The Salamander, page 3
‘Had there been any such changes recently?’
‘No … at least not to my knowledge.’
‘Then why was the General depressed?’
‘I don’t know. I was trying to find out.’
‘Money problems?’
‘I wouldn’t think so… He was never a lavish man – even to me.’
‘Political pressures – blackmail?’
‘I had the feeling that it was a personal and not a political matter.’
‘What gave you that impression?’
‘Things he said when he was relaxed here with me.’
‘For example?’
‘Oh, odd remarks. He had a habit of saying something – how would you call it? – something cryptic; then passing immediately to another subject. If I pressed him to explain, he would close up like a shell-fish. I learned quickly to hold my tongue… One night, for example, he said: “There is no simple future for me, Lili, because my past is too complicated.” Another time he quoted from the Bible: “A man’s enemies are those of his own household.” … Things like that.’
‘Anything else?’
‘I’m trying to remember… Oh, yes, about three weeks ago we met in Venice. He took me to the opera at the Phoenix Theatre. He talked about the history of the theatre and he explained the name to me. He said that the Phoenix was a fabulous bird that rose again, alive, from its own ashes ; then he said that there was another animal more fabulous and more dangerous – the salamander that lived in fire and could survive the hottest flames… Wait! That’s your card … the Salamander!’
‘So it is, Lili. You see how far we come when we talk like friends? What else did he say about the salamander?’
‘Nothing. Nothing at all. Some friends joined us. The subject was dropped and forgotten.’
‘Let’s leave it then. There will be other times and other questions. From now on you will be under constant surveillance. There is my card with day and night numbers. You’ll be notified of the date of the funeral. I’d like you to be there.’
‘Please, no!’
‘Please, yes! I want tears, Lili. I want deep grief and black mourning. You will not move back into society until I tell you. Naturally, you will have telephone calls from your masters and from friends of the General. Your house-keeper will want to know the reason for my visit. You will tell them all the same story. The General died of a heart attack. It would not hurt to confess that he had an ailment which sometimes interfered with his love-making… One other thing. No new boy-friends until you are out of mourning. That would make an ugly figure. If you find a live one after that, I’d like to check him out before you adopt him.’
She managed a weak and watery smile.
‘Him or me, Colonel?’
‘I admire you, Lili, but I can’t afford you. If you could make an old fossil like Pantaleone sit up and beg, God only knows what you’d do to a hungry fellow like me. Still, it’s a thought to keep. One fine tomorrow, we just might play a little chamber music. Be good now. And there’s a prize for every tear at the requiem… Where’s your telephone?’
Half an hour later I was seated in a glass booth on the Veneto, with a sandwich and a cappuccino, scanning the afternoon editions of the Roman and Milanese papers. The General’s death was reported only in the stop press. The terms of each report were identical, a direct quotation of the Army announcement. There were no obituaries, no editorial comments. There might be some in the final editions but the bloodhounds would not be in full cry until morning. By that time, the General would be safely embalmed and lying in state in the family chapel at Frascati, with the cadets of his old regiment standing the death watch.
The obsequies of Massimo Count Pantaleone, General of the Military Staff, made a splendid piece of theatre. The requiem was sung by the sub-urbicarian Bishop of Frascati, Cardinal Amleto Paolo Dadone, assisted by the choir of the monastery of Sant’ Antonio della Valle. The panegyric was delivered in classic periods and ringing tones by the Secretary-General of the Society of Jesus, a former classmate of the deceased. The Mass was attended by the President of the Republic, Ministers of the Council, Members of both Chambers, Prelates of the Roman Curia, Senior Officers of all Services, representatives of NATO and the Diplomatic Corps, relatives and friends of the deceased, family retainers, press-men, photographers and a motley of Romans, countrymen and casual tourists. Six field-officers carried the bier to the vault, where the regimental chaplain consigned it to rest until resurrection day, while a detachment of junior officers fired the last volley, and the Penitentiaries or Sant’ Ambrogio recited the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary. The door of the vault was closed and locked by the President himself, a gesture of respect, gratitude and national solidarity not lost upon the gentlemen of the Press. Lili Anders was there, heavily veiled and leaning on the arm of Captain Girolamo Carpi, who was visibly moved by the passing of his beloved patron.
I was among the mourners, too; but I was less concerned with the ceremonies than with the efforts of my camera crew to produce a clear photograph of every person at the funeral, from the Cardinal celebrant to the florist who laid the tributes. I hate funerals. They make me feel old, unwanted and disposed to sexual exercise which is a kind of defiance of my own imminent mortality. I was glad when the rites were over, so that I could drive down to see Francesca, while my colleagues were still guzzling spumante and sweet pastry at the Villa Pantaleone.
At three-thirty in the afternoon, I went back to the forensic laboratory to talk to Stefanelli. The old fellow was jumping like a grass-hopper.
‘… I told you, Colonel! Bet with old Steffi and you have to win! I showed the card to Solimbene and he recognized it at first glance. The crowned salamander is the emblem of Francis the First. It recurs, with certain modifications, in arms derived from the House of Orleans, the Duchy of Angoulême and the Farmer family in England. I’ve retained Solimbene to get us a list of existing Italian families who use the symbol. You’ll have to authorize the payment. The pen-work? We say it’s based on Aldo the Calligrapher but probably executed by Carlo Metaponte who used to be a forger, made papers for the partisans during the war and has been going straight ever since. The card itself … I was wrong about that. It’s not Japanese at all. It’s a very passable Italian imitation made in Modena by the Casaroli Brothers. They’re supplying us with a list of their principal customers in Europe. The inscription makes no sense yet; but we’re coming to it. How’s that, eh! Not bad for forty-eight hours. Tell me you’re happy, Colonel, otherwise I’ll drown myself in the toilet.’
‘I’m happy, Steffi. But we need a lot more. Fingerprints for instance.’
‘I’m sorry, Colonel. The only ones we’ve been able to lift belong to the late lamented General. You didn’t expect anything else, surely?’
‘I want miracles, Steffi. I want them yesterday.’
‘Spare us a little pity, Colonel. Everything takes time… How was the funeral?’
‘Beautiful, Steffi. I cried all through it! And the eloquence! … “That noble spirit snatched untimely from among us, that dedicated servant of the Republic, that Christian patriot, that hero of many battles …” Merda!’
‘Requiescat in aeternum.’ Stefanelli crossed hands on his bony chest and rolled his eyes heavenwards. ‘If he’s in heaven, I hope never to go there. Amen! … Have you read today’s papers?’
‘Now, when have I had time to read, Steffi?’
‘I’ve got them in my office. Come on! They’re worth a look.:
The obituaries were, like the obsequies, an exercise in grandiloquence. The Right wing was fulsome; the centre was respectful and only mildly censorious of the General’s Fascist period; the Left achieved a kind of poetry of abuse, culminating in a pasquinade, which for form’s sake was attributed to some anonymous Roman:
‘Estirpato oggi,
‘Uprooted today,
L’ultimo della stirpe,
The last of his line,
Pantaleone,
Pantaleone,
Mascalzone.’
The rogue.’
I was not unhappy with the things I read. They were good reviews for a bad score and a book full of contradictions. Not one of them called in question the official version of the General’s demise; which was not to say they believed it but only that it suited all parties to accept it. The pasquinade worried me a little. Take it at face value and it was a harmless squib. The General was the last of the Pantaleone line, and an old rogue to boot. Read it another way and it might mean that the Left had taken a hand in rooting him out and that happily no successor was in sight. If one were very subtle – and I was paid to read meaning even into blank pages – one might see it as the opening gambit of a campaign to vilify the General and bring all the skeletons out of his family vault. A pity if it happened, but there was nothing I could do about it. I was still drowsy and disinclined to exert myself, so I began leafing through the journals, while Stefanelli added a spicy commentary.
‘… Now, here’s a pretty thing: “The Principessa Faubiani presents her summer collection!” You know about her, don’t you? Came from Argentina originally, married young Prince Faubiani, set him up with a boy-friend, and then petitioned for separation on the grounds of his impotence. That way she kept her freedom, the title and a right to maintenance. Since then, she’s had a new protector every couple of years – old ones now, and all rich. They finance the collections and improve her standard of living as well. That last one was the banker, Castellani… Wonder who it is this year? Funny thing, she still stays friends with them all. See, there’s Castellani, next to the model in the bikini. Ah, there’s the new one, in the front row, behind Faubiani and the Editor of Vogue. That’s the place of honour. Ritual, you know. When the High Priestess gets tired of you, she hands you down to the models. Still, if you’re sixty or over, who cares? The girls come cheaper than a whole summer collection, eh? … I must find out who the new one is.’
‘And what’s your interest in fashion, Steffi?’
‘My wife has a boutique on the Via Sistina … high mode for rich tourists.’
‘You crafty old devil!’
‘I’m a lucky man, Colonel. I married for love and got money for my old age as well. Also the staff is decorative and the gossip’s always interesting… Which reminds me. Pantaleone is supposed to have a brother floating around somewhere.’
‘Not in my dossier, Steffi. The old count, Massimo, had two daughters in the first three years of his marriage and a son about ten years later. One daughter married a Contini and died in childbirth. The other married a Spanish diplomat and lives in Bolivia. She has three adult children who all have Spanish nationality. The son, our General, was the only male issue. He inherited the title and the bulk of the real estate. That’s the record, verified at Central Registry, and from the baptismal files at Frascati.’
‘Well, I agree she’s not as official as the Central Registry, but the old Baroness Schwarzburg has been a client of my wife’s for years. She’s tottering on the edge of the grave, but she still spends a fortune on clothes. She claims she knew the General’s father – which is very possible, because the old boy was chasing girls until the day he fell off his horse on the Pincio and broke his neck. According to her story, the Count bred himself a bastard from the girls’ governess. He paid her off and she married someone else who gave the boy a name, though what the name was the Baroness couldn’t remember. She’s getting doddery, of course, so it could be nothing but scandalous rumour. You know what these old girls are. They’ve never got over their first waltz, and the time King Vittorio Emanuele showed them his coin collection… Anyway, it’s a note in the margin, if you’re interested.’
‘Not really, Steffi. Now, if you could find me a suicide note or a blackmail letter that would tell me why Pantaleone killed himself, I’d be much happier… Dio! It’s nearly five. The funeral photographs should be ready. If they’re not, I’ll send you three heads for pickling. See you later, Steffi. Keep in touch.’
Naturally enough, the photographs were not ready, and the Chief of Photographic Records was liverish and unhappy. Everyone understood the urgency, but I must be reasonable. Could I not see that the tanks were clogged with film, the enlargers were working overtime, and even with three photographers and two photo-file experts, it would take hours yet to identify all the personages. Even then there would be gaps. This was like an epic at Cinecittà, the whole set crowded with hundreds of extras – and how did one put names to farm-labourers and three bus-loads of tourists?
After ten minutes of snappish dialogue, I gave up in disgust and went back to my own office. Here, at least, there was a semblance of order and efficiency. The documents I had brought from the General’s flat were all indexed and filed, and number one clerk had made some interesting discoveries.
‘Brokers’ advice notes, Colonel. All sales. The General has unloaded about eighty million lire worth of prime stock in the last four weeks. Covering letters from the Brokers, each one in the same terms … “We have remitted proceeds in accordance with your instructions”. Question: Where did the proceeds go? Not into his bank, because there’s his last statement, issued a week ago. Then there’s a letter from the Agenzia Immobiliare della Romagna. They advise that though the Pantaleone property has been on open offer for more than two months, there has been no serious interest at the figure named. They recommend withdrawing the property until the credit situation in Europe eases a little, and the new agricultural agreements have been announced for the Common Market… Now come to this little piece. It’s a handwritten note from Emilio del Giudice in Florence. You know him; a big name, a heavy dealer in important art works. Here’s what he says : “Strongly advise against any transactions which involve you personally in a commitment to export works from the Pantaleone collection. As vendor you offer the works for sale subject to the conditions of the laws in force. After that, full responsibility for export formalities rests on the purchaser” …’
‘So, he was trying to sell up. Any indication why?’
‘Not in these papers.’
‘What else have we got?’
‘Cheque stubs, household accounts, bank statements, correspondence with estate managers and renting agencies, desk directory, pocket address-book. I’m still checking those against the names in our dossiers and so far, no surprises. This is the General’s key-ring with a key to a safe-deposit box at the Banco di Roma. I’d like to see the inside of that.’
‘We will – as soon as the banks open in the morning.’
‘His lawyer is howling for us to release the documents.’
‘I’ll worry about him later. I’ll also have a chat with the General’s brokers. I’d like to know where they remitted the sale money… If you want me in the next hour, I’ll be at the Chess Club. After that, at home.’
The Chess Club of Rome is an institution almost as sacred as the Hunt Club. You enter it, as you hope one day to enter Heaven, through a noble portico, and find yourself in a courtyard of classic dimension. You climb a flight of stairs to a series of ante rooms, where servants in livery receive you with cautious deference. You tread softly and speak in muted tones, so as not to disturb the ghosts who still inhabit the place, Kings and Princes, Dukes, Barons, Counts and all their consorts. In the salone, you are dwarfed by soaring pilasters and frescoed ceilings, and gilt furniture designed for the backsides of grandees. In the dining-room you are awed by an afflatus of whispers, the talk of men who deal with great affairs like money and statecraft and spheres of commercial influence. You are daunted by the cold eyes of dowagers, sour with the virtue of age. You are hounded by waiters so disciplined, that even a crumb upon the shirt-front seems a sacrilege… And you will look in vain for chess players, although it is rumoured that they do exist, cloistered as Carmelites in some secret cell.
I was not coming to play chess. I was coming to wait upon the Secretary, who might condescend to present me to the head-waiter, who, might, if the stars were in favourable conjunction, put me in touch with the steward who had served General Pantaleone on the eve of his death.
I did not relish the prospect. The Chess Club is one of those places that makes me despair of my countrymen. In the uplands of Sardinia, where I once served as a junior officer, there are shepherds who live a whole winter on corn-bread and black olives and goat-cheese, and turn to banditry to feed their families, while their landlords lobby senators and ministers over brandy in the Club. In the mortuary at Palermo, I have identified the body of a colleague murdered by the Mafia, while the man who ordered him killed was lunching with a Milanese banker – at the Chess Club, of course. The economists weep tears of blood over the flight of capital from Italy to Switzerland, but the men who put wings to the money, sit sober and respectable over lunch at the corner table. Here, the survivors of the old order and the exploiters of the new, make truce and treaty and marriages of convenience, while the people, poor, ill-educated, impotent, fume at the chicanery of politicians and the tyranny of petty bureaucrats.
Time was when I toyed with the idea of joining the Communists who promised at least a levelling and a purging and one law for all. My enthusiasm died on the day when I saw a high Party official sharing smoked salmon and fillet steak with the president of a large chemical corporation. The more things change in Italy, the more they are the same. The scion of an old house joins the Christian Democrats; the cadet is free to flirt with Left or Right; and no matter who wins the last race, the bets will still be settled in the Chess Club… Eh! Philosophers are as big a curse on the country as politicos: and a muddled conscience is bad medicine for an investigator. Let’s be done with the job and go home!
It was still only eight-thirty and the guests were sparse. The Secretary was unusually urbane and the head-waiter was disposed to be helpful. He installed me in the visitors’ room, brought me an aperitif, and, five minutes later, reappeared with the head-porter and the steward who had served the General’s last meal. I explained my mission with suitable vagueness. Sometime during dinner the General had been called to the telephone. For reasons connected with military security, I wished to trace the call and contact the person who had made it. Then I had my first surprise.
