Involuntary Witness (24 page)

“I might add a consideration of a purely procedural nature. Article 507 permits the taking of additional evidence when the need for it has emerged in the course of the proceedings. In this case the evidence could easily have been requested in the introductory phase, but the defence did not so act, whether from negligence or some other reason we do not know. In any case the request is late, and in this respect also it must be rejected.”

“Does the civil party have any observations?” said the judge.

“We concur with the considerations put forward by the public prosecutor.”

“Your Honour,” I put in, “may I be permitted a brief objection to the observations made by the prosecution?”

“As you well know, Avvocato, objections are not admitted at this stage.”

“Your Honour ...”

“Avvocato, not a word more. I repeat, not a word more.”

Thus saying, he rose to retire. One by one the members of the jury rose to follow him. The associate judge remained seated. I got the impression that he clenched his teeth for a moment. Then he too got up and was the last to leave the courtroom.

 

 

The wait was a long one. Usually decisions of that kind, regarding applications for additional evidence, are taken directly in the hearing, or after only a few minutes of consultation in camera. But not that day.
The hours went by without anything happening. I chatted a bit with the clerk of the court, who told me he didn’t understand the reason for the delay. I told him that I didn’t either, but it wasn’t true. They were out that long because the court was in fact divided between those who had already decided to convict Abdou and those who wanted to understand things better. If the first lot won, and my application for the attachment of the phone records was rejected, I might as well save myself the trouble of disputing the case. Abdou was already done for. Only if the others won was our hat still in the ring.

From where he was in the cage, Abdou asked me what was going on and I lied to him, saying that the wait was perfectly normal.

I had an urge to call up Margherita, but I didn’t.

For no reason I could put my finger on, there came to mind an ancient Turkish proverb that goes more or less like this: “Before you fall in love, learn to walk on snow without leaving footprints.” Now why did that come to mind?

I felt terribly alone and, hell and dammit, I was on the verge of tears. After months, just then of all times, just there of all places.

No. Please, no!

I made for the courtroom door, just in case I should make a spectacle of myself, and anyway to have another cigarette. I had already put it to my lips when the providential ringing of the bell tore through my thoughts.

I returned to my place, put on my robe, and realized I still had the cigarette dangling from the corner of my mouth even when the court had filed back in and taken their seats and the judge was beginning to read the ruling.

I lowered my eyes to my desk, half closing them, blurring the papers lying there. I listened.

“The Court of Assizes of Bari, pronouncing on the application for the taking of additional evidence put forward by the defence of the accused Abdou Thiam, observes as follows.

“The defence of the accused – in accordance with Article 507 of the code of criminal procedure – applies for the attachment of the mobile-telephone records relative to the telephone traffic of mobile number 0339-7134964 for the day of 5 August 1999, on the double presupposition that the necessity for the aforesaid attachment has emerged in the course of the proceedings (and in particular from the examination of the accused) and that in any case the above-mentioned attachment is absolutely necessary to the ascertainment of the truth.

“The public prosecutor objects, maintaining the non-relevance (or at any rate the absence of absolute necessity) and the tardiness of this request.

“In fact – as the public prosecutor observed – the application could well have been made at the time of the introductory exposition, because the elements to make it were at that stage already in the possession of the defence.

“Technically, therefore, the application is to be considered tardy.”

The judge paused, or so it seemed to me. I stayed stock still, eyes cast down, head bent. A moment or two later I realized I had been holding my breath.

“From another point of view, however ...”

However!
They’d granted it.

“From another point of view, however, we have to point out, in accordance with the judicial principles of the Court of Appeal, that the presiding judge is
obliged not to neglect the fact that the primary purpose of a criminal trial cannot be other than to search for the truth. Within this perspective we cannot accept methods or decisions which unreasonably obstruct such ascertainment of the course of events as is required to arrive at a just decision.

“This said, we are bound to stress the fact that the evidence requested is to be considered as potentially decisive. From the attachment of the mobile-telephone records there could in fact emerge a real and proper alibi, in the case of the accused being located in a place incompatible with the hypothesis of his responsibility for the facts set down in the indictment.

“For these motives the Court of Assizes of Bari orders the attachment of the mobile-telephone records relative to the telephone traffic of subscriber number 0339-7134964 for the day of 5 August 1999 from 06.00 to 24.00 hours.

“It furthermore orders the presence of the officer responsible for Telecom (Bari Branch), or another employee of the company expressly empowered, to explain the precise meaning of the records before the court.

“It charges the criminal police with the execution of this order within five days.

“It postpones the taking of evidence and the closing argument until the hearing of 3 July.

“The court is dismissed.”

When I reopened my eyes and looked up, the court had already left.

One week and it would all be over. One way or another.

During that week there were some strangely normal days. I worked as normal, attended my normal hearings, received clients, pocketed a few fees – which was all to the good – and so on and so forth.

I didn’t concern myself with Abdou’s trial. I had to wait for the mobile-phone records to arrive anyway, because on the result of that inquiry depended the line I would take in my final speech. Until then it was pointless to re-read documents or prepare for the closing argument.

On Thursday afternoon Margherita called me on my mobile. I had heard nothing from her since the message on Sunday evening. I hadn’t called her, or tried her on the intercom. I don’t know why. Something had held me back.

Would I care to go out for a drink after supper? Yes, I would. Should I buzz her from down below or knock at her door? Ah, she was going out earlier and could we meet up somewhere, fairly late on. How would Via Venezia suit me? In front of the Fort at about half-past ten? Fine by me. See you later, then.

Her tone of voice was a little puzzling, and worried me slightly.

From that moment on, the afternoon dragged by. My thoughts wandered and I kept looking at my watch.

I left the office at about eight, went home, had a shower and change of clothes, and started off long before the appointed hour. I whiled away the time in
one way or another, and headed towards the Fort at about ten.

I walked up the slope of Via Venezia, crowded as it always was at that hour in summertime.

Mostly with groups of youngsters. They exuded a mixture of deodorant, sun cream and mint-flavoured chewing gum. A few bronzed fifty-year-olds with twenty-year-old girls in clouds of perfume. Very few of my age. I wondered why, just to give my mind something to toy with.

I reached the Fort at least ten minutes early, but I felt better simply because time had passed. I leaned my back against a wall and lit a cigarette, waiting.

She arrived at about twenty to eleven.

“So sorry. It’s been a rough day. In a rough week. And that’s only to mention this week.”

“What’s happened?”

“Let’s walk, is that all right?”

We headed north, still on Via Venezia. The further we got from the area of the Fort, the more the crowd thinned out. Smaller groups, couples, a few solitary walkers, a uniformed policeman or two on duty.

We walked together without speaking until we drew level with the Basilica of St Nicholas. A fellow with a Corsican mastiff passed right by us and the huge dog stopped dead to sniff at Margherita’s legs. She stopped too, stretched out a hand and stroked the dog’s head. The owner was amazed that the ferocious creature allowed itself to be touched like that, and by a stranger too. It was the first time such a thing had happened, he said. Did the lady have a dog? No, she didn’t. She’d had one, but it had died years ago.

The dog and its owner went on their way and we sat on the low wall facing the right-hand side of the basilica.

“How’s it been going for you these last few days? How about the trial?” she asked.

“Well, I hope. Monday next we may see the end of it. And how about you?” Tentative.

She paused, then spoke as if I hadn’t asked any question at all.

“In the places where they teach you to knock off drink they also explain how to resist the temptation to backslide. In the first year after treatment an awful lot of people relapse, and even after that it’s very frequent. It was something they told us over and over again. There will be difficult moments – they told us – when you will feel depressed, you will have a terrible nostalgia for the past or fear of the future. At those times you will feel the urge to drink. An urge you feel you can’t resist, that will sweep over you like a wave. But it’s not irresistible. It seems so to you because at that moment you are weaker. But it really is just like a wave. A wave of the sea only submerges you for a second or two, even if when you are under water it seems like eternity. You come out easily enough if you don’t panic. So remember – they said – that at such moments you have only to stay calm. Don’t give way to panic, remember that your head will soon come out from under because the wave has passed. When you are struck by the overwhelming impulse to drink, do something to make the seconds or the minutes pass, or however long the crisis lasts. Do exercises, run two miles, eat a piece of fruit, call up a friend. Anything that makes the time pass without thinking.”

I remained silent, fearful of what was coming next.

“It has happened to me several times, as it has to everyone. Aikido has helped me. When the wave came, I put on my kimono and went through the technical moves, trying to concentrate only on what I was doing.
It worked. When I finished training I’d forgotten the urge to drink.

“With time those moments have become rarer and rarer. For at least two years I hadn’t had one.”

I lit the cigarette I’d been holding between my fingers for several minutes. Margherita went on in the same tone of voice, gazing at some indeterminate spot before her.

“There’s someone in my life, there has been for nearly three years. He doesn’t live in Bari, and maybe that’s why it has worked for so long. We see each other at weekends, either he comes to me or I go to him. Last weekend he came here. I had already mentioned you. Casually, as one might normally, and at first he didn’t mind. Or if he did he didn’t say so.”

She turned slightly towards me, took my cigarette and smoked quite a lot of it before giving it back.

“However, I don’t know how, but the discussion cropped up again last Saturday. That is, not so much a discussion as a jealous scene. Now, I should tell you that he is
not
a jealous person. He’s quite the opposite. So I was taken aback and reacted badly. Very badly. We had been together, in a word we’d made love ...”

I felt a stab in the guts. Instant fog in the brain for I don’t know how long before I could grasp what she was saying again.

“... and then I told him that I’d never have expected him to say such things. That I was disappointed in him and so on. He got back at me by calling me a hypocrite. I was lying when I said that you were just a friend. Lying not just to him but to myself, which made me even more of a hypocrite. And I was reacting so violently just because I knew he was right. We argued most of the night. In the morning he said he was leaving me. That I must get my ideas straight, and
try to be honest with him and with myself. After that we could talk about it again. He went off and I stayed put, sitting on the bed, my mind in a turmoil. Unable to think. The hours passed like a hallucination, and of course I got the urge to drink. A mad craving, such as I’d never had since I gave up. I tried putting on my kimono and doing some training, but there was no drive behind it. I had only this craving to drink, to feel good, to drown the turmoil in my head, to shuffle off responsibility and duty and effort, the whole bloody lot. Shit!

“So I went downstairs, got in the car and drove to Poggiofranco. You know that big bar that’s open round the clock, I can’t remember what it’s called, where they sell wines and spirits?”

I knew the bar and nodded. My mouth was dry, my tongue stuck to my palate.

“I went in and asked for a bottle of Jim Beam, my favourite. At that point I felt calm. Deathly calm. I went home, got a big tumbler and went out onto the terrace. I sat down, broke the seal of the bottle – you know that lovely snap when you open a new bottle? – and helped myself to three fingers of bourbon, for a start. I did it slowly, watching as it poured into the glass, the colour of it, the reflections. Then I raised the glass to my nose and breathed in deeply.

“I sat for a long time staring at that glass, with thoughts whirling in my head. You’re a naughty girl. You’ve always been one. You can’t fight your own destiny. It’s useless. Several times I raised the glass to my lips, looked at it and put it back on the table. I was sure I’d drink it in the long run so I might as well take it slowly.