Dying on the Vine

TWO

Eleven months later, August 22, 2011

RESPONDER: “One-one-two, emergency response. What is the nature of the problem, please?”

CALLER: “I don’t know if this is the number I should be calling. I—I—”

RESPONDER: “Just tell me the problem, signore. Speak slowly.”

CALLER: “Well, I just saw two dead bodies.”

RESPONDER: “Give me the address, please, signore.”

CALLER: “There is no address. I was hiking. I’m in the mountains, in the Casentino National Park near Mount Falterona. But I have a GPS. The coordinates are, ah, 43.87983 and, ah, 11 .758633. Yes, that’s right, 8633.”

RESPONDER: “And can you see these bodies right now?”

CALLER: “Not exactly. They’re on the other side of a big boulder, maybe five meters from me. I’m at the bottom of a cliff. If I remember right, there’s a path up there along the edge, and it looks to me like they fell off it, but I don’t—”

RESPONDER: “Signore, you are certain they’re dead?”

CALLER: “Oh, yes, definitely.”

RESPONDER: “Are you sure? Have you checked their pulse? Their breathing?”

CALLER: “No, but—”

RESPONDER: “It may be that they’re still alive. We—”

CALLER: “If they are, it’ll be the first time I ever saw skeletons that were still alive.”

RESPONDER: “Skeletons? Did you say skeletons? But are you’re sure they’re human? There are many animals in the park, signore. Goats—”

CALLER: “Well, if they’re goats, it’ll be the first time I ever saw goats wearing clothes.”

RESPONDER: “I see. Signore, the authorities will be there shortly. We request—”

CALLER: “I’m not sure they’ll be able to find the place, even with a GPS. Tell them to drive into the park on SS67, and maybe two kilometers after they come to a tiny village—Campigna, it’s called—there’s a gravel road on the right. It’s not much of a road, it has no number, it’s rough, you have to drive slow. But it they take that a few kilometers through the forest, they’ll come to a clearing—it looks like maybe they were going to build something there, but there isn’t anything. Well, that’s where I am, and the skeletons are right—”

RESPONDER: “Signore, we request that you kindly remain at the site.”

CALLER: “Oh no, I don’t think so. I’ve done my duty. This doesn’t concern me.”

RESPONDER: “But may I have your name, please?”

CALLER: “No, no, I don’t think so, no.”

Telephone call terminated

• • •

CAPITANO Roberto Marco Conforti, commander of the Operations Department of Florence Province’s Arma dei Carabinieri, read the transcript for the second time, while his secretary, who had brought it to him, awaited his instructions.

“Cosima,” he said, with a sigh of resignation that few people besides his longtime aide would recognize for what it was, “please tell Tenente Gardella I would like to see him.”

As Cosima left, the captain rose from his teak desk and walked to the arched window of his airy office. Ordinarily the view down Borgo Ognissanti, an ancient street of ancient churches and stately, gray palazzos (of which Number Forty-eight, Carabinieri headquarters with its great interior stone courtyard, was a classic example), pleased and calmed him, but not today. Beribboned, bemedaled (by the president of Italy, no less), and famed within the corps for his unflappability, Captain Conforti was not a man to be intimidated by anything, least of all by the prospect of an interview with a member of his own staff. With one exception. From the day the young lieutenant had been transferred from Palermo four years earlier, Rocco Gardella had displayed an unmatched knack for raising the captain’s blood pressure.

“Come!” he called on hearing the quiet tap at his door. When it opened, he turned reluctantly from the window to look dourly at his subordinate.

“You wanted to see me about something?” Lieutenant Gardella asked.

Well, there you were. The conversation hadn’t even begun, and already the lieutenant had managed to get under his skin. “Upon entering the presence of a superior officer, Tenente, it is customary to salute,” he said coldly.

“Oh yeah, right, sorry about that,” was Gardella’s affable reply, accompanied by a vague gesture in the general direction of his forehead, a motion somewhere between a wave and a flap.

The captain, erect as always despite his fifty-four years, returned this halfhearted gesture, but did it one hundred percent by the book, shooting it back with stiff, snapping precision. Not that he thought the lesson would take; not with Gardella. Still, it was his obligation to try. “It is also customary to address senior officers either by their rank or by ‘sir.’”

“Sir,” Gardella said, following it with a closed-mouth grin, as if happy to go along for the sake of form with a custom that they both knew to be ridiculous.

With a discreet roll of his eyes, Conforti returned from the window to sit behind his desk, indicating with a curt dip of his chin that Gardella was to take the chair across from him. Gardella fell into it and settled comfortably back. A small, fit, compact man, he sprawled like a teenager, more or less on the bottom of his spine, not easy to do in a government-issue visitor’s chair, and not at all suited to the beautifully tailored uniform he wore, and even less to the two silver stars on each shoulder tab. Just looking at him was enough to make Captain Conforti grind his teeth.

If he were a raw twenty-five-year-old, it would be one thing; he would still be moldable. But this baby-faced Gardella was nearing forty; he’d been in the corps for over ten years. He would soon come up for luogotenente—senior lieutenant; a position of considerable responsibility—and would no doubt pass the test with flying colors, as he had passed all his tests. But how had he lasted this long without running up against a senior officer with less patience than the forbearing and tolerant Conforti? How did he ever get to be a carabiniere in the first place? Why had he ever wanted to be a carabiniere?

On the other hand, it wasn’t the man’s fault, really; it was simply the way he was made, something in the blood. Rocco Gardella was half-American, a dual citizen born in the United States to an American mother and an Italian father. Through his teens, he had spent his summers in New York with his mother’s family, and unfortunately the American half had come to dominate. Not that the Italian half was anything to write home about; his father was from Sicily, after all. Lieutenant Gardella was overly casual, bordering on irreverent, in his attentions to the glorious history and traditions of the carabinieri, overly informal in dealing with his superiors, frequently on the edge of insubordination—but never quite actionably over the line—and infuriatingly cavalier in matters of rules and deportment. He spoke Italian with an American accent, and, so it was said, English with an Italian accent.

But he was also the finest investigative officer Conforti had under him, maybe the finest he’d ever had, and that made all the difference in the world. And the public—he knew how to get along with them. In his decade with the corps he had received a dozen commendations from citizens and not a single complaint. No, it was only here, within the hallowed ranks of what was, after all, an elite military organization going on two hundred years old, that his incurable Americanness proved so grating on the capitano’s nerves. At the same time, it had to be said, Gardella was hard not to like; always innocently cocksure and blithely unaware of his offences. Which naturally made him all the more infuriating.

“Here,” Conforti said gruffly, sliding a sheet of paper across the desk. “Something for your attention. This is a transcript of a 112 call that was made half an hour ago.”

Gardella took the transcription and read it with interest, pausing only to utter a snort of laughter at one point, no doubt at the reference to goats wearing clothing. Even that displeased Conforti—understandable it might be, but decorous it was not, considering the situation. Nevertheless, the captain contented himself with no more than a recriminatory rumble from deep in his throat, of which the lieutenant predictably took no notice.

“Casentino National Park,” Gardella mused. “You think it could be that winery couple, the . . .”

“The Cubbiddus, yes,” Conforti responded. “Those coordinates, they’re less than half a kilometer from Pietro Cubbiddu’s cabin. A remote and difficult area. I think we may have found them at last.” He proffered another sheet. “A map of the area with the coordinates shown.”

Gardella studied it, nodding. “You could be right.”

Conforti scowled. Well, there it was again. You could be right. Technically, there was nothing wrong with what Gardella had said; it was a statement of fact. But “You could be right?” Was this the way to address one’s superior? “I would like you to handle the investigation, Tenente,” Conforti said mildly.

“Me? Well, who headed up the task force when they first disappeared?”

“That was the late, unlamented Maresciallo Galli,” the captain said. “But even if he were still among us, I would be assigning the responsibility to you. That is, of course, if you wouldn’t mind.”

But sarcasm bounced off Gardella like raindrops off a mallard. “All right, no problem. I’ll see that it’s taken care of for you,” he said as if bestowing a favor. “I’ll give it to Martignetti. Tonino’s a good man.” He folded the sheets in two and (without being dismissed) rose to leave.

“No, I want you to lead the investigation personally,” Conforti said.

“Me, personally? Why?”

“Because this may well turn into a high-profile matter.” Was it possible to feel one’s blood pressure rising? Conforti was sure he could sense his arteries tightening. “Because there may be foul play involved. I want a commissioned officer in charge from the beginning, not a maresciallo. I have chosen you.”

“But I barely know the case. I hardly—”

“Nevertheless you will be the investigative officer.” He spoke through clenched teeth. His patience continued to fray.

“But—”

Conforti glared at him. Had the man ever, even once, accepted an order without a but, an argument, a question? A why? “Tenente!” he said sharply. “I have given you a direct command. I do not wish to be questioned further.”

“But—”

“I do not wish to be questioned at all. You will go to the site now. Take Martignetti with you. The crime-scene van is on its way. Representatives of the prosecutor’s office and the medico legale will meet you there. You will give an account to me when you return, even before making out your report. Is all this clear?”

“Well, sure it’s clear. I just—”

“Dismissed.”

“I only—”

“Dismissed.”

Gardella, totally unfazed by his captain’s growl, got up with an amiable shrug and made for the door. “You’re the boss. I’m on my way.” He pulled open the door and stepped into the hallway.

Conforti began to call sharply after him. “On leaving the presence of a superior officer, Tenente, it is customary . . .” Mid-sentence, he threw up his hands. His final muttered words were addressed to the walls.

“Ah, ma va all’inferno.”

Ah, the hell with it.