The eight men and four women eating in the trattoria at that moment all stopped, one after another, forks in midair, to stare at the girl who’d just walked in. A real beauty, tall, slender, long blond hair, blue eyes. The kind one sees on the covers of magazines, except that this one had the look of a nice family girl. What was she doing in the Trattoria San Calogero? The inspector had barely the time to ask himself this question when the creature headed straight for his table.
“You’re Inspector Montalbano, aren’t you? I’m Beatrice Dileo.”
She sat down. Montalbano remained standing for a moment, at a loss. Beatrice Dileo hadn’t a trace of makeup on her face; she looked that way naturally. Perhaps that was why the women present continued to eye her without envy. How can one envy a jasmine flower?
“What’ll it be?” asked Calogero, approaching their table. “Today I’ve got a risotto in squid ink that’s really special.”
“Sounds good to me. And what’ll you have, Beatrice?”
“I’ll have the same, thanks.”
Montalbano was pleased to note that she didn’t add the typically female admonition: Not too much, mind you. Just two spoonfuls. One spoonful. Three grains of rice, no more. Unbearable.
“For the second course, there’s last night’s catch of seabass, or else—”
“Forget the ‘or else.’ I’ll have the bass. How about you, Beatrice?”
“The bass.”
“For you, Inspector, the usual mineral water and Corvo white. For you, signorina?”
“The same.”
What were they, married?
“By the way, Inspector,” Beatrice said with a smile, “I have a confession to make. When I’m eating, I’m unable to speak. So you should interrogate me now, before the risotto comes, or between courses.”
Jesus! So it was true: the miracle of meeting one’s spiritual twin did sometimes happen. Too bad that, at a glance, she looked to be twenty-five or so years younger than he.
“Never mind the interrogation. Tell me about yourself instead.”
And so before Calogero arrived with the special risotto, which was more than simply special, Montalbano learned that Beatrice was indeed twenty-five years old, had finished her course work in literature at the University of Palermo, and served as a representative of Sirio Kitchenware to support herself while continuing her studies. Sicilian despite appearances, surely of Norman extraction, she was born at Aidone, where her parents still lived. Why did she herself live and work in Vigata? Simple: two years earlier in Aidone, she’d met a boy from Vigata, also a student at Palermo, but in law. They fell in love, she had a terrible quarrel with her parents, and she followed the boy to Vigata. They took an apartment on the sixth floor of an ugly tenement in Piano Lanterna. But from the bedroom balcony you could see the sea. After four months of bliss, Roberto—that was her boyfriend’s name—left her a polite little note telling her he was moving to Rome, where his fiancee, a distant cousin, was waiting for him. She hadn’t had the nerve to go back to Aidone. End of story.
Then, with their noses, palates, and throats invaded by the heavenly scent of the risotto, they fell silent, as agreed.
They resumed speaking while waiting for the bass. The subject of the Griffos was broached by Beatrice herself.
“That couple who disappeared—”
“Excuse me, but if you were in Palermo, how did you know—”
“The manager of Sirio phoned me yesterday and said you summoned all the passengers for questioning.”
“Okay, go on.”
“I naturally have to bring a collection of samples with me. If the coach is full, the samples—which are cumbersome and fill two big boxes—are put in the baggage compartment. But if the coach isn’t full, I usually put them in the last row, the one with five seats. I fit the two boxes into the two seats farthest from the exit, so as not to get in the way of people getting on or off the bus. Well, the Griffos went straight to the last row and sat down there.”
“Which of the three remaining places did they take?”
“Well, he sat in the center seat, the one with the aisle in front of it. His wife sat beside him. The seat left unoccupied was the one closest to the exit. When I arrived at seven-thirty that morning—”
“With the samples?”
“No. The boxes had already been put on the bus the evening before, by an employee
“Go on.”
“When I saw them sitting right next to the boxes, I suggested they might want to find better seats, since the coach was still almost entirely empty and no places were reserved. I pointed out that, since I had to display the merchandise, I might be a nuisance to them, always going back and forth. The woman didn’t even look at me. She only stared straight ahead; I thought she was deaf. The husband, on the other hand, looked worried—no, not worried, but tense. He replied that I could do whatever I needed to do, but they preferred to stay where they were. Halfway through the journey, when I had to get down to work, I asked him to move.You know what he did? He bumped his hip against his wife‘s, forcing her to move into the open seat beside the exit, and slid into her seat, so I could get my frying pan. But when I turned around, with my back to the driver, microphone in one hand and frying pan in the other, the Griffos were already back in their old places.”
