The Puppeteer Read Free Page B

television to give himself company.
    Signora Baccoli—the contadina—had made supper for him. In the kitchen he lifted the inverted dish and smiled. Ham, melon, salad and gnocchi, which needed heating. Suddenly he felt very hungry.
    The Villa Ondina had belonged to Agnese’s father, who had made a fortune in pharmaceutical products for cattle. An unsmiling man, he had died ten years earlier. His wife, equally unsmiling and a devout Catholic in her last years, had waited seven years before following him to the family grave in Brescia.
    Trotti undressed. His clothes were stiff with blood. He put them all in a plastic bag and tied the bag with a piece of string.
    (Trotti had recognized the photograph.)
    He could hear the mumble of the immersion heater. Signora Baccoli had turned it on.
    (A coincidence, perhaps, that Maltese had a photograph ofthe girl in his pocket. The same photograph that Trotti had seen in the Questura.)
    Trotti shaved and then showered, letting the scalding water run against his skin until he began to feel the heat penetrate his body and the coldness within him.
    The shower was still running, and the water was still hot, when the telephone rang. He had forgotten to take a towel and, in his haste, pulled the cover from the bed the contadina had prepared for him. He left a trail of wet prints down the marble stairs. “Where’ve you been?”
    “Who’s speaking?” Trotti asked and immediately regretted his own stupidity.
    “Where’ve you been?” Repressed anger in her voice. “I’ve been trying to get through for the last twenty-four hours.” Agnese’s voice—her anger—was as clear as if she were phoning from the village.
    “Where’re you phoning from?”
    “You tell me you’ll be at the Villa and then you keep me waiting. Twenty-four hours, Piero.” A slight echo along the line—or between the telephone and the satellite somewhere over the Atlantic. “You are really very inconsiderate at times.”
    “I was in the village.”
    Agnese laughed one of her unpleasant, mocking laughs. “With one of your women friends?”
    “I was at the Carabinieri barracks.”
    “What on earth for?”
    “It’s not important.”
    “Of course not, Piero. After all, I’m just a silly woman. Why should you have to tell your wife what you’ve been doing? But that’s the way it’s always been, hasn’t it?”
    Trotti did not reply.
    “Piero?”
    “Did you get my letter?” he asked.
    “Perhaps. I can’t remember.”
    Not even the decency to lie.
    Without stopping to catch her breath, Agnese went on, “I imagine you’re enjoying yourself.”
    “I needed a rest.”
    “You never needed a rest when your wife wanted you to go to the Lake.”
    “Is your American company paying for this phone call?”
    There was a silence during which he could hear her breathing.
    “You’ve got a nerve, Piero.”
    “Is that what you phoned to tell me?”
    “I need my diplomas.” Her voice was brisk. “It’s now two weeks since I asked you for them.”
    “I’ll send them.”
    “Now, Piero, now.”
    “I’ve already got them out.”
    “I need them immediately—my university degree and my specialization diplomas. The Americans are in a hurry and you can’t be bothered …”
    “I’ll post them on Monday.”
    “I’d ask Pioppi to do it for me—she’s more reliable than you. But like you, she doesn’t answer the telephone.”
    “Perhaps she’s with the Nonna. She’s working hard for her exam next week.”
    “Well, will you phone her and tell her to post them? I can’t keep on wasting time and money on these phone calls.”
    “When do you think you’ll be coming back, Agnese?”
    Her brisk, efficient businesswoman voice. “Pack them properly. At Bertini’s in via Stradella you can buy a plastic roll container. I don’t want them arriving here in a thousand little pieces. Don’t forget, Piero.”
    He did not reply.
    “Well, can you do that—can you do something for your