The name rang a bell, but it was only after the caller had testily supplied further information that Zen linked it with the short-tempered, workaholic southerner who was deputy head of the Criminalpol section of the Interior Ministry.
‘What the hell’s going on there?’ Foschi demanded. ‘The place sounds like a madhouse.’
‘It often feels like it too.’
‘What? Why aren’t you answering your duty issue phone?’
‘It’s not switched on.’
‘Why not?’
‘I’m on sick leave.’
‘Says who?’
‘Dottor Brugnoli,’ Zen replied with the air of a chess master declaring checkmate.
‘Ah, you’re one of Brugnoli’s babies, are you? Well, I’m sorry to have to inform you that life around here has become rather more spartan during your prolonged absence. As in stake them out on the mountain and see who survives.’
‘I don’t follow you.’
‘Call me back on your encrypted mobile. This line is not secure.’
When Zen did so, Foschi informed him that Brugnoli, Zen’s patron at the Ministry had taken up the offer of a consultancy position with a leading bank following a governmental ‘crisis’ and cabinet reshuffle of which Zen had heard nothing.
‘I didn’t know,’ he explained feebly. ‘I had to have an operation and I’ve been on indefinite sick leave ever since.’
‘Very indefinite,’ Foschi retorted. ‘So much so that there’s absolutely no record of the fact in the personnel database.’
‘Dottor Brugnoli told me that he would arrange everything.’
Foschi laughed shortly.
‘I’m sure he did, but that was before he arranged his own departure to greener pastures in the private sector. Since then we’ve gone back to playing strictly by the book of rules, according to which you are available for immediate active duty. Are you saying that such is not the case?’
Zen thought for a moment. He could probably get a letter from the consultant excusing him from service for another month or so, and explaining and documenting the record of his case. On the other hand…
‘What did you have in mind?’ he asked.
‘It’s this Curti business.’
Zen had no idea what he was talking about, but he had already created a bad enough impression for one morning. He decided to bluff.
‘What exactly do you want me to do?’
Foschi sighed deeply.
‘It’s a damn shame you don’t live here in Rome like everyone else, Zen. That’s something we may have to review in the light of the changed situation. It would make things so much easier if we could discuss this face to face.’
Zen said nothing.
‘Anyway,’ Foschi went on, ‘the Questura in Bologna are handling the actual investigation, but we need someone to go up there and liaise with the Ministry. Your name came up.’
‘Why should they tell me anything they don’t tell you?’
Instinct told him that bluntness was the best way to whatever organ had been substituted for Foschi’s heart.
‘They won’t. But they’ll tell you sooner, and above all you’ll be in a position to report back on what they’re not telling us.’
‘Why should they try and conceal the truth? We’re all playing for the same team.’
‘I’m not saying that they necessarily will. But they are going to be under enormous pressure to deliver results, and quickly. Lorenzo Curti was a figure of fame and notoriety not just in Emilia-Romagna but on a national and even international level, a millionaire entrepreneur who owned the Bologna football team and was also the majority shareholder in a dairy conglomerate currently under investigation for tax evasion and serious fraud. In short, this promises to be the highest-profile case in the Bologna jurisdiction since the Uno Bianca fiasco.’
After a moment, Zen recalled the spate of serial killings around Bologna in the late 1980s involving a white Fiat Uno. He also recalled that when the perpetrators had finally been brought to justice, they had almost all turned out to be policemen working out of the Bologna Questura, many of them involved in the investigation into their own crimes. It had taken years for morale in the Polizia di Stato to recover from this scandal.
‘Forewarned is forearmed,’ Foschi concluded. ‘Your assignment is not to take command of the investigation but to remain fully informed about progress and to report developments to me personally on a daily basis, and more frequently if necessary. That way, if the media vultures start to circle, we’ll be ready for them.’
‘I understand.’
‘How soon can you get there?’
Zen was about to remind Foschi that he hadn’t agreed to go yet, but instantly realised that as far as he was concerned he had.
‘In a few hours.’
‘Very good. I’ll tell them to expect you after lunch.’
When Gemma came in, Zen had already showered and dressed and was busy packing. Without offering a word of apology for the vile names she had called him at their last encounter, she started gathering together her clothes. Clearly this would be another day when they were ‘not talking’. Someone else, however, was.
‘…sure to tune in again next week, when Romano takes a pilgrimage to the temple of the one and only Parmigiano Reggiano!’
‘Believe it or believe it not, it takes no fewer than sixteen litres of the finest, richest, freshest milk to make a single kilo of this, the Jupiter of cheeses lording it over the rabble of minor gods. And then as much as two years of completely natural ageing, according to traditions handed down over seven centuries of continuous production…’
The television screen at the far end of the living room, visible through the open door, showed contented cows grazing, pails of creamy, pure milk being poured into vats and then cooked in a cauldron over an open fire, while authentic-looking peasants stirred the brew with wooden staves, all interspersed with close-ups of a Luciano Pavarotti lookalike got up in a chef’s outfit beaming toothily at the viewer while belting out extracts from Verdi’s ‘ Celeste Aida ’.
‘Aren’t you even going to apologise?’ Gemma demanded, pausing in the doorway with her bundle of clothing. As had become customary, she would dress in the spare bedroom. It seemed just a matter of time before one of them started sleeping there.
‘I might ask you the same,’ Zen replied mildly.
‘What have I to apologise for?’
‘Ditto.’
‘For cruelly mocking me when I fell over! You just lay there cackling instead of even offering to help me up or ask whether I was hurt. And the only reason it happened was because I got out of the shower to wake you for your stupid phone call.’
Zen slipped several strata of socks into a spare corner of the suitcase. He seemed to have only one clean vest. Oh well, he’d buy more in Bologna and then have them washed at the hotel. With the situation the way it was, the last thing he wanted was to raise the question of dirty laundry.
‘You’re leaving?’ Gemma went on, still hovering in the doorway.
Zen nodded. No, not that green horror, he decided. He hadn’t worn it for years, but the laws of thrift inculcated by his mother died hard. He laid the rest of the shirts flat on top of the other garments, then closed the case.
‘So where are you going to go?’
‘Bologna.’
The first flicker of some expression appeared on Gemma’s face, but was instantly suppressed.
