by Donna Leon
The set-up was easily understood: arrive with enough firepower, blow the men away, and then provide an explanation likely to be believed. What more fashionable than terrorism these days? It was entirely likely that the Carabinieri who were called in had no idea of what was really going on, were there like extras in a production of Aida, useful to cross the stage once or twice to provide verisimilitude in what might otherwise be revealed as a shabby, ill-rehearsed spectacle.
Brunetti thought back to the scene the cameras had revealed: the blue cars had no markings, and the uniforms of the men in the ski masks bore no insignia. By calling in some favours, he could probably see the Carabinieri report on the incident, but there was no guarantee that it would reveal the identity of the masked men, nor was it likely to specify which corps had been the first to enter the apartment.
He tried to recall the appearance of the room in which the two men were photographed, for it suddenly occurred to him that they might just as easily have been executed somewhere else. The shapes on the stretchers were merely shapes, and it was easy enough to spill blood on a floor, any floor. He stopped himself there, realizing that he was entering the land of paranoia: it would, after all, have been far easier for them to track down the two men and follow them to where they were hiding. It required far less scene-setting than the other scenario. Besides, only those who broke into the apartment need know what had happened there.
Inside his office, Brunetti went to the battered wardrobe against the far wall and pulled down the metal box in which he kept his service revolver. He placed it on his desk and unlocked it, then took out the cloth-covered wooden head.
He unwrapped it and set it upright on his desk, but the splintered pieces of the neck caused it to fall over and roll to one side. He took it in his hand and studied the face. Though there was no trace of a smile, the head nevertheless gave a sense of peace and well-being. The smooth finish reflected the light. He placed a finger on the pattern carved into the forehead and followed the zigzag until it returned, unbroken, to the point where it had begun.
‘Chokwe,’ Brunetti said, trying to pronounce the word as Professoressa Winter had.
After some time, he replaced the figure in its cloth, slipped it back in the box, and put the box back on to the top shelf of the closet. Then he went home.
For two days, Brunetti neither discussed the case, nor allowed himself to think about it at any conscious level. To his colleagues, he seemed abstracted, but they paid little attention.
On the morning of the third day, a Saturday, his father-in-law called him at home early enough to wake him up.
‘Guido,’ the Count began, ‘have you been out to get the papers yet?’
‘No,’ said a befuddled Brunetti.
‘Then I suggest you do so. Get Il Sole 24 Ore and look at the short piece at the bottom of page eleven. It might answer some questions for you.’ Before Brunetti could ask for any explanation, the Count was gone.
Paola remained inert beneath the covers. Brunetti got up and did as he was told, but on the way back from the news-stand he stopped and bought a package of pastries and took them home with him. He put them on the counter in the kitchen and made coffee, perversely delaying the process of opening the paper and reading whatever it was the Count wanted him to see. When his coffee was ready, he sat at the table, glanced at the black headlines against the orange, and opened the newspaper to page eleven.
Two single-column articles, each of about fifteen centimetres, stood among the ads at the bottom of the page. The first carried the headline, UBS LAYS OFF SIX HUNDRED EMPLOYEES IN RESTRUCTURING: Brunetti did not bother to read any further.
The second read, MILAN CONSORTIUM SIGNS AFRICAN MINERAL RIGHTS AGREEMENT. Brunetti set down his coffee and pulled the paper closer. The article reported that a group of Milanese mineral and oil exploration companies had signed a ten-year contract with the government of Angola, which granted them exclusive rights to all exploration and future mining of ‘extractive materials and products’ in the eastern part of the former Portuguese colony. This agreement was made possible, the article explained, by the recent sweeping victories of government forces in the decades-old civil war against insurgents of the Lunda and Chokwe tribes. It was hoped that the disappearance of the leader of the rebel movement, presumably in recent fighting, would contribute to the restoration of peace in the region, which had for more than a decade been the scene of rebel massacres.
Giorgio Mufatti, senior Vice-President of the conglomerate, said in an interview that the contract would create at least five hundred jobs for European employees of the contract-winning companies and at least twice that many for the local population. ‘These jobs will help restore peace to this war-ravaged nation,’ said Mufatti.
Dottor Mufatti praised the aid and encouragement given the project by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, whose ‘assistance to and close ties with the legitimate government of Angola have been instrumental in winning this contract for an Italian company’.
Details of the terms of the deal were not yet available, but it was hoped that exploration would begin with the end of the spring rains.
He looked up as Paola came into the kitchen, still drugged with sleep. She wiped her face with both hands and looked across the room at him. ‘Did the phone ring earlier?’ she asked, moving to the sink to make fresh coffee.
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘Who was it?’ she asked.
‘Oh, nothing,’ he answered. ‘A wrong number.’
She moved much in the manner of a robot, filling the pot with water, spooning in the coffee, screwing the top back on. While she moved about, he closed the newspaper and set it aside, then opened the Gazzettino. She came and stood behind him, resting her elbows on his shoulders. ‘Why are you up so early?’
‘I don’t know. Couldn’t sleep.’
She saw the package on the counter and went over and opened it. ‘Guido,’ she said, ‘you are a saint.’
The coffee boiled up, and she poured it into a cup, then added some of the hot milk he had left on the back of the stove. She came and sat beside him.
She sipped at her coffee, sipped again, then asked, ‘Who was it that called?’
‘Your father,’ he answered, wondering why he was, after all these years, still such a transparent liar.
‘What for, so early?’
‘To give me some information about the black man.’
‘Ah. Did it help?’
‘I think so, yes.’
‘How?’
‘It showed me who he might have been and why he was killed.’
She sipped again. ‘And?’ she asked.
‘And Patta was right: there’s nothing to be done about it.’
‘Nothing?’ she asked in honest surprise.
He shook his head.
After a long time, Paola asked, ‘What about the diamonds?’
Her question startled Brunetti, who had forgotten about them entirely. ‘They’re in a bank,’ he said.
‘I should hope so. But what will you do with them?’
He picked up his cup and found it empty, but he didn’t want to go to the bother of making more coffee. The man who had had the stones was dead, and it seemed the cause they were perhaps meant to aid was lost. They lay in a bank, inert, without real value until someone placed it on them. ‘I don’t know,’ he admitted.
‘What do you want to do?’ Paola asked.
‘About the diamonds?’
‘No, about today.’
When she spoke, Brunetti realized that, though he had walked down to Sant’ Aponal an hour ago, he had paid no attention to the day. He looked out of the window, towards the mountains, and when he saw them in the distance, he realized the day was clear. ‘I’d like to walk down to Sant’Elena and then go out to Lido and take a walk on the beach,’ he said.
‘A purification ritual?’ she asked with her first smile.
He shrugged. They remained silent for some time until Brunetti said, ‘If Claudio s
old them, Don Alvise could see that the money got to people who need help.’
‘It’s better than keeping them in the bank,’ Paola said.
‘And it’s better than what the money was supposed to be used for,’ Brunetti said, but instantly added, ‘I think.’
His mood suddenly lightened and he got to his feet to make more coffee. He paused and looked out of the window again, at the distant mountains, covered with snow now: pure, aloof, eternally unconcerned with the lusts and desires of men. ‘I’ll wait for you to get dressed,’ he said. ‘And then we’ll go for a walk.’
ALSO AVAILABLE IN WILLIAM HEINEMANN
Suffer the Little Children
Donna Leon
When Commissario Brunetti is summoned to the hospital bedside of a senior pediatrician whose skull has been fractured, he is confronted with more questions than answers. Three men – a Carabinieri captain and two privates from out of town – have burst into the doctor’s apartment in the middle of the night, attacked him and taken away his eighteen-month old baby. What can have motivated such a violent assault by the police?
But then Brunetti begins to uncover a story of infertility, desperation, and an underworld in which babies can be bought for cash, at the same time as Inspector Vianello uncovers a money-making scam between pharmacists and doctors in the city. But one of the pharmacists is motivated by more than thoughts of gain – the power of knowledge and delusions of moral rectitude can be as destructive and powerful as love of money. And the uses of information about one’s neighbours can lead to all kinds of corruption and all sorts of pain . . .
Praise for Donna Leon:
‘Through A Glass, Darkly, like all her work, has the exuberance of a Puccini opera.’ Independent
‘A joy from start to finish.’
Evening Standard
ALSO AVAILABLE IN ARROW
Friends in High Places
Donna Leon
When Commissario Guido Brunetti is visited by a young bureaucrat investigating the lack of official approval for the building of his apartment years earlier, his first reaction, like any other Venetian, is to think of whom he knows who might bring pressure to bear on the relevant government department. But when the bureaucrat rings Brunetti at work, clearly scared, and is then found dead after a fall from scaffolding; something is obviously going on that has implications greater than the fate of Brunetti’s apartment . . .
‘Leon tells the story as if she loves Venice as much as her detective does, warts and all. The plot and subplots unfold elegantly; beauty and the beast march hand in hand, and the result is rich entertainment.’
Sunday Times
‘All Donna Leon’s novels are excellent in their evocation of place, whilst in Brunetti she has created a character, who becomes more real in each book . . . However, Friends in High Places is by far the best and makes a quantum leap forward.’
Evening Standard
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