smell his sour breath.
‘You think I’d tell you?’ asked the man with a smirk. But behind his bravado, Fabrizio thought he could see a desperate need to talk to someone. To relieve himself, perhaps, of an intolerable burden.
‘Probably not,’ replied Fabrizio calmly. ‘But I can tell you that you’re the one who tipped off the police about the Phersu tomb. You were almost certainly there at the site with those poor wretches who ended up with their throats ripped out. But you slipped away before the Finanza team got there.’
The man suddenly leaned in closer. ‘Then it’s true that you’re dangerous!’ he said, gulping down more wine.
‘Who told you that? The woman from the Le Macine tavern?’
‘You know her? But how…’
‘Yeah, I know her. And so do you, I see.’
The man was increasingly surprised and confounded by Fabrizio’s words. He lowered his head, letting out a long breath.
‘I wish I didn’t,’ he said. ‘I’d be better off if I’d never met her.’
‘Same here. But why did she come here to see you in the middle of the night?’
The man sighed again. ‘Nightmares also come to visit in the middle of the night,’ he replied. ‘Since I found that inscription, she’s changed completely. She’s turned into another person.’
‘She’s the one who told you where the inscription was, isn’t she?’
‘How do you know that?’
‘Was it her?’
‘Yes.’
‘And she has kept one of the pieces after she got you to break up the slab?’
The man nodded.
‘So she instructed you to notify the National Antiquities Service.’
‘That’s my own fucking business!’ the man responded with a flash of pride. ‘They were supposed to give me a pile of money. And I was having problems making ends meet… I was in prison.’
‘She’s also the one who told you where you’d find the tomb.’
The man nodded, submissive again.
‘And she’ll tell you where the seventh fragment of the inscription is… when she decides.’
‘No. She’s already told me.’
‘Tonight?’
The man nodded again.
‘Why were you arguing?’
‘Because… I’ve had enough. I can’t take it any more. I won’t.
Fabrizio looked at him closely. His face was sallow, his brow damp with sweat. His hands were shaking uncontrollably. His eyes were wide and filled with fear. He was a sick man.
‘Tell me where it is,’ tried Fabrizio in a commanding tone.
But the man just shook his head convulsively, as if he were the prisoner of a force that dominated him completely.
‘Tell me!’ insisted Fabrizio, grabbing him by the shirt. ‘You absolutely must tell me! Many human lives may still be destroyed unless you do. Can’t you understand?’
The man yanked free, took a long breath and seemed to be about to say something when a long howl echoed, frighteningly close, followed by a deep snarling growl. The two men looked at each other with sudden, acute distress.
‘My God,’ said Fabrizio.
11
FABRIZIO SEARCHED the other man’s face but found only bewilderment and a touch of madness.
‘Do you have a weapon?’ he asked.
The man lowered his head. ‘It’s no use,’ he said. ‘This time it’s come for me. I should never have refused.’
Fabrizio grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him. ‘A man like you must have a gun somewhere, damn it! Get it and defend yourself. It’s only an animal. Ghosts don’t rip people apart the way he does.’
But as he spoke he felt like his voice was coming from someone else’s mouth, as if those weren’t his own words. This feeling of alienation made him profoundly uneasy.
‘You must have a weapon,’ he insisted, trying hard to pull himself together. ‘Get it and cover me while I try to reach my car. My rifle’s inside and it’s locked and loaded.’
As he spoke he could see the soft reflection of the burnished barrel in the darkness, smell the glycerine oil mixed with the persistent scent of gunpowder. All his senses were enhanced as he sought a point of focus.
The other man finally shook himself out of his trance. He got up, went towards the glass case and tried to control the trembling of his hands as he opened it. At that same moment the howl of the beast sounded even closer and was joined by the hoarse, furious barking of the dog outside. They heard the chain snapping back and forth, back and forth along the wire, followed by a fierce snarl and an immediately suffocated yelp. Then silence.
The man covered his mouth with his hand in a gesture of despair. ‘He killed my dog,’ he said softly. ‘He’s already here.’ Then, with a sudden flash of conscience, he pushed Fabrizio towards a door at the back of the kitchen. ‘You can get out this way. The regional road is just 100 metres away. There’s always a car passing. Run.’ He searched Fabrizio’s face fleetingly, but then his eyes turned blank. He walked mechanically to the door that led to the courtyard and was outside before Fabrizio could stop him.
Fabrizio heard a shriek of terror, followed by the same growl he’d heard a few nights before, suffocated as the animal sank his snout into flesh and blood. He ran through the kitchen, down the hall and out the back door. He could see his car out of the corner of his eye; he knew he could make it. But as he was about to make a dash for it, he saw two headlights flare at the far end the courtyard and Francesca’s little Jeep pulled up. He heard her voice calling, ‘Fabrizio! Fabrizio, are you there?’
Fabrizio felt his blood turn to water and, gripped by panic, he shouted out at the top of his voice, ‘Francesca! Francesca, no! Lock yourself in! Don’t move!’
And he sprinted towards his own car, partially illuminated now by Francesca’s headlights. But the beast instantly looked up from its victim and lunged after him. Fabrizio could feel its hot panting at his back, but he was sure he could make it. The car was there and Francesca was alive, though he could hear her terrified screaming. He opened the door, grabbed the gun, spun around and pulled the trigger. In the beam of the Jeep’s headlights he saw the creature’s terrifying bulk, its hackles raised, its bared bloodied fangs, and he understood he had failed in the same instant in which horror nailed him fast to the ground, slowed, almost paralysed his movements but left his mind free to race at an insane speed towards his own death.
He had no idea what was happening when the courtyard was swept by the blinding glare of another set of headlights. The dilated space of that unreal event was ripped through with agitated shouting and a burst of deafening explosions. He finally separated a voice he could recognize. It was Lieutenant Reggiani, yelling, ‘Fire! Fire! Shoot to kill, damn it. Don’t let it get away!’
Fabrizio heard bullets whistling in every direction, saw the dark sky streaked by vermilion tracers. White-hot stones scattered about him, filling the air with the sharp odour of burnt flint. A black mass made an impossible leap, cleared the squad-car blockade and disappeared into nowhere. Without noise, weightless, shape without substance, it seemed, until you saw the trail of blood it left behind. The man with his throat torn out was still bleeding in the glow of the headlights, his corpse jumbled up with the body of a dog, a brave little creature killed in the line of duty.
Fabrizio thought his head would explode. He called out, ‘Francesca!’ and the girl ran to him, threw herself into his arms and clung to him, crying the whole time.
Fabrizio touched her hair, caressed her cheek. ‘Do you believe me now?’
‘Looks like we got here just in time,’ rang out Reggiani’s voice to his right.
Fabrizio turned to face him. He was wearing combat fatigues and held two smoking pistols, one in each hand.
