Deep Sea

Chapter 6 - Revealing tapes and photos

A mini recorder without cassette, an agenda, a blank notepad. Nothing else had been found in the car, and those few elements were not much to start the investigation. The police had ascertained that it was an accident without a collision with other cars, it remained to be examined whether there were any other cars on the road at that time, and no testimonies to this effect had been received.

It wasn't credible that Valerio would go around without a cassette in the recorder and without notes on the pad. The paper was wrinkled, as was that of the diary, they had gotten wet under the abundant water that had fallen throughout the day. The water makes the road slippery, the curves, the guardrail torn up, an accident can happen to anyone if you drive at a certain speed with worn tires and perhaps even worn brakes. Valerio had done the last inspection years before and it could not be ruled out that the state of neglect of the Clio was the main reason for the disaster. The police inspector had a kind manner, he said he knew Valerio and respected him, but how many had he seen good family men lose their lives due to absurd negligence, due to small distractions? Sometimes the ring of a cell phone is enough to lose control.

Alberta couldn't believe those justifications. His father had just been killed, he was sticking his nose in too hot matters and he had been killed for it. Inspector Gargiulo had last seen Valerio at the police station, hot on the heels of a non-EU illegal immigrant from whom he wanted to extort the story of his odyssey at all costs. Someone definitely had to have the video of that interview. Paola remembered the phone call with Edoardo, the argument about a video interview to be broadcast on TSTV. Alberta, without further hesitation, went to the station to speak with the editor-in-chief.

Edoardo Cresci was in his shirtsleeves, sweating behind his desk with a fan blasting hot air into his face. Half the editorial staff was on holiday and the offices, with their aseptic shape of a seventies factory, looked like an abandoned film set.

- Yes, I remember the interview... there was an argument between me and your father. - Edoardo never stopped smoking, once he put out one butt he immediately lit another, so much so that the ashtray on his desk filled up quickly and the The air in the office was filled with smoke.

- I told Valerio that the interview alone would not have had a large audience, therefore I advised him to do a reportage, to dissect the plight of the illegal immigrants, so that contribution would have greater prominence.- 

- And he got excited at the idea...-

- He left here all happy. And to think that just a few minutes earlier he would have strangled me if he could.-Alberta smiled. The father continually spoke badly of his boss: he reproached him for provincialism, for being closed to new things, for servility to the publisher.

- How much did Valerio and I say to each other... but you know that I respected him, that I loved him... - and ultimately, if it hadn't been for him, for the advances he had given him, for the loans and for the guarantee of a continuous job... Alberta knew how much her father owed to Edoardo Cresci and she had never been able to see in that lanky-looking man with a watchful eye the enemy that Valerio had often wanted her to believe.

- Can I see the tape of the interview? -

Edoardo remained for a second with the cigarette on the ashtray, careful to shake the ash from the tip, then he looked up, furrowing the wrinkles on his forehead in an expression that didn't seem sincere to Alberta.

- I don't have it. Valerio didn't leave it to me. He just showed it to me then took it with him.-

- Edo... please.-

- It's the truth, my dear. What reason would I have to tell you otherwise? -

Alberta remained unconvinced and moved her gaze around the office as if hoping to discover the tape on top of some folder or stuck in some hole in the bookcase.