Death Brings Gold

“Yes, who knows what he gets up to in that flat.”

“Ah, Beatrice, he can’t do much now, eh… with only one foot and one hand …”

Luigia stopped. She realised that sentence had stirred some kind of curiosity in the young man. Beatrice realised it too.

“Eh, yes eh…” the latter jumped in. “Probably someone didn’t like his dealings. One time they really beat him up. They cut his hand and his foot off …”

“Yes, Yes, cut off for real” Luigia repeated. “Cut off. Thwack!” she finished, mimicking the movement of a machete.

The young man’s eyes widened, nodding. Then, a shy smile appeared on his lips.

“Now to home. Tired. Much work.”

“Of course!” Beatrice exclaimed. “My friend always has a tendency to drag things out. Please forgive her, she’s of a certain age.”

Luigia gave her a crooked eye. Then she spoke to the young man again.

“I just wanted to put this young lad on his guard. So now he knows who he can trust. And with whom he needs to be careful.”

“Indeed, indeed” Beatrice took the opportunity to continue the conversation. “In this building you need to be wary twenty four hours a day, you never know what your neighbour has in store for you. There are some odd types of people around…”

“And then they gossip, and gossip. Ah, scandalmongers!”

“See, one time…”

“Sorry. I have to go now,” the young man interrupted her, taking two steps towards the next flight of stairs.

“Of course!” Beatrice again. “Poor thing, you must be tired after a day at work.” Then she said to her friend: “Luigia, let him go, this handsome lad must get some rest. He will have another opportunity to talk to us some other time.”

With those words, the young man finally felt authorised to climb the steps, while the two elderly ladies observed him with inquisitive looks.

Once they heard the door of the upstairs apartment closing, the two women said goodbye to each other, arranging to meet the next day. And with that they each took refuge inside their own homes, which were old and shabby, just like them.

***

Giuliani was there, on the wrecked couch, his gaze remaining, since who knows when, on the arm and leg. An incomplete man, that’s what he was.

He repeated to himself for the hundredth time that at least the disability had allowed him to skip the housing waiting list to be given the miserable abode. Otherwise he would have been forced to sleep in a cardboard box under some bridge. Having to compete for a spot, maybe even fight for it, with other homeless people.

Those were the thoughts that took hold of him every night; the thoughts that made him believe he might have been better off dead than reduced to this.

Knock, knock, knock.

Was he mistaken or had somebody just knocked on the door?

He said to himself that the first hypothesis was more likely, because nobody ever visited him. Only Mrs Pina, the one who offered him breakfast in the morning ,and in the evening, unbeknownst to her husband, brought him an ashtray full of cigarette butts, so that he could finish them, smoking the small amount of tobacco that was left. The gossipers in the building were even saying that they were having an affair.

Please! Although he was in a really bad state, he was not desperate to the point of having it sucked by an old hag.

Giuliano looked at the cheap wall clock. Almost 11pm.

Pina had already come at 9pm. It couldn’t be her again. He must have been mistaken, he must have misheard.

In that moment he heard another knock on the door and realised that it was not a mistake.

“Come in,” he said without much confidence. After all he wasn’t accustomed to receiving guests. “It’s open!”

He stood for a long minute staring at a door that had no intention of being opened. Then, exactly when he was taking the last sip from his cut-price supermarket beer – a present from the same Pina – three knocks, stronger and clearer than the previous ones, were heard.

He put the beer can on the coffee table. Supporting himself with his good arm, he stood up on his leg. He didn’t feel like bending to pick up his crutches, so, bracing himself against anything he could find, he started hopping on one foot until he reached the door.

“I said it’s open!” he said sharply, opening the door wide.

The landing was dark and empty. He frowned. It was obvious that the alcohol and his melancholy had played a trick on him.

He shook his head and closed the door. Then, hopping on one foot he turned around and leaned against a small cabinet to regain his balance.

The man in the raincoat was a lot faster than him and attacked, banging him against the wall. Blind with pain caused by his arm bent violently behind his back, Giuliani almost didn’t feel the light sting, as if a needle were entering his forearm.

His sight became blurred and he was forced to shut his eyes. He felt his leg collapsing and a sense of torpor took hold of him.

Then, at once, everything became dark.

CHAPTER 17

That’s all he needed that morning: a flat tyre.

Lucky for him, there was a garage a couple of hundred metres away. He walked almost half a kilometre to get there. To him, walking was a bit like smoking: it helped him to relax and think. He was a born walker. Even his surname confirmed that. Walker, the one who walks.

David congratulated himself because he was still in the mood for making jokes even during times as unlucky as this one was.

When he saw the bald man in the mechanic’s overall, he explained the situation to him. The man didn’t waste time. He retrieved his breakdown van and headed towards the Inspector’s Audi.

While waiting for him to come back, Walker lit a cigarette. It had been a pleasant walk, but it hadn’t helped with the fact that he was pissed off. It was going to cost him a fat one hundred euro note, apart from all the wasted time.

Bloody tyre.

He had just caught sight of his Audi on top of the breakdown van, when he felt his pocket vibrating.

“Fuck!” he exclaimed seeing the extension of a Police Headquarters number. “You can’t have something unexpected happen to you, because they can’t get by without you.”

He swiped the screen with his finger and accepted the call.

“Walker,” he answered.

Bassani’s voice was on the other end of the phone.

David’s face froze in surprise. The phone call was brief. But as painful as a punch in the teeth. He hung up and stood staring at the mechanic without seeing him. His mind was processing images of men laying on the ground, dead, with gold coloured neckties wrapped around their necks as a decoration.

Shortly after, his Audi A3 was ready to go again.

The mechanic had done him a big favour by helping him immediately. Well, truth be told, he did charge him, and quite a lot. But Walker didn’t feel like arguing about it, he had other priorities. Bassani had been succinct, but clear.

“The killer has struck again.”

Then he had given him just enough time to write the new victim’s address down.

Absorbed in the vortex of his own thoughts, Walker almost didn’t notice the traffic light was red. He jammed on the brakes, causing the tyres to squeal.

“Fuck!”

He lit a Marlboro and waited for the traffic light to change; then, he engaged first gear and flattened the accelerator. His A3 took off like a flash, becoming a white dot lost in the traffic of Milan.

The entrance of the building was blocked with the usual red and white tape.

Inspector Walker marched in resolutely, until a man in a uniform signalled him to stop.

“Police,” Walker said, showing his Police ID.

The police officer apologised with a movement of his arms and lifted the tape, inviting him to cross it.

David climbed the stairs, two steps at a time. He had no difficulty identifying the flat, with two policemen guarding the entrance.

Even before he’d pulled out his Police ID for them, the policemen stepped aside, clearing the way for him. He thanked them ,nodding, and pushed the door open.

The sound of the door creaking open caused another uniformed man to turn.

“Chief, welcome!,” he said.

“Good morning, Bassani.”

“Something wrong?”

“Next question, please! I’ve had an awful start to the day” admitted Walker.

“Well, I don’t think you’ll find anything relaxing here, Chief.”

Walker immediately understood what his subordinate meant.

Not far from them, on a filthy floor , was a man lying in an arranged position.

The Inspector moved closer and stood staring at the dead man. It wasn’t the necktie that was troubling him. He’d expected to find that. The dead man had two body parts missing: a hand and a foot.

Of course, the amputations were not the work of the killer. They were covered with two identical socks. Therefore, they were old wounds.

The same couldn’t be said about his own shoulder. Fuck, it hurt!

He bent over the dead man, careful not to contaminate the scene. The mouth was half-closed. The temperature inside the flat had contributed to slow down the process of stiffening the body, the Inspector noticed. The rigor mortis hadn’t yet set in . Not completely, at least.

Walker pulled a pair of latex gloves out from the small box the Forensic agents had left almost beside the dead man. He lifted the end of the necktie to get a glimpse of what interested him. He smiled bitterly, seeing MODADUOMO clearly on the label. A serial killer was having fun behind their backs.

“A tough nut to crack.” A voice said unexpectedly. “Two dead bodies in a couple of days.”

Walker and Bassani turned. Then, David stood up.

The Public Prosecutor had his eyes fixed on the dead body.

“Good morning, Fini”,Walker and Bassani greeted him in unison.

Antonio Fini waved at them. Then the three men moved further away, the Forensic specialists were there to collect evidence.

Before the Public Prosecutor could ask , Bassani gave him an account of the facts.

“We were called by a neighbour. An old lady that used to come here to bring him breakfast every morning”. He gestured in the direction of the dead body. “She told us he was a poor devil. He never had a penny in his pocket and she was doing all she could to help him. However, I was informed by Headquarters that he was no saint. He’d been inside on several occasions for theft and drug dealing. Between us, it’s no great loss.”

He could have omitted his last comment, thought Walker. Especially in front of the Public Prosecutor.

“Well, at least somebody took care of a guy who could still have caused us trouble,” said Bassani, trying to make amends.

Fini said nothing, and moved on to the matter at hand.

“I’ve read the report on the first victim. No abnormalities, if we consider that we live in a crazy world. The only thing I don’t understand is what was Super Glue doing under his tongue.”

“Super Glue?” repeated Bassani.

“Methyl cyanoacrylate,” Fini informed him. “Glue.”

“Oh, yes. Now I remember,” Bassani said, annoyed over the bad impression he was making.

Then Fini continued talking, but Walker had stopped listening to him. His brain was now following other trajectories.

When the Inspector came back to earth, he did it with a tone of voice that froze everyone present.

“Glue!” he shouted. Everything was clear to him now.

Fini and Bassani looked at him dumbfounded. So did the others.

“Don’t move!” Walker ordered to the Forensic agents, who had just closed the bag, after the Public Prosecutor had given them permission with a nod of his head.

Without waiting for anyone to ask for explanations, Walker moved closer, but an agent of the Forensic team tried to stop him, catching the attention of the Public Prosecutor.

“Let him go,” Fini said firmly, “Inspector Walker knows what he’s doing.”

David smiled at him, pleased. Then, regaining his serious look, he made sure that the gloves he had taken earlier were still intact. As a precaution he took them off, pulled a new pair from the box, and put them on.

The body bag opened with the metallic sound of its zip.

Trying to ignore the pressure of everyone’s eyes on him, Walker’s hands disappeared inside the bag.

Anyone who had seen his arms fussing around inside that bag would have thought that he was playing with the dead person’s face.

Then, unexpectedly, Walker’s voice rang out. Tinged with triumph.

“Bingo!”

Bassani took two steps towards him, trying to identify what Walker was holding in his hand. He thought he’d caught sight of something sparkling. He narrowed his eyes to slits and, when he was a few centimetres from the Inspector, he repeated his Chief’s exclamation.

“Bingo?”

Walker opened his hand, showing Bassani what he had recovered from the mouth of the dead man.

“Yes, bingo!” he repeated satisfied. “Forget about the gold necktie. This is the killer’s true signature.”

CHAPTER 18

Walker was sitting in his car, still parked a few metres away from Giuliano Giuliani’s house.

He had just ended a phone call with Visconti. He had told him about the new victim. There was more work for him, although, Walker was sure about it, nothing new was going to be revealed by the autopsy. The usual death caused by strangulation with a necktie and the usual lack of clues. The only difference was going to be the fact that Giuliani didn’t have bruises on his wrists, but only on one wrist and ankle.

Anyway, he was looking forward to this new autopsy report, hoping for some news that would boost the investigation.

Right now he had more important puzzles to solve.

He thought again about the small tag found in Giuliani’s mouth. It was gold, he’d have bet on it. Its form resembled a circle – and at a guess, its diametre was not much more than a centimetre–, although its edges were quite irregular. Jagged. It almost looked gnawed by rats. It was approximately a couple of millimetres thick. He had never seen anything like it in his life. Also, there were those strange symbols engraved on one of its faces, and roughly polished.

Tapping the fingers of his hand on the wheel, he was keeping his eyes fixed on the sheet of paper where he had copied, in large size, the symbols.

The more he stared at them, the more he repeated to himself that it was all absurd.

Four fucking lines. Two were parallel, a third one, always parallel but a bit off, and a final line that, compared to the others, was oblique. In his opinion, those lines were the signature left by the killer. The problem was twofold: how to read those lines and how to interpret them. He could have put them in many positions.

= / -

= / -

= / -

= / -

= / -

= / -

= / -

= / -

= / -

= / -

= / -

= / -

= / -

= / -

Which was the right one? If there was a right one.

Four lines, that at that moment meant nothing to David Walker. Almost nothing.

The only thing he could think of was “equals divided by minus”. Or “equality division minus”. Or “minus divided by equals”. Anyway, mathematics seemed the only thread of the damned symbolism.

Now, however, he couldn’t wait to arrive at Headquarters. He should have already sent two men to tail Merli, but with the flat tyre and the new dead body, he had lost time. One of the priorities, apart from studying those stupid symbols, was to keep an eye on Merli. He didn’t like that man at all.

A knock on the window made him jump.

He turned suddenly and recognised Bassani’s moustache.

The detective, showing an amused smile, was signalling him to wind his window down.

“I didn’t mean to startle you, Chief,” he said to him.

“No problem,” Walker replied, defensively, “I was studying these damned symbols,” he continued, waving the paper in front of him.

“Ah!” exclaimed Bassani. “It’s a big headache.”

“It is,” confirmed the Inspector.

When Walker turned back to Bassani, he noticed the detective’s face was as dark as a cloudy night sky.

“What’s the matter, detective?” he asked him.

The man waited for an eternity before answering.

“What’s got into you?” Walker pressed him again.

Bassani stroked his moustache.

“We must return to Ghezzi’s house,” he stated, serious.

“To Ghezzi’s?”

“Yes, Chief.”

“But why?” asked Walker.

“Do you remember when someone said they’d heard the noise of something falling on the floor? A metallic sound…”

“It was a butto…” Walker didn’t finish his sentence. “Are you trying to say that…?”

“Yes,” admitted the detective. “If we’re lucky, we’ll find what we’re looking for.”

“You’re a genius, Bassani.”

CHAPTER 19

David was sitting on the bed, his eyes fixed on his mother’s lifeless ones. He was listening to the mangled words the woman was pronouncing with difficulty. They seemed meaningless and made no sense. A sign that death was coming to take her.

David sighed, trying to hold back the tears.

“David, m-mhy d-d-hear…”

The voice shook him.

For the first time his mother had said something almost comprehensible.

He granted her his full attention. He stood there staring at her for a time that seemed eternal, then more words came.

“… ss-h-k-keep on sshmoukeeng, if hhhyou c-can’t do… uithout …em…”

Then, on the woman’s face there was the sign of a breakdown, a snarl of pain that prompted David to squeeze her hand to comfort her, making her feel his presence.

The old woman’s head fell heavily forward, almost lifeless, and he tried to call her.

“Mum…”

The woman, with her last strength, raised her head and half-closed her eyes, trying to focus on her son’s face. Then, she shut them completely and started chewing on nothing again.

A series of distorted and fragmented syllables was the reward to David’s patient wait.

“…But plheashe … it’s for u hoo… art a mmly…I whuont hhee you sttleouwn.”

He sprung suddenly and sat on his bed soaked with sweat. That dream again. That nasty pain again, suffered at his mother’s deathbed.

He placed a hand on his chest, as if trying to calm the frantic beat of his heart.

He repeated the words engraved in his memory, but he couldn’t decipher their meaning.

He sat there until a normal heartbeat returned.

He lit a cigarette and took a long strong drag. He held the smoke inside until he felt some kind of itchiness in his lungs, then he let it out, along with a thousand thoughts.

He entered the bathroom with uncertain steps, in the hope that his morning routine would bring him some peace. He came back to the bedroom, leaned for a moment against the door frame.

It was from there that he saw it.

On the pillow was the sheet of paper that he had almost worn out from constantly looking at the symbols.

He stood there observing the crumpled piece of paper, while taking his mind back to Ghezzi’s house.

He had entered into Raffaele Ghezzi’s flat, after Bassani had his intuition. The metallic sound …

At that point he and the detective, having donned latex gloves, had begun searching the living room. They had looked everywhere. Under the furniture, on and under the rug, they had searched meticulously between the gaps of the tiles. Nothing. Besides, what could they have expected to find, after the Forensic team had gone through that room again and again?

They had looked at each other, dejected. Walker had dragged a small chair over to sit down. That was when he heard something scraping against the floor. He had turned the chair upside down and there it was: the tag.

He held the little gold coloured piece close to his eyes and tried to read the symbols engraved on its surface.

While Bassani, triumphant, was going back to Headquarters with their loot, Walker got in his car to go home, having copied the symbols of the two small tags on a new sheet of paper.

And now, as he approached the sheet of paper, he realised that he was not even a millimetre closer to the solution. In fact, the increasing number of symbols rendered him practically unable to come up with (let alone find!) any meaning whatsoever. Lines, dots, circles. Nothing, he couldn’t think of anything.

He noticed his cigarette had almost burnt out. He stubbed out what was left of it in the ashtray and grabbed the crumpled paper.

He stood staring at the new symbols.

ḷ % -

ḷ % -

He sighed.

Then he made his tongue click against his palate, turned the paper over, so he could see the whole sequence of symbols, and tried for the umpteenth time to solve the problem.

- / = ḷ % -

- / = ḷ % -

He was sure: those signs were nothing more than a mathematical code to decipher. Or maybe a lead, a hint that, somehow, held information. About what? The murders already committed, or…

They should expect a third murder, Walker said to himself. And maybe a fourth one, even.

Many serial killers were in the habit of using that modus operandi. It was the means the killer was using to communicate with the Police. The only thing in common between him and those who were hunting him. The main difference was that one formulated the riddles to make them as difficult as possible; whereas the others racked their brains trying to solve them, before it was too late.

“This son of a bitch wants to play the maths professor,” he said out loud, conscious that he was talking to himself like crazy people do.

He turned the sheet of paper over again and focused on the symbols found at the first crime scene.

ḷ % -

ḷ % -

He tried to find a link between the three or five symbols – in case the central one was a percentage symbol – and the place where the second victim had been found.

What is the fucking connection between the minus, the percent, that bloody ‘i’, and the murder of Giuliano Giuliani, a man with one foot and one hand?

The answer he was hoping for didn’t come. And he was sure it was not going to come easily.

Disheartened, he let the paper fall on the pillow.

He retrieved the clothes he had thrown on a chair the night before and started putting them on, letting his mind keep wandering around those damned symbols.

He shook his head, depressed. He had never been that good at maths, even less at algebra.

Nevertheless, he smiled.

He knew who to turn to. Arturo Mosetti would surely have given him some brilliant advice. He had done it several times during previous investigations, when Walker had been in difficulty.

And there was nothing to say that he couldn’t have also solved this complicated problem.

He would see him that same afternoon, but right now he had another meeting. He had decided to have Merli followed from that very night. Before that, however, he was going to ask him some questions. If he could catch him straight away, there would be no need to have him followed.

When Walker arrived at Headquarters, he was surprised to see that detective Paolo Caslini, – his most loyal man – had already come back to work.

“Weren’t you supposed to come back next week?” he asked , with a sidelong glance.

“Let’s not go there , Chief. I thought this time she was the real thing, but I had to dump her too.”

“Even this brunette left hair in the toilet?” Walker said ironically.

This was not the first time Caslini left a current flame while on holiday and took off in haste. He was intolerant of people, but if you asked him, it was they who were full of faults.

“If that had been all, Chief” answered Caslini, disconsolate.

“You’ll tell me later, Paolo. Now I’ve got some urgent work to do. Actually, you could come along.” he said to him. That wasn’t a suggestion, it was an order.

When they entered the office, Merli – who was the only suspect, though unaware of the fact - was already there waiting for them. Once again Bassani had done a great job. He had got him there in record time.

The guy seemed anxious. Was it guilt or fear?

Walker stood behind Merli, who had neither seen nor heard him come in. Walker could sense Merli’s anxiety even by standing behind him. So he decided to surprise him.

“Good morning, Mr Merli.”

Merli turned, almost scared, his mouth open.

“I’m Inspector Walker,” he continued. “And this is detective Caslini.”

At last Merli spoke as well.

“Good morning,” he answered in a soft, but firm, voice.

David went past him, looking at him. He took a seat at the other end of the desk, along with Caslini. Lining themselves up in that way, they wanted to make Merli understand that there were two of them, while he was on his own. They were putting mental pressure on the suspect, something that in the majority of cases brought results.

Walker’s steady eyes locked on Merli’s disorientated eyes. He deliberately remained silent, in order to increase the man’s anxiety.

Merli started looking around, as if he was wondering if they were still waiting for somebody else. He was also wondering if one of these two men was going to tell him why he was in that room with Homicide police, instead of being in his small garage. When his anxiety was about to become painful, he made up his mind.

“May I know why you’ve called me?” His tone of voice was trying to show a confidence that he didn’t have. He was scared, clearly.

Caslini didn’t answer, because he wasn’t authorised to do so. He knew that the first to speak must always be your superior.

Walker didn’t answer. He did it on purpose. He wanted to see how much he could increase the level of Merli’s anxiety. He wanted to read his guilt in his eyes. Or his innocence.

“Hey, I’m talking to you,” Merli urged them.

Finally Walker made up his mind. It was always the same strategy. Make the alleged killer believe he is the crucial key to the solution of the investigation, hoping to gain his trust . And then that he might give himself away, showing some sign of his guilt.

“Mr Merli, I decided to have you brought in,” Walker’s voice was kind, “ in the hope you could give us a hand.”

After a moment Merli’s reply arrived.

“A hand? Doing what?”

Walker sneered.

“Raffaele Ghezzi. Does it ring a bell?”

Merli stiffened.

“No,” he answered, looking in another direction. Looking anywhere as long as he could to avoid the Inspector’s eyes. “Never heard it before.”

“Never heard it before,” Walker repeated. “And what if I told you this man is dead?” he continued, leaning forward to reduce Merli’s personal space.

“Well, I’m sorry for him,” Merli replied dryly.

“Ah, you’re sorry for him,” echoed Walker.

“I’m sorry, but better him than me.”

“Sooner or later it will happen to all of us. Death does not spare anyone.”

That sad reality, tinged with irony, had the purpose of softening the conversation. Maybe he had used the wrong approach, Walker thought .

“Death does not spare anyone, Inspector.”

Merli was doing all he could to look confident, but you could see from a mile away that he was very tense.

Walker smiled, ignoring the provocation. That was the right moment to plunge the knife.

“Mr Merli, we know that you knew Raffaele Ghezzi. So if you decide to cooperate seriously, perhaps we might be able to nail the killer.”

Merli shook his head.

“I really don’t know how I could help you.”

“Well, maybe you could start by telling us why we found your fingerprints in Ghezzi’s flat.”

Merli’s face darkened. His forehead was now covered in sweat. After some time he spoke and sounded upset.

“Inspector, are you accusing me of murder?”

“Absolutely not,” Walker lied. “There’s no proof you killed Ghezzi. But, considering that your fingerprints were in the victim’s house, I assume you knew each other. And maybe you could tell me something about him, help to understand what kind of person he was, whom he associated with, if he had problems with anyone …”

“I’ve told you,” Merli said, looking firstly at Walker, then at Caslini. “I didn’t know the man.”

“Do you think I’d be here telling you lies?”

Walker paused, before throwing the bait.

“Mr Merli, we need your testimony. Give us a hand solving this case.”

“I would happily do it, if I could,” were Merli’s only words.

“Maybe you don’t understand the gravity of this situation. There’s a killer out there. If we don’t stop him, he will kill again.”

Merli looked around, as if planning an escape. He realised these men knew much more than he thought. The thought crossed his mind that he needed to start talking, before the situation became irretrievable.

“I’ve got a wife,” he wanted to point out. As if that was the priority. “I want my privacy to be respected. I know the law, I know my rights.”

Walker granted him a smile.

“What you’re going to tell us will stay in this room. Actually, it will only be used for investigative purposes. Your wife won’t be informed of anything, if you don’t want her to.”

A never-ending silence seemed to be anticipating Merli’s words.

“All right then,” he said, almost whispering. “You win.”