The Villa Triste (44 page)
‘It must have been difficult for your children, their father moving to South Africa? Or did they go with you?’
Piero Balestro guffawed again as if the idea in and of itself was ludicrous.
‘No. No,’ he said. ‘What would I have done with children? Women’s work. They stayed with their mother. She married again. Good luck to her. Or I should say, him.’
‘Daughters?’
‘Boy and girl. I haven’t seen or heard from them in fifty years,’ he added.’
‘And your old friends, from the war? From your time in the partisans? Do you keep up with them?’
Piero Balestro spread his hands and laughed again. ‘
Certo
. I have no secrets, Dottore, from you. But you must stay quiet about them, my days in the partisans, or there’ll be nothing left to put in my book.’
‘Your book?’
‘
Certo! Certo!
’ Piero Balestro raised his eyebrows, as if it was common knowledge that he was penning the blockbuster of the century. ‘It will be a revelation,’ he said, ‘I assure you.’
He reached for another photograph from a collection of heavy silver frames on the table beside his chair and handed it to Pallioti. It was a copy, or perhaps the original, of the photo that hung on Achilleo Venta’s wall.
‘Do you know what that is?’ he demanded. ‘The greatest day in our history! The liberation of the most beautiful city on earth.’
‘Yes.’ Pallioti handed it back to him. ‘11 August 1944. What did you do during the war?’ he asked. ‘Exactly?’
Piero Balestro propped the frame beside the still-empty teacups and tapped the side of his nose, winking.
‘Very hush-hush,’ he said. ‘Though I suppose there’s no harm in telling you. If you break the story, I’ll know who to sue.’ He looked from Pallioti to Eleanor. Then he asked, ‘Have you ever heard of Il Spettro?’
‘The Ghost?’ Eleanor’s voice was faint.
‘Of course,’ Piero Balestro said. ‘Il Spettro. Well.’ He leaned back in his chair and grinned. ‘Let’s just say, when my book is published, you’ll know a great deal more.’
‘And that would be what?’ Pallioti asked, forcing himself to smile. ‘His true identity, after all these years?’
Piero Balestro winked and tapped the side of his nose again.
‘I’ll send you an advance copy,’ he said.
Eleanor Sachs leaned forward.
‘Are you saying—’
‘I’m not saying anything, young lady. Not until publication day!’
‘But—’
‘If we could return to Giovanni Trantemento—’ Pallioti interjected, cutting Eleanor off. ‘He’s not in that photograph?’
He could feel Eleanor glaring at him.
‘Giovanni? No.’ Piero Balestro shook his head. ‘No. He wasn’t there for the final fight. Long gone by then, Il Corvo.’
‘Long gone?’
‘Yes. Yes, his mother was very sick, you see. He took excellent care of her. Took her to Switzerland.’
‘And how did he do that?’
‘How?’
Piero Balestro looked at Pallioti. For the first time, there was silence in the room. Pallioti leaned forward, battling the sofa.
‘I would have thought,’ he said, ‘that travel passes, and money, were very hard to come by. In June 1944. So, how did he get them? A young man working with the partisans. And half Jewish. Bank accounts had been frozen, and I would have thought papers of that kind would be almost impossible to get hold of.’
The old man smiled.
‘Nothing is impossible, Dottore.’ The heartiness had gone out of his voice, replaced by a cold quiet. He spread his hands. ‘I come from a family of farmers,’ he said. ‘And look at this house.’
Pallioti and Piero Balestro stared at one another.
‘I repeat my question,’ Pallioti said after a moment. ‘How did a young man in the partisans come by three sets of papers and passes to get his family into Switzerland?’
‘How would I know?’ Piero Balestro shrugged. ‘Il Corvo. He was always the cleverest of us all.’
‘Really? Your leader, was he?’
‘I didn’t say that.’
‘No. Achilleo Venta said that was you. Massimo.’
If the use of the name had startled him, he didn’t show it. Instead, Piero Balestro said, ‘A man did what he had to do, in those days, Dottore.’ The words were clipped. He fixed Pallioti with his cold, pale eyes. ‘People like you can’t understand,’ he said. ‘All that mattered was to take care of your own. Nazis. Fascists. Partisans. It was every man for himself.’
Under the full head of white hair, Piero Balestro’s eyes appeared colourless. Like the bottom of a clear glass that had nothing behind it.
Despite his padded jacket and the heated house, Pallioti felt cold.
‘Tell me,’ he said. ‘What do you know about Radio Juliet?’
Piero Balestro didn’t blink. For a moment he didn’t move. Then he spread his hands again. ‘Tragic,’ he said. ‘They were betrayed. All of them. Killed.’
‘Betrayed by whom?’
‘No one knows.’
‘You must have been particularly sorry.’
‘Me?’ Piero Balestro smiled. ‘Why would that be?’
‘Because they were your comrades, your fellow GAP members.’ Pallioti waited a moment. Then he added, ‘And because of Lilia.’
For a second, he thought he saw something flicker across the old man’s face. A memory? The shadow of a beautiful girl? The face of a woman ‘worth ten men’ who loved someone else, a pretty boy from the Veneto, a young officer who looked like an angel – exactly the sort of person a farmer’s son, even a wealthy farmer’s son like Piero Balestro, must have loathed?
‘Lilia,’ Balestro said finally. ‘I don’t remember her.’
Pallioti nodded. He toyed with the empty teacup. Then he said, ‘She was shot. Lilia. Wounded, during the assassination attempt outside the Pergola Theatre. On 14 February 1944, Valentine’s Day – when you and Roberto Roblino and Giovanni Trantemento were arrested. Before your miraculous escape.’
Piero Balestro smiled. His eyes didn’t move from Pallioti’s face.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Yes, of course. Now I remember. That was lucky, wasn’t it?’
Pallioti put the cup down. It rattled slightly in the saucer.
‘For Lilia?’ he asked. ‘Or for you?’
‘For all of us, Dottore. For all of us. Luck favours the fortunate.’
‘So I’ve heard.’
Pallioti stood up abruptly.
‘Lilia, however,’ he said, ‘was not so fortunate, was she? When Radio Juliet was betrayed, her whole family was killed. And the man she loved. She was pregnant. Did you know that? When she was deported.’
Piero Balestro did not get to his feet. Instead, he leaned back in his armchair and looked up at Pallioti. He smiled.
‘Everyone’s luck runs out, Dottore,’ he said. ‘I’m sure you can find your own way to the door.’
As Pallioti stepped out of the sitting room and into the hall, he took a deep breath. Pausing, he closed his eyes, trying to keep the anger that was boiling inside him from erupting. The maid appeared, the rubber soles of her shoes squeaking on the tiles as she scurried to the door and began struggling with an alarming number of locks. Finally, she stepped back, nearly tripping over a boot shelf that sat below a polished rack holding a shotgun and two rifles. Agata Venta’s gun, dropped on her portico as casually as if it was an umbrella, popped into Pallioti’s mind. Jesus, he thought, didn’t anyone in this country lock up their weapons? He had started to say something when he felt Eleanor Sachs’s hand on his elbow.
‘Let’s get out of here,’ she whispered.
Five minutes later, the Renault turned out of the drive. This time, the electric gates swung closed behind it, all but clipping the fender. By the time Pallioti reached the motorway and turned the car towards Florence, it had started to rain. He settled into the fast lane and adjusted the wipers. Eleanor Sachs leaned back in the passenger seat.
‘They’re right,’ she said.
‘About what?’
She glanced at him. ‘That you should be careful of what you wish for.’
Closing her eyes, she shook her head.
‘If that man is my grandfather,’ she said, ‘I think I’ll shoot myself.’
‘Come! Come! I have your table ready. On a night like tonight—’
Bernardo threw up his hands as if the weather was a badly behaved child whom he had given up all hope of controlling. Shaking his head, he divested Pallioti of his wet coat and hustled him towards the sanctuary of his table in the back corner of Lupo.
With its low lights and flickering candles the restaurant was as dark and welcoming as a cave to a bedraggled wolf cub. Which was approximately how Pallioti felt. He was tired, hungry, bad-tempered, and wet. The rain that had started on Saturday afternoon had not let up. Now, twenty-four hours later on Sunday evening, it was still flinging itself at the city, pummelling the buildings and streets in a tantrum of icy gales and downpours that left the piazzas empty and sent what few tourists there were this late in the season running for cover.
As soon as he had got back to the city and into his office on Saturday afternoon, he had called Saffy and informed her that he would not be appearing for Sunday lunch. His sister had insisted that Maria Grandolo would be deeply upset, because she had wheedled an invitation solely in the hope of building on the new rapport the two of them had recently established. But Pallioti had not even laughed. He had been in no mood to be teased, and in the last twenty-four hours his temper had grown steadily worse. Even as he had driven up the motorway, Eleanor Sachs half asleep beside him, he had been piecing together the case against Piero Balestro in his head.
Everything he had found out only reinforced what he now believed – that sixty years ago Balestro, Roblino and Trantemento had betrayed Radio Juliet and God knew who else. That they had then fallen out, perhaps recently, perhaps a long time ago, and that Balestro had killed the other two – probably to shut them up. As far as he could see, it all fitted. The two men had opened the door to someone who, admittedly, they might not have liked, but whom they did not consider to be a threat. The gun used was exactly the sort of ‘souvenir’ old soldiers kept. The cash in Trantemento’s safe pointed to blackmail. He was not entirely certain whether Trante-mento had been the blackmailer or the victim, nor was he sure exactly what it was that had caused the rift between the three old ‘brothers-in-arms’. He was certain, however, that Piero Balestro, or Peter Bales, or Massimo or whatever he wanted to call himself, would tell him. If he could get a chance to question him. Properly. Under caution. In an interview room.
The only problem was, no one else agreed.
Enzo Saenz, who had returned from Brindisi on Sunday without the confession he wanted but with what he called ‘significant progress’, had listened politely. He had even conceded that Pallioti might be well on his way to solving a crime that happened sixty years ago. However, despite the fact that the case against Bruno Torricci was looking a little less rosy than it had, that they had not yet been able to break his alibi for the day Roblino was murdered, or place him in Florence, or find the weapon; despite the fact that, other than the letters, the only other remotely interesting thing they had been able to come up with was the fact that Bruno’s girlfriend worked for an IT firm that had installed a series of police software systems – not a crime in itself as far as anyone knew; despite all of that, Enzo was not convinced that a series of events that might or might not have happened over six decades ago was the motive for two murders. He had heard Pallioti out. Then he pointed out calmly that the fact that Piero Balestro was not a very nice person did not, sadly, outweigh the fact that they had not one shred of evidence against him.
The investigating magistrate had concurred – and failed to be persuaded by the argument that turning over the Balestro property would undoubtedly yield such evidence, specifically the Sauer 38H that Pallioti could practically feel sitting smugly in an upstairs safe or gun locker. Feeling, the magistrate had pointed out acidly, was no longer a basis for charging people or ransacking their property. For charging and ransacking, one needed evidence. Otherwise one was on a fishing expedition. Which made one a sportsman, not a policeman. Having pointed this out, he had then gone so far as to inform Pallioti that he was ‘surprised and disappointed’.
And the truth was, Pallioti was too. A good half of his disgust was with himself. Which, although admirably self-enlightened, did not alter the fact that, instead of sitting in Lupo and pointlessly reading the menu, he would rather be putting the fear of God into Piero Balestro before the murder weapon ended up in some river or pond or drainage ditch God knows where.
Where it probably was already. Where it had probably been within hours, if not minutes, of their leaving. If Balestro hadn’t already been getting rid of it down at the stables when they arrived. Dismantling it and hiding the bits. Burying them, so to speak, in a heap of horse shit.
Pallioti sighed and put the menu down. Even his friend the Mayor was not his friend at the moment. After the investigating magistrate had called in a temper, demanding to know why the Mayor was allowing Pallioti to ‘derail a perfectly good case’ and in effect ratting him out, the Mayor had picked up the phone and thrown a fit. He had warned Pallioti that his new department was under scrutiny, that his budget was by no means guaranteed, that there were evil and dark forces who wouldn’t mind seeing him and the Mayor taking permanent vacations and that everybody loved old partisans and hated neo-Nazis, so what was his problem? Pallioti rubbed his hand across his eyes and told himself that it didn’t matter what they said any more than it mattered what items he chose on the menu. Bernardo would bring whatever he felt like and it would be delicious, regardless. Much as the evidence against Piero Balestro would add up to a reasonable case, if he just kept picking away at it. Which was what he had been doing all day. Guillermo had been hauled back to his desk. Bales, Trantemento, Roberto Roblino – or Balestro, Rossi and Menucci, whoever they were – Pallioti had ordered that all of them, and anyone else Guillermo could think of, anyone even remotely connected with the case, be checked and double-checked.
So far, the great effort had not turned up a silver bullet. But doing it did make him feel better. And, as Guillermo had pointed out, he could afford to look on the bright side. At least there wasn’t anyone else for Piero Balestro to kill. If he was going to do in Little Lamb, he’d have done it years ago. The only time-sensitive issue now was getting enough evidence on the old bastard to charge him before he dropped dead.
With that happy thought, Pallioti picked up the glass Bernardo had brought him and remembered to spare a moment for the good things in life, not least of which was the fact that Lupo was open on Sunday.
The foul weather guaranteed that the restaurant was quiet, the few occupied tables taken by regulars, old diehards, many of them alone. Usually sated, if not stuffed, after his family meals, Pallioti rarely came in on Sundays. Now, tucked into his dark corner, lulled by the soft hum of conversation and the wine, he paid little attention to the rest of the room. Bernardo removed the offending menu. A hot consommé was followed by veal chops and mushrooms, and a small plate of spinach. A pear with hard white slices of pecorino appeared. Pallioti had no idea what the wine was, and didn’t care. He was content to sip it and let the events of the weekend slip away, show themselves out like bothersome guests.
‘Dottore?’
Pallioti looked up.
‘This comes with compliments.’
Bernardo was holding a glass in one hand and a very expensive bottle of grappa in the other. Feeling suddenly uneasy, expecting to see the Mayor or the magistrate and wondering if he’d have to apologize to them, Pallioti looked around.
‘From the Signora,’ Bernardo said, setting the glass on the table.
Pallioti glanced beyond him.
Signora Grandolo was sitting alone, in the opposite corner. She raised a hand. It was a slight, graceful motion. Beauty knows no age. Pallioti did not know who had said it, but he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was true. Getting to his feet, he crossed the room.
‘I did not mean to disturb you.’ She smiled up at him. ‘It was such a foul night. I couldn’t bear the house alone. All those windows rattling.’ She gestured to the chair opposite. ‘Will you join me? Or are you too busy, keeping our world intact?’
‘As long as I will not disturb you, Signora.’
‘Never, my friend.’
Bernardo, who had been watching them, retrieved Pallioti’s glass and hurried across with the grappa bottle. At a nod, he poured for Signora Grandolo as well. Pallioti sat down opposite her.
She smiled.
‘To the good fight,’ she said, raising her glass. ‘And to comrades. Fallen and living.’
‘To comrades.’ Pallioti joined her, tasting the faintly sweet, sharp grappa on the back of his tongue.
She was wearing grey tonight, a soft colour. Smoke. A discreet pair of earrings, considerable diamonds, sparkled in the candlelight. As she reached up to adjust one, Pallioti noticed again that, in contrast, her wedding and engagement rings were simple. Seeing his eyes drawn to them, she smiled.
‘Cosimo gave me some exceptionally beautiful things over the years,’ she said. ‘But nothing more valuable than this.’ She twisted the plain gold band. ‘Neither of my daughters wear one. They say they don’t “need rings to prove their love”. I don’t know whether to admire them, or think they’re frivolous. What is your opinion?’
‘Is that what it is, a ring – proof?’
‘No.’ Signora Grandolo shook her head. ‘It’s just a ring. And some memories.’
She raised her hand to the light, letting the candle catch the dull gleam of the gold and the deep shine in the small cluster of stones that was her engagement ring.
‘But,’ she added, ‘they’re a testament too, I think. And a souvenir. A vow. A kind of promise that has nothing to do with proof. Would you agree?’
‘Possibly,’ Pallioti said.
‘I don’t know.’ She regarded the rings, then looked at him. ‘My daughters have great faith in the rightness of things,’ she said. ‘In the inevitability of the correct conclusion, without the assistance of things like vows and remembering. It’s a belief in natural justice, I suppose. I’m glad they have it. But I’m not sure I share it. Perhaps that has something to do with the war.’
‘Where did you spend it?’
Even as Pallioti asked the question, he wondered whether it was impolite, whether it sounded as if he were somehow angling to find out about her background, or her age, or any number of other things she would rather not tell him. He thought about Caterina Cammaccio’s warning – that where the war was concerned it was sometimes better not to have an enquiring mind – and of her father who would apparently have found that horrific, and smiled, as if the memory was his own.
‘What?’ she asked.
Pallioti shook his head. ‘Nothing,’ he said, sipping his grappa. ‘Just something I read. About the dangers of enquiring minds.’
‘Better, on the whole, to have them than not, surely?’ Signora Grandolo raised her own glass. Then she added, ‘I was here, at the beginning. We moved about. Cosimo was in Rome, then in a POW camp. The bank is Florentine, of course. But his family has a house in Rome. You sit down to lunch and look out on the Palatine Hill. We lived there after we were married, for a few years, before he came back here to run the bank. I could never settle to it. Do you know Rome?’
‘I know it. But not well.’
‘No, don’t tell me—’ She smiled and sipped her grappa. ‘A city is like a woman, you know her well only after living with her for a lifetime?’
Pallioti felt himself blush.
‘Something like that, I suppose. Although you’ve managed to make it sound faintly ridiculous.’
‘I didn’t mean to.’ She shook her head. ‘I think it’s true. About cities, and people. When you reach my age, a lifetime begins to feel short, to get to know anything. Which still surprises me. Surely, you must find that in your work?’
‘Continually.’
The answer was more heartfelt than he had intended it to be. Pallioti laughed.
‘The only thing I have found I can be certain of,’ he said, ‘is that I know very little, and I’m very likely to be wrong.’
‘Then how do you ever solve anything?’ She put her glass down, her face suddenly serious. ‘How do you ever solve anything or convict anyone, if you can’t know?’
‘Oh, I didn’t say you can’t know. It was the amount of knowing I was talking about. It’s a question of persistence, really,’ he added, answering her question. ‘Of putting together a picture. Piece by piece. Until you see it. Until the story makes sense. Until all the pieces fit. With no cheating. No cutting and trimming. Then, you know. Not that it always helps you,’ he added. ‘In fact, a lot of the time it makes no difference at all.’ He shrugged. ‘But it doesn’t matter, because most people simply tell you. If you wait long enough.’
‘Confess?’
She smiled as if she found this hard to believe.
Pallioti nodded.
‘Eventually. They don’t always realize they’re doing it. But they do.’
‘So, it’s true then – the lure of the confessional – that policemen are like priests.’
‘I suppose so, Signora.’ Pallioti smiled. ‘In more ways than you would think.’
‘That sounds rather sinister.’
Before Pallioti could consider this, Bernardo approached. Both of their glasses were nearly empty. He refilled them and turned back to the room. Tucked into the corner, their table was an island surrounded by flickering light and the warm lapping murmur of voices.
‘Don’t you think,’ Signora Grandolo asked a moment later, ‘that it’s not so much people telling you things, as you knowing how to hear them? It seems to me,’ she added, picking up her glass, ‘that you policemen, good policemen – and I should think there are only very few of you – are rather more like hunting dogs than priests. I don’t mean the sense of smell. I mean what you hear – the whistle. The rustle in the undergrowth that the rest of us are deaf to. It’s a gift, I suspect.’ She smiled. ‘Like perfect pitch. Only a very few people have it. And it can’t be taught.’