Earthly Remains

by Donna Leon

  Griffoni let out a guffaw and immediately slapped her hand over her mouth. ‘I’m sorry, Commissario. I wasn’t thinking,’ she said, her voice partially muffled by her fingers. She turned her head to face Bianchi when she added, ‘I shouldn’t have laughed.’

  Brunetti had been looking at Bianchi when she made the noise and had seen tension flee from his face at her words.

  In a sober voice, Bianchi asked, ‘And if you find nothing?’

  ‘Then I could at least reassure your friend’s daughter that it was an accident.’

  Bianchi nodded a few times, then said, his voice struggling against what sounded like anger, ‘It wouldn’t be the first one.’ Brunetti decided not to respond and held a hand up to stop Griffoni from speaking.

  After a very long time, Bianchi asked, ‘Did he tell you it was his fault?’

  Brunetti tried to think of an answer that would disguise his ignorance yet make it sound as though Casati might have told him. ‘He said that he acted without considering the consequences of what he did,’ Brunetti began, watching Bianchi’s face. When he saw the old man’s lips tighten and his nostrils flare, he went on as though he’d only paused to find the right words to finish his sentence. ‘He didn’t want to say more than that.’

  ‘No, he wouldn’t, would he?’ The anger had grown more audible, no matter how hard Bianchi seemed to struggle against it.

  ‘Why not?’ Griffoni interrupted to ask, sounding honestly puzzled.

  ‘He didn’t consider the consequences of what he did?’ Bianchi repeated rhetorically, outrage finally unleashed to streak through his voice. ‘Of course he didn’t, the fool.’ Because his eyes were hidden behind his dark glasses, only his voice and the mouth that spoke the words conveyed his feelings. The voice had grown rough and loud, and his left cheek was flushed almost as red as the scar above it. His good hand abandoned the stump and tightened into a fist.

  ‘Did he tell you he smoked a cigarette in a place where it was forbidden?’ Bianchi began but stopped immediately as though that were enough.

  Before Brunetti could answer, Griffoni said, ‘I’m afraid I don’t understand, Signore. What happened?’

  ‘He tripped,’ Bianchi answered, turning towards her. ‘We were in an area where barrels were stored. Some of them had leaked, but we didn’t know that. We were supposed to roll them out to the trucks and boats, but Casati wanted a cigarette, so he stopped to light one.’

  On the last words, Bianchi’s voice veered out of control. He brought his good hand up, wiped the spittle from his mouth and rubbed it on the knee of his slacks. Brunetti saw a tremor run from his shoulders, down his arms to his two hands.

  Bianchi took a few deep breaths and went on in a calmer voice. ‘I tried to stop him, but he told me to leave him alone. He lit the cigarette.’ As he said this, Bianchi’s left hand moved as though he were trying to hold the cigarette while his right struck the match. ‘Then he had to show me what a wise guy he was, so he put his head back and blew a line of smoke rings.’

  Bianchi stared ahead, facing the past. ‘There was a piece of pipe or hose on the floor, half covered in liquid, but he didn’t see it. He stepped on it and it moved, must have rolled under his foot.’ Bianchi raised his head, and if he could have seen, he would have been looking at the ceiling. ‘That’s when he fell. He must have dropped his cigarette because, all of a sudden, he was on the floor and there was this line of light moving away from him. Towards the barrels.’

  Bianchi pulled his attention back from the ceiling and returned to facing forward, straight between Griffoni and Brunetti. ‘That’s what I saw, that line of light, and then there was an explosion and heat and more light and then I didn’t see anything any more.’ He lowered his head and used the fingers of his left hand to rub delicately at the skin on the back of the other, reduced hand.

  Silence descended on the gazebo and expanded until they heard a clicking noise on the steps. Bardo had returned. This time he ignored both Griffoni and Brunetti and, as though sensing Bianchi’s need, put his front paws on his knees and hopped on to his lap. He danced a few circles then settled comfortably and dropped his head on to his paws, eyes on Brunetti. Bianchi’s good hand went to the dog’s neck and began to scratch it gently.

  ‘How did you get out?’ Griffoni dared to ask.

  Bianchi’s hand stopped moving; Bardo turned his head and licked it back into motion. ‘Davide carried me out of the warehouse before it burned down,’ he said, his voice suddenly calm, almost solemn. ‘I didn’t know that until later. Weeks. They took me to the hospital. All I remember from that time is the pain. And the darkness.’

  ‘How did you find out about what he did?’ Brunetti asked.

  ‘Someone from the company came to see me. He asked if I remembered what had happened to cause the fire. I said I didn’t.’

  ‘He did that to you and you lied for him?’ Griffoni interrupted, making no attempt to disguise her astonishment.

  Bianchi’s chicken-like shoulders pushed the material of his jacket up, then let it drop back into place. With his index finger, he tapped Bardo on the top of the head a few times and asked the dog, ‘He was a friend, wasn’t he, Bardo? And you can’t drop your friends in the shit, no matter what they’ve done, can you?’

  The dog turned his head and licked at Bianchi’s hand again, this time in agreement. Head still lowered to the dog, he went on, ‘That’s when they told me it was Davide who had got me out of the building and that he’d been hurt. A lot of people saw him coming out of the warehouse, carrying me in his arms like a child. That’s what they said. That’s when more barrels inside began to explode, the ones with flammable waste, and …’ He stopped. ‘I have some scars on my legs. It burned through the cloth.’

  Bardo began to snore, a remarkably peaceful sound. The three of them sat there silently for a long time, listening to the smooth sound of the dog’s breath.

  ‘When did you speak to him again?’ Brunetti asked.

  ‘Not for months. He called me. I was still in the eye hospital in Padova. He called me and asked me if I’d talk to him.’

  ‘What did you tell him?’ Brunetti asked.

  Bianchi turned his face towards Brunetti, who saw the man’s brow furrow, as though he didn’t, or couldn’t, understand the question.

  ‘I said of course I’d talk to him,’ Bianchi said, and nodded at the simplicity of it.

  ‘Why?’ Griffoni asked.

  The sunglasses turned to face her. ‘I told you. Because he was my friend.’

  25

  ‘Of course,’ Griffoni sighed. Brunetti remembered that she was Neapolitan and so might understand this more profoundly than many other people, or might be quicker to sense the unease in Bianchi’s voice. ‘And you remained friends?’

  ‘We spoke last Sunday,’ Bianchi said. ‘The way we did every Sunday.’

  Brunetti quelled his impulse to catch Griffoni’s eye. From the beginning of his career, he had schooled himself to disguise his reaction to what he was told or what he saw, and so, even now, when there was no chance that Bianchi would gain an advantage by seeing Brunetti’s response, he pressed against it and kept it from his face or voice.

  ’The way we did every Sunday,’ Brunetti repeated to himself. Well, that was a lie, wasn’t it? But why would he bother to tell it to the police? And in what way was it related to the lie about his being kept hungry here?

  Brunetti’s thoughts turned to one of the old sayings popular with his mother and her friends: ‘Non c’è due senza tre.’ ‘There are never two without three.’ Bianchi had told them at least two lies already; what would the next one be?

  ‘Why are you telling us what he did to cause the fire?’ Brunetti asked, quite as though he believed the story.

  Bianchi gave a slight shrug of one shoulder. ‘It doesn’t matter any more, does it? Now that Davide’s dead.’

  Hoping that Bianchi would not sense his suspicions, Brunetti turned towards him, and was prepared to offer some bromide when
Griffoni held up a hand to silence him and said, ‘How fortunate you are to have had a friendship that lasted so long, Signore.’

  Bianchi lowered his head but had nothing to say, either to them or to the dog.

  ‘And how fortunate to be able to stay in a place like this. It’s so lovely.’ Ah, the woman was a snake, undulant and sly and very dangerous. ‘My grandmother was in a home for years, but it was nothing like this.’ Then, before Bianchi could speak, she said, raising her voice minimally, ‘Not that the place where she was had anything wrong with it. Not at all. It’s just that this is so … oh, I don’t know the right word. Elegant?’

  Bianchi raised his head and, with a weak smile, said, ‘I’m afraid I’m not able to see that, Signora.’

  Hearing Bianchi’s remark and seeing the expression of silent long-suffering he put upon his face, Brunetti realized that he was watching a chess game, played by masters. He thought of the chief tourist attraction of Marostica, a game of chess with humans costumed as the various pieces, played on giant squares in the medieval city centre. That game, however, was played out with identical moves every two years: here, each move was made in response to that of the adversary, and there was no question that they had become adversaries, Bianchi and Griffoni.

  ‘How is it that you come to be in such a place, Signor Bianchi?’ she insisted, voice dripping with wonder and admiration.

  ‘It’s what the insurance company suggested,’ he answered. ‘And, as I said, it doesn’t make much of a difference to me, anyway. I can’t see what the other people tell me about: the roses, the paintings, the fresh uniforms.’ To a man with his disability, he left it to them to infer, they were meaningless frivolities, completely foreign to the poor victim of eternal darkness.

  Brunetti watched Bianchi’s mouth contract, as though he were trying to decide on his next move or if the last one had been correct. As Brunetti watched, Bianchi gave a tiny nod and said, ‘Even the food, which everyone tells me is so good, tastes different if you can’t see what you’re eating.’ He raised his hands in a gesture of acceptance, as though to emphasize that he spoke reluctantly, like someone forced to tell the truth about a party everyone else had enjoyed. At least he didn’t tell them he was always hungry.

  ‘Ah, that’s too bad,’ she sighed. ‘But I can assure you that everything is perfect; it couldn’t be lovelier, and the garden is a marvel.’ Like every good actress, she continued the scene even as she prepared to step offstage and, sweet-voiced, asked Brunetti, ‘Wouldn’t you say so, Commissario?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ Brunetti affirmed and then immediately asked, ‘And which insurance company is that, Signor Bianchi?’

  ‘Surely you don’t expect me to remember that after all this time,’ Bianchi said, allowing irritation to sift into his voice.

  ‘I’m sure the accounting office here could give me their name,’ Brunetti said, wondering if his easy certainty would make Bianchi squirm. Though the man gave no sign of being disturbed by Brunetti’s remark, Bardo suddenly raised his head, opened his eyes, and whined, as though he’d been disturbed in his sleep.

  Griffoni looked at Brunetti and raised her eyebrows.

  ‘You said you spoke to Signor Casati every Sunday, Signore,’ Brunetti began. ‘Did he say anything to you recently that might have suggested that he was worried about something, the way his daughter said he was?’

  Bianchi put his hand on the dog’s head and patted it to calm him. Bardo lowered his head to Bianchi’s knees and closed his eyes again. ‘No, nothing that I recall.’

  ‘Do you remember what you talked about the last time you spoke?’

  Bianchi made a light, chuckling sound. ‘Probably about football. Davide was mad for it.’

  Brunetti injected some testosterone into his voice and said, ‘And last Saturday Inter wiped the floor with Pescara, so if he was an Inter fan, he would have been especially excited.’

  ‘Yes, that’s what he talked about,’ Bianchi said, sounding distressed. ‘He always forgot how little I care about it now.’

  As if in apology for his own enthusiasm, Brunetti said, ‘I think we all get a little carried away when there’s a victory like that: seven/zero. I can’t remember the last time Pescara was beaten that badly.’ He put a great deal of self-satisfied triumph into his last sentence.

  ‘Yes, that’s pretty much what Davide said.’

  ‘Commissario,’ Griffoni interrupted, ‘I hardly think Signor Bianchi needs to listen to the football news again. Or,’ she said, putting her hand on Bardo’s neck and giving a small tickle, ‘piccolo Bardo, either.’

  ‘Oh,’ Bianchi said, smiling, ‘He doesn’t know he’s small.’ Then, turning his head towards the wall, he added, ‘He’s not small to me.’

  Brunetti got to his feet and, looking down at the claw that rested on Bardo’s back, decided not to try to shake hands with Bianchi again. ‘I’d like to thank you for your time, Signor Bianchi.’ He stopped there, not telling the other man whether he had been helpful or not.

  Griffoni stood and said much the same thing, then bent down and patted Bardo on the head a few times as a way of saying farewell to both of them.

  They went down the steps and crossed the space between the gazebo and the main building, both of them suddenly aware of the heat, which the shade and the plants inside the gazebo had lessened. ‘Well?’ Brunetti asked.

  ‘Nice invention,’ Griffoni said.

  ‘What?’ Brunetti asked, complimented but still embarrassed.

  ‘The football game. Inter and Pescara play in different leagues; any idiot knows that. Even I do. Anyone does, even if all they do is read headlines.’

  ‘Well, he doesn’t read them or have them read to him, does he?’

  ‘Apparently not, but apart from this he wanted us to believe Casati still called him on Sunday, and they chatted like old friends.’ She stopped, and turned to Brunetti to say, ‘Why would he do that?’

  They started walking again, and at the main building, Brunetti held open the door to allow Griffoni to pass in ahead of him. Just inside, he paused, and when she turned to look at him, Brunetti said, ‘Isn’t it strange, the way we’re so willing to assume that what handicapped people tell us is true? As if their suffering had made them honest.’

  ‘You don’t think it does?’ she asked.

  ‘Is he honest?’ Brunetti asked with a flick of his head in the direction of the gazebo.

  ‘I doubt it,’ Griffoni said. ‘But he loves his dog.’

  Brunetti stared at her as if she had tried to interest him in a copy of The Watchtower. ‘I beg your pardon,’ he said.

  ‘He’s been blind all these years, and yet he can still love his dog.’

  ‘It seems very little to me,’ Brunetti said and turned away, starting back towards the main entrance, where he hoped to find Signora Segalin in her office.

  Behind him he heard Griffoni’s steps and then her voice: ‘It’s still something.’

  Signora Segalin’s eyes blinked out her delight in seeing them, these kind people who had come to visit Signor Bianchi. Without giving any explanation of why they wanted the information or with what authority they requested it, Brunetti managed to be given copies of the receipts for payment of Signor Bianchi’s bills for the last year.

  Casually, he slipped the folder under his arm, as if this were a mere formality, and shook hands with Signora Segalin, thanking her for all her help. She accompanied them to the door, where their car and driver awaited them. Signora Segalin seemed to give this no special importance: perhaps she was accustomed to guests who arrived in cars with drivers.

  Beyond the gates, they turned on to the state highway and returned to the real world. ‘But I still think he’s manipulative and dishonest,’ Griffoni said, as if she were finally completing her last sentence.

  Brunetti smiled and opened the file that lay on his lap.

  ‘Who pays them?’ she asked.

  ‘GCM Holdings,’ he answered.

  ‘Never heard of it.’<
br />
  ‘Me neither,’ Brunetti said. He pulled out his phone.

  ‘Who are they?’

  Brunetti pressed in one of the autodial numbers; both of them heard it ringing.

  ‘Who are they?’ Griffoni repeated; perhaps he had not heard her.

  He turned aside from the phone and said, ‘We’ll know when we get back.’

  The phone clicked, and a woman’s voice said, ‘Ah, Commissario, how can I help you?’

  26

  And so it was. They went directly to Signorina Elettra’s office from the boat and found her – it must be said – preening. A number of papers lay on her desk.

  ‘Casati’s employer?’ Brunetti asked when they entered, nodding in the direction of the papers.

  ‘Sì, Signore, in a way,’ she said with an easy smile. ‘In its current incarnation, it’s a construction company, owned by Gianclaudio Maschietto.’ She nodded towards the screen. ‘There’s more.’

  Brunetti thought he had read the name of the owner, a successful entrepreneur in the north-east. ‘I know his name, but that’s all.’ A whiff of memory came, and he added, ‘Something about a church?’ He glanced aside at Griffoni. ‘You, Claudia? Anything?’

  She tilted her head and stared at the wall. ‘No. Not even the name.’

  Signorina Elettra nodded to confirm his memory. ‘I’ve made you each a copy of what I found. If you’d like to read it, I’ll make some calls.’

  ‘To friends?’ Brunetti asked.

  ‘To friends,’ she assented.

  ‘Come on, Claudia,’ Brunetti said and picked up the papers. Seeing how many there were, he suggested they go to his office to read them and leave Signorina Elettra to get on with her work.

  The windows of his office had been closed for some time, and it took Brunetti a moment to decide whether it would be better to leave them closed or to let the air into the room. The windows faced east; he pulled them open and was enveloped in a Saharan wave of desiccated air.

  Well, it was done, and at least the air had a whiff of the sea. He passed one set of papers to Griffoni and went behind his desk, removed his jacket, and sat.