The Fatal Touch (47 page)

“How much is in there?”

“Five grand.”

“I’ll add another three. They’ll probably start at fifteen. Getting them down to eight shouldn’t be hard. They’re not so good at this sort of thing.”

“So you think you should be the one to get the paintings from them.”

“Can you think of a better person?” said Paoloni. “It’s the only . . . ” He stopped as the phone in the apartment trilled and the dog started growling.

“He hates the sound of that phone,” said Paoloni. “The only person who still uses that number is my ex-wife.” He pointed at the growling dog. “Dog says what I think.”

Paoloni reached for the phone on the sideboard, and picked up, rolling his eyes, then turning away so Blume would not have to listen.

The dog ambled over, yawned, stuck his head between Blume’s legs, and snuffled contentedly at his genitals. With one bite, thought Blume, the beast could castrate him in revenge for being abandoned to Paoloni’s care.

“I didn’t think it was possible, but Filomena is worse as a mother than she was as a wife,” said Paoloni, putting down the phone. “Fabio didn’t come home after school and she immediately assumes he’s here with me playing with the PlayStation. That’s the worst she could come up with: video games. If she had any idea what he really gets up to.”

Blume couldn’t call Fabio’s face to mind. What age was the child now—fifteen, sixteen? He asked the only thing he remembered. “Does he still play soccer?”

Paoloni nodded eagerly, pleased to be asked. “He does. As a matter of fact, he’s captain. Not a complete loss, then. And I exaggerate about his behavior. He’s got his act together this year. Gets sevens and eights instead of fours and fives at school. He even said he liked, what was it? Math or science or something improbable.” He hoisted the bag onto his lap. “No point in delaying this thing. You need the paintings back, I can get them. Let’s do it.”

“I’m not sure, Beppe.”

“If you had a better idea you’d have said it by now.”

Blume glanced at his watch. Almost eight. Should he go to Caterina now, or wait for Paoloni to come back with the paintings? Paoloni could take hours.

“Where are you going to get the cash you were talking about?”

“I’ve got some stored away. Don’t you worry about that.”

“Then you call me, soon as you get it done?”

“It could take some time. Also, I don’t want to be caught with you directly afterwards. Wouldn’t do my credibility much—
cazzo
!” The phone was ringing again. “That woman has no patience.”

Paoloni spoke, alternating hushed tones with raised voice. He made some comforting sounds, then got annoyed, and slammed down the receiver.

“Fabio’s not at any of his friends’ houses, according to his unbalanced mother,” he said. “He doesn’t usually pull this kind of stunt. Like I said, he’s been doing better recently. I’ll kill the little bastard when I get him. Puts his mother through this sort of worry, then she takes it out on me. It’s not what he usually does.”

“He never goes off without telling anyone? I thought all teenagers did that.”

“No,” said Paoloni. “He’s done plenty of shit, but not that. No need, since we always let him go. Personally, I think having friends is better than being good at school. No point in ending up smart and alone, is there? But after this, I’m going to ground him.” He slid an uncharacteristically apologetic note into his tone. “Look, would you just call in and see if there have been any, you know, accidents or incidents in this area?”

Blume took out his phone too quickly, fumbled, and dropped it. “No problem.”

“You look almost as worried as his mother sounds,” said Paoloni.

“Go and get those paintings, Beppe.”

“Maybe I should wait till I get news of Fabio.”

“Go get them now, Beppe. I mean it. The sooner you get them . . .”

“What? The sooner I get them, the sooner what?”

“The sooner all this is over. I’ll find Fabio for you. I’ll call you when I’ve found him. I’ve got nothing else to do.”

Paoloni stood up, pushed the envelope under his arm, and walked out the room. Minutes later he was back. “You don’t have to worry about paying back the difference.”

“Thanks. I appreciate this. But I’ll get the money back to you.”

“Another thing.” He handed Blume the three notebooks. “No point in keeping these here. If they come looking for them, this will be the second place they’ll look. If I were you, I’d just burn them.”

Blume took the notebooks back without any great pleasure. “Thanks, Beppe.”

“Yeah. Listen, just now you said you would find Fabio . . . that was a strange way of putting it.”

“What was strange about it? If I find him, you know, maybe a patrol car will spot him on a corner. If I don’t find him, it means he’s back with his mother.”

“Just let me know,” said Paoloni.

They left together. As Paoloni climbed into his car, he said, “I don’t know how long this will take. I’ll call you when I’ve got something.” He paused. “It’s the
motorini
that scare me most. Death traps. Let me know immediately if there’s been an accident.”

“He’ll be fine,” said Blume.

“Yeah. But let me know, eh?”

Chapter 40

While caterina was washing the dishes, wondering about Blume’s weird self-invitation and dark warnings about staying in, Elia appeared at the doorway and informed her, with wonderment in his voice, that AS Roma had as good a goal average as Inter Milan, even though Inter was eight points ahead in the Championship. Did that strike her as in any way fair?

She feigned interest in this, and was rewarded with a series of statistics demonstrating beyond argument that AS Roma, despite frequent losses, seemed to be just as good as any other team in the Championship or, indeed, Europe.

Warming to his theme, Elia wondered who she thought they should use as the center-forward for the game against Palermo on Wednesday night? She frowned, thinking hard, until he offered a few names and thoughts of his own. She picked a name. Baptista. Elia was amazed. It was exactly the name he had been thinking of. Clearly she was not so completely out of the loop as all that. Now, as regards the defense, was Mexes better than . . .

When he had finally finished, she told him to go to bed. She went into her bedroom, took her pistol from its hiding place in the closet, loaded it. By the front door she unhooked a framed poster from the wall to reveal a cavity in the wall that housed the electricity meter. She placed the pistol there, and hung up the poster, looking at it for the first time in years. It was an impressionist’s work, showing a beautiful garden. She checked the name of the artist. Camille Pissarro. Probably Italian in origin. All the best artists were Italian.

Caterina looked at her watch. It was a quarter to ten already. Elia had to be in bed by nine-thirty and was usually asleep within twenty minutes or less. They had by unspoken mutual consent abandoned her attempts to read him bedtime stories. Instead, she listened to more soccer facts, while she helped him undress, brush his teeth, and climb into bed. She sat there for a while stroking his head until he told her to stop. She picked up his trainers and carried them to the shoe cupboard in the hall. They were like two dirty white barges. Size 35. One size smaller than hers.

At a quarter past ten, she went into her son’s room, kissed him on the forehead, noting again how much he sweated in his sleep. Usually she left his door ajar, in case he called out. They liked to remind each other of their company in the apartment. He called out less often now. Tonight she would close it.

She undressed and put on a green sweatshirt, gray soft cotton pants, a pair of red woolen socks. It was not the most alluring getup, but it was her house and this is what she wore indoors. Besides, she was far from certain she wanted to allure anyone. Blume was coming round because her child had been threatened. Hardly a reason to put on makeup and high heels.

While she was in the bathroom removing her makeup, the buzzer to her apartment rang. She stopped in mid movement, a blackened cotton ball pinched between her fingers, staring into the mirror at her tense face staring back. Then she said aloud to herself, “That will be him. Early.”

She let the cotton fall into the sink and walked toward the front door. The buzzer rasped again, and she unhooked the Pissarro, touched her Beretta, then answered the intercom.

“Inspector Mattiola?”

Not Blume. A woman. A girl. “Emma?”

“Yes, can I come up?”

“Are you on your own?”

“Yes.”

Caterina paused, her finger hovering over the button.

“I really need to talk,” said Emma. “And I have something I want to show you.”

“Is there no one down there with you?”

“No. What do you mean? There’s a police car across the street, two policemen in it, if that’s what you mean.”

“Police or Carabinieri?”

“Police.”

“How did you get my address?”

“You’re in the book. You are the only Mattiola, C. in Rome.”

She waited, listening to Emma’s breathing and the background sound of traffic.

She watched the corridor through the peephole in her door, and just as Emma, who was carrying something, stretched out her hand to knock, she swung the door open, catching the girl by surprise and leaving her with a slightly guilty look.

Caterina led Emma into the living room, and watched as she cast around looking for a place to sit. She finally chose the armchair, and placed the object she had been carrying flat on the floor, face up. It was a framed picture. Caterina looked down at it. It was filled with dark greens, blues, and a muddy brown. It seemed unfocused, or like someone had smudged it while it was drying. A garden again, maybe before a storm. The garden of a big house, or maybe a public garden. She preferred her Pissarro.

Caterina sat down on the sofa.

“Are we alone?” Emma asked quietly.

“My son is in bed asleep.”

“I’m sorry about this,” said Emma.

Caterina nodded. “Tell me what it is before apologizing for it.”

“As you know, the Colonel and that Maresciallo turned up at my mother’s house today,” said Emma. “I’ve been staying there, in Pistoia. The Colonel said they were looking for paintings that Treacy had sent or she had taken, and my mother, looking him straight in the eye, said Treacy had sent her a painting once and she had sent it back. I never knew she could lie like that. But the Colonel did not believe her, and they just started looking around.”

“You could have called the police.”

“The two of them are pretty intimidating, and maybe they had a magistrate’s warrant. It’s easier to imagine all the things you should have done afterwards,” said Emma. “After a bit the Colonel comes back. Behind him is the Maresciallo, seven framed paintings under his arms. Four of them are works by Treacy, ‘in the style of Old Masters,’ as he used to put it in his dishonest way. The fifth—I can’t remember what it was. I think it was an original painting by some seventeenth-century Dutchman. I can’t even think of a name, now. Ter Borch, maybe—probably another Treacy fake. And the last two were nothing to do with Treacy. He left us all the modern-style works, making sure he damaged them and my mother’s feelings first. He says, ‘These modern works here are obviously yours,’ and starts circling the room, unhooking the paintings, breaking open the backing boards as if this was the most natural thing in the world, then checking out the canvas, smelling it. At one stage I think he even licked his finger, smiling all the time and shaking his head to show how pathetic he thought they all were.”

Emma sat back with a sigh, and said, “Have you got a drink?”

“Only bottles of sweet stuff that I take out and put away again at Christmas without opening. Do you want some of that?”

“No vodka?”

“No.”

“All right,” said Emma. She half slipped a stockinged foot from her shoe. Caterina looked down at her own spreading thighs, her cotton running pants.

“I’m waiting,” said Caterina.

Emma resumed. “Then he sits down. The Maresciallo comes up, hands him a file folder and a tin. He puts the tin in the middle of the table, opens it, picks out a round brown ball wrapped in crinkled plastic, unwraps it, pops it into his mouth.

“ ‘Give me your hand,’ he says, plucking another ball from the tin. I refused. ‘From England. Uncle Joe’s Mint Balls. Very hard to find here.’ Then he pulls out pages of numbers with the TIM logo on it and fans them out on the table. He explains it showed the connections my BlackBerry had made with cell masts and the GPS satellites during the day on which Treacy was killed. It showed, he says, that I was with Treacy until late. So I asked him how he knew Treacy was with me all that time, and for a moment he stopped sucking the candies, then he smiles, and says, ‘Good point. I like that. We’ll have to get witnesses, too, won’t we?’ Then he asks if I had accompanied Treacy to the place where he was found dead, and I told him I had accompanied him part of the way.

“ ‘So you do not deny you were with him moments before his death,’ said the Colonel. And I sort of shrugged at that. I expected more questions, but then he announced, ‘None of that matters, the case is being filed away since we do not suspect foul play.’ ”