Death and the Olive Grove (2 page)

‘What got into you, Casimiro?'

‘If I'd been alone he would have torn me to pieces,' the little man replied, shuddering.

‘Do you come this way often?' asked Bordelli, cleaning his shoes against the wall's rocks.

‘Now and then,' said Casimiro, hopping down from the bonnet and looking around with a tense expression on his face.

They got into the Beetle and headed back towards town. Casimiro sat there stiff and silent, the little skeleton between his fingers. They were already at the Regresso bend when Bordelli abruptly stopped the car.

‘What are you doing, Inspector?'

‘I'm going back up there.'

‘Why?'

‘I don't know,' said Bordelli. He made a U-turn and headed back up towards Fiesole, stepping on the accelerator. The Beetle's vibrations came straight up into their backbones. A short distance later he turned again on to the Via del Bargellino and parked in the same spot. He opened the car door and put one foot outside.

‘You're not coming?' he asked Casimiro, seeing that he hadn't moved.

‘I'd rather wait here,' the little man said gloomily.

‘Suit yourself Bordelli got out of the car and, retracing the same route, rushed back to the olive grove. The moon was beginning to light up the walls of the villa, which made it look even more abandoned. He approached the buttresses, gun drawn, and saw at once that the Doberman's carcass was gone. All that remained was a bit of blood on the grass. He checked the immediate surroundings, but the carpet of compact grass showed no footprints. He shook his head, thinking he'd acted stupidly. If only he hadn't left the scene …

All at once he heard a sound of crunching gravel that seemed to come from the villa's garden. He crouched instinctively behind a buttress, hiding in the shadow. Looking up, he saw a man's head peer out over the balustrade at the top of the wall. He was able to get a good look at him in the moonlight. The man had very white hair and a long black mark on his neck. He stood there for a few seconds, scanning the olive grove with his eyes, then disappeared.

There was deep silence. The only sound was the wind rustling the leaves of the olive trees. In the distance a dog began to bark angrily, every so often howling like a wolf. The inspector waited a few more minutes, holding his breath and looking up until the coast seemed clear. He stepped out of the shadow but hugged the wall, to lessen the risk of being seen from the villa. When he found a more shielded path, he headed back towards the woods, turning round repeatedly to look at the house, but seeing no sign of life. He hurried back to the car and found Casimiro standing on the seat with his face against the window.

‘The Doberman's gone, but I saw someone look out from the garden above,' said Bordelli, quietly closing the car door.

‘That bloody dog …' Casimiro said with a tragic look in his eye, clutching his little skeleton.

Bordelli calmly lit a cigarette and blew the smoke against the windscreen.

‘Any idea who lives in that house?' he asked the dwarf.

‘Some foreigner who's never there.'

‘How do you know?'

‘Gossip.'

‘Foreigner from where?'

‘Dunno …'

‘Where's the entrance to the villa?'

‘Up above here, on the Bosconi road … Why?'

‘Just curious.' The inspector started up the car, turned it round, and drove up to the top of the hill. That man with the black spot on his neck seemed familiar to him … He felt as if he had seen someone with a mark like that before … Or perhaps it was only his investigative imagination …

He turned on to Via Ferrucci, in the direction of the Bosconi. After rounding a few bends he stopped the Beetle in a spot where the shoulder broadened, not far from the villa's gate, which bore a plaque with indecipherable initials on it.

‘You wait here,' he said to Casimiro, getting out of the car.

‘Where are you going?'

‘I just want to go and have a look.'

The road was feebly illuminated by a yellow street lamp. Bordelli arrived at the gate and tried to push it open, but it was locked. The garden was full of high-trunked trees and overgrown plants, which shielded the dark ground from the moonlight. Scattered everywhere were large, empty vases, terracotta jugs, and strange marble statues of varying size and shape. The villa was set back a good way from the road and surrounded by cedars that rose well above the roof. On that side, too, the shutters were closed tight, with no light visible behind them. The inspector pulled the chain of the doorbell and heard it ring solemnly inside the house. There was no reply. He rang it again, and again, then twice consecutively. In the end he saw some light filter out between the slats of one shutter. A small light came on over the stone moulding of the front door, which opened at once. A human silhouette appeared on the threshold.

‘Who's there?' asked a woman's voice.

‘Police. Could you please open the gate for me?' The woman went back inside, and the gate opened with a click. The inspector pushed the gate open with both hands, making it squeak on its rusted hinges. He entered the garden and headed down the gravel lane, through the shadows cast by the jugs and marble monsters. Wrapped in a black shawl, the woman waited for him on the threshold, in front of the great door, which she had pulled to. She didn't seem dressed in nightclothes and didn't look as if she had just woken up. The inspector stopped in front of her, pulled out his police badge, and bowed slightly.

‘Inspector Bordelli's the name. Sorry to disturb you at this hour.'

The woman appeared to be about fifty. She was tall and slender and did not look Italian. She had a hard mouth. She stood there without moving, back erect, watching Bordelli from behind her glasses.

‘Vhat can I do for you?' she asked in a strong German accent, pulling the shawl tightly around her. Her hair was all white and gathered into a perfect bun at the back of her head. Bordelli had the feeling that someone was spying on him from behind a shutter on the first floor, but he pretended not to notice.

‘And you are Signora …?' he asked.

‘I am baron's housekeeper,' the woman said icily.

‘And his name is …?'

‘Baron von Hauser.'

‘And you are …'

‘Miss Olga.'

‘Is the baron at home?'

‘No.'

‘May I ask where he is?'

‘Baron ist alvays travelink, he's not often at home.'

‘Does anyone else live here?'

‘No.'

‘You live here alone?'

‘
Ja
.'

‘Year round?'

‘I don't understant … Vhy all these qvestions?'

‘I'm sorry, somebody called in and reported a shooting in this area.'

‘I hear nothink, I go to sleep early.'

Bordelli threw his hands up and smiled.

‘Well, that's all I have to ask. Sorry again for the disturbance. Goodnight,' he said.

‘Goodnight,' the woman replied, poker faced.

Bordelli gave a slight bow of respect and headed back towards the gate, but after taking a few steps he stopped and turned round to face the woman again.

‘One more question, Miss Olga … Have you got a Doberman in this house?'

‘No.'

‘Do you know by any chance if any neighbours—?'

‘I don't know much about dogs,' the woman interrupted him, with a note of scorn in her voice.

‘All right, then. Goodnight,' said Bordelli, and he headed back down the dark garden path. Closing the gate behind him, he noticed that the woman was still standing in the doorway. He walked back towards the Beetle without turning round, and moments later heard the sound of the great door closing.

In the car he found Casimiro asleep. The dwarf's head had fallen to one side, and he was snoring. The moment Bordelli started up the car, the little man raised his head abruptly and rubbed his eyes.

‘I wasn't asleep,' he said.

‘I'll take you home.'

‘Did you discover anything, Inspector?'

‘No, but there's something fishy about all this,' said Bordelli, staring into space. Then he turned the car round again and headed back towards town. During one straight stretch of road he pulled his wallet out of his jacket pocket, took out two thousand lire, and put the money in Casimiro's hand.

‘You could use a little, no?' he said. The dwarf hesitated for a moment, as he always did, then took the money and put it in his shoe.

‘Thank you, Inspector, I can't be too picky,' he said darkly.

‘Cigarette?'

‘No, thanks … If you want, I can try to find something out myself.'

‘But you've already shat your pants once …' Bordelli said, laughing.

‘I'm not afraid,' the little man said, slightly offended. He didn't like to be seen as a coward.

‘Never mind, Casimiro, it might be dangerous,' Bordelli said in a serious tone.

‘Why dangerous?'

‘You never know.'

‘I know what I'm doing,' said Casimiro, squeezing the little skeleton tightly in his hand.

‘And what if you run into another puppy dog like the last one?'

‘I'll bring a pistol this long …' said Casimiro, playing the tough guy. He seemed in the grip of a fit of pride.

‘This isn't a cowboy movie, Casimiro … But I may have another little job for you in a few days,' Bordelli lied, already trying to think of something. Once he had even had the little guy tail Diotivede, telling him the doctor was a mafioso …

They rode for a few moments in silence. The Beetle descended slowly towards the city. At San Domenico, Bordelli turned to pass by way of the Badia Fiesolana for no reason in particular, perhaps only because he wanted to see one more time the steep descent he used to take in his toy wagon, always risking a broken neck.

‘Have you got any news of Botta, Casimiro?' Bordelli hadn't seen Ennio Bottarini for quite a while. He wanted to arrange another dinner party at his place, with Botta at the cooker. The luckless thief wasn't a bad cook at all. He'd spent a number of years in jails across half of Europe and had learned from his various cellmates how to make the local dishes.

‘He must be still in Greece,' said Casimiro.

‘Free or in jail?'

‘A few days ago I ran into a friend of his, who said Botta'd made a little money down there and is supposed to return soon.'

‘You don't say …'

*  *  *

A few days later, a phone call came in to the station, and Bordelli set out in his VW, stepping hard on the accelerator. As usual, young Piras was with him. It was almost 7 p.m., and the sun had already set a while before.

There was a big crowd at the entrance of the Parco del Ventaglio, along with three police cars with their headlamps on. Bordelli parked the car beside the gate and got out, blood pounding in his brain. Piras walked beside him in silence. Ever since the tough, intelligent lad had joined the force, Bordelli had been bringing him along on every investigation, and to avoid always having a uniform at his side, he'd told him to dress in civvies. He got on well with Piras, just as he had got on well with Piras's father, Gavino, during the war.

The moon was covered by a thick blanket of cloud, and the park was as gloomy as the sky. To their left was a grassy slope, steep and dark, and at the top of the hill shone the glow of the police's floodlights, as a crowd of people gathered round. Bordelli and Piras began to climb. The soles of their shoes slipped on the wet grass, and the cuffs of their trousers were soaked after only a few steps. They heard a siren in the distance. When they got to the top of the hill, Bordelli started clearing a path through the crowd, advancing in long strides. Piras followed right behind him, stepping into the opening before it closed again. There were already some journalists scribbling in their notebooks, as well as a few photographers. The press were always the first to arrive on the scene, though it was never clear how they did it.

The inspector kept elbowing his way until he got to the police cordon. And suddenly he saw her: under the white light of the police lamps, the little girl looked like a bundle of rags thrown on the grass. She lay face up at the foot of a big tree, legs straight and arms open, like a tiny Christ. The inspector went up to her, with Piras still following, and they both bent down to look at her. She must have been about eight years old. Her mouth and eyes were open wide, and she had jet-black hair tied in a braid that was coming undone. She was so white in the light that she seemed unreal. And on her neck were some red marks. Her jumper was pulled up, and her belly bore the traces of a human bite. Bordelli looked at her a long time, as if to burn that image into his memory, then turned towards his Sardinian assistant. They looked at each other for a few seconds without saying anything.

Busybodies were falling over one another to get a look at the child, grimacing in horror and exhaling vapour from their mouths. A few women could be heard weeping and, farther away, someone was vomiting. But what most bothered Bordelli was all that commotion of legs and shadows around the little girl's dead body. He pressed his eyes hard with his fingers. He felt very tired, though perhaps it was only disgust for what lay before him.

The sound of the siren grew closer and closer, and the inspector wondered whether it was indeed coming towards the park, since, at this point, he thought, the blaring sirens were useless. The girl was dead, and nobody was to touch anything before Diotivede, the police pathologist, got there. Bordelli glanced at his watch. How bloody long was Diotivede going to take? He took one of the uniformed policemen by the arm.

‘Rinaldi, do you know if anyone saw or heard anything?'

‘No, Inspector, nobody saw or heard anything.'

‘Then please send them all away.'

‘Yes, sir.'

Suddenly a man's voice was heard above the crowd: