Blood Curse

XXX

Filomena walked uphill from the Via Toledo in the direction of the Vico del Fico. She had her shawl wrapped over her head, downcast eyes, and her face covered as usual. She walked briskly, skirting close to the walls.

The wide overcoat concealed her shape. Old shoes, an ankle-length skirt.

The usual masquerade, her suit of armor to protect her from the eyes of her predators: if you lack claws, hide.

She raised her head for just an instant as she came up to the last few yards of pavement separating her from the Via Toledo, and there he was, loitering at the corner: Don Luigi Costanzo, the picture of elegance as always in his light-colored suit, his hat pushed back on his forehead to reveal his swarthy brow, his mustache. Leaning back, shoulders resting against the wall, one hand in his pocket, the other at his side, holding a cigarette.

In the distance, Filomena saw two construction workers walk by, bowing so low before the guappo as they passed that they were practically crawling on the ground. Fear and power. She didn’t want to be afraid anymore.

As she slowed her pace, she thought of Gaetano. He’d been at the construction site for two hours already, carrying bucketfuls of gravel, balancing his way across wooden planks perched sixty feet above the street. She trembled at the thought of the risks he took, but work was work and in those difficult times, one didn’t have a choice. She felt a surge of anger that sprang from her frustration at having to see her son, still just a little boy, being forced to fight for scraps of food.

As she walked with her eyes on the ground, she regretted not being the whore they said she was. They would have lived better, she and her son. Perhaps in luxury, the luxury that came with a lover. She’d be respected, too. Money brings respect. She’d no longer be a whore; she could be a lady instead, with silk dresses and a fashionable haircut. Perhaps even a house to live in. Warm blankets to ward off the cold. Real mattresses. And Gaetano, smart boy that he was, could go to school.

How many nights, when the wind rattled the door, trying to make its way into the basso, or the heat almost suffocated them and rats scurried past, the masters of the vicolo, had she choked back her doubts and her tears?

But some people are born to do that sort of thing. She, on the other hand, had been born with a beauty that made it impossible for other people to believe that she lived only to care for her son, to make ends meet, and to hold on to the memory of a husband carried away by a coughing fit and a burst of blood.

She had almost come to where Don Luigi was standing. He saw her, flicked away his cigarette, and took a step forward to bar the path. The usual confident smile, the same piercing eyes.

“There you are, Filome’. How are you? Did you miss me? I was out of town a few days for business, in Sorrento. But I thought about you the whole time I was gone, you, the most beautiful girl in all Naples. So, have you given it some thought? I’ll come see you. Tonight. Send the boy out to sleep in the street; after all, as you can see, the cold weather is gone. Spring is here.”

Filomena had slowed to a halt. She held her head low, gripping the shawl that covered her face. Time stood still.

Annoyed that her reply was slow in coming, Don Luigi reached out suddenly and jerked the shawl off her face.

“Look me in the eye, why don’t you, when I’m talking to you.”

Filomena lifted her head and stared straight at him, tears flooding her eyes. The guappo’s smile froze on his lips and he took a step back, as if he’d just been slapped in the face. His shoulders collided with the wall; his hat fell to the pavement and rolled a short distance downhill. He lifted one trembling hand to his mouth and uttered a wail, the sound a frightened woman might make. His power was gone; fear had just moved house.

Filomena slowly drew her shawl back over her head and continued on her way. A young man walked behind her and looked curiously at Don Luigi, still shrinking back against the wall, one hand covering his mouth.

He didn’t bow.

Ricciardi and Maione watched Nunzia cry, waiting patiently for her to finish. In their line of work it was common for people to break down in tears.

When confronted with the ragged bundle that had been found underneath Carmela’s mattress, the porter woman had been, in her own way, a spectacle to behold. At first, there was only a faint trembling of the lip, which then spread to her shoulders. Then a tiny whine, almost a whistle, like a far-off train. When enough pressure had built up inside her, as in an overheating boiler, she threw herself face-first onto the table, racked by sobs, her skin covered with bright red splotches. Beneath her, the chair creaked in helpless despair.

The two policemen looked at each other and waited for the rainstorm to end.

Sniffing, the woman raised her head from the table. She looked at Maione, hoping for a handkerchief, a friendly hand, or at least a look of compassion, but he just stared at her, expressionless. So she shifted her gaze to Ricciardi, meeting those green-glass eyes in which she felt as though she were drowning.

“She gave me a little help, sometimes, Donna Carmela did. She loved my Antonietta, the poor child. And she’d give her a little present now and then, just a trifle-pennies for candy.”

Maione took the wad of cash from his other pocket.

“Well, mamma mia, that daughter of yours sure eats a lot of candy! Guess that’s why she’s such a little roly-poly. Looky here, ten, twenty, fifty. . one hundred thirty lire. How much candy is that, two cartloads?”

The woman glanced around her, her narrowed eyes seeking help. She’d walked into a trap and she knew it, but she wasn’t ready to give up the fight.

Ricciardi sat waiting, as patient as a spider at the center of its web. It was only a matter of time. Soon they’d have Nunzia with her back to the wall, and that’s when she’d lift the veil on another part of the story. He’d never thought for a second that she was responsible for the old woman’s murder; if anything, now that he knew she’d been giving the porter woman money, he was all the more certain that it hadn’t been Nunzia. Money: a strong motive, both to kill and to mourn. This woman’s grief was genuine. She’d suffered a terrible loss.

From her corner, the old woman with the broken neck croaked out her proverb about accounts due and accounts payable. In his mind Ricciardi asked her: Did the person who killed you owe you money? Was he or she angry, desperate, offended? Or perhaps in love? As hideous as she’d been, deformed by her arthritis, she’d been able to stir such powerful emotions in someone as to be killed the way she was killed, murdered with such ferocity.

Ricciardi had always thought that hunger and love, or at least perversions of these two powerful drives, were at the root of most crimes. He could sense their presence in the air, around the dead people who called out for justice, and around the hatred of the living who survived them. Which had been behind the terrible blows that had ravaged Carmela Calise: hunger, or love? Or possibly both?

Nunzia straightened her back, once again assuming a proud expression. The chair beneath her creaked briefly.

“Who said the money was for me? A person can write whatever they want on a handkerchief. If you ask me, you don’t have a scrap of evidence and you’re just going around looking for someone to pin the blame on.”

This reaction was also a familiar one, both to Ricciardi and Maione. The final whiplash: the last spark of rebellion.

“Exactly, Petrone. You’re quite right; what a smart woman you are. We have no evidence and we just need someone, anyone, to pin this murder on. Otherwise, what’ll we tell our bosses? All we have in hand is this handkerchief with the money for the candy. So you know what we’re going to do? We’re going to haul you off to jail. We’re going to say you were blackmailing the Calise. And that’s all there is to it.”

Without changing his tone of voice, without changing his expression.

“You mean you’d actually have the nerve to do such a thing? You’d have that much nerve? What about my daughter?”

Ricciardi shrugged.

“There are excellent orphanages. She’ll be well provided for.”

Nunzia ran a hand over her face.

“All right, Commissa’. I’ll tell you everything I know.”