God's Dog (8 page)

The hairdresser's and the beauty salon were barely thirty metres apart. Salazar went in and approached the first assistant available.

‘Excuse me, may I ask you a few questions?' he said, pointing to his badge. The girl was mixing a dye. Before she could reply, a heavily made-up woman intervened.

‘Can I help you?' she asked, edging Salazar towards the door. She was chewing gum, and smelled strongly of violets.

‘I'm looking for this woman,' said Salazar, taking the photo of Chiara Bonardi out of his pocket and edging the woman backwards in his turn.

‘Do you know her? She came to your establishment on 27 February.' The woman took the photograph and put on the glasses which had been hanging round her neck; she looked at the face for a moment, frowning.

‘That's Signora Loiacano! How young she looks! Look, Teresa!' Salazar snatched the photograph from her hand.

‘Do you know where she lives? Does she come here often?'

‘She's been a client of ours for years. But I don't know where she lives. I think she's local, though, because I often see her go by with shopping bags.'

‘Thank you,' said Salazar, and slipped out of the shop under the curious gaze of the two assistants. He wandered aimlessly through the streets around Piazza Risorgimento, looking at people at the tram stops, in shop windows and doorways with the secret hope of catching the woman by surprise. She lived round here; at this very moment she might be in the supermarket on the corner or the café opposite, or perhaps, unknown to him, she was at some window, observing him from behind the curtains. Salazar looked up at the uncommunicative façades of the buildings which lined the street: closed curtains, blinds half-down, the frosted glass of surgeries and offices. He looked at his watch: by now it was two o'clock and he hadn't had anything to eat. He went into a bar and ordered a sandwich, casting an eye at the television that was hanging from the wall, at the piles of Easter eggs in the window and at the headlines of the newspaper being read by the man seated at the bar's only table. The man had heavy, stumpy hands; when he put down the paper, Salazar saw that it was the South American from San Basilio!

I've missed a trick here, no two ways about it. I should have followed the woman throughout the day, and searched the flat on Via Cornelia from top to bottom. I made a play at catching her out; in fact, the opposite has happened. I didn't think that things in Italy had come to such a pass. These Free Death Brigades mean business. I am far from convinced that self-serving orthodoxy is the most effective strategy. Ever since abortion, the pill, assisted fertilisation and euthanasia were proclaimed terrorist offences, anonymous accusations have been raining down on the desks of the papal police, and those in charge of anti-terrorist activities have been wasting their time hunting down a handful of offenders in order to be able to boast of some headline-grabbing arrest. University professors, journalists, even the odd priest have fallen into the trap. Banner headlines, triumphal announcements, everyone congratulating everyone else, but where does this get us? Here every member of the hierarchy dons the mantle of defender of the faith and vies with all others in observance of the Catholic rule – purely to earn promotion, to curry favour, to procure themselves important positions in the curia. But, by so doing, such men lose sight of their goal. Here we see that same obtuseness which caused us such bitter setbacks in the past. Dogma is to be used against atheists, not against ourselves. There is no point in even trying to cure incurable ills. Giving placebos instead of drugs would solve the problem of euthanasia, as well as exposing the limits of what medicine can do. Courts sitting in judgement on the course of a disease serve no purpose, indeed they are counterproductive. The principle is correct: a sick person cannot take his own life because it is not his to take, it has been bestowed on him by God. But when decisions about treatment are entrusted to a court, and not to the patient himself, or to his family, then inevitably there will be ill-feeling. There are other, less controversial ways of taking this decision out of his hands. Indeed, he should be allowed to choose his own treatment: he will never know what is in the pills that he swallows. What counts, all in all, is not to prolong a man's life for as long as possible, but to remind him that death is his destiny. That way, he is more likely to give himself over to the Church. What the curia is interested in above all is getting its hands on the property of the euthanasiasts, and may thus be seen as gaining material advantage from the situation; but that is tantamount to paving the way for the angels of death. I shall draw attention to this paradox in my report on this mission. Perhaps some enlightened spirit in the curia will read it.

I'm worried about Guntur; he hasn't answered my last e-mails. It's too risky to telephone him. I'll try and contact him again by e-mail tomorrow at the same time. There's an internet point near the church of Sant'Andrea della Valle.

That Friday, the church seemed to be empty. The canon who normally stayed behind to tidy up the missals had already left; no one had come to clean the candlesticks or empty the collection boxes. Then Salazar saw the curtain being pulled back and caught sight of the black shoes, but when he knelt down in the confessional he was surprised not to smell the usual scent of mouthwash. Obeying orders, he recited the credo, gave his registration number and launched into his speech.

‘Vicar, I have news. A man died in the hospital. At first sight it looked like a natural death, but I'm sure it was euthanasia. Unfortunately the angel of death slipped through my fingers, but now I'm on the scent. I may even have a name. I know how they operate…'

Hearing unusual sounds from behind the grille, Salazar broke off. He noticed that the curtain on the other side was half-drawn. He glimpsed something glittering, then heard the click of a gun being loaded. He threw himself out of the confessional just as three bullets fired from a pistol with a silencer hissed through the brass grating and sank into the marquetry, splintering carved putti and garlands as they did so. Staggering around behind a pillar, Salazar managed to pull out his own gun, fired several shots in the direction of the confessional, then rushed to take refuge behind the chapel wall. The shots reverberated through the church like thunder; a light rain of shattered plaster pattered down on to the floor. Huddled on the ground, the inspector strained his ears, expecting further shots. For one brief moment the distant din of the traffic could be heard through the silence. Then a thud, the crash of overturned chairs and, a few moments later, a sound of shuffling coming from the high altar. Salazar trained his gun on the shadowy figure which had appeared on the stairs below. The canon, who had come back into the church on hearing the sound of the fracas, was holding up his hands and shaking his head; rigid with fear, he was staring into space, his chin quivering. Then Salazar emerged from behind his pillar and ran into the nave, peering between the rows of benches towards the confessional. Stretched out in a puddle of blood lay a man half-enveloped in the purple curtain which he had brought down with him as he fell, his gun still in his hand. Salazar went closer and turned the body over. He was a young man, with an olive complexion and a haircut like that of a cadet; his eyes were wide open – both of them. Salazar went through his pockets, extracting a bunch of keys, a mobile phone, two cartridge clips and a badge just like his own. The man was a Dominican.

A north wind had got up, giving a sheen to the paving and the facades of the houses, whipping up swirls of dust which settled on car bonnets. An empty tram jangled along Corso Vittorio Emanuele; the last shutters were coming down. Salazar walked fast, avoiding passers-by, trying to collect his thoughts. The person who had killed the Vicar clearly knew about their meetings; perhaps he had been on his trail ever since his arrival in Rome. That would explain the unexpected visitors to the convent. It would also solve the mystery of the stolen paintings. It was him they were looking for. He had not expected such reckless behaviour; he had been proved wrong. These people are dangerous, he thought; but now they were the only trail he had. Someone was undoubtedly lying in wait for him in the convent. That was where he had to go. He was well aware that it was dangerous; but he had to amass further proof. He went into the first church he came upon, to get his breath back and consider his situation. The silence and the scent of incense calmed him. He took his aggressor's mobile phone out of his pocket. The address book had just ten numbers, referred to by the signs of the zodiac, but he did not have the password. He thought of the dead man, the supposed cadet, who had probably just left the academy; he imagined the lectures his superiors would have given him. Suddenly sure of himself, he typed in
domini canis
, and found just one file, headed Semana Santa. It was a plan of the security measures for Benedict XVI's canonisation ceremony, down to the last detail: the make-up of the squads of guards, the positions of the marksmen and telecameras, the route to be taken by the pope, the seating arrangements for the great and the good on the podium, the teams who would be manning the police vehicles, the general running-order, with comments, and the timing of the entry of the various groups for the final parade. Salazar read it carefully. Useful though it was, he could not run the risk of keeping that phone in his possession. When he had memorised its contents as best he could, he took out the battery and removed the microchip, broke it in two and threw the pieces into the vases of cut flowers on the altar. Now he had to brace himself to return to the convent.

In Civitavecchia Harbour three men were waiting nervously in the embarkation parking lot. Two of them were seated in a car, with the windows down. The third, a thin man with very fair hair, was pacing up and down in front of the bonnet, smoking a cigarette. Then he propped his elbows up on one of the open windows.

‘You and Boris stay in the car. I'll do the talking.' The others nodded. It was almost evening, and lights were going on along the quays. The ferry from Genoa was drawing alongside: all lit up, it set the water foaming, its funnels sending out clouds of black smoke. The cars began rattling down the gangway, and soon a long queue had formed at the exit from the parking lot. The fair-haired man threw down his butt end and got into the driving seat. A group of harbour-workers in blue overalls set off towards the bar, taking off their caps and wiping the sweat from their foreheads. One of them, who had stayed behind, went up to the car and said in a low voice: ‘That's the one, that yellow TIR that's coming down right now.'

The fair-haired man switched on the engine and looked towards the yellow truck that was bumping down the gangway. He turned the car round on the quay, tyres screeching, and joined the queue of cars leaving the harbour. The truck slithered after him. They made their way slowly forward, one behind the other, as far as the service area outside Santa Severa, where the truck driver parked in the small empty square and went to check the tarpaulins. He was middle-aged, fresh-complexioned, solidly-built and slow-moving; his head was shaven, but his chin bore the faint suggestion of a beard. He had a ring in his left ear, a snake tattooed on his upper arm, and he was wearing shorts and flashy trainers. The fair-haired man stopped the car some distance away from him, just beyond the turn-off to the petrol station. He gave the others a tense nod, pulled something out from under the seat and walked off towards the truck, then addressed the man behind the trailer.

‘Good evening, I'm Sergio's contact.'

The driver pretended not to hear; he just stood there, tightening a strap. The fair-haired man went a bit closer.

‘Semtex. Altogether, a kilo in all. Plus the detonators. We've agreed on a price,' he said, lowering his voice. The driver nodded. The fair-haired man took a folded newspaper out from under his shirt.

‘To be handed over in two installments. Next one, same place, same time.'

The driver nodded, stuffed the newspaper into his trouser pocket, winked, went off towards the driver's cab and started the engine; the truck moved slowly off, suddenly lit up from nose to tail with coloured lights. The sky over the dark sea, still red from the sunset, was casting a golden glow over the houses in the little bay. The fair-haired man was just about to go back to the car when he heard shouting. Two four-by-fours with darkened windows were now blocking the car's exit, one in front and one behind. Armed men were surrounding it, ordering the other two to get out and put up their hands. The fair-haired man squatted down among the bushes in the flower-bed and proceeded on all fours towards the wall of the motorway restaurant. The truck slithered slowly down the road leading to the petrol station on the other side of the little square, and there the fair-haired man climbed into it through the open window. At that moment two police cars drove into the service area, sirens blaring. Scarlet in the face, the driver first tried to push the man out again, then pulled him up on to the seat and gestured to him to hide on the bunk bed, swearing in his own language as he did so. He drove the truck towards the motorway, gradually picking up speed, peering nervously into the rear-view mirror and gesticulating furiously at the cars which were overtaking him, hooting wildly.

Salazar held his breath, hoping that that would enable him to hear better. The time switch was ticking away in the entrance-hall, and that ticking sound was a time bomb. He looked for the button with the orange pilot light so that he could press it when the moment came. The further along the corridor he went, the colder the air became. There was no longer the usual smell of vinegar, no candle lit before the statue of the Virgin. The glass doors were open. He slipped through the first one, gun levelled. The first room was empty, as was the next, and the last one was occupied only by bags of linen, heaped up on the floor. Salazar went up the stairs three steps at a time, flattening himself against the wall. When he reached the first floor, he raised his pistol and slipped behind the pillar supporting the stairs. Then the light went out; a hinge creaked and Salazar fired, three shots into the warm belly of the darkness. He stood stock-still. But he sensed movement: someone, apart from himself, was breathing. The switch for the automatic light was too far away, on the other side of the stairs; to reach it, he would have had to cross the area lit up by the skylight. He inched forwards along the wall; he heard a scuffling sound, a thud and then the din of a volley of bullets, shattering the plaster on the wall behind him. He fired another random shot, then threw himself to the ground. When silence fell again, he heard the sizzling of an electric cable, giving out sparks, and the sound of plaster flaking down on to the benches. He got up and dusted himself down; now the switch was right in front of him, just by the half-open door of his room, but it had been pulled out of the wall. He was about to jump to the other side of the stairs when he stumbled and fell against the soft mass of a lifeless body, pushing the door of his room fully open as he did so. At that same moment, a sign flashed on outside the skylight, casting a mauve gleam over the face of a bald man who was lying on his back on the floor in a pool of blood, his sub-machinegun protruding from beneath his blood-spattered ribs, his arms and legs spread-eagled and his fingers weirdly splayed. He was young and solidly built, and his still open mouth suggested surprise. Salazar went through his pockets, which yielded some scraps of paper, a wad of banknotes, a key and a railway ticket for Milan, with a reserved seat for Saturday 11 March. Salazar got to his feet: he had to get out of there, and fast. He had a quick look into his room: the cupboard was open, and empty, the camp-bed stripped; all his possessions had disappeared.