by Donna Leon
Brunetti knew he was supposed to ask, but he didn’t. “It might take a long time. Would you be willing to meet me for dinner?”
“What about Paola?”
“She’s taken the kids up to the mountains.”
There was a moment’s silence from Padovani, a silence which Brunetti could not help but interpret as entirely speculative. “I’ve got a murder case here, and the hotel’s been reserved for months, so Paola and the kids have gone up to Bolzano. If I get through with this on time, I’ll go up as well. That’s why I called you. I thought you might be able to help me.”
“With a murder case? Oh, how very exciting. Since this AIDS business, I’ve had so little to do with the criminal classes.”
“Ah, yes,” Brunetti said, momentarily at a loss for a suitable rejoinder. “Would you like to meet for dinner? Any place you like.”
Padovani considered this for a minute, then said, “Guido, I’m leaving to go back to Rome tomorrow, and I’ve got a house full of food. Would you mind coming here to help me finish it up? It won’t be anything fancy, just pasta and whatever else I find.”
“That would be fine. Tell me where you live.”
“I’m down in Dorsoduro. Do you know the Ramo dietro gl’ Incurabili?”
It was a small campo with a running fountain, just back from the Zattere.
“Yes, I do.”
“Get the fountain in back of you, looking at the little canal, and it’s the first door on the right.” Far clearer than any giving of number or street name, this would get any Venetian to the house with no difficulty.
“Good, what time?”
“Eight.”
“Can I bring anything?”
“Absolutely not. Anything you bring, we just have to eat, and I’ve already got enough here for a football team. Nothing. Please.”
“All right. I’ll see you at eight. And thanks, Damiano.”
“My pleasure. What is it you want to ask me about? Or would I say, ‘whom’? This way, I can sort through my memory, or I might even have time to make a few phone calls.”
“Two men. Leonardo Mascari.”
“Never heard of him,” Padovani interrupted.
“And Giancarlo Santomauro.”
Padovani whistled. “So you people finally tumbled to the saintly Avvocato, eh?”
“I’ll see you at eight,” Brunetti said.
“Tease,” Padovani said with a laugh and hung up.
At eight that evening, Brunetti, freshly showered and shaved and carrying a bottle of Barbera, rang the bell to the right of the small fountain in the Ramo dietro gl’ Incurabili. The front of the building, which had only one bell and which, consequently, was probably that greatest of all luxuries, a separate house owned by only one person, was covered by jasmine plants which trailed up from two terra-cotta pots on either side of the door and filled the air around them with perfume. Padovani opened the door almost immediately and extended his hand to Brunetti. His grip was warm and firm and, still holding Brunetti’s hand, he pulled him inside. “Get out of the heat. I’ve got to be out of my mind to go back to Rome in the midst of this, but at least my apartment there is air-conditioned.”
He released Brunetti’s hand and stepped back. Inevitably, like any two people who have not seen one another for a long time, they tried, without being obvious about it, to see what changes had taken place. Was he thicker, thinner, grayer, older?
Brunetti, seeing that Padovani still appeared to be the thickset ruffian he very clearly was not, turned his eyes to the room in which they stood. The central part of it soared up two floors to a roof inset with skylights. This open space was surrounded on three sides by an open loggia reached by a wooden staircase. The fourth side was closed in and must hold the bedroom.
“What was it, a boathouse?” Brunetti asked, remembering the little canal that ran just outside the door. Boats brought for repair could easily have been dragged inside.
“Good for you. Yes. When I bought it, they were still working on boats in here, and there were holes in the roof the size of watermelons.”
“How long have you had it?” Brunetti asked, looking around and giving a rough estimate of the quantity of work and money that must have gone into the place to make it look the way it did now.
“Eight years.”
“You’ve done a lot. And you’re lucky not to have neighbors.” Brunetti handed him the bottle, wrapped in white tissue paper.
“I told you not to bring anything.”
“It won’t spoil,” Brunetti said with a smile.
“Thank you, but you shouldn’t have,” Padovani said, although he knew it was as impossible for a dinner guest to show up without a gift as it was for the host to serve chaff and nettles. “Make yourself at home and look around while I go and take a look at the dinner,” Padovani said, turning toward a door with a stained glass panel that led to the kitchen. “I put ice in the bucket in case you’d like a drink.”
He disappeared behind the door, and Brunetti heard the familiar noises of pots and lids and running water. He glanced down and saw that the floor was a dark oak parquet; the sight of a charred semicircle of floor that stood in front of the fireplace made Brunetti uncomfortable because he couldn’t decide whether he approved of the placing of comfort over caution or disapproved of the ruining of such a perfect surface. A long wooden beam had been set into the plaster above the fireplace, and along it danced a multicolored parade of ceramic Commedia dell’Arte figurines. Paintings filled two walls; there was no attempt to order them into styles or schools: they hung on the walls and fought for the viewer’s eye. The keenness of the competition gave evidence of the taste with which they had been selected. He spotted a Guttoso, a painter he had never much liked, and a Morandi, whom he did. There were three Ferruzzis, all giving joyous testimony to the beauty of the city. Then, a little to the left of the fireplace, a Madonna, clearly Florentine and probably fifteenth century, looked adoringly down at yet another ugly baby. One of the secrets Paola and Brunetti never revealed to anyone was their decades-long search for the ugliest Christ child in western art. At the moment, the title was held by a particularly bilious infant in room thirteen of the Pinacoteca di Siena. Although the baby in front of Brunetti was clearly no beauty, Siena’s title was not at risk. Along one wall ran a long shelf of carved wood that must once have been part of a wardrobe or cabinet. On top of it rested a row of brightly colored ceramic bowls whose strict geometric designs and swirling calligraphy clearly marked them as Islamic.
The door opened and Padovani came back into the room. “Don’t you want a drink?”
“No, a glass of wine would be good. I don’t like to drink when it’s so hot.”
“I know what you mean. This is the first summer I’ve been here in three years, and I’d forgotten how awful it can be. There are some nights, when the tide is low, and I’m anywhere on the other side of the canal, that I think I’ll be sick with the smell.”
“Don’t you get it here?” Brunetti asked.
“No, the Canale della Giudecca must be deeper or move more quickly, or something. We don’t get the smell here. At least not yet. If they continue to dig up the channels to let in those monster tankers—what are they called, super tankers?—then god alone knows what will happen to the laguna.”
Still talking, Padovani walked over to the long wooden table set for two and poured out two glasses from a bottle of Dolcetto that stood there, already opened. “People think the end of the city will come in some major flood or natural disaster. I think the answer is much easier,” he said, coming back to Brunetti and handing him a glass.
“And what is that?” Brunetti asked, sipping at the wine, liking it.
“I think we’ve killed the seas, and it’s only a question of time before they begin to stink. And since the laguna is just a gut hanging off the Adriatic, which is itself a gut hanging from the Mediterranean, which . . . well, you get the idea. I think the water will simply die, and then we’ll be forced either to
abandon the city or else fill in the canals, in which case there will no longer be any sense in living here.”
It was a novel theory and certainly no less bleak than many he had heard, than many he himself half believed. Everyone talked, all the time, of the imminent destruction of the city, and yet the price of apartments doubled every few years, and the rents for those available continued to soar ever higher above what the average worker could pay for one. Venetians had bought and sold real estate through the Crusades, the plague, and various occupations by foreign armies, so it was probably a safe bet that they would continue to do so through whatever ecological holocaust awaited them.
“Everything’s ready,” Padovani said, sitting in one of the deep armchairs. “All I’ve got to do is throw in the pasta. But why don’t you give me an idea of what you want so I’ll have something to think about while I’m stirring?”
Brunetti sat on the sofa facing him. He took another sip of his wine and, choosing his words carefully, began. “I have reason to believe that Santomauro is involved with a transvestite prostitute who lives and, apparently, works in Mestre.”
“What do you mean by ‘involved with?” Padovani asked, voice level.
“Sexually,” Brunetti said simply. “But he also claims to be his lawyer.”
“One does not necessarily exclude the other, does it?”
“No. Hardly. But since I found him in the company of this young man, he has tried to prevent me from investigating him.”
“Which him?”
“The young man.”
“I see,” Padovani said, sipping at his wine. “Anything else?”
“The other name I gave you, Leonardo Mascari, is the name of the man who was found in the field in Mestre on Monday.”
“The transvestite?”
“So it would seem.”
“And what’s the connection here?”
“The young man, Santomauro’s client, denied recognizing Mascari. But he knew him.”
“How do you know that?”
“You’ll have to believe me here, Damiano. I know. I’ve seen it too many times not to know. He recognized his picture and then pretended he didn’t.”
“What was the young man’s name?” Padovani asked.
“I’m not at liberty to say.” Silence fell.
“Guido,” Padovani finally said, leaning forward, “I know a number of those boys in Mestre. In the past, I knew a large number of them. If I’m to serve as your gay consultant in this”— he said it entirely without irony or rancor—“then I’m going to have to know his name. I assure you that nothing you tell me will be repeated, but I can’t make any connection unless I know his name.” Brunetti still said nothing. “Guido, you called me. I didn’t call you.” Padovani got to his feet. “I’ll just put the pasta in. Fifteen minutes?”
While he waited for Padovani to come back from the kitchen, Brunetti looked at the books that filled one wall. He pulled down one on Chinese archaeology and took it back to the sofa, glanced through it until he heard the door open and looked up to see Padovani come back into the room.
“A tavola, tutti a tavola. Mangiamo,” Padovani called. Brunetti closed the book, set it aside, and went over to take his place at the table. “You sit there, on the left,” Padovani said. He set the bowl down and started immediately to heap pasta onto the plate in front of Brunetti.
Brunetti looked down, waited until Padovani had served himself, and began to eat. Tomato, onion, cubes of pancetta, and perhaps a touch of pepperoncino, all poured over penne rigate, his favorite dried pasta.
“It’s good,” he said, meaning it. “I like the pepperoncino.”
“Oh, good. I never know if people are going to think it’s too hot.”
“No, it’s perfect,” Brunetti said and continued to eat. When he had finished his helping and Padovani was putting more onto his plate, Brunetti said, “His name’s Francesco Crespo.”
“I should have known,” said Padovani with a tired sigh. Then, sounding far more interested, he asked, “You sure there’s not too much pepperoncino?”
Brunetti shook his head and finished his second portion, then held out his hands to cover his plate when Padovani reached for the serving spoon.
“You better. There’s hardly anything else,” Padovani insisted.
“No, really, Damiano.”
“Suit yourself, but Paola’s not to blame me if you starve to death while she’s away.” He picked up their two plates, set them inside the serving bowl, and went back into the kitchen.
He was to emerge twice before he sat down again. The first time, he carried a small roast of ground turkey breast wrapped in pancetta and surrounded by potatoes, and the second a plate of grilled peppers soaked in olive oil, and a large bowl of mixed salad greens. “That’s all there is,” he said when he sat down, and Brunetti suspected that he was meant to read it as an apology.
Brunetti helped himself to roast and potatoes and began to eat.
Padovani filled their glasses and helped himself to both turkey and potatoes. “Crespo came originally from, I think, Mantova. He moved to Padova about four years ago to study pharmacy. But he quickly learned that life was far more interesting if he followed his natural inclination and set himself up as a whore, and he soon discovered that the best way to do that was to find himself an older man who would support him. The usual stuff: an apartment, a car, plenty of money for clothes, and in return all he had to do was be there when the man who paid the bills was able to get away from the bank, or the city council meeting, or his wife. I think he was only about eighteen at the time. And very, very pretty.” Padovani paused with his fork in the air. “In fact, he reminded me then of the Bacchus of Caravaggio: beautiful, but too knowing and just on the edge of corruption.”
Padovani offered some peppers to Brunetti and took some himself. “The last thing I know about him firsthand was that he was mixed up with an accountant from Treviso. But Franco could never keep himself from straying, and the accountant threw him out. Beat him up, I think, and threw him out. I don’t know when he started with the transvestism; that sort of thing has never interested me in the least. In fact, I suppose I don’t understand it. If you want a woman, then have a woman.”
“Maybe it’s a way to deceive yourself that it is a woman,” Brunetti suggested, using Paola’s theory but thinking, now, that it made sense.
“Perhaps. But how sad, eh?” Padovani moved his plate to the side and sat back. “I mean, we deceive ourselves all the time, about whether we love someone, or why we do, or why we tell the lies we do. But you’d think we could at least be honest with ourselves about who we want to go to bed with. It seems little enough, that.” He picked up the salad and sprinkled salt on it, poured olive oil liberally over the leaves, then added a large splash of vinegar.
Brunetti handed him his plate and accepted the clean salad plate he was given in its place. Padovani pushed the bowl toward him. “Help yourself. There’s no dessert. Only fruit.”
“I’m glad you didn’t have to go to any trouble,” Brunetti said, and Padovani laughed.
“Well, I really did have all of this in the house. Except for the fruit.”
Brunetti took a very small portion of salad; Padovani took even less.
“What else do you know about Crespo?” Brunetti asked.
“I heard that he was dressing up, calling himself Francesca. But I didn’t know he’d finished on Via Cappuccina. Or is it the public parks in Mestre?” he asked.
“Both,” Brunetti answered. “And I don’t know that he has finished there. The address he gave is a very nice one, and his name was outside the door.”
“Anyone’s name can be on the door. Depends on who pays the rent,” Padovani said, apparently more practiced in these things.
“I suppose you’re right,” Brunetti said.
“I don’t know much more about him. He’s not a bad person, at least he wasn’t when I knew him. But sneaky and easily led. Things like that don’t change, so he’s li
kely to lie to you if he sees any advantage in doing so.”
“Like most of the people I deal with,” Brunetti said.
Padovani smiled and added, “Like most of the people we all deal with all of the time.”
Brunetti had to laugh at the grim truth of this.
“I’ll get the fruit,” Padovani said, stacking their salad plates and taking them from the table. He was back quickly with a pale blue ceramic bowl that held six perfect peaches. He passed Brunetti another of the small plates and set the bowl in front of him. Brunetti took one of the peaches and began to peel it with his knife and fork.
“What can you tell me about Santomauro?” he asked as he peeled the peach, keeping his eyes on that.
“You mean the president, or whatever he calls himself, of the Lega della Moralità?” Padovani asked, making his voice richly somber as he pronounced the last words.
“Yes.”
“I know enough about him to assure you that, in certain circles, the announcement of the Lega and its purpose was met with the same sort of peals of delight with which we used to watch Rock Hudson make his assault upon the virtue of Doris Day or with which we now watch some of the more belligerent film appearances of certain living actors, both our own and American.”
“You mean it’s common knowledge?”
“Well, it is and it isn’t. To most of us it is, but we still respect the rules of gentlemen, unlike the politicians, and we do not tell tales out of school about one another. If we did, there’d be no one left to run the government or, for that matter, the Vatican.”
Brunetti was glad to see the real Padovani resurfacing, well, the airy chatterer that Brunetti had been led to believe was the real Padovani.
“But something like the Lega? Could he get away with something as blatant as that?”
“That’s an excellent question. But, if you look back into the history of the Lega, I believe you will find that in the days of its infancy Santomauro was no more than the eminence grise of the movement. In fact, I don’t think his name was associated with it, not in any official capacity, until two years ago, and he didn’t become prominent until last year, when he was elected hostess or governess, or whatever their leader is called. Grand priore? Something pretentious like that.”