The Potter's Field Read Online Free PDF Page B

off.

    Entering the station, he found Catarella at his post.
    â€œBut didn’t you have a fever?”
    â€œI got rid of it, Chief.”
    â€œHow’d you do that?”
    â€œTook four aspirins an’ then drunk a glass o’ hot spicy wine an’ then got in bed an’ covered m’self up. An’ now iss gone.”
    â€œWho’s here?”
    â€œFazio in’t here yet, an’ Isspector Augello called sayin’ as how he still had a little fever but would come in later in the morning.”
    â€œAny news?”
    â€œThere’s a ginnelman wants a talk to yiz who’s name is—wait, I got it writ down somewheres—iss an easy name but I forgot it, wait, here it is: Mr. Giacchetta.”
    â€œDoes that seem like a forgettable name to you?”
    â€œIt happens to me sometimes, Chief.”
    â€œAll right, then, send him into my office after I go in.”

    The man who came in was a well-dressed gentleman of about forty with a distinguished air, perfectly coiffed hair, mustache, eyeglasses, and the overall look of an ideal bank clerk.
    â€œPlease sit down, Mr. Giacchetta.”
    â€œGiacchetti. Fabio Giacchetti’s the name.”
    Montalbano cursed to himself. Why did he still believe the names Catarella passed on to him?
    â€œWhat can I do for you, Mr. Giacchetti?”
    The man sat down, carefully arranging the creases in his trousers and smoothing his mustache. He leaned back in his chair and looked at the inspector.
    â€œWell?” said Montalbano.
    â€œThe truth of the matter is, I’m not sure I was right to come here.”
    O matre santa! He’d happened upon a ditherer, a doubting Thomas, the worst kind of person who might ever walk into a police station.
    â€œListen, I can’t help you with that. It’s up to you to decide. It’s not like I can give you little hints the way they do on quiz shows.”
    â€œWell, the fact is that last night I witnessed something . . . and that’s just it, I don’t know what it was . . . something I really don’t know how to define.”
    â€œIf you decide to tell me what it was, perhaps together we can arrive at a definition,” said Montalbano, who was beginning to feel something breaking in the general area of his balls. “If, on the other hand, you don’t tell me, then I’ll have to send you on your way.”
    â€œWell, at the time, it seemed to me . . . at first, that is, it looked to me like a hit-and-run driver. You know what I mean, don’t you?”
    â€œYes. Or at least I can tell a hit-and-run driver from a hit-and-run lover—you know, the kind with bedroom eyes and a little black book. Listen, Mr. Giacchetti, I haven’t got much time to waste. Let’s start at the beginning, all right? I’ll ask you a few questions, just to warm you up, so to speak.”
    â€œOkay.”
    â€œAre you from here?”
    â€œNo, I’m from Rome.”
    â€œAnd what do you do here in Vigàta?”
    â€œI started three months ago as manager of the branch office of the Banco Cooperativo.”
    The inspector had been right on the money. The man could only be with a bank. You can tell right away: Those who handle other people’s money in the cathedrals of wealth that are the big banks end up acquiring something austere and reserved in their manner, something priestlike proper to those who practice secret rites such as laundering dirty money, engaging in legalized usury, using coded accounts, and illegally exporting capital offshore. They suffer, in short, from the same sorts of occupational deformities as undertakers, who, in handling corpses every day, end up looking like walking corpses themselves.
    â€œWhere do you live?”
    â€œFor now, while waiting to find a decent apartment, my wife and I are staying at a house on the Montereale road, as her parents’ guests. It’s their country home, but they’ve turned