‘And you believed him?’
‘I believed him. His manner was that of a dutiful subordinate carrying out a task without regard for his personal feelings or opinions. He displayed no discernible political animus or involvement whatsoever. On the contrary, he remained completely detached throughout. His role was simply that of the go-between, the messenger, executing the orders that he had been given.’
Zen raised his eyebrows.
‘He then proceeded to reveal the existence within the armed forces of a parallel entity consisting of selected officers organized into four-man groups. Only one man in each group had access to the next level of command, and none of them to any other groups.’
‘The classic cell structure, in other words.’
‘Indeed. An invention of the Bolsheviks. My informant claimed that the superior officer who had sent him was a member of one of these cells, but had lately grown disillusioned and now felt that it was his duty to bring the true purpose of the conspiracy to the attention of the public before it could be put into effect. Since he was closely watched at all times, he was doing so through an intermediary.’
‘And the purpose was?’
‘Nothing less than the overthrow of the elected government and the imposition of a military dictatorship.’
Zen laughed.
‘You must have thought you’d won the lottery!’
‘It’s easy to laugh now,’ Brandelli retorted testily. ‘For that matter, it seemed pretty far-fetched to me even at the time. But there was so much we didn’t know about back then. We didn’t know about the CIA-funded stay- behind Gladio terrorist operation, for example, to be activated in the event of the Communists coming to power. Nor about Licio Gelli’s P2 organization, specifically intended to provide support and personnel in the event of a right-wing coup. And in which, lest we forget, the onorevole Silvio Berlusconi was enrolled with the membership number 1168.’
Zen gave a chastened nod.
‘You’re right. I apologize.’
‘We didn’t know about any of that at the time, but what we did know was that the governance of this country was teetering on the brink during that whole decade. It seemed then, and continues to seem now, perfectly credible that certain people should have put in place a plan for bypassing the democratic process and seizing power in the name of “normalization” and “stability”. According to my informant, such a plan existed. Its code-name was Operation Medusa.’
At that moment Aurelio Zen did something that anyone familiar with him would have regarded as very uncharacteristic. Whatever his faults, Zen was not physically clumsy, yet now he kicked the low table in front of him hard enough to overturn the tea pot.
Luca Brandelli went out to the kitchenette, returning with a sponge to wipe up the spillage and brushing aside Zen’s apologies.
‘So what follow-up action did you decide on?’ Zen asked when order had been restored.
Brandelli sighed.
‘I was still not completely convinced that it wasn’t a set-up,’ he said at length. ‘Not to murder me, but to plant information which could later be shown to be false, thereby discrediting myself, the paper I wrote for, and by extension the entire progressive movement of that period. In short, anyone who tried thereafter to expose any conspiracy of the extreme right — and there were plenty of them, as we now know — would be laughed off stage and told to pull the other one. Nevertheless, I couldn’t be entirely sure. I therefore displayed a cautious interest and arranged another meeting a few weeks later, with the excuse that I had to go to Cuba to research a lengthy article on political organization under Castro. That happened to be true, but my real reason for not cancelling the trip was to give the other side, whoever they were, a cooling-off period to reconsider the situation. If they were genuine, I reasoned, then they would re-engage on my return. If it was a put-up job, they might well think that they had been rumbled and drop the whole thing.’
‘And what happened?’
‘On my return from Cuba, I learned of the plane crash over the Adriatic. The papers published photographs of the two victims, the pilot and the only passenger. The latter was identified as Lieutenant Leonardo Ferrero of the Alpine Regiment, attached to a unit stationed in Verona. I instantly recognized him as my informant in the Medusa affair.’
‘Which presumably convinced you of its reality.’
‘It certainly swung the balance of probability that way.’
There was a long silence.
‘I did what I could,’ Brandelli remarked with yet another sigh. ‘Through some of the PCI conscripts at the barracks where Ferrero had been stationed, I elicited the names of some men he had allegedly been close to. I wrote to them both, under the pretext of researching a general background article about “The Army Today”. Neither replied.’
‘What about the senior officer on whose orders Ferrero claimed to be acting?’
Brandelli threw up his hands.
‘It could have been anyone! Ferrero was a junior lieutenant. There were plenty of officers superior to him in the hierarchy. I assumed that if the person concerned still wanted to contact me, then he would do so. But I heard nothing.’
‘You mentioned that you were not convinced that Ferrero’s death was an accident. Perhaps his superior reached the same conclusion and decided to learn from an example.’
‘Exactly what I told myself at the time. So I left it at that, while keeping the file open in case I heard any other whispers about this Operation Medusa. That never happened, and of course I had more urgent and pressing matters to attend to.’
‘So assuming that this organization existed, the people concerned were either rank amateurs…’
‘Or consummate professionals. Yes.’
Zen nodded slowly, as if mulling all this over.
‘What about the two friends of Ferrero?’
‘What about them?’
‘They must have retired by now. Have you made any attempt to contact them? Perhaps they might be able to help close that file. And provide some material for your book.’
Luca Brandelli shrugged.
‘One was a man named Gabriele Passarini. He runs a second- hand bookshop here in Milan now. I met him for the first time as a result, perhaps five years ago. I was walking around through the centre of town when my eye was caught by a title that I’d been searching for in vain for ages. I went and bought it and the owner gave me his card. I recognized the name and asked him if he’d once been in the Alpini. He said he had. I then asked if he’d known someone called Leonardo Ferrero.’
‘And?’
Brandelli smiled.
‘He almost threw me out of the shop. No, he almost threw himself out. He was in a total panic. Amateurs, I thought, not professionals. But he wouldn’t tell me anything. I don’t believe that even you, dottore, with the full panoply of the law behind you, could have got anything out of him.’
‘He was that tough?’
‘Not tough. Terrified.’
Zen digested this for a moment.
‘Do you recall the name and address of the bookshop?’
Brandelli produced a business card from the file on his knees and handed it to Zen.
‘You can keep that. I don’t think I would be a welcome customer again.’
‘And what about the other friend of Ferrero’s? Have you tried to get in touch with him?’
Luca Brandelli smiled even more broadly.
‘I didn’t think it worth the trouble, not to mention the trouble it might cause. His name is Alberto Guerrazzi, and he is now a full colonel and divisional commander with the military secret intelligence service.’
