Arriving at the senator’s villa, the honorable Riccobono had knocked a long time at the door to no avail. Alarmed— because he knew that the senator was at home alone—he’d walked around the house and looked inside a window, seeing his friend lying on the floor, either unconscious or dead. Since, given his age, he couldn’t very well climb up through the window and enter, he’d called for help on his cell phone.
In brief, Senator Nicotra had, as the newspapers like to put it, “died of heart failure” that same Sunday evening after speaking to the Honorable Riccobono. Nobody’d been to see him either Monday or Tuesday. He himself had told his secretary he wanted to be left alone and undisturbed and that, at any rate, he was going to unplug the phone. If he needed anything, he would call for it.
TeleVigata, through the pursed lips of their political commentator Pippo Ragonese, was explaining to one and all the vast sweep of Italy’s grief over the loss of the eminent politician. The chief executive—the very same into whose party the senator had fled with all his belongings—had wired a message of condolence to the family.
“What family?” Montalbano asked himself.
It was well known that the senator had no family. And it would have been going too far, indeed it was entirely beyond the realm of possibility, for the chief executive to wire a message of condolence to the Sinagra crime family, with whom the senator had apparently had, and continued to have, long and fruitful—but never proven ties.
Pippo Ragonese concluded by saying that the funeral would be held the following day, Friday, in Montelusa.
Turning off the television, the inspector didn’t feel like eating anything. He went and sat out on the veranda for a bit, enjoying the cool sea air, then went to bed.
The alarm went off at seven-thirty, and Montalbano shot out of bed like a jack-in-the-box. Shortly before eight o’clock, the phone rang.
“Chief, ohh, Chief! Dr. Latte wit ansat the end jess called!”
“What did he want?”
“He said that ‘cause that they’re having the furinal services for that sinator that died and seeing as how the c’mishner gotta be there poissonally in poisson, atta furinal, I mean, the c’mishner can’t come to see youse like he said he was gonna do. Unnastand, Chief?”
“Perfectly, Cat.”
It was a lovely day, but the moment he set down the phone, it seemed downright heavenly to him. The prospect of not having to meet with Bonetti-Alderighi made him practically idiotic with joy, to the point that he composed a perfectly ignoble couplet—ignoble in terms of both intelligence and meter—for the occasion: A dead senator a day
Keeps the commissioner away.
Michela had mentioned that Emilio Sclafani, Elena’s husband, taught Greek at theliceo classicoof Montelusa, which probably meant he got in his car every morning and drove to school. Thus when the inspector knocked at the door of Apartment 6, Via Autonomia Siciliana 18, at 8:40, he was reasonably certain that Signora Elena, the professor’s wife and the late Angelo Pardo’s mistress, would be at home alone. But in reality when he knocked, there was no answer. The inspector tried again. Nothing. He started to worry. Maybe the woman had asked her husband for a lift and gone into Montelusa. He knocked a third time. Still nothing. He turned around, cursing, and was about to descend the stairs when he heard a woman’s voice call from inside the apartment. “Who is it?”
This question is not always so easy to answer. First of all, because it may happen that the person who’s supposed to reply is caught at a moment of identity loss and, second, because saying who one is doesn’t always facilitate things.
“Administration,” he said.
In so-called civilized societies, there is always an administrator administrating you, thought Montalbano. It might be the condominium administrator or a legal administrator, but it really makes no difference, since what matters is that he’s there, and stays there, and that he administrates you more or less carefully, or even secretly, ready to make you pay for mistakes you perhaps don’t even know you’ve made. Joseph K. knew a thing or two about this.
The door opened, and an attractive, thirtyish blonde appeared, dressed in an absurd kimono, with pouty lips a fire red without even a trace of lipstick, and sleepy blue eyes. She’d got out of bed to answer the door and still bore a strong smell of sleep. The inspector felt vaguely uneasy, mostly because, though barefoot, she was taller than him. “What do you want?”
The tone of her question made it clear she had no intention of wasting any time and indeed was in a hurry to go back to bed.
“Police. I’m Inspector Montalbano. Good morning. Are you Elena Sclafani?”
She turned pale and took a step backwards.
“Oh my God, has something happened to my husband?”
Montalbano balked. He wasn’t expecting this.
“To your husband? No. Why do you ask?”
“Because every morning when he gets in his car to drive to Montelusa,I…well,he doesn’t know how to drive… Since we got married four years ago, he’s had about ten mi-nor accidents, and so …”
“Signora, I didn’t come to talk to you about your husband, but about another man. And I have many things to ask you. Perhaps it’s better if we go inside.”
She stepped aside and took Montalbano into a small but rather elegant living room.
“Please sit down, I’ll be right back.”
She took ten minutes to get dressed. She returned in a blouse and skirt slightly above the knee, high heels, and with her hair in a bun. She sat down in an armchair in front of the inspector. She showed neither curiosity nor the slightest bit of concern.
“Would you like some coffee?”
“If it’s already made …”
“No, but I’ll go make it. I need some myself. If I don’t drink a cup of coffee first thing in the morning, I don’t connect.”
“I know exactly what you mean.”
She went into the kitchen and started rummaging around. The telephone rang, and she answered. She returned with the coffee. They each put sugar in their demitasses, and neither spoke until they’d finished drinking.
“That was my husband, just now, on the phone. He was calling to let me know he was about to start class. He does that every day, just to reassure me he got there all right.”
“May I smoke?” Montalbano asked.
“Of course. I smoke, too. So …” said Elena, leaning back into the armchair, a lighted cigarette between her fingers. “What’s Angelo done this time?”
Montalbano looked at her bewildered, mouth hanging open. For the past half hour, he’d been trying to figure out how to broach the subject of the woman’s lover, and she comes out with this explicit question?
“How did you know I—”
“Inspector, there are currently two men in my life. You made it clear you hadn’t come to talk about my husband, and this can only mean you’re here to talk about Angelo. Am I right?”
“Yes, you’re right. But before going any further, I would like you to explain that adverb you used: ‘currently.’ What do you mean?”
Elena smiled. She had bright white teeth, like a wild young animal.
“I mean that at the moment there’s Emilio—my husband—and there’s Angelo. More often there’s only one: Emilio.”
While Montalbano was contemplating the meaning of these words, Elena asked:
“Do you know my husband?” “No.”
“He’s an extraordinary person, kind, intelligent, understanding. I’m twenty-nine years old. He’s seventy. He could be my father. I love him. And I try to be faithful to him. I try. But I don’t always succeed. As you can see, I’m speaking to you with total sincerity, without even knowing the reason for your visit. By the way, who told you about me and Angelo?”