‘Upstairs.’
She nodded slowly.
‘Upstairs,’ she said.
He was woken by a cry below the window.
‘ Spazzino PRONTI!!! ’
Zen lay back in bed, listening to the other tenants tossing down their bags of rubbish for the street sweeper to add to the pile in his hand-cart. He felt clear-headed, relaxed and lucid. There was no doubt about it: Cristiana was good for him.
This time she had not been able to stay the night. Rosalba was expecting her home and would have phoned Wanda Dal Maschio if her daughter had not reappeared. It would have been perfect if she had still been there, a warm, sleepy presence, a token that what had happened the night before had indeed been real. Unlike the previous occasion, Zen now had no anxieties about facing Cristiana by the cold light of morning. On the contrary, he was already missing her. They had stayed up talking late the night before, and there had been no moment of awkwardness or strain. Everything had seemed perfectly easy and normal, as though they had known each other all their lives.
The house did not feel quite as cold as the day before, and when he threw open the window it was clear that a thaw had set in. All but the largest heaps of snow were already gone, leaving only a faint sheen of water which made the worn paving stones gleam like a fishmonger’s slab. Diffuse sunlight lent a vernal suppleness to the bright, clean air. It was a day for assignations and excursions, a day to tear up your plans and arrangements and make things up as you went along, preferably in the company of a friend or lover.
As he set out in search of his morning coffee, Zen’s heart sank at the very different prospect before him. It seemed absurd to spend such a day sitting in poky, neonlit offices being lied to by the likes of Giulio Bon. He no longer cared one way or the other about the Durridge case. But there was no alternative. It would be as dangerous now to abandon the investigation as to pursue it — perhaps more so. The only way he could justify the measures he had already taken was by seeing the thing through to the end.
At the Questura, he surveyed the various options open to him and tried to decide how to proceed. Based on the way the men had reacted to being taken into custody the day before, Bugno seemed the weakest link in the chain, so Zen sent for him first. While he waited, he skimmed through the man’s file. Born in 1946, married with three children, an employee of the muncipal transport company ACTV, Bugno had no previous convictions. The only black marks against him were a failure to vote in a recent general election and the complaint of trespass made the previous year by Ivan Durridge.
Massimo Bugno had a big bald head, a deeply-indented broken nose, a weak chin, bushily compensatory moustache and the general air of someone who fears that he has forgotten to turn off the bath water. He was evidently considerably less refreshed than Zen by the night he had spent in a cell in the windowless annexe behind the Questura. Zen invited him to sit down. He glanced at his watch.
‘What shift are you on this week, Massimo? Your workmates will be starting to wonder what’s become of you.’
‘Why are you holding me here?’ Bugno whined. ‘What have I done?’
Zen lifted the file off the desk in front of him.
‘On the 27th of September last year, you and two other men landed on a private ottagono near Malamocco. The owner called the police, and you were subsequently apprehended by a patrol boat.’
Bugno frowned.
‘That’s all over!’ he protested. ‘No charges were ever brought. It was all a fuss over nothing, anyway. We were…’
He hesitated.
‘We were fishing. The motor packed up. We drifted on to the island. We left as soon as we could.’
Zen raised his eyebrows.
‘Fishing? That’s not what you told us at the time.’
Bugno dampened his lips rapidly with his tongue.
‘Well, it was something like that. I don’t exactly remember.’
Zen nodded.
‘Let’s see if your memory is any better when it comes to your next visit to the island.’
‘You’re mistaken. I’ve never been back there.’
Zen was surprised and dismayed in equal measure. For the first time, Massimo Bugno had spoken with a casual ease which carried complete conviction. Suddenly Zen had the horrible sensation that his whole theory about the Durridge kidnapping was totally and utterly wrong. His reaction was to lash out.
‘Still feeling big and brave, are we?’ he sneered at Bugno. ‘Your wife isn’t, I can tell you that much. She’s been ringing every five minutes wanting to know what’s going on and when she can expect you home. She’s worried, the kids are terrified, the neighbours are gossiping, but what can I tell her? It all depends on you, Massimo.’
Bugno wrung his hands piteously.
‘What do you want me to do? What do you want me to say?’
‘The truth!’ Zen shouted.
‘But I’ve told you the truth!’
Zen swung his fist as though to strike him, then drew it aside at the last moment and drove it into his palm with a resounding smack.
‘Stop messing me about, Bugno!’
Bugno looked abject.
‘I’m sorry, dottore! I’m really sorry! I just don’t know what you want me to say.’
‘What were you doing on the eleventh of November last year?’
Massimo Bugno frowned.
‘November?’
‘November, yes! Are you deaf? Answer the question!’
Suddenly Bugno’s face cleared.
‘The eleventh? Ah, well, that weekend I would have been out of town.’
Zen laughed contemptuously.
‘Had the alibi nice and pat, didn’t you? Now I know you’re guilty, Bugno, and so help me God I’ll get a confession if I have to beat it out of you.’
‘It’s the truth! I was on the mainland, near Belluno, at my father-in-law’s farm. I can prove it!’
‘Oh I’m sure you can dig up a few relatives who are prepared to perjure themselves on your behalf.’
‘It’s my father-in-law’s birthday!’
‘The eleventh?’
‘The eighth.’