A Walk in the Dark (6 page)

It was almost midnight by the time I started eating. I drank half a bottle of a fourteen-proof Sicilian white. I’d tried it in a wine shop two months before, and bought two cases of it the following day.

When I’d finished, I took a book from the pile of my latest purchases, still unread, which I kept on the floor next to the sofa.

It was a Penguin edition of
My Family and Other Animals
by Gerald Durrell, brother of the more famous – and much more boring – Laurence Durrell. It was a
book I’d read, in Italian, many years before. Well written, intelligent, and above all very funny. Funny as few books are.

I’d recently decided to brush up on my English – when I was younger, I’d spoken it quite well – and so I’d started to buy books by American and English authors in the original language.

I lay down on the sofa and started reading and, almost simultaneously, laughing out loud without restraint.

Without being aware of it, I went straight from laughter to sleep.

A lovely, effortless, serene sleep, full of childlike dreams.

Uninterrupted, until the following morning.

When I went to the clerk of the court’s office to lodge the civil action, I had the impression the official responsible for receiving documents looked at me in a strange way.

As I left, I wondered if he had noticed which case I was bringing a civil action in, and if that was the reason he’d looked at me that way. I wondered if that particular clerk of the court had connections with Scianatico’s father, or with Delissanti. Then I told myself that maybe I was becoming paranoid and let it go.

That afternoon, I had a call at the office from Delissanti. Now at least I knew I wasn’t becoming paranoid. The clerk of the court must have called him less than a minute after saying goodbye to me.

Part of Delissanti’s professional success was based on his shrewd handling of relations with clerks of the court, assistants, bailiffs. Christmas and Easter presents for everyone. Special presents – sometimes very special, it was said in the corridors – for some people, where necessary.

He didn’t waste time beating about the bush.

“I hear you’re representing that Fumai girl in a civil action.”

“News travels fast. I suppose you have a little bug in the clerk of the court’s office.”

The clerk of the court was a small, thin man. But Delissanti didn’t catch the double meaning. Or if he did catch it, he didn’t think it was very witty.

“Obviously you realize who the defendant is.”

“Let me see . . . yes, Signor . . . no, Doctor Gianluca Scianatico, born in Bari . . .”

I was annoyed by the phone call, and I wanted to provoke him. I succeeded.

“Guerrieri, let’s not be childish. You know he’s Judge Scianatico’s son.”

“Yes. I hope you didn’t phone me just to tell me that.”

“No. I phoned to tell you you’re getting involved in something you don’t understand, something that’s going to cause a lot of trouble.”

Silence at my end of the line. I wanted to see how far he would go.

A few seconds passed, and he regained control. He probably thought it wasn’t the right time to say anything too compromising.

“Listen, Guerrieri, I don’t want there to be any misunderstandings between us. I’d just like to explain to you the spirit in which I’m phoning you.”

All right, I thought. Explain it to me, fatso.

“You know the Fumai girl is unbalanced, psychologically speaking, don’t you?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean exactly what I said. She’s someone who’s been in mental hospitals with serious problems. She’s someone who’s still in therapy, under psychiatric observation. That’s what I mean.”

Now he was the one to enjoy a pause, and my silence this time was because I was stunned. When he thought maybe he’d waited long enough, he started speaking again. In the tone of someone who has the situation under control now.

“In other words, we’d like to try to avoid situations we might come to regret. The girl isn’t well. She’s had serious problems. Young Scianatico was very stupid to
take her into his home, but then the relationship finished and the girl made up this whole incredible story. And that other woman, who’s a fanatical oldstyle feminist” – he meant Alessandra Mantovani – “has taken it as gospel truth. Obviously, I’ve talked to her, but it was no use; knowing her type I should have expected it.”

I resisted the impulse to ask him what Martina’s psychiatric problems were. I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction.

“There’s no evidence against my client. Just her word, and you’ll soon realize what that’s worth in court. This case should never have come to trial. It should have been dismissed by now. So let’s avoid making waves, which would only be pointless and damaging. Look, Guerrieri, I’m not saying anything. Check it out yourself, get the information you need, and then tell me if I’m talking rubbish. Then we’ll have another word. You’ll end up thanking me.”

He broke off, but resumed almost immediately, as if he’d just remembered something.

“Oh, and don’t worry about your fees. Find a way to get out of the case, and whatever you’re owed for the work you’ve already done, we’ll take care of it. You’re a good lawyer. More than that, you’re a smart fellow. Don’t do anything stupid when you don’t have to. This is just a petty squabble between a misguided fool and an unbalanced girl. It’s not worth it.”

Without waiting for my reply, he said goodbye and hung up.

After Delissanti’s phone call, I told Maria Teresa I didn’t want to be disturbed for the next ten minutes. I always felt a bit stupid telling my secretary
I didn’t want to be disturbed, for any reason
, but sometimes it was necessary. I put my feet up on the desk, crossed my hands behind my head, and closed my eyes.

An old method, when I start to feel panicky and don’t know what to do.

I opened my eyes again about ten minutes later, looked through my papers, found the sheet with the mobile number, and called Sister Claudia. The phone rang about ten times without any answer and in the end I pressed the red button to end the call.

I wondered what to do next. When I call a mobile phone and there’s no answer, I always have the unpleasant sensation that they’ve done it on purpose. I mean, they’ve seen the number, realized it’s me, and are deliberately not answering. Because they don’t want to talk to me. A throwback to my childhood insecurities, I suppose.

My mobile rang. It was Sister Claudia. Clearly, if she was calling me back a few seconds after my call, she hadn’t deliberately avoided answering.

“Hello?”

“I had a call from this number. Who is that?”

“Avvocato Guerrieri.”

A puzzled silence.

I said I needed to talk to her. Without Martina being
present. It was quite urgent. Could she come to my office, maybe this afternoon?

No, she couldn’t come this afternoon, she had to stay at the refuge. None of her assistants was there and she couldn’t leave the place unattended. Some of the girls were under house arrest and someone always had to be there, in case the police or carabinieri checked. How about tomorrow morning? Same thing tomorrow morning. But what was the problem? No problem. Or rather, there were a few problems, but I wanted to talk about them in person, not over the phone.

I don’t know what made me think of it, but I told her I could come to the refuge myself, tomorrow morning, as I didn’t have to be in court.

A long silence followed, and I realized I’d put my foot in it. The location of the refuge was a secret, Tancredi had said. With my spontaneous – and quite unprofessional – suggestion, I’d put Sister Claudia in a difficult position. She could either tell me we couldn’t meet at the refuge, because I wasn’t allowed there, and even though the fault was mine she’d be forced to say something unpleasant. Or, reluctantly, in order not to offend me, she could tell me to come.

Or she’d give me a good excuse, which was probably the best solution.

“All right, I’ll see you here.” She said it calmly, like someone who’s weighed up the situation and has decided to be more trusting. Then she told me how to get there. It was outside the city, and her directions were so elaborate as to verge on the paranoid.

 

 

I set out at ten o’clock the next morning. What with the city traffic and the wrong turnings I took once I was out in the country, the journey lasted nearly an
hour. I’d put
The Ghost of Tom Joad
in the CD player when I left. By the time I got there, the disc had finished and I’d just started listening to it again. Before my eyes, the dirt road along which I was slowly advancing became confused with nocturnal images of the American highways, populated by desperadoes.

At last, I came to a rusty gate, held closed with a rusty chain and a huge padlock. There was no entry phone, so I gave her a ring on her mobile to come and open up for me. Soon after, I saw her coming round a bend in the avenue, between rows of shabby-looking pines. She opened the gate, and gestured me beyond the bend and the trees, towards where she’d come from, where there was space to park. Then she carefully closed the gate and padlock, while I drove along the avenue of beaten earth, keeping an eye on her in the rear-view mirror.

I had only just parked behind the house – which was actually a farmhouse – and was getting out of the car when I saw Sister Claudia coming back.

We entered the farmhouse. It smelled clean, a mixture of unscented soap and something else, something herbal that I couldn’t put a name to. We were in a large room, with a stone fireplace opposite the entrance, a table in the middle, doors on the sides. Sister Claudia opened one of them and made way for me. We went along a corridor, at the end of which there was a kind of square box room, with three doors on each of its sides. Behind one of these doors was Sister Claudia’s
office. It was a spacious room, with an old desk of light-coloured wood, a computer, a telephone, a fax machine. A bulky old stereo unit, with a turntable. Two small black leather armchairs, both quite old, with cracks everywhere. An acoustic guitar, propped up in a corner. A very slight smell of sandalwood incense.

And there were shelves of books and discs. The shelves were full but tidy. I managed to glance at them just enough to read a few titles in English.
Why They Kill
was one of them.
Patterns of Criminal Homicide
another. I wondered what that was all about, and why a nun would read that kind of book.

No crucifixes on the walls, or at least I didn’t see any. Certainly there weren’t any behind the desk. There was a poster there, with a sentence printed in joined-up letters, in imitation of a child’s handwriting.

Luke 18:16.

 

In a corner of the poster was a drawing. A child seen from the back, his hands over his head, as if to protect himself against blows from someone you couldn’t see. In the foreground, a teddy bear lay abandoned. It was a very sad drawing, and below it something was written. It looked like a kind of logo, but I couldn’t read it.

Sister Claudia gestured to me to take a seat in one of the small armchairs and she slid into the other, with a sinuous movement.

In the refuge that morning, apart from her, there were only three girls, two of them under house arrest. They were well hidden, I thought: the place seemed completely deserted.

Well? her eyes were asking.

Obviously. But at that moment I didn’t know where to start. It would have been easier in my office. And there was an extra problem: I wasn’t sure I really knew why I’d come all the way here.

“There’s . . . something more I need to know about Martina. Given that the trial is starting, as you know, in a few days.”

“In what sense:
something more
?”

In what sense, indeed? In the sense that Martina may be unbalanced, mad, a compulsive liar, and we’re about to get into even more of a mess than we thought at the start?

“I mean . . . as far as you know, has Martina ever had psychiatric problems?”

“What do you mean?” Her tone was much less cooperative now.