Track of Sand by Andrea Camilleri

Author:Andrea Camilleri [Camilleri, Andrea]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: General, Fiction, Mystery & Detective, Police Procedural, Crime
ISBN: 9780330507660
Publisher: Penguin Group, Inc.
Published: 2009-12-31T13:00:00+00:00

Before taking the panoramic road to the temples—which could only be traveled on foot, though they, being policemen, were allowed to go by car—Montalbano asked Fazio to stop, went into a bar-bookshop, and bought a guide.

“Are you serious? You really want to do the tour?”

No, he wasn’t serious, not really. But the fact was that, although he had been there many times, every time he went back he always forgot the period of construction, the dimensions, the number of columns . . .

“Let’s go up to the top,” said the inspector, “and we’ll visit each temple as we make our way down.”

Once at the top, they parked the car and climbed to the uppermost temple on foot.

The construction of the temple of Juno Lucina dates from 450 BC. It measures 41 meters in length and 19.55 in width, and used to have 34 columns . . .

They looked at it carefully, then got back in the car.They drove a few meters, pulled up and parked, then walked uphill to the second temple.

The Temple of Concord is dated 450 BC. It is 42.1 meters long, 19.7 meters wide and originally had 34 columns, each 6.83 meters high.

They looked at this, too, then got back in the car and did as before.

The Temple of Hercules is the most ancient. It dates from 520 BC. Measuring 73.4 meters in length and . . .

They looked at this one in detail.

“Are we gonna visit the other temples?”

“No,” said Montalbano, who was already feeling fed up with archaeology.“What the hell is Galluzzo up to? It’s been almost an hour.”

“If he hasn’t called, it means he—”

“Ring ’im.”

“No, Chief. What if he’s close to your house and his phone starts ringing?”

“Then call Catarella and let me talk to him.”

Fazio complied.

“Any news, Cat?”

“Nossir, Chief. But the lady Esther Man called. She axed if you could call ’er.”

Montalbano and Fazio spent another half hour pacing back and forth in front of the temple.

The inspector was growing more and more nervous. Fazio tried to distract him.

“Chief, why is the Temple of Concord almost intact but the others aren’t?”

“Because there was an emperor, Theodosius, who ordered that all the pagan temples and sanctuaries should be destroyed, except for those that were being converted into Christian churches. And since the Temple of Concord became a Christian church, it was left standing.A fine example of tolerance. Just like today.”

After this brief cultural digression, the inspector returned at once to the matter at hand.

“Wanna bet those three guys in the boat were real fishermen? Listen, let’s go to the bar and sit down.”

This proved impossible. All the tables were occupied by English, German, French, and especially Japanese tourists, who were taking snapshots of anything they could think of, including a pebble that had found its way into one of their shoes.The inspector started cursing the saints.

“Let’s get out of here,” he said, agitated.

“Where we gonna go?”

“We’ll go scratch our balls in—”

At that moment, Fazio’s cell phone rang.

“It’s Galluzzo,” he said, bringing the little phone to his ear.

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