Conor Fitzgerald: The Namesake

‘Not what the law says. I meant, could you just walk away from it all?’

‘Yes, I could,’ said Arconti. The idea had a calming effect on him. Speaking in a softer and more confidential tone, he added, ‘And so could you, Commissioner. Maybe someday you will. Do you have somewhere to go when that day comes?’

‘I couldn’t quit.’

‘You could. It’s one of the advantages of being on this side of the law. It’s the criminals who have pledged lifelong allegiance. If I sold my house in Rome, I could live out the rest of my days up north, walking in the mountains, looking after myself. I might even write a book, like that magistrate from Bari, Carofiglio. He’s done well for himself. Somehow managed to eke out his magistrate’s salary by writing books for a country full of people who don’t read. Are you happy, Commissioner?’

‘With what?’

‘Life. You don’t want to answer, I can see that. You probably can’t. I was wrong just now about your partner. Make this woman your wife if she’ll have you. Marriage is important.’

‘Marriage?’

‘Do you know how the Ndrangheta lets it be known you are about to be killed? They don’t invite you to a wedding. So you see, a wedding is life, absence from one is death.’

‘I see,’ said Blume.

‘You lied to me about being alone. I found out by chance about Chief Inspector Mattiola only this morning. Imagine, I thought that that was going to be the biggest shock of the day.’

‘I’m not married to her. I don’t even live with her.’

‘That hardly matters now. Besides, I was wrong. No matter what you do, no matter where you go, no matter how alone you are, they can hurt you and they will come looking. At least you’ll have someone to stand by you. You know at the start of the inquiry I called Curmaci’s wife — did I mention that? The judge in charge of preliminary inquiries wouldn’t grant me a wiretap, so I called her myself, recorded and transcribed the conversation. Do you want to know what I learned, but am only now realizing?’

‘What?’ asked Blume, more to humour Arconti than because he expected anything useful.

‘I learned that not only is Curmaci invulnerable on that front, she makes him stronger. She counterattacked in a way that makes me think we’re talking not just about a wife but a sorella d’omerta. When she replied to me, it was like she was reading from a script. Maybe she wrote it, maybe she learned it as part of the standard rebuff to magistrates who dare go after the wives.’

‘Isn’t that the sort of move that gets these guys really pissed off with you? Children and wives, the family is somehow sacred and off limits? Could that be why they killed your namesake?’

‘You are not making me feel any better, Blume.’

‘I am not blaming you, Giudice. Going after the criminal’s family is perfectly justifiable.’

‘They were Maria Itria’s cousins that we arrested. We had justification, even according to the warped code of the Ndrangheta. Of course, she knew at once that I was interested only in her husband, but the pretext was there. Do you think I was wrong to go after her like that?’

Arconti seemed to be asking for some sort of permission, which Blume was perfectly willing to give. ‘Wrong — morally speaking? No way. The criminals she helps support destroy thousands of children with drugs and guns, kill women and children with impunity. They rip apart families and communities and poison the land. They run hospitals for profit and money laundering, and leave the sick and infirm to die. Nothing is off limits in getting the bastards.’

‘She could also have been acting out of love for her husband. It’s hard to understand the people from my region.’

‘I don’t want to understand them,’ said Blume. ‘To understand is to forgive, and that’s not my line of business. I’ll understand only for investigative purposes.’

‘That makes it harder to detect sincere repentance.’

‘I don’t get to experience much of that.’

‘No, me neither,’ said Arconti. He surveyed the files he had tipped onto the floor. ‘Look, let me show you the transcript of the call. I gave her your contact details, too, by the way, on the off-chance she preferred policemen to magistrates.’

‘What? Why the hell did you do that?’

‘Good question. I had you figured for a more forgiving sort of person, Commissioner. The transcript’s somewhere on the floor now. But it says nothing about her tone. She sounded sad. Aggressive in bursts, but essentially sad. She reminded me of a hostage reading out propaganda. I think there is a slight chance of her talking, if only she had a sympathetic listener.’

‘Not me. You picked up all this from a phone call?’

‘I’m a Calabrian like her. I have an ear for these things. It can’t be nice being trapped for life in a small Calabrian village — well, it isn’t nice. I should know. She’s from Cosenza, you know. That’s on the edge of freedom. The writ of the Ndrangheta is not total there. Almost, but not total. In my town of Gerace and the horrible new town of Gerace-by-the-Sea at the bottom of the hill, Locri as it’s now called, they command everything. No one escapes.’

‘You escaped.’

‘You call this escaping?’

With a grunt of effort followed by what sounded like a sigh of hopelessness, Arconti bent down to retrieve a file from the floor.

‘If I left the police,’ said Blume, addressing Arconti’s curved back, ‘I would not know what to do in life. It’s as simple as that. You get a chance to be good at one thing in life, and most people don’t even get that. If it turns out you don’t like what you’re good at, that’s too bad. The wrong life cannot be lived right.’

Arconti did not reply.

Pity, thought Blume, because he liked the phrase he had just made. The wrong life cannot be lived right. He surveyed the chaotic desk, the bowed-down figure of the white-haired magistrate. ‘Did you write the transcript up yoursel f?’ he asked. ‘If you can’t find it, just give me the gist.’

Arconti still did not reply. Instead, he slid silently out of his chair and fell face first into the scattered files and folders on the floor. Blume leapt up, rushed around, and flicked the magistrate over as if saving him from drowning in a pool of papers. The magistrate’s face was grey, his body stiff and unresponsive.

Dead, just like that. Another dead Matteo Arconti. Two in one morning. A sudden urge to laugh welled up in him, but when it broke his lips, it was as an angry shout.

The magistrate’s gaze was glassy and unseeing, but as Blume looked the right eye suddenly started blinking rapidly, and the right side of his mouth was twitching. In his left hand, he was clutching a piece of paper, which Blume yanked free, as if disarming a wounded criminal. Arconti, so silent in his collapse, was now breathing like a crashed-out drunk, full of snores, gasps, gurgles and murmurs from far down in the throat that sounded like the beginning of violent curses. Blume put his head down to Arconti’s chest and listened. There was a beat there. In fact, there seemed to be several hearts beating at once.

Blume rolled Arconti sideways, stood up, went to the door, opened it, stepped out and found himself looking at a corridor full of seedy lawyers dressed for court and clients dressed, apparently, for running. He ducked back in and, finally, marvelling at the slowness of his own wits, pulled out a phone and called an ambulance.

Then he sat down in the middle of the papers, and did his best to comfort Arconti, whose right eye had stopped moving but whose lip continued to twitch.

‘I don’t know if you can hear me, Magistrate — Matteo? I think you’ve had a stroke or a seizure. The ambulance is coming. You’ll be OK.’ He tried to think of some other comforting thing to say, pulling the piece of paper he had taken from Arconti’s hand out of his pocket in the hope it might inspire him. He saw it was the transcript Arconti had been reaching for. ‘See, you found the transcript,’ said Blume. ‘I’ll read it.’