The Salati Case Read Free

young assistant, a girl whose body was perfect but for her cantilevered nose, ‘could you make us a coffee?’
    There was something gentle in the way he spoke to her and I wondered if they were lovers. Most of the shopkeepers ended up taking their pretty assistants out for dinner as a prelude to showing them the finest hotel rooms in Romagna.
    ‘You’re not closing for lutto?’ I asked.
    He shook his head. ‘It actually helps having something to do. We’re closing up later.’
    Laura was out back now and I decided to iron out what I knew. ‘The night your brother disappeared, he was waiting for a train back to Rimini, right?’
    ‘He had bought a ticket. Some people came forward to say they had seen him buying a ticket.’
    ‘And then?’
    ‘Nothing. He was supposed to be going back to Anna in—’
    ‘Who’s Anna?’
    ‘His woman. They had a daughter, my niece.’
    ‘Called?’
    ‘Elisabetta.’
    I was writing down the names. ‘Anna what? Salati?’
    ‘No, di Pietro.’
    I wrote it down. ‘Do they still live in Rimini?’
    ‘Last I heard.’
    ‘You’re not in touch?’
    ‘On and off. Not as much as back then, but sure, we talk occasionally. Anna and my mother weren’t close.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘You would have to ask Anna. But they didn’t get any closer once Ricky went missing. The opposite. Once it was clear
    Ricky wasn’t coming back, we saw a lot less of her and of little Elisabetta. She was two I think when it happened.’
    ‘And what brought Ricky back this way that weekend?’
    ‘He had just come to see my mother in Sissa for the day.’
    ‘Sissa? That where you’re from?’
    ‘Right. She had driven him back to the station, dropped him there. I think that was another reason it hurt her so much. She blamed herself for not staying with him on the platform until the train came. As if you had to wait with a twenty-year-old. He would have thought it ridiculous, and so, in other circumstances, would she. But because she never saw him again, she felt it was her fault that she had just dropped him there.’
    ‘What time, do you remember?’
    ‘She said it was twenty minutes before the ten thirty train.’
    ‘And she drove off as he went to buy a ticket?’
    ‘Sure.’ He said it like he was still defending her.
    ‘Where will I find Anna?’ I changed tack.
    ‘I told you, Rimini.’ Salati’s tone had altered now. He clearly felt he alone was left to defend his family’s honour.
    ‘Any address?’
    ‘I’ll go find it.’ Salati stomped out to a back room and I looked at Laura, the young assistant. She had come back with two plastic thimbles of coffee. She looked at me and held the tray out.
    ‘Thanks.’
    Salati returned with a piece of paper: ‘Via dei Caduti, 34. Rimini.’ He took the other coffee and smiled at the girl.
    ‘What were you doing’, I caught Salati’s eye, ‘the night Ricky disappeared? 24 June, wasn’t it?’
    Umberto looked at me and laughed nervously. He was
    about to say something, but then wiped down his moustache with his thumb and his forefinger and looked at me again. ‘You don’t waste time do you?’
    ‘Who were you with?’
    ‘Roberta.’
    ‘Your wife?’
    He nodded. ‘My ex.’
    ‘Anyone else with you two that Saturday night?’
    ‘Just the two of us. I think she was due that weekend, or the one after. I can’t remember. We were just sitting there at home waiting.’
    ‘Your first?’
    ‘Yeah. Daniele.’
    ‘How many you got?’
    ‘Two boys.’
    ‘They still in the city?’
    ‘No. She took them back to Traversetolo when we split.’
    ‘Why was that?’
    ‘Why did she go to Traversetolo? That’s where her parents were from.’
    ‘No, why did you split?’
    ‘Roberta and I?’
    I threw my chin into an upward nod.
    ‘She didn’t give a reason. Just said our marriage was over.’
    He didn’t look particularly wistful about the separation. If there was any pain there, I guessed Laura eased it nicely. He seemed like so many of the