“Then you can add these five: Sixth degree, losing your place in a book you’re reading. Seventh degree, put down waiting for your luggage at the airport. Or else seeing it arrive, but with a broken handle or zipper. Or not seeing it arrive at all. Eighth degree, put people who text you without saying who they are. Ninth degree, attending a performance of folk dances. Tenth degree, obviously, an unsolved case of murder. Speaking of which, Pierron, get ready, because we have to go. Fumagalli has something for us.”

“Do I have to come, too? I already saw the dead body yesterday, at the prison.”

“Your presence is essential!”

Italo nodded. Caterina walked over to the chart with a pen in hand. “Well, I’ll add the new pains in the ass, then.” And she started writing.

“Caterì, when you’ve finished this thankless task, do you think you could bring Lupa some water? She’s asleep on the armchair in my office.”

“Certainly. And where should I put waiting for your luggage at the airport, again? What level?”

“Seventh. Put that at the seventh.”

“So are we certain that I absolutely have to come?” Italo insisted, hoping he could avoid this visit to the morgue. “I just had breakfast.”

“Don’t worry. I’m told that it’s not disgusting, just horrifying.”

“So, it’s not going to make me throw up?”

“Exactly.”

FUMAGALLI WAS WAITING FOR THEM IN FRONT OF THE MORGUE. He was looking up at the sky full of clouds that sailed along serenely, like so many little cotton balls, gliding on the calm spring winds. The snow, the cold, the black winter sky were all things that seemed light-years away. “Strange, isn’t it?” said the medical examiner as soon as Rocco and Italo came within earshot.

“What?” asked the deputy chief.

“When you’re in the middle of the winter, the days drag out and you get the feeling they’re never going to end. And it seems as if the cold will never end, either. But then, look! Zap! You can’t even remember when it was winter anymore.”

“Speak for yourself. I can remember it perfectly. It was barely a week ago,” Rocco replied. “Anyway, what about this horror flick?”

Alberto Fumagalli pressed his lips tight and gazed at the two cops with a serious expression. “Before you go in, Rocco, a word.”

They stepped off to one side, leaving Italo standing alone in the middle of the plaza.

“Listen. It really is a rather distressing sight. I can just picture him”—and here he pointed at the Valdostan officer—“already stretched out on the floor. In other words, maybe we should leave him outside. Unless . . .”

“Unless what?”

“Unless you and me care to make a little bet.”

Rocco looked the doctor in the eye. “I like it . . .”

“Let’s say I give your officer six seconds.”