Day of Confession - Allan Folsom [41]
“Be respectful of your personal passions, Ispettore Capo. You will remember that they, among other things, were why you were not selected to head the investigation.” Farel stared at Roscani for a long moment, then turned to Taglia.
“I am confident you will make the right decision…”
With that, he walked out.
25
ONCE AGAIN ROSCANI HAD TO WORK TO IGNORE Farel. The Vatican policeman was gruff, direct, abrasive when it suited him, putting the Holy See before anything else, as if it and only it had any stake here. It was what you got when you dealt with him, especially if you were from a police force outside his control, and if you were, like Roscani, a person far more introspective, and a great deal less political. Roscani’s daily life was devoted to grinding it out and doing the best job he possibly could, whatever it was and whatever it took. It was an attribute he’d learned from his father—a taskmaster and maker and seller of leather goods who had died of a heart attack in his own shop at eighty while trying to move a hundred-pound anvil; the same attribute that he tried to instill in his sons.
So, if you were like that and you realized it, you did your best to disregard people like Farel altogether, and devote your energies to things more positive and useful to what you were doing. Like Scala’s comment after Farel had gone, about what they had seen on the video, pointing out the bandage on Harry Addison’s forehead and suggesting that most probably he had been injured when Pio’s car collided with the truck. If so, and if a medical professional had treated him and they could find that person, it would give them a direction the man had gone.
And Castelletti, not to be outdone, had picked up the videocassette itself and written down the manufacturer and manufacturer’s batch code number printed on the back. Who knew where a trace like that could go, what it might turn up? Manufacturer, to wholesaler, to a store chain, to a certain store, to a clerk who might remember selling it to someone in particular.
And then the meeting was over, with the room emptying of everyone but Roscani and Taglia, Taglia with a decision to make, Roscani to hear it.
“You want to give the video to the media. And, like the TV show America’s Most Wanted, let the public help us find them,” Taglia said softly.
“Sometimes it works.”
“And sometimes it drives fugitives farther from sight…. But there are other considerations. What Farel was talking about. The delicate nature of the whole thing. And the diplomatic implications that could rise between Italy and the Vatican…. The pope may wish one thing personally, but Farel did not mention Cardinal Palestrina without reason…. He is the real keeper of the Vatican flame and how the world views the Holy See.”
“In other words, diplomatically, scandal is worse than murder. And you are not going to release the video.”
“No, we are not—Gruppo Cardinale will continue to treat the hunt for fugitives as classified and confidential. All pertinent files will continue to be protected.” Taglia stood. “I’m sorry, Otello…. Buona sera.”
“Buona sera…”
The door closed behind Taglia, and Roscani was left alone. Frustrated, emasculated. Maybe, he thought, his wife was right. For all his dedication, the world was neither just nor perfect. And there was little he could do to change it. What he could do, however, was to stop railing so hard against it; something that would make his life and his family’s a little easier. But the reality was that he could do as little to change himself as he could the world. He had become a policeman because he did not want to go into his father’s business and because he had just been married and wanted stability before starting a family, and because the profession itself had seemed both exciting and noble.
But then something else had happened: victims’ lives began to touch his on an everyday basis, lives torn apart, ripped often irreparably by senseless violence and intrusion. His promotion to homicide made it worse: for some reason, he began to see the murdered, whatever