SATURDAY, AUGUST 28, 4:15 P.M.

BACK IN HIS office, Blume looked at a list of names that Ferrucci had gotten from the Carabinieri. Ferrucci had apologized five times so far for helping D’Amico out the previous night without telling him. Blume had forgiven him, but was not going to allow him to know it yet.

The Carabinieri had detained forty-seven people and then released forty-six of them without charge. The one charge was against Renato Alleva, organizer of the event. It was his seventh time to be detained.

On this, as on the last six occasions, Alleva had been charged under Articles 718-721 and 727 of the Penal Code. The first set of articles referred to illegal gambling, and Alleva was acquitted all six times because no one had found any money on him. Article 727 referred to the mistreatment of animals, and on five separate occasions in the past he had been found in breach of this statute, which came at the end of a section setting out the penalties for similar crimes, such as cursing in public, insulting God, and speaking ill of the dead.

This time, however, an ambitious prosecutor had also charged Alleva with criminal association. This was a serious charge, and Renato Alleva had hired real lawyers to deal with it in the Court of First Instance. He won. The case was now scheduled to go before the Court of Appeal.

Eight dogs were recovered and put down. A letter of protest from LAV dated October twelfth of the previous year was appended. LAV was Clemente’s organization. A reconfirmation that the link between Clemente and Alleva was direct. So maybe Gallone was right to insist on Alleva. But for now Blume was sticking to his own instinct, Paoloni’s assurances, and the word of the daughter of a gangland boss.

Blume stuck his head out of his office. “Ferrucci. If Paoloni’s about I want him in here.”

Ten minutes later, Paoloni entered. He pointed at the Carabinieri report on Blume’s desk.

“I saw that. There is a prosecutor who needs to be shunned,” he said.

“He’s young,” said Blume.

“So is Ferrucci in there, but even he knows better than to blunder his way through something like this in the hope of advancing his career.”

Blume agreed with Paoloni’s analysis. The dog fights made excellent negotiating territories. People made bets, passed information. Deals got made, orders imparted, moods judged. They provided a nice cross section of criminal life in one place. Like boxing bouts but even more so. When Paoloni and other detectives operating the streets needed to send out a warning or a request, a dog fight was a perfect interface point. Sacrificing a few animals for the sake of maintaining the peace was worth it.

Alleva had certainly been in criminal company. Ferrucci had listed the charges against the men detained. Then he had separated them by category, marking out twelve names who had served time for violent crime and twenty-six who had been charged but not convicted. The others had records relating to drug pushing, theft, robbery, vandalism, trading without a license, disorderly conduct, and so on.

Just three of the names had no previous convictions.

“We’ve got twelve convicted violent offenders,” said Blume. “Five of them have done stretches for murder, the other seven for assault. I suppose we can start with these.”

“I’ll follow these up,” said Paoloni. “But I don’t see we have a motive for any of them.”

“The only one with a clear motive is Alleva,” said Blume. “Like the Holy Ghost says.”

“Yes, but it wasn’t him,” said Paoloni. “He didn’t order it, either. Are you going to trust me on this?”

“Remind me again why you and I know it was not Alleva.”

“Intuition.”

“Come off it,” said Blume.

“You don’t believe in intuition?”

“Sure I do. It’s that mysterious gift policeman have for knowing they’re right when they’re wrong.”

“I know Alleva,” said Paoloni. “He’s too smooth. He doesn’t do violence. That’s the prerogative of the Innocenzi gang. He operates because they let him.”

“No violence?”

“A little light intimidation is all. It only works on some. Look at the names of the guys on this list—how would you set about intimidating them?”

Blume pointed to the list on the table. “So you think we should prioritize these guys before Alleva?”

“Definitely,” said Paoloni. “That already gives us a crossover point where they intersected with Clemente.”

“But Alleva has a motive,” said Blume. “Now don’t get me wrong here. I’m not buying the line that the Holy Ghost is selling, and I don’t even like dogs. But the way I see it, a person who does this sort of thing to dumb animals wouldn’t have too much of a problem doing the same to a human. Give me a strong reason.”

“OK,” said Paoloni. “He called me this morning, said he was worried about this Clemente thing.”

“Alleva called you? He’s a friend?”

Paoloni stuck his fingers into the belt hoops of his jeans and pulled them up. “He called me. It’s my job to know him, and people like him.”

“Go on.”

“He said people were mistakenly connecting him with Clemente.”

“People like us?”

Blume thought back to Manuela and the way she had categorically ruled out Alleva. “Did Alleva say he had spoken to them?”

“No,” said Paoloni. “But he sounded like he had. What I mean is he sounded scared. Innocenzi doesn’t like too much private initiative. Alleva is tolerated, but if he wants to break wind, he has to get permission. And now you say the victim was messing around with Innocenzi’s daughter. Why would anyone do that?”

“Maybe he didn’t know. No reason Clemente should make the connection, not if he was honest. I didn’t make it,” said Blume.

“And you are as honest as they come,” said Paoloni.

Blume ignored the sarcasm. “Alleva wouldn’t have dared touch a person Innocenzi’s daughter was sleeping with, no matter how bad that person was for business. He would have gone through Innocenzi. And that puts Innocenzi back in the picture, except for the nature of the hit. But let’s suppose Alleva didn’t make the connection. Suppose he decided Clemente’s activism was getting too expensive. Suppose he had Clemente eliminated without knowing anything about his sex life.”

“I thought you were not convinced by the Alleva angle,” said Paoloni.

“I’m not. But I can’t rule it out just to spite Gallone, D’Amico, and whoever’s pushing the agenda.”

“They don’t buy it any more than us—at least, your ex-partner D’Amico doesn’t. He’s just following orders, and the order is to close down the case as quick as possible with the minimum of fuss.”

“The widow won’t want that. She’ll want whoever killed her husband,” said Blume.

“Maybe,” said Paoloni. “Then again, maybe not.”

“Why would she not?”

“She’s a politician.”

“That’s pretty cynical,” said Blume.

“Politicians are all the same,” said Paoloni. Suddenly he lowered his voice and put his hand on Blume’s shoulder. “Has Alleva got something on you? Something that might make you want to defend him?”

“No,” said Blume, moving out of Paoloni’s reach. “He does not. What about you? Does he have anything on you?”

He expected Paoloni to react with anger to the counterattack, but Paoloni simply said, “He might. Maybe on others, too.”

“Something big?”

“I wouldn’t go to jail for it, but it wouldn’t help my career any. Tell you something, though: what Alleva’s got on me is nothing compared to Innocenzi’s leverage over half the department and just about all the local politicians. He’s got some pretty convincing political mentors in Parliament, too. So no matter what, this investigation is going to flow right around Innocenzi, like he was a hidden rock. If we lower our sights and move against Alleva, then Alleva is going to get his revenge on people like me.”

“You and others.”

“A few others. I’m not going to advance the case against him, because I don’t think there is one. But I think you’ll help me.”

“What makes you think that?”

Paoloni pulled out a soft pack of MS, extracted a crumpled cigarette and lit it. Smoking was banned in the offices, but no one had ever reported anyone for breaking the rule. “Two reasons,” he said. “First, you’re my superior officer and it’s up to you to look after my interests, just like I look after yours.”

“I hope the second reason is more convincing than the first,” said Blume. “And put out the cigarette.”

Paoloni dropped the cigarette, still lit, on the floor. Its smoke streamed upward toward Blume’s nostrils. He went over and trod on it.

“Second,” said Paoloni, “you don’t believe Alleva had anything to do with it either, so it’s not as if I’m asking you to look the other way.”

“No,” said Blume. “But neither are we going to pretend Alleva isn’t there. He’s going to get detained and questioned. I want to talk to the widow, but, basically, Alleva is our next move.”