“Before we go to the cops and flush my life down the toilet, there’s something I want to say to you.”
Her voice was seething with rage and violence. Perhaps she was expecting me to ask what it was she wanted to say. I didn’t, and that only stoked her fury.
“The only reason I had sex with you was to control you, to keep you from finding out about what we did.”
Well, then, perhaps we should say that it didn’t work out the way you planned, I thought as I nodded my head.
“It was a real effort. I was faking it the whole time. You disgust me. You’re old, and when you’re lying there with Alzheimer’s, pissing on yourself, or you’re hobbling down the street with a Moldavian caregiver holding you by the elbow, I’ll still be young and pretty, and I’ll think back with loathing on the day I let you lay your hands on my body.”
Now, hold on there a minute. You’re taking it a little too far, sweetheart. I’d like to remind you that there are twenty-two years between us, not forty. It’s a big difference, sure, but when my caregiver is taking me for a walk, you’re not exactly going to be in the first blush of youth yourself.
That’s not what I said, but I was seriously considering saying it when she put an end to my dilemma and the whole uncomfortable situation with a final flash of real class.
“Piece of shit,” she said, just in case the concept she had explicated a minute earlier hadn’t been clear to me. Then she spat in my face, jerked open the car door, and got out.
I sat there motionless, watching her walk down the sidewalk in my rearview mirror.
I saw her go up to Navarra and then vanish with him, once and for all, into the Carabinieri barracks.
Only then did I wipe my face clean and drive away.
38.
For a few minutes, I thought I would give Fornelli a call, tell him what I’d uncovered, and leave it to him to inform Manuela’s parents.
After all, I’d done the job they’d hired me to do. In fact, I’d done much more. They had asked me-Fornelli’s words were still in my mind-to identify any further lines of investigation to suggest to the prosecutor, to keep him from closing the case. I had gone well beyond that request. I had done the further investigations myself. I had solved the case, and so I had more than fulfilled my responsibility.
It wasn’t my job to tell Manuela’s parents what had become of their daughter.
Like I said, for a few minutes that was my plan. During the course of those few minutes, I picked up my phone to call Fornelli repeatedly; each time, I put the phone back down. A lot of things went through my mind. And in the end, I remembered the time-it might have been two years ago-that Carmelo Tancredi invited me out for a spin in his inflatable motorboat.
It was a beautiful day in late May. The sea was calm, the light opalescent.
We set out from San Nicola wharf, steered north, and an hour later we were in the ancient port of Giovinazzo. It was a surreal place, almost metaphysical. There was no sign that time had passed over the last two or three centuries. There were no cars in sight, no antennas, no speedboats. Only rowboats, medieval ramparts, little boys in their underwear diving into the water, large seagulls gliding through the air, solitary and elegant.
We ate focaccia and drank beer. We sunbathed. And we talked a lot. As so often happens, we went from idle chitchat to deep discussion.
“Do you have rules, Guerrieri?” Tancredi asked me at one point.
“Rules? Never gave it much thought. I don’t think I have any explicit rules. But I imagine I have some, yes. What about you?”
“Yeah, I have some rules.”
“What are your rules?”
“I’m a cop. The first rule for a cop is never to humiliate the people you have to interact with in your job as a policeman. Power over other people is obscene, and the only way to make it tolerable is to show respect. That’s the most important rule. It’s also the easiest one to break. What about you?”
“Adorno said that the highest form of morality is never to feel at home, not even in one’s own home. I agree. You should never get too comfortable. You should always feel a little bit out of place.”
“Right. For me, another rule has to do with lies. You should try to tell as few lies as possible to other people. And none to yourself.”
He thought for a few seconds, then added, “Which is of course impossible, but you should try at least.”
The port, awash in opaque sunlight and unseasonably muggy heat for May, slowly dissolved as the lights of the city and the frantic chaos of evening traffic reappeared. Tancredi’s words shimmered out of that seascape and into my car, where they stayed, hovering in midair.
You’re wetting your pants at the idea of meeting the girl’s parents and giving them the news. So you look for excuses and you tell lies. To yourself, which-as we were saying-isn’t a good thing.
Isn’t it up to you to tell the parents? If not, whose job is it?
No one else’s job but mine. End of discussion.
I stopped thinking. From then on I did everything as if in a trance, and it all came easily to me. I called Fornelli, explained the bare essentials to him, and told him I’d drive by his office to pick him up so we could go see Manuela’s parents together. He might have wanted to say something or raise some objection, but I didn’t give him time. I hung up and started the car for what seemed like the thousandth time that day. I was about to experience the worst part of the whole horrible story.
When we got to the Ferraros’ house, they were expecting us. Fornelli had called ahead, and when I saw their faces, I knew they already understood what was coming.
For the third time in less than two hours, I told the story of what I had found, and what had happened to Manuela.
I told them almost everything.
I kept a few parts of the story to myself. The fact that Manuela was a coke dealer, and the way the young couple disposed of her corpse. I decided that I had the right to spare myself that agony, at least. Of course, sooner or later they’d find out everything, down to the last cruel detail. Not that evening, though, and not from me.
When I said that Manuela was dead, Rosaria Ferraro rested her head in her hands, and I thought she was going to scream. But she didn’t. She just emitted a muffled sob and then remained motionless for a long time, her head in her hands and her mouth half-open, in a still image of mute, infinite, intolerable sadness.
Antonio, aka Tonino, Ferraro was seated slightly behind her, leaning on a table. Tears started running down his face, and then he began to sob. And there I sat, watching and listening, because there was nothing else I could do.
Luckily, it didn’t take long. Three quarters of an hour after I walked into the Ferraro’s house, I was back in my car. I dropped Fornelli off after helplessly sitting through a long monologue about how amazing it was that I had discovered what I had discovered, and how I would have to tell him all the details in the coming days. And, of course, I should represent the family as civil plaintiffs in the upcoming trial, he said, as we shook hands.
Absolutely not, I replied. He’d need to find another lawyer. Something in my voice, or my face-or both-must have dissuaded him from trying to change my mind, or even asking me why.
I walked into my apartment; I felt enveloped by, and pervaded with, a perfect, throbbing exhaustion.
I greeted Mister Bag and told him that I would be with him in two minutes, no more. I walked into my bedroom, calmly undressed, and carefully and thoroughly taped up my hands. Then I put on my gloves. There are times when you have to do things right.
I boxed for half an hour. I was loose and I was quick, as if the exhaustion and other things that I carried inside me-things much worse than exhaustion-had been transformed into a fluid and mysterious energy.