IB02 - Death and the Olive Grove by Marco Vichi

Author:Marco Vichi [Vichi, Marco]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: police procedural, Italy
ISBN: 9781605984483
Google: NtA1AgAAQBAJ
Amazon: 1605984485
Goodreads: 21960546
Publisher: Windsor
Published: 2012-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

The trattoria Da Cesare was always very crowded. One ate well there and spent no more than was necessary. The walls were covered with naif paintings, mostly rural landscapes, painted by the hundreds of artists who had swarmed in the wake of the Macchiaioli16 like chickens in the furrows of the plough, endlessly copying and recopying, paying for their meals with pictures in order to survive.

Bordelli greeted the owner and slipped into the kitchen, where at that moment Totò, the cook, was busy with a basin full of spaghetti and mussels.

‘Hello, Inspector.’

‘Hello, Totò, will there be any of that left for me?’

‘Of course.’

Totò finished filling the bowls, passed these on to the waiter, and handed Bordelli a generous serving of spaghetti.

‘Wait till you taste this, Inspector. It’s Totò’s own recipe.’

Bordelli ate the first forkful and raised his eyebrows.

‘Mmm,’ he said, mouth full. The cook made an expression of satisfaction and put a bottle of white wine from the north in front of Bordelli before running back to the cooker to get more food for the waiters. That done, he finally had a moment to relax. He came back to the inspector and poured himself a glass of wine.

‘You’re a born cook, Totó,’ said Bordelli, mopping up the sauce with bread.

‘No, Inspector, I was born a labourer and only became a cook later on.’

‘I didn’t know that.’

‘When I was still just a kid my parents sent me out to earn my keep, down in the village. Ten hours a day, mixing cement with a shovel and carrying pots of lime up ladders. For a beggar’s pittance, Inspector. Evenings I’d come home so tired I wouldn’t even eat … I remember one morning … I was twelve years old, maybe less … A fancy car with a chauffeur pulled up at the worksite, and a big fat guy with a beard and hat got out. You could see he was a bigwig. He walked with a cane, as if there was something wrong with his leg. He calls the engineer over and, with his hands in his pockets, tells him: “We’re closing this place down tomorrow.” The engineer says: “What do you mean, ‘we’re closing?’The engineer was from the north, a skinny bloke, always well dressed. “We’re closing the place down tomorrow,” the fat guy repeated. “And who the hell are you?” the engineer asked him, eyes popping out of his head. “And why should we close down?” The rest of us were all frozen, watching the scene. The fat guy didn’t answer, but just turned and walked back to his car. Before getting in, he turned round and looked at the building under construction. The skeleton was already in place, as well as a few internal walls. “Nice building,” he said, then, all sad, “Too bad it’s so frail.” Then he got in his car, made a signal to the chauffeur, and drove off. The engineer started cursing at him and then turned and looked at us. “Tomorrow’s a workday,” he said.

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