Ghosts and Graves
1260 Words
The warped voice went silent and Luca squeezed the phone in his fingers.
Her brother has not been killed.
The next one will be you.
He had no time to reply to the call.
The villa was absorbed in silence.
On the other side of the room Matteo was gazing, eyebrows drawn. Who was that?
Luca nodded and shook his head. “A voice. Distorted. However the message was loud and clear, somebody was playing both sides.”
Matteo frowned. You believe that Isabella is lying?
I do not understand what to think. She carried a picture. A body.”
It is possible to stage bodies. Photos manipulated. These days lies are cheaper than bullets.”
Luca looked up the dark hallway where Isabella lay asleep. She appeared to have been broken.”
She may be. Or that may be part of the show.”
Anyhow, said Luca, "I must know the truth."
In the morning Isabella had disappeared.
Luca looked in the villa: the couch was still turned down, her coat was gone, as was the dragon necklace.
In the night she had disappeared.
Matteo looked in the driveway. There was her car.
Luca felt sick in the gut. Why should she run?
“Somebody got her wind up.” Matteo screwed his eyes. Or because she never was on your side anyway.
Luca paced. And assuming that her brother is alive where would she reside?
Matteo took up his keys. She only knows one place where she can find ghosts--old cemetery of Rome. The undated graves.”
“Why there?”
It is where Enzo buries secrets.
The San Lorenzo cemetery was a proliferation of the past and shadiness-over there was where the dead of Rome lay, by the poor along with the lost people of the underworld of Rome.
Luca and Matteo tread so gently that they pass between some broken gravestones and some falling down mausoleums.
It was beginning to rain, a gentle rain, that penetrated the collar of Luca.
There, at that, Matteo said.
Sitting on the grave without a name, a figure, at the extreme end of the cemetery, on the edge of the wilderness of wildness, knelt facing a grave. Long coat of dark color. Wind-tossed hair.
Isabella.
Luca came up to her as a mist.
When he came to her she did not turn.
“You ran.”
She said softly, I needed space.
You stole my car.”
I did not imagine that you would miss it.
I did not realize the truth.
She sighed, with a sort of preparation. I was twelve years old when I saw them dump him into that pit.
Isabella.
Luca came toward her like the silence of the mist.
She made no turn when he approached her.
“You ran.”
She spoke quietly. She had said, I needed space.
You stole my car.
I had not imagined you would miss it.
“I lacked truth.”
She breathed out slowly, bringing herself so to speak. I was twelve and I saw how they threw him in that pit.
“Your brother?”
She nodded. “No name. No stone. Nothing but dust and quiet.”
Luca moved by her side. Somebody telephoned me last night. He says he is alive.”
Her head turned to him. It can not be.
You are sure?
Her eyes were filled. They presented me with a body. A dragon necklace. It was imprinted on my mind.”
Luca knelt with her eyes still closed. And then again, hypothesizing, but supposing you were used; supposing that photo was faked; how could it be?
She wavered under the edge of her tears. Then all that I have lived by is a lie.
Then we must have evidence.
They dug together.
Matteo was on guard pacing up with a pistol under his coat.
Luca tore at the work with cold and grime-covered hands; he did not relent.
Isabella did not either.
She gasped when the shovel hit wood.
It was a simple box. No inscription. No embellishment.
Luca opened the lid.
Empty.
not one bone. No remains left.
Isabella gasped, and staggered back. “No. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no … ”
Matteo shouted an oath. They just staged the entire thing.
Luca looked deep into the empty grave.
It is not merely a lie.
A setup.
Some person had wished Isabella to think that her brother had been killed.
In order to shut her up.
To make her stay broken.
Luca cast his eyes up to her, in a low undertone. That was a manipulation on both of us.
She dropped to her knees and trembled. “Why?”
Matteo reached into his phone and was reading something. I might know the answer.”
What is it? Luca asked.
One name keeps appearing in shipping records, Luciano Ferri. A corrupt coroner whom Enzo would use year after year. Falsified deaths with certificates. They hid real ones.”
Luca stood. Where is he now?
“Retired. Resides in a protected villa in Palermo.”
Then we go to Palermo.”
In twelve hours they reached Sicily.
It was warmer, but none the less tense.
Luciano Ferri, villa was perched above the sea, white stucco and red tiled to show that nothing sinister had ever been experienced within the house.
Two blocks away, Matteo stopped his car.
I will keep the car. In the event that things do go awry, you will need a quick way out.”
Luca and Isabella walked the remaining part of the way.
The main gate was shut and Luca opened it with the keys of Matteo.
The house was silent within. Too quiet.
They discovered Ferri in the study.
Old. Pale. Plugged to oxygen.
He arose hastily. You,you are the son of Moretti.
Luca moved forward. I am a son of my mother.
Ferri smiled a little. It was like Alessandro was not good enough for her.
Luca held back anger. You have signed the death certificate of Matteo Romano. Enzo’s son.”
Ferri turned pale. there are so many names… I can scarcely recollect.”
Isabella took the dragon necklace out of her pocket and flung it on the desk.
Ferri flinched.
And he said, I remember that.
And so do I, said she through her teeth. You knew him when they put him under the ground. Was he dead?”
Ferri shut his eyes. He was not buried in that tomb.
Luca bent. Where? where? where is he?
Ferri shook his head. “He’s not the boy you remember anymore. He works for them now. He became them.”
Luca felt a cold shove in the blood. You mean Enzo?
“No.” Ferri’s voice trembled. “Something worse. A breakaway family. Exiled Romanos, born in exile. They call themselves La Fratellanza Nera—The Black Brotherhood.”
Isabella drew its breath.
Ferri said, Matteo Romano was taken in. Brought him up in their image. He is living--but he is no longer yours.”
At this moment a window behind Ferri crashed.
The mark of a bullet tore through the chest of the old man.
Blood burst out over the desk.
Isabella went down and Luca ducked, instinctively.
Outside could be heard a motor cycle engine, and the report of a silenced rifle.
Luca looked up and Ferri was dead.
But still in the hand, (clenched now), lay a piece of paper, several times torn.
A location.
And name.
Matteo Romano. Alive. Naples.
- Writer
