more real than the reality which surrounded him.
‘So what is this Cabal?’ Nieddu said suddenly. ‘It was mentioned in that anonymous letter to the papers about the Ruspanti affair, wasn’t it? Are you still investigating that?’
‘No, this is private enterprise.’
Nieddu glanced at him.
‘So what is it?’
‘Oh, something to do with the Knights of Malta,’ Zen replied vaguely.
Nieddu shook his head.
‘Bad news, Aurelio. Bad news.’
‘Why do you say that?’
‘Well for a start-off, the Knights of Malta work hand in glove with the American Central Intelligence Agency and with our own Secret Services.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘I get around, Aurelio. I keep my ears open. Now I don’t know what you mean by private enterprise, but if you’re thinking of trying anything at all risky, I would think again. From what I’ve heard, some of the stuff the Order of Malta have been involved in, especially in South America, makes Gelli and the P 2 look small-time.’
They drove in silence for a while. Zen felt his spirits sink as the city tightened its stranglehold around them once more.
‘Like what?’ he asked.
‘Like funding the Nicaraguan Contras and mixing with Colombian drug barons,’ Nieddu replied promptly. ‘You remember the bomb which brought down that plane last year, killing a leading member of the Brazilian Indian Rights movement? Every item of luggage had been through a strict security check, except for a diplomatic pouch supposedly carrying documents to one of the Order’s consulates.’
Zen forced a laugh.
‘Come on, Gilberto! This is like claiming that Leonardo Sciascia was a right-wing stooge because his name is an anagram of CIA, CIA and SS! The Order of Malta is a respectable charity organization.’
Nieddu shrugged.
‘It’s your life, Aurelio. Just don’t blame me if you end up under that train to Milan instead of on it.’
Tania Biacis had said that she wouldn’t be home until eight o’clock, so Zen got there at six thirty. This time there were no problems with the electricity, but as he pushed the button of the entry-phone to make sure that the flat was in fact unoccupied, Zen couldn’t help recalling the night when Ludovico Ruspanti had died and all the lights went out. As the darkness pressed in on him, Zen had thought of his colleague Carlo Romizi. That association of ideas now seemed sinister and emblematic.
There was no answer from the entry-phone, and the unshuttered windows of the top-floor flat were dark. Zen let himself in and trudged upstairs. On each landing, the front doors of the other apartments emitted tantalizing glints of light and snatches of conversation. Zen ignored them like the covers of books he knew he would never read, his mind on other intrigues, other mysteries. A series of loud raps at the front door of Tania’s flat brought no response, so Zen got out the other key and unlocked the door.
Once inside, he turned on the hall light and checked his watch. He had plenty of time to search the flat and then retire to the local bar-cum-pizzeria, run by a friendly Neapolitan couple, before returning at about ten past eight for his dinner date with the unsuspecting Tania. First of all, though, he phoned his mother to make sure that Maria Grazia had packed his suitcase. His train left at seven the next morning, and he didn’t want to have to do it when he got home.
‘There’s a problem!’ his mother told him. ‘I told Maria Grazia to pack the dark-blue suit but she said she couldn’t find it! She wanted to pack the black one or the dark-grey, but I said no, the black is for funerals, God forbid, and the grey one for marriages and First Communions. Only the blue will do, but we can’t find it anywhere, I don’t know where it’s got to…’
‘I’m wearing it, mamma.’
‘… unless we find it you won’t be able to go. We can’t have you appearing at an official function looking less than your best…’
‘Mamma, I’m wearing the blue suit today!’
‘… so important to make a good impression if you want to get ahead, I always say. People judge you by your clothes, Aurelio, and if you’re inappropriately dressed it doesn’t matter what you do…’
‘Mamma!!!’
‘… watching on television while I was at Lucrezia’s yesterday, ever so nice, and talented too! He’s written this book called You Are What You Wear, which is precisely what I’ve been trying to say all along, not that anyone ever has me on TV or even listens to me for that…’
Zen depressed the rest of the telephone, cutting the connection. He counted slowly to ten, then dialled again.
‘Sorry, mamma, we must have got cut off somehow. Listen, apart from the blue suit, is my case packed?’
‘All except your suit, yes. We looked everywhere, Maria Grazia and I, but we just couldn’t find it. Perhaps it’s at the cleaners, I said, but she…’
‘I’ve got to go now, mamma. I’ll be back late. Don’t wait up for me.’
‘Oh listen, Aurelio, I almost forgot, someone phoned for you. They were going to ring again tomorrow but I told them you were going to Milan on the early train and they said they needed to speak to you urgently and so they gave me a number you’re to ring at seven thirty tonight.’
‘Who was it, mamma?’
‘I don’t remember if he gave a name, but he said it was about something you had for sale. It’s not any of the family belongings, I hope?’
Zen felt his heart beating quickly.
‘No, no. No, it’s just something to do with work. Give me the number.’
He noted down the seven digits and stared at them for some time before setting to work. Like a burglar, he made his way steadily through the flat, turning out drawers and searching cupboards, wardrobes and shelves. He became much better acquainted with Tania’s taste in clothes and jewellery, including a number of unfamiliar items bearing designer labels which even Zen had heard of. He had been allowed to see the Falco sweater, but the others had been concealed from him. None, he reckoned, could have cost much less than half a million lire.
As he passed by the extension phone in the hallway, he had an idea. He dialled the Ministry, quoted the Rome number which his mother had passed on, and asked them to find out the subscriber’s name and address. Then he went into the kitchen. Spreading an old newspaper over the floor, he lifted the plastic rubbish sack out of its bin and emptied out the contents. When the phone rang, he was on his hands and knees, separating long white worms of cold spaghetti from the whiffy mess in which they were breeding, poring over fish bones, separating scraps of orange peel from the gutted hulks of burst tomatoes. Wiping his hands quickly on a towel, he took the call in the hallway. It was the Ministry with the information he had requested.
‘The number is a public call-box, dottore, in the lobby of the Hotel Torlonia Palace. The address is…’
‘It’s all right, I know the address.’
‘Very good, dottore. Will that be all?’
Zen closed his eyes.
‘No. Contact the Questura and have a man sent round there to watch the phone. He’s to take a full description of anyone using it around seven thirty. If the person is a guest, he’s to identify him. If not, follow him.’
Back in the kitchen, he resumed his analysis of the mess on the floor. Deep in the ripest puree of all, which had been fermenting for days at the bottom of the sack, he found the first scrap of paper. Gradually he recovered the others, one by one, from a glutinous paste of coffee grounds moistened with the snot of bad egg white. In the end he traced all but two of the sixteen irregular patches into which the sheet had been torn, and carefully pieced it together again on the kitchen counter.
Dear Tania, It’s great news that you can make it on the 27th. Let me know which flight you’ll be on and I’ll meet you. I have to take my wife to the opera that evening, but we can have lunch and then spend the afternoon
