The Crocodile (19 page)

Rinaldi nodded. “I don’t think I have anything more important in my schedule right now, signora. I’m at your complete disposal.”

Just then, the secretary stuck her head in and announced, “The two ladies are here.”

Sweetheart, my darling,

We’re almost there. The last spin of the merry-go-round. Not a bad metaphor, you have to admit it; it suits the situation, doesn’t it? Or maybe not, now that I think about it. It’s still a little early for the merry-go-round.

I’ve finally opened the window. Not too much. Let’s say that I’ve drawn the curtain a bit.

The panorama of this city seems so strange to me. It’s like a pasteboard backdrop. You know what I mean—the kind of props you see on low-budget TV shows. But really, there’s nothing there.

Everyone walks with their head down, rushing around, and if anyone looks anyone else in the eye, it’s with hatred or with fear. Of course that’s fine by me, you know what we have to do. But for them? I remember what you said, when you told me about the people here, and as usual I couldn’t agree with you more. You’re so right.

But I don’t have time to waste pondering these matters. I have a lot of things to do. I really can’t spare a second for anything else.

Yesterday, I drew up an initial action plan, and I think I’m going to have to forget about the idea of doing it with him still in the house. It’s too risky; there are too many variables. This isn’t like the other times. I’ll have only one chance and I can’t afford to make any mistakes. So like a good boy, I sat down and wrote out the whole timeline, all the arrivals and departures. It’s no simple matter: his work varies, he goes to construction sites, he drives around, he has no fixed schedule. Sometimes he even spends the whole afternoon at home. I can see him from here.

He plays with the baby girl.

It’s odd, don’t you think? An older father, so in love with his daughter. If you have such a powerful instinct, if it’s something that’s so important to you, you’d think about it earlier, wouldn’t you? Well, it doesn’t matter to us, does it, my darling?

The important thing for us is that I’m almost finished, and soon I’ll be able to wrap my arms around you again.

She, on the other hand, strikes me as a woman from bygone times. She reminds me a little bit of my own mother. She’s Mamma to a tee, inside and out. You should see her when she looks at the baby: she’s transfigured, as if there were a light glowing from within her.

I’ve decided that I’m going to have to equip myself in a slightly different way than I expected. But I’m not going to tell you quite how. I want to leave an element of surprise for you. Otherwise, how boring, don’t you think?

In any case, there’s really very little time left. It’s a matter of days. Maybe only a day or two.

Sweetheart, my darling.

Lojacono concentrated to the best of his ability, aware that the first time the three of them came into contact would be absolutely decisive. He had arranged for the two women, upon arrival at police headquarters, to be taken to separate waiting rooms: he would have to observe instantly whether or not they recognized each other, or whether there was at least a hint of uncertainty.

He and Piras had evaluated the real possibility that Rinaldi and De Matteis already knew each other. They were members of the city’s high society, a fairly restricted milieu, so it was virtually impossible to think that they’d never met before.

De Matteis walked in, accompanied by a policeman. She was well dressed, the same as she had been at her daughter’s funeral, her hair neatly groomed, lightly but neatly made up, an elegant dark dress suit, a silk scarf around her neck. Her eyes were shielded by a pair of dark glasses. Lojacono recalled the delirious expression she’d had the last time he’d seen her. As she came in she nodded to Piras, who’d already questioned her, and then she recognized Rinaldi and extended her hand.

“Ah, Doctor. I heard. My condolences.”

Rinaldi smiled with his mouth, if not his eyes, and gave the woman’s hand a faint squeeze.

“Signora. I’m so sorry to hear about your loss.”

Passing acquaintances, nothing more, Lojacono concluded. Those two have nothing more in common than a small circle of friends.

All the same, he ventured, “Do you two know each other?” Rinaldi turned to look at him. “We’ve met at a few benefit dinners, and perhaps at a party or two. I don’t actually get out much. But Signora De Matteis is not a patient of mine.”

The woman confirmed with a nod. “Yes, I think the last time was more than a year ago, at the Piromallis’ place, if I’m not mistaken.”

So there was nothing between the two of them.

The woman took a seat in an armchair, and Rinaldi too sat down, as stiff as before. Both of them were embarrassed by the other’s grief. They didn’t know each other well enough to give full rein to their grief as they might have wanted; a long, well-consolidated habit of formality prevented them from doing so. It was a difficult situation to manage.

Piras took a stab. “As I was explaining to the doctor, signora, we’re here to try to see if we can find another way to fathom the tragedy that has struck you both. You must surely understand that any connection between the victims—that is, if there is one, and we know of none at this point—would narrow the field considerably, helping us to identify any potential suspect. Of course, this means we’ll be asking questions that may appear, how to put this—indiscreet. We would ask you to have a little patience.”

The woman grimaced. “A little patience, you say? We’re so far beyond patience, dottoressa. We’re at the bottom of a pit, and we’ll never get out of here. Nothing’s going to change for us, please believe me, even if you do find out who did this and you draw and quarter him in front of our eyes. There’s no remedy for this . . . this tragedy. That’s all I have to say.”

De Matteis’s words came out as little more than a whisper, but it still caused a chill to run down Lojacono’s spine. Piras, however, was not someone who could easily be silenced.

She replied sweetly, “Well, that’s one more reason to give us a hand, then. I’m going to ask you the same question we asked Dr. Rinaldi: is there anything in your life, recent or past, that might be cause for revenge or extortion? Any reason for ill will, anyone who might harbor a grudge towards you? Thus far, we’ve only looked into your daughter’s circle of acquaintances, and as you know, nothing has emerged. Now I’m referring to you, yourself.”

De Matteis sat for long time without saying a thing, lost in thought.

Then she said, “Dottoressa, I have a complicated, stubborn personality. My Giada and I often argued, to say nothing of our arguments with others. We argued a lot recently, but not when she was little; things were different then. But there’s nothing that could make me even remotely imagine such a thing. A couple of years ago I fired a housekeeper for stealing, but she went back to her home country and we never heard from her again. Of course, there is a person I hate, and he hates me, but he’s Giada’s father, so I’d rule him out, in part because he came back from America purely to upbraid me and accuse me of every crime under the sun. And then left.”

Piras nodded. “Fine. And there are no relations with Dr. Rinaldi sufficient to make us think of a connection between the two families. So we’re back at square one. Let’s bring in Signora Lorusso, whom neither of you has ever met before, I imagine.”

The two exchanged a glance. Rinaldi shook his head no, and De Matteis shifted uncomfortably in her seat. Lojacono decided that De Matteis wouldn’t be able to hold out much longer and was liable to get up and leave any minute.

At a signal from Piras, the secretary left the room and returned immediately with Mirko’s mother, Luisa Lorusso.

The woman was unassuming, dressed in black, her face creased with strain. A tragic mask of unremitting sorrow and grief. Her hair hung grey, lank, and lifeless, her hands were reddened, and there was no sign of makeup. At her neck she wore a pendant with a picture of her son as a child. Her eyes, empty and expressionless, lazily ranged around the room with indifference.

Lojacono, who remembered the terrible voiceless scream that had disfigured the woman’s face the night of her son’s murder, felt a stab of pain for a person who clearly had no intention of submitting to considerations of form or style, unlike the other two, distraught though they clearly were. This really was a dead woman walking. The fact that she was still breathing was a chance detail, and in any case it seemed unlikely to persist.

Immersed in these thoughts, Lojacono came dangerously close to missing the one flash of consciousness that glittered through Lorusso’s glazed eyes. It only lasted an instant, so brief that he almost doubted he’d seen it, but Mirko’s mother had recognized someone—Dr. Rinaldi. Lojacono immediately swiveled his gaze over to the man, and he glimpsed a faint blush on his cheeks. But the doctor had turned his eyes away and now he was staring intently at his coat that lay neatly folded over his legs.

Bingo, Lojacono thought to himself.

He turned to glance at Piras and immediately understood that she had noticed the same thing. Her large dark eyes were wide open and alert.

“Signora, thanks for coming in. We’re on the case, as you well know, and from what we’ve found so far, your son was killed by someone who employed the same technique to kill the children of the other lady and gentleman we’ve invited here this morning. Do you happen to know each other?”

Lojacono appreciated her style: an offhand question, as if merely a round of introductions for the benefit of her guests. Lorusso had regained her composure and was now staring fixedly at Piras. She was still standing, though she’d been invited to take a seat.

“No. I’ve never met the lady and the gentleman. And I don’t understand why you’ve asked me to come in. I’ve already told you everything I know, and your officers have also questioned everyone in the building and all of Mirko’s friends. It seems to me that you already have everything you need.”

The woman’s hostility was unmistakable. She came from an environment where the police were the enemy—certainly not a source of help or assistance. It was equally obvious to Lojacono that when she said that she didn’t know anyone there, she was lying. He decided to go along with it.

“Signora, we’ve seen each other before; I was there that night. You’re right, we talked to you, and to everyone we could track down. We’re trying to understand what happened, and who killed your son. To do that, we need all the help that this lady and this gentleman—and you—can give us. It’s a possibility—and I repeat, just a possibility—that the murderer actually had nothing against these children; that all this is directed against . . . someone else. And that organized crime, for once, might have nothing to do with this murder. If we can only establish some relationship linking the three of you, then we might be able to pinpoint a motive. And once we have a motive, we can catch the killer.”

Lorusso said nothing. She stared at the inspector wild-eyed, as if she were looking right through him.

“What do you think, dotto’, that if you catch the guy who murdered my son, I’ll come back to life? Do you think that if you put him in jail or whatever, I’ve suddenly got a reason to get out of bed in the morning, get dressed, and leave the house?”

The same line he’d heard from De Matteis, thought Lojacono. In his mind’s eye he glimpsed again the vision of his dream: the curve of Marinella’s back, her head bent to one side in the effort of writing.

Lorusso went on, in a conclusive tone of voice. “And in any case, let me say it one more time: I’ve never met this lady and this gentleman. And there’s nothing in my life—like there was nothing in my son’s life—so terrible that he deserved to be murdered. I’m a nurse, dotto’. Every day all I do is tend to people who suffer, people who despair, people who want nothing better than to die. My son wanted to live, and he was my one reason for living. There was no one out there who had it in for him, and even if he was doing some bad, stupid things towards the end, he was doing them to improve our lives. Before long, though, I know he’d have told me all about it, and I’d have put a stop to it. So can I leave now, please?”

Rinaldi and De Matteis got to their feet too. Piras wearily waved them to the door and they filed out.

Stella breathes. She smells the odors and remembers the flavors.
She recognizes her mother, that warmth. Her shape is indistinct, but that skin against her skin, that hand on her face, is something she recognizes, for sure. Unmistakable.

As soon as she feels the pressure, that special smell, Stella starts suckling. She knows that any second now, along with that smell, she’ll sense the taste of that warm gooey substance that gives her nourishment. Her mouth waters, but if food is not immediately forthcoming, she doesn’t cry. Stella is a happy baby.

Stella recognizes the smell of Papa too. The strong grip of his fingers, his long arms. The sensation is different with him. She feels safe, protected. She feels sleepy, and she falls into a contented, smiling slumber, safe in her papa’s arms.

Stella plays.

She feels like laughing when she senses the arrival of the part of the nursery rhyme that she knows. And when they bounce her on their knees, up and down, up and down. She can recognize the colors of the little balls; she especially likes the red one when it rolls to a stop and they hand it to her. She wants to bite it, but they take it right away from her again. Still, even then Stella doesn’t cry; she takes it in good grace.

Stella recognizes her name.

They pronounce that name with infinite tenderness; they whisper it in her ear with a sigh. Every time they say her name, someone caresses her, and so she’s happy and smiles again.

Stella recognizes love.

Her button nose senses love like a scent. She hears love like the beat of the heart that accompanied her for nine months, she feels love pour over her like a warm wave from those who sang her lullabies long before she was born, when she was nothing but a wonderful idea in the mind of the woman who wished for her so ardently.