He grabbed the identity card which Zen was holding out.
‘… your mind? Are you out…? Are you…? Aaaaaaaagh! Ha! Yes. Yes, yes, of course. Dottor Zen! We meet at last.’
He held out his hand with a fixed smile.
‘Nanni Morino. Forgive me for not recognizing you, dottore.’
‘On the contrary, forgive me for interrupting. Nothing important, I hope.’
‘No, no, just an accident at a local winery. But the victim was quite a big name round here, so we’ve had to cancel our plans for Sunday evening and show willing. Still, it’s double time, eh, lads?’
With an insincere laugh, he motioned his subordinates to make themselves scarce, which they duly did.
‘Now then, this phone tap,’ Morino said, once he and Zen were alone. ‘No problem, of course, but it may take a while to set up.’
He stared intently at Zen.
‘That’s a nasty-looking cut you’ve got there, dottore.’
‘Yes, and quite fresh, too, by the look of it. Can we get back to the point, please? I’ve been getting some anonymous calls recently. The first was at the hotel, the second at the Vincenzo house.’
Nanni Morino raised an eyebrow.
‘I went out to Palazzuole today, to take a look at the scene of the crime,’ Zen explained. ‘The son, Manlio, was there, and he invited me back to the house for lunch. While we were eating, the phone rang and it was for me. My anonymous caller.’
Morino brightened up.
‘In that case, I should be able to give you a lead right away.’
‘How do you mean?’
He lifted the receiver of his own phone and dialled.
‘The Vincenzo line has been tapped ever since the crime. Any calls received there today should have been logged. This was at lunchtime, you said?’
Nanni Morino spent over five minutes talking to various police personnel in Asti, running through a repertoire of stock phrases such as those he had used in his previous phone conversation. Then he hung up and turned to Zen.
‘That’s odd,’ he said. ‘There was only one call recorded to the Vincenzo house at that time today. It was made at twelve fifty-two.’
‘That sounds right. Where was it from?’
‘That’s what’s odd. It was made from the hotel you mentioned, the one where you’re staying. The Alba Palace.’
There was a long pause. Then Zen slapped his forehead.
‘I’m an idiot. My apologies again for the interruption.’
‘Don’t mention it, dottore.’
At the door, Zen turned, suddenly recalling Tullio Legna’s warning about the consequences of Manlio Vincenzo’s release.
‘That accident you mentioned…’
‘Yes?’
‘Who was involved?’
‘A man called Scorrone. He ran a big commercial operation out near Palazzuole and was found dead there earlier this evening.’
‘You’re sure it was an accident?’
‘No question about it! It’s something we’re all too familiar with around here. He was found floating in a vat of fermenting grapes. Apparently he’d been to a local restaurant and had a long and well-lubricated lunch, then drove straight to his winery to check on some wine he’d started up the day before. He must have leaned over too far and fallen in. The atmosphere above those vats is heavy with carbon dioxide and alcohol fumes. One slip and you drown or suffocate, or both.’
Zen nodded absently.
‘Scorrone, you said?’
‘Bruno Scorrone. Do you know him?’
‘I’ve heard the name.’
He turned towards the door.
‘About that phone tap…’ Morino said.
‘That won’t be necessary, thank you. Good night.’
At the main entrance downstairs, Dario was explaining in an authoritative tone to the assembled fans that if only Del Piero had taken down that long ball from Conte late in the second period with the inside of his foot and then got in the cross to Inzaghi, who was wide open… Zen slipped unnoticed through the opinionated throng and made his way back to the hotel.
The night clerk on duty was the same one who had been there when Zen arrived on the train from Rome, a short balding man with an expression which mingled anxiety, humiliation and aggression, as if he were perpetually haunted by the suspicion that everyone secretly despised him for his frailty and incompetence and was defying them to come right out and admit it.
Zen flashed his identification card.
‘Show me a list of everyone staying here,’ he said.
‘ Staying here?’ asked the clerk, wide-eyed, as though the idea of anyone staying at a hotel was a bizarre and slightly disturbing notion which had never occurred to him before.
‘Everyone currently registered at the hotel,’ Zen explained.
‘Staying here now?’
‘What do you think I mean, April the first next year? Just show me the book.’
The clerk shook his head violently.
‘There isn’t one! No one has a book any more! Books are finished.’