Free Solea by Jean-Claude Izzo, Howard Curtis

beans, a few potatoes and macaroni. She’d let it simmer all morning. Then she’d tackle the basil and garlic. Crushing them in an old wooden mortar. You really couldn’t disturb her when she was doing that. “If you’re going to stand there like a statue, watching me, I’ll never finish.”
    I put the casserole on the stove, on a low flame. Vegetable soup with basil and garlic was even better when it had been reheated a couple of times. I lit a cigarette and poured some red wine from Bandol. A Tempier 91. My last bottle of the year. Maybe the best.
    Had Sonia talked about all those things with Honorine? Or with Fonfon? About her life as a single mother. About Enzo. How had Sonia figured out I wasn’t a happy man? She’d told Honorine that she thought I was “unhappy.” I hadn’t told her about Lole, I was sure of that. But I had talked about myself. I’d talked a lot about myself. About my life since I’d come back from Djibouti and become a cop.
    Lole’s departure was more than just something that made me unhappy, it was my great tragedy. But it may be that she had left because of my way of life. My attitude to life. I’d spent too long without really believing in life. Had I, without realizing it, become permanently unhappy? Believing as I did that the small joys of everyday life were enough to make you happy, had I given up on my dreams, my real dreams? And, at the same time, on the future? Whenever the dawn rose on a new day, as it was doing now, I never thought about tomorrow. I’d never gone to sea on a freighter. I’d never sailed to the other side of the world. I’d stayed here, in Marseilles. Loyal to a past that didn’t exist anymore. To my parents. To my friends who were gone. And every time a friend died, it made me all the more reluctant to leave. I was trapped in this city. I’d never even gone back to Italy, to Castel San Giorgio . . .
    Sonia. Maybe I’d have gone down there with her and Enzo, down to the Abruzzi. Maybe after that, I’d have taken her—or would she have had to urge me?—to Castel San Giorgio, so that both of them could fall in love with that beautiful region that was as much mine as this city where I was born.
    I’d had a plateful of soup—lukewarm, the way I like it. Honorine had surpassed herself again. I finished the wine. I was ready to go to bed. To confront the nightmares. The images of death in my head. When I woke up, I’d go see Sonia’s father. Attilio. And Enzo. “I’m the last man Sonia met,” I’d say. “I’m not sure, but I think she liked me. And I liked her, too.” It wouldn’t make any difference, but there was no harm in saying it, and there couldn’t be any harm in hearing it.
    The phone started ringing again.
    Angrily, I picked up the receiver. “Fuck!” I yelled, ready to hang up.
    â€œMontale,” the voice said.
    That loathsome voice I’d heard twice the day before. Cold, in spite of the slight Italian accent.
    â€œMontale,” the voice repeated.
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œThe girl, Sonia. That was just to make you realize we’re not joking.”
    â€œWhat?” I cried.
    â€œIt’s just the beginning, Montale. Just the beginning. You seem a little hard of hearing. A little stupid, too. So we’ll carry on until you find the shit-stirrer for us. Do you hear me?”
    â€œYou bastards!” I screamed. Then, louder and louder, “You scumbag! You bastard! You piece of shit!”
    Silence at the other end. But the guy hadn’t hung up. He waited until I was out of breath, then said, “We’re going to kill your friends, Montale. All of them. One by one. Until you find the Bellini woman. And if you don’t shift your ass, by the time we’ve finished you’re going to regret you’re still alive. The choice is yours.”
    â€œO.K.,” I said, feeling