Involuntary Witness (25 page)

“Darkness fell and there I still was with that glass of bourbon. I felt like filling it some more. I put it down on
the table and poured, very slowly. Halfway, two-thirds, right to the brim. And still I went on pouring.

“Very gradually the liquid began to overflow, and I watched it dribbling down the outside of the glass, then spreading over the table, dripping onto the floor.

“When the bottle was empty I set it down on the table. I took the glass between finger and thumb and slowly tipped it, without lifting it. It began to empty. Very, very slowly. As it emptied, I tipped it more. Finally I turned it upside down.”

I passed my hands across my face, breathing at last. I realized my jaws were aching.

“At that point I got up, fetched a bucket and floor-cloths and cleaned everything up. I put the rags and empty bottle into a bin-liner, went downstairs and threw the lot into the rubbish. I wanted to call you, but it didn’t seem right. I had to deal with this on my own, I thought. So I just sent you that message.”

She stopped abruptly. We were silent for a long time, sitting on that wall. I was burning with questions. About him, of course. What had happened after that evening? Where had she been today? Had they met again, and talked, and so on?

I asked none of them. It wasn’t easy, but I didn’t ask a single question. All the time we were sitting there and after, walking across the city to our building. Until the moment came to part, at her door. Then it was she who spoke.

“What do you think of me, after what I’ve told you?”

“What I thought before. It’s just a bit more complicated.”

“Would you like to come in?”

“No, not this evening. Don’t misunderstand me, it’s just that—”

She interrupted me, speaking quickly. Embarrassed.

“I don’t misunderstand you. You’re right. I oughtn’t even to have said it. Did you say the trial ends on Monday?”

“Most likely. It depends on one last check-up ordered by the court. If certain documents arrive in time, then we should wrap it up on Monday.”

“Will you be speaking in the morning?”

“No, I don’t think so. Almost certainly the afternoon.”

“Then I’ll almost certainly manage to come. I want to be there when you speak.”

“I’d like you to be there too.”

“Then ... goodnight. And thanks.”

“Goodnight.”

I was already on the stairs.

“Guido ...”

“Yes?”

“I did go to him afterwards. I told him he was right. About the hypocrisy – mine – and all the rest.”

She paused briefly, and when she spoke again there was an unfamiliar timidity in her voice.

“Did I do right?”

I took a deep breath and felt a knot dissolving in the pit of my stomach.

I told her yes, she had done right.

The mobile-phone records arrived punctually on the fifth day after the hearing during which they had been ordered. I was assured of this by the carabinieri sergeant who had carried out the court order. He was a friend of mine, so I had called him up to find out. On his assurance I went to the law courts to examine them.

It was Saturday, 1 July. The Palace of Justice was deserted and the atmosphere slightly surreal.

The door to the Assize Court chancellery was closed. I opened it and found no one inside, but at least the air-conditioning was working. I therefore entered, closed the door behind me and waited for someone to come back and let me see those records.

After a quarter of an hour a clerk arrived at last, a little titch of about sixty whom I didn’t know. He gave me a vague look and asked if I needed anything. I did need something and told him what. He appeared to reflect upon the matter for a while before nodding thoughtfully.

The search for the documents was a laborious business and pretty exasperating, but one way or another the little man finally managed to unearth them.

From the mobile-phone records it emerged that Abdou had certainly told the truth about his trip to Naples. The first call was at 9.18. It was an outgoing call from Abdou’s mobile to a number in Naples, and had lasted two minutes fourteen seconds. At the time of
the call Abdou was already in Naples or the immediate vicinity. There followed four other calls – to Naples numbers and to mobiles – always from within the Naples area. The last was at 12.46. Then nothing happened for more than four hours. At 16.52 Abdou received a call from a mobile. At that time the area was Bari city. The call after that was at 21.10. It was an outgoing call from Abdou’s mobile, still from Bari. Then nothing more.

I sat there thinking over the result of that inquiry. Certainly it was not decisive and it failed to sew up the trial. There was a gap of more than four hours, and smack in the middle of those four hours the child had disappeared. What emerged from the phone records did not exclude the possibility that Abdou, returning from Naples, had gone on to Monopoli, reached Capitolo, kidnapped the boy and done God knows what else.

I got up to leave and noticed that the little man had sat himself down on the other side of the chancellery, with his chin on his hands, his elbows on the desk and his gaze lost in space.

I wished him good day. He turned his head, looked at me as if I had said something extraordinary, then turned away again and gave a vague nod. Impossible to say if he had replied to my greeting or had still been elsewhere, talking to some ghost.

The air outside was scorching. It was midday on Saturday, 1 July and I was bound for the office to shut myself in and prepare my speech for the defence.

I was in for a long weekend of it.

The hearing began on the dot of nine-thirty. The court took note of the arrival of the mobile-phone records, and we all agreed that we did not require explanation from an expert in order to understand the data. For our purposes, what was written in those records was clear enough. The Telecom engineer who had presented himself for the hearing was thanked and told his services were not required.

Immediately afterwards the judge went through the last formalities and called upon the prosecution. It was nine-forty.

Cervellati got to his feet, pressing down on the table and shoving back his chair. He adjusted his robe, glanced at his notes, then raised his head and addressed the judge.

“Your Honour, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, today you are called to give judgement on a very horrible crime. A young life, a very young life, brutally cut off, as the result of an act so iniquitous that we are unable to grasp the motive or the measure of it. The consequences of this iniquity are tragically irremediable. No one can restore this child to the love of his parents. I cannot, you cannot, no one can.

“You, however, have a great power, an all-important power, of which I hope you will make good use. Of which I am sure you will make good use.”

I thought: now he is going to say they have the power, and also the duty, to see justice done. To see to
it that the author of such a heinous crime does not get away with it, due perhaps to some cavil or quibble.

“You have the power to see justice done. And this is a power of great moment, because it brings with it the
duty
of doing justice. In the first place to the family of the little victim. But thereafter to all of us who, as citizens, expect a response when such abominable things occur.”

It was one of his favourite dictums in the Court of Assizes. I think he was convinced that it impressed the jury. Anyway, he continued in this vein and after a little my attention began to stray.

I heard his voice like a background noise. Every so often I followed his drift for a minute or two and then my thoughts went rambling off again.

He spoke of what had taken place in the course of the trial, in a monotonous drone read long chunks of the records and explained exactly why the evidence advanced by the prosecution was totally convincing, bar nothing.

One of the most tedious closing speeches I had ever heard, I thought, as I leafed through my file just for something to do.

But at a certain point he came to speak of the evidence of the bar owner, the heart of the whole trial.

He re-read Renna’s statements – but not his answers to
my
questions – and commented on them. I forced myself to listen carefully.

“So we must ask ourselves,
you
must ask yourselves: what reason did the witness Renna have for bringing false accusations against the defendant? Because the question, in fact, is very simple and the alternative is clear. One hypothesis is that the witness Renna is lying, thereby paving the way for an innocent man to be sentenced to life imprisonment. Because he is well aware
of the consequences of his testimony, but nevertheless persists in it, despite the difficulties we saw in the course of his cross-examination. If he is lying, thus accusing an innocent man of a crime punishable by life imprisonment, he must have a reason. Indeed, a ferocious and ignoble personal antagonism, because only hatred of such a kind could explain so aberrant an action.

“Is there any proof, or even the suspicion, of such destructive hatred on the part of Renna with regard to the defendant? Naturally not.

“The other hypothesis is that the witness is telling the truth. And if there is nothing to tell us that the witness is lying, we have to recognize the fact that – in spite of approximations, errors, understandable moments of confusion – he is telling the truth.

“The effect on the outcome of the present trial is obvious. For do not forget that the accused denies being at Monopoli, at Capitolo, that afternoon. And if he denies it when in fact he was present in those localities – and we can assert it with complete confidence because we are told it by a witness who has no cause to lie – then the explanation is one and one only and, unhappily, is there for all to see.”

I made a note of this concept too, because it had a sense to it that had to be confuted explicitly.

Cervellati continued, following the proceedings in chronological order, and finally came to discuss the mobile-phone records.

He said what I expected him to say. The verification requested by the defence had not only failed to prove the innocence of the defendant, but, on the contrary, provided further material in favour of the prosecution.

Because that gap of four or so hours with no telephone calls, during which the instrument was probably
switched off, was an item of circumstantial evidence worth exploiting. And Cervellati exploited it. There was a degree of verisimilitude – a high degree, he said – in the hypothesis that the defendant, having returned to Bari from Naples, had gone on to Capitolo, having already formed a plan of action. Or perhaps in the grip of a “raptus”, or brainstorm. It was probable that he had switched off his mobile phone so as not to be disturbed during the heinous deed. And this, better than any other hypothesis, explained the absence of calls between five and nine o’clock that evening.

I took notes on this part of the speech as well. It was an insidious argument and might well influence the jury.

There followed a hypothetical reconstruction of how Abdou might have put his plan into effect, basely and craftily exploiting the little boy’s trust in him.

What had occurred after the kidnapping could be easily imagined. The child, realizing what was happening, had tried to resist the attempted violence. Maybe he had tried to escape, and this had sparked off the lethal reaction of the accused. It is probable that no signs of sexual abuse had been found because the situation had got out of hand before such abuse – which was certainly the defendant’s object – had taken place.

In conclusion the public prosecutor explained why the only adequate punishment for such a crime was life imprisonment. It was the most convincing part of his whole speech, because life imprisonment was in fact the just penalty for the perpetrator of such a crime.

While this thought was in my mind Cervellati went through the ritual request for a verdict of guilty.

“For the reasons previously stated, therefore, I ask you to affirm the criminal responsibility of the defendant for all the offences of which he stands accused and
therefore to sentence him to imprisonment for life with isolation by day for a period of six months, together with the application of the additional penalty of perpetual debarment from holding public office.”

I took a deep breath, glanced at my watch and realized that almost two hours had passed.

The judge said there would be a short break before counsel for the civil party was called. Subsequently there would be an hour for lunch, and when the hearing resumed I would have the floor. Following any further discussions, the court would retire to consider the verdict.

The courtroom emptied out and I too got up to go and have a smoke. Only Cotugno remained behind, putting the finishing touches to his speech.

Outside, a woman journalist I had never seen before asked me what I thought of the prosecution’s request for a sentence of guilty.

What I thought of
that
was that rarely had I heard such an idiotic question. I was sorely tempted to give expression to this opinion, but of course I didn’t. I said nothing, just shrugged my shoulders, shook my head and spread my hands slightly, palms uppermost. I went off, fishing out my cigarettes while the girl stared after me a bit nonplussed.

I felt fairly calm. I had no wish to look through my notes. I had no wish to do anything further until the moment came for me to speak. In any case, I didn’t feel I needed to.

This was a new sensation for me. I had always arrived breathless at important appointments, in my studies, my work or anything else. I had always left things until the last moment, the last night, the last revision; and afterwards I had always had the feeling of having stolen something and got away with it. I had managed
to cheat the world yet again. Yet again they hadn’t managed to catch me out, but within myself I knew I was an impostor. Sooner or later someone would find me out. Sure to.