The Snack Thief (10 page)

Like mother, like son.

With the proceeds from the office and the apartment,

said Montalbano in a fit of malice, you could pay for twenty
funerals.

Empedocle Mulone, owner of the print shop, said yes, the late
Mr. Lapra had indeed ordered some stationery with
slightly different letterhead from the old one. Signor Arelio
had been coming to him for twenty years, and they were
friends.

How was it different?

It said Import-Export instead of Importazione-Es-
portazione. But I advised him against it.

He shouldnt have made the change?

I didnt mean the letterhead, but the idea of restarting
the business. Hed already been retired about five years, but
things are different now. Businesses are failing. Its a bad time.
And you know what he did, instead of thanking me for the
advice? He got pissed off. He said he read the newspapers
and watched TV, and so he knew what the situation was.

Did you send the package with the printed matter to
his home or his office?

He asked me to send it to the office, and thats what I
did, on one of the weekdays when he was there. I dont remember
the exact date, but if you want

Never mind.

The bill, on the other hand, I sent to the missus, since I
guess Mr. Lapra cant very well make it to the office now,
can he?

And he laughed.

Heres your espresso, Inspector, said the barman at the
Cafflbanese.

Totisten. Did Mr. Lapra sometimes come here
with his friends?

Sure! Every Tuesday. Theyd talk and play cards. Always
the same group.

Give me their names.

All right. Lets see: Pandolfo, the accountant

Wait. Give me the phone book.

No need to call him on the phone. Hes the elderly
gentleman sitting at that table over there, eating an ice.

Montalbano took his demitasse and went over to the accountant.

May I sit down?

Absolutely, Inspector.

Thanks. Do we know each other?

You dont know me, sir, but I know you.

Mr. Pandolfo, did you play cards with the deceased very
often?

Often? We played every Tuesday. Because, you see, every
Monday,Wednesday, and

Friday he was at the office, said Montalbano, completing
the now familiar refrain.

What would you like to know?

Why did Mr. Lapra decide to go back into business?

Pandolfo looked sincerely surprised.

Go back into business? When did he ever do that? He
never talked about it with us. But we all knew he went to the
office out of habit, just to pass the time.

Did he ever mention the maid, a certain Karima, who
used to come and clean the office?

There was a darting of the eyes, an imperceptible hesitation
that would have gone unnoticed had Montalbano not
been keeping the man squarely in his sights.

The man had no reason to tell me about his cleaning
woman.

Did you know Lapra well?

Whom can you say you know well? Some thirty years ago
when I lived in Montelusa, I had a friend, a smart man, bright,
witty, sharp, sensible. He had it all. And he was generous, too, a
real angel. If anyone was in need, they could have anything he
owned. Then one evening his sister left her baby boy with him,
not six months old. He was supposed to look after him for two
hours or so, maximum. As soon as the sister left, the guy picked
up a knife, chopped the baby up and boiled him in a pot with
a sprig of parsley and a clove of garlic. Im not kidding, you
know. Id been with the man that same day, and hed been the
same as always, smart, polite. So, to get back to poor old Lapra,
yeah, I knew him, all right, enough to see that hed really
changed over the last two years.

In what way?

Well, he became nervous, never laughed. In fact, hed
pick a fight and make a big to-do over the smallest things.

Any idea what might have been the cause?

One day I asked him about it. It was a health problem,
he said. The first stages of arteriosclerosis, thats what his doctor
told him.

The first thing he did in Lapras office was sit down at the
typewriter. He opened the drawer to the little secretarial
table and found some stationery printed with the old letterhead
and yellowed with age. He took out a sheet, reached
into his coat pocket, and removed the envelope that Signora
Antonietta had given him. He copied its address on the typewriter.
A foolproof test if there ever was one. The rs jumped
above the line, the as dropped below, and the o was a little
black ball. The address on the anonymous letters envelope
had been written by this same typewriter.

He looked outside. Signora Vasile Cozzos housekeeper,
standing on a stepladder, was cleaning the windows. He
opened the window and called out.

Hello! Is the signora there?

Wait, said the girl, giving him a dirty look. Clearly she
wasnt very fond of the inspector.

She stepped down from the ladder, disappeared, and a
short while later Signora Clementinas head appeared just
above the sill. There was no need for them to raise their
voices so much, as they were less than ten yards away from
each other.

Excuse me, signora, but if Im not mistaken, you told
me that, sometimes, the young man, do you remember...?

Yes, the young man.

You said he used to type sometimes. Is that right?

Yes, but he didnt use the office typewriter. He would
bring his own portable.

Are you sure? Might it have been a computer?

No, it was a portable typewriter.

What kind of cockamamie way to conduct an investigation
was this? He suddenly realized the two of them must
look like a couple of old housewives gossiping across their
balconies.

After saying good-bye to Clementina, to regain some
semblance of dignity in his own eyes he began a detailed
search of the office like a true professional, looking for the
package the printer had sent. But he never found it; nor did
he find a single envelope or sheet of paper with the new letterhead
in English.

Theyd removed everything.

As for the portable typewriter Lapras bogus nephew
used to bring along instead of using the office machine, he
thought hed come up with a plausible explanation for this.
The young man had no use for the keyboard of the old
Olivetti. Apparently, he needed one with a different alphabet.

8

He left the office, got in his car, and drove to Montelusa. At
Customs Police headquarters, he asked for Captain Aliotta,
who was his friend. They let him in immediately.

Its been so long since we spent an evening together!
Im not blaming you. Its my fault, too, said Aliotta, embracing
Montalbano.

Lets forgive each other and try to rectify the situation
soon.

Okay. What can I do for you?

I need the name of that sergeant of yours I spoke to on
the phone last year, the one who gave me that precious information
about the supermarket in Vig. The case of the
weapons traffic, remember?

Of course. His names Lagan

Could I speak with him?

Whats it about?

He would have to come to Vig for half a day at the
most, I think. Id like him to examine the files of a business
owned by that guy who was murdered in an elevator.

Ill call him for you.

Sergeant Laganas a burly fifty-year-old with a crew
cut and gold-rimmed glasses. Montalbano took an immediate
liking to him.

He explained in great detail what he wanted from him
and gave him the keys to Lapras office. The sergeant
looked at his watch.

I can be in Vig at three oclock this afternoon, if the
captain has no objection.

Just to be thorough, once the inspector had finished chatting
with Aliotta, he asked if he could use his phone and called
headquarters, where he hadnt shown his face since the previous
evening.

Chief, is that really you yourself ?
Cat, its really me myself. Been any calls?
Yessir, Chief. Two for Inspector Augello, one for
Cat, I dont give a fuck about other peoples phone calls!
But you asked me yourself just now!
All right, Cat: have there been any phone calls person

ally for me myself ?
By making the necessary linguistic adjustments, maybe

he would get a sane answer.
Yessir, Chief. There was one. But it didnt make sense.
What do you mean, it didnt make sense?
I couldnt understand anything. But I think they were

relatives.
Whose relatives?

Yours, Chief. They called you by your first name: Salvo,
Salvo.

Then what?

Then they sounded like they were in pain, or sneezing
or something. They said: Aiee . . . sha! Aiee . . . sha!

Wait, who was they? Was it a man or a woman?

An old woman, Chief.

Aisha! He dashed out the door, forgetting to say goodbye
to Aliotta.

Aisha was sitting in front of her house, upset and weeping.
No, Karima and Frans had not shown up; shed called him
for another reason. She stood up and led him inside. The
room had been turned upside down; theyd even gutted the
mattress. Want to bet theyd taken the bank book? No, that
they didnt find, Aisha said reassuringly.

Upstairs, where Karima lived, it was even worse. Some
flagstones had been torn out of the floor; one of Franss
toys, a little plastic truck, was in pieces. The photographs
were all gone, including the ones advertising Karimas
charms. A good thing I took a few myself, the inspector
thought. But they must have made a tremendous racket.
Where had Aisha run off to in the meantime? She hadnt run
off, the old woman explained. The previous day shed gone
to see a friend in Montelusa. It got late, and so she slept over.
A stroke of luck: if theyd found her at home, they would certainly
have cut her throat. They must have had keys; neither

of the doors, in fact, had been forced. Surely theyd come for
the photos; they wanted to erase the very memory of what
Karima looked like.

Montalbano told the old woman to gather her things together.
He was going to take her himself to her friends
house in Montelusa. She would have to remain there for a
few days, just to be safe. Aisha glumly agreed to go. The inspector
explained that while she was getting ready, he was
going out to the nearest tobacco shop and would be back in
ten minutes at most.

A short distance before the tobacco shop, in front of the Villaseta
elementary school, there was a noisy gathering of gesticulating
mothers and weepy children. They were laying
siege to two municipal policemen from Vig whod been
detached to Villaseta and whom Montalbano knew. He drove
on, bought his cigarettes, but on the way back, curiosity got
the better of him. He pushed through the crowd, invoking
his authority, deafened by the shouting.

They bothered you about this bullshit too? asked one
of the policemen in amazement.

No, I just happened to be passing by. Whats going on?

The mothers, who heard his question, answered all at
once, with the result that the inspector understood nothing.

Quiet! he yelled.

The mothers fell silent, but the children, now terrified,
started wailing even louder.

The whole things ridiculous, Inspector, said the same
policeman as before. Apparently, since yesterday morning,
theres been some little kid attacking the other kids on their
way to school. He steals their food and then runs away. He
did the same thing this morning.

Looka here, looka here, one mother butted in, showing
Montalbano a little boy with puffy eyes from being
punched. My son dint wanna give im is omelette, and so
e it im! An e really urt im!

The inspector bent down and stroked the little boys head.

Whats your name?

Ntonio, said the little boy, proud to have been the
one chosen from the crowd.

Do you know this boy who stole your omelette?

No sir.

Is there anyone here who recognized him? the inspector
asked in a loud voice. There was a chorus of No.

Montalbano leaned back down to Ntonio.

What did he say to you? How did you know he wanted
your omelette?

He spoke foreign. I dint unnastand. So he pulled off
my backpack and opened it. I tried to take it back, but he
punched me, twice, and he grabbed my omelette sandwich
and ran away.

Continue the investigation, Montalbano ordered the
two police officers, managing by some miracle to keep a
straight face.

106

At the time of the Muslim domination of Sicily, when Montelusa
was called Kerkent, the Arabs built a district, on the
outskirts of town, where they lived amongst themselves.
When the Muslims later fled in defeat, the Montelusians
moved into their homes and the name of the district was Sicilianized
into Rab. In the second half of the twentieth
century, a tremendous landslide swallowed it up. The few
houses left standing were damaged and lopsided, remaining
upright by absurd feats of equilibrium. When they returned,
this time as paupers, the Arabs moved back into that part of
town, replacing the roof tiles with sheet metal and using partitions
of heavy cardboard for walls.

It was to this quarter that Montalbano accompanied
Aisha with her paltry bundle of belongings. The old woman,
still calling him uncle, wanted to kiss and embrace him.

It was three oclock in the afternoon and Montalbano, who
hadnt had time to eat, was in the throes of a gut-twisting
hunger. He went to the Trattoria San Calogero and sat down.

Is there anything left to eat?

For you, sir, theres always something.

At that exact moment he remembered about Livia. Shed
completely slipped his mind. He rushed to the phone, trying
feverishly to think of an excuse. Livia had said shed be there
by lunchtime. She was probably furious.

Livia, darling.

I just got here, Salvo. The flight left two hours late, with
no explanation. Were you worried, darling?