The Sardinian shrugged. 'So don't do it. Phone in sick or something.'
'For fuck's sake, this is not just another job! I've been recommended to these people! They've been told that I'm an unscrupulous self-seeker, that I cooked the books in the Miletti case and wouldn't think twice about doing so again. They've briefed me, they've cut me in. I know what they're planning to do and how they're planning to do it. If I try and get out of it now, they're not just going to say, "Fine, suit yourself, we'll find someone else."
They've already hinted that if I don't play along I could expect to become another statistic in somewhere like Palermo. Down there you can get a contract hit done for a few million lire. There are even people who'll do it for free, just to make a name for themselves! And no one's going to notice if another cop goes missing. Are you listening to any of this?'
'Ah, finally!' Gilberto cried aloud. 'A big client, Aurelio, very big,' he hissed in an undertone to Zen. 'If we swing this one, I can take a year off to listen to your problems. Just play along, follow my lead.'
He sprang to his feet to greet a stocky, balding man with an air of immense self-satisfaction who was being guided to their table by the unctuous Licio.
'Commendatore! Good morning, welcome, how are you? Permit me to present Vice-Questore Aurelio Zen.
Aurelio, Dottor Dario Ochetto of SIFAS Enterprises.'
Lowering his voice suggestively, Nieddu added, 'Dottor Zen works directly for the Ministry of the Interior.'
Zen felt like walking out, but he knew he couldn't do it.
His friendship with Gilberto was too important for him to risk losing it by a show of pique. The fact that Gilberto had probably counted on this reaction didn't make Zen feel any happier about listening to the totally fictitious account of Paragon Security's dealings with the Ministry of the Interior which Nieddu used as a warm-up before presenting his sales pitch. Meanwhile, Zen ate his way through the food that was placed before them and drank rather more wine than he would normally have done.
Occasionally Gilberto turned in his direction and said, 'Right, Aurelio?' Fortunately neither he nor Ochetto seemed to expect a reply.
Zen found it impossible to tell whether Ochetto was impressed, favourably or otherwise, by this farce, but as soon as he had departed, amid scenes of compulsive handshaking, Gilberto exploded in jubilation and summoned the waiter to bring over a bottle of their best malt whisky.
'It's in the bag, Aurelio!' he exclaimed triumphantly. 'An exclusive contract to install and maintain anti-bugging equipment at all their offices throughout the country, and at five times the going rate because what isn't in the contract is the work they want done on the competition.'
Zen sipped the whisky, which reminded him of a tarbased patent medicine with which his mother had used to dose him liberally on the slightest pretext.
'What kind of work?'
Nieddu gave him a sly look. 'Well, what do you think?'
'I don't think anything,' Zen retorted aggressively.
'Why don't you answer the question?'
Nieddu threw up his hands in mock surrender. 'Oh!
What is this, an interrogation?'
'You've gone into the bugging business?' Zen demanded.
'Have you got any objection?'
'I certainly have! I object to be tricked into appearing to sanction illegal activities when I haven't even been told what they are, much less asked whether I mind being dragged in! Jesus Christ almighty, Gilberto, I don't fucking well need this! Not any time, and especially not now.'
Gilberto Nieddu gestured for calm, moving his hands smoothly through the air as though stroking silk.
'This lunch has been arranged for weeks, Aurelio. I didn't ask you to come along. On the contrary, you phoned me at the last moment. I would normally have said I was busy, but because you sounded so desperate I went out of rny way to see you. But I had'to explain your presence to Ochetto, otherwise he would have been suspicious. This way, he'll just think I was trying to impress him with my contacts at the Ministry. It worked beautifully. You were very convincing. And don't worry about repercussions.
He's already forgotten you exist.'
Zen smiled wanly as he dug a Nazionale out of his rapidly collapsing pack. 'You were very convincing.' Tania had said the same thing the night before, and it had apparently been Zen's 'convincing' performance in the Miletti case which had recommended him to Palazzo Sisti.
Everyone who used him for their own purposes seemed very satisfied with the results.
'So you're in the shit again, eh?' continued Nieddu, lighting a cigar and settling back in his chair. 'What's it all about this time?'
Zen pushed his glass about on the tablecloth stained with traces of the various courses they had consumed. He no longer had any desire to share his troubles with the Sardinian.
'Oh, nothing. I'm probably just imagining it.'
Nieddu eyed his friend through a screen of richly fragrant smoke.
'It's time you got out of the police, Aurelio. What's the point of slogging away like this at your age, putting your life on the line? Leave that to the young ambitious pricks who still think they're immortal. Let's face it, it's a mug's game. There's nothing in it unless you're bent, and even then it's just small change really.'
He clicked his fingers to summon the bill.
'You know, I never had any idea what was going on in the world until I went into business. I simply never realized what life was about. I mean, they don't teach you this stuff at school. What you have to grasp is, it's all there for the taking. Somebody's going to get it. If it isn't you, it'll be someone else.'
He sipped his whisky and drew at his cigar.
'All these cases you get so excited about, the Burolos and all the rest of it, do you know what that amounts to'?
Traffic accidents, that's all. If you have roads and cars, a certain number of people are going to get killed and injured. Those people attract a lot of attention, but they're really just a tiny percentage of the number who arrive safely without any fuss or bother. It's the same in business, Aurelio. The system's there, people are going to use it. The only question is whether you want to spend your time cleaning up after other people's pile-ups or driving off where you want to go. Fancy a cognac or something?'
It was after three o'clock when the two men emerged, blinking, into the afternoon sunlight. They shook hands and parted amicably enough, but as Zen walked away it felt as though a door had slammed shut behind him.
People changed, that was the inconvenient thing one always forgot. It was years now since Gilberto had left the police in disgust at the way Zen had been treated over the Moro affair, but Zen still saw him as a loyal colleague, formed in the same professional mould, sharing the same perceptions and prejudices. But Gilberto Nieddu was no longer an ex-policeman, but a prosperous and successful businessman, and his views and attitudes had changed accordingly.
On a day-to-day level this had been no more apparent ihan the movement of a clock's hands. It had taken this crisis to reveal the distance that now separated the two men. The Sardinian still wished Zen well, of course, and would help him if he could. But he found it increasingly difficult to take Aurelio's problems very seriously. To him they seemed trivial, irrelevant and self-infiicted. What was the point cf getting into trouble and taking risks with no prospect of profit at the end of it all?
Gilberto's attitude made it impossible for Zen to ask him for help, yet help was what he desperately needed for the Project that was beginning to form in his mind. If he couldn't get it through official channels or friendly contacts then there was only one other possibility.
The first sighting was just north of Piazza Venezia. After the calm of the narrow streets from which most traffic was banned, the renewed contact with the brutal realities of Roman life was even more traumatic than usual. I'm getting too old, Zen thought as he hovered indecisively at the ke rb. My reactions are slowing down. I'm losing my nerve, my confidence. So he was reassured to see that a tough-looking young man in a leather jacket and jeans was apparently just as reluctant to take the plunge. In the end, indeed, it was Zen who was the first to step out boldly into the traffic, trusting that the drivers would choose not to exercise their power to kill or maim him.