The aerial cable went up from the container roof and used the same cavity that brought reasonably fresh air down the pipe – its outlet was in the hollowed-out trunk of the long dead tree above. A little more water dribbled down the pipe, enough to dampen the air inside. The heating created a sweat effect, and twice in the last ten minutes he’d had to wipe the TV screen, which left it smeared. He’d watched the news and the weather forecast. The news had shown flooding of roads on the Ionian side of the Aspromonte and some landslips, and the weather forecaster had said there would be no break in the rain before the end of the afternoon. When it rained incessantly and was damp in the container, Bernardo always kept the lights on.
It had been wet that year. The clouds had been low and heavy day after day, night after night, when the child had been brought down from the north and sold to the family. Bernardo remembered taking the short, steep goats’ trail up the slopes behind the house to where they had chained her. So dark in the cave and the torch he had brought with him barely penetrated its depths. It dripped when there was rain and the beam showed the water that fell onto the lower rock surfaces. He had found her dead. Enough water had fallen on the candle to put out the flame. She would have died in darkness. It cost them serious money to buy her, and represented a greater loss to the family than any capsizing at sea of a fast launch bringing in cigarette cartons from north Africa. Financially, it could have proved difficult. Too much money to lose – but negotiations were proceeding. The camera had been brought, and a newspaper.
The child had been propped up and her clothing straightened. It had been Mamma’s idea but she had not come to the cave. He had arranged the newspaper, that day’s Corriere della Calabria, and had used a finger to wipe water from a bucket in a trail down the child’s cheeks, having prised back her eyelids: she would appear to be weeping. That would accentuate the misery of her condition and speed the negotiations for the ransom. At the time he had thought nothing of it, and the word from the far north was that the intermediaries believed a deal was possible – probable, in fact. Recently, since he had been sleeping in his bunker, he had remembered – been unable to forget – the damp, cold and darkness in which the child had died. He had every light on, and the heater turned high.
Bernardo was in the container, left to himself, because Giulietta thought – as the hours ticked away and the prosecutor’s resources approached their limit – that a raid might be made. Especially in that weather. Better to stay where he was. Neither Marcantonio nor Stefano had visited him. He existed, wiled away time, had no interest in the television . . . He thought of the pigs at the farm high in the foothills, and what instruction he must give: it was because he had remembered the child, resurrected her memory, that he must give an order about the pigs. As long as the lights were on, and the heater, he felt secure, safe.
The rain sheeted and water sluiced around him. Jago watched and learned.
In the ferocity of the wind, the handyman held an umbrella. It was one of those issued by construction companies or possibly by a bank after a session for investors. The man by the main door into the house, with the City-Van parked close to the step, clung to it in the gale. It was what a driver did – a lesser person: the vehicle was brought to the front door, a man shivered and got soaked but held an umbrella ready and no one came. Maybe he or she had gone for a last pee, to change a shirt or put on eyeliner. It was an ordinary house, not a palace. But the girl, Consolata, had told him in broad brushstrokes what the family was worth. They could have afforded a gated place, behind high walls and a barricaded entrance, like the ones in west Berlin, where the fat cats lived. The man tried to light a cigarette. Not easy: he had the wind and rain to fight while one fist clung to the umbrella handle and the other had the lighter – the cigarette would be wet so maybe the flame wouldn’t take, despite the efforts he was making to shelter it. Smoke billowed.
Jago learned about power. He had ceased to care about the cold, the wet and his hunger. He had no plan, and that nagged. The lesson continued. A master class in power: a man stood in the rain with an umbrella that the storm tossed aside.
Marcantonio came out.
The family had begun to take shape. The mother, the daughter-in-law, the grandchildren, the daughter and Marcantonio. Jago assumed he had had his own car when he lived here, but this was a brief visit. He was to be driven. The hair was spiky. The boy wore a scarlet shirt, a leather black jacket and jeans. From that distance, they looked stylish and expensive. He nodded to the guy with the umbrella. The guy let the rain cascade on his own head and reached forward to open the passenger door – not the Audi that had tramlines etched onto the paintwork, which would be hard to fix. Marcantonio slid inside. Jago waited for a nod of gratitude. None came. The guy went round the van, tossed the sopping umbrella into the back and shook water off an old, weathered face. His coat was dark with damp.