Inspector Lynley 18 - Just One Evil Act

information that my colleague in London gathers,” he said. He himself would be returning to London. “
Buona fortuna, amico mio
,” he’d concluded. “
Tutto è finito bene
.”
    Salvatore tried to be philosophical about this. Things had indeed finished well for DI Lynley. They had finished far from well for himself.
    He brought
il Pubblico Ministero
into the picture as soon as he and Lynley had parted. Fanucci, he reasoned, would want to know that the child had been found alive and well. He also assumed that Fanucci would want to know what Hadiyyah herself had reported: about the card ostensibly in her father’s handwriting, about Roberto Squali’s use of her nickname, and most of all about what these two facts suggested about culpability for her disappearance. She had, after all, not said one word about Carlo Casparia.
    What he hadn’t reckoned on was Fanucci’s reaction to what he perceived as Chief Inspector Lo Bianco’s defiance. He’d been removed from the case, hadn’t he? He’d been told the investigation was being handed over to another officer,
nevvero
? So what had he been doing voyaging off into the Apuan Alps when he should have been sitting in his office, awaiting the arrival of Nicodemo Triglia, who was taking the case off his hands?
    Salvatore said, “Piero, with the safety of a child in jeopardy, surely you did not expect me to sit upon information I had as to her possible whereabouts? This was something that had to be dealt with without delay.”
    Fanucci allowed that Topo had returned the child to her parents unharmed, but that was as far as he would go in the area of congratulations. He said, “Be that as it may, everything now goes into the hands of Nicodemo, and your job is to give to him whatever it is that you have gathered.”
    “Allow me to ask you to reconsider,” Salvatore said. “Piero, we parted badly in our last conversation. For my part, I am filled with apology. I would only wish—”
    “Do not ask, Topo.”
    “—to be allowed to finish with the final details. There are curious matters concerning a greeting card, also matters concerning the use of a special name for the child . . . The lover of the girl’s mother insists that this man—the girl’s father—must be considered before he leaves the country. Let me tell you, Piero, it is not so much that I believe the lover but that I believe something more is going on here.”
    But this Fanucci did not want to hear. He said, “
Basta, Topo.
You must understand. I cannot allow defiance in an investigation. Now, it must please you to wait for Nicodemo’s arrival.”
    Salvatore knew Nicodemo Triglia, a man who had never missed his afternoon
pisolino
in his entire career. He carried a gut upon him the size of an Umbrian wild boar, and he’d never encountered a bar that he passed by without stopping in for a
birra
and the thirty minutes that were required for him to savour it.
    Salvatore was brooding upon this at the
questura
while he waited for the old stained Moka in the little kitchen to finish its coffee business for him on the two-burner stove. When it had done so, he poured himself a cup of the viscous liquid, dropped in a sugar cube, and watched it melt. He carried it to the room’s small window and looked out at a view that was limited to the
parcheggio
for the police vehicles. He was staring at them without really seeing them when one of his officers interrupted.
    “We have an identification,” a woman’s voice said.
    So deep into his thoughts was Salvatore that, when he turned, he did not remember the officer’s name. Just a crude joke that had been in the men’s toilet about the shape of her breasts. He’d laughed at the time, but now he felt shame. She was earnest about her work, as she had to be. It was not easy for her in this line of employment that had for so long been dominated by men.
    “What identification?” he asked her. He saw that she was carrying a photo and he tried to remember why any of his officers were showing photographs to anyone.
    She said, “Casparia, sir. He’s seen this man.”
    “Where?”
    She looked at him oddly. She said in some surprise, “
Non si ricorda?
” but hastily went on lest her question sound disrespectful. She looked about twenty years old, Salvatore thought, and she probably thought the antiquity of his forty-two had begun to affect his memory. She said, “Giorgio and I . . . ?”
    At which point he remembered. Officers had taken photographs to the