A Florentine Death (21 page)

Massimo shuddered. 'Let's change the subject.'

'With pleasure. I have something to show you. Another "riddle".'

'You mean a threatening letter?'

'Judge for yourself.'

When he'd finished reading the letter, Massimo Verga let out a long whistle. 'You're in trouble, my friend.' 'I already knew that.'

'But it's worse than you think. Your secret admirer is quoting Schopenhauer! A great philosopher, but a bit gloomy' 'What do you mean?'

'The first few lines. As far as "swallows it". Taken word for word from Schopenhauer. The rest is all his own work, and nothing special. But it means this fellow is quite well educated. A man of refined tastes, I'd say. The opposite of you, if you don't mind me saying so. You're in trouble.'

'Because he's more intelligent than me?'

'That I can't say. I don't know the man. But he's convinced he is. And he's enjoying himself playing with you like a cat with a mouse. He even says that.'

'So you agree? He's challenging me?'

'That's very clear. He feels so strong, he's even given you a handicap of two points. Two more lives before taking yours, he says.'

'And he's written it by hand. He must know we'll get our handwriting experts on to it.'

And what will those experts tell you? That he's someone of above average IQ, well educated, meticulous, tidy, a psychopath perhaps, but clear-headed, shrewd, an excellent planner and tactician. Unless you're planning on arresting Napoleon, you're back to square one.'

'Thanks for your encouragement.'

A pleasure.'

They both fell silent.

Massimo used the pause to relight his pipe, which he had neglected in his enthusiasm.

Ferrara would have liked to light a cigar, but his courage failed him.

Tm thinking

'What?' Ferrara asked.

About the riddle in the previous letter. "The last letter will be the first", you remember? I haven't solved that one yet.' 'Maybe he's more intelligent than you as well.' 'That's for sure. But I'm not the one he wants to kill.' 'You didn't add "fortunately".'

'Don't joke, Michele. This guy is serious. I'm not sure if this new message is any help in understanding the previous one. "The last will be the first" - what does that mean? Which one is this, the third?'

'Yes.'

And he makes clear that the last one will be the seventh. But there's one missing. Does that mean it'll arrive after you're dead?'

Ferrara said nothing.

'Only if his plan works out, of course! Obviously you'll catch him first.' 'I hope so.'

'Let's think of it this way. The first letter, which wasn't sent, is the announcement of his plan, if you like. The details of what he intends to do before he gets to you. Then, after your death, as a final insult, he'll send it to the authorities to show how brilliant he's been. The first letter written, the outline, the plan, which he has seen through to the end, will be the last one sent. There you are. "The last will be the first". Clever, isn't it?'

'Yes, it is. But it's only a theory, that may not be it at all.'

'And in any case it only helps you if you're lucky enough to get your hands on a detailed plan to kill the head of the
Squadra Mobile
and also the man who wrote it.'

'Well, it's not much, but at least it's something.'

By the time he left the bookshop, it was dark.

A boy with his face painted like a cat with long black whiskers threw a handful of confetti at him and ran off to join his mother.

It was the last day of Carnival.

Carnival was over and he hadn't even noticed it had started.

8

It was the first day of Carnival, Saturday 26 February.

During the night, some wit had disguised the snow sculptures along the sloping street that leads from the first houses in the village to the main square.

Snow sculptures are a long-standing tradition in San Vigilio. There is a festival of them in the middle of January, involving the best artistic talents in the area, who spend the rest of the year expressing their genius by carving in wood whatever local tradition, the fashion of the moment or personal inspiration suggests to them.

San Vigilio di Marebbe, a village dating back to the Middle Ages, when it was subject to the abbey of Castelbadia, is in the heart of the Dolomites, to the south of the Val Pusteria: an area where Latin culture has resisted the ravages of time and where Latin is a spoken language even today.

It is a place that attracts skiers in winter and hikers and climbers in summer. The snow sculptures stay through the winter to greet tourists, then melt with the first warmth of spring.

'Look at that one with his trousers on his head!' Cinzia exclaimed.

They laughed heartily at an abstract composition looking something like a knight fighting a dragon. On top of the hypothetical knight the prankster had placed a pair of long Johns, and the dragon on the ground, strewn with confetti and shooting stars, seemed to be splitting its sides laughing rather than lying there defeated.

They continued merrily on their way to the bar of the Hotel Posta, where they stopped to buy cigarettes for Cinzia and some punch to warm themselves.

They had arrived the day before on the same train: Valentina had got on at Florence, and Cinzia at Bologna.

They had agreed to spend this vacation together.

Only as friends, they had sworn.

Valentina hadn't told her parents anything about Florence, not only because she felt embarrassed, but also because it would have been difficult to justify the fact that she wasn't paying for the apartment where she was living. Nor did she have any desire to tell them about her relationship with Mike, which she herself did not understand.

Since that night, they hadn't had sex again.

Their life had gone back more or less to the way it had been before. He was away on business even more often. Whenever he was there, he was affectionate and considerate, even loving. But more like a shy, somewhat foolish schoolboy than a companion and a support.

More than once, she had wondered if he felt remorse for that impulsive act of sodomy and if she ought to be the one to raise the question and confront the subject, so as to have done with it once and for all. But the truth was, she wouldn't have known what to say, because she herself didn't know what she felt about what had happened. Did she feel disgust or regret, had she really suffered or had she felt a secret pleasure? How would she react if he asked her to do it again?

So things had dragged on, in a kind of limbo.

'What's new?' Cinzia asked, lighting a cigarette.

She looked beautiful, vivacious, her black eyes intense, her cheeks red with the cold.

They were sitting on wooden benches at one of the rustic tables in the bar, with their steaming glasses of punch in front of them. There were only a few regulars in the bar, some distance away, and they could talk without being either disturbed or overheard.

'You begin.'

'I miss you.'

'Cinzia, we said —'

'Okay, okay! I won't insist. I promise. I swear. We're here as friends. What do you want me to say? Bologna is a drag. The university makes me sick, my father is more fucked up than ever, my mother can't stand him but pretends nothing's wrong. She's so accepting. She doesn't even have the courage to find a lover. The only new thing in my life is CNN. I'm trying to learn English' -
seeing as how you like Americans so much,
she'd have liked to add, but she held back in order not to break the truce - 'so I've put up a satellite dish so I can get foreign channels.'

'Any new friends?'

'They're all little bitches.'

'What about what's her name?'

'Who?'

'The girl who was there once when I called you . . .'

Cinzia thought about it. Or pretended to. 'Oh, you mean Chiara? She's young, she's still at school. I give her Greek lessons, just to earn a bit of money'

'What's she like? Is she a little bitch, too?'

'No,' Cinzia replied, feigning indifference. 'She's nice, funny. You want to know if she's sexy, don't you?' she added wickedly.

'No, I don't care.'

'I'll tell you something. She's a great shag.' 'You're such a bitch!' Valentina cried. 'Come on, I was only joking. Friends tease each other, right?'

Valentina nodded, and smiled.

But she'd felt a pang of jealousy which was hard to shake off.

'How about you? It's your turn now. How's life on the banks of the Arno?'

'I don't really know. There are tons of great things to see, but I spend almost all my time shut up at home studying.'

'You're serious, aren't you?'

'I want to graduate. Finish university and then do something - find a job, maybe travel first, change my life somehow.'

'Lucky you. I still have a long way to go.'

'Maybe we could travel together. Go abroad for a while. Would you like that?'

'Very much. We'll see. And what about that guy?'

'Mike Ross. He's working most of the time. He's nice, I told you. He took me out to dinner a couple of times. Nice restaurants, expensive.'

'Nothing else?'

'Come on, Cinzia, I told you . . .' She didn't like talking about it. That was obvious. By the time they left the bar, Cinzia wasn't in such a good mood any more.

*

'Ready?'

'Wait,' Cinzia said, looking around again before putting on her glasses and taking a last drag at her joint. She had never lost the habit, whereas Valentina had never caught it.

The view that sunny Monday from the peak of the Plan de Corones, at an altitude of 7,460 feet, was breathtaking. From here you could see the whole of the white valley, surrounded by a crown of perennially snowy peaks: the jagged garland of the Dolomites to the south and the mighty Aurine Alps to the north.

On Sunday, the ski slopes had been too crowded. It had been a day of renewed harmony between the friends, most of it spent with Valentina's parents, who were as kind and considerate as ever. Cinzia felt at ease with them and respected them. And they loved her as if she were their second daughter.

If they knew about the two of them, they'd never let on. But Valentina's mother had had no qualms about subjecting her daughter, in front of Cinzia, to a thorough grilling, full of innuendo, about the American in Florence'. Valentina had skilfully evaded her questions, suitably backed up by Cinzia in a spirit of friendship.

Now it was Monday, and they had challenged each other to a race on the most difficult of the slopes, the Sylvester, known for its downhill run of two and a half to three miles over a drop of 4,260 feet.

'Let's go!' Cinzia cried, throwing away the stub of her joint and launching herself into the run.

Typical
of
her,
Valentina thought, still putting her gloves on, having taken them off to tuck her hair into her cap.

But she didn't mind. In fact, she smiled. The head start would add spice to the run. And, being a native of the place, she had always considered herself the stronger of the two.

She followed down the run.

Cinzia was more than fifty yards ahead of her, nimbly dodging the skiers in her way, trying to keep as straight a course as possible.

Valentina felt a vague sense of pride, seeing her friend's slender figure manoeuvring so elegantly and confidently. She shouldn't still feel pride, but she did.

She almost didn't notice the boy on the snowboard who suddenly came to a halt just ahead of her.

What the hell are snowboards doing here?
she thought, swerving violently to the right to avoid him and then left again to get back on the piste.

But they were still on the red part of the piste, which deviated before the black did, and ended up at the starting post at Gripfelbaum.

The manoeuvre had cost her a few precious seconds. By now, Cinzia was nearly ninety yards ahead of her and had disappeared behind a narrow bend. Beyond it the piste divided in two, the Sylvester slope became steeper, and it was quite common to find long stretches of frozen snow.

She really had to make an effort now.

She concentrated, slowed down her breathing, and leaned forward, trying to put exactly the right amount of weight on the skis.

She took the bend.

All the skiers were advancing along the easier fork of the piste.

She immediately realised why. A sign announced that the Sylvester was closed for maintenance. Cinzia had calmly ignored it.

Typical,
she thought again, throwing herself into the gully at a speed she had never before reached. The pines on either side were a blur, the air whipped her face like a shower of sharp needles.

Although protected by her glasses, her eyes were tearing, clouding her vision, but she managed to see her friend below. She was gaining ground.

After about two miles, she had reduced the distance between them by half and was getting closer still.

She smiled, pleased with herself. She calculated that she would catch up with her after another quarter of a mile and would overtake her long before the finishing post.

She slowed down very slightly, to coordinate her movements better.

It was a mistake.

Cinzia, sensing that she was close, reduced the radius of her slalom, gaining more speed just as Valentina was losing hers.

Valentina cursed. She renewed her efforts and managed to regain ground, but more slowly.

After two and a half miles, her friend was still at least thirty yards ahead of her, and just beyond that Valentina could make out the end of the run.

She also saw that the piste rose abruptly, in a kind of makeshift ski-jump, and that to avoid it you had to make a long detour to the right or left. When Cinzia reached it, she chose to turn right.

A yellow mechanical snow shovel was working on the left.

Valentina did not hesitate.

She aimed straight for the ski-jump and took it at the highest speed her skis would allow her. By the time she reached the edge, she was completely bent. She launched into the air with her body almost parallel to the skis, her arms opened wide like wings.

She was flying.

She felt an intoxicating sense of freedom. Down below, she could see Cinzia getting back on the piste and stopping to watch her.

She reached the apex of the curve and as she started descending, she began to gradually raise her body so that she would have the correct shape by the time she touched the ground.

But then cramp hit her left leg, and she was still bent double when she saw the ground coming dangerously close. She braced herself for the pain, but it was too late. One ski hit the ground before the other, throwing her off balance, the other ski came off, she saw the snow coming towards her, her right shoulder hit the ground, and her face slammed against the layer of frozen snow and her cheek scraped along it for what seemed like for ever.

She lost consciousness.

Cinzia hadn't realised what was happening at first. Once she had curved past the false ski-jump, she had looked up and seen Valentina's red and black snowsuit leaping beyond the edge of the mound, which the snow shovel had cut straight through by now, reducing it by half. She stopped, terrified.

She saw her friend flying through the air, somehow - by the grace of God - going a long way beyond the snow shovel, and for a moment her strongest feeling was one of admiration. Then she saw Valentina's body twist in the air and fall and slam onto the piste and slide towards the woods, dragged along in an implacable movement that seemed as if it would never end.

Her eyes filled with tears.

'Vale,' she whispered, 'Vale . . .' then screamed,
'VALENTINA!!!
' and rushed down the slope, thinking she would find her with her head smashed against the trunk of a tree.

She
was
near a pine, but had stopped some yards away. She lay there, motionless, her eyes closed, her beautiful face covered in blood.

Cinzia reached her, threw off her skis and gloves, and knelt beside her.

'Vale,' she wept. 'Talk to me, I beg you. Talk to me, say something, tell me you're all right. Tell me you're fine, I beg you, I beg you. Oh my God, what have I done? It's my fault, all my fault . . . Valentina, my love, my darling . . .'

Alerted by the men on the mechanical shovel, a snowmobile was coming towards her, dragging a stretcher behind it.

'Come on now, don't worry, everything will be all right, you'll see,' Valentina's father tried to console her, covering his own anxiety with words. 'If only you knew how many broken bones I've seen!'