“Because since you’ve moved into the residential hotel, I’ve been calling the receptionist every day and by now I know your habits.”

Rocco spat out the smoke, looking up at the sky that was spangled with stars. “In that case, let’s come to the gravity of the matter.”

“The dead man in prison. It’s Mimmo Cuntrera.”

At that name, Rocco shut his eyes. “Goddamn it to hell . . .” he murmured. “How can that be? Did someone murder him?”

“It looks like a heart attack, but the judge seems to be convinced that it’s something else.”

“Right. Mimmo Cuntrera isn’t going to die like that. It would be too nice if pieces of shit like him were taken down by heart attacks. No, he’s a weed, it’s a lot harder to kill his kind.”

“Rocco, maybe you’d better come back into the office.”

Italo was right, and the deputy chief knew it. Mimmo Cuntrera was the irritating aftermath of the Berguet case. And of the investigations that Rocco had carried out in order to save the hide of the Berguets’ daughter, Chiara. He couldn’t just remain shut up in the Vieux Aosta. Adele was dead. And he felt personally responsible, even though his old friend Seba didn’t see it that way. Those 6.35 mm bullets had been meant for him, for Rocco Schiavone.

“Put this in the log, Italo. On a May night, at . . . ten minutes past one, Deputy Chief Rocco Schiavone came face-to-face with a pain in the ass of the tenth degree!”

Italo smiled as he thought back to the chart that he’d hung up outside the deputy chief’s office. “All right, I’ll log it in tomorrow.”

The deputy chief looked at him blankly, uncomprehending.

“So, Rocco, what are you going to do?”

“I’ll sleep on it.”

“Are you feeling sleepy?”

“No. Lupa’s feeling sleepy.”

It was true. The puppy had fallen asleep on his Clarks desert boots.

HIS THOUGHTS TURNED BACK TO MIMMO CUNTRERA. AND the story of the Berguet family. Something didn’t add up in that coil of connections. There was one note that was out of tune in the musical score. Cuntrera had been discovered, Rocco and his officers had freed Chiara Berguet, the attempt of the Mafia conspiracy to take over Edil.ber had failed utterly, so why rub Cuntrera out? What had he known? Who wanted him dead? Drowning in his thoughts, he climbed the stairs and found himself once again lying on the hard-as-hell mattress of the Vieux Aosta. On the ceiling, the same old waltz of the three colors of the pub sign in the street below. “One two three, one two three . . .” And suddenly he was fast asleep.

Friday