Gold, Frankincense and Dust (12 page)

The commissario’s mind was elsewhere, in a dreamland where the past and the present overlap, with the irreversible loss of Ada and the probable loss of Angela already a part of the landscape. That was what growing old meant – seeing parts of yourself and parts of a shared life fade away. As he forced himself to focus on the crime, memories of his dead wife and his unborn son merged with the image of the girl, producing a fresh surge of indignation inside him.

“I’m grateful for this lead. I’ll go round myself,” he said, cutting short the conversation.

Nina provoked a whirlwind of emotions because she brought back the trauma of the loss of Ada and the sudden disruption of his whole life. This case was running disturbingly parallel to the life he had known. He was unsettled by the realisation that people’s experiences were not so very different and could be superimposed one on top of the other. Not even a solitary soul like him could claim originality.

“What idea have you formed of Nina?” he asked Juvara.

The inspector had nothing to say. The commissario envied his detachment. He was young and could dodge putting awkward questions to himself. There was time enough for that, and in the meantime it was better to let him live.

“The photographer, Dimitriescu, told me she was very shy, and she regarded her good looks as a problem,” Juvara said.

“He confirmed that the photographs were his?”

“Yes. He even remembers when he took them. The first one at the end of high school and the second a couple of years later.”

“They seem two different people.”

“The photographer had the impression she had changed her lifestyle, but he doesn’t know anything else.”

Soneri contemplated the photographs in silence, but he became aware of a level of frenetic activity in the yard outside that was hard to reconcile with the rhythms of life in a sleepy town like Parma. Instinctively he thought of Nina as a naïve girl who attracted attention because of her beauty. Perhaps they had duped her and she had ended up in dubious circles. She reminded him of the fate of dogs abandoned on the motorways, acquired as fluffy toys when they were puppies and tossed aside the first time they peed on the sofa.

“What’s causing all this commotion?”

“The maniac. Some serial rapist on the loose. He’s been prowling after women in public gardens, in doorways, in parks. He’s already raped three. They say he’s a foreigner. Musumeci’s in charge.”

“He won’t be operating during the day, will he?” Soneri said, looking at the grey skies.

“The city’s completely neurotic. People are talking about nothing else. The switchboard’s jammed. They’re seeing maniacs everywhere,” the inspector said.

Soneri was surprised he had known nothing about it, and put it down to the state he was in. “It’ll be the same as with the bulls,” he muttered, “but this guy knows how to keep out of sight a bit better.”

“SEEMS LIKE THEY’VE
got him,” Alceste announced, as he put a plate of
anolini in brodo
in front of the commissario.

“Got who?”

“What do you mean – got who? The sex maniac, obviously. An illegal immigrant, or so they say.”

“So now the witch hunt gets underway once again,” he mumbled to himself as he blew away the steam from the dish. He could sense the opening of the tiresome ritual enacted so many times before: the Right railing in shrill tones against immigrants, the Left asking people not to make a mountain out of every molehill and the Fascists threatening to get their clubs down from the attic. Reality was always elsewhere, the facts denied, and he would have to deal with the consequences.

At least he could still enjoy the consolations of the table, the one pleasure left to him apart from walking in the mist and sitting at home with a book on autumn evenings. Such thoughts were running through his mind as he gazed at the rings in the soup, but they were interrupted when he found Sbarazza standing before him. His gait was so silent and discreet that it was easy to miss his approach, even for a trained eye like the commissario’s.

“Thank goodness you’re here, otherwise I’d have gone
hungry. There’s not one free table and there’s a queue of people waiting.” Three women had just got up from a table next to Soneri’s, and Sbarazza reached out to pick up a plate with an almost untouched chop. Another agile movement and a half-full bottle was placed in front of the commissario.

“A
dolcetto di Ovada
. Not bad,” Sbarazza said

Soneri looked around in embarrassment, but no-one seemed to have noticed.

“Don’t worry, commissario. The important thing is to possess the right measure of self-confidence and nonchalance. When you have these attributes, even the most crass gesture will not arouse the slightest objection, because you need a bit of pluck to make a fuss, don’t you? And in this place,” he added, looking around the restaurant, “who do you think has such pluck?”

The commissario thought again of the girl whose body they had found, and wondered if she had been particularly plucky. “A rare commodity,” he said. “Did you fancy one of the women sitting there?” he asked.

“Each woman draws us into another world. When all’s said and done, that’s what seduction consists of. We’re given a glimpse of the missing part of ourselves.”

“Very much missing,” the commissario replied in a dull voice, thinking of his own situation.

“We always lack something or other. In my case, time is running out. The man out there who is assaulting women lacks a partner, but these are all insignificant and transient passions, like a man complaining of hunger while facing a firing squad.”

His reasoning was delicate and light. Listening to him, Soneri drew some consolation from his words.

Sbarazza went on. “I don’t envy you, you know. For someone who considers the absurdity of our life, it must be
frustrating to have to reconstruct the actions of those who steal and kill. If we were to reflect a little, we would all be forced to be good and to weigh every act, but we are such profoundly irrational creatures, governed by the passions. Our animal side always prevails. The wise man is the one who resists the pull of the passions and ensures that the brain triumphs.”

“If only it were that easy …” Soneri muttered. “Look at you with women.”

“Purely intellectual caprice, aesthetic diversion. Age is of assistance here,” he said with a wink. “I can say that because it was not always thus. I was a fiery youth, and that was my ruination, yet I’d do it all again. The passions, even if they toss you about this way and that, impel you forward. It’s because of them that we keep ourselves active. They move everything forward, transforming the world, perhaps into a repugnant mess, but somewhere in that shambles there’ll be the spring of continual competition towards an ill-defined future.” Putting his face close to Soneri’s, he went on: “Wisdom is something for old men. And never believe it’s a conquest of time. It’s merely the decay of the body.”

Inside himself, Soneri felt heartened. Any unhappiness over Angela was a sign he was still alive. Two police cars with sirens squealing passed by and he decided Sbarazza was right. The world was moved by the passions.

“Have they got him?” Sbarazza said.

“Looks like it,” the commissario replied without much conviction, and before Sbarazza could ask him anything else about the maniac on the loose, the commissario got up so quickly that he seemed to be running away.

Refreshed and consoled by this conversation, Soneri set off for the lingerie shop in Via Garibaldi. En route he called Juvara. “So then, they got their sex maniac.”

“If only! They arrested a Moroccan, but he was freed two hours later because he’d nothing to do with it. He was quarrelling with his girlfriend and somebody decided he was assaulting her.”

“Give me some background. When did all this start?”

“Yesterday evening, a woman was attacked in Via San Leonardo, and the description of the rapist fitted one given by another woman who’d been assaulted in Via Solferino two days ago. It was probably the same man who also sexually assaulted a girl in Via Toschi.”

It was true. Instincts and passions were what motivated people, and when these exploded outside the confines of law, he had to take over. He could hear sirens in the mist as the city attempted to cope with the tension created in its innermost being by an insidious virus capable of spreading and striking randomly.

The owner of the shop he went into shortly afterwards must have felt herself threatened, judging by the wary eye she cast on Soneri. She relaxed only when he introduced himself.

“Is there a Romanian girl who comes here?” he said, showing her the photograph.

“Ines. Certainly. A wonderful person.”

Evidently she mistook her for her sister.

“Does she buy her underwear here?”

“She is a very faithful client. If only I had more like her.”

“What kind of thing does she buy?”

“Oh, all kinds. Unlike other clients of mine, she doesn’t have one definite style. One day she might purchase a very girly, matching set with lace and frills, and then two days later she would walk out with a much plainer outfit. Sometimes she would choose very sexy, see-through lingerie, but at other times she would take articles more fit for a young girl, with little angels embroidered into it. She would go from top of
the range to economy items. In other words, there are no fixed rules with her.”

“One of a kind, you mean,” Soneri said, trying to make sense of what the woman was telling him.

“In general my clients have precise tastes and always choose the same type of article. Most times I get it right when I interpret their wants, but with Ines … in addition … such a beautiful young woman. I’m sure men go crazy over a girl like her.”

“Did she ever come with a man?”

“Women never buy lingerie in the company of men, if for no other reason than not to spoil the surprise,” she said flirtatiously. “However, now I think of it, I was once struck by seeing Ines get out of a dark car. There was a man at the wheel, but he stayed in the car and I didn’t see his face.”

“Do you remember what make of car it was?”

“I’m sorry, but I can’t help you there. All I saw was a horse design on one side.”

The commissario remembered Manservisi’s account. It must have been the same sticker. “Do you have any idea where she lives?”

“Nearby, in Via Cavallotti, but I don’t know the number. She didn’t speak much about herself, and if the conversation turned to her, she would change the subject.”

The commissario moved towards the door, and the woman followed him.

“Will you get him?” she asked apprehensively.

He looked at her generous figure, her enormous calves, her feet spilling out of her shoes and decided that she ran no risk of being assaulted. He shrugged and walked away.

A hundred metres further on he turned into Via Cavallotti, which in mid afternoon was deserted. He started peering at the nameplates like a postman on his first round,
but there were so many names missing and those which were there belonged mainly to immigrants – Arabs, Moldovans, Russians, Albanians and Indians. Read in haste from top to bottom, the names sounded like the morning roll call in the Foreign Legion. At number 12, in a recently renovated block of flats, there were no names, only the numbers of the individual flats: 1/1, 1/2, etc. Instinctively he believed that Nina lived there, a belief suggested by the air of de luxe mystery hovering about the block and by its defensive, forbidding chestnut door with shining copper rings. He was tempted to go in, but elected first to obtain a search warrant from the magistrate Marcotti, who still knew nothing of his belief that Nina and the girl burned by the roadside were one and the same, with all that that involved.

The light was fading under the advancing front of mist enveloping one side of Via Garibaldi and wafting around the arches of the Pilotta as though a river had suddenly evaporated and was gushing down from the parapets. The sky darkened as if it had been coloured by the stroke of a brush and the whole city was plunged into shadow. He dialled Angela’s number once more, but all he got was the voicemail. Seconds later, his mobile rang and he answered as quickly as a sprinter getting off the blocks.

“I’ve disappointed you yet again,” Nanetti teased.

“Cut it out,” Soneri said.

“You’re waiting for a call, I know.”

The commissario muttered something, but could not conceal his impatience. His colleague accompanied him along a street he had never liked. Like a tourist guide, he took note of every stage of the walk. He could not get Angela out of his mind, and still wanted her. “Anything new?” he said.

“We have the girl’s identikit and she’s very like the one in the photograph. I’d say there’s no doubt,” Nanetti said.

“I’ll send Juvara to visit Signora Robutti and the haberdasher who sold Nina her underwear to see if she recognises her.”

“Haberdasher! The way you speak you’d think we were still in the Fifties. The place is called Intim Shop and it sells lingerie, not underwear. And it’s not even correct to call it a shop. Where have you been all these years? It’s a boutique!”

“Fuck off!” Soneri said. The air all around was filled with the sound of sirens. He snapped shut the mobile without saying goodbye as he watched a police car screech to a halt under an ancient plane tree in Piazzale della Pace. Esposito jumped out as though he were in an American gangster movie and raced over the grass in the direction of the fountain and the monument to Verdi. The commissario followed him, but after a few strides he realised how seriously unfit he was. The soles of his shoes slipped on the damp grass, and he lost ground with every step he took. The extra kilos made him almost bend double as he ran, but in spite of that after a few seconds he caught up with Esposito, who was himself out of breath and panting.

“Did you see him?” Esposito managed to gasp.

“Who was I supposed to see? I was coming after you.”

“The bloody bastard,” Esposito swore. Other policemen emerged from the mist. “There was a call to say that the maniac had been sighted harassing some poor girl.”