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No?”
    Caciuoppolo stood lost in thought.

    â€œEven though . . .” Rocco added, “ . . . that means they put the down jacket on him afterward. Because a person’s hardly likely to die indoors wearing a down jacket. Or else—why not? Maybe he was about to go out, and then he died? Or else he went to see someone, only had time to get his gloves off, and then died?” Rocco looked at Caciuoppolo without seeing him. “Or else no one killed him at all, he just died on his own, and I’m standing here spouting bullshit. No, Caciuoppolo?”
    â€œCommissa’, if you say so.”
    â€œThanks, Officer. We’ll look into this, too. In any case, I don’t know if you read the memos that circulate, if you keep up with these things, but they’ve abolished the rank of commissario in the police force. Now we’re called deputy police chief. But I’m just keeping you informed. I really couldn’t give a damn, personally!”
    â€œYes sir.”
    â€œCaciuoppolo, why would someone born in Naples, with Capri, Ischia, and Procida just a half-hour ferry ride away, along with Positano and the Amalfi Coast—why would you come up here to freeze your ass off?”
    Caciuoppolo looked at him and flashed a southern smile, with all his gleaming white teeth accounted for. “Commissa’—excuse me, Deputy Police Chief, sir. What’s that old expression? There’s one thing that pulls a cart stronger than a team of oxen, and that’s . . .”
    â€œUnderstood.” Rocco looked up at the black sky, where racing clouds covered and uncovered the stars. “And you met her up here in the mountains?”
    â€œNo. In Aosta. She has an ice cream shop.”
    â€œAn ice cream shop? In Aosta?”
    â€œSure. You know, they have summer up here, too.”
    â€œI wouldn’t know that yet. I got here in late September.”
    â€œTrust me, Dotto’. It’ll come, it’ll come! And it’s beautiful, too.”
    Rocco Schiavone started walking toward the snowcat, which was waiting to take him back to town. By now his feet were like two frozen flounder fillets.

    When the snowcat let Schiavone and Pierron out at the base of the cableway, the crowd of rubberneckers was smaller, thanks to the leverage of the snow and the cold. Only the Brits were still there, a small knot of people singing “You’ll Never Walk Alone” at the top of their lungs. The deputy police chief looked at them. Red-faced, eyes half shut from the beer they’d swilled.
    Suddenly he couldn’t take it anymore.
    He still remembered May 30, 1984, like it was yesterday. Conti and Graziani kicking the ball at random while Liverpool beat Rome and took home their fourth European Cup.
    â€œPierron, tell them to shut up!” he shouted. “There’s a corpse up there—a little respect, for fuck’s sake!”
    Pierron walked over to talk to the Brits. They very civilly begged pardon, shook hands, and fell silent. Rocco only felt worse. First of all because now he was pissed off, and a nice rowdy brawl would have been just the thing. And second because Pierron spoke English. Schiavone barely knew how to say “Imagine all the people,” a phrase that was unlikely to be particularly useful, either in Italy or in far-off Albion.
    â€œDo you speak English, Italo?” he asked him.
    â€œWell, you know, Dottore . . .” replied the officer in an apologetic tone of voice, “in the valleys here, we all speak French, and they do a good job of teaching English in the schools. The thing is, we live on tourism. See, the schools in Val d’Aosta are first-rate. We learn languages, banking, and we’re pretty much in the vanguard when it comes to—”
    â€œPierron!” the deputy police chief broke in. “When you people were living in caves and scratching your fleas, in Rome we were already decadent faggots!” and he