فصل 37

Chapter 37

THE TURBOPROP air ambulance lifted over the red tile roofs and banked southwest toward Sardinia, the Leaning Tower of Pisa poking above the wing in a turn steeper than the pilot would have made if he carried a living patient.

The stretcher intended for Dr Hannibal Lecter held instead the cooling body of Matteo Deogracias. Older brother Carlo sat beside the corpse, his clothing stiff with blood.

Carlo Deogracias made the medical attendant put on earphones and turn up the music while he spoke on his cell phone to Las Vegas, where a blind encryption repeater relayed his call to the Maryland shore .

For Mason Verger, night and day are much the same. He happened to be sleeping.

Even the aquarium lights were off. Mason’s head was turned on the pillow, his single eye ever open like the eyes of the great eel, which was sleeping too. The only sounds were the regular hiss and sigh of the respirator, the soft bubbling of the aerator in the aquarium.

Above these constant noises came another sound, soft and urgent. The buzzing of Mason’s most private telephone. His pale hand walked on its fingers like a crab to push the telephone button. The speaker was under his pillow, the microphone near the ruin of his face.

First Mason heard the airplane in the background and then a cloying tune, “Gli Innamorati.”

“I’m here. Tell me.”

“It’s a bloody casino,” Carlo said.

“Tell me.”

“My brother Matteo is dead. I have my hand on him now. Pazzi’s dead too. Dr Fell killed them and got away.”

Mason did not reply at once.

“You owe two hundred thousand dollars for Matteo,” Carlo said. “For his family.”

Sardinian contracts always call for death benefits.

“I understand that.”

“The shit will fly about Pazzi.”

“Better to get it out that Pazzi was dirty,” Mason said. “They’ll take it better if he’s dirty.”

“Was he dirty?”

“Except for this, I don’t know. What if they trace from Pazzi back to you?”

“I can take care of that.”

“I have to take care of myself,” Carlo said. “This is too much. A chief inspector of the Questura dead, I can’t buy out of that.”

“You didn’t do anything, did you?”

“We did nothing, but if the Questura put my name in this -dirty Madonna!- They’ll watch me for the rest of my life. Nobody will take fees from me, I won’t be able to break wind on the street. What about Oreste? Did he know who he was supposed to film?”

“I don’t think so.”

“The Questura will have Dr Fell identified by tomorrow or the next day. Oreste will put it together as soon as he sees the news, just from the timing.”

“Oreste is well paid. Oreste is harmless to us.”

“Maybe to you, but Oreste is facing a judge in a pornography case in Rome next month. Now he has a thing to trade. If you don’t know that already you should kick some ass. You got to have Oreste?”

“I’ll talk with Oreste,” Mason said carefully, the rich tones of a radio announcer coming from his ravaged face. “Carlo, are you still game? You want to find Dr Fell now, don’t you? You have to find him for Matteo.”

“Yes, but at your expense.”

“Then keep the farm going. Get certified swine flu and cholera inoculations for the pigs. Get shipping crates for them. You have a good passport?”

“Yes. “

“I mean a good one, Carlo, not some upstairs Trastevere crap.”

“I have a good one.”

“You’ll hear from me.”

Ending his connection in the droning airplane, Carlo inadvertently pushed the auto dial on his cell phone. Matteo’s telephone beeped loudly in his dead hand, still held in the steely grip of cadaveric spasm. For an instant Carlo thought his brother would raise the telephone to his ear. Dully, seeing that Matteo could not answer, Carlo pushed his hang-up button. His face contorted and the medical attendant could not look at him.