The Crossroads (23 page)

Beppe Trecca, too, with three Xanaxes and half a bottle of melon vodka inside him, was snoring, with his forehead resting on the table between the foil dishes of the Chinese meal.

‘I could have found anyone I liked to join me on this job, Rino Zena, my friend. Who do you think you are? Do you think you're the only person who can do it? And what was that you said? “We must talk.” What the fuck have we got to talk about? Has somebody made you our leader? I'm the leader, till I see any proof to the contrary. Do you know how many better men than you I could have found if I'd wanted?' Danilo Aprea was talking out loud, gesticulating and raising his shoulders. ‘Who thought up the plan? Who did all the work? Who spent a month sitting opposite the bank watching every movement? Who found the tractor? Me! Me! And me! I did it all! I'm going to make you both rich. I …' He was addressing the sofa, as if Rino and Quattro Formaggi were sitting on it. ‘Shall I be honest, really brutally honest? No beating about the bush? I should have had fifty per cent and you two twenty-five. That would have been fair. But since I'm a gentleman, a great gentleman …' He looked at the bottle of grappa on the table. He needed another drop. He raised it.

Empty.

After the phone conversation with Rino he had told himself a drop would help to soothe his anger and he had drained the whole bottle without even realising it.

I'm fine. Nothing to worry about. There's no problem
. He shook his head like a cocker spaniel after its bath.
I'll be better in a minute
.

He took three unsteady paces. In fact he was a bit tipsy, but as soon as Quattro Formaggi arrived he would leave, and outside, in the wind and rain, he would recover in no time.

(She turned her head. Don't you see that she's calling you? You
stupid fool)
Bob explained to him.

Why did she accelerate, then?

Quattro Formaggi decelerated even more, though still keeping close enough not to lose sight of the scooter.

(Turn off your headlight. She'll think you've taken another road.)

He would be able to catch up with her again immediately. The Boxer's engine was souped up, it had an expansion exhaust and when he took up an aerodynamic position, on a downward slope, he could do as much as eighty kilometres an hour.

The little blonde would soon reach the fork.

It was up to her. If she took the road through the woods he would stop her.

Please take the bypass. Please
.

(You fool.)

Fabiana Ponticelli looked in the rear-view mirror.

The Boxer's headlight wasn't there any more. The tramp must have turned off down another road.

A classic case of pot-induced paranoia.

My God, though, what a fright he gave me
.

Meanwhile in front of her the road, with the rain beating down on it, widened out and a hundred metres further on divided into two.

To the left was the narrow road that passed through the San Rocco woods and led straight home, to the right you went onto the bypass, which ran all the way round the hill, and which was wide and brightly lit but never-ending.

She heard her father's voice. Like Little Red Riding Hood's mother, he was saying:

(Fabiana, remember, never go along the road through the woods
at night.)

Yes, maybe I'd better take the bypass. I'm soaked to the skin as
it is anyway
.

But at the last moment she changed her mind –
in this weather
the big bad wolf will stay in his lair
– and swerved sharply, taking the little road that burrowed into the woods.

When Quattro Formaggi had seen Ramona heading decisively towards the bypass his heart had filled with disappointment and happiness.

You see? I told you she doesn't want me. Now leave me alone
.

But then, at the last moment, as if the Eternal Father himself had commanded the girl to take the road through the woods, she had swerved.

(Now you've got no more excuses.)

But how was he going to stop her? He couldn't very well just go up and say, ‘Excuse me, would you mind stopping, please?' …

I'm shy
.

(If you don't stop her you're a coward. You'll regret it for the
rest of your life. She's dying for you to do it.)

This was true, but he had to think. He must try to find a way of stopping her and asking her.

(If you don't get moving you'll never catch her.)

Quattro Formaggi began to accelerate.

The trees bent down over the narrow road, stretching out their branches as if they were trying to grab Fabiana Ponticelli.

The rain, under the roof of foliage, was not so heavy, and there was a smell of wet earth and rotting vegetation.

The Scarabeo's headlight threw a weak cone of light on the leaf-strewn, muddy asphalt.

The girl rode, following, with intense concentration, the white line in the middle of the road. The game was to keep the wheels on the line, because there were bottomless pits on either side and if she went off the white she would go hurtling down for the rest of her life.

But suddenly the road curved sharply, following the line of the hill, and Fabiana failed to keep the tyre on the white line.

You'd be dead. Okay, the first time doesn't count. You don't fall
into the pit till your third mistake
.

She was so absorbed in the game that she didn't notice that behind her, fifty metres back, a Boxer was following her.

Now he knew what to do.

Quattro Formaggi had racked his brains, and finally Bob the lumberjack had come to his aid. A brilliant idea, as if by magic, had materialised in his brain.

He turned on the headlight and accelerated. The engine began to roar in protest and gradually the Boxer gathered speed.

The little red dot of the Scarabeo's rear light drew nearer at every bend. After about two hundred metres, if he remembered the road correctly, the descent would begin and at that point he would overtake her.

Fabiana Ponticelli, riding on the centre line, concentrating all her attention on not falling into a bottomless pit, almost fell off the saddle when out of the darkness, hunched up like a vulture on its perch, emerged the loony on the Boxer. He held his head at the level of the handlebars and his elbows splayed like wings.

The girl clutched the handlebars and stiffened.

Before she even had time to decide whether to speed up or slow down, he overtook her, charging on down the slope at a maniacal speed. She saw him take the bend leaning steeply over to one side, without braking.

Fabiana shut her eyes, certain she was going to hear the sound of a crash, but when she opened them again there was only a curtain of white smoke and the roar of the now distant exhaust pipe.

He's completely crazy, that guy
.

What on earth was he doing? Did he want to get himself killed? Who did he think he was – Valentino Rossi?

She couldn't make out whether he was interested in her or if he was just a poor lunatic who liked racing in storms.

After overtaking her, Quattro Formaggi had nearly crashed into the guardrail. He had done well – when he was already practically down on the ground he had stuck out one leg and with a kick had managed to straighten up, but now, after taking another three bends at the risk of breaking his neck, he decided to slow down. Another bend like that, on the slippery asphalt, and he would be a goner.

He pulled the brake levers gently, not trusting the drums, especially now that they were full of water. The front shock absorber started juddering like a pneumatic drill and the back wheel began thrashing about like a fish caught on a hook.

He came to a stop fifty metres further on, at a point where the road through the woods widened out into a layby with a concrete electricity hut.

Quattro Formaggi quickly dismounted from the Boxer and laid it down on the asphalt, taking care not to turn off the engine, right in the middle of the road. He took off his gloves and lay face down on the ground, arms and legs outspread.

Fabiana Ponticelli rounded the last bend and entered the long descent that ran straight down the hill to the plain. She was almost there. She had to go past the service station and turn along a road that cut across the fields for about a kilometre, and she would be home. In her mind she was already in bed under the duvet, she had already had a boiling hot shower and what was left of the strudel in the oven. The rain and the cold wind had washed away her torpor, so
if she did happen to find her parents still awake she wouldn't start giggling like an idiot.

I could tell them I was late because my scooter broke down and
there was no one around. And that the battery of my mobile had
run down. I coul
…

She didn't finish the thought because she saw in front of her a red glow in the middle of the road. As she got nearer she noticed that there was also a pool of white light on the asphalt. She slowed down and heard the metallic gurgle of the exhaust of the loony's scooter, and realised at once that the idiot had crashed on the final slope.

(Keep still
.

Motionless
.

You're a scorpion-fish waiting for the minnow.)

There she is. I can see her
.

(Keep still! Don't move
.

Let her be
.

Let her come closer
.

If you move you'll ruin everything
.

Dead.)

Sure, boss. Stone dead. Deader than the dead themselves
.

Jesus, he had crashed all right.

He was on the ground, lying full length, beside the scooter, and wasn't moving. Fabiana Ponticelli passed by and didn't stop.

He must be dead. At that speed, on that ancient scooter
…

She didn't know what to do. Or rather, she knew very well what she should do, but she didn't like the idea of it at all. She was soaked to the skin, half frozen and almost home.

(You can tell a person's quality from whether they help people in
trouble.)

That's what papa would have said.

If Esmeralda was in my shoes
…

Only she wasn't Esmeralda, though for the past six months she had been trying to be.
She
helped other people, even tramps who thought they were Valentino Rossi.

She puffed out her cheeks resignedly, turned her scooter round and went back.

Danilo Aprea was ringing Quattro Formaggi at thirty-second intervals and as soon as the odious recorded voice replied, saying ‘The number you are calling is not …,' he would hang up with a curse.

He was certain by now that, like the bonehead he was, he had forgotten all about the bank raid.

‘It's possible. Oh yes, it's perfectly possible. He's capable of anything,' said Danilo, taking a swig from a bottle of Cynar that he had found at the back of a cupboard in the kitchen.

That bitter awareness was the result of years of friendship with Quattro Formaggi, and in particular of the famous ‘Belladonna question', after which he had refused to see him for three months.

About a year earlier Danilo had found a job at the villa of the Avvocato Ettore Belladonna, but to do it properly he had needed help. Between Rino and Quattro Formaggi he had chosen Quattro Formaggi, because Rino wanted fifty per cent. A demand which, in Danilo's humble opinion, was ridiculous, given that he had found the job. He had offered Quattro Formaggi thirty-five per cent of the fee and he, without any argument, had accepted. The job involved repairing a crack in the villa's septic tank. It had been emptied a few days earlier by a specialised firm, but when Danilo had climbed down into it he had almost fainted from the stink.

In order to be able to work he had poured some eau de cologne onto his handkerchief and tied it over his face. When he had finished
filling the crack with quick-drying cement, as agreed, he had given two tugs on the rope to alert Quattro Formaggi, but the top end had fallen into the tank. Danilo had shouted himself hoarse calling him. But there was no reply. He had gone away. All he could see from down there was the circular eye of the manhole and the blue sky with clouds scudding across it like a flock of fucking sheep.

Danilo couldn't sit down without putting his buttocks in the muck. It was hotter than the devil's arsehole in there and the air stank of rotten cheese.

Suddenly a little boy's face had appeared. Ten or eleven years old. A tuft of blond hair and a nice innocent smile. It must be René, the Avvocato Belladonna's son. René had waved to him and then, although Danilo implored him not to, had closed the manhole, burying him alive.

Quattro Formaggi, two hours later, had reopened it and pulled out a hysterical creature covered in excrement who bore a distant resemblance to his workmate Danilo Aprea.

The fool had apologised, saying, ‘I went away for a moment,'
a
moment
, that was what he'd said, ‘to buy a slice of pizza because I was starving. I've brought you a piece with potato and rosemary, your favourite.'

Danilo had snatched the pizza out of his hands and jumped up and down on it with his shit-soaked boots.

‘That's the kind of people I have to work with!' he said and took another swig of Cynar, grimacing like a little boy who has been forced to drink cod-liver oil.

Through the visor of his crash helmet Quattro Formaggi saw the long legs of the minnow approaching.

Come here, little fish
.

It took one step and then stopped. But it was a well-brought-up little fish and would never leave a man lying injured, perhaps dead, on the road.

‘Sir …? Sir? Are you hurt?'

(Dead.)