He moistened the thread with his lips to slip it more easily into the tiny hole, and pulled it through. Thus stitched together, the bones rattled against each other. They looked like bits of dried wood, blackened by time. He had washed the dirt off them and smoothed the bite marks left by the rats. He had neglected them for too long, but the hush of winter had once again awakened in him the feeling that he no longer wanted to be alone.

Sometimes he felt like a fox and thought he needed a pack. He thought he had a lot in common with that tawny, fleet-footed creature: it too could adapt to the most extreme environments, surviving winter upon winter. It wasn’t fearful, but cautious. It approached humans and often followed their tracks in search of food when there wasn’t enough of it in the woods.

But other times he felt like a lynx, solitary and free, a feline with claws so sharp that they left gashes on the trunks of the trees it so effortlessly climbed. He looked at his hands, his skin as thick as wood bark. His fingernails were long and hard. Every day he sharpened them with whetstone, like farmers did with the blades of their scythes when the fields turned gold in the summer sun.

His hands hadn’t held another human hand since time immemorial.

He stroked the bones that he had threaded back into their original positions. They felt velvety beneath his fingertips and smelled of dried earth. He held them in his palm and felt as if he were caressing again what had once been a hand.

-33-

-33-

“Are you trying to bribe me again?”

Teresa Battaglia was eyeing the coffee Massimo had just placed on her desk. But he wouldn’t let her intimidate him. He knew by now that the superintendent liked to bark, but he had never seen her bite.

“Would it work?” he asked.

She flung her bag to the floor and kicked it under her desk. To say she lacked elegance would have been an understatement.

“Definitely not,” she told him. “Did you put sugar in it?”

“You can’t have sugar.”

“Whatever. What the fuck do you want?”

Massimo found her manner of speaking appalling.

“Why can’t you just ask a question without . . .”

“Shit! I’ve stained my shirt. Anyway, what do you want?” she said before he could finish. She rummaged for a tissue, and he promptly offered her one. She stared at him for a moment before taking it.

“Don’t you have a life?” she asked.

“Why do you ask?”

“Just the fact that you’re here, attending to an old lady like some sort of houseboy. Just so you know, I’m not the one who decides who gets promoted around here.”