The Age Of Doubt

16

As Montalbano was entering Geremicca’s office, he had no idea that in a few minutes, inside those four walls, a word would be uttered, only one, but that word alone would suffice to put him on the right track.

Upon seeing Montalbano, Geremicca stood up smiling and rotated his right hand in the air, as if to say that something really big had happened.

“Montalbano! You’ve landed a big one!”

“Me? What’d I do?”

“I e-mailed my French colleague a photocopy of the passport you gave me. And I told him that you’d told me that the name on the passport was the same as that of a character in a Simenon novel, if I remember correctly.”

“That’s right. And so?”

“And so he started telling me that a month ago they’d arrested an expert forger, a real master, but the guy refused to name his clients. They had, however, managed to confiscate two passports ready for use, among other things. Your passport, together with these, made three. And thanks to the clue we’d given them, my friend discovered that the forger was in the habit of using fictional names of characters from French literature. Imagine that!”

“I guess the guy liked to read.”

“And there’s more. The names the forger chose always had some sort of connection with something the client did in real life.”

“Can you give me a little more detail?”

“Sure. Just to give you an idea, my colleague said this Emile Lannec, the fictional character, owns a small steamboat in the novel. Is that true?”

“Absolutely.”

“Well, thanks to some other information, and despite the mangled face, my colleague was able to identify the man on the passport. His name is Jean-Pierre David. He has a clean record, but the police have had their eye on him for a while.”

“And what’s the thing connected to his real life?”

“His father used to own a small steamboat that eventually sank. And so the clue you gave them helped lead the French to the true identities of the other two whose passports were ready for use. They convey their heartfelt thanks to you.”

“And why were they keeping an eye on this David?”

“Apparently he was part of a large organization involved in some heavy traffic.”

“What kind of traffic?”

“Diamonds.”

Montalbano gave a start. For a moment he couldn’t see a thing. The lightning that had flashed through his brain was so bright, it had blinded him.

***

What to do next?

It should have been his duty to go at once, without wasting another minute, to the office of Mezzamore, no, Mozzamore, or whatever the hell his name was, and tell him point by point everything he had learned. Should have been, mind you. Because, according to the commissioner’s orders, the inspector shouldn’t even have gone to see Geremicca that morning. He should have told him, over the phone: “Thank you, my friend, but you should pass all information on to my colleague Mizzamore, since he’s the one handling the case henceforth.”

Instead, he’d gone. Thus committing an act of insubordination. Now if he went to Mozzamore and told him that the dead man had been identified, the commissioner could accuse him of insubordination or worse…

“But aren’t you ashamed to be pulling out such lame excuses?” the voice of his conscience reproached him. “The truth of the matter is that you’re such an egotist, such a selfish wretch that you don’t want to share anything with anyone…”

“Would you just let me think for a second?” Montalbano replied.

To report or not to report. That was the question.

In the end, his conscience won out. He walked around the building, entered through the main door, and asked where Inspector Muzzamore’s office was.

“You mean Mazzamore?” the person at the reception desk, who knew Montalbano, corrected him. “It’s right next door to Dr. Lattes’s office.”

Alas. Alas, alack, and wailaway. He had to proceed with extreme caution.

Instead of taking the elevator, he climbed the stairs. When he’d reached the right floor, he stopped. There was a whole corridor to cross. He stuck his head out and saw none other than Lattes, standing right in the middle of the hallway, talking to someone.

No, he just couldn’t go on any longer with this farce about the nonexistent little boy who died.

He turned tail and left. He would give Mazzamore a ring. But later, whenever he happened to. There was no hurry.

“Pretty good excuse you came up with there!” his conscience needled him.

He told his conscience where to go, to the same place he probably too often sent it. Actually, there was no “probably” about it.

***

“Ahh Chief Chief! Ahh Chief!”

Montalbano knew what this plaintive litany meant.

“Did the commissioner call?”

“Yessir, ’e did, jess now, by tiliphone.”

“What did he want?”

“’E said as how ya gotta go rilly rilly emergently t’ see ’im, ’im being Mr. C’mishner hisself.”

Utterly and totally out of the question! No way could he risk running into Lattes. At the very least he would be forced to thank him for the funerary pillow.

“Tell Fazio to come to my office at once. And, by the way, did you find anything about Kimberley Process?”

“Yessir, I did, Chief, I’ll prinn it up straightaways.”

Going into his office, the inspector noticed that one of the flowers that had come detached from the wreath when he’d knocked it to the floor had remained there. He bent down, picked it up, and threw it out the window. He didn’t want to see anything that might remind him of the dream he’d had of his own funeral.

“What is it, Chief?” asked Fazio, coming in.

“You have to do me a favor. I want you to call the commissioner.”

Fazio looked puzzled.

“Me?!”

“Why not? Do you find it offensive? Embarrassing?”

“No, Chief, but…”

“No buts. I want you to tell him a lie.”

“About what?”

“He wants to see me right now, but for reasons of my own, I really can’t go there just now.”

“And what am I supposed to tell him?”

“Tell him that as I was driving to work somebody bumped into me, and you had to take me to the emergency