Valerio Varesi - River of Shadows

“Even the Po devours what it has created. Everything is changing all the time. In the party, no more than twenty years ago, they taught us that history is on the march, towards a better future. Now, not only has optimism disappeared, but so has the party. Don’t ask me to say that things are getting better. Just like the Po, we’re marching towards the filth of some stinking sea,” Barigazzi said.

He gulped back the last drops of Fortanina, slammed his bowl noisily down on the table and rose swiftly to his feet. He was on his way out when the other three got up to follow him, in silence.

The mobile rang while the Alfa was travelling through the mists of the lower Po at the speed of a horse-drawn carriage. This time, Angela’s voice did no violence to his eardrums, and this of itself was sufficient to put him in a state of alarm.

“You need to keep your finger in the hole in the dyke and can’t get away, is that it?”

“I’m doing my level best to get back, but the fog is so thick you could lean your bicycle against it.”

“Don’t worry. If you do get lost, the worst that could happen is that you’d end up in a fast food joint.”

“I’d rather end up in a ditch.”

“Don’t overdo it.”

“I’ll content myself with a glass of Fortanina and some spalla cotta.”

“Poor thing! They’ll hear your tummy rumbling all the way to the Alps. Do you know that Juvara has been searching high and low for you all day?”

“In some areas you can’t get a signal. But how did you know that?”

“I was down at the police station. I’ve been handed a public defence case.”

“When will I see you?”

“Forget it, it’s almost ten o’clock. I don’t like being kept hanging about by men. It’s better the other way round. But if you’d asked me earlier…” she teased, leaving the suggestion hanging in the air.

“I was late because I had to question the men at the boat club. Today I went to the barge where I found a note that said something about a partisan. Perhaps that’s the key to understanding the motive, but it’s all very puzzling.”

“I’ve never been on board a barge. Anyway, if you’re in your office tomorrow, I’ll see you there.”

“Will you be defending anyone I caught?”

“No, calm down. It’s a small-time dealer picked up by the drugs squad.”

“Just as well.”

“Pity. I’d have made you squirm,” she said, mischief in her voice.

As soon as Angela was gone, he dialled Juvara’s number.

“At long last!” the ispettore exclaimed. “I was about to send a search party along the Po.”

Soneri peered into the mist which made it impossible for him to put on any speed. He was afraid he had completely lost his way, not only on the road but in the investigation he was leading. The sensation was heightened as he listened to the words of his assistant: “Nanetti and Alemanni were both looking for you. Nanetti says he has further results from the analysis of the blood found on the windowpane. It doesn’t belong to anyone in the ward.”

“And Alemanni?”

“I think he was after you for the same reason.”

He felt his stomach tighten with the unpleasant sensation of having got it all wrong. He had set off along the Po searching for the ghosts of times past and for a missing man, while in the city that man’s brother had unquestionably been a murder victim. “Did you tell them where I was?”

“Yes,” Juvara said, with a tremble in his voice.

That tone told him all he needed to know and was in its own way more eloquent than any reproach. He had no wish to go on with the conversation. In annoyance, he pressed the accelerator, but then had to step smartly on the brake when the rear lights of a car suddenly loomed out of the darkness ahead of him.

When he got home, he chose to remain in the half dark in his kitchen, smoking his last cigar, his elbows on the table. Before he fell asleep, with the taste of the Fortanina still in his mouth, he remembered that this was the position often assumed by his father.

Alemanni did not detain him for more than a quarter of an hour. He informed him of the outcome of the tests on the broken window with a degree of pedantry worthy of an infant school teacher, which irritated Soneri, but he refrained at least from making comments on the conduct of the investigation. For his part, Soneri made no reference to the magistrate’s earlier scepticism, but on the telephone Nanetti had set out in detail his impressions. The man must have been at least unconscious before being ejected from the window. There was no sign on the windowsill or on the radiator of any struggle, nor were there any fingerprints, a clear indication that he had not grabbed hold of anything or been able to resist. The only sign of any struggle was the indentation on the steel cabinet where there was the imprint of the rubber sole of one of Decimo’s shoes. Furthermore, no-one had heard the thud, nor had they noted any unusual coming or going. Soneri was curious about the way the killer had struck the blow and how he had stunned his victim. Everything had gone smoothly until the impact with the windowpane and the sound of breaking glass. Then the escape through the ordinary hospital exit. The murderer was plainly a cold-blooded individual, so much so that he had moved off without conspicuous rush, merging in with patients and visitors.

“Juvara!” he yelled.

The ispettore arrived as the secretaries were putting forms in front of him for his signature.

“Interrogate the patients and the nurses in the wards frequented by Decimo Tonna,” he said without raising his eyes from the clerical assistant’s index finger as she showed him where his initials were to go. “I want to know all his movements in the last fortnight and anything he was talking about.”

He was now in the grip of an unhealthy frenzy, and only somewhat later, in the peace of the half-deserted Milord, behind the smoke screen of his own cigar, calmed by the prospect of a plate of tortelli stuffed with herbs and ricotta, did he come to recognize that his anxiety was the product of curiosity aroused on the banks of the Po and capable of being satisfied only there. He brought to mind the faces of Barigazzi and the others, with that slightly contemptuous look they had. He was already aware of a pressing urge to return when his mobile rang. He hated having it ring in the middle of a meal, but he had forgotten to turn it off. The few other diners, hearing the strained tones of “Aida”, turned in mild irritation in his direction. He uttered a peremptory “Hello” to silence it.

“Commissario, I’m in a consulting room at the hospital,” Juvara stuttered.

“Have you broken your leg?” Soneri said, finding Juvara’s preambles more and more tiresome.

“No, but the nurses on duty are telling me something I can’t make sense of…”

“What can you not make sense of?” he said, stuffing a whole tortello into his mouth.

“They say that recently Decimo was extremely nervous and would stare suspiciously at everyone who turned up, and that once they saw him rush off when he noticed someone or other walk down the corridor.”

“Did you get any idea who that person might have been?”

“No, nobody remembers. It was only a brief appearance.”

Juvara’s account had distracted his attention from the tortelli, and when he turned back to it, the dish had gone cold. He could not bear butter and cheese once they formed into lumps and lost the warmth of soul acquired in the oven.

Alceste stared at the plate as though he had espied a beetle on it. “It’s what I always say. The sound of the mobile telephone turns good ricotta bad,” was all he said.

By this time, Soneri was in a state of agitation. Juvara’s report had created for him such a melee of competing scenarios that he could have been in a puppeteer’s workshop. So as not to give way to mere conjecture, he got up and made his way to the hospital. He found the ispettore perched on a high stool in the canteen.