Now for a television review commencing with the latest Montalbano. The latest episode shown on Easter Saturday April 7th proved to be the most thoughtful. The citizens of Vigata are in uproar because they invested heavily in a company offering 20% interest. The young man responsible came from Milan and had disappeared.
Montalbano becomes involved when one of the investors, an 80 year old, holds the secretary to the company at gun point. Montalbano pretends the conman has been captured and the money is safe to persuade the man to give himself up. There are no leads about what happened to the conman so Montalbano and his team concentrate on the three members of staff.
One young woman is a business graduate taking her final examinations. She lives at home with her parents where the father is deaf. She is something of a vamp tease and has been to bed with the Casanova Deputy who afterwards admitted that he was engaged to another. She has little information to give at first but later remembers little things which help Montalbano towards a solution.
The second assistant is a financial graduate and has also disappeared. He has a rented flat but is also having a beach house built close to where Montalbano lives. He is incensed when he discovers that in order to build the house a large old olive tree has been up rooted. It appears that the man arranged to travel to Germany but over time it is established that he did not do so. His scooter has disappeared along with the car used by the conman when in the city.
The third member of the staff is a very loyal secretary who is convinced the boss will return and explain why he is has been absent. She appears to be the key to unlocking the mystery.
There is only one clue which acting on advice of his number three Montalbano ignores. A crank who has previously seen flying saucers and other amazing phenomenon claims that he saw the vehicle of the missing conman near to where he lives late one night, the night before the young man was scheduled to fly to Germany.
During the episode his deputy Mimi, visits just when Montalbano is about to eat a late evening meal with wine. Mimi is having one of his doubts about getting married to Beba although the date has been arranged in less than a week and Montalbano is to be a witness with Livia travelling for the event. The deputy goes through all his doubts as well as positives, drinks lots of whisky and goes to sleep on Montalbano’s bed while he wakes up having gone to sleep on the couch without touching the meal. The wedding is postponed because the father of his fiancée has a heart attack.
The other story line is that the Judge has been looking at some of Montalbano’s old cases before he was appointed. He challenges the action taken over the orphan boy who he was to have adopted with Livia but then places with the sister of Mimi and the boy said he wanted to stay. So sadly the couple had agreed and the boy had been adopted by the sister and was now part of their family. The Judge also raises the issue of the deposit account which the mother had possessed and the boy inherited when he came of age. Fortunately Montalbano had not kept the pass book but had given it to the Notary for safe keeping and had the official receipt. This he sends to the Judge.
He also checks that the money was still safe and not invested with the conman. He visits the sister to explain about the money. The boy is thrilled to see him and shows him that he can ride on a pony given to him by his adopted father who he now refers to as father. He tells Montalbano that he has decided to become a policeman when he grows up.
This is the story of what happened to the two missing men. It emerges that the conman was gay and had a relationship with the assistant who helped him to move the investor’s money to various offshore accounts. The Assistant had been paid 350000 euros over a period for work on the beach house. When the man started to default on the interest which investors had expected and they started to demand the return of the money, the assistant had got into panic and demanded that the conman arrange for him to leave Sicily and Italy by a route which could not be traced. He had packed two suitcases and left his home cancelling the accommodation and paying in lieu of notice. It is only later that the landlady confirms that he also had with him a brief case and a lap top which he always carried around with him.
Montalbano visits the man who reported the car and finds that he is not the crank which others had said about him. The man takes him to the place where he saw the car and Montalbano takes a launch with his deputy and goes diving, locating the car and a body. It that of the missing assistant shot in the head. He works out that having arranged to meet the assistant he had then shot him and dumped the car and scooter over the cliff. But where was the conman? Why was there no trace of him?
Arising for work undertaken by his assistants, Montalbano goes to see a relative of the Secretary. He finds that she is the daughter of a wealthy family who was so shocked when the second of her parents died that she had not reported the death for several days unable to accept the reality of what happened. She was a teenager when this happened. Separate comments had been made about her inability to accept that her boss was a conman.
The woman is in such a state that she has an accident and accepts the invitation to be driven home where on arrival she insists on showing him the part of the large house in which she lives alone. In the guest bedroom he sees the decomposing body of the missing man. He arranges for a doctor to visit and gives the woman a sedative to keep her asleep for several hours. This provides the opportunity for the body to be removed.
Montalbano works out that the man had gone to her after shooting his assistant and his lover. He was a conman and not a murderer and had gone to pieces following the killing. Not wanting him to be exposed for what he was she had shot the man with the gun he had used on his assistant and then left the body oblivious that it was there or what she had done. Fortunately the lap top and papers in the brief case were retrieved and therefore the investors got most of their money back. Everything is OK but is Montalbano/ He spends time at the cliff top where the car entered the sea. We see nothing of Livia.
Montalbano becomes involved when one of the investors, an 80 year old, holds the secretary to the company at gun point. Montalbano pretends the conman has been captured and the money is safe to persuade the man to give himself up. There are no leads about what happened to the conman so Montalbano and his team concentrate on the three members of staff.
One young woman is a business graduate taking her final examinations. She lives at home with her parents where the father is deaf. She is something of a vamp tease and has been to bed with the Casanova Deputy who afterwards admitted that he was engaged to another. She has little information to give at first but later remembers little things which help Montalbano towards a solution.
The second assistant is a financial graduate and has also disappeared. He has a rented flat but is also having a beach house built close to where Montalbano lives. He is incensed when he discovers that in order to build the house a large old olive tree has been up rooted. It appears that the man arranged to travel to Germany but over time it is established that he did not do so. His scooter has disappeared along with the car used by the conman when in the city.
The third member of the staff is a very loyal secretary who is convinced the boss will return and explain why he is has been absent. She appears to be the key to unlocking the mystery.
There is only one clue which acting on advice of his number three Montalbano ignores. A crank who has previously seen flying saucers and other amazing phenomenon claims that he saw the vehicle of the missing conman near to where he lives late one night, the night before the young man was scheduled to fly to Germany.
During the episode his deputy Mimi, visits just when Montalbano is about to eat a late evening meal with wine. Mimi is having one of his doubts about getting married to Beba although the date has been arranged in less than a week and Montalbano is to be a witness with Livia travelling for the event. The deputy goes through all his doubts as well as positives, drinks lots of whisky and goes to sleep on Montalbano’s bed while he wakes up having gone to sleep on the couch without touching the meal. The wedding is postponed because the father of his fiancée has a heart attack.
The other story line is that the Judge has been looking at some of Montalbano’s old cases before he was appointed. He challenges the action taken over the orphan boy who he was to have adopted with Livia but then places with the sister of Mimi and the boy said he wanted to stay. So sadly the couple had agreed and the boy had been adopted by the sister and was now part of their family. The Judge also raises the issue of the deposit account which the mother had possessed and the boy inherited when he came of age. Fortunately Montalbano had not kept the pass book but had given it to the Notary for safe keeping and had the official receipt. This he sends to the Judge.
He also checks that the money was still safe and not invested with the conman. He visits the sister to explain about the money. The boy is thrilled to see him and shows him that he can ride on a pony given to him by his adopted father who he now refers to as father. He tells Montalbano that he has decided to become a policeman when he grows up.
This is the story of what happened to the two missing men. It emerges that the conman was gay and had a relationship with the assistant who helped him to move the investor’s money to various offshore accounts. The Assistant had been paid 350000 euros over a period for work on the beach house. When the man started to default on the interest which investors had expected and they started to demand the return of the money, the assistant had got into panic and demanded that the conman arrange for him to leave Sicily and Italy by a route which could not be traced. He had packed two suitcases and left his home cancelling the accommodation and paying in lieu of notice. It is only later that the landlady confirms that he also had with him a brief case and a lap top which he always carried around with him.
Montalbano visits the man who reported the car and finds that he is not the crank which others had said about him. The man takes him to the place where he saw the car and Montalbano takes a launch with his deputy and goes diving, locating the car and a body. It that of the missing assistant shot in the head. He works out that having arranged to meet the assistant he had then shot him and dumped the car and scooter over the cliff. But where was the conman? Why was there no trace of him?
Arising for work undertaken by his assistants, Montalbano goes to see a relative of the Secretary. He finds that she is the daughter of a wealthy family who was so shocked when the second of her parents died that she had not reported the death for several days unable to accept the reality of what happened. She was a teenager when this happened. Separate comments had been made about her inability to accept that her boss was a conman.
The woman is in such a state that she has an accident and accepts the invitation to be driven home where on arrival she insists on showing him the part of the large house in which she lives alone. In the guest bedroom he sees the decomposing body of the missing man. He arranges for a doctor to visit and gives the woman a sedative to keep her asleep for several hours. This provides the opportunity for the body to be removed.
Montalbano works out that the man had gone to her after shooting his assistant and his lover. He was a conman and not a murderer and had gone to pieces following the killing. Not wanting him to be exposed for what he was she had shot the man with the gun he had used on his assistant and then left the body oblivious that it was there or what she had done. Fortunately the lap top and papers in the brief case were retrieved and therefore the investors got most of their money back. Everything is OK but is Montalbano/ He spends time at the cliff top where the car entered the sea. We see nothing of Livia.
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