‘Why didn’t you tell me it wasn’t a jump? Salati died on the ground.’
‘You’ve spoken to Garrone?’
‘Sure. So much for swapping favours.’
‘I’ve told you before, I don’t trade favours. But I’ve got something for you. You’re going to like this. My women in the finance department have traced the Visa record for the Gazzetta payment.’
‘Go on.’
‘Unfortunately it’s not Riccardo. I half hoped we would hear that it was genuine, that it really was your boy. As it is, I really don’t understand it.’
‘Give me the name,’ I said impatiently.
‘Massimo Tonin, the lawyer.’
‘Tonin?’ I laughed.
‘What’s so funny?’
‘It’s not funny, so much as…’ I shook my head. Humans never cease to surprise me, but Tonin was certainly a weird one. ‘I got the impression he really cared for that boy.’
‘Maybe that’s why he paid to put a piece in the paper.’
‘You don’t believe that?’
‘I don’t know what to believe any more.’
‘I reached that point a long time ago.’ I couldn’t understand why old Tonin would want to pretend to be Riccardo in print. Unless he didn’t want people to think he was dead, unless he wanted people to think his boy was alive and well.
‘We’re going to bring him in,’ Dall’Aglio said.
I felt my limbs tense up. Once he was in custody he would be all buttoned up. I would have no element of surprise. I wanted to race round to his now, before they brought him in.
But I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t race round there on information Dall’Aglio had just given me. Dall’Aglio would accuse me of interference and favoreggiamento. I would have to come in on Dall’Aglio’s coat-tails.
‘I’ll come,’ I said.
Dall’Aglio didn’t say anything.
‘As an observer. Nothing else.’
Dall’Aglio was still silent. He must know, I thought, that this was my case as well as his. It was my information that gave him the breakthrough.
‘All right,’ said Dall’Aglio. ‘You know the rules. You don’t touch anything, you don’t say anything.’
‘Right. When’s the arrest?’
‘We’re going there now. Wait for us on Via Trento by the cinema.’
I put the phone down and went out. Tonin was a strange one. He had seemed to me one of those astute lawyers. He might sell his soul for a few percentage points, but I couldn’t see him knocking off his own son. But then, you never think that when you first set eyes on someone. There is no dark streak, not until you know someone’s killed another human being and you put that streak on them yourself. They’re just ordinary people who do something irreversible. They’re all different, and Tonin might be just one more specimen for me to study.
Dall’Aglio picked me up in the force’s luxury Alfa Romeo.
‘You armed?’ Dall’Aglio asked as soon as I opened the car door.
‘Sure.’
‘Give it to me.’
I reached inside my jacket and passed him the pistol. It wasn’t because Dall’Aglio didn’t trust me. He knew me well enough not to worry about me getting twitchy if it got tense. It was a power thing. It meant he was in complete control of the operation. I admired the formality, even though I didn’t like going after a suspect with only my bare fists.
Tonin came to the door before Dall’Aglio had even rung the bell. He stood there like a condemned man as Dall’Aglio read him his rights. Two officers then bundled him into the car. That was it.
‘I’m taking him to the station. You coming?’ Dall’Aglio said.
‘I’ll have a look round.’ I replied. There was no point going back to the station. We would hang around for at least two or three hours whilst they searched for evidence to lay on Tonin’s plate. I calculated that I might as well hang around and watch what happened at the house.
I went inside. The cadets were surprisingly efficient. Everything was turned upside down very neatly. I had expected them to send in the heavies, but it was all very deferential.
They went through all the drawers, pulled them out and looked underneath and behind. They took pictures off the walls, leafed through the books and magazines. The bathroom was pulled apart. They lifted up the shower tray and dismantled the bath. They listened to the plumbing and examined the surface of the soil in the garden. They went through the cypress and poplar trees with sticks. Still looking for those keys, I thought.
I wandered upstairs. It was a house like you used to see in American movies: a staircase wide enough for large plants where it turned a corner. The corridor upstairs was long and all lit up. Beings covered in white overalls kept coming out of rooms to the left and right.
I pushed into a room that looked like an old man’s place. There were suits in the wardrobe, a single toothbrush and razor in the bathroom. I took the top off a rectangular bottle of aftershave and sniffed it. It smelt like Tonin.
The couple obviously slept apart because the next room along was feminine. The wardrobe was full of designer outfits in garish colours. On the reproduction chest of drawers were photographs of the same man. He was good-looking in an overdone sort of way. He had long curling hair and facial hair which changed in each photo: a goatee in one, long, narrow sideburns in another. He must have spent half an hour shaving every day. There was a large photo where the man was wearing yellow corduroys. His brogues looked like the narrow nib of a fountain pen and they had fat, external stitching as if to pretend they were done by hand instead of by a machine. It looked like the same guy from the photo in Tonin’s office.
‘Who’s that?’ I asked one of the cadets taking tape samples from the carpet.
‘No idea.’
I looked at the photographs again. I assumed it was their son Sandro because he was everywhere. There wasn’t anyone else, no sibling to rival his place on his mother’s chest of drawers. He must have thought he was an only child until poor Riccardo came along.
I went back downstairs and saw the huge hall. It was cold and unloved. Even the sofa against the far wall looked austere, like it had never been sat in. The cushions were placed at deliberate angles. I remembered when I had come in here two days ago how the woman’s voice had bounced off the walls. I closed my eyes and tried to recall that atmosphere when we had first walked in. She had been on the phone.
I got to the bottom of the stairs and saw the handset. She had been speaking to someone. I got out my mobile and called Dall’Aglio. He was still in the car by the sound of it.
‘I’ve got something else for you. Find out who their phone operator is and get an itemised breakdown of the calls from the Tonin house on Wednesday night.’
Dall’Aglio said nothing. He wasn’t happy taking dictation from a rival.
‘Has Tonin said anything?’ I asked.
‘Nothing. Says he will reply to questions in the presence of his lawyer.’
I laughed and hung up. Why a lawyer needed another lawyer to defend himself I couldn’t understand. It made it look like the truth wasn’t enough for him. He wanted to find a way out, and that meant calling in a colleague to help.
I went outside on to the drive and walked slowly towards the gate. I dialled the switchboard sweetheart.
‘Studio Tonin.’
‘That Serena?’
‘Sì.’
‘Castagnetti here.’
She didn’t say anything.
‘How you doing?’ I asked.
‘Fine. Can I help you?’ She sounded distant, as if there were someone listening to her talking.
‘Sure you can. In the next hour or two a call is going to come in from jail. It will be Massimo Tonin, asking to speak to one of his colleagues.’
‘Massimo’s been arrested?’ She sounded indignant.
‘He has.’
‘What for?’
‘I don’t know. Here’s what I need you to do. As soon as you’ve put the call through, phone me and let me know who he asked to speak to.’