Three young guys in T-shirts came in with an acetylene torch and set to work. The flame was noisy and smelly and I preferred to go out into the courtyard.

It wasn’t far from the hospital to the church. Graziano’s father was in no shape to drive his taxi, so I got behind the wheel and followed the undertaker’s van. I didn’t go into the church for the service, which in any case was very short. Instead, I sat down on the rim of a dry, cracked fountain. Here too there were cats, crouching in its shade. I was joined by the man from the undertaker’s. “Incredible heat,” he said. “We have to be very quick in these cases. I know now’s not the time,” he went on, “but about the expenses…” I told him I’d see to it and to contact me at the Corriere dello Sport. He said that was fine, and went and leaned against the van.

After a while, the coffin came out of the church. Graziano’s father must have been feeling bad, because two of the guys in T-shirts were supporting him. He sat down in the backseat of the taxi. He was very pale. “I haven’t slept all night,” he said. “And the drive didn’t help,” he went on. I got behind the wheel. It was a long ride to the cemetery, but the streets were empty in the sun and the van made good time. Once, it jumped a red light, but there really wasn’t anybody on the streets.

It was cooler at the cemetery, but the smell of flowers wilting in the heat was suffocating. The marble headstones looked like gigantic cuttlefish bones abandoned on a beach. A priest, along with two seminarians, blessed the coffin as it descended into the grave. I wondered why the two boys were in the city, doing this crummy job, instead of being on vacation like everyone else.