A Season for the Dead

Thirty-Three

Thirty minutes after an exhausted Nic Costa left the station, Falcone looked up from the desk in his office to see the familiar figure of Arturo Valena waddling toward him. This was only the second time he had seen Valena in the flesh. The first was when the television presenter had been paid to MC a police awards ceremony, a job Valena had undertaken with a swift, efficient professionalism that almost merited the huge fee he pocketed with little grace afterward.

Falcone had found the appearance of the man fascinating. He was one of the most familiar figures on Italian television. He interviewed everyone: politicians, film stars, entertainers. He had a big, handsome face and a gruff, booming voice that had a perpetual question mark on it, as if asking perpetually, “Really?” Officially he was forty-nine, though rumors suggested this was one of many myths surrounding the man. Valena had been born into dire poverty in Naples, working his way up through minor jobs in government and public relations until he was given his chance to try his hand at broadcasting. It was, Falcone now thought, the same kind of relentless progress Gino Fosse had made from his peasant farm in Sicily, aided perhaps by the same kind of friends. Once he had established his position as the leading commentator for one of the most successful networks, Valena never hesitated to criticize government policy and, on occasion, question whether the fight against “crime” did not infringe on the rights of the individual.

He had dabbled with politics himself, sitting on a variety of committees. He made no secret of his right-wing views. The one-time Naples gutter kid had become a mover and shaker in the higher echelons of social life in Rome, and married a minor countess too, a severe-faced woman rolling in money who preferred to spend most of her time on the family estate in Perugia.

And it was all an act, one which could only be sustained on TV. The camera flattered Valena’s exaggerated features, the clever lighting hid his fast-expanding belly. The rigorous preparation for each interview, the ever-ready autocue and his cultured on-screen sensibility, which was more that of the actor than the journalist, all served to hide the real man from the public. Falcone had seen this at the awards ceremony, when Valena made the mistake of hanging around long enough afterward for people to talk to him and come away disappointed by what they found.

Valena lived behind a mask and fought to keep everyone from peering around the sides. Close up, in unrehearsed conversation, he was exposed for the fraud he truly was: inarticulate, snappy, unconfident. And physically repellent. The man was a famous gourmand who had sponged his way around the city’s finest dining rooms for years. Now he was paying the price. His waistline had expanded enormously, enough for the magazines to notice.

In the last few months they had nicknamed him “Arturo Balena”—“Arthur Whale”—and started running a series of pictures to hammer home the point. There were snatched shots showing him at the table, with foie gras and worse on his plate, alone, eating like a pig.

There was a series too of him around the swimming pool of a hotel in Capri, with an unidentified blonde. He lounged on a sun bed slowly cooking under the sun, his overample flesh turning an unattractive lobster color. The spectacle had sold many, many magazines. Valena, unwisely, had complained to the authorities and pleaded for the editor of the rag to be prosecuted under the privacy laws. The result was predictable. He was now on the paparazzi’s A-list of people to be photographed at every possible opportunity. They stalked him on scooters. They invaded the restaurants where he ate alone, at a single darkened table at the back. Arturo Valena had become fair game for a media sensing a figure on the brink of some spectacular, public downfall. The ratings for his nightly chat show were in decline.

There were rumors that he might soon be dragged into an endless and messy civil court case about the misuse of state funds by officials who had bribed the media for favorable coverage. He was on the cusp of a cruel descent from the starry heights.

Falcone beckoned Valena to sit in the chair opposite his, then opened his desk drawer and took out a set of copies of the photos found in Fosse’s room. There was a big, pale fat man in some of those. You never saw his face but it could be the same man. Valena collapsed sweating into a chair. The TV man looked terrified. His dull brown eyes were bleary and liquid. His chest heaved with labored panting.

“I want protection,” Arturo Valena said between gasps. “You hear me? I only just got back from doing a show in Geneva. I read on the plane what this crazy bastard did to that poor bitch Vaccarini. He’s after me next. You hear me?”

Falcone gave him a glass of water and smiled, hoping to calm him down. “Please,” he said. “From the beginning.”

“To hell with the beginning,” Valena spat back at him. “I’ve got to be at the Brazilian Embassy in forty-five minutes. Can’t avoid it. There’s an exhibition opening and I need to be there. I want protection, you hear me? Or do I have to ring upstairs and get someone else to make you listen?”

Falcone pushed the phone across the desk. Valena glowered at him. “What?”

“Call. Whoever you like. They’ll just ask me to decide anyway. In case you hadn’t heard, Mr. Valena, we have every officer we’ve got on this case. Most of them are looking after people who have given us good reason to spend some time with them. You’ll have to convince me you fit that category.”

“Idiot!” Valena yelled. He was sweating profusely. A bad smell, of perspiration and fear, was starting to permeate the little office.

He picked up the phone and started to make the calls. Falcone watched him, knowing what would happen. Arturo Valena understood he was on the slow drift downward but had yet to appreciate how far he had already progressed. There would be no coming back. The future held only obscurity and perhaps some disgrace to fill it.

He tried six people, five of them senior men within the police department, the last, in desperation, a government minister. Every one of them was “busy.”

After the final rejection he slammed the receiver back on the hook and buried his head in his hands. Falcone wondered if he was going to start to sob. Valena spared him that. The man was simply drained, left helpless by some inward terror.

“Mr. Valena,” Falcone said calmly, in a pleasant, comforting voice. “All you have to do is talk to me. I’m not saying we can’t help. I’m just saying I need a reason why.”

The big, exaggerated face looked up at him. “What do you want to know?”

“The Farnese woman? You’re saying you had a relationship with her?”

“No,” Valena replied grimly. “I wouldn’t say that. I screwed her. That’s all. And it wasn’t a lot of fun either. At least when you got a real hooker they try to fake things a little. She didn’t even make that effort. Lousy bitch. I don’t know why she bothered.”

Falcone nodded. This was progress. “You hired her? From an escort agency or something?”

“Are you serious? Did I come in here to be insulted? I’m Arturo Valena. I don’t hire hookers. I don’t have to.”

“I’m not hearing anything that helps me here,” Falcone said icily. “Why don’t you just go home, Mr. Valena? You’ve got a big house here. You’ve got money. Hire yourself a bodyguard if you’re feeling scared.”

The man’s face went white. “A bodyguard? With that lunatic on the loose out there?”

“I need more. How did you meet Sara Farnese? What happened?”

Valena closed his eyes. “She was a gift. She was a reward. She was a prize. Call it anything you like. Someone wanted something. Sara was a few coins they left on the plate afterward to try to tip my hand.”

“Who? What?”

“Huh?” Valena grunted. “I’ve got one man out there wanting to kill me already. You honestly think I should make it two?”

Falcone shrugged. “It only takes one, though, doesn’t it? I mean, what does it matter? If you tell me, I can put a couple of cops by your side. If you don’t, you can walk out there right now on your own.” He paused, watching the man, noticing for the first time that there was something dead in his eyes. “It’s nothing to me either way, Valena. I hate your fucking program. It stinks. You stink. And you’re stupid enough to think you still carry some weight around here. The only weight’s that spare tire around your belly. Don’t you get it?”

“Bastard,” Valena murmured. His head hung down once more. “Bastard.”

“There,” Falcone said, smiling. “Now that’s out of the way. May we get down to business? Please?”