A Walk in the Dark

5

Maria Teresa answered as usual, after the third ring.

After a few moments I heard the buzz of the intercom.

“Who is it?”

“Inspector Tancredi, of the Flying Squad.”

“Put him on.”

Tancredi was almost a friend. Although we’d never spent any time together outside work, I felt – and I think he felt too – that we had something in common. He was the kind of policeman you’d like to meet if you were the victim of a crime, the kind you’d avoid like the plague if you were the one who had committed the crime. Especially certain kinds of crime. Tancredi dealt with perverts, rapists, paedophiles, that kind of criminal. None of them had been very happy to have Tancredi on their case.

“Carmelo. How are you?”

“Hi, Guido, not too bad. And you?” He had a deep voice, with a slight Sicilian accent. Hearing him on the phone, without knowing him, you’d have imagined a tall, stocky man, with a paunch. Tancredi was only about five and a half feet tall, with rather long hair, always unkempt, and a thick black moustache.

We quickly got through the civilities, and then he said he needed to see me. On a work-related issue, he hastened to add. My work or his? Mine and his, in a way. He wanted to come to my office, with someone. He didn’t say who this someone was, and I didn’t ask him. I told him we could meet after eight, when I’d be alone in the office. That was fine, and we left it at that.

They arrived about eight-thirty. Everyone had already left, and I went to open the door.

Tancredi was with a woman about thirty, or a bit more. She was nearly six feet tall, had her hair tied in a ponytail, and was wearing discoloured jeans and a worn leather jacket.

A colleague of Tancredi’s, I thought, even though I’d never seen her before. The typical masculine style of a policewoman from the street crimes squad or the drugs squad. She must have screwed up and now she needed a lawyer. By the look of her – the look of someone you wouldn’t want to mess with – my guess was that she’d beaten up a suspect or someone brought in for questioning. It happens, in carabinieri barracks and police stations.

I showed them into my office, and Tancredi did the introductions.

“Avvocato Guido Guerrieri…” I held out my hand, expecting to hear something like “Officer So and So” or “Inspector Whatshername”. Tancredi didn’t say that.

“… this is Sister Claudia.”

I looked at Tancredi, then looked at the woman again. He had the barest hint of a smile, as if relishing my surprise, but she wasn’t smiling. She held out her hand, looking me straight in the eyes, with a strangely fixed expression. It was only then that I noticed the very small wooden crucifix she was wearing around her neck, hanging from a thin leather cord.

“Sister Claudia is the director of Safe Shelter. Have you heard of it?”

I’d never heard of it and he told me what it was.

Sister Claudia still said nothing, and kept her eyes fixed on me. She gave off a very slight scent, but I couldn’t have said what it was.

Safe Shelter was a community, housed in a secret location – it was still a secret at the end of the conversation – which provided a refuge for women who’d been victims of sex trafficking, women who’d been rescued from abusive relationships, battered wives, ex-prostitutes, or women who’d turned state’s evidence.

Whenever the police or the carabinieri needed to find accommodation for any of these women, they knew the door of Safe Shelter was always open. Even at night or on public holidays.

Tancredi spoke, I nodded, Sister Claudia looked at me. I was starting to feel slightly uncomfortable.

“So how can I be of service?” Even as I was finishing the sentence, I felt like a complete idiot. Like when I find myself saying things like “Hi!” or “How’re you doing?” or “Are you all right?”

Tancredi ignored that and came straight to the point.

“There’s a woman who works as a volunteer at Sister Claudia’s community. Or rather, she used to. Right now she isn’t exactly in a fit state to do so. Anyway, let me tell you the story as briefly as I can. A few years ago this woman met someone. She met him after she’d been through a difficult period, though in fact she’s never had an easy life. This guy seemed like Prince Charming. Kind, affectionate, loving. Rich. Handsome too, the women say. Practically perfect. Anyway, after a few months, they started living together. Fortunately, they didn’t get married.”

I’d heard this kind of story before, not just in my work. So when Tancredi paused for a moment, I cut in. “After they started living together he changed. He wasn’t as nice to her as he used to be, then he started to turn violent. Just verbally at first, but after a while physically too. To cut a long story short, their life together became hell. Am I right?”

“More or less. As far as the first part of the story goes. Maybe Sister Claudia would like to tell you the rest.”

Good idea, I thought. That way she’ll stop staring at me like that, which is making me nervous.

Sister Claudia had a soft, feminine, almost hypnotic voice. In complete contrast to the way she looked. I bet she’s a good singer, I thought, as she began her story.

“In my opinion, he didn’t change after they started living together. He was like that before too. He just stopped acting because he thought he didn’t have to any more. From now on, she was his property. He started insulting her, then hitting her, then doing other things she can tell you herself, if she wants to. Then he started hanging around the place where she worked, convinced she had a lover. Trying to catch her. Of course, he never did catch her, because it wasn’t true. But that didn’t calm him down. It just made him worse. One night, she told him she couldn’t stand it any more and if he didn’t stop all this nonsense she’d leave him, and he beat her up.”

She broke off abruptly. I could tell from her face that she’d have liked to be there when those things had happened. And not just standing and watching.

“The next day, she packed a few of her things, just the things she didn’t need any help with, and moved to her mother’s. She’d had her own apartment before, but she’d let it go when she went to live with him. And now the harassment started. Outside her office. Outside her mother’s place. Morning, noon and night. He followed her. Called her on her mobile phone. Called her at home. At all hours of the day, and especially at night.”

“What did he say?”

“All sorts of things. Twice, he beat her in the street. One morning she found her car scratched all over with a screwdriver. One evening, she got home to find her bicycle, which was in the entrance hall of the apartment block where her mother lives, all smashed up. Of course, there’s no proof it was him. Anyway, to cut a long story short, as you said, Avvocato, her life became hell. The girls in the community and I have been trying to help. Whenever possible we go with her to and from work. For a few weeks she even came and worked in the refuge, which at least is somewhere he doesn’t know and can’t find her. But that’s no solution. She doesn’t have a life, she can’t go out in the evenings, can’t go for a walk, can’t go shopping in a supermarket, can’t do anything for fear she’ll run into him. Or that he’ll be following her. So she doesn’t go out any more. She stays at home, shut in, as if she’s in prison. But he can move around without anyone bothering him.”

“Has she reported him?”

It was Tancredi who replied. “Three times. Once to the carabinieri, once to us at police headquarters, and the third time directly to the Public Prosecutor’s department. Fortunately, the case was assigned to Prosecutor Mantovani, who’s been working on it. She investigated as much as she could, listened to the woman, got hold of the medical reports, and then put in a request for the bastard to be arrested.”

“On what charge?”

“Actual bodily harm and threatening behaviour. But it was useless. The judge rejected the request, saying there were no grounds for arrest. This is where things get interesting. Sister Claudia is here to ask you if you’re prepared to take on the woman’s case and bring a civil action. Two of your colleagues have already refused. A malicious gossip might say for the same reason the judge refused to arrest the man.”

I asked him to explain, and he told me a name. I made him repeat it, to make sure I’d understood. When I was certain we were talking about the same person, I let out a kind of whistle, but didn’t say anything.

Tancredi told me the rest. As soon as her request for the man to be arrested had been rejected, Assistant Prosecutor Mantovani had asked for him to be committed for trial. When he’d received the summons to appear, he’d gone and waylaid the woman outside her mother’s apartment building.

He had told her she could report him as many times as she liked, nothing would happen to him. Because nobody would ever have the courage to touch him. And he’d added that he’d pull her to pieces in court.

That was why she needed a lawyer. Because she was scared but didn’t want to turn back now.

Tancredi also told me the names of the two colleagues of mine the woman had turned to before me. One of them had said he was sorry, but on principle he didn’t take on civil cases. I knew him well and wondered if he even knew the meaning of the word principle.

The second one had said he had too much work on at the moment and so, unfortunately, he couldn’t take on the case. Unfortunately, of course.

By now, the woman was desperate and terrified. She didn’t know what to do. She had talked to Sister Claudia, and Sister Claudia had talked to Tancredi. To get his advice. He’d mentioned my name and they’d come to see me. Without the woman. They hadn’t even told her about this meeting, because if I refused too, Sister Claudia didn’t want her to know.

That was the story so far. I shouldn’t feel obliged to take on the case, Tancredi said. If I refused, they’d understand. And they were sure that if I did refuse I wouldn’t talk about questions of principle or having too much work.

Silence.

I looked at Sister Claudia. She didn’t look like someone who’d understand. No way.

I passed my hand over my face, against the grain of my beard, which had grown a bit since morning. Then I pinched my cheek four or five times, between index finger and thumb, still scratching my beard.

In the end I gave a self-satisfied grin and shrugged my shoulders. No problem, I said. I was a lawyer and one client was just like another. As I said it, I knew I was talking bullshit.

It seemed to me that Sister Claudia’s features relaxed almost imperceptibly, with something like relief. Tancredi smiled slightly, looking like someone who’d never had any doubt how the game would turn out.

There wasn’t much else to say for the moment. The woman had to come to the office in order to sign the forms agreeing to have me represent her. And in order for us to meet, obviously, seeing as I was about to become her lawyer. Then I would go to the Public Prosecutor’s department to make copies of the file. I wouldn’t have long to study it all. The trial was due to start in three weeks’ time. I asked Sister Claudia to leave me a telephone number, and after a moment’s hesitation she wrote the number of a mobile phone on a piece of paper.

“It’s my number. The telephone’s always on.”

When they’d gone, I leaned back against the door and looked up at the ceiling. I made the gesture of searching in my pockets for the packet of cigarettes that wasn’t there.