The Second Life of Inspector Canessa Page 2

  Astroni’s linguistic musings had been inspired by the work he was doing on that warm, bright morning in Milan. So, he went back to his paperwork and took out the Tippex to remove the adjective indissoluble. He really didn’t like it. He grabbed the thesaurus and opted for indivisible, which was a better fit for the theory he was trying to get across: a real leader exercises power and doesn’t manage it; therefore, crucial decisions cannot be shared, or even worse, delegated. They fall on one person; therefore, one person had to be guilty.

  Judge Astroni wrote his statements, speeches, and talks on the computer (well, he didn’t, his team did), later editing them by hand, polishing them with his enormous, black, phallic Montblanc and its silver tip. It was a precious gift from a Milan aristocrat. He made frequent visits to her salons, and cautious ones to her bed. ‘So when you send all those people to the stake,’ she’d told him with melodramatic flair, ‘I’ll be pleased to know I have a part in it.’

  She was an attractive fifty-year-old. Back in the 70s she’d taken on the revolutionary aesthetic along with so many others. They’d marched around Italy wearing colourful fake jewellery, shapeless jumpers, long skirts, messy hair. Sworn enemies of cleanliness and tidiness, they now sought the priciest beauty salons. They were worse than the men, more extreme. They took part in assemblies, marches, okkupations, convinced that they were history’s heroes, instead of realising that it was a phase, a hobby, something they’d drop as they might drop fishing, crochet, restoring old furniture or yoga. Which is exactly what had happened. Admittedly, some of them stayed true to their youthful ideals, some to the clothing or the infrequent showers and baths. But they’d long since left the squats and communes in favour of mansion blocks and flats, the nice comfy houses their families could afford.

  He smiled. In those days, Astroni would’ve pushed her away: he had actually tried bringing about the revolution. He hadn’t just played a part. He truly wanted to believe that his struggle had not changed – the times had. And with them, above all, the means. He would never have thought back then that the State would be on his side, the same institutions he’d dreamt of overthrowing and was now serving, supported by adoring masses he wholeheartedly despised.

  So he’d included her in his invisible harem, which everyone knew about, including the journalists at the courts of law, but no one was brave enough to reveal – one or two out of respect, but most out of fear. Because he was Judge Federico Astroni, the Office’s former enfant prodige, the protégé of the prosecutor himself. The real leader of the group, the best read, the best prepared, the man who had ‘fucked’ everyone (horrible phrase, but he did enjoy its crudeness), who broke the law, politicians, business people, small fry and big cheese in public office, political parties and private companies.

  Playing both accuser and judge, he’d forgiven a few of those he’d led to his office in handcuffs blubbing, waving photos of their young children, old mothers, widows, and telling him of terminal illnesses in an appeal to his sentimentality. Others he’d simply destroyed, even for the smallest of sins. It depended on his role, the situation, sometimes a spur-of-the-moment thing. But there was one thing above all others that really sparked his cold, determined rage: resistance. That was the reason he had wanted to drag to court – successfully, too – the leader of the biggest opposition party, the only one who hadn’t come crawling but had challenged him outright, in public, claiming political persecution, calling him a ‘terrorist’, setting his journalist friends on him, taking refuge in private TV studios. Maybe Judge Astroni had started his investigation because he saw the remains of the country’s toxic politics, an enemy of his own ideas and what he believed he stood for. But later, it was no longer for that reason. Even if he’d never admit as much, it had turned into pure, visceral hatred. It was personal. Me or him. Sure, the wealthy politician had some faults, but nothing that warranted that amount of effort or attention.

  Everything in his life had led up to this, and it would destroy him in the end.

  He recalled another man he’d hated in the same way, though for different reasons. He dismissed the memory, drank his coffee and headed over to the window.

  Because of him, no one could park outside his apartment building, which was located in a square in the city centre. At the height of the corruption investigation, when the names of the presiding magistrates were on everyone’s lips and everyone saw them at home thanks to the papers and TV, talk shows, and live court reports, one of his neighbours had practically knelt before him on the street: ‘For you, I’d park my car in Beijing, even give you my home.’

  That kneeling man was now behind a petition lying on a table at the building’s entrance, where the post accumulated. Essentially, they were requesting that life return to normal: no bans (especially the no-parking ban), no security checks, no more heavy police presence. If his safety was truly at stake, why didn’t he get out of there? They were tired of the tight security and having to park some blocks away.

  He’d have felt disheartened if he had built his beliefs, convictions and work around these people. Serve the masses? Nonsense. Luckily, everything he’d done had been for his own benefit.

  Astroni felt good. His reflection in the window showed a tall man with thick, curly hair. Behind golden glasses (used only for reading, since his sight was pretty good otherwise) were the eyes he’d inherited from his father, a royal magistrate removed from his post for refusing to join the fascist party. Happily, the family had enough money for that not to have been a problem.

  Downstairs were two parked cars, his own and the escort’s. One of the Carabinieri was leaning against the car, his gaze focused, scanning the rooftops. Their eyes met. The judge waved and the Carabiniere replied with a slight nod. Another loyal subject, chosen after many attempts.

  But just then, a shadow fell over the bright day, the working weekend ahead of him and his general optimism. That wave had brought back some bad memories, even worse feelings. For someone who boasted an ability to predict almost anything, seeing that face on the way out of the courts two weeks earlier had been a real surprise. They’d been in the car at a red light – he didn’t like using sirens to weave through the streets unless it was actually necessary. ‘Impossible,’ he’d thought, and looked again. The person he’d glimpsed had vanished: perhaps a mirage, or if it actually had been him, just a coincidence. Milan was a big city. He could’ve been there for any reason at all. But then, the following Saturday, he’d headed into the office to pick up some missing paperwork, and there he was again, in the same spot: no crowd this time, so he couldn’t be wrong. He’d even used binoculars to make sure. There he was, on the paved area in front of the church of San Pietro in Gessate. He was alone, hands in his jacket pockets, thin grey hair, his icy blue eyes staring at the courts – and almost directly at him, even though it wasn’t actually possible from so far away. He was unmistakable, despite the years carved into his face. He’d casually looked into his current situation. No, there was no reason for him to be here, reawakening an old nightmare.

  So he’d dialled a number with a heavy heart, and spoken with an even heavier heart to another ghost from the past, the legacy of a time he had erased from his life. Reservations had almost held him back: even touching the phone irritated him. But having talked to him and listened to him, he felt better.

  3

  Rocco finished his third Coke and threw the empty can into a non-recyclable plastic bag at his feet. In any other situation, he wouldn’t have hesitated to chuck it out the window, without a care for the city’s cleanliness or decorum, or onto the back seat. But he didn’t want to risk leaving any traces behind. Coke was his addiction, maybe because he’d always been too poor to buy it as a kid, and the colourful adverts full of happy people and jingles had made it even more of a success symbol. Now he drank litres of it every day.

  Rocco had little regard for the police, especially forensics (‘We’re not on CSI, mate�
��) and he didn’t even believe in DNA testing (‘Anything can be disproved in this country’). But better not to leave anything lying around. He suddenly belched long and hard, before turning his fierce grin on the man in the driver’s seat of the blue Astra. They were parked in via Cappellini, on the corner of Vittor Pisani.

  Nando Panattoni looked at Rocco in disgust, pulled out his phone and punched in a number. ‘Train here yet?’ he asked.

  ‘Two minutes,’ chirped the voice of his assistant Carletti. It was drowned out by the announcement of a freight train entering the station. ‘The fast train is right on time.’

  Panattoni glanced at the silent, empty street, and pulled on his baseball cap.

  ‘Don’t lose him. Try to follow those two when they meet up. I want to know what they’re saying to each other, so make good use of the mic. And don’t get caught.’ Nando put away the phone. He wouldn’t fail. This was the toughest, most delicate task of his life, his turning point. No more dirty jobs or secret missions. It was risky, but he had made up his mind; he couldn’t put up with that shit any more.

  ‘On your marks,’ he barked. Rocco looked at him, on the verge of replying to orders with some obnoxious profanity. Instead, he tilted his head slightly and patted the tennis bag on his lap. There weren’t any rackets in it – he’d never played that ‘game for sissies’. Instead, there was a short-gripped AK-47, loaded, clean, and checked: 40 shiny 7.62 bullets he’d personally modified to hold an explosive charge at their tip.

  Nando Panattoni had met Rocco in his previous life, before he’d become a private investigator in a cushy office on via Bergamo in Milan, and was still a retired fascist enforcer, a former Lazio hooligan a little too old to beat up Rome fans (or anyone else, for that matter). He collected debts for a loan shark in Testaccio, a butcher who paid him in steaks and cuts of lamb. This one time, he’d had to pay a visit to a furniture maker in Formia who found himself priced out by the big furniture companies, the ones that were all the rage in the 80s. The ‘bastard’ – as the loan shark inevitably called all of his customers – had made the mistake of seeking out the butcher, but hadn’t paid him by the deadline. Despite repaying more than double the amount he’d borrowed, he hadn’t been able to pay the remaining interest, which meant there was no chance his debt would be cancelled.

  And so the ‘bastard’ had called the butcher to say he considered the matter settled. Thanks, see you later. ‘Mate, you gotta break his legs,’ the butcher had ordered Panattoni, wrapping up a hundred quid’s worth of ribs. ‘Tasty, need cookin’ Milan style, bit o’ rocket, coupla tomatoes on top.’ Panattoni had taken his third-hand Fiat 128 (a car that struggled with first gear, and outright ignored second) and driven to the outskirts of Formia with some friends who needed the extra cash. When the furniture maker came out in the dark, Panattoni and his friends blocked his path. Just then, a skinny guy jumped out from behind the ‘bastard’ brandishing a butterfly knife. Twirling it around, up and down, left and right. It was hypnotising.

  ‘Who the fuck are you?’ Panattoni had asked.

  ‘My bodyguard,’ the furniture man replied. He was small and ugly. Scary, and suddenly smug.

  ‘This punk?’ said one of Panattoni’s grunts. But his comment stuck in his throat as Rocco plunged the knife into his leg. At the sight of his friend on the ground, his calf oozing blood, the other man fled the scene. Rocco stared at Panattoni, daring him to follow suit, but Panattoni just stood there.

  ‘How much is this bastard paying you?’

  The question threw the kid off.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’ll double it.’

  Rocco gave him the first of many hideous grins and immediately switched sides. The furniture maker ended up with broken tibias and femurs.

  And so their partnership began. Panattoni would find and plan the jobs, Rocco would execute them. Intimidation, collections, a couple of extortions. Then the hits started, but Panattoni was only the go-between on those. He didn’t want to get directly involved in murder: petty crooks, loan shark victims who squealed too loud, nothing too dangerous. It was during the investigation of one of those crimes that he met his current employers. His existence had definitely improved, but over time he’d become increasingly uneasy. He moved to Milan, opened an investigative agency as a front and started working for his new bosses. He dealt with the dirty work as it got progressively dirtier. And it was all the more two-faced since the instigators were hiding behind a façade of respectable luxury. But there was money. Tons of money. Even more money for that last dirty job. At least, he hoped it would be his last.

  ‘This is it,’ he’d tell himself. ‘We’re going our own separate ways after this’. After all, they’d never been friends. Panattoni had stayed in Rome for a while before moving to Milan, and Rocco was still based in Naples. They used public phones, no mobiles, and only for work: rendezvous, timings, type of job. Harmless conversations, on the surface. No mention of their private lives, at least not from Nando.

  Rocco was different. He’d confessed everything about himself, starting with his nickname: his legal name was Ciro D’Alletto. ‘Rocco’ was after Rocco Siffredi, the porn star.

  ‘Is it a size thing?’ Panattoni had asked.

  ‘I wish,’ was the answer. His awful boorishness somehow hid sparks of humour, even self-deprecation. It was his gigantic collection of porn, initially videotapes, then DVDs that had earned him his nickname. ‘Rare stuff,’ he’d say. He spoke as a connoisseur, as if he held a selection of ceramics and not hardcore films of a very specific kind: extreme sex, violence, rapes. All fiction, ‘Except,’ he’d say, lowering his voice, ‘for a dozen originals, from the former Yugoslavia and Thailand.’ Snuff films, essentially. Though no one had ever seen them and very few of those privy to the fact believed that filth was real.

  The only tangible, objective fact was that Ciro D’Alletto, aka Rocco, was a serial offender, and he’d pounce on women as soon as he could. That’s why he had to be kept on a short leash, as Nando Panattoni had always explained to his employers, who were convinced that day trips would arouse suspicion. He insisted that Rocco had to arrive in the morning and leave in the evening – or night at the latest, on the sleeper train. Keeping him around for longer or putting him up overnight would create inevitable security breaches. He was a ticking bomb: he might attack a cleaning lady in a hotel, molest a roommate or, perhaps worse, brutalise a prostitute as soon as he was alone.

  Panattoni shook the thought away in disgust. The guy was a psychopathic maniac. Efficient, sure, but a psychopath nonetheless.

  Rocco lived in Secondigliano with his grandmother: no father to speak of, and his mother would surface every now and then from some brothel where she was working to support her addiction. But she’d only show up to scrounge a meal, a packet of biscuits, a bed.

  His first victim had been a twelve-year-old girl. That’s what had made him a killer. Or rather, that’s what had made him kill the first time. Panattoni was convinced that he’d have become a killer eventually no matter what. The girl lived in the building across from his, and their road was a type of Berlin wall, a border. Fewer than ten metres divided rampant crime and slums from honest, dignified poverty. On one side people lived in awful conditions by choice, on the other they survived with discipline, clean houses, and everyone had a small job somewhere. She was the daughter of an Alfa Romeo employee – a good man and a card-carrying communist, like his wife. They’d go round the neighbourhood on Sundays selling the party newspaper, and Rocco used their absence to get into their house and rape their daughter. Her father lost his mind. Instead of reporting Rocco, he’d waited for him at the front door and gave him such a beating that he landed him in hospital. Rocco was in a terrible condition. He ended up in traction and they removed his spleen. But he never revealed the name of his attacker, nor did the police ask for it. They couldn’t care less who’d beaten up that piec
e of human garbage. In fact, they might’ve congratulated him if they’d known.

  Rocco got out a couple of months later, and it took him three more to walk again. He waited. As soon as he thought he was ready, he stole a scooter and went to wait for the girl’s father in the employee car park of the Alfa factory. It was dusk, he was starting the night shift. Rocco approached with his hand out.

  ‘I’m not angry with you. You did what you had to do. In fact, you did the right thing. I deserved much worse.’

  The girl’s father, who’d been wary as soon as he saw Rocco, lowered his guard and took his hand. Without breaking eye contact, Rocco plunged a bread knife into his chest, twisting as he pushed it into his heart. The man collapsed in front of him without losing a drop of blood. Methodical.

  ‘The only one I ever killed for free,’ he’d cackled to Panattoni.

  As he thought of the girl and her father, murdered in a car park on a moonless night, Panattoni felt his phone vibrate through his shirt pocket.

  4

  Carla Trovati tossed and turned in her bed with a strange uneasiness. A sliver of light came in from the window on the other side of a wide room that effectively made up her entire flat, cleverly divided by screens and furniture. She looked at the clock: wake up, nyt never sleeps. The New York Times never sleeps, and tonight, neither did she – not after the evening before, which had ended her promise to herself: never get in bed with your managing editor.

  Her anger was keeping her from sleeping, but was it because she’d slept with the legendary Giulio Strozzi – or because she’d kicked him out? Main reporter for the Corriere della Sera, lead journalist on the Mani Pulite case that uncovered mass scale political corruption, official biographer, friend and confidant of Judge Federico Astroni. He’d found a perfect match in Astroni at the time of the case that had placed the DA’s office in Milan at the centre of the universe. Strozzi had climbed that ladder, and he would climb even higher: he was attractive to both women and men, especially the powerful and the rich. It was no secret at the paper that the higher-ups loved him more than his colleagues.