Persona Non Grata

The Inspector Piero Trotti Novels
Converging Parallels
The Puppeteer
Black August
Big Italy

The Anne Marie Laveaud Novels
Another Sun
The Honest Folk of Guadeloupe

ARMA: Arma dei Carabinieri, a military corps with police duties

AUTOSTRADA: highway

BUONA SERA: good evening

BUONGIORNO: hello, good morning

CAPITANO: captain

CASERMA CAIROLI: the Cairoli barracks

COMMISSARIO: commissioner

DOTTOR: doctor (mas.)

DOTTORESSA: doctor (fem.)

ESPORTAZIONE: an Italian cigarette brand

FINANZA: autonomous police force concerned with customs and excise

GRAPPA: a dry, clear brandy distilled from fermented grapes

I PANINARI: a youth group centered around a consumeristic, globalized way of life

ISPETTORE: inspector

MARESCIALLO: warrant officer, senior NCO

MATURITÀ TECNICA: high school technical exam, akin to British A Levels

OSTETRICA: maternity ward, obstetrician

PALAZZO: building, palace

PAZIENZA: patience

PIAZZA: plaza

PIEMONTESI: people from Piemonte

POLICLINICO: hospital

POLIZIA STRADALE: highway patrol

PRONTO SOCCORSO: first aid

PROVINCIA (PADANA): an Italian newspaper

PUBBLICA SICUREZZA: Italian police force

PUBBLICO MINISTERO: public prosecutor

QUESTURA: police headquarters

QUESTORE: chief inspector

REPUBBLICHINI: Republicans

SCIENTIFICA: forensics

SCUOLA MEDIA: middle school

SIGNORA: madam, lady

SIGNORINA: miss, young lady

SQUADRA MOBILE: first response team

TENENTE: lieutenant

VIA: road

ZIO: uncle

T
HERE WAS THE
smell of coffee on his breath and, as he spoke, small clouds of moisture escaped from his mouth into the chill air. “I am too old.”

Pisanelli smiled but said nothing. He bumped the car up onto the pavement. The two men got out of the Lancia.

The first light of the new day rose above the colorless buildings. No wind, no traffic and, apart from the changing lights at the crossroads, the city at four o’clock in the morning was dead. Dead except for the distant whine of a siren.

Accompanied by the echo of their footfalls they crossed Piazza Castello.

On the far side of the square, a police motorcycle stood at the entrance to an apartment building. There was another vehicle, with the blue lamp revolving unheeded in the silent, first dawn.

They went through the open doors.

A non-commissioned officer saluted and accompanied Trotti and Pisanelli up the stairs. A building that was neither rich nor poor, it had been built at the time of Fascism and was still hanging on to its fading respectability. The walls had once been painted but were now grubby; no graffiti, just the marks of rubbing shoulders and the contact of dirty hands and greasy clothes.

The air carried no smell other than that of the chill September morning and the policeman’s cigarette. Pisanelli took the stairs two at a time; Trotti followed him.

Families, dressed for the night, but with faces already accustomed to the new day, had come out on to the landings. They watched interested and unblinking at the passage of the three men. Trotti was out of breath by the time they reached the third floor. The doorway on the left side was wide open and yellow light flooded out.

Bloodstains.

Thin traces of splashed blood across the stone floor and the sound of somebody crying.

Trotti bit his lip.

The NCO placed his hand on the door handle and Maresciallo Santostefano stepped forward. He was wearing boots and had not removed his motorcycle helmet; the chin-strap hung at the side of his round, unimaginative face.

“The girl has been taken to the hospital—she’s just left.”

“What girl?”

“The girl, Laura, she’s …”

Trotti interrupted, “What happened?”

“I was called at half past three. Why me, I don’t know; I don’t work for Pronto Soccorso.” He made a movement of irritation, then Santostefano gestured through the open door to the far side of the landing. “The neighbor’s got a phone. He phoned one-one-three.”

“What happened?”

Santostefano hesitated, taken aback by the brusqueness of the question. “Somebody tried to kill the girl.” Santostefano turned to look at the other people in the small room: a room that looked lived in, with a heavy sideboard, a wooden table and a divan that had been pulled down to form a bed. Dark smears on the white bedsheet. “Signor Vardin was next door sleeping and he was woken by the screaming of his daughter.” The policeman nodded uncomfortably towards the narrow-shouldered man dressed in a pajama bottom and a singlet.

Trotti turned and looked at the man. The face was creased and the eyes appeared as if they were accustomed to suffering. Vardin had placed his arm around the shoulders of the weeping woman.

“Signor Vardin jumped out of bed and came in here. He
had just enough time to turn the light on and see somebody darting out of the door—out of the door and down the stairs.” Santostefano added, “Signor Vardin says that he tried to follow the aggressor …”

Vardin removed his arm from the woman’s shoulder. “Of course I would have followed him and I would have killed him.” The voice was a hoarse whisper devoid of menace. “I would have followed him but I saw Laura and I saw that she was covered in blood and she was moaning and calling out, ‘Papa, Papa.’ ”

“What did you do, Signor Vardin?”

There was dry saliva at the corner of his lips. “Laura is twelve years old—a little girl. My daughter is a little girl.”

Santostefano said, “The work of a maniac.” He crossed his arms against his leather jacket and, for an instant, a grim smile lingered on the full lips. “At least ten stab wounds, Commissario—not deep, I think, but blood all over the body. The ambulance was quick, and she was breathing normally when they took her away.”

The southern accent grated on Trotti’s nerves.

“I couldn’t tell if there was internal hemorrhaging, but there was no blood in the mouth.”

The woman had been crying in silence, a knuckle pushed hard against her lips; she now started to slump forward. “My baby is going to die.” She would have fallen to the cold floor but her husband held her. “To die.”

“Commissario.” Santostefano took Trotti by the arm—a strange act of intimacy for a member of Polizia Stradale—and led him towards a corner of the room. Trotti noticed the bronze tower of Pisa on a shelf and the unframed picture of the Pope. “She wanted to accompany the child in the ambulance but I told Vardin that she would have to stay here until you came.” He shook his head. “I think she’s going to need treatment. Something to calm her. Before you came she was screaming hysterically.”

Trotti turned and looked at the woman and, beyond her, at the paling morning sky over the city.

T
HE CUP OF
coffee was half-empty and fast growing cold. The smell coming from the hall had destroyed Trotti’s desire to drink.

“Time?” The eyes were pale grey and they looked at Trotti cautiously.

“What time did you get back with your family from Piazza Vittoria?”

The man fumbled with the packet of cigarettes that Trotti had given him; the green packet of Esportazione appeared strangely small and crumpled in the large, work-worn hands. “Time?” he repeated in his hoarse whisper.

“You went with your family to the piazza, didn’t you?”

The man was silent.

“Signor Vardin, you went with your family to the piazza last night.”

He looked up. “I’m sorry, but I haven’t slept.” He ran a hand across his forehead. “I can still see that screen dancing in front of my eyes.” He rubbed at the side of his nose while screwing up his eyelids. “I was sitting too close to it and the man in the white coat …”

“Signor Maserati?”

Vardin nodded. He spoke with difficulty and Trotti wondered whether the man’s lungs or larynx had been damaged. “I was trying to help him. The man in the white coat, I think he
was getting impatient with me. But I only saw him—the man who attacked my daughter—I only saw him for a second—for a fraction of a second.”

“However, you have managed to give Maserati a description, haven’t you?”

“On the machine. What do you call it? On the computer.” The face brightened for an instant. “He got me to help him draw the face—but I can’t be sure. The attacker—I scarcely saw him.”

“You say he was a young man?”

“He looked young to me—I saw him as he ran down the stairs. I saw that he was wearing a jacket and that he had long hair.”

“You had never seen him before?”

“No.” The reply was prompt.

Trotti smiled. “It is very good of you to help.”

“I just want to help my daughter.”

“You can help her by trying to answer the questions, Signor Vardin. I realize how you must be feeling but please—please try to cooperate as much as you can. You want us to find the man who did these terrible things to Laura.” Trotti took out his pen and started drawing lines on the yellow stationery. “Can you remember at what time you got back from Piazza Vittoria last night?”