Everyone in Their Place

XV

The bedroom where Matteo Musso, duke of Camparino, was losing his final battle was immersed in shadow. You could smell the aromas of disinfectant and putrefaction, lye and stale urine, medicine and dust. Ricciardi recognized the stench of death.

Once their eyes became accustomed to the dark, the two policemen distinguished a silhouette in the bed, the source of the rhythmic gasping they’d heard when they entered. It would seem that the duke was asleep. Suddenly, however, a raucous voice said: “Conce’, open the shutters just a little. Let me see who’s come to call on me.”

The woman moved soundlessly in the darkness, demonstrating that she had a perfect knowledge of the arrangement of furniture and objects, and opened the window just a crack. A shaft of light entered the room, illuminating Ricciardi and Maione like a spotlight in the night.

“Your grace. My name is Ricciardi and I’m a Commissario of Public Safety. This is Brigadier Maione, with me. First of all, my condolences for your loss.”

The vague shadow had taken on some outlines. On the pillow lay a skull, hollowed out cheeks and eyes, a shiny bald cranium; an exceedingly skinny neck sank under the sheets, from which protruded a parchment-like arm. The hand looked like the talons of some bird of prey, the yellowish fingers wiggled slowly.

“Forget about that. A stranger has died here, what should I care about it? Be seated. Conce’, make the Commissario and the Brigadier comfortable.”

His voice sounded like the rasping of a metal file on sandpaper. It sent shivers down your back. The heat in the bedroom was tremendous.

“Please, don’t go to any trouble, Signora, grazie. We’ll only be here a short while, just a few questions, if you have no objection, your grace.”

Once again the hand waved softly, as if giving permission. Maione decided that over time, the duke had gotten used to expressing himself in this fashion, with gestures, to save his breath. Ricciardi went on:

“When was the last time you saw the duchess?”

There were a few moments of silence. Just when the commissario was starting to think that the duke must have fallen asleep, the scratchy voice said:

“Have you ever spoken to a dead person before, Commissario?”

This time it was Ricciardi’s turn to be left breathless. Just like that, point blank, that question. As if the duke had possessed, from his deathbed of pain, the faculty of peering through the darkness and into his soul.

“What do you mean by that?”

The tone of voice was harsher than he meant it to be, but the duke hardly seemed to notice.

“You can see with your own eyes exactly what I mean. I’m a dead man, Commissa’. Not today, not tomorrow, or whenever they carry me out of here. I died when my wife passed away. Not this one, of course. My wife, my real wife.”

With some effort, Ricciardi had resumed breathing normally. A metaphor. It had been nothing but a metaphor.

“Why do you say that, your grace? And if I may venture to ask, what does it have to do with my question?”

“It has a great deal to do with it, Commissario. A man dies at the very moment that his life no longer means anything to anyone else. And the last person I had any meaning for was Carmen. I died when she died.”

Ricciardi didn’t know what to say, so he just waited.

“Right now, you’re talking to a dead man. It’s a novel experience, isn’t it?”

You have no idea, thought Ricciardi. The duke went on:

“A dead man doesn’t deserve affection or care. He’s just there to be exploited for his possessions, for his money. Every so often, maybe, you might bring him a flower. The woman you’re talking about, Commissario, the last time she came into this room was at Easter. She came in laughing, she threw open the windows and let in a gust of cold air. She looked at me and she started laughing again; if you ask me, she was drunk. She said, it’s Easter Sunday, Christ is risen, why don’t you get up, too? She put a bunch of flowers into a vase, on that dresser, and then she left. Who knows who even gave her those flowers. I couldn’t tell you when the time before that was.”

The effort that it took the man to go on talking must have been enormous. His sentences were fragmentary, and he had to catch his breath every third or fourth word. Maione felt an urge to leave: the heat, the stench, and the discomfort he felt as he listened to the duke were becoming intolerable. But Ricciardi seemed willing to go on asking questions.

“How long ago were you married?”

The implicit meaning of the question was clear to Maione, and also to the duke: there was such a vast age difference, how could he have thought it would turn out any other way? The old man cackled, until a violent burst of coughing interrupted his laughter. Concetta hastened over to the bed with a handkerchief and dabbed at his mouth.

“She was young and I was already old. You see, Commissario, what cruel tricks old age plays on us. A glance, a word, a smile: and suddenly you feel interesting again. I knew it, I always knew that what Adriana wanted was the title, and the money. And I took her in all the same. Because she was beautiful and young. I gave her what she wanted, and I took what she had. As long as I could, as long as I was capable of it. It was an exchange, nothing more than an exchange.”

In a way, the chilly nature of the reasoning horrified Ricciardi more than the broken, gasping voice.

“There’s no such thing as love, Commissario. Love is an illusion. There’s only self-interest, everyone wants something that someone else has. If you think that love is wanting someone else’s well-being, you’re lying to yourself.”

Ricciardi half-closed his eyes, and he saw a young woman sitting on a sofa, listening to a man’s promises. He should have let her go, if what he really felt was love, but instead he felt like he was dying. The stabbing pain behind his stomach returned for a brief instant.

“What about hatred, Duke? What does hatred make you do? When the illusion of love vanishes, what’s left?”

Maione scuffed the floor with his foot. Concetta stood like a statue in the shadows.

“Hatred is a thought, Commissario. An impulse, perhaps even a desire. Someone who’s busy dying hour after hour, someone who never leaves his bed and depends on the kindness of those who come to assist him, cannot afford the luxury of hatred. Because it’s a luxury too.”

Ricciardi considered what the duke had just said. He couldn’t imagine that shell of a man murdering the duchess; but still the duke was clear-minded, he could have issued orders and given instructions. Out of the corner of his eye he studied Concetta, who didn’t even seem to be breathing.

“You have a son, isn’t that right?”

The question fell into silence. It seemed to Ricciardi that even the rattling of the duke’s dying lungs had changed its tone. After a few moments the man replied.

“Yes, I have a son. His name is Ettore.”

No affection, no emotion. A simple stark statement. Ricciardi waited, but the duke didn’t seem to have any intention of adding anything; when he did speak it was to say:

“I hope you’ll forgive me, now, Commissario; I’m very tired. I’ll be glad to see you again whenever you like, but right now Madame Death wants my sleep.”

“Of course, your grace; pardon me. Just one more thing: did your wife wear a. . special ring, as far as you know? Something of particular value, I don’t know, a rare stone perhaps?”

The duke coughed again, and it took him a while to gather his breath and his strength for a response.

“My wife, my real wife, my Carmen had a ring. It was my family’s ring, with our coat of arms; the ring that all the duchesses of Camparino wore. I took it off her dead hand, but I wish I’d never done it, I’ve regretted it every instant of my life since then; and I gave it to her, to Adriana. As if she were worthy of wearing it. When you’re finished with the. . with her, give it back to us. To my son. It’s the only part of her I wish I had back.”

Ricciardi decided that this was hardly the moment to inform the duke that the ring had already been taken from the interloping gold digger; and for now the brief description of the object was all he needed. He said goodbye and left the room, and a relieved Maione followed him out.

Livia walked out of the elevator in the hotel lobby; instantly, she was surrounded by a porter, a coachman, and a bellboy who, until a few seconds earlier, had been snoozing in the late-morning heat. Two men reading the paper as they sipped their coffee looked up and both whistled softly and admiringly.

The woman was stunningly beautiful: she’d spent more than two hours trying on, over and over, just some of the countless dresses that she’d brought with her; in the end she’d selected a little light gray dress in a fine material, with a black handbag and black shoes. The hat, set at a coquettish angle on her short, dark brown hair, had a tiny black veil, her one concession to her state of mourning. If it had been entirely up to her, she’d have dispensed with that as well, but she didn’t know what Ricciardi thought about it and so she’d decided to keep at least a marker of her loss, which was more social than it was emotional. She wore black gloves on her hands, in fishnet, just like her stockings.

Elegance was one of Livia’s distinguishing characteristics, like her feline movements and the spicy aroma of her perfume. As always, her entrance into any room immediately captured the attention of one and all, and never let it go.

The two men had risen and, with allusive smiles, come over; they clearly belonged to the elite, discreet army of gigolos that brightened the holidays of solitary female tourists, especially foreign ones. Livia smiled and gestured with one hand to the only member of the group whose services interested her: the coachman.

The man, hat in hands, bowed and inquired: “Where can I take you, Signo’?”

With a smile, Livia told him. Her offensive had finally begun.