The Crossroads (19 page)

They were showing the usual auction on Channel 35.

In the middle of the painting there was a clown, complete with top hat, lozenge-patterned tie and a round, cherry-red nose.

The clown was clinging like a climber to the peak of a mountain and stretching out his arm in an attempt to grasp an edelweiss which grew alone among the grey rocks.

The painter had succeeded in freezing the movement, like when you put a video recorder on pause.

It was easy to imagine the conclusion: the clown picks the flower and puts it to his nose to smell its scent.

But that wasn't all there was to the picture. Behind the figure that occupied the foreground there was a breathtaking sunset. It reminded Danilo of those summer evenings when he was a child and the sky was something different, as if the Eternal Father himself had painted it. The colour tones shaded and blended into each other as they do on the peace flag. From black to blue to violet to the orange of the distant valley, over which floated the ball of the sun, enveloped in white clouds like a bride in her veil. Above, where the night had already gained possession of the sky, some distant little stars were twinkling. But lower down, the plain, with its villages and roads and forests, was still bathed in the last rays of the sun.

Danilo knew nothing about art and had never wanted to own a painting. Pictures, to him, were just receptacles of dust and dust-mites. But this one was a real masterpiece.

You can keep your Mona Lisas and your Picassos. This is something
else
.

What he found most moving was the clown's expression.

Sad and … even Danilo himself couldn't describe it.

Stubborn?

No, not exactly.

Proud
.

Yes, that was it. The proud clown had defied the mountain and all its dangers to get up there. Although he wasn't an expert climber, but just a poor clown. What an incredible effort it must have been, in those long, broken shoes. And just imagine the cold …

Why had he made all that effort? Of course, to pick a rare little flower to offer to the woman he loved, along with his heart.

He and that clown had a lot of things in common. He too had been treated like a bum, almost like a murderer, an alcoholic who was a public laughing stock, but tonight he would defy the mountain, he would risk his life just for the sake of picking a flower, the boutique to give to Teresa, the only woman he had ever loved.

Yes, he and that clown were sad and proud. Two misunderstood heroes.

The picture widened out to reveal a man at the side of the painting. His hair was flecked with grey, and he wore a blue blazer and a pink shirt with a white collar.

Danilo seized the remote control and turned up the volume.

‘This painting is one of the magnificent series of clowns in the mountains by maestro Moreno Capobianco,' said the telesalesman, who spoke with a pronounced guttural R. ‘But of the whole series, if I may say so, this is undoubtedly the most effective and accomplished, a consummate work of art, where the artist has given of his best and has most poignantly expressed the … how shall I put it … the titanic, timeless struggle between man and nature. The meaning is clear, even to the layman: the clown represents farce, which ranges beyond the confines of the world as we see it, to reach places where no one has ever gone. Travelling towards God and love, on a mystico-religious journey.'

Danilo was incredulous. The expert was saying, in more precise terms, the very things he had thought himself. He turned the volume up even higher.

‘But, ladies and gentlemen, leaving aside the philosophical implications, let us look at concrete things: the magnificent landscape, the light, the refined phrasing, the confident brushwork … Capobianco's brushwork is so delicate that … Just imagine for a moment having a picture like this in your sitting room, in your hall, if I may say so, wherever you wish, this is an unrepeatable opp …'

Danilo glanced at the bare wall beside the door. A rectangle measuring one metre by two seemed to pulse out from the rest of the wall.

That's where it must go
.

With a little halogen light just above it, it would be a knockout.

‘Imagine making yourself a gift of this masterpiece … Imagine having it, owning it, being able to do what you want with it, and
for a mere seven thousand five hundred euros! An investment, ladies and gentlemen, which in the space of five years will multiply seven or eight times over, never mind your unit trusts and ISAs … If you pass up this opportunity, I would almost …'

Danilo turned back towards the television and then, as if in a trance, picked up the telephone and dialled the number that was scrolling across the screen.

Quattro Formaggi, too, had absently watched
Dog Day Afternoon
, but hadn't made any connection between the film and the raid. Afterwards, growing bored, he had switched on the video recorder and started up
Ramona's Big Lips
.

He had fast-forwarded to the scene where she was fucking the moustachioed sheriff.

‘Don't you know that only whores hitch-hike in this county?' he recited in the voice of the lawman. And then, in falsetto, imitating Ramona's female voice: ‘No, I didn't know that, sheriff. All I know is I'll do anything to avoid going to jail.'

While he was performing the dialogue he squatted down on the floor and started building a new railway station with Lego.

The window, pushed by the wind, suddenly blew open, and a gust of rain spattered his face and toppled a big table lamp which, like a crippled spaceship, crashed down onto a cardboard bridge lined with cars, destroying it, and then plunged into a papier-mâché mountain on which herds of rhinoceros and blue smurfs were grazing and scattered them among the flocks of sheep and Tiny Toons that were advancing into the mouth of a canyon.

Quattro Formaggi rushed over to shut the window.

On closer inspection he saw that the wind had wrought further havoc. The troops of blue soldiers, snakes and galactic robots had fallen over and some of them were floating in a lake made out of a Danish biscuit tin.

He ran his fingers through his hair, making strange grimaces with his mouth.

He must tidy up at once. He couldn't do anything else while he knew that the crib was in such a mess.

‘But I've got to go round to Danilo's. What am I going to do?' he said to himself, pinching his cheek.

A minute. It'll only take a minute
.

What if Danilo rings me?

He switched off his mobile and started tidying up.

‘Fabi, listen, I've had a brilliant idea!' Suddenly, as if someone had pressed
PLAY
on her remote control, Esmeralda woke up and jumped off the desk.

‘What?'

‘Let's play a trick on Carraccio.'

‘What kind of trick?'

Esmeralda and Fabiana were sure Nuccia Carraccio, their maths mistress, hated them, because she resented the fact that they were pretty and she was a monster. And as well as never giving them good marks, they were sure she held black masses with Pozzolini, the PE teacher, against them.

‘Listen, you know the fat boy?'

‘Which fat boy?'

‘The one in 2C.'

‘Rinaldi.'

‘That's him.'

Matteo Rinaldi was an unfortunate little lad. He suffered from a serious pituitary imbalance, and weighed a hundred and ten kilos at the age of twelve. In his fifth year at primary school he had won a certain notoriety by doing a testimonial for a campaign against child obesity promoted by the local council.

Fabiana stretched and yawned: ‘Well, what about him?'

‘Ravanelli said he was in the scouts with Rinaldi and that once Rinaldi crapped in a field. And out of curiosity he went to look at the turd …' Esmeralda shook her head. ‘You can't imagine the size … He said it was as big as …' She struggled to remember.
‘… as a packet of precooked polenta. You know what that's like, don't you?'

‘No. I've never seen one. My mother usually makes it herself. What's it like? Does it taste good?'

‘No, not really. You cut it into slices and heat it up in the oven. The home-made stuff's much better. Anyway …' Esmeralda indicated the size with her hands and then added: ‘He says it was really hard, like a torpedo.'

‘So?'

‘We must get Rinaldi to crap on the teacher's desk. On Wednesdays we have gym just before maths. During that lesson we could take him to the classroom and get him to climb up on the teacher's desk and crap.'

Fabiana laughed scornfully. ‘What a stupid idea!'

Esmeralda looked at her in disappointment. ‘Why?'

‘How are you going to get Rinaldi to do it?'

Esmeralda hadn't thought about that. Their weapon, seduction, which bent practically all the males in the school to their will, had no effect on that sexless lump.

‘What if we offered him cash? Or food?' hazarded Esmeralda.

‘No, he's got pots of money. I suppose maybe if you gave him a blow-job …'

Esmeralda made a disgusted expression: ‘Yuck … Not even if they killed me.'

Fabiana touched her kidneys with a grimace of pain. ‘How much would you charge him for a blow-job?'

‘There's no price!'

‘A thousand euros?'

‘Are you crazy? Too little.'

‘Three thousand?'

She smiled. ‘Three thousand. Well, I might consider it …'

It was their favourite game. They spent hours imagining giving hand-jobs and blow-jobs and letting themselves be sodomised by the ugliest guys they knew for money.

‘Suppose you had to choose between Rinaldi and …' Fabiana couldn't think of anyone more disgusting, but then had an inspiration: ‘… the tobacconist in the shopping mall?'

‘The one with the toupee stuck on with Bostik?'

‘Yes!'

‘I don't know … Neither of them.'

‘If you don't do it, they'll kill your brother.'

‘You bastard! That's not fair!'

‘Yes it is! Yes it is!'

Esmeralda reflected for a moment. ‘Well, if I think about it carefully, the tobacconist. At least he might throw in a few packets of fags.'

‘You have to swallow, though.'

‘Of course, I'd give him the full service … But can you imagine what it'd be like if we succeeded? Can you imagine Carraccio coming into class and finding a hot, steaming turd on her desk? As a personal monument, just for her …'

‘She calls the carabinieri …'

‘And the carabinieri have to requisition it.'

‘Why?'

‘It's evidence …'

‘But they can't touch it, or they'll leave fingerprints.'

Esmeralda burst out laughing. ‘And they take it to the, er … To the … Oh hell, what are they called?'

‘Who?'

‘The guys who analyse the evidence … You know … Them.' It was no good. It wouldn't come. Her head felt like it was full of foam rubber.

‘I don't know … Who do they take it to?'

‘Oh you know, those guys in the TV series.'

‘Forensics?'

‘That's it. And they do a DNA test and trace it back to Rinaldi.'

He had done it. He had phoned and bought
Climbing Clown
, the masterpiece by Moreno Capobianco.

No problem
.

Danilo strolled contentedly round the room, looking at the wall where he would hang the painting.

Fantastic. You entered the room to be met by a climbing clown. It would give his apartment a touch of unique style and refinement. A painting of such quality would brighten up a catacomb.

Danilo was holding a glass of grappa.

He had sworn he wouldn't touch a drop till after the raid, but he couldn't very well not drink to a purchase like this. Perhaps he had been a little hasty in buying it, but with the guarantee of the money from the cash machine it had been a good decision.

‘A
great
decision.' He raised his glass to the blank wall.

The young lady at the call centre had been extremely kind. She had congratulated him on his choice and had added that Capobianco's paintings were selling like hot cakes.

If I hadn't called right away I'd certainly have missed out on it
.

Danilo had made a no-obligation appointment for the next day. One of their experts would bring the picture round to his home.

‘Here's to a new life!' And he knocked back the grappa.

The young lady had assured him that he would be able to look at it for as long as he liked and then decide at his leisure. Danilo hadn't told her, but he had made up his mind to buy it the moment the figure of the clown had appeared on television.

That painting had spoken to him through the screen.

It was the baptism of Danilo Aprea's new life.

First the picture, and immediately afterwards the boutique for Teresa.

And everything would start over again.

The headlights of Beppe Trecca's Puma lit up a huge sign, in the shape of a banana, bearing the words
CAMPEGGIO BAHAMAS
.

Here we are
.

The social worker, in a fever of excitement, emerged stooping from the metallised coupé, sheltering under a tiny umbrella, which the wind promptly turned inside out. He approached the gate, which was chained up. He pulled out of his raincoat pocket the bunch of keys for the camper belonging to Ernesto, his cousin's husband.

The key to the gate must be here too
.

But he wasn't absolutely sure, because he had …

(stolen)

… borrowed them from the tray by the front door of his cousin Luisa's flat, without telling them.

Well, where's the harm? Tomorrow morning I'll put them back
and no one will be any the wiser
.

The idea of asking Ernesto if he could borrow his camper for the night hadn't even crossed his mind, for two reasons: