City of Devils: A Novel (20 page)

On James walked through the deserted streets. It was as if there had been an apocalypse, leaving him as the only survivor. All he could hear was his own footsteps on the damp cobbles. The quiet unnerved him and he began to whistle to himself, quietly at first and then more loudly, even though he attempted to persuade himself that he was being ridiculous. He was a grown man walking along a city street. What was there to be afraid of? Then he heard it – a whistle, similar to his own – reflecting his tune back to him as a sinister echo. He quickened his pace and changed his whistle to a hum but to no avail. The tune was returned to him until they were almost singing together in a macabre symphony. This was no light-hearted jape. James could sense a note of what could only be described as malice.

And then suddenly there was silence, smothering him with its completeness, until he could barely breathe. He stood waiting in the darkness – for what he could not say. If he walked on, then he would be followed. If he stayed where he was then . . . what? The terror of the unknown made him yearn for the ordinary – a cup of coffee, his sister’s laughter at some silly joke, even listening to his aunt lecture him about his prospects – anything would be preferable to this all-encompassing fear. And then the silence was broken again, by a steady beat like a thump on a door to gain entrance. Three knocks . . . then a pause . . . then three knocks again.

James stopped and turned quickly but he could see nothing. The knocks started again and at that moment some of his fear was replaced by anger. Somebody was playing games with him and he was tired of it. He peered through the mist. ‘Is there anyone there? Show yourself, you scoundrel!’

There was no reply. He stood there and listened carefully for a breath, a whisper, anything. But there was nothing. The silence had returned yet again.

He could barely see a foot in front of him but he felt quite alone. Suddenly all that had happened to him, both recently and in the past, began to weigh like a leaden burden on his shoulders. He sighed and continued on his way. What was it about this city? All he had encountered since he arrived was darkness and shadows. Nothing seemed to be honest or straightforward and no one seemed to be telling him the complete truth about anything, not even Sofia. He had come here to seek a future but the past seemed to be as inescapable as ever. He turned the corner into the small square where Sofia lived and paused, looking up at her window. A solitary candle lit up the casement as if in welcome. What should he do? Sofia was a servant in his teacher’s employ and not only that, she had been a prostitute – it was unthinkable that he should get involved with such a woman, even in secret. If they were found out both would lose their positions and he would have to return home in disgrace.

But to turn away and leave Sofia on the edge of his life was something he simply could not contemplate. This was not just a mere dalliance with a servant girl. There was something more between them. He knew it to be so because he had felt that way before. He closed his eyes for a second and remembered the woman who he had once loved and then lost. In his head he could hear the tune she used to hum as she worked on her embroidery. Kate, with her blond curls and skin like porcelain, had looked a little like one of Lucy’s dolls, as different from Sofia as it was possible to be. He had met her at a university function because she was the daughter of one of its chief patrons, a lord, no less. As such she had been out of bounds for him but that did not stop her from flirting with him at every opportunity. She had nearly driven him mad with suppressed desire, captivating him to the extent where he proposed to her, notwithstanding her position. He went to see Kate’s father in order to make his intentions clear. James winced as he remembered the scorn with which his visit was greeted. The man had actually laughed in his face before dismissing him out of hand as a potential suitor for his daughter. James had stormed out and tried to see Kate, fully intending to run away with her there and then. But she had refused to see him and he had finally realised the cruel game she had played with his heart.

It was a salutary lesson and since then he had been cautious in such matters, preferring to concentrate on his work. But even his feelings for Kate, and he could still remember how she had made his heart race with even the tiniest of smiles, seemed inconsequential in comparison to how he felt at this moment. He went up the rickety stairs and knocked on the door.

Sofia opened it and smiled at him. ‘So you decided to pay me a visit after all.’

‘I am sorry it is so late,’ James said. ‘It has been a long evening.’

‘Oh, poor Dr Murray,’ Sofia said in mocking tones. ‘It must be hard to listen to all that grand conversation, not to mention the fine wines and food that goes with it.’

James grinned. ‘Well, perhaps it was not such an ordeal. But still I am here now. Will you let me in?’

Sofia hesitated, looking up and down as if she was measuring him up. Finally she stood back from the door and allowed him to enter. ‘Yes, I will . . . but just for a moment or two. I need my sleep.’

Her rooms were small, poky even, but he could see the efforts she had made to make them homely. A small table with two chairs was in one corner. It was covered with a cloth and had a vase of flowers in the centre. In another corner was a bookcase with a few books on it.

‘Please sit.’ Sofia indicated a sofa that had seen better days. He glanced over to an open door through which he could see a bed.

‘Would you like some
grappa
?’ she asked, closing the door firmly.

‘Yes please,’ he said, more in the hope of prolonging the visit than in anticipation of the drink itself.

Sofia brought a glass over to him and sat in a chair by the table, as far away from him as she could manage, given the available space.

‘So how was the reception?’ she asked.

‘Interesting. I am beginning to see what you mean about the professor having enemies.’

‘Good. I am glad that you understand.’

‘What I don’t understand is exactly what you want me to do about them.’

‘It is simple. I want you to find out who killed Soldati. Otherwise his enemies will be able to use the murder to discredit him.’

‘How could they do that?’

‘The note – it implicates him.’

James frowned, trying to remember if Sofia had been present when the note had been mentioned. ‘How do you know about that?’

‘Everybody in Turin knows. Marshal Machinetti has seen to that.’

‘Well you don’t need to worry. We are already investigating the murder.’

‘We?’

‘Myself, Ottolenghi and Tullio.’

‘And what have you found out so far?’ Sofia asked impatiently.

‘We know how he was killed and that he was a regular at La Capra.’

Sofia rolled her eyes. ‘Is that it?
I
could have told you that.’

‘If your friend Rosa Bruno would cooperate, we might find out more.’

Sofia stood up and threw her hands up. ‘So that’s the sum total of your fancy scientific policing – almost nothing!’ She swore under her breath.

James also got to his feet. What did she expect? ‘Look, it isn’t as easy as you seem to think. The killer wants Lombroso to be blamed. He’s not going to make it easy for us to find him.’

‘Perhaps not but you are supposed to be experts in crime. You should be able to find out something.’

‘How can we,’ James asked, ‘when nobody will tell us the truth about anything?’

‘If people are lying to you then they must have a reason,’ Sofia said, her voice getting louder with each word. ‘You must ask the questions in a different way.’

‘A different way? What does that mean? Are you saying we’re incompetent?’ James ran his hands through his hair in frustration. ‘I don’t understand you. We’re trying our best.’

‘Well, it does not seem to be good enough!’

James stared at Sofia who was standing with her hands on her hips, her eyes full of anger. ‘What would you know anyway? You’re just a—’

‘A what? A servant? A whore?’ Sofia shouted.

‘I was going to say housekeeper! Really, it’s impossible to speak sensibly to you!’

‘Go, then!’

Infuriated, James walked out, slamming the door behind him.

10

Criminals’ feelings are not always completely gone; some may survive while others disappear
.

Lombroso, 1876 p 64

The sun was about to rise over Turin. The city was experiencing unseasonably warm weather for November. Usually, by now, a mist of fog would be winding itself around every corner, covering everything in its wake with a thin, damp cloak, light as gossamer – a film of moist droplets that insinuated itself into every bodily crevice, making it impossible ever to feel dry. For the last two or three days, however, this had only arrived once the sun had set. During daylight hours the fog had been replaced by blue skies and hazy sunshine, giving the city an air of reckless abandonment to pleasure as its inhabitants made the most of the weather, sitting outside cafés and strolling around squares as if it was high summer.

For Antonio Bettoni the weather had a double benefit. Not only was his employment as a gardener in the Parco del Valentino a good deal more pleasant in the warm sunshine but it also made his journey to work a pleasure rather than a chore. The darkness was just abating as he made his way across the vast Piazza Vittoria, and then towards the Lungo Po Diaz, the road that ran alongside the river Po. He pulled his coat around him. Warmth would come with the sun but it was still cold in the early morning. He breathed in deeply as he went down the slope towards the water. He had always loved the river’s smell although he had never been able to identify its exact components; a combination of pondweed and fish, he thought, but it was never the same aroma twice. He walked whistling along the bank by the
murazzi
– boatsheds carved into the riverside. He was that most unusual of beings, a happy man, at peace with the world and everyone in it.

In the distance Antonio glimpsed a man leaning against one of the stone posts, his legs dangling over the side of the bank. His head was flung back as if he was dozing. Was he fishing? Antonio smiled to himself – so many things to appreciate: a beautiful morning, a solitary fisherman, a day of tending the gardens ahead and yes, there was his favourite sound of all – birdsong. A single blackbird trilled its simple tune, adding to the air of tranquillity. It was so perfect a scene that even Antonio the optimist felt that it could not last.

He was right. As he approached the fisherman the sun went behind a cloud, the bird stopped singing and Antonio saw something that he would never forget. For the man was no angler – there was no rod, no wriggling bait, no catch – just a corpse, its head flung back at an odd angle, eyes staring sightlessly up into the sky.

Antonio moved in and looked more closely. What he saw made him gasp with horror and stumble backwards. He turned to one side and vomited. There were no eyes to stare, just empty sockets. Dried black blood congealed around a neck wound and the mouth hung open loosely as if the jaw was dislocated. He could see a set of rotting teeth, which seemed to be broken and jagged as if they had been hit with something. As if this wasn’t enough, something was missing. There was no tongue. Antonio looked down and saw the man’s hands, cupped in front of him as if waiting to receive a gift. In one, rammed precariously between the fingers, was a piece of bloodstained paper with red writing on it and in the other was the missing tongue and two eyes.

The unmistakable sound of a pistol being fired reverberated around the panelled walls of Lombroso’s laboratory. James stood, the gun drooping from his hand, shocked at the loudness of the report.

‘Ah, now, that was particularly interesting,’ announced Lombroso from behind a screen. ‘There was a definite change in the pressure – well, good enough to note anyway. Would you record that, Ottolenghi?’

Ottolenghi was standing to one side, well away from James. He was in his shirtsleeves, holding a clipboard, his glasses perched on the end of his nose, looking like a shopkeeper doing some stocktaking. His subject, a heavily tattooed man with a receding forehead, was seated with his left arm connected to one piece of machinery and his right arm to another.

Ottolenghi looked up. ‘Yes, Professor – I think the machine might need to be readjusted, though.’

‘Which one – the hydrosphygmograph or the Ruhmkorff?’

‘The Ruhmkorff. One of the terminals has come loose so I can’t be sure we got the correct effect.’

James looked with interest at the machines in question. The Ruhmkorff was an induction coil made up of a large black cylinder surrounded by brass knobs and dials which Ottolenghi was busy adjusting. The hydrosphygmograph or ‘pulse writer’, like many of the machines favoured by Lombroso for his experiments, looked more like an instrument of torture than a piece of scientific equipment. It was a thin metal machine that was strapped to the subject’s wrist. It put James in mind of a thumbscrew.

‘Oh, never mind,’ Lombroso called out. ‘I’m sure it made no difference. Write it down regardless. We can’t keep firing a pistol all morning. Murray will soon tire of it, not to mention our subject!’