A Walk in the Dark (9 page)

Then she shook my hand and left.

 

 

I decided to go and have a coffee, or whatever. I felt light-headed, like after an exam at university. Or, indeed, after winning a case.

As I was walking along the corridor leading to the bar, I saw Dellisanti ahead of me, in the middle of a group of trainees, young lawyers and secretaries. We hadn’t spoken since his phone call to my office.

My first impulse was to turn on my heels, leave the courthouse, and have my coffee in some bar outside. To avoid an encounter. I even slowed down, and had almost come to a halt when I heard these words quite distinctly, in my head: “Are you losing it completely? Are you afraid of that windbag and his band of flunkeys? You’ll have your coffee wherever you like and
that lot can go fuck themselves.” The exact words. It sometimes happens.

So I started walking quickly again, passed Dellisanti and his entourage, pretending not to see them, and walked into the bar.

They joined me at the counter as I was ordering a fresh orange juice.

“Hello, Guerrieri.” As friendly as a python.

I turned, as if I’d only just become aware of their presence.

“Oh, hello, Dellisanti.”

“Well, now, what have you got to say?”

“How do you mean?”

“Did you check out what I told you? About the girl, I mean.”

I didn’t know what to say. It was a bother having to say anything at all, and the man knew how to make whoever he was speaking to feel uncomfortable. No doubt about that.

In reality I’d have liked to tell him that he ought to be thinking about defending his client. Accused of serious crimes. And I would think about defending my client. The victim of the same serious crimes.

I’d have liked to tell him not to make any more phone calls like the one a few days ago, that I’d make sure he lost any desire he had to do so.

In other words, the reply of a man.

Instead of which, I babbled something about how things aren’t what they seem, and anyway they were different from the way they’d been told to him, and to cut a long story short, I didn’t know how to wriggle out of it only a few days after taking the case. Without a valid excuse, I couldn’t do anything. Maybe in a few weeks, or a few months, depending on how the trial went, we could talk again.

In other words, the reply of a coward.

“All right, Guerrieri. I’ve already said what I had to say. Do as you see fit, let everyone take responsibility for his own actions and face the consequences.”

He turned and walked out. With all the others, in formation. Perfectly trained.

After a few seconds I shook my head, with the kind of movement dogs make when they’re wet and want to shake the water off them, and then went to the cash desk to pay.

“Avvocato Delissanti’s already paid,” the cashier said.

I was about to reply that I’d pay for my own orange juice, or something like that. Then I thought it best to avoid ridicule.

It’s always best, as far as you possibly can.

So I nodded, made a gesture to say goodbye and left.

My good mood after the outcome of that morning’s trial had vanished.

Martina and Sister Claudia came to the office the day before the hearing.

I didn’t get straight to the point. I beat about the bush for a while, as I almost always do. First of all, I told Martina it wasn’t necessary for her to be in court the following day. The hearing would consist merely of preliminary issues, the introduction of documents and requests for the admission of evidence. As long as I was there, it was fine.

There was no need for her to miss a day’s work, I said.

There was no need for her to get scared before she had to, I thought.

She wouldn’t need to be in court until we had to examine her, which would presumably be in a few weeks’ time.

She asked me how things would be at that hearing. This was it. We were getting to the point.

I told her how things would be, with all the caution of which I was capable.

First she would be examined by the public prosecutor. Then I would ask her a few questions. Then it would be the turn of the defence.

“This is where things get a bit more . . . complicated. The charges are based mainly on your word, and so the objective of Scianatico’s lawyer is very simple: to discredit you. He’ll try to do that with every means at his disposal. He’ll try to make you contradict yourself. He’ll try to provoke you and make you lose your cool.
It’s unlikely he’ll be gentle, and if he is, it’ll only be to make you lower your defences.”

I paused, before getting on to the worst part. I looked her in the face. She seemed calm. A bit vague, but calm.

“He’ll bring up your health problems, Martina. He’ll bring up the fact that you spent time in hospital, the fact that you had psychiatric problems . . . I mean psychiatric treatment.”

Martina’s expression did not change. Maybe she looked just slightly vaguer than before.

Maybe. But almost immediately I felt the smell. Intense and slightly acid.

I’ve always been sensitive to people’s smells, able to recognize them, and to notice when they change.

As a child, whenever I entered a lift I could always tell which of the people in our block had been there before me. And I could even put names to the smells. For example, there was a lady in our block who smelled of bean soup. A sad, pale girl with glasses gave off a smell of old paper and dust. The owner of a delicatessen left a hot, thick smell in the lift, which filled the space and made you feel uncomfortable. Many years later I smelled something similar in a shop in Istanbul. It was so similar that for a moment I thought Signor Curci might suddenly appear, with his thick neck, small head and short, solid arms. A few seconds passed before I was able to escape the olfactory shortcircuit and recall that the man had died ten years earlier, while I was still living with my parents. So it was unlikely he’d be hanging around the shops of Istanbul.

Often I notice if a woman is indisposed, from the smell. It’s something I don’t usually talk about, because it’s not the kind of information that puts women at their ease.

I’m capable of smelling and recognizing the smell of fear, which is very nasty, rancid and primeval. I’ve smelled it so many times in police stations, in carabinieri barracks, in prisons, sitting in on my clients’ interrogations. The ones who are most desperate, weakest or simply most scared when they realize they’re really in trouble, or just that there’s no way out.

The first time it happened was not long after I’d become a prosecutor. I found myself appointed by the court to sit in on the interrogation of a man accused of murder. They called me to the station at night – I was on call – because they had to interrogate him immediately. They said he’d stabbed a bruiser who’d previously beaten him up in a bar. They said he’d been seen by a witness. The little man – narrow, slightly bent shoulders, the bewildered look of a small predator – denied everything. It isn’t true, it isn’t true, it isn’t true, he kept repeating, shaking his head, talking in an almost monotonous voice, quite out of place given the situation. He asked to be confronted with the witness. The witness, he said, was wrong and would surely realize his mistake if he could see him face to face. There was something convincing about the dullness and terseness of his defence, and I started to suspect that the police had made a big mistake. And I think the assistant prosecutor who was interrogating him was starting to get the same idea.

Then came the twist. Two policemen entered the interrogation room. One of them was carrying a small transparent plastic bag, and inside it you could see a big knife, the kind called a Rambo knife, its blade dirty with blood. The two policemen looked like cats who’ve caught a mouse. The one with the bag dangled it in front of the little man’s face.

“Now you’re really fucked, arsehole. You should
have found this for us yourself. So what about a confession now, eh? There are more prints on this than in all the files in this station. And they’re all yours.”

It was obvious he’d have liked to underline his words with a pair of well-aimed slaps. But unfortunately he couldn’t – he must have thought – not with a magistrate and a lawyer in the room.

I don’t remember what happened next. I know the man stopped denying it and confessed soon after. But I don’t remember the exact sequence, what he said, what the public prosecutor asked him, what I said to justify my unnecessary presence. By this point it wasn’t important. But what I do remember is the smell, which soon filled that little room in the station. Covering the stench of smoke – the cold stench of years and the warm stench of a night of interrogations – the smell of the people, the paper, the dust, the dregs of coffee in the plastic cups.

It was a sharp, obtrusive, slightly obscene smell. And since that night I’ve never mistaken it.

 

 

Immediately after telling Martina that Scianatico’s lawyer would pry into her most personal problems, I smelled that smell. It wasn’t very strong, but there was no mistaking it. And it wasn’t pleasant. I tried to ignore it as I started giving her instructions on how she should act.

“As we’ve said, he’ll try to provoke you. So the first rule is: don’t let yourself be provoked. It’s what he wants and we mustn’t give it to him.”

“How . . . how will he try to provoke me?”

“Tone of voice, insinuations, aggressive questions.” Before continuing, I paused for a moment. To breathe, and to glance at Sister Claudia. Her face had the lively expression of a statue on Easter Island.

“References to your problems . . . as I said.”

“But what have my problems got to do with the trial?”

Yes, what did they have to do with it? Good question. If you needed a psychiatrist once, does it mean you can’t testify? And what about the lawyer? Can the lawyer do
his
job? I asked myself before replying, remembering a few distressing fragments of my own past.

“In theory, and I emphasize, in theory, the fact that a witness has had some . . . behavioural difficulties may be relevant. To assess the admissibility of what he says, to get a better idea of the story behind his statements, and so on. In practice we – I mean both I and the public prosecutor – will be very careful to prevent abuses. But it wouldn’t be a good idea for us to object to every question about your health problems . . .”

Behavioural difficulties. Health problems. I stopped to think: I was doing some real verbal acrobatics in order not to call a spade a spade.

“. . . your health problems, because then it might look as if we have something to hide. So my idea is this, if you agree. Let’s play them at their own game. When it’s my turn to question you, I’ll be the first to ask you about these things. Your stay in hospital, your therapy, and so on. That way we tackle the subject calmly, we show we have nothing to hide, we take away their big surprise, we prevent them influencing the judge, and we reduce the risk of stress. What do you think?”

Martina turned to look at Sister Claudia, then she looked at me again and nodded mechanically. The smell had become sharper, and I wondered if Sister Claudia smelled it. If she did, you couldn’t tell from her face. You couldn’t tell anything from her face. I resumed speaking.

“Of course to do this you need to tell me everything calmly.”

She lit a cigarette, and looked around as if searching for something on the shelves, the desk or out of the window.

Then she told me everything. A common story, not at all out of the ordinary.

Eating disorders, ever since she was a teenager. Problems with her university studies. Nervous breakdown because of an exam she couldn’t pass. Depression, anorexia, a spell in hospital. And then the start of her recovery. Drugs, therapy. Meeting a nurse who also worked as a volunteer at Safe Shelter. Meeting Sister Claudia, the job at the refuge with the girls. Graduation, at last. Work.

The meeting with Scianatico.

And all the rest, which I partly knew already. She also told me a few things I didn’t know, about the time she lived with Scianatico and some of his predilections. Very unpleasant things, which we might be able to bring up in the trial, if I could find a way.

She also told me something about her family. A little about her mother. And her younger sister, who was married with one child. But she didn’t talk about her father and of course I assumed he was dead, but I didn’t ask her.

Martina’s story lasted at least three quarters of an hour. She seemed a bit calmer, as if she had at last relieved herself of a burden. She insisted that she hadn’t taken any medication for at least four years.

Let’s hope she doesn’t need to start taking it again after this trial, I thought.

“Can I ask you something?” she said, after lighting another cigarette.

“Of course.”

“Will he be in court when I testify?”

“I don’t know. He’s free to come or not to come. We
won’t know until the day. But it shouldn’t make any difference to you if he’s there or not.”

“But will he be able to ask me questions?”

“No. Only his lawyer can ask you questions. And remember: when he examines you, and when you answer, don’t look at him. Look at the judge, look straight in front of you, but not at him. Remember you mustn’t get into any arguments with him, and that’s easier if you avoid looking straight at him. And if you don’t understand a question, don’t try to answer. Politely, without looking at him, tell the lawyer you haven’t understood and ask him to repeat it. And if I or the public prosecutor object to one of his questions, just stop, don’t answer, and wait for the judge to rule on the objection. I’ll go over all these things the day before your appearance, but try to memorize them now.”

I asked if there was anything else they wanted to know. Martina shook her head. Sister Claudia looked at me for a few moments. Then she decided now wasn’t the moment for her question, whatever it was, so she shook her head too.