Blood Curse

XLIV

As he climbed the stairs of headquarters, Ricciardi ran into Officer Sabatino Ponte. Ponte was a short, nervous-looking man taken on by Deputy Chief of Police Garzo to serve as his doorman and clerk. The position did not appear on any organizational chart, but the little man’s brown-nosing, unctuous personality, along with a few shadowy recommendations from people in high places, had helped him to escape regular police duty and win himself a cushy, comfortable job. Maione, who maintained an attitude of polite contempt for the man, grumbled that he was a dog who commanded just as much respect as his master. Which is to say, none at all, he added with a smirk.

The man had a superstitious fear of Ricciardi; to the extent that he was able, he simply avoided him. When he had no choice but to speak to him, he did his best not to look him in the eye, turning and fleeing as soon as the conversation was over. Something serious must be afoot, to find him at the foot of the stairs at this hour of the morning.

“Buongiorno, Commissario. Welcome,” he said, staring fixedly first at the ceiling, and then at Ricciardi’s shoes.

“Yes, Ponte. What’s going on? Have I put my foot in it?”

A nervous smile twitched on Ponte’s face, and he focused intently on a little crack in the wall, off to his left.

“No, of course not. And who am I, to criticize a man of your stature? No, it’s just that the deputy chief of police wonders if you could stop by his office, when you have a minute.”

Ricciardi was annoyed by the little man’s darting gaze, which was starting to make his head spin.

“What, you mean the deputy chief of police is already in his office, this early, on a Sunday morning? That strikes me as unusual.”

Ponte stared at a patch of floor ten feet away, as if he were following a crawling insect with his eyes.

“No, no, you’re quite right; he hasn’t come in yet. But he said to make sure you speak with him this morning. Before you take any further action on the Calise murder.”

Aha, thought Ricciardi. Maione was right, the sly old fox.

“All right, Ponte. Tell the deputy chief of police that I’ll be in his office at ten o’clock. And let me get a look at your eyes; I think there might be something wrong with your vision.”

The police officer opened his eyes wide, saluted halfheartedly, and turned and ran up the staircase as fast as he could, taking it three steps at a time.

Waiting for Ricciardi at the entrance to his office was Maione, wearing a disconsolate expression.

“The day’s not off to a good start, Commissa’. Doctor Modo called from the hospital. Iodice died last night.”

He hung up the phone. It was the third call he’d made. Once again, he’d received ample reassurances.

In the voices of all three of the people he’d spoken with, he could hear compassion; and from what he could tell, though it was hard to judge without being able to see their expressions, all of them knew about Emma and that man. And about him, as well.

Now the important thing was to resolve the matter once and for all; he could deal with mending the damage to his reputation later. He knew from experience that people forget about every scandal sooner or later. And besides, he didn’t really think there was any hope of finding a solution.

He heard a cough through the wall: his wife was home this morning. This, too, was good news. Perhaps there were grounds for optimism after all. Ruggero ran the back of his hand over his cheek; he’d better shave and wash up.

So much depended on his image.

Ricciardi, standing by his office window, looked at Maione, who still stood crestfallen in the doorway. Both men could see at a glance that neither of them had slept a wink that night; and both men decided not to mention it.

“I know what you’re thinking, Commissa’. Iodice’s death, as far as this investigation is concerned, changes nothing. But the fact is that now he can’t explain why he did what he did. And this doesn’t seem like the time to go bother those two unfortunate women, his mother and his wife. What should we do?”

“Well, first of all I have to say that you hit the nail on the head with regard to Signora Serra di Arpaja. I found your friend Ponte waiting for me right out front this morning, and he told me to come speak with Garzo before getting started on anything else. Obviously, the phone call has already come through. Have you made sure that Iodice’s family has been informed, as we promised yesterday?”

Maione nodded quickly.

“They were there at the hospital, Commissa’. They showed up at dawn, mother and wife, but no one had the heart to tell them anything until the doctor came in; even though it wasn’t his shift, he wanted to see how Iodice was doing. He broke the news to them.”

Ricciardi shook his head.

“What madness. To kill yourself-a father with three children. He really must have lost all hope. But why? It would have made just as much sense to turn himself in if he had killed her. It doesn’t gel. Normally, someone who commits a murder with that much rage behind it, the way Calise was killed, doesn’t have the sensitive personality that it takes to commit suicide. And anyone who feels enough shame to kill himself doesn’t have the rage inside him to kick a person to death.”

Maione listened closely.

“To tell you the truth, it doesn’t seem all that obvious that Iodice did it to me either. And to see his mamma and especially his wife, the despair on their faces-he must have really been a good man. On the other hand, if it wasn’t him, why would he kill himself?”

“Maybe he thought he’d be charged and he’d have no way to defend himself. Maybe he had other problems. Maybe he just snapped. And, of course, maybe he was the killer. Whatever the reason, we have to keep investigating until we find proof, one way or another. A wife’s sorrowful expression is not accepted as evidence in a court of law.”

Before Maione, who had suddenly blushed bright red, could get out an answer, there was a knock at the office door and Camarda stuck his head in.

“Commissario, Brigadie’, forgive the intrusion. The two Signoras Iodice, mother and wife, are waiting in the hall. They would like to speak with you.”

The two women walked into the office and Ricciardi and Maione greeted them at the door. The wife was the very picture of unconsolable grieving sorrow: her delicate features were ravaged by twenty-four hours without sleep, filled with uninterrupted weeping; her eyes were swollen, her lips red. The mother, with the same black shawl covering her head, seemed like a figure out of Greek tragedy, her face expressionless, her eyes blank. Only her waxen complexion betrayed the hell she had inside her.

The two policemen were surprised by their visit; by rights, they should have been at the hospital, arranging to have the body transported to the cemetery. Perhaps, it occurred to Ricciardi, they were here to request police authorization, but there was really no need for that; the operation performed the previous day left no doubt about the cause of death, so an autopsy would be pointless. He gestured for them to have a seat, but the two women remained standing. He turned to address the wife.

“Signora, I’m so sorry. I understand your pain and, believe me, we are here for you. If there’s anything that we can do, please don’t hesitate to ask.”

Concetta took a step forward and drew a deep breath.

“Commissa’, my mother-in-law and I gave this a lot of thought last night. On one hand, we thought that Tonino. . my husband, that is, should rest in peace. That there should be no more talk about him, especially not under this roof-forgive me, Commissa’. But then, we thought about my children. There are three of them, and they’re young; they have their whole lives ahead of them. And they’ll have to bear this name. And this name musn’t be tarnished.”

Ricciardi and Maione exchanged a glance. Concetta had stopped talking, overwhelmed by emotion. Her mother-in-law, standing one step behind her, laid a bony hand on her shoulder. She heaved a sigh and went on.

“We sometimes say that you can feel things. Things happen, and a person might see them with his own eyes and understand them. Other times someone might tell you about them, so you hear them with your own ears and understand them that way. Then there are other times still when you can see some things and you can’t see others, and yet you still understand it all in your head. But sometimes there are things, Commissa’, that you can’t see and you can’t hear, things you can’t even think in your head, and yet you know them all the same. That’s what happens with people you hold dear in your heart,” and with those words she clutched to her breast a hand reddened by hard work and tears, “and you’re never wrong. You’re never wrong.”

Ricciardi stared straight into the woman’s face and his green eyes were clear and empty. Concetta stared back unwaveringly from the depths of her certainty, her pupils two dark stars swimming in her reddened eyes.

“My husband never killed anyone, Commissa’. Only himself. I know this, his mother knows this. His children know it too.

“So what we want to do is, what’s the word, cooperate. We talked it over between us. You and the brigadier here strike us as two kind and decent men. You’ve offered us help, and we can see that you’re sorry about what happened to my husband. We’re poor people, we don’t even know how we’re going to make ends meet now; we can’t hire a lawyer to defend us. All we can give our children is our name, and it must be untarnished.”

“Signora,” Ricciardi said, “our job is to find out the truth. Whatever that truth might be, whether or not we like it, even if it creates suffering. We’re not on anybody’s side. We’re here for one thing only: to find out what happened. We’re glad that you want to cooperate. But if we happened to discover that. . that your husband were responsible for something bad, something serious, it will only be worse. You understand that, don’t you? If we close the case the way things stand now, there might still be a shadow of a doubt. But if we proceed, then there will be no doubts left. Are you sure this is what you want?”

After a quick glance at her mother-in-law, behind her, Concetta answered.

“Yes, Commissa’. That’s why we came here to see you, with my dead husband still at the hospital, like a man without any family picked up off the street. Did they tell you what he screamed when. . when he did this thing? He screamed: my children! And that’s what we have to do: what’s best for his children. We’re sure, Commissa’.”