The Deliverance of Evil (27 page)

“Let’s talk about the letter E,” Floris said. “And about the R, naturally.”

Pasquali straightened the knot in his tie. He must have already weighed the political pros and cons.

“We should reopen the Samantha Rossi investigation, which was never officially closed anyway,” he said, as if this were the truth. “But no press and no official link between the two cases.”

“The E on Nadia will get out—it was pretty visible. Anyone who was there when she was pulled out of the well saw it, and everyone in Forensics,” Balistreri said.

“But no one knows about the R in the Rossi case. And who says they’re linked?” Pasquali replied.

“We have the same M.O.,” Balistreri said. “The guilty Roma served up on a platter and another person who disappears.”

“Are you saying there’s some kind of plot against the Roma?” Pasquali asked sarcastically.

“Apart from the Roma, we have a serial killer who carves initials on his victims. First an R, then an E. Maybe he’s writing a word,” the chief said.

“There are major differences between the two crimes,” Pasquali said.

Balistreri preferred to let this theory run its course without any rebuttals from him.

“Differences in the modus operandi,” Pasquali continued. “Samantha was attacked and raped by persons unknown to her. Nadia got into the car of a person she knew and went of her own free will to have sex with a Roma shepherd. That’s assuming the autopsy doesn’t reveal any violence.”

“There’s another difference,” Balistreri said. “Samantha Rossi was an Italian student, and Nadia was a Romanian prostitute.”

“Exactly,” Pasquali said. “They could be two unrelated cases and the letters purely a coincidence. Or else the three Roma boys in the first case knew this Vasile and they told him how they’d murdered a girl and carved a letter on her before we arrested them. And then he imitated what they did.”

Balistreri shook his head. “Vasile’s only been in Italy since September, and the three Roma in the Rossi case were in prison by August.”

“When you interrogate Vasile more thoroughly, you can determine whether he made it all up,” Pasquali said. “This story of lending his car sounds like fiction. He picked up Nadia for sex and instead of paying her, he threw her down the well. The end.”

“Except for the E carved into her forehead,” Balistreri said.

Pasquali got up. “We’ll put out a short press release in the early afternoon that doesn’t mention the letter. It’s not a high-profile case. A Romanian prostitute, a Roma shepherd. We have everything—let’s close the case there. Officially. But unofficially we’ll continue investigating the Samantha Rossi case.”

It was a reasonable solution. It could even hold up if the letters were kept secret.

And if the murderer had finished writing.

. . . .

Corvu had called Piccolo and told her about Nadia. She related the story to Rudi. He cried for a long time. Then he got up and prepared a cool compress for her.

Piccolo was lying on the sofa in her pajamas. She had a high temperature. It was hot in the living room, and Rudi insisted on opening a window to let in fresh air.

He placed a compress on her forehead.

“I’ll squeeze some more fresh orange juice for you,” he told her. He’d been taking care of her since she returned that night; they had grown closer than ever.

“You’ve already made me two glasses.”

“You have to drink. Liquids and vitamins.”

“I haven’t tasted the lentils you made for New Year’s Eve yet,” she said weakly.

“Nor the boiled sausage that goes with them. But tonight you’ll feel better and then . . .”

“I’ve messed up for two nights running, one after the other, doing really crazy things.”

“Well, all things come in threes. Today you’re not going out, so you can do crazy things at home, if you want.”

She recognized a slight hint and was surprised to feel a certain pleasure.

Dim midmorning light filtered in from outside. Piccolo didn’t want the lights on—they hurt her eyes. Rudi was sitting on the floor at the foot of the sofa. He hadn’t gathered his hair into a ponytail and he looked even more handsome than usual: slim, angelic, and kind. But still frightened.

“If you know anything, you should tell me, Rudi. Help us find the person who did this to Nadia.”

He shook his head. He was trembling. They heard the first muffled sounds of people waking after New Year’s Eve. Chairs moved in the apartment above. There were voices, a television being switched on. While the world was waking to the new year, Piccolo finally began to drift off to sleep.

But then Rudi began to talk. His voice sounded distant, as if it, too, came from one of the neighboring apartments. “Mircea and Greg were in Ramona’s room. They were yelling at her, pushing her around. I was in bed, scared out of my wits. I could hear they wanted something from her, but I couldn’t understand what. Then Mircea came to get me.”

Piccolo’s head stopped throbbing, and she felt a little less weak.

“Ramona was crying. The room was a mess. Greg said that if she didn’t help them, they’d take it out on me, but she begged them to leave me alone and promised she’d do anything she could. But she didn’t have what they wanted. So Mircea went to get the broom.”

Piccolo felt him take her hand. Half asleep, she heard him still talking, now closer. He went on for a long time, lying next to her. Then she began to feel his light breath on the end of her nose, his lips brushing against hers. She became aware that it was her very own hand that was guiding Rudi’s under the elastic of her pajama bottoms, then lower down inside her underwear. Then everything became mixed up in her sleep.

The last man who had tried to touch her had been that guy at school. He’d been awkward and rough. Rudi was the exact opposite.

The violence of that time, all the violence of all the men in the world, faded, and she melted under those delicately exploring fingers. She gave into the pleasure, and it grew more intense and unstoppable.

When she woke many hours later, her fever had broken.

. . . .

Balistreri knew the Samantha Rossi file by heart—every name, every photograph, every timeline. But he wanted to read it again now that he’d seen the E on Nadia’s forehead. He opened the window to fresh air, silence, rain.

First, the autopsy. Multiple blows to the body and sexual violence. Then strangulation. Then the incisions. He lingered over the description of the actions that had been the cause of her death. Prolonged pressure at the base of her neck. Thumbprints. Strong hands with firm and deadly intent.

He moved on to the confession made by the three young Roma men. They had come to the bar early and only had money for beer. Inside the club, coming out of the bathroom, they met a man. He spoke Italian and was rolling in money, but he had no friends and wanted to have some fun. He’d given them a hundred-euro note so they could drink to his health. Then he disappeared and they drank like fish for an hour. At a certain point he showed up again. He led them into the men’s room to do some coke. They lost sight of each other and then at a quarter to ten he was at the entrance to the bar. He called them over. “Let’s get some women,” he said.

They thought he meant to pay for some whores to go along with the booze and the coke, so they eagerly went with him. As soon as they were outside, the fourth man offered everyone more cocaine. Then a girl ran toward them. The piazza was empty; there was no one at the bus stop. He grabbed the girl. They helped him drag her into the bushes as the bus went past. He delivered a sharp blow to her head and knocked her out. They threw her into the dump. He passed around a bottle of whiskey. Then the girl came to, and they began to beat her. None of the Roma could say exactly what they or the fourth man had done. One of the three said that he’d stood off to the side, watching and smoking. When the girl fainted again, he was no longer there. They went back to their trailer. They didn’t even remember taking the bracelet, never mind carving the R on the girl’s back. They’d been given a handwriting test. None of the three could read or write.

Balistreri moved on to the part that interested him more: the identikit of the fourth man. Unfortunately, the three Roma had supplied only vague details. Indistinct features, long straight hair over forehead and cheeks, hat, large glasses. They were even more confused when it came to his height: one said medium, another very tall.

He looked at the picture. It could have been anyone. The hair was probably a wig, the glasses too large. Like the hat and sunglasses worn by the driver on Via di Torricola.

He reread the last part of the description. The fourth man hit Samantha Rossi first, but then he moved aside, falling further back into the dark shadows until he disappeared altogether.

Vasile the shepherd had said the same thing about the man who’d borrowed his Giulia GT. The man who’d sent Nadia to him along with two bottles of whiskey. Two very similar men. Or else they were one and the same.

The thoughts clashed with one another in the mix of facts. It was useless trying to find the end of the thread to untie all the knots—the tangle seemed too complicated.

While he waited, Balistreri drank water and listened to music, shut in the silence of his office in the early morning. He was waiting for inspiration.

Sure enough, a thought began to take shape slowly in his head: the Invisible Man.

. . . .

Balistreri walked by just before lunch. He saw Linda Nardi coming out of the newspaper offices. She looked well rested, as if she’d gone to bed very early, skipping the festivities. Perhaps after reading a good book and sipping a cup of herbal tea.

“I was just going to have coffee across the street,” Balistreri lied shamelessly.

She didn’t seem to realize it was a lie, nor was she angry with him. Instead, she seemed happy to see him, as if that contentious dinner had never happened. But she was still extremely polite.

“I heard about it on the radio a little while ago,” she said bluntly.

“The newspapers published the details of the vehicle we were looking for, and Colajacono received an anonymous call about the Giulia GT.”

Linda Nardi stared in silence.

“I’m happy to give you some answers. I said I would, in return for your calling Pasquali.”

She asked “Who is Marius Hagi?”

That wasn’t the question he’d been expecting. He was quiet for a moment. Then he told her about Hagi, Greg, Mircea, and Nadia.

She listened without saying a word. When he was finished, she posed another unexpected question.

“When did Hagi’s wife, Alina, die?”

“In 1983,” he replied. He had no idea what was behind her questions, but he liked talking to her. It was like walking on a thin sheet of ice toward the gates of paradise.

Linda Nardi traced the line of a drop of coffee with her finger on the steel counter. He watched her as if she were a fairy that had stepped out of a children’s book.

Afternoon

Corvu must have had time to relax; he was dressed casually, a dark-green shirt hanging out of his jeans and a good amount of gel holding his short black hair in place.

When Coppola saw him, he started to whistle the theme from
Love Story,
and Corvu gave him a fierce look. They were sitting at the table in Balistreri’s office.

Mastroianni was recounting all the details of his talk with Ramona.

“What did she tell you about the bachelor pad where she took the distinguished-looking customer?” Balistreri asked.

“In what sense?” Mastroianni asked.

The guy was handsome, but he wasn’t as quick as Balistreri would have liked. Or maybe he was just jaded by his many years on the job. “The bedroom, Mastroianni. Where was it? How was it set up?”

“She told me there were sex toys, dildos, whips, handcuffs, a big mirror on the ceiling.”

No, you couldn’t trust him. Unless I’m the one who’s too much of an expert in these things. A mirror on the ceiling, a video camera.

Mastroianni went on. “Then I went from Iasi to Galati to check on Mircea and Greg. They have serious records. Premeditated double homicide.”

“Who did they try to kill?” Corvu asked.

“Two retired ministry officials. A couple of friends who were former colleagues. They’d bought a small farm outside Galati with their severance and their pension. They went to the market one day and sold thirty lambs for cash. Our two suspects attacked them on the way back to their farm with the intent to rob them. The two retirees put up a fight, and the other two simply cut their throats. A witness saw them walking away from the farm just after the crime. They were arrested, but two days later a high-profile Romanian lawyer took on their case. He got them released from custody and their passports were returned. After that, the charges against them were dropped.”

“I take it we don’t have any idea who paid this lawyer,” Corvu said.

“No idea,” Mastroianni said.

Corvu said, “There are more pressing issues anyway. First an R, now an E. What if that’s only the beginning?”

“But they might not be related. Samantha Rossi was a respectable Italian student; the other victim was some Eastern European whore,” Coppola said.

“Aren’t you ashamed of what you’ve just said?” exploded Corvu, stammering with emotion.

Balistreri decided it was time to end the meeting.

Evening

He kept imagining conversations in which they spoke different and incomprehensible languages, but where she understood everything and he nothing.

A different level of understanding. A level that I recognize and that scares me. That of total trust.

In order not to think about Linda Nardi, he made a decision.

“Margherita, today is New Year’s Day and I don’t want to eat dinner alone.”

She hesitated for a moment, but then her innate trust and desire to please prevailed.

“Thank you, Captain. It would be an honor to have dinner with you.”

He took her to a well-known and crowded little restaurant near Piazza Fontana di Trevi. Margherita kept on calling him “sir.” She certainly had no fears about her old boss coming on to her after dinner.

At one time I’d have had her in my Duetto as soon as we came out of the restaurant, or perhaps already on the way there and saving on the money for dinner.