Free The Memory Key by Conor Fitzgerald Page B

business.’
    ‘Nonsense. The only reason we have opinions is to present them to others. That’s the definition of an opinion.’
    ‘You neo-Fascists tend to have a lot of opinions, I’ve noticed.’
    ‘I take it that, too, was intended as an insult? You notice our opinions because we have to speak them out. All the neo-liberal and capitalist propaganda is taken as a given, you see. It’s not counted as an opinion if you talk about the importance of GDP growth and the bond markets. No, I object merely to the “neo” in “neo-Fascist”. I advocate a return to the original ideology, to the idea that one stick is weak but a bundle of sticks bound together is strong. Finally, after many false starts and a period of hope in the 1970s, the time has come again. State corporatism, taxing the rich, strong governance and public spending, exit from the European Union, the jailing of Silvio Berlusconi and his lackeys. Don’t tell me there are not some ideas in there you dislike?’
    ‘I am here to talk about Stefania Manfellotto, and the recent murder of a young woman.’
    ‘Ah, poor Stefania. Yes, we can talk about her. But you know I have an alibi?’
    ‘Yes,’ said Blume, adding ‘unfortunately’ in his own mind.
    ‘Also, when the young girl was killed, I was in Lucca. Lucky for me, I suppose.’
    ‘You were heard to fight with Stefania minutes before she left here and was shot.’
    ‘I fought with her the week before, and she was not shot. And the week before that, and she was not shot then either. It was a dispute, not a fight.’
    ‘Students heard voices raised.’
    ‘Not so much that they could make out the words, though. You see, without words to report they may as well say they heard us moving furniture. Words are everything, as I know you know. When the Romans had destroyed the Second Temple in Jerusalem, Yochanan ben Zakkai fled to a place called Yavneh where he set up the first academy for the study of the Torah. Ever since then, Jews have been a people of the book, a literate and academic race. Bildung is everything. Your parents are intellectuals, am I right?’
    Seeing he was getting no answer, he continued. ‘Commissioner, you’ll soon need to choose sides. The collapse is happening now. Late-phase capitalism turned out to be a perverted socialism, with the state paying bankers instead of workers. Your pay, let’s talk about that. In a short time, you won’t be earning enough to eat, but the pigs and the technocrats, the Germans, the IMF, the bankers, and the thieving politicians who never defended the interests of this country will expect you to be there, gun in hand, to defend them against righteous rage.’
    ‘Let’s get back to talking about your meeting with Stefania Manfellotto.’
    ‘Why, what new skill do you bring to the questions that was not available to your Carabinieri peers? Read the reports they made. They contain precise accounts of my meeting with Stefania,’ said Pitagora. ‘I have deliberately crystallized my memory of the events. If I tell you, there will not be a single comma’s difference between the statement I made to the Carabinieri and the one I will make to you. Also, you have no authority in this investigation.’
    ‘So you checked my credentials before this meeting,’ said Blume.
    ‘Yes. My original plan was to throw you out of the office, but you brought in an aura with you that I simply have to understand and oppose. For your sake, too. I can make you feel better about yourself. Look at us here. Which of us is the happier man?’
    ‘Ah, but which one of us is sane?’ said Blume.
    The professor got up from his desk and went to the large bookcase behind him and stared up at the long row of books as if they might speak to him. He walked around his desk. ‘I think I may give you my book.’
    ‘Thanks, but . . .’
    Pitagora cut across him. ‘I do not keep copies of it here, of course. It is too valuable.’
    ‘All your copies are first editions?’