The Bastards of Pizzofalcone by Maurizio de Giovanni, Antony Shugaar Page B

in there now, and the corpse has already been taken to the morgue. Listen, would you do a broad sweep of the Internet for me?”
    â€œSure. What am I looking for?”
    â€œThe dead woman is the wife of a notary, a rather prominent one, I believe, because the apartment is like something out of the Arabian Nights. Her name was Cecilia De Santis, he is the notary Festa, Arturo Festa.”
    â€œIs there anything in particular you’re looking for?”
    â€œNo, not for now. Just anything interesting you can come up with. Call me on my cell phone as soon as you have a general picture.”
    Ottavia spoke distractedly.
    â€œThere, the search engine tells me that the notary’s office isn’t far from where you are: Via dei Mille 32. You could walk there in no more than five minutes. I’ll call you in a little while with everything else. Do you want me to say anything to the commissario?”
    Lojacono thought it over for a second or two.
    â€œMaybe tell him to get in touch with the investigating magistrate, and alert him that we’re on the move.”
    â€œIs Aragona coming with you?”
    Lojacono thought he could detect an ironical note in his colleague’s voice.
    â€œI’m afraid so. But this time we’re going to be on foot. Let me give you a piece of advice: never, and I mean never, get in a car with him. Understood?”
    Calabrese burst into laughter.
    â€œYes, I’d already heard that from a few of my colleagues at police headquarters. Talk to you later.”
    Aragona came back into the kitchen, followed by the girl, brandishing a cell phone he held carefully with a handkerchief.
    â€œHey, I heard you! You’re safer in a car with me, going 125 mph, than sitting in this kitchen with a phone in your hand, take it from me. In any case, here it is, the signora’s cell phone. It was on the nightstand, turned off and charging. I didn’t touch it; that was right, wasn’t it?”
    The lieutenant sighed: “You watch too much TV, Arago’. In any case, yes, better to be too careful than not careful enough. Now go and see if anything’s missing.”
    He turned on the phone and waited until it had picked up a signal. Lojacono checked the most recent calls up through the night before, remembering that the doctor had placed the woman’s death at the very most eleven hours earlier. There were a couple of “Unknown Callers,” an “Adele,” two “Monicas,” and an “Arturo,” the last one, at 10:10 P.M.
    The lieutenant wondered whether it might be a good idea to use that same cell phone to call the notary, but he decided it would be best not to alter the contents of the device’s memory. He took down the information in his notebook and handed the cell phone over to his colleagues from forensics so they could check for fingerprints and then send it on for electronic analysis.
    Now it was time to head over to the notary’s office, at the address Ottavia had given him, hoping someone was already there. He liked to be able to look people in the eye when he gave them news of a murder. People’s faces told you a lot of things.
    While he was heading for the door he practically ran straight into an excited Aragona: “Lojacono, you were right. A few pieces of silver are missing, things they kept on the living room table, where the corpse was, in the hallway, and near the entrance.”
    â€œIs that all?”
    Aragona nodded.
    â€œYes, in the woman’s bedroom everything’s still there: the jewel box on the dresser, with all the jewelry still inside, and on the nightstand we found the jewelry that she’d taken off to go to sleep. And in the husband’s study, whose door was closed, there was a gold paperweight—that, if you ask me, is worth as much as my entire apartment with all the furniture in it—and a collection of coins in a glass display case that’s just spectacular.