Zen nodded.
‘Listen, Geraci, I want you to keep an eye on the other two for me.’
The inspector stared uncertainly at Zen.
‘Keep an eye on them?’
‘That’s it. Just in case.’
He winked and tapped the side of his nose.
‘Better safe than sorry. Know what I mean?’
Geraci clearly didn’t have the slightest idea what Zen was talking about.
‘I should get going,’ he muttered nervously.
‘Good thinking. Don’t want to make them suspicious.’
He watched Geraci walk all the way down the corridor before going back to his office, leaving the connecting door open so that if anyone came in he could see them reflected on Pertini’s portrait. Then he picked up the receiver again.
‘Hello?’
‘ So far I’ve got Miletti Ruggiero, Pietro and Silvio.’
‘Right. Also Miletti Daniele, Santucci Gianluigi and Cinzia nee Miletti.’
‘ Who’s speaking? ’
Zen seemed to see again that glare of hostility and hear the Questore murmur, ‘Until today he was handling the Miletti case for us.’
‘Fabrizio Priorelli.’
‘ I’ll call you straight back, dottore.’
‘Eh, no, my friend! Sorry, but you’ll do it now, if you please. I’ll hold.’
‘ Of course, dottore! Right away.’
There was a clunk as the receiver went down, followed by receding footsteps. While he waited Zen looked round his office. Something about it was slightly different today, but he couldn’t decide what it was.
The footsteps returned.
‘ There are three cards, dottore. A Luger 9mm pistol in the name of Miletti Ruggiero, issued 27 04 53. Then Santucci Gianluigi registered a rifle on 19 10 75. Finally Miletti Cinzia, a Beretta pistol, 4.5mm, dated 11 01 81.’
Zen noted these details in the margin of his earlier doodles.
‘ Shall I send a written copy up to your office, dottore? ’
‘No! Definitely not. I’ve got what I wanted. Much obliged.’
He hung up, studying the information. Ruggiero’s Luger would be war loot, belatedly registered once the menace of an armed Communist insurrection had faded. That might possibly have done the damage to Valesio’s head, at close range. So might Gianluigi’s hunting rifle, for that matter. But he didn’t really believe any of it, not for a moment.
He got an outside line, dialled the law courts and asked to speak to Luciano Bartocci. While he waited he looked round his office with a deepening frown, trying to track down the detail which had been altered. What was it? The filing cabinet, the coat-stand, the rubbish bin, that big ugly crucifix, the photograph of Pertini, the calendar. Of course, the calendar! Someone had thoughtfully turned the page to March and now the glossy colour photograph showed the Riot Squad drawn up in full battle gear in front of their armoured personnel carriers.
‘ Yes? ’
‘Dottor Bartocci? It’s Zen, at the Questura.’
‘ Finally! I’ve been trying to get hold of you since yesterday afternoon! Where have you been? ’
‘Well, I was…’
‘ Listen, there’ve been developments. Come and see me at once.’
‘Patrizia Valesio has been here. She claims that…’
‘ I’ve already seen her. This is something else. Be here in twenty minutes.’
Outside the weather was hazy and dull. In the car park between the Questura and the prison Palottino had taken a break from polishing the Alfetta to chat to a pair of patrolmen. He looked hopefully at Zen, who waggled his finger and walked off up the street.
It was market day, and the wide curving flight of steps leading up to the centre was lined with flimsy tables covered in kitchenware and watches and clothing and tools and toys. Music blared out from a stall selling bootleg cassette tapes. The traders called like barnyard cocks to the women moving from one pitch to the next, uncertain which to mate with.
‘… at prices you simply won’t believe…’
‘… never before in Perugia…’
‘… thanks to the miracle of American technology…’
‘… ever wears out I will pay you twice the…’
‘SOCKS!!! SOCKS!!! SOCKS!!!’
‘… one for thirty thousand, two for fifty…’
A man sitting on a three-legged stool emptied a dustpan full of rubbish over his suit and then removed it with a battery-powered mini-vacuum cleaner. On the wall behind him the name UBALDO VALESIO appeared over and over again in large black capitals. It was a notice-board devoted exclusively to funeral announcements, and the lawyer’s death was well represented. There were posters signed by his partners, by the local lawyers’ association, the Miletti family, various relatives, and of course his wife and children. The wording changed slightly, depending on the degree of intimacy involved, but certain formulas recurred like the tolling of a bell.
‘… an innocent victim of barbarous cruelty…’
‘… tragically plucked from the bosom of his loved ones by a callous hand…’
‘… a virtuous and well-respected life extinguished by the criminal violence of evil men…’
The morning session at the law courts was in full swing, and the halls and corridors were crowded. Luciano Bartocci’s office was tall and narrow, with shelves of books that seemed to lean inwards like the sides of a chimney as they rose towards the distant ceiling. Two lawyers were facing the magistrate across a desk that occupied most of the floor space. One was clearly asking some favour on behalf of a client: bail or a visitor’s pass or access to official files. Meanwhile the other lawyer was growing impatient with Bartocci for allowing himself to be imposed upon in this way by his pushy and unscrupulous colleague instead of attending to his utterly reasonable request for bail or a visitor’s pass or access to official files. In the end Bartocci solved the problem by shooing both of them out of the office and leading Zen downstairs.
‘There’s something I want you to hear.’
He took him to a long narrow room in the cellars of the law courts, where phone-taps were carried out. A bank of reel-to-reel tape recorders lined the wall. A man was monitoring one of them over a pair of headphones. He jumped slightly as Bartocci touched his shoulder.
‘Morning, Aldo. Can you play us that recording I was listening to earlier?’
‘Right away.’
He selected a tape from the rack and threaded it on to a spare machine.
‘This was intercepted late yesterday afternoon on the Milettis’ home phone,’ the magistrate explained to Zen. ‘That’s why I’ve been trying to get hold of you.’
The technician handed Zen a pair of headphones and started the tape. There was a fragment of ringing tone and then a voice.
‘ Yes? ’
‘ Signor Miletti? ’
‘ Who is this? ’
‘ Go to the rubbish skip at the bottom of the hill, on the corner of the main road. Taped to the inside there is a letter for you. Get down there quickly, before the cops beat you to it.’
The caller had a thick, raw Calabrian accent.
‘ The time for games is over. You have three days to do what we say, otherwise we’ll do to your father what we did to Valesio. Only more slowly.’
Zen removed the headphones, looking for clues to Bartocci’s reaction. The message had sounded genuine enough to him.
‘What was in the letter?’
