Ravenna stroked the sick woman’s back.
“Would you get some water?” she asked Valerio.
—
In the kitchen, dirty dishes were in the sink. Valerio moved some of these aside to get to the faucet and fill a glass.
A list of numbers was taped to the refrigerator, alongside shopping lists. There were also snapshots of Ines and her son throughout the years. As a kid, Gaetano was dimple-cheeked, with a shy smile and an overgrowth of thick dark hair that seemed to never look combed. As the chubbiness of youth settled into a teenage heft, the smile vanished and he grew a sparse mustache. In the most recent photos, his expression had hardened into a distant, unsatisfied look.
The pictures of Ines were from an earlier era when her figure was slim and tight. Before her illness, she’d been a handsome woman, although an overlarge jaw and small eyes prevented her from being entirely beautiful. She had a clear complexion and long, dark hair. She posed for thecamera, tossing her head and peering flirtatiously into the lens. There were also several photos of Ines next to a short, grey-haired man with a wide white smile and tanned, leathery skin.
Valerio took pictures of the photos and notes. For good measure, he checked the cupboards, where he found dishes, canned goods, pasta, an assortment of medicines, and a colony of shiny brown cockroaches.
—
Back in the living room, Valerio handed the water to Ines. She gripped it with skeletal fingers and drank, then was silent for a long time afterwards, staring straight ahead at the large flat-screen television opposite her chair.
A ginger cat had migrated to Valerio’s seat in his absence. It ignored his attempts to shoo it away, so he picked it up and plopped it onto the ground. It hissed, then stalked to Ines’s feet, where it stared malevolently at him.
Valerio waited.
“Gaetano was working for a local shop,” Ines said, at last. “Deliveries.”
“Do you have the name of the shop?”
She shook her head no, but Ravenna interjected, “He delivered produce to restaurants.”
“How do you know this?” Valerio asked.
“I saw him around town,” she said. “Making deliveries.”
Valerio took notes.
“Do you know anyone he worked with?”
Neither seemed to know.
“What can you tell me about the other guys he was living with?”
“I don’t know them,” said Ines. “Just some boys.”
“How did he know them? From school? From work?”
“I told the other police: I didn’t know them!”
Her eyelids drooped and she seemed to crumple. Her head sagged against the chair and the water glass tipped. Ravenna took it from the sick woman’s fingers and looked at Valerio.
“You should go,” she said.
—
Valerio left his card, and was glad to escape the stink and clutter of the apartment.
Taking a deep breath in the cold air of the corridor, he’d started to head down the stairs when he heard a door close and someone said, “Capo!”
Valerio stopped and looked back.
Ravenna stood on the landing above.
