up on Monte Caio.”
“Have you ever heard tell of this ‘Kite’?”
“There were all kinds who passed this way,” Dinon said, to quash any further discussion. “There were followers of General Badoglio, as well as members of the Garibaldi Resistance group. They came from Lombardy, from the Veneto or up from the Gothic Line. And then there was the other lot, the G.A.P., and nobody had any idea who they were. They wouldn’t have given away their undercover names even to their own families.”
“Perhaps Tonna had killed-”
“Nothing more likely,” Dinon interrupted him. “And it wouldn’t have been the only time.”
Soneri signalled to the waitress to bring another bottle and when he had refilled the glasses, he confronted them: “I believe you both know exactly who this ‘Kite’ is.”
Vaeven now pushed his hat to the back of his head with his knuckles, put one elbow on the table and leaned forward, causing the table to tilt to one side: “Listen, Commissario, I got to know lots of you police types back in 1960 when we took to the streets to stop Tambroni becoming prime minister. So you’re not going to catch me out.”
Soneri said nothing and the other took it as a surrender, but instead of attacking, he retreated, relaxing against the back of his seat. They remained in that position until the commissario decided to drop the subject. The equilibrium underlying their exchange was as precarious as the currents of the Po.
“You’ve stayed in the party?”
“Always. We’ve never changed our banner. Ours has the hammer and sickle,” Vaeven said forcibly, pulling up his sleeve to show off his tattoo.
“Are you saying that others…”
The man raised his right hand as though he were going to toss something over his shoulder. “The majority has changed. Nowadays they’re cosying up to the priests and the churchy lot. They’ve got their co-operatives and strike deals with the bosses.”
“Barigazzi as well?”
“He’s getting on now, but the people he has around him…they’ve watered everything down. They used to be Lambrusco, but they’re very thin wine now.”
“Do the two of you still sail?”
“We do some fishing as a hobby. I’ve got an old magano which is holding up well.”
“What did Tonna transport?”
“They say he carried odds and ends, but what was really below, nobody knows. There are no borders or customs along the Po.”
It was dark now, nearly time for dinner, and the bar was emptying. Dinon rose to his feet, slowly stretching his giant body. Each of his movements was deliberate, as though he were keeping his balance on a boat on the river. “Commissario, what are you looking for?” he asked, when the conversation seemed over.
Soneri was thrown by the question. He had lowered his guard and that question reopened the door on all his doubts, because he was not sure himself what he was looking for. For a second time he felt lost, and all the while the boatman kept his steely gaze on him. There was in him a certainty which had probably never faltered. There was no trace of doubt in his eyes. Soneri felt a twinge of envy.
“I’m looking for Tonna,” he said, but he had voiced the first thought that came into his mind.
The other two stared harder at him and then left the Italia without another word.
At that hour, the town was deserted. The only noise that cut through the mist was the unchanging sound of the water pumps. Behind the embankment, the floodlights trained twin beams, two shining circles made almost solid by the enveloping mists, on to the floodplain at the points where the pumps were draining the water away. He felt the full weight of the question: was he wasting his time in a town indifferent to the fate of a boatman who had been a leading figure in an age long gone? Not even his family wanted to understand. For them, too, Tonna had been dead for some time. He belonged to a past that no-one wished, or was able, to remember — the old from abhorrence and the young from ignorance.
He walked under the colonnade leading to Il Sordo, and on the far side of the street he heard the click of heels, a woman’s heels. He stopped but could see no-one. He went on walking but again heard from under the arches the steps of someone who seemed to be playing hide-and-seek with him. He stepped into the middle of the road and shouted, “Come out, whoever you are!”
Angela appeared from behind a pillar and walked towards him, imitating a streetwalker.
“Stop that,” he said with a smile. “This is a small town and people talk.”
“I can see the headline and the photograph already. The commissario and his lady friend.”
“I’m not important enough for the gossip columns. The stuff Alemanni is planting with the journalists is ample for the time being.”
“They’re getting all hot and bothered now about your absences. Juvara is running out of things to say. He tells them that you’re away, pursuing leads, and he has no idea when you’ll be back.”
“How did you get here?”
“I came down when it was still light and followed you until you went into that bar.”
“I had someone to meet.”
“And two bottles of Malvasia to down.”
“I can’t stand vegetarians and teetotallers.”
Angela started unbuttoning her shirt, but Soneri pulled her close to him to make her stop.
“Please, don’t hit me. I’m feeling very fragile tonight,” he begged her in a voice weighed down with anxiety.
Suddenly recognizing his vulnerability, she returned his look, gave him a tender hug and a kiss. “You’re irresistible when you surrender,” she whispered in his ear. “But do remember that you owe me one. Remember? That barge and only us on board making…”
“What are you talking about? There might still be people at the boat club.”
“So much the better. More exciting.”
Resistance was pointless, but as they walked on, Soneri felt ill at ease in the unaccustomed role of a fragile man looking for consolation from a woman, yet if he was disconcerted at first, he rediscovered his self-assurance in assuming the more usual role of taking the necessary precautions to avoid being seen by the members of the club, whose shadowy outlines were visible as they passed in front of the brightly lit windows. They climbed up the embankment and came down at a dark corner of the yard. Once more the commissario was acting as guide to Angela.
They proceeded cautiously in the dark on the far side, away from the lamp light, in the shelter of the slope. There were no steps there alongside the club, so they had to make their way on the riverbank itself.
“I’ve got high heels on,” Angela murmured.
Soneri cursed under his breath. In addition to vegetarians and teetotallers, he now had to cope with an insane woman. He lifted her in his arms and began the descent, while she whispered ironical flatteries, “How strong you are!” and such like, punctuated with melodramatic sighs.
“Carry on with that nonsense, and I’ll drop you in the Po.”
They reached the bottom, out of sight of the club. They ran the risk that someone might come outside for a pee and catch sight of them on the landing stage. The noise from the pumps mixed with the splash of the water as it gushed over the embankment from the field was particularly loud there, in contrast to the river which flowed silently by. Whoever had set off in the barge on the night of the flood had in all probability taken the same route, unseen by Barigazzi and the others.
Soneri put the gangplank in place and helped Angela across before following her. When he was safely on board himself, he used the perch pole to carefully reposition the plank on the quay. They went down below, and Angela made an immediate beeline for the cabin.
“I want the captain’s bunk,” she said, peremptorily.
They lay in each other’s arms for a while until the barge was rocked by bigger waves and the mutter of voices made itself heard alongside. A craft was passing close to the jetty, causing Soneri some alarm. The cavernous roar of its engine, only partially drowned out by the noise of the pumps, died away as it drew alongside the barge. The commissario leapt up from the bunk. He tried to pull on his clothes, but Angela held him by the arm and made him lie back on the mattress. Every time he attempted to raise his head to listen, she gripped him firmly round the neck
