you’re crying already—tell him the kid has disappeared, maybe he ran off in search of the old lady, you don’t know, but in short you want him to help you find him. In the meantime, I’ll have returned. And one last thing: call Palermo airport and reserve a seat on the flight to Genoa, the one that leaves around noon tomorrow. That’ll give me enough time to find someone to take you there. See you soon.” He hung up, and his eyes met Valente’s troubled gaze.
“You think they’d go that far?”
“Farther.”
o o o
“Is the story clear to you now?” asked Montalbano.
“I think I’m beginning to understand,” replied Valente.
“Let me explain better,” said the inspector. “All in all, things may have gone as follows: Ahmed Moussa, for his own reasons, has one of his men, Fahrid, set up a base of operations. Fahrid enlists the help—whether freely offered or not, I don’t know—of Ahmed’s sister, Karima, who’s been living in Sicily for a few years. Then they blackmail a man from Vigata named Lapecora into letting them use his old import-export business as a front. Are you following?” “Perfectly.”
“Ahmed, who needs to attend an important meeting involving weapons or political support for his movement, comes to Italy under the protection of our secret services.
The meeting takes place at sea, but in all likelihood it’s a trap.
Ahmed didn’t have the slightest suspicion that our services were double-crossing him, and that they were in cahoots with the people in Tunis who wanted to liquidate him.
Among other things, I’m convinced that Fahrid himself was part of the plan to do away with Ahmed. The sister, I don’t think so.”
“Why are you so afraid for the boy?”
“Because he’s a witness. He could recognize Fahrid the way he recognized his uncle on TV. And Fahrid has already killed Karima, I’m sure of it. He killed her after taking her away in a car that turns out to belong to our secret services.” “What are we going to do?”
“You, for now, are going to sit tight. I’m going to get busy creating a diversion.”
“Good luck.”
“Good luck to you, my friend.”
o o o
By the time he got back to headquarters it was already evening. Fazio was there waiting for him.
“Have you found Francois?”
“Did you go home before coming here?” Fazio asked instead of answering.
“No. I came directly from Mazara.”
“Chief, could we go into your office for a minute?” Once they were inside, Fazio closed the door.
“Chief, I’m a cop. Maybe not as good a cop as you, but still a cop. How did you know the kid ran away?”
“What’s with you, Fazio? Livia phoned me in Mazara and I told her to call you.”
“See, Chief, the fact is, the young lady told me she was asking me for help because she didn’t know where you were.”
“Touche,” said Montalbano.
“And then, she was really and truly crying, no doubt about that. Not because the kid had run away, but for some other reason, which I don’t know. So I figured out what it was you wanted me to do, and I did it.” “And what did I want you to do?”
“To raise a ruckus, make a lot of noise. I went to all the houses in the neighborhood and asked every person I ran into.
Have you seen a little kid like so? Nobody’d seen him, but now they all know he ran away. Isn’t that what you wanted?” Montalbano felt moved. This was real friendship, Sicilian friendship, the kind based on intuition, on what was left un-said. With a true friend, one never needs to ask, because the other understands on his own and acts accordingly.
“What should I do now?”
“Keep raising a ruckus. Call the carabinieri, call every one of their headquarters in the province, call every police station, hospital, anybody you can think of. But do it unofficially, only by phone, nothing in writing. Describe the boy, show them you’re worried.” “But are we sure they won’t end up finding him, Chief ?”
“Not to worry, Fazio. He’s in good hands.”
o o o
He took a sheet of paper with the station’s letterhead and typed:
to the ministry of transportation and automobile registration:
for delicate investigation into abduction and probable homicide of woman answering to name karima moussa need name owner automobile
license-plate number am 237 gw. kindly reply promptly. inspector salvo montalbano.
God only knew why, whenever he had to write a fax, he composed it as if it were a telegram. He reread it. He’d even written out the woman’s name to make the bait more appetizing. They would surely have to come out in the
