Secretum

took you away with the help of the guards, obviously in collusion with Zabaglia.'

I remembered that when I came to my senses after Sfasciamonti had brought me home from the failed expedition to the ball above Saint Peter's, 1 had heard Atto pronounce certain obscure phrases. Now their meaning became quite clear to me.

'That was why you said, if my memory does not betray me, 'No one can escape death like that save with the help of an assiduous practitioner.'You meant that it was Sfasciamonti who saved me from death or capture.'

'Exactly.'

'You also said: 'Behind every strange or inexplicable death there lies a conspiracy of the state, or of its secret forces.''

'Yes, and that's not just true of assassinations but of every single theft, every injustice, every massacre, every scandal about which the people complain to high heaven and yet, strangely, no culprits are ever brought to justice. The state can do absolutely anything, if it so desires. It doesn't matter whether it is the King or France, the Pope or the Emperor who's in command. The all-too-easy life of the cerretani here in Rome is a perfect example: they can get away with it only because of the corruption of individual catchpolls or their superiors, the Bargello or the Governor. Or perhaps the state may find it useful to manipulate the cerretani for its own purposes. Or they may hold them in reserve to do so when necessary. Remember, my boy, happy is the criminal who sows terror on behalf of the state: he'll surely never go to prison. But only for as long as he's not privy to too many infamous secrets; when that day comes, he'll meet a bad end.'

'Yes, just recently I was told that the halt and the blind belonging to the Company of Saint Elizabeth bribe the catchpolls to be able to beg in peace.'

'I'm perfectly aware of that. So why are you surprised if the cerretani pay Sfasciamonti?'

So here, I thought, was the suspicion which had been tormenting me ever since I had learned about the Company of Saint Elizabeth, and which I had never quite been able to put my finger on.

'But why did he help us to get as far as Zabaglia and so to understand that your treatise was inside the ball?'

'Because when I asked him to find the person of whom Don Tibaldutio had spoken, I did not tell him what I meant to do with that information. He himself was curious to know what we wanted it for.'

I fell silent, licking the wounds in my soul.

'Sfasciamonti is no fool,' the Abbot continued. 'He's one of the many catchpolls who's short of money and tread the line between justice and crime. They're always on the lookout for a good source to exploit: assassins on the run, harlots occupying apartments illegally, embezzling tax officials, and so on and so forth. Anyone susceptible to a good extortion racket. Once he's identified his victim, the catchpoll puts on a terrifying face: he pretends that he means to investigate, to arrest or sequester property. Thus, he makes a good impression on his superiors, while in reality he always comes to a stop one step before reaching his supposed goal: when he has to arrest someone, he arrives two minutes too late, when he's interrogating, he conveniently forgets to put the right question; when he's searching premises, he doesn't look in the room where the loot is hidden. In exchange, obviously, the victim shells out a good deal of money. Rogues always set a good deal aside for such contingencies.'

'But the cerretani are far too numerous to be afraid of…'

'… of a fathead like Sfasciamonti? For those engaged in dirty business, every single catchpoll is like a mosquito: if you can't squash him, you try to make sure he stays outside. With money, you can do that, and there are no pointless risks involved. On the contrary, you'll make a friend of him forever, because he'll have every interest in leaving things as they stand. You know the saying: stir the shit and out comes the stink.'

I felt bewildered, and said nothing. The coarse but honest catchpoll I thought I knew had turned out to be no better than an astute, corrupt rascal.

'Who knows how long Sfasciamonti's been on the heels of the cerretani?' Atto continued. 'Whenever he got too close to the objective and threatened to cause them serious trouble, they'd give him something to keep him happy. And off he'd go back home with his tail between his legs. That's what he did when he interrogated II Roscio and Geronimo: he falsified the data so that it could never be found and would never be used. What judge can accept evidence a century old? Yet the information contained in those records could not be hotter; these things are all taking place here and now: a thorn in the side of the cerretani who want to keep their sects secret and are prepared to pay generously to ensure that stuff does not get around. So he keeps blackmailing them and they keep paying. The catchpolls' pay is risible, you too know that from when you overheard those two prelates at the villa, and that's why the Rome police are so corrupt.'

'But is Sfasciamonti not afraid that the cerretani may sooner or later grow tired of this and get rid of him?'

'Kill him? Forget it. A dead catchpoll can cause a whole load of trouble, while buying him off with money resolves everything discreetly and well. Besides, if you kill him, you don't know who may take his place. Perhaps it will be a hard man who takes no bribes and does his job thoroughly.'

'When were you sure he was betraying us?'

'After you climbed up to the ball at Saint Peter's. But tonight 1 got the final confirmation: how do you think the cerretani knew that II Roscio had talked, as Geronimo told us?'

'It was Sfasciamonti,' I murmured disconsolately.

So, I reflected bitterly, the catchpoll had accompanied us during our investigations, even providing us with some help here and there, only in order to spy on us and keep a check on our activities.

'The funny thing is that, to keep him at my service for the past while I too had to pay him. So he was taking money from both sides: from Abbot Melani and from the cerretani,' said he with a bitter smile.

'Did you plan to use the fireworks?'

'Only if our backs were to the wall, in order to create chaos and exploit it. It was Cardinal Spada's idea of rounding off the celebrations with a pyrotechnical display that saved us. Even you did not know what was going to happen in the amphitheatre: I couldn't risk the possibility that you might give something away to Sfasciamonti.'

I felt myself blushing. Despite all his expressions of friendship and esteem, at the decisive moment, Atto had treated me like a troublemaker to be trusted with as few secrets as possible. There was nothing to be done about it, I thought: once a spy, always a spy, an outsider with everyone and an enemy to all forms of trust.

'Why did you bring him here with us?'

'To keep a check on him. He thought he was keeping an eye on us, but it was the other way around. I told Ugonio that Sfasciamonti was not to accompany us to the meeting. Thus, he wouldn't get in our way. Of course, he could not object: he knew perfectly well that he'd have raised too many suspicions, had he done so, because I paid him to do what I told him. He may perhaps have tried to get in and give us away, but he doesn't know where the secret passage is.'

I stared out into the nothingness. How was it possible? Had I really understood nothing about the people around me? Was Sfasciamonti really that hypocritical and immoral? I called to mind the first time I had met that clumsy but courageous sergeant who claimed he was trying to convince the Governor to put those mysterious cerretani in the dock: the catchpoll who withdrew from the daily struggle only to go and find his mother…

'By the way,' added Atto, 'between visiting libraries, I sent Buvat to put a couple of questions to the parish priest where Sfasciamonti lives. He discovered something really funny.'

'What?'

'Sfasciamonti's mother died sixteen years ago.'

I fell silent, saddened by my own inadequacy. Atto had deduced Sfasciamonti's betrayal from observations and information much of which I myself had collected, and yet I had been incapable of collating it all logically.

'There is one thing I do not understand,' I objected. 'Why did you not unmask him earlier?'

'That is one of the stupidest questions you have ever put to me. Think of Telemachus.'

'Again?' I exclaimed impatiently. 'I know that the myth of Telemachus gave you the idea of creating a diversion to distract the cerretani with fireworks, but here, frankly, I can't see…'

'Homer called Telemachus 'wise',' Atto interrupted me, ''the equal of the gods' and even 'endowed with sacred strength'; he praises him in almost every verse. But what did the good Eumaeus, the swineherd who so loved him, have to say about him? That 'one of the gods has damaged his brain'. And what of his own mother, the faithful Penelope? She screamed at him: 'Telemachus, you are mindless and witless!' Thus was his behaviour judged by those who best loved him. They were unable to appreciate the subtle wisdom and extreme prudence of