The Dark Heart of Florence: Number 6 in series (Michele Ferrara) (23 page)

Fabio Biondi pressed the button to open the door as soon as he heard the bell.

He was expecting Teresa. He had called her an hour earlier to let her know the news.

Now she was here, curious to hear what he had to say.

Fabio looked away from the monitor and announced with a smile of satisfaction, ‘I’ve managed to extract two more images. Come over here, Superintendent!’

Teresa went closer. On the screen, charred remains lay on a floor, recognisable as Madalena’s body. There could be no doubt now about the nature of these images.

‘Something awful must have happened in that place, Superintendent,’ Fabio said. ‘The crucifix… those burns…’

‘Madalena,’ Teresa said, and immediately regretted letting the word slip out. Fabio was an external technician, and had no official role, which meant that he was not bound by rules of professional secrecy.

She tried to correct herself, telling him that she was just speculating at the moment.

In reply, Fabio merely said that he would continue working on the video.

‘Thanks Fabio, we’re counting on you.’

There were few names in the small phone book with its soft leather cover, and the contents were written in a way that only he could interpret, thanks to his amazing mathematical memory. It was the only thing he had been able to show off about in front of his classmates. He had cultivated his talent over time, and had reached a professional standard at the game Salto del Cavallo. With the appropriate modifications, he exploited these skills to demonstrate his own genius.

The game consisted of moving the knight in the typical L-shaped move as defined by the rules of chess, in such a way as to touch each square once and once only. It was a real brainteaser, which had been attempted by a number of mathematicians.

He leafed through the phone book until he found what he was looking for. He had changed her first name to a man’s name. He had changed the area code too, so that, if some nosy parker had tried to call that number, a complete stranger would have replied.

He had just got out of the shower, a towel around his waist. He could see her in front of him as he dialled the number. A few inches short of six feet, long black hair, dark eyes, small breasts with pointed nipples. He remembered every detail perfectly. He saw her kneeling in front of him, submissive and ready to give him pleasure, so aroused that she did not feel his nails digging into her back.

He became aware of his erection beneath the towel. The woman answered on the fourth ring. ‘Hello?’

It was the warm, sensual voice he remembered.

‘Florinda?’

‘Yes.’

He imagined her naked: her firm thighs, her long legs, her black pubic hair.

‘It’s Stefano, do you remember me?’ It was a name he had only ever used with her. ‘I’ve just arrived in Florence…’

‘Oh, yes, Stefano. Of course I remember you.’

She waited in silence.

‘Would it be OK if I came over? I told you I’d see what I could do, and I’ve got some really good news for you…’

‘Not right now,’ she replied. ‘I’m expecting my sister. Come in an hour. But can’t you tell me the news now?’

‘I’ll tell you when I see you, and I’ll bring a bottle of champagne, because this demands a celebration.’

‘OK, then. I’ll see you later.’

When the call was over, he switched off the phone, took out the sim card and put another one in immediately. It was a precaution worth taking. They would never be able to identify him, never track him down. He always used mobiles without GPS.

He looked at his watch. It was almost eight in the evening. In just sixty minutes, he would be at her apartment, right on time. Punctuality was one of his obsessions. As he put on his black tracksuit, he let his fantasies run wild.

When he was ready, he looked at himself in the mirror. He liked the devilish gleam in his eyes. He went to the drinks cabinet, took out the bottle of whisky and half-filled a glass. He felt the alcohol moving down into his stomach, the burning sensation there, the warmth spreading through his whole body.

Tonight he would add another piece to his jigsaw.

From the big underground room, he got a five-inch double-bladed knife with a mother-of-pearl handle. He had bought it some time ago for a special occasion, just like the one that was taking shape in his mind.

He went out.

On the way, he thought with growing excitement about their meeting a week earlier.

He had approached her in the Giubbe Rosse, the historic café in the Piazza della Repubblica, founded at the beginning of the nineteenth century by the Reininghaus brothers. The café, which owed its name to the Viennese-style red jackets worn by the waiters, had started out as a focal point for the German community and had become the heart of intellectual and artistic Florence during the twentieth century.

He was familiar with the history of the café, and loved to spend time there, looking up at the drawings and paintings covering its walls.

One day, he had noticed an extremely beautiful girl who was a regular and had started looking out for her. They would often sit beside each other and before long they were exchanging a few words.

She told him she had done modelling work abroad and had come to Italy with one dream: to be a catwalk model for a famous Florentine fashion house.

‘But it’s not as easy as I thought,’ she said, with a slight grimace. ‘I guess I don’t have the right connections. It’s a closed shop. Someone advised me to try Milan instead.’

He had listened to her attentively, unable to look away from her stunning black eyes, which had struck him from the first moment he had seen her. ‘You’re right,’ he had said. ‘You do need the right connections to work here, but today’s your lucky day.’

‘Really?’

‘Oh, yes!’

He had told her he worked for an American film production company and could certainly help her out.

‘I can get you into films, maybe only as a walk-on to start with, but that could lead to other things. There are great opportunities in the fashion world in New York too.’

He was very good at inventing new identities for himself, and it had never for a moment occurred to her that he might be telling her a pack of lies. She had trusted him and had told him how entranced she was by the beauty of the Florentine hills.

‘That’s why I rented an apartment in Pontassieve. It’s beautiful and cheap, too.’

‘It’s such a long way out, though,’ he had said. ‘Do you have a car?’

‘No, but there are plenty of trains and buses.’

‘Are you doing anything right now?’

‘No.’

‘Let me take you home, then. On the way I can tell you what I’ll do when I go back to the United States.’

‘Thanks very much.’

‘And you know what we can do?’

‘Tell me.’

‘We’ll go via Mugello. It’s not too much of a detour, and there’s something I want to show you I’m sure you haven’t seen before.’

She had smiled.

After driving for about an hour, they had reached Vicchio del Mugello, the birthplace of Giotto and Fra Angelico.

They had had a snack just outside the village, at the Casa del Prosciutto, and when they resumed their journey towards Pontassieve he had taken an unpaved side road. He had told her that the river Sieve, a tributary of the Arno, flowed nearby. The river was almost dry, and they had walked along the bank. Then they had stopped and sat down to enjoy the peace of the countryside.

There was not another living soul about, and the silence was total.

He had talked to her about Giotto and his art, then about Michelangelo and the statue of David that he liked so much.

After a while he had taken her hand and she had squeezed his tightly. He had brushed her cheeks with his lips, then kissed her on the mouth, and she had responded eagerly. It was at that moment that he had felt a kind of explosion inside. It was his dark side aching to burst out.

‘No, not here,’ she had said when she’d felt his hand slipping inside her T-shirt. ‘Let’s go to my place.’

Fate had come calling for her.

And for him, too, when he thought about it. Because he had planned this new piece of the jigsaw, but at a different time.

Now, though, was perfect. Right now.

He was ready to let his fantasies run wild.

That night, the Rohypnol had no effect on him. Maybe he needed to increase the dose. He had opened his eyes and was surprised to find himself in his own bed. Nobody had tied him to a chair, gagged him and dragged him away, nor were the words he had heard his own: ‘At this point I should confess that I have been seriously considering eating your wife.’

He remembered now: it was a scene from Ridley Scott’s
Hannibal
, which had been set in Florence. In it, Chief Inspector Rinaldo Pazzi, played by the great Giancarlo Giannini, was the object of Hannibal Lecter’s attentions. The scene was still vivid in his mind.

Hannibal Lecter was one of his idols.

He closed his eyes and tried to get back to sleep, telling himself how great he was.

Lies, disguises, fantasies. Perfection. He was a true genius.

He fell asleep with this one last thought: the climax to everything would soon be here.

It was a matter of days, maybe even hours.

He would keep the promise he had made himself.

It was eight twenty-five in the morning when the car from the Carabinieri barracks in the Via Aretina turned into a dead-end street in Pontassieve, about seven miles from Florence. The driver stopped outside number seven, a small, three-storey, ivory-coloured apartment building dating from the beginning of the twentieth century. It was the address that a woman, her voice shaking with emotion, had given the 112 operator a few minutes earlier.

Two carabinieri, one superior to the other, got out and walked quickly towards the front door, looking around without noticing anything out of the ordinary – either because it was still early, or maybe because the woman on the phone had lied. At least that was what they were hoping. It wouldn’t be the first time that they had responded to a tip-off that had then turned out to be false. There were always plenty of attention-seekers, and plenty of young kids killing time.

The front door was ajar. They went in and climbed the stairs, taking care where they put their feet. You could never be too careful. But there wasn’t anything strange here either. They stopped on the first floor.

The door to the apartment was wide open, and a young girl was sitting on the landing outside it with her back against the wall. She was crying softly and wiping her tears with the back of her hand. Her eyes were filled with horror. A young man was crouching beside her, trying to comfort her. When she saw them, she turned her head and mumbled a few words, ‘Inside… inside… oh my God… go inside.’

The two carabinieri went in.

The small, shabby, barely lit entrance led to a narrow corridor. A tracksuit top was hanging from an old coat peg attached to the wall. To the right was a kitchenette and to the left a room with a sofa, an armchair and a round table with four chairs pushed up against a wall. Everything looked second-hand. Even here, though, there was nothing unusual.

At the end of the corridor was a small bathroom. The superior officer stuck his head in. Nothing. Just the smell of talcum powder. Next came a wide-open door. The bedroom.

The furniture had been kept to a minimum: a wooden chest of drawers with a television and VCR on top, a dresser, a small wardrobe, and a double bed with an imitation leather headboard. Everything appeared to be in order, apart from one of the dresser drawers, which was open, the dishevelled bed, and the red marks on one of the walls.

Next to the bed, between the bedside table and the wall, was the body of a young woman. She lay on her back, in a pool of blood. Her stomach was covered with a sheet, and one foot was half inside a slipper, but the rest of her was naked. Her legs were splayed open. On the exposed part of her body were a number of wounds, almost all concentrated around the left breast. They looked as if they had been inflicted with a knife, or at least a very sharp object.

She must have been about twenty. Even in death, her face was very beautiful, with prominent cheekbones, full lips, now turning purple, and long black hair. Her mouth was wide open, as were her eyes.

How had she reacted to the fury of the attack? Had she frozen with terror or had she defended herself with all her might?

The officers stood looking at her, but without going too close. Their first thought was that, in all probability, this had been a sexually motivated murder.

‘Go downstairs and call the barracks,’ the superior officer said to his subordinate. Then he went out to the weeping girl and the young man consoling her and said, ‘Come on, signore, signorina, let’s go inside.’

They went to the living room, where the young woman, still overcome with shock, collapsed into an armchair. She was the victim’s sister. The young man introduced himself as her boyfriend. She could not stop crying and was only able to speak every now and again in a strong local accent while the young man tried in vain to calm her down.

Soon they were joined by other carabinieri.

Patrol cars and unmarked vehicles filled the street, double parking. Among them was the commander of the barracks, Marshal Vincenzo Moretta.

One of the officers who had found the body came to meet him on the stairs, and from the expression on his face Moretta could imagine the horror of the scene awaiting him.

He had seen a lot of bodies in his time, but the one he now saw sent him back years into the past.

The terrible wounds, almost all concentrated around the left breast, the blood on the floor, the splayed legs: they were like a language that spoke directly to him. A distinct language, reflecting the modus operandi of the Monster of Florence, who had killed a young couple in their car in a secluded spot just a few miles from here, back in 1974. The girl had been stabbed over ninety times with a sharp object, particularly in the area around her left breast.

For a while, the marshal said nothing, unable to accept the idea that one of that band of perverts, still at large, had struck again.

He dismissed these thoughts. He mustn’t jump to any conclusions in the heat of the moment. He knew perfectly well how much that could prejudice or even impede the progress of an investigation and delay the discovery of the truth.

After a while he heard voices on the stairs. It was the pathologist and his assistant.

In the meantime, a couple of the carabinieri had been checking the windows. They all looked out onto an internal courtyard and all had shutters that had been closed from the inside. Nobody had forced them open. Nor had anyone forced the wooden door.

This meant that either the killer had been in possession of a key and had let himself in, or had been let in by the woman because she knew him.

‘Ranieri,’ the marshal said to the officer from the patrol car, ‘establish the names of all the tenants here and interview those who are at home. We need to know as much as we can about the victim, her life, her habits. Then question her sister.’

They had no time to lose.

The pathologist put on his plastic overshoes and latex gloves, approached the body, crouched down and lifted the sheet.

Piero Franceschini was a pupil of Gustavo Lassotti, director of the Institute of Forensic Medicine. He had been in Florence for just over two years. He was in his forties, at the height of his professional career, and there was every reason to believe that he would soon follow in Francesco Leone’s footsteps.

He stood up and moved aside so that the photographer from the forensics team could record the scene and document the exact position of the body.

The thing that had most horrified all of them was the large wound that went from the pubic area to the navel. The killer had made a cut more than four inches long and opened the skin, leaving part of the intestines exposed.

There were other cuts, some deeper than others, around the pubic bone.

Just like Jack the Ripper… or the Monster of Florence!

There could only be contempt and hatred behind such cruelty. The killer must be a sadist who got pleasure from torturing his victim, seeing the terror in her eyes, watching the blood flow from that violated body. It was like an unusually severe punishment, and maybe that was what it was meant to be.

Since they did not have hi-tech equipment in this district, other technicians had come from Florence and were now moving about the room in white coats, examining the bloodstains. There were lots of them and they were spread over a considerable area.

The technicians noted the position and shape of the various spatter marks. This was in order to establish the exact place where the attack had begun, the height and strength of the assailant, not to mention his position in relation to the victim and, above all – a detail that could be particularly useful during the investigation – whether he was left- or right-handed. The post-mortem would then provide the key by revealing the angle of the wounds.

Naturally there was a greater concentration of blood near the body, where the woman’s life had ended. However, there were also some marks present on the wall where the chest of drawers was. Some suggested dragging, as if the victim had walked along that wall after being wounded, leaning against it to support herself before collapsing to the floor.

Could they be bloodstains that the killer had tried to erase? the marshal wondered. In that case, maybe he had left a trace of DNA behind.

One of his men came over to him and said, ‘Marshal, there’s more blood on the floor near the sink in the bathroom.’

Moretta went to the doorway of the bathroom and saw the marks immediately. Maybe the killer had washed himself before fleeing the scene, he thought. Given the amount of blood spilled during the murder, that was a reasonable assumption. Samples were being taken from all the stains to be analysed later in the lab.

On the floor, just inside the bathroom door, they found a light print from a rubber-soled shoe measuring ten inches by three inches. There were also several hairs in the sink. Collected and sealed according to international protocol, they would be handed over to the pathologist for examination.

As Moretta was overseeing the work, he heard the pathologist calling him. ‘Marshal, could you come here, please?’

Franceschini was crouching next to the body and holding up, for Moretta to see, what looked like human hairs. They were light brown in colour.

‘She was clutching these in her right hand and some of them have the bulbs attached. She must have fought her attacker. That’s also shown by the wounds on her left forearm and some of her fingers. They’re typical defence wounds.’

‘Was there any sexual violence?’ Moretta asked.

‘From an initial examination, I’d say no. But I can only confirm that after the post-mortem.’

‘When are you thinking of doing it?’

‘In the morning. What I can tell you now, for certain, is that there are no signs of recent sexual activity.’

As he said this, he stood up, moved away to take off his latex gloves, then added, with his back still to the marshal, ‘The body can now be taken to the Institute of Forensic Medicine in Florence and you can continue with your work.’

‘Thank you, Doctor,’ Moretta said. ‘I’ll expect your phone call after the post-mortem.’

‘OK.’

Franceschini said goodbye and started to leave, with his typical shambling gait, but stopped in the doorway of the bedroom and turned.

‘Marshal.’

‘Yes?’

‘Who’s the deputy prosecutor on call?’

‘Vinci. We informed him straight away but he said he couldn’t come. He’s busy with the murders in Florence. He delegated the crime scene investigation and the initial inquiries to us.’

‘Thank you,’ Franceschini said and walked out.

The body was put in a waxed fabric body bag, then into a zinc coffin, and carried outside, where a hearse was ready to take it to the Institute, escorted by a patrol car.

At last they were free to carry out their search.

They combed every corner, looking for clues, hoping to recover the murder weapon.

The bedroom was full of papers of various kinds: business cards, handwritten notes, a 2004 diary, a few magazines, and a lot of photographs stored in a cardboard box. They seemed to be part of a professional portfolio. Many of them featured the victim in a variety of poses, and some showed her on the catwalk wearing a swimsuit.

There was nothing, though, that could be linked to the crime, let alone the murder weapon, or any clothing belonging to the perpetrator. This led them to believe that the killer had not changed his clothes before leaving. Which could mean only one thing: the murder had been planned down to the last detail.

Finally, the apartment was sealed and placed under a sequestration order. Chalk marks had been left on the floor to indicate the position of the body, and everywhere were traces of the silvery powder used to lift fingerprints from the furniture, doors and light switches.