Valerio Manfredi - The Ancient Curse

Fabrizio couldn’t help but blurt out, ‘Excuse me, I don’t know how you can say that. I came in here the other day and you served me a drink. Remember? When I tried to pay you said, “It’s on the house.” And you were at La Casaccia just a few minutes before that animal massacred Pietro Montanari.’

The woman regarded him as if he were raving. ‘Animal? Pietro Montanari? Young man, are you sure you’re talking to the right person? Lieutenant, would you mind explaining what this is all about? Are you here on official business, and if so what am I being accused of?’

Reggiani tried to explain. ‘Absolutely nothing, ma’am, but my friend here says-’

Fabrizio interrupted him. ‘She’s the one who calls me at night and has made explicit threats about what will happen to me if I don’t cut short my research.’

The woman looked at him in seeming amazement. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know anything about any research and I don’t even know you. You’re either crazy or you’ve mixed me up with someone else.’

Reggiani realized that they wouldn’t get anywhere under these circumstances and he gave Fabrizio a look, as if to say, ‘Let’s get out of here.’

Fabrizio nodded and followed him out, but before he left he turned to look the woman in the eye, to catch her off guard, to see if her expression would give her away. He saw nothing but the face of a sphinx, but before he looked away he noticed she had yellow mud on her shoes.

‘Damned witch,’ he said as soon as they were outside. ‘I swear to you I saw her here the other night. We had a conversation, she threatened me… You don’t believe me, do you?’

Reggiani lifted a hand to calm him down. ‘I believe you, I believe you, but relax for a minute, will you? The only thing I can do is put someone on her. If she’s who you say she is, she’ll betray herself sooner or later. The only problem is time. That’s what we’re short of.’

They were about to get into the car when Fabrizio thought he heard a rustling. He turned just in time to glimpse a child rushing to hide behind the corner of the farmhouse. It looked like the same boy he’d spotted the last time he’d been to Le Macine. ‘Wait!’ he tried to call out, without much conviction, but the child had gone.

He got into the car. ‘Did you notice her shoes?’ he asked as soon as Reggiani had started it up.

‘They looked like normal shoes to me.’

‘They had yellow mud stuck to them.’

‘So?’

‘I’m an archaeologist. I’m quite familiar with the stratigraphy of the soil in this area. It’s the same as the mud we saw piled up by the digger.’

‘Right.’

‘Do you know what that means?’

‘That the woman’s been walking around in this area.’

‘No. She appeared out of nowhere, behind us. If she’d come from outside we would have seen her or heard her. I think she came from underground. More precisely, from a depth of two metres, give or take a centimetre. Now, if I-’

Reggiani slowed down, came to a stop and pulled on the handbrake. ‘Wait. Let me guess. You want to get yourself into more trouble. Listen to me. Don’t get any strange ideas about sneaking around at night to do underground reconnaissance, or anything of the sort. While this creature’s on the loose you’re not moving unless you’ve got company and unless I say so. If you want to stay alive.’

‘Who’s moving?’ grumbled Fabrizio. ‘Sergeant Massaro is always just around the bend in his grey Uno. Almost always…’

Reggiani drove off again, intending to drop Fabrizio off at his house on the Semprini property. Neither did much talking, as each was oppressed by his own nightmares.

‘Know how long we’ve got to go?’ asked Reggiani, turning off the engine. ‘To the start of operations, that is?’

‘A few hours?’ asked Fabrizio.

Reggiani checked his watch. ‘You’re in luck,’ he said. ‘We’ve had a load of problems pulling together the necessary men and vehicles. But in thirty-six hours’ time, not one minute later, the operation will get the go-ahead. If I can do it any sooner than that, I will.’

Fabrizio smiled. ‘See where arrogance gets you? The other police forces not good enough to ask for help? Come on, Marcello, don’t play the tough guy with me. There’s got to be some flexibility built into that deadline. If I should need another two or three hours, say, half a day…’

Reggiani wiped his brow. He looked like he hadn’t slept much the night before either. ‘I trust that won’t be necessary,’ he said. ‘I hope you realize I’m not fooling around here. When you mobilize for an operation like this one it’s down to the minute. Let’s get this straight. Although I hope it won’t be necessary, I’m not going to bicker over minutes.’

Fabrizio lowered his head. ‘Driving out there just complicated matters, didn’t it?’ he said. ‘I never would have thought she could lie so brazenly, without letting out the tiniest bit of emotion. But that yellow mud is an important clue, you’ll see. Goodbye, then. I’ll be in touch soon.’

Fabrizio walked into the empty house and thought he should call Francesca, but the realization that he hadn’t spoken to her for so many hours discouraged him. He didn’t want to have to justify himself or get into an argument. He wasn’t sure what to do next. Ambra Reiter was the only person who knew where the missing fragment of the inscription was, if Montanari had been telling the truth. And there was no way that she was going to tell him. Maybe there was no other option than to go in with the big guns, to let Lieutenant Reggiani run his operation, in the hope that that would solve matters. But Fabrizio couldn’t resign himself to that.

He immersed himself in reading his translation and felt the dark vision of the night before encroaching again. Had it been extreme fatigue, the pills he’d taken to stay awake, or the influence of what he’d read or thought he understood in the inscription that had projected such images into his mind?

He felt oppressed by a sense of deep discouragement. The surveillance that Reggiani had provided to protect him made him feel like he was in prison. He couldn’t move independently in any direction. He felt tormented by the confusion flooding his head, by that strange mix of reality and hallucination that hadn’t left him, not even after awakening. It felt like he couldn’t shake off the effects of a powerful drug. He’d experienced the feeling once before, in Pakistan, the only time he’d tried opium, out of curiosity. It had put him in a strange, black mood that hadn’t left him for days.

Every now and then he looked over at the phone, thinking that he really should call Francesca, hoping that she might be the one to call him. Time stretched out in an unreal way. It seemed like months, or years, that he’d been living in this nightmare, this claustrophobic, agonizing situation.

He suddenly felt like simply walking out. He wished he could start up his car and just leave, forget about everyone, abandon the research that had brought him to Volterra, erase the inscription carved into the bronze slab by Aule Tarchna. He could find another way to make a living; become a high school teacher or a journalist.

But then he realized immediately that he didn’t want to leave Francesca, didn’t want to leave Marcello Reggiani or even Sonia, who was down in the basement of the museum assembling his monster. She must be well along by now. And above all he didn’t want to leave that sad little boy who now had not only a face but a name, Velies Kaiknas, and a story, a story that felt to Fabrizio like it had happened the day before.

A light knock on the door made him jump. Was he hearing things? Who could be at his door, with the police outside? A soft knock, again.