The Memory Key (9 page)

‘I don’t think that’s any of your business.’

‘Do you consider it a taboo question?’

‘An irrelevant one.’

‘A millennial cultural tradition that defines your religious identity is not irrelevant. All your actions flow from what happened in infancy. Blume is a foreign name. Jewish?’

‘Me?’

‘There is no one else in the room, is there?’

Blume had never really considered the matter. His mother had been a non-practising Episcopalian who went through an evangelical phase, which swiftly transmogrified into aggressive atheism. He never remembered his father expressing a single religious idea in his life. He doubted they would have been able to tell him anything even if they were alive. He had an aunt in the United States whom he had failed to track down on his last visit, not that he had searched too hard. Maybe she could tell him something about his name. He was circumcised, but then again, that had more to do with being born in America. Or so he had always assumed.

‘I am perfectly capable of decoding the meaning behind your long silence,’ said Pitagora. ‘It’s what I do. You know of course your questore is Jewish? De Rossi. That is one of the oldest Jewish names possible.’

‘De Rossi is Jewish?’ Blume had never imagined it for a moment. He found himself unaccountably interested in the idea, then sceptical, and finally scornful. He would have heard about it. Overtly or covertly, Jews in power were always identified. ‘No, he’s not.’

‘Thing is, De Rossi himself probably doesn’t know. Do you have many dealings with the man?’

‘As few as possible,’ said Blume.

‘Healthy attitude,’ Pitagora tapped his nose, went back to his big red chair, and invited Blume to sit down.

‘This fascination with Jews,’ said Blume, crossing his legs, ‘is it connected with your Nazi politics?’

‘I could tell you were intelligent the moment you walked in. Intelligent, but very, very negative. You noticed my golden foulard and bracelet, and you thought they were affectations, but wearing gold on your person gives you the energy of the sun. I know, you don’t believe me. You were trying to provoke me with the Nazi taunt, but of course the real problem with Nazism was the socialism. Without socialism, you don’t get big assemblies gathering to serve a man-made ideology. Are you following me?’

‘No.’

‘You are, and you are evaluating me, too. Subtle Hebrew.’

‘Drop the Jewish references, Professor.’

‘I speak out of absolute admiration. Yours is a fascinating race. Do you know that the Jews of Rome pre-date the Christians? The Jews were here first. As a religion, that is. When the Emperor Titus, one of the greatest men this city ever produced, destroyed Jerusalem in 70
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, many Jews fled here, to the centre of the empire. They settled in camps on one of the hills facing Rome, where the Etruscans used to be, what we now call Monteverde, and
they are still there
! Still in Monteverde and down the hill, too, in the Ghetto. That is some staying power, isn’t it?’

Blume grunted what Pitagora took for acquiescence.

‘The immigrants from Jerusalem were followed by St Peter and St Paul, both Jews themselves, who formed a breakaway sect called the Christians. And if the Romans didn’t care much for the Jews, but could accept they had a case, they definitely didn’t care at all for the flesh-eating, blood-drinking Christians. But the breakaway group got the upper hand, and then turned on their own people. So you see, the Jews are literally their own worst enemy . . . You seem tired. A bit flabby around the waist for a man of your age. I trust you have a woman? So what about your politics? As you can see, I love the light. I hate intrigue and I despise people who do not have the courage of their convictions. In what do you believe, Commissioner Alec Blume?’

‘My opinions are my own business.’

‘Nonsense. The only reason we have opinions is to present them to others. That’s the definition of an opinion.’

‘You neo-Fascists tend to have a lot of opinions, I’ve noticed.’

‘I take it that, too, was intended as an insult? You notice our opinions because we have to speak them out. All the neo-liberal and capitalist propaganda is taken as a given, you see. It’s not counted as an opinion if you talk about the importance of GDP growth and the bond markets. No, I object merely to the “neo” in “neo-Fascist”. I advocate a return to the original ideology, to the idea that one stick is weak but a bundle of sticks bound together is strong. Finally, after many false starts and a period of hope in the 1970s, the time has come again. State corporatism, taxing the rich, strong governance and public spending, exit from the European Union, the jailing of Silvio Berlusconi and his lackeys. Don’t tell me there are not some ideas in there you dislike?’

‘I am here to talk about Stefania Manfellotto, and the recent murder of a young woman.’

‘Ah, poor Stefania. Yes, we can talk about her. But you know I have an alibi?’

‘Yes,’ said Blume, adding ‘unfortunately’ in his own mind.

‘Also, when the young girl was killed, I was in Lucca. Lucky for me, I suppose.’

‘You were heard to fight with Stefania minutes before she left here and was shot.’

‘I fought with her the week before, and she was not shot. And the week before that, and she was not shot then either. It was a dispute, not a fight.’

‘Students heard voices raised.’

‘Not so much that they could make out the words, though. You see, without words to report they may as well say they heard us moving furniture. Words are everything, as I know you know. When the Romans had destroyed the Second Temple in Jerusalem, Yochanan ben Zakkai fled to a place called Yavneh where he set up the first academy for the study of the Torah. Ever since then, Jews have been a people of the book, a literate and academic race.
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is everything. Your parents are intellectuals, am I right?’

Seeing he was getting no answer, he continued. ‘Commissioner, you’ll soon need to choose sides. The collapse is happening now. Late-phase capitalism turned out to be a perverted socialism, with the state paying bankers instead of workers. Your pay, let’s talk about that. In a short time, you won’t be earning enough to eat, but the pigs and the technocrats, the Germans, the IMF, the bankers, and the thieving politicians who never defended the interests of this country will expect you to be there, gun in hand, to defend them against righteous rage.’

‘Let’s get back to talking about your meeting with Stefania Manfellotto.’

‘Why, what new skill do you bring to the questions that was not available to your Carabinieri peers? Read the reports they made. They contain precise accounts of my meeting with Stefania,’ said Pitagora. ‘I have deliberately crystallized my memory of the events. If I tell you, there will not be a single comma’s difference between the statement I made to the Carabinieri and the one I will make to you. Also, you have no authority in this investigation.’

‘So you checked my credentials before this meeting,’ said Blume.

‘Yes. My original plan was to throw you out of the office, but you brought in an aura with you that I simply have to understand and oppose. For your sake, too. I can make you feel better about yourself. Look at us here. Which of us is the happier man?’

‘Ah, but which one of us is sane?’ said Blume.

The professor got up from his desk and went to the large bookcase behind him and stared up at the long row of books as if they might speak to him. He walked around his desk. ‘I think I may give you my book.’

‘Thanks, but . . .’

Pitagora cut across him. ‘I do not keep copies of it here, of course. It is too valuable.’

‘All your copies are first editions?’ enquired Blume.

‘I understand what you are insinuating. My book was not written to sell in bulk. I have come up with an entire memory technique for policemen, did you know that?’

Blume indicated that he hadn’t known. His manner suggested that he did not care very much either, but Pitagora was not deterred. ‘You know the University for Forensic Investigators in L’Aquila? I was organizing a three-year course for the police there. It was all ready to go, when the earthquake struck. That was a setback, which has delayed the project by several years. But they tell me we can try again next September. I teach techniques for perfect recall, and I am prepared to put my knowledge at the disposal of law enforcers. In the meantime, in addition to my courses in literature, I give an interdisciplinary course in memory techniques. Hundreds of students from all faculties attend my seminars.’

‘You were going to teach all your memory techniques to cops?’

‘Technique is only technique. Memory is just the beginning of the ultimate knowledge.’

‘I’ll try to remember that,’ said Blume.

Pitagora took a sheet of paper from the neat stack beside him and pulled a black fountain pen out of his pocket. He lifted a golden pince-nez from his desk, placed it on his nose, and started writing something, then handed it to Blume. ‘Here, read this.’

Written in a thin spidery script was the following:
Zezza, Aaron Fisher, tin, string, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, Nero, Otho, wire, Vespasian, Titus
.

Blume glanced at the list. ‘I would prefer not to get sidetracked, Professor. Can we get back to the matter in hand?’

‘Have you read all the names on that list?’

‘Yes.’

Pitagora took the sheet of paper back, ripped it into four pieces, and then walked over to an ebony box from which pieces of paper were already protruding, and dropped them in. Blume saw he limped slightly as he walked. He had an unexpected bald patch behind, around which his dead straight silver hair formed a sort of curtain. The effect was monkish.

‘Do you recognize them all?’ asked Pitagora, returning to his oversized chair.

‘The first is the name of the Carabinieri captain in charge of the case, which I take as a reminder that I am not, which is fine. Then some random words and a few Roman emperors up to your favourite Titus, destroyer of Jerusalem. And there was another name. I have forgotten it already.’

‘I am glad you have not heard of the second person in the list. He is a filthy plagiarist. A vulgar American who has stolen my ideas and is hawking them as his own. He has written a series of bestselling books using my memory techniques. I have sued him and his publishers in a Los Angeles court for plagiarism.’

‘I’ll ask you all about that another time,’ said Blume, ‘as soon as it becomes in the slightest bit relevant to anything at all. Meanwhile, how do you know Stefania Manfellotto?’

‘We met here, in this very university, back in 1977. We shared a lot of beliefs. We were also sexual partners. I believe a man should have as many sexual partners as possible. Even this became a controversial position thanks to the AIDS conspiracy of the 1980s.’

‘There are rumours about your relationships with students.’

‘Some of them are grounded in fact, what of it?’

Blume shrugged. ‘Oh, I don’t care. They are all over the age of consent in here. Did you agree with Manfellotto’s terrorist activities?’

‘Who would ever respond yes to a question such as that?’

‘You,’ said Blume. ‘You strike me as just the sort of person who might, Professor.’

Pitagora parted the curtain of his hair to find and fondle his ear. ‘Thank you, Commissioner Alec Blume.’

‘Let’s get back to the evening you met her,’ said Blume.

Pitagora was right about one thing: his version of events showed absolutely no change from what was in the Carabinieri report that Principe had shown him. Indeed, it was as if he had seen the report and learned it by heart. Manfellotto had been in his office between 5 and 5:45 in the evening. They had drunk some expensive peat-flavoured Scotch, reminisced about old times, and discussed the current political situation. The door to the office had been closed, and twice some student or other had knocked tentatively to see if he was there. He had not answered. At one point, around half past five, she had excused herself to go to the toilet down the corridor. He had opened the door for her, and waited on the threshold. Several students and staff had seen him there, and he could provide the names of some of them. Two students were outside his office, and he agreed to see them afterwards. When she came back, they talked some more, and then had that argument that everyone seemed to have heard.

‘What was it about?’

‘I’d prefer not to say.’

‘Politics or money?’

‘Well, since you were so succinct, you deserve a succinct answer. Both. Then we arranged to meet at a restaurant on Via Della Scrofa.’ Pitagora wetted his finger with the tip of his tongue and consulted a black leather-bound desk diary. ‘Look.’

He turned the diary around on the desk, and Blume saw the same spidery script with ‘Ristorante Istria’ written next to the line reading 8 p.m. It was the only entry on the page.

‘Turn back a page, Professor, please,’ said Blume. Pitagora obliged. There were no entries on either side of the diary. ‘And another,’ said Blume, motioning with his finger. The pages again were blank. ‘You don’t seem to have many appointments. Just the one that was supposed to be on that evening.’

‘Stefania made me write it down. I use my memory techniques, but she likes to see things in writing.’