“No. How about you?”
“No, I haven’t either. Later, if there’s time, we could . . . By the way, what are we doing tonight?”
“I’ll explain on the way there.”
The telephone rang. It was Marzilla.
“Inspector, the car they brought me is a Jaguar. I’ll be leaving my place in five minutes,” he said in a quavering voice.
Then he hung up.
“If you’re ready, we can go now,” said Montalbano.
He put on his jacket with nonchalance, not realizing it was inside out. Naturally the gun slid out of the pocket and fell to the floor. Ingrid recoiled in fright.
“Are you serious?” she asked.
Following Catarella’s instructions, they didn’t miss a single turn. Half an hour after they’d left Marinella—half an hour which Montalbano used to fill Ingrid in—they arrived at the lane of oaks. They took this, and when they’d reached the end, they saw, by the light of the headlights, the ruins of a large villa.
“Go straight,” said Montalbano. “Don’t follow the road and don’t turn left. We have to hide the car behind the villa.”
Ingrid did as he said. Behind the villa was open, desolate country. She turned off the headlights and they got out. The moon lit their way. The night was so quiet, it was frightening. They didn’t even hear any dogs barking.
“What now?” asked Ingrid.
“We leave the car here and we go find a place from where we can see the lane, so we can watch the cars that go by.”
“What cars?” said Ingrid. “Here we won’t even see any crickets go by.”
They headed off.
“Well, we can do what they do in movies,” said Ingrid again.
“Why, what do they do in movies?”
“Come on, Salvo, don’t you know? When the two police officers, a man and a woman, stake out a place, they pretend they’re lovers. They embrace and kiss, but they’re actually keeping watch.”
Now they were right in front of the villa, about thirty yards from the oak tree where the road turned towards Lampisa. They sat down on the remains of a wall and Montalbano lit a cigarette. But he didn’t have time to finish it. A car had come down the lane, advancing slowly. Perhaps the driver didn’t know the road. Ingrid leapt to her feet, held her hand out to the inspector, pulled him to his feet, and wrapped her arms around him. The car approached very slowly. For Montalbano it was like being wholly enveloped by the branches of an apricot tree. The scent made his head spin, stirring up what there was to stir up in him. Ingrid held him very tightly. At one point she whispered in his ear:
“Something’s moving.”
“Where?” asked Montalbano, chin resting on her shoulder, nose drowning in her hair.
“Between us, down below,” said Ingrid.
Montalbano felt himself blush and tried to pull his hips back, but Ingrid kept him plastered against her.
“Don’t be silly,” she said.
For a second the car’s headlights shone directly on them, then it turned left at the last oak tree and disappeared.
“That was your car, a Jaguar,” said Ingrid.
Montalbano thanked the Good Lord that Marzilla had arrived in time. He couldn’t have held out another minute. Breathing heavily, he pulled away from Ingrid.
It wasn’t a chase because at no point did Marzilla or the other two men in the Jaguar have the feeling that another car was following them. Ingrid was an exceptional driver. For as long as they were off the main road to Vigàta, she drove without headlights, guided only by the moonlight. She didn’t turn them on until they reached the main road, since she could easily hide in the traffic. Marzilla drove along briskly, though not overly fast, and this made it easier to shadow him. It was like following someone on foot. Marzilla’s Jaguar turned onto the road for Montelusa.
“I feel like I’m out for a boring Sunday drive,” said Ingrid.
Montalbano didn’t answer.
“Why did you bring your gun?” she continued. “You haven’t been needing it much.”
“Disappointed?”
“Yes, I was hoping for something more exciting.”
“Well, never fear. We’re not in the clear yet, something could still happen.”
After Montelusa, the Jaguar took the road for Montechiaro.
Ingrid yawned.
“Ouf! I have half a mind to let them know we’re following them.”
“Why?”
“To shake things up a little.”
“Don’t do anything stupid!”
The Jaguar drove past Montechiaro and took the road that led to the coast.
“You drive for a while,” said Ingrid. “I’m bored.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“First of all, because soon there won’t be any more cars on the road and you’ll have to turn off the headlights to avoid being spotted. And I can’t drive by moonlight.”
“And second?”
“And second, because you know this road a lot better than I do, especially at night.”
Ingrid turned a moment to face him.
“You know where they’re going?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“To the villa of your former friend Ninì D’Iunio, as he used to call himself.”
The BMW swerved, almost ending up in a field, but Ingrid quickly got it under control. She said nothing. When they got to Spigonella, instead of taking the road the inspector knew, Ingrid turned right.
“That’s not the—”
“I know,” said Ingrid, “but we can’t keep following the Jaguar here. There’s only one road that goes to the promontory and the house. They would definitely see us.”
“And so?”
“So I’m taking us to a spot from where we can see the front of the house. And we’ll get there a little before they do.”
Ingrid stopped the BMW at the edge of a cliff, behind a Moorish-style bungalow.
“Let’s get out. They can’t see our car from here, but we’ll have an excellent view of them.”
They went around the bungalow. On their left they had a clear view of the promontory and the road leading to the villa. Less than a minute later, the Jaguar pulled up to the closed gate. They heard two very brief toots of the horn, followed by a long one. Then the door on the ground floor opened, and against the light they saw the silhouette of a man going to open the gate. The Jaguar drove in, and the man walked back to the house, leaving the gate open.
“Let’s go,” said Montalbano. “There’s nothing more to see here.”
They got back in the car.
“Now, turn on the motor,” said the inspector, “and, with headlights off, we’re going to go to . . . Do you remember that small red-and-white villa where Spigonella begins?”
“Yes.”
“Good. We’re going to take up position there. To go back to Montechiaro, one has to drive by that spot.”
“Who has to drive by that spot?”
“The Jaguar.”
Ingrid barely had time to get to the red-and-white house before the Jaguar went flying by at high speed, skidding at the curve.
Apparently Marzilla wanted to put as much distance as possible between him and the men he’d driven to the villa.
“What should I do?” asked Ingrid.
“Now shalt thou prove thy mettle,” said Montalbano.
“I didn’t get that. What did you say?”
“Follow him. Use your horn, your brights, get up right behind him, pretend you’re going to ram him. You have to terrorize the man at the wheel.”
“Leave it to me,” said Ingrid.
For a stretch she drove on without headlights and at a safe distance; then, when the Jaguar disappeared behind a bend, she accelerated, turned on all available and imaginable headlamps, rounded the bend and started wildly honking the horn.
Seeing that unexpected missile come up behind him must have frightened Marzilla out of his wits.
First the Jaguar zigzagged, then it veered all the way to the right and off the road, thinking the other car wanted to pass it. But Ingrid did not pass him. Riding right on the Jaguar’s tail, she was flashing the brights on and off and continually blasting the horn. Desperate, Marzilla accelerated, but he couldn’t go much faster on that road. Ingrid didn’t let up; her BMW was like a mad dog.