Still, I forced myself to start talking. After a few minutes, I gradually calmed down.
I went through everything Luna said, then described my encounter with the two drug dealers in the alleyway.
When I was finished, Adriano nodded at me approvingly.Good job.
Niccolo asked a few questions about DBA – thedi Brozzi Assassini– then fell silent.
All eyes turned to Don Rosolini, who in turn addressed Dante. “Are you seeing this sort of thing in your territory?”
Dante winced. “Unfortunately, yes, Don Rosolini. Every day, we hear more and more about small-time gangs pushing drugs on our streets. When we catch them in the act, my men break a few bones and send them packing, but we can’t be everywhere at once.”
The Don sighed. “Well, it’s notgoodnews, but – ”
“That’s just the half of it,” Adriano interrupted. “Wait till you hear from our gunshot doctor.”
“And what doyouhave to report, Raffaelo?” Don Rosolini asked in a weary voice.
“Nothing good, I’m afraid,” he replied.
Raffaelo was far more casual in addressing Don Rosolini. I admired Raffaelo’s sense of ease – and at the same time, was slightly annoyed at his lack of formality.
The Don deserved respect, but Raffaelo treated him as an equal. And yet, no one reprimanded him for it, which astounded me. But if Don Rosolini was fine with it, then there was nothingIcould say.
“What do you mean?” the Don asked.
“I may not practice medicine anymore – at least not in the traditional sense – but I still have a lot of friends who do. ER doctors, mostly, since that’s what I used to be. They talk about what’s going on… and they’re worried.”
“Worried about what?”
“Drugs. More precisely,baddrugs. Tainted shit. It seems that the vast majority of heroin making its way into Florence these days has fentanyl in it.
“You probably already know about fentanyl, but for anyone who doesn’t, here’s the crash course: it’s a synthetic opioid. It’s far cheaper to make than heroin, because you don’t have to harvest poppies and process them. You just cook it up in a lab from a bunch of chemicals that are legal and fairly easy to get. And you don’t even need a lab. Any stovetop will do.
“What’s worse is that fentanyl is 50 to 100 times more potent than heroin. Someone with no opioid tolerance will overdose from roughly a gram of heroin. The same person would only need about twopercentof that to die from fentanyl – the same weight as a few grains of sand.
“Which leads us to the main problem. Overdoses in Florence are up 500% from this time last year. The morgues are filling up with dead bodies –youngdead bodies. Kids under 20 are dying at a much higher rate than any other age group.
“This has been a huge problem for the Americans for years. Drug dealers in the U.S. started adding fentanyl to drugs back around 2013, and the number of fentanyl-related deaths jumped something like 2500percentover a span of ten years. It’s gone down a bit in the last year or two, but not by much.
“You know me. You know my history. So you know I don’t judge. I don’t care about the ‘morality of the situation,’ whatever the fuck that means. I don’t give a damn about who uses drugs, or who sells them, or any of that. I only care about the health crisis I see going on.
“All I know is that the ‘American problem’ has come to Florence. And unless somebody does something soon, a lot more people – a lot moreyoungpeople – are going to die.”
Don Rosolini was somber. He stood there for a moment staring into the distance, then finally looked at both Raffaelo and me. He smiled wearily.
“Thank you both for what you’ve said. You’ve given me a lot to think about, and now I need the counsel of my family members.
“My wife and Caterina were in the kitchen before I came in here. I’m sure Caterina would love to fix you something to eat. Giorgio, if you would show Raffaelo the way – I don’t believe he’s been to the house before.”
Raffaelo shook hands with Don Rosolini, and then I led him out of the parlor.
“How do you think it went?” Raffaelo asked me in a low voice once we were out of earshot of the parlor.
“You did very well,” I told him.
“Thanks – but do you think it’ll change anything?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted, “but I’m sure that’s what they’re talking about now.”
