The Terra-Cotta Dog

19

The more he mulled it over, circled round it, snuck up beside it, the more convinced he became that he was on the right track. He hadn't even needed his customary meditative walk to the end of the jetty. Upon leaving the Burgio house with the wedding photo in his pocket, he'd raced off directly to Montelusa.

"Is the doctor in?"

"Yes, but he's busy. I'll let him know you're here," said the custodian.

Pasquano and his two assistants were standing around the marble table, on top of which lay a naked corpse with eyes agape. And the dead man had good reason to look so wide-eyed, as if in surprise, since the three were drinking a toast with paper cups. The doctor had a bottle of spumante in his hand.

"Come on in, we're celebrating."

Montalbano thanked the assistant, who handed him a cup, and Pasquano poured him a finger or two of the sparkling wine.

"To whose health?" asked the inspector.

"To mine. With this guy here, I've just performed my thousandth autopsy."

Montalbano drank up, called the doctor aside, and showed him the photograph.

"Do you think the dead girl from the Crasticeddru could have had a face like this one?"

"Would you please go fuck yourself ?" Pasquano gently asked.

"Sorry," said the inspector. He turned on his heels and left. He was the asshole, not the doctor. He'd let himself get carried away by his enthusiasm and had gone and asked Pasquano the most idiotic question imaginable.

...

He had no better luck at the crime lab.

"Is Jacomuzzi in?"

"No, he's at the commissioners office."

"Who's in charge of the photography lab?"

"De Francesco, in the basement."

De Francesco eyed the photo as if he hadn't yet learned that one could reproduce images on light-sensitive film. "What do you want me to do?"

"Tell me if you think it's a photomontage."

"Ah, that's not my game. I only know about taking pictures and developing them. The more difficult stuff we send to Palermo."

...

Then the wheel turned in the right direction, and things started falling into place. Montalbano phoned the photographer of the magazine that had published the review of Maraventano's book, whose name he remembered.

"Sorry to trouble you. Is this Mr. Contino?"

"Yes, it is. Who's speaking?"

"This is Inspector Montalbano. I need to talk to you about something."

"Pleased to make your acquaintance. You can come right now, if you like."

The photographer lived in the old part of Montelusa, in one of the few houses to survive a landslide that had done away with an entire quarter, one that bore an Arab name.

"Actually, I'm not a photographer by profession. I teach history at the lyceum, and I love it. How can I be of help to you?"

"Do you think you could tell me if this photograph is a montage?"

"I could try," said Contino, examining the photo. "When was it taken, do you know?"

"Around 1946, I'm told."

"Come by again tomorrow."

Montalbano hung his head and said nothing.

"Is it very urgent? I'll tell you what: I can give you a preliminary answer in, say, two hours, but I'll need more time to confirm it."

"It's a deal."

The inspector spent the two hours in an art gallery that was featuring a show by a seventy-year-old Sicilian painter still caught up in a sort of populist rhetoric, but felicitous in his intense and lively use of color. Yet he lent only a distracted eye to the paintings, as he was impatient for Contino's answer. Every five minutes he looked at his watch.

"So, what did you find?"

"I've just finished. In my opinion, it is definitely a photomontage. Rather well done."

"What makes you think so?"

"The background shadows. The girl's head has been mounted in place of the real brides head."

Montalbano had not told him this. In no way had Contino been alerted to this fact or been led to this conclusion by the inspector.

"I'll say even more: the girls face has been retouched."

"In what way?"

"She's been, well, made to look a little older."

"Could I have it back?"

"Sure, I don't have any more use for it. I thought it was going to be more difficult, but there's no need for any further confirmation."

"You've been extremely helpful."

"Listen, Inspector, the opinion I gave you is just between us, okay? It has no legal value whatsoever."

...

The commissioner greeted him at once, with arms joyfully open.

"What a wonderful surprise!"

"Do you have a little time?"

"Come along with me, we'll go to my house. I'm expecting a phone call from my son. My wife will be so happy to see you."

The commissioner's son, Massimo, was a doctor who belonged to a volunteer organization that defined itself as without borders. Its members went to work in war-torn countries, lending their skills as best they could.

"My sons a pediatrician, you know. He's in Rwanda at the moment. I'm very worried about him."

"Is there still fighting?"

"I wasn't referring to the fighting. Every time he manages to call us, he sounds more and more overwhelmed by the horror and anguish."

The commissioner fell silent. To distract him from his preoccupations, Montalbano told him the news.

"I'm ninety-nine percent certain I know the first and last name of the dead girl we found in the Crasticeddru."

The commissioner said nothing, but only gaped at him.

"Her name was Elisa Moscato, aged seventeen."

"How the devil did you find that out?"

Montalbano recounted the whole story.

The commissioner's wife took his hand as if he were a little boy, and had him sit down on the sofa. They spoke for a short while, and then the inspector stood up and said he had an engagement and had to go. It wasn't true, but he didn't want to be there when the call came. The commissioner and his wife should be allowed to enjoy their faraway son's voice in peace and by themselves, however full of sorrow and pain his words might be. As he was leaving the house, he heard the telephone ring.

...

"I've kept my word, as you can see. I brought you back the photograph."

"Come in, come in."

Signora Burgio stepped aside to let him in.

"Who is it?" her husband called loudly from the dining room.

"It's the inspector."

"Well, invite him inside!" the headmaster roared as if his wife had somehow refused to let him in.

They were eating supper.

"Shall I set a place for you?" the signora asked pleasantly. And without waiting for an answer, she put a soup dish on the table for him. Montalbano sat down, and the signora served him some fish broth, reduced to a divine density and enlivened with parsley.

"Were you able to find anything out about the photo?" she asked, without noticing the disapproving look her husband was giving her for being, in his opinion, too forward.

"Unfortunately, yes, signora. I think it's a photomontage."

"My God! So whoever sent it to me wanted me to believe something that wasn't true!"

"Yes, I do think that was the purpose. To try to put an end to your inquiries about Lisetta."

"See? I was right!" the woman practically yelled at her husband, and then she started to weep.

"Come on, why are you crying?" Burgio asked.

"Because Lisetta is dead, and they wanted me to think she was alive and happily married!"

"Well, it might have been Lisetta herself who"

"Don't be ridiculous!" said the signora, throwing her napkin on the table.

There was an awkward silence. Then Mrs. Burgio spoke again.

"She's dead, isn't she, Inspector?"

"I'm afraid she is."

The headmaster's wife got up and left the dining room, covering her face with her hands. As soon as she was out of the room they heard her give in to a kind of plaintive whimpering.

"I'm sorry," said the inspector.

"She got what she was looking for," Burgio said without pity, keeping to the logic of his own side of the marital quarrel.

"Let me ask you one question. Are you sure that the feelings Lillo and Lisetta had for each other were only the kind that you and your wife mentioned?"

"What do you mean?"

Montalbano decided to speak plainly. "Couldn't Lillo and Lisetta have been lovers?"

The headmaster started laughing, swatting the idea away with a swipe of the hand.

"Look, Lillo was madly in love with a Montelusa girl he'd stopped hearing from after July of 43. Besides, the corpse in the Crasticeddru couldn't be him, for the simple reason that the farmer who saw him bleeding and being loaded onto the truck by the soldiers, and then carried away who-knows-where, was a sensible, serious person."

"Then," said Montalbano, "this can mean only one thing: that it's not true that Lisetta ran away with an American soldier. Therefore Lisetta's father told your wife a big fat lie. Who was Lisetta's father, anyway?"

"I vaguely remember his name was Stefano."

"Is he still alive?"

"No, he died at least five years ago."

"What did he do for a living?"

"I think he dealt in timber. But Stefano Moscato was not someone we talked about in my house."

"Why not?"

"Because he, too, wasn't our kind of person. He was in cahoots with his relatives, the Rizzitanos, need I say more? He'd had trouble with the law, I don't know exactly what sort. In those days, in good, respectable families, you simply didn't talk about people like that. It was like talking about shit, if youll excuse my language."

Signora Burgio came back, eyes red, an old letter in her hand. "This is the last letter I received from Lisetta when I was staying in Acquapendente, where I'd moved with my family."Serradifalco, June 10, 1943 My dear Angelina, How are you? How is everyone in your family? You have no idea how much I envy you, since your life in a northern town can't be even remotely comparable to the prison in which I spend my days. And don't think I'm exaggerating by using the word prison. Aside from Papa's asphyxiating surveillance, there's also the monotonous, stupid life of a village with only a handful of houses. Just imagine, last Sunday, as we were coming out of church, a local boy whom I don't even know said hi to me. Papa noticed, called him aside, and started slapping him. Sheer madness! My only recreation is reading. And I have a friend: Andreuccio, a ten-year-old boy, my cousin's son. He's very smart. Have you ever noticed that little children are sometimes more clever than we are?For several days now, Angelina, I've been living in despair. I received by means so adventurous it would take me too long to explain here a little note, four lines, from Him Him Him. He says he's desperate, he can no longer stand not seeing me, and now, after staying put all this time in Vig, they've just received orders to leave in the next few days. I feel like I'm dying without him. Before he leaves, before he goes away, I must must must spend a few hours with him, even if it means doing something crazy. I'll keep you informed. Meanwhile I send you a great big hug. Yours truly,Lisetta

"So you never did find out who this Him was," said the inspector.

"No. She never wanted to tell me."

"Did you receive any other letters after this one?"

"Are you kidding? It was already a miracle I got this one. At the time you couldn't cross the Strait of Messina; they were bombing it nonstop. Then, on July 9, the Americans landed and all communications were cut."

"Excuse me, signora, but do you remember your friends address at Serradifalco?"

"Of course. It was care of the Sorrentino family, Via Crispi 18."

...

He was about to put the key in the lock, but stopped in alarm. Voices and noises were coming from inside the house. He thought of going back to the car and getting his pistol, but did nothing. He opened the door cautiously, without making the slightest noise.

Then all at once he remembered that he'd completely forgotten about Livia, who had been waiting for him for God knows how long.

It took him half the night to make peace.

At seven in the morning he tiptoed out of bed and dialed a phone number.

"Fazio?" he said very softly. "I need you to do me a favor. You have to call in sick."

"No problem."

"By this evening, I want to know everythingfrom the cradle to the grave about a certain Stefano Moscato, who died here in Vig about five years ago. Ask around town, check the records office and anywhere else you can think of. It's very important."

"Don't worry, I'll take care of it."

He hung up the phone, grabbed a pen and a sheet of paper, and wrote:Darling, I have to run out for something urgent and didn't want to wake you. I'll be back by early afternoon, promise. Why don't you grab a cab and go see the temples again? They're as splendid as ever. All my love.

He stole out of the house like a thief. Had Livia opened her eyes, there would have been hell to pay.

...

It took him an hour and a half to get to Serradifalco. It was a clear day, and he even started whistling. He felt happy. It made him think of Caifas, his fathers dog, who used to mope about the house, lethargic and melancholy, until he saw his master start getting his cartridges ready, and immediately he would turn frisky and spry, before transforming into a mass of sheer energy when he was finally out in the fields for the hunt.

Montalbano found Via Crispi right away; number 18 was a small nineteenth-century building, two stories. There was one doorbell, with the name Sorrentino inscribed beside it. A pleasant girl of about twenty asked him what he wanted.

"I'd like to speak with Andrea Sorrentino."

"That's my father. He's not at home.You can find him at the Town Hall."

"Does he work there?"

"Sort of. He's the mayor."

...

"Of course I remember Lisetta," said Andrea Sorrentino. He wore his sixty-odd years quite well, only a few white hairs. A handsome man. "But why do you ask?"

"I'm conducting a rather confidential investigation. I'm sorry I can't tell you more. But you must believe me: it's very important that I get some information about her."

"All right, Inspector. I have very beautiful memories of Lisetta, you know. We used to take long walks in the country. With her at my side, I felt so proud, like a grown-up man. She used to treat me as if we were the same age. But after her family left Serradifalco and she returned to Vig, I never heard from her again."

"Why's that?"

The mayor hesitated a moment.

"Well, I'll tell you because it's all in the past now. I think my father and Lisetta's father had a terrible row. Around the end of August in 43, my father came home in an awful state. He'd been to Vig, to see Uncle Stefanou, zu Stefano, as I called him, I don't remember what for. He was pale and had a fever. I remember that my mother got very scared, and so I, too, got scared. I don't know what transpired between the two of them, but the next day, at the dinner table, my father said that in our house, the Moscato's name must never be mentioned again. I obeyed, even though I really wished I could ask him about Lisetta. You know how it is, with these horrible feuds between relatives..."

"Do you remember the American soldier Lisetta met here?"

"Here? An American soldier?"

"Yes. Or so I've been led to believe. She met an American soldier in Serradifalco, they fell in love, she followed him, and a little while later they got married in the United States."

"I heard some vague talk of this marriage business, when an aunt of mine, my fathers sister, was sent a photo of Lisetta in bridal dress with an American soldier."

"So why were you surprised when I mentioned it?"

"I was surprised that you said Lisetta met the American here. You see, Lisetta disappeared from our house at least ten days before the Americans occupied Serradifalco."

"What?"

"Oh, yes. One afternoon, it must have been around three or four oclock, I saw Lisetta getting ready to leave. I asked her where we were going on our walk that day, and she told me I shouldn't feel hurt, but she wanted to take her walk by herself. Of course I felt deeply hurt. That evening, at suppertime, Lisetta still hadn't returned. Uncle Stefano, my father, and some local peasants went out looking for her but never found her. Those were terrible hours for us. There were Italian and German soldiers about, and the grown-ups were worried she'd come to harm ...The following afternoon, Uncle Stefano said good-bye, telling us he wouldn't be back until he found his daughter. Lisetta's mother stayed behind with us; poor thing, she was devastated. Then the Americans landed, and we were cut off by the front. The very day the front moved on, Stefano Moscato came back to get his wife and said he'd found Lisetta in Vig and that her escape had been a childish prank. Now, if you've been following me, you will have understood why Lisetta could not have met her future husband here in Serradifalco, but must have met him in her own town, in Vig."