back, he wouldn’t tell you anything. You couldn’t squeeze a single word out of him. In the end I was convinced he was seeing another woman, having some passing fling. But after the way he was killed, I’m no longer so sure he was having affairs.”
“What was he doing, then?”
Paola threw up her hands in despair.
12
Before going to eat, Montalbano dropped in at the station. Catarella was sleeping in front of the computer, head thrown back, mouth open, a bit of saliva trickling down his chin. He did not wake up. The next phone call would take care of that.
On the inspector’s desk was a dark blue canvas bag. A leather label stuck onto the front of it bore the words “Salmon House.” He opened it and realized it was insulated. Inside were five round, transparent plastic containers in which one could see large fillets of pickled herring swimming in multicolored sauces. There was also a smoked salmon, whole. And an envelope wrapped in cellophane.
He opened it.
From Sweden with love. Ingrid.
Apparently Ingrid had found someone there from Sicily and taken the opportunity to send along that little gift. He suddenly missed Ingrid so much that the desire to open one of those containers and have a little foretaste faded. When would she make up her mind to come back?
It was no longer possible to go to the trattoria. He had to race back home and empty that bag in the refrigerator.
Picking it up, he noticed there were three sheets of paper under it. The first was a note from Catarella.
Chief. Seeing as how I don’t know weather or not your coming personally in person to the ofice, I’m leving you the printout of the siccond file which I had to stay up all nite to figger out the past word for but in the end I stuck it to that file I did.
The other two pages were all numbers. Two columns, as before. The left-hand figures were exactly the same as those in the first file. He pulled the pages he’d worked on that morning out of his jacket pocket and checked.
Identical. All that changed were the numbers in the second column. But he didn’t feel like giving himself a headache.
He left the old pages, the new pages, and the coded songbook on the desk, grabbed the canvas bag, and went out of the room. Passing by the closet at the entrance, he heard Catarella yelling.
“No, sir, no, sir, I’m sorry but the inspector ain’t in, this morning he said this morning he wasn’t coming in this morning. Yessir, I’ll tell ‘im, certifiably. Have no fears, I’ll tell ‘im.”
“Was that for me, Cat?” asked the inspector, appearing before him.
Catarella looked at him as if he were Lazarus risen from the dead.
“Matre santa,Chief, where djouse come from?”
It was too complicated to explain that he’d been sleeping, drained from a night of battle with passwords, when the inspector came in. Never in a million years, moreover, would the diligent Catarella have admitted nodding off on the job at the switchboard.
“Who was it?” the inspector asked.
“Dr. Latte wit’ ansat the end. He said that seeing as how Mr. C’mishner can’t see you today, neither, the day we’re at now, as you guys prearraigned, he says he rearraigned it for tomorrow, atta zack same time as was sposed to be on the day of today.”
“Cat, do you know you are brilliant?”
“For as how the way I ‘splained what that Dr. Latte wit’ ansat the end said?”
“No, because you managed to open the second file.”
“Ahhh, Chief! I straggled all night wit’ it! You got no idea what kinda trouble I had! It was a past word that looked like one past word but rilly was—”
“Tell me about it later, Cat.”
He was afraid to waste time. The herring and salmon in the bag might start to spoil.
But the moment he got home and opened the first container, the persuasive aroma invading his nostrils made him realize he needed to equip himself at once with a plate, a fork, and a fresh loaf of bread.
At least half the contents of those containers needed to go not in the refrigerator but straight into his belly. Only the salmon went into the fridge. The rest he took outside onto the veranda, after setting the table.
The herring, which were high caliber, turned out to be marinated in a variety of preparations ranging from sweet-and-sour sauce to mustard. He had a feast. He really wanted to scarf them all down, but realized that he would spend the whole afternoon and evening wanting water like someone stranded for days in the desert.
So he put what remained into the fridge and replaced his customary walk along the jetty with a long walk on the beach.
Then he took a shower and lolled about the house a bit before returning to the station around four-thirty. Catarella was not at his post. In compensation he ran into a glum-faced Mimi Augello in the corridor.
“What’s wrong, Mimi?”
“Where are you coming from? What are you doing?” Augello fired back edgily, following him into his office.
“I come from Vigata, and I’m doing my job as inspector,”Montalbano crooned to the tune of “Pale Little
