by Donna Leon
‘Of course,’ Brunetti said, filling his voice with the admiration of non-members. ‘What did he say?’
‘That his wife panicked when she saw that Terrasini was going to hit her.’ Then, with a confidentiality that allowed Brunetti a one-day membership in the old boys’ club, Patta said, ‘You can imagine what would happen to her face if anyone hit it. It might fall apart.’
Brunetti’s stomach clenched with rage at the words, but then he realized that Patta was entirely serious and spoke literally. A moment’s reflection forced him to accept the fact that Patta was also probably right.
Patta went on, ‘And when he was on the ground, she saw his hand start to move towards her leg. Her husband told me that’s what made her shoot him again.’ Then, to Brunetti directly, he asked, ‘Did you see it?’
‘No, sir, I was looking at her, and I think the angle was wrong, anyway.’ That made no sense, but Patta wanted to believe what he had been told, and Brunetti saw no reason to prevent that.
‘That’s exactly what Griffoni said,’ Patta volunteered.
Some imp of the perverse urged Brunetti to ask, ‘What did you and her husband decide, sir?’
Patta heard the question but not the words, and answered, ‘I think what happened is pretty clear, don’t you?’
‘Yes, sir. I do,’ Brunetti answered.
‘She felt threatened and she defended herself the only way she knew how,’ Patta explained, and Brunetti was suddenly sure he had said the same to the Questore. ‘And this man, Antonio Terrasini – I’ve asked Signorina Elettra to find out about him, and once again she has done so with remarkable speed – has a criminal record filled with violence.’
‘Ah,’ Brunetti allowed himself to exclaim, then asked, ‘And so the possibility of criminal charges?’
Patta flicked the idea away as though it were a fly. ‘No, that’s certainly not necessary.’ Then, switching to the mode of pathos, the Vice-Questore went on, ‘They’ve certainly suffered enough.’ Presumably, her husband was the other part of that plural, and Brunetti thought how true his words were. They had.
He got to his feet. ‘I’m glad this is settled, then,’ he said.
Patta graced Brunetti with one of his rare smiles, and Brunetti was struck, as happened each time he smiled, by how very handsome the man was. ‘You’ll write a report, then, Brunetti?’
‘Of course, sir,’ Brunetti said, filled with the uncharacteristic desire to do his master’s bidding. ‘I’ll go up and do it now.’
‘Good,’ Patta said and pulled some papers towards him.
Upstairs, Brunetti remembered his missing computer but could not bring himself to care much about it. He wrote an account, neither brief nor long, of what had happened in the Casinò two nights before. He confined himself to describing what he had seen, making reference to Franca Marinello in a passive way, as the person who had followed Terrasini down the steps and to whom he had handed his gun. She became active, in Brunetti’s account, only when Terrasini raised his hand to her, and then Brunetti described her response. He made no mention of having seen her speak to Terrasini, nor did he mention her asking him about Ovid, nor yet did he refer to his meeting with her in the gelateria.
As he was writing, his phone rang and he answered.
‘It’s Bocchese,’ the chief technician said.
‘Yes,’ Brunetti said, still writing.
‘They just emailed me the autopsy reports on that guy who got shot in the Casinò.’
‘Yes?’
‘He had a good deal of alcohol in his blood, and something else they can’t identify. Might be Ecstasy, might be something like it. But something. They’re doing more tests.’
‘And you?’ Brunetti asked. ‘You find anything?’
‘They sent me the bullets, and I had a look. The guys in Mestre had already sent me the photos of the bullet they took out of the mud in that tank in Marghera. If it’s not a match, I’m going to retire and open an antique shop.’
‘Is that what you’re going to do when you retire?’ Brunetti asked.
‘No need to,’ the technician answered. ‘I know so many people in the business by now that I don’t have to bother with a shop. That way, I don’t have to pay taxes.’
‘Of course.’
‘You still want me to check on that, what was he, that guy with the trucks in Tessera?’
‘Yes, if you can.’
‘It’ll take a couple of days. I’ll have to nag them to send me the photos of the bullets.’
‘Keep at it, Bocchese. It might be something.’
‘All right, if you say so. Anything else?’
There was the dentist, Brunetti knew, and his still unsolved murder. If the police found a link between his death and the gun, then they would have a link between Terrasini and the dentist, wouldn’t they?
‘No, nothing else,’ Brunetti said and replaced the phone.