“Who made up the difference?”
“Do I really have to say?”
“Yes.”
“I did,” the doctor said reluctantly.
“And what happened next?”
“After the three months had gone by, Giulia asked her brother if he could pay back the loan, at least in part. Antonio asked her if they could delay it a week. Mind you, they had nothing in writing: no agreements, no promissory notes, nothing. The only document was a receipt for the two hundred fifty million lire my brother had insisted on giving me. Four days later,Antonio was indicted for a variety of things, including corruption of a public official, fraudulent balance sheets, and so on. After five months had passed, Giulia, who’d been wanting to send Susanna to an exclusive boarding school in Florence, asked again for some of the money back, only to have Antonio reply rudely that this was not the right time for it. And so Susanna stayed here to study. Well, in short, the right time never came.” “Are you telling me those two billion lire were never re-paid?”
“Precisely. Antonio beat the rap at his trial, quite probably because he’d managed to get rid of the incriminating documents, but one of his businesses mysteriously went bankrupt. Then, by some sort of domino effect, his other businesses all met the same end. Everybody got screwed: creditors, suppliers, employees, everyone. What’s more, his wife caught the gambling bug and lost incredible sums of cash. Then, three years ago, Giulia and Antonio had a terrible row, after which they stopped speaking to one another.
That was when Giulia first got sick. She no longer wanted to live. And, as I’m sure you understand, it wasn’t simply a matter of money.”
“How’s Antonio’s business doing now?”
“Splendidly. Two years ago he got his hands on some new capital. Personally, I think the bankruptcies were all staged, and in reality he illegally transferred his money abroad. Then, with the new law, he brought it back in, paid his percentage, and put his affairs in order—like all the other crooks who did the same thing, once the law legalized what had once been illegal. Now, because of the earlier bankruptcies, all his businesses are in his wife’s name. As for us, I repeat: We haven’t seen a cent.” “What’s Antonio’s surname?”
“Peruzzo. Antonio Peruzzo.”
Montalbano knew that name. Fazio had mentioned it when reporting the phone call from a former “administrative employee at Peruzzo’s” who’d wanted to remind Susanna’s father that too much pride was a bad thing. It was all starting to make sense.
“You do realize,” the doctor went on, “that Giulia’s illness complicates the present situation.”
“In what way?”
“A mother is always a mother.”
“Whereas a father is only sometimes a father?” the inspector retorted brusquely, feeling slightly irritated by the cliche.
“I meant that with Susanna’s life in danger, if Giulia weren’t so sick, she wouldn’t have hesistated a second to ask Antonio for help.”
“And you think your brother won’t?”
“Salvatore has a lot of pride.”
The same word the former Peruzzo employee used.
“So you think there’s no way he would ever give in?”
“My God, ‘no way,’ I can’t say. Maybe, if put under enough pressure . . .”
“Like receiving one of his daughter’s ears in the mail?” He’d said it on purpose. The whole manner in which the doctor had set about telling the story had put his nerves on edge. The man acted like he had nothing to do with any of it, even though he’d personally thrown in two hundred and fifty million lire. He only got upset when Susanna’s name was mentioned. This time, however, the doctor gave such a start that Montalbano could feel it in the bench they were sitting on, which shook a little.
“Would they go so far?”
“They could go even farther than that, if they want.” He’d succeeded in rousing the doctor. In the wan light filtering out the living room’s French doors, he saw him reach into his pocket, pull out a handkerchief, and wipe his brow.
What he needed to do now was to pry open the chink he’d opened in Carlo Mistretta’s armor.
“I’m going to tell it to you straight, Doctor. The way things stand right now, we haven’t the slightest idea who the kidnappers are or where they’re keeping Susanna prisoner.
Not even a vague idea, despite the fact that we’ve found your niece’s helmet and backpack. Did you know we’d found them?”
“No, this is the first I’ve heard of it.” A long, deep silence ensued. Because Montalbano was waiting for the doctor to ask a question. A natural question that any other person would have asked. The doctor, however, didn’t open his mouth. So the inspector decided to go on.
“If your brother doesn’t take the initiative, the kidnappers could take that as a sign that he’s not willing to cooperate.”
“What can we do?”
“Try to persuade your brother to make some overture to Antonio.”
“That won’t be easy.”
“Tell him that otherwise you’ll have to make the overture yourself. Or is it too hard for you, too?”
