The Terra-Cotta Dog

Anna kissed him on each cheek and handed him a package.

'I brought you a petrafula.'

This was a cake now very hard to find, which Montalbano loved, but it was anyones guess why the pastry shops had stopped making it.

'I had to go to Mittica for work and saw it in a window, so I bought it for you. Careful with your teeth.'

'The harder the cake was, the tastier.'

'What were you doing?'

'Nothing, just reading a magazine. Why don't you come outside?'

They sat down on the bench. Montalbano went back to looking at the photographs, while Anna rested her head on her hands and gazed out at the sea.

'It's so beautiful here!'

'Yes.'

'All you hear are the waves.'

'Yes.'

'Does it bother you if I talk?'

'No.'

Anna fell silent. After a brief pause, she spoke again.

'I'm going inside to watch TV. I feel a little chilly.'

'Mm-hmm.'

The inspector didn't want to encourage her. Anna clearly wanted to abandon herself to a solitary pleasure, that of pretending she was his partner, imagining they were spending a quiet evening together like so many others.

On the very last page of the magazine, he saw a photo that showed the inside of a cave, the grotto of Fragapane, which was actually a necropolis, a network of Christian tombs dug out of ancient cisterns. The picture served in its way to illustrate the review of a recent book by one Alcide Maraventano entitled Funerary Rites in the Montelusa Region. The publication of this richly documented essay by Maraventano, the reviewer claimed, filled a void, giving us a work of great scholarly value that investigated, with keen intelligence, a subject spanning the period from prehistory to the Byzantine-Christian era.

He sat there a long time meditating on what he had just read. The idea that the jug, the bowl with coins, and the dog might be part of some burial rite had never even crossed his mind. And perhaps he'd been wrong not to think of this; in fact, the investigation should probably have started from this very premise. He suddenly felt uncontrollably pressed. He went inside, unplugged the phone, then picked up the whole apparatus.

'What are you doing?' asked Anna, who was watching the gangster movie.

'I'm going into the bedroom to make some phone calls. I don't want to disturb you out here.'

He dialed the Free Channels number and asked for his friend Nicolto.

'Quick, Montalbano, I go on the air in a few seconds.'

'Do you know someone by the name of Maraventano who wrote'

'Alcide? Sure, I know him. What do you want from him?'

'I'd like to talk to him. Do you have his phone number?'

'He hasn't got a phone. Are you at home? I'll track him down myself and let you know.'

'I need to talk to him by tomorrow.'

'I'll call you back in an hour at the latest and tell you what to do.'

He turned off the bedside lamp. In the dark it was easier to think about the idea that had just come to him. He tried to imagine the Crasticeddrus cave the way it had looked when he first entered. If you removed the two bodies from the picture, that left the rug, a bowl, a jug, and a terra-cotta dog. If you drew lines between the three objects, they formed a perfect triangle, though upside down with respect to the caves entrance. At the center of the triangle lay the two corpses. Did it mean anything? Maybe he needed to study the triangles orientation?

Between thinking, musing, and fantasizing, he ended up dozing off. After a spell of indeterminate length, he was awakened by the ring of the telephone. He answered in a thick voice.

'Did you fall asleep?'

'Yeah, nodded off.'

'And here I am putting myself out for you. So: Alcide is expecting you tomorrow afternoon at five-thirty. He lives in Gallotta.'

Gallotta was a village a few miles outside of Montelusa, a handful of peasant houses once famous for being inaccessible in winter, when the rains were heavy.

'Give me the address.'

'What address? If you're coming from Montelusa, it's the first house on the left, a big tumbledown villa that would delight any horror-film director. You cant miss it.'

He fell back asleep as soon as he put down the receiver. Then he woke with a start, feeling something moving on his chest. It was Anna, whom he'd completely forgotten about, lying down beside him on the bed and unbuttoning his shirt. On every piece of skin she uncovered, she planted her lips and held them there a long time. When she reached his navel, the girl raised her head, slipped one hand under his shirt to caress his nipple, then