Tobias Jones - The Salati Case

‘He had only just found out about,’ she paused, ‘about his brother. He seemed to blame my family for what had happened to the boy.’

She had recovered her composure and was talking fluently again. I had lost my chance to catch whatever it was that she was being evasive about. I looked at her face. She had a small, tight mouth which made her look mean.

‘Who do you think killed Riccardo?’ I asked her.

‘How should I know? All I knew about him was that he was a bad one. The kind that ran up debts and couldn’t stay still. It happens to some people. Especially those without a stable family life.’ She looked at her husband archly.

‘You didn’t like him much, did you?’

‘I didn’t dislike him. I wanted nothing to do with him. I’m sure you can understand why.’

‘Did Umberto ask you for money?’

‘He said he was owed, and he was going to get what was owing to him. That’s what he said.’

‘And what did he mean by that?’

‘That his father’s fortune shouldn’t be wasted on illegitimate ghosts. He said he needed proof that the boy was dead.’

‘And he thought he could get it from you?’

She stopped to draw breath, exhaled dismissively through her nostrils, and sneered. ‘I don’t know anything about his disappearance, let alone his death. I don’t know anything about his life. All I know about him is…’

‘How he was conceived.’ I finished her sentence for her.

‘I’ll open the gate for you on your way out.’ She said walking towards the door and holding it open.

I looked at her again. Her nails were painted a dark red, the same colour as her thin lips.

I bowed towards Tonin, feeling cowardly for leaving the poor man alone with such a woman.

As I walked back along the gravel, my footsteps sounded loud. I turned to look at the house, but the front lights had been switched off and it was in darkness. Someone must have been watching though because the gates swung open as I approached them.

As they closed behind me I stopped. I looked at the buzzer and walked towards it one last time. I pushed the button and held it. No one answered. I had wanted to know how many children they had, how many children of their own. I made a mental note to find out.

The taxi driver was impatient when I returned. We headed back to the city in silence. I was thinking about what I had heard. The woman seemed to know all about Riccardo. She had the weary, sarcastic tone of the wronged woman who didn’t want to be reminded of a past humiliation or slight. She must have been able to see what was coming. Umberto Salati had felt so indignant that he decided to confront the Tonin family, to insist that they compensate him for anything they had done wrong. I wondered what that was. What, other than dishonouring his father, did he blame them for?

I looked at the fields in the dark.

‘You been in this business long?’ I asked the driver.

‘Twenty-odd years. Since I left school.’

‘Always hanging around the station?’

‘Station, stadium, schools. You never know where you’re going to end up. That’s why I like it.’

The car was speeding back towards the tangenziale .

‘You the longest serving in that line-up?’

‘Just about. There’s a couple been there longer than me. But apart from them, I’m the veteran.’ He laughed.

Within a minute or two, we were approaching the outskirts of the city. There were static cranes and unfinished housing blocks amidst the frozen mud.

‘What’s the furthest anyone’s ever gone with you?’ I asked.

The man chuckled to himself. ‘I used to have a good number driving an Austrian girl to Vienna and back. Lovely girl, an Erasmus student.’

‘Ever take anyone to Rimini?’

‘Couple of times, sure. In the summer.’

‘In 1995?’

The driver put his brakes on gently and the car slowed down into the darkness.

‘What is this?’ he said quietly, catching my eye in his mirror. ‘If someone wants to ask me a question, I prefer they do it straight, if I explain myself.’

‘Try this: you ever heard of a boy called Riccardo Salati?’

‘Yeah, sounds familiar. Who is he?’

‘Was he. He went missing in 1995 whilst waiting for a train to Rimini.’

The man was nodding slowly like it was all coming back to him. I looked at his ID on the dashboard and memorised the number just for luck.

‘Yeah, I remember. I read about it.’

‘No one ever ask you about it?’

‘Not until now.’

‘You mind asking your colleagues if they know anything?’

The man nodded without saying anything.

‘No one’s under any suspicion. I’m just starting from scratch and trying to put the pieces together.’

The man nodded again, his suspicion and curiosity aroused.

He dropped me off at Borgo delle Colonne and asked for a small fortune. He stared at me closely as I handed over the cash. I realised that my face was bound to arouse interest for the next few days.

‘Here, take this,’ I said, slipping him a card. ‘There’s a reward for any information,’ I lied.

I went into the bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror. I was shocked at what I saw. Only my cropped hair looked normal. My right eye had swollen mauve and my ear lobe was caked in dark red crusts. The lower lip of my mouth looked bloated. I tried to roll my shoulders, but each millimetre of movement hurt in different ways. I was surprised how the pain shot to my back or fingertips as I tried to move my arms. I swallowed some painkillers and crawled into bed. I fell asleep to the hypnotic sound of the rain lashing against the windows.

Thursday morning. I had been getting dressed when the phone went. It was Mauro. I found the news more confusing than surprising.

‘Salati’, I heard him say, ‘committed suicide.’

I thought it was him telling me his take on the Riccardo case. It sounded like a statement about what had happened to the young boy. But his voice was urgent and it was barely morning.

‘What?’ I said.

‘Umberto Salati. He’s committed suicide.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘I heard it from a friend.’ Mauro told me the news. They had found Umberto outside his condominium early this morning. He had sky-dived from the top floor.

I kept hearing myself say I couldn’t believe it.

‘I heard this morning’, Mauro said, ‘when I was out buying the paper. Someone at the edicola told me.’

‘Is it public yet? Is it on the news?’

‘The radio said at six that a dead body had been found. They haven’t formally identified it.’

‘So how do you know it’s him?’

‘Because this guy seemed to know the details. He said Salati had jumped.’

‘I can’t believe it. You’re sure it’s Umberto Salati?’

‘Like I say, it hasn’t been confirmed. What are you going to do?’

‘He lives in Via Pestalozzi, doesn’t he?’

‘By the cittadella.’

‘I’ve got to go. Thanks Mauro.’

I threw the phone on the bed and finished getting dressed. It was freezing. I pulled on a jumper and went to put on the coffee.

Salati had committed suicide. Umberto Salati had jumped and I was the one who had pushed him to the edge. I had tried to break him and I had succeeded nicely. I don’t normally feel guilt because I live, if I may say so, a pretty clean life. But now I felt guilt like an ice-cube in the heart. If it was true that Umberto was dead, I knew I was to blame.

It was still early and after last night’s rain the sky was a slightly lighter grey than yesterday. I slugged the coffee and headed out towards the cittadella . The city was still asleep, just the odd bike or moped heading off to work.