The Dark Heart of Florence: Number 6 in series (Michele Ferrara) (28 page)

At the Carlo Corsi barracks in Borgo Ognissanti, long the Carabinieri’s provincial headquarters, Marshal Gori was still dealing with the murder in Pontassieve. It was almost eight in the evening, and Sergeant Surace, who had returned to the office after spending the whole day looking for clues, was sitting in front of him.

Gori was tired. He was thinking about his wife, who was waiting for him at home, ready to go and see the last show at the cinema. He had promised to take her and did not want to disappoint her.

But Surace still needed to update him on his work. First and foremost, on the latest interview with the victim’s sister. The evening before the murder, Florinda Olivero had told her sister that she had received a phone call from an acquaintance of hers, a famous producer who had promised to help her get into films, and she was planning to meet him later.

‘Sounds suspicious to me,’ Gori remarked. ‘What did you find out from the phone company?’

Surace started sifting through the papers in the file.

‘Well?’ Gori urged him on, having glanced at his watch.

‘Here it is!’ Surace said, holding up a paper. The call had been made using a cloned sim card, like those used by criminal organisations.

‘I think we can assume that it was the killer who called her,’ Gori said.

Surace nodded several times. ‘He could have been a hacker, Marshal, instead of a film producer.’

‘Indeed. Now I’ll need to ask for the results of the DNA test. Science could well be the determining factor in this case.’

‘Let’s hope so.’

‘You can go now, Surace, thank you.’

Alone once more, the Marshal immediately called Rome. His colleague reassured him he would have the results by Monday morning.

These scientists certainly took their time, he thought.

The smell was unbearable.

Ferrara extinguished his cigar beneath the sole of his shoe.

It was Teresa Micalizi who had summoned him. In spite of the late hour, she had still been in her office. Along with Officer Alessandra Belli, who had finally been seconded to the
Squadra Mobile
less than twenty-four hours earlier, she had been continuing Fanti’s work on the records of calls made to and from Fiesole. When she had received the telephone call from the Operations Room, she had wasted no time in calling Ferrara at home. Next, she had called Rizzo, and now all three of them stood outside the apartment building, with bewildered looks on their faces. The apartment on the third floor – the top floor – was a gaping hole. The windows had been blown out and a good section of the roof had also been destroyed by the flames, which had caused panic among the residents of the neighbouring buildings as they had grown.

That third floor was where Fabio Biondi lived.

The firefighters were still trying to put out the last few flames, but then they would have to make sure the whole building was safe, which was likely to take some time.

‘Can we go in?’ Ferrara asked a fireman standing next to a fire engine, behind which an ambulance was parked.

‘You’ll have to ask my chief, Fossati,’ he replied.

In the meantime, other firefighters were coming out through the front door. They had already taken off their masks and were trying to wipe the sweat from their foreheads with handkerchiefs. On the other side of the street, the usual crowd of bystanders had gathered. Some were waiting to be able to go back to their homes, others were just trying to find out what had happened. A few, perhaps not locals, were standing a bit apart from the others.

‘Is there a lift?’ Ferrara asked Teresa.

‘No, I had to climb the stairs to the third floor.’

‘Have you tried calling him on his mobile?’

‘Yes, but there’s no answer, it just goes to voicemail. I’ve left him a message.’

‘Can you see him anywhere?’

‘No, I’ve had a look, he’s not here.’

Just then Rizzo winked at Ferrara and tilted his head slightly to his right. Ferrara looked in that direction and saw the journalist Cosimo Presti with his mobile phone pressed to his ear. Behind him was a press photographer, ready to start snapping.

‘Anything for me?’ Presti asked, drawing level with them. He had already put his phone back in his pocket.

Ferrara shook his head, and Presti looked around, perhaps in search of another source of information. Then he looked back at Ferrara and asked, with a sneer on his sunken and horribly disfigured face, ‘Is the elusive arsonist behind this one too?’

Ferrara avoided rising to the bait and walked away. Presti did not follow him, but took a pen and notebook from his pocket.

Ferrara looked at the crowd. It seemed to have grown even bigger. Nobody would be able to sleep tonight.

Venturi now joined them after questioning some of the people standing on the pavement. ‘I’ve spoken to the neighbours. They’re all shocked. Fabio Biondi’s aunt, who lives on the floor below, told me she heard him come home about eleven last night. After that she didn’t hear anything until the neighbours started shouting just after one this morning. I also spoke to one of the firemen, and he told me the technical apparatus in the apartment probably acted as fuel for the fire.’

At that moment, the fireman who had been standing by the fire engine came over. ‘Chief Superintendent, our boss has just come out,’ he said, pointing.

Ferrara thanked him and he and Rizzo made their way over to the man, who was tall and distinguished-looking.

‘Chief Superintendent Ferrara,’ he introduced himself. ‘And this is my colleague, Superintendent Rizzo.’

‘Nice to meet you. I’m Eugenio Fossati, Provincial Commander of the Florence Fire Brigade.’

‘What can you tell me, Commander?’

‘At the moment nothing’s certain about the cause of the fire. But I can tell you a bit about what we still have to do.’ He explained that his men’s work would consist of locating possible victims, making the apartment and the rest of the building safe, and determining the cause.

‘So am I right in thinking you haven’t yet found anyone inside?’

‘Yes, Chief Superintendent. But now we’re going to have to take a closer look.’

Ferrara told him that the man who had lived in that apartment was known to the police.

‘A criminal, Chief Superintendent?’

‘No.’ He did not add anything further, despite the fact that the Commander’s curiosity had clearly been aroused.

‘If you’ll excuse me, I need to supervise my men,’ Fossati said.

And he walked briskly away and crossed the street.

‘It’s difficult to see this as an accident,’ Ferrara said.

He had moved off to the corner with Rizzo, away from prying eyes. Teresa joined them.

‘First Costanza,’ he went on, ‘then Sergi and Beatrice Filangeri, and now, just a few days later, Fabio, who was doing a tricky job for us.’

‘It could be a coincidence,’ Teresa said. ‘We still don’t know the cause of the fire.’

‘When there are so many coincidences, it’s hard to believe that’s what they are. There’s really no room for them in our work. But anyway, we’ll wait for the fire brigade’s report. Commander Fossati seems to have his feet on the ground. He didn’t want to speculate about the cause, quite rightly. In the meantime let’s see if they find the body.’

He had barely finished speaking when Venturi ran over to them again, took a deep breath and announced, ‘They’ve found a body. They think it’s a male. It was in the living room, under a piece of the roof that had fallen down. That’s why they didn’t notice it sooner.’

‘His laboratory,’ Teresa said.

‘The fire brigade will take photographs and transport the body to the morgue,’ Venturi went on.

‘One of us should go to the morgue too,’ Ferrara said, looking at Rizzo.

‘I’ll go,’ Rizzo said.

By now, it was almost five in the morning.

Their attention was caught by the cries of an old woman who was being supported by two of the firefighters.

‘Who’s that?’ Ferrara asked Venturi.

‘Fabio Biondi’s aunt.’

Teresa ran over to her and saw that Officer Alessandra Belli had already beaten her to it.

She seemed even thinner than when they had first seen her. She kept her sad, swollen eyes on Teresa. In her hands was a photograph of her nephew.

Teresa and Officer Belli had brought her to Headquarters to comfort and, when possible, question her. They had managed to establish that her name was Rosa Biondi. She was Fabio’s paternal aunt and his only relative in Florence. Fabio’s parents had emigrated to Switzerland and ran a laundry in Basel. Somebody was already trying to contact them and tell them the tragic news.

In the photograph, Fabio was wearing a white suit and was standing to attention like a toy soldier, with his arms down by his sides. ‘He was eleven when this was taken,’ the woman said, gently caressing the corner of the frame, as if trying to stroke that clean, innocent face. ‘It was the day of his first communion. The man beside him is my poor husband, his godfather, who always wanted the best for little Fabio.’

Her voice broke.

Teresa felt a lump in her throat. That smiling little boy did not look like someone who would end his life burnt to death. In addition, the photograph reminded her of her own first communion. An unforgettable occasion, a day when they had all been so happy together as a family. She too had kept a photograph of that moment, showing her standing between her own parents, the shadow of misfortune still a long way away. Now, though, some of her photographic memories were no longer hers, but in the hands of whoever had stolen the album from her.

Now the woman’s eyes were filling with tears. They looked like drops of glass.

There was a light knock at the door and a uniformed officer came in with a cardboard tray holding three hot cappuccinos. He put it down on the desk and went out.

‘Help yourself to a drink, Signora Rosa,’ Teresa said.

‘No, thank you. I couldn’t get it down.’

‘Please try,’ Teresa said gently. With one hand she lifted the cup to the woman’s mouth, and with the other gently stroked her back. The woman took a tiny sip, perhaps just to humour her.

‘Do you have any idea what might have happened?’ Teresa asked her after a few moments.

The woman shook her head several times. ‘I don’t know,’ she replied. ‘I was always telling him all those wires and machines were dangerous, but he never listened to me. Poor little Fabio.’

And she burst into tears again.

Teresa did not insist. She realised that this was not the moment, and she already regretted asking her the question. And anyway, they still did not know what the true cause of the fire was, whether it was arson or not.

The old woman’s face had become even stiffer with grief. Teresa saw her eyes closing.

‘I don’t feel well,’ she said in a low voice.

A moment later, her head fell forward onto the desk.

‘Alessandra, call an ambulance right away,’ Teresa said.

Barely ten minutes later, two paramedics were laying her on a stretcher and taking her away. She had not regained consciousness.

‘A heart attack,’ the police doctor who had arrived within minutes to administer first aid had declared.

Teresa was silent as she listened to the ambulance siren fading into the distance.