The Fallen Angel

SIX

Costa followed Mina’s instructions as they wound down the hill from Montorio, back into the centro storico. After a while he began to understand where they were going, and the knowledge left a cold feeling in his stomach.

The Museo Criminologico was an outpost of the Ministry of Justice in the Via del Gonfalone, a cul-de-sac between the Via Giulia and the Lungotevere. This was the Italian state’s official black museum, a place he had visited as a cadet, one that had filled him with horror, with nausea. He could still recall dashing out into the street, taking deep breaths, staring at a chilly winter sky, the first time he’d been forced to visit. The next, a kind of punishment for his perceived weakness, went more easily. He’d been a police officer for a few months by then, and had become. . desensitized was the word the college instructor had uttered. It still amazed Costa that the term had been used as if it were praise. As if that was the point of the process of becoming a police officer. To feel less yet somehow see more. If anyone else noticed the contradiction they never mentioned it.

‘Are you all right?’ Mina asked as he leaned on the parked scooter for a moment.

‘Just remembering something,’ he said, and walked up to the door, flashed his ID and walked in.

‘You don’t have to pay for much, do you?’ she said as she joined him.

Costa tried to smile when he told her, ‘I wouldn’t pay for this.’ It was late afternoon, a little early, but right then a beer would have been wonderful. ‘Afterwards I’ll buy us some ice cream.’

The tears were gone. The pretty, somewhat overactive yet cerebral teenager was back.

‘Or even a lollipop,’ she replied, her head cocked to one side. Then she stepped inside, ahead of him.