Killing Ground (58 page)

The prison was a part of the antiquity of Palermo.

The prison was a place of pain, torture, death, from the history of Palermo.

The walls of Ucciardione Prison, built by the Bourbons to impose their rule, were now covered with weeds in pretty flower, and the mortar crumbled in the joints between the stones. At the base of the walls the military trucks passed in continuous patrol, at the top of the walls the armed guards gazed down, listless, on the exercise yards. Beyond the exercise yards, spread out from the central building like the arms of an octopus, were the cell blocks. The cell blocks had failed to break the resistance of La Cosa Nostra.

The Men of Honour had been sent to the cell blocks by the officials of the king, and the officials of the Fascist Duce, and by the officials of the democratic state - and the officials through history had failed to break the spirit of La Cosa Nostra. It was the place of the Men of Honour, where they ruled and where they tortured and where they killed.

The cell blocks, that day, sweated under the brilliance of the sun.

There was a quiet, that day, in Ucciardione Prison, and word seeped along the corridors, and up iron staircases, and through locked doors, that Salvatore Ruggerio had requested a meeting with Rocco Tardelli, the magistrate who hunted his brother.

The men in the cells blocks waited.

The aircraft lifted. The journalist from Berlin sat rigid in his seat, and the aircraft banked over the beach at Ostia, and climbed, and turned again, and headed north. He thought he returned to the track towards civilization . . . champagne, yes, he would appreciate a glass of champagne. He thanked the Lufthansa girl. . . He could not remember when he had last felt such relief at the completion of an assignment. There were no headwinds, no turbulence pockets, it was a steady flight, and he tried to relax.

The problem, his difficulty, and it was a wound to his pride, he did not believe in the story he had written, it was his failure. When the champagne had been brought to him, he pulled down the table flap and laid his briefcase on it. He took his copy from the briefcase. He read back the story he carried home.

'There is the appearance of war on the island of Sicily. There are military road blocks, there are armed men guarding politicians and law-enforcement officials, there is talk of war. But, if there is combat, your correspondent has not found it.

'I remain unconvinced of the reality of conflict. It is possible there is only a delusion of war. My area of confusion, I could find no battle-lines and there is a complete absence of the traditional no-man's-land. There are military commanders and police chiefs who talk a good war, but I could not find, or touch, or feel, their alleged enemy.

'Your correspondent has reported from many of the world's darker corners. In Saigon I met with General William

Westmoreland; in Hanoi I was privileged to meet General Vo Nguyen Giap. I saw Saddam Hussein in Baghdad and General Norman Schwartzkopf in Riyadh. Yassir Arafat and George Habbash in Beirut. I drank coffee with the secessionist leader, in his Grozny bunker, as he was shelled by Russian tanks.

'Where is the enemy in Sicily? Does he exist? Is he a figment of Sicilian imagination, as they display their island trait of demanding uniqueness. The commander of La Cosa Nostra in Sicily, if indeed such a person exists, does not give news conferences or television interviews, nor does he issue war bulletins. For three weeks I have chased shadows. I remain in confusion.

'What is said: from this humble, poverty-ridden island are spewed the most sinister criminals of our time . . .'

He read no more. He returned his copy to the briefcase. He sipped his champagne.

They sat across a table.

'You are well, signore?'

'I am well. And you, dottore, you are well?'

'I thank you for your enquiry. Yes, I am well.'

The magistrate pushed across the table a packet of cigarettes. Salvatore Ruggerio, in Asmara and Ucciardione, would have as many cigarettes as he cared to smoke, but it was a gesture. The magistrate kept in his jacket pocket a packet of cigarettes, opened, with three taken out. To have passed Salvatore Ruggerio a full packet, unopened, would have offended his dignity, would have implied that he was short of cigarettes. It was necessary to maintain the dignity of the man. Salvatore Ruggerio lit a cigarette, and the smoke wafted over the table, and he pushed the packet back towards the magistrate.

'Your mother and father, they are well?'

It was a fascination to the magistrate, the calm politeness of these men. He was never aggressive with them, and he tried hard not to be arrogant towards them. They craved respect and he gave it them. And he made a rule, always, of asking a question to which he knew the answer. He knew that, for their age, the parents of Salvatore Ruggerio were well.

'I saw my mother last night, she seemed well.'

They were alone in the room. The maresciallo would be immediately outside the door with an officer of the prison staff. There were microphones built into the legs of the table, and their conversation would be recorded. Because he did not know the answer, he did not ask Salvatore Ruggerio why the meeting had been requested.

'And in two days you go on trial again?'

'They pluck fantasies from the skies. They bring new charges. What can a poor man do, dottore, an innocent man? They use old lies from the disgraced pentiti to persecute an old and poor and innocent man.'

There were some who threatened him. Sometimes he was warned. Did he take his guard to the toilet with him? He should. Was he concerned for his health? He should be.

Some had their friends and families send him funeral wreaths and photographs of coffins. He did not expect to be threatened by a man of the stature of Salvatore Ruggerio because to issue a threat would be beneath the dignity of a man who gave himself such importance. It was often his thought, why did such gifted men need to pursue criminality in order to find that craved dignity?

'Have you been recently to Prizzi, dottore?'

'Not recently.'

'You have not had the opportunity to see my parents' home?'

'I have not.'

'It is the humble home of old people who live in poverty.'

He did not know yet where the road of their conversation would lead. He shifted in his seat. It was hard for him, but he should not show impatience. He squirmed on his chair, and he felt the tickle of hair on his neck. His hair was too long, should have been trimmed, but it was a military operation to take him to a hairdresser, and the maresciallo would not permit a parrucchiere to be given access to the apartment. There was a woman in the offices of the squadra mobile who came occasionally to cut his hair, and then it was crudely done... He believed it valuable to talk with the brother of Mario Ruggerio. The body language was important, and the attitude. There were morsels to be gathered.

The magistrate had, between the time he had received the message from the governor and the departure for the prison, gutted the files he held on Mario Ruggerio and the family of Mario Ruggerio. He knew the material by heart, but he had again dug into the files. The father of Mario and Salvatore Ruggerio was a millionaire in American dollars, the man was crippled by rheumatism from his prison days and could afford the best treatment available on the island. The father of Salvatore and of Mario Ruggerio was neither humble nor living his last days in poverty. The magistrate had no need to score a cheap and small point.

'There are many in Prizzi who are humble and who live in poverty. It is the value of the family that is more important than material possessions.'

'I think you speak the truth, dottore.' The smile played on Salvatore's face. 'They tell me, dottore, that you are not blessed with a loving family.'

It was a barb. Always, inside the tracks of extreme politeness, they would try to ridicule him. The smile was obsequious. Probably they knew to the hour when his wife had left. Probably they knew the identity of the man with whom his wife slept.

Probably they knew which schools his children attended.

'We cannot choose our family, and the circumstances of the family. It must be, signore, a source of disappointment to your parents that Giuseppe does not live close to them.' He played a card, he sparred.

No expression. Salvatore stubbed the cigarette. 'In a flock there is always one sheep that looks for a greener field. The other sheep forget. Dottore, I have a small request.'

'Please.'

'My parents are old.'

'Yes.'

'My father has rheumatism. My mother is frail. The journey to Asinara is long and expensive. They are old, they live without money. Should I not receive freedom, it would be a most charitable gesture to them should I be transferred from Asinara to Palermo. It would bring a small joy to the last years of their lives.'

It would be a decision of the Justice Ministry. It was not in the power of the magistrate. There was a subcommittee. Salvatore Ruggerio, a 'harsh regime' prisoner, a murderer with sentences of life imprisonment that were accumulating, would know the procedures.

'If you, dottore were to speak on my behalf - for my parents . . .'

'I will see what is possible.'

The brother of Mario Ruggerio stood. He bobbed his head in respect. He went to the door. He turned at the door and looked at the magistrate and his face was impassive. He was gone through the door. He would be taken back to his cell.

The magistrate sat alone at the table. He did not understand. He had not known what would be asked of him, nor whether a warning threat would be offered him. It was ridiculous that Salvatore Ruggerio had requested a meeting to ask for a prison transfer, and he had come like an obedient dog. Perhaps the maresciallo, with his keen and suspicious nose, would have comprehended why he had been called to a meeting with no content. He did not have the nose of the maresciallo. He did not understand.

There was a football game alongside the parked cars in the yard. One goal was the piled coats of the ragazzi of Tardelli and the second goal was the piled coats of the men who guarded the governor of Ucciardione. It was a lunatic game, as if the ragazzi of Tardelli had a fever for victory. Alongside the parked cars, close to the bunker building, beneath the old walls of Ucciardione, the ragazzi of Tardelli tripped and elbowed and kicked their way to a victory, as if nothing else was of importance to them. Pasquale was not a part of the game. Pasquale was not given the bouncing and careering ball. Pasquale was an onlooker to the game.

There was a shout from the gate. The game stopped. The ball ran free.

A man walked from the gate towards the cars and the piled coats. He had a thin and pinched face. He had sparse grey hair. He had bent shoulders above a body that was without fat. The others of Tardelli's ragazzi went to him. He carried a small bag, and a dried smile cracked his face. The driver of the chase car embraced him. The passenger of the chase car thumped his shoulder. Pasquale watched the greeting given his replacement. Pasquale was ignored. He heard the man say that he had been able to come earlier than he had expected, so he had come. He was from the team that guarded the mayor, and the mayor had flown to Rome. Pasquale thought the circle was again joined, as it had not been when he was a part of the team. The maresciallo stood in the outer door to the yard and the replacement came to him and held up his hand for the maresciallo to smack with his own, as if an old and dear friendship was renewed.

'Am I needed? Am I wanted?' Pasquale felt the depth of humiliation.

The maresciallo looked over the shoulder of the replacement. 'I think the cars are full. Take a bus, Pasquale, to the Questura and they will find you something to do.'

Pasquale bit at his lip. He went to the lead car and he took from the floor his machine-gun, with the magazines, and his vest. He gave them to the replacement. He was not thanked. The replacement to the team would have been told that there was a boy who was inefficient, whose inefficiency endangered them all. The replacement had a hard face. There was no fear in the face. Pasquale wondered whether the replacement had a wife, had children, wondered whether the replacement had volunteered to travel with the 'walking corpse'.

He walked away. Behind him was laughter, as if an old story was told from old times.

He went out through the gates of the yard. He walked past the policemen and the soldiers who guarded the gates. He walked under the walls of Ucciardione Prison. He saw a heavy- built man with slicked oiled hair leaning against the door of the bar on the far side of the street who talked into a mobile telephone.

He turned into the Via delle Croci. He passed a young woman. She wore a shapeless grey skirt. She stood with her mother. She waved a handkerchief. She shouted at the wall and at the cell block behind the wall. He wondered if it were her lover or her husband or her brother who was held in the cell block. He passed a cat that gnawed at bones from a rubbish bag. He passed a woman who was bent under the weight of her shopping bags, and two businessmen who walked arm in arm and who both talked and did not listen to the other. He passed the flower stall. He heard, away behind him, the starting of the siren wail. He walked on the pavement of the Via delle Croci, beside the tight line of parked cars and vans and motorcycles.

He did not turn. He did not wish to see the car of the magistrate and the chase car. He could not shut out from his mind the sirens' call.

He heard, behind him, the scream of the tyres as the cars turned into the Via delle Croci.

He passed a man. The man had the face of a peasant from the fields, the clothes of a businessman from the office. The man tapped the numbers of a mobile telephone.

The cars came from behind Pasquale.

The replacement was in the passenger seat of the magistrate's car, was in Pasquale's seat. There was the back of the maresciallo's head, there was the screen at the back window, there was the chase car, and he saw the tension on the old, worn faces of the driver and the passenger. He saw the cars accelerating away from him and they would have seen him on the pavement, all of the bastards would have seen him, and there had been no wave, no kindness.