On Saturday 26 th April 1986, at 6.04 in the morning, I parked my car near the City Wall. The sky was getting lighter, even if the sun was still way out of sight. An incorporeal fog danced upon the freshly cut grass left behind to dry at the bottom of the Wall. It was meant to stay a couple more days at least, before seasoned handymen with the City Council logo on their stained uniforms came around with their bags and40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcGV2pVfoLB
pitchforks and tractors to collect it.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ04s8Fc0Kxp
At least it doesn’t smell.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7sS69prNdL
Still, I wouldn’t sit on it for a nice picnic.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2ke1oAv2al
Via Pomposa was quiet, but it wouldn’t be for long. The air was still crispy from the night, but spring lure and warmth enveloped the city, promising a hot, humid day. More than one family would have soon been packing towels and flip-flops and buckets and spades and head to the Seven Lidos. I didn’t mind the heat; I was happy to trade my rainy summers in London for 90% humidity and mosquitos as big as hummingbirds any time.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkSbUIeY1MK
Even if I still felt alien in the city I was born and where I lived until I was 8, I grew to love Ferrara, the capital city of a territory that lived off of farming and fishing and a meagre beach tourism during the summer. It was a different universe, compared to London: people left their door unlocked, because everybody knew everybody else, in the summer women sat outside on the streets, gossiping about this or that person, in the winter paraded their furs and sheepskin jackets across the city centre’s shopping streets, helped each other to get jobs or look after kids, went to church because it was the right thing, but mostly kept themselves to themselves, got up early, went to bed early and joined forces against anyone who wasn’t at least part of the province.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5MlOUN8wbA
Me included.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡX46kicTr7d
But it wasn’t their fault. Ferrara had a long, not always glamorous, past: originally it was a swamp, and keeping the territory dry has always been a hard and not remunerative job, that along with cold, humid and foggy winters and dry summers where the heat was scorching, toughened up the inhabitants to their core. In between the Wars, during the Mussolini regime, Ferrara was one of the main centres of fascist power – two of the four quadrumvir that led the March on Rome, the event that officially put Mussolini in power, were from Ferrara, and despite the fact it was an old story, there were still too many people who had lived through it to let the others forget. At the end of the War, the Socialist and the agricultural party took over, pushing the territory in the opposite direction, but ending up making an even bigger mess. Eventually, working in agriculture became just hard and not profitable anymore, unemployment reached sky-high levels, factories never developed and people moved somewhere else. Whoever remained had to face adversities and resentment and saw others thrive where all they had was fog, mosquitos and hard existences.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRnMqJpIfKh
But with all its adversities and hardships, the countryside was magic, a vast plane that filled up every available interstice that wasn’t the city, a village or even a small ensemble of houses in the middle of nowhere that once homed the peasants and their families. As a child, my grandma used to live in one of them. And it was an all-year-round show. It started in autumn, when the trees went on fire and the land was squeezing out its last products before a well-deserved sleep. The earth became still and grey by All Saints, on November 1st , soon it began to be covered in fog, at times thin and wet, like a drizzle, other times so thick that you couldn’t see a person on the other side of the road. It was cold in winter, colder than London, but humid to the point that you always had the feeling of walking around in wet clothes. Then spring came, gradually, a bit here, a bit there. One nice, sunny day, followed by a foggy night, a mild, cloudy afternoon followed by a rainy day, the first gems on the trees, the first tractors in the fields, the occasional Saturday afternoon at the Lidi if it was sunny. And finally summer exploded once again, and the magic reached its peak. One day you slept with the blanket, the following day with the windows wide open and not even a sheet, the trees were in full bloom and the air smelled of flowers and soil and garlic and onions and the first strawberries and loquats, the heat hit you with no warning, days became long, nights short and conceited, letting you toss in bed endlessly because it was too hot. The only hope for a break from the impossible temperatures came from trips to the Seven Lidos, even if what the locals called sea was the mouth of the Pò River, which poured kilometres and kilometres of mud and tree branches and leaves and rubbish a few metres from those same families that were going to pack towels and flip-flops and buckets and spades in a few hours.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmq2HO89nX5
Who are you kidding? You’d probably be on the way too in a few hours if it40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5aLFLbD1qE
weren’t for this.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡREaTPpixpY
Right. Focus. I rubbed my face and passed my fingers in between my already messy hair, making it even messier. It had looked good the night before when I entered the Kontiki dance hall, but then I lost track of it after the third Blue Lagoon the barman served me and I hit the floor dancing on the notes of ‘Notorious’. The rest40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGFUVUzP24R
was blurred. I remembered a nice guy with brown hair who offered me a cigarette, I40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡj2ScF4nx7W
think we even made out in his car – or was it mine? – then I drove home and fell asleep face first on the carpet in the living room. The phone woke me up a few hours40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmXQcRTuhVB
later, and still dressed like the night before, a deathly taste at the back of my throat and a pounding headache I drove my car to the bottom of the City Walls, checking my badly smeared make-up in my car rear-view mirror at every red traffic light, trying my best to fix it but eventually deciding that sunglasses were my best option. So, I pushed them up my nose and thanked the heavens for the dimmed light they40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHylqubBuQ2
provided.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0r4mtNa3S0
I spotted the scene immediately. Impossible to miss the two starched sentries in the middle of the freshly cut grass, stiff as two blue bricks, and just as much compatible with the surroundings.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXkww6OfdL9
“Go, go. Nothing to see here” they repeated to the few passers-by. They40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLAePAvqhEv
reminded me of Sweetchuck and Zed from Police Academy.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjwFgjdUDlC
“Morning” I muttered, passing them by. They replied with a simple nod. I didn’t care for formalities, I preferred to avoid them when not strictly necessary, but once again I couldn’t suppress the pang of irritation that hit the bottom of my stomach. If their Inspector were a man, they would have bent over backwards to salute him.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSIjhrjr3zQ
Sergio Reali, my deputy, was talking to a woman. She was visibly shaking and her dog, a medium-sized mongrel, was barking loudly and jumping all around her, in a futile attempt to reclaim her attention and go back to his walk.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJdnr5VPohY
Poor thing, disturbed in one of the few pleasures his simple life has to offer.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1IdwuJLECp
I had been working with Sergio since I started in Ferrara, two years prior, and our chemistry was off the charts since day one. But just as colleagues. And not because Sergio was married with two kids, or because he was three years younger than me. I thought about it a few times, in a theoretical and interrogative way, but kissing him had the same appeal as licking asphalt in August. It might have been someone’s thing, and in that case who was I to judge, but it wasn’t mine. He was a friend, and a brother in arms, and there were times where these two things mattered more than any love affair or sexual pleasure.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnYY0WvDWLZ
Definitely it will last longer.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnXLKZSvNfP
I walked the short distance that separated me from him and the dog lady, ready to rescue him.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2DGK20OdWL
“Inspector Linda Bonora, good morning” I introduced myself. I purposely avoided to add Lilith, my stupid middle name, to the mix. It always made me feel pretentious and fake, but it was crucial for my mother to agree to an Italian name. It also contributed to how I was feeling: I have been torn between Evelina, the tomboy who loved to run in the garden and climb trees and play with remote-control cars, and Lilith, the fairy-tale princess that took ballet and piano classes and went around dressed in pink frills and laces, since a very young age. Moving between two different countries didn’t help either, and for a very long time I didn’t know who to be. Until a few years ago, when I melted the two together, and Linda was born, this entity who played piano when she was nervous, batted in the boys’ team, spotted the occasional red or yellow top in her wardrobe and was not a person who left her house without make-up and her hair done.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡd3CMEbnDpL
Unless it’s an emergency, like this morning.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYFbIpnGWCR
“Does it look like a good morning to you?” the woman sniffled. “I came out with Poldo, here” she pointed at the mongrel with the tip of her chin, which continued his unnoticed crusade of barking and jumping “for a quick walk before waking up my husband and go to Spina, and look! Look!” she shrieked, pointing at the body under40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0UMikjdEgf
the white sheet. “Can you believe it? A tragedy, plain and simple! I am in shock! It will take me a long time to recover from the trauma.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSsfx5O2P6J
I did my best to master my expression, noticing the side glances that that bastard of Sergio was sending my way, but I avoided them inspecting carefully the morning dew that covered my shoes.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPbS5eqeqgI
“I am sure you are, Madam, and I am really sorry you have to go through this ordeal. But my deputy here, Reali, is an extremely capable agent and he will make it as painless as he can. Right, Sergio?” I slapped him on the shoulder, ignored the boorish comment that left his lips in a whisper and moved away in three rapid steps, leaving the woman still raging about how disgusting it was and what a terrible experience she was going through. Typical Italian propensity for drama.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaGLjH3Zy6H
The white sheets the government equipped us with were big. Just in case. In the ‘70s there were too many bodies, barely covered, that scandalised public opinion and the prude middle-class. But that sheet seemed even bigger, the bumps and lows underneath it concentrated in a small section right in the middle, almost flat to the ground, as if it was a mistake. It made me wonder if the phone call I got at an inhuman hour of the morning was just a prank because I did something to upset my superiors, and that was their way to get back at me. With a terrible and very questionable prank. It had to be. Because the alternative was that the body belonged to a child.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmODD7I3H2x
I never had problems with dead people – death is part of life – but I didn’t like it when they were young. When it came to kids – and luckily it only happened four times in my career – I joined the crime scene at the very last minute, trying to take in as much as I could in the least amount of time. There is already a sense of wrongness in violent deaths, that becomes amplified when it comes to anyone below the age of 25 and it just becomes a capital sin if the person is underage.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlNWDA52q5f
I took a deep breath to steady my nerves and knelt, the fingers of my left hand brushing the wet grass.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrQmXkcW4zQ
Feel the wetness against your skin.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrRt4wDvlys
It was a simple trick to ground myself, to be in the present instead of spiralling out of control and looking stupid in front of my subordinates who already had serious difficulties considering me a human being.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpWwfD19cc5
I lifted the corner of the sheet and saw long, brown, wavy locks.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5znaARNwcV
Which of your fingers are touching the grass?40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNv0bwrm5FQ
She had olive skin-tone.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡz3zTa1Mww6
Is the grass you’re touching soft or hard?40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvgpBdqCcNJ
She had blue nail polish.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuEguqY65mQ
Is the grass hot or cold?40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwC6dGmsKnU
Her eyes were light brown, open wide.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgG0toJ0HQs
Is the grass smooth or coarse?40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnKy5QIQVlZ
She had full lips slightly ajar, blades of freshly cut grass stuck to her bright red40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTo3zrXGv6B
lipstick, her nose, her hair.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqWEva3gds9
Is it wet or dry?40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡk9nXDh1cQB
I closed my eyes and released the sheet, which fluttered back into place, recreating its small pattern of bumps and lows.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7F1L8o0h6C
The fingers that touch the grass are my index and middle finger of my left40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyuPHGOWXPH
hand, and it was wet, cold, coarse and stubbly.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBtXi2nqS8S
A bout of nausea hit my throat, but I swallowed hard a couple of times and the feeling disappeared.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCqSi5Baf8g
She looks so young.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0VbuKHyddD
Because she was young.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiMXvor7dIO
“What do we have?” asked a familiar voice behind me.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡI8LDmwg9Iw
Doctor Fernando Landi, class 1934, graduated in 1962, a good two years ahead of his class, with more than twenty years of experience of dead people. He’s never been my biggest fan, but it wasn’t personal. He came from a generation where the highest achievement for a woman was buying a washing machine. For him, work with one in a position higher than secretary or switchboard operator was as normal as celebrating Christmas in July.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMOL7hVSE55
“Dr Landi, good morning” I greeted him, getting back to a standing position. “Girl, young, I would say between 20 and 25. I am quite sure she fell, but if it was intentional or not is not for me to say.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7h6EQyKO4y
Dr Landi waved his hand in a dismissive way.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQpaGVgTUnV
“I will never understand English people” he said, rummaging in his bag. “You are brilliant at masking your lack of spine for politeness. Try again.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDJu43QbQUT
I had been working with Landi since I had arrived in Ferrara, fighting hard for every shred of respect I had gained. The reason why he tolerated me was because he liked to teach on any occasion, and when he taught, I learnt.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDpld9D3kyZ
You’ve always been one of my best students, said a voice in my head. But it wasn’t Dr Landi’s; it was a painful one, a voice that I only heard in my nightmares.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZjz5urt7Tb
“Inspector? I am waiting” he said, pulling the sheet all the way back.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzngH4x3QGx
“She is quite close to the walls, meaning she didn’t jump.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡT4Txwm2eOh
“Why is that?” asked Dr Landi, fetching a thermometer from his bag.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4tcFTW3p8r
“The trajectory. If someone is being pushed, they tend to land perpendicular to the starting point. If she jumped, even if she didn’t run-up, she should have landed at least a meter forward.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkWaVUiswWe
“What else?” he probed me, a corner of his mouth lifting in a smirk.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyl2CxTnYSK
I walked around the girl, doing my best to ignore the sense of wrongness. There was going to be plenty of time, later, alone in my house.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxfg2BX7LJN
Feel the earth below your feet, is it soft or hard?40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXZdxq3uR6R
“Her nails.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOy4Dts6puZ
“What about them?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5JyAWljWex
“The nail polish… it’s ruined. One nail is missing altogether. She struggled. But her clothes seem alright. A robbery? A scorned admirer?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡybMDwVG05u
“That’s your job. Mine is to find out how she died. It will take me a few days” he said, busying himself around the body. He had that glimmer in his eyes, the one of a curious child in front of a wrapped present. Once again, I wondered if he ever killed anyone just to see what happens in real times, instead of studying it on dusty books.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoYxBHTaUuO
At this point, getting any more information out of him was going to be like squeezing water out of a stone. I said my goodbyes and walked toward my car, Sergio still stuck with the woman. Poldo, instead, gave up his protests and was now sitting at her feet, with his snout in between his front paws. Sergio tried to catch my attention with some comical gestures of his head, but I hid my smile behind a cough and continued to walk.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpbjkMteq2Q
The two sentries still stood uptight like two bricks, but at least they did the job. A few joggers and more dog owners stopped in small clumps away from the crime scene. Ferrara City Walls surrounded the core of the city, in a 9km long belt. During the Middle Ages and the Renaissance it was a safety measure. Nowadays it lost its protective function against arrows and cannonballs and became a popular spot for joggers, dog walkers and teenage lovers at their first kisses. Not at 6.30 in the morning, though. At that time there only were joggers and dog walkers, and the occasional pensioner out for the fresh bread and newspaper run. And the bastards seemed to multiply by the minute, gathering in bigger groups to discuss what happened, stretching their necks so much I was worried they were going to snap.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSd2MEeYQeR
Dead people can be morbidly fascinating, especially in a tight-knit community where the installation of street lighting is a big deal and requires months of public40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7YLOStdjjB
debate.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYrQTP6OKEI
I called for reinforcement, before the two bricks lost their power of repulsion and bystanders decided that Dr Landi was too old and needed help to load the body on the hearse.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYR0u2Lg53P
“Two cruisers are on their way, Ma’am. ETA three minutes.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡed4BHGBMiT
“If they don’t stop for a coffee break” I muttered in the mic. I hung up and squeezed the bridge of my nose, trying to stop my frustration from going all the way up to my brain and contributing to the massive headache. All I could do, in the meantime, was to go and disperse the crowd myself.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXXP92n19hF
A blink of silver and a fast movement caught my attention. Hiding behind a tall durmast there was a girl. She looked like a child dressed in her mother’s clothes, with long wavy hair cascading from her shoulders, a Bardot top that exposed her shoulders and belly, a colourful long skirt and lines and lines of bracelets around each wrist. As soon as she noticed I was looking in her direction she fled, like silversides fishes do in the Adriatic, followed by the tinkle of her jewellery. I was about to go after her when a man, the bravest, or the most idiotic of the group, according to the point of view, stopped me.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGia1MHsLwl
“I’m sorry, sgnurina” he said in a thick accent, making his best effort to not mix Italian and dialect and coming out with a scrunchy version of Sorry, miss. In time I40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBQf3r4QfGa
got used to the dialect, but part of conversations still were lost in translation.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3otkAK0zq6
“Yes.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmztewp7fJj
“What happened there?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQIEax81YPS
“We are in no position to release any information” I said to him. Then I turned to the rest of the crowd. “If you saw something you want to report to the authorities, please approach one of the agents now or come to the Station as soon as you can. Otherwise, I suggest you leave the premises. All of you.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbREXfxR1nu
More than one head turned on the other side, and a few people went as far as commenting that they weren’t going to take suggestions from a secretary.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4f4Hu7ZZHr
“I am Chief Inspector Linda Bonora” I said, charging my voice with all the pain and resentment and anger I had. “Not a secretary. And if you have something else to40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiUPE66Tepz
say, you can say it to my face.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdHzEa0Pr0m
At the words Chief Inspector, the crowd dissipated. Only to reform on the other side of the crossing, under the big ship that commemorated the Navy soldiers that fell during one war or another.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqeku1ckkfQ
I observed the whole transhumance with a careful eye: crowds can pick up details and moods that my ten years out of the country haven’t taught me how to. I was an exotic foreigner in London, I am the snotty bitch from another country here.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKPjLfHPjyo
I took another look around, but the girl was gone. And the cruisers were nowhere near. Dr Landi was doing his things and Sergio was still busy with Poldo’s owner. I gestured him that I was going. His half smiled replaced the middle finger he really itched to flip at me but he couldn’t, given the situation. I turned the key in the ignition and the radio came alive too.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ96BjPCtxaD
“…while Ghaddafi’s status remains to be verified. There are no football matches scheduled for today, all championships suspended ahead of the celebrations for Liberation Day. SPAL will play Fano team next weekend at the Paolo Mazza stadium, tickets are still available. The San Marino Formula One Grand Prix will start at 2pm, Ayrton Senna will be in pole position, followed by Nelson Piquet, Nigel Mansell and Alain Prost, the two Ferrari are starting in fifth and seventh position. That’s all for this hour, next radio-journal at eight.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1KXx5VB6Qo
When the speaker finally stopped talking, Madonna began her tirade against lying men and how she hoped to live to tell all the secrets she learned. I made a mental note to go and watch the movie before the only cinema that showed it in the whole city and province pulled it for the low volume of ticket sales.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeA50i5AiRR
It was at times like these I missed London and its buzz.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3N1wxgBme3
Do you also miss the long sequence of balls and dinners and events your mother dragged you to?40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGdfgUhqoAK
London was a great city, but, at times, it could be overrated. Ferrara was a bum, far from the splendour of a more cosmopolitan agglomerate like Bologna, but big enough to have a university and a couple of decent events during the year. It was the capital of a dilapidated territory, that stopped growing when the rest of Italy was bathing in the post-war economic boom and tried to catch up for the past 20-odd years with no success. Always chasing the others, always a couple of steps behind, always a minute too late. Maybe that’s the reason why it felt like home.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHOizugd3C9
The city was slowly awakening: bicycles, more dog walkers, the first kids, the last all-nighters. I reached the Station and manoeuvred the car into my personal parking space. Across the road the bar was open, with Lucia already busy behind the counter. She was a skinny lady probably over 50, but she looked at least 200 thanks to all the fags she started to smoke a few hours after she was born.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlsM0mRbWJS
“Morning inspector! Coffee?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmQBkx92H9e
“Please” I pushed my sunglasses on top of my head, planted my elbows on the counter and toyed with the sugar dispenser.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3r0PzDjP3z
“How come you are up so early? And on a Saturday!” she asked in her raspy voice.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡP9ZJnPc9Uw
“A new case.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyb1Jbmhd4L
“A bad one, looking at your face” she placed the espresso cup on the saucer in front of me. “Milk?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0kgvQVkEIb
I nodded and she poured a drop, while I looked for my cigarettes.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡk8HGiHA13Z
“She was young” I said in a cloud of smoke. Lucia nodded her disappointment but didn’t comment any further. She knew when to ask more questions and when to listen, and that was why we hung out at her bar.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXyJJAq9XU8
“Morning old ladies!” said the delivery boy, entering with two big trays wrapped in paper.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxeoxlRK9zV
“Your father didn’t slap you enough while you were growing up. Give it here.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRXnjEaL4kI
Lucia grabbed the two trays from his hands and while the boy took a long look at a not at all impressed me, she clipped him behind the ears.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyCUn8lCjuC
“Don’t complain or I’ll tell Lucio!” she said, waving her index finger under his nose. He left as fast as he had entered, and I laughed.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZSxlJnU1ac
“He’s a good boy” I said.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUDmbP53pTT
“He needs to be reminded some manners from time to time. Do you want a cornetto? They are still warm.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0HF1OzKRNc
Lucia offered me the whole tray, and after a careful examination, I picked an apricot jam croissant and wrapped it in a paper tissue.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJNTqhTMlNM
“Put it on my tab, please, and save one for Sergio too. A bombolone with custard, please. The biggest you have.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNctiBz7n88
Lucia whistled.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡduhAEDqGwi
“What do you have to make up for?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6WR4q5TWYO
“I left him with a potential witness, one of those stiff old ladies that wear pearls at 6 in the morning to walk the dog.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3HKayyd1b1
“And you think a bombolone will do?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡL6IZcRQJ2J
“There is also the cappuccino.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡij7YWYGmGL
When I left the bar Lucia was still laughing.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOltY9nEG1r
I crossed the threshold of a red brick building: outside it looked just like the rest of the constructions along the road; inside, though, it was decorated with Renaissance frescoes and marble statues that dated back to the 16th century, when the Este dynasty was one of the most powerful in Italy. Being a Saturday morning, the only person there was the night sentry, ready for the change of the guard, and two constables, who almost stood at attention when they noticed my presence.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ606uuk4j70
At least them.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡf9oeR6MEd0
I ignored everybody, not in the mood for formalities, and walked up the stairs briskly, my cornetto cooling down in my hand. I opened the last door on the left, that, as per a cruel joke, was in front of the toilets. More than once I wondered if that was only pure coincidence, as everyone seemed so keen to reassure me, even if I found out that the room had been used as an archive up to my arrival from Bologna, two years ago.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpo7UxHaYJs
“It’s the biggest room in the building” said the Commissioner, when he did the honours “and also the most richly decorated. It was used as dance hall back in time” he added, pompously.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPLDX53mJVQ
“That’s nice” I said, not listening to the art lesson any longer.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWUrt1TdUFY
Yes, it was big and richly decorated. And the light was amazing, since I had windows on three sides that captured morning, mid-day and sunset. But it was also a place where I laid pictures of dead people, had evidence and firearms and a lot of paperwork that detailed the most inhuman behaviours.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuVWgCuLVRb
There is also a sofa with two armchairs and a rug, that is a nice touch.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiFoUKTnYSj
Yes, a sofa where sometimes I receive guests and witnesses and sometimes I spend the night, if I am too spent to make it home.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsVCth6Jqad
I took a deep breath and exhaled, closing the door behind me. The typewriter was hidden by its cover, my chair neatly pushed under the desk, my trench still on the coat rack. The only difference was that the pile of documents I signed the day before was gone. Sandra, my very efficient and very young secretary, had swept them before the end of her working day.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVuyCPTe4or
They could be the same age.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvzJIDbMLVK
A churn twisted my stomach and I was grateful I only had a coffee. I sat my cornetto on the desk, still wrapped in its tissues, no longer hungry. Twenty-something was not an age to die. It was the age to go clubbing at night, go shopping with friends on a Saturday afternoon, maybe have a forever boyfriend that was going to last only until the next forever boyfriend entered the picture. But not an age to lie under a white sheet with Dr Landi probing your body in private places.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAhAfZT1OG3
I opened the west-facing window, welcoming the fresh air in the humid room.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYbPRCQHFUY
Looking out, on the left, I could glimpse at the Este Castle, that nowadays housed the Town Hall. It was deserted, all its employees celebrating the extra day off. I sat behind my desk and opened the last of three drawers on the right side, the only one I kept locked. Beside an envelope with a copy of my birth certificate and my passport, my beauty case with sanitary products, a change of underwear, a brush, make-up and hairpins, I kept my diary. It was a simple ruled A5 notebook, the type that primary school kids use to learn how to write letters and numbers. I usually bought them in bulk at the beginning of the school year, taking advantage of special offers and compiled them meticulously every day I was working on a case. I started when I became a constable; jotting questions, events and personal considerations on paper was cathartic. Nothing went missing, nothing was stupid. I could switch from Italian to English and back, mix the two languages, create new words that made sense only to me. I used a special substitution alphabet to write names, arrows to indicate that someone went or came to or from a place, crosses to say that something stopped or finished or was a dead end and, at times music notes or ballet poses’ names.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUCIuKAC5Re
I took a pen from my overcrowded pen holder and opened my diary on a fresh page.
26 April 198640Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡl3vofAXqJl
Sunny, people -> the Lidi. St George’s funfair almost X. School 2, soon there will be < students. / uni still in session until late July. ?? uni student? She looks young / not high school young.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcCzASlb3sg
Local? Dark brown hair, natural olive-skin. ?? southern beau? ?? 2nd gen? Like me she could have been living around 4 a while.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZf97GvRz0P
X jump. Pushed. ? Her nails. The nail-polish was ruined. / she was well dressed. Her blouse was ironed. She wore nylon tights. It’s not summer yet, / girls are already baring their legs => made an effort in her appearance => X chipped manicure is wrong.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeQlgEb9gTn
X jacket. X bag. Theft? It might. The area is XXX. Whoever assaulted her got her bag, ??even her jacket, she defended herself -> the ruined polish, in the effort of getting her bag they pushed her while she was pulling, the bag handle snapped, ?? she tripped and she fell backwards, going off the wall.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6KJBQkLGIt
If so -> she would have landed on her back. So if
Someone knocked at my door, interrupting my concentration.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhHHrxpx6sT
“Come in” I barked, tossing the pen in the middle fold of my diary. Reali pushed his head in.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5hnrh3mNaB
“Is it a good time?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2iZAuOf5gi
“As good as any.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHA51gVNYUV
I closed my diary and pointed at the two chairs in front of my desk. Reali sat and crossed his legs.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡi7NndftXO2
“Dr Landi will give you a call later today with the preliminary results, but he will need at least 72 hours for the rest and a minimum of two weeks for alcohol and drug reports. According to his preliminary tests, she died last night, or in the very early hours of the morning.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDIyL8Vnd8n
“When the sky was dark and people were asleep.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjT8ibEdfyh
“Exactly” nodded Sergio. “The closest residential building is across the road, a good 300 metres away from the scene anyway. I left a couple of agents for a door-to-door round of questions.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJbQ4xIvR3c
“It’s a long shot, but it’s a good call. Anything else?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ54X7MV7Ilr
“Yes. The gypsy girl came back.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡr6dDOXoATI
“What gypsy girl?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPl4f8q2dc2
“The one with long hair and bare feet.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPdoKtoxGwY
“Bardot top and as many bracelets as the Madonna statue inside the Cathedral?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgDC3WgwnF3
“That one” he confirmed Reali, looking for his cigarettes. He stopped as soon as he noticed my face. No one was allowed to smoke in my office.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡo05Zq40IcB
“Why do you think she’s a gypsy?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmzuIGgMyJb
“She’s a carny. They are all gypsy…” he said with a dismissive wave of his hand. I looked at him ready to separate his body from his head and he apologised.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7np8kuVj6p
“Anyway. After you left, she came back. I managed to ask if she saw something, but40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHnZTmj5TC9
when she opened her mouth to reply, someone called her, and she ran away in a wave of curls. She has some pretty, strong long legs.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡppVekXLwtR
And the possible gypsy roots are not important anymore.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡO5jeeFuz7k
“What’s her name?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcoJkkMNPtw
“Something like Dea.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfSiPbwjzhs
“Dea. As in goddess?” Sergio shrugged his shoulders. “I’ll have a look later. You can go, thanks.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDSgUFzwjhi
He got up and opened the door.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvDd0Rx0yC3
“Oh, Sergio. One more thing.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8kjLKITTE4
“Chief?”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHwDIHcuXM3
“Breakfast is already paid for at Lucia’s.”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQZqMSfetp5
“I’ll need a bit more than breakfast to forgive you for leaving me with Mrs Sartori’s rambling for 45 fucking minutes.” said Sergio.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDZFknibOFi
“You know I am not gonna have sex with you” I said, opening my diary again.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfcecZto5pB
“At least a hand job!”40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxOB9enJPkt
“Piss off, jerk” I said, aiming at his head with my pen, but hitting the door instead.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgK702B2k1f
When he left, I tried to make sense of the ‘so if’ that concluded my last paragraph, but when I couldn’t recall that train of thought, I crossed it out and started a new paragraph.
The girl – she is a carny – <- after I left / someone called her, and ->. ? family member. ? a husband. BB l8r. S. says her name is Dea. ??? S. can be such a bigot.40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNN7IxugfTR
* call Samia. It’s been a few days, she must be worried. Need to do the laundry. Another day and I won’t have any clean underwear left. ? go commando. I might consider it.
40Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡe6aVaVigNm
