Numero Zero (17 page)

I was sweating. The inspector didn't seem to notice, or perhaps he put it down to momentary distress.

“I'm not sure what Braggadocio was up to these past few days,” I said. “Maybe Dottor Simei can tell you, he assigns the articles. I think he was working on something to do with prostitution. I don't know if that's of any help.”

“We shall see,” said the inspector, and he moved on to question Maia, who was crying. She had no love for Braggadocio, I thought, but murder is murder. Poor dear. I felt sorry not for Braggadocio but for Maia—she'd probably be feeling guilty for speaking ill of him.

At that moment Simei motioned me to his office. “Colonna,” he said, sitting down at his desk, his hands trembling, “you know what Braggadocio was working on.”

“I do and I don't. He mentioned something, but I'm not sure that—”

“Colonna, don't beat around the bush, you know perfectly well that Braggadocio was stabbed because he was about to reveal important information. Now I don't know what was true and what he invented, though it's clear that if his inquiry covered a hundred stories, he must have gotten to the truth on at least one of them, and that is why he was silenced. But since he told me all of it yesterday, it means I also know that one story, though I don't know which it is. And since he told me that he told you, you know it too. So we're both in danger. To make matters worse, two hours ago I got a call from Commendator Vimercate. He didn't say who told him, or what he'd been told, but Vimercate found out that the entire
Domani
venture was too dangerous even for him, so he decided to shut the whole thing down. He's sent me checks for journalists—they'll each get an envelope with two months' salary and a few words of thanks. None of them had a contract, so they can't complain. Vimercate didn't know you were in danger as well, but I think you might find it difficult to go around banking a check, so I'm tearing it up—I have some money in hand, your pay packet will contain two months' in cash. The offices will be dismantled by tomorrow evening. As for us two, you can forget our agreement, your little job, the book you were going to write.
Domani
is being axed, right now. Even with the newspaper shut, you and I know too much.”

“I think Braggadocio told Lucidi as well.”

“You haven't understood a thing, have you. That was where he went wrong. Lucidi sniffed out that our dear departed friend was handling something dangerous and went straight off to report it. To whom? I don't know, but certainly to someone who decided that Braggadocio knew too much. No one's going to hurt Lucidi, he's on the other side of the barricade, but they might harm us. I'll tell you what I'm going to do. As soon as the police are out of here, I'm putting the rest of the cash in my bag, shooting straight down to the station, and taking the first train for Switzerland. With no luggage. I know someone there who can change a person's identity, new name, new passport, new residence—we'll have to work out where. I'm disappearing before Braggadocio's killers can find me. I hope I'll beat them to it. And I've asked Vimercate to pay me in dollars on Credit Suisse. As for you, I don't know what to suggest, but first of all, don't go wandering the streets, lock yourself up at home. Then find a way of disappearing, I'd choose eastern Europe, where stay-behind didn't exist.”

“But you think it's all to do with stay-behind? That's already in the public domain. Or perhaps the business about Mussolini? That's so outlandish no one would believe it.”

“And the Vatican? Even if the story wasn't true, it would still end up in the papers that the Church had covered up Mussolini's escape in 1945 and had sheltered him for nearly fifty years. With all the troubles they already have down there with Sindona, Calvi, Marcinkus, and the rest, before they've managed to prove the Mussolini business a hoax, the scandal would be all over the international press. Trust no one, Colonna, lock yourself up at home, tonight at least, then think about getting away. You've enough to live on for a few months. And if you go, let's say, to Romania, it costs nothing there, and with the twelve million lire in this envelope you could live like a lord for some time. After that, well, you can see. Goodbye, Colonna, I'm sorry things have ended this way. It's like that joke our Maia told about the cowboy at Abilene: Too bad, we've lost. If you'll excuse me, I'd better get ready to leave as soon as the police have gone.”

I wanted to get out of there right away, but that damned inspector went on questioning us, getting nowhere fast. Meanwhile evening fell.

I walked past Lucidi's desk as he was opening his envelope. “Have you received your just reward?” I asked, and he clearly understood what I was referring to.

He looked me up and down and asked, “What did Braggadocio tell you?”

“I know he was following some line of inquiry, but he wouldn't tell me exactly what.”

“Really?” he said. “Poor devil, who knows what he's been up to.” And then he turned away.

Once the inspector had said I could leave, with the usual warning to remain available for further questioning, I whispered to Maia, “Go home. Wait there until I phone you, probably not before tomorrow morning.”

She looked at me, terrified. “But how are you involved in all this?”

“I'm not, I'm not, what are you thinking, I'm just upset.”

“Tell me what's going on. They've given me an envelope with a check and many thanks for my invaluable services.”

“They're closing the newspaper. I'll explain later.”

“Why not tell me now?”

“Tomorrow, I swear I'll tell you everything. You stay safe at home. Just do as I say, please.”

She listened, her eyes welling with tears. And I left without saying another word.

I spent the evening at home, eating nothing, draining half a bottle of whiskey, and thinking what to do next. I felt exhausted, took a sleeping pill, and fell asleep.

And this morning, no water in the tap.

17

There. Now I've told it all. Let me try to make sense of it. Who are “they”? That's what Simei said, that Braggadocio had pieced together a number of facts, correctly or incorrectly. Which of these facts could worry somebody? The business about Mussolini? And in that case, who had the guilty conscience? The Vatican? Or perhaps conspirators in the Borghese plot who still held authority (though after twenty years they all must be dead), or the secret services (which?). Or perhaps not. Perhaps it was just some old Fascist who's haunted by the past and acted alone, perhaps getting pleasure from threatening Vimercate, as though he had—who knows?—the Sacra Corona Unita behind him. A nutcase, then, but if a nutcase is trying to do away with you, he's just as dangerous as someone who's sane, and more so. For example, whether it's “they” or some lone nutcase, someone entered my house last night. And having gotten in once, they or he could get in a second time. So I'd better not stay here. But then, is this nutcase or are these “they” so sure I know something? Did Braggadocio say anything about me to Lucidi? Maybe not, or not much, judging from my last exchange of remarks with that sneak. But can I feel safe? Certainly not. It's a long step, though, between that and escaping to Romania—best to see what happens, read the newspapers tomorrow. If they don't mention the killing of Braggadocio, things are worse than I imagine—it means someone's trying to hush it all up. I've got to hide at least for a while. But where? Right now it would be dangerous to stick my nose outside.


I thought about Maia and her hideaway at Orta. My affair with Maia has passed, I think, unnoticed, and she shouldn't be under surveillance. She no, but my telephone yes, so I can't telephone her from home, and to telephone from outside means I have to go out.


It occurred to me that there was a back entrance, from the courtyard below, through the toilets, to the local bar. I also remembered a metal gate at the far end of the courtyard that had been locked for decades. My landlord had told me about it when he handed me the keys to the apartment. Along with the key to the main entrance and the landing door, there was another one, old and rusty. “You'll never need it,” said the landlord with a smile, “but every tenant has had one for the past fifty years. We had no air-raid shelter here during the war, you see, and there was a fairly large one in the house behind, on Via Quarto dei Mille, the road that runs parallel to ours. So a passageway was opened up at the far end of the courtyard for families to reach the shelter quickly if the alarm sounded. The gate has remained locked from both sides, but each of our tenants had a key, and as you see, in almost fifty years it's become rusty. I don't suppose you'll ever need it, but that gate is also a good escape route in the event of fire. You can put the key in a drawer, if you wish, and forget about it.”


That's what I had to do. I went downstairs and into the bar through the back door. The manager knows me, and I've done it before. I looked around. Hardly anyone there in the morning. Just an elderly couple sitting at a table with two cappuccinos and two croissants, and they didn't look like secret agents. I ordered a double coffee—I still wasn't properly awake—and went to the telephone booth. Maia answered immediately in great agitation, and I told her to keep calm and listen.


“So follow carefully, and no questions. Pack a bag with enough for a few days at Orta, then get your car. Behind where I live, in Via Quarto dei Mille, I'm not sure what number, there'll be an entranceway, more or less the same distance up the road as my place. It could be open, because I think it goes into a courtyard where there's a workshop of some kind. Either go in, or you can wait outside. Synchronize your watch with mine, you should be able to get there in fifteen minutes, let's say we'll meet in exactly an hour. If the entrance gate is closed, I'll be waiting for you outside, but get there on time, I don't want to hang around in the street. Please, don't ask any questions. Take your bag, get in the car, make sure you have the timing right, and come. Then I'll tell you everything. Check the rearview mirror every now and then, and if you think someone's tailing you, use your imagination, do some crazy turns to throw them off. It's not so easy along the canals, but after that, lots of ways to give them the slip, jump the lights on red. I trust you, my love.”


Maia could have had a promising career in armed robbery. She did things to perfection, and within the agreed hour, there she was in the entranceway, tense but happy.


I jumped into the car, told her where to turn to reach Viale Certosa as quickly as possible, and from there she knew her way to the highway for Novara, and then the turnoff for Orta, better than I did.


We hardly spoke during the entire trip. Once we'd reached the house, I told her it might be risky for her to know all that I knew. Would she prefer to rely on me and remain in the dark? But I should have guessed, there was no question. “Excuse me,” she said, “I still don't know who or what you're frightened of, but either no one knows we're together, in which case I'm in no danger, or they'll find out and be convinced I know. So spit it out, otherwise how will I ever think what you think?”


Undaunted. I had to tell her everything—after all, she was now flesh of my flesh, as the Good Book says.


18

For several days I barricaded myself in the house, afraid to go out. “Come on,” said Maia, “no one in this place knows you, and those you're scared of, whoever they are, have no idea you're here.”


“It doesn't matter,” I replied, “you can never be too sure.”


Maia began treating me like an invalid. She gave me tranquilizers, stroked the back of my neck as I sat at the window gazing out at the lake.


On Sunday morning she went off early to buy the papers. The killing of Braggadocio was reported on an inside page, without much prominence: journalist murdered, may have been investigating a prostitution ring, attacked by pimp.


It seemed the police had accepted the idea, following what I had said, and perhaps after hints from Simei. They were clearly not thinking about us journalists, nor did they appear to have noticed that Simei and I had gone missing. If they'd returned to the office, they would have found it empty, and besides, the inspector hadn't bothered to take down our addresses. A fine Maigret he'd have been. But I don't imagine he's worrying about us. Prostitution was the more convenient lead, routine stuff. Costanza could have told him, of course, that it was he who was investigating those women, but he may also have thought Braggadocio's death had something to do with that story, and he might have begun to fear for his life and kept quiet as a mouse.


Next day Braggadocio had even vanished from the inside pages. The police must have had plenty of cases like his and, after all, the dead man was no more than a fourth-rate hack. Round up the usual suspects, and be done with it.


At dusk I watched as the lake darkened. The island of San Giulio, so radiant under the sun, rose from the water like Böcklin's
Isle of the Dead
.


Maia decided to try to put me back on my feet, so she took me for a walk on the Sacro Monte. I'd never been there before. It's a series of chapels on the top of a hill with mystical dioramas of polychrome statues in natural settings, smiling angels but above all scenes from the life of Saint Francis. In the scene of a mother hugging a suffering child, I saw, alas, the victims of some remote terrorist attack. In a solemn meeting with a pope, various cardinals, and somber Capuchin friars, I saw a council meeting at the Vatican Bank planning my capture. Nor were all those colors and other pious terracottas enough to make me think of the Kingdom of Heaven: everything seemed a perfidiously disguised allegory of infernal forces plotting in the shadows. I went as far as imagining that those figures at night would become skeletons (what, after all, is the pink body of an angel if not a deceptive integument that cloaks a skeleton, even if it's a celestial one?) and join in the
danse macabre
in the Church of San Bernardino alle Ossa.