The Potter's Field

“Which leaves us with how many?”

“Three, Chief. Of these three—all of whom are around forty—one is five foot two, the second is six foot four, and the third has a pacemaker.”

“And so?”

“And so none of these reports concerns our corpse.”

“And now, what should I do to you?”

Fazio looked flummoxed.

“Why should you want to do something to me, Chief?”

“Because you wasted so many words. Didn’t you know that wasting words is a crime against humanity? You could have simply said to me: ‘Look, none of the people who have been reported missing corresponds to our body in the bag.’ That would have synthesized the whole thing, and we both would have saved something: you, your breath, and me, my time. Don’t you agree?”

Fazio shook his head negatively.

“With all due respect, sir, no.”

“And why not?”

“My dear Inspector, no ‘synthesis,’ as you call it, could ever give a sense of all the work that went into arriving at that synthesis.”

“All right, you win. And what was the other thing?”

“Do you remember when I was telling you what I’d found out about Dolores Alfano, I said there was something somebody had told me but I couldn’t remember what it was?”

“Yes. Do you remember now?”

“One of the people I talked to was an old, retired shopkeeper who told me that Giovanni Alfano, Dolores’s husband, was Filippo Alfano’s son.”

“So?”

“When he told me, I didn’t attach any importance to it. It’s something that goes back to before you started working here. This Filippo Alfano was a big cheese in the Sinagra family. He was also a distant relative.”

“Whoa!”

The Sinagras were one of the two historic Mafia families of Vigàta. The other was the Cuffaro family.

“At a certain point this Filippo Alfano disappeared. He resurfaced in Colombia with his wife and son, Giovanni, who at the time wasn’t yet fifteen years old. Of course, Filippo Alfano didn’t leave the country legally. He didn’t have a passport, and he had three serious convictions. Around town they said the Sinagras had sent him abroad to look after their interests in Bogotá. But after he’d been there awhile, Filippo Alfano was shot and killed; nobody ever found out by whom. And there you have it.”

“What do you mean, ‘and there you have it’?”

“I mean that’s the end of the story, Chief. Giovanni Alfano, Dolores’s husband, works as a ship’s officer and has a clean record, absolutely spotless. Why, do the sons of mafiosi always have to become mafiosi like their fathers?”

“No. So, if Giovanni Alfano is clean, then the attempt to run over his wife can’t have been an indirect vendetta or a warning. It must have been a nasty prank or drunken antic. Do you agree?”

“I agree.”

The inspector was thinking of going home to change clothes for his meeting with Ingrid when he heard Galluzzo’s voice asking permission to enter.

“Come in, come in.”

Galluzzo entered and shut the door behind him. He had an envelope in his hand.

“What is it?” Montalbano asked.

“Inspector Augello told me to give you this.”

He set the envelope down on the desk. It wasn’t sealed. On the outside, in block letters typed by the computer printer, it said: “FOR CHIEF INSPECTOR SALVO MONTALBANO.” And below: “PERSONAL AND CONFIDENTIAL.” And on the upper left: “FROM DOMENICO AUGELLO.”

Montalbano didn’t take the letter out. He looked at Galluzzo and asked:

“Is Inspector Augello still in his office?”

“No, Chief, he left about half an hour ago.”

“Why did you take half an hour to bring me this letter?”

Galluzzo was visibly embarrassed.

“Well, I . . .” he began to say.

“Did he tell you to wait half an hour before bringing it to me?”

“No, Chief, it took me that long to understand what he had written by hand on the sheet of paper he told me to type up and bring to you. A lot of stuff was crossed out and some of the words were hard to decipher. When I finished, I went back to his office to ask him to sign it, but he’d already left. So I decided to bring it to you anyway, without his signature.”

He reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out a sheet of paper, and laid it down beside the envelope.

“This is the original.”

“Okay. You can go.”

6

The letter said:

Dear Salvo,