of ostensible indifference and intense alertness.
Ricciardi showed no indication that he had noticed a thing. He kept his hands in his pockets and his eyes on the ground. All around him, the living and the dead whirled in their two separate worlds, distinct and unaware of each other, murmuring, speaking, and shouting their sufferings and their joys. The commissario did his best to keep his mind off this, and off Rosa as well, tried to keep from thinking about her unnatural sleep, wondering to himself what he could do, and forever coming to the same answer: nothing. And he tried to focus on the murder he was investigating, because the professor had a right to his full devotion to the case; whoever had cut his life short ought to pay for that crime. Because the professor should have been able to die in his bed. Like Dr. Ruspo. And like his Rosa.
They realized that they had reached their destination when an empty alley appeared before them, an oasis of silence in the tempest-tossed sea that was the rest of the neighborhood.
A young man, leaning against the wall and smoking, tossed his cigarette, gave Maione a bold stare, and ambled off. Two floors up, a pair of shutters slammed shut, while a woman began singing from a balcony.
On the pavement in front of a ground-floor hovel, a basso, an old woman sat peeling potatoes. She looked up at the two policemen and asked, in thick dialect, whether they were looking for someone. From her expression, Maione understood that his answer would be virtually useless.
“Buongiorno, Signo’. Yes, we’re looking for a certain Graziani, Giuseppe Graziani. Do you know him?”
The old woman stared at him, as if she didn’t understand the language the brigadier was speaking. Then she shouted loudly: “Tanino!”
A half-naked boy came running out of a doorway. He couldn’t have been any older than seven or eight. He was barefoot, his arms and legs, stick-thin, dotted with scrapes and scabs. He came to a halt next to the two men, turned his back to them, and returned to the building he’d just emerged from. At the threshold he turned to see if they were following him. Then he jutted his chin in the direction of a staircase. Ricciardi and Maione started upstairs.
On the second floor, in front of a door, two young men dressed in work shirts and caps gave them an unfriendly stare, without so much as a hint of greeting. Maione met their hostile gazes and asked: “Is he in there?”
The elder of the pair nodded yes.
Maione turned to Ricciardi: “After you, Commissa’. Apparently we’re expected.”
They stepped into a clean and tidy apartment, furnished in a sober style. Daylight filtered through the half-open shutters. The heat was suffocating. An elderly woman in black came to meet them: “Who are you looking for? No one here has done anything wrong, we’re honest folk.”
Maione faced her sternly: “Excuse me, Signo’, but did anyone here say that we’d come because you weren’t honest folk? This damned bad habit of thinking of the police as an enemy—when is this city going to get over it?”
A deep voice boomed out from behind them: “Evidently, Brigadie’, if people behave that way there must be a reason. Or maybe we’re all just crazy, is that what you think?”
They turned around and found themselves face-to-face with a very tall man, with an athletic physique, dressed in a white shirt, a waistcoat, and a pair of dark trousers. On his arm he wore a black band, a mark of mourning. His hair was tousled and he hadn’t shaved, he had bags under his eyes and his face wore a harsh expression that made him look old: but he couldn’t have been even thirty.
Maione touched his fingertips to the brim of his hat and, without changing his tone of voice, asked: “You’re Giuseppe Graziani, isn’t that right?”
The man, leaning against the doorframe, his arms crossed on his chest, nodded. He really was huge, his powerful forearms made muscular by hard work. He seemed indifferent to the presence of the two policemen in his home. He told the woman: “Don’t worry yourself, Mammà. Go see if the baby has woken up. Earlier I thought she sounded a little restless.”
The old woman reluctantly moved away.
Graziani gestured with his head, inviting them to follow him into a room that was furnished with a table and chairs; against one wall hung a mirror covered by a black cloth. On a low credenza there was a framed photograph of the same man, standing, clearly ill at ease, in a jacket and tie; sitting in front of him was a beautiful girl in a wedding dress. Both of them had solemn expressions, as was customary when people posed for a portrait; but she was holding his hand, their fingers intertwined in a gesture of great tenderness.
Maione said: “I’m Brigadier Maione, and he is . . .”
The man interrupted him: “Yeah, yeah. I know who you are, and you know who I am. And I know why you’re here, too. The answer is: no, I didn’t kill that piece of shit, Professor Iovine. I didn’t get to him fast enough, because someone else took care of it before I could.”
Maione laughed: “Congratulations, Signor Peppino the Wolf. That’s what they call you, isn’t it? Bravo. Since you’re so clever and you’re willing to tell us what we need to know, excuse us for barging in on you like this, we’ll be on our way. If you’d just sent us a note, informing us that you hadn’t committed the murder, we could have even spared ourselves the walk over in this heat.”
“I’m telling it to you straight. But if you want to waste your time and shoe leather, there’s nothing I can do about it.”
Maione roared: “Grazia’, you’re just a little too much of a comedian. You make me want to take you into police headquarters and start asking you questions there. What do you say, do you feel like taking a walk? That way, you can stroll in the midst of your own people and show off a nice pair of steel bracelets.”
Ricciardi knew that this wasn’t going to get them anywhere. He decided it was time to intervene: “Listen here, Graziani: I’m sorry about your loss. We heard how it went, and I understand the kind of grief that . . .”
Peppino hissed back: “You don’t understand a thing, Commissa’. You don’t know how it went, you don’t understand the grief. You don’t know anything and you can’t know anything.”
Maione said: “Now, Grazia’, I’m warning you: unless you start speaking respectfully to the commissario, I’ll . . .”
“What are you doing, Brigadie’? What are you doing? You do understand, don’t you, that if I’d wanted to make sure you never got this far, you never would have? That you could have disappeared a hundred times along the way here, you and your commissario, and no one would ever have known what had become of you? So do me a favor and do yourself a favor while you’re at it: don’t threaten me. Not here, not in my home. All right? Are we understood?” Then he turned to Ricciardi: “Commissa’, I wasn’t trying to get a rise out of you. I was telling the truth. You can’t possibly know, because no one’s told you the way things really went.”
Ricciardi said: “Well then, why don’t you tell me yourself how they really went?”
“Then who would you believe, Commissa’?”
“Graziani, you strike me as an intelligent young man. If we’d already decided not to believe you, would we have come down here into your lair to talk to you? Wouldn’t it have been much easer to have you come down to police headquarters for a deposition or, easier still, simply put you on trial straightaway?”
Peppino looked amused: “The Wolf’s lair. Very nice, Commissa’. You’ve convinced me. What do you want to know?”
“Everything, that’s what we want to know. Your relations with Professor Iovine. Why and where you swore to kill him. And why you say you weren’t fast enough to do it yourself.”