I Will Have Vengeance (19 page)

Instead, the Commissario had led him almost on to the stage, between the rigging and hoists that were used to change the sets. The Brigadier, at a sign from Ricciardi, had then left them and gone back down to the secondary entrance. Don Pierino sighed, resigned: would he ever be able to enjoy an opera seated comfortably in the audience?

Ricciardi stepped closer to him.

“Who's coming onstage now?”

“No one, Commissario. First there's just music, very soft. Then Turiddu sings. A serenade, to Lola.”

“Alfio's wife, right?”

“Yes, Alfio's wife.”

After a brief prelude, with the curtain lowered, a beautiful male voice began to sing. Don Pierino noticed that Ricciardi was continually checking his watch, noting the times in pencil on a piece of paper.

“What is he saying, Father? I can't understand him.”

“It's a serenade in Sicilian dialect, Commissario. He's telling her how beautiful she is and that her beauty is worth damnation; he also tells her, but it's only poetry, you understand, that he would be willing to be killed for her and that if she isn't in heaven, it's not worth going there. It's prophetic, because in the end he is killed by Alfio.”

The two spoke in a whisper. At the end of the song, as the orchestra went on playing alone, the curtain rose. After a purely musical interlude, men and women entered, and after taking their places on the stage, began to engage in a choral dialogue. Ricciardi relaxed and don Pierino hoped he was enjoying the beauty of the music. Unfortunately, however, he sensed that the Commissario's thoughts were elsewhere.

Maione returned, his bulky overcoat covering his uniform. He was breathing somewhat heavily, as if his hefty body had been subjected to some unusual exertion. Don Pierino noticed that the Brigadier's shoes bore traces of fresh mud, along with a few blades of grass. Had he gone out? And where to?

The Brigadier spoke to Ricciardi.

“All done,
Commissa'
.”

“All right then, let's check: did you leave when I told you?”

The Brigadier checked his wristwatch, holding it a distance away, being far-sighted.

“Yes, I think so. My watch read seven minutes past eight. From the stage to the dressing room, less than a minute. From the window to the dressing room, two minutes, including the time it took to open the door of the gardens, which I wasn't familiar with. But it's easy, a normal lock. From the dressing room to the stage, another minute, even less.”

Ricciardi was keeping count on the tips of his nervous fingers.

“Barely four minutes to account for the movements. Let's see, then.”

He turned to don Pierino.

“Father, what happens when a singer leaves the stage and then has to return to it?”

“Well, it depends. If he has to return immediately or almost, he waits in the wings. If instead he has a longer interval, then he goes back to his dressing room: retouches his make-up, straightens his clothes. He doesn't go outdoors, partly to avoid draughts which are always possible when going from one temperature to another.”

The little priest continued to whisper, waving his hands in his characteristic way.

“But is the way to the dressing rooms from the stage the same for everyone?” Ricciardi asked.

“Yes. First come the dressing rooms of the orchestra conductor and the principal singers, then the common ones for the other singers and the extras in costume.”

Ricciardi's crystalline green eyes gleamed in the darkness, as onstage Santuzza and Lucia sang their duet. Behind the Commissario, Maione's imposing figure kept watch in the shadows.

“And tell me, Father, to get to the common dressing rooms, you have to pass those of the principals? Are you sure?”

“Yes, Commissario. I just told you.”

On the stage, the women's duet over, a new character had entered, dressed as a rustic villager, and singing in a deep voice. A tall young man with broad shoulders. Ricciardi glanced quickly at Maione, who nodded his head slowly. The Commissario again turned to the priest, tilting his head toward the singer.

“And him?”

“That's compare Alfio, the baritone who later on sings the lines you quoted this morning. He's Lola's husband, the one who kills compare Turiddu at the end.”

“And the singer? Who is he? Do you know him?”

“Yes, I've heard him a few times this season. He's a very talented young man, if you ask me. He has a career ahead of him. Nespoli is his name. Michele Nespoli.”

Onstage, Michele, seated at a table with a glass in his hand, thundered: “
M'aspetta a casa Lola, che m'ama e mi consola, ch'è tutta fedeltà
.” Lola awaits me at home, the woman who loves and consoles me and is wholly faithful to me.

The opera continued; the company performed well together, the singers perfectly suited to their respective characters. The audience, Ricciardi thought, seemed to be enjoying it quite a bit, and on several occasions there was spontaneous, heartfelt applause. In addition to his voice, Nespoli was notable for his stage presence. His athletic, imposing build helped him stand out, and he sang with the passion and enthusiasm of a man who lives and breathes just to sing. The Commissario, hands in his pockets, took it all in with a watchful eye, not missing a word.

He moved only when, at the end of a dramatic duet with Santuzza, he heard the lines that he had come to know: “
Io sangue voglio, all'ira m'abbandono, in odio tutto l'amor mio finì . . .
” I will have vengeance . . . , all my love shall end in hate. Repeated several times, with force and rage, by Nespoli. To Ricciardi they seemed very different from when he had heard them from Vezzi's dead lips, more than one might reasonably expect.

The tenor, in his high, modulated voice, was expressing regret over what happened: Vezzi's image meant to convey, Ricciardi finally understood now, the emotion that had guided the killer's hand. The second singer, with the deep timbre of his baritone voice and his eyes flashing with rage, was articulating his own feelings. The Commissario had no doubt that Nespoli, after two days, still felt the full reverberation of his vengeance. In fact, he wondered how the audience, the other singers, even don Pierino, who, as usual, was murmuring the lines to himself, hadn't noticed it and been horrified.

With a final, terrible “I will have vengeance!” Nespoli ran offstage, unknowingly passing right under the noses of the three hidden spectators. The audience got to its feet in a furious round of applause that drowned out the music of the orchestra. From his position Ricciardi, who glanced quickly at his watch just as Maione had done, saw the expression in the singer's eyes: they were vacant, as though he were thinking of something else.

The baritone did not pause to hear the applause, which gave no sign of stopping; hastily he descended the stairs that separated him from the dressing rooms and Ricciardi. The Commissario took a few steps after him, and saw that he passed Vezzi's door without looking at it, his head held high and his gaze focused straight ahead. Ricciardi looked at his watch again and went back to his place, as the orchestra started playing again.

When Nespoli came back onstage, with a ringing
“A voi tutti salute!
”—good health to you all!—exactly nine minutes and fifty-six seconds had passed. Ricciardi thought it was more than enough time. He was a grim, silent observer of the story's ending and of the roaring success the opera enjoyed that evening as well. Don Pierino and Maione watched him, the one oblivious and the other well aware of the thoughts that were going through the Commissario's head. The difference between Nespoli's expression and that of the other members of the company when they were individually called back to the stage to receive the public's ovation did not escape any of them: the baritone smiled with his mouth, but not with his eyes. Ricciardi looked at Alfio's shoes and the faint marks left by Maione's shoes on the floor he had walked across. Mud and a bit of grass. The picture was complete.

Ricciardi said goodnight to don Pierino while the public, on its feet, was still applauding.

“Thank you, Father. Once again, thank you very much. Your help has been vital. Now it's time for the hard part of my job, and I have to do it on my own. My promise still stands; I'll come and see you.”

The Assistant Pastor looked at him steadily, his lively, spirited dark eyes staring into the other's unwavering, expressionless green gaze.

“Goodnight, Commissario. May God help you make the right choice, for others will pay for your mistakes. If you need me, for my services, you will find me available. Day or night.”

With one last intense look, Ricciardi turned and walked towards the dressing rooms, followed by Maione.

A
s he walked off the stage, Michele Nespoli knew instantly that it was all over. As soon as he saw the two men standing there motionless, their hands in their pockets, in front of the door,
that
door, he knew right away.

He was surprised to feel relieved, more so than he would have imagined; he couldn't live with that constant threat over his head. Maione stepped forwards and touched his arm.

“Are you Michele Nespoli? We have to ask you a few questions. Please, come inside,” he pointed to Vezzi's dressing room, the door to which had been repaired.

A stunned silence fell around them. The still heavy breathing of those who had just left the set was palpable; those who were near the baritone instinctively moved away and left him alone in the middle of a small imaginary stage.

The three men entered the dressing room. Inside, everything had been cleaned up. There was no trace of the tenor's blood anymore, except for some damp stains on the carpet. The mirror had been replaced. If it weren't for Vezzi's image, which he could still see in the corner of the room, though it was fading by now, Ricciardi would have had a hard time recognizing the crime scene that had appeared to him only two days before. Nespoli, who had not lowered his eyes for a moment, looked around briefly, his intense dark gaze pausing at the window, which like before was open partway.

Maione had finished stating Nespoli's name and referencing the occasion of the murder, and silence now fell in the dressing room. Ricciardi stared fixedly at the baritone, who met his gaze boldly. It was the Commissario who spoke.

“Who is the woman?”

Nespoli sighed, slowly.

“I don't know what you're talking about.”

Ricciardi nodded his head faintly, as if he had somehow expected that reply.

It was Maione, without altering his tone, who stepped in.

“Would you tell us about what happened the night of March the twenty-fifth, the day before yesterday?”

Nespoli exhaled sharply, irritated.

“What do you think happened?”

Ricciardi took a couple of steps and turned again to the baritone, his back to the corner where Vezzi's image continued spewing out blood.

“We have reason to believe that, for undetermined reasons, you intentionally or unintentionally killed Arnaldo Vezzi; that you killed him on the night of March the twenty-fifth, between seven and nine
P.M
.”

Nespoli smiled, again only stretching his lips. His eyes were those of a caged animal.

“And on what basis do you have reason to believe such a thing?”

They went on staring at one another. Maione stayed where he was, centred between the two of them. Outside the door a constant murmuring could be heard.

The Brigadier said calmly: “We're the ones asking the questions.”

The singer did not seem particularly shaken by the accusation.

“Then ask,” he said disdainfully.

“Did you encounter Vezzi on the day and time of the crime?”

“I saw him, yes. I ran into him.”

“Where?”

Nespoli gave a faint sigh, looking around briefly.

“Right here. Or rather, out there; at the door, I mean.”

“At the door?”

“Yes, at the door. I was coming from the stage, on my way back to the dressing room.”

“And you spoke to him?”

“He spoke to me.”

Until that moment, Ricciardi had not intervened in the conversation; he had been staring at Nespoli the entire time, studying his behaviour. Now he spoke, in a low voice.

“Look, Nespoli, you're in a difficult position. We have our facts and the evidence we need: not being forthcoming will make us waste a little more time, but it will certainly not save you. It will be better for you if you stop pretending you don't understand what we're asking you.”

Nespoli turned to the Commissario and smiled.

“If you have this evidence, why are you wasting all this time?”

“Because we have to reconstruct everything that's happened, that's why. And because,” here Ricciardi lowered his voice even further, “we have to know if there were accomplices.”

A silence fell. Nespoli and Ricciardi stared at one another. Maione glanced from one to the other, his eyelids half-closed as if he were about to fall asleep: his way of staying focused.

Finally Nespoli said: “Evidence, you say? What evidence could you have?” Restrained like that, his powerful voice sounded like distant thunder.

“We found the shoes you switched so as not to track mud from the gardens on to the stage. You're the only one who had prop room shoes of that size checked out to you at that time. You have big feet. You're among the limited number of people who had access to the dressing rooms, the only one who could wear Vezzi's clothes. And lastly, you were seen re-entering from the stairs and you were recognized.”

Maione gave no sign of being surprised by the small trap that Ricciardi had set for the baritone: they both knew that it was only circumstantial evidence and that don Pierino could never be sure that the individual he had met on the stairs was Nespoli rather than Vezzi or anyone else of that size. But the Brigadier knew that at times their work resembled mullet fishing, which he did on Sundays near the port; and the mullet, this time too, took the bait.