into wood or with a dull thud as they hit the ground. The commissario crouched down behind a beech tree whose roots had pushed through the soil to create a kind of rampart. The air carried the smell of gunshot towards him, while broken branches fell like rain onto the rotting wood beneath the trees. Soneri felt real fear when he heard the carabinieri running towards the pathway, but once they approached the foot of the gorge, a shot from the Woodsman exploded before them, throwing earth and leaves from the undergrowth up into the air. He was firing in the hope of bouncing his shot off a stone, knowing that if he struck a rock, the ricochet was certain to bring someone down. The carabinieri halted and then doubled back into the thick woods. Soneri took advantage of the pause to drag himself and Dolly along the gulley, and to dive behind the cement columns under a little bridge over a path in the woods. Dolly was reluctant to follow him but Soneri grabbed her by the collar and hauled her in.
They stayed in there, huddled against each other. Every so often Dolly would turn to him, giving the idea that she was obeying although she did not understand. The commissario for his part was besieged by images from long ago. He felt again like a boy in a cabin, as he recalled the resentful solitude of his teenage years as well as various stories told to him by his father. He seemed to hear his voice as he recounted the events of July ’44, the S.S. round-ups, the three days spent hiding in a hole in the ground and the return to the light of day to find a landscape of death and fire. It was a miracle they had not killed him, and it was a miracle for Soneri that he had been born and was there.
He shook his head at that thought and Dolly, who took the gesture as an invitation, licked his hand. He was surprised at these mysterious associations which carried him back to relive episodes from the past, but these were all swept aside a few moments later by the heavy marching steps of the carabinieri. They were moving at a steady pace towards the spot from which the Woodsman had been firing. He heard the radios crackling and one voice communicating the direction they were to take. He assumed they were trying to surround the Woodsman, forcing him to higher ground where there was less shelter and less space for manoeuvre. From the sound of their footsteps, he calculated that there must be about fifteen of them. He had been hiding to avoid being shot by mistake, but even if he was now at liberty to come out and give himself up, he put his hand into Dolly’s collar to keep her calm, and stayed where he was. He had no wish to expose himself to the carabinieri as he crawled out of his hole like a beetle. In there, he felt like a real man of the mountains, or like an animal in its den. He was different from those untrained, frightened and shivering policemen.
He waited until the marching, the shouts and the confusion had passed. When he came out into the sunlight, he thought once more of his father and of how he must have felt himself a survivor. There were so many things he did not know about him, but there was at least one memory which could be rescued from the oblivion into which his life had almost completely fallen, provided, of course, that Soneri could reach the Woodsman in time.
This thought drove him on. He called to Dolly and started down the valley. Time had flown, as he understood from the sun which seemed even brighter in the freezing wind from the north-east. He stopped at a sheltered spot near some rocks and since his stomach had been rumbling for about half an hour, he decided to have something to eat. He was certain they would not be able to capture the Woodsman as long as his cancer left him even a little strength, but he was equally certain that he himself would have little chance of meeting up with him in that rocky landscape, unless he chose to let himself be found.
With these thoughts in his mind, he set off again. He walked along the final stretch of the path until he felt himself out of danger. He heard one isolated shot fired by the Woodsman further up the Macchiaferro valley, but it wasn’t at a great distance. Perhaps the gun had gone off by accident. When he reached Greppo, he took out his mobile, dialled the number of the police station and asked the officer on duty if Crisafulli was there.
“I’ll put you through,” was the reply. “Can I say who’s calling?”
“Just put me through to Crisafulli.”
As Soneri was wondering how Crisafulli had managed to dodge heavy duty yet again, he heard his voice. “What’s the matter, Commissario?”
“Come up to Greppo. I’ve something interesting to show you.”
“What’ve you found? A dozen huge ceps?”
“A really superior type of mushroom. Get up here and see for yourself.”
He switched off his mobile, convinced he had done the right thing in calling the maresciallo rather than bringing the rifle down to the police station, since everybody in the village would have seen him. The case now seemed to him closed. There was only one further check to be made, but he could not do it himself, which was why he had called in Crisafulli.
He finished his meagre meal while Dolly chewed at the rind which she gripped between her paws. He lit his cigar and looked contentedly at the old village with its houses covered by slates of Montelupo stone darkened by moss. About ten minutes later he saw the carabiniere cap with the tongues of fire on the front, as Crisafulli himself walked towards him with his trademark, springy step. Soneri got to his feet as he drew near, and gave him time to get his breath back before he spoke.
“I wanted to give you this myself,” he said, handing over the mud-encrusted rifle.
The maresciallo started back as though he was afraid of soiling his uniform. He took a good look at the weapon without touching it, until the commissario handed it firmly to him, leaving Crisafulli with no choice but to get his hands dirty.
“Where did you find this?”
“Along the Croce path.”
The maresciallo’s eyes lit up briefly. “You believe that…” he tried to say, before losing himself in a tangle of thoughts.
“I think the whole lot of you have made a mess of the entire business.”
“Bovolenta is in charge of the enquiry,” Crisafulli said, too emphatically for Soneri’s taste.
“Palmiro didn’t get lost that night,” the commissario said.
“Obviously not. Now that we have this rifle, things which at first appeared absurd fall into place.”
“Oh, there’s still no shortage of absurd things. Life is full of them,” Soneri said, with a bitter laugh.
The maresciallo looked hard at him without appreciating his meaning, while the commissario, turning serious, put a hand on his shoulder. “Listen, Crisafulli, you go back to the police station and hand this rifle over to the forensic people. Then go up to the Rodolfi villa and do a house search. Before you do that, have a look at the weapons licensed to Palmiro. If even one is missing in the villa… all the rest will come out in the report, won’t it?”
The maresciallo looked at him like a schoolboy gazing at his teacher. “I will report that it was you who found the rifle.”
Soneri shook his head energetically. “I don’t give a damn about the case. I’m here on holiday. There are other matters which do interest me.”
“I’ll have to give some explanation of how I found it.”
“Say that you had an anonymous tip-off, or that you followed your own line of enquiry. I didn’t tell the officer on duty who I was.”
The maresciallo’s face lit up. “You are a saint and a bearer of grace.”
Soneri shrugged.
“I’ll let you know when I have the report. And I’ll go to the villa as soon as I have put this weapon in safe custody.”
“Thanks, even if I’m already sure how the whole thing went. I don’t need to deal with magistrates. It’s you who needs incontrovertible proof. I have the luxury of being able to follow my instincts.”
“A terrible business,” Crisafulli murmured.
“The world is terrible. Don’t you find it disgusts you?” Soneri felt anger swelling inside him, or perhaps it was the pain of living which he had attempted in vain to dispel by coming to the one place where he should have been able to feel at home. “And there is no escape,” he said, as though talking to himself.
The maresciallo listened with an expression of appropriate gravity, but it was clear he had not grasped the meaning of what Soneri was saying. “So what’s going to happen when they realise the Woodsman had nothing to do with it?”
“They’ll have to keep on searching for him. He has, after all, killed one of your colleagues.”
“And he died for nothing,” the maresciallo said. “I told Bovolenta to proceed cautiously. It wasn’t certain it was the Woodsman, but the captain’s not one for subtleties. He’s a dangerous man.”
“Have you got a towel?” Soneri said. “You’d better not let anyone see you with a muddy hunting rifle.”
