Nicola was firing glances at him. Pierre wasn’t fazed: partly the gloom and partly the excitement. And if he had noticed.
La Gaggia looked at the others.
Garibaldi was drenched in sweat, despite the cool of the cellar. Bottone had come up almost at a run. Walterún repeated obsessively that they should call Benfenati.
They understood too.
The older officer raised his candle and leaned over a pile of tables and chairs. He moved a few of them, stood upright again, and seemed to be satisfied.
Pierre threw open the crockery cupboard. Pierre pointed at the boxes on the shelves. Pierre said, ‘That’s the crockery: glasses, cups, saucers, plates. Two services used in turn. Shall we see if there’s anything sinister in there?’
Bottone pushed his way on to the stairs to get back in position. La Gaggia looked as though he was paralysed. Garibaldi was thinking about their treasure: two Bren guns, two machine-guns with perforated barrels, ten magazines, eight hand grenades. Walterún wondered if it wouldn’t be a good idea to warn Benfenati.
‘Come on,’ Pierre insisted. ‘What are you looking for? Cocaine? Opium?’
The younger officer turned purple in the face. ‘Spare your breath until we call you to the station,’ he hissed.
The onlookers protested. The people in the front row informed the people behind, they told the ones on the stairs, then anyone passing through the courtyard, the little boys of the district and finally the greengrocers. Villain! Provocateur! Criminal! They haven’t found anything and they’re trying to provoke us into a fight!
Capponi, to the general surprise, sided with the policeman. ‘He’s right. Could we have a bit of quiet, please?’
Pierre had no time to disagree. The older officer held out a hand to say goodbye. ‘Very well. Everything seems to be in order. We’ll leave you to it.’
The crowd parted like a little Red Sea. Not quite enough to allow the guardians of the law to leave the scene quickly and comfortably. Little pushes, nudges, tripping feet and muttered insults.
Garibaldi gripped Walterún’s shoulder with a spasm: the danger had passed. Capponi looked at Pierre with ice in his eyes and the promise of yet more fury to come. Bottone and La Gaggia headed for the stairs, just behind the policemen.
‘Smell this, Gaggia,’ whispered Bottone, tapping his nose. ‘They really do smell of corpses, don’t they?’
Chapter 30
Confidential document written by Charles Siragusa, District Supervisor, US Bureau of Narcotics, dated 13 June 1954. For the attention of Inspector Pasquale Cinquegrana with reference to the arrest and interrogation of Stefano Zollo
Dear Inspector,
The American Consulate has sent me the enclosed document in which it informs me, concerning the situation of Stefano Zollo, that the authorities of the United States can wait no longer and if, by the 16th inst., investigations into the Chiofano murder supply no fresh evidence, they will find themselves obliged to intervene to free him, as requested on several occasions by Mr Schifanoia, Zollo’s lawyer, since allegations made against his client have proved to be unfounded.
Nonetheless, new evidence against Zollo would enable us to keep him in extended custody, and I consider this essential for the current phase of Operation Luciano.
On this subject, I have carefully examined the declarations made by our informer, Gennaro Abbatemaggio, eighty-five, concerning the so-called ‘Montesi case’, with particular reference to the visits to Naples of the suspect Ugo Montagna and links with the Neapolitan underworld and drugs trafficking.
Of the names mentioned by Abbatemaggio, none has direct links to Luciano.
This matter has struck me as a little strange, and for that reason, just yesterday, I obtained, on police authority, permission to interrogate Abbatemaggio.
It immediately struck me as apparent that the ‘gap’ in the previous declaration was due solely to reticence, and in particular to the fear that the figure of Luciano inspires in all and sundry.
Reassured about the protection that he will be guaranteed,
even more than he was at the time of the Cuocolo trial, and about the advantages of his cooperation, Abbatemaggio has supplied valuable information about the connections that Luciano’s lieutenants maintain in the capital, and in particular with ‘marquis’ Montagna (see Appendix No. 2).
Abbatemaggio has declared himself willing to make an official declaration on this subject.
I therefore maintain that, by tomorrow, we should proceed to the interrogation ot Abbatemaggio, in order to be able to make fresh accusations to Stefano Zollo by the 16th inst., and interrogate him on this matter.
Yours sincerely,
Charles Siragusa
Chapter 31
Bologna, 13 June
He had missed the tram after fifty metres of useless sweat.
He decided to walk to the next stop. The meeting with Ettore was arranged for seven. He had time.
Ettore. How would he pay his debt?
Montroni had put the police on to him. Angela had warned him. Palmo had taken the boxes back just in time.
Montroni wanted to fit him up. Angela had said: he knows about Yugoslavia, too. Nicola had stopped talking to him: the spectacle in the cellar had left him furious.
Montroni knew.
Just to make the situation even worse, that morning, a letter from Pisa. Sent by the pigeon-fancying group ‘Wings of Tyrrhenia’. Inside, two lines of explanation and a message from Vittorio Capponi.
His father. Hidden in an abandoned sheep pen in the mountains on the border with Albania. His father, man of few words. I’ve finished with Yugoslavia. Find out about conditions for a return to Italy. Hug. Vittorio.
Pierre checked the time on the wrist of a passer-by. Sultry, oppressive heat. The sun shining over Via Emilia, about to pass through Porta San Felice.
He had to pay his debt to Ettore.
He had to think of his father’s return.
He had to pay Angela back for saving his arse.
He owed too much to too many people.
Angela had raised a suspicion. I think Fefe’s death had something to do with his medication. They were supposed to scale it down and instead they stopped it completely. I asked Odoacre: he says it isn’t true, but he didn’t convince me, I think he’s afraid. Afraid to admit that Fefe might have died because of that. Afraid I will hate him for the rest of my life. Afraid I will start seeing you again.
The pneumatic drill crushed his eardrums. Work on the new hospital was continuing. A deafening noise: the tram had passed him before he even knew it was there. He gave up running.
Who could help his father? Usually, the Party took care of such. But Vittorio Capponi had stayed with Tito when Moscow and the other comrades had abandoned him. And now that there was a rapprochement between Tito and the Soviet Union, he was with Djilas. So the only person he could ask for help was his son Pierre, who didn’t have a lira, who had a debt to pay and didn’t know how to do it, who had been abandoned by his girlfriend, who was in the sights of her husband, a big shot in the Bologna Federation. And what was he going to come back and do here, in Italy? Fifty years behind him, twice a widower, a whiff of jail, jobless, marked out as a ‘Tito fascist’. A fine prospect.
Pierre crossed the tramlines and took the path through the middle of the stubble. The shed was covered by trees. He glimpsed the truck. They were unloading.
He passed by an improvised pile of bricks and tyres. He smoothed his hair and appeared in the dusty yard. Ettore emerged from behind the tank and nodded to him to come in. An oven, 400 square metres.