table. There was no point refilling it, he realized, for his was not the kind of thirst water could quench. It was an inner thirst—fueled by fear.
It was unheard of that Giuseppe Berilli could be overtaken by fear. He had been the epitome of self-confidence and determination since prevailing, barely out of law school, over a team of experienced prosecutors in a legal battle that had rocked the town. The case concerned allegations of fraud against a conservative political leader, Massimiliano Zappa, accused by the opposition of having used tax funds to purchase a home on the Riviera. He was acquitted, thanks to Giuseppe and his father, though he resigned his post immediately and moved to Switzerland, his name having been tarnished forever. It was the young Giuseppe who found the legal loophole that saved Massimiliano Zappa, and he again who wrote and delivered the closing arguments, impressing judges and lawyers with the eloquence of his statements and the power of his words. The courtrooms during his trials had been filled with spectators ever since. There were colleagues, law students, and magistrates, as well as common people in awe of his pugnacity and speeches. His victories became topics of conversation inside the courthouse and outside, throughout the city’s social circles and at balls, theater intermissions, and dinner parties. When the sudden death of his father placed him at the head of Berilli e Figli, Giuseppe took charge of the firm with the charisma of a seasoned leader. Not even the unsightliness of his physique had hindered his ascent to power—he was short, with a round, protruding belly that kept growing steadily year after year, making Francesco Roccatagliata, his tailor, the happiest man alive when every January he had to redo the lawyer’s wardrobe from A to Z.
The sense of vulnerability and the confusion that had dawned upon him in the past days had thus caught Giuseppe by surprise. He wondered what his father would do were he still alive. He’d be in that same room, for sure, and, in all likelihood, seated on that same armchair. To Giuseppe, no other room in the house had the solemn yet tranquil and inspiring atmosphere of the reading room. It had been his father’s private sanctuary before becoming his, and he had faithfully preserved its layout and decor: the hand-carved marble fireplace still towered in the center of the north wall; the bookcases filled with leather-bound volumes covered, floor-to-ceiling, the west wall; and the four-pane Palladian window opened to the east, onto the rose garden. Even the leather armchairs and the antique mahogany desk had been his father’s, and he had taken great care not to alter their original placement in the room: the armchairs were still facing each other on the two sides of the fireplace, and the desk was still slightly off-center, close to the bookcases. The only two additions Giuseppe had made to the decor were a photograph of Italy’s current king, Vittorio Emanuele III, and a brand-new electric table lamp with a translucent ivory shade—a luxury unique in town.
He crossed his stocky legs and stared at the pink veins of the marble floor, wondering why he felt the urge to look at the letters one more time. By now, he knew every word by heart. Was he hoping he had given those words the wrong meaning? A thin hope, he admitted, but worth a try. So he rose from the armchair and waddled to the mahogany desk, belly shaking as he walked. As he sat, back to the bookcases, the sheets glared at him from the open drawer. For a moment, he was still. When he reached, his arm felt disconnected from his body, moving on its own. A shiver ran through him while he placed the letters on the desktop. In whispers, beneath the warm light shed by the ivory shade, he read the text of letter number one.
Shame on you, Giuseppe Berilli,
and on your household of sin.
The time has come for you to stand
in front of the Supreme Judge.
“No mistake here,” Giuseppe grunted. That was definitely a threat, a subtle one, which made the message all the more daunting. To make matters more abstruse, below the fourth line, in black ink, the writer had drawn a horse galloping with its mane in the wind. What the drawing meant, Giuseppe had no idea, but he shuddered at the thought that perhaps his horse accident had not been an accident after all but part of the writer’s scheme. As