Involuntary Witness (16 page)

“How was the search organized?”

“As well as the state police I also called upon the municipal police. Of course I also reported the fact to my superiors in Bari. I ought to mention at once that the captain was on sick leave, so that I was in command of the Monopoli detachment. In any case, after the very first phase, personnel from HQ also took part in the search. The next morning we also put the dog-handling units to work.”

“Did anything of relevance emerge from the work with the dogs?”

“Yes, sir. We took the dogs to the villa and started them from the point at which the boy was playing when last seen. The dogs set off confidently, crossed the square immediately outside the gate of the villa, reached the lane that leads to that particular group of villas from the Capitolo Provincial Road, went the length of that lane as far as the main road and then stopped. That is, at a point corresponding to the intersection of the lane with the main road the dogs lost the boy’s scent. We took them to the other side of the road, then for some hundreds of yards in one direction and the other, with no result. The last point at which they gave a sign of picking up the boy’s scent was the intersection between the lane and the main road. From this fact we deduced that the boy had boarded a motor vehicle.”

“When was the boy found? And how?”

“Yes. We found the body of the boy in the vicinity of Polignano, down a well, out in the country near the coast. An anonymous message had been received by the carabinieri station at Polignano.”

“What did the person say on the telephone?”

“He said that the child we were looking for was in a well, in the locality of San Vito, in the territory of the Commune of Polignano. He stated exactly at what point the well was to be found, that is, he said something in the nature of ‘at such and such a milestone’ ... I don’t now remember which. In any case, he mentioned State Road Number 16.”

“Can you tell us if this person had any particular accent?”

It was time to intervene.

“Objection, Your Honour. Leaving aside for the
moment the fact that we are concerned with an anonymous telephone call, I point out that, as I understand it, the lieutenant did not receive the call in person. These questions regarding the tenor of the telephone call – granted for the sake of argument that they are admissible, but this we will discuss later – should be put to the carabiniere who received the call.”

The judge said I was right and did not admit the question. The examination went on monotonously about the history of the investigations up to the moment of Abdou’s arrest. The lieutenant had confined himself to coordinating operations, had not taken part in the searches, had not interrogated the chief witnesses, and was therefore from my point of view of secondary importance.

The judge said I could now put questions, if I had any.

In point of fact I had very little to ask the lieutenant, and could easily have done without cross-examining him at all. But I had to make the jury aware of my existence. I therefore said yes, I did have a few questions to ask the witness.

“So, Lieutenant, you have said that the telephone call reporting the boy’s disappearance reached your operations room at ...”

“At 19.50 hours.”

“At 19.50. Thank you. And the patrol you sent out, when did that arrive at the grandparents’ villa?”

“The time it takes to get from our station in Monopoli to Capitolo. I should say a quarter of an hour, twenty minutes at most.”

“At what time did the child disappear?”

“How can I give an exact time ...”

“Look here, Lieutenant, I have asked you that question because you, in replying to the prosecution,
said that the patrolmen realized the child had already been missing for two hours.”

“Yes, of course, I mean to say that it was my men who informed me of this circumstance.”

“Would you therefore kindly tell the court, on the basis of the data in your possession, at roughly what time the child disappeared?”

“A couple of hours before, as I said.”

“And therefore ...”

“At about six, more or less.”

“The child disappeared at about 18.00 and the grandfather called at 19.50. Is that correct?”

“They are approximate times.”

“Yes, the child disappeared at approximately 18.00 and the grandfather telephoned at 19.50. Correct?”

“Yes.”

“Have you, even informally, asked the grandfather what reason he had for waiting nearly two hours before giving the alarm?”

“I don’t know why he waited. They probably went hunting around—”

“Forgive me for interrupting, Lieutenant. I did not ask you for your opinion in this regard. I asked you to state whether the grandfather said for what reason he waited for those – nearly – two hours. Can you answer that question?”

“I don’t remember if he mentioned it.”

“Do you remember having asked him, even informally?”

“No, I don’t remember.”

“It is therefore correct to say that you do not know what happened during the two hours between the child’s disappearance and the report of it on the telephone.”

“Excuse me, Avvocato, at that time we were busy
looking for the boy, organizing search parties and so on, not concerned with how and why the grandfather delayed reporting it, always supposing he did delay.”

“Certainly, no one is disputing the correctness of your actions. I want to ask you only a few more questions. Before the public prosecutor interrupted you, you hinted at the fact that the boy’s parents are separated—”

Now the public prosecutor interrupted me too.

“Objection, Your Honour. I do not see what the fact that the parents are separated has to do with the proceedings.”

Cotugno also put his oar in.

“The civil party supports the objection. This is a family which has suffered a tragedy, and I cannot see what motive there may be for introducing private matters with no bearing on the question before the court.”

As a rule I would not have persisted. I had asked the question simply to feel out the ground and because Cervellati had interrupted the lieutenant on that point. But now the reactions from the other side seemed to me excessive. So I thought I would push the matter a little further. To see what happened.

“Your Honour, I do not understand the strong reactions of the public prosecutor and the civil party on this point. I intend absolutely no lack of respect for the family of the child and the tragedy that has struck it. In any case, I fail to see how my question could have such an effect. My only interest is in understanding what happened during the minutes and hours after the disappearance and whether the child’s parents took part in the search.”

“Within these limits you may continue, Avvocato.”

“Thank you, Your Honour. So we were saying that the boy’s parents were – or are? – separated. Is that so?”

“So I believe.”

“When did you learn of this circumstance?”

“When I went to the house.”

“The child’s parents were there?”

“No.”

“Do you know where they were?”

“No ... that is, I think the mother was away on a few days’ holiday, and I don’t know where the father was.”

“How did you learn of these facts?”

“They were reported to me on my arrival by Signor Abbrescia, the grandfather on the mother’s side.”

“Did Signor Abbrescia tell you whether the parents had been informed of the disappearance?”

“Yes, he told me that he had got in touch with his daughter on her mobile and that she was on her way back, I don’t remember where from. Or perhaps they didn’t tell me. In any case, late on in the evening I saw the boy’s mother, there at the villa, which we were using as a base for our search.”

“And the father?”

“Look, I can’t tell you about the father. I saw Signor Rubino the following day, but I don’t know when he arrived or where from.”

“Do you know if he was on holiday too?”

“No.”

“Do you know if the grandparents telephoned the father, as well as the child’s mother?”

“I don’t know.”

“In more general terms, do you know who informed the boy’s father?”

“No.”

“In any case, on the evening of the disappearance
the mother had arrived and the father not. Is that correct?”

“It is.”

“Thank you, I have no more questions.”

In actual fact these were pointless questions. The separation of the parents had nothing to do with the child’s disappearance, with the trial or any of the rest of it. The prosecution and the civil party were probably right in objecting.

But I had very little room to move. Very little indeed. So I had to do something, even loose off shots at random, in the hope of hearing some sound, learning if in that direction there might be some way. Some track to follow.

Handbooks for lawyers would have said that this was the wrong way to set about it.

Never ask questions for which you cannot foresee the answer. Never cross-examine blindly, without having a precise object in mind. Your cross-examination must be punctiliously planned, nothing left to improvisation, because otherwise you might even strengthen the position of your adversary. And so on and so forth.

I’d really like to see the fine fellows who write such manuals conduct a damned trial. I’d like to see them in the thick of the noise, the dirt, the blood, the shit of a real trial. I’d like to see them apply their theories then.

Never cross-examine blindly.

I’d like to see them at it! Me, I was forced to go ahead blindly. And not only in the trial either.

 

 

That hearing continued with several other witnesses. There was the carabiniere who had received the call which enabled them to find the boy’s body. He said that the anonymous voice was
strange
. The prosecutor
wanted to know more. He would probably have liked the witness to say that the accent was
Senegalese
. The carabiniere, however, did not help him out. The accent, for him, was simply strange, which meant everything and nothing.

Then there were the dog handlers, who added nothing to what the lieutenant had said. Then the fireman who had gone down the well to fasten the sling around the boy’s body and haul it up. A distressing, useless account.

Then we heard some of the habitués of the Duna Beach establishment. They knew Abdou, some had bought things from him, all of them remembered that from time to time the Senegalese stopped to chat with them on the beach. They said that they had also sometimes seen him talking to the little boy. I asked them how Abdou behaved, and they all said he was always friendly, that he had never behaved oddly. As for him and the boy, they had almost seemed to be friends.

We were to have heard the police doctor who performed the autopsy, but he wasn’t there. He had sent a justification and asked to be heard during a later hearing. The judge was not sorry to get away a little earlier than expected. The trial was adjourned until the following Monday.

My fear was that by then, alas, the heat would have started. We couldn’t always be so lucky with the weather, not in June.

A couple of weeks had passed since that evening with Margherita. In the interim we had neither seen nor spoken to one another. A strange thing had happened to me the following morning: I had felt guilty. Towards Sara, I think.

It was a strange thing because it was Sara who had left me and had been living a life of her own for over a year and a half. And yet, absurdly, for the first time I felt I had betrayed her. For the sole reason that I had enjoyed myself that evening in Margherita’s company.

When we were married and living together I had done a lot of rotten things. They had made me feel uncomfortable, sometimes they had caused me to despise myself. But they had never really made me feel guilty, as I did after that evening.

I have often thought back on this phenomenon. At that time I didn’t understand it. Now perhaps I do.

One grows fond even of grief, even of desperation. When we have suffered a great deal on account of a person, we are shocked by the fact that the grief is growing less. Because we think that means, yet again, that everything, really everything, comes to an end.

It isn’t true, but I was not yet ready to understand this.

And I had not called Margherita. I had not called her because I was afraid of losing my grief. What strange creatures we are.

However, it was she who called me. I was in a bookshop at about half-past two in the afternoon, my
favourite time. There’s never anyone around, one can listen to the music and, with no people there, even catch the odour of fresh paper.

When I answered the mobile I was giving a quick reading to an essay. An old technique I acquired when I didn’t have the money to buy all the books I wanted.

What was I doing? Well, I was in a bookshop. Would I care to have a cup of coffee with her? Yes, I would. In just the time it would take me to get home from Laterza’s. About ten minutes. No, I didn’t want the decaffeinated, a proper coffee would be fine. See you soon. Yes, I’m glad to hear from you too. Really glad.

While I was – without realizing it – hurrying home, it occurred to me that I didn’t remember giving her my mobile number, that I didn’t recall having talked about my sleeping problems and the decaffeinated coffee. And that I was glad she’d called me.

She greeted me by taking my hand, pulling me gently towards her and kissing me on both cheeks. A friendly, almost comradely greeting. Yet it gave me that certain feeling in the pit of my stomach, and I blushed a little.

She had me sit on the terrace, which was north-facing and therefore cool and shady. We drank our coffee and lit up cigarettes. She was wearing faded jeans and a short-sleeved T-shirt bearing the legend:
What the caterpillar thinks is the end of the world, the rest of the world calls a butterfly. Lao-tzu
.