Pernazzo said nothing.
“So you’re good at this game?”
“One of the best. Level seventy.”
“Really? And how many levels are there?”
“Sixty.”
“If there are sixty levels…,” began Blume.
“Sixty levels for most people. But when you reach the top, there is a higher plane.”
“Sounds very frustrating,” said Blume.
Pernazzo handed him a glass. It was greasy around the rims, and caked with lime scale inside.
“I can’t drink from this,” said Blume. “It’s filthy.”
“Do as you fucking please.”
“Very well, I’ll do it myself,” said Blume and walked quickly out of the living room into the kitchen.
Blume placed the glass on top of a pile of unwashed dishes and pizza cartons. He opened a food cupboard and peered inside. Potato chips, Pavesi chocolate drop biscuits, Rice Krispies, UHT milk cartons, Nutella, pasta in the shape of wagon wheels, Knorr mixes, and a single jar of Skippy peanut butter.
Pernazzo appeared in the doorway behind him, panting a little.
“I see you have peanut butter,” said Blume.
Pernazzo pulled a piece of kitchen towel from beneath a toaster, dislodging a shower of crumbs. He wiped the side of his mouth with the towel, balled it up, put it on the counter.
“So?”
“Where did you get it?”
“Supermarket, I suppose.”
“Really? You see, I like peanut butter, but it’s hard to find in this city.
Not as hard as it was once, but still. Which supermarket?”
“I can’t remember.”
“A local one?”
“I can’t remember, OK?”
“OK. Do you get the supermarket to deliver? Some supermarkets, they put your shopping in a cardboard box, bring it to your house. Ever hear of that?”
“No.”
“You never heard of it? I think they all do it now.”
“Well, I never heard of it.”
“There’s nothing clean in here, Pernazzo. Can’t you afford a maid?”
“I’m not interested.”
“Do you have a girlfriend, Angelo?”
“None of your fucking business.”
Blume looked again at the peanut butter. “You know what?” he said.
“That has a bar code on it. Now that could be useful.” He picked up the jar, which had no top. It was slippery in his hand. “Mind if I borrow this?”
“Of course I mind,” said Pernazzo.
“You’re right, of course,” said Blume. “I have no right to deprive you of food.” He ripped the label off the jar and pocketed it.
“You can’t do that!” Pernazzo’s voice rose to a squeak.
“I just did,” said Blume. “I’m interested in seeing if this came from a certain supermarket. That can’t worry you, can it?”
“Chain of evidence!” said Pernazzo. “You can’t just-you need other police in here, search warrants. You have to log evidence.”
“You’ve been watching too much television, Pernazzo. And this is just personal curiosity on my part. I don’t see why you should be so worried.”
Pernazzo seemed to have entered a sort of trance. “You can’t use that type of barcode for the exchange of information keyed to a unique identifier without referential integrity.”
“I’m afraid I wasn’t quite following you there,” said Blume. “What I want to find out is whether this label got beeped through a checkout at a certain supermarket. If you want, you can have the label back afterwards.”
Pernazzo opened his eyes wide, like Blume used to do when trying not to sleep in the classroom.
“Angelo, your whole setup here. You know what it says to me? It says loser.”
“Well, you’re wrong. You’re the loser.”
“How much money did you lose to Alleva?”
“Who says I even lost? Maybe I won.”
“You said you lost. You said it yourself. You paid off a debt to Massoni last year.”
Pernazzo brought a finger up to touch what seemed like a very faint moustache. “You always lose at the beginning. That’s how it works. Then you get better at it. You get knowledge, skills, weapons, you move up. Eventually you become the best there is.”
“Maybe in your games. Not in real life, Angelo. You never win gambling with criminals.”
“That’s just where you’re wrong. I have it hacked. I know how it’s done.”
“How the dog fights are done?”
Pernazzo touched his nose, licked his lips, scratched his crotch. “It’s valuable knowledge.”
“I won’t tell,” said Blume. “Promise. Let’s go back into the living room, and you tell me about it.”
Blume had been breathing shallowly while in the kitchen, which was worse than the living room. He was lusting after the idea of drawing a deep breath of air as soon as he got out of the building. When they returned to the living room, he remained standing. Christ, he needed to get out of there.
“So tell me. How have you hacked it to make such a success of your gambling?”
“I know their underdog trick.”
“The underdog trick. How does that work?”
Pernazzo moved away from Blume and stood by the shuttered window. It was dark outside now. The storm rumbled in the background.
“It works like this,” said Pernazzo. “They get the meanest animal, some big as fuck Rottweiler, stick him in a cage with other dogs. They give the dogs water, but don’t feed them for about three days. Any longer than that, the animals lose strength permanently. Then they throw in a hunk of meat. Total frenzy. The meanest dog fights the others, wins. But every time he tries to eat, the others set on him again. Any time one of them tries to get the meat, the others go for him. You following?”
“Yes.”
“But sometimes there is a dog that doesn’t attack. He hangs back, lets the others do the fighting, and when the top dog is defending his place, he sneaks in and grabs a small piece of meat. A nibble, retreat, a nibble, retreat. That dog became the hidden champion. The underdog.”
“I get it. So they create the underdog, then get people to bet against it?”
“They build up a bit of a record for the champion big dog, the Rottweiler or what ever, get the clueless punters to lay bets on him, and he wins a few fights. Then one day, they bring out the underdog, which they’ve been training to be really fucking mean. They file his teeth, too. Make them real sharp. So now it’s mean as well as clever, pumped full of hormones, fed on raw meat, milk. No grains. Throw him in against some big dog, clean up on the fight. Except next time, I’ll have my money on the underdog.”
“Angelo, did you just make up that bullshit?”
“It’s not bullshit!” Pernazzo’s voice became shrill.
“You didn’t make it up, then?”
“No!”
“OK, so who told you? Who explained the underdog strategy to you?”
Pernazzo brought a pink hand up to his mouth and nibbled at a fingernail. Blume repeated his question.
“I don’t have to tell you my sources.”
“No, you don’t have to tell me, because I know. Only two people could have told you that. Alleva, who, by the way, was a con man before he became a dog man, or else his helper, Massoni, whose name you couldn’t
