At about the time Zen and Valeria parted in a quiet alley on the slopes of the Vomero, with only a cat for company, the two men who were the subject of their discussion entered a shop in Spaccanapoli amid the shriek of sirens and the raucous shouts of street vendors. The shop sold wine and beer and filling snacks: balls of cooked rice with a soft heart of melted mozzarella, folded pizzas stuffed with curd cheese and ham, potato croquettes laden with oil and melted cheese.
The elderly woman behind the counter was adding to the general din by yelling an order to the kitchen, where her husband and a teenage boy were hard at work in the ferocious heat of ovens the size of tombs. Then she saw the two men who had just come in and her face became studiously blank.
'Giosue here?' asked the older and taller of the pair.
He was dressed in designer slacks and a tight-fitting sweater which revealed his taut, muscled frame to advantage.
'Eh, oh!' the woman called to the back of the shop. 'And these pizzettel'
The other man reached over the counter and took one of the golden rice balls stacked on a plate. He was wearing jeans and a smartly pressed sports jacket over an open-necked shirt.
'Good/ he said appreciatively, biting into the arancia.
'What do you want?' the old woman asked.
'A double cone with pistachio and chocolate/ returned the first man in dialect as thick as her own. 'Oh, and a scoop of raspberry, what the hell.'
'We don't have ice-cream.'
The man looked shocked.
'You don't?'
He turned to his companion.
'They don't have ice-cream, they don't have Giosue. So what the fuck do they have?'
The other swallowed a mouthful of rice before replying.
'They have problems/ he said, shaking his head.
The old woman made a face.
'Eh, problems! Of course we have problems, and so many!'
The first man flicked his forefinger at her face.
'Ah, but you have problems you don't even know about yet. Maybe you have ice-cream too, without knowing it.'
'Maybe they have Giosue/ the other man put in.
At this point the woman's husband emerged from the kitchen, wiping his hands on a filthy towel. He was old too, just like his wife, and the neighbour's kid who was helping out was too young to be any help in a situation like this. Once upon a time he could have seen scum like this off the premises without any trouble, but not any longer. He knew it, and so did they.
'Gesualdo! Sabatino!' he cried with faked enthusiasm.
'How's it going?'
The taller one gave him a brief expressionless glance.
'You'll have to ask Giosue/ he said. 'He's the one who knows how it's going.'
The old man shrugged apologetically.
'Eh! I haven't seen him for a long time.'
'How long?' demanded Gesualdo.
'Must be a week or more. He didn't say why. Just stopped coming in.'
'Maybe he lost his appetite/ said Sabatino, grabbing a calzone.
'Who knows?' replied the old man, still mechanically rubbing away with the towel. 'It can't be the food. There's nothing wrong with that, is there? You guys like it, right?'
Gesualdo surveyed the shop with a look of bored distaste.
'Sure we like it. We like it just fine. The problem is that nobody really gives a damn what we like or don't like.
They just don't care. It's a shame, but there you go. What they care about is what someone else likes. And I can tell you right now that he isn't going to like it when we tell him Giosue hasn't been around recently. Especially if it turns out he has. He really wouldn't like that. Not even a little bit.'
The old man nodded vigorously.
'It's true, I swear it! I haven't seen him, haven't heard anything. If I do, I'll let you know right away'
'You do that/ said Gesualdo. 'Otherwise your insurance rates could soar sky-high. Right, Sabati?'
'That's right/ agreed the other man through a mouthful of the stuffed pizza. 'See, we have two kinds of rates. Low risk and high risk, we call them in the trade. Up to now this establishment has always been regarded as a low risk, but if it turns out that you're selling ice-cream on the side, it might become necessary to reassess your classification.'
'Ice-cream is a very unstable substance/ Gesualdo observed solemnly. 'If it's not handled properly, the results can be disastrous. Remember what happened to Ernesto's workshop, just down the street here? The blaze was so intense they never did figure out how many Moroccans he had cooped up in there. Luckily for us, his insurance had just lapsed.'
He turned to his companion.
'Oh, Sabati! Still feeding your face? We've got calls to make. Let's go!'
The men walked out into the crowded street, leaving the old man and his wife alone. They went about their work silently, avoiding each other's eyes.