For All the Gold in the World (16 page)

Spezzafumo was no fool. He realized he'd gotten off on the wrong foot. “We could join forces,” he proposed.

“We wouldn't so much as have a cup of coffee with you guys, so forget about forging an alliance.”

“It would be in everybody's interest.”

“True,” I agreed. “But we don't want to have anything to do with people like you.”

“You're insulting me.”

“I'm glad to see you get my point.”

I heard him sigh. “You're shutting off all room for negotiation.”

“That only ever existed in your imagination.”

“There will be consequences.”

“At this point, I'm going to have to remind you of what Rossini said about your threats and ask you to back the fuck up. You know how it works.”

“Don't make me laugh. There are three of you, but the old man is the only one who counts for anything. You and the fatso are only good at blowing hot air. Either you give me all the information you have about those guys this very second or you'll pay for it dearly.”

I hung up and ordered another grappa. Nicola Spezzafumo was a poor idiot and there was no way to fix the mess he'd just made.

 

I went back to Padua. I found Max standing in line at an ice cream shop not far from home. He didn't know what flavor to get and it was impossible to get him to listen to me until he'd chosen between three types of vanilla and four types of chocolate.

Then he ate the ice cream in a hurry, chomping the cone down as well, to keep the heat from turning it to slush.

After an espresso and a cigarette, he declared himself ready to listen to me. “Be patient,” he said, excusing himself. “But sometimes, if I don't satisfy my nervous hunger, I can't think straight.”

Now I was suspicious: “What's happened?”

“The journalist, you know the one who reports on contractors?”

“She didn't give you the information.”

“No, she turned out to be very cute and very helpful.”

I immediately guessed what had happened. “So cute that you tried something and she sent you scurrying.”

My friend had an afflicted expression. “She said straight out that she didn't like obese people, whether male or female. She believes that excess fat is a symptom of slovenliness and weakness.”

“So what did you do?”

“I thanked her for the favor and left with my tail between my legs.”

“You didn't say anything back? She was needlessly nasty.”

Max sighed. “I know, but then and there she laid me out; it was as if she'd kicked me right in the balls. Luckily, in the freezer I found the usual pan of eggplant parmesan made by that sainted woman, Signorina Suello.”

“At least four generous portions.”

He put his arm around me. “Exactly. And then the ice cream, the espresso, the cigarette, and now when I get home I'll have a shot of something strong to help digest it all, and I'll be ready to examine our case without being distracted by my wounded ego.”

“But she was cute, at least?”

“Yes, she has an ass that, in spite of everything, continues to enjoy my most boundless admiration.”

 

Ludovico “Vick” Bellomo and Salvatore Adinolfi had met in Libya where they worked as bodyguards, protecting Italian businessmen for a Belgian company. They came from different backgrounds. Bellomo had served briefly in Afghanistan as well, while Adinolfi had spent a couple of years in Iraq.

They weren't well-known individuals and they'd never traveled in ideological circles. They seemed to be interested in just one thing: money. In fact, they'd both been fired without notice because, according to the woman Max got his information from, the two of them had attempted to loot one of their clients' houses.

“Fucking mercenaries, in other words,” I commented.

“If it hadn't been for them, Fecchio and Patanè would never have had the nerve to organize that home invasion.”

I, in turn, I brought my partner up-to-date on my friendly conversations with Gigliola Pescarotto and Nicola Spezzafumo.

“The woman tried to bump you off and the other one threatened you for the third time,” the fat man commented. “You know what's going to happen when Beniamino hears about it. The rules are clear; the widow will be spared because she has a little girl, but Spezzafumo is a dead man.”

“I know,” I said. “And since that's an indisputable fact in this mess—because you can't leave someone alive if he might decide without warning to pump you full of lead or else hire someone else to do it for him—let me suggest a potential solution to the case, factoring in that grim probability.”

The thought had occurred to me while I sat nursing my second grappa at the bar where I'd received Nick the Goldsmith's phone call.

The parties at odds had always reasoned per very specific criminal viewpoints, and it mattered little that a couple of civilians like Fecchio and Patanè, who claimed motives nobler than filthy lucre, were involved. To put an end to the feud, it was necessary to remain within the context of that twisted criminal logic.

In the underworld, when situations arise that threaten to end in a bloodbath, the thing to do, if possible, is arrange for negotiations that will at least limit the number of corpses. My plan called only for Spezzafumo's death, while Gigliola, Denis, and Giacomo could retire to private life, which, after all, is what they had already been ordered to do.

Now it was necessary to limit the damage on the other side, and the only way to do that was to create the conditions that would allow for dialogue. Unlike what most people might imagine, when rival gangs have a serious problem to resolve, they talk early and often before moving on to the mass slaughter option.

It didn't take much effort to talk Max into it, and I called Rossini, who was standing sentinel, guarding the boy's safety. “How's it going?” I asked.

“No sign of anyone.”

“I'd like to go back and have a chat with the father and son, but I need you to approve it.”

“Can you tell me anything more?”

“No.”

“What does Max say?”

“He's in agreement.”

“Then so am I. Do your best to come back in one piece.”

 

The Patanès' house had had its roof ripped off by the tornado. Huge plastic tarps covered the roof, now stripped of its terra-cotta tiles, until the construction workers could tend to it. A neighbor told me that they'd moved to a small house made available by the township of Dolo. It wasn't far away and it only took me a few minutes to find it. A small yard and a single-story building designed for the handicapped. As I approached the privet hedge surrounding the yard, I peeked into the kitchen where Signora Patanè was making dinner. I walked all the way around the house, but it seemed that the woman was alone just then.

I guessed that the father and son were out on their usual walk, and I waited for them, sitting in my car, continuing the therapy advised by Catfish with a piece of “contaminated blues” by the Funky Butt Brass Band.

I checked my cell phone for texts from Cora. Though I had my hands full with a situation that meant beginning to draw up a list of the soon-to-be dead, the jazz woman was still always on my mind. I wanted to see her, love her, wrap her in my arms and kiss her.

I was hopelessly in love. But I'd never uttered a word to convey that concept to her clearly. I was afraid I'd chase her away. She'd always been careful not to let slip a single word that would violate the code to which illicit lovers adhered. Strictly by the book, even though I was certain she liked me, a lot, and that she thought about me and desired me in return.

But we were both well aware that I had nothing to offer her. I was the lover she'd say goodbye to someday.

I pushed the off button on the stereo when I saw the wheelchair emerge from a narrow side street.

Father and son were walking in silence, faces strained with tension. Between their damaged home and the two former mercenaries on the run, they must not have been feeling very comfortable.

I got out of the car and headed toward them, putting on a nonchalance that I did not, in fact, possess.

As soon as Ferdinando saw me, he stopped pushing the wheelchair. They were both staring at me, with different expressions. Fear and contempt.

Lorenzo was a tough nut. He was convinced he had nothing to lose and maybe that was true.

“You should hear me out,” I said, showing them I wasn't hiding a recording device. “We want to give you a chance to find a way out.”

“Why such a magnanimous gesture?” the young man snickered.

“To limit the number of deaths and the general fallout from a gang war,” I explained, as if I were a broker explaining to a customer why it's in his interest to invest in the stock of a given company. “Bellomo and Adinolfi can eliminate some of your enemies, but then what are they going to do? Go back to pulling draft beers until someone walks into the Bad Boys Pub and rubs them out?”

I leveled my forefinger straight at Lorenzo, who seemed to have been seriously stunned by the fact that I knew the names of his accomplices. “You don't give a fuck about your parents. You've made that clear, but after them it'll be your turn. And you're wrong if you think they won't find a horrible way to make you die. There was an Albanian, once, a guy just like you, who acted like a smartass because he was convinced he had nothing to lose. He was a big enough asshole to besmirch the memory of a local boss's father. You know what they did to him? They locked him in a cellar full of starving rats. They heard him scream for days.”

Ferdinando Patanè gave in to the tension and sat down on the edge of a low wall. “I always said it would end badly,” he stammered in a broken voice.

“Shut up!” his son ordered. “I can't stand you when you act like this.”

“You have no chance of getting out alive,” I insisted. “The time has come to talk and find a solution.”

“Which would be?” Lorenzo finally made up his mind to ask, announcing a de facto surrender.

“Bellomo and Adinolfi, along with with Kevin Fecchio, raped, tortured, and murdered Luigina Cantarutti. One of the two must die,” I replied in a flat voice. “And after that, you have to compensate Sergio, Luigina's son, by paying him three hundred thousand euros.”

I was pretty sure that they weren't in possession of such a huge sum, but this wasn't the time to haggle.

The two of them stared at me as if I were crazy. Ferdinando's jaw actually dropped.

“What you're asking is impossible,” Lorenzo muttered. Fear was finally forcing him to think.

“Not a bit,” I retorted. “You just need to take one more step down the ladder of criminal degradation, and so far you've shown yourself more than able to do that.”

“Perhaps we should confess everything to the carabinieri,” the father broke in; he was clearly having trouble breathing.

“It's a respectable option,” I acknowledged. “We don't like it because we'd lose the money earmarked for young Sergio, but it would certainly help to prevent future bloodshed. And it would result in the trial of the century, with the spotlight on your son, the criminal mastermind, who planned home invasions and brutal murders and was ready and willing to betray a man as popular as Kevin Fecchio. Your lawyer will certainly have a hard time trying to talk the court out of sending him to a penitentiary clinic where he'll spend the rest of his life sucking other convicts' dicks.”

Ferdinando Patanè burst into tears. His son did have a point: The old man was a real crybaby. I handed him a piece of paper with a cell phone number jotted down on it.

“We want a meeting with Bellomo and Adinolfi, too,” I said. “You'll have to be present. Call me when you're ready.”

“You really have no pity!” the father sobbed in anger.

“Pity died with Luigina,” I reminded him. “In these kinds of situations, there's never room for friendly feeling. You've shown you can think like low-ranking Mafiosi. Keep that up and you'll be fine.”

I turned on my heels and left, abandoning the two of them to a grim despair they'd never be able to shake.

As for me, though, I was more than satisfied. Lorenzo had immediately given up all brash trash-talking, proof that the two ex-mercenaries were by no means capable of resolving the situation. They'd have to hide out somewhere while they tried to figure out what to do next.

And then there was a chance we could wrap up the whole mess, I'm not going to say discreetly, as we'd hoped, but at least without attracting attention from cops and reporters, who certainly had better things to do than to dig into a case they would have all much preferred to leave unexamined.

In prison, in order to survive and to keep the place from becoming even more unlivable, I'd invented a job as peacemaker among the various underworld factions. A hard, challenging, dangerous calling, but one that taught me to understand mindsets and behaviors and, above all, to understand that the more a door seemed to be locked, the harder you needed to keep on knocking.

For that reason, after briefly informing my partners as to my plans, I headed for Piove di Sacco to resume discussions with Gigliola Pescarotto.

At that time of night the knitwear plant was closed and I studied the GPS map to find the best way to approach her house without risking surprises. I was positive she'd ignored my advice to leave town for a while.

I parked two streets away and cautiously ventured closer, hugging the hedges in front of the yards. The dogs caught my scent immediately, but I wasn't too worried. In the summer dogs bark for no reason at all and the owners usually aren't too alarmed. The widow's house was shrouded in darkness, and here and there a few shafts of light filtered out through the closed roller shutters. I stood there, watching from the shelter of a tree. After ten or so minutes, I noticed the blaze of a lighter and then the dot of a cigarette ember that glowed red with every puff.