Vipers (24 page)

The commissario remembered the first time that he'd seen that dog, on one of the steps of the monumental Capodimonte staircase, next to the corpse of a little boy. He remembered how he had quickly concluded that that death had been accidental, because his hidden sense failed to show him any image of the boy, as it did whenever the death had been violent and sudden. And how the dog, which followed him everywhere and constantly appeared to him in the pouring rain, had instead forced him to carry out a more in-depth investigation, which finally led to an atrocious discovery.

And now here that dog was again, completely out of context.

Ricciardi searched for the shambling figure of Dr. Modo, hoping for the reassurance of his presence; but a tingling on his skin told him that he wasn't going to see him.

He crossed the street and approached the dog. The animal didn't move until Ricciardi stood beside him. Ricciardi noticed that the dog no longer wore the leather collar that his friend had put on him so he wouldn't be netted and euthanized as a stray, as was the custom. Then the dog got up, as if responding to a call, and trotted off up Via Toledo, against the stream of people heading in the opposite direction; every so often he would stop to let Ricciardi catch up.

To tell the truth, the commissario felt a little stupid to be following the dog; after all, Modo had always let the dog run free, off leash, and so the animal could follow his every momentary instinct, chasing down streets at random. But something about this didn't add up: the late hour, for instance, and above all the lack of a collar. Just as the doctor would never have bound him with a leash, neither would he have run the risk of having him seized by the dogcatcher and put down.

The dog headed for the hospital, with Ricciardi at his heels. When he came level with the dark alleys of the Pignasecca, deserted at that hour, he stopped, yelped, and then began to bark insistently; when the man caught up with him, the dog entered without hesitation into the courtyard and headed straight over to a chain from which dangled the collar he'd slipped out of, when he'd set off in the vain pursuit of the car that was carrying away Dr. Modo.

Ricciardi, who had no way of knowing what had happened, unhooked the slender strip of leather from the chain and put it back around the dog's neck, then the dog resumed his sitting position. At that point, Ricciardi decided to enter the building, in order to make sure that Modo was at work and reassure him that his four-legged friend was well.

But Modo wasn't there. At his usual station Ricciardi met a young doctor, who shrugged and said that he'd been summoned by a functionary of the hospital administration to cover a shift.

Ricciardi headed up to the upstairs offices, where he was greeted by an employee who introduced himself as Egidio Montuori, administrative assistant of the Pellegrini hospital. The commissario identified himself, and noticed how the man stiffened as he did. Montuori was about forty and quite ridiculous, with a celluloid collar that rose practically to his ears and a pair of half-frame reading glasses perched at the tip of his long nose.

“I'm looking for Dr. Modo, Bruno Modo. These are important matters of public safety, and I need to get in touch with him.”

Montuori looked rapidly around, as if looking for help; then he said:

“Dr. Modo? He isn't here. He . . . he left, a few hours ago.”

“He left? And where would he go?”

Ricciardi's tone of voice made clear he would brook no nonsense, which just made Montuori's situation even more awkward.

“He . . . didn't say, and then, I wasn't here when he left. We, as you may know, we are run by a religious congregation, and at that hour, when they . . . when he left, there was a priest, I don't know which one. I think he went . . . on vacation, yes, that's right. He went on vacation. He said he was leaving town for Easter.”

Ricciardi decided that that man was as honest as a one-and-a-half lira coin. He looked him in the eye and said to him, decidedly:

“Signore, you do know that lying to a police officer is a criminal offense, don't you? I'm going to ask you again, for the last time: where is Dr. Bruno Modo?”

Montuori's lower lip began to quiver:

“Commissario, I'm in charge of accounting here. All I know is what they told me, that starting today Dr. Modo is on vacation, and that they'll inform us if and when he comes back to work. That's all I know, and that's all I can tell you.”

Ricciardi ran a hand over his forehead. This wasn't making sense.

“Excuse me, but didn't you tell me that he was away for Easter? And now you're telling me that you have no idea when he'll be back.”

Montuori spread out his arms.

“That's exactly right, Commissario. We don't know when he'll be back. Please, I can't tell you anything else because I don't know anything else. I have a wife and two small children.”

Now Ricciardi really was worried. He left without saying goodbye, and left the courtyard walking hurriedly.

The dog followed him.

 

Sometimes, against his instincts, Ricciardi allowed himself to be dragged into evenings out with Modo to chat and drink beer.

The commissario would give in unwillingly to the doctor's cheery and repeated invitations, but afterward he was glad he had: it was a different way of experiencing the city, on hot summer nights, when the enormous red moon hung in the sky as if it were painted cardboard, or when smoky taverns offered welcome haven from the chilly air and biting winds. Invariably, those evenings would conclude with a long stroll during which both men would talk about life, which they viewed so differently; and they'd walk each other home repeatedly, first one, then the other, prolonging their chat when the discussion grew heated, until finally, exhausted, they would say goodnight.

As Ricciardi hurried toward his friend's home, followed by the dog, he realized just how fond of the man he was. His apparently superficial approach to things, his profound involvement in the sufferings of others, his cheerfulness, at once vulgar and cultured, his intelligent irony—all these things had burrowed into his heart, and the thought that the doctor might be in serious trouble brought him a sense of anguish.

Maybe I'm overreacting, he thought to himself. Maybe he really has taken a few days off to get some rest, and right now he's sitting in some horrible tavern down by the waterfront drinking cheap wine and singing filthy songs, and tomorrow he'll laugh at my concerns. Or else he'll come open the door in his nightshirt and make some nastry crack with sexual overtones about the fact that I can't sleep.

Modo lived over near Piazza del Gesù, in an old building that had seen much better days. “It's just like me, no?” he liked to say, with a laugh. Ricciardi had never been through the front door, but according to his friend's descriptions, the apartment had always belonged to the Modo family and by now the place was too big for him.

As he approached the apartment building, the dog yelped and shot past him. The commissario hoped that the animal had sensed the doctor's presence: but the man pacing back and forth in front of the street door, hair rumpled and evidently very worried, wasn't Bruno Modo.

It was Brigadier Maione.

H
ow is he?”

“Fine, I think. Now he's sleeping.”

“Sleeping how?

“How else is he supposed to sleep? He's just sleeping. He tosses and turns. He mutters, he cries. But he's sleeping. Like always, ever since . . . like always.”

“It's nice out here. Look at that moon. For the first time, you can see that spring is here.”

“I don't understand you. Do you realize the situation we're in? You're thinking about the moon, about springtime. And meanwhile the world's caving in on us.”

“You're the one who doesn't understand. Nothing's happened at all. Everything is normal, perfectly normal. This is the only way he'll be able to recover and go back to doing what he was doing before. And everything will go back to normal.”

”I wish I could be like you. I wish I could always think things were going to turn out for the best. But I don't; I think that everything's going to go to hell in a handbasket. The police . . .”

“Oh, don't make me laugh, the police! The police don't understand a thing, they've never solved a single case, and you think that this one time . . .”

“That one guy, I don't like him. The commissario, the one with the weird eyes. You talk and he stares at you, hard, no expression. As if he was digging into your body.”

“I'm telling you again, they've never solved a case. If you don't let yourself get rattled, if you stay cool, they can't charge you with a thing. You have to be like a card player, you know? Like when you have a winning hand and you have to make sure no one knows.”

“Ha, ha . . . How funny you are. After all, you're not the one who has to worry.”

“Ah, no? And why not? Aren't we both in the same boat? If the boat goes down, we're all going down with it, you know? It's not like some of us will make it and some won't.”

“The brigadier worries me too. He's a sly old fox. One of those guys who pretends to be an idiot so they won't draft him, but when the time comes . . .”

“Brigadier, Commissario, even if it was the Duce himself: if they don't have anything, they don't have anything. And they can't charge you with nothing.”

“Maybe you're right. The worst thing is the face, her face. I can't get it out of my head.”

“So why, why did you insist on looking at her? Couldn't you . . .”

“Sure, I could just as well have left her the way she was. But in the end, I don't know . . . it just seemed like too much, to leave her like that. So I pulled away the pillow.”

“Pointless pity. For a whore, for an ordinary stupid whore who would have ruined your life and your future. A future that we earned, a future that we built, day by day.”

“But I see her again, and I'll keep seeing her. Not that I'm repenting, obviously. We did what we had to do. But to see her like that, afterward . . . afterward, it was terrible.”

“Now it's going to be a test of nerves, and you can't afford to be weak. Neither you nor I can afford to be weak. We have to protect our future. That's why we need to remain calm and unruffled. We can't worry about anything or anybody, least of all the police, who couldn't find a murderer if he bit them in the ass.”

“You think not? But, you know, the commissario . . .”

“I told you, nothing at all. Nothing to worry about. If anything, are we sure we haven't made any mistakes? For instance, is there anyone who might have, I don't know, seen something by any chance, or have . . .”

“No, I told you. I was very careful, no one could trace it back to me. Seen from outside, nothing outside of the ordinary happened that day. The clients were there and, you know, there's a constant flow of people, young and old. There was music, everyone was thinking about . . . in short, everyone was minding their own business, that's what the place was designed for.”

“Well then, like I've told you lots of times, we should just keep calm and collected and wait for time to pass and heal all wounds. And then, when everything is back where it should be, we can start looking forward again. And it will be as if that whore had never been born.”

“She'd said that she was going to give her answer on Easter Sunday. Just think, on Easter Sunday!”

“I'll say it again: it's going to be as if she'd never been born.”

“But she'll go on existing, every time I try to go to sleep.”

“No. Because it was something we had to do. Now try to breathe. And look at what a beautiful moon there is tonight.”

M
aione went over to Ricciardi; he was extremely agitated.

“Commissa', then you know about it too! I was about to come to your house to call you, even if it's past midnight. What are we going to do now? Who can we go to? We can't even be sure that Garzo isn't involved; that idiot's a master when it comes to things like this . . .”

Ricciardi was so surprised to see the brigadier there that it took him a while to stanch that flood of words:

“Hold on, hold on, Raffaele. I don't know anything, tell me: what are you doing here at this hour?”

Maione stopped, perplexed:

“Excuse me, Commissa', but if you don't know anything, then how . . .”

Ricciardi pointed at the dog.

“I found him, sitting obediently on the Via Toledo, when I left police headquarters. As if he was waiting for me. So I went over to see at the hospital, but an employee there told me that Bruno had taken a vacation, for Easter. It struck me that the man was afraid of something, he was hesitant, he kept contradicting himself and he seemed worried, at a certain point he even told me that he had small children, as if that was supposed to help me understand why he wouldn't tell me anything more. That's when I got worried, and I came here.”

“He's not here, the doctor; I've been ringing the doorbell for the past half hour.”

“What about you? Do you want to tell me why you're here? Maybe we're both worried for no reason, while Bruno is actually someplace like Il Paradiso, drinking and playing cards.”

Maione adjusted his collar. For some reason, the fact that he was in civilian clothes in the presence of the commissario put him ill at ease.

“Commissa', I really don't think the doctor is anywhere having a good time; this is serious. Very serious. I think our friend has been taken by the Fascists.”

The phrase fell in the lonely night like a bottle from a balcony. Though he'd barely whispered it, Maione still looked around the deserted street to make sure no one had overheard.

“What do you mean, by the Fascists? And how do you know that?”

Continuing to whisper, Maione told him what Lucia had witnessed in the hospital courtyard.