to time?’
‘No. I just wouldn’t have thought it of you.’
Peroni let out a deep sigh. ‘Remember what I told you once? Everyone’s got that dark spot.’
‘Not everyone lets it out.’
The big, ugly head shook slowly. ‘Wrong. One way or another they do. Whether they know it or not. Why did I do it? Won’t a simple answer do? The girl was damn beautiful. Slim and young and blonde. And young. Or did I mention that? Maybe she made me feel alive again. When you’ve been married twenty years you forget what that’s like. Yeah, before you say it, so does your wife. Blame me twice over.’
Costa said nothing, worried he might cross the line and destroy the delicate bonds the two of them had managed to build over the last few weeks.
Peroni’s damaged face wrinkled some more in puzzlement at his silence. ‘Oh. I get it. You’re thinking, “Who does this hideous bastard think he is? Casanova?”’
‘You don’t look like the great Latin Lover. That’s all. If you don’t mind me saying so.’
‘Really?’
‘Really.’ Costa knew what was going on here. He wondered if he dared ask.
‘Are you calling me ugly? That happens from time to time, Nic. I have to tell you I don’t like it.’
‘No …’ Costa stuttered. He took a good look at that battered face. ‘I was just wondering.’
‘What?’
‘What the hell happened?’
Gianni Peroni burst out laughing. ‘You kill me. You really do. In all the time I’ve worked here you are the first person who’s come out and asked that question direct. Can you believe that?’
‘Yes,’ Costa said hesitantly. ‘I mean, it’s a personal question. And most people wouldn’t like the idea that you could take it the wrong way.’
He waved a huge friendly hand in Costa’s face. ‘What the hell do you mean a personal question? You guys have to look at this ugly mug every day you come to work. I got to live with it. This …’ he pointed a fat index finger at his face, ‘… is just a fact of life.’
Costa felt he’d made progress of a kind anyway. ‘So …?’
Peroni chuckled again and shook his head. ‘Unbelievable. Just between the two of us, OK? This goes no further? No one knows this. Most of the guys out there think I look like this through getting into a fight with a hood or something. They wonder what the other guy looks like too. I’m happy with things that way.’
Costa nodded his agreement.
‘A cop did this to me,’ Peroni said. ‘I was twelve years old. He was the village cop. I was the village bastard. I mean that literally. My mamma worked for the couple who owned the lone bar in town and got knocked up after the fair some time. She always was a little naïve. So I spend twelve years being the village bastard, getting the village bastard treatment all those years. Spat on. Beaten up. Laughed at in school. Then one day the moronic kid in the same class who was my principal tormentor went just a touch too far. Said something about my mamma. And I kicked the living shit out of him. First time I ever did that. You want the truth? It’s the only time I ever did that. Don’t need to now. I just look at people and go, Boo …’
Costa thought about it. ‘I can believe that.’
‘Good. The stupid thing was, I forgot the moron I was beating up was the village cop’s kid. So Daddy comes along, and Daddy’s been drinking. One thing leads to another. He gets done with the strap and he’s still not happy. So he goes and gets these metal things he carries, just for protection you understand, and he puts them on his fists.’
Peroni watched the cars go by out of the window. ‘I woke up in hospital two days later, face like a pumpkin, Mamma by my side. I couldn’t see a thing. The first thing she says is, don’t even think of telling anyone. He’s the village cop. Second thing she says is, don’t look in the mirror for a while.’
Costa sighed. ‘You could have told someone.’
Peroni gave him a frank look. ‘You’re a city kid, aren’t you?’
‘I guess so.’
‘It shows. Anyway, a couple of weeks later I come out of hospital and I notice things are different. People look at me and suddenly their eyes are on their shoes. A couple cross the road when they see me walking down the street. You know the worst thing of all? I was helping my uncle Fredo sell those pigs at weekends then. I went back to it. What else could you do? After a while he comes to me, tears in his eyes, and fires me. No one buys food from someone with a face like this. That was the worst thing of all at the time. I didn’t want to do anything else when I grew up except raise those pigs and sell them every weekend. Those guys … they all look so happy. But—’
He folded his arms, leaned back in the passenger seat, and glanced at Costa to make sure this point went in. ‘That was not to be. I became a cop instead. What else do you do? Partly to spite that old bastard who beat me up. But mainly, if you want to know, to even things up a little. I’ve never laid a finger on anyone in this job. Never would, not unless there was a very good reason and in more than twenty years I never found one. It’s a question of balance.’
Costa didn’t know how to respond. ‘I’m sorry, Gianni.’
‘Why? I got over it years ago. You, on the other hand, have spent the last six months going loopy inside a bottle of booze. I’m sorry for you, kid.’
Maybe he deserved that. ‘Fine. We’re even now.’
Peroni was peering at him with those sharp, all-seeing eyes. ‘I will say this once, Nic. I am starting to like you. A part of me says that I will miss this time we’re spending together. Not that I wish to prolong it you understand. But let me offer some sincere advice. Stop trying to fool yourself you’re something special. You’re not. There are millions of people out there trying to cope with fucked-up lives. We’re just two in the crowd. And after that little lecture …’ he said, stretching up in his seat as Costa parked the car in a tiny space off the road by the ghetto, ‘… let me make a request.’
Peroni looked into his face, hopefully. ‘Cover for me. I got something important to do. I’ll meet you back here at two.’
Costa didn’t know what to say. Bunking off for a couple of hours wasn’t unknown. He just didn’t think Peroni was the kind of cop to do it.
‘Anything I should know about?’ he asked.
‘Just personal. It’s my daughter’s birthday tomorrow. I wanted to send her something that might make her think her father is not quite the jerk she’s come to believe. You can cope with the Campo on your own. Just don’t pick on any big bastards, OK?’
Leo Falcone was reading the file on his desk, trying to focus on the case. He didn’t want to rush anything. Going public too quickly only alerted those he would wish to interview, though given how leaky the Questura had proved of late they probably knew by now anyway. The pause would also give him time to turn his mind back towards work after a solitary two weeks spent at a luxury beachside hotel in Sri Lanka. He
