watch the news on TV, right?’ Murder insisted, unmerciful. ‘You remember that nun from Caianello that they found decapitated near Pavia?’
‘Yeah, so?’
‘The Children of the Apocalypse did it. They picked her up at a bus stop and then Kurtz decapitated her with a double-headed axe.’
Saverio couldn't stand Kurtz, the leader of the Children of the Apocalypse from Pavia. He always had to be top of the class. Always the one coming up with extravagant stuff. Good on you, Kurtz! Congratulations! You're the best!
Saverio wiped his hand across his face.
‘Well, guys . . . Don't forget how much of a hard time I've been having lately, what with the birth of the twins . . . the bloody bank loan for the new house . . .’
‘That reminds me, how are the little darlings?’ asked Silvietta.
‘They're like drainpipes. They eat and shit. At night they don't let us get any sleep. They've got the measles, too. On top of it all, Serena's father had hip-replacement surgery, so the whole furniture shop is my responsibility. You tell me when I'm supposed to get something organised for the sect . . .’
‘Hey, have you got any special offers at the shop?’ Zombie asked. ‘I want to buy a three-seater sofa-bed. The cat's ruined mine.’
The leader of the Beasts wasn't listening. He was thinking about Kurtz Minetti. As tall as a dick on a tin can. Full-time pastry chef. He had already set fire to a Kirby Vacuum Cleaner salesman and now he had decapitated a nun.
‘Anyway, you're all ungrateful.’ He pointed to them one by one. ‘I've worked my arse off for this sect. If it hadn't been for me introducing you to the Worship of Hades, you'd all still be sitting around reading Harry Potter.’
‘We know, Saverio, but try to understand us, too. We do believe in the group, but we can't keep going like this.’ Murder bit angrily into a grissino. ‘Let's just give it up and stay friends.’
The leader of the Beasts slammed his hands down on the table in exasperation.
‘Or how about this? Give me a week. You can't say no to an extra week.’
‘What are you going to do?’ asked Silvietta, nibbling on her lip ring.
‘I've been laying the groundwork for a mind-blowing piece of action. It's a really dangerous mission . . .’ He paused. ‘But don't think you can just cop out. We all know that talk is cheap. But when it's time to act . . .’ He put on a whiney voice. ‘“I can't, I'm sorry . . . I've got problems at home, my mother's not well . . . I have to work.”’ And he looked hard at Zombie, who lowered his head over his plate. ‘No. We all put our arses on the line in the same way.’
‘Can't you give us a hint?’ Murder asked shyly.
‘No! All I can say is that it's something that will send us right to number one on the list of Italy's Satanic sects.’
Silvietta grabbed a hold of his wrist. ‘Mantos, come on. Please. Just a little hint. I'm so curious . . .’
Saverio shook himself free. ‘No! I said no! You'll have to wait. If in a week's time I haven't brought you a serious plan, then thanks very much, we shake hands and disband the sect. All right?’
He stood up. His black eyes had turned red, reflecting the flames from the pizza oven.
‘Now, disciples, honour me!’
The members lowered their heads. The leader raised his eyes to the ceiling and stretched out his arms.
‘Who is your Charismatic Father?’
‘You!’ the Beasts said in unison.
‘Who wrote the Tables of Evil?’
‘You!’
‘Who taught you the Liturgy of Darkness?’
‘You!’
‘Who ordered the pappardelle in hare sauce?’ asked the waiter with steaming plates perched on his arm.
‘Me!’ Saverio stretched out his hand.
‘Don't touch, they're hot.’
The leader of the Wilde Beasts of Abaddon sat down and, without saying another word, began eating.
2
About fifty kilometres away from Jerry's Pizzeria 2, in Rome, a little three-gear Vespa struggled up the slope of Monte Mario. Sitting astride the saddle was the well-known writer Fabrizio Ciba. The scooter stopped at a traffic light and when it changed to green turned into Via della Camilluccia. Two kilometres further on, it braked in front of a cast-iron gate on the side of which hung a brass plaque that read ‘Villa Malaparte’.
Ciba put the Vespa into first gear and was about to face the long climb up to the residence when a primate squeezed into a grey flannel suit stepped in front of him.
‘Excuse me! Excuse me! Where are you going? Have you got an invitation?’
The writer took off his bowl-shaped helmet and began searching the pockets of his creased jacket.
‘No . . . No, I don't think I have . . . I must have forgotten it.’
The man stood with his legs wide apart. ‘Well, you can't go in then.’
‘I've been invited to . . .’
The bouncer pulled out a sheet of paper and slipped on a pair of small glasses with red frames. ‘What did you say your name was?’
‘I didn't. Ciba. Fabrizio Ciba . . .’
The guy began running his index finger down the list of guests while shaking his head.
He doesn't recognise me. Fabrizio wasn't annoyed, though. It was obvious that the primate didn't ‘do’ literature but, for Christ's sake, didn't he watch television? Ciba presented a show called Crime & Punishment every Wednesday evening on RAI Tre for this very purpose.
‘I'm sorry. Your name is not on the list.’
The writer was there to present the novel A Life in the World by the winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, Sarwar Sawhney, published by Martinelli, his own publishing house. At the age of seventy-three, and with two books as thick as a law dictionary behind him, Sawhney had at last received the coveted prize from the Swedish Academy. Ciba was to do the honours alongside Gino Tremagli, Professor of English–American Literature at the Sapienza University of Rome. That old gasbag had been asked to participate just to give an official tone to the event. It was, however, up to Fabrizio to unravel the ancient secrets hidden within the folds of Sawhney's huge novel and offer them to a Roman audience notoriously thirsty for culture.
Ciba was getting fed up. He lost the polite tone.
‘Listen to me. If you can forget about that guest list for a minute and take a look at the invitation –
