by Donna Leon
'Pucetti’ Brunetti said as he reached the desk, 'have you seen Vianello?'
At the sound of his name, Pucetti looked up from the papers, but it took him a few seconds to tear his attention away from them; he pushed his chair back and got to his feet. 'Excuse me, Commissario, I didn't hear you,' he said. His right hand still grasped the papers, so he was prevented from saluting. To compensate, he stood as straight as he could.
'Vianello,' Brunetti said and smiled. 'I'm looking for him.'
He watched Pucetti's eyes and saw him force himself to recall who Vianello was. Then Pucetti said, 'He was here before.' He looked around the office, as if curious to discover where he found himself. 'But he must have gone out.'
Brunetti let almost a full minute pass, and during that time he watched Pucetti return from the land where interrogation techniques were discussed with cold dispassion—if, in fact, that was the subject that had so fully captured the attention of the young man.
When he had Pucetti's full attention, Brunetti said, 'Lieutenant Scarpa asked me about a folder he had, dealing with a Hungarian woman named Mary Dox. Do you have any idea what this is about?'
Pucetti's face registered comprehension and he said, 'He came in here this morning, sir, asking about the same woman. He wanted to know if any of us knew about her case.'
'And?'
'And no one did.'
Aware of the uniformed staff's opinion of the lieutenant, Brunetti asked, 'No one did or no one said they did?'
'No one did, sir. We talked about it after he left, and no one knew what he was talking about.'
'Is this where Vianello's gone?'
'I don't think so. He didn't know anything, either. My guess is that he's just gone down to get a coffee.'
Brunetti thanked him and told him to continue with his reading, to which Pucetti did not respond.
At the bar near Ponte dei Greci, Brunetti found Vianello at the counter, a glass of wine in front of him as he leafed through that day's paper.
'What did Scarpa want?' Brunetti asked as he came in. He asked the barman for a coffee.
Vianello folded the newspaper and moved it to one side of the bar. 'I've no idea,' he answered. 'Whatever it is, or whoever she is, it's trouble. I've never seen him so angry.'
'No idea?' Brunetti asked, nodding his thanks to the barman as he set down the coffee.
'None’ Vianello answered.
Brunetti stirred in sugar and drank half the coffee, then finished it. 'You read these regulations from the Ministry of the Interior?' he asked Vianello.
'I never read their directives,' Vianello said and took a sip of his wine. 'I used to, but I don't care about them any more.'
'Why?'
'They never say anything much: just words, words all tortured so as to sound good while justifying the fact that they really don't want to achieve anything.'
'Anything about what?' Brunetti asked.
'You ever been sent to ask one of the Chinese where the cash came from to buy his bar? You ever been asked to check the work permits of the people who work in those bars? You ever been sent out to close down a factory that got caught dumping its garbage in a national forest?'
What struck Brunetti was not the subject of Vianello's questions—questions that floated around the Questura like lint in a shirt factory— but the cool dispassion with which he asked them. 'You don't sound like you care much’ he observed.
'About this woman Scarpa wants to know about?' Vianello asked. 'No, I don't.'
That made quite a list of things Vianello didn't care much about this morning. 'I'll see you after lunch’ Brunetti said and left, heading home.
On the kitchen table, he found a note from Paola, saying she had to meet one of the students whose doctoral work she was overseeing but that there was lasagne in the oven. The kids would not be home, and a salad was in the refrigerator: all he had to do was add oil and vinegar. Just as Brunetti was preparing to start grumbling his way through lunch—having come halfway across the city, only to be deprived of the company of his family, forced to eat heated-up things from the oven, probably made with some sort of pre-packaged whatever and that disgusting orange American cheese for all he knew—he saw the last line of Paola's note: 'Stop sulking. It's your mother's recipe and you love it.'
Left to eat alone, Brunetti's first concern was to find the right thing to read. A magazine would be right, but he had already finished that week's Espresso. A newspaper took up too much space on the table. A paperback book could never be forced to stay open, not without breaking the binding completely, which would later cause the pages to fall out. Art books, which were surely big enough, suffered from oil stains. He compromised by going into the bedroom and taking from his bedside Gibbon, whose style forced him to read in translation.
He took out the lasagne, cut it and put a chunk on a plate. He poured a glass of pinot grigio then opened Gibbon to his place and propped it up against two books Paola had left on the table. He employed a cutting board and a serving spoon to hold the pages open on both sides. Satisfied with the arrangement, he sat down and started to eat.
Brunetti found himself back in the court of the Emperor Heliogabalus, one of his favorite monsters. Ah, the excess of it, the violence, the utter corruption of everything and everyone. The lasagne had layers of ham and thin slices of artichoke hearts interleaved with layers of pasta that he suspected might have been home made. He would have preferred more artichokes. He shared his table with decapitated senators, evil counsellors, barbarians bent on the destruction of the empire. He took a sip of wine and ate another bite of lasagne.
The Emperor appeared, arrayed like the sun itself. All hailed him, his glory, and his gracious-ness. The court was splendid and excessive, a place where, as Gibbon observed, 'a capricious prodigality supplied the want of taste and elegance'. Brunetti set his fork down, the better to savour both the lasagne and Gibbon's description.
He got up and took the salad, poured in oil and vinegar and sprinkled in some salt. He ate from the bowl, as Heliogabalus died under the swords of his guards.
On the way back to the Questura, Brunetti stopped for a coffee and pastry at Ballarin, then arrived just in time to meet Signorina Elettra at the front entrance.
After they exchanged greetings, Brunetti said, "There's something I'd like you to try and check for me, Signorina.'
'Of course’ she said encouragingly, 'if I can.'
'De Cal's medical records’ he said. 'His daughter said he had a doctor's appointment this afternoon, and a number of people have commented on his health. I wondered if there's reason for, well, for preoccupation.'
"That shouldn't be at all difficult, sir’ she said, pausing at the beginning of the second flight of steps. 'Anything else?'
If anyone could find out, it was she. 'Yes, there's one thing. Lieutenant Scarpa has been asking if anyone knows anything about a foreign woman, and I wondered if he's spoken to you.'
She looked frankly puzzled and said, 'No. He hasn't said a word. Who's the poor person?'
'A Hungarian woman’ Brunetti said. 'Mary Dox.'
'What?' she demanded sharply, coming to a halt. 'What did you say?'
'Mary Dox’ explained a puzzled Brunetti. 'He asked me, and it seems he went into the officers' room this morning to ask them if they knew anything about her.'
'Did he say what he wanted?' she asked, her voice calmer.
'No, not that I know of. When I saw him, he had a folder in his hand.' As he talked, the memory surfaced and he said, 'It looked like one of our files.' He hoped she would volunteer whatever information she had, but when she remained silent, he asked, 'Do you know her?'
After a pause he could describe only as speculative, she said, 'Yes, 1 do.' Her eyes shifted into long focus, as if the reason for Scarpa's curiosity might be found on the far wall. 'She's my father's cleaning woman.'
'The one you spoke to the Vice-Questore about?'
'Yes.'
'Did you give him her name?' Brunetti a
sked.
'Yes, I did, and the file number.'
'You think he could have passed them on to Scarpa and asked him to find out about her?'
'Possibly’ she said. 'But I left the information on his desk, so anyone could have seen it.'
'But why would Scarpa start asking about her unless Patta told him to do so?'
'I've no idea,' she said. She smiled and tried to dismiss the unease provoked by the idea that Scarpa was involved in something that concerned her, however tangentially. 'I'll ask the Vice-Questore if he needs any other information about her.'
'I'm sure that's what it is’ Brunetti—who wasn't—said.
'Yes, thank you’ she answered. 'I'll go and have a look for the medical records, shall I?'
'Yes’ Brunetti said, leaving her, and went back to his office, his mind a jumble of Scarpa, Heliogabalus, and the mysterious Mary Dox.
14
Most people dread middle of the night phone calls for their presage of loss or violence or death. The certainty that one's family is sleeping peacefully nearby in no way diminishes the alarm; it merely directs it towards other people. Thus Brunetti's fear was no less sharp when his phone rang a little after five the following morning.
'Commissario Brunetti?' inquired a voice he recognized as Alvise's. Had the call reached him at home at any other time of day, Brunetti would have asked the officer what man he expected to find answering the phone at his home, but it was too early for sarcasm: it was always too early for anything other than the literal with Alvise.
'Yes. What is it?'
'We just had a call from someone on Murano.' Alvise stopped, as if to suggest that this information was sufficient.
'What about, Alvise?'
'He found a dead man, sir.'
'Who?'
'He didn't say who he was, sir, just that he was calling from Murano.'
'Did he say who the dead man was, Alvise?' Brunetti asked as sleepiness retreated, to be supplanted by the careful, plodding patience one had always to use with Alvise.
'No, sir.'
'Did he say where he was?' Brunetti asked.
'Where he works, sir.'
'Where is that, Alvise?'
'At a fornace, sir.'
'Which one?'
'I think he said De Cal, sir. I didn't have a pen. Anyway, it's on Sacca Serenella.'
Brunetti pushed back the covers and sat up. He got out of bed and looked at Paola, who had one eye open and was looking at him. 'I'll be at the end of the calle in twenty minutes’ Brunetti said. 'Send a launch.' Before Alvise could begin to explain why this would be difficult, Brunetti cut him off by saying, 'If we don't have one, call the Carabinieri, and if they can't come, call me a taxi.' He replaced the phone.
'Dead man?' Paola asked.
'On Murano’ he said, glancing out the window to see what sort of promise the day might hold.
When he looked back at her, her eyes were closed, and the thought struck him that she had fallen asleep. But before disappointment could register, she opened her eyes again and said, 'God, what a terrible job you do, Guido.'
He ignored the remark and went into the bathroom.
When he emerged, shaved and showered, the bed was empty, and he smelled fresh coffee. He dressed, remembering to put on heavy shoes in case he was going to spend time in the fornace, then went down to the kitchen and found her seated at the table, a small cup of coffee in front of her and a large cup of coffee with milk ready for him.
'There's sugar in it already’ she said as he reached for it. He studied his wife of more than twenty years, conscious that something was wrong with her but unable to recognize what it was. He studied her and she looked back at him, smiling quizzically.
'What's wrong?' Paola asked.
The fact that she had heard him say someone was dead should have been enough, but he continued to study her, trying to figure it out. Finally he saw it and blurted out, 'You're not reading.' There was no book, no newspaper, no magazine in front of her: she simply sat there, drinking her coffee and, it seemed, waiting for him.
I'll make more coffee when you're gone and go back to bed and read until the kids are up’ she said. Order returned to Brunetti's universe. He finished his coffee, kissed Paola, and said he had no idea when he'd be home but would call when he knew.
When he turned into the calle that led to the canal, the silence told him that the boat had not arrived. If he had given the order to anyone but Alvise, Brunetti would have thought this nothing but a short delay; as it was, he wondered if he would end up having to call a taxi. Occupied with these thoughts, he reached the edge of the canal and looked to the right. And saw what he had seen only in photos taken in the early part of the last century: the mirror-smooth waters of the Grand Canal. Not a ripple stirred the surface, no boats passed, not a puff of wind, no gulls paddled around. He stood transfixed and looked on what his ancestors had seen: the same light, the same facades, the same windows and plants, and the same vital silence. And, as far as he could distinguish the reflections, it all existed in double.
He heard the drone of the boat's approaching motor, and then it swept around the curve in front of the university and headed towards him. As it came, it destroyed the stillness ahead of it and left in its wake those many wavelets that, minutes after it passed, would still be splashing against the steps of the palazzi on both sides of the canal.
Brunetti saw Foa at the wheel and raised a hand in greeting. The pilot slid the launch towards the twin pilings, slipped the motor into reverse, and glided up to the dock with a touch as gentle as a kiss. Brunetti stepped aboard, wished the pilot good morning, and asked him to take him to the De Cal factory on Sacca Serenella.
Foa, like most pilots, had the grace of silence and did nothing more than nod to acknowledge Brunetti's request. He seemed to feel no need to fill up the journey with words. By the time they reached Rialto, the broad-beamed boats that hauled produce to the market had turned the stillness into memory. Foa swung into Rio dei SS Apostoli and directly past the palazzo in which some distant ancestor of Paola's had lived before being beheaded for treason. They shot out into the laguna where the first thing Brunetti saw, off to the right, were the walls of the cemetery and, behind it, banks of clouds scuttling towards the city.
He turned away deliberately and faced Murano, stood with the warmth of spring on his body; the boat swung past the island then slipped around to the right and into the Serenella Canal. Brunetti glanced at his watch and saw that it was barely six o'clock. Foa made another silk-smooth landing, and Brunetti stepped up onto the ACTV embarcadero.
'You can go back,' he told the pilot. 'And thanks.'
'Do you mind if I try to find a coffee and then come back and wait for you, Commissario?' Foa asked. He did not explain his reluctance to return to the Questura; somehow, Brunetti suspected it had nothing to do with not wanting to work.
'What you could do,' Brunetti said, 'is call Vianello at home and then go and get him and bring him here.' Brunetti had been too dulled by sleep and then distracted by the inevitable irritation of having to deal with Alvise to have thought of calling Vianello, but he would prefer to have the Inspector here with him.
Foa raised his hand minimally and smiled. Brunetti barely saw the pilot's hands move, but the boat swung away from the dock in a tight U, and then Foa gunned the motor, forcing the prow up above the water as he sped away in a straight line towards the city.
Brunetti turned into the field and followed the cement path towards the factory in the background. It came to him then that he had not thought to tell Alvise to send the crime squad. 'Maria Vergine,' he exclaimed aloud, taking out his telefonino. He dialled the central number of the Questura and spent a few minutes learning that, yes, a crime scene team had been requested: they were waiting for the photographer and would leave as soon as he arrived.
Brunetti hung up, wondering how long it would take them to get out to Murano. He continued towards the building, and as he drew close, he saw two men stan
ding outside the sliding metal doors. They stood side by side, but they were not talking, nor did it seem they had broken off conversation when they saw him approach.
He recognized one of them as the maestro he had seen making the vase—had it been only two days before? Close to him, Brunetti only now noticed the deep acne scars on both his cheeks. The other man might have been any of the ones who had been working with or around him.
They glanced over at Brunetti and kept their eyes on him as he approached. Neither gave any sign that they had seen him before. As he drew up to them, Brunetti said, 'I'm Commissario Brunetti, from the police. Someone called to report finding a dead man.' He raised his voice at the end of this, turning it into a question.
The maestro turned and looked at the other man, who gave Brunetti an agonized glance and then looked at the ground, exposing the top of his head. Brunetti saw how sparse his hair was and how shiny the scalp beneath it.
'Was it you who found him, Signore?' he asked the top of the man's head.
The maestro held up an admonitory hand to catch Brunetti's attention. He raised one finger and waved it back and forth to silence Brunetti, then shook his head in the same rhythm, pointing at the other man. Before Brunetti could speak, the maestro placed his hand on the other man's sleeve and pulled him gently aside. Together they walked a metre or two away from Brunetti.
After a moment, the maestro came back. 'Don't ask him,' he said in a barely audible voice. 'He can't go back in there again.'
Brunetti wondered if the other man's guilt was preventing him from returning to the scene of the crime, but then he sensed the real fear and compassion that led the maestro to try to protect his friend. In the face of Brunetti's continuing silence, the maestro said, 'Really, Commissario, he can't. You can't do that to him.'
In what he hoped was a reasonable voice, Brunetti said, 'I won't force him to do anything. But I need him to tell me what happened.'