The Deliverance of Evil (36 page)

Tuesday, July 11, 2006

Morning

H
E HAD WAITED TOO
long to make the visit. It was Giovanna Sordi’s suicide that spurred him on to make it.

You can at least ask to be forgiven
.

Linda offered to drive. It took less time to get from Rome to the outskirts of Naples than from there to the center of the city. Balistreri took advantage of the delay to read the newspapers, avoiding the sea of articles on the World Cup triumph. Several newspapers remarked on how most immigrants joined in celebrating Italy’s victory, as if that made them worthy of living there. Such was soccer’s power.

Linda drove calmly through hellish traffic in Naples while Balistreri hurled curses at the cars beeping at them for stopping at red lights. The city was even more strewn with flags than Rome, and hordes of people were spilling out everywhere. They had told Lucia Coppola they would arrive in the morning, but it was almost one o’clock by the time they got there.

The apartment was small, but the entire bay was visible from its balcony. “It belongs to my parents,” Lucia explained as she welcomed them in. “They’re on vacation in Capri.”

She was a good-looking woman, much better-looking than Coppola had been, and much taller. Inside, there were photographs of Coppola everywhere: photos of him with Lucia in high school, on their wedding day, on vacation, with handsome Ciro getting taller at every stage. Lucia was calm and relaxed, as if Coppola would be home from work at the end of the day. She showed them a photo she’d taken when they’d celebrated Giulia Piccolo’s entry into the team. On the steps outside the offices, Balistreri was standing in the middle with Piccolo, Corvu, and Mastroianni, while Coppola was perched on the step above.

The table in the shady part of the balcony was set for four. The wonderful smell of pasta sauce and fresh basil drew Balistreri into the kitchen.

“Ciro’s at practice; he’ll be home any minute,” Lucia told him.

Lucia and Linda were stirring the pasta when Balistreri heard a key in the door. He had prepared something to say, but he found words failed him when Ciro entered. The lanky teenager spoke first. He shook Balistreri’s hand and said “My father found fault with everyone, but never with you.”

At the table they talked about Italy’s victory and the incredible fireworks display that had lit up the bay. Then Ciro told them about his successful trial period with the Naples basketball team. He would be starting on the team the following year.

“And school?” Balistreri asked, remembering Coppola’s fixation with his son finishing high school and going on to study law.

Ciro’s eyes sought his mother’s. Lucia said, “It’s been a difficult year, but he’ll make it up.”

After coffee, Lucia and Linda started to clear the dishes and Balistreri went along to Ciro’s room. It was full of posters of star players and singers. Above the bed was an extraordinary photo of Coppola in a basketball uniform, completing a three-point shot at the hoop.

“He wasn’t a bad player,” Ciro said. “When he was young, he was a decent point guard.”

They sat on the edge of the bed, one already an old man, the other still a boy. Without saying a word, they stared for a while at the photo that said so much. Then Ciro spoke. “My mother says you were absolutely not to blame.”

Balistreri had no idea what to say.

The boy went on, smiling at him. “You were wounded going to help my dad.”

Coming to Naples, he’d sworn to himself that he wouldn’t tell this kid what violence could mean. But that photo changed things. He told him that his father had emerged from cover to save his life, rolling on the ground like a cop in the movies, and had scored a bull’s-eye on the man who was about to kill him. He told him that they’d only succeeded in stopping him by hitting him in the back. Ciro’s eyes glowed with pride.

As they were saying their good-byes, Ciro brought him a small flat packet. “Papa kept a calendar of his appointments at work—they gave it to us with his things. I want you to have it.”

Looking at this gentle boy who would no longer have a father to applaud him as he scored three-pointers or praise his high grades, he felt a cold rage rising inside him—the rage he’d tried to put behind him and forget after that January night on the hillside outside Vasile’s house. He feared that in twenty-four years, Lucia and Ciro still be waiting for justice, just like Giovanna Sordi.

Evening

When they arrived back at Linda’s apartment, Balistreri opened Detective Coppola’s diary while he drank a little white wine on the terrace and watched the sunset. As usual, Linda drank water and seemed lost in distant thoughts.

Coppola was a stickler for detail. Under each day he noted times and events. It was his diary for 2006, so it was new, yet in three days a good deal had happened. The last note was for 8:00 p.m. on January 4, jotted down immediately after he’d been sent to keep an eye on Colajacono.

Tell B. about Carmen. Call Cabot again. I spoke to Carmen again and something new came up.

Those had been Coppola’s last words as he’d left Balistreri’s office on that wretched evening. At the back of the diary were phone numbers. Balistreri immediately found the one he wanted. Still angry at the thought of Ciro and Lucia alone in that apartment, he dialed it immediately on his personal cell phone.

A foreign voice answered on the first ring. “Carmen speaking.”

“Good evening. This is Balistreri from the police. I worked with Detective Coppola.”

“I know who you are,” the woman said. “The papers mentioned you a lot a few months ago. I’m sorry about Coppola.”

“Thank you. Look, I could use your help. Coppola came to see you the day he died.”

“He did. I remember he told me his son had a basketball game that evening.”

“Right. Unfortunately he didn’t have time to report what you talked about.”

“I’m happy to help, but it’s been a while. Anyway, nothing new came out.”

Linda was listening in silence.

“Please bear with me and try to remember. I’d asked him to go over with you the phone call your boyfriend made to you that night, before the . . . before he was . . .”

“Before that bastard on the motorcycle killed him,” she said.

“I wanted to be sure about the times.”

“I’ve told you the same thing a thousand times. He called me at two forty five. It shows up on my cell phone records and his. He called to tell me how he was feeling. He said he had to urinate a lot, but he didn’t seem to have a temperature. I asked him if it was a quiet night. He said it was, then he told me about this fool who’d gone past on a motorcycle and insulted him for no reason.”

“And you asked him if he’d had any other problems with this guy?”

“I asked him, but he said nothing else had happened that night.”

“Then what did he say to you?”

“Nothing. I can’t recall anything else.”

“The call lasted two and a half minutes. Did he describe the motorcyclist to you?”

A moment of confusion. “No, Coppola asked me that last time. Papa just said the guy was wearing a full-face helmet and it was strange.”

“How could he see something was strange about the guy if he was wearing a full-face helmet?”

“It wasn’t the rider who was strange. It was the bike.”

“Strange? How do you mean?”

“He only said it was strange. Nothing else. And that the man was wearing a full-face helmet.”

Balistreri said good-bye to Carmen and started to think. He quickly found the summary of Coppola’s questioning of Fred Cabot on his BlackBerry. Rereading it, he realized it was highly condensed. Coppola had probably had difficulties with the language and had summarized a good bit. Cabot had spoken of a motorcyclist with a helmet and a big bike, one that was easy to handle and fast. That was a pretty full description. Either Coppola was exaggerating, or Cabot was a motorcycle enthusiast. He turned to the diary’s last page. There were two numbers for Cabot, a landline and a cell phone. He picked one and dialed.

Cabot was a little confused at first, but he got up to speed quickly. Apparently the American newspapers had reported on the shooting of Balistreri and the deaths on January 4.

“I’m sorry about your guy. He was a good man.”

“Thanks, Mr. Cabot. I just need to clarify something with you. In your conversation with Coppola you described the rider and the motorcycle, but Coppola translated it into Italian. Could you tell me what you originally said in English?”

A little embarrassed, Cabot explained Coppola’s misunderstanding about a prostitute and a gay.

Balistreri couldn’t help smiling quietly.

“Why did you say queer?” he asked.

“I said the whole thing was strange,” he recalled.

There was that word again. “The rider or the bike?” Balistreri asked.

“I was thinking of the bike, not the rider. You see, I love motorcycles—I collect them.”

An expert, so the description was based on something more than just a simple impression.

“You said the bike was big, easy to handle, and speedy.”

“No, no. It was easy and speedy, but it wasn’t big. The detective must have misunderstood me. I meant that it was an unusual bike for him to be riding.”

“Unusual in what way?” Balistreri asked, but then the truth dawned on him a second before Cabot’s voice spoke it from the other side of the world.

“Well, it was a motocross bike. I was surprised to see one in the middle of a city.”

. . . .

An evening breeze was blowing across the little terrace. Everything was as it had been for months. Yet everything was different, too.

“Linda, you asked me once about when Alina Hagi died . . .”

Linda was motionless, as if she were making a decision. She stared at St. Peter’s dome. The vertical crease ran down the middle of her forehead.

Balistreri remembered her two questions at the end of their first dinner.
What about the fourth man? What if he carves up another girl?

He couldn’t bear the silence any longer.

“Who told you about the carved letters?” he asked urgently.

“No one told me, Michele.”

“I don’t believe you.”

She stroked his hand. “Find the person who killed Nadia and Samantha and you’ll find the person who killed Coppola.”

Angry now, he jerked his hand away. “I’ll find out who it was and when I do I’m going to throw him in jail.”

She took the phrase in, as if it were confirmation of what she’d known for some time. Then she made a decision. She got up, went inside, and took a thick folder full of newspaper cuttings from a drawer.

Balistreri went over a little uncertainly. She held the folder out to him without saying a word. On it was written “For When You’re Well.”

Now that he was well, he could do what he wanted. But without her—that was the message.

“I’m not well, Linda.”

She shook her head as he left. “You have to heal yourself.”

Walking back to his own apartment, he thought about how she’d embraced him in the hospital, about the past months together, about the evening when he’d thought of kissing her and she had fallen asleep with her head on his shoulder, about the moped grease between his fingers.

There are no dreams without reality. There is no freedom without truth.

. . . .

Antonio Pasquali had taken a few days off and was relaxing in Tesano, his hometown, with his wife. His private cell phone vibrated briefly. He excused himself and went outside. When he heard the voice on the other end, he shivered with fear.

“Your friend has made two disturbing phone calls. There may be problems.”

They had tricked him, dragging him into something so disgusting that he couldn’t even have dreamed of it. He had believed he was serving his country better by helping them make sure an ex-Communist mayor lost the election, because he was convinced that the Communists could never change and with them in power Italy would be poorer and less free. But he had never imagined finding himself involved in anything like this and wouldn’t tolerate anymore deaths among his policemen, least of all Balistreri’s.

He gathered all the courage he could muster.

“Nothing drastic,” he whispered.

“I beg your pardon?” The voice appeared to be mocking him and threatening him at the same time.

He didn’t dare say anything more. It wouldn’t have helped. He had to make a quick decision, a different one that would satisfy Balistreri, putting him out of danger.

“Keep an eye on him,” said the voice, “and the woman, too. Don’t ever forget about that article.”

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Morning

C
ORVU’S RELATIONSHIP WITH NATALYA
was having a rejuvenating effect on him. He’d changed his haircut. He’d bought new clothes. Even his poker strategy these days was a little more daring and less analytical.

“Alberto says no poker game tomorrow. Angelo can’t make it.”

“All right,” Balistreri said.

He hadn’t slept a wink. He’d tossed and turned all night thinking of Linda and that voice on the hill that had announced Colajacono’s death. And a motocross bike.

“But Alberto’s still expecting you for dinner around eight thirty.”

“All right.”

It was the second “all right” that aroused Corvu’s suspicion.

“Are you okay, sir?”

Balistreri lit a cigarette, the first of his five for the day.

“Sit down, Corvu.”

That “sit down” left no room for doubt. Playtime was over.

Balistreri pointed to the blackboard. It was an old habit. Sometimes, when an investigation had stalled, he asked Corvu to set his analytical gifts in motion and write all the important details on this board, where they stayed until the investigation was over.

“You can start writing,” Balistreri said.

Corvu remained seated.

“What do you want me to write, sir?”

“Whatever you want. Details, questions, doubts,” Balistreri said.

Corvu found the courage to look him in the eye. “Up there? After Dubai you told me that—”

“We’ll keep the office locked.”

Corvu went hesitatingly up to the board. “Let’s do it like this,” said Balistreri to encourage him. “Let’s put down an exhaustive list of questions, along with any doubts. You do one, I’ll do another, until we can’t think of any more. We’ll write the answers next to them as soon as we know them.”

“What does the letter R mean? And E? Does it come after?” began Balistreri.

As he wrote this down, Corvu found renewed confidence and energy. They went on with growing enthusiasm for two hours. The blackboard was very large and Corvu’s writing was tiny. By the end they were exhausted.

. . . .

What does the letter R mean? And E? Does it come after?

Why did Colajacono want to stand in for Marchese and Cutugno? Because he knew that Ramona might come in about Nadia.

And how did he know that? Mircea told him.

Why was Colajacono already dog-tired on the morning of December 24?

Why did Ramona offer her services to deputy mayor Augusto De Rossi? In order to blackmail him and make him change his vote.

Who blackmailed him? Mircea and Colajacono.

On behalf of whom and why?

Is there an Invisible Man in the Samantha Rossi case? Who is he? There is, but we don’t know who he is.

Is he the same person who phoned Vasile to ask for the Giulia GT?

When was the Giulia GT’s headlight broken?

Where was Hagi between six and seven on the evening of December 24 when Nadia was taken away? And then after nine?

Same question for Colajacono and Ajello.

Where was Hagi the night Coppola and the others died?

Same question for Ajello.

Were Mircea and Greg guilty of murder in Romania? And who were the two victims?

How did Alina Hagi die in January 1983?

Why did Colajacono want Tatò with him, even though he knew he intended to spend time with his sister?

Why did the Giulia GT slow down when the driver saw Natalya?

What was the relationship between Ornella Corona and Ajello and his son before her husband died?

Who suggested that she take out a life insurance policy on her husband?

How did Sandro Corona really die?

Why did Camarà die? Because he’d seen Nadia with someone in the private lounge on December 23.

Who owns ENT?

They decided not to write down the reply to the last question, nor to the question about the instigators of the Augusto De Rossi blackmail. The secret service would have been an inadequate reply, anyway. The question was who was behind it.

“For goodness sake,” said Corvu, looking at the blackboard. “With all the things we don’t know, it’s a miracle we’ve got any guilty parties in prison.”

“That’s assuming they’re really the guilty parties,” Balistreri said. “I’ve got two more questions to add, but I’d rather you didn’t write them down.”

“Why’s that?”

“Let’s just say I’m superstitious. The first is this: Where was Adrian’s bike on the evening of December 24 while he was at Casilino 900?”

Corvu looked at him. He paged through the statements made during questioning, then looked up again. “Why do we need to know that?”

“Because there are at least two things we don’t know, and I’d like you to find out the answers. Where was that bike on December 23 when Camarà was killed? And where was it on December 24 when Nadia was kidnapped and killed?”

“I still don’t get it. What does Adrian’s motocross bike have to do with a guy on a motorcycle outside Bella Blu?”

Balistreri told him about his conversations with Carmen and Cabot. Corvu frowned. A second connection between Nadia and Bella Blu. Bella Blu meant ENT. And ENT meant big trouble, as Balistreri himself had made clear.

“What’s the second question, sir?” he asked.

“There are too many invisible men in this case. The one who had the bike is the easiest one to find.”

“Right. What do you want me to do?”

“Get ready to find the answers to these questions, except for the questions about ENT and Alina Hagi—I’ll take care of those. And send Margherita in.”

Corvu looked down, not meeting his eye. “Yesterday when you were in Naples she asked me if she could take the rest of the week off and I gave it to her.”

“Is she okay?”

“Yes. I think she and Angelo are going away together.”

Afternoon

The death toll from mopeds was seemingly infinite. No one gave a damn except the victims’ parents. Everyone said that mopeds had been Rome’s salvation, and that without them traffic would have ground to a halt twenty years earlier. The center could have been turned into a pedestrian-only area, but store owners wouldn’t hear of it. Government offices could have been moved out to the outskirts, but public employees wouldn’t hear of it. The roads could have been better maintained and the cobblestones paved over so that moped riders didn’t bounce around as if they were in a pinball machine, but historic preservationists wouldn’t hear of it. And so the death toll climbed higher.

Alina Hagi was just one of the countless victims. In Rome, a moped accident that cost a twenty-year-old her life was a purely routine case. Her accident might have had a few more details because it had been her uncle, Monsignor Lato, who filed the report, but there wasn’t even a photo of her stapled to it. She’d died on a rainy night in January 1983, shortly after ten o’clock. Many witnesses saw her take the curve around the Colosseum at top speed, hit a hole in the road, swerve off to the side, and crash into a plane tree. Helmets weren’t yet mandatory then, and she wasn’t wearing one. No one had cut her off, and nothing unusual had occurred.

Balistreri read Monsignor Lato’s statement, which the monsignor had later retracted. He said that a few days earlier Alina’s arms had been covered in bruises. One of Alina’s friends had told him that after the girl’s funeral. However, there was no direct link between those bruises and the accident, and after a month Monsignor Lato regretted that he had mentioned it.

Linda Nardi’s question nagged at him.
When did Alina die?

The one-way roundabout suggested that Alina was coming from home and going somewhere in the dark after ten on a rainy January night, riding a moped at idiotically high speed. And Alina Hagi by all accounts had been an exceptionally sensible young woman, well-mannered, religious, and with a good head on her shoulders.

. . . .

He called Angelo many times that day, but his cell phone was always off.

He called Corvu and told him to track down Monsignor Lato. Corvu told him that he’d organized the investigation and set it in motion and that Piccolo was ready to jump in again. That enthusiasm worried Balistreri. The last thing he needed was a mountain of muscle ready to avenge wrongs against women.

The desire to call Linda came over him in waves, but he resisted. Not out of pride—there was no tug-of-war between them—but for a better reason: secrets are a barrier against complicity.

He spent hour after hour at his desk. He read all the statements again on his computer, then the list of questions on the blackboard. He knew that the solution was there in the answers to those questions. He read the first one again.

What does the letter R mean? And the E? What comes next?

When did Alina die?

Linda’s question bounced around in his head.

When? Why “when” and not “how”?

. . . .

Corvu called him around nine o’clock while he was walking home, alone, without Linda for the first time in many months.

“Monsignor Lato went back to Poland ten years ago. But he’s alive and well, and I dug up his phone number.”

“Excellent. You’re still managing to get some work done.” Corvu didn’t catch his drift.

“I also contacted a friend of mine at the Vatican and found out where Alina Hagi worked. I sent you an e-mail about that.”

“Good work.”

“One more thing, sir. Natalya and I are going out for a pizza. Would you and Linda like to join us?”

“No, thanks. Not tonight.”

He ended the conversation with Corvu. Now the desire to call Linda was irresistible.

Corvu’s e-mail was very short. It began with the Monsignor’s phone number in Poland and then noted in the driest terms that in 1982, Alina Hagi had worked in the San Valente parish on the Via Aurelia Antica.

I did it, memory says. I couldn’t have done it, says pride. In the end, memory relents.

. . . .

Linda Nardi was looking beyond St. Peter’s toward the river that now separated them.

She had tried with all her might to convince herself that he could understand or at least accept it.

But that wasn’t the case. She knew that very well now, from that evening on the terrace. She spoke to her mother. She made the necessary phone call.