Now, though, the political pendulum seemed to be on the point of swinging back again. Voices had been heard in parliament claiming that such a massive show of force was undermining the democratic culture of Italy and shaming the country in the eyes of its partners in the European Union. One deputy had gone so far as to compare it to the brutal repression instituted by Cesare Mori, Mussolini’s Iron Prefect’, who virtually eradicated the Mafia in the 1920s, only for the invading Allies to release the jailed capi and their followers just in time for them to get rich on the easy money and unregulated growth of post-war Italy. No one in the government had expressed such views as yet, but Corinna Nunziatella was by no means alone in feeling that it was only a matter of time before Beppe and his fellow recruits were reunited with their girlfriends and families, and the situation in Sicily returned to what had always passed for ‘normal’.
The convoy of cars drove round to the rear of the Palace of Justice, past the armed guards in their bullet-proof vests, and down a ramp leading into the bowels of the building. Corinna thanked the members of her escort — whose lives, of course, were as much at risk as hers — and took the lift to the third floor, where the offices of the Procura della Repubblica were located, and then walked along a corridor ending at yet another checkpoint. Here she not only had to present her identification to the guard on duty — despite the fact that they both knew each other by sight — but also to pronounce the codeword, changed daily, which permitted access to the offices of the so-called ‘pool’ of AntiMafia magistrates.