'Total insanity! Total insanity!'
'Simmer down, boys. Let's proceed in orderly fashion,' Montalbano ordered, imposing his authority.
Then, noticing that Galluzzos shirt and jacket no longer bore traces of the blood from his crushed nose, the inspector asked him:
'Did you go home and change before coming here?'
'Home? Home? Didn't you hear what Fazio said? We've just come from Palermo, we came straight back! When we got to the Anti-Mafia Commission and turned over Tano the Greek, they took us one by one and put us in separate rooms. Since my nose was still hurting, I wanted to put a wet handkerchief over it. I'd been sitting there for half an hour, and still nobody'd shown up, so I opened the door and found an officer standing in front of me. Where you going? he says. I'm going to get a little water for my nose.You can't leave, he says, go back inside. Get that, Inspector? I was under guard! Like I was Tano the Greek!'
'Don't mention that name and lower your voice!' Montalbano scolded him. 'Nobody is supposed to know that we caught him! The first one who talks gets his ass kicked all the way to Asinara.'
'We were all under guard,' Fazio cut in, indignant.
Galluzzo continued his story:
'An hour later some guy I know entered the room, a colleague of yours who was kicked upstairs to the Anti- Mafia Commission. I think his name is Sciacchitano.'
'He looked at me as if I smelled bad or something, like some beggar. Then he kept on staring at me, and finally he said: You know, you can't very well present yourself to the Prefect looking like that.'
Still feeling hurt by the absurd treatment, he had trouble keeping his voice down.
'The amazing thing was that he had this pissed-off look in his eye, like it was all my fault! Then he left, muttering to himself. Later a cop came in with a clean shirt and jacket.'
'Now let me talk,' Fazio butted in, pulling rank. 'To make a long story short, from three oclock in the afternoon to midnight yesterday, every one of us was interrogated eight times by eight different people.'
'What did they want to know?'
'How the arrest came about.'
'Actually, I was interrogated ten times,' said German with a certain pride. 'I guess I tell a good story, and for them it was like being at the movies.'
'Around one oclock in the morning they gathered us together,' Fazio continued, 'and put us in a great big room, a kind of large office, with two sofas, eight chairs, and four tables. They unplugged the telephones and took them away. Then they sent in four stale sandwiches and four warm beers that tasted like piss. We got as comfortable as we could, and at eight the next morning some guy came in and said we could go back to Vig. No good morning, no good-bye, not even get outta here like you say to get rid of the dog. Nothing.'
'All right,' said Montalbano. 'What can you do? Go on home now, rest up, and come back here in the late afternoon. I promise you I'll take this whole business up with the commissioner.'
...
'Hello? This is Inspector Salvo Montalbano from Vig. I'd like to speak with Inspector Arturo Sciacchitano.'
'Please hold.'
Montalbano grabbed a sheet of paper and a pen. He started doodling without paying attention and only later noticed he had drawn a pair of buttocks on a toilet seat.
'I'm sorry, the inspectors in a meeting.'
'Listen, please tell him I'm also in a meeting, that way were even. He can interrupt his for five minutes, I'll do the same with mine, and we'll both be happy as babies.'
He appended a few turds to the shitting buttocks.
'Montalbano? What is it? Sorry, but I haven't got much time.'
'Me neither. Listen, Sciacchitanov'
'Eh? Sciacchitanov? What the hell are you saying?'
'Isn't that your real name? You mean you don't belong to the KGB?'
'I'm not in the mood for jokes, Montalbano.'
'Who's joking? I'm calling you from the commissioners office, and he's very upset over the KGB-style treatment you gave my men. He promised me he'd write to the interior minister this very day.'
The phenomenon cannot be explained, and yet it happened: Montalbano actually saw Sciacchitano, universally known as a pusillanimous ass-lick, turn pale over the telephone line. His lie had the same effect on the man as a billy club to the head.
'What are you saying? You have to understand that I, as defender of public safety..'
Montalbano interrupted him.
'Safety doesn't preclude politeness,' he said pithily, 'sounding like one of those road signs that say: be polite, for safety's sake.'
'But I was extremely polite! I even gave them beer and sandwiches!'
'I'm sorry to say, but despite the beer and sandwiches, there will be consequences higher up. But cheer up,
