Valerio Manfredi - The Ancient Curse

‘Marcello, can I ask you a favour?’

‘Sure.’

‘You might want to put one of your men on my colleague, Dr Vitali. She’s the one who’s working at reassembling the skeleton. She likes a good time and she can be a bit imprudent on occasion. Now is not the best moment to be wandering off on your own, especially after dark.’

‘I’ve already taken care of it,’ replied the officer.

He put on his cap, slipped on his black gloves and left.

Fabrizio went into the basement to put the tooth back in its place. Sonia wasn’t there but she’d already started her work, concentrating on the skull, which she was assembling on a platform lit by a couple of halogen bulbs. With its hollow eye sockets and huge toothy jaw, it might have seemed a grotesque mask, if he didn’t know the context it had been found in. She had applied little dots of putty along the chalk lines that she’d drawn on the skull, both lengthwise from the nape of the neck to the tip of the snout and crosswise from temple to temple. Each piece of putty held a pin half a centimetre long. The pins had different-coloured heads, depending on the line, which he supposed identified muscles or other anatomical features. Around the earholes the pins were much longer and had yellow heads.

Fabrizio knelt and very cautiously inserted the fang into its socket, then returned to his office and got back to work. The days were becoming shorter now and the small cubicle was soon plunged into shadow. When he was forced to get up and switch on the overhead light, he realized that it was already seven thirty and that the museum was empty. He wondered where Francesca might be and felt like calling her, but then reasoned that if she hadn’t called him she hadn’t felt the need, so why should he?

He backed up his files and rose to leave, stopping on his way out to check on Sonia.

‘Would you like to get a bite to eat with me?’ he asked.

She declined his invitation. ‘I’m sorry, but I’m just too tired to go out. I’ll just have a glass of milk at the hotel and go to bed.’

‘Don’t forget to set the alarm before you go,’ Fabrizio reminded her.

He left the museum and headed towards Signora Pina’s place for some dinner.

There were still a few tourists out and about and when he turned into Piazza dei Priori he noticed quite a few people sitting outdoors at the two main cafes, having a drink before dinner. He deliberately walked between the tables so he could hear what people were talking about in the city besieged by a bloodthirsty monster and realized it was soccer. There was an early National League game that evening: Milan versus Fiorentina. Everyone was making predictions and placing bets. No one much liked the line-ups that had been announced and everyone had a smarter strategy to propose.

There was a little breeze coming from Via San Lino, carrying the scent of hay and mint all the way to the big grey-stoned square. A radio somewhere was playing an old classic, ‘Struggle for Pleasure’, and the music made Fabrizio feel melancholy, despite the quick beat. It seemed crazy that he was having dinner all alone without either one of his attractive colleagues, but Sonia was too tired and Francesca must have been busy if she hadn’t thought to call. He decided to take his time, strolling through the centre so he could check out the shop windows and bookshops. By the time he entered the trattoria, it was well past eight.

Pina came to take his order and brought him some bruschette and a glass of white wine to start. A group of teenage boys were already sitting in front of the TV, waiting for the whistle that would signal the start of the game, and there was a party of Germans at a long table downing one carafe after another while they waited for their food.

Pina got everyone served and came to sit at his table, seeing he was the only guest she’d be able to talk to now the game had begun and the Germans were already tipsy as well as impossible to understand.

‘Want to hear the latest, Doctor?’ she asked him with a mysterious air.

‘I most certainly do, Signora Pina,’ replied Fabrizio, imitating her tone.

‘The other night I saw a light filtering out from the cellar of the Caretti-Riccardi palace.’

‘Someone had gone down to get a bottle of wine,’ suggested Fabrizio.

‘Nothing to joke about, Doctor. A living soul has not crossed that threshold,’ she said, pointing at the front door, ‘since the late Count Ghirardini left, and he only lived there two or three years in all.’

‘So what was it, then, ghosts?’

‘Well, I certainly don’t know about that, but you tell me, you who are a man of letters and have an education. Who could have been down there at one o’clock in the morning, wandering around that cellar? Just thinking about it gives me goosebumps.’

‘Someone, somewhere must still own the place. Maybe he came by to pick up something he needed…’ His voice trailed off as he realized how lame his reply sounded.

Pina shrugged. ‘They say that you’re studying the statue of the thin young boy at the museum.’

‘That’s the truth, but I’d like to know who told you that.’

‘Oh, this is a small place, people talk. You’re a stranger and everyone’s wondering what’s so special about that statue. It’s been there forever and no one has ever noticed it before now.’

‘You’re right, there’s nothing special about it. There’s a publisher coming out with a book about the Etruscans and they’re paying me to study a few statues at the Volterra museum. That’s all, Signora Pina. If you wouldn’t mind bringing my bill, I’ll be off towards home, then.’

‘You go right ahead, Doctor. Goodnight. Well, will you look at that?’ she added, glancing out the window.

‘What?’ asked Fabrizio.

‘Oh, nothing. It’s just the fire chief, who sleeps with attorney Anselmi’s wife. Oh, that’s right, it’s the weekend. The lawyer will have been at his other office in Grosseto yesterday and he’s probably still there.’

Fabrizio shook his head and got up. Joyful shouts exploded from the group clustered around the TV, leading Fabrizio to conclude that Fiorentina had scored. He paid his bill, tossed his jacket over his shoulders and walked out towards the Caretti-Riccardi palace instead of retracing his steps. He walked along the pavement that flanked the building down the whole block and noticed that every so often there was a heavy iron grating covering the cellar’s ventilation ducts.

The doors and windows were all closed and the paint was peeling. He’d walked practically all the way around the building and was approaching the facade when he heard the squeak of a door opening.

He ran around to the front and caught a fleeting glimpse of a child letting himself in from a smaller entrance next to the main door. Fabrizio saw him quite well in the lamplight: a slight, slender boy with short hair and big dark eyes. But it all happened very quickly. The child disappeared inside and the door clicked shut behind him.

Fabrizio ran to the door and knocked repeatedly but got no answer. The main door was covered with rust; it looked like no one had opened it for ages. The side door seemed firmly locked but evidently someone still had the key.

He walked off, perplexed. Who could that child be? If he’d had time, he would have been curious to go to the land registry office to find out who the current owners were. Maybe some well-heeled family from Milan living on Via Montenapoleone who had so many properties they’d forgotten about this one. Before turning on to Via di Porta dell’Arco, he glanced back impulsively at the dark mansion and saw a reddish reflection flashing briefly from behind one of the ventilation ducts on the rusticated base. He started and began to feel as if he were seeing things. He fought the urge to go back and take a closer look and turned instead towards the music that was coming from one of the little cafes in the centre, which sounded appealingly normal and real.