At the station the thief had started philosophising, holding forth on certain injustices that nobody understood, and since he couldn’t get so much as a dog to listen to him, he set his sights on Assistant Inspector Bordelli. He asked for him with such insistence, and with so many words, that in the end they gave him his way just to be rid of him. Even back then, Botta already bore the signs of a hard, wretched life on his face. Small and agile, he had the eyes of an ignorant genius, which won Bordelli’s sympathy at once.
‘Mr Inspector, I am pleased to meet you in person at last.’
‘I’m still an assistant inspector.’
‘Not for long, Inspector, not for long.’
‘Why did you want to see me?’
‘I’m called “Botta”, Inspector. I just know you’ll be able to understand me. My friends have told me that you’re someone who sees things straight.’
‘Which of your friends?’
‘Gino Gamba and “the Beast”.’ Two smugglers.
‘Go on,’ said Bordelli.
‘Look at me, Inspector. Do I look like a criminal? I haven’t even got a jackknife on me. I break into the villas of millionaires, rich people whose knick-knacks could feed me for a year. And so I go in and take a couple of these stupid gewgaws just to get by; but if I’m caught, I get five years. Now, you tell me if that’s fair.’
The assistant inspector knew that the little burglar was right.
‘How many times have you been locked up, Bottarini?’ he asked him.
‘Not very many, at least not in Italy.’
‘So you’ve worked abroad as well?’
Botta gave a start in his chair.
‘You see, Inspector? You said “you’ve worked” and not “you’ve robbed”… I knew you would understand.’
‘Not so fast, Botta, not so fast …’
They kept on talking a while longer of this and that. Botta started describing the peculiarities of various European prisons, the differences between Spanish warders and Turkish warders; it was a kind of anthropology lesson, an enriching experience. This was not just any common thief. In the end the assistant inspector had taken him home, and they dined together, tripe and onions, washed down with a foul wine that Botta knocked back by the pitcherful.
At the trial Bordelli had done everything possible to have him given the minimum sentence. In the end he got ten months, but was released after four for good behaviour. Ever since, they had remained friends of a sort. Sometimes they would dine together at Dal Lordo, in Via dell’Orto. Or else they would spend an evening together on the banks of the Arno, exchanging stories about the war. Every so often they would fall out of touch and then meet back up again. It was only a year ago, at Christmas time, that Bordelli had discovered that Botta was a born cook. The little thief had put together a French dinner that was hard to forget.
Bordelli tapped on the windowpane of Botta’s basement with the keys to his Volkswagen.
‘Are you there, Ennio?’
The window opened slightly.
‘Inspector!’
‘I hope I’m not disturbing you.’
‘I’ll be right with you.’
A good minute later, the front door giving on to the street opened up, and Botta appeared wearing a housewife’s apron.
‘Hello, Inspector, I was just making coffee.’
Descending the stairs into Botta’s lair, Bordelli noticed a strange burnt smell.
‘What are you cooking?’ he asked.
‘Nothing edible, Inspector. I’m doing a little job for a friend.’
‘A “little job”?’
‘Ancient coins. I boil them in mud to age them.’
‘A swindle, in other words.’
‘No, no, it’s a way to make the tourists happy.’
‘Well, when you put it that way …’
As they entered the flat the coffee pot started whistling. It felt better in there than on the street; the three steps down made all the difference. Botta’s home consisted of two large, gloomy rooms, arranged with a certain care despite the modesty of means. One was the bedroom, with a bed and and an old wardrobe for clothes; and the other was a kitchen as well as sitting room, ‘work’ room and every other kind of room possible. Hanging on one wall was a framed photo of Fred Astaire in motion. Ennio had a burning passion for dance, never fulfilled for want of means. But, like all sentimentalists, he had many other passions as well.
Bordelli saw some ten or so half-dismantled wristwatches on the table.
‘Looks like you’re starting another “little job” the police ought not to know about.’
‘Just changing the dial-plates, Inspector. That way, Forcella watches become Swiss.’
‘I don’t want to hear about it, Botta. Let’s have this coffee.’
Ennio went and prepared the cups according to his personal method, with the sugar first, and any use of spoons forbidden.
‘What brings you here, Inspector?’
‘I was thinking about arranging a dinner at my place. What do you say?’
‘When?’
‘Got anything on for Wednesday?’
Botta reviewed his engagements in his mind, staring at the floor.
‘Wednesday … Wednesday … Yes, I’d say that would be all right.’
‘Good, I’ll tell the others.’
‘They’ll be the same as last time, no?’
‘Mind if I add a couple more?’
Ennio’s face darkened.
‘Policemen?’ he asked.
‘Don’t worry, one is the son of an old friend, and the other is a scientist and friend to mice.’
‘I’ve got no problem with that.’
‘Okay, then, you’re to make whatever you like. Just one wish, on the part of Diotivede.’
‘If I’m up to the task …’ Botta said, modestly.
‘Bean soup alla lombarda. Just imagine, in this heat.’
Ennio brightened.
‘Excuse me if I start drooling, Inspector, but that’s one of my specialities. It doesn’t matter if it’s hot outside; I only have to find the right beans. And for the rest, I’ve already got something in mind.’
Now came the most delicate part of the operation, since Botta was a very sensitive man. Bordelli coughed into his hand and, with maximum nonchalance, pulled out his wallet, took out one ten-thousand-lira and two one-thousand-lira notes and laid them on the table.
‘That should suffice,’ he said.
Botta blushed.
‘It’s too much, Inspector. Take back the two thousand,’ he said, putting the two notes back into Bordelli’s hand. The inspector put them back on the table.
‘You’ll see, there won’t be any change,’ he said.
‘You can tell a good cook by the way he shops, Inspector.’
‘Well, if there’s any left over, you can buy more wine.’
‘Sooner or later, I’m going to buy you a fine dinner, I swear.’
Bordelli lowered his eyes.
‘Never mind, Botta, you’ve already paid enough.’ He patted him on the shoulder and left him to his watches with Swiss faces and Neapolitan hearts.
The heat in the street was ghastly. And there was no hint of rain. Bordelli tried to distract himself by thinking about the dinner and the guests. Was Dr Fabiani in town? He was an old, melancholy psychoanalyst who had made a strong impression on him. Bordelli had met him a year before, during the course of an investigation, and invited him to Christmas dinner with Botta and Diotivede. It was a quiet, pleasant evening. Late into the night, each had told an old story from his past as they sipped cognac.
On his desk Bordelli found a handwritten note: I must speak to you. I’ll be back shortly. Zia Camilla. Zia Camilla was Rodrigo’s mother. Strange. She never called on him at headquarters. Bordelli expedited a couple of matters by telephone and finished reading the report of an arrest for murder. An unambiguous affair: a row, a knife, many witnesses. The killer was a young Calabrian male whose mother’s virtue had been slandered. He had been in town for only a few days and didn’t know that, in this part of Italy, slandering someone’s mother was almost as common as saying ‘Ciao’. A sad story of cultural misunderstanding. Bordelli got to the last lines: ‘… after which Bruno Pratesi addressed Salvatore Loporco with the words “son of a whore”, whereupon Loporco took out a cutting instrument with a five-inch blade and set upon Pratesi, stabbing him repeatedly in the chest and abdomen, saying in dialect, “I’ll teach you to talk about my dear mother that way”. All witnesses concur in saying that Loporco etc …’