It was at that moment, as the judges gathered their papers to retire to their chamber, that I was struck by a feeling that I was hovering between dream and reality.
Had the events of the past four months really happened? Had Natsu and I really made love, twice, in my apartment? Had I walked in the park with Natsu and little Midori, taking unfair advantage of those few minutes to play father, or had I only imagined it? And was the defendant Fabio Paolicelli really the Fabio Rayban I’d been obsessed with during my teenage years? And did it still matter to me to find out the truth about that distant past, supposing there had ever been a truth to find out? On what basis can we say with any certainty that an image in our head is the result of something we’ve actually seen or an act of the imagination? What really distinguishes our dreams from our memories?
It lasted a few seconds. When the judges disappeared into their chamber my thoughts went back to normal.
Whatever the word means.
47
That day there were several hearings involving prisoners, in various courtrooms, and not many guards. So the head of the escort had asked Mirenghi for permission to take Paolicelli back down to the holding cells so that he could use his men in other courtrooms. When the judges were ready to give their decision, the clerk of the court would call the head of the escort and Paolicelli would be brought back up to the courtroom for the ruling to be read out.
Only Natsu and I were left in the courtroom. We sat down behind the prosecution bench.
“How’s Midori?”
She shrugged, a forced smile on her lips. “Well. Quite well. She had a nightmare last night, but it didn’t last long. They’ve become shorter and less violent lately.”
We looked at each other for a few moments and then she stroked my hand. Longer than was advisable, if we wanted to be careful.
“Congratulations. It wasn’t an easy speech, but I understood everything. You’re very good.” She hesitated for a moment. “I didn’t think you would go to so much trouble.”
It was my turn to give a forced smile.
“What’s going to happen?”
“Impossible to predict. Or at least I can’t. Anything can happen.”
She nodded. She hadn’t really expected any other answer.
“Can we get out of here, go for a coffee or something?”
“Of course; it’ll be a while before the decision.”
I was about to add that if they came to a decision straight away it wasn’t a good sign. It meant that they had upheld the sentence without even taking into account the things I’d been trying to say. But I stopped myself. It was pointless information, at this stage.
We left the courthouse, had a coffee, then had a little stroll and went back. We didn’t talk much. Just enough to give a bit of direction to the silence. I don’t know what she was feeling. She didn’t tell me and I couldn’t figure it out. Or maybe I didn’t want to. I felt great tenderness for her, but it was a sad, resigned, distant, intangible tenderness.
At five, the courthouse emptied. Doors closing, voices, hurried footsteps.
And then silence, the strange, unmistakable silence of deserted offices.
It was just before six that we saw the escort coming back into the courtroom with Paolicelli. They passed close to us. He looked at me, searching for a message in my eyes. He didn’t find one. In all my years as a lawyer, I’ve rarely felt so unsure of the result of a case, so incapable of making predictions.
I went back to my seat, while the guards put Paolicelli back in the cage, the prosecutor came back into the courtroom, and Natsu returned to the now deserted public benches.
Then the judges came out, without even ringing the bell.
Mirenghi read out the decision quickly. Before I’d even had time to adjust the robe on my shoulders. He read it with a very tense expression on his face, and I was sure that they hadn’t been unanimous. I was sure that Mirenghi had fought for the sentence to be upheld, but that the other two had outvoted him.
The court overturned the previous sentence and acquitted Fabio Paolicelli of the charge against him on the grounds that the act does not constitute an offence.
In our jargon the expression the act does not constitute an offence can mean many different things. In this case it meant that Paolicelli had indeed physically transported the drugs – that was a fact, there was no doubt – but without being aware of it. There was no motive, and an absence of criminal intent.
The act does not constitute an offence.
Acquittal.
Immediate release of the defendant if not held for other reasons.
Mirenghi caught his breath for a moment and then resumed reading. There was something else.
“The court asks that the ruling and the transcripts of the appeal hearing be sent to the regional anti-Mafia department for examination.”
That meant the affair wasn’t over. It meant that the anti-Mafia department would deal with my colleague Macri and his friend Romanazzi.
It might mean trouble for me. But I didn’t want to think about that now.
Mirenghi declared the hearing over and turned to leave. Girardi also turned.
But Russo hesitated for a moment. He looked at me and I looked at him. His back was straight and he seemed ten years younger. I’d never seen him like that before. He nodded, almost imperceptibly.
Then he, too, turned and followed the others into the chamber.
48
They let Paolicelli out of the cage. He still had to be taken back to prison to go through the formalities of release, but they didn’t put his handcuffs on, because he was a free man now. He came towards me, surrounded by the guards. When he came level with me, he embraced me.
I responded graciously to the embrace, patting him on the back and hoping it would soon be over. After me, he embraced his wife, kissed her on the mouth, and told her he would see her at home that evening.
She said she would come and pick him up but he said no, he didn’t want her to.
He didn’t want her to go near that place even for a moment. He would come home alone, on foot.
He wanted to prepare himself for seeing his daughter, and a walk would be the ideal way of doing that.
Besides, it was spring. It was a nice thing to walk home, free, in the spring.
His lower lip was trembling and his eyes watery, but he didn’t cry. At least not while he was still in the courtroom.
Then the head of the escort told him, gently, that they had to go.
One of the guards, a tough-looking old character with very blue eyes and a scar that started under his nose and went across his lips all the way down to his chin, came up to me. He had a voice roughened by cigarettes and thirty years spent among thieves, dealers, traffickers and murderers. He was a prisoner, too, who wouldn’t finish his sentence until the day he retired.
“Congratulations, Avvocato. I listened to you and understood everything.” He pointed to Paolicelli, who was already walking away with the other two guards. “You saved that man.”
And then he rushed off to join his colleagues.
Again, Natsu and I were alone. For the last time.
“And now?”
“Goodbye,” I said.
It came out well, I think. Goodbye is a hard word to say. You always run the risk of sounding pathetic, but this time I hit the right note.
She looked at me for a long time. If I let her image go slightly out of focus and replaced her eyes with two big blue circles, I could see her daughter Midori as she would be in twenty years’ time.
In 2025. I tried not to think about how old I would be in 2025.
“I don’t think I’ll ever meet anyone else like you.”
“Well, I should hope not,” I said. It was meant as a kind of joke, but she didn’t laugh.