ready to close up for the season. He was short and sturdy, with white hair and moustache.
The two men exchanged greetings, before Soneri said: “Are there still many hunters around?”
“The season’s nearly over.”
“What about the roe deer?”
“Not much doing. They’ve got cleverer and go down the valley into the reserve.”
“And the trout in the lake?”
“They’re not biting any more. You would swear they feel winter coming on.”
“Same as us. When do you shut up shop?”
“Any day now. Or at the first snow fall — which is more or less the same thing.”
“You think the snow’s nearly here?”
“Feel the air. There’s frost every morning now.”
Two shabbily dressed men came into the bar. One of them, in a heavy foreign accent, asked for two coffees and two grappas.
“Nowadays we have to put up with all kinds of foreign wildlife,” Baldi said contemptuously, but speaking in dialect so that he would not be understood.
“What do they do here?” Soneri said. “I saw that other people had been down at the huts.”
“Everything and nothing. They come from Liguria and Tuscany with all kinds of stuff. I’ve even seen some of them struggling up here with suitcases.”
“Are the carabinieri aware of this?”
Baldi shrugged his shoulders. “Occasionally they come to make checks, but by the time they get here, everything seems to be in order. These people bury whatever they have in the woods.”
“Who do they sell it to?”
“Well, you hear so many stories. They pass it on to other people who take it to the cities. Some of it’s given to the kids in the village. They’re at it now too.”
“Drugs? Around here?”
Baldi gave another shrug. “Everything’s changed. They get bored. The winters are long, there’s nothing to occupy their minds, so they look for something different. If they’d ever known hunger, like this lot…” Baldi said, indicating the strangers with his chin.
Soneri’s thoughts went back to his father, setting off for work with three pears and a crust of bread for his midday meal. He changed the subject. “Do you see the Woodsman from time to time?”
“He hasn’t been here for a while. The woods are his world. Here, it’s too open for his tastes. When you reach a certain altitude, the mountain’s no good for keeping secrets. You can see everything that’s going on, even if there are very few people watching.”
Soneri took his time to decipher those words, the time needed to light a cigar, but he still failed fully to grasp their sense.
“What does he do that anyone might watch?” the commissario said, instinctively, without thinking.
Another shrug. “Nothing, but he wouldn’t find out here what he finds in the woods.”
“You mean the wild boar?”
Smiling, Baldi looked at him and murmured, “Yes, the boar.”
Soneri understood there was more to it, but he chose not to ask. It would have been in vain, but he was left with the disagreeable feeling of having been outwitted.
“Nobody knows Montelupo like him. He reckons he owns it. Who’s going to get the better of him? Delrio? Volpi?” Baldi spoke with a sneer in his voice.
The two foreigners got up, paid their bill and were gone. The commissario had watched as the one who had done the ordering took out a thick wodge of notes and peeled one off, as the fixers and middlemen who had once been active in those parts used to do.
“There’s no telling who’s coming and going on these mountains nowadays,” Baldi said.
“Are you sometimes afraid?”
“I’ve got my gun under the counter, and my aim’s as good as ever.”
A light haze was hanging over the lake, like steam from a pot coming to the boil.
“Have you heard what’s going on in the village?” Soneri said.
“Palmiro? It’s terrible. I would never have thought of him hanging himself. Did you know that he and the Woodsman were good friends?”
The commissario shook his head. “I knew he was a friend of Capelli’s, and he too ended up with his head in a noose.”
“The only one of the trio left is the Woodsman. They were all from the Madoni hills, raised in the poorest families in the valleys. They knew what it was to go hungry, and they were all desperate to get out.”
“Do you think the Woodsman too could kill himself?”
“Not unless he’s cornered. When his time comes, he’ll lie down in the woods and the worms will get to him before the dogs do. He’s happy in his world and he’s never cared for money.”
“Where can I find him?”
“Somewhere on Montelupo. He only goes home when it’s dark, that is, unless he decides to rough it in some hideout for the night. Your only hope is that you’ll bump into him on some path. If he’s in the mood, he’ll talk to you, and if not he’ll slip away the moment he catches sight of you.”
“How does he live?”
“He’s never short of meat,” Baldi chuckled. “Apart from that, he sells firewood and charcoal. He’s the only one left who can make it.”
“Did he stay in touch with Palmiro?”
“I don’t think there was much contact. They would run into each other on Montelupo, but they had grown apart. Money creates boundaries that aren’t easy to cross. It’s true that once they were inseparable, but then Palmiro married Evelina. The Woodsman and Capelli both had their eye on her, so the friendship between them was bust.”
“The same old story, women…”
“There’s more to it than that. Palmiro’s money was what made up her mind. Not that Capelli was short of cash, but he spent it on whores.”
“Was this Evelina really so beautiful?”
“They were all after her in those days, and the Woodsman completely lost his head over her. They say she was quite keen on him too. He had more of a spark to him than the other two, but then her parents persuaded her to make the most of her good looks. Was she really going to go off and live in a den in the woods when she had the chance of marrying a man who could show her the good life?”
“But you are sure she was more fond of the other one?”
Baldi gave a guffaw and rose to his feet. He produced a bottle of Malvasia and two glasses. “When they’re pitched against self-interest, fine feelings are as much good as a two in a card game. A pretty face has its value, doesn’t it? Why undersell it?”
This time it was the commissario’s turn to shrug. “Money can’t make up for an unhappy life.”
“You get used to anything,” snorted Baldi. “Humans are the most adaptable of all animals.”
“Anyway, the Woodsman took it badly.”
“Very badly. He believed she wanted him. And also because for the first time the companion with whom he had shared so much had stolen something important from him. But what really got him was the realisation that the two of them were different. Palmiro’s thoughts were elsewhere, on his business in the big city, on buying pigs and selling prosciutto. The Woodsman, on the other hand, imagined that the bond formed when they both had nothing would never be broken. The result was that he never really grew out of adolescence, while Palmiro became harder and more dour as he focused more and more on his own interests.”
“It’s always that way with people who have feelings and people who only care about things,” Soneri said, his eyes still fixed on the lake and its smooth surface with its light veil of mist.
Baldi gave another laugh. “I’ve never been persuaded by all this talk of feelings. The Woodsman was on heat for Evelina, and she had the same effect on the other two. That’s all there was to it. Nobody in this world ever wants to call things by their proper name, so we have all this drivel about love and rubbish of that sort.”
Soneri reflected for a moment, and was disconcerted to find himself largely in agreement. When he thought
