Liar Moon (16 page)

Bora was in pain even now, and the words gave him a sinking feeling, as though the room were trying to slip from under him and he’d have nothing to hold. “No.”

“Well, think about it.”

“It’s out of the question. I can’t possibly make use of such strong medication.”

The surgeon went to wash his hands in the sink. “It’s your call. You’ve got a high fever. I advise lukewarm compresses on your arm, rest in bed and antipyretics.” Standing by his desk, he dried his hands with a spongy cloth, then scribbled something in his prescription book. “Meanwhile here’s a prescription for plain old Veramon.
Take it. Providing of course that a bland painkiller does not contrast with a soldier’s stiff upper lip. You’ll find a pharmacy at the end of the street.”

 

On the same day, Guidi arrived in Verona for his appointment with Enrica Salviati. Although it was already one in the afternoon and milder, with rain beginning again, a lacy, white trim of frost still edged the tramway tracks.

The girl waited by the park fountain, a sombre, sleek-lined silhouette turned away from him. Guidi approached her, and she returned his greeting.

“I’m sorry I made you come all the way here, Inspector, but the other day I couldn’t tell you the whole story. That’s why I had to see you alone.”

Guidi nodded. “If it’s because of the German officer, haven’t they explained to you that we’re working together on this case?”

“No, it isn’t because of the German. It’s the other one.”

“De Rosa?”

“Yes, him. I didn’t want to say anything about him that he could hear from outside the door.”

Guidi was suddenly hopeful and curious. Fascist plots and revelations that could alter the game tumbled like playfully tossed cards in his head. “Tell me,” he encouraged her. “Tell me everything.”

On Enrica’s bare head, little drops of rain sparkled like broken glass in the blackness of her hair. She said, her doleful face upturned, “I had seen De Rosa before. He came a couple of times to visit the master. They would lock themselves inside his office. And you could tell from the way he showed up that he was coming to ask for favours. He crept against the walls and asked ‘May
I?’ every five minutes. If the
signora
was in, he’d bring flowers or chocolates. When he talked to the master he even called him ‘Your Excellency’.”

Guidi was impatient. “Fine, fine. And then?”

“You could just feel the master didn’t want to talk to him.” Enrica chewed on her clumsy Italian. “You know? You can tell. For two days in a row he told me to say he was not at home, and De Rosa took it badly. He bullied me to find out when he’d be back. One afternoon, about six weeks ago or so, he came on Sunday, and you could hear them argue in the office. The master didn’t want anyone on the ground floor when he discussed business, so I couldn’t make out what it was all about.”

“What did
Signora
Lisi do, during these visits?”

A grimace discomposed Enrica’s dark beauty. “
When
she happened to be at home, you mean. She’d have to stay upstairs, like me. She’d listen to Rabagliati records or paint her nails. She couldn’t care less about the master’s business, as long as she had
schei
– I mean money – to spend. I think the master didn’t want to meet De Rosa in his house, because once I heard him call back to him from the door, ‘The next time we meet in Verona, or we don’t meet at all.’ But, as I told you, six weeks ago De Rosa was back, hat in hand as every other time.”

Guidi noticed that Enrica was shivering. Although they had stopped under one of the trees in the park, they were getting thoroughly wet.

“Let’s go to the café across the street,” he suggested. “We’ll catch pneumonia out here.”

Reluctantly Enrica followed him, arms folded, head low in the rain. “I can’t stay long, Inspector. I have an appointment.”

“Yes, but I want to hear whatever else there is. It can’t be all you had to tell me.”

Guidi was disappointed, and he knew it showed. He’d hoped for a more sensational revelation. Of course Lisi apportioned favours and exacted obeisance; it didn’t take Enrica Salviati to figure that out.

They entered the café. The place was crammed full with people who had come in from the weather. Squeezing among shoulders and backsides, Guidi remembered what Bora had told him to ask, and was suddenly resentful of the charge.

At first Enrica pretended she did not hear, or else the hubbub of the crowded room truly kept her from hearing. Guidi repeated the question, and she turned slowly to him.

“If she had a lover? It isn’t you who wants to know.”

“Never mind who wants to know. What do you know about it?”

“Nothing, that’s what. If I knew I’d tell you, you can be sure, but the
signora
was not stupid. If she played around, she did it away from home. Since they were practically separated, it wouldn’t be that difficult now, would it? She came to visit only when she needed money.”

Even in the crush of trench coats and folded umbrellas, Guidi felt a liberating sense of relief at the words, as if Bora’s spite and Enrica’s jealousy had been smashed against the impeccable wall of Claretta’s conduct.

“So, what you had to tell me is that De Rosa frequented Vittorio Lisi. You never saw
Signora
Lisi with other men, either. Anything else?”

“Yes, something else. Just before the separation – it must have been around the end of May – there was a
telephone call at the villa. I was in the kitchen, and the
signora
answered herself. I don’t know who it was, but she closed the parlour door and whispered for a good half-hour, and her eyes were red when she came out. The master had told me to report any telephone calls that came while he was outside gardening. He loved roses, he was very good at growing them and he’d won prizes for it. When he came back in, I informed him someone had called, and his wife had answered. I don’t know what tales she told him afterward, but for sure she didn’t tell him she’d been crying over it.”

By the force of his skinny elbows, Guidi had cut through the crowd to reach the counter, followed by Enrica. “How did Lisi travel from the country to Verona? How did he travel by car? I heard nothing about a chauffeur.”

“He’d ordered a one-of-a-kind car from Fiat in Turin. It cost him a fortune, but it was designed so that he wouldn’t have to use the pedals. He always drove it himself.”

“There were no cars in the garage.”

“Well, Inspector, ask De Rosa. The Fascists came to pick it up the day after the incident. I heard it was given to an army general who lost his legs in the war.”

“Very well. Let me know if you remember anything else, but make sure you call me at this number.”

Without comment Enrica took the slip of paper with Guidi’s office number. She then told him she was looking for employment, and was due at Via Mazzini for an interview at three-thirty. Guidi bought her a cup of coffee, and let her go.

 

Only after he left German headquarters did Bora recall he was supposed to stop by the pharmacy. He instructed
the driver to stop by the first one on the way, and began rereading the report on anti-partisan warfare the Italian officers had given him. The rambling document went into great detail about the organization of partisan bands in the valleys of north-eastern Italy. Bora, who was familiar with the manual published on the subject in ’42, was not surprised by the bad news. With resignation, he read carefully and did not grow angry.

Brusquely the BMW came to a halt. “Are we at the pharmacy?” Bora asked without lifting his eyes from the paper.

“No,
Herr Major.
There’s a traffic jam ahead.”

Bora looked. Given the scarcity of wartime traffic, he could hardly believe the confusion. Immediately ahead of the BMW was a delivery van, and in front of it two German army trucks, part of a convoy that had somehow become separated. A tram idled across the street beyond, and passengers clustered at its doors to get off.

The driver lowered the window to hear if the anti-aircraft alarm was sounding somewhere. Only a freezing, needling rain, on this side of becoming snow, ticked on the car and pavement.

Bora left the car. Even if it was a partisan manoeuvre to isolate and assault German vehicles, he’d rather face the danger out in the open.

As things went, the driver of one of the army trucks had already walked ahead to see, and was now coming back with a swinging step.

“What happened?” Bora asked.

The soldier saluted. “Just an accident,
Herr Major.
The tram ran over somebody; it will be some time before they
clear the tracks. We’re taking the parallel street. If you wish, you can follow with your car.”

Bora looked at his watch. He had a headache, and even the dim light of day bothered his eyes. Damn, he thought, the surgeon should never have told him he was running a fever. Re-entering the BMW, he told his driver, “Forget the pharmacy. Follow the trucks and let’s get out of town.”

 

Early on Sunday, Bora buttoned his tunic in front of his window at Lago, with deft small movements. He had slept poorly, but coffee kept up his alertness for the time being. Nagel and the other soldier who’d accompanied the guardsmen had returned the night before. Debriefing had lasted two full hours. Bora had kept Nagel in his office longer than that, and shaken his hand after the interview. Guidi’s pre-dawn phone call had jogged him out of sleep, but did not vex him. He’d agreed to go out with the Italian party because snipers, crazy or not, were his business too.

And here it was, a dull-edged glassy day that promised more snow. Minute crystals came down in serpentine spirals even now, from a mackerel sky that seemed not to have enough in it to produce snow. Bora looked up at the speckled clouds creating an illusion of tiered space loosely drawn between horizons. The sun was trying to peek out from one of the layers, prying through with long shafts of light. Bora found himself humming along with the piano music from his radio, though it was not a merry piece. But not a sad one either. Like Guidi’s pale long face, it shared information without revealing immediacy of
moods. God forbid, Bora thought, perhaps Guidi had no sense of humour.

Thumb and index clasped the hook of his collar, and he was ready. With the palm of his hand Bora cleaned the window pane that began to grow cloudy under his breath, staring beyond it at the smoke from distant chimneys so as not to look at his hand, whose perfection as a physical tool abashed him now. Smoke drifted white from the chimneys only to turn a cheerless blue higher up, against the tangled brown of trees. It was the sterile blue of Russian skies, a colour Bora had hoped never to see again. Against that sterility, where the low sun took hold of it, the curl of smoke grew orange.

Guidi’s car was stopping in front of the command post. Guidi came out, wrapped in overcoat, scarf and hat. Around him, bits of snow continued to fall askew and in spirals, as if the invisible moon overhead were shedding its skin to nothing.

Stepping back from the window, Bora glanced at his hand, closed into a moderate, controlled fist. Forgiveness came hard to his body. But for all the nights he still felt scooped out and empty, he was hyperactive with energy most of his days.

Guidi was incredulous at the first words Bora told him.

“The father of the dead girl is around? Why didn’t De Rosa tell us about it earlier?”

“It’s a moot question, Guidi. Be thankful he chose to tell.”

“And how long has this person been around?”

“Zanella is the name. He was in Verona at the time Lisi was killed. Since neither his name nor his daughter’s name begins with a ‘C’, De Rosa said he felt the suspicion
didn’t apply. But the man did punch his way into Fascist headquarters about two weeks before the murder. According to De Rosa, he was asking for money, since it was far too late to discuss the dead girl’s honour. De Rosa says Lisi refused to pay.”

Unconvinced, Guidi watched Bora check and replace the magazine in his P38 pistol. Somehow he wanted to believe, but he had to say, “These late developments are suspicious, especially coming from De Rosa. What else is there, Major? Please don’t tell me Zanella has conveniently disappeared so that we can’t interrogate him.”

“Not exactly. His name is among those drafted last Tuesday by the Organization Todt for labour in Germany. Drafted as an ambulance
driver
, you’ll be interested to know. But you can’t blame his removal on De Rosa. He only told me about the man because I grilled him at two o’clock in the morning about the matter of Clara Lisi’s car.”

Despite Guidi’s efforts, the rise in his interest had to be obvious, because Bora made a rather long, somewhat amused pause.

“It seems that I was right in suspecting that De Rosa had Marla Bruni in his sights. The soprano got the car and De Rosa got the soprano. Will I ever learn about the rottenness of the Italians?”

Although Bora smiled saying the words, Guidi was offended. He was about to refuse the offer of a cup of coffee, but remembered Bora always had the real thing at his disposal, and let the major pour him a hefty cupful. Briefly he reported on his meeting with Enrica Salviati.

“We’re practically back where we started from, Major.”

Across his gleaming desktop Bora pushed a sugar bowl toward Guidi. “Why? You can talk to Zanella’s wife. I have her address.”

Guidi promptly unfolded the piece of paper Bora gave him. “Thank God it isn’t far from Verona.”

Bora seemed pleased. Too pleased, in fact, for someone who’d lost the prisoners entrusted to him. Guidi assumed they’d been recaptured, or shot. “Now that I’ve lifted your spirits, let’s go hunting. We can talk on our way down to the cars.”

When they drove through the fields, cackling flights of crows drew ever-changing, incomprehensible scribbles against the white foothills. The snow on the highest saddlebacks was already tongued yellow by sunlight rifting the clouds.