Read Online Darkness for the Bastards of Pizzofalcone by Maurizio de Giovanni, Antony Shugaar - Free Book Online Page A

camera at the front entrance ought to have recorded something.”
    Ottavia waited for the group of schoolchildren led by Sister Beatrice to leave the room to make sure that no one had entered the camera’s field of view in the few minutes that followed; then she started the other video.
    The tension became palpable: The small ad hoc audience was about to make the visual acquaintance of the little boy who might have been kidnapped. Almost imperceptibly, everyone moved a few inches closer to the screen, and Ottavia felt her arm come into contact with Palma, who was standing next to her. She felt a shiver, or rather an electric shock. She focused on the video controls.
    The security camera offered a partial view of the atrium, from the door that led out to the grounds to the door that gave onto the first hall of the art gallery. But anyone who came in or went out would certainly have been caught in the frame.
    There were a number of tourists with cameras around their necks, a young woman eating something, a father bouncing a child on his shoulders. Like the other footage, this was also in black and white and pretty grainy. People came in, people left. Suddenly a figure appeared, dressed in a gray sweatshirt; the hood was pulled over the figure’s head.
    Aragona snorted: “A hood, in this heat? Who is that?”
    Alex, standing beside him, narrowed her eyes to focus better and said: “It’s a woman.”
    â€œHow can you be so sure?”
    The female officer pointed at the screen: “You can just see her breasts, look there. And the shoes have a bit of heel too. That’s a woman.”
    They followed her with their eyes as she walked through the atrium and stopped just short of the entrance proper and the clerk taking tickets. She kept her hands in her pockets and peeked into the first hall. She stood there like that, motionless, for almost two minutes; then she raised her right hand and started to wave. The clerk, who was no more than a yard away, was chatting amiably with the young woman who was eating; he was leaning forward from the waist, his body language making it obvious he was hitting on her.
    Romano snarled: “Look at that idiot. Just inches away there’s some woman waving her head off at a little boy inside the museum and this numbskull’s busy flirting with a girl.”
    Lojacono, fully focused on the video, replied: “Well, he’s not a security guard.”
    The grainy figure waved one last time, as if inviting someone to come over, then put her hand back in her pocket. A moment later, Dodo appeared.
    There he is.
    A small child, whose diminutive height made him look younger than his years. He wore dark clothing, a pair of long pants, maybe jeans, tennis shoes, and a light jacket. His hair was tousled, and he looked slightly lost. He went over to the figure in the sweatshirt, who patted him lightly on the cheek, took him by the hand, and then headed with him toward the exit.
    They slowly crossed the atrium with no trouble at all; they might as well have been invisible. All around them, everyone went on walking and talking, taking pictures and munching food, all absolutely indifferent.
    â€œStop them, damn it!” whispered Guida, as if that were still possible. Instead the two of them headed off without a hitch. Just before they went through the door and vanished from the frame, the little boy, for no apparent reason, turned to look at the security camera, as if he wanted to say a silent goodbye to his dear friends at the precinct house of Pizzofalcone.
    The unexpected glance hit everyone watching like a punch to the gut. Ottavia murmured: “Sweet mother of God!” while Guida took in a sharp, noisy breath and Lojacono clutched his head with both hands.
    Dodo’s face was expressionless; in that moment, looking into the lens of the security camera, he betrayed neither fear, nor discomfort, nor pain. He seemed fine. Then he vanished from