The Terra-Cotta Dog

5

"Worse than criminals! Worse than murderers! That's how those dirty sons of bitches treated us! Who do they think they are? The fuckers!"

There was no calming down Fazio, who had just returned from Palermo. German, Gallo, and Galluzzo served as his psalmodizing chorus, wildly gesticulating to convey the exceptional nature of the event.

"Total insanity! Total insanity!"

"Simmer down, boys. Let's proceed in orderly fashion," Montalbano ordered, imposing his authority.

Then, noticing that Galluzzos shirt and jacket no longer bore traces of the blood from his crushed nose, the inspector asked him:

"Did you go home and change before coming here?"

"Home? Home? Didn't you hear what Fazio said? We've just come from Palermo, we came straight back! When we got to the Anti-Mafia Commission and turned over Tano the Greek, they took us one by one and put us in separate rooms. Since my nose was still hurting, I wanted to put a wet handkerchief over it. I'd been sitting there for half an hour, and still nobody'd shown up, so I opened the door and found an officer standing in front of me. Where you going? he says. I'm going to get a little water for my nose.You can't leave, he says, go back inside. Get that, Inspector? I was under guard! Like I was Tano the Greek!"

"Don't mention that name and lower your voice!" Montalbano scolded him. "Nobody is supposed to know that we caught him! The first one who talks gets his ass kicked all the way to Asinara."

"We were all under guard," Fazio cut in, indignant.

Galluzzo continued his story:

"An hour later some guy I know entered the room, a colleague of yours who was kicked upstairs to the Anti-Mafia Commission. I think his name is Sciacchitano."

A perfect asshole, the inspector thought, but said nothing.

"He looked at me as if I smelled bad or something, like some beggar. Then he kept on staring at me, and finally he said: You know, you can't very well present yourself to the Prefect looking like that."

Still feeling hurt by the absurd treatment, he had trouble keeping his voice down.

"The amazing thing was that he had this pissed-off look in his eye, like it was all my fault! Then he left, muttering to himself. Later a cop came in with a clean shirt and jacket."

"Now let me talk," Fazio butted in, pulling rank. "To make a long story short, from three oclock in the afternoon to midnight yesterday, every one of us was interrogated eight times by eight different people."

"What did they want to know?"

"How the arrest came about."

"Actually, I was interrogated ten times," said German with a certain pride. "I guess I tell a good story, and for them it was like being at the movies."

"Around one oclock in the morning they gathered us together," Fazio continued, "and put us in a great big room, a kind of large office, with two sofas, eight chairs, and four tables. They unplugged the telephones and took them away. Then they sent in four stale sandwiches and four warm beers that tasted like piss. We got as comfortable as we could, and at eight the next morning some guy came in and said we could go back to Vig. No good morning, no good-bye, not even get outta here like you say to get rid of the dog. Nothing."

"All right," said Montalbano. "What can you do? Go on home now, rest up, and come back here in the late afternoon. I promise you I'll take this whole business up with the commissioner."

...

"Hello? This is Inspector Salvo Montalbano from Vig. I'd like to speak with Inspector Arturo Sciacchitano."

"Please hold."

Montalbano grabbed a sheet of paper and a pen. He started doodling without paying attention and only later noticed he had drawn a pair of buttocks on a toilet seat.

"I'm sorry, the inspectors in a meeting."

"Listen, please tell him I'm also in a meeting, that way were even. He can interrupt his for five minutes, I'll do the same with mine, and we'll both be happy as babies."

He appended a few turds to the shitting buttocks.

"Montalbano? What is it? Sorry, but I haven't got much time."

"Me neither. Listen, Sciacchitanov"

"Eh? Sciacchitanov? What the hell are you saying?"

"Isn't that your real name? You mean you don't belong to the KGB?"

"I'm not in the mood for jokes, Montalbano."

"Who's joking? I'm calling you from the commissioners office, and he's very upset over the KGB-style treatment you gave my men. He promised me he'd write to the interior minister this very day."

The phenomenon cannot be explained, and yet it happened: Montalbano actually saw Sciacchitano, universally known as a pusillanimous ass-lick, turn pale over the telephone line. His lie had the same effect on the man as a billy club to the head.

"What are you saying? You have to understand that I, as defender of public safety.."

Montalbano interrupted him.

"Safety doesn't preclude politeness," he said pithily, "sounding like one of those road signs that say: be polite, for safety's sake."

"But I was extremely polite! I even gave them beer and sandwiches!"

"I'm sorry to say, but despite the beer and sandwiches, there will be consequences higher up. But cheer up, Sciacchitano, it's not your fault. You cant fit a square peg into a round hole."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that you, being a born asshole, will never be a decent, intelligent person. Now, I demand that you write a letter, addressed to me, praising my men to the skies. And I want it by tomorrow. Good-bye."

"Do you think if I write the letter, the commissioner will let it drop?"

"To be perfectly honest, I don't know. But if I were you, I'd write that letter. And I might even date it yesterday. Got that?"

He felt better now, having let off some steam. He called Catarella.

"Is Inspector Augello in his office?"

"No sir, but he just now phoned. He said that, figuring he was about ten minutes away, he'd be here in about ten minutes."

Montalbano took advantage of the time to start writing the fake report. The real one he'd written at home the night before. At a certain point Augello knocked and entered.

"You were looking for me?"

"Is it really so hard for you to come to work a little earlier?"

"Sorry, but in fact I was busy till five oclock in the morning. Then I went home and drifted off to sleep, and that was that."

"Busy with one of those whores you like so much? The kind that pack two hundred and fifty pounds of flesh into a tight little dress?"

"Didn't Catarella tell you?"

"He told me you'd be coming in late."

"Last night, around two, there was a fatal car accident. I went to the scene myself, thinking I'd let you sleep, since the thing was of no importance to us."

"To the people who died, it was certainly important."

"There was only one victim. He took the downhill stretch of the Catena at high speed, apparently his brakes weren't working and ended up wedged under a truck that had started coming up the slope in the opposite direction. The poor guy died instantly."

"Did you know him?"

"I sure did. So did you. Cavaliere Misuraca."

...

"Montalbano? I just got a call from Palermo. They want us to hold a press conference. And that's not all: they want it to make some noise. That's very important. It's part of their strategy. Journalists from other cities will be there, and it will be reported on the national news. It's going to be a big deal."

"They want to show that the new government is not letting up in the fight against the Mafia, and that, on the contrary, they will be more resolute, more relentless than ever"

"Is something wrong, Montalbano?"

"No. I was just imagining the next days headlines."

"The press conference is scheduled for noon tomorrow. I just wanted to give you advance warning."

"Thank you, sir, but what have I got to do with any of it?"

"Montalbano, I am a nice man, a kind man, but only up to a point. You have everything to do with it! Stop being so childish!"

"What am I supposed to say?"

"Good God, Montalbano! Say what you wrote in the report."

"Which one?"

"I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"Nothing."

"Just try to speak clearly, don't mumble, and keep your head up. And...Oh, yes, your hands. Decide once and for all where youre going to put them and keep them there. Don't do like last time, where the correspondent of the Corriere offered aloud to cut them off for you, to make you feel more comfortable."

"And what if they question me?"

"Of course they'll question you, to use your odd phrasing. They're journalists, aren't they? Good day."

Too agitated by everything that was happening and was going to happen the following day, Montalbano had to leave the office. He went out, stopped at the usual shop, bought a small bag of caesimenza, and headed toward the jetty. When he was at the foot of the lighthouse and about to turn back, he found himself face-to-face with Ernesto Bonfiglio, the owner of a travel agency and a very good friend of the recently deceased Cavaliere Misuraca.

"Isn't there anything we can do?" Bonfiglio blurted out at him aggressively.

Montalbano, who was trying to dislodge a small fragment of peanut stuck between two teeth, merely looked at him, befuddled.

"I'm asking if theres anything we can do," Bonfiglio repeated resentfully, giving him a hostile look in return.

"Do about what?"

"About my poor dead friend."

"Would you like some?" asked the inspector, holding out the bag.

"Thanks," said the other, taking a handful of caesimenza.

The pause allowed Montalbano to put the man he was speaking to in better perspective: Bonfiglio, aside from being like a brother to the late Cavaliere, was a man who held extreme right-wing ideas and was not all there in the head.

"You mean Misuraca?"

"No, I mean my grandfather."

"And what am I supposed to do?"

"Arrest the murderers. It's your duty".

"And who would these murderers be?"

"Who they are, not would be. I'm referring to the local party leaders, who were unworthy to have him in their ranks. They killed him."

"I beg your pardon. Wasn't it an accident?"

"Oh, I suppose you think accidents just happen accidentally?"

"I would say so."

"You would be wrong. If someone's looking for an accident, there's always somebody else ready to send one his way. Let me cite an example to illustrate my point. This last February Mim Crapanzano drowned when he went for a swim. An accidental death, they said. But here I ask you: How old was Mim when he died? Fifty-five years old. Why, at that age, did he get this brilliant idea to go for a swim in the cold, like he used to do when he was a kid? The answer is because less than three months before, he had got married to a Milanese girl twenty-four years younger than him, and one day, when they were out strolling on the beach, she asked him: Is it true, darling, that you used to swim in this sea in February? It sure is, replied Crapanzano. The girl, who apparently was already tired of the old man, sighed. What's wrong? Crapanzano asked, like an idiot. I'm sorry I won't ever have a chance to see you do it again, said the slut. Without saying a word, Crapanzano took off his clothes and jumped into the water. Does that clarify my point?"

"Perfectly."

"Now, to get back to the party leaders of Montelusa province. After a first meeting ended with harsh words, they held another last night. The Cavaliere, along with a few other people, wanted the chapter to issue a press release protesting the governments ordinance granting amnesty to crooks. Others saw things differently. At a certain point, some guy called Misuraca a geezer, another said he looked like something out of the puppet theater, a third man called him a senile wreck. I learned all these things from a friend who was there. Finally, the secretary, some jerk who's not even Sicilian and goes by the name of Biragh asked him please to vacate the premises, since he had no authorization whatsoever to attend the meeting. Which was true, but no one had ever dared say this before. So Gerlando got in his little Fiat and headed back home to Vig. His blood was boiling, no doubt about it, but the others had made him lose his head on purpose. And youre going to tell me it was an accident?"

The only way to reason with Bonfiglio was to put oneself squarely on his level.The inspector knew this from experience.

"Is there one television personality you find particularly obnoxious?" he asked him.

"There are a hundred thousand, but Mike Bongiorno is the worst. Whenever I see him, my stomach gets all queasy and I feel like smashing the screen."

"Good. And if, after watching this particular MC, you get in your car, drive into a wall, and kill yourself, what am I supposed to do, in your opinion?"

"Arrest Mike Bongiorno," the other said firmly.

...

He went back to the office feeling calmer. His encounter with the logic of Ernesto Bonfiglio had distracted and amused him.

"Any news?" he asked as he walked in.

"There's a personal letter for you that came just now in the mail," said Catarella, repeating, for emphasis: Per- son-al.

On his desk he found a postcard from his father and some office memos.

"Hey, Cat! Where'd you put the letter?"

"I said it was personal!" Catarella said defensively.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means that you have to receive it in person, it being personal and all."

"Okay. The person is here in front of you. Where's the letter?"

"It's gone where it was supposed to go. Where the person personally lives. I told the postman to deliver it to your house, Chief, your personal residence, in Marinella."

...

Standing in front of the Trattoria San Calogero, catching a breath of air, was the cook and owner.

"Where you going, Inspector? Not coming in?

"I'm eating at home today."

"Whatever you say. But I've got some rock lobster ready for the grill that'll seem like youre not eating them, but dreaming them."

Montalbano went inside, won over by the image more than the desire. Then, after finishing his meal, he pushed the dishes away, crossed his arms on the table, and fell asleep. He always ate in a small room with three tables, and so it was easy for Serafino, the waiter, to steer customers towards the big dining room and leave the inspector in peace. Around four oclock, with the restaurant already closed, the proprietor, noticing that Montalbano was showing no signs of life, made him a cup of coffee, then gently woke him up.