Marco Vichi: Death in Sardinia

But it was no use. Giannino lived only three more days. As he was dying he kept saying his right foot hurt, the one that had been amputated.

The inspector felt his heart start to grow calmer. He lay down on his back and, looking into the darkness with eyes open, continued to wander randomly through his memories.

He remembered Cayman’s broad smile. They called him that because of some silly resemblance he supposedly had with the animal. The war had reached Cayman during his third year of studying philosophy at university. He shamed everyone with his vast culture, but one was always sure to be amused in his company. He said Jesus Christ was just a poor fanatic who had read too much Plato, and that was exactly why he liked him.

But to believe he was the son of God was a bit much. Despite the sophistication of his arguments, Cayman cursed like a docker, and when he wasn’t talking he looked like the coarsest of them all. He had survived five years of mines and bombs only to die at the hands of a drunken Pole after the war had ended. Stabbed twice in the back for an empty wallet. Bordelli saw again the train that had taken Cayman back home: a train full of corpses crossing half of Italy, dropping off more dead at each stop. A dirty train driven by dirty men. But there was also something cheerful about it, because it travelled through a country free at last of Nazis and home-grown Fascists, a destroyed, shattered country that nevertheless hoped for something better than having to deal with pricks like Badalamenti.

When he opened his eyes that morning, the first thing he thought of was his beating heart. Putting his hand on his chest, he had the impression it was more sluggish than usual. But it was only an impression, he told himself. It was already nine o’clock. Getting up out of bed, he immediately felt dizzy, but for only a second or two. No need to worry, Inspector, you’re just a little tired. You really ought to take some time off every now and then. A proper holiday. It’s probably been ten years since you last lay down on the sand by the sea, thinking of nothing …

He went into the kitchen in his underpants to make some coffee, then drank it slowly, looking out the window. The sky was clean. He felt strange and ached a bit all over, but perhaps he’d only slept badly. He slowly got dressed and went into the bathroom to shave. Grabbing the shaving brush, he moistened it, slapped it across the soap a few times, and before lathering up his face, stood there with his hand in the air … He’d often heard such things as: He lathered up his face, started shaving, when suddenly, pow! He collapsed on the floor . No, he wouldn’t like that. He rinsed the brush and put it back in its cup. No shave today, he thought, looking at himself in the mirror … No shave, no heart attack. Not that he really believed it, but that morning he simply preferred not to shave, nothing more.

He went out into the street and pulled his trench coat tightly around him. The sun was shining brightly, but it was cold. He bought a newspaper in Piazza Tasso and started walking towards Badalamenti’s building. On the front page blared the headline: the most amazing feat in aeronautics history: rendezvous in space . Gemini 6 and Gemini 7 had met up in weightless space, and the astronauts had waved ‘hello’ through their portholes. Everything had gone quite smoothly, and the Americans had reconfirmed their supremacy in matters of space travel.

Bordelli folded up the newspaper and stuck it under his arm. Before long they would be travelling to the moon, while back on earth, loan sharks still preyed on honest people.

There was only one week left before Christmas, and the shop windows were full of blinking lights and colourful festoons to enchant children of all ages. He absolutely had to remember to get a present for his friend Rosa, a former prostitute. He knew how much it meant to her. Even at her age, Rosa was as innocent as a child, and she loved getting presents. But Bordelli lacked imagination when it came to such things, and he feared that on the evening of the 24th he would still be wandering about the centre of town without any idea of what to get her.

When he got to Badalamenti’s building, he opened the front door with a key and climbed the stairs to the top floor, feeling winded. Bloody cigarettes. He removed the seals and pushed the door open. The sickly-sweet smell of death was still strong and seemed to stick to his skin.

He started wandering lazily about the flat. The rooms were rather large and had high ceilings. There were two bedrooms, a sort of sitting room, the study in which the body had been found, a big kitchen and a spacious bathroom with a tub. The killer had had the sangfroid to remain a good while in the apartment and ransack every room, including the bathroom. To judge from the state the flat was in, it had been an angry and summary search. Drawers upended on to the bed, clothes scattered across the floor, papers everywhere. Who knew whether the killer had found what he was looking for? Maybe not. Otherwise, instead of continuing to turn the flat upside down, he would have stopped at some point.

Bordelli postponed his first cigarette of the day until later and phoned police headquarters from the study. The previous day Rinaldi and company had continued to question the neighbourhood residents until late in the evening. He had faith in Rinaldi, who was young and efficient.

‘Anything of interest?’

‘Not much, Inspector. There was only one witness, an elderly lady called Italia Andreini, who lives in one of the buildings opposite Badalamenti’s …’

‘What did she say?’

‘She said that one night about ten days ago she couldn’t sleep, and so she bundled herself up, opened the window and started looking outside. It was raining hard. It was about two o’clock in the morning, and the piazza was empty. After a while, she noticed someone coming out of Badalamenti’s building. Average height, slender build. From the way he moved, she thought he was young. But that was all she could say, because the square was dark and the guy’s head was covered with a hood because of the rain. The lady is certain he didn’t see her, because she had the lights off. The guy walked fast and went towards Piazza Piattellina. But that’s all, Inspector.’

‘No cleaning lady?’

‘Nobody knows anything.’

‘Very well, then, go and get some rest,’ said Bordelli, hanging up.

They were getting nowhere fast. He went back into the hallway, hung his trench coat on a peg and got down to work.

He started searching the rooms calmly one by one. He rifled through armoires already ransacked by the killer, pulled them away from the wall to look behind them, searched under and on top of every piece of furniture, under the beds, pulled out the few drawers left in place and emptied these out on the carpets, climbed on to chairs and tables to search the ceiling lamps. In the kitchen he even looked inside the coffee can and the sugar bowl. In the study where the body had been found there was a brown jacket hanging from the back of the chair.

Searching its pockets, he found a golden key chain with the keys to the Porsche and put it in his own pocket.

The more he got to know the flat, the more depressing and cold it seemed to him. It was a far cry from the sort of cosy nest most people like to withdraw to. He realised that his own place was a lot nicer … with its grit-tile floors, its bathroom with fine, yellowed porcelain, its worm-eaten furniture inherited from some old aunts of his father’s whom he’d seen only in photographs.

He stuck a cigarette between his lips and, without lighting it, continued searching the flat. He did it calmly, convinced that sooner or later something would turn up. He had all the time in the world. If he’d searched his own place the same way, he would surely have found countless things he didn’t even remember he had.