Blood Curse

XIX

As he climbed the stairs, Ricciardi could hear the radio in his apartment bellowing out a dance song. My Tata is going deaf, he thought with tenderness. She’s a bossy, indelicate, nitpicking ballbuster, a lousy cook with a rotten personality. But she’s all the family I have.

He unlocked the door, fully aware that he could have head-butted it off its hinges without Rosa noticing a thing. He walked straight into the parlor and resolutely rotated the handle of the large, light-colored wood radio. He counted to three and then turned to face the door, at the exact instant in which his infuriated Tata appeared in the opening.

“Well, what’s going on? So now I can’t even listen to a little radio?”

“Of course you can, why shouldn’t you? It’s just that over at the National Museum, about a mile and a half from here, a bunch of mummies woke up and started dancing to the melodies of Cinico Angelini, and the museum director came in to complain at headquarters.”

“Good boy, you’ve developed a sense of humor! You must have had a nice easy day, eh? Sitting there, as comfortable as can be, reading documents, while I, poor old woman that I am, and with all the pain I suffer, have to run around in circles to keep this house from falling to pieces.”

“That’s fine, you keep on doing that while I go splash some water on my face.”

“All right, but hurry up, I’m serving dinner in ten minutes. It’s late and you still haven’t eaten your dinner.”

A threat and a punishment, Ricciardi thought to himself. I already know what she’s planning to inflict on me tonight. You can smell the stench of cauliflower all the way from Piazza Dante.

He went to his bedroom, doffed his overcoat and jacket, and gave in to the temptation to walk over to the window. A few yards away, the family on the third floor was finishing dinner. From his vantage point he could see half of the large kitchen and only a section of the table where the meal was taking place.

But even less of a view would have been enough for him. Right in his line of sight, as usual right at the end of the table to make sure that her left hand wouldn’t bother a neighboring diner, Enrica sat eating. Around her were her siblings, her parents, and the man he presumed to be her brother-in-law because he had seen him hold her sister’s hand.

He knew every detail: dishes, glasses, tablecloth and napkins, chairs. A year of mute devotion combined with the professional habit of memorizing every detail. He didn’t even know her surname, but he didn’t care. To the contrary, for once, he had been careful not to do any investigative work.

He liked her this way, with her timeless normality, outside of space: all calmness and gentleness, strength and quietude. Motionless, the one beacon in the fog of his unhappiness, the small, tranquil port to which he could return every night. When work kept him away, when an investigation dragged on or there was a report to complete, and he was deprived of the enchantment of that moment, a faint sense of uneasiness would take possession of him. He wouldn’t find peace until he was able to return to the window once again.

Rosa bellowed his name from the kitchen. Angelini sketched out one last arabesque with his orchestra.

See you soon, my delicate love.

Maione said nothing. A hundred questions bore down on his stomach, but he remained silent.

Filomena walked along next to him at a distance of less than three feet. As hard as he tried, Maione couldn’t get her to walk at his side. She kept just slightly behind the man in uniform, almost as if she didn’t think herself deserving of the honor: almost as if she were ashamed.

“You must be in a lot of pain.”

“No, not really. The doctor was very kind. He was gentle with me.”

They walked along a little farther in silence. Maione looked down at the ground, while Filomena stared straight ahead of her. Without fear, without audacity, without pride. She held the bandage in place with her hand.

“Signora, you must understand. I have some questions I need to ask you.”

“But why, Brigadie’? I haven’t pressed charges and I certainly don’t intend to.”

“But. . Signora, this is a crime, and I’m a policeman. I can’t turn a blind eye to what happened.”

Filomena slowed her pace, as if she were thinking over what Maione had just said.

“You just happened to come by. I wouldn’t have called you. That is, you mustn’t think that I’m not grateful. You did something for me that not even a brother would have done. The people in my quarter. . I don’t have many friends, as I’m sure you’ve guessed. I could have sat there bleeding for the rest of the day.”

“Yes. I mean, no. I didn’t do anything special. I took you to the hospital, and now I’m going to see you home. Still, I need to know.”

Maione stopped walking. They were standing on the corner of the Piazza Carità, in the faint cone of light cast by a street lamp. Somewhere, a dog was barking.

“You’ve suffered a terrible wrong. Perhaps you don’t realize it yet, but someday soon it will become clear to you. The way they slashed your face. . you’ll never be the same again, don’t you understand that? What happened? Who did this?”

The light illuminated the wounded side of her face and the bloodstained bandages. The other half was in shadow and Maione couldn’t have deciphered the expression. But even though he knew it was absurd, for an instant he could have sworn that she was smiling.

There, thought Tonino Iodice, pizzaiolo. I’m done sweeping up-not even a crumb on the floor. Everything looks as if no one had even eaten here, just as it was before. They’ve all gone home, to their wives, to their mothers. They laughed, they sang, they got drunk. They paid, too: just the right amount. Some of them will come back. I wonder when. Who knows-they may bring their friends.

If they liked what they ate, they’ll come back again. And again and again. A bit of luck will finally come my way: my wife will look at me with love in her eyes, and my children will look up to me with respect. Because good luck brings money, and money brings respect. God gave me a little more time. If the old woman had lived, I wouldn’t have had the time I needed. I’d have had to shut this place down, and it’d be good-bye freedom, good-bye children, good-bye wife. But she died. There was so much blood, by the holy virgin. There was so much blood.

I can’t remember the stairs, I can’t remember the street. It was God’s will that no one should see me. And I’m sorry; I’m truly sorry. But now I have time. She’s lying dead in her own blood and now I have time. I’ll go on. And I’ll wait.

I’ll wait for the day they come to get me.

Ricciardi was back at the window, watching. Enrica had swept up every last crumb, and the kitchen was just as it had been before, as if no one had even eaten there.

He watched her look around, swiveling her head, cocking it slightly to one side, drying her hands on the apron that she wore tied around her waist.

There: now she’ll nod her head ever so slightly in approval and she’ll sigh. She’ll pick up her embroidery frame, turn on the lamp next to the easy chair, right there: just next to the window. She’ll start stitching.

Ricciardi holds his breath, slowly closes his eyes, and then opens them again. His arms are folded across his chest and he’s breathing slowly. Enrica threads the needle.

No one on earth will ever love you the way that I love you. Me, the man who never speaks to you. You don’t see me, but I watch over you. That’s what a man does when he loves a woman, in silence, the way I do.

On the stairs at police headquarters, the ghost of the police officer calls out to his wife, saying “Oh, the pain.” In the dark fourth floor apartment in the Sanità, the figure of the murdered old woman repeats her proverb.

Ricciardi watches Enrica as she embroiders.

The dead seem alive and the living seem dead.