time dealer of soft drugs and the manager of an open-air bordello known as the Pasture, the inspector had been reading a detective novel by a writer from Barcelona who greatly intrigued him and had the same surname as he, though hispanicized: Montalb. One sentence in particular had struck him: The pistol slept, looking like a cold lizard. He withdrew his hand with a slight feeling of disgust and closed the glove compartment, leaving the lizard to its slumber. After all, if the whole business that was about to unfold, turned out to be a trap, an ambush, he could carry all the pistols he wanted, and still they would fill him with holes with their Kalishnikovs however and whenever they so desired, thank you and good night. He could only hope that Gege remembering the years they'd spent together on the same bench in elementary school and the friendship they'd carried over into adulthood, had not decided, out of self-interest, to sell him like pork at the market, feeding him any old bullshit just to lead him to the slaughter. No, not just any old bullshit: this business, if for real, could be really big, make a lot of noise.
He sighed deeply and began to make his way slowly, step by step, up a narrow, rocky path between broad expanses of vineyard. The vines bore table grapes, with round, firm seeds, the kind called, who knows why, Italian grapes, the only kind that would take in this soil. As for trying to grow vines for making wine, in this soil you were better off sparing yourself the labor and expense.
The two-story cottage, one room on top of another, was at the summit of the hill, half-hidden by four large Saracen olive trees that nearly surrounded it. It was just as Gege'd described it. Faded, shuttered windows and door, a huge caper bush in front, with some smaller shrubs of touch-me-not the small, wild cucumber that squirts seeds into the air if you touch it with the tip of a stick, a collapsed wicker chair turned upside down, an old zinc bucket eaten up by rust and now useless. Grass had overgrown everything else. It all conspired to give the impression that the place had been uninhabited for years, but this appearance was deceptive, and experience had made Montalbano too savvy to be fooled. In fact he was convinced that somebody was eyeing him from inside the cottage, trying to guess his intentions from the moves he would make. He stopped three steps in front of the house, took off his jacket, and hung it from a branch of the olive tree so they could see he wasn't armed. Then he called out without raising his voice much, like a friend come to visit a friend.
'Hey! Anybody home?'
No answer, not a sound. Montalbano pulled a lighter and a pack of cigarettes from his trouser pocket, put one in his mouth, and lit it, turning round halfway to shelter himself from the wind. That way whoever was inside the house could examine him from behind, having already examined him from the front. He took two puffs, then went to the door and knocked with his fist, hard enough to hurt his knuckles on the crusts of paint on the wood.
'Is there anyone here?' he asked again.
He was ready for anything, except the calm, ironic voice that surprised him from behind.
'Sure there is. Over here.'
...
It had all started with a phone call.
'Hello? Hello? Montalbano! Salvuzzo! It's me, Gege'
'I know it's you. Calm down. How are you, my little honey-eyed orange blossom?'
'I'm fine.'
'Working the mouth hard these days? Been perfecting your blow-job techniques?'
'Come on, Salvo, don't start with your usual faggot stuff. You know damn well that I don't work myself. I only make other mouths work for me.'
'But aren't you the instructor? Aren't you the one who teaches your multicolored assortment of whores how to hold their lips and how hard to suck?'
'Salvo, if what you're saying was true, they'd be the ones teaching me. They come to me at age ten already well- trained, and at fifteen they're top-of-the-line professionals. I've got a little Albanian fourteen-year-old..'
'You trying to sell me your merchandise now?'
'Listen, I got no time to fuck around. I have something I'm supposed to give you, a package.'
'At this hour? Can't you get it to me tomorrow morning?'
'I won't be in town tomorrow.'
'Do you know what's in the package?'
'Of course. Mostaccioli with mulled wine, the way you like 'em. My sister Mariannina made them just for you.'
'How's Mariannina doing with her eyes?'
'Much better. They work miracles in Barcelona.'
'They also write good books in Barcelona.'
'What's that?'
'Never mind. Just talking to myself. Where do you want to meet?'
'The usual place, in an hour.'
The usual place was the little beach of Puntasecca, a short tongue of sand beneath a white marl hill, almost inaccessible by land, or rather, accessible only to Montalbano and Gege who back in grade school had discovered a trail that was difficult enough on foot and downright fool hardy to attempt by car. Puntasecca was only a few kilometers from Montalbano's little house by the sea just outside of Vig, and that was why he took his time. But the moment he opened the door to go to his rendezvous, the telephone rang.
'Hi, darling. It's me, right on time. How did things go today?'
'Business as usual. And you?'
'Ditto. Listen, Salvo, I've been thinking long and hard about what..'
'Livia, sorry to interrupt, but I haven't got much time. Actually I don't have any time at all. You caught me just
