No formalities of any sort at the border, of course. You simply drove across an invisible line and were, equally invisibly, in Switzerland. Politically Italian, financially Swiss, but to all intents and purposes offshore, Campione was a useful anomaly which attracted many sophisticated and wealthy foreign residents such as himself. The principal amenity it had to offer, although not to Italian citizens, was its negligible rate of income tax, the assessment for which was at the discretion of the local authorities, but almost equally important to Nestore was the fact that Lugano was just a short drive or ferryboat ride away across an unsupervised frontier. That made various things so much easier, notably banking.
There were many fine establishments in Lugano, but he favoured the UBS, partly for the discretion and professionalism of their staff, and partly because it came raccomandata by no less a figure than Roberto Calvi, who before being found hanged under Blackfriars Bridge in London had paid a seven million dollar backhander to the Socialist party leader Bettino Craxi through that very bank. Nestore reckoned that what had been good enough for the late lamented Dr Calvi would be good enough for him.
Despite its international flavour, due not least to the casino whose profits provided all the municipal income, thereby abolishing all other rates and taxes, Campione was geographically a dead end, almost forty kilometres from the country of which it was nominally a part. The one way out reflected this, a narrow unimproved country road running between nineteenth- century villas set in huge walled gardens above the lake, then ducking underneath the huge swathe of the autostrada up to the San Bernardino and Gotthard tunnels, before trickling into the insignificant village at the head of the lake.
He left his Mini Cooper — a personal toy that Andreina didn’t appreciate, but which Irene certainly did — in the Swiss Federal Railways car park and went off to feed the machine at the entrance. The Swiss might be happy to let the residents of Campione pay virtually no taxes whatever, but God forbid you shouldn’t pay for your parking ticket.
A thickset man with a spectacularly broken nose was sitting on a bench at the end of the mainline station. A huge jaw, ratty eyes set too close together, jug ears, shaven head. Black suit, narrow rectangular shades. Not Swiss, Nestore thought idly, returning to place the ticket on the dashboard of the Mini. He prided himself on being able to spot people’s nationality at a glance, sometimes even their profession.
He walked across the metre-gauge rails embedded in the roadway to the bar opposite, with its typical lakeside array of lindens, palms and dwarf pines. Here he checked the timetable for the mountain railway and then ordered a large espresso and a glass of kirsch. He was going to need a bit of fortification before his appointment with Alberto. Amazing, he thought. Of all the stupid things he’d done, and there had been plenty, this was the last that he had ever imagined would come back to haunt him. On the very rare occasions when he thought about it at all, he’d always imagined it to be as dead and buried as Leonardo himself.
Anyway, apparently the corpse had turned up. So now what? ‘We need to talk.’ Meaning of course that Alberto need¬ ed to talk. And what would the talk amount to? That they were all in this together, a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, all for one and one for all, etc, etc. That would be about the extent of it, and it was all perfectly obvious, but it was only too much like Alberto to seize this heaven-sent opportunity to bore him to death.
Not to mention insisting on this absurd secret rendezvous! As if anyone cared about Operation Medusa any more. Those days were long over, far longer indeed than the intervening three decades of calendar time. The innovative ideas of that period were now accepted and its various political causes were all lost. Obsessed as always with the conspiracies and counter-conspiracies which went with his fanatical half-baked patriotism, Alberto was probably the only person left in the country who didn’t realize this.
A blue and orange two-coach electric unit came to rest in the road opposite, pushing a small wagon filled with two large metal rubbish bins and plastic-wrapped cases of mineral water destined for the hotel at the summit of the mountain. Nestore tossed back the rest of his kirsch, crossed the road and took a seat at the very end of the rear carriage. From there he could keep an eye on anyone who boarded after him. They all seemed to be the expected crew of sightseers and hikers. The ugly pug had left his bench and was now taking something from the boot of a red Fiat Panda in the parking lot. It had Italian number-plates, quite unusual here. The minute hand of the station clock clicked to a vertical position and the train jolted into motion.
Nestore leaned back in his seat as the train rumbled across the mainline tracks, under the concrete cliff of the autostrada, gripped the rack rails and hauled itself through a thick growth of elder trees up the steep lower flank of the mountain, then through a sharply curving tunnel almost as narrow as the one to which they’d taken Leonardo and out on to the eastern slopes of the ridge in a ravine of dense beeches. There was no undergrowth here, just the tall erectile trees, most of them retaining their dead leaves, and the brown mulch of beech nut casings below. The air-brake system exhausted its excess pressure with a loud hiss. The thug down at the station could have been Alberto’s companion or driver, thought Nestore idly. Alberto himself would have taken an earlier train, and return by a later one. The old fart always had been a stickler for security procedures, not to say obsessed with conspiracies and plots of every kind.
Bellavista station was a passing loop set in a level clearing in the beeches before the railway started its final climb towards the summit. There was a small buffet and booking office, both closed at this time of year. A sign above the door stated that the altitude was 1223 metres, while another on a pole nearby indicated that the walking time to Scudellate and Maggio was two hours, and to Castel San Pietro two and a half. The air was distinctly colder and sharper than down by the lake.
Nestore waited by the station building, apparently shortsightedly peering at the timetable, until various hearty types in brightly coloured hiking gear had dispersed along their respective paths. Once they were out of sight and the train had continued on its way, he looked around him. There was no one in view, and the only sound was the soughing of the breeze through the beeches, which were mostly bare in this more exposed spot. The ballast between the tracks was thickly covered in their crisp umber leaves.
It was beginning to look as though he had been stood up. And there was nothing he could do except wait for the next train down to Capolago. Another and very nasty thought crossed his mind, namely that Alberto’s call had just been a ruse to draw him away from his home. The hood at the station had been there to check that he did indeed board the train, and as soon as it left he had driven to join Alberto in Campione and force an entrance to the villa. They could be going through his papers right now, noting down all the secrets of his business and financial dealings with a view to blackmailing him. Andreina might even be in peril! Dream on, he thought cynically.
Then he heard a low whistle. He turned and saw a figure standing at the edge of the trees on the other side of the tracks. After a moment’s hesitation he started towards him.
‘Alberto,’ he said neutrally when he drew close enough.
The other man had been inspecting him closely as he walked towards him. Now he nodded once, as if to confirm the resulting identification.
‘Nestore.’
He gestured towards the path from which he had emerged, a narrow ribbon of bare earth winding off into the forest.
‘Shall we?’
Alberto seemed to have changed only in the sense that leftover fondue changes from a bubbly sauce to a compact, grey, gelatinous mass. He had lost some hair and put on a bit of weight, but both his physique and his peremptory manner were essentially unaltered.